Squad 1 - Soeki Village

[Junan]

Day 2​

Only a days travel south west from Kumogakure at the base of the Thunder Mountains is this small farming village. Soeki is known for its swamp surroundings provided by the rivers of water which flow down the mountains into the land below. A huge amount of rice is grown here and is part of Soeki's pride.

Once one gets past the rice fields they will find several rises where small hills have formed. These have given solid land for the population to build their houses with rope bridges linking them all. If it weren't for lack of people one wouldn't suspect that anything had happened.

Nearing the village the shinobi will hear the wailing cries of the female population with an undercurrent of the sobbing of the men with the occasional outcry of rage at their gods.

Closer still will reveal that the dead have been gathered in a central location, kids are held by young adults and other adults. Nothing seems out of the ordinary except for the number of dead. At least a hundred are piled up, but no more than a hundred and fifty.

 

[Shinrya Kitsune]

As Kitsune and her team drew closer to the village, Kitsune stopped them all ”Okay guys. Lets talk procedure here. First off, we have no idea what we’re walking into, so I think we’d better be wearing our hazmat suits.” she said, and upon saying hazmat suits, she took a scroll from her bandolier and rolled it out and brought forth the necessary equipment for them to use, light hazmat suits, that wouldn’t impede their movement, gloves, and various other tools and bits ‘n bobs. ”As it could be chemical in nature, I’d rather not we go in, and get infected like the rest. Okay? Also, don’t split off from the group, stick together.”

According to the intel the team received, the imperial army wanted to hurry the heck out of there. Kitsune hadn’t told this to the others, but she intended to. ”We can’t rule out that it was the imperial army that’s behind this either. According to our intel, they seemed all too eager to get the heck out of there” she said in a stern tone while putting on her gear, piece by piece. ”Apart from that, we know that everyone above 50 dropped dead. It’s likely that we’ll see a lot of bodies, we have to examine them, and do analysis on them.”

She turned to Hebi ”Don’t run off on your own. I saw you walk out the gates right as Isaki-sama said we could, stick to the group, I’m very sure we’ll be needing your special talents for this job.” Kitsune said, before turning to Enjeru ”Y’know, you really look a lot like your dad did when he was your age. And yet, you don’t seem to take after him in any other department..” she said with a wink, teasing him a bit before turning to Haruka ”Well then, Haruka-chan~ You ready for this?”

After having said those few words to each of the three others, she cleared her throat a bit. ”Well then. A wise leader knows how to draw upon the experience of others. So I’d like to hear your thoughts on the intel we have, as well as any concerns you may have with the current plan of sticking together, and examining the village closer. Don’t be afraid to speak up.”

[MFT; WC: 380]

 

[Sanageyama Masaoko]

Takaki Enjeru…It was quite a coincidence to meet him directly after enjoying a discussion with his father. Unlike Masao, Enjeru wasn’t so gallant or nearly as engaging. No, he just seemed to drag along like a dead cat with cold dark eyes. He resembled Masao enough. She wondered if maybe he took after his mother. Having children now confirmed that Masao was not single and what a shame! She wondered what kind of woman would be married to the Main Branch Sennin. However, he remained quiet on the walk there and Haruka didn’t have the interest to attempt a conversation. Instead, she chattered with Kitsune and listened to what their team leader had to say.

Hebi was just as anti-social as Enjeru, having taken off without an introduction. She walked ahead of the group a few paces with that creepy doll of her’s. Haruka hadn’t much else to think about the woman. This woman better not run off without orders from Kitsune. She really didn’t need this mission to be complicated after such a tiring journey.

She was glad to see Kitsune was in the same line of thought. Keeping themselves safe was a first priority. Haruka wouldn’t turn away the use of PPE in such a dangerous and unknown hazard area. She found it suspicious too that the imperial army turned tail as quickly as they could. She filed that away for use later. How strange it was to see that it only affected those above 50 in this village. If only Kushin had been kind enough or even smart enough to give everyone the statistics of each village. It wasn’t as if the villages were each an isolated case. This was all a part of a larger scheme. She’d work with what she had though.

She got suited up in her disease prove hazmat outfit with the help of her teammates, helping Kitsune to tap up the lines in her suit and offering help where needed. They didn’t need to make a rookie mistake with not securing their suits. As Kitsune gave them a pep talk, Haruka nodded at the red haired cougar. She admired Kitsune’s leading skills. She was willing to hear what the others said, which comforted Haruka. At least they didn’t have some arrogant asshole in charge.

“As far as doing our check list of examinations go…” Haruka began, “We need to run some obvious tests on the water system. Perhaps the crops as well. Rice grown in this village is probably shipped to the effected villages. That might be our cause. If those come back negative, then I suggest our next look would be in our victim’s autopsy. If the rumors of a plague prove to be true, the pathogen effecting the villagers may be evolving into several different strains resulting in varying virulence and mortality. Any animals in the village should be checked as well. I know, it’s a lot of testing and a very tedious process, but I don’t want us to miss anything.”

[MFT. 502]

 

[Takaki Saeko]

The foothills of the Thunder Mountains were ancient land stained with the blood of thousands of years of warfare. Kumogakure had originally been a mountain fort held by warriors of Raiden’s own choosing, and against the rocks at the base of mountain passes and valleys untold numbers of men had found their deaths in countless battles throughout the history of the known world. In the timescale of conflict, the shinobi of Kumogakure were still but a momentary blip in the slow passage of history. Such a place stirred the blood of a man like Takaki Enjeru, who in the course of his life had become a mednin to heal the sick but also in his heart truly enjoyed and sought out the opportunity to take life. It was in places like these that he felt most…alive.

The stench of decaying corpses was apparent from almost a kilometer away, and raised his hackles. There was death afoot here, that much was obvious. Enjeru brushed the palm of his hand against the thick grip of the pistol bolter holstered at his waist, tracing his fingertips across the back of the weapon’s slide and verifying that the weapon was in Condition One – a bolt chambered with the hammer back, safety on. The Delta Elite was heavy for its size, thanks to the rather large projectiles it shot, and some considered it too heavy for comfortable carry, but he found the heft to be reassuring. Nearby the grip of the bolter, the hilts of his folding katana extended outwards, parallel to the small of his back. He carried two of them. Both were designed to be compact at only thirty centimeters apiece, but able to instantly extend to nearly a meter in length via a complicated mechanism of latches and leaf springs. Tagiushi Moro, the ANBU Sennin, wielded a pair as well, and used them to great effect.

The leader, Shinrya Kitsune, soon signaled a halt as they approached the village. Although Enjeru groaned inwardly when she ordered them to suit up in Level B Hazmat, he realized that she was right. The priority for any medical team entering a disaster was their own safety, after all. And the most common source of chemical or biological exposure resulting in injury was from liquid or splash exposures. The most virulent pathogens in the world had a habit of getting in through the tiniest cracks in equipment. Still, getting into those suits as still a total pain in the ass, and the respirators they needed to wear were stuffy, muggy, and restricted vision.

It sounded like they would be doing a bunch of autopsies as well. Another thing Enjeru hated more than anything else (there were a lot of these). Especially when bodies had been laying out in the open under the sun. The smell of decay and fetor would be gut-wrenching. Fuck my luck, he sighed, as he started to pull on the heavy, steel-toed rubber boots over his own shoes, and shrug into the heavy, one-piece jumpsuit that provided the rest of the protection.

“Y’know, you really look a lot like your dad did when he was your age. And yet, you don’t seem to take after him in any other department..” said Kitsune to him now, in what was probably supposed to be a playful joke to elicit a response from him. But what she did not realize was that he was most definitely not his father, who always had a gallant quip to come back with. Takaki Masao was fun to be around, apparently.

Enjeru, on the other hand, had fun once. It was awful.

“Oh, you must be that Shinrya Kitsune,” he sighed. “Classmate of my father's and all. That would make you, what…about fifty years old?” he sniffed, turning his attention back to his suit. The other issue with applying these suits was also that in order to fully secure the gaps between the gloves and boots and the jumpsuit, as well as to secure the middle seam of the jumpsuit itself, one needed a partner to apply the heavy chemical-resistant tape to the suit. That involved someone basically touching one’s junk, since the seam extended down to the crotch. Seeing that Haruka and Kitsune were already helping each other, Enjeru turned to Hebi.

“I’ll help you with the tape – you do me in turn,” he said reluctantly. Crap, why is this team all women except for me? Is Kushin trying to imply something? Bastard.

 

[Ryu Hime]

Hebi was eager to this over with. The sooner this problem was fixed, the sooner she can work on making human puppets. The leader of the group mentions something about putting on something that will protect them from getting infected. Hebi was way ahead of her. Hebi looks through her scrolls and summons a behemoth. The huge construct appears just were Hebi once stood, but Hebi herself was nowhere to be seen. This puppet has a chest cavity upgrade and was custom built to be puppeteered from the inside. The puppet lacked any doors so the puppeteer would need to summon the puppet around them to use it. The puppet had its own air supply, which will last for a few days provide she doesn’t use the wind generator trap. Also its armor was thick which would protect her from any chemicals. “Puppet for hazardous environment equipped, internal air supply functional, speech mechanism operational, all traps check out. Standing by for further orders.” Hebi was starting to sound like some sort of machine in that thing.

Spoiler

The little brown haired puppet took off her metal gloves. Obviously her hands may be needed to preform delegate procedures the other could not because of their suits. The only boy in the group seemed to have some trouble with his suit so the little puppet goes and helps him with the tape. Hopefully this would make him less embarrassed considering it was a puppet touching him and not a real person, however the puppet did you quite real. If Enjeru shows signs off embarrassment the puppet would giggle. “There you go. All sealed up and ready to go.”

 

[Shinrya Kitsune]

"Ara ara Enjeru-chan~" Kitsune said with a sly grin before turning to Haruka "You know, he's cute in a surly sort of way. But I imagine his V-card would be tougher to steal than even our Raikages. What do you think Haruka-chan~?" Kitsune giggled and made sure her suit was fully closed before she put on her helmet, to make sure she was sealed in. ”Well then. Enjeru-chan. Surely you’ve picked up a few tricks from your parents. What do you make of this situation? Haruka-chan, and Hebi-san. Same question. I’d like to hear your honest opinions about all this.”

Kitsune intended to involve her team as much as she could. After all, they might spot things that Kitsune herself missed. And the more information they had, the better they could do their job. Hopefully, Kitsune was wrong on the part regarding the imperial army being behind this, but if she wasn’t… Kumo might be in serious trouble. And if the rice shipped from this village was infected, the entirety of Kaminari no Kuni might be in deep shizzle. Like, end of the world deep shizzle. And Kitsune liked her country, she didn’t want to see it die because of some politicians and their madness.

 

[Sanageyama Masaoko]

He was just as bitter and sour as his face. Enjeru sighed and dragged on. Well, maybe this was an indication as to what his mother was like. He certainly had that snide attitude that Haruka appreciated and emulated in her day to day life. This could be potentially good or bad that they both were seeped in sarcasm. Mostly, she could see it going badly. But, they both seemed professional. Emphasis on the seemed. It shouldn’t take much effort to focus on the mission and not worrying about being buddy buddy. Thank Raiden. Haruka was hardly ever in the mood to make friends.

The Takaki spawn incited a little back and forth match between him and the medical kunoichi when he hit a very sensitive spot for woman: age. She wondered if Enjeru was just uncouth or if perhaps he really didn’t understand how to talk to woman. Funny, considering his father seemed to be adept at the art, but Masao probably never had the time to teach his son. Besides, he was young and didn’t know any better. He was probably about Natsu’s age. Were all guys in that age group such idiots with their heads shoved so far up their asses that they didn’t know how to talk to a woman without insulting her?

Kitsune returned a remark like a pro. She didn’t skip a beat, but she also ended up dragging Haruka into it as well. It was such an embarrassing question for her to ask. Jeez, what was with people today? First Masao asked and eluded to Haruka and Natsu’s strained relationship as being something comparable to the next biggest OTP of Cloud. Now this? Alas, Haruka would play along because girl coded indicted her to. “Hmmm,” she began, tilting her head to the side to enjoy the view of Enjeru. “He certainly is handsome, like his father, but has none of the charm Takaki-Sama has. I’d have to agree. He plays the role of a dandere quite well.” Her lilting laugh would probably hit Enjeru’s ears like an atomic bomb of annoyance.

She locked her helmet into place, sealing off the outside world from her system. Hebi was quite the show off with her puppet suit. Haruka was never fond of puppets, but there was some beauty in the woman’s art form that she could appreciate. Kitsune, like a good leader, wanted the teams incite on the situation. It was all very hard to judge at this point. There were so many possibilities. “Well…It’s really quite a toss-up on what the situation could be. We’ll need to get the villagers to trust us. Maybe we can draw information out of them. Ask if they’ve seen any suspicious with the army or any other factoring groups that have passed through the village. This disease could have been contracted by any means. We won’t know until we start eliminating possibilities- and quickly.”

 

[Takaki Saeko]

If resentment could kill (or at least maybe severely chastise), Enjeru’s would certainly have done so. Despite the air of vaguely-disgusted stoicism that he prided in maintaining about himself, he found himself turning a shade of deep pink as his insides frothed with a mixture of rage and self-indulgent embarrassment at the fact that the very attractive duo of Shinrya Kitsune and Shima Haruka admitted they found him handsome (how awful!).

“I am n-not a d-dandere!” he attempted to snarl manfully, but instead it came out as a surprisingly endearing, sort of girly-sounding whine, as if some bishoujo character in a harem anime were reacting to the dense male main character walking in on her naked. Hearing himself say this of course just made things worse, and he whirled around, crossing his arms to hide his reddening face. “Besides, you harpies, I have a girlfriend,” he added, trying to perform damage control. After all, the most useless thing in the world was a male virgin.

At the very least, Hebi wasn’t being a total tease. He was silently grateful for the fact that she had sent a puppet, however realistic it was, to help him with certain aspects of his suit – a flesh and blood girl’s touch might have been too much to bear at the moment. He nodded in thanks to the puppet, although realizing that he was trying to communicate with a puppet left him feeling mildly foolish. At the very least, the tittering duo responsible for his suffering had switched the topic of conversation to something a bit more professional.

”Well then. Enjeru-chan. Surely you’ve picked up a few tricks from your parents. What do you make of this situation? Haruka-chan, and Hebi-san. Same question. I’d like to hear your honest opinions about all this.”

This he could do – talking about numbers, objective information, tactics – that was what all men loved to jabber about anyway. Thank goodness for small favors.

“I find it strange that whatever affected the village seems to have systematically targeted the older adults only. It doesn’t fit the known patterns of natural epidemics or deliberate biochemical warfare. For example, disease caused by microorganisms such as Haemophilus influenza tends to have a bimodal distribution of mortality. Elderly and the young have weak or underdeveloped immune systems, and so they die disproportionately compared to the rest. And yet I see seemingly healthy-looking children among the survivors. On the other hand, military-grade alkyl-mustard as currently used by the Imperial Army, or weaponized Bacillus anthracis spores, which are forbidden by the Hayata Convention, tend to have a level mortality curve. In addition, they also kill animals as effectively as they kill humans.

“It is highly unlikely that this is the result of a sudden, natural evolution of some endemic pathogen. Something about this stinks of deliberate human intervention, and the fact that the Imperial Army has been moving around in this area, which isn’t even very close to the fighting going on in Bear, is suspicious. Furthermore, if the Army is involved, I suspect that this is not an officially-sanctioned exercise. Soeki is part of the breadbasket of Lightning. Why would a local Daimyo or Count ever want to harm his own food-growers on such a scale?

“I think we should try to track down whatever unit passed near this village and interrogate them. If necessary, I can ask my father to put pressure on the area Brigadier General, even order that unit to come back here, although something tells me they won’t.”

 

[Ryu Hime]

Hebi did not feel like this was a natural outburst either for there were other villages hit with quite a deadly force. That fact alone did not make her question, but the fact that they differ so much did. “I concur that this disease is most-likely artificially made. Haru here was to be send to one of those villages.”

The brown haired puppet steps over to stand in front of the behemoth. She politely bows and tales her story, “I am Fubuki Haru and I was to be delivered to a Miss Kugimiya from the village Ekirei. I was to be a gift to her son for his sixteenth birthday. I never even made it into the village. The roads… the surrounding area around the village…” The puppet was experiencing what seemed to be short of breath from reliving something dramatic. Hebi was always one to bring life to her puppets. “They were all dead. Young, old, human or animal it did not matter. It killed them all.” Of course this was all information Hebi retrieve from the one that was delivering the puppet.

“I find it hard to believe that two different diseases of such strengths could hit two different villages so far apart from each other at around the same time.” She would hate to admit it but this military could be the creators of this epidemic.

 

[Junan]

The group had been noticed by a couple of the villagers, one of whom made his way towards them. A young adult and physically fit, could even pass for a shinobi were it not for the mud and dirt which stained his features. Lines of flesh revealed that the man had been crying, his reddened and swollen eyes displaying this truth further. Closer inspection would show that the bags under his eyes could show that he was nearing exhaustion, a lack of sleep which likely could be found on all the villagers save a few.

Who are you? What do you want? He said, his voice tired, strained like a man who didn't know what to do anymore.

You don't look like the soldiers who viewed us from a distance and told us we had to remain here. He frowned, clearly angry at being told that he had to remain. After all, who would want to remain in a place where the population just took a sudden hit for no apparent reason.

 

[Shinrya Kitsune]

Kitsune smirked at Enjeru ”Oh Enjeru-chan~ Having a girlfriend doesn’t mean you know how to satisfy her” she said with a devious wink before turning to face Haruka, and grin. ”Now then. We should probably get to work, hm?” she said and shook her head a bit before looking towards the village again, it seemed they had been noticed. Not surprising really, considering their suits were bright orange and thus easy to see. There was a villager on his way up to meet them, and Kitsune decided that the best policy here would be honesty.

She listened to what he had to say, and she obtained a vital piece of information. The soldiers had viewed the villagers from a distance. That raised a few questions in Kitsune’s head. More specifically these: 1. How’d they get here so fast? 2. Were they already here? 3. If so, why? Hopefully Kitsune could get answers to these questions from the villagers or maybe even the corpses strewn across the village. ”We are Kumogakure medical nin. We’ve been sent here to investigate what’s happened, why it happened, and how to prevent it from happening again.” she said in a no nonsense tone.

”Is there anything you can tell me about what happened?” she asked the man ”And, if possible, we’d like to examine a few of the corpses to find any clues as to what went on. Oh, and, another thing, you said the soldiers only viewed from a distance? Do you know if they were present in the area before this all happened?”. As she waited for the responses from the villager, she turned to her team, and looked at Hebi and Enjeru "Hebi-san, Enjeru-chan. I want the two of you pairing up, and beginning a standard analysis of the situation, after that, i want you to examine a couple of bodies. Haruka and I will search the village for clues, and do analysis on the water and rice."

 

[Sanageyama Masaoko]

Putting playfulness aside for the time being, the groups mood seemed to drop to focus on the matter at hand. It seemed the group was beginning to form a consensus that this was the work of humans and not an unfortunate plague that tripped through the rural villages. How could anyone wish this upon a mass group of people who never harmed anyone? She could understand if it ravaged Cloud, to attack the military hard and hit the powerful weapons of Lightning country. People weren’t meant to control such vile things, but she expected nothing less of anyone. In a country filled with violence, perhaps slipping away from an illness was the more humane way of destruction. Still, Haruka would count out nothing when it came to investigating the sickness.

She saw the man coming up to them. He was rather suspicious and looked to be in great pain. Those poor people had lost so many loved ones so quickly.
The woman wasn’t all too sympathetic in most cases (because if she cared too much, her line of work would drive her mad), but this was a grave loss. The speaker of the group of villagers seemed suspicious. So, had they not been informed that Kushin was sending his men to check on the village? He did give them one piece of information to use.

And use, they did. Kitsune took the one piece and began to kindly interrogate the man. She really knew what she was doing. Haruka was glad to have somebody on her team who was in the same line of thinking. Haruka wouldn’t have asked any differently. She just would remember to pay attention to what he said. Even though he did not know it, the information could be invaluable.

 

[Takaki Saeko]

Enjeru glowered back at Kitsune’s final retort, but decided to keep a stiff upper lip rather than extend this already shameful exchange. Godrotting MILF, I bet she’s slept with half the village already, he thought venomously. Fortunately, the rather tense situation was almost immediately forgotten with the arrival of one of the villagers.

His hand instinctively went to the side of his waist, where the bolter was holstered. Inexperienced medical personnel tended to naively believe that their presence would always welcomed in hard-hit disaster areas. That their desire to help and their skill would be greeted with immediate and unconditional happiness and gratitude by the population they were sent to help, and that personal protection from threats was the last thing they needed to concern themselves with. But in reality, disaster areas were incredibly dangerous places, and some of that danger tended to come from the surviving populace. Mednins as well as non-shinobi doctors and nurses had been attacked and even killed before in places like refugee camps and bombed-out cities, targeted for the money or drugs or supplies they were thought to carry like so much gold on their person, or simply because the stricken were pissed off and didn’t care anymore. So Enjeru kept a keen eye on the new arrival’s movements, ready to step in should he start to pose a threat.

Fortunately, he did not, and at last the team had orders to follow now, even if Kitsune had called him “Enjeru-chan.”

“There’s no ‘-chan’,” he corrected her tersely. “Hebi-san, we have our orders. Why don’t we try to get some basic information from the villagers on how many have died, what their names and ages were, and how long they were sick for until they died. See if we can extrapolate any common signs and symptoms from the group, and see if we can establish a natural history of illness. After that, let’s select the freshest bodies we can to minimize the smell, cordon off an area, and then do an autopsy. It should be done out of view of the villagers and the remains cremated immediately. Lots of these peasants have the belief that we’re going to harvest their organs for ju-ju magic or some ridiculous bullshit.”

 

[Ryu Hime]

Okay the orders was given, however having her huge monstrous puppet waking through the village would probably be a bad idea. It would probably scare the villagers into hiding rather than invite them out to answer questions. The puppet Haru comes up to Enjeru from behind and drapes her arms over his shoulders. “Hey Enje-kun, why don’t we go into the village together? Just the two of us. You know I can do things your girlfriend could never preform.” If he thought he could get away from the teasing by leaving Kitsune, he was wrong. Hebi is more than willing to pick up where she left off.

“I’ll stay here. I don’t think the villagers would appreciate a monster roaming the village. They’re likely to attack me. I’ll be here watching through Haru’s eyes.” Hebi had sharp eyes even in her puppet and could see the tiredness in the man’s eyes. This was definitely having a strong effect on the village. Even if they cure the village of this plague she fears the psychological damage is going to take much longer to repair.

 

[Junan]

The man looked at Kitsune You mean this has happened elsewhere?

Perhaps we were wrong... he said at a bare whisper.

As Kitsune questioned him further he shrugged No soldiers come here normally. There weren't any before this happened, not that we know of anyway. We had thought that the visitors might have had something to do with it but weren't sure. They had been acting kinda strange around our well, but if it's happened in other places then that wouldn't be it would it? It must have just been some disease. He smiled.

I can tell the others that now. It means we don't need to... well... he grinned sheepishly ... some of us were thinking of trying to find and kill those visitors for killing so many of us. Relief seemed to flood over him as he felt that the conviction of the visitors had been wrong.

He looked at the sour-puss faced boy and laughed, though how much of it was because he thought it was funny and how much were nerves caused by the released tension who could tell. I don't think we thought you were here to take our organs. I just wondered what you were all doing here was all. No-one else has come close to us for days.

I think the rest of us will be quite happy to talk to you all if you come in.

He would lead those willing to follow towards the survivors should they want him to.

 

[Shinrya Kitsune]

”Two other villages has also seen similar things, but as far as we were informed, not the exactly the same.” Kitsune said and then listened to the other answers. She blinked at the other vital piece of information the villager provided, specifically, that there had been visitors that had been hanging out at the well. She turned to Haruka and said ”Haruka-sensei, our first order of business will be the well.” using a more professional tone as they had to get down to business. Kitsune took a deep breath. ”Well, Hebi-sensei. Enjeru-sensei, you know what to do.” she told them and nodded at them, still sticking to her all-business tone.

They’d have to handle the autopsies and talk to a few of the villagers, in the meantime, Kitsune and Haruka would be taking samples of the well, the food, and if they were to see something that caught their eye, that’d just have to be sampled too. Hopefully the analysis of those samples would yield important information pertaining to this current conundrum. ”Ideally, Hebi-sensei, if you can handle the autopsies with your puppet, Enjeru-sensei could go talk to the villagers. That way he doesn’t expose himself to any form of risk by handling corpses.” Kitsune mused

”We’d also like to hear more about those visitors you said you had gotten. Anything you can tell us would be a help. Clearly they need to be talked to as well. Any information we can get from the sources available to us would be an asset.” she said and looked at the village. ”Alright. Lets go.” she finalized and turned towards the village. Ready to enter.

[MFT; WC: 273]

 

[Takaki Saeko]

So it looks like the Army isn’t the most likely culprit. Too bad, thought Enjeru grimly as he listened to the man’s words. The revelation did not change much, however, as the situation remained the same. This was a disaster area filled with ticked-off people ready to blow up at any perceived threat to their remaining lives. The visitors he mentioned, though – now that was a real lead.

“I don't think we thought you were here to take our organs,” said the man to Enjeru.

“Isaki Kushin would beg to differ,” muttered the mednin inaudibly. A mental image of the sennin gleefully cracking a fetus open and licking up the delicious stem cells inside flashed through his mind, making him oddly proud to have such an evil boss signing his paychecks.

“Ideally, Hebi-sensei, if you can handle the autopsies with your puppet, Enjeru-sensei could go talk to the villagers. That way he doesn’t expose himself to any form of risk by handling corpses,” said Kitsune, now being more socially acceptable.

Ah, finally the respect I deserve. Wait, I was respected once. It was horrible, thought Enjeru, nodding to her.

“Very well, let me speak to the survivors. We will offer as much aid as we feasibly can,” he said to the man. Once he spoke with the villagers, he would take out a notebook and record the answers to the following questions:

“When did you start feeling ill?”

“Where in your body did you feel the greatest discomfort or pain?"

“How long were you or the others sick for?”

“What did the symptoms make you feel like?”

“Did you have any fever, chills, cough, vomiting, or shortness of breath? Did you feel anything else was abnormal?”

“What made the symptoms better or worse?”

If allowed, he would also proceed to perform a physical exam on anyone he could, mainly listening to their chest sounds, palpating their abdomens, assessing their skin for any discoloration, and testing their nerve function.
For the malnourished or dehydrated, he had a supply of nutrition packets and oral rehydration salt solutions. For infections, there were intramuscular antibiotic injections as well as 7-day dose packets of common cephalosporin antibiotics.

I’d rather be killing things. Or playing video games, he griped to himself.

 

[Ryu Hime]

Hebi was then radioed by her assistant back in cloud. Someone obviously came to the shop or Sayo would not be calling her. “Yes Sayo what is it?”

“You got a message. It reads, ‘You have requested an audience with the CEO of the Titan corporation, and your request has been heard and granted. Please report to the following address at the appropriate time given. Please bring examples of your work along with you, and any relevant information the company might need to make a fruitful deal for both sides.’”

Hebi smiled for she was hoping to receive such a letter, but it is unfortunate that she is away. Hopefully she will get back to the village in time for the meeting it would be horrible if she missed it. “Prepare a summoning scroll with the appropriate puppets.”

“Yes Aunt Hebi.”

“Oh and Sayo, one more thing; I need you to radio Matsuka tomorrow. Have her ask the spirits if they have seen visitors go through the village she is in.” Hebi thought it might be a good idea to rely messages to the other squads. In case they shared a similar cause. However now it was time to inspect some bodies. Hopefully the villages didn’t cremate their dead. The giant puppet she was in shuts down for she needed the chakra strings. The Behemoth should still work as a hazmat suit regardless. The other puppet pulls out a scroll and through her Hebi summons a small swarm of drones.

The drones looked like wasps and were even the size of wasps. Their small bodies should allow Hebi to perform an autopsy without disfiguring the corpse. The puppet carried the drones and followed the man in the village asking, “Where do you keep your dead?” Obviously she needs a dead body to perform an autopsy.

 

[Sanageyama Masaoko]

Other people besides the army had passed through. They were just mining information with ease no thanks to the brave villager who dared approach such a strange group of ninja. He clued in that they had indeed acted strange around the well. Perhaps she was right about the water system being targeted. No doubt Kitsune would instruct them to investigate there first. The villagers had apparently thought the mass deaths had occurred because of foul play. She was glad to know that the man was content in thinking it just a disease. It would dissuade their angry nature and keep things simple for the squad for the time being. Handling a large group of people who were untrained and out for blood would have been troublesome. And, the squad had managed to win his and the other’s trust. It was running a bit too smoothly for Haruka. Missions such as these don’t ever go easily for her.

The icy Crow nodded at Kitsune’s directions. The team was dismissed into their planned groups to execute their investigation. Of course they would sample the well. Haruka definitely wanted to get a sample of the fields to test the food source. While they were doing their collecting of samples, she ran through an obvious checklist to help find the source. “Shinrya-Sensei, perhaps we should try radioing in to the other groups soon. Maybe they have gathered some information as well that might help us. And we can share what we know.” These villages all had to have some kind of connection.

[MFT. 258]

 

[Junan]

The villager opened his mouth to answer but was then silenced by yet another question. He grinned and listened some more. Perhaps the soldiers caution amused him. Nah, the soldiers don't tend to come here. We cart our harvest out to Raiden's Eye ourselves, the only visitors we get are when taxes are due, and they're not soldiers, at least not here. The dead are buried... I think there might be an uproar if you were to dig one up. His face fell a bit, his mind returning to the dead We all lost people, you know. Some are taking it better than others, but everyone lost a family member, everyone is related to someone who died.

A lump formed in his throat and he choked it down, forcing himself to look back at the shinobi, his eyes glistening with fresh tears.

The boy overheard Haruka though and frowned, thought and confusion crossing his features There are other villages affected by this?

[OOC: Just to note: Contacting other groups is a good idea, but remember the time to travel differences. You're in Day 2, they're in Day 3... you can tell them your info, but they're still traveling to their locations.]