Supply Depot Destruction Part 2 (Group Mission w/ Ami Hyuuga)

Senkou simply nodded as Ami rejected his offer. Perhaps he came off as a little too obsessive for these details, a side effect of his continued research in these particular matters. Senkou accepted the map and stashed it back into his manila envelope. It was time to go to the site and survey the scene in person.

As they left the Administration sector, through the streets of Gekkousato, out the gates, and onto the road, Senkou figured it was time to indulge in Ami’s curiosity about him. The types of questions that people asked were usually pretty good indicators of the type of impression that they had of Senkou when they first met him.

He turned his masked face to her, his eyes hidden behind the sunglasses that were built into the eyeholes of the mask, “What would you like to know about me? Clearly there is something on your mind. In exchange I would like you to answer a question of mine.”

The morning started to giveaway to early afternoon and with it came an increase in heat and humidity under the jungle canopy. Monsoon season was still some time away so they didn’t have to worry about a sudden storm raising the water levels of the river or just making the journey miserably wet, so Senkou was content with taking their time to the supply depot site.

The bandits wouldn’t move or abandon the site just yet it had only been built a week ago. Intelligence services were on the ball, at least within the main territory of Gekkousato. Thinking on that, perhaps that is the next ambition for young Senkou, establish a more secure and robust intelligence operation with a focus on the smaller territories. Something to think about. Speaking of future plans, Senkou wondered exactly what Ami Hyuuga had planned for herself. How far does she plan on reaching for? The possibilities started to itch that part of Senkou’s brain that wanted to know everything.


1409/1600

WC: 1600+

Why the mask? Out of all the questions, nothing about who he was, where he came, nope. Why the mask? Senkou paused a few steps out of the gate, his face tilted as he put some thought into it.

“A mask represents something beyond the self. An ideal, an organization. The object is to hide yourself so that what it represents shows through. For some what represents is their cowardice or evil nature, for others it represents their loyalty to their village. For me, it is blank because it has nothing to represent at the moment.

I hope that answers your question satisfactorily. Mine is this, there are whispers about a shinobi that has escaped and gone rogue from our village and you were there for the incident. Who are they?”

Senkou held fast to his rule about one question in return for the one asked of him. He did want to ask why that person left, but he did not want to press the issue at this time. These topics required a circular way of arriving at the point. Establishing a name was always the first step. It was a way to solidify the existence of an incident, hard to ignore or deflect when a proper noun has already been said. It niggles at the back of the mind, like a worm that eats away at one’s sanity. Some people do completely shut down when confronted with this, but that simply accelerated the feelings that they were trying to avoid.

After asking his question, Senkou would continue walking, catching up to Ami and continuing towards their destination. She could answer at any time, he would not hound her for the answer. Patience would be required for this step and the steps beyond. The end product would take a very methodical approach to produce it, but that is what Senkou was extremely talented at.

1600+/1600

WC: 1600+

A Kaguya member. Senkou nodded to himself and began composing the next part of his investigation. A community stays secure and prospers through trust in the members of their community, when someone leaves that community of their own accord intending to cut all ties with the members within their community, that damages the community as a whole. Trust turns into distrust eroding any progress that was made. Senkou knew the importance of ties to the community from his own clan and by extension through his time at the academy Gekkousato was now part of his community ties. He would deal with this matter, thoroughly.

Their travel would take them further into the jungle and finally into the Sobek River Basin. Throughout this journey, Senkou did not speak another word about his question early in their travels. If Ami felt the need to speak then she was free to do so. The sun was setting over the river as they had finally arrived and it was then that Senkou decided to speak.

“We still have a distance to go to the hideout itself, but now we can decide which direction we want to approach it.”

He took out the map and a marker, circling their location and numbering the distance in meters from the already circled hideout location.

“Do we want to start from the back tangentially to the river or one of the sides. Either way we decide we leave the front to last. They will have one or two lookouts already set up. One no doubt looks up and down the river, the other would try to survey as much of the jungle as possible. We can ignore the river lookout, but avoiding the jungle one either by killing him without their notice or through stealth is paramount. Through your experiences out here in the basin before, what are your opinions on where the jungle lookout would be located?”

WC: 1600+

As Ami shared her opinion on the placement of the jungle lookout and pointed to the cluster of trees, Senkou made two dots, one where they were currently located the indicated spot on the map. From there he began analyzing the terrain difference, the distance, and possible line of sight that the lookout would have. As the analysis went through Senkou’s brain, lines calculating angle of vision would appear around the lookout dot. The analysis finished with a squiggly-arcing line that eventually ended up in an unmarked section between the vision angle indicators.

He showed the finished product to Ami, tracing the line with a finger, “This is our path based on your indication. Now this is not perfect as we are not a hundred percent sure where he is and what altitude he is at, but it gives us the best shot of reaching him without being seen. We stay low, using the trees and brush to mask ourselves as much as possible. We will make irregular stops behind full cover to break up the pattern of our movement, so that the noise created if heard seems as random as possible.”

Senkou moved his hands into his cloak and secured his equipment for the stealth portion of the plan, his hands came back out with the right one holding one of his karambits.

“Of course I can lead the way. Follow me.”

And with that, Senkou took off into the jungle at a jog following the line he had memorized from the map. He kept himself bent low, stopping behind a tree now and then to interrupt his movement and to make sure that Ami would be following him at a similar pattern and pace. As they got closer, Senkou was able to identify the exact location of the lookout. The bandit was a few meters off the dot and hanging out underneath a tree with a lit cigarette in his mouth. Senkou motioned for Ami to remain still where she was. He went to a crouch and circled around the lookout so he was behind the target. The lookout went to move the cigarette from his mouth to puff out some smoke and it was during that exhalation of breath that Senkou made his move. Lightning fast his left hand wrapped around the mouth as the right hand circled to the throat, pushing the chin down, Senkou drew the blade across the throat and dragged the lookout into the jungle putting him face down to bleed out into the soil and muffling any potential sounds.

Whispering across to Ami, “Alright, since we are flushing them out to the river bank, we don’t have to worry about the river lookout. If you would like to make a move now, I’ll cover your approach.”

WC: 1600+

Looks like we are already at the explosive stage of the operation. Senkou broke out of his hiding spot, twirling his karambit that were tied to wire entered into the depot proper. The supply depot was built out of wreckage of boats that the bandits had pirated and whatever jungle wood that they could reasonably get their hands on. The ramshackle structure sat on the edge of the jungle and the beach, Senkou had a brief moment to notice some of the bandits were at the water’s edge pushing a rowboat in loaded with packages, their heads shot up and turned towards the sound of the explosion from the lookout post.

The light flashing from the sun on the river would catch the reflective lining of his cloak and be directed back into the eyes of the bandits who had all turned to look at him. Not one to waste an opportunity, Senkou swung his karambits at different altitudes, but just similar enough to catch the unprotected throats of the bandits who covered their eyes to escape. Bright red blood sparkled in the sunset and Senkou turned to face the entrance to the depot, his blades a whirl. There were about ten bandits wielding assorted weapons, swords, knives, staffs, and sickles. A motley collection of weaponry for a motley collection of people.

The bandits charged at Senkou, a few were taken out by the flying blades before they got close. The remainder that managed to get within close range were meant with a ferocious bladed dance that swept from high to low, a flicker of light here and there from the cloak caused lethal pauses in their attack and those opportunities allowed Senkou to finish up the fight. Cut hamstrings, diced arm ligaments, eviscerated throats, a few eyeballs scattered about the beach, the blood staining the sand and the once white exterior of Senkou’s cloak. He stepped over the bodies, some who were still alive but bleeding out. Hopefully Ami would be finished with setting up the destruction of the depot though he was kind of curious about what exactly these bandits were hoarding.

WC: 1600+

Senkou blinked rapidly a couple of times behind his mask as the depot he was looking at went up in fire and smoke. The shockwave rolled past him, he leaned into it, the tail of cloak flapping against the wind generated by it. Little backwards waves form in the river. Well that certainly answered his question about whether Ami had finished with the explosives. Senkou looked around and found his partner swimming back to shore towards him.

From the fragments from the destroyed depot, it looked like the bandits were storing weapons here. Which meant that they were looking on having more people come by here or would need to resupply due to an uptick in aggressive behavior on their part. Well that problem was for another time. As Ami came out of the water, he nodded in recognition and a light golf clap for the job well done.

“It seems we are done here, though I am curious about how they ended up with such an arsenal and what did they intend on using it for. I’ll write up the report and send it to headquarters when we get back. If you are interested in working together again, here’s my address.”

Senkou held out a folded piece of paper with his apartment number and street address.

“I’m always up for a mission. Keeps me from being stuck inside with my research for unhealthy amounts of time.”

He made his way off the beach, a pitter patter of blood formed a trail from the hem of his cloak as Senkou entered into the jungle and began to make his way back to Gekkousato.