Chapter 68
Senior Erusa (approximate time: 10:45 AM)
"You did what?" Senior Erusa demanded.
"Konohagakure specifically requested a mission with her presence. We had no option for refusal," Ebizo countered firmly.
"It's one thing to send that Shiratori girl out on a mission—it is another thing entirely to send her out on a mission without my division's clearance! Foreign Intelligence Division. Foreign intelligence! Does my position mean nothing?!"
"With the death of Lord Rasa, I am interim Kazekage. Regent, if you will. Consulting you would have delayed my response by days we didn't have."
"Excuses. Are you trying to countermand me because I'm a woman, Lord Councilor Ebizo? Because I daresay it looks that way to me, your lordship. And I'll remind you, my position was earned on account of my diplomatic edge I had dealing with Iwa. An edge, I'll further remind you, that no male could have ever had."
Ebizo paused, answering levelly, "No. I am acting as the regent to the Kazekage position of Sunagakure no Sato, making the best decision we could have made given the time and resources we had. And I'll remind you, I was a jonin as well, during the mission that helped ultimately lead to your current rank and position. We both know why the details of that mission are not openly public, and we know that it being classified is to your benefit."
"Is that a—?"
"No. Because I know who ordered the mission and I understand its cost to you. I mention it now to only let you know I did not make the decision I did without understanding your concern."
Ebizo took the time now to nod his head and look (under a very large pile of papers) for a dossier. "We know for a fact infatuation can be used to manipulate. We shinobi use it because it's easy to manufacture, easy to exploit. But love is much the same, if not stronger but harder to intentionally curate."
Ebizo found what he was looking for, handing the fat stack to Erusa, across the table. A personality assessment on Gaara, a large file riddled with Shukaku-caused discrepancies. And then Katiya's. A much shorter profile, written years ago on biased data. Neither of them seemed sexually attracted to each other and Ebizo, at least, doubted such an attraction could happen easily for either of them. It was not sexual infatuation that drew them to each other. Erusa hadn't read the files yet. But when she would, she would understand. Ebizo trusted her that much, at least.
The mission that got Lady Erusa her position nearly failed because she was instructed to treat herself as a face and a mask, with a body hollowed out like a cavern. She nearly got caught. She did get caught. But the operation was spared only because she had been able to fill herself with love at perhaps the last second. She knew her… lover would die. She led him to his death, as Sunagakure ordered. But that was only possible because she and he understood what she was doing was ultimately for the best. As-in, the least collective loss of life for both of their respective villages and nations.
She led him to his death, but he followed her willingly because he saw their moral values aligned and loved her for it.
Even knowing he would die for it.
Temari (approximate time: 10:45 AM)
"While we have the upper hand, though, there is something we can try. Take out all the Oto-nin on the other side of the rubble without even contacting them," Katiya told the team, her eyes gleaming.
"Oh, yeah? How's that?" Kankuro asked.
"All Oto bases have a unique ventilation system. The prison cells are on a different air system because the scientists in the bases like to test poisons there. But the hallways are all connected to the other side rooms and if the Oto-nin here called for reinforcements from the next base over, meaning the seal doors to the next base are open, the vents connect to the next base too. The air, or whatever's in the air, can reach the next base like that," Katiya explained.
"Okay, yeah, so? Where're we going to get that much gaseous poison from? Each can of mine can only cover a five meter radius!" Kankuro countered.
Katiya raised a brow and pointed at Temari. "That's where."
Temari's brow furrowed.
"How good's your chakra control?" Katiya asked.
"Decent," Temari replied.
Katiya met the eyes of the rest of the two teams before she began to explain, "Jutsu control goes beyond jutsu strength. By focusing on a mental image of a particular particle—molecules, atoms, ions, whatever—while regulating physical and spiritual chakra in even amounts, you can change what atoms get pulled from the spirit realm during an 'elemental' jutsu.
"For fire-style, that's combustion species. Water: particulate ratio. Wind and earth: chemical identity. Lightning: ion identity—when a jutsu of a conceptual 'element' is fired or activated here in our world. So long as one has a decent mental image of the conceptual element in mind during the casting, the jutsu works. But that doesn't mean there's no wiggle room for what chemical element gets pulled through the spirit realm to create the jutsu we actually see.
"Most people don't care about the actual atoms that go into play, but most people know there's a difference between mud and water. And they picture drinking water as 'water' so they instinctively make that, not distilled or salt water for their jutsu with that logic. But that doesn't mean you can't pull up salt or distilled water intentionally."
"So… you want Temari to make—pull—gaseous poison from the spirit realm by changing what type of air she pictures for her jutsu casting?" Kotetsu asked.
"Precisely."
"But which type of air? What gaseous poisons can we even do? The more complex the… molecule is, the more difficult it is to mentally picture and pull through, isn't it? And something like chlorine's going to hurt us as much as them," Izumo countered.
"That's why Temari's going to stand by the collapsed tunnel and we'll stand behind her. And to not kill ourselves, we're not going to use chlorine, we're going to use carbon monoxide."
Everyone except Katiya frowned, thinking. Carbon monoxide detectors had yet to be invented, but their world's chemists knew the danger.
"Carbon monoxide, in low amounts, doesn't hurt anyone, it's naturally in the air. But as Kankuro can tell you, it's the dose that makes the poison. Temari, I want you to pull up enough carbon monoxide to just put them to sleep. Thirty swings should be enough if you have good jutsu control, fifty since this is your first time toying with the jutsu. You think that's doable for you?"
"I'm willing to give it a try. I should have enough chakra to still whack the stragglers if I fail—if it's just a control thing."
"Excellent."
Katiya (approxi—I don't give a f—!)
Temari commanded air particles—or more correctly carbon monoxide—hopefully—to fly from each beat of her fan in a continuous stream.
"Keep going. Remember, we need duration and control, not cutting strength," Katiya reminded her.
Temari frowned, focusing on her mental image of carbon monoxide, its feel as a concept in her mind. An oddball, carbon dioxide's and diatomic oxygen's silent, less common, but seductive half-sibling, according to Katiya. Though Temari didn't know much more than that, focusing more on the chemistry lessons her Academy gave her for a mental image; lessons vastly different from what Katiya learned from her mother and gathered from Oto. Focusing on the spiritual chakra she needed to guide a greater ratio of out of her fan, more than her usual output.
Behind Temari, Katiya hummed to herself contentedly. Pulling carbon monoxide out of the spirit realm was a type of control Temari never bothered with before, though it was something she did for atmospheric levels of nitrogen and oxygen instinctively enough for her idea of "breathing air". Carbon dioxide, sometimes. And Katiya knew it.
Temari huffed. Fifty swings. Just like they agreed. Temari pulled her fan back.
"Wait. Temari, swing a few times more with just oxygen to clear the air."
Temari complied.
Katiya's lip twitched. "Gaara? Open up the tunnel," she said coldly. Gaara recognized the tone.
Sand guided the earth to part. And Temari blinked to a scene of so many slumped over bodies. More than she expected. They didn't even look like they knew to run, some instead looked like they were attempting to dispel a genjutsu when faced with the headaches and dizziness of rapid-onset carbon monoxide poisoning.
Because carbon monoxide was naturally occurring in the atmosphere (despite being in low amounts), any seal on an Oto-nin's hooded mask would be ineffective at blocking the poison as it only worked on non-atmospheric constituents to prevent the opposite effect of oxygen toxicity. Katiya knew this.
Kankuro and two of the Konoha-nin ran forward, checking pulses. "Uhh… Tem—Temari?"
"They're dead," Gaara announced. He knew the tone of someone with killing intent even if they didn't add chakra.
Temari breathed and Katiya smirked. We should know just an hour of exposure of about 800 parts per million of carbon monoxide could be fatal. But if the build-up of carbon monoxide exceeded that before then, it could displace the oxygen in their confined space even quicker than that. Death by asphyxiation.
"Huh. Looks like fifty swings was too much. All well," Katiya said remorselessly. "Confined space, the carbon monoxide couldn't go anywhere else besides the ventilation system across the base before hitting the parts of it we collapsed, spreading the poison over their occupied section. The air outtake is much slower through the ceiling vents than your stream of gas… It's a glorious sight to behold, isn't it?"
Inside Gaara, Shukaku laughed. Shukaku liked Katiya now. And Gaara knew—had known—it was a bad idea to have called her a pawn for Oto. If this was how she was trying to prove otherwise.
Temari gaped. "I—they—they—!"
"Oh, come on, Temari," Katiya said, passing Temari, her voice subtly sing-song over her usual monotone. "It was them or us. Nothing wrong with a little death. It's in our job description."
Temari stared in shock, a hand over her mouth. She hadn't thought she could do such a dangerous jutsu. Was this even a jutsu? It wasn't even as strong as a Wind Scythe in cutting power and yet it… killed… so many.
"Your first killing? Or hundred, rather, with one blow. It was too easy, wasn't it? You're too used to your kills fighting back, aren't you."
Kankuro swung his eyes over to Katiya as she pirouetted to face Temari. "Yes," the look in his eyes said. Temari was not the kind of person to hide behind poisons to kill, at least.
"Oops," Katiya said, unapologetic, pirouetting to walk forward again. "You know, Kabuto would be proud of me," she said, walking calmly. Stepping joyously… joylessly around and onto the bodies. "Perfect condition for preservation, no visible damage to the bodies that wasn't already there."
STOMP, CRE-ACK!
Kankuro winced, covering his eyes. He knew what a crushed hand sounded like when he heard one.
Katiya stuck her hands up, reveling in the carbon monoxide-laced air, delighting in the almost high feeling she was getting from the deprivation of oxygen. Or was that from her victory?
Gaara (approximate time: 11:15 AM)
Behind Katiya, Anko was growing increasingly incensed by her behavior… Katsu's. The talk about preservation, the fake, shoddy attempt to hide the perverse joy from the killing like she didn't care people knew she was a sadist. It reminded Anko too much of Orochimaru. And Gaara could see Anko's rage building from the balling of her fists.
Fight, fight, fight, fiGHT! I wAAAaaNNnA see BLOOD!
"Striking Shadow Snake!" Anko exclaimed. Anko Body-Flickered to Katiya, punching a wall after Katiya leaned to one side, still ensnared.
YeS, yES, YES!
"What, like you never collected a body for Lord Oroc—! T-uh!"
OnE, TWO, ThRee, FOUR! Katiya grimaced, tasting blood. OH, COmE oN, FIGHT BACK, fiGHT BACK, FiGHt BACK, pReTTy YaRiMan! Katiya couldn't stick her wiggly teeth back without chakra and she was pretty sure her nose was busted. It hurt, but Katiya didn't seem to mind the pain to Gaara's eye. Anko suddenly stopped, looked to her hands, then backed away. Because… Anko remembered. Collecting—collecting… Anko had thought it was normal.
Katiya rubbed her jaw after Anko released her Striking Shadow Snake, Anko backing away further. Katiya scoffed, resetting her nose and wiping the blood on her arm guard. "Who's the bootlicker now?" she asked nasally.
OoH!
Anko let out a scream, charging, a jutsu turning her fists to fire. Katiya dodged. Dodged and dodged. Oh, COMe ON, HIT BAcK! Both teams watched, unsure of what to do. Shukaku whooped as Katiya stepped on another body and flipped forwards, pushing onto Anko before flipping again to land on her feet. Anko caught Katiya's belt with her flaming fists. It lit on fire. Now it was personal to Katiya.
Katiya undid her belt knot, whipping her belt to the wall to put out the flames, swinging it around Anko's neck like a garrote and pulling while bracing a leg against Anko's chest to keep her from striking from the front. PoP hER heAD oFF, pOP heR HeaD OFF, POP GOES THE WeaSeL! One can only assume Anko saw red.
"That is enough!" Gaara commanded, pushing apart the two with his sand, slamming them to opposite sides of the tunnel walls, a giant headache coming on.
Katiya left her narrowed eyes fixed on Anko. Anko did the same. Gaara breathed, gradually releasing the pressure of the sand constraining the two after seeing no more attempts to attack.
"Which curse mark. Don't lie. I can smell Orochimaru's damned stench on you like fuhai seieki."
Spoiled cum, fuhai seieki vaguely translates to in this context.
After a minute of Anko's glaring, Katiya silently unzipped her vest and let it drop to the floor. Katiya pushed her long sleeved undershirt back too, exposing the back of her neck. She turned around. And Anko stared, confused. Confused. Gaara's eyes widened and Shukaku waved his tail excitedly, pressing his head against the bars of his nonphysical enclosure. It was the first time Gaara ever saw the mark.
It was on Katiya's back, on her spine below her nape, just like Anko predicted. But it wasn't a mark anyone had ever seen before, white over Katiya's slightly sunburnt skin, barely visible. Katiya's curse mark was of two equidistant tomoe revolving around a circle of white void, like her own Sharingan but in opposite coloration, thin white crescents arcing parallel to each other between the equally white tomoe. Like a mixture between a prototype of the Curse Mark of Heaven and the Curse Mark of Earth. But with a radial symmetry of two instead of Orochimaru's preference for three. None of it matched what Anko thought of for one of his curse marks.
But there was no sealing jutsu placed over Katiya's mark. Katiya had the ability to use it at will. No redness, no swelling. And as she clearly wasn't fighting the mark, she took her mark willingly. But no spread of the curse mark's… marks across her body the entire mission meant she just didn't. Didn't use the curse mark while awake, wasn't tempted by it, didn't even consider using it to override the chakra cuffs and collar she wore. Because in reality, control over the curse mark wasn't something Katiya even had. Not while conscious, anyways.
Katiya shrugged her shirt back on, and then picked up her vest, flinging her belt over the shoulder. She pretended her belt pouches catching on fire didn't scare her, that it didn't matter. She re-tied her belt over her zipped-up vest.
"Orochimaru wasn't the one to give me my mark," Katiya said, answering Anko's unspoken question. "It wasn't his formula either, it was my mother's from when she worked with him. That's why it looks the way it does. I don't need a sealing jutsu because mine is a part of me I know will never overtake me."
Anko massaged the side of her neck warily.
"If you want, I'll take you up on your offer to talk, though. It seems you have some misperceptions I need to rectify," Katiya told Anko, her eyes unreadable. "As I'm sure you can see now, I'm no bootlicker of Orochimaru's."
Katiya exhaled, flicking a glance to Gaara. She pushed herself off the wall and moved deeper into the darkened tunnel, her back to the two teams of shinobi. One could walk on frostbitten feet. One cannot walk on missing feet, and so unfreezing one's toes before it was safe was considered bad practice, rendering one a deadweight.
Katiya was a deadweight without chakra, but a deadweight was still a weapon.
Temari (approximate time: 7:25 PM)
They tagged and bagged the material contents of the base in near-silence; freed the prisoners that were spared by their alternate air system put in place to ironically test gaseous poisons on them.
"Wait. That jutsu," Temari started as they left the base, reaching for Katiya's shoulder.
"Only works in a confined space, needs a lot of carbon monoxide, an hour if it's less concentrated, can't currently be detected," Katiya supplied. "Only works temporarily, too, so long as you're focused enough to keep chakra running through the molecules procured."
Temari frowned, her eyes intense as she dropped her hand. "What's it called?"
"Don't know. 'Atmospheric Asphyxiation Jutsu'? I guess you get to pick because I just made it up a few hours ago."
Katiya paused, and then answered a question Temari didn't ask.
"Jirobo, one of my old colleagues, was an idiot and yet he managed to do something similar by consistently pulling up gneiss for his Earth Dome Jutsu, making them stronger than average."
It was also coincidentally how Izumo made his Water Style: Syrup Trap Jutsu after accidentally turning his water into mucus-like "water candy" following inspiration from a jar of syrup, though Izumo might not have known the theory behind the useful accident.
Katiya continued, "Jirobo would then combine the strengthened Earth Dome with a chakra siphon. I don't know how Jirobo did it without a chemistry background but I assume Orochimaru managed to train it into him, similarly to how I can pull up distilled water if I tried. I wasn't sure you could do it without training like we did. But I was pleasantly surprised."
Senior Erusa (one month later, approximate time: 3:00 AM)
Senior Erusa steepled her fingers over the reports Ebizo gave her. Whatever he wanted her to see, she did not.
"Ziri?" she asked, calling for her assistant beside her desk.
"Yes, my lady?" he responded.
"What do you think? 'Lord' Gaara and this Shiratori girl are so close. It's curious, wouldn't you agree?"
"Should I send a whisper along to the civilians to the civilian newspaper press? Perhaps Shiratori is so close to Lord Gaara because she's made a sex slave of him or something."
Erusa sent a sharp glance to her assistant. There were some days she wondered what went on in that head of his. "I was more concerned with improper foreign contact muddying Suna's soil. But I should not speak more about it myself. To spread rumor and gossip is not permissible or ethical," she replied carefully to him.
Erusa knew from a mission scroll the team Katiya was sent with had to hit five bases, each one some distance away from each other, each one taking at least a day to clear and pillage for information. Perhaps a week to plan or travel to each attack. Perhaps additional time for medical care in Konoha at the end of the mission. It had given Senior Erusa much time to think.
"Surely 'Lord' Gaara's sand barrier would have prevented such a thing," Erusa continued, attempting to dispel Ziri's last comment.
"Mm, maybe. Maybe not. Not if he's been led to believe she is not a threat and instead 'loves' him," Ziri countered.
Erusa let out a long-suffering sigh. "This is only discussion," she replied tiredly but ambiguously.
"Uh huh. Would you intend for the press to do their own investigation or commision a shinobi to look into the matter? 'Soiling' her name?"
"Not quite, Ziri. Not quite."
Author's Note
Katiya uses a different process to pull up distilled water than Jirobo or Izumo used for their own jutsu, that's why it's more mechanical when she explains it to Temari. There's more than one way to skin the cat for the jutsu trick she pulled but she only knows the highly theoretical (more science-y) version, though.