Attack of the Lizardmen [Open Topic]

[Toraono Michino]

The clock ticked and struck a chord. It was around 11 at night and the hospital had only started to quieten down as it tended to do in these spare moments. In another few hours the ‘regulars’ and those who didn’t know how to party hard would be showing up. A blonde giant of a man was sitting inside a circular desk that looked more like a battle fortress with the stacks upon stacks of folders. Nestled between two smaller towers of patient notes the young man was chewing on the end of a pen in deep thought for a few moments before continuing to jot. The pen scratched across the page swiftly and it seemed to be the only sound that echoed through his empty section of the ER.

Ryuu Tama had found himself thrown far more back into his work than the village had expected of him. Of those that knew of him still continued to be dumbfounded by his looks of youth but rarely said a word against him. Since his return the ER was seeing less stress, mysterious illnesses and unhealing wounds were being thwarted, and the medical staff was taking a collective sigh of relief at all his hard work; especially with the war that loomed over them all.
A small but heavy hand suddenly rested itself on his shoulder and the scientist couldn’t hold back the smirk that played at the corner of his lips as his head tilted to nudge against the limb. It slowly stroked up his neck to his chin, and with an index finger, tilted Tama’s head back until the blonde was face to face with the male nurse he generally worked with. For a moment the two simply stared at each other in a loving manner before the man standing tilted his head down a little more to gently place a kiss on Tama’s lips. The scientist’s playful smirk grew wider as he reached up and casually smacked the man’s cheek,

“Not at work Ryo, weeze professionals 'ere,” but stretched his neck out a little to return the kiss regardless of his chiding. The man pouted at Tama who only proceeded to wag a finger. Ryo sighed,
“Don’t stay too long then. You still haven’t made up for standing me up last week, mister.”
“H-hey! I was a busy tryin to cure a horridible disease before eet caught on! Far more pressin’ matters…pressin’, yes...” The scientist didn’t keep an eye lock with his lover though and faced back towards the work in front of him. Ryo gave a knowing snort and chuckle before relenting to the man’s whims; he knew full well the scientist did what he wanted.

The sound of Ryo’s footfalls grew more and more silent and before long the blonde giant was left alone. He stared down at the patient notes he had started but with Ryo’s distracting kiss he couldn’t keep his mind from wandering no matter how hard he tried. With a frustrated sigh the doctor tossed his pen onto the desk and stood up. His seven-foot tall frame easily stood over even the tallest of book stacks and his hand reached down to grab the white and grey speckled coffee cup that had been his companion long before transformation.
The doctor’s feet didn’t make a single sound as he moved out of his desk fort and on towards the break room to pour another cup of coffee and try to clear his head. He had at least six more charts to fill out for today and three to close out, though in all honesty he should of been letting Ryo handle some of the work and clocked out long ago. It wasn’t his passion for the living or medical practice that kept him here working on these charts either, but instead a painstaking need to control everything. The last time he had let Ryo fill out some charts it lead to a really nasty fight. Dr. Ryuu had learned rather fast afterwards that the nurse was better suited to working with patients than with paper.

Once inside the small break room the smell of old coffee assaulted the Hybrid’s senses of smell and taste. The bitter look on his face was unmistakable as he strode over to the coffee pot. Removing the glass from its perch he took a sniff at the black contents inside causing his face to screw up more than a Picasso painting. With a disgusted grunt Tama tossed the liquid inside into the nearby sink and began making preparations for a new pot. He was about two-thirds the way done when he heard a scream.
Now, inside of a hospital, screams were not uncommon. Screams even at eleven o’clock at night were not abnormal. However the elevated pitch followed by the desperation behind the force of the scream, while itself also not uncommon, flipped a switch inside of the scientist; for such screams were cries for help. Raw energy formed around his body and he used it to grant him a swift exit of the break room and out towards where heard the sound.

Back at his desk there was nothing but silence. Tama’s feet continued to make no sounds but he walked around brazenly as if he hadn’t heard the alarming sounds. It was to hopefully bait whatever had decided to terrorize his little section of the ER. The doctor rounded back into his desk, continuing on calmly, and began to reorganize his charts when he caught something in the corner of his right eye. A lizard’s tail slowly slid into an empty patient room. For a moment the scientist lifted his right hand to check the little gecko marking between his thumb and index finger but it remained the little black stain on his perfect skin that it was. This told him it wasn’t anyone from the Realms trying to contact him and it was something possibly dangerous. Tama sucked air between his teeth and with an annoyed sigh raised his left hand up. Invisible energy began to slowly shape around the hand until it was enclosed. The good doctor then grabbed the very air itself and shook it as if he was trying to put a sheet on a bed. This motion caused a sudden strong gust of wind to tear into the patient’s room and expunge anything that would be trying to scare up his neighborhood.

[MFT]

 

[Kazumi]

Exhaustion had not been a feeling that Suzume had really experienced in the weeks following the incident. One would have through that an inability to sleep would certainly have a great number of medical repercussions, but if anything the girl had as much energy as she ever had before. As it turned out, this was turning into a saving grace for the Storm Heir as she worked to juggle responsibilities with her clan, as a shinobi and as a Medic-in-Training. As the weeks pressed on, she was quickly discovering that even those boundless reserves of energies had their limits.

Spending twelve hours on a shift at the hospital, followed by four hours of memorization of clan and village documents, and then another six hours out on small missions around the village did not leave much time for rest. Even unable to sleep, she found herself mentally taxed into oblivion after a few months of the rigorous schedule. The slow periods at the hospital were one of the few bastions of reprieve she allowed herself, practically melting into a semi-conscious blob half sprawled onto the couch of the hospital's Emergency Ward break room. If it was not for the slow rythmical breathing, her otherwise motionless body and glassy eyed stare towards a corner of the ceiling might have given the other staff pause to question if the girl was still alive.

Even as one of the doctors made their way into the room on the hunt for fuel, she did not even budge from her nearly comatose state as he rattled around the mug, drawers and sink as he worked to prepare a new batch of the glorious liquid. Suzume wasn't sure if the drug would help her keep focus, as the stark bitter taste effortlessly warded her away from even trying it a second time. With her mouth faintly agape she continued to stare off into oblivion, it was not until a sudden scream roused her from her sleepless slumber that she sat up with a jolt and looked around. Only a few moments passed before the man that had been in there, which her mind was only now beginning to process, hastily bolted from the room.

As her mind began to process reality once more, she continued to look about the area in confusion. However, before she could stop herself, she too found herself hurrying out of the room and towards the location from which it seemed the sound originated from. Such a task was more difficult than it seemed, given the quality construction of the building, as well as its winding hallways. It took a minute for her to locate the man who had bolted from the room before her, but he did not appear to be in any state of alarm. Standing a good dozen feet away, dressed in the plain garb of station as a Medic-in-Training, she looked about the area for some source of alarm. The only thing she seemed to find out of place was the battlements of folders that surrounded the man's desk.

The Oushi-ouja was beginning to think she must have hallucinated the sound. Standing on the opposite side of the larger room from the supposedly vacant room that the unseen intruder happened in, she had no idea of anything amiss that was transpiring. That was until the sudden burst of wind slammed open the door, nearly sending her leaping from her skin as loose medical supplied flew from the room as a result of the sudden torrent of air from the mostly hidden man behind his desk. Unsure as to what was happening, or even what to do, she scanned the area with searching eyes as she half-muttered to herself, "what in the?"

 

[Toraono Michino]

The gush of force that rolled through the patient room pushed out all the loose metal out first followed by two cabinet doors and finally a rolling bed came tumbling out, breaking the door frame as it did. The seven foot tall man narrowed his eyes a little waiting for something when he heard the sound of a female directly near him and out of his eye shot. Instantly his flesh crawled and an involuntary shiver shook right up his spine. Of all the phobias a man could be cursed with, his was by far the most annoying. His fear of the opposite gender went far beyond some silly mentor-taught fault but was instead a true psychological twitch that somehow didn’t get worked out when his body was reshaped. Unlike his old self, however, the ‘young’ scientist quickly worked out a technique to help keep himself stable around women. Tama gently clapped his hands together and formed three mantras before placing both hands on either side of his temple to activate the Genjutsu on himself.
His chakra balked at the idea and he could feel his body already rejecting the idea when Karma’s energy reached up and accepted the self inflicted jutsu. It was the only way Dr. Ryuu could describe the spiritual being he had managed to encase inside of his physical form as it was truly bent on destroying the practitioner any chance it got. The illusionary technique he placed upon himself was meant to remove one’s fear or at least tone it down to the point of near removal as instinct will always override the subconscious. Due to this, forcing one’s chakra to tone down their fear was next to impossible, however the living being inside of him could easily reach out and manipulate the technique to actually take hold. Mind, the scientist was letting Karma do this. It would take some time to undo, but, like taking a shower to scrub off the daily germs it wouldn’t bother the genius anymore than that to complete.

Once he felt his guts beginning to unwind from their stranglehold he carefully moved his way out and around of the nurses station. By the time he turned to catch eye to eye with Suzume it was clear that his pupils were devoid of some emotion. Of course that was not uncommon to see the deadpan eye doctors, especially not at this time of night, so perhaps she wouldn’t think much of it. His mind quickly began to calculate the possibility of her having something to do with the unusually large lizard tail, but, from what he knew of her as a hard-working trainee told him otherwise. Even in the worst-case scenario the girl would be an unknowing accomplice which gave the doctor a bit of relief and a companion in tackling this situation. In all honesty he had really hoped this was an easily frightened patient saw one of Suna’s strange desert critters wondering around in his section of the ER and that it wasn’t something more sinister. Knowing his luck however…

“’Scuse meh,” the doctor said as he quickly slipped past Suzume and creeped up on the dark room. Quickly darting his hand inside he flipped up the light switch causing the sorta-busted overhead to start flickering. The orange-ish light revealed little more than a wrecked up hospital room and a pang of guilt hit the man in his stomach. Did he hallucinate all of this? Did he really need to sleep already? It had only been two days…
“’ey”, he said as the blond turned to the trainee behind him, “You ‘erd that scream too, righ-.”
Before Tama could finish the head of crocodile ripped out of the paneled ceiling to bite down on the man’s collar, hard, and jerk it’s head violently to the left. The scientist’s neck was broken near instantly causing his head to flop over onto the other shoulder as blood began to gush from the wound on his neck. His body started to go limp as the light in his mismatched eyes flickered for just a moment. For just a brief second the man felt his body convulse and wondered if he was finally going to die.

“Fat chance,” Karma whispered in his ear.

Within seconds, as the crocodile started to attempt and drag its kill into the ceiling the doctor’s spare arm struck across his chest and gripped the creature’s face with a crushing force. Life flared back into his eyes as if his body was going through some kind of reboot and, with head still tilted, stared out of the corner of his sockets,
“Oi thar, yer gonna need teh try a bit ‘arder than that teh end ol’ Tama.”
Raw energy began to spark out of his body in little bolts of lightning that began to catch bits of things on fire here and there. The eyes turned to look at Suzume,
“Yuh might ‘unt to find sum sheltah, this is nevah pretty.”

The good doctor would hold back the sheer life energy that Karma was forcing through his being until the trainee got back somewhere safe and finally let the energy flow through him. A blinding white bolt of energy exploded in a pillar out from Tama that consumed both himself and the reptile. It shook the entire hospital followed by a booming sound that would no doubt get the attention of someone else to send help: hopefully they wouldn’t need it. As quick as it came and rocked the light zipped itself back into the doctor’s eyes. His neck was back on right and the wound on his shoulder was gone without so much as a scar, though sadly his scrub top had all but been incinerated into the black dust that swooshed around him. It wouldn’t take one long to figure that some of that dust must also be the beast that attacked him. Making a show of himself by dusting his previously injured shoulder as if it had been nothing, Tama started to stride forward again until he came across Suzume once more.
And his heart froze. The genjutsu that he had placed on himself had been erased in the ‘reset’ and now his phobia ran rampant through his subconscious. His flesh turned pale and a cold sweat started to immediately break out on his forehead as he tried to unstiffen his muscles enough to properly face the girl. As he did so his peripheral caught the sight of another large scaly tail slithering around the corner behind the girl.

Crap…<i></i>

 

[Kazumi]

Suzume watched the doctor intenly for a short while as he faces away, his body seemed to tense and for a few seconds he remained facing away from her. Confusion lined her eyes, and she was about to speak when he finally turned toward her, his posture seeming more relaxed than it had a few seconds prior. He quickly brushed past her with an excusing word and she turned to try and follow. She onyl made a it a few steps as she watched him make his way over towards the door from where all the commotion was coming, which she was still convinced should have been empty.

Her nerves began to settle as she watched him peering inside, seeming to not find the source of the sound. Before she had a chance to respond or react, a long snout and jaws clamped down on the man's neck and collar bone, instantly snapping the life from him. Suzume took a reflexive step back, her hands raising up as if to ward away the sight. Her lack of true combat expereince and the relative ease of the past few months, at least in terms of such violence, had not served her well as the creature struck out and began to drag the corpse away. She felt a sensation that was not unfamiliar to her now, the cold chains of death had dug into the body.

Still frozen in shock, she thought she saw the corpse spasm, and then as soon as it came, that deathly sensation vanished. She stumbled back once again as sparks began to jump from the once-corpse and he began to speak. For the first few seconds following, her feet were stuck to the ground, but as the display strengthened she finally broke herself free. Quickly making her way behind the countertop of the reception desk, she peeked around its side to watch, her curiosity overpowering her survival instincts. As the blinding pillar erupted into existance, she raised a hand and quinted to keep from blinding herself, still trying to see what was happening.

A few more seconds passed and her eyes readjusted to the darkened room, half of the lights in the hallway were broken or barely flickering from the surge of energy and the booming explosion. Her head still felt as if it was shaking, but she tried to push the discomforted sensation down as she hesitantly pushed herself to a stand, seeing that the man somehow looked completely unscatched. It wasn't impossible, she knew, if any in the village were able to shrug of near-mortal injuries it would be the shinobi who worked within these very halls, but it was still a strange and yet wondrous sight to see.

As her eyes adjusted, she could see the sweat upon his brow and the paling of his complexion. It was obvious that the attack had left its mark, even if his physical scars had receded. Briefly she wondered how she would have reacted should something like that happened to her. The thought was brief, however, as she had little confidence in any ability of hers to not simply die, though she was unsure how her body would react to such. Curious as she was, she was not eager to try and tease out the possibilities on this.

With a few quick steps, she hurried over closer to the doctor, inspecting him over to see if there were any other lingering wounds. She could see his muscled tighten in what she presumed to be adrenal fear, which was understandable. "A-are you alright?" She asked, looking more to ascertain his mental state than his physical. She stepped closer and placed a hand on his chest and shoulder to try and see where the creature had bitten him, sure there must be some mark. After a moment of inspection she continued, "what happened, how did that thing get in here?"

Distracted by her inspection and questions, she did not notice the creature a few paced behind her, lurking for just such an opening. With little but the sound of claws digging into the smooth hard tile, the large crocodile surge around the side of where she had been hiding, its jaw open as it scrambled forth to clamp down on her. As if they were coordinating, the ceiling in the room that Tama had been inspecting gave way as another large scaled beast crashed to the floor. It was momentarily dazed, but it quickly recovered and it too scrambled towards the back of the doctor, its jaws wide and ready for its meal.

A trail of barely seen black energy snaked out from Suzume's feet in both directions, disheartening a mere foot before each of the two creatures. A fraction of a heartbeat later the ceiling above Suzume's assailant smashed down like a heavy metal gate, pinning the creature's chest to the ground as it scrambled fruitlessly to pry itself from the weight of the sudden wall. The second fared no better as the remnants of the door frame suddenly grew from both sides, pinning the second by its neck, the chakra reinforced wood, metal and stone pinning it helplessly.

 

[Toraono Michino]

The cold terror of fear dropped the doctor into a state of sheer paralysis. The soft touch of her hand gliding across his shoulder to inspect the place that a wound should be triggered a special part of Tama’s brain. Before he knew it the flashbacks were kicking in. Movie reels of black and white played behind his narrowed pupils. Scenes of his late lover tenderly touching him despite his phobias, and scenes of the woman who caused the fears of the opposite gender to manifest so strongly interlinked with the ones of friendship…

She is at your neck…
</I>

…so close…she could grab the top of your skull…​

<i></i>
</I>

A simple twist.​

<i></i>

The scientist recoiled the moment Suzume’s hands got near his throat, and before he could stop himself his own hands were darting up to snatch the medical trainee’s wrists. His mis-matched eyes looked wild as his breaths had started to become sharp and short as if he was on the verge of a panic attack. It was in that moment that he realized the mistakes he was making due to his personal fears as the next giant lizard ripped at the tiles on the ground to penchant a faster kill behind her. At the same time another dropped on the ceiling behind Tama; within seconds it was moving towards them.Yet for all the danger rushing at them in a pincer attack, the scientist still couldn’t find his voice or let go of Suzume’s wrists for all the fear that choked him.

It was barely a movement, and Tama couldn’t follow the speed of the energy flicking across the floor, before suddenly he felt parts of the building crumbling apart rise up and against the crocodiles, easily killing one of them and pinning the other helplessly.
The brief seconds of chaotic attack snapped the doctor out of his trance and he quickly let go of the MiT’s wrists before taking a quick two steps back; the fear was still clearly right there.
He turned his back for a moment and took a deep breath as he used his right arm to lean against a still standing wall. If it wasn’t obvious before, then his true colors would start to show now as the scientist showed not even an iota of interest of the creatures who were trying to attack them. All he could do was let out a strange little noise of frustration, stomp his foot like an angry horse, and run a large hand through his long blond hair.
“Whooo….” he spoke to himself, probably a little too loudly as he tried to steel his nerves. There would be no turning to his self Genjutsu now with his mind in such a frantic state. They had giant lizards attacking from one side, he had a worry about where the hell Ryo was during all this, and to top it off, <I>a girl just touched his skin. There were creepy crawlies squirming over the poor mans nerves that he could only describe as, ‘a bunch of spiders.’

It was probably a good two minutes of standing there collecting himself, using a finger to interrupt the poor MiT any time she had a question, before the scientist could steel his nerves again to look at her.
Give him Mikaboshi to fight any time. Women were incarnations of pure terror to Tama.

“S-sorry,” he was finally able to blurt out as he used a still standing wall to support his seven foot tall frame, an’ please dun take any offense, please. I mean, yuh can, but, I really can’t help eet. Chicks scare the absolute beejeezus out uh me. I usually have a, uh, mental trick, to help, it helps…kinda, sorta, but, I can’t focus with all,” he waved an arm in a single pass to display the destruction of their little nursing station in that took all of about thirty seconds, “this. Undah normal circumstances I’d say we’d be best to split up but…we’re ain’t in exactly the right state of political state to afford such luxuries. T-this could very well be an attack…though I ‘ave no idea who the <I>hell uses desert ironjaws. Seriously, I thought dey were endangered because of the maelstrom…”

The scientist didn’t even so much as need to inspect the crocs apparently. He knew exactly what kind of creature they were and despite how it seemed that they were impossibly coordinated, they were actually very much like this in the wild. However, their natural habitat was a good hundred kilometers away from the very edge of Sunagakure, let alone the hospital. Something was, at the very least, using them for a distraction and they just happened to make the mistake of starting on the side of the hospital Tama and Suzume were working.

Putting on an obvious brave face and giving a huff to try and overcome his fears and think, if even for a couple of seconds, the blond reached into his pocket to pull out a rubber band. Quickly gathering his mass amounts of hair he quickly began to tug, twist, and flip with his hands and the rubber band until it was in a tight bun.
“So, I doubt yuh do, but before I go doing one of my crazy ideas I’d like to hear if you have any better uns. Which, by the way, I plan on ‘unting down and dismembering the sonuvabitch who thought eet was a good idea to throw giant reptiles at meh….you in? Unless, of course like I said, you got a better idea. Really, I’m open ears. I have a bad reputation when eet comes to capturing bad guys, serious.”

He was stuttering a little and honestly the poor doctor probably sounded like a guy trying to macho up in a terrifying situation in front of a girl, but the truth was far more worrisome. There was once a dark time in his life that, at one point, he had the luxury of forgetting about. Since his Resurrection into the youthful form he inhabited, the memories of hunting down his fellow man and eating their souls was far too vivid. Yet the stacking pressure of battle, fear induced adrenaline, and the painful restitching of his flesh was pushing his carefully manicured mind on edge. Unless Suzume had a better idea the doctor before her was really about to regress, if only for a moment, and wade in that pool of insanity while his body did whatever it needed to do to return to a state of ‘normal.’

Although, thankfully, the poor MiT wouldn’t need to quickly figure out a way to psychoanalyze and figure out how to get Tama off of his fear perch. Whoever was behind the desert ironjaws set off a trigger that both the trained military professionals had but a split second to react to. It was the sound of metal scrapping against a cylinder of the same make. A pin being drawn from a trigger. A small egg-shaped rock with a metal attachment at the top came flipping in from a dark corridor before the trigger reached the explosion jutsu imprinted on the inside. There was going to be shrapnel of some kind flying through the air and they both only had fractions of seconds to do anything to avoid it.
Tama was still paralyzed by his staggering mental problems.