Hikaru spotted Hiromasa, curling up even tighter, he sat there, listening to his friend, he guessed Hiro was right, it was part of their Shinobi lives to protect villagers and even travelers at any cost, it was the only way after all, With that, Hikaru looked up to see Hiro's hand, and he gripped onto it immediately, using it to pull himself up, "I guess you're right...thanks...", he muttered.

"One last thing", he announced to Hiro shuffling over to Dai's corpse, he quickly dug a hole in the ground and shoved it in, it wasn't much, but it was good enough, "This man deserved a better life, I could tell in his last moments...", Hikaru mumbled, looking at the grave.

With that, Hikaru began lifting his second lightning rod, quite weak from his battle, he was at about half his normal chakra levels so his strength had gone down, "A little help Hiro?", he asked, grinning in an embarrassed way...

Skye looked over at Sanosuke to see how he was holding up. He immediately noticed the injury on his friend's leg. As much as he wanted to rush over and help, he knew that he had to deal with this other guy first. Sano mentioned the name "Baki", but it didn't really help much. The best he could do was guess. "I'm guessing the one I tackled was Baki..." Skye took a few moments to prepare himself. He had to go from one fight to the next, so it was only reasonable to switch his planning and tactics. "I'm guessing there's a group of you guys... and all you want is like... 100 ryo? Because that other guy didn't think before he tried to stab me..." It was somewhat obvious at that point that Skye had already dealt with one of them.

"Other guy...?" Baki took a few seconds to think about who Skye was talking about. "Ba! Tank, this guy fought Ba!" It seemed like he was somewhat surprised that Skye had beaten Ba. "I... I guess I have to fight you now... but I really don't want to... I just want the 100 ryo." By the tone of the man's voice, he sounded pretty sincere. Unfortunately, it didn't stop Skye from wanting to fight him. As far as it concerned him, Baki needed to face justice. To make things worse, Skye still knew that his friend was hurt. And he was positive that he wouldn't be able to help Sano if Baki was still up.

"Listen... I think you and your friend over there should just walk away from this whole situation... Not doing so will probably result in me doing to you what I did to this "Ba" guy." Skye held his chain scythes up and adjusted his stance. This fight wouldn't be as quick as the last. Mainly because the previous guy tried to rush in without thinking things through.

The burning in his leg was excruciating as Sanosuke ran at Tank with his sword held high, Tank was glaring at Sanosuke with every intent to run him through. Tank made a swipe to Sanosuke's busted leg, but this time he was prepare for the slash. Instead of the rusty katana meeting the tender flesh of Sanosuke's already wounded leg, it encountered the clash of Sanosuke's own sword. The amount of strength Tank put into the slash was at novice levels, just as Sanosuke predicted, and wouldn't have the chance of breaking the experiecne of the sword Sanosuke had.

When Sanosuke took another step towards Tank to get under his guard, the pain in his leg traveled from his left leg to his throat in an attempt to choke the breath out of him. Sanosuke swallowed the yelp that was about to come out of his throat and replaced it with a growl of anger. His anger was even showed in the symbol of the Akumasureiya clan in his left pupil. It was as though it pulsed with anger and for blood. Tank saw the look in Sanosuke's eyes and began to lose his mental resolve of fighting, Sanosuke could see it. He was going to expose this fake leader of his ways by showing him exactly what true strength was.

With a roar Sanosuke channeled that chakra that was in his sword to a fine point to strength the slashing potential of his blade and visciously slashed at Tank's rusty katana. The power of his kekkai genkai empowered his slash making it more powerful than it normally would have beem. "RUPTURE!" Sanosuke bellowed at the slash he made. The poor, overally used katana didn't stand a chance as the bladed end of his katana went spiraling off into the distance for it to be skidding away from its owner.

Tank's face turned pale as he looked down at the broken end of his sword, and then at Sanosuke who was no longer sporting the symbol of his clan's kekkai genkai. Beads of sweat could be seen breaking out of Tank's skin as Sanosuke looked at him with contained fury in his eyes. Sanosuke leveled the blade to Tank's neck as he heaved with each breath he took. The tip of Sanosuke's blade was resting just and inch away from Tank's neck, in the perfect position to get stabbed in. "W-what are you going to do with me?" Tank managed to get out.

Spoiler:

Helping Hikaru put up his second rod. "Looks like just about everything is good to go here. Suppose we should go see what's going on with Sano and Skye." Walking with Hikaru towards Sanosuke's designated area, Hiro saw Sano holding a blade at yet another thug and Skye had one of his own, the pair facing off with each other. Still, intervention on his own part seemed unnecessary.

"Well, you guys seem like you're doing alright so far, and the rods are up, so I think I'll take a nap here. Wake me up when you guys are done and we'll go get paid and get that leg to a doctor, Sano." With that he flopped on the ground and closed his eyes for a bit, the lightning strikes providing the perfect background noise.

Hikaru followed Hiro silently, giving a sort of giggle and slumping down next to Hiro, he was so tired, and he let his merciless thoughts fade away into his happy little dream world...

Baki looked over at Tank, who was already bested by Sanosuke. He glanced down at his hammer, but shook his head to stop any thought of rebelling against Skye. With Tank pretty much done, he lost all will to fight. Though he never really had the will to begin with. Without a word, he put his hands up to show that he was giving up.

Skye sighed in relief. He didn't really like the risk of getting an injury. Especially an injury like the one he got during the Chuunin exams. That particular one landed him in the hospital and left him hurting for a few days. It wasn't really a surprise that Baki wanted to quit. In fact, it was possibly the best thing to happen at the moment. Skye wouldn't let his guard down though. For all he could tell, Baki could have been faking it to attack him at the very moment he was open. Yelling out loud, he started to try and communicate with his ally. A simple question though, not anything too big. "Hey Sano, you alright over there?"

Tank looked at Sanosuke with fearful eyes as his blade was aimed at his neck. In this position, Sanosuke could kill the thug leader in many different ways; slit his neck, stab him, decapitation, gouging of his eyes. The place where Sanosuke's sword was in had many possibilities of a gruesome death for Tank; they were all the numerous ways an executioner could kill a villain. It wasn't as though Sanosuke thought about killing Tank; the man was a threat to the mission, he threatened the mission, he led thugs to try and kill his teammates, and from what it looked liked he tried to force a toll tax on all travelers coming to Kumo. Any normal ninja would easily kill Tank right then in there. Sanosuke didn't have a doubt in his mind that each of his teammates each took their first life; Hikaru himself was shaking from taking his first life and if Sanosuke hadn't ordered Skye not to kill Baki he would've done it without a doubt.

But Sanosuke was no executioner and he knew it. Sanosuke rose his blade from Tank's neck and swung his sword at Tank making sure the flat side of his sword his Tank accross the face with the impact of a good punch. Tank barely had enough time to prepare for the swing of the blade before it struck him. The thug leader was sent spiraling to the ground unconscious. As he laid there, Sanosuke looked at him in disgust how the hell can a guy like you have people ready to die for you? he asked himself before turning his attention to Skye. "Yeah I'm fine, it looks like we're finished here. With the ruckus we made, village reinforcement should be coming to see what's going on" Sanosuke said while making his way to the unconscious Tank. He got out handcuffs and handcuffed the leader.

Once he was done, Sanosuke struggled to walk towards Baki. The big guy looked at Sanosuke with those same sad eyes of his. If times were different, he could see Baki being a an outstanding Kumo shinobi. "I guess I should thank you for sparing my life" Sanosuke said as he handcuffed Baki. Baki smiled as he looked at the ground. He didn't move a muscle or supply any form of resistance even though he could easily out muscle Sanosuke, especially while Sanosuke was in such a weak state.

"No it should be us who should be thanking you for sparing us. I know you could have easily killed us with each of those swings from your sword" Baki said before sitting next to his unconscious leader. "You're not like many shinobi who take lives needlessly, I like that. Maybe one day I can repay your kindness."

There were no words to describe the feelings Sanosuke was experiencing from Baki's kind and gentle words. There was much to this man than he let on, what made him chose the life of a bandit he knew it was for his family. If he did it with a more noble cause then maybe it wouldn't have ended this way. Sanosuke leaned on Hiromasa's shoulder for support, his leg was still busted and he was in no shape to walk. "I'll hold you to your promise you know. So behave yourself and I'll ask the Raikage to send assistance to your family's situation." Sanosuke noted before his whole team left. What he nor the rest of Sanosuke could see were the tears that were shedding from Baki's face.

Baki made a bow with his handcuffed hands as low as he could manage"Thank you, Sanosuke-sama!" he bellowed to the top of his voice.
-end-