A needle-thin frequency forced its way in first.
Not wind or leaves, and certainly not the low, grinding simmer of geothermal vents bleeding steam into the cold November air. A note lanced between the layers of the forest, bypassing the ears to vibrate directly against the bone of the skull.
A nerve-deep pinch spiked behind the right eye socket. The horizon dipped left. Footing failed on the frost-stiff litter; a sandal drifted half an inch on a patch of slick volcanic mud, the sudden lack of traction jolting through the hip and jarring the spine.
It came again—higher this time—rattling through the jaw hinge. Breath caught, the inhale missing the timing of the stride. Not loud—worse—clean, carving out a jagged, empty space inside the head that made thoughts feel thin and brittle.
Troublesome.
Fingers twitched toward his temple. Wavering pillars of vapor warped the audio; the flute's origin reflected off the white sheets until the music seemed to come from three directions at once. Shikamaru's head jerked toward a phantom echo on the left, eyes searching the trees before he realized the signal was a bounce.
The pressure surged again—no pattern—and the air turned grainy.
FFFFFHHHHOOOOOOOWWWWWW.
Particulate lift preceded the blow; dead needles and ash swirled upward in a sudden vertical vacuum. A wall of compressed air slammed into his chest cavity a heartbeat before the first Doki drove into the earth.
CRASH-BOOM.
Weight punched a crater through the root lattice. Clods of wet ash and fractured rock spun outward as the shockwave drove the oxygen from his lungs. Frost shattered into fine white dust. Underfoot, the mud layer slid over packed frost, the ground rippling with a force that sent a spike of nausea through the inner ear.
Balance slipped—footing lagged as the treeline spun. An auditory dampening followed the blast—a hollow ringing that made Ino's voice sound like it was coming from the bottom of a well.
"Positions!" Asuma's command arrived as a muffled vibration. "Chōji, left! Ino, anchor!"
"G-got it!" Chōji's acknowledgement was ragged.
"Shikamaru, talk to me!" Ino pressed, hands already forming a seal.
No response—he was still trying to stop the horizon from drifting out of alignment. He forced his weight onto his heels, feeling the sharp thrumming along his teeth from the geothermal heat, but proprioception was lagging. The air tore open twice more. Shapes twisted, extruding into the world at angles that defied geometry. Limbs caught a fraction too late. Puppet-like.
The second Doki stepped forward. It landed heavily, its foot tearing the soil inconsistently—too deep on the heel, too shallow on the toe.
Gaze snagged on the rise between two skeletal birches. She stood there, small, with wild pink hair. He could see the jaw tension while she gripped the flute, her cheeks puffing with a breath cycle that missed the rhythm and made the notes waver.
The pitch shifted. It stuttered. Just a hitch.
Right index. Ring. Left—no, middle—
Eyes burned, eye-strain pulsing as he tried to lock onto her fingers through the refracted light of the steam.
"Lackey," a grunt escaped his throat. "Focus on the girl! Ignore the perimeter!"
Chōji pivoted, dropping his guard toward the edge of the clearing to surge forward. But the thought broke as a man in a med-nin uniform planted his feet over the broken root lattice. No force—just a weight shift so controlled it barely disturbed the ash. He hit a pocket of soft soot, his ankle dipping a fraction before he compensated with a minute, organic correction in his knee.
"Wait—no!" The correction arrived late; Chōji was already committed to a lunge that left his flank open. "He's not... attacking. Just watching—waiting for the mistake—seeing where she misfires."
The pitch climbed and tore. The first Doki moved. Grit and wood shards lifted in the air displacement as its massive club compressed against the atmosphere, driving a pressure wave into Shikamaru's ribs a heartbeat before the wood arrived.
"Move!" Asuma barked.
He twisted late—half a beat behind—his foot catching on a tangled root. The micro-latency in his nerves nearly cost him his head. The wind of the club's passage whipped across his face, cold and violent. The root lattice gave way, the ground collapsing as stone fragments spun outward. A chunk of earth hammered into his shoulder, jarring the joint and sending a dull, sickening ache down the arm that smeared his vision.
The second Doki misfired toward Chōji, targeting empty space before yanking its movement mid-motion.
"Shikamaru! Give us something!" Ino shouted.
"So we... we bait the delay—?!" Chōji yelled, misinterpreting the frantic analysis. He ignored the med-nin entirely, charging the girl.
"Chōji, back off! Don't—!" Shikamaru's voice broke. The med-nin's glasses reflected the filtered light, his posture perfectly still as he watched the boy rush into the trap.
Seams along the third Doki's stitched mouth stretched until the thread groaned.
"Don't let that—!"
Then it drove in deeper—a frequency lancing through his jaw hinge. Vision flashed white, the image of the opening mouth smeared into a streak of grey and red. Cold air, hot earth, and a high-pitched ringing that swallowed his own breath. Troublesome didn't even begin to cover it.
Teeth clenched against the noise, forcing his mind to hold onto the stutter even as his knees threatened to buckle. The hot earth felt miles away as his balance drifted again, the ringing pressing against his eardrums with a physical weight.
"That wasn't... the tune," he murmured, a jagged, pained smirk breaking through as his vision smeared against a fresh pulse of noise. He caught the hitch—the tremor. "She didn't... mean to play that."