Haruichi was wondering if this was becoming a trend: being supplied with motive to ensure he made it back to Konoha alive due to the neccessity of - as the kids these days said - having to smack a bitch. He was going to get the name of this thing's Intel cartographer and demonstrate to the git the exciting and painful ways in which a set of compasses could be used to find one's way from their ass to their elbow.

But right now, such hopes did neither them nor their client any good whatsoever. Haruichi took one last incredulous look at the map --Cliff of Sorrows? He'd 'sorrow' them, alright-- and then to Katsuko's hand and then her rat-masked face, tilted up towards the canopy of space above them.

It was purest starlight. Moonless, cloudless and devoid of any light pollution. The stars above them were spectacularly distant and bright, speckled screeds of light from horizon to horizon. Haruichi silently gazed up into it, finally having to close his eyes gently, before the sensation of falling upwards into it took grip in his body as well as his mind.

He loved the stars. Being reminded of that brought his mind to Hoshi, and he felt a strain of traitorous feeling as he pushed her name away from his thoughts.

"Of course I can," he responded quietly, turning his face away from the stars. Astronomy was a stronger scientific love of his than even medicine, and he'd never once gotten lost when it came to tracking a path by the night sky. He didn't even think of why Katsuko might not be taking charge of finding their way herself, too busy with the calculations in his mind to spare thoughts for why he was the one making them. It took only a minute, and the consultation of a compass to align the arcs of several key stars, and he had them a point of reference.

"Alright," he said, finger tracing along the axis of the map. "We can keep track of ourselves if we start a grid search now," he led his finger north past the... Wastes of Woe (official now, somebody would be dying when he got home)... and paused at the far edge of the mapped Dunes. "North by Polaris. Then we can reference East by Sirius. I'll use my byakugan as well, to expand our search area."

Night was cool enough, and Haruichi had no intention of storming a sandstone fortress in the middle of the day with sunburn and heatstroke. He wanted to do this quickly, and he had no doubt Katsuko did too.