[Lonely] Never out of reach

[Zao]

In the basement of his Suna home, the man set in a lotus position with hands fingers interlocked and thumbs gently touching at the tip of each the jointed hands look like the shape of an 'O'. Both brilliant blue eyes were currently closed as the long harried bannin contemplated the next step. It was a difficult one, but he continued to solidify his own resolve, even now, that this was the right path for him to step upon. But he knew that once he took that first step, his life would be unable to return to the way it was before and that everything needed to be put in order. Silently he meditated on the preparation that he had put in place.

Over a month ago the man had silently gathered information from the international chuunin exam and bingo books, his target being the various pieces of lingering evil within this world, to include evil spirits and the evil weapons left over from an ancient time. Having been a bannin for over a decade, the man had done much traveling and made many friends and acquaintances over that time. Some of those were a bit more secretive that others, it was these shadier individuals who had ties with the black market whom he had signed a contract with looking for information on the whereabouts of a handful of powerful and unique individuals.

With that group he left a handful of contact charms, these were special space time tokens that allowed for him to be contacted in an expedited manner if any of his requested information was to be found on those named individuals. His preparation had finally come full circle now as he felt a sudden warmth on his right wrist causing the almost glowing blue eyes to snap open and dart down to the rising right arm. Using his artificial left hand, he pulled back the oversized sleeve to reveal a handful of different bracelets and the second from the right glowed gently. "Could it be?"

'Go ahead.' He mentally spoke as chakra flowed into the charm before a rough whisper was relayed back through the talisman. 'We've recently seen one of your targets moving on the border of Fire and Star country, but we weren't able to follow the woman as her senses were too good and we didn't want to give ourselves away.' With the simple mention of 'her' the middle-aged man nodded to himself as he already knew who they were talking about without speaking her name, especially at the mention of her enhanced sense as most Inuzuka member all had a powerful sense of smell and hearing. Following someone like that was difficult without the right skill set. 'I will be there shortly...'

Exhaling slowly blue chakra flamed out from the man's body before he allowed his thoughts to flow through space and time to lock onto the location of the small bracelet amulet that was around the wrist of an old man at the border of Star country and Konoha. Suddenly the fabric of space began to swirl inwards and the slender body of the Suna-nin disappeared from his home in Wind country only to appear moments later standing before the hunched over man who wore a hood and half face mask to hide their true identity from prying eyes. "Where did you lose her at?" The normally kind and gentle voice of Zao was gone replaced with a rather cold and distant one that caused the spy to leap backwards a few yards pulling a short blade out ready to defend himself, having not expected the man to warp through space and time to his location.

"Um...she left the road a few hundred meters up ahead." Zao glanced down at the ground in thought before he extended his hand outwards and turned its palm to the darkening sky as a mixture of red and blue chakra swirled around the hand and a tiny poof of smoke concealed the hand. Within the palm of the hand was a tiny demon pup with soft violet wings, the entire puppy being barely bigger than the soft skinned hand of the man. 'Jou, what do you smell from those tracks?' The puppy stretched its body and hopped down, gently gliding for a moment before it touched down in the grass quietly off the edge of the path and began to sniff around. The masked spy looked with both curiosity and confusion at the spirit that had been sealed into the body of a puppy. "Was she alone?" Zao pushed his voice back to the spy who shook.his head and spat back, "A red haired man was inside with her."

One could easily see the mix of horse tracks and wheel tracks, identifying that whom ever it was had been traveling by carriage. This was good as it left easily to follow tracks between the horse and the carriage itself. Plus it wasn'ta very fast means of transportation and the horse would need to rest more often than when one was rising it. 'This way, something smells like a nice bitch. Mm...' Zao could only shake his head from side to side as he pulled the hood of a cloak onto his head that he summoned from his realm before tossing it on and following closely behind the dog. He knew that his demon pup meant that she smelled like a female dog but his unfiltered mouth was something he couldn't control it seemed. "Seems your information is credible my friend."

The spy scoffed as he sheathed his blade, as if his information wouldn't have merit....did he think they were amateurs or something? He quickly disappeared into the forest leaving the man to do whatever it was that he was doing, not getting paid enough to ask questions but to just do his own job but he wondered how much someone would have to pay his employers to have this man followed. Smirking under the mask he went back to make his reports.

Meanwhile Zao and his demon pup companion communicated telepathically with one another as they also disappeared off into the woods at the edge of the roadway in order to follow the tracks without overly exposeing their presence to others along the road. Was this the step that would lead him on his path of a righteous crusade to remove the evils from the human world? Though the direction of the tracks worries him as they crossed over into Fire country in the general direction of the Hidden Leaf village.

Would he be able to intercept the carriage before it reach Konoha? Was it even going to the village or perhaps a nearby town or city within the large Fire nation. Unsure of his destination Zao moved through the forest along the roadway as his pup acted as a backstop in case the occupants of the carriage tried to sneak out of the carriage...one followed the scent and one followed the obvious visible trail. Where did it lead to and who was with the woman?