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Leap of Faith. [Asuma & Natsumi] [May. 29th, 2009|12:53 am]
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[User Picture]From: [info]fallen_asuma
2009-05-28 07:57 pm (UTC)

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Half a second after he reappeared ten feet below the violent, confusing, freakin' cold surface of the river, Asuma remembered the definition of a bad idea. Like always, it was anything he'd decided to call a good idea.

Gravity--still determined to make him pay for at least half of that fall--dragged him down. The current wrenched him sideways. He scraped through a jagged forest of black-toothed rocks, smashed against a canyon wall, and lost all sense of direction. A hip pouch caught in a crag and tore away. His mask put up even less resistance. Only the sword stayed, jammed hurriedly through armour straps. He lost breath swearing, lost even more when a chunk of stone like a damn reef sprung up from the depths and tried to stave his ribs in, and latched a millisecond hold on something he couldn't even see.

Chakra didn't work so well when you forgot to focus it.

Another rock greeted him spine-first, guaranteeing the back of his armour was just as smashed as the front. The full weight of a million tons of water with a place to be right now pinned him there. Ice clamped around his chest. White blotches exploded across his vision, obscuring his view of--

Nothing.

There wasn't time for panic; he needed air. The urge to inhale spilled up behind his gag reflex, spasming from lungs that didn't care about the difference between breeze and current. Splayed against stone, bloodless fingers flexed, then clenched.

Death was a great motivator for focus. He smashed chakra through his pathways, drawing strength from desperation, control, and sheer bloody-mindedness, and grabbed a hold in the water itself. Then another, higher. The current wrenched his arms back; Asuma hauled himself up.

It was like working on a chin-up bar, only backwards and blind and bleeding. He grabbed another hold, felt his back scrape a razor edge of stone, and pulled. The river slammed him backwards--then free. He twisted wildly, clipped his elbow on something hard, and struck out for the first direction that felt like up. Faint light glimmered above him. Chakra flooded down to his feet, burned in the tips of his fingers; he climbed the water, bursting up so fast that friction burns almost became an issue.

Except--well, river.

His head broke the surface. One gasp filled lungs to the breaking point; two put some steel back in his spine. He scrambled onto the surface, chakra flashing in knees and shins, hands and elbows, and tried to get up; then tumbled back under a third gasp later.

His second attempt got him to a rock crest big enough to grab. He latched on, breathed, looked around wildly for Natsumi, then pulled himself out and ran. Water lashed beneath his feet, punched into momentary craters. He headed straight downstream, caught in a long snapshot between standing and falling, and relied entirely on momentum to keep him upright. Entirely on luck (prayer) that he wasn't doing all this just to find a waterlogged corpse.

As it turned out, black and white was easier to see in the gloom of the canyon than the green of the forest.

He spotted battered armour plastered against spray-wet rock, gloved fingers clinging desperately to slick stone, dark, bedraggled hair unbound like a shredded flag, and didn't have time--or breath--to yell a warning.

Crashing into Natsumi's flank and tearing her straight off the sheer granite cliff-face worked almost as well as a rescue.

Sort of.