Chasing the Clues [ANBU Mission - Event]

[Senka]

[Continued From Here.]


Running through abandoned buildings too badly damaged to use, but at the same time too costly to tear down, Asayuki Enzou was fleeing and hiding from the masked hunters of the village. He would have had no chance to even consider escaping if it had been anywhere else but this district, which was like his own backyard; knowing every nook and cranny, he was able to hide in places people would not even think of looking. However, it was a dangerous game he played, since by fleeing, he showed that he had done something wrong.

Even then, his instincts had told him to get away, before thoughts told him that while he had done a lot of illegal dealings, there was nothing warranting any overly grave punishment. Maybe, if he had turned himself in, he could have been treated even better; regardless, it was all too late now. Enzou's life played before his eyes, and while it all looked dark and dirty, there were bright moments that inadvertently brought a smile to his face.

Sitting inside a barrel disguised as a garbage can with a fake, garbage-filled concave lid, the man in his mid forties listened intently to any sounds from the outside. He was well aware that the Shinobi of the village, and especially the ANBU, would not make the mistake to be audible in any situation, much less on a pursuit. But he was in luck; one of them came to a stop right in front of him and raised his voice, muffled by his mask and then again by the barrel. Enzou could barely understand, but it appeared that the young man on the outside was calling for reinforcements. The middle-aged man almost gasped, but could hold himself back. What had he done to warrant such a relentless pursuit?

And then it came to him: If the ANBU on the outside stopped talking, would he leave the spot? Since there would be no noise regardless of whether he left or not, Enzou could not come out just like that. Thus, he had to make a gamble; he lifted the lid slightly and looked through the tiny slit that formed. Luckily, he had won this round and nobody was around. It was time to move again, to prevent the hunting dogs from sniffing him out - figuratively speaking, considering the stench he was covered in matched that of his surroundings and properly camouflaged him against possible strong noses, such as those of dogs or those of that particular clan of which the members shared their beds with dogs.

 

[Fuu]

"You know Doku, I read this old folktale once about a guy who used to kill people and turn their bodies into puppets and armor. They say he went off the deep end and started replacing parts of his body with the puppets he made until you could no longer recognize him as a human, just a big heap of random body parts that talked.”

Fuu nodded absentmindedly as the trainee prattled on beside him, his mind in a flying in a dozen directions at once. He didn’t like the odds right now, none seemed to be in his favor. Having been stuck with heading the investigation, the mempo was having a rough time dealing with the prospect of failure. It would not look well for him to fail on his first assignment of this magnitude, despite the unfavorable circumstances. The corpses were over a day old which meant the killer could be anywhere, even past the gates and on their way out of the country. On top of this, the killer himself had apparently either disposed of a Rikudo Sennin user or was one themselves, which elevated the risk level exponentially. The user could have bodies anywhere, even steal the body of a freshly killed ANBU and infiltrate the Sileo.

This was not lost on Fuu, who had requested extra security at many key points in the village, and even suggested screening all ANBU in service. He was concerned there may be a breach and his paranoid mind reached so far that the mempo honestly believed in the possibility that this murder was part of something much bigger. The heat had brought a feeling of despair to his conscious, filling him with dread as if it were an omen.

‘Some things are better left frozen.’ He thought, catching the end of Bikou’s sentence just as she finished speaking. He hadn’t had experience, his knowledge being second hand, and was about to say as much when his earpiece crackled to life. "Calling Doku and Bikou. An associate of the Shinonome siblings has been identified in Southern Cronopolis by our patrol. He is on the run and outmaneuvering us in the abandoned buildings... this area is too contorted!" The words sent a shiver up his spine, expelling all other thoughts and concerns. Raising a hand to the hardware in his ear he spoke loudly and clearly, his voice calm and cold. “Doku and Bikou inbound.”

Shooting a quick look the trainee Fuu fastened his robes shut to ensure his secret remained intact. “Cover me, carefully.” He said, his voice low and tense. Without pause he launched himself forward, taking three long strides before leaping skyward and landing softly on the roof of nearby shop. With haste he flew across the buildings of Kumogakure, moving straight as the crow flies towards his target. Somewhere in the back of his mind he wondered if the small girl would be able to match his long powerful strides, but the thought was quickly smothered as the familiar stench of the slums rose to greet him.

“On scene, commencing sweep.” The area was quiet once more, the eerie silence spread like a blanket throughout the oven of a district. The residents here knew when something major was in taking place and seemed to simply disappear in such instances. After crossing only a few blocks, the ANBU snapped himself to a stop and took in his surroundings. It was one of the abandoned, dilapidated sections of the Cronopolis, devoid of life and left to rot quietly while other sections of the village were improved. Fuu had been here before, once for an illegal substance manufacturer and twice for murders, but he could scarcely say he was familiar.

With a few hand motions, Fuu blinked as his eyes adjusted to the infrared. He hadn’t dabbled much in Genjutsu, but he was immensely glad to have what little he had learned. Thermal Vision would help him distinguish his prey from the environment, and would possibly even help him track the man. From the report, the suspect had been fleeing for some time, the watchful ANBU above confining him to the oven like streets below. By now his body would probably be over heating, much like Fuu wrapped in his cloak, and that would make him easy to spot. Glancing over his shoulder he turned to around, praying Bikou would still be behind him. “I’m going to comb the buildings, starting here and clearing each block like a grid. I’d like you to stay above and watch, hopefully we can flush him out.” Waiting only a moment, he spun on his heel and hopped off the roof to the ground below, the heat smothering him before he even touched land. He knew it was rude, but Fuu didn't want the young girl to be in thick of things if the situation went sour. The ANBU was a well manned branch, but they weren't so well off that they could afford to throw away trainees. Hopefully she wouldn't take offense to it, but Fuu wasn't particularly concerned either way.

Quietly and quickly, he slid into the first building, making his way through with care and finesse. With any luck he would sneak up on the suspect, though the possibility of the suspect sneaking up on HIM was not far from his mind. The thought of a body snatcher was still fresh in Fuu’s brain, and he didn’t want his to be the next rotting heap discovered in the Cronopolis. Should he stumble upon the man, the ANBU was prepared to hold nothing back. He would make use of his Web Shot (rank 3) technique, revealing all six of his pale, lean arms in an attempt to detain the suspect without injury. Fuu was ready for anything, and in this moment he felt oddly alive. ‘The thrill of the hunt.’ He mused, stepping out of the first building and into one of the many alleyways that made up the slums. “Come on out,” he growled softly, so low he could barely hear it himself.
“Little fly.”
[MFT]

 

[Tsuirakuya Shashu]

Shashu was a little miffed at Doku brushing her off so easily, but she was beginning to accept that the older ANBU was just going to be tight-lipped about everything. The silent giant seemed to be lost in thought as she talked, but finally seemed about to react when she mentioned Rikudo Sennin and Sages...until their headsets rasped out a command for them to report back to the Cronopolis. Someone who could give them a lead had been sighted, and it was up to them to apprehend him.

The younger ANBU sighed and followed after her longer-legged counterpart as he dashed across the rooftops. He might have height on me, but since when did that mean anything to Shinobi? She thought, channeling small amounts of chakra to add extra oomph to each step. Less body mass meant less air friction, and she had little trouble keeping up with the taller -nin.

She wrinkled her nose in distaste as they neared their destination, several blocks of the smelliest real estate the Cronopolis had to offer. I've been spending way too much time in this garbage hole lately. A quick scan of the area revealed that whoever lived in this area had been using the alleys as dumping grounds for quite some time, and there were more than enough spots for their quarry to hide himself among the garbage. It would be no easy task to sniff out their prey, but they would get him.

It seemed the plan was for Shashu to serve as lookout and perimeter guard while Doku flushed him out. She simply nodded in acquiescence as he turned towards the first building and made for the rooftops herself. As soon as Doku was out of sight she activated the chakra coils in her mid-section, causing the signature limbs of her bloodline to reform around the twin chakra marks on either side of her torso. Once fully materialized she flexed her extra arms in relief: it always felt better to have them, going around with only two arms felt far too restrictive when she had access to four more.

That done, the trainee made a rapid circuit of the area, laying down tripwires of hair-thin silk over entrances and exits to the area, effectively cutting off the perimeter and much of their quarry's possible routes. From there she took a position at the highest point in the area and hunkered down out of sight, her eyes closed and fingers splayed wide. All of her attention was focused on the myriad, practically invisible threads that extended from her fingertips. If their quarry so much as breathed on one of them, she would know. Like a spider on her web Shashu waited. She was the weaver, and Doku the hunter. Run or hide, their prey couldn't escape them both for long.

 

[Senka]

Running through the buildings randomly would not help him get away, and while he had been doing so for a while, he found that by moving about quickly, he was more likely to be discovered. Maybe it was the ability to detect sound or movement overall, but for some reason, the hunters had an uncanny skill to appear close to him whenever he tried to make a dash for another part of the city, confining him in a limited area which seemed to grow smaller over time. Even then, he had not been caught yet, miraculously so, but maybe he was only being played with.

Enzou decided to disappear completely for a while and lay low underneath a pile of rags, with a hole for him to peer through. He saw the shadows of people running across rooftops or hints of the hunters passing by near him, but none were able to detect his presence. Under the rags, the heat became unbearable, more so because he was directly under the sun and the pieces of cloth had not been designed with breathing through them in mind. Enzou wondered whether they had been designed for any purpose at all or just stitched together randomly to gain the semblance of something called "clothing", but the fact that they had been discarded meant that they did not fulfill their purpose properly.

Then came a new type of hunter, unlike any of the others he had seen before; a giant of a person, most likely male, jumped down from the rooftops right in front of him, his broad back facing Enzou. His presence was oppressing and the man in hiding forgot to breathe - or maybe it was an instinctual response to being in close proximity to a true predator. However, the hunter turned around to look everywhere but exactly behind him, and appeared to have seen something, causing him to walk inside an abandoned building - the one Enzou had come out of only a few minutes earlier.

Almost a minute passed, during which the man did not dare to take a breath, but the hunter never came back outside. Maybe he was searching methodically and was moving through the building by each story, but Enzou knew he could not stay in his hiding place forever. Taking off the rags slowly as to not cause any sound, he slipped out of the pile and tiptoed away into another building.

Somewhere else, at the same time, Bikou would feel one of her threads being tripped; not far from where Enzou had left his hiding place, a stray dog had walked through a tripwire and triggered it. However, there was no sign of the man they were hunting on her end; even with every other citizen hiding inside their homes, there were plenty of animals to distract from the hunt; stray cats and dogs, occasionally rats and pigeons, would move about the scene. Unless they were cleared, in one way or another, they would prove to be detrimental to Bikou's method of hunting - of course, if she was able to sense the difference between the things that triggered her tripwires, that would be a different matter.

In the end, the area in which the man could be hiding in had shrunk considerably; it was only a matter of time until he was found.

 

[Tsuirakuya Shashu]

The seconds ticked by, followed by inevitably by minutes, and Shashu remained still, her eyes closed in concentration. She had taken a kneeling position with her body bent over her right thigh and her six arms spread horizontally, the fingers of each splayed outwards. The many, many threads quivering slightly as things like the wind and small animals sent vibrations back to her. Personally she was a bit miffed that Doku had resigned her to a passive role, but she couldn't deny she was well suited for it. It was true she took a sort of gleeful joy in the rapid movements and heart-pumping thrill of combat, but she had never had trouble transitioning back and forth from that and a calm, focused, and calculating mindset.

Case in point... she thought idly. Part of her weekly training in the Ancient Forest was a full day spent meditating much like this, her awareness spread out over a wide area in the form of countless threads. For her, this was nothing compared to the sheer volume of input one got from a forest environment. The wind had a specific feel to it depending on it's direction and the surrounding area it flowed through, she had become accustomed to it within a minute of settling into her trance. The animals had been even easier: she knew how much force their small bodies would exert on her threads. They had been identified in seconds. Humans though...humans were the easiest. They either blundered through whole swatches of threads at once completely unawares, frantically brushed them off in a panic, or, if they were particularly perceptive, pushed them aside with deliberate movements that no animal or gust of wind would make.

Mentally Shashu chuckled. Her smaller brothers and sisters could innately tell the difference between such things practically from birth with zero training. What took her months of training to master, true spiders did without even thinking. Then again they're much easier to fool, so I guess I lucked out eh?

Idle thoughts in the back of her mind trickled by as she kept her attention firmly focused on the stimulation provided by her threads. Suddenly one of the threads on the ring finger of her right middle arm twitched, closely followed by the one next to it. She waited a second for confirmation, and sure enough a third thread in that area twitched. Gotcha, little fly.

Shashu cleared her throat and spoke into her throat mic, silently grateful that the things were voice activated. "Doku. Movement in the North-East quadrant, heading West. Likely searching for an exit to the perimeter. I'll keep tabs and inform you of further movement." She paused for a half-second before adding, "Oh, and try to avoid breaking the threads."

[Marked for Abilities: WC-460]​

 

[Fuu]

This needed to end, and soon. Fuu was growing frustrated, smothering in his robes and mask as he moved from building to building, and scanning everywhere thoroughly as he slowly passed. The heat had begun to get to him, his entire body slick with sweat, causing his armor and robes to cling to his skin uncomfortably. He yearned to shed his bulky robes to facilitate some sort of ventilation, but the armor he was wearing today wasn’t of the custom made stock he had tailored to hide his four extra arms. Instead, it was built to facilitate his full range of motion with all six arms, leaving them bare and exposed. This was hardly the place to be running around exposed, or at least not the time.

So he stalked, claiming ground like a ghost as he hunted his prey. Completing his first circuit the tall ANBU stepped out into the alley where they had split up and begun their search. Lifting his mask up and onto his sweaty hair, pushing the wet blond strands out of his eyes in the process, he paused and took in the scene around him. Against one of the walls was a pile of rags, which Fuu had dismissed only minutes before. Now however, something was amiss. Through his infrared eyes the rags were glowing like an oven, producing much more heat than a pile of old cloth rightly should. Approaching it cautiously, he stopped only a few feet shy of the pile, silently staring into the folds.

Whoever or whatever had been there had left shortly after Fuu’s arrival on the scene, he most certainly would have noticed the ball of radiating heat upon his entrance. That meant his prey could have been closer than he suspected, perhaps right under his nose. Just then, his earpiece crackled to life, Bikou’s voice shocking him. It had been so quiet, the voice had actually startled him. ‘Don’t break the webs?’ He wondered, glancing around. At first it was only one, but soon he began to notice dozens of strands, across openings and paths. The trainee had canvased the area with a veritable web of string, intriguing Fuu and raising even more questions. Was it her, or her spider friends that did this? Did she have some sort of affinity with spiders, like Fuu himself?

Just as he rose a finger to respond his affirmation, the ANBU noticed something else. One doorway, the one closest to the pile of rags, was barren of web. Gritting his teeth, he sucked in a quiet breath and lowered his mask back over his face. He couldn’t risk giving himself away by speaking, so instead he glided silently across the ground towards the door, gently tapping two different strands of web as he passed. If the trainee could track using her web, then she would certainly feel those tugs and hopefully realize how unnatural the tremors were.

His heart racing, the spider crept through the door and into the building. If he found his prey, he would not hesitate to Web Shot him with all six arms. After detaining the suspect, through whatever means necessary, he would wrap them in a thick coating of mucus and take every precaution to make sure he wasn’t a threat.

 

[Senka]

Just as he passed through the door to the stairwell, an unprecedented chill assaulted Enzou's neck. He knew that his instincts could be trusted, but even then it was way too late to react; the hunter had come after him, for an unknown reason knowing exactly where he was. Spinning around to face the ANBU, he could only open his mouth in awe.

Then he was hit by something and pounded into the wall, onto which he was pinned; the hunter had shot him with something sticky. Enzou watched in horror as for a very short instant four extra arms could be seen under the flipped heavy dark coat, holding onto white strings, before they were concealed again. They were testament to the hunter's nature of a Ninja, willing to subject his body to all sorts of modifications; unbeknownst to Enzou, the ANBU had not tampered with his own physical integrity, and it was inborn.

"You... you monster!"

Was all he could say.


Finally, a clue had been found, and the investigations would begin in earnest, provided the man was cooperative. If he was not, there were ways to make him speak; the life and security of the citizens of Kumo depended on it. Whether the same members would spearhead the investigations or the higher-ups would decide to leave interrogation to specialists was up to debate. All the same, the two ANBU first on the case had contributed greatly towards the solution of this incident.


[Part 1 of the Mission Series is over with this. Take it as a cliffhanger between episodes, if you will. This will be treated as a successful B-Rank Mission. You may go request your rewards now. Expect the next part up sometime within the week.]