Author's Note: This fic is a respin of my old "Dark Tournament" fic, done after watching some let's-plays of the game Soma. This is dark moral-free drama, gratuitous smut, out of character fluff and humor, and as many crossover lemons as I can come up with without getting bored or squicked. Series, character, and pairing requests are welcome. Unlike the original DT, this fic is so open I can always add more characters as I go along. As usual, I will be sticking to my preferred semexuke pairings as far as any romance is concerned, but when it comes to the crossover smut, I'll write just about anything. I'll be changing the category to reflect the main series in each part until I get a nice mix set up. Check the warnings of each part to find or avoid particular pairings/character-perspectives/series. Since this is largely an 'anything-goes-pwp' fic, skipping around shouldn't make it unreadable.
Focus for this part:
Naruto - Naru/Sasu, Zabuza/Haku, Iruka
MKR Magic Knight Rayearth - Lantis/Eagle
HunterxHunter - Milluki.
The Den
Part 1
Number fifty-seven was killing himself again. He had dug his fingers into his throat, caught hold, and pulled. His current body was as unnaturally strong as his original had been. More blood coated the once white floor as he slumped forward in a lifeless heap. The body instantly was removed and replaced with a fresh one. The scan of his very last memories was installed and the recording in the room began to play again the moment he opened his eyes.
"Welcome to the Den. You are a clone, a copy, a biological duplicate of your original self. Your life continues in your original world just as you now do in this one. You have been chosen to live forever. You will have no choice as to what you do with this life until you have completed the program. There is no escape. Death is not an option for you. Should your body sustain enough damage to die, your mind will immediately be placed into a new one. This will continue forever until you accept your new reality and complete the program. In order to complete the program and earn your freedom, you are required to..."
Fifty-seven went for the eyes this time. There was no hesitation, just a strange rictus grin and laughter that sent chills down Eagle's back. He had woken up in a room just like that one. As far as he could tell, everyone began in an identical room. And was monitored by someone just like him? He wondered if he would ever meet the person, or people, who had watched over him as he came to grips with his new reality. He had accepted his lot much quicker than most of the numbers he was now monitoring. He had woken on the floor of one of those identical empty little chambers, naked and chilled, but physically whole. He had woken feeling better than he had in years. No cough, no blood, no agonizing vice clamping tightly behind his ears. He woke well rested, refreshed, and...at first...very relieved. Then the recording had begun to play. His recording had been different from the one these people were being subjected to. He supposed the message was different for each program. The core remained the same, however. He was no longer free, no longer real, no longer alive?
His last memory of life was pain, pride in doing the right thing, and hope that somehow he would make a difference. He hadn't truly hoped to survive. Now he hoped that he had survived. If he had died in his original world, then this copy was the only part of him that would continue on. So many wishful scenarios played through his mind as he sat in that empty room listening to the recording play over and over. If anyone could have found a way to save him, it was Hikaru and Lantis. He imagined himself bedridden but alive, enjoying their company during his slow recovery. Heartbreak, when he eventually left them behind and went back to his people alone, pleasure, when he and his people were invited to join the two of them on Cephiro. Any outcome was better than death. He indulged in the daydreams for what felt like years before finally accepting the truth. He might never know what had become of his original self. This current him was all he had left, and it wasn't in him to sit still when he could be moving forward. And so he had accepted his new reality, and begun his own 'program', his own purgatory of watching others work through the same struggle he had. Watching the majority devolve into suicide, madness, grief and fury, he wished he had put up more of a fight himself. Then again, the program he had woken up in wasn't nearly as disturbing as the one he was now monitoring.
"Active suicide? How many are still doing that?"
Eagle was grateful for an excuse to look away. The body replacement was so fast as to seem instantaneous, yet each time he couldn't help imagining storage rooms full of soulless copies. That was nearly as disturbing as fifty-seven's mad tenacity. "Only three left, not including him. I don't think he's going to stop." Lantis placed a hand on his back, and he leaned into the warmth. Lantis was his reward for having given in so easily. He wondered if they were both original scans, lucky enough to have been started in the same program. Or maybe one or both had already finished a program and chosen death as his reward, only to be restarted in another program, and another, until finally they had been placed together in this one. He would never know. That was good because the thought of that was maddening. They were together now. That was all that really mattered. If he kept telling himself that, maybe he would eventually believe it.
"He'll stop," said Lantis. "They all do eventually."
The recording had begun again, barely audible over the psychotic laughter in the chamber. Eagle winced away from both. "He listened once all the way through. Then the laughter..."
"And suicides? It happens. Once he satisfies his need to rebel and accepts, he will be held in stasis until the program starts. If he truly desires death, he will have to earn it by completing the program."
"That isn't death," Eagle bit out. That was the worst part. "This version of him will die, but the original scan will simply be restarted in a new program. He could even be placed into this one again!"
"He won't remember that, so it's of no consequence to him. Perhaps his next incarnation will choose to take advantage of eternal life. If people's choices could be predicted as well as the entertainment value of these programs, there would be no value in them. Don't get attached to the subjects, Eagle. They are numbers for a reason. They won't be people until they officially begin the program."
Eagle turned dull eyes back to the monitor. Wrists this time, though his nails hadn't looked that sharp. "I can't take much more of this."
"Then switch out. There are other monitors. Remember why we're here and return when you're able."
Eagle turned sharply to look up at the dark-haired man looming over him. "Why are we here, Lantis? How can we simply trust what we've been told by people we've never even seen? When the program starts, are we going to wake up in one of those chambers, freshly copied from our own world and ready to experience purgatory all over again?"
Lantis stared for a long moment before dropping to crouch beside his chair. "This is the only purgatory we will experience because we aren't going to choose death. Our scans won't ever be restarted. We will earn our freedom overseeing this program, just as those people in there will earn theirs by participating in it. That is the price of eternal life. Endless opportunities with you by my side? It's worth it."
Eagle gave a bitter smile. "Yes, it's worth it. All we have to do is sell our souls."
Lantis rose abruptly. "That you can still talk like that proves you haven't been monitoring long enough. Give him another ten before you switch out. He'll accept the reality of this new existence eventually. So will you."
Eagle made a face at his back. "Accepting it doesn't require liking it," he called after him. Getting no response, he resigned himself to seeing how many additional suicide methods fifty-seven could come up with in a barren room without even a piece of cloth to strangle himself with. This subject was as creative as he was stubborn. Just as well that time had no meaning here. The program wouldn't start until the last subject had agreed to participate. At this rate, that would be an eternity in itself.
.-.
Uzumaki Naruto, blonde-haired blue-eyed ninja extraordinaire only had to listen to the recording twice in order to understand exactly what was going on. He was dreaming, obviously. He had gone to sleep with Jiraiya's last book open in his lap and a cup of possibly bad milk on his table. No wonder he was dreaming about being trapped in some weird game thing where he had to have sex with a long series of randomly selected strangers in order to 'earn' an eternity in a paradise of his own making. Since this was all in his head, his partners would be hotties, the sex would be great, and then he'd be Hokage in a world where he was the best ninja around, Sakura was madly in love with him, Kakashi relied on him for everything, and Sasuke was his obedient slave for life. The only question was why he found himself stuck in a featureless white room listening to the recording start its third loop when he should have been sexing up the first of the girls while a groveling Sasuke cleaned up their mess.
"Should you fail to enjoy a match, stimulation will be provided," the recording droned.
"I know," Naruto groaned over the voice. "You already said it twice. I'm too young to have trouble getting it up. That's not even an issue. Just let me out of here so I can get started." He wanted at least a little sex and groveling before he woke up.
"...refusal will result in immediate intervention by means of..."
Naruto kicked one of the seamless walls hard enough to smash his toes. He cursed and hopped and bitched about being nude and barefoot when there was no one around to appreciate it. "I'm not refusing anything," he growled. "You're the one refusing to let me out. How many times do I have to listen to this?" The recording got to the part about fully accepting the reality of the situation and he dropped to sit cross-legged and bare-assed on the floor. It was cold, but at least it was clean. So far this dream was all hype and no hotties. He grumbled under his breath as the recording wound down to the closing question.
"Do you accept?"
"Yes," Naruto said sarcastically. "I accept. I'm in. What, do you want me to sign something to prove it? Just get on with it, already. This is boring." Dreams weren't supposed to be boring!
He closed his eyes. Or maybe the lights went out. When he opened his eyes again the dream had changed. He was dressed now, in the same black and orange outfit he'd worn yesterday. His first thought was that the sex dream had ended, because it made no sense to put on clothes if he were about to take them back off again. He was in the same room, though. Mostly. One of the walls had a doorway in it now. He jumped up and bolted through before his mind could take the exit away and start playing that recording again. He stepped out into an impossibly big circular chamber with doorways all the way around. People were stepping out of the doors, all at the same time. The doorways vanished behind each one. He froze, startled by the sheer number of them, the noise as people spoke, even yelled, and many surged forward till the chamber was a mass of churning bodies. For a split second he could have sworn he spotted Orochimaru, of all people. As if he was screwed up enough to imagine him in a sex dream. Then something exploded, people screamed, and a crackling blonde giant rose up to float in the air above the crowd. Naruto gaped, rubbing his eyes when two more crackling figures flew up to pound on the guy. The milk had definitely been bad, he realized.
"I should have listened to Kakashi-sensei," Naruto grumbled to himself. So much for sex and paradise. He'd probably spend half the day on the toilet once he woke up.
"You should always listen to me," a voice murmured from beside him.
Naruto whipped around, bumping into a small red-haired boy, who had joined some of the people cringing away from the ridiculous lightshow in the distance. "Kakashi-sensei! What are you doing in my dream?"
"Dream...?" Kakashi stared down at the boy for a long while, then drew him further to the left. A tall black-haired teen had come to hover near the frightened redhead and was glaring at the oblivious Naruto. "You would think this is a dream," he sighed, mostly to himself. Naruto had spotted the angry youth and was now gaping at his black feathered wings. Convincing Naruto this was not a dream would be much harder with individuals like that one sharing the room. Just as well. He almost envied Naruto for accepting this so easily.
"Is anyone else here?" Naruto asked excitedly. He scanned the closest faces. Strangely, most of them looked blank, confused by the lightshow and the crowd of weirdos, maybe. Even Kakashi didn't look happy to see him. Actually, no one looked happy. Another glance around gave him an idea as to why. "Kakashi-sensei," he blurted, "Why are there only guys here?" Was this still the sex dream? He spotted a pretty one with long pink hair, but his chest was as flat as could be. No girl in a dream of his would be anything less than a jumbo.
"Naruto," Kakashi started, in a strained tone, "from what I understand-"
"Oh! There's Shikamaru! Hey, Shikamaru, over here!"
Behind his mask, Kakashi grimaced as Shikamaru waded through the crowd, a panicky-looking Lee close on his heels. If Gai were here as well Kakashi was going to thoroughly test the limits of the 'body-replacements' this 'program' could supply. It was bad enough to see so many children present without the possibility of a match with Gai. He watched the boys greet each other, and then looked over to where another masked man was staring at them from across the way. Zabuza had his pretty partner tucked close to his side. If those two were here, all bets were off. They had been dead for over three years. Maybe he really had glimpsed Minato on the other side of this crush. For Naruto's sake, he hoped he hadn't.
"He's here, too," Shikamaru muttered to Naruto. "They both are."
"Who?" Naruto looked around when Shikamaru jerked his head. "Iru-" He cut himself off. It was Iruka, all right. The familiar brown-haired man was crouched near the wall next to a seated...Sasuke. And not two feet away from them stood none other than Itachi, watching the pair with a blank face and sharingan-red eyes. Naruto stumbled back a step, knocking into an unusually quiet Lee. "What the hell? What the hell kind of dream is this?"
"The best kind," a smug voice answered.
Naruto glanced over just in time to be punched in the face. It didn't hurt that bad, but it did sting. He even tasted blood on his lips. Nothing ever hurt in his dreams. He licked the blood with stunned confusion as he stared at the two silver-haired men. Kakashi had his attacker in a careless headlock. As if he needed to. Mizuki was trash. Naruto had kicked his ass back when he was still in the academy. It was random luck that the guy had even landed a hit. That could never happen in real life. It shouldn't happen in a dream, either. Even his nightmares weren't this stupidly bizarre. "What is this...?"
"Justice," Mizuki spat. "Get off me," he tossed back at Kakashi. "What do you plan to do, kill me? I'll just be brought right back. No death, no consequences. Don't think you can protect him. I'm going to enjoy watching you get what's coming to you," he sneered at Naruto. "From every single man here! You better pray you aren't matched up with me because next time it won't be your face tasting my fist." He laughed, a crazed sound that had the nearest people edging away.
"Get lost," Kakashi growled, shoving him away. He wasn't surprised when Mizuki slunk away like the coward he was. The man might have bulked up since his time as a teacher at the academy, but he was still the same snake he had always been. Just another enemy back from the dead. "Come on," he said to Naruto. "We might as well get this over with." He led the way over to the lost member of his team and the older brother his former student had, according to all reports, finally managed to kill. Itachi was alive and well enough to nod at him before turning to vanish into the crowd. There were far too many corpses here. It was no wonder Sasuke appeared to be broken.
Iruka was too mentally drained to feel surprise. He wasn't ready to even acknowledge Naruto's presence and what that might mean. For now all he could do was stare blankly up at Kakashi. "Mizuki, too? Your former teacher is here as well. He brought me to Sasuke. Strange that the dead should have a chance at eternal life. Do you believe any of it?"
If the chunin instructor was hoping for a lifeline to sanity, Kakashi had none to extend. "I haven't decided yet," he admitted. "This has a lot in common with the Tsukuyomi, to be honest." Although, if Minato was alive here then he could no longer dub this a living hell. That would depend on whether or not the man was matched with his own son. "There are some sick minds behind this. That's all I can say with confidence at this point."
"This is real," said Sasuke. His black eyes remained fixed on the textureless floor beneath him, but his lips twitched. "As real as you make it. Or utter nonsense, if you prefer. Whatever keeps your sanity intact."
"How is yours?" Kakashi drawled. The smirk that flitted over Sasuke's lips was less than reassuring.
"This can't be real," Naruto blurted. If this were real, then Sasuke wouldn't be sitting on a floor as casual as could be - eerily casual, in fact - and talking to them. Real Sasuke would have completely ignored this weird situation and single-mindedly set out after Itachi to kill him again. And Naruto would have ignored everything to single-mindedly chase after him again. Because that was what they did in the real world. This was obviously something else. Naruto scowled down at Sasuke, annoyed that he hadn't even glanced up to acknowledge his presence. Would the bastard still be a bastard if this were his own dream? He frowned at Kakashi. "Is there any chance we really are clones? There was this recording when I woke up that said-"
A yellow blazing humanoid missile came rocketing toward them. Naruto froze, his mind once again rebelling at the idea of glowing flying people. Sasuke glanced up, reached over to snag the wrist of the person standing to the right of him, and yanked him off his feet. The flying man crashed into the wall with an impact that should have shook the entire room. Since the wall didn't crack, let alone crater inward, the man should have splattered like an overly ripe tomato. He certainly shouldn't have immediately rose, shaken himself, and launched back into the air. Naruto was still struggling with the insanity of that when it occurred to him that Sasuke had just played the part of hero and had a lap full of flushed pretty-boy for his efforts. Naruto bristled in pure outrage.
"Be more careful," Sasuke said blandly. "Death might be meaningless here, but it hurts just the same." He watched the boy flush and scramble up before offering a stiff thanks. Despite the bright green eyes, this blonde looked more like the Fourth Hokage than Naruto did. Or maybe it was the boy's proud bearing that leant that impression, the fact that he didn't immediately default to defensive blubbering at having needed help. Sasuke glanced to the side to take note of the way Naruto was fuming. Jealousy? Anger that he had, as usual, not acted quickly enough to be of use? Sasuke went back to ignoring him. Naruto's presence here changed nothing. No one's presence here changed anything. As Itachi had rightfully noted, this was merely a form of purgatory, an endurance exercise and nothing more. Only what came after this would matter.
"Perhaps you should stay with us," Lee said, when the rescued boy started to move away.
"That isn't wise," Kakashi cut in before someone else, Iruka most likely, could second the invitation. It was bad enough they knew people here without voluntarily forming new attachments. "Safety in numbers is a concept I doubt will hold true in this situation. Certainly not once the matches are made." Lee flinched at the reminder and dropped his eyes, Iruka looked sick, and Shikamaru grimaced. Only Naruto appeared eager to argue. Kakashi was beginning to wonder if Naruto had been given a different 'explanation' from the rest of them.
"What's wrong with safety in numbers?" Naruto demanded. "If we gang up on those...flying weirdos, I bet we could take them down no problem." It had to be better than relying on antisocial bastards to randomly do the right thing. Jerks like Sasuke were hardly hero material. He scowled at his foremost rival, and then promptly gaped. The rescued pretty-boy had apparently decided he didn't need permission from the rest of them and was now sitting by Sasuke's right side. He had been joined by a skittish black-haired boy and a blank-faced teen with shoulder-length white hair. As Naruto stared, the flat chested pink-haired pretty-boy joined the little group. Sasuke glanced over at him, raised an eyebrow, and smirked. Naruto exploded. This had to still be the sex dream because that smug bastard was forming a harem! There was no way Naruto was going to let Sasuke show him up in his own dream. "If the rest of you want to be cowards, fine. I'll stop those freaks myself!"
"Naruto!" Iruka exclaimed.
Kakashi put an arm out in front of the man to prevent him from giving chase. "Let him go. If he's killed, he'll be brought right back. You discovered that yourself, didn't you?"
Shame twisted in Iruka's stomach until he had no choice but to turn and walk away from that knowing gaze. He had resorted to suicide. Just once, but once was more than enough. He had finally accepted the terms of this 'program' as the only way of getting out of that room by telling himself that since his true self continued on in the real world nothing he did here would affect who he really was. He would know no one and no one would know him and so nothing that happened here would matter to anyone. Once this was finished he would have the option of erasing every last memory of this entire experience, so there were no consequences to any of this. None of those rationalizations made the prospect of enduring this any easier. What comfort was there in knowing he could regain his true self later when he had to compromise himself in order to achieve that end?
He was buffeted by the crowd, catching snippets of conversation as people searched for familiar faces...or hid from them. Gasps and cries were all the warning he had before the crowd surrounding him surged closer to the wall. Another fight had broken out. An orange-haired youth was wielding a slender black sword against a pale blue-haired...humanoid. The man looked almost feline. Iruka's view was blocked before he could do more than wonder how the youth had come by that sword. He certainly hadn't been provided with any weapons. Not that he would have used his weapons even if he had them. Not here, where death didn't take. This was pure madness. No death meant no consequences. It was the weak and vulnerable who would suffer for that. And he had agreed to it. He closed his eyes, letting the skittish crowd shove him along. He was pushed back forcefully into someone and a hand caught his shoulder to keep him there.
"Giving up already, Iruka-sensei?"
He didn't have to look to identify the owner of that voice. He only looked to confirm his suspicions. It was Asuma. And, as he had feared, the man wasn't alone. Standing close to him were Neji, Kiba, and...Gaara. Well, why not? There were too many strangers here for Konoha to have been singled out. Iruka met Asuma's weak smile with a bleak one of his own. "If I hadn't given up, I would still be in that room listening to that recording on its endless loop."
"Fair enough," Asuma agreed. He drew Iruka to the side before he could be knocked over by another surge of the crowd. "Anyone else here we know?" A sudden eruption of orange above the crowd answered that question. He winced when a lone green flicked amidst the exploding clones. "Lee's here," he informed Neji. "Sorry."
Of course Lee had joined Naruto. Iruka should have expected as much. His shoulders slumped miserably, but he didn't bother to look. "Kakashi is here as well, along with Shikamaru. And Sasuke. And Mizuki, Itachi, and Minato."
"The Fourth?" Asuma exclaimed. "But he's been dead for years!"
"Death doesn't seem to mean much here," Iruka muttered.
"That explains Orochimaru, then. I thought I spotted him."
"It explains you as well," Kiba pointed out frankly.
"Don't start that again," Asuma said dismissively. "Before I woke up in that room, I was enjoying some well earned private time. I wasn't even on a mission. I sure as hell wasn't facing off with a pair of Akatsuki." He gave Iruka a friendly shake and prodded him into motion. "Take me to my kid. Want to make sure he isn't getting himself killed any more than necessary like those two fools."
Iruka grudgingly led the way back to the others. He caught a glimpse of an orange-clad clone spiraling through the air only to poof out after being swatted by an annoyed looking giant with impossibly upright spiky black hair. He kept his eyes down after that. Naruto had always learned things the hard way. Since he was no longer the boy's teacher, he didn't have to play witness to this particular lesson.
.-.
"Are we supposed to do something about this?" asked Eagle. He watched the screens with a combination of dread fascination and horror. Even Lantis couldn't mask his disapproval of the spectacle unfolding before their eyes. The overweight and beady-eyed controller just laughed and dug another handful of chips out of the bag next to him. Since Eagle had yet to experience true hunger, he could only assume the man ate for the pleasure of it. That his pleasure wasn't dampened by this bloody spectacle said a lot about his nature. Eagle was fast coming to loath him.
"Are you kidding?" Milluki scoffed. "For some people, the violence is even more entertaining than the sex. See? There goes another one. Bet he gets trampled to death at least twice before he stays alive long enough to get out from under that herd. And not one of them bothering to jump over him, forget going around. I swear, this is the best part. Take away consequences and they're just animals. They know they can't really die, yet they'll happily let others die in order to avoid a little pain. This part separates the people from the sheep. Gives you heroes and villains, too." He made a face when one of the younger would-be heroes had his head ripped off for his efforts. He shoved the chips into his mouth and grumbled around them. "Not that any of these stand out so far. That rat brother of mine could have shut the big guy down in seconds if he weren't so damned lazy."
Eagle shifted uncomfortably as he looked at the boy in question. Milluki's little brother was tucked safely against a wall, shielding his companions from the crowd with careless ease. He was tiny compared to some of the people he was holding at bay. Far too young to be subjected to such violence, let alone what was yet to come. "How can you stand to see him participate in a program like this? He's just a child."
Milluki rolled his eyes. "I forget you're a conscript, just earning your freedom. It's different once you've been around forever. This is his eighth program. The brat chooses death every single time. So what if he's young? At the rate he's going, he'll never live to be old enough by some people's standards. Besides, he's got his loser 'friends' with him this time around. Not to mention Illumi and the old man."
"Your father," Lantis stated coldly.
"Bleeding morals," Milluki squinted. "Fuck off with that. Every program has a few ringers. If the old man wants to help out his favorite, what's it to you? I'm the one who should be bitching. He'd never have done that for me. Let me tell you, paradise isn't all it's cracked up to be. Sure, you can be treated like a god by the people who used to look down on you, but unless that's their idea of paradise, too, it's not really them. Their personalities might be based on the original scans but they're still just AI's. That gets old fast when you live forever. Much more satisfying to see the originals fight their way through stuff. Why do you think these programs are so popular? Immortality goes hand in hand with boredom induced insanity. We're feeding a need here." He scowled over his shoulder at the two uptight newbies. "Speaking of which, you have work to do. Grab a seat and get to it. Our viewers will be picking favorites at this stage. They'll bitch up a storm if one of them gets neglected."
His helpers took the seats to either side of him. He rolled his eyes at their reluctance. "Keep dragging your feet and you can serve your time by joining them instead of monitoring them. Then you'd really have something to complain about." He would never understand why it was so hard to get volunteers for this particular program. Illumi had been great at making sure every last bit of sadism and drama was captured on screen. It was a shame the snooty bastard had gone and joined the old man in this stupid shit. Sure, Killua had been the family heir in their original world, but he was just a passive-aggressive brat now. Why so many of their loyal viewers kept hoping he would finish a program and choose a happy ending was beyond him. It was a ratings boost, though, so he wouldn't complain too much.
Now that the noobs were back on the clock, he turned his attention to preparing the alcoves. A big chamber was great for exposing the pacifists, sullen resistors, and wimps to random violence, but there were far too many people scanned from the same worlds who hadn't even noticed they weren't alone in there. The easiest drama played off preexisting bonds. He had personally picked as many connected scans as he could before the random generator supplied the rest. Audiences rebelled when programs were too scripted, so he couldn't intervene directly to gather the lost sheep back into their original flocks. He could, however, design the environment to make convenient encounters more likely. The big screen wouldn't come into play until the first round of matches, which was handled by an entirely different department. He had to stick with prepping his alcoves with small screens and numbers. Good enough. Once they were up, anyone entering one would know exactly who was occupying each of the others. That ought to help get the flocks back together. He smirked and grabbed another handful of chips. Ten to one he got bonus points for screwing over any attempt to hide in plain sight. He hoped Illumi was especially pissed when he noticed that. It would serve him right for bailing on him. As if Milluki could have missed the bug that had placed Hisoka's latest restart into this particular program. He wasn't the hacker of the family for nothing.
By the time he got back to the action, things had gotten completely out of hand. So far as he knew, the big guy wasn't a ringer. He had sat black-haired and blank-eyed through an eternity of loops before finally stirring himself to accept the terms. It was only when he spotted others from his own world that he had snapped. Rarely did a random pick cause so much carnage at this stage. It helped that at least one of his opponents cared as little about the bystanders as he did. Those energy blasts cut entire swaths through the sheep, the best kind of overkilll. Unfortunately that was going to get old fast. Viewers couldn't get invested in participants who were incinerated as quickly as their bodies were replaced.
"If they don't figure it out soon, you'll get your intervention," he informed his tight-lipped helpers.
"Figure what out?" asked Eagle. He didn't appreciate the way Milluki sighed and rolled his eyes. This was unpleasant enough without having to deal with someone like him.
"Just keep an eye on fifty-seven," Milluki snapped.
"He isn't doing anything," Lantis pointed out.
"Exactly."
.-.
Haku was impressed by Naruto's tenacity. The first death had clearly shaken him. Perhaps it was the violent intimacy of being torn apart by his opponent's bare hands. He was quicker to shake the second death off, probably because hesitating would have gotten his green-clad comrade killed. By the third death, he was in motion the moment his body was replaced. Having vast experience with clones no doubt helped him adapt. Haku couldn't imagine being assaulted by the death-memory of every single bunshin that was dispatched, much less being able to continue fighting with those constant distractions. The only questions in his mind were what Naruto hoped to achieve and why none of his other companions were joining or stopping him.
"Pathetic," Zabuza muttered.
"Having been defeated by him?" Haku returned Zabuza's quick glare with a sweet smile.
"Knowing we wouldn't fare much better. This is like watching bulls take on a rabid dog. They're as stupid as he is."
"Knocking him out could be far more difficult than we assume," Haku said fairly. "Perhaps that's why they persist in killing him despite the fact that doing so merely causes him to be revived at full strength again. Or maybe they're simply enjoying themselves too much to have it end so quickly. Some people would rather fight than win." That, he believed, was the real reason Naruto kept jumping back into the fray. He was more of a hindrance than a help to those able to fight the man on equal terms and only a little more clever than those golden muscle-headed bulls with their pointless charges. An energetic fox kit snapping at the mad dog's tail while trying to avoid being trampled by the stampeding hooves. Haku could see how that might be enjoyable.
"If you want to join him, go for it. No one is stopping you."
"I never fought for the sake of fighting." He wouldn't start now that he was right where he wanted to be. They had both died in their world. Zabuza wouldn't admit as much, but it was there in his eyes. Zabuza had experienced failure and wore his newfound humility like a filthy cloak Haku longed to strip away and wash clean for him. He had no right to do so when he refused to don one of his own. His death, far from being a heartfelt sacrifice, had been as meaningless as the deaths taking place around them now. Zabuza had died anyway. He should have felt anger and shame that it was all for nothing. He was too content to feel either. Better this strange hell at Zabuza's side than some idealistic afterlife without him. He was too selfish to regret the way things had turned out. Strange that he had needed to die in order to learn that about himself.
A sudden churning in the crowd warned them that their place near the wall was no longer safe. Haku glanced up at the ball of burning white energy streaking toward them, and then looked down at the tanned hand that had latched onto his shoulder. To keep him close? To support him against the panicked shoving of the people around them? To ensure that whether they evaded or stayed, they did so together? Fanciful thoughts that proved futile. He never had a chance to find out what Zabuza had intended. A young man in the tight pack of bodies raised his right hand over his head and that beam of white heat was sucked into his palm without so much as singeing anyone. Haku was privately annoyed with the intervention. It wouldn't have hurt that badly. Now he might never know if Zabuza had meant for them to stand their ground and die together as they hadn't done in their original world. The hand left his shoulder and his disappointment darkened into resentment.
"I have changed my mind," he decided, sending a quick look back to judge Zabuza's reaction. "This needs to end."
Zabuza raised an eyebrow and then smirked beneath the cloth masking the lower half of his face. It was rare to see Haku truly annoyed. He had to wonder at the cause. So far the boy had accepted their new situation with that patient complacency Zabuza had always found both admirable and irksome. He appreciated whatever had caused this sudden change. "What do you have in mind?"
"A better vantage point, to start with," Haku frowned. They had already discovered that clinging to the walls with chakra was impossible here. He could see the airborne fighters in the distance. Beyond that, there was a small ocean of heads blocking his view. He huffed a self-depreciating laugh. "What I wouldn't give to have your height."
"That one's easy." Despite years of training, Haku had remained a slender little thing. Zabuza caught his waist and lifted him up to sit on his shoulder. The loose cloth of his hakama against his cheek was annoying, but Haku's horrified expression made it tolerable. Zabuza snorted, wondering again just how long it was going to take the boy to realize he was no longer a tool.
"Zabuza-san..."
"Get to it," Zabuza muttered. "Unless you'd rather I make a hill out of these wretches, this is the best you'll get." The boy still blushed easily, he noticed. That wouldn't do him any favors here. He sneered at the reminder of what was to come. So much for snagging a ride to heaven in Haku's wake. He had known all along where he was headed. It was just a shame he had dragged Haku down with him.
.-.
After a lifetime of being the odd man out, Shino was finally experiencing what it felt like to be the normal one. Three of his companions were dead and none of them, from what he understood, had gotten along while alive. Keeping company with the Fourth Hokage was a privilege. Sharing that company with Itachi and Orochimaru was simply confusing. He was quickly regretting not having joined Naruto in his continuous suicide attacks. Although visibly pointless, they at least made sense. Nothing else here did, in his opinion.
"He's just like his mother, for all that he looks like me," Minato smiled.
"She was ignorant as well?" Orochimaru inquired, with a smile of his own. He didn't seem to mind when his barb received only a mild look of reproof.
"He may never stop," said Itachi.
Minato dismissed that. "Since each revival refreshes his energy, he'll never have to stop. But he will. Once he gets bored. Besides, this can't go on forever."
"Can't it?" Orochimaru drawled. "Time has no meaning here. Or haven't you noticed?"
Shino noticed that Orochimaru and Itachi were ignoring each other completely. He would have picked up on that sooner if he hadn't been focused on trying to stay close to the Fourth while staying as far from the other two as possible. Given that the three had him nearly pressed into the wall, his efforts were in vain. He gave up and slipped off to the side. Itachi's side, as the lesser of two evils. He hoped.
"I'm sure you're ecstatic," Minato sighed, sending an annoyed look at the gloating Sound ninja. "You'll never have to switch bodies again."
"Nor be limited to what a mere shinobi can master," Orochimaru purred. "I feel rather sorry for my original self."
"I should say so, considering he died at the hands of your prey." Minato sent a sidelong look at Itachi, who remained as blank-faced as ever. "You two do have that much in common. Perhaps a truce? You know what they say about keeping your friends close..."
"Kisame is currently occupied elsewhere," Itachi murmured. "As is the only one here tedious enough to be considered an enemy of mine."
Minato glanced up at the pony-tailed blonde riding a giant bird of clay and maniacally lobbing bombs down at the area Itachi's little brother had chosen. Upon last check, everyone in that area had been shielded by sand, yet the blonde was apparently as undaunted as his own son when it came to fruitless endeavors. Tedious, indeed. Still, Orochimaru could be very nasty when riled. Itachi would do well to remember that. "I suppose I'm lucky to never have personally slighted anyone here."
"Aside from your son," said Itachi.
Minato's eyes narrowed at that low blow. Perhaps there was some truth to Orochimaru's sly claims about Konoha having degraded since his death. But even if the village had treated his son badly, that was hardly his fault. He'd been dead, after all. "I did the best I could for him. At least his seal remains active here."
"For now," Orochimaru agreed, far too readily.
There was a strange undertone to this unlikely threesome that Shino was astute enough to grasp and sane enough to recoil from. He edged further away. He had been told often and at length how his insects gave people the creeps. He was now experiencing the creeps himself and finally had some sympathy for the people he had unwittingly inflicted them upon. It was a prickly, uncomfortable, and...rather dirty feeling. He decided lingering near the Fourth wasn't worth this. He turned, determined to seek comfortable anonymity amidst the strangers. He stepped to the side to go around the outstretched leg of a white-haired man seated against the wall and walked right into a spray of blood. The body hurtled by so quickly he barely saw it. He both saw and felt the remains as the body splattered against the wall. He jerked back, stumbling over that outstretched leg and blinking blearily at the freshly revived body that picked itself up out of the blood smear and ducked back into the crowd.
The white-haired man came to his feet, blood dripping down the side of his face and into the v of his chest, which was exposed by his long black coat. Pale seagreen eyes flicked to Shino for a split second before the man strode into the crowd. Shino immediately lost sight of him. He had a good view of the giant maniac who had sent that body flying their way, though. He was staring right at the man when he turned to gray stone and dropped out of sight. A gray foot with part of a leg attached bounced back up into view, making him wonder how badly he had shattered upon impact. Shino gave a slow blink behind his black sunglasses.
"What sort of technique is that?" Orochimaru demanded. "Being turned into a statue should certainly be considered death. A body can't survive once the heart stops. My own experiments have proven that even external paralysis can-"
"I doubt this place operates according to the same science as our world," Minato said quellingly. "It appears to have worked. If he were dead, he would be up by now. A shame, really. I was hoping someone might consider using an illusion to calm him down and settle this peacefully."
"I was never going to do that," said Itachi. "You could have suggested it to Sasuke, however."
"Would he have done it?" Minato frowned when Itachi gave him a blank look. "I can't believe your brother turned out worse than you." He sent an exasperated look at Orochimaru. "Is my son really fixated on him?"
"Possessive, even," Orochimaru gleefully informed him. "He once warned me never to refer to Sasuke-kun as if I owned him. He then lost his mind to the fox when I refused to yield to his ownership of him. Calling it a fixation is putting it mildly."
"But, why?"
"Because Sasuke ran away," said Itachi.
"Because Naruto's only instinct is to chase," said Orochimaru.
"Well, I don't like it one bit," said Minato. Neither Orochimaru nor Itachi told him to join the club. They didn't need to. All three of them knew very well what things they had in common. Having all died in their original world didn't even rank highly on that list.
"Is it over?" Shino asked, enduring the returning creeps in order to get close enough to catch the Fourth's eyes. Those blue eyes which were so similar to Naruto's moved past him, and Shino turned to see that the blood-splattered white-haired man had returned. The man was smiling. It was a small smile, barely visible, really, but it somehow magnified the creeps prickling all over Shino's skin.
"It hasn't even begun," the man said ominously. He didn't seem to mind the four stares that followed him as he resumed his seat next to the bloody mess. The smile faded away, his gaze once again dropping to the little black orb lying in the palm of his hand.
Shino made a full retreat this time. From the sound of things, there were still some fights going on, but dying a few times was better than staying near those...people. Keeping an eye out for Naruto, Lee, or any other non-creepy face, he headed directly for the other side of the room. He judged himself near the center when he was sideswiped by orange and blue and blonde. Naruto was such refreshingly normal company he resolved to never comment on the boy's clearly questionable bloodline. What Naruto didn't know, Naruto couldn't be creeped out by.
.-.
"Damn," Milluki spat in disgust. "Not even a summon to cap things off. I hate magic. I keep telling them they need to block that shit."
"Is he dead?" asked Lantis.
"Of course not. That's the problem. They didn't even bring him down first. He'll probably start up again the second that shit wears off, assuming they don't just replace his body anyway for his first match. That'll be great for ratings," he said sarcastically. "No one would ever see that one coming." He hefted himself out of the chair, which reminded him he was overdue for a body replacement. Bigger chairs weren't in the budget. As if money was an actual thing. What bullshit. "Keep monitoring," he tossed over his shoulder. "I have a call to make." They would have to fix this fast to avoid cries of the program being fixed. Nothing like a random pick to make viewers accuse them of implanting predictable ringers. At this rate the actual ringers were really going to have their work cut out for them.
.-.
TBC
