| [Sep. 27th, 2013|10:17 pm] |
Kakashi went to join her. Katsuko nodded at him and glanced over at Ryouma, who’d decided to prop up the doorframe like it was his job. “Coming with?”
Ryouma pushed away from the door, with some effort. “Lead on, senpai. I hope your clones are planning on carrying the head.”
Footsteps scuffed the floor. Genma leaned out from behind the screen that hid Hisa from view. “Ready to go.”
Katsuko waved an airy hand as Raidou headed over to help Genma. “My clones can handle the head. You and Hound are just coming along for decoration.”
Ryouma fell into step with her as they left the infirmary. "Always hoped I'd find someone who'd appreciate me just for my pretty face. Or fake mask. Whatever."
Kakashi hovered a pace behind, probably ready to catch whichever one of them decided to collapse first. Katsuko concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other and stared straight ahead, ignoring the way faces kept on popping up in windows or peering out from around doorways as they passed.
The clones were waiting for Katsuko a short distance from the village gates, hidden by a thick copse of trees. They perched on top of and around the demon queen’s head like a flock of silent magpies.
Katsuko propped Ryouma up against the nearest tree and sent a small group of bunshin back to the village for tarp and rope. The bunshin returned shortly after, laden down with enough tarp and rope to wrap a herd of cattle like a birthday present, and started to swathe the giant insect head. The end result looked a giant, mummified boulder, but at least there weren’t any visible glowering dead eyes or jagged mandibles poking out.
Leaves crunched deliberately underfoot behind her: Kakashi. “Three days on a boat, that thing is going to stink.” He contemplated this. “It stinks now.”
“We could drag it in the water,” Ryouma suggested, from his leaning tree.
“That could work.” Katsuko frowned up at the mummified head. “We have enough rope, and it doesn’t matter if the tarp stays on after we get out of sight of the village.”
“Keep the tarp, or you’ll lose bits,” Kakashi said.
Ryouma’s voice was honey-thick with exhaustion. “That shell was thick. It’ll last.”
“We can talk about it on the way to the boat,” Katsuko said. Food. Food was better to think about than bugs, or demon bugs, or demon bug queens and their skulls. “I’m hungry.”
“I’m out of rat bars,” Ryouma said mournfully.
Plastic crinkled. Kakashi tossed both of them a rat bar and informed them, “There’s something wrong with you.”
“Chakra exhaustion’s what’s wrong,” Ryouma retorted. “Also, we grew up on a battlefield. Where were you?”
Kakashi shrugged, as if to say I’d respond to you if your opinion had any weight, and headed for the river.
The merchant boat waiting for them at the dock was large enough to fit several families, but the only people Katsuko could see up top were the navigator and several deckhands. Raidou had his head bent to confer with an elderly woman leaning on a cane on the gangplank. There was no sign of Genma or Hisa; probably they’d gone below deck.
Katsuko lifted her hand to rub her eyes and stopped herself at the last moment, remembering the henge mask. “I’ll talk to taichou about hitching this thing to the back of the boat,” she said, jerking her thumb over her shoulder at the queen’s head. A cadre of clones had it hoisted above their shoulders. “You guys get some sleep.” |
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