Ryuichi stood motionless in the middle of one of the many corridors of the Sileo Tempestas with his white mask adorning his face, and hiding most of his distinguishing features aside from his extremely prominent rippled eyes. The rinnegan in his skull weren't exactly a trait that was easy to cover, considering he needed his eyes to be in the open to...well....see. Despite this, Ryu had no fears for his identity being found out, considering his lifestyle. He lived, ate, and breathed ANBU. From his training to his daily life, his own personal self and the ANBU persona-less entity called 'Matcha' were practically one in the same.
The same to a point to where his missions were just like the tedious chores in the tea house. He would go out, get it done, come back for more training. Well, he DID. Now was different, with the little shift of doujutsu. Not only has his loss of eyes due to his mother weakened his reputation, but it has also left him in an inoperable state for months, and changed his fighting style entirely. Of course this was reason for concern, as he was basically a different ANBU in Training unit than what had initially joined the branch.
So right now was the deciding factor. Ryu was never told that this was going to be his do or die mission, but everything about it just screamed it. Mostly from the fact that he wasn't going to be doing much by himself...
He looked down at the small piece of paper explaining the mission details that was to be destroyed before leaving the village.
That was all it wrote. Anything more would only be a detriment to completing the task, which was the only goal for an ANBU. You don't accept missions in this branch. You simply do what you specialize in without question. Questions lead to personal actions, personal actions lead to emotion...Emotion can never represent the village.
These were basic ANBU teachings that were instilled into Ryuichi's mind since day 1 in the training program, and he still stood with those standards. With that in mind, he still had to keep his allies in mind, both for his own mental stability and the fact that they're all beneficial for the program. Him protecting another ANBU wouldn't be a problem, even if it was a test for him.
Eventually the silence of the well-furnished halls was ended as a robed figure around Ryuichi's height in a rabbit mask stepped out of the nearby room. "Matcha?" They asked with a soft, feminine voice.
"Right. You're Rabbit, then...?" He asked, knowing that must have been the case due to their mask indicating that simple fact.
"Snow Rabbit." The robed figure corrected. "There's a unit or two that go by the simple codename 'Rabbbit'. Please refer to me as my full codename, or simply Snow. Understood?" She finished with a nod, and started walking towards the exit without an answer. Ryu could already tell how this was going to be...
With a small sigh he followed behind, and the colorful jacket he usually adorns faded into a dull color scheme of navy blue, and dark brown with even the white fuzzy tufts of fur around his neck turning black. No point in trying stealth if your jacket had such vibrant colors, like light blues, bright red, bright greens, and orange....especially orange. Any ninja wearing orange would be like a walking target in a stealth operation.
Regardless, Ryu made sure he had his bag of soldier pills, and the mission slip burned with fire chakra in his left palm. With a nod towards Snow rabbit they bolted out of the village, showing the gate officers their ANBU tattoos to confirm their mission before leaving.
After a day of running the mission duo had decided to take a break for the night. Not sleep, mind you, but just a break. After a recon of the area, and several traps being set the two of them sat on tree branches above the ground. An awkward silence between the two was clear to notice, considering all that could be heard were the occasional small hum from Ryu, and similar chirping sounds from the bugs, and birds around them.
Ryu currently sat on a tree branch almost perfectly parallel to Snow Rabbit's, and only a few yards away. Being able to see one another was important, after all...with random bandits very likely being able to catch one of them off guard in a blind spot, the other could cover with ease.
But without the threat of bandits, all there was were the lingering feelings of awkwardness, and tension. Why would he care about that, you ask? Simply, he's used to more talking. Snow rabbit hadn't said a word all day aside from 'Turn here', 'take a soldier pill', or 'let's break for the night', and that was completely against the casual chatting several other ANBU had done when in the clear like this.
Desperately wanting to make some small talk, Ryu waved to Snow Rabbit, which got her attention instantly. He answered her attention by removing his hard white mask to reveal a thin cloth one underneath that just covered his lower face. and neck. "We're in the clear. You can take a breather now." He said to her, placing the mask on a small metal hook on his belt. Snow Rabbit looked at him with an expression unable to be read from underneath her mask.
She turned to look around Ryu in his blind spots to ensure that it was safe, before removing her own to reveal nothing underneath. Just her face.
"Fine." She said, wiping sweat from her cheeks, and forehead while avoiding eye contact with Ryu. "But the moment we hear trouble they go back on. You know protocol." She said, pulling out a plastic bag full of soldier pills. She quickly popped one into her mouth, and didn't bother chewing it to avoid the awful taste. Other than that, nothing.
Hours of silence went into the night as the sun finally set, and the nocturnal animals of the night started their daily routine. However, not having a thing to say or ask was a problem with Ryu. ANBU weren't the type of people to get personal in their talks. Ever. Even if they usually break protocol to take off their masks in front of other ANBU if it's safe, it's usually more for the comfort of it than anything.
However, the silence was eventually broken; Not by Ryuichi, but by the girl who was a little bit older than Ryu.
"So, Matcha. Why the codename?" She asked, flinching at the sound of a small bat flapping overhead, before going back into a resting position.
"Why? I was just given the name, and I like matcha. It just stuck." He said, looking over to see her glancing at him, locking with his rippled eyes. She was obviously a bit creeped out by them, because she broke the eye contact in a few moments, and Ryu looked away in a small burst of shame. "Erm...and you? Why Snow Rabbit? Not just....Rabbit."
She looked at him again, avoiding eye contact. "Same as you, I guess. I used to hunt snow rabbits, and I loved how they tasted when they were cooked over the fire. People thought the name was fitting, so I made it my codename...."
"neat..."
"yeah..."
Then, silence again. Just when the ball got rolling, a halfwit response was enough to end the vibe. Not that a vibe was needed for a mission, but...it's nice. Luckily for the white haired boy, Rabbit continued. "Those eyes. They're creepy. Are they some kind of bloodline? Like those Uchiha freaks, with the sharingan." She asked, pointing to her own eyes.
"Well...I'm not sure about them, but I know they're called the Rinnegan. but that's all I really know about them..." He instinctively rubbed hie eyelid without a real reason to. Just meaningless movement to try and emote while talking. "It's the reason why I was put on guard duty for you instead of my own assassination mission. This is a...recent development. I used to be an Uchiha freak with a sharingan."
"Oh...sorry."
"Yeah...."
And again, with the silence....only this time, it never picked back up, Any more questions would get too personal which is a big taboo for them. Right now, they had their mission to deal with. They just sat there for the night, using energy drinks and soldier pills to avoid sleep while awaiting the conditions to leave.
Daytime came, then went for another four nights. Every night was met with awkward silence, and small talk between the two youths before leaving again. At this point, Ryu didn't even care. He had a sneaking suspicion that if he kept trying to make a connection to an ANBU it'd only get him into trouble. He had a mission to focus on, and doing this every time was nothing but a delay to work in most cases. So for now, he kept mostly quiet same as Rabbit.
Eventually they arrived at their location. A small group of trees being loomed over by a large series of hills, and small cliffs. Rabbit would look past the trees in front of them, then a small piece of paper in her hand.
"The location the target is arriving in is directly north of here. This will be where we will be setting up for the assassination. I want you to set traps in the area, and get some sleep. Tomorrow is the day this all happens." She said, holding one hand seal to allow the paper in hand to soak itself with water before falling apart. All Ryuichi did was nod, and hold a hand seal to focus chakra into his body to give him a short burst of speed to scout the area.
The surrounding area was simple, and clean so it didn't take long for Ryu to make a mental map of it. Everything from the separate trees, and rocks to the elevation of certain places were noted, and kept in mind while Ryu prepared the traps. It started with the treetops. "Three cutting wire nets, and two poisoned senbon launchers..." He muttered, opening a sealing scroll and allowing massive pile of loose metal trap equipment, and weaponry to sit upon the paper.
For the next four hours he would use the trap supplies from the scroll to set up the desired traps all around, from wire traps to oil slicks to floor spikes coated in skin-rot inducing poisons, nothing was uncovered. Of course, because he had an ally here he had to do SOMETHING to note where the traps were to prevent Snow Rabbit from getting hurt should she need to leave before planned.
So every dangerous location was marked with a green leaf with an X cut into it, then adhered to a surface where it would be visible, but not obvious. The trained ANBU eye should be more enough to hunt these out if given prior knowledge.
Once the final trap, and marker were placed Ryu came back to the sniping location to find Snow rabbit sitting in the treetops with a massive bow, almost 50% taller than she was. It looked extremely plain, and metal with several small lines going around the material all across the weapon, hinting at it being a collapsing weapon to have an easier carry.
Ryu jumped up to the same branch, and rested with his hands on his knees while his feet stood on the wooden limb. He looked to Snow Rabbit, and nodded. "Traps have been set, Snow. all of them marked with a cut leaf, in case you need to get out of here before planned." He said plainly, shifting his gaze to the hills.
The ANBU girl nodded, before responding "Good job Matcha. Now we simply wait until dawn, when the target will be making an exchange directly ahead of us. Until then, get some sleep. I'll stay and guard for a while, then we switch." She stated. All Ryu did was simply nod, and jump down near a small bush, and lay his jacket down like a sheet before laying down to sleep, wondering how this would play out...
Eventually he was awoken by the girl in the middle of the night, surrounded by the chirping of bugs, and the distant flapping of tiny bat wings. After a brief recap of how nothing had happened they traded places with Ryu sitting around to keep watch. Again, there was nothing of interest happening so all Ryu had to keep him company were his own thoughts. He imagined the possibilities this could go, and how he would be able to do much more with his ANBU missions afterwards. Not really for 'the sake of the village' like he typically kept in mind, but for his own strength...
As the sun rose, Ryu had to awaken Snow Rabbit and have her get ready for the target to appear. Eventually she prepared her collapsing bow, and pulled a quiver from a sealing scroll, and simply stood watch.
"Remember Matcha, you aren't to attack. Just focus on keeping anyone far away from me. If the target escapes, we're to hunt him. If it gets to that, then we both share the same objective....kill." She said with a dead, monotone voice. All Ryu did in response was nod, and look out towards the fields.
"Because if this guy gets away, he'll have nothing but dirt on kumo. He'll always be a target, but he could cause some serious unrest." She continued before Ryu twitched slightly. His extremely sensitive senses for chakra ticked in, and he was quick to jump to the ground. "At nine o' clock, two chakra signals. One much larger than the other. Then at 2 o' clock a single one, bigger than the other two combined." He said as the figures came into view. The group of two consisted of a large brute of a man, and a much more puny man tagging behind him. 'Probably a hired bodyguard' Ryu thought to himself, knowing Snow Rabbit had to be doing the same.
"That's the target. The small one. No more chakra signatures from my end, so now we just need them to talk for information then we go in for the kill." She whispered, leaving Ryu confused as to how they could hear them from this distance. Little did he know, Rabbit wasn't listening. Instead she used her uncanny sight that was so precise that even single-tomoe sharingan users would have trouble keeping up with her skills. She used this sight to lip read the individuals once they came close to the third figure.
It was a man with long flowing robes, and a mask on that mimicked those of cult priests. Snow rabbit prepared her arrow, and awaited for the right time. All three had to be dead, considering the situation. However, something strange was said by the lanky man that was their target.
"Did you bring the worms?"
Rabbit simply flinched as the moment became tense, and cold. Because the masked person had no way of reading their lips, all Rabbit had at her disposal was what the target said.
"The gross, slimy worms that ruin everything. Like we agreed." He said once again, and yet again...silence. The masked man MUST have been talking.
Meanwhile, Ryu was left with none of this information, only watching through the treeline. However, another small chakra pulse from behind them caught his attention...then everything went into slow motion.
Everything happened too fast to react to, but at the same time it felt like it took an eternity. From behind Ryu could see an arrow flying straight overhead, and straight into the other anbu's skull. Her brown hair was quickly stained with blood, and bone fragments were sent flying from behind her, revealing a gory mess of a head, and it's body, falling to the ground with a heavy thud.
Ryu froze, not expecting someone to be able to see them through the trees or even act upon any small opening they saw through the trees. Not from behind, anyways. They had countless trees protecting them, and now....
Ryu didn't even hesitate to run to the limp body of Snow Rabbit and pick them up to see the arrow lodged...EXTREMELY deep into skull. There was no doubt that this had hit her brain. Ryuichi checked everything to find a way to make sure she had a chance to survive with treatment. She wasn't breathing, she wasn't moving, but....'her pulse!' he thought to himself, ripping off the cloth sleeve of her cloak to feel her still warm wrist.
However, with his minor medical training forgotten he overlooked one small thing. The fact that if you press too hard when feeling for a pulse, you feel your own through the blood pumping in your finger. With a gasp,+Ryu threw together three hand seals, and several individuals started running through the woods. The sounds of countless traps arming, and the occasional scream could be heard as a circle of chakra appeared on the ground, and a large demonic statue slowly arose out of it.
"HAAAAAA!" Ryu screamed, as he poured a massive amount of chakra into the statue in an attempt to use it's healing powers on Snow Rabbit. Alas, he was only preparing for something entirely considering you can't heal a dead body...
The statue opened it's large mouth, and countless hands shot out to embrace the girl before pulling her from Ryu's arms into it's mouth. Then, it began to chew, and chew...but then it stopped. Nothing.
The people were coming closer, Ryu had no backup, and the traps weren't stopping them. Sure, it would stop or even kill several, but at this point more and more chakra signatures were coming in from all directions. 'SH*T!' Ryu cursed, before standing up. Then, in a flash everything got shaky. As if he was hit with a massive wave of sickness rushed over him, he fell to his knees. Next, his back started to sting, and burn before Ryu felt his chakra moving through his spine, slowly and painfully like a thick acid. Eventually the skin on his back broke, and he let out a loud scream as several pitch-black rods shot out of his spine, and towards the demonic statue.
When they got close to it, it's mouth opened and countless yards of the black rods were devoured by it before they broke off from Ryu's back, leaving behind eight black chunks of material lining his back, vaguely mimicking the kanji for 'king' 王. He was left breathing heavily, with his mask falling to the ground and sweat pouring from every part of his body. He felt like he could puke, bleed from every pore, and have every limb fall off at this point, with a large portion of his chakra gone.
He had no clue how that had happened, or why but one thing was clear. The statue was done. It's mouth slowly opened, and Ryu could only shiver as he felt something completely foreign. He could see straight out of the inside of that thing's mouth. He could feel two different heart beats, breath twice at the same time, and feel the coming breeze graze his skin twice as much.
He simply had to focus to get up, and look into the mouth of the statue to see...Snow Rabbit, without her robes and mask. Instead she wore was was supposedly underneath, and had several black metallic rods sticking out of her back and ear lobes, and was adorning the rinnegan...And from Ryu's second set of vision he could see himself staring into his own rippled eyes again.
It was disorienting, it was confusing, it was sickening. Was that even her? Was Ryu....controlling her?To test he simply did as he would to move his own hand normally, but imagined himself in the body of Rabbit. Sure enough, her hand moved upwards, just as Ryu wanted.
'no....That didn't save her...' He cursed himself as he slowly became surrounded by enemy ninja, all armed and ready.
"Here they are. The worms." Said a deep voice as the masked figure simply walked towards Ryu, kicking away a small wooden latch that was filled with poison.
"Been keeping an eye on them for about three days now." he continued, stepping forward. All Ryuichi did was star was him, and throw away his ripped up coat, and tank top.
"You killed her...."
"excuse me?"
"You killed her. She's gone. One of my fellow ninja..." Ryu didn't emote anything during this time, not having any emotional strength to try and prove a point. Instead, he simply followed his instincts.
The girl now controlled by Ryu held out a hand, and three orbs flew out of the mouth of the statue, all of them impaling an enemy ninja before returning like a boomerang, then another wave of them flew out. This time the original three along with another set of three newer orbs, doing the same again. Any counterattacks by enemy ninja were quickly destroyed by the orbs with quick precision, and eventually within seconds every single one of them was dead, including the man that was the original target who had watched it all and tried to escape. All that was left was a field of corpses, and blood with Ryu on his knees, breathing heavily.
This had all taken such a toll on him, he didn't even have the ability to think. All he could manage in this state was to use his elemental justu to slowly clean the area of bodies and blood, only leaving the heads of the ninja, and putting them into a sealing scroll.
Then, he and his second body began walking towards the nearest town. He almost wanted to try talking to it, but he knew by now that he had done nothing but make his once living ally a puppet. He barely got any sleep that night, and all the following nights until his return to kumo...
Now Ryuichi sat in the Sileo. His arms bound, and several people looking over him. After his return they had no choice but to interrogate him once they noticed the state of their ANBU unit. They filled him with truth serum, and asked him countless questions that he answered truthfully, only ever stopping for food and sleep.
After an entire week in interrogation, and after several DNA tests it was all confirmed. Both his story, and the DNA of the eyes that were officially placed into his skull by the kumo hospital that once belonged to a girl of senju decent. Even his story was given a pass, and his AiT status untouched.
They didn't have any reason to not believe him, anyways. If they killed, or imprisoned him it would have been nothing but a loss for kumo due to his rinnegan, and the body of a once near perfect ANBU unit under his control.
Now all he had was the quiet voice in his head that kept calling...Ryu shivered, not wanting the idea of him going insane over this...He already had a lot to think about, and rest on. Including the fact that he was now controlling an entirely individual body...
The same to a point to where his missions were just like the tedious chores in the tea house. He would go out, get it done, come back for more training. Well, he DID. Now was different, with the little shift of doujutsu. Not only has his loss of eyes due to his mother weakened his reputation, but it has also left him in an inoperable state for months, and changed his fighting style entirely. Of course this was reason for concern, as he was basically a different ANBU in Training unit than what had initially joined the branch.
So right now was the deciding factor. Ryu was never told that this was going to be his do or die mission, but everything about it just screamed it. Mostly from the fact that he wasn't going to be doing much by himself...
He looked down at the small piece of paper explaining the mission details that was to be destroyed before leaving the village.
The mission said:
That was all it wrote. Anything more would only be a detriment to completing the task, which was the only goal for an ANBU. You don't accept missions in this branch. You simply do what you specialize in without question. Questions lead to personal actions, personal actions lead to emotion...Emotion can never represent the village.
These were basic ANBU teachings that were instilled into Ryuichi's mind since day 1 in the training program, and he still stood with those standards. With that in mind, he still had to keep his allies in mind, both for his own mental stability and the fact that they're all beneficial for the program. Him protecting another ANBU wouldn't be a problem, even if it was a test for him.
Eventually the silence of the well-furnished halls was ended as a robed figure around Ryuichi's height in a rabbit mask stepped out of the nearby room. "Matcha?" They asked with a soft, feminine voice.
"Right. You're Rabbit, then...?" He asked, knowing that must have been the case due to their mask indicating that simple fact.
"Snow Rabbit." The robed figure corrected. "There's a unit or two that go by the simple codename 'Rabbbit'. Please refer to me as my full codename, or simply Snow. Understood?" She finished with a nod, and started walking towards the exit without an answer. Ryu could already tell how this was going to be...
With a small sigh he followed behind, and the colorful jacket he usually adorns faded into a dull color scheme of navy blue, and dark brown with even the white fuzzy tufts of fur around his neck turning black. No point in trying stealth if your jacket had such vibrant colors, like light blues, bright red, bright greens, and orange....especially orange. Any ninja wearing orange would be like a walking target in a stealth operation.
Regardless, Ryu made sure he had his bag of soldier pills, and the mission slip burned with fire chakra in his left palm. With a nod towards Snow rabbit they bolted out of the village, showing the gate officers their ANBU tattoos to confirm their mission before leaving.
After a day of running the mission duo had decided to take a break for the night. Not sleep, mind you, but just a break. After a recon of the area, and several traps being set the two of them sat on tree branches above the ground. An awkward silence between the two was clear to notice, considering all that could be heard were the occasional small hum from Ryu, and similar chirping sounds from the bugs, and birds around them.
Ryu currently sat on a tree branch almost perfectly parallel to Snow Rabbit's, and only a few yards away. Being able to see one another was important, after all...with random bandits very likely being able to catch one of them off guard in a blind spot, the other could cover with ease.
But without the threat of bandits, all there was were the lingering feelings of awkwardness, and tension. Why would he care about that, you ask? Simply, he's used to more talking. Snow rabbit hadn't said a word all day aside from 'Turn here', 'take a soldier pill', or 'let's break for the night', and that was completely against the casual chatting several other ANBU had done when in the clear like this.
Desperately wanting to make some small talk, Ryu waved to Snow Rabbit, which got her attention instantly. He answered her attention by removing his hard white mask to reveal a thin cloth one underneath that just covered his lower face. and neck. "We're in the clear. You can take a breather now." He said to her, placing the mask on a small metal hook on his belt. Snow Rabbit looked at him with an expression unable to be read from underneath her mask.
She turned to look around Ryu in his blind spots to ensure that it was safe, before removing her own to reveal nothing underneath. Just her face.
"Fine." She said, wiping sweat from her cheeks, and forehead while avoiding eye contact with Ryu. "But the moment we hear trouble they go back on. You know protocol." She said, pulling out a plastic bag full of soldier pills. She quickly popped one into her mouth, and didn't bother chewing it to avoid the awful taste. Other than that, nothing.
Hours of silence went into the night as the sun finally set, and the nocturnal animals of the night started their daily routine. However, not having a thing to say or ask was a problem with Ryu. ANBU weren't the type of people to get personal in their talks. Ever. Even if they usually break protocol to take off their masks in front of other ANBU if it's safe, it's usually more for the comfort of it than anything.
However, the silence was eventually broken; Not by Ryuichi, but by the girl who was a little bit older than Ryu.
"So, Matcha. Why the codename?" She asked, flinching at the sound of a small bat flapping overhead, before going back into a resting position.
"Why? I was just given the name, and I like matcha. It just stuck." He said, looking over to see her glancing at him, locking with his rippled eyes. She was obviously a bit creeped out by them, because she broke the eye contact in a few moments, and Ryu looked away in a small burst of shame. "Erm...and you? Why Snow Rabbit? Not just....Rabbit."
She looked at him again, avoiding eye contact. "Same as you, I guess. I used to hunt snow rabbits, and I loved how they tasted when they were cooked over the fire. People thought the name was fitting, so I made it my codename...."
"neat..."
"yeah..."
Then, silence again. Just when the ball got rolling, a halfwit response was enough to end the vibe. Not that a vibe was needed for a mission, but...it's nice. Luckily for the white haired boy, Rabbit continued. "Those eyes. They're creepy. Are they some kind of bloodline? Like those Uchiha freaks, with the sharingan." She asked, pointing to her own eyes.
"Well...I'm not sure about them, but I know they're called the Rinnegan. but that's all I really know about them..." He instinctively rubbed hie eyelid without a real reason to. Just meaningless movement to try and emote while talking. "It's the reason why I was put on guard duty for you instead of my own assassination mission. This is a...recent development. I used to be an Uchiha freak with a sharingan."
"Oh...sorry."
"Yeah...."
And again, with the silence....only this time, it never picked back up, Any more questions would get too personal which is a big taboo for them. Right now, they had their mission to deal with. They just sat there for the night, using energy drinks and soldier pills to avoid sleep while awaiting the conditions to leave.
Daytime came, then went for another four nights. Every night was met with awkward silence, and small talk between the two youths before leaving again. At this point, Ryu didn't even care. He had a sneaking suspicion that if he kept trying to make a connection to an ANBU it'd only get him into trouble. He had a mission to focus on, and doing this every time was nothing but a delay to work in most cases. So for now, he kept mostly quiet same as Rabbit.
Eventually they arrived at their location. A small group of trees being loomed over by a large series of hills, and small cliffs. Rabbit would look past the trees in front of them, then a small piece of paper in her hand.
"The location the target is arriving in is directly north of here. This will be where we will be setting up for the assassination. I want you to set traps in the area, and get some sleep. Tomorrow is the day this all happens." She said, holding one hand seal to allow the paper in hand to soak itself with water before falling apart. All Ryuichi did was nod, and hold a hand seal to focus chakra into his body to give him a short burst of speed to scout the area.
The surrounding area was simple, and clean so it didn't take long for Ryu to make a mental map of it. Everything from the separate trees, and rocks to the elevation of certain places were noted, and kept in mind while Ryu prepared the traps. It started with the treetops. "Three cutting wire nets, and two poisoned senbon launchers..." He muttered, opening a sealing scroll and allowing massive pile of loose metal trap equipment, and weaponry to sit upon the paper.
For the next four hours he would use the trap supplies from the scroll to set up the desired traps all around, from wire traps to oil slicks to floor spikes coated in skin-rot inducing poisons, nothing was uncovered. Of course, because he had an ally here he had to do SOMETHING to note where the traps were to prevent Snow Rabbit from getting hurt should she need to leave before planned.
So every dangerous location was marked with a green leaf with an X cut into it, then adhered to a surface where it would be visible, but not obvious. The trained ANBU eye should be more enough to hunt these out if given prior knowledge.
Once the final trap, and marker were placed Ryu came back to the sniping location to find Snow rabbit sitting in the treetops with a massive bow, almost 50% taller than she was. It looked extremely plain, and metal with several small lines going around the material all across the weapon, hinting at it being a collapsing weapon to have an easier carry.
Ryu jumped up to the same branch, and rested with his hands on his knees while his feet stood on the wooden limb. He looked to Snow Rabbit, and nodded. "Traps have been set, Snow. all of them marked with a cut leaf, in case you need to get out of here before planned." He said plainly, shifting his gaze to the hills.
The ANBU girl nodded, before responding "Good job Matcha. Now we simply wait until dawn, when the target will be making an exchange directly ahead of us. Until then, get some sleep. I'll stay and guard for a while, then we switch." She stated. All Ryu did was simply nod, and jump down near a small bush, and lay his jacket down like a sheet before laying down to sleep, wondering how this would play out...
Eventually he was awoken by the girl in the middle of the night, surrounded by the chirping of bugs, and the distant flapping of tiny bat wings. After a brief recap of how nothing had happened they traded places with Ryu sitting around to keep watch. Again, there was nothing of interest happening so all Ryu had to keep him company were his own thoughts. He imagined the possibilities this could go, and how he would be able to do much more with his ANBU missions afterwards. Not really for 'the sake of the village' like he typically kept in mind, but for his own strength...
As the sun rose, Ryu had to awaken Snow Rabbit and have her get ready for the target to appear. Eventually she prepared her collapsing bow, and pulled a quiver from a sealing scroll, and simply stood watch.
"Remember Matcha, you aren't to attack. Just focus on keeping anyone far away from me. If the target escapes, we're to hunt him. If it gets to that, then we both share the same objective....kill." She said with a dead, monotone voice. All Ryu did in response was nod, and look out towards the fields.
"Because if this guy gets away, he'll have nothing but dirt on kumo. He'll always be a target, but he could cause some serious unrest." She continued before Ryu twitched slightly. His extremely sensitive senses for chakra ticked in, and he was quick to jump to the ground. "At nine o' clock, two chakra signals. One much larger than the other. Then at 2 o' clock a single one, bigger than the other two combined." He said as the figures came into view. The group of two consisted of a large brute of a man, and a much more puny man tagging behind him. 'Probably a hired bodyguard' Ryu thought to himself, knowing Snow Rabbit had to be doing the same.
"That's the target. The small one. No more chakra signatures from my end, so now we just need them to talk for information then we go in for the kill." She whispered, leaving Ryu confused as to how they could hear them from this distance. Little did he know, Rabbit wasn't listening. Instead she used her uncanny sight that was so precise that even single-tomoe sharingan users would have trouble keeping up with her skills. She used this sight to lip read the individuals once they came close to the third figure.
It was a man with long flowing robes, and a mask on that mimicked those of cult priests. Snow rabbit prepared her arrow, and awaited for the right time. All three had to be dead, considering the situation. However, something strange was said by the lanky man that was their target.
"Did you bring the worms?"
Rabbit simply flinched as the moment became tense, and cold. Because the masked person had no way of reading their lips, all Rabbit had at her disposal was what the target said.
"The gross, slimy worms that ruin everything. Like we agreed." He said once again, and yet again...silence. The masked man MUST have been talking.
Meanwhile, Ryu was left with none of this information, only watching through the treeline. However, another small chakra pulse from behind them caught his attention...then everything went into slow motion.
Everything happened too fast to react to, but at the same time it felt like it took an eternity. From behind Ryu could see an arrow flying straight overhead, and straight into the other anbu's skull. Her brown hair was quickly stained with blood, and bone fragments were sent flying from behind her, revealing a gory mess of a head, and it's body, falling to the ground with a heavy thud.
Ryu froze, not expecting someone to be able to see them through the trees or even act upon any small opening they saw through the trees. Not from behind, anyways. They had countless trees protecting them, and now....
Ryu didn't even hesitate to run to the limp body of Snow Rabbit and pick them up to see the arrow lodged...EXTREMELY deep into skull. There was no doubt that this had hit her brain. Ryuichi checked everything to find a way to make sure she had a chance to survive with treatment. She wasn't breathing, she wasn't moving, but....'her pulse!' he thought to himself, ripping off the cloth sleeve of her cloak to feel her still warm wrist.
However, with his minor medical training forgotten he overlooked one small thing. The fact that if you press too hard when feeling for a pulse, you feel your own through the blood pumping in your finger. With a gasp,+Ryu threw together three hand seals, and several individuals started running through the woods. The sounds of countless traps arming, and the occasional scream could be heard as a circle of chakra appeared on the ground, and a large demonic statue slowly arose out of it.
"HAAAAAA!" Ryu screamed, as he poured a massive amount of chakra into the statue in an attempt to use it's healing powers on Snow Rabbit. Alas, he was only preparing for something entirely considering you can't heal a dead body...
The statue opened it's large mouth, and countless hands shot out to embrace the girl before pulling her from Ryu's arms into it's mouth. Then, it began to chew, and chew...but then it stopped. Nothing.
The people were coming closer, Ryu had no backup, and the traps weren't stopping them. Sure, it would stop or even kill several, but at this point more and more chakra signatures were coming in from all directions. 'SH*T!' Ryu cursed, before standing up. Then, in a flash everything got shaky. As if he was hit with a massive wave of sickness rushed over him, he fell to his knees. Next, his back started to sting, and burn before Ryu felt his chakra moving through his spine, slowly and painfully like a thick acid. Eventually the skin on his back broke, and he let out a loud scream as several pitch-black rods shot out of his spine, and towards the demonic statue.
When they got close to it, it's mouth opened and countless yards of the black rods were devoured by it before they broke off from Ryu's back, leaving behind eight black chunks of material lining his back, vaguely mimicking the kanji for 'king' 王. He was left breathing heavily, with his mask falling to the ground and sweat pouring from every part of his body. He felt like he could puke, bleed from every pore, and have every limb fall off at this point, with a large portion of his chakra gone.
He had no clue how that had happened, or why but one thing was clear. The statue was done. It's mouth slowly opened, and Ryu could only shiver as he felt something completely foreign. He could see straight out of the inside of that thing's mouth. He could feel two different heart beats, breath twice at the same time, and feel the coming breeze graze his skin twice as much.
He simply had to focus to get up, and look into the mouth of the statue to see...Snow Rabbit, without her robes and mask. Instead she wore was was supposedly underneath, and had several black metallic rods sticking out of her back and ear lobes, and was adorning the rinnegan...And from Ryu's second set of vision he could see himself staring into his own rippled eyes again.
It was disorienting, it was confusing, it was sickening. Was that even her? Was Ryu....controlling her?To test he simply did as he would to move his own hand normally, but imagined himself in the body of Rabbit. Sure enough, her hand moved upwards, just as Ryu wanted.
'no....That didn't save her...' He cursed himself as he slowly became surrounded by enemy ninja, all armed and ready.
"Here they are. The worms." Said a deep voice as the masked figure simply walked towards Ryu, kicking away a small wooden latch that was filled with poison.
"Been keeping an eye on them for about three days now." he continued, stepping forward. All Ryuichi did was star was him, and throw away his ripped up coat, and tank top.
"You killed her...."
"excuse me?"
"You killed her. She's gone. One of my fellow ninja..." Ryu didn't emote anything during this time, not having any emotional strength to try and prove a point. Instead, he simply followed his instincts.
The girl now controlled by Ryu held out a hand, and three orbs flew out of the mouth of the statue, all of them impaling an enemy ninja before returning like a boomerang, then another wave of them flew out. This time the original three along with another set of three newer orbs, doing the same again. Any counterattacks by enemy ninja were quickly destroyed by the orbs with quick precision, and eventually within seconds every single one of them was dead, including the man that was the original target who had watched it all and tried to escape. All that was left was a field of corpses, and blood with Ryu on his knees, breathing heavily.
This had all taken such a toll on him, he didn't even have the ability to think. All he could manage in this state was to use his elemental justu to slowly clean the area of bodies and blood, only leaving the heads of the ninja, and putting them into a sealing scroll.
Then, he and his second body began walking towards the nearest town. He almost wanted to try talking to it, but he knew by now that he had done nothing but make his once living ally a puppet. He barely got any sleep that night, and all the following nights until his return to kumo...
Now Ryuichi sat in the Sileo. His arms bound, and several people looking over him. After his return they had no choice but to interrogate him once they noticed the state of their ANBU unit. They filled him with truth serum, and asked him countless questions that he answered truthfully, only ever stopping for food and sleep.
After an entire week in interrogation, and after several DNA tests it was all confirmed. Both his story, and the DNA of the eyes that were officially placed into his skull by the kumo hospital that once belonged to a girl of senju decent. Even his story was given a pass, and his AiT status untouched.
They didn't have any reason to not believe him, anyways. If they killed, or imprisoned him it would have been nothing but a loss for kumo due to his rinnegan, and the body of a once near perfect ANBU unit under his control.
Now all he had was the quiet voice in his head that kept calling...Ryu shivered, not wanting the idea of him going insane over this...He already had a lot to think about, and rest on. Including the fact that he was now controlling an entirely individual body...