Sifting the Sands [Mission]

[Kazumi]

Outside the Gates of Soon's Haven​

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Harsh dry winds blew mercilessly across the sands of dunes before they broke against the massive walls that encompassed the port city. Towering high into the sky they kept all intruders from entry, be the man, beast or wind. Gathered into a loose cluster were twentry men and women, all garbed in appropriate desert faring attire. They spoke to one another, some tending to packs that were strapped to massive armatunks, armored beasts of burden. THe sun was just keeping over the horizon across from the city as the group awaited their escort.

The mission Naoki had been conscripted for was relatively simple, but it lacked any sort of concrete details. SHe was to meet a man that went by the name Takeshi outside of Soon's Haven's gate. There she would receive her full instructions from him, but the indications that she received from the offices was that it was to be an escort of some kind. The threat level was low, as the requester did not wish to pay any great deal of money for an 'experienced' shinobi. While they would rarely turn down a paying contract, Naoki was instructed to keep her guard up just in case and report back if anything was amiss with this 'D' ranked mission.

 

[Samejima]

Uwaaaah, it's been awhile since I've been here! Naoki walked closer to the gates she'd seen only one or two times before, blindfold still on and dressed in her old t-shirt and shorts, complete with a cloak to shield her from the sun's rays. Bag slung across her shoulder, it held not much more than a few canteens of drinking water, a few bottles of soldier pills, some bandages, explosive notes, an emergency signal flare and a certain something she kept with her at all times as a promise to a friend. She didn't bring her kokyuu today, but her battle-knife was tucked into its sheath. Knuckles wrapped in bandages already, and training weights still strapped onto her ankles and wrists (both under bandages), she did indeed feel like she'd prepared as much as she could for the upcoming mission.

So I need to find someone named Takeshi... He should seem like he's waiting for someone out here...

If it was an obvious sort of search, whether they were the only ones who seemed to be waiting at the gates while she snapped her fingers or if the man called out to her as she got closer with the genin headband over her eyes, she'd likely walk up to them somewhat off-guard. This was a D-Rank mission after all, there shouldn't be any great danger. Otherwise, Naoki would attempt to identify someone who knew the area and its people well and ask them for someone by the name of Takeshi and go from there.

[Topic Entered]
[ Don't kill her ;-; ]

 

[Kazumi]

The various responses and attitudes she received from the people she saw varied as widely as the temperature did in this unforgiving country. Some seemed to look at her in awe, having possibly never seen a shinobi before. Unfortunately the one she decided to ask for directions, a short woman didn't seem as impressed. With obvious annoyance she directed Naoki towards a small gathering of six or so similarly clothed individuals. The similarity in the garb of all these people was almost unnerving, but given the harsh climate it was understandable.

As Naoki would approach she could 'see' a large umbrella strapped to the top of one of the beasts along with a cushioned saddle. Apparently whomever was running the operation did not care for the sun or walking. A dozen feet away was the individual whom the woman refered to, and he stuck out like a sore thumb among the others...
[col]He stood listening to one of the other expedition members, his arms crossed as if he were only listening in passing. In the middle of the person's sentence he interrupted with, "not unless you want to carry them on your back. We can't afford another." He spoke in a voice befitting his size, authoritative and privileged. Noticing the oncoming girl he brushed the others away with a few waves of his hand. "You must be the Sand Ninja we hired, right?" He eyed her through his dark shades with obvious amusement, "they sent a little girl? We paid that much for a child... Great, told him it was a waste of money. I could have hired half a dozen armed guards for what it cost to get you here."

He shook his head with contempt and pulled a bottle of water from the side of a random pack animal that was nearby. Cracking it open he took a nice long drink, "Just wonderful. Maybe we'll have you carry supplies or something... and take that thing off your eyes, you look stupid." He half gestured towards the protector that covered her eyes with his bottle before taking another drink. After finishing the entire bottle in record time he casually tossed it towards another of the expedition members who only barely managed to catch it.|

[/col]

 

[Samejima]

"Ah, um, yes, I'm a Sunagakure genin, Samejima Naoki," she replied nervously, standing at attention as the man asked her if she was the Sand Ninja they hired and giving the man a bow as she finished introducing herself. Nodding at the order, but reluctant to remove the headband, "This, um... This is part of training! I'd get in trouble if I took it off, so, um..." she paused a little, unsure of what else to say that might get him off her case. Re-gathering some of her earlier confidence, she gave the man another bow as she finished, "Please excuse me for this, but I can't take this off right now..." Naoki trailed off at the end, losing her grip on it again. It was all ups and downs with the girl's confidence.

Upon being assigned to anything to pull, push or otherwise move, she'd promptly move over there to do her job, nodding at anyone who happened to turn their heads her way as she did so. The noise being made by the rest of the expedition members should have allowed her to notice movements within the ranks.

 

[Kazumi]

The Journey

---

It only took another half hour, by Naoki's estimates, for them to depart. True to his word, Naoki was given the job of making sure one of the over-packed armatunks didn't have its cargo fall of. It did of course, quite frequently. The beast did not seem to care for the load, but the ropes that tied bundles, boxes and loose excavation equipment were not as abundant as they should. Barely a minute passed without something tedious for Naoki to do most of the trip. Combined with the heat and the scorching dry wind it was a rather miserable experience.

Hours passed and eventually it was time to take a rest and have their lunch. Their rest stop was as boring as any other place in the desert. Endless dunes of sand stretched on as far as they could see, and they had lost sight of the city a few hours prior. Most of the other members of the party, fifty or so by a rough count were exhausted and almost dying of thirst. They clearly were not used to this sort of travel. The only individual who looked as refreshed as he did when the trek began was none other than the Expedition Leader himself, Takeshi. He had been shouting words of 'encouragement', at anyone who had begun to fall behind.

Ten more minutes went by, quicker than Naoki or any of the others would have prefered. From what Naoki could overhear it seemed like this was an expedition to find some old ruins which had been uncovered a few days travel from here. Details were scarce, but most of her traveling wards were quite eager to go. Perhaps more concerning was that they all seemed to be little more than researches or archaeologists. It was entirely possible that none of them had any sort of self defense training of any sort.

Just as they were about to begin their travels, a young man's loud cry of pain was heard from the other side of the camp..

 

[Samejima]

After setting out, it seemed like there wasn't any actual carrying, just making sure things didn't fall right off the armatunk she was assigned to.

Whoa! One of the larger boxes seemed to be slipping out of the rope, though it was quickly saved from falling with a crash thanks to the random shouting happening during the trip so far. Thank goodness Takeshi-san shouts so much... Though he could be a bit nicer about it. It's not like they've all got an umbrella over their heads... Naturally, with all the time she's spent toiling under the sun prior to arriving at Suna, she fell back into the rhythm of figuring out where the sun was and working with her back to it by instinct, sometimes helping people on the other armatunks with their cargo. By the end of the first leg, she was walking alongside the armatunks, tired to a worse extent than she should've been at this point, if she wanted to last the whole trip.

When the rest of them took a break, so did she, situating herself among the people she was closest to while on the move. She realized they were all thirsty... But she wasn't gracious enough to pass out her own canteens of water, keeping them to herself for the time being and taking a single medium-sized gulp from the one she had latched onto her hip. It was better than taking several small sips and wanting for more after all. Overhearing the purposes of the trip, she couldn't say it was overly exciting to her, but it was a mission, so...

The cry of pain didn't go unnoticed. Naoki bolted upright at the sound, but since she was eating with people at that point in time, she didn't go to investigate it immediately, instead just following the group as they gathered around the young man... provided they did. Otherwise, she'd likely just remain where she was. There's a medic here anyway right? A lot of other people though, one of them should know how to help...

Curiosity got the better of her though, and she went over to check as well, some time after the cry was heard.

[MFT]

 

[Kazumi]

At first, people seemed to have the same amount of eagerness that Naoki did to investigate. The sound came from a good fifty yards away on the other far end of the caravan, and so that was the last Naoki had heard of it until she decided to go over there after some time. Two circles of the people had formed, one seemed to be curiously afraid and the other morbidly curious. A terrified groan came from the latter as a young man desperately called out, "someone, do something please!" No one seemed to be stepping forward to help him though, as he laid on the ground, clutching his right arm as he curled over it, hidden from view.
[col]The other was shifting around something in the center of the circle. Occassionally small squeaks of fear or cries called out as people jumped or pushed themselves back from the edge of the circle. "Don't touch it!" a woman called. "Someone squish it or something!" cried another, but no one in that group seemed eager to do much either. In the center was a small black scorpion which skittered around as it tried to ward everyone away from it. Its stinger waved around and lashed out at anyone who got close, but thankfully no one did.|

[/col]

 

[Samejima]

The trouble in the center of the circle was loud, loud enough to allow Naoki to identify its source: a scorpion. It seemed to have stung the man in his right arm. Ohhh that's not good. That is not good. I don't know how to deal with poison, and I've only read a little bit about scorpions because they looked so gross and I lost focus after awhile... Ohhh what do I do, okay, calm down, calm down.

Taking a deep breath, she pushed her way through the rest of the crowd, unsheathing the battle knife and launching it straight at the scorpion. With the amount of noise everyone was making, and the fact that she waited until the scorpion was pausing in one spot and distracted by the rest of the crowd, the knife should have pierced right through the arachnid. If it didn't... she'd have to resort to using ninjutsu. On a scorpion. Granted, she had no idea what kind of scorpion it was... If it didn't die at once she'd go with the quicker Wind Slash to slice the thing in half, and follow it up with a Wind Scythe if the thing still hadn't stopped moving. Bugs are gross, especially while they writhed before death, and the little screeching sound some of them made would cause her skin to crawl if it made one.

Once the threat was neutralized, she would rush over to the young man... who may or may not have stopped moving already. "Is there a medic here?" she shouted, even if the heartbeat was becoming faint or if she could no longer hear it. Not sure whether or not to close the wound, she wouldn't do anything until someone responded. Doing something without knowing possible repercussions was more careless than launching into an action only to have made it worse... But if he was crying out in pain, she'd begin trying to use Mystical Hand, which was just about the only Medical jutsu she knew. Oh man, oh man, oh man, what's with this, right when I thought it's all going pretty smoothly...

 

[Kazumi]

The knife pierced the creature with ease, skewering it into the sand as it squired for a few final seconds in its death throes. Even as it does, however, the crowd seemed nervous to approach the insects's body. Now that the creature had stopped its movement and Naoki was close enough to get a better 'look', she would recognize it if she was modestly familiar with Wind Country's fauna. The news was not good. It was a Shruiken Scorpion. It is said that these things are one of the highest causes of death in the entire country, and its venom is toxic enough to kill within half an hour.

The unfortunate individual was now sitting on the ground, his demeanor somewhat less erratic as he stared down at his arm that Naoki was attempting to tend. The tissue around on the palm of his hand had already blackened and died. Patches of similarly dead tissue traced up his arm in uneven patterns. "I-... I can't feel my arm!" He fearfully mumbled as he stared at it in horror. A few moment's later he jerked and collapsed onto his back, writhing as pain started to wrack other parts of his body.

Most of the onlookers were now turned to Naoki, looking at her expectantly to save the man. Their stares and silence did not abate until a familiar voice and a large hand parted the gathering crowd of researchers. "What is going on over here. We were supposed to get moving half an hour ago." He sounded quite annoyed as he stopped at the inner edge of the circle, staring towards Naoki and the convulsing man beneath his shades. "What is the meaning of this, ninja. What did you do to him? We are already behind schedule." He didn't sound angry, or atleast any more angry than he did at the delay in their departure.

 

[Samejima]

Freezing in horror as he said he couldn't feel his arm, Naoki was actually lucky she couldn't see right now, or she would have seen the arm turning black and panicking further. Once he began writhing, she had a feeling there was no way anything she did would be able to save him, but at the very least she tried to alleviate the pain with Mystical Hand. Scorpion... It couldn't be that one could it? Isn't it pretty rare for the thing to just pop out in the middle of the day like this? I didn't think we'd even need to be careful about these things until after the afternoon! "A medic! Please! He won't have long if no one has the antidote for the poison and a way to give him it!" Still standing, her eyebrows furrowed. Was there really no medic here? Was the expedition team this unprepared? They should have hired a mednin, or a higher ranked shinobi, or something! Why didn't they state they'd be going into Shuriken Scorpion territory?!

Once someone gave her an antidote and it was administered, or if still no one answered, she would turn to the expedition leader. "Sorry for the delay sir, but I think that was a Shuriken Scorpion. If one gets stung by the thing they'll die of the poison pretty quick," she said, and standing up began to address the group of researchers, who really should have some antidotes in their possession. They knew they were venturing out into this area, and about the Wind Country's fauna. It wasn't a closely guarded secret, a leading cause of death in the Wind Country in fact; it should be common knowledge to carry at least something to counter the poison. "We need an antidote for umm... nek-necrosis? I think that's what it was called. Does anyone have an antidote for necrosis?"

If none of them did... well, there wasn't much she could do about that. She knew that deaths on the job were sometimes unavoidable, but this was the first time she'd actually witnessed one, let alone participate. If the man began begging for death, she would give it to him, if nothing else. "I'm sorry," she would utter, whether or not she put an early end to his suffering with a swift stab to the neck, once the knife was recovered.

 

[Kazumi]

404000

The large man listened to her response, looking past her towards the dying man on the ground with a tinge of annoyance on his expression. As Naoki suggested spoke of antidotes he broke into an amused laugh, unhindered by the life that was quickly and painfully ebbing away behind her. "You think we have the funds for that? Probably cost as much or more than it did to bring you along." He turned from her and looked around towards the onlookers who were a mixture of scared, confused and intimidated by his scanning stare. "You see that? That's what happens if you act stupid. The ninja can't protect you from your own stupidity. You all signed the wavers, you all know it was dangerous. Yet hforerunenrs, forerunners of what could be the find of the century."

He turned and looked over towards Naoki and the man who had slipped into unconsciousness. Naoki's attempt at healing him had taken away some of the pain and thrashing and while he was still alive, for the moment, he was catatonic and unresponsive to any stimuli. "Now make sure it doesn't happen again. We've got more than enough of these mooks to do what we need to, but I'd rather not have to deal with more paperwork than I have to. So do your job and get us there without killing any more of them off."

Without so much as another glance towards the dying man, he turned from her and brought his fingers to his mouth as he let out a loud whistle before he yelled, "get your packs ready, we are leaving in one minute. You aren't ready you get left behind!" Lowering his voice to a normal tone he said, "ninja. Get all of the corpse's stuff and put it on one of the packs. No point to waste his clothes and supplies." Not giving her more than a moment to complain, he walked off towards his mount on the other side of the camp. The crowd that had gathered began to quickly dissipate. Some lingered longer than others near the body, still giving slow shallow breaths, but after a hesitant few moments they moved off to strap any removed supplies back to their back animals. The leader of this caravan certainly did seem to have a tight leash on these researchers.

 

[Samejima]

It's expensive huh... I think there was something on that for sure, but... Would people really risk not having a cure to a deadly poison ready for a journey somewhere that poison was possibly contracted? It spoke volumes on how expensive the thing must've been. Naoki couldn't do much more than nod, struggling to keep her expression blank as the regret coursed through her.

Interest somewhat piqued by 'find of the century' before remembering the fact that she'd failed to save someone on the job, she decided she'd at least ensure he was at least given a proper burial, if not now then sometime after they got back... Her mind went through several different alternatives, from wrapping the man up for the duration of the trip to completing the ceremony as quickly as possible, before she snapped back to attention as the man addressed her once more. "...Yessir," she replied, the pause taken to digest exactly how callous he was when speaking of human lives. ...I'm going to need to get used to this. She settled for just covering him in a tarp for the time being, hoping they took the same route back, after quickly asking "Sir, could I get permission to use a tarp?" though she'd relent fairly quickly if it wasn't allowed.

And after that, a less hesitant "Yessir." as she wrapped things up and picked up any remaining articles of use. This is just how things're done in the adult world right? The sooner I get used to it the better... Do I even want to? was the question she couldn't bring herself to ask, and pushed it to the back of her mind, determined to keep her cool and finish the mission quickly as she bundled the corpse's items and spread them across several packs that had somewhat less to store, keeping note of what had been stuffed into which pack as she might need it herself at some point.