Kumo trips up
Two figures darted through the trees, taking advantage of the lack of moonlight and the shadows of the forest to hide themselves. Hiroto used his sensory abilities to help them stay out of sight of any Konoha patrol; getting caught so early in their operation might prove fatal.
“One hundred meters straight,” Gou murmured next to him, eyes trained on the distance. They had approximately twenty minutes before their rendezvous with their leader, which they absolutely could not afford to miss.
Soon the trees thinned out, giving way to the huge grounds where their target lived. “Such a large place for one girl,” Hiroto scoffed, searching for any chakra signatures that would indicate guards. To his surprise, he found none.
Not even the Uzumaki the two Kumo nin had come for.
He tensed, “Something’s wrong, Gou. I don’t sense anyone.”
“So? Isn’t that good for us?”
Hiroto shook his head, hand slipping into his weapons pouch to wrap around a kunai. “According to our informant, the Uzumaki has decent chakra reserves. I should be able to sense her.”
“Think she’s not here then?” Gou asked quietly, glancing at the house in the distance. Now that he understood what his partner was saying, he also found it strange. There were lights on in one room of the house and a dark silhouette occasionally crossing the window told them that there was at least one occupant.
“It’s probably a barrier,” Hiroto said triumphantly, struck by a sudden revelation. “We should see if we can take it down. I doubt it’d be anything complicated.”
Gou agreed and the two crept closer to the house, staying just within the tree line.
Suddenly, the front door opened, spilling golden light out on the grass. A person -an adult, based on their stature- stepped out, followed by an animal of some kind. The door closed behind them, shrouding the duo in darkness.
The hidden Kumo nin tensed; they could still see the silhouette assumed to belong to the Uzumaki girl in one of the rooms.
So who was outside?
And were there more people inside the house?
Hiroto glanced at his companion, quietly asking, “What do we do now, Gou? I can’t tell if that person is a shinobi or not.”
“…let’s go around the perimeter,” the other man replied after a few seconds. Unpredictable factors had been thrown into the situation and it was too dangerous to engage without decent information. “Let’s see if there are more people around.”
“Right.”
Only instincts honed on the battlefield saved the two nin from becoming pincushions, the sensor detecting the hail of shuriken at the last second and pulling his partner and himself to safety. Unfortunately for the pair, the projectiles covered a large range and prevented the Kumo nin from retreating back into the trees.
Hiroto and Gou had no choice but to jump into the clearing, where they were well out in the open. “Damn it!” the sensor hissed, stumbling as one of the shuriken pierced his foot. He sank onto a knee to avoid putting weight on his injured leg and tugged out the weapon, dismissing the injury as minor.
“Looks like we have no choice but to fight, huh? So much for a stealth mission.”
Gou grunted in reply, covering the other man’s back as his eyes swept over the clearing. The two who had emerged from the house were still where he saw them last, so that meant…
“There’s at least one person in the trees. Stay sharp, Hiroto!”
“Nah, your partner’s out for the count. Isn’t that right, Kuromaru?”
“Hmph. Is this all Kumo can do? Weaklings.”
Gou bristled at the obvious taunts but bit back any retort, instead raising his kunai to intercept possible attacks. The drifting clouds allowed slivers of moonlight to illuminate the clearing, enough for him to stiffen as he recognized the pair in front of him.
“Inuzuka,” he growled, shifting his stance into a defensive one. The woman and her ninken were known to be powerful brawlers; they were not to be underestimated, especially not on their home turf. “This just got messy.”
“Yeah, and you’re in for worse,” Tsume agreed, a sharp and feral grin curving her lips. “Oi, Shibi! Tell Hiashi that he has missing ‘guests’ yet?!”
“My kikaichu have passed on the message.”
A calm, male voice spoke in reply to her, Shibi stepping out from the shadows of the trees, clad in the bulky overcoat customary of the Aburame. “He will apprehend their leader.”
‘We’re screwed,’ Gou cursed; of all the people they had to encounter, it had to be two of the clan heads. He inched back, whispering to his partner, “Hiroto, we’re aborting the mission. We can’t let Konoha catch us.”
No response.
“Oi, Hiroto!”
There was still no response.
Alarm bells rang in the back of the man’s head and he chanced a look over his shoulder. Hiroto had collapsed face first into the grass; he twitched at random intervals but it didn’t seem like he had any control of his body.
“There is no cause for alarm,” Shibi said in his usual inflectionless voice, walking towards the two Kumo nin. “It is only a paralytic poison.”
The Aburame paused, tilting his head at the cornered men. “I see Kumo has no honor, disrespecting the treaty within less than a day of its signing.”
“I’ll show you honor!”
Gou pounced with a vicious snarl, slashing his kunai at the infuriatingly calm Aburame. The attack would have disemboweled the man had Shibi not hopped back, in a seemingly careless manner.
“One should never show their back to a known opponent.”
A foot slamming into his back knocked the breath out of Gou and he stumbled forward, trying to regain his balance. Another kick to sweep his legs from under him followed by a swift punch to his head brought the Kumo nin down, dazed but still conscious.
“Why you-!”
“Stay down,” Kuromaru cut him off a threatening growl, forcing the man down with his body weight. The ninken bared his teeth at Gou, snarling when he tried to move.
Tsume came over to stand next to her partner, smirking down at the glaring Kumo nin. “You really should have done your homework if you wanted to take us down on our turf, bastards.”
“Raikage-sama will not stand for this!”
“You think he has a leg to stand on?” the woman rolled her eyes, slamming a sandaled foot on Gou’s stomach and effectively rendering him unconscious. “Idiots. They sure are underestimating us.”
Shibi nodded, kneeling to check if the poisoned Kumo nin was conscious. Fortunately for Hiroto, he was out like a light. “I believe Uzumaki Hikari-san was their target,” he theorized, straightening and looking the Inuzuka in the eye. “There is no other reason for them to be so far out in the village.”
“Who cares?” Tsume scoffed, kicking the unconscious men none too kindly. “Anyone who dares to touch any of our pups is in for the beating of a lifetime.”
At the moment, Hikari and Naruto weren’t the only kids in the house behind them. Hinata, Neji, Shikamaru, Shino and Kiba were having a sleepover with the Uzumaki, Shibi and Tsume having volunteered for babysitting and guard duty. It had been the redhead who had noticed the intruders and promptly warned the adults, allowing them the chance to set a trap for the Kumo nin.
The Inuzuka woman shook her head and grabbed one of the men’s legs, proceeding to drag him away as Kuromaru followed with the other. “Keep an eye on the brats, Shibi!” she called over her shoulder. “I’m taking the trash to T&I!”
If the Kumo nin had their heads bounced on every cobblestone on the paths or slammed against walls on their way to the hellhole that was T&I, well.
Tsume wasn’t quite so devious to have planned it, after all.
Just an innocent mistake.
On the other side of the village, in a room devoid of its original occupant, Hiashi raised an eyebrow at the collapsed form of Kumo’s Head Shinobi.
Although awake and aware, he had all his tenketsu closed and body paralyzed.
That’s what he got for underestimating the Hyuuga clan head.