Stitched || Kakuzu

Ch. 4 - Well, Now It's A Date With A Third Wheel

"¥35,000,000."

"I-I..." Nozomi choked over her words. She barely had enough for that since she'd spent some money on inn fees. If she told she didn't have that, he'd probably kill her on the spot.

It was her fault. It was her fault that she was in this mess. Getting on that boat, coming to Kumogakure, and now meeting this deadly, but mysterious man and his creepy partner. And somehow she was just going to agree to follow them and trust that they won't kill her and take her money.

Nozomi made a small sigh, before nodding. "Of course. I'll pay you ¥35,000,000 at the end of your services."

Hidan looked down at the small blond with a glare and turned away, leaving the site. He couldn't believe that on the small break he and Kakuzu had, his "harsh" partner was going to help this small nobody out for the money as always.

"We leave tomorrow morning at dawn."

With that said, the male disappeared. Nozomi stood there for a moment before sighing. A bounty hunter was willing to help her out (for the reward of course) but his partner was even more willing to kill her. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea after all.

The next morning, Nozomi was awake and ready to go, having been able to get all the sleep she could. She stood outside the outskirts of Kumogakure, her cloak covering her body. She fiddled with the ends of her shoulder-length hair and rocked on her heels.

Something pulled her to the side into the forest and covered her mouth so no one would hear her scream. Once they let her go, Nozomi tried to put her heart back in her chest and calm down. She turned to her captor with a glare.

"You truly have no survival skills, do you?"

Nozomi was appalled by the question as she looked up at Kakuzu. "Yes I do! I have basic genin skills! I can take care of myself."

"Keep your voice down. Let's go." The male simply ignored her and started walking. Nozomi glared at the back of his head but didn't dare say anything as she walked with him. As they walked, the female noticed it would've been pretty easy to ignore Kakuzu's partner, if he hadn't been giving off the aura of complete and utter hatred.

"Who is the person and where are they?"

The blond turned her attention away from Hidan and looked at Kakuzu. "Um... that person is my father and the last time he was seen was in Kumogakure. But he's alive, I know that."

"How do you know he's alive?" Hidan crossed his arms. "You have my stupid partner helping you because you believe your fucking father is alive and well when you haven't see his ass since when?"

"I don't need to explain myself to you." Nozomi snapped at him. "My brother saw him a few days ago. That's proof enough. I'm not hiring you for this job, I hired Kakuzu-san."

Hidan nearly lunged before her in rage and Nozomi quickly moved away from him, apologizing quietly. If she wanted to live, it'd be best not to get on the bad side of the crazy man with the huge weapon.

"Shut up." Kakuzu told them both. "Where was he seen?"

"Outside Kumogakure."

"Then let's move."

For the next couple of the days, the small group traveled westwards with little breaks for resting. Kakuzu, who insisted time was money, refused for them to rest. Nozomi struggled to keep up, not used to this kind of schedule. She slept whenever she could and found food for when she needed to eat since the other two didn't need that to survive.

The more westward they went, the colder it got. They reached Shimogakure, the Land of Frost. Nozomi hugged her cloak to her body to keep warm as she only had shorts and a t-shirt on under it.

"C-Can we stop so I can get some pants, please? I'm really cold.." She shivered as she walked behind the two.

Kakuzu didn't even stop walking to acknowledge her. "No."

"P-Please?" She whined. With the amount of money she was giving this man, he could at least be a litte less rude and possibly a little more understanding. She wasn't a ninja. She didn't know how to bare these kinds of climates without things normal people would wear.

"No."

She frowned and begrudingly walked after him. After a while, it started snowing and she whined again. "Can we stay the night somewhere please?"

"Can you shut the fuck up already?" Hidan turned and glared at her.

Nozomi sighed in defeat and rubbed her arms, praying to the gods that she wouldn't freeze to death. A few more horribly slow hours and they finally reached a spot where you could see a nearby small village. Nozomi nearly jumped for joy at the sight of just lights - which was enough to signal warmth to her.

In the midst of leaving the spot to head through the village, the snow fall started to get heavier - nearing a blizzard stage. The three trudged through the growing snow, Nozomi's body nearly freezing over as she was certain she could not feel her toes anymore in her sandals.

Ninjas popped up out of the trees, one hundred of them, and surrounded the group. Out of no where, they lunged to attack. Hidan immediately went into attack mode, raising his scythe and going on a killing spree. Kakuzu stood back and watched Hidan annihilate the men. Nozomi ran and stood by Kakuzu, not seeing anything she could do.

A single ninja jumped down in from of the two. a black cloak covering his body and a mask covering his face. The mask had a peculiar design - fitting the description of a hunter nin's mask, without a village insignia. While Hidan faced the now depleting group of ninjas on his side of the hill, Kakuzu faced the masked ninja. They battled it out, mostly using taijutsu as it looked like neither deemed it necessary at that point to go into more complicated jutsus and movements. 

The mysetrious ninja however grabbed the right wrist of Kakuzu and got a whole of his stitching while they were engaged in hand-to-hand combat and easily grabbed a hold of Nozomi's left wrist and put them together before forming a jutsu. Hidan, who had seen, went after the male, blinded in a sense for blood after having killed all one hundred ninja. The masked figure sensed this and after completing his jutsu, disappeared in a flurry of smoke.

The snow continued to fall as Hidan scowered the area. He found no sign of the mystery ninja and put his scythe back, yawning. "Damn fucker. He got away."

Kakuzu looked at Nozomi and noticed how attached she was to his side. He was not a 'people' person at all. His eyebrow twitched as he looked down at her. "Why are you so close to me?"

She stared back up at his oddly colored eyes and bit her lip, trying to pull away from him. She winced as she tried a little harder to pull her left wrist away from his right one.

". . . I'm stuck."