| [Nov. 14th, 2011|03:13 am] |
Chakra slammed into her chest, a spike of pure energy that dragged her back from a world of hazy grey. Katsuko sucked in a copper-tinged breath, cracking swollen eyes open as far as they could go.
The air smelled wet, like earth and trees and the open sky. The damp bank of a burbling stream greeted her, choked with ferns and moss-grown stones. A rabbit startled at her gaze, leaping into the undergrowth with a rustle of leaves. Something called overhead; it took Katsuko a moment to recognize it as a crow, winging its way south.
Outside.
She was outside, in the light of day, while somewhere below Asuma and Ichiba burned alive. Freedom turned to ashes in her mouth, twisting her voice into a low groan. The seal on her stomach throbbed, trying to tear her coils apart with single-minded purpose. She had half a mind to let it.
Foreign chakra wrapped around hers, soft and kind. A gloved hand smoothed over her forehead as a woman’s voice ordered, “Stay still. I’ve dampened your chakra, but it’s only temporary.”
A tiger mask swam into her line of sight, blue eyes tinged with pity in the dark hollows of reinforced porcelain.
“ANBU,” Katsuko spat, head pounding. “Why didn’t you come sooner?”
Tiger didn’t react, simply pressed two glowing fingers to Katsuko’s temple.
Things faded out, for a while.
The next time she came to someone had laid her out on a bedroll, cocooning her up to the neck in a clean field blanket. Tiger and a male ANBU with his arm in a sling were conferring nearby, voices drifting in and out of hearing range. Katsuko kept her breathing steady and listened with all she had.
“...need a fuuinjutsu expert. My dampening jutsu’s barely holding on her as it is...”
“...destroyed that hell-pit. No survivors except for...”
“...leader and her husband escaped. Taichou says--”
No survivors. No one except for her. No one else had been dragged out of that blaze, because no else’s chakra had threatened to bring the very foundations of the facility down on their heads. Katsuko remembered the seal twisting as the dampening wards went down, her coils bleeding light as they tried to consume her as surely as the flames would have.
Be strong, my child.
Don’t give up on me, sweetheart.
Grief slid its blade between her ribs, making each breath sharp and painful, but she had nothing left for tears. Katsuko stared up at the sky, eyes dry, chest hollowed-out and empty. Under the blanket, one hand crept up to splay over the dried ink on her stomach.
Anger. Anger was better. It was easy to recall the amusement in Kaminari’s green eyes, the cold malice in Inazuma’s. Easier still to relive each minute cut of the scalpel, the grate of bone under Inazuma’s hard hands, every time Kaminari called her ‘Yoshiko’ before tearing her apart.
Hakuin’s hand cold in hers, Ichiba screaming her name as they wheeled him away, Asuma’s red-stained smile--she carved a special place in her memory for those, a box she could take out and go through when she was in the mood for a little self-loathing.
Something dark and ugly pooled in the hollow of her stomach. Katsuko wrapped herself around it like a lifeline, pushing herself up from the bedroll with one shaking arm.
The ANBU stilled and turned, painted faces tilted in her direction. Tiger moved to Katsuko’s side, hands glowing green. “How are you feeling?”
“Functional,” Katsuko answered, shortly. “How soon can we get back to Konoha?”
Tiger’s companion had blond, spiky hair sticking up from behind his eagle mask. It swayed a little as he crouched down beside the bedroll, one hand hovering over Katsuko’s shoulder. “Depends on what Kiyoko’s exam turns up, kid. We’re not gonna risk moving you with internal injuries. Why, you in a hurry?”
This close, Katsuko could see the wide, friendly set of his brown eyes. She looked at him, and whatever he saw reflected in her own made him draw back. She cracked a smile. “You could say I’ve got things to do.”
Kaminari and Inazuma were still alive, and there was nothing left in her to mourn for what she’d lost. Revenge would have to do. |
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