There was only a short bit left of their patrol to finish, but the entire time the two swapped ideas and made plans for how to conduct their private investigation. Another sleepless night sure would suck, but if they got back to camp before morning, nobody would be any wiser about their little escapade. “It’s not disobeying orders,” Ringo clarified as they met back up after swapping out of their Annitou uniforms and into nondescript work clothes. “All soldiers are allowed to pursue their own interests in their free time, such that it does not conflict with Annitou policies or laws. If the rest of the agents can go out getting drunk every evening after work, there’s certainly nothing wrong with us taking a walk around Camp Monog like any good civilian is free to do.”

“Yeah!” Hajime got a bit too excited and some hiding rats nearby scattered. “I mean, yeah.” He adjusted his volume as the two took the direct street to the edge of Camp Monog, heading towards the abandoned logging camp where the stranger had described seeing Gekko. “General Gou just said not to pursue the fugitives but we’re...you know, just checking it out! Learning experience and all that jazz! Totally legit. No doubt in my mind.”

His voice rose too high again and some dogs started barking in the distance. Ringo didn’t shush him, because even off duty a cadet shouldn’t publicly shame a superior officer. She did however shoot him a very unpleasant glare, prompting him to feel a little bit worse, but not enough to actually change his behavior. The night was still young! He needed to conserve his energy, especially given the lack of downtime both cadets shared. It would be a long day tomorrow but at least he could rest easy knowing he was making an attempt at finding their kidnapped comrade. Even if they got in trouble that felt like a worthy trade-off.

They arrived at the old logging camp right around the most ideal time of night, right as the moon sat high enough in the sky to shine just enough light that it wasn't completely necessary to use a lamp. They had brought one anyway though (“Always be prepared, Sir!”). An eerie stillness settled over the whole place, apart from the occasional distant rustling of wind or strange animal noise. The camp was fairly large but it wasn’t difficult to locate the battle site described by the stranger. Both Ringo and Hajime’s noses curled up as the scent of fresh blood wafted in the breeze.

“Ugh. This will be such a mess for the guys to clean up tomorrow.” Hajime had doused their lamp prior to arrival but still held his spear at the ready, and poked with it at one of the damaged dog corpses they came across. “I bet they’ll make us do it, actually. They made us clean up that bar brawl a few weeks ago with all that vomit and glass and...whatever that orange stuff was. Bleh.”

While Hajime concerned himself with more material concerns Ringo kept her face tight and unhappy. Something didn’t sit right with her. That was almost always the case anyway, but Hajime had learned the subtle nuances in Ringo’s eternal displeasure. This wasn’t disgust at a crime scene she was expressing. This was a ‘somebody isn’t following orders’ face. “What’s up, Ringo?” Hajime turned away from his prodding of the dead animal to see if he could tell what was making Ringo upset this time. “We got in pretty easy. No Annitou investigators in sight, even. They must have all gone home already.”

“That’s no good.” Ringo gripped at the baton on her hip. “That isn’t good at all. Annitou guardsmen are to remain on the crime scene until morning, to prevent any evidence tampering. Somebody should have been here standing watch.”

“Well, maybe they decided it wasn’t worth watching. Or maybe they already took all the evidence back to headquarters.” Hajime shifted his weight and glanced back with a creeping paranoia. “All we’ve come across are dead dogs. That’s hardly worth writing home about. Hell, is there even any evidence Gekko was here? Some damaged buildings and a bunch of strays hardly makes for a compelling case. They probably decided that hobo just made the whole thing up.”

Ringo looked back at Hajime in confusion. “What do you mean? Gekko was definitely here.”

Hajime let the statement float for a bit as he carefully decided what to say. “...sure, but just so we’re on the same page, how do you know that?”

“Those animals were clearly cut to pieces by an extremely sharp weapon.” Ringo looked up at the stars as she struggled to explain. The nuance of putting together a convincing argument was a bit lost on the girl, who much preferred the military method of ‘it’s true because I said so’ when it came to discussions. “There’s three pairs of bloody footsteps all over the place, and one of them is too small to belong to an adult. And it’s not like a normal soldier could have toppled that tower over...” She balled up one of her fists and pounded it into her palm. “Kiku-Ichimonji Junko must of had General Hashimoto Daisuke with her. It all lines up perfectly!”

“Yeah, okay, sure.” Hajime turned away and the pair continued walking through the scene, their steps getting more winding as they tried to avoid the mounting piles of gore. “I have some problems with that theory. There’s no burn marks anywhere-”

“It’s dark. We just can’t see it.”

“-and we don’t smell it either.”

“All the blood is masking the scent.”

“No way, man.” Hajime pinched his nostrils for emphasis. “Have you smelled burning dog hair? We’d totally know.”

“Okay, well.” Ringo’s lips curled as Hajime kept shooting her down. “General Daisuke has that Six-Eyes that cut a cannonball in half. It looks exactly like how all these animals died!”

“No, no.” Hajime wasn’t sure why he was being so dismissive of the theory, when they had both come out here to explicitly look for Gekko. It was just in his nature to be honest, and Ringo’s explanation just didn’t sit well with him. “This weapon was too small to be that...gun-thing. It would have obliterated these animals. Daisuke-”

“General Daisuke.”

“General Daisuke’s weapon isn't small enough to make these cuts. These strays were killed by conventional weaponry. And besides that, shouldn't there be four sets of prints? One for Gekko, and then three for Dai- General Daisuke, Junko, and the mystery dude? We're a person short.

“Alright, well, maybe Daisuke wasn't here. Fine.” Ringo grew a bit despondent but the two kept moving on, having still found nothing worth the trip yet. Next came the collapsed tower and a brief inspection proved nothing was meaningful there either. The trip was quickly becoming quite the downer.

“How do a bunch of dogs end up on top of a watch tower, anyway?” Hajime pulled aside some of the debris and grimaced. “Can strays climb trees or something? It makes no sense.”

“Wind jutsu.” Ringo nodded as Hajime sighed. “General Daisuke blew some of the animals up here and-”

“That vagrant never said anything about seeing Daisuke. I don’t think the dude was ever here.” Hajime could see why Annitou had decided not to guard the site. It was a mess to be sure but Jinchi was full of unexplained messes. General Daisuke was still at large, and currently all the resources the government could throw at that were being used. There might not have been enough manpower to sit even a single guard up at the otherwise empty camp site.

“People smarter than us have already been here and found nothing, Ringo.” Hajime, deep in thought, plucked with one finger at his spear while Ringo stood at full (off-duty) attention. “Like we talked about, we can't investigate like soldiers. We have to look for something that only we, as Gekko's friends-”

“Allies.”

“-allies could understand. Something in our own special language that we share, as teammates!”

Ringo also tilted her head in thought, then raised her objection. “Neither of us speak Bossa-”

“No, not like that. I mean the language of our fraternal bond-”

“I don't know that language.”

“No, not literally, you know, like an unspoken communication-”

“Neither of us speak Bossa.”

“No! Jeez.” Hajime groaned and planted his spear in the ground to fuss about with his bag. “Besides, General Gou was here already, if there were any Bossa clues left he would have found them already.”

Having decided the coast was clear enough Hajime reached down to relit his lantern. The movement caused Ringo to stiffen.

“Sir, are you sure you should do that? What if it gives us away?”

“Relax.” Hajime fussed about with a match and dismissed the girl’s concerns. “We would have been found by now for sure. I can’t investigate just using moonlight, if we’re serious about this we need to be thorough. If some homeless guy sees us I’m not too worried. Aha!” With a triumphant too loud yell the lamp burst into flame. He swung the spear around to point it at Ringo who now wore an absolutely terrified expression. “Lighten up, Ringo. Get it? Lighten up? Because of all the light?”

Rapid footsteps tapped the earth behind Hajime. His ever acute danger sense finally kicked in and he pivoted on the ball of his heel to snatch up his spear and swing it around. In doing so he flung the lamp aside, casting the whole scene in a stark set of shadows. Hajime's aim held true and his weapon thrust out right in the path of the rapidly approaching stranger. Then, right at the moment of impact, rather than heroically dispatching his foe instead some unseen twisting force tore his trusty spear straight from his fingers. The reaction occurred so fast that Hajime stood frozen for a moment, standing still like a weaponless statue pointing at nothing. How embarrassing!

The spear clattered away to join the lantern on the dirt. Shouting with an even mix of surprise, confidence, and fear, Hajime went to plan B and put up his arms to block whatever horrible implement of death was about to get stabbed into him.

“Sir!” Ringo squawked out as she tried to dart to her teammate’s aid. Yet instead she merely tripped and face planted right into the earth. With Hajime’s spear and lamp being down there as well, the forces of Annitou were certainly not putting on a very skillful showing that night. Ringo attempted to pull her feet up and resume her defense but found her lower limbs tightly bound and unable to move. Twisting her hips so the uncooperative appendages were in the lamp’s yellow light she saw multiple coiled layers of what looked to be bandages tying her feet together. The ribbons trailed of somewhere into the shadows where the lamp didn’t shine but no doubt something horrible awaited them on the other end! Ringo yanked out a small knife and reached down to cut herself free, only to be hit by another pair of ribbons from the shadows. The flexible material had a life of its own as it snapped around her arm and firmly rooted it in place alongside the leg she was trying to cut free. Ringo lost hold of the knife from the force and it predictably landed on the ground just out of reach. It appeared Annitou’s biggest weakness that night was a complete inability to hold onto their own personal belongings.

Now the ball shifted back to Hajime, who shouted “Ringo!” as he watched his teammate get pulled off into the void. The cloaked figure assaulting him did not relent and Hajime felt a multitude of blows hit him from all sides. His attacker wasn’t the one landing the strikes, though, and instead Hajime seemed to be getting pelted by the air itself, like dozens of separate unseen fists were smacking him around. Was this General Daisuke?

No, not possible. Hajime had only caught a few glimpses of General Daisuke, but he knew the man wasn’t this short. Or, if the handful of glances Hajime stole of his attacker could be believed, quite that feminine. Hajime lashed out blindly to try and intercept whatever strange jutsu was pummeling him and the attacker drew back to avoid being hit. The blows continued unabated but it seemed as though this technique being used against him was purely offensive and couldn’t be used to block. Steeling himself and tightening what muscles he could Hajime let out a powerful, mighty battle cry, then launched himself into a flying tackle at the unseen foe. He would end this in one strike!

His opponent simply sidestepped the cadet, then one of those invisible fists struck something deep inside. To Hajime it felt momentarily like something punched his insides, right before he lost any ability to feel at all. His eyes rolled back in his head and the collapsed onto the ground totally unconscious. When the dust settled, every person and belonging of Annitou now lay on the grimy earth.