Suzume couldn't stop shaking. She needed her body to respond.

The boy was around Kankuro's age but unlike her brother, was still a Genin. There was a sickly sweet twinge to the air around the stranger that repelled her, she couldn't stand to breathe it in. 

Gulping, she didn't dare remove him from her sight, didn't even dare to blink. She shifted her twitching hand along the ground and grasped a rock.

He took a stride toward her and she flinched, her skin crawling with chills.

Move!

She chucked the rock at the boy's head and rocketed to Saya's side. She was reaching out an arm for the dog's prone body when suddenly, she was back where she started. She gasped as the kick to her torso threw her against the wall. That was fast. It was really fast. She didn't see it coming.

This wasn't good. Suzume's brain went blank. This wasn't good.

Suzume sensed movement and she crudely lifted her arms to protect her face. 

A flash of silver and blood flew into the air. She screamed and her body convulsed. A kunai was cut deeply into her palm, keeping her pinned to the building behind her.

Tears stung at her eyes and she stared hysterically at the foreign object gored into her skin, the blood leaking out of the incision in syrupy beads. Her quickened breathing filled her ears, her whole being was shrieking at her to run.

"My little brother did say you were a weak one." Suzume's eyes snapped back over at the Genin. "But I didn't think you were this rubbish." His mouth split into a sadistic grin. "I think I'll make you my punching bag from now on. My last one switched villages on me."

Calm down. If you're panicked you can't think.

"Are you going to run crying to your family?" The boy licked his lips and shivered excitedly.

Suzume took in and released and shaky breath. She tried to detach herself from the pain like Gaara had taught her. She'll be fine. There's a way out of this.

The wind from a launched kunai tickled her cheek and it nicked her ear. Drawing a frightened breath, Suzume's eyes slid over to see the kunai wedged into the wall behind her. A few more inches and she would have lost an eye.

"Hey, hey. Don't think about running. Don't worry, I'm not gonna kill you or anything."

Suzume gasped at how close he was now and just as she was thinking that, the boy grabbed her wrist, ripped out the kunai beside her head and sunk it into her other hand. She was about to let out another scream when a blade was pressed to her throat, convincing her to swallow her voice.

"Keep your screams in or else," he threatened. "Blame it on your family. If you were in my class, you'd've learned proper defense. And ever since those idiots began flouncing their old man's authority the new generation has to learn how to get themselves killed."

"They're not idiots," Suzume strained out. The pounding in her head was back.

"You're tellin' me the guy who threw his weight around in the village murdering everyone just 'cause but couldn't kill one kid from Konoha isn't a nutcase? Wow, thanks for telling me. Then I guess he's just a retard."

Suzume glowered at him, wincing from a sudden twinge of discomfort skittering through her skull. It was easy to forget one wound when you were inflicted with a greater one. Her bones were freezing over.

"If it wasn't for him and his little servants, we'd be ruling over Konoha right now!" His yelling was so irritating. It bounced around in her head. "No! Instead we're going to learn from a village we almost conquered! That makes so much sense!"

"Then why don't you go over there and kill the Hokage if you think you're so great!" Suzume hissed.

"Hm? Why? Your shit of a family's flushed the pride of our village! Why should I do something for a village that's crumbling into a hole?"

"Pathetic."

"Huh?!" he grabbed the front of Suzume's shirt and dragged her upwards. She let out a hiss of pain from her skin being torn even further by the kunai. "Why're you talking so much, trash? Oh, I see. Takes one to know one! You're just as much of an outcast as they are. Tell me, is Temari really a whore for the Council members or are those just rumors?"

"Stop it," Suzume forced out through his grip on her throat. The agony seeped down her neck and shoulders.

"I heard Kankuro's a mad recluse who actually acts like his puppets are alive and talks to them. Poor bastard."

"Stop it." It wrapped around her stomach and spread into her legs.

"And Gaara can't be much of a brother if he's disemboweling corpses in the basement of the Mansion! They're perfect examples of society's invalid—"

"DON'T INSULT THE PEOPLE WHO SAVED MY LIFE!" Suzume's eyes turned primal and a menacing red swallowed up her onyx irises. Her nails elongated and came to a honed point. Her canines sharpened until she had a beast like maw.

Something snapped and streams of energy and power coursed through her veins. Until this moment, she hadn't realized how unnatural she'd felt, how leashed she'd been. Now, everything was as it should be.

In a split second, she ripped her hands through the kunai and she chucked the Genin into the air. He was falling when a punch to his gut popped him back up and Suzume ran up the wall, flipped in the air, and kicked him, returning him back down to earth.

He was shaking the stars out of his vision when he caught the footfalls coming his way. A fear struck him and he was trapped in a tiger's wrath. The boy struggled to pick himself up but was too late. Somebody seized his collar and pulled him up.

"I'll make you regret it," she whispered into his ear.

His rational fear was destabilized by his pride and he gritted his teeth as he glowered at Suzume's impassive face.

"What did you say?!" he growled.

Suzume was forced to let him go when he swung his kunai at her face. Now that he had a clear view of his adversary, the Genin noticed key details he hadn't been able to identify before.

H-how was this possible? He goggled as he watched Suzume calmly spectate his breakdown. Chakra... she had chakra in her body... Where'd it come from?!

"Heek!" Suzume's face was right in front of his and he glimpsed the fist coming fast toward him. He ducked and heard the smash of dried clay. He shivered in his shoes, showered in tan dust and being pelted by the pieces of the wall above him.

He scampered out from under Suzume and ran. That strength...! How?! She's as weak as a newborn, she had no muscles to speak of. The boy risked a look behind him. Suzume was still standing in front of the marred wall, examining her fist.

His eyes widened. Chakra? She coated her fist with chakra?! But...! Even the best Genin couldn't control their chakra that proficiently! How was she doing it?!

His blood ran cold when Suzume's gaze darted to him. "Take it back."

"I take it back!" he shrieked immediately, tripping over his feet to get away. "I take it back, alright! Just leave me alone!"

She granted him that favor.

_ _ _

The young man convulsed in his bed and sat bolt upright. His sweat was a cold wrap around his body, his parched mouth opened and closed like a dying fish.

"Toya."

He whipped around to see his partner setting aside his book and looking over his state worriedly.

"What's wrong?"

He shivered and his body folded together on reflex. He was out of breath despite just being asleep a moment before. He gulped and made shaky eye contact with the other man.

"It broke," he said it so quietly he was only sure he was heard when Kagami's face shadowed.

An instant later, Toya found himself being ushered along the hallway by Kagami. He was barefooted and weak kneed, he loathed relying on the other man for balance but he couldn't think about that now.

They burst into a large, dim drafty room whose walls extended far above their heads and regardless of the lack of ceiling still managed to obstruct the sunlight. An intersecting perpendicular set of bridges were built over the void darkness below. Four massive pillars occupied the space the bridges couldn't fill and the peeling paint was joined by the ancient, unused seal tags scattered across their surfaces. 

In the middle of the crossroads stood a soulless man. Toya always wondered how he could constantly be there especially since he attends to business in the village so often. He's learned not to question it.

The two men hastened over to stand in front of the bandaged figure and knelt down in front of him.

"Sir," they greeted curtly.

Toya felt the prickly roving of tens of eyes examining his restless body.

"Hm," was the gruff conclusion. "Earlier than I expected. Well, I suppose it lasted longer under such circumstances, but I was hoping it could've lasted a few more turns, what with the few batches we got in conceding nothing of vital importance."

"What're your orders, sir?" Kagami inquired.

"The Sand was working under suspicions and after this their suspicions have probably been realized. They'll want to act. Fortunately our girl got herself taken in under powerful allies. The bird has her wings but what of her head?"

"Still detached," Toya reported.

"Half a year," the man decided after a minute in thought. "Half a year more until we retrieve her."

"Yes, sir!"