Contact 8.3
Hisana tensed, her hand resting on the hilt of her sword. She wanted to move, to dash outside and confront the attacker in open space and get the drop on them. Every instinct she had was screaming at her to reverse the ambush, but she was undercover as a samurai. Chakra adepts they might be, as dangerous as ninja in open battle, but they weren't sensors.
The girl she was pretending to be couldn't possibly know what was coming, so Hisana forced herself to relax. Jiraiya gave her a knowing look, and that helped. He'd sensed it too - she wasn't sure if that was a sage thing or a technique he'd picked up along the way.
Then the door came flying off its hinges. Hisana moved forward, her sword blurring from its sheathe and deflecting the flying wood. Her chakra, bright crimson, ran along it; giving it an unmatched edge and strength. People screamed, dived for cover, and generally attempted to flee. Hisana felt vulnerable without her Sharingan - she'd told herself that she wouldn't come to rely on it, but she had.
Standing where the door, and doorframe, had once been was a girl and an assortment of puppets. They were lanky-looking things, with long metal claws and joints made from bone-white wood. The girl wore a mask that concealed her face, and it took Hisana a moment to realise what was wrong with the picture before her.
She couldn't sense any chakra strings from the girl towards the puppets. Or even any string touching them at all - and yet they were standing, and one of them had clearly kicked in the door. Their 'eyes' glowed a soft purple, and Hisana felt her disquiet grow. There was something wrong here.
"I know you're in here, ninja! You can't hide from me with those disguises. Get them!" she shouted, and Hisana rounded her age estimate down. The girl sounded about twelve. The puppets started to move forward, spreading out, as the bar's patrons started to flee out the back. Jiraiya went with them, and Hisana saw how the eyes of the puppets were on her.
"I'm no ninja. Please, call off your puppets," she said, and to her surprise, she saw fear flash across the girl's face.
"No, she's lying! She's one of the foreign ninja!" the girl shouted. Hisana settled into her stance, her sword glowing bright red. The first puppet rushed her, faster than she'd been expecting, and it was all Hisana could do to dodge out of the way without her Sharingan or jutsu. She blurred backwards for space, and as the first puppet followed her into the more confined space at the back of the bar, she struck.
Hisana's sword cut deep into the thing's chest, but the wood was clearly infused with chakra somehow and resisted her cut. It might have gone through if she'd been able to use her elemental chakra flow, but that was ninjutsu and she was pretending to be a samurai. With only her sword and the samurai sabre technique, Hisana's options were limited.
She didn't know what these strange, stringless puppets were and couldn't find out - at least not without using her Sharingan and giving herself away - so she'd have to guess. They weren't normal battle puppets, but the weak point of any minion summoning or creating ninja was usually the ninja themselves.
Hisana ducked underneath a clawed arm; the dark chakra metal claws glowing with a sickly purple chakra that left the wood of the wall they'd hit instead of Hisana bubbling and melting. Her sword struck out and smashed into the same place she'd cut before and this time the puppet couldn't resist the blow. The bone-white wood splintered, and Hisana saw with growing horror that there had been some kind of rotting flesh and bone inside the thing.
She had no time to be disturbed. Her blow had created an opening, but one of the other puppets would fill it in a moment. She blurred forward through the temporary gap in their lines and put her sword to the girl's throat.
"Call your puppets off," Hisana said, infusing her chakra with malice to create killing intent, the ninja corruption of the Sage's ninshu. She had no intention of actually cutting the girl's throat, but it was important she believe her.
"Stop!" the girl shouted, and the three remaining puppets went still. The bar was basically empty at this point, except for the girl, Hisana, the puppets, and Jiriya. The dead puppet, now that the wood was breached, stunk of rot and decay. Shattered glass and spilled beer covered the floor, whilst the girl stood very, very still with Hisana's sword to her neck.
Jiraiya gave a hand signal to capture the girl, so Hisana moved to look her in the eye, still keeping her sword at her neck. Her eyes flashed red for just a moment, the Sharingan genjutsu knocking the girl out. Jiraiya bit his thumb and scrawled out a quick seal on a napkin, then sealed all the puppets away. He folded up the napkin, shrugged, and gestured to the girl.
"Well, let's have a chat with her somewhere with less prying eyes. Bring her along, kid," he said, and Hisana slung the girl over her should and sheathed her sword.
People stared at them as they walked out of the bar, but none of the street toughs and petty bandits lining the sides of the street were eager to get into a fight with Hisana. Her lacquered armour and fine sword marked her out not as a bandit or minor chakra adept but as a true samurai - and as obsolete as they might have been on the modern battlefield, nobody here was a ninja.
They met back up with Naruto and Sasuke some distance from the town, and whilst they tied the still unconscious girl up, Hisana unsealed the destroyed puppet and started to examine it. It was definitely based around a dead body - the smell alone could tell Hisana that - but it had numerous seals and jutsu formula all over it. It might have looked and fought like a puppet, but it required much less effort to control - only a little chakra.
Hisana shivered at the idea. This was the sort of ninjutsu that the world would very much be better off without.
"So what's with the attack, brat? Don't think I can't recognise a Fuma battle puppet when I see one," Jiraiya said after Sasuke had woken the girl up.
"I won't tell you anything, sound scum!" she shouted. Hisana blinked. Jiraiya laughed.
"Nice to see my disguises still hold up. You two, come over here," he said and gestured for Sasuke and Naruto to join him. With their Konoha headbands and Sasuke's eyes, they were worth a thousand words.
"You are... Leaf Ninja. Not Sound?" she asked.
"Believe it," Naruto said with a grin.
"Well, that's a pleasant surprise. Get to talking quickly brat," Jiraiya said.
"I - I wish to hire you, honourable ninjas of the Hidden Leaf."
"What?" Sasuke asked.
"I wish to apologise for my my poor conduct, and hire you for a mission," she said.
"I'm certain you can't afford us. But you wanted help with Sound, right?" Jiraiya asked.
"Most of our - of our active ninja have gone missing. Sound claims that they are not responsible, but they are the only ones with a base in the area. Please, you have to help us!"
"You know where that base is?" Jiraiya asked.
"Ye-yes, I know where it is," the girl said, her voice nervous and uncertain.
"Well, change of plans. We're going after that base, and if we happen to see any Fuma clan prisoners there, we'll free 'em. Give the kid back her puppets, and change out of that Samurai crap," Jiraiya said.
"Hey, what's your name, anyway?" Naruto asked the girl.
"Sa-sasame, of the Fuma Clan," she said, her voice still nervous. Hisana busied herself unsealing the rest of the puppets. When they were all out, Sasame ran over to the borne puppet and raced through a series of complex, non-standard hand seals.
Her chakra glowed a sickly purple for a moment - not her natural colour, orange - and the broken puppet started to reassemble itself. The sight was a familiar one - tiny strips of paper began to appear and fade into dead flesh or bone-whoot wood as the wound sealed itself up, and the puppet sprung back to unlife.
She could see why Orochimaru might want to get his hands on the secrets behind those puppets. It seemed like the special chakra used to repair or operate them might come from a bloodline limit, but Hisana knew that such things were not insurmountable to one of the Sanin.
They travelled for perhaps an hour towards the Sound base, and Hisana was glad to have her own mission outfit on again. If she wanted to actually use the outdated chakra metal armour, she'd need to master Earth Release chakra flow. It was an expensive technique, she knew, but she had ideas for jutsu formula and artificial chakra conduits that might be able to mitigate that.
The base was located on the side of a mountain, hidden by a powerful genjutsu. Hisana had to break Sasame out of it, and Sasuke did the same with Naruto before they both could see it. It didn't look particularly impressive - just a rough protrusion of concrete jutting out from the side of the mountain.
"You're sure Orochimaru isn't in there?" Hisana asked.
"He's days away poking around in the Land of Sea for some reason. No, this place just has lackeys. Get ready now, kids," Jiraiya said. He broke off a bit off rock from the mountainside, felt its weight, and shrugged.
"This'll do," he said, as lines of chakra-ink spread across in a spiralling, twisting pattern. A touch blast, but not one that Hisana had ever seen - something exotic and not at all like a standard explosive.
"Orders?" Sasuke asked.
"Search and destroy, unless you find some of the Fuma clan. Naruto, stick with Sasame," Jiraiya ordered.
Then he threw the rock at the Sound outpost so fast that the crack of a sonic boom could be heard. It impacted the concrete outer walls, shattering into dust, but the seal-ink transferred and expanded massively. What had once fit into Jiraiya's palm now covered a half dozen metres. Hisana could sense people moving rapidly towards the entrance, but she knew it was already too late.
Jiraiya made a single handseal and space rent itself apart. A massive spiral of rippling distortion appeared on the wall, ripping the concrete into liquid as it spun. It lasted for only a moment, but that was more than enough as the five of the charged across the open space towards the new entrance to the base.
One kunai came at them that became a thousand in an explosion of chakra smoke, but Hisana's hands blurred through handseals.
"Wind Release: Arrow Defying Hurricane!" she shouted, as the justu she'd copied from the One-Tailed Beast shielded them with roaring, hurricane-force winds. More kunai exploded from the chakra smoke, these fired from a mechanical kunai launcher and trialling explosive tags.They hit the dome of wind and detonated, creating a wall of explosions between Hisana and the base.
"Mass Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Naruto shouted and Hisana nearly buckled from the sheer mass of chakra she felt burst into the air. Dozens and then hundreds of clones appeared, each charging forward and blasting wind release justu from their palms. The tide of kunai was sent flying backwards to their source, and a titanic explosion echoed from the first defensive echelon inside the base.
Then they were across the valley and Hisana activated her lightning blood seal, blurring forward and cutting a Sound ninja in half before the explosion Naruto had caused had even dissipated. Her sword glowed the crimson red of her chakra as she focused her chakra flow - the Sword of Spring was a far superior tool for it than her old blade had been.
She cut down the crew of another kunai launcher that hadn't had the angle to fire on them as they crossed the valley as the crew stood almost frozen in her view. Her seal cut off, the heat from the explosion shortening her active time, and she blurred away from the launcher - but not before leaving a touch blast behind on it.
Sasuke had a kunai in each hand, blurring through the Sound ninja that rushed forward to stop him without slowing down. He danced through a hail of senbon crackling with lightning and returned the favour with a thrown kunai bursting with lightning chakra flow.
Naruto was everywhere at once, his clones fighting with fist and kunai and ninjutsu - each a whirlwind of destruction, and when put together they became a veritable hurricane. Sasame's battle puppets cut Sound ninja in half with their buzzsaws and fired off beams of purple chakra that melted flesh and stone alike.
Jiraiya was almost too fast for Hisana to follow, his Frog Style taijutsu deadly even without the natural energy of Frog Kata. Each blur of movement sent sonic booms roaring through the concrete base, each strike less killed men than it did annihilate them. Even with only taijutsu, Hisana could see why the Sanin were so legendary.
"Uzumaki Style: Hidden Attacking Chains!" a half dozen Narutos called out, each summoning dozens of chains to wrap around an armoured hulk of a ninja that must have been eight feet tall. He wore huge slabs of chakra metal as armour and carried a titanic kanabo. He had already squashed a half dozen clones with one swing, but the rest had him pinned.
Hisana blurred forward and drew her sword in a perfect iaido strike, but the earth-natured chakra running through the armour made it so durable that it could resist even her chakra-flow sharpened blade. She blurred backwards as the huge ninja struggled against Naruto's chains.
"You'll have to try better than that, Leaf scum!" he screamed, his muscles flexing against Naruto's chakra chains.
She had several options, but almost all of them would consume large amounts of chakra - chakra she might need past this entrance room. It was time to use her newest personal seal. She sheathed her sword and activated her lightning blood seal. Wind whipped around her as she activated her wind shroud.
Hisana leapt off the ground, propelled forward in an almost horizontal arc by a single burst of chakra-enhanced strength and her flight justu. She outran the tremendous noise of her approach and extended her foot as she cut through the air at supersonic speeds.
With reflexes only her lightning blood seal could grant her, Hisana activated her chakra burst network just before impact; turning a kick that would have splintered armour into one that exploded with the force of a bomb - only concentrated into her foot.
There was a moment of impact, and then Hisana sailed right through a cloud of shrapnel and red mist as the huge Sound ninja simply exploded from the force of her kick. She landed as the shards of chakra metal armour took down a half dozen Sound ninja, and an unfortunate clone, before returning her hands to her sword.
Hisana heads to...
[x] The heart of the base, looking to take out the leader of this outpost.
[x] The cells, looking for any Fuma Clan prisoners.
[x] The secret rear entrance that must exist, to cut off any avenue of retreat.
