Judging by the faint shadows the nearly overhead sun cast, they were east of the village now, rather than west. And Kakashi was racing east and a little north, paralleling the course of the East Sea Road. Which, fine, so he'd followed directions. That meant he'd heard them, which meant that little attempt to coerce Ginta to reveal more about their destination was just that, an attempt at coercion.

As they ran, Ginta considered whether, were he in Kakashi's place, he'd do the same thing. He probably wouldn't, he decided, not exactly, anyway, but only because forcing a translocation on someone else wasn't the first thing he'd think of as a subtle power play.

The breakneck pace, on the other hand, wasn't punishment. It was desperation. And as much as Ginta wanted to point out that they'd be better off taking a sustainable pace, given the ground they had to cover, he didn't. With three weeks already elapsed and three teams already come back empty-handed, the chances that they needed to run hellbent for leather — that even a half a day gained would make any difference — were slim, but Kakashi already knew that, Ginta was sure.

Ginta knew it too, and he still felt better running so fast he couldn't quite focus his eyes.

His leg complained, aching with every jarring footfall, but it held up. He sheared his chakra along the newly-knit bones, reinforcing the patchwork craze of healed, once-shattered tibia and fibula. He was gaining strength, had been gaining strength and stamina ever since the medics had cut the cast off at last and turned him loose to start training again, under the watchful eye of a physical therapist, and his training had paid off. They'd warned him, though, over and over, a chakra-healed fracture was not as strong as a naturally healed one. It would take several more months before his injures were as well-healed as they would have been if he'd just let time do the work.

Time was the one commodity a ninja never had enough of.

Especially not Ryouma.

So Ginta kept up, correcting the course a little north, a little more east, as they followed what he was certain was Ryouma's trail. He didn't bother looking for signs, because there would be none. The three previous search teams had come this way, after all, fanning out through the woods around them, and they were still close enough to the village that this wasn't — this couldn't have been — where Ryouma ran into trouble.

It wasn't until the sun's rays were tinting gold, sending long fingers of shadow ahead of them as they ran east, that he had to stop. He raced in front of Kakashi, crooked his arm into the ANBU sign for halt and dropped to the grassy ground under bright-leaved oaks. When Kakashi landed panting beside him, Ginta couldn't speak yet, still sucking in air with a heaving ribcage, but he gestured with three fingers: We need to scan this area.