Left alone with half a crew of terrified sailors and four waning clones, Asuma leaned on the railing, studied the skyscape, and wondered what to do with himself. Every mission had one of these moments, when the excitement was over, injuries had finally sorted themselves out on the line between painful and probably not fatal, and the immediate future held nothing but waiting.

After a moment, he remembered the two still-hovering clones, whacked his forehead (very gently), and ordered them back to work. The third was still up in the rigging, eyes fixed on the horizon, voice cracking out orders to the men around it. The fourth was leaning lazily on the wheel, idling the wooden spokes between its hands; out of all of them, it had the most chakra left.

There were eight sailors, ranged out between the deck and the sails, all of them burly and tanned and barefoot. Asuma regarded each of them in turn, but found none that would meet his eyes. He thought about striking up a conversation, but condemned men had nothing on their minds but the hangman's noose, and he wasn't in the mood for begging.

The distant land was still nothing but a smudge on the horizon, like a god's blurry fingerprint.

He sighed.

Then he finished his cigarette, lit another, backtracked his steps to the galley, dug out the first three edible-looking cans to catch his attention and a small keg of something that was probably water, headed back up onto the deck, (didn't stop to think about checking on Tsume), grabbed the first abandoned shirt that presented itself, and clumped up to drop--carefully down behind the wheel-clone.

"Hey."

"Mornin'," returned the clone, without looking at him. "Bored?"

"Yup." Stiffly, he yanked the shirt on. Then he pulled out a trench knife to set about levering the cans open. "What'd I miss?"

"Your pretty little partner almost goring a guy to death, for starters." The clone sounded amused. "Didn't even kill him before she tossed him overboard. Turns out your buyer's captain was the only one who knew anything."

"Damn," Asuma muttered. He licked a drip of juice off his blade, then pulled a face and spat, ridding himself of the taste of enemy blood. "How's she been?"

"Tsume?" The clone glanced back, head tipping thoughtfully as Asuma nodded. "Tense, snappy, snarling. Tired and hurting. Pretending she wasn't checking on you every ten minutes. She threw up after she got done with her screamer. Good, otherwise."

There was probably some social commentary in wordless acknowledgement Asuma gave, as he accepted everything and questioned nothing. If anything, he was grateful; at least Tsume had got to vent something on one poor bastard.

Which left eight for him to deal with once they hit land.

Silence settled, broken only by short commands and high whistles from clones and crew. By quietly slapping waves, and the mental noise of half-formed plans. He polished off two cans and half the water, smoked his remaining cigarettes, took more painkillers, organized his thoughts enough to scrape together the threads of thank you into a battered, silent prayer, and passed the time playing cards with the wheel-clone.

Halfway to the shore, one of his deck-clones shimmered and vanished, startling the sailors. Asuma scowled and pressed more chakra into the remaining three. Despite that, he was down one more doppelganger by the time they made it almost within hailing distance of land.

There was a harbour. Small, weathered, boasting mostly tiny fishing vessels and a few bigger sloops. Away from the sea-front, ravaged looking buildings faced the ocean, the paint peeling away from salt- and sun-blistered wood. He didn't recognize it, but at least it was there.

Relief was beautiful.

Asuma waited until he could hear the shushing crash of surf breaking against sand, and then rose to his feet, snapping a wordless order through his clones.

It took sixteen seconds to break eight necks.

He helped drag the bodies into the hold, set his two remaining clones to the not completely impossible task of docking the ship alone, and went to wake Tsume.