Chapter 18 : The long awaited mission

When Akira's father told her she was grounded, he wasn't kidding after she made him so angry by telling him that she intended to take a ninja mission to shine on the battlefield like other shinobi of her age. She was no longer allowed to leave the house except to go almost ten hours a day to the hospital to work there. He even watched her more closely than usual to make sure that she followed this rule. Therefore he was coming home when she was there – Akira couldn't believe her eyes the first time he passed the doorstep as she couldn't remember the last time he went home – but with a pile of files so he could work as if he was still in his office.

This close surveillance was weighing on Akira who could no longer live her life as she wished. She couldn't speak freely to Tatsuno and Matsuo anymore as her father was trying his best to separate them as much as possible. Without the twins, Akira found herself alone as she didn't really have any other close friends. There were a few young people who were also doctors at the hospital but she suspected them to be unusually friendly with her only because her father asked them to keep an eye on her.

Akira's days thus became extremely boring. She could no longer train her ninja abilities as her father had forbidden her to do so and she wasn't allowed to do her holiday homework for Hogwarts as her father was still extremely mad at Dumbledore after the latter failed to protect her from apprentice Death Eaters who wanted to kill her. In the end, her daily life was punctuated only by the patients that she was treating.

But when Akira was about to lose hope of doing something else than working in the shadow for the war effort, an event occurred to pull her out from her usual routine. It was during a mid-August evening. Night was falling but was still warm as stars – including shooting stars – began to appear in the sky. Akira had just returned home and had simply dropped on her sofa while waiting for her father to also come back.

That was when she heard rustling coming from outside and then a knock. Intrigued, she got up and saw a folded piece of paper that had been slipped under the entrance door. She grabbed it without waiting and began to read it with interest, wondering who was trying to contact her when her father had taken care that she found herself isolated from the twins and her ninja comrades.

"Following an altercation between spies and shinobi from Konoha, compromising items lost by both sides may have remained on the battlefield.

It's crucial that you go and collect them as the village is running out of competent ninjas for this mission."

This message was short, enigmatic and without signature as a brief sketch of the path to follow to find the battlefield starting from Konoha was drawn below the text. But on the other hand, this unexpected mission was what Akira wanted to illustrate herself in this war. In addition, this mission seemed easy. She just had to find a place near Konoha and search it as it was deserted. This foreshadowed no confrontation and it was an opportunity to help the village in a useful way.

"I only have to escape the surveillance of my father. Easier said than done." Akira sighed but she was still excited to have been given this mission that was feasible for a ninja with her skills.

At the same time, Akira heard the door handle being turned and she just had the time to hide the paper in her pocket before her father appeared in front of her with his usual pile of patient files under the arm.

"What's going on ?" He asked her suspiciously as he noticed her delighted air when she had always been grumpy around him from the day he grounded her.

"Nothing." Akira lied while trying to sound as convincing as possible. "You want me to help you sort through those medical records ? You seem to have a lot of them." She offered while pointing at the huge pile that her father was holding.

"Yes please." He agreed even though he was a bit surprised by this kind suggestion as his daughter had been too mad at him for the last few days to help him with anything.

But this time it was different as she had a mission awaiting her in her pocket. Or rather her and the twins as they had always done their missions together. All she had to do was to find a way to talk to Matsuo and Tatsuno about it so that they would accompany her. It was difficult knowing that Akira's father was preventing them from seeing each other but not impossible as they were working in the same hospital. One day, Akira got the opportunity to bump into Tatsuno while she was carrying with her a patient file in which she had put a letter explaining the mission she received and what was the plan to achieve it.

"I had to give you this. You should be really interested by the page number three." She announced to Tatsuno while insisting on the word "really" as she put the file in his hands.

"Why ? That's not even my patient." The latter replied after briefly reading the name that was written on it.

"Just read this page three. And once you're done, keep the page." Akira advised him with insistence while pushing away the file that Tatsuno was trying to give her back.

"Okay." Tatsuno said in a puzzled tone.

However, when he was about to open the file to see what was on this page three that was in fact her letter, Akira spotted her father in the hallway.

"Read this in a quiet place." She told Tatsuno before pushing him in the opposite direction than the one that her father was taking and she also quickly left the hallway to not be seen by him.

She only crossed Tatsuno path again late at night, accompanied this time by his brother as Akira had given them in her letter an appointment on top of the Hokage Rock, more precisely on the head of the Third Hokage. It was the perfect place as it was steep, little visited and it allowed to leave the village more discreetly than by passing through the large entrance door that everyone borrowed.

"Were you able to slip away from your house without being seen ?" Akira asked the twins when they finally reached her under the pale rays of the moon.

"We left a decoy as you suggested in your letter so that our grandmother will believe that we're still there and not at a secret meeting." Tatsuno advised her.

"She thinks we're two little angels so a simple pillow under our covers is enough to do the trick." Matsuo added with a weak smile. "And you, not too many problems to escape the close surveillance of your father ?"

"I left a clone behind. I just hope it won't disappear too quickly." Akira announced to them as it was indeed what she feared the most as her father was at home with it.

"All this for a mission left by a stranger." Tatsuno pointed out while crossing his arms.

"A mission which is manageable for us." Akira replied in an attempt to convince them to follow her. "This is an unexpected chance for us to finally shine as real shinobi."

"Or to get into trouble. We don't even know if this mission is official." Matsuo said in turn with concern.

"It's easy to find out. We show up, we search the area and if we don't find anything, we go back to the village as if nothing happened. Is it okay with you ?" Akira asked them apprehensively.

"Yes." The twins answered with one voice.

"Since we're already breaking our curfew, we might as well pursue with this mission." Tatsuno added.

"So that if we're caught, we'll be punished for a good reason." Matsuo joked.

Now that they were ready to join the battlefield to inspect, they left the village without wasting time. They first climbed discreetly the wall that surrounded Konoha without anyone noticing them, then they located themselves in the forest to find the place represented on the paper that Akira had received. Between the lack of light and the density of the forest with trees that all looked alike, it was difficult for them to find their way but Akira, Matsuo and Tatsuno - after many disagreements - finally succeeded as they arrived in a clearing that seemed to have been damaged by a bitter fight. It was now up to them to bring back any item that might interest Konoha.

"Your secret informant didn't give you an example of what he would like to get ?" Matsuo inquired as he picked up a common piece of cloth from the ground.

"No. I think it's up to us to be savvy and bring back something that's worth it." Akira replied while scanning the dark surroundings for such an object.

"Like this ?" Tatsuno asked while heading towards a half-charred scroll of parchment.

He bent down to pick it up but at the same time, a shuriken flew towards him at full speed and planted itself in the parchment, a few millimeters from his hand.

"Woaw, what was that ?" Tatsuno asked worriedly after quickly retreating while holding his hand which had almost been injured by the sharp weapon.

"I think we're not alone." His brother replied in a small voice while looking around.

He was right as they heard a distant voice coming from the surrounding treetops.

"Get them all."

This enigmatic sentence was accompanied by a rain of shurikens that fell on the clearing in which Akira, Tatsuno and Matsuo were standing. They quickly all drew a kunai to deflect the weapons before fleeing as their opponents – whose number and identity were unknown to them – were going after the three medical ninjas.

"What do we do now ? I thought that no fights were involved in this mission." Matsuo pointed out with concern as Akira and the twins were jumping from tree to tree in an attempt to escape their assailants that were right behind them.

"I thought so too !" Akira answered as she was trying to remember what the message was saying to make her think so.

But it wasn't the time to daydream as their life was at stake. They had to get back to Konoha as soon as possible to find a shelter there against unknown shinobi. However, their pursuers weren't about to let them go as they got closer and closer.

Suddenly, Akira spotted shiny objects coming at them from the front. Realizing that it was a multitude of kunais launched in their direction, she barely had time to take support on a branch to propel herself down. The twins were still on the trajectory of these weapons so she grabbed their ankle and pulled them both down out of the way of the kunais.

That was close as all the weapons passed right above their head but it wasn't finished as a second attack - of shurikens this time – was coming at them still from the front. However this time, Akira and the twins couldn't find a way to get away from it. It wasn't really the case as Akira - who felt responsible for having lured the twins into such an ambush - got an idea to spare Tatsuno and Matsuo.

As she was still holding the twins by their ankle, she managed to pull them down to her level. Once they were both next to her, she pushed each one violently to the left and to the right respectively. This was a little brutal as Tatsuno and Matsuo both crashed against the trunk of trees but at least they couldn't be reached by the shurikens. Akira was the only one to still be on the path of these weapons and she just got enough time to cross her arms in front of her before some shurikens hit her.

The shurikens came with such force that Akira was thrown against the trunk behind her. But just as she thought that she would slide against it until she crashed onto the forest floor, it turned out that she was able to lean on a branch that lay beneath her. However, her wounds which were deep cuts that made her suffer excruciatingly prevented her from standing up. She was about to collapse miserably on the branch when someone appeared at lightning speed in front of her and placed his forearm under her chin to hold her in place while in his hand he was holding a kunai which was ready to slit her throat. Akira tried to push her opponent away but she was too weak to do so.

Instead, she opened one eye – the one that wasn't crossed by a cut that ran from her forehead to her cheek – and looked briefly around her. Despite the darkness, she could see that the twins were held hostage in the same way as she was by their opponents who were wearing masks similar to those worn by Anbu. Matsuo and Tatsuno weren't hurt like Akira thanks to her help but they still weren't able to move due to their assailants strength and also perhaps due to fear.

Akira was about to pass out when her enemy applied a little more force on her throat to the point of half choking her, waking her up in the process as she put her hands on his forearm in an attempt to push it away.

"Go ahead." Her opponent then ordered to his accomplices.

That was the signal they were waiting for to move their hand holding the kunai along the throat of Tatsuno and Matsuo.

"NO !" Akira exclaimed with despair as an excruciating sound of slicing was heard before Tatsuno and Matsuo were finally released.

The twins both collapsed on their branch before they fell several meters on the ground. Seeing this was too much for Akira - even her injuries didn't hurt that much – and everything went black around her as she lost consciousness while burning tears were running down her cheeks.

Hello dear readers,

Aaannnd that's the end of this book ! I hope you enjoyed it as much as I liked to write it and thank you for continuing to read my story after all this time (it's been three years since I started it, time flies quickly).

Anyway, there's no reason to celebrate after letting my main character and her two dearest friends in such an awful situation. But I planned it since the beginning of this book. That's the reason why I gave so much "screen time" to the twins to the point that they joined briefly Akira in Hogwarts. That was because a tragedy would strike and leave their group changed for ever. But to know the final fate of these three ninjas, you'll have to read the first chapter of the next book that will be published on September 1 for back-to-school in the wizarding world.