| [Sep. 14th, 2013|01:09 am] |
Ryouma would have given his second-best kunai to see Kakashi's face. The mask didn't so much as tilt. Kakashi gazed at her for a long moment, and then his hands twisted and the last rabbit peeled bloodlessly out of its skin. "Done, darling."
Katsuko cackled. Kakashi's knife flicked, making swift work of the rabbit's head and viscera. He bundled the four cleaned carcasses into a skin, scooped the scraps into another skin, and straightened. "Where did you dig the latrine trench?"
Ryouma twitched a thumb north-east. "About twenty meters from the stream, behind a white oak and a bunch of rhododendron. There's a good deep spot downstream a ways for washing your hands. I left some soap on a rock." He couldn't resist adding, "It's the night-blooming jasmine one, but I got lemon verbena if you'd prefer."
"That explains why you smell like a noblewoman's bedroom," Kakashi said, which was at least better than his reaction to Ryouma's chakra-rotted corpse scent when they'd first met. The edge that had sharpened every misered word since the formation of Team Six was finally beginning to dull from his voice. He sounded almost like the sardonic young man in the Hokage's waiting room again as he added to Katsuko, "Nothing explains you."
She propped herself up on her elbows, smirking. "I was made in a lab. Only science could explain me."
The mask hid everything but the twist of amusement in Kakashi's voice. "I guess we'll blame your test-tube, then." He dropped the bundle of cleaned carcasses on Ryouma's rock and headed off, bloody-handed, into the trees.
Ryouma's first pheasant was almost done. He shoved the rabbits and the unplucked bird aside for a little more room, then drew a kunai. "He's doing better," he said, leaning a little more weight on the haft of the kunai to force the blade through bone. "I think he's getting used to disappointment." He held the beheaded bird upside down to drain for a moment. He'd bled them already, but there was still a sluggish trickle left. "D'you know he actually struck up a conversation, during the Trials? More than once?"
"Voluntarily?" Katsuko's eyebrows shot up. "Like, it wasn't required for him to pass the Trials?"
"Like he was bored," Ryouma said, lowering the bird back to the rock again and hacking off the wings and feet. "Or curious, maybe, which is better than bored. I mean, not friendly." He hadn't seemed inclined to seek out Ryouma's company when there were better options available, but he'd been at least willing to talk. Or insult, at any rate. Maybe that was the best they could hope for.
Katsuko sat up, drawing her legs up to her chest and resting her chin on her knees. "Give it time," she said. "With both of us working on him, Hatake will crack sooner or later."
"In the head, maybe," Ryouma said, and tossed her the other pheasant. "Work on that, will you?" |
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