The Way Through Stone Village (Naruto)

39: The Shinobi get Rocked

[OP: "Cold is the Night"--The Oh Hellos]

Hours ago now, Wally, Shoto, Momo, Karin, and Suigetsu had not had much luck looking for anything useful around the village. Karin had helped them avoid any scouts from Stone.

Wally said he was sure there was something other than scouts out here. But it might be no one they needed to worry about.

"How are you even sure?" Shoto was kind of grumpy after doing nothing for a long time and being in the sun--which was not that hot, but still enough to make them perspire.

"Just a gut feeling," Wally replied.

"Does your gut have any feelings about if we can go back for lunch?" Suigetsu asked.

"It's not lunch time," Momo said.

Suigetsu took a long swig of water. "I'm hungry now."

It was almost a relief when they got the message--until they heard that Bakugo was chasing thieves.

"I'm sure Bakugo can handle them," Shoto said. "But that's actually a bigger problem, almost."

"Shoto!" Momo cried.

"What? We're trying not to make any more waves here," he said.

"That kid is more trouble than the rest of you put together, I think sometimes." Wally rolled his eyes. "Let's go get him. Try to keep up, Icyhot."

Shoto really wished Wally hadn't adopted that nickname, but it was too pun-like not to appeal to his sense of humor.

Finding Bakugo was easy enough. Karin might not be able to read them that well, but by now she was used to Bakugo enough to track him once they got inside the village. He was too different from the shinobi of Stone.

They never saw the others, because they cut around the edge where they wouldn't hit anyone running or ice skating.

Suigetsu tried to keep up, but he ended up lagging behind before long, and no one really cared if he arrived late.

They followed Bakugo out to the far wall.

Now, Bakugo was such an intimidating person even for a 16-year old, that the thieves he'd been chasing hadn't actually tried to fight him at first. When they saw someone using explosions to catch them and screaming "DIE!!!" they just ran for it.

But once they were farther out from the pedestrian area, they probably figured they could corner him, because they slowed down.

Where they stopped was right by the water vein that was channeling in the water from the outside.

Then one of the thieves, who seemed to be a grown man, made earth come from the ground and try to catch Bakugo's feet, but Bakugo wasn't falling for that s--t; he was too used to things like that at school. He blasted over it easily and fired at the guy.

The other one (smaller, so either a child or a woman from their build) raised their hands, and mud around the area shot up into spikes.

"You two got some kind of yin and yang thing going?" Bakugo asked, also dodging those. "One of you is soft and the other is hard?"

"Don't answer that," the man said. "He's just trying to get information."

"I'd be lost without you," the other said. It was a woman.

"Heh." Bakugo landed on part of the pipe, which was metal. "You two aren't the same kind of thieves as those brats some of us caught the other day. You're older... Ain't no way you're just doing this for food. Adult thieves wouldn't be so sloppy."