The Worst Game of Hide and Seek (DP-Hard)

[William O, Creed]

Name: Find the Hive
Participants: Kazura + Irina
Location: Karakura Town
Difficulty Level: Hard
Setting: Damage Permanent

Plotline: A report arrived several minutes ago to Kazura Uzaki about a man that had been found early this morning in Karakura, dead. The deceased had been found and examined by the local authorities outside of the spiritual community yet even to them this is quite rare. Death through a thousand strings. The man’s body seems to have been impaled several hundred times by a small barb like weapon similar to a hornet yet the wounds are far to grave. Even the giant Hornet in Japan doesn’t inflict anything close to the wounds across this man’s body. A special report has been given to Kazura though from the coroner who happens to be a member of the spiritual community. “The holes on this victim, they’re leaking out reiatsu. This man was completely normal.” It’s now up to Kazura and his staff at UE to figure out and locate the source of this strange death and put a stop to it as swiftly as possible.

Estimated Enemy Strength: Class 7-1
Estimated Time Until Completion: 3 pages
Starts: Right Now
Special Conditions: N/A

[Irina Davayte]

It had been two days since anyone in the spiritual department at UE had heard from Kazura, and Irina decided it was time to check and see what was going on. Sure, lately, it had been typical for him to disappear for a day so. But this time, somehow he had fallen so far off the grid that now Yuri, Kazura's contact with the local police force, was calling Irina to leave messages for him. And Irina was not Kazura's secretary. So obviously, this needed to be taken care of.

First she tried texting. This tended to be a pretty quick way to get a hold of him. After not receiving a response own the phone, she tried swinging by his office. Her loud knocks went unanswered, so she stopped by his house after she was done in the office for the day. Most likely, this was not really what Kazura had in mind when he had given her his home address when they were marathon training together, but Irina decided that this was not a time to worry about personal boundaries. After talking with Kazura's butler, who had not seen him in about the same amount of time as anyone at UE, she tried calling the local hospitals. Where was this guy's emergency contact? Who was she supposed to call, anyway?

After checking with the security guard downstairs, who confirmed that Mr. Uzaki had entered the building two days prior, but had no record of him leaving, Irina supposed Kazura was probably most likely to be in his office. She tried knocking, and shouting a bit, with no luck. She decided that the logical option was to break in. Again, she thought ruefully. The first time she'd done this, she had just unlatched the locking mechanism using Soul Command. Easy enough. But Kazura had since rigged the lock so this was no longer an option. The next time, she'd just made a hole in the wall. But she supposed that Kazura had probably reinforced the walls, as she had recommended after that incident. But had he reinforced the ceiling and floor? She doubted it. Anyway, she was pretty sure that kind of structural change would require building permits from the city. Nope, she was pretty confident that might be her way in.

Of course, she would get in from the floor above, not below, Kazura's office. If she came in through the floor, she could cause things to fall through it. The ceiling was a safer option. What was above Kazura's office anyway? Irina shrugged and went up to find out.

Honestly, it had never occurred to Irina that UE would even have a marketing department. Oh well, their work couldn't be that important. She introduced herself briefly to a roomful of young men making a storyboard for a commercial about electric Ramen, then apologetically told them that, due to an issue with the carpet, she would have to work on their wing tonight, so they'd need to go home. Then she got to work, sawing a neat, Irina-sized hole in the floor.

[Kazura Uzaki]

"Coming for you..."

"Coming for you..."

"Coming for you..."

________________________________ "Coming for you..."

KAZURA

The nightmares had only increased day by day. If he got sleep, he was tossing and turning all night. If he stayed awake, they bled into his vision while he tried to focus on anything of importance. Sometimes, whole days would disappear in a fit of varying consciousness with some times being asleep with night terrors and some times being awake with day terrors. It was a living nightmare Kazura was going through and he still couldn't pinpoint exactly why... It had to do something with the report Kitai and Marcus had brought back from Australia. That's when the first message had appeared, written in blood on a wall where Hell minions had been defeated.

Kazura had poured over the footage that had been captured by the media, by his employees, and other groups operating in that area. He couldn't make sense of it all. Nothing he had done had any bearing on why Hell had broken free and rampaged there. He hadn't any connection to it. What had he done to deserve this nightmare in his waking and sleeping moments? He hadn't a clue, but whatever it was it was affecting his work life, his home life, his social life... Charles his butler was worried, but Kazura didn't see him enough at the mansion for him to say much about it.

Today was a day like any other. Or was it? Kazura couldn't remember how long it had been since he had eaten, or left the office. Had it been over 24 hours? 48, even? Stuck in this room that thankfully had a bathroom adjoining, feeling sick to his stomach and not being able to focus on much. His phone was dead and he hadn't charged it in who knows how long. The cord to that was... somewhere. He probably was missing a lot but he hadn't really cared. More than once there was a knock at his door, but he didn't have the energy to get up and get it. Didn't really have the energy to be seen like this either. His clothes needed ironed, his hair needed washed, he needed deodorant badly... The CEO shouldn't be seen like this, for sure.

He phased out of consciousness and thought he heard some yelling, but he paid it no attention. When the nightmares started again, he shook himself awake and tried to work once more. When a piece of ceiling hit him in the face though, he knew something was up. There was a saw poking out of the floor above him... What was going on? Pretty soon, Kazura could see Irina on the other side of the ceiling. What was she going to do from there? Jump? Had she learned to manipulate reiatsu to the point where she could utilize Air Ground? Either way, Kazura pushed his chair aside and stood up. He was going to have to face her and his demons.

Somehow.

He started by using Soul Command to iron his suit out. His hair and odor would have to be fixed before he left but he could figure something out. "Can I help you, Irina?" Trying his best to stay calm, it might be pretty obvious that he was tired, stressed, and anxious. He'd also need to figure out how to reinforce the ceiling and floor now... Or just give the lady a key... For emergencies only, of course...

[William O, Creed]

Moving throughout the company building wasn’t anything outside the norm not just for Irina, but virtually any spiritually aware employee. So the sight of her wandering throughout the hallway wasn’t anything eye catching to anyone who might have seen her. Actually getting to Kazura to inform him about what she had learned over the phone was the biggest challenge so far it seemed. It wouldn’t take her long to saw her way through the floor however while she neared the end Irina would hear the sound of her phone going off.

Yuri, the contact at the police department was calling Irina once again. If Irina managed to answer the call or not the message was essentially the same. “Hello Irina my apologies for pushing, but Mr. Uzaki seriously needs to get over here. The body has started to decompose and the reiatsu it’s leaking out is giving off some really gross scent. I don’t feel comfortable leaving it like this for much longer.”

[Irina Davayte]

"Hey, can you pick this up for me?" Irina said casually to Kazura below, tossing her phone his way when it rang without looking to see who was calling. She widened her hole enough to jump through, and used Soul Command to soften the floor as she landed. Not the most comfortable landing, but then again, it was only an eight-foot fall. Someone more empathetic probably would have ignored the phone and focused on Kazura's unusual state. "Are you okay?" the more feelings-oriented person would have asked gently, tilting their head in concern. They probably would have asked how he was feeling or something or other about emotions. Irina, though, while earnestly caring and honestly interested in what was going on with Kazura, was not a particularly empathetic or feelings-oriented person. Instead, she said "What's going on with you? You look like you've been in here for days." As per usual, Irina addressed her boss quite casually. She considered Kazura a friend, but she always felt like he was keeping her at arms-length. Maybe he just felt like he was more important than her, but her instinct told her that wasn't it. She decided to talk him into going to a movie or something on a better day. He needed an evening to chill out, Irina figured.

But that was an issue for later. If Kazura hadn't picked up the phone, she would call Yuri back and finally get the message. She knew Kazura wouldn't decline to assist with this leaking body situation, so she nodded towards the phone and said "Let's get going." She resisted the instinct to say "Unless you want to go take a shower first." Personally, Irina had already hit the shower after her workout for the day, and smelled minty-fresh.

[Kazura Uzaki]

Irina didn't really answer Kazura's question, instead tossing him a ringing phone. With a small, barely audible groan he checked the caller ID and saw it to be Yuri, his contact at the police force. What did she want? Probably something important or she wouldn't be going through his employees to get to him. He really needed to charge his phone. He swiped the accept button on the phone and listened to Yuri breathlessly explain to "Irina" that he needed to get down to the morgue and examine a leaking body. A body leaking reiatsu was uncommon, but only if he wasn't already a Fullbringer or Quincy or something. This had to be a normal guy leaking spiritual energy for Yuri to be calling him over it. "Understood, Yuri." This surprised the woman on the other end of the line, as she thought she was talking to Irina. That was probably more awkward than it needed to be, but hopefully she wouldn't get any wrong ideas about the situation.

Anyways, Kazura needed to freshen up before heading out of his office into the real world. The dangerous world. Before he could do that, though, he watched as Irina jumped down into the room and softened the landing with Soul Command. She was learning, and improving. Very good for her. Anyways, he needed to answer the Russian. "Has it been days? I've lost track. Not been sleeping well. Or really at all. Not something I feel like going into at the moment." And with that, he tried to drop the conversation. He did need to freshen up though. He sat down cross legged on the floor and began to meditate. Pulling fresh water from the sink with Soul Dominance, he ran it through his hair and Willed the grease in it to leave into the water with another application of Soul Command. He could have done the same to his underarms, but he'd have to take his shirt off for that. And Irina was in the room already.

So, instead he Willed the sweat of his body to leave and tried to include as much of the odor causing bacteria as possible. He mixed all of the grease water and the sweat water into one big floating ball and flushed that down the toilet. He checked himself, found his scent to be tolerable, and scoured his desk for something he could use to make deodorant. He surprisingly found an actual stick of deodorant and applied it before gesturing to the door. Past Kazura had Present Kazura's back. Present Kazura put the deodorant back where he found it, to help out Future Kazura."After you. I'll fix the ceiling later. We'll call it... I don't even know what we'll call it, but we'll fix it. I need to just get you a key... for emergencies only, of course."

And with that, they headed towards the Morgue to meet with Yuri.

[William O, Creed]

The surprise that Kazura was the one listening on the other end of the phone caused Yuri a bit of shock though it wasn’t anything substantial. It seemed that presentation was definitely a major factor for the CEO. Now though it seemed Irina would be accompanying Kazura to investigate just what was going on with the deceased.

By the time the both of them made it over to the morgue and were allowed into the back where the corpse was being held it had been roughly twelve minutes. Now though once Kazura and Irina got into the back both would start to hear the sound of something buzzing. It was loud yet no one else seemed to notice. Once they entered the morgue itself though both would see several large bee like insects located throughout the room. None of them moved aside from their wings which caused the buzzing.

Kazura would perhaps notice first that Yuri his contact here was laying on the ground while the corpse on the table already looked as if it had been deceased for several weeks. Dark purple reiatsu seeping out from the dozens of sting wounds across its body. Something was clearly going on in Karakura so the leader of UE was going to need to step up his game and keep his nightmares at bay otherwise would Irina be able to handle this on her own?

[Irina Davayte]

Irina had never been in a morgue, and it wasn't actually as scary as she had assumed. It was in the back of their local hospital, and while it wasn't fancy, it was clean. Irina was feeling pretty calm about the whole thing until they reached the autopsy room. No medical examiner was in sight: only the body, and Yuri, and the big, buzzing insects. Irina was no medical professional, but she was pretty sure the corpse was beyond saving. Yuri on the other hand, she hoped, might not be. Yuri, who was about Kazura's age, was the only spiritually-aware detective in the local police force, at least as far as Irina knew. And plus, even though she had only met Yuri a few times, Irina liked her. Like Irina, she was decisive and serious, and she didn't let people push her around. "Can you take care of Yuri?" she addressed Kazura without looking at him, keeping her eyes on the bees. As Kazura was aware, Irina had absolutely no skill in first aid or caring for the injured whatsoever. And honestly, she was not sure whether Yuri was presently dead or alive. Her ponytailed hair covered her face, and Irina had no idea whether she was breathing.

Irina didn't love that there was a tray of medical instruments between some of the creatures and herself, and she decided to move them. She pulled the cart using Soul Command, trying to gently move it, without startling the insects. Wild animals, she knew, reacted poorly when scared, and she liked these creatures staying stationary. Unfortunately, she had recently become quite a bit spiritually stronger, due to training with Kazura and Amare. It was only unfortunate because when she tried to pull the wheeled cart gently, she accidentally yanked it hard instead. This caused the cart to fly towards her, and the medical tools, without enough friction with the cart to hold them on it, to crash to the ground loudly. Irina groaned inwardly, and tried to position herself between the creatures and the door.

[Kazura Uzaki]

As they got close to the examining room of the morgue in Karakura General Hospital, Kazura's exceptional Instincts warned him that something wasn't quite right. While they moved through the hospital towards the back of the building, the buzzing definitely was odd. The nurses and doctors didn't seem to notice, but Kazura could hear them plainly. They were louder than normal bees, most likely, due to their size. Cautiously entering the examining room, Kazura's brain took a snapshot of the room and examined it thoroughly with his supercomputer like processing power. He noticed the body with its seeping purple wounds. He noticed Yuri on the ground and looked for signs of life, such as if she was still breathing (observed by movement of her hair near her mouth or movement of her chest), if her heart was still working (observed by color of her skin being pale or full flesh color), and extent of her wounds compared to the corpse on the table (observed by comparing color of purple seeping, looking for any bleeding, and simply mentally estimating the amount and severity of the stab wounds).

Once that snapshot was examined, Kazura took stock of the peripheral vision he had. He checked for cameras, Willing the power cable to be disconnected from the camera if he found any, checked for signs of potential infestation such as seeping from any vents or ducts or walls, and checked for any other exits to the room. Finally, before Irina had even began to ask if Kazura could take care of Yuri, he took stock of the enemies in the room. They had hurt his contact in the police force, a friend, and they would be treated as enemies completely and utterly. When Irina asked if he could take care of Yuri, he relayed what he saw. If he saw signs of life, he'd point them out to her. If he saw signs that she was less alive, he'd just nod and then terminate the insects before heading over to Yuri to check more physically for signs of life.

To terminate the insects, Kazura hurt himself fairly badly. Raising both arms, he unleashed a Mastered torrent of Energy Generate: Electrocution at any and all large wasps in the room. He could hit 6 at one time by using both arms, and if they popped from the force of Nature coming from Kazura's body, he could redirect the arc of lightning towards a new one. 3 full seconds he unleashed lightning at the room, being very careful not to hit anything of value, whether it be organic or inorganic. When it was finished, he winced at the numbness and pins and needles he felt from his arms as the pain set in from using the full power of the technique.

If Kazura had seen any signs of additional infestation in the room, he'd examine that closer before making any decisions on where to go. He needed to check Yuri for her wellbeing as well as examine the corpse that looked nearly completely decomposed. Yuri would most likely need heavy medical attention, which was good as they were in an actual hospital at the moment. Kazura could probably easily acquire the components for an antivenom at the pharmacy or in a medcart. But for now, he needed to make sure no one else was at risk. It was like a whole different person had arrived than the person who left his office today. He was in work mode, trying desperately to force his nightmares out of his head and focus on the task at hand.

But he could still hear that whisper in the back of his head.

Coming for you...

Remaining Reiatsu: 9,400/10,000 (-600 Electrocution)

[William O, Creed]

This definitely wasn’t a typical sight nor a situation as the spiritual insects didn’t make any sort of aggressive move against Irina or Kazura when they got into the morgue. It was obvious that they should be able to see both of them so why weren't they attacked if Yuri was on the ground from being attacked? These questions would have to be pondered later though as Irina used soul command and accidentally caused a lot of noise which set off each of the bees. Now the buzzing in the room was almost deafening and both of the Fullbringers would feel as if their ears were about to bleed.

Everything else happened in just a few moments as the bees were all now off whatever position they were at a moment ago and now in the air of the room beginning to move towards Irina and Kazura. Irina was ready to do what she could to keep them from getting out into the rest of the hospital, but she wouldn’t have to do much as Kazura swiftly unleashed a powerful torrent of lightning that danced through the air. Arcing from one insect to another the strands of lightning moved through the room with as eagerness matching a teenage boy in the girls locker room.

Despite the size of each bee it didn’t seem that was going to give them much as each one popped like a balloon from the lightning splashing the room in quite a bit of green goo. Now though that the lightning was finished and all the bees were dead both Irina and Kazura would be able to catch on quick. The goo was causing quite a bit of white smoke as it burned whatever it was on. The bees from the looks of it didn’t have poison, but were acidic! Kazura would have to rush to Yuri who still lay on the ground although now her left shin and left forearm were burning from just a small amount of goo that landed on each spot. (Only the size of a dime) As for the body well the shins and everything else down were melting quick as an entire bee had popped right over it.

[Irina Davayte]

Irina was one to calmly take stock of a situation before attacking anything, so she wouldn't have shot the bees without first seeing what they were going to do like Kazura. It seemed that his action was for the better though; as soon as the bees were disabled, the terrible buzzing noise she'd prompted stopped. Unfortunately, the bees dissolved into juice that began melting through everything they touched...including Yuri. And the body. "Do we need this? Should I be trying to salvage this body at all?" Irina wondered out loud. "If we do, I can cut off the legs at the knee or something, but I really don't want to get charged with messing with a corpse or anything." She would leave Kazura to the living patient. At least with the deceased one, Irina couldn't cause too much damage. She grabbed a saw that looked just like the one the doctor had used to remove the cast she'd had as a kid when she'd broken her arm, but didn't do anything with it yet; she was going to need a second opinion on this one.

[Kazura Uzaki]

With the insects well and truly popped, Kazura immediately found that the composition of the enemies was highly acidic. Some had splashed onto Yuri and drenched the lower half of the corpse as well as had coated the floor in various places. Kazura moved quickly, searching the cabinets with his eyes for any bases to neutralize the acid. He looked for things that would typically be found in a hospital and hopefully be found in a morgue, such as surgical soap which was a weak base but better than nothing. If it was a good hospital, they'd have to have antimicrobial soap somewhere to prepare their hands for procedures. Even the morgue wing should have this for autopsies. He glanced for anything else he could identify as a base, such as baking soda or similar, but he didn't have a lot of hope in finding something stronger than soap.

Whatever he found, he'd work on applying it to the spots on Yuri's leg as soon as he could. "I think we've seen enough to know that the acid stingers of the bees were the problem with the body. Not sure what else we can gain from it, now. Try neutralizing the acid with a base as best you can, but we'll have to leave the body." The saw, while it could help salvage the body for burial, would probably just end up melting with the acid anyways, if it was a spiritual kind of acid. If the base that Kazura was using wasn't working well on Yuri and her wounds, Kazura would try pulling at the acid with Soul Command to try and ease it out of the wounds. He did his best to go over all of Yuri's stings, but he knew that he was lacking in the Power department when it came to his Soul Command.

Having witnessed Irina pull the cart much harder than he could have ever pulled on it with all his spiritual might, he turned his head to Irina. "Come help me try to get the acid out of Yuri's wounds. She appears to be alive, for now. But we have to hurry."

[William O, Creed]

Most of the attention was being given to Yuri which wasn’t really something that anyone couldn’t commend Kazura for, he was being a good friend and ally. However, he was quick to assume that there was no additional information to be gained from the corpse. The soap that he found fought off some of the acidity of the bees innards which at this point had burned Yuri enough that moving her arm or leg for the next month was going to cause her a good deal of pain, but she’d keep both appendages with no permanent damage.

Whether or not Irina joined Kazura and began to utilize Soul Command in order to pull out the acid from inside of Yuri’s wounds wouldn’t matter as he would be able to accomplish it himself. No doubt though Irina’s help if she gave it would speed things along. After the first few sting wounds were cleared that’s when both of them would be able to start feeling a very faint reiatsu signature. It would feel just like the bees had although much weaker and even they hadn’t felt like anything even moderate. Neither had the energy sensory skills to pick up accurately where the signatures were coming from but they could tell they were inside the room.

If either checked the sting holes on Yuri closely, actually looking inside of the wound now that the acid was pulled from them they’d see a small insect moving around. A small larva inside of her wounds! This was how the bees had gotten inside of the morgue. They had been inside of the corpse and grown until they could get out. Now though they’d have to get rid of all these small larva a simple task for them but still something that had to be done. The real question that would no doubt be racing through the minds of the two Fullbringers would be where had the bees come from originally? What was causing this.

[Irina Davayte]

With relief, Irina put down the saw, and went along with Kazura's plan to let the corpse be, focusing on Yuri. While she had virtually no medical knowledge, Irina knew enough to move a fluid from one location to another, and assisted Kazura in removing the acid. That was easy enough, and Irina wasn't really bothered by Yuri's injuries. She wasn't bothered, that is, until she noticed something wriggling in one of the wounds. "Is that a worm?" Irina said aloud, having poor bedside manner. "Eew. What is this thing? I'm going to Google it." Irina tried to scoop up a larva using tweezers to transfer them to a plastic sample cup. If she succeeded, she would keep pinking at the larvae one at a time, putting them in the cup, and taking care not to touch them. She would also do a reverse image search to try to identify the things, although she assumed that since they seemed to be spiritual kind of bugs, nothing would really come up. "So sorry for the delay today, Yuri," she addressed her apologetically, not sure if she was fully conscious or not.

[Kazura Uzaki]

As soon as the larva started appearing in Yuri's wounds, Kazura got nervous about the corpse behind him. "Sure, Irina, let me know what Google has on these. I doubt they will show up, though." Leaving Yuri once she was clear of acid, Kazura turned and moved over to the body on the table in an attempt to get closer to the reiatsu signature he could feel in the room somewhere. When he made it to the body, he'd check it for any additional larva, bugs, bees, cocoons, or anything like that. He didn't want this acid splashed corpse to become even more giant killer bees. Glad that he had unplugged all the cameras before vaporizing the acid bees, he scrolled through his mental files to see what options he had for this.

If he found any sign of the insects, he'd look and make sure the autopsy report was out of the way and would call over to Irina. "You brought your Fullbring, right? I need this body iced solid to kill any residual larvae here." If she consented, he'd make his way towards the back dock of the morgue, where the funeral homes came to drop off bodies, and looked out it for any signs of leftover larvae that may have fallen out during transport of the body. He extended his Energy Sensory to the best of his ability, searching for any sign of a Hive that was close by. Hopefully Yuri would regain consciousness soon and could tell them where this body was found...