A New Story

Continue to the sand:

"Aaagh! Agh! Aaa..." The screams echoed in the small concave fissure we found ourselves in. The storms outside harrowing the sound, reverberating to reflect on our hiding place in shocked alarm. The place we were fortunate to find, split and lifted from the rest of the even plains that were the long pass to sand, an unexpected blessing when we saw the storms coming.

I had just woken from shallow dreams, lingering memories, of my lost comrades. In the ANBU, there were few we could call friend, but the friends I found were now dead. I woke from my half sleep, the sleep of a ninja, with the screams caught in my ears like the kunai in my hand.

I cuffed a hand around the Sand ninja's mouth and held my kunai up, looking ahead. "Naoki, where is Argies" he woke up and his eyes narrowed in on the point of my weapon before the sense of my words made him shift his eyes, indicating a direction. "I don't see him there... Get up! We have to move"

My company didn't have the heightened senses I possessed. They couldn't hear the screaming in the howls of the wind, they were deafened by the strength of the storm and couldn't hear the voice rattling in fear. Argies!

As Gaidra of the 25th elite teams, no matter what I endured, I must complete my mission! As I am Shinobi, as I am Gaidra Erito, and my team was taken from me.

I stepped out into the storm

...

"We must find Argies, and then we are leaving, the storm cannot hold us from our mission." She spoke with such confidence that I couldn't even discourage her. Walking out into a sand storm wasn't an idea, it wasn't something you would think of doing, it was just not done. I was someone who trained in the sand. I wasn't juvenile but knew that something's about the desert, you fear regardless of age or experience. There was a strong determination, an instinct telling me to say something, but she was Shinobi, and she was... Gaidra.

I said it anyway, "The storms of the desert are a force that kill many shinobi!" I shouted over the winds, the sand beating on my face with the bandana round my mouth keeping the dirt out. "We wouldn't be the first to make that mistake again, it wouldn't be wise to underestimate it." Even as I did this, even as I questioned her command, I packed my things.

Gaidra made our choices for the group, it was her words that determined our course. Her say was unparalleled "I can sense the limits of the storm, nearby." She looked at me as she spoke, sharp eyes that made every vulnerability feel exposed. "I probed the storm while Argies and you slept" I rubbed at my neck, feeling how open it was to attack, like my argument and judgment of her choices for us. Underestimating her, was death, it wasn't unwise it was just opposed to living.

...

Further into the storm I began to hear the screams Gaidra had mentioned earlier. I couldn't hear what woke her, but she made it sound urgent and I did not know where Argies was. We closed in on the screams, we both made our weapons ready.

A wondering shadow walked within the winds. The outline of a person, wailed like a restless spirit, in the sand storm it drifted about the ground like a phantom. The screams of shadows, the shrieks of storms, the weeping of winds, the wrenching of waning spirits, the horror of a storm mage turning the storm. When finally we came closer, the face of the demon in the storm was revealed.

"Argies! Hey! Arj-" I reached out to grab him, but a smoke like mist enveloped him and carried him away from reach. "How inexplicable, I think his asleep!" I turned to Gaidra, who confirmed with a slight tilt of her head.

"You will have to wake him, I do not know much about his abilities and you are his team mate." This was another test, Gaidra was 'testing' us throughout our journey. It was uncommon for two strong ninja villages to assign missions with mixed teams. The possibility of being ambushed and betrayed was too great an opportunity to forfeit all together. Ninja villages that did assign joined efforts would often weigh that possibility in their favour, assigning their strongest to accompany the weaker allied ninja. This further stimulated the temptation to cripple your ally; killing their strongest ninja and offering a different enemy as the cause for their deaths.