"No, I meant really hold on to me," Genma said with a shake of the head. "I'm going to translocate us again a couple more times, so we break the trail up as much as possible."

Rina nodded slowly, looking like she doubted even that silent acquiescence. Genma could feel her eyes raking over his body, lingering on injuries in a way that made him aware of pain he'd been ignoring. She stepped closer and leaned against him, wrapping slim arms in soaked sleeves around his waist. Genma's panting breaths came out of synchrony with her own winded huffing. "You sure you have the chakra for this so soon?" she asked. Her eyes fell on his hands, gloved again, and already half crooked into the Ram seal.

Genma turned his head to answer her, and she looked up, eyes meeting his, then down, with a shake of her hair. "Of course you're sure."

"Yeah," Genma grinned at her: a cocky, confident smile because there was a part of him that thrived on this kind of excitement. "That's what this uniform means, right?" It meant making hard choices like the one that had doomed her partner. It meant a masked visage and a reputation as a baby killer with no morals. It meant having the talent, the training, and the judgment to get into a heavily fortified and trapped bunker, rescue a cornered comrade, fight their way back out, keep her on her feet, keep himself on his feet, and get home.

He dropped one elbow against her shoulder in something not quite an embrace, then called up his chakra and cast the jutsu. They touched down in a clearing several kilometers away. Genma looked at Rina's pale, sweaty face, then up at the surrounding woods. Still too many hiding places, and too much danger of pursuit. Another flicker-flood of chakra, and another several kilometers, and they were finally in territory Genma felt safe enough stopping in. He bent over, hands on knees, and sucked in heaving lungfuls of damp evening air tinged with the scent of decayed leaves and the coming fall.