Finally the main reason he had come to Suna was now close at hand. He had hid the reason from others and even protected the secret as if he was really hiding something. In reality he didn’t completely know why he was drawn to the desolate village out in the sand dunes. His lack of sleeping lately bringing revelations to light in the form of nightmares and visions. Along with the dream of him killing his friends while being unable to stop himself. In his dreams he was tied to a cross in the middle of the desert and was set on fire as he watched a man in the shadows kill his friends. Just before he burned alive he would discover that the man in the shadows was himself. He had no idea what this meant but the desert lingered in his mind and he had been drawn to it all the way from Taki. Now he just needed to figure out why he was out in the middle of nowhere in the hot desert heat. Dunes larger than himself stood in front of him and he felt like going over them would kill him within time. He was still unused to the desert and he hated the way whenever he had to walk up a dune it took forever because of the sand sliding backward. It was a world where one step forward was really two steps back. One he was over the dune though walking became a breeze.

He had been in Suna and around Suna a few days now and was slowly getting used to the heat though it still had its moments. The sand being blasted in his face was the more annoying part though he realized this was the wind country for a reason. It was still a radically different change from what he was used to back in Kiri. It reminded him of his past lover from Suna and how she was always kind of cold in Kiri and he could now understand why. Having grown up in the sand and been used to the heat and moving to somewhere wet and damp would feel extremely different and it was. Both environments had a tendency to be harsh in one way or another but at list in Kiri there was water to keep you alive unlike the desert. As he continued to walk and somewhat slide down yet another sand dune he could tell in the distance that this would keep going on for a lot longer than he had expected. There were very few trees and shade and no places to get water but luckily he had a decent sized canteen for when he got thirsty. He didn’t even truly know what he was looking for except he expected he would know when he discovered it. He was looking for some sign to validate his dreams or learn the reason why he was so drawn to this barren wasteland of a place.

A few more minutes of walking he stopped and pulled out his canteen to take in some of the water he brought with him. It was then that his ear twitched slightly. He had heard something, something different from what he had been used to during his entire trek through the desert. He put the canteen away slowly after only having taken a mouthful. Whatever had made the noise had stopped and the sound that he had heard sounded like someone walking behind him or following him. He turned around slowly looking for any signs someone was following him. He didn’t see anything and he no longer heard anything. He kneeled down slowly to touch his finger to the ground and sense the area around him but there was no need. Whoever was following him recognized the sensing jutsu he was about to use and made themselves known by sprinting behind Dameon a good ten feet away. He turned around and there was a man in a robe his face hidden by shadows. His robe was the color of the sand a good camouflage that allowed him to move freely in the desert without attracting much attention. Something was different though, it was no ordinary man. The man just stood there and did nothing. Why follow him all the way out here if he was going to just stand there and do nothing. A slight grin appeared on Dameon’s face. He finally had realized who exactly was standing in front of him. Zeta.

“Hello again Dameon. What brings you to this god forsaken place?” Zeta asked his face becoming visible as he adjusted his line of sight and let the sun catch it. He looked the same age and completely unchanged from every other time he had seen him. He was being just as mysterious as always. His arms and hands folded into the robe to not expose much skin to the ruthlessness of the sun above.

“Hello Zeta. My nightmares have lead me here,” Dameon answered dropping his guard now knowing that Zeta was a friend not and enemy. He had not seen him around in a while; the last time was when he had nearly died to Seven Bells. While in a coma Zeta had appeared to him somehow and helped him through it and brought him back to the world of the living with only a short time to go before he had died.

“Ah yes. The dreams where you die bound and burned while you are forced to watch your loved ones die at your own hands. Only you would come to a place where you are supposed to die Dameon. You truly are unique. Most people would have avoided the desert like the plague after having the vivid dreams you have been having lately,” Zeta said in his usual emotionless tone. The way he talked made him seem very wise and you knew he was the moment the words flowed from his mouth.

“How do you know about my nightmares?” Dameon asked with a puzzling look on his face, curious now as to how the man could see his nightmares and even show up as an intelligent life form while he was in a coma. It was a question he had been meaning to ask ever since the incident and now he finally had.

“There is a great deal that I know young Shikyo. I know everything about your life. Every little detail, I could tell you things about yourself that you didn’t even know. I am in your blood and I am in your mind and always will be to help guide you,” Zeta said lowering the hood of his robe revealing the rest of his head. With his gray hair falling down to each side of his face.

“You are an illusion? A figment of my imagination?” Dameon asked trying to comprehend what exactly he was being told by the very person who had founded his clan centuries ago.

“I am more like a spiritual guide. It is true that I do not exist on the physical plane but I am very much here on an intelligent level. I know you grow curious about your life as a boy. Why you were banished from your village. Why your parents didn’t help you. You wonder what is going on with them today. If they still think about you or care about you. The only thing I can say is that you should try and visit as soon as possible,” Zeta said explaining himself before turning around to walk away.

“Wait, you wouldn’t happen to know why I am being drawn here would you?” Dameon asked taking a step forward.

“Other than speaking to me? I suppose it would have something to do with what is on the other side of this dune. Until next time Dameon,” Zeta said before vanishing as he walked away like a mirage.

His curiosity had now gotten the better of him. What exactly was on the other side of the dune? He ran up the dune as quickly as he could and could see something lying in the sand. He ran down the dune sliding with every step that would almost cause him to lose his balance. It was a person lying face down in the sand and had been covered up so that he was almost completely invisible in the sand. The blowing wind must have made the fabric of his shirt visible. He pulled the body out knowing fully well that the man was dead. The attire was almost completely sand blaster off of him but a scroll was still in the dead shinobi’s pouch. He pulled it out and carefully broke the seal and unrolled the paper. It was blank. Dameon knew something was off about it. Being ANBU he knew a few ways to hide messages not meant for other people’s eyes. Here was not the time to do such a thing though. With a sandstorm coming in he turned around to race back to the village of Suna and to the hotel he was staying at to try and figure out the mystery. He had arrived back just before nightfall and made his way through the gates and toward his hotel the scroll in his pouch as he raced through the crowd of people to get to the hotel. Rather than continue his journey to the hotel he found it curious why it was so busy. He had almost overlooked the fact that nearly everyone in the village was outside and staring at something. He turned around and saw that there was something posted on the public board. It was a picture and of the same man he had just discovered in the desert. Above the picture it said “Wanted” and below there was a reward listed for a very high amount of ryo. He almost regretted not bringing him back to the village but the real prize he hoped he was holding onto already.

1,671WC
Perception: A-2 to A-3: 1,625
46wc left over.

Dameon continued to look at the wanted poster. The person who was offering a reward for his return was not listed and instead was indicated that it was from a private person unaffiliated with Suna. This made things more curious to him. He looked down toward his pouch where the scroll he had taken was. If his curiosity was going to be satisfied he needed to learn what was on the scroll. He turned and left the crowded area of the village he had just come from and raced toward the hotel he was staying at. The scroll was protected by a courier and that was taking back roads way off the beaten path and it was supposedly a blank scroll. He knew from his training that the scroll would not simply be blank or there would be no reason to try and keep such secrecy or to post a reward for locating the body of the missing courier. He would walk at an accelerated rate, weaving in and out of the crowds until he could finally see his hotel in the distance. He walked in pushing the door open and quickly ran up the stairs and located his room. He took out the metal key and turned it into the door until a clock could be heard. He then turned the handle and walked it. It was a large room like a suite and offered its own kitchen, living room, and bedroom area and from the balcony one could overlook the village.

He walked past all of it until he found the desk in the corner of the living room with a candle stick and brought it closer before he began to search the desk for a match. He found a packet of matches and lit one and brought the flame to the candle lighting it. He waved his hand putting the fire out, the smoke trailing up from where the fire once was. He took the scroll out of his pouch and unrolled it. He raised the parchment to his nose and sniffed it. It definitely had some form of ink on it and he knew exactly what kind it was. He brought the scroll closer to the fire so the heat could run along the paper of the scroll. A few seconds later words began to appear slowly on the scroll. He would make sure the entire parchment received enough heat so that he could read it. After about a minute or so the black ink stood out clearly like it was never hidden to begin with. The words on the scroll were limited however. It told of a story that seemed irrelevant. From what he could tell it was another security measure like a skip code. He looked at the story more finding bits of words and finally seeing the pattern of the number of words that needed to be skipped after each relevant word. Separately Dameon wrote the words down on another piece of paper.

After a couple minutes the message became clear as the code stopped and the small instructions appeared on the paper he was writing on. It read ‘The blood of a clansman can read the message within’. It would be difficult, the scroll was apparently sealed an encoded only for someone of an intended clan to open. So why was he supposed to find this thing is the middle of a desert miles and miles away from his own village. It made no sense what so ever, unless. He reached into his holster and pulled out a kunai and placed the scroll down onto the desk. He would move the sharp blade across the bottom part of his palm just underneath his thumb. Blood would flow out and drip down onto the scroll. The scroll itself would use the blood soaking it in and using the droplets to create an entirely different message. More blood would continue to flow onto the page. Apparently whoever this was intended to go to it was meant to go to a member of his clan somewhere. He didn’t know of anyone else in his clan other than in the small village he had been raised in. Things were getting interesting now. This meant that one Shikyo or perhaps an entirely different group of Shikyo were communicating back and forth with one another or this was their first message. He waited patiently for the rest of the message on the scroll to fill out and once it did he wrapped his hand up and picked up the parchment once more.

‘We have been watching Lightning, he has left his village in the south and is now in the sand. We are tracking him now and it seems as if he intends on finding the shrine. Do not let him reach it under any circumstances. Take him out as he travels. He is strong though so do not take him lightly. If Zeta is appearing to him like we assume than he might be the strongest of us, but that does not mean we can’t beat him with numbers. Stay close to his family as well in case he tries to make contact with them. Another scroll will be sent after the first one by air to make sure you are given this information, just in case. Good luck.-Fire’

Dameon set the scroll down and reread it again and again. His own clan was keeping tabs on him and even plotting against him. People he had never met from different factions of elements. This was bad. The temple also popped into his mind, it meant that they knew about his vision of the temple and even might know where it was located. So many different things were going through his mind right now that he couldn’t focus straight. They knew about Zeta and how he kept appearing to him? How long had they been watching him? A second scroll had been sent which meant the recipient had no received that scroll and that was why the missing person paper had been posted. This was bad and things were about to get much worse.

1,026wc
1,072WC total
Endurance E to D: 939wc
133WC remaining

It seemed as if he wouldn’t have a whole lot of time to think about the situation he had been thrown into. After all he had a potential student now which meant her safety was top priority and it was also his duty to report this information to the Mizukage as it did pose a potential threat to the village if they could not locate or kill him right away. He would sit there and continue to ponder as he stretched and laid down across his bed and looked up at the ceiling. Things were slowly becoming chaotic, just like back then. Just like it had been during the war. An uneasiness feeling build in his stomach as he rolled onto his side and looked out the window to the barren wastes of the sand village. Would he be able to be just as reliable as last time? His mind set and mentality were completely different these days, before he had no reason to live so he just waited to die a warrior’s death, one that obviously never came. Now he had responsibilities and things to protect. Whether he was protecting the village or a student he wondered if that would be a strong enough motivator for him when it came to crunch time. He sighed and closed his eyes and began to focus on his breathing hoping to doze off and get a quick nap in to process all the information and make a clear decision on what to do next.

He would dream during his nap. Dreams were actually a very rare occurrence for him; he usually slept so lightly that he never had the chance to dream. He would always end up waking up from the littlest things and have to force himself to go back to bed. Now though he began to dream of a time during the war. A time he had never truly gotten over and would still haunt him in the back of his mind. It was during the final days of Seven Bells attacks where the city was war torn from crumbled building to fire blazing around the entire village. Dead and inactive puppets laid about everywhere but they were not the issue. The issue was the mercenaries the thousands of mercenaries Seven Bells had managed to persuade or pay to fight one of the strongest nations in the shinobi world. The mentality needed to do that was, less than admirable. Almost every enemy he would come across had a blood lust unsatisfied during the entire length of the war. They were reckless and did not care if they had died so long as they took someone out with them. It was a manner of fighting unfamiliar to almost everyone in the village, everyone but him. He was reckless and only a special jounin at the time but he also had the highest success on missions. The reason was because he could relate and understand their fighting methods. They would not surrender or quite they would rather die. Death before dishonor. It was because he knew that he never underestimated them, never tried to reason with them and never tried to take anyone captive.

There he was though, in the middle of the main street alone staring down a good ten enemies who would not run or give in to reason. Death would be enough reason, death was logical. He had already been fighting countless hours and his body was reaching its limit of what it could handle. He tried not to show how much his breathing had picked up as he struggled to even stand. There though, they could relate and understand one another. He would recall how they talked, how they applauded him for taking down so many of their allies and for doing it with so little rest. They would end their talking however by drawing their blades and letting Dameon know this was his end. Part of him had believed it too. After all, how could he fight all ten of these guys when he could barely stand. He would sigh as the enemy charged at him. He would raise his kunai prepared to make this as challenging for them as he possibly could. If he was to die then so be it but he would not die on their terms, he would die on his own. The first enemy blade he would dodge and lunge forward ramming his kunai in the jugular of his enemy. Blood would spray out as he removed the blade.

The enemy didn’t care whether or not Dameon had just dispatched someone from their ranks if anything they ended up using it to their advantage. After having killed the man in front of him he was met with the slash of a blade across his back. His armor defending him some but still cutting through enough to leave a bloody cut. He yelled in pain though briefly as adrenaline coursed through his body pushing him into his fight response. A yell escaped his lips as he turned around and lunged at the man who had slashes his back. The man went to block the kunai but Dameon had other plans. Instead of cutting him right away. He stopped and brought his knee up into the man’s gut and grabbed his hands and thrust the enemies own blade into his chest and let him fall to the ground. Eight to go still and like before someone had taken this opportunity to attack him while he took the life from one of their colleagues. He felt the blade of a kunai stab into the back of his shoulder blade. This time he did not yell he just pulled it out as he fell to the ground exhausted. He knew he needed to keep going his life depended on it. The enemy was getting ready to speak, one of them was already telling him how fruitless his efforts at survival would be and that he should just surrender.

Rather than letting him finish his sentence he tossed the kunai into the man’s eye as he fell to the floor. At least that time he wouldn’t be attacked again in response. He was low on chakra as well or else he had a wide variety of jutsu he could just use to end this quicker. He had to be careful because if he used any of them for too long he could just as easily die from running out of chakra. None the less he needed to gain the upper hand somehow, he needed some sort of advantage or he would not last much longer. He reached into his pouch and tossed a smoke bomb on the floor. He hoped it would be an equalizer to the situation. He could easily navigate through low visibility even without his jutsu. He just hoped they weren’t as good as he was. He could hear the enemy yell in frustration, calling him a coward for running. He was not running though. He quickly found his way behind an enemy and stomped on the back of his knee forcing him to lean backward in a sense of loss of control. He wrapped his arms around the man’s head using his forearm to cover the man’s mouth as he twisted just enough to snap the man’s neck. Six more to go, it was all that kept appearing in his mind, counting down until this madness was over. He worked his way through the smoke to locate another one.

He would eventually find another one and perform the same technique to make his lean backwards but this time he would cover the man’s mouth and stab a kunai into his jugular. He would take the kunai out and throw it ahead of him to a silhouette of a man. The kunai would hit him in the head and brief arbitrary grunt would come out of the man’s lips before he died. It was enough to know that Dameon had not run however. Four left. The smoke was beginning to clear and the enemy shinobi were assisting the smoke away. When the smoke cleared he could see the four remaining shinobi gathered together each of them with their katanas drawn to a civilians throat. How? How did they have enough time to gather civilians as hostages. They must have acted like they couldn’t navigate the smoke in an effort to get some sort of advantage. Even at the cost of a few more of their men’s lives. This situation just went from extremely bad to impossible. He didn’t know what to do one part of him wanted to rush them the cost of four civilians outweighing the lives of potentially much more. He didn’t care if he lived or died so they grabbed someone whose life was not his own. He swore and tossed his kunai onto the ground knowing he had more anyways if he needed them. Dameon cursed them for being cowards.

He didn’t see a lot of options they would kill the hostages anyways given enough time. So he had to risk it and hope to kill all 4 with 4 different kunai before they had time to cut the civilians throats. This was an impossible situation the likes of which he had not seen before. It was not his own life in the balance and that was the problem. He realized now that half of him didn’t care if the civilians lived or died as long as he killed the enemy the realization of this made him sick to his stomach. He realized now that the war had indeed changed him into a brutal killing machine with no need for emotions only logic and results. Right now though he didn’t have a choice he needed to try and save them even regardless of his own feelings. He just hoped none of them would die as a direct result of his actions. He sighed and let his body go slack to show he would not fight back to the enemy. Hopefully give them a false sense of security or at least that is what he had hoped would happen. He looked at the civilians knowing that if he failed this he would regret it for the rest of his life. Even if there was no other way to save them he would regret that he couldn’t have saved them. He raised his hands up as a sign of surrendering to the enemy.

He bit his lip doubt spreading like wildfire into his mind of whether or not he could do this and whether or not he should. His mind had been made up. His hands moved quickly to his pouch and pulled out four kunai and tossed them all accurately at the enemy. He could see the path of his kunai going straight for their heads. Still there was little reaction on the enemy faces. A moment later one reacted knowing what was going on. He moved his head enough and the kunai just grazed by his face. The other kunai’s would hit their marks. This last enemy composed himself after dodging the kunai and dragged the blade of his sword across his hostage’s neck, blood squirting out as the civilian crumbled to the ground. Dameon stared his body paralyzed that he had just killed a hostage by not being strong enough to kill the enemy. The enemy laughed outstretching his arms and laughing to the sky like a wild animal. Dameon fell to his knees as the other civilians ran away while the enemy cared little about them anymore. A blow had been dealt to Dameon a blow so strong it would hurt him mentally for years to come. He felt sick like he was going to throw up as he stared at the ground not wanting to move an inch and his mental shield shattered by himself and his failure. When the civilians of the village needed him he had failed.

The enemy approached closer to him and he didn’t care he didn’t know what to feel. He felt angry but he also felt sad and hopeless. The enemy stopped in front of him taunting him as he smeared the blood of the civilian across Dameon’s hands. The enemy got a huge chuckle out of it as well as he laughed again in the most sinister of ways. Dameon gritted his teeth staring at the blood on his hands he had caused. His teeth grinded more, grinding slowly as he let loose his building rage and tackled the enemy. He would punch the enemy in the face and draw out his kunai and stab the man but he would not just stop there. His rage taking control he would continue to stab the man for several minutes before his rage would finally subside and he would drop the kunai to the ground and stand up. He had lost it much like he had as a genin. He though he had finally gotten all of the blood lust and rage under control but the enemy had managed to awaken it again. Yet he had no further strength left. His mind went blank as he fell backwards onto the dirt. He would look at the sky unable to move cursing and swearing at himself for not being stronger as tears built up in his eyes and he tried hard to forget but more tears and more pain would follow his failure.

Dameon would wake up from his nap back in the hotel room in Suna. That dream always haunting him and reminding him of the past. He was sweating and not just from the heat either. He swung his feet over the side of the bed and looked down at the floor after his boots touched the warm wood. The sun was bright and hot as it always was in the village. He shook his head of all the grogginess and even smacked his cheek to help wake himself up. He hated feeling vulnerable but sleep was necessary even at random times one in a while. He yawned and laid back down on the bed to stare at the ceiling. A good nap minus the post traumatic dream that continued to haunt him even a full year after the incident. He sighed feeling hopeless again; hopeless to the power that was his mind. He crossed his legs as he lay down and chewed on the bottom of his lip. He needed to refocus his mind reuse it for the mystery that was at hand and not about the past. His current situation with the other members of his clan that were even at this moment hunting for him. It puzzled him though there was so little attention devoted to finding him or at least that was the way it seemed. He started to think about if he was them, how would he try to locate an enemy in a city? Perhaps they already knew where he was. How would they know? Did they see him with the dead massager? Perhaps they killed the massager to locate him and follow him, but if that was the case why hadn’t they made their move yet?

Dameon launched himself back forward putting his feet back down on the ground and standing up reluctantly. He looked toward the bathroom with a yawn and caught a glare out of his right peripheral. He glanced and could see a kunai flying at him. He moved out of the way just in time as it sped through the window and implanted itself into the wall behind him. Several shinobi stood on the rooftop across and began throwing more kunai this time with explosive tags. Dameon sprinted and jumped into the bathroom as they also crashed through the window ending up in various parts of the room. The explosions would happen a moment or so later. Sending shrapnel and fire everywhere as the structure of the room collapsed the floor falling out from underneath. Dameon would fall with it in the bathtub using it as protection. The roof would also collapse on top of them leaving nothing but a large pile of destruction and rubble. The other shinobi would laugh from on top of their rooftop clapping hands and cheering that they had just killed a member of the seven swordsmen. Dameon laid there in the bathtub and pushed the wooden rubble up slowly, the bathtub once again protecting him.

There was too much rubble to push off of him and as it burned above him his oxygen was becoming less and less available. He grabbed his sword and aimed it upward and slashed his way out almost instantly. The shinobi that had attacked him stared in amazement as they saw the target that they thought they had killed rise from the pile of rubble and ashes. Dameon looked up at them his eyes locking onto the enemy shinobi. The enemy shinobi were already beginning to express signs of fear as their mouths opened and they stood there wide eyes and trembling. Dameon would flick his sword out to his right side and waste no more time. There were other people in that hotel they could have possible killed he needed to get them now. He dashed forward at his blinding speed and running up the side of the building till he appeared next to them before they were even ready for the possibility of him being there. They would try to defend but his sword would literally cut through their defenses with just a flick of his wrist. Their reactions to the cut would be slow as they crumbled to the ground dead or in the process of dying. He had no tolerance for people who put others’ lives at risk to complete a mission. He would kill them all to clarify that point and to make sure that these mercenaries would never put other people’s lives at risk ever again.

He would dodge their attacks with little effort and attack them back by cutting them down. The group of shinobi’s numbers would fall more and more as each second past and every cut with his blade was made. After a few more seconds the enemy was missing entirely all cut down in a bloody mess on top of the rooftop. He sighed as he looked in the distance and saw a cloaked person who quickly vanished faster than even he could trace. He ignored it for now but knew it was probably who was responsible for all of this. He looked down at the rubble of the hotel and hopped down back to the main street level. He would do what he could to help look for survivors but luckily only half of the hotel had collapsed as their hadn’t been enough explosives around the completely level the building. Still they were lucky that their hadn’t been more casualties. In fact there wasn’t any some had some good injuries but luckily nobody had died from the rogue mercenary effort and assassination attempt on his life. He looked out to the from of the town toward the reservoir hoping to find more solace and safety there than anywhere else in the city.  He looked back at the rubble and sighed wishing that people didn’t have to constantly be put in harms way for his sake. With that thought he left for the reservoir.

3,245wc

3.378wc total remaining

Endurance: C~B (3,219 Word Count)

159wc remaining