Starring:
Date: December 5, 2012
Summary:
Aoitsuki finds Taiki by the lake recovering, interviews him about the attack, and heals him some
"The Recluse Saga - Kiri Investigates"
Mist Lake
It's a couple of days after the events at Namami Resaurant, and the downed guard had been sent back to Konoha with a message for a replacement plus two. In the meantime the three remaining guards have insisted Taiki go no-where without /two/ of them, especially considering he couldn't stay in the medical center. Thus it is early afternoon and Taiki, along with two bandaged ninken, are leaning up against a tree witha fishing pole in his hand.
The guards and their ninken are situated to watch anyone going near Taiki, especially since both of his eyes are bandaged closed, meaning he is effectively blind at the moment. Thus he holds on to the poll, apparently to tell when he gets a bight.
Aoitsuki had been runing her rounds, especially with the Chuunin exams going while much of the village had it's guard down, Kirigakure shinobi were constantly on watch to make sure nothing was happening in the background, which prompted Aoitsuki to track down and approach an Inuzuka who was apparently attacked "or something" during his stay in Kirigakure. She approached from afar, adorned in a beautiful sparkling blue kimono sashed with a scarlet red, her long locks of blonde hair bounced along her shoulders as she moved forward, a large blade strapped and bandaged along her back, a blade that seemed to be a little to large for the girl to carry. "Hello, my name is Shirayuki Aoitsuki, Mizukage-sama summoned me to check up on a Konoha shinobi that was attacked?" she arched an eyebrow at the guards, spotting a bandaged individual with a fishing pole, she was almost sure this was the perso nshe was looking for.
The guard looks over the woman for a moment, not checking her out perse, but looking at the weapons. The two bandaged dogs perk up when Aoitsuki announces herself and turn to face her. Each has an ear bandaged, and their eyes are bloodshot. Apparently they got hit by whatever hit Taiki. The dogs growl something, causing the guard to step back. "Go on, but I would not make any sudden movements," the guard says plainly but diplomatically. The reason is both dogs are watching the woman intently, and look ready to defend the teenager.
The teenager, in the meantime sighs as he uses the off hand to wind in the fishing line. The pole is wedged in between his legs to provide support. Once the line is in the off hand sets the pole down while he turns bandaged eyes to face where he heard the woman's voice. "My name is Inuzuka Taiki," his very hoarse voice says politely. "I heard you wish to talk to me?" He moves his body very gingerly so he's facing Aoitsuki's direction, revealing the heavily bandaged hand and arm that is his right arm. The dogs move to bracket him, one one each side, where they proceed to watch the woman carefully.
"Inuzuka Taiki… It's nice to meet you. My name is Shirayuki Aoitsuki, I am one of the Seven Swordsman of Kirigakure. We were informed that you were attacked, that which is something not taken likely in Kirigakure. I'm hoping you can give me a little more insight on the situation as well as allowing me to properly treat your wounds…" Aoitsuki allowed a single handseal to allow a rush of chakra to bellow about her, even her form began to change slightly, her blonde hair bleaching out into vibrant snow like locks, not at all threatening as it normally would have been. "The medical care you have is exceptional poor as well, I would like to take care of that… As well as possible increase protection around you as we grasp the situation…" Aoitsuki seemed to be speaking from the heart, she really didn't like people sneaking into the village and causing trouble.
Taiki listens and nods. "Some preliminary work was done by one of my instructors, which probably saved me from having my chakra network completely shut down," he says matter-of-factly, as if simply advising her of what had been done so far. "That alone tired him out, as what was used on me was similar to something that had been placed on my father in the past, which he had removed. But it was different enough to cause him to tire himself just fixing those problems. So I would appreciate any help you can provide." Taiki's voice is still very hoarse, but calm and polite.
In fact, Taiki doesn't seem to be upset at all, either about the attack, or about being questioned by one of the Seven Swordsmen. It's almost as if he expected this, which he probably did. "Where do you want me to start Shirayuki'sama?"
"Let's start from the very begining," Aoitsuki stated as she motioned through a pair of hand seals. Water from the lake began to swirl and levitate, bending and becoming a more vibrant hue as it became enriched with her chakra. This same water gradually made way towards Taiki, washing along his flesh and allowing much of the pain to begin it's soothing and healing process, right on top of the bandages for now focusing on his hand and arm. " I've heard various accounts of what had happened there, were you attacked? Did you notice anything out of the ordinary?" Aoitsuki continued to question him, arching an eyebrow while focusing on her healing jutsu. "From start to finish," she repeated.
Taiki nods and takes a moment to collect his thoughts. "You have interacted with the guards I have on me, already, but in truth they came with me from Konoha to here for the specific purpose to guard me," Taiki says as a start. "The fact I have had guards from the beginning has nothting to do with Kirigakure itself, they aren't here to protect me from normal people," he starts. "Truth of the matter is that… well to put it bluntly I'm a hunted man. There is a group of high-level missing-nin that have been out to kill me since just after the last exams in Suna. Since we knew about them this time, we decided to exercise precaution. I would not have come here at all, had it not been for my entire genin team participating in the chuunin exams. I'm their sensei, so I have to be here for them." Again, he's perfectly calm about this, as if this is nothing out of the ordinary for him. Given what he's said so far though, it probably isn't.
Taiki would be watching this jutsu in action, save that he cannot see it being performed. "Anyway, things had been quiet so far, and we decided to visit Namami's on the night in question to be around other shinobi. I had just arrived, and was sitting down at a table with my guard and my ninken partners, Shinobu and Nozomi," he says, motioning to the huge white dog and smaller red dog with him, "To eat when my distant cousin Inuzuka Atsuro came up to me to talk to me for a few minutes about being in that kind of establishment. Having dealt with attacks from these missing-nin before, he's a bit protective of me. My appetizer arrived, and I reached over to grab the soy sauce. But when I touched the bottle, I apparently sprung a seal trap. I can only guess it was attuned to my chakra since other similar bottles in the restaurant had been handled with no ill effects."
"Did you see anyone suspicious? Was you waited to a particular table? If a seal was made prematurely perhaps whoever took you to the table was in on the situtaion…That would be the first lead we have to finding who ever did this," Aoitsuki informed, allowing her washing healing chakra continue to soak against his wounds, the soothing feeling began to wrap around his arms moving up to his eyes, "This will be fairly cold but bare with me…" She warned while proceeding with the process, of course she still had a few questions to ask. "Missing shinobi that we need to know about? If you can give us more information about that we can assure that the situation doesn't happen again… As you know these are fairly sensitive times… "
"No, no one looked suspicious to me at the time. I have on good authority the person who waited on me was known to the bartender. I didn't know anyone else other than my guard and his ninken and Atsuro and his partner, so I'm afraid I can't tell you who it was…" He pauses for a moment and then adds, "There was one shinobi with a Konoha hitai itai that tried to kill me with a kunai when Atsuro was trying to move me out from the table, that's the only suspicious thing I can think of there."
Taiki does shiver, slightly as the water works its way up, but he doesn't react much beyond that. He's probably used to cold weather climates, given his ninken look like winter dogs, albeit the white one is the size of a small horse. "I'm afraid we don't have much information about these missing nin that are hunting me myself, other than a few basic things. They apprently call themselves "The Recluse." So far they seem to be expert seal masters on par with the Uzumaki, and excel at infiltration and medical ninjutsu. We don't know why they're after me, save we suspect they were working with two of my uncles that were proven traitors to the Leaf. They're very good at what they do, but that's all I can tell you without clearance from the Hokage, other than they so far have not shown any identifying characteristics when they're out and about."
"I see…" Aoitsuki mused quietly under her breath, allowing the energy to continue to sooth his wounds and seal them tighter than the ice bandages allowed on their own, he definitely didn't look like he was in any good shape what so ever, but she was going to do her best to fix him up as needed. " We will need to retrace our steps… and at least figure out who was involved in the events that took place, I do thank you for this information and it is unfortunate that this had to happen…" Seemed to be pretty conclusive, no longer neednig any other questions from him, instead she decided to keep up her work with her healing chakra.
Taiki shrugs a little and says, "You have no need to apologize. I've been dealing with this threat for a year now. I can't tell you how many times I wound up needing medical attention from the actions of the Recluse. One can only lose so much…" He shakes his head and then shrugs. "Much worse has happened to me, this really isn't all that bad. The timing is awful, but Kirigakure is not responsible. This is one more thing that the Recluse will answer for, believe me." The hoarseness of Taiki's voice does not change, save to get slightly worse as his tone promises lingering pain and death to those he truly considers responsible for this attack. Being from the clan he is, he likely does not appreciate being prey.
"Eventually their time will run out, living in the shadows is never possible inevitably," Aoitsuki stated simply, she began to finish up on sealing his wounds, perhaps giving him better leverage to heal in the long run. "I believe that should do for now.. I recommend removing those bandages, the cold weather will only get you stick, unfortunately I don't have traditional means of healing others," She bowed her head slightly and finally began to rise to a stand. " We will be on the look out for this…Recluse, you should at least feel safe when security is at it's highest…" There was a hint of disappointment within Aoi's voice, even if it wasn't necessarily Kirigakure's fault. " If you come across any more information, you can find us at the administration building,"
Taiki reaches up and starts to remove the bandages from his eyes as his partners settle down. "Cool weather does not bother me anymore than it would bother them," Taiki says as he gets the binding loose and slowly removes the gauze holding the pads over his eyes in place. When he finally gets the bandage off, he slowly opens his eyes, actually seeing the woman that had been talking to him and helping him. "Thank you Shirayuki-sama. If I do find out anything more, I will contact you. In the meantime, my genin are supposed to meet me at my hotel suite, so I suppose I should go back." He stands himself, uncertainly but with less pain, and bows at his waist. "If you have any other questions for me, I'm sure the registration office knows where I'm at."
