Genin
By Flashfyre5
Chapter Twelve: Assault
Naruto did his level best not to
shift from foot to foot. He was
standing in a line next to Sakura.
Beyond her were Neji, Lee, and Iruka. All four of them looked far more at ease
with the situation than he did, which bothered the blond-haired chuunin more
than a bit.
“Well, I have to say that this is
more than impressive,” Tsunade began, strolling in front of the candidates. “We’ve never had five people make it to
the final section of this test before.
I’d like to congratulate you all.
However, this is where many of your predecessors have failed.” Naruto’s stomach twisted at this, but he
managed to keep a straight face.
Tsunade looked disheveled, as if she
hadn’t slept. Naruto felt for her;
he had thought that he’d have to resort to sleeping pills to get to sleep the
night before. In the barely post
dawn light, he was grateful that he hadn’t had to resort to such measures. Though the espionage pseudo-mission that
he’d completed with Sakura the day before hadn’t been strenuous for him, Naruto
had slept for most of the afternoon, as well as the entire night. Now, for the first time since Sasuke’s
rampage, he felt like himself.
“As you know, this test has been
testing your capabilities, and matching those up against what we need in a
jounin. What you may not know is
that the Anbu and the medic-nin have been monitoring this test very closely as
well,” Tsunade marshaled herself, appearing to shake away her
sleeplessness. “The Anbu and the
medic-nin are special jounin organizations. A shinobi that is a member of either
organization is technically a jounin, even if they are not assigned with the
full range and scope of missions that a full-fledged jounin would normally
undertake. After this test, each
group will independently decide for themselves weather or not each of you fit
their needs, and inform you of their decision.” Tsunade trailed off, her head dipping a
bit. She snapped it up and shook
her head again. One of her aides
stepped forward and conversed with her in hushed tones, but Tsunade shook her
head and pushed him away gently.
“You all have trained here before,”
Tsunade began again, dispensing with the formality such a situation usually
called for. “Inside the castle is a
dummy, much like this one,” she continued, hefting a human-sized dummy. A few lights blinked around its body,
and its shape vaguely approximated that of a human’s. “This thing will indicate ‘death’ by
asphyxia, crushing, or wounding in a vital area. Your mission is to assassinate an enemy
daimiyou, approximated by this dummy’s twin. We know that it’s in the castle
somewhere, but even I don’t know where specifically. However, the castle is guarded by a
large number of shinobi. Some
estimates say between twenty and thirty mixed jounin and chuunin. Furthermore, they know who you are and
that you’re coming.” Naruto lost
his composure a bit at this.
Sneaking in between that many jounin, as he had the day before, was one
thing. Having to fight them was a
whole other proposition.
“How are we supposed to succeed,
then?” Neji asked, his face stoic.
Naruto glanced over at the Hyuuga prodigy and noticed a very tiny sheen
of sweat, just below Neji’s hitai-ite, the only indication of any nervousness
that the Hyuuga could not control.
“Kill the daimiyou, then take out as
many of the shinobi guarding the castle as possible,” Tsunade explained
bluntly. “The daimiyou is the
mission critical objective. If he
gets away, you all fail immediately.
The method the five of you use to complete this mission will be the most
important consideration. The team’s
‘survival’ ratio… is secondary.”
“In other words, this is a suicide
mission,” Sakura stated, her eyes blue.
Naruto hadn’t noticed that her inner self was in control this morning,
and mentally kicked himself for missing the opportunity to greet her. Sakura didn’t let her inner self out
much lately, and the blond-haired chuunin enjoyed being around someone even more
mischievous than himself.
“Yes,” Tsunade nodded, and Naruto
could hear the others shifting.
“You have until midnight.
Good luck.” Each of the
chuunin nodded in response and moved into the training area. Naruto, the last in the line, was
stopped when Tsunade placed a hand softly on his shoulder. He turned to face the aged
legend.
“About Sasuke,” she began, then fell
silent. “You’re the only one who’s
fought him and lived. When it comes
time to kill him…” Naruto’s face
fell, then hardened.
“With a good night’s sleep, I can
take him, no problem,” Naruto declared decisively. “Even with that stupid scroll of his,
he’s not as good as Kakashi-sensei was.”
Tsunade looked up at Naruto, her face betraying surprise. “Kakashi-sensei only ever let his guard
down around Sasuke. He probably got
caught by surprise. As long as
Sasuke doesn’t use the scroll again, there’s no way he can beat me.” Naruto’s jaw clenched and unclenched a
few times as he thought. Tsunade
simply sighed and nodded.
“All right. You can go now,” Tsunade said, a wan
smile alighting on her face.
“You’re not gonna kill him,” Naruto
said, his tone iron. Tsunade’s
surprise showed itself again at the determination that was written plainly on
Naruto’s face. “Sasuke was the
first person to ever acknowledge me as a rival. He was the first person my age to treat
me like something besides a monster.
I’m gonna kick his ass until he sees straight again. Got it?” the blond-haired chuunin
declared, his eyes glassy with determination. Tsunade did her best not to smile at
Naruto’s loyalty. Fortunately, an
Anbu leapt to the ground next to her in a crouch, so she was able to direct her
attention elsewhere before her frazzled willpower gave
out.
“Yes?” she addressed the Anbu. He looked up at her before speaking, his
face obscured by a mask shaped like a fox.
“We have him under close
surveillance, but he still hasn’t led us to her. Should we take him anyway, Hokage-sama?”
the Anbu asked in the clipped tones of a commander. Still, Naruto couldn’t help but feel
like he recognized the voice.
Tsunade glanced at Naruto, then back at the Anbu.
“No. We’ll leave him be unless he tries to
hurt someone,” she finally decided, nodding to the man. He nodded and rose. When he turned, he saw Naruto and
stopped. A hand snaked up and
lifted the mask, revealing a face that Naruto hadn’t seen in
years.
“Uzumaki Naruto,” Morino Ibiki
half-growled in the tone of voice he’d used when he’d administered the chuunin
exam so very long ago. “The one
that made it through with a blank test.
Good luck, kid. I’d like to
work with you, personally.” Then he
was gone, leaving Naruto with an odd mixture of determination and embarrassed
pleasure.
“Go,” Tsunade said after a few
moments. “They’re probably
wondering where you are.” Naruto
nodded once and leapt off into the training grounds, chasing after his erstwhile
team.
* * * * * *
The last rays of the sun’s light were fading from the sky by the time
Sakura made her way, alone, into the castle at the center of training area
23. It had taken the entire day for
the five of them to argue through the details of their plan of attack. Sakura, her inner self in control at the
time, had complained for hours about her assigned role in the attack. Again, she was to make herself invisible
and sneak into the stronghold to assassinate the daimiyou dummy. /Well,/ she thought wryly, sneaking past
a yawning guard, /I’ve proved that I can become invisible very well. Maybe that’ll count for
something./
Sakura had taken back control once her inner self had resigned herself to
the simple logic of the strategy.
Inner Sakura was inept at most genjutsu. In fact, she only knew one, which Naruto
had taught her in his spare time.
Sakura had to bite back a giggle at the memory of the blond-haired boy’s
attempts to teach her the technique without seeming like a pervert. /On the other hand,/ Sakura reasoned,
/what other kind of person invents a technique called ‘Sexy no
Jutsu?’/
Regardless, Sakura now found herself, using Me ni Mienai, inside the
castle. Her sharp eyes picked out
several well-hidden traps in the gloom.
Carefully avoiding them, Sakura checked in room after room as she made
her way around the first floor of the castle. There were guards everywhere; she had
already counted twenty, and knew that there would be just as many on the second
floor. Tsunade had given them a
very conservative estimate.
After about a half-hour of searching, Sakura had satisfied herself that
the dummy was not on the first floor of the castle. Silently and invisibly, she stole up the
central staircase, carefully bypassing several traps on her way. This time, the jounin were ready for
her, it seemed. If she tripped even
one of these traps, her position would be given away and the entire plan
ruined. Sakura took her time to
make sure that that didn’t happen.
Finally on the second floor, Sakura made her way around the perimeter,
noting that the sliding doors to almost every single room was closed. If there were people inside any of them,
it would be impossible to check without giving herself away. Finally, though, Sakura stopped and
smiled. To her left, on the far
side of the flimsy rice-paper door, she could hear two people conversing
quietly. Though there had been
shinobi patrolling the upper level, no other room had emitted any semblance of
sound. A quick glance around
confirmed that Sakura was alone for the moment. She knocked on the door and stepped to
the side, drawing her ninja-to silently.
After a few moments, the door slid open and a man that Sakura vaguely
recognized poked his head out to glance around. Sakura wasted no time and brought the
flat edge of her blade down on his neck.
The jounin seemed to get the idea and slumped to the ground with a thump,
spitting out a long toothpick as he did so. Inside the room, his companion gave a
shout of surprise, but Sakura was already on the move. By the time that the jounin had drawn a
kunai, Sakura had clambered over the first jounin’s prone form and slashed
towards the second. Somehow, he
managed to block her initial slash.
Sakura grinned and pivoted, striking the other side of the jounin’s neck
with her ninja-to, which was held in her other hand. In this stance, her torso was fully
presented to her opponent; it was a risky stance made usable only because her
opponent could not see her vulnerability.
He dropped to the floor, as the rules of the test
dictated.
As Sakura had expected, the human-like brown dummy sat in the corner of
the room, the lights scattered around its form blinking merrily. Sakura reversed her grip on her
ninja-to, then slashed crosswise.
The dummy’s head fell from its body with a thud, and the lights blinked
out. Suddenly, Sakura felt a
wrenching sensation, and her invisibility dropped. Clutched in her left hand was the steel
sheath for her ninja-to, matching the instrument itself in her right hand. She cursed, realizing that she had
tripped a chakra-draining trap when she’d taken the daimiyou’s head.
Sakura clambered back out of the room. /If that didn’t set off a silent alarm,
I’ll be amazed,/ Sakura thought to herself. She slipped the sheath of her sword back
into its specially-made quick release holder, then reached into her supplies
pouch and pulled out a small cylinder.
Behind her, she could hear the sounds of quiet running, and glanced
back. She made out three figures in the
half-darkness, then corrected herself as a fourth joined them. /There’s no way I’m getting away,/ she
thought with a pang of regret.
/I’ve gotta signal the others./
She remembered a place earlier, where there had been a large hole in the
second story wall. /If I can make
it that far…/ she trailed off mentally.
Sakura rounded the last corner and grabbed a little string attached to
one end of the cylinder with her teeth.
She yanked hard, pulling the short length free of the cylinder. A small trickle of smoke seeped out, and
Sakura grinned. She hadn’t been
sure that it would work when Neji had given it to her earlier, but
now…
“There!” Sakura couldn’t keep herself from shouting when the hole in the
wall came into view. There were now
at least a dozen shinobi chasing her, and Sakura knew that they’d catch her
within moments. With all her might,
she hurled the chakra flare out of the wall. It bounced off of a support and tumbled
out into the night sky. A special
Hyuuga creation, it emitted only a little heat, but a great deal of stored
chakra. It made for an excellent
signal flare when one was allied with a Hyuuga. The only disadvantage of the item was
that the chakra was blocked by any physical barrier, even something as thin as
rice paper. /HELL YEAH!/ Inner
Sakura celebrated, seeing the special signaling device tumble out of the
building. Then, Sakura found
herself utterly immobilized.
“Caught ya. You’re dead,
woman,” a man Sakura recognized as Shikamaru’s father grinned
cockily.
“Maybe, but so are you,” Sakura replied just as
cockily.
“Kuchiyose no Jutsu!” Naruto’s voice shouted, followed by a massive
explosion. Someone ran over to the
hole in the wall, then nearly fell over in surprise.
“Get outta here! It’s
Gamabunta!” he shouted, and the jounin that had chased Sakura dispersed
immediately, seeming to vanish into the corridors of the castle. Sakura suddenly found herself mobile
once again, and glanced back at the elder Nara, who had held her captive with,
she presumed, Kagemane.
“You’re still dead, girl, but get outta here before something really bad
happens,” he told her, and Sakura nodded her thanks. Then, she heard the creaking of massive
tendons, and a sudden rushing of air.
Remembering the next part of the plan, Sakura dove out of the hole in the
wall and landed hard on her feet, two stories down. Wincing at the pain the jump had caused
in her legs, Sakura ran away from the castle as quickly as she could, chanting
one phrase over and over again.
“Get away from the castle, get away from the castle, get away from the
castle,” she repeated to herself.
Behind her, Gamabunta came crashing down on the ancient building, his
incredible weight snapping the foot-thick wooden columns that held the building
upright as if they were nothing sturdier than matchsticks.
* * * * * *
“Go, now!” Neji shouted from his position about fifty feet to Naruto’s
left. The blond-haired teen had
been waiting excitedly for the signal, and quickly performed the five hand seals
that were the prerequisite for all summoning.
“Kuchiyose no Jutsu!” Naruto
shouted, perhaps a bit more loudly than he strictly had to. With a wrench of outpouring chakra, the
gargantuan frog appeared beneath Naruto.
He towered above the treetops, and was larger than even the castle that
they had to assault.
“What’s the plan, kid?” Gamabunta rumbled, his gravely voice betraying
only a sliver of respect. Naruto
had worked for years to gain even that from Gamabunta, an honor that not even
the legendary Jiraiya had received.
Out of that modicum of respect, Gamabunta would act before asking
questions when Naruto summoned him, which was exactly what Naruto needed at this
moment. The shock value that the
toad boss would generate was considerable, but would be wasted if they didn’t
act quickly.
“Jump! On the castle!”
Naruto shouted, and wedged himself between two particularly large warts on
Gamabunta’s head. The toad boss
grunted his assent, and gathered himself for the jump. The great muscles and tendons in his
rear legs creaked as he bunched them, sending an eerie echo through the
woods. Then, Gamabunta leapt into
the air, his trajectory taking him very high, but not very far. As Gamabunta reached the top of his arc,
Naruto peered down at the castle below them. Shadowy figures, looking like ants at
this height, were pouring out of the building below them. Naruto quickly realized that there were
quite a few more than the twenty that Tsunade had predicted, and shouted at
Gamabunta.
“Try not to crush the castle,” Naruto shouted over the wind as they began
to fall. “There might still be
people inside!”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Gamabunta rumbled. “That’s the whole point!” Naruto’s eyes widened a bit; Gamabunta
thought that this was a real assault.
Naruto opened his mouth to shout at the toad boss again, but they were
falling so quickly now that the rushing wind stole the air out of Naruto’s
lungs. He gulped another breath in
and tried again.
“Training!” he managed to shout, and Gamabunta grunted beneath him. Less than a second later, the toad boss
landed much harder than he usually did.
Despite his best efforts, Gamabunta’s own momentum pulled his body down
into the castle. Beneath him, the
sounds of gigantic pieces of wood snapping was clearly audible throughout the
clearing. Still, the castle did not
collapse, and Gamabunta stepped slowly over and away from
it.
“Thanks, oyabun,” Naruto breathed, still regaining his breath. Gamabunta grunted
again.
“You’re gonna get me killed one of these days, brat,” the gigantic toad
spat back, and Naruto tried not to look sheepish. Beneath the two of them, ninja ran from
the badly damaged building and escaped into the forest, where Neji, Lee, and
Iruka were waiting.
To his left, Naruto could see that
Lee had managed to capture a jounin in his chains, and was now flailing him
about as though he was an oversized morning star. His skin was a shade of bright red
caused only by the Ura Renge.
Naruto knew that, to his right, Neji would now be doing his best to take
out individual jounin with his Jyuuken.
Iruka had set dozens of traps in his sector, behind Naruto. A few surprised shouts told Naruto that
they had claimed their first victims.
“Waddya want me to do now, kid?” Gamabunta asked seriously. Beneath him, many jounin had stopped
fleeing and were beginning to organize a counterattack against the gigantic
toad.
“Do what you can, but don’t kill anyone,” Naruto ordered. Gamabunta rumbled more deeply than usual
in response, and Naruto very suddenly remembered his position. “Oyabun,” he added, trying to make it
sound like anything but the afterthought that it was. Gamabunta paid him no real mind; he was
focused on the rather daunting task of causing major distress to a large number
of jounin without actually injuring them.
To his credit, the frog boss was stomping around his massive, webbed feet
in a surprisingly careful fashion.
He scattered jounin group after jounin group, but they always managed to
re-form quickly. Even lone jounin,
however, were beginning to mount attacks against the toad boss in surprisingly
effective ways. Gamabunta’s
expansive flanks soon became an easy target for the quickly moving jounin. Powerful jutsus poured fire, lightning,
and hails of kunai and shuriken onto the gigantic toad. Despite the fact that they were tiny in
relation to his great girth, the thousands of injuries were beginning to mount
up on Gamabunta.
“This isn’t working,” Gamabunta rumbled. Naruto had to agree; Gamabunta, unable
to properly counterattack, had become a hundred-foot-tall target, and the jounin
beneath him were taking full advantage of the fact. Quickly, Naruto crossed the first two
fingers of his hands and called upon a most of his remaining chakra, as well as
a goodly portion of what Kyuubi would offer.
“Kage Bunshin!” he shouted, and the entire clearing was covered in a
thick explosion of ninja smoke. It
slowly blew away, revealing thousands of clones. They covered Gamabunta’s broad back
completely, as well as almost every square foot of ground beneath him. Even still, there wasn’t enough room for
them all; even more clones hung from trees and prowled the edges of the
forest. Still, not a single jounin
was surprised by the sudden multiplication of their adversary. They set about the systematic
destruction of the attacking clones with a level of efficiency that Naruto
couldn’t help but admire. Clones
were caught in the flames of simple Goukakyu jutsus, unable to escape the
killing fires because they were so tightly packed together. Gamabunta, however, was spared from the
jounin while they dealt with the clones.
“What now, kid?” Gamabunta asked, accidentally crushing a dozen clones
with a reflexive step backwards.
“I’m working on it,” Naruto shouted, trying to think of anything that
would aid them. The shadow clones
had been an impulsive move, born from the need to protect Gamabunta. Now that he was able to take a moment to
assess the situation, Naruto realized that Lee was gone, the jounin that he had
used as a weapon laying on the ground senselessly. No more screams came from Iruka’s
section of the forest, and Naruto was fairly sure that Neji would be out of
chakra by now, despite the fact that the teen’s chakra reserves rivaled Naruto’s
own.
“This is bad. I think that
everyone else is gone already,” Naruto explained after a few minutes. Gamabunta rumbled his assent. Beneath them, the shadow clones had been
reduced to a tenth their original number, and not a single jounin had fallen
from the assault. One group of
three had gathered directly beneath Gamabunta, where the gigantic toad couldn’t
see them. Two were pouring chakra
into the third, who was doing his best to control it in order to perform the
jutsu he needed to.
“I think you’re right, kid, and I’m feeling pretty out of it myself,”
Gamabunta admitted after a moment, deigning to show weakness to the little human
on his back. Naruto nodded; the
giant toad was breathing heavily, and his movements revealed how much the
thousands of little wounds had hurt him.
“Kuchiyose no Jutsu!” a man called from beneath Gamabunta. The toad boss found himself flung up and
away by the gigantic spatial distortion that the summoning had just
generated. Naruto barely had time
to leap away from his form before the toad crashed into the forest on his
back. Gamabunta righted himself
quickly, then cursed as the ninja smoke billowed away from the figure that had
thrown him.
“Damn it, I’m too tired to deal with you,” Gamabunta cursed, reaching
around to grasp the sword he carried across his back. Towering in front of him was a
gray-furred wolf, its bushy eyebrows framing a wizened old muzzle. Long mustaches hung from his muzzle,
whitening as they pulled away from his face. The wolf was standing upright, his rear
paws resting on a pair of immense geta sandals. He was dressed in the garb of a samurai,
pressed to crisp perfection. His
pants were black, and his outer kimono was a dark shade of blue usually only
seen on royalty. Beneath it, he
wore a crisp, white kimono, barely visible beneath the outer kimono. Cinched at his belt were a pair of
blades, one significantly longer than the other. Stamped on the left breast of his kimono
were the characters for ‘wolf’ and ‘man,’ surrounded by
circles.
“Gamabunta,” the gigantic wolf said, inclining his head a bit in
respect. His left front paw rested
lightly on the hilt of his katana, and was slowly distorting into a rather
human-like hand.
“Been a long time, Ookamijin,” Gamabunta replied, returning the wolf’s
gesture of respect. There was no
love lost between the two, but a degree of respect was warranted when confronted
with the head of a rival tribe.
“Not long enough, in my humble opinion. I see that you still bear the scar from
our last encounter,” Ookamijin said in an exceedingly polite taunt. Gamabunta winced, knowing that the long
slash mark was easily visible along the left side of his face. Ookamijin had come very close to taking
his eye that time.
“Feh,” Gamabunta replied with an amphibian’s grin. “I came out ahead in that fight. Your balls are still pickling in a jar
on my mantle,” the toad taunted. It
wasn’t entirely true, but he had castrated the giant wolf in retaliation for the
rather obvious scar that now adorned his face. Naruto, meanwhile, had managed to hide
himself where he could still see the two behemoths. He was impressed with Ookamijin; he’d
never summoned the wolf shogun, though he knew that he probably could, if he had
to. Naruto much preferred Gamabunta
and the toads, though he could never really figure out
why.
“Scum,” Ookamijin spat, anger aflame in his eyes. His paws had transformed into hairy
human’s hands, and he now grasped the hilt of his katana in his left hand. With a smooth motion, he drew it, then
extended the blade in a very traditional kendo stance. Gamabunta’s blade leapt out of its
sheath, but the toad boss edged away from the wolf. Many of the jounin around the two had
stopped searching for Naruto to watch the two legends
fight.
“Your kind should have been wiped from the earth generations ago!”
Ookamijin growled, slashing hard at Gamabunta. The toad boss jumped to the side and
deflected the blade. Had he been at
his full strength, he could have managed a stab at Ookamijin’s leg, but his
wounds caught him as he was about to.
Instead, the toad boss backed away slowly, keeping his blade between him
and the wolf shogun. Ookamijin
turned quickly to face Gamabunta again.
Anger was still in his eyes, but so too was cunning
now.
“You’re not fighting like you normally do,” the wolf observed, slowly
shuffling forward, his geta dragging wide furrows in the ground. He slashed again, and Gamabunta blocked
the strike with his sword. The two
locked swords and glared at each other.
Eventually, Gamabunta slipped, and Ookamijin’s sword slid down and off
his blade.
“Sorry, but ya caught me at a bad time, samurai. I’m outta here,” Gamabunta rumbled as
his form blurred, then disappeared.
Ookamijin snarled a bit, then sheathed his blade. After a few moments, he too
vanished. Naruto turned to run, but
was struck hard on the back of his head.
He pitched face-first into the tree’s trunk, and darkness claimed
him.
* * * * * *
“All right, let’s close it up for the night,” a chuunin called
quietly. He was crouched on top of
Konoha’s Eastern gate, which he was charged with guarding. A few voices returned their
acknowledgement of his order, and the almost-silent shinobi set about closing
the massive oaken gates. In the
bright light of a full moon, hanging low overhead, they were barely visible, and
the man smiled at their skill, even when performing such a mundane task as
this.
“Excuse me, young man,” a woman’s voice intruded upon his reverie. It carried the weight of decades of age,
and the guard looked down the wall, trying to trace the voice to its
source. Standing near the closing
gates was an elderly woman, leaning on a bamboo staff for
support.
“What is it, ma’am?” he asked, hopping down from the wall. The woman had to be over sixty, and such
age was regarded with profound respect in Konoha.
“I’d like to leave, if it’s not too terribly much trouble,” she
explained, pointing at the gates with her right hand. It shook slightly as she held it aloft,
a subtle sign of arthritis.
“It’s dangerous out, ma’am.
You might get hurt,” the guard said, trying to argue his case as
diplomatically as he could. While
citizens of Konoha were allowed to leave the village whenever they wanted, the
gate’s guards made every effort they could to dissuade anyone from leaving after
dark. Proximity to a hidden village
tended to lead to a brand of highwaymen far more skilled than the average
brigand, so nighttime travel was quite dangerous until one was a good distance
from Konoha.
“I’ll be fine, young man. I
was a ninja once, you know,” she replied, good-natured laughter lilting just
behind her words. The guard shook
his head, then nodded to his companions.
The gate was cracked a few feet, just enough for one person to
exit.
“If you change your mind, just call out. The night shift’ll open up for you,” the
guard said as the woman slipped through the gates. Outside, she paused a minute, then
turned to address him.
“I won’t,” she said flatly, all merriment gone from her voice. The moon shone down on her carefully
controlled head of what was once blue hair. Now, it was mostly gray. For the first time, the woman stood up
straight, and any impression of frailness that she might once have exuded
vanished. Taut muscles rippled
under wrinkled skin, and a look of grim determination adorned the woman’s aged
face. The guard suppressed a
shudder of apprehension, but the woman turned and walked away from the
village.
“Close the gate,” he ordered, turning his back on them. Behind him, his subordinates scurried to
comply. A few of them conversed
quietly with one another, but the head guard paid them no mind. After only a moment’s hesitation, he
began his journey home, to try and wash the unpleasant meeting from his
memory.
* * * * * *
“We could be there tonight,” Dontou growled, crouching next to a small
fire. Itachi sat near him, and
stared into the flames blankly, his face betraying no
emotion.
“Masako-sama ordered me to be there tomorrow. I will be there tomorrow; no earlier,”
Itachi replied simply, his quiet, even tone grating on Dontou’s already-frayed
nerves.
“And you’re just a mindless doll that does whatever she wants,” Dontou
sniped, exasperation finally getting the best of him. Traveling all day with the utterly
silent Uchiha was hard; Kisame’s unvoiced hatred had made it immeasurably
worse.
“I perform Masako-sama’s will,” Itachi replied, his eyes narrowing
fractionally. Dontou was inwardly
surprised at this; it was the first time that he’d ever seen Itachi display
emotion on any level.
“Like some puppet with invisible strings,” Dontou pressed, hoping to
crack Itachi’s facade. “You know
damn well that you’ll do anything that she tells you to.”
“Shut up,” Itachi ordered flatly, his eyes narrowing a bit
more.
“You’re a prisoner,” Dontou realized aloud, laughing in incredulity. Itachi’s eyes narrowed again, and the
immensely dangerous man rose to his feet slowly. “You’re a prisoner to her will. You don’t actually want to do what she
says.” Suddenly, Dontou’s limbs
locked up. No matter how hard he
tried, he couldn’t so much as twitch a finger. Itachi’s Sharingan eyes whirled quickly,
and Dontou could make out the slightly bulging cheek muscles that indicated a
tightly clenched jaw. Itachi rose
and approached Dontou slowly.
“If you ever,” Itachi began, the word ‘ever’ clearly emphasized, ”speak
of this again, your death will be the most awe-inspiring work of art that a
torturer could ever hope to see. Do
you understand?” Dontou nodded
dumbly, and could suddenly move again.
Itachi turned, walked back over to the fallen tree that he’d been sitting
on, and assumed the exact position that he’d been in before Dontou had spoken to
him. Visibly shaken, Dontou turned
back to the fire.
“We have a visitor,” Kisame called from the darkness around the
camp. He had been standing watch, a
necessity this close to a hidden village.
Into the fire’s light walked the gigantic man himself. Following him was an elderly woman who
was using a bamboo staff as a walking stick. Itachi and Dontou immediately
stood.
“Masako-sama,” Itachi said, then bowed. Dontou said nothing, but he didn’t bow
either. “It’s been years since I’ve
seen your true form.”
“It’s been nearly that long since you’ve seen me at all,” she replied
coolly. “This mess with your
brother has grown too large, and it’s mostly your fault.”
“I apologize, Masako-sama. I
felt that it needed to be done,” Itachi said, straightening. Masako shook her
head.
“Well,” she began, squatting next to the fire. “He’s proven to be far too
troublesome. I cannot control
him.” Itachi’s lips pressed
together fractionally, darkening his already severe face. “You know what this means. I can’t have another Shijuukaigan user
running around without my supervision,” she continued after a long minute of
silence.
“There is no other way?” Itachi asked, his voice seeming to strain
slightly. Masako glanced over at
him, an expression of mild surprise on her face.
“No,” she replied, turning back to the fire. “And I want you to do it. Personally.”
“Yes… Masako-sama,” Itachi nodded, his voice clearly straining. Masako shook her head at the Uchiha’s
inner conflict. She knew, however,
that he would always follow any orders that she gave him. He’d lost the capacity to disobey at age
seven.
“So…” Masako trailed off, finally glancing in Dontou’s direction. “What are you doing
here?”
“Keeping an eye on him,” Dontou explained with a slight shrug. “After a four year absence, the rest of
Akatsuki is rather… concerned, shall we say, with his status. They asked me to watch him for a
while.”
“I have him under control,” Masako replied icily.
“The rest of us are not nearly so confident, Masako. Nor are we very confident with you,”
Dontou returned, his tone just as icy as Masako’s had been. “And I take it from your earlier
conversation that your plan to recruit another Uchiha to the organization has
failed.” Masako’s eyes narrowed,
but she made no move towards him.
“I hope you have a backup plan.
The organization has already called for a vote of no confidence. If you return empty-handed, you’ll
likely be voted down.” Dontou
paused for a moment, to allow this to sink in, then continued in a tone filled
with sarcasm, “And what a tragedy that would be.”
The blade of Masako’s shikomi-zue was resting on Dontou’s Adam’s apple
before he’d even finished his sentence.
He closed his eyes briefly and clenched his jaw; he hadn’t even seen
Masako grab her weapon, much less draw it.
As he reopened his eyes, he saw that the only part of the woman that had
moved was her right arm, which was clutching the shikomi-zue. Masako was still staring deeply into the
little fire that Itachi had made earlier that evening.
“You will address me,” she said slowly, without a hint of emotion. “With the respect I am due as the head
of the organization. Am I
clear?”
“Perfectly, Masako-sama,” Dontou replied, and she shikomi-zue was
suddenly gone. Once again, he
hadn’t been able to see it move, but in the blink of an eye, Masako had
re-sheathed the weapon and laid it at her side. Dontou allowed himself an involuntary
shudder. He knew that Masako had a
backup plan; she always had a backup plan.
Dontou feared the woman. He
feared her even more than he feared Itachi. While she might not have the level of
combat prowess that Itachi did, she was a relentless planner, and a brilliant
tactician.
And it was a ‘might,’ concerning her physical capabilities. Masako had risen to power by defeating
every other member of the Akatsuki organization in single combat. Most fights hadn’t even been close. /If there was someone out there that
could beat Itachi,/ Dontou reasoned, /It’d be Masako./
* * * * * *
Naruto groaned a bit as he forced his eyes open. Above him, he could make out the dim
shapes of ceiling tiles. This made him groan again; he knew a hospital ceiling
when he saw one, and his pocketbook suddenly began to hurt more than his
head.
“Welcome back,” Sakura’s voice greeted him. Naruto rolled his head to the left,
where he’d heard her voice coming from.
“Who got me?” he asked around his pounding
headache.
“Genma. He brought you in
too,” Sakura explained, smiling faintly.
She was sitting next to his bed, and looked like she’d been sleeping
there.
“Damn,” Naruto cursed good-naturedly. Sakura laughed at him quietly, and
Naruto smiled at her merriment.
“You’ve got a concussion, so try not to move around a lot,” Sakura told
him. Naruto screwed up his face,
then sat up.
“No I don’t. If I did, I’d
be throwing up right now,” he said, referencing his rather swift rise. “It’s just a bad headache.” Sakura shook in silent laughter at
Naruto’s simple, yet effective, diagnosis.
“Who made it out?” he asked after she got herself under
control.
“Neji and Lee. That caught
Iruka while he was trying to escape, and I didn’t make it out of the castle
before they caught me,” Sakura told him.
Naruto nodded, understanding.
“Who summoned Ookamijin?” he asked after a minute of
thought.
“Genma,” Sakura replied. At
Naruto’s look of surprise, she continued, “He had two people helping
him.”
“Oh,” Naruto said intelligently.
Sakura nodded, and they fell silent. Her face was downcast, and her
expression dark. “What is it?” he
finally asked.
“Tsunade-sama told me that the Anbu have spotted Itachi near the
village. He’s come for Sasuke,” she
explained, looking up. “She’s
decided to let Itachi kill him.”
“Damn it,” Naruto cursed, clenching his fist.
“She’s ordered us not to interfere,” Sakura continued, a tear shimmering
down her cheek. Naruto clenched his
jaw for a long moment.
“Fuck that,” he finally decided, pulling himself out of bed. Sakura looked up at him in
surprise. Naruto walked over to the
room’s closet, grabbed his pants from the day before, and pulled them on. Sakura blushed a bit at Naruto’s state
of undress, but didn’t look away from the boxer-clad
teenager.
“I’m gonna go save his ass.
Again,” Naruto declared, pulling on an undershirt and his jacket. Sakura stood and took a few steps
towards him. Before she could get
close, however, Naruto walked over to the door and yanked it open. Outside, Lee and Neji
stood.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Lee asked
good-naturedly.
“I’m gonna go and make sure that Sasuke doesn’t get killed by his
brother,” Naruto said firmly.
“Tsunade-sama instructed us to keep you from doing anything brash,” Neji
said off-handedly. Naruto could see
that he was adjusting his stance a bit, to be less at
ease.
“I don’t give a damn.
Sasuke’s a Leaf shinobi and my comrade. I’m gonna save his ass, even if it means
kicking both of yours,” Naruto shouted, Kyuubi’s chakra held just below the
surface.
“I was hoping you’d say that,” Neji grinned, his milky-white eyes
narrowing with anticipation. Neji
pushed himself off of the wall, then held out a kunai holster and supplies
pouch. “You’re going to need these
if you’re really planning on doing anything against Itachi.” Stunned, Naruto accepted the supplies
and strapped them to his leg and belt, respectively.
“All right!” Lee declared, pumping his fist in the air. “Let’s go kick some Akatsuki
ass!”
“Huh?” Naruto responded, his surprise deepening.
“We’re Leaf shinobi too. We
feel the same as you do,” Neji grinned, crossing his arms. Naruto glanced from Neji to Lee, then
back again.
“Thanks, guys,” Naruto said sheepishly, scratching the back of his
head. Neji just smirked, and Lee
offered him a thumbs-up. Without
further ado, the three of them charged out of the hospital in search of
Sasuke. Behind them, Sakura
trailed, keeping up as best she could.
* * * * * *
Tsunade grinned softly and rose slowly from her seated position. She walked over to the door of the room
she’d been sitting in quietly for the last few hours, opened it, and exited in
to the central hallway of Konoha’s only hospital. Only two rooms away, the door to
Naruto’s room was still ajar.
“It’s human nature,” she grinned to herself. “The best way to get a group of people to do something is to tell them that they can’t.”
“Rhodes
to the Past,” by Fatty Acid. This
is a wicked good Chrono Trigger remix.
Go get it. NOW. It’s seriously that good.
Character
Themes:
Sorry, none this chapter. Dontou’s the only guy left, and he doesn’t get his for another chapter or two.