Takuma opened the door to Aranai's room, waking up the prisoner laying down on the dusty floor. It had been a few days since the torture and beatings had ended, giving Aranai the time to recover and he would've recovered faster if not for his chakra locked under the prisoner seal.

He was alone in the cell, Takuma having separated him and Ryoya before he left for the banquet hall—Takuma walked towards Aranai, forcibly putting an end to his spiralling thoughts. He nudged him with his foot.

"Wake up, it's time," said Takuma.

Aranai sat up with a groan and looked at him suspiciously.

Takuma took out a syringe loaded with the sleeping agent he had received from Iori when she had come to refresh the prisoner seals.

"What's that for?" asked Aranai.

"Well... I can't have you leaking our location, so we'll be transporting you while you're unconscious." He could've told them the truth now that he had the information, but he chose to continue the ruse about their being out of the city. "I'll leave you in front of the city council building; your people will pick you up from there."

Takuma knelt in front of Aranai and reached out for his arm only for him to struggle violently with a fearful crazed look on his face.

"You're lying, aren't you?"

Takuma didn't meet his eyes and grabbed his arm again, but he once again shook it off. "Let's not do this."

"You are lying... You never planned to let us leave alive," Aranai spoke barely above a whisper before opening his mouth to yell at the top of his lungs. "I-I DON'T WANT TO DIE! YOU'RE GOING TO KILL—!"

Takuma socked him in the face with an augmented punch, knocking him out, but not before his head slammed against the wall behind them, doing even more damage.

As he watched Aranai slump forward, he suddenly felt so incredibly tired, so much so that he didn't move for a couple minutes and stared into space. Eventually, he injected him with the sleeping agent, even as he struggled to push the plunger down.; his hands felt like they had no strength.

He laid down beside Aranai and mindlessly stared at the ceiling not wanting to move or think, finding everything too exhausting. He wanted to close his eyes and take a short nap to energise himself, and even closed them for a few seconds, but knew that if gave in, he wouldn't wake up for at least half a day.

So he got up and forced himself to wrap Aranai's torso in a thick cloth wrap, encasing him in a makeshift straightjacket. He then repeated the process with Ryoya, who had unfortunately heard Aranai's screams and was terrified. Takuma's patience had worn thin and he once again used excessive force to resolve the matter quickly.

He looked down at the two unconscious shinobi.

Aranai was right in thinking that he wasn't planning to let them go alive. It wasn't always going to be like that; there was value in keeping them alive and letting the jonin decide what to do with them.

However, after the events at the banquet hall, his plan was to incite chaos and their death would add to the already swirling pool. If the jonin had any issues with that, then there wasn’t much they could do.

Inciting chaos was the reason Team-9 had been sent to Yu anyway.

———
.

Ebi didn't think he had made any big mistakes during his time in Yu.

Perhaps he had not done enough, but he hadn't made any explicit mistakes resulting in the deterioration of the mission. Sure, he assumed responsibility for everything that happened but not before pointing fingers at the other jonin who’d dumped all their responsibilities on his head.

But he had to admit, he had made a mistake by being passive in pursuing leads in Aranai and Ryoya's abduction and now, he had lost four more shinobi. The four genin surveilling Chinatsu, the courtesan, and her group were missing. He stood up on the roof of a house across from Chinatsu's house as the sun broke across the horizon.. The amount of blood on the roof told him that all of his surveillance team was dead. He didn't know when they were attacked, but when the other team arrived to relieve them of their shift duty, they found the blood and the team missing.

"Where are they?" he asked the chunin responsible for securing the area and collecting clues.

"...This is all we found, sir," the chunin said stiffly.

All they found was four sets of uniforms and gear belonging to the team; their bodies were missing.

"Why would they take their bodies? Are they alive? If so, why leave their clothes behind?" Ebi half-said to himself while also questioning the chunin.

"They are absolutely dead."

The one to answer was Kon standing on the other side of the roof.

"What makes you so sure?" Ebi asked as he walked to him.

"Look at this," Kon pointed at the blood stains on the floor. The stain was strange and looked like someone had dragged a body through blood, leaving a trail—but the trail was in a curved pattern.

"What is it?" Ebi asked, confused.

"These are snake trails," said Kon with a furrow between his brows.

"Snake trails?" Ebi looked at the blood trail and felt doubtful because the width of the trails were at least a foot wide and he didn't think there were snakes that big in the region. But then the realisation hit him and his blood went cold. "The snake summoning contract. Are you saying it's him?"

As a jonin, there weren't many people who he genuinely feared in the world. A lot of people thought of jonin as a monster—and they weren't wrong given the difference in power—but Ebi knew that he wasn't a monster.

Not when there were real monsters in the world—and the Snake Sannin was one of those monsters.

"It's not Orochimaru. We would probably already be dead if he was here," said Kon, displeased.

"Then who?"

"There's only one other person with the snake contract—his student, Mitarashi Anko.... She's in Yu, and she fed your shinobi to her snakes."

Ebi knew that Orochimaru had a student, but he wasn't aware of her name or her achievements. But seeing that she was his student, he could only guess that she wouldn't be a slouch.

"Is she a problem?" he asked.

"She holds the rank of chunin. She's strong, vicious, ruthless—everything you'd expect from the snake's student. You can take her in a fight, but that's not the problem," Kon placed a hand on his shoulder as he rolled it. "The problem is your two abducted shinobi. She would've wrung out all the information out of them—and that's a big problem."

"The surveillance reports don't show any suspicious activity," said Ebi.

"She could've deceived them. We can't rule that out."

Ebi tapped his feet. He had to assume Aranai and Ryoya gave up information, meaning they were at an immediate disadvantage. The enemy would come prepared for the personnel they had in the city but also plan for the strategies and operating procedures they had established to combat attacks.

Moreover, they had also lost a jonin and four chunin—and he knew that he wouldn't be getting a jonin replacement despite sending a report back to the Hidden Frost the day before. Even if they sent more chunin and genin, they would barely arrive in time according to Kon's estimate for the impending attack.

The silver lining was that the jonin's death had finally woken up the forces and all the jonin and chunin were finally preparing their teams. Ebi had even given the order to update their strategies to make up for the troops they had lost to the blast—but if the enemy had their plans, he wondered if those updates would be useful. They would have to change everything drastically, but those things took time to not only plan but also implement.

They had no time—and that made it, as Kon said, a big problem.

As Ebi wrapped his head around the situation and thought of short-term solutions, a genin not part of the team handling the scene rushed to the roof.

"Sir!"

"What?" asked Ebi. He could tell that it wasn't good news.

"The bodies of Chunin Aranai and Genin Ryoya were just found hanging in front of the city council building."

———
.

When Takuma entered the factory base, he felt a wave of emotions well up inside of him when he saw the team sitting on the dirty couch and chairs, locked in a serious discussion. It hadn't been that long since he had seen them—he had seen Iori just a few days ago—but seeing them all together brought up a sense of comfort that he desperately needed.

He clenched his fist and dug his nails into his palm to control himself from tearing up and then took a few deep and long breaths before stepping out of the shadow.

"Where are Chinatsu and Gaku?" he asked as he announced his presence.

"Oh thank god, you're safe," Iori jumped from the chair and enveloped him in a hug.

Takuma leaned into the hug and embraced her back.

"...It's great to see you as well," he said and wanted to smile but couldn't muster one. "All of you as well," he nodded to everyone else. "So what about the other two?"

"They bounced and will stay hidden until everything is over," said Anko. She had been dressing in clothes suitable for a handmaiden, but now with that over, she quickly reverted back to her normal hairstyle and now only wore a sports bra and short pants as she sat with her feet up on a table. Everyone else too had changed into their comfort clothing

"Of course he did," said Takuma with a groan, slumping into the couch beside Rikku and half-leaning against her small frame. “He’s a piece of hot garbage.”

"What about Aranai and Ryoya?" asked Kameko.

"I killed them," said Takuma flatly. "Hanged them up in front of the city council building, and then slit their throats." To be quick and safe, he had created two water clones to do the job, using a significant amount of chakra; he was more exhausted than ever, he had a fever, and his muscles felt like lead.

"We killed the shinobi keeping an eye on us."

"Anko fed them to her snakes," said Rikku.

"That's great. Six shinobi found dead in two different spots, that's a massive blow." Takuma then looked at Anko. "Gnarly. That must've helped with making up for the snakes."

"It did. I just might be able to summon a big one to help me in the battle."

"That's good..."

A quietness snuck into the base as the team stared at Takuma, who was blinking down at the floor until he noticed everyone had gone silent. He looked up and was surprised to see everyone looking at him.

"What?"

"Do you want to talk about the blast?" Daiki asked.

Takuma stiffened and leaned away from Rikku as he felt the eyes on him. He then noticed that he was simply curious and realised that he was overthinking it.

"What do you want to know?"

"How did you do it?" asked Kameko.

"Got myself a dishwashing job at the banquet hall. Inserted the waterproof explosive tag into a water clone, dressed him as a waiter, and then sent him right next to the jonin to blow himself up. The people there were rich and powerful, and none of them saw a lowly waiter as a threat."

He noticed that they wanted to talk more about what he had done but didn't want to talk and was about to switch the topic to their experience when Anko interrupted,

Takuma, I want to talk to you alone.

He got up and followed her to the other side of the factory base. "Is this about the blast?" he asked. Seeing that she had taken him away from the team, he guessed that she wasn't happy with him and didn't want to scold him in front of the team.

"Of course, it's about that!" Anko's voice was sharp, her expression stern. She had a deep frown on her face. "Do you realise what you did?"

"I killed a jonin," said Takuma stiffly as though repeating a mantra to fortify his mind.

"You blew up dozens of civilians! That's what you did," Anko raised her voice. "Do you know much of a mess this might lead to? The Hidden Steam will make a huge stink out of this. This could reach the Hokage and Fire Daimyo, and all of us will be screwed if the tiles fall on the wrong side."

"They were traitors; they deserved to die," Takuma said in his defence.

"Really? You want to justify it like that?" Anko stared down at him with a hard look. "What about the staff? Did they deserve to die? Was simply working in that hall to put food for their families made them traitors?"

The screams of terror echoed in his head. Takuma grabbed the bridge of his nose and turned his head away slightly as he said, "They were unfortunate collateral damage. There was no better place to take out a jonin than that banquet hall. Most of the staff was in the back of the house; they were safe."

"That was not your choice to make!" said Anko, the look of anger worsening. He hadn't seen her this angry ever, not even when she was mistreated by Toridasu. "We are not Hidden Steam shinobi. This is not our country. We are outsiders with limited operational freedom. A few people here and there are understood and thus covered—but blowing up a banquet hall and sacrificing civilians is not something you can do! It's not something any of us—even me—can do!"

She began to pace around with her hands in her hair. He could hear her taking deep breaths out of anger to calm down. She continued, "Yes, I gave you the autonomy to operate; you are allowed plenty of freedom. But you should've known better, Takuma."

"I have saved lives," Takuma said in his defence but couldn't meet her eyes. "It was our mission to weaken the enemy; I just did my mission. I have made the attack on the city safer for the main forces by taking out the jonin and the four chunin. I have made sure that after the city is freed, the good people of Yu will be in control of their homes instead of those turncoat traitors!" His volume rose, and his tone became harsher as he defended himself. He had to justify his actions because he didn't want to accept any other scenario where he hadn't done good.

When Anko didn't reply, he looked up to see that the anger had disappeared, replaced with a muted look of disappointment, which somehow hit much deeper. He clenched his fist as his heart thumped louder.

Don't look at me like that, he thought. Go back to being angry.

"We are shinobi of the Hidden Leaf from the Land of Fire," she said, her voice much calmer—no flatter—than before. "The rules of engagement between civilians and shinobi have long been established. Not to mention this is the Land of Hot Waters; we are outsiders—we can't make judgments like the one you made. The people of this country deserve to deal with the people you call traitors on their own; that's their right—you took it away from them. If someone else did what you did in the Land of Fire, the Hidden Leaf would've considered it an insult to the entire nation, even if it was one of our allies."

Takuma knew that. He knew all of that. He had simply chosen to ignore all of it so that he could hurt the enemy in the worst way possible. Taking away a jonin was the way to send fear into the hearts of the enemy who were abusing the lives of the people in the city.

"I'll be honest; I don't think you'll be punished," said Anko with a sigh. "I don't really care about the turncoats; they're dead—that's it. I care about the staff, but I don't think the people up the chain will care because you killed a jonin, and unlike us, they aren't here in this city to see what it's like for the people. As you said, you did your mission and made it safer for the main forces... I just don't like the way you did. The fault also lies with me because it only happened because I gave you the autonomy... If things do go wrong for us, don't worry, I'll take my share of the responsibility."

Anko shook her head and then turned to walk away, leaving Takuma alone to deal with what he had been thinking all along and was now thrown more bluntly than he had expected.

Two days remained until the main forces arrived at Yu.

 

 

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