A/N: I've started another Naruto story o.O I'm insane. I like this one…it allows me to be much more gruesome, bloody and angst-y than I am allowed to be in Shinyuu, although I like that one just as much. This first chapter will probably pretty graphic (be weary if you have a weak stomach). There will be lots of blood, descriptions, carnage, and pain. BUT, this first chapter is absolutely vital to understanding the rest of the story, so I wouldn't miss it if you can manage. So, here's the first chapter – do try and keep up.
Disclaimer: All characters – and some dialogue – mentioned in this story are the rightful property of their owners, namely Masashi Kishimoto and affiliated groups. Copyrights, civil rights, trademarks, company names, Christian names, James names and rights of ownership are respected. Most major credit cards accepted as well. Any liabilities of economic, moral, physic, psychic, para-psychic, paternal, maternal or every other nature is NOT my responsibility, so don't say you weren't warned.
Warning!: Story takes off at manga chapter 365. If you've not read that far you're in for some major spoilers and it may take you a bit to get a hold on what's happening in the first few chapters. Also, there's a fair share of blood, gore, vivid details, violence, and a bit of mild language throughout the entire story – just in case you'd like to know.
Afraid of the Dark
The
Hunter Becomes the Hunted
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Naruto raced through the forest, his cloak flapping everywhere as he jumped from branch to branch. He was so close – so close to finding Sasuke again that he felt like he could simply reach out and tug on his friends shoulder, say hello, and then head back to Konoha together. So close, he could see the small frown that always occupied Sasuke's face and the involuntary twitch of the left side of his mouth when he found something humorous. So close, he barely sensed the hidden chakra signature – "Wait, what?!"
Naruto silently descended from the high tree branches, running across the ground, before stopping with his back against a tree. He peered around the massive trunk, listening, watching, probing with his own chakra. His eyes involuntarily squinted as he saw a shadowed figure standing in between a cluster of trees a few yards away. He inwardly gasped, not daring to make a sound, when he made out the red eyes staring back at him. "Sasuke!"
The figure emerged slowly from his cover into the small plot of grass devoid of trees.
Naruto's eyes widened as a nervous sweat began to form on his brow. "Uchiha…Itachi…" His hand hovered towards his kunai holster and silently slid in, fingering one of the handles. He took a step back, hiding himself further behind the tree.
"Show yourself, Uzumaki Naruto…"
Naruto stepped from behind the tree, body completely on guard and ready to attack. He couldn't help but let his hatred and malice towards the man in front of him be portrayed through his voice, "Finally going to try and capture me?"
The silence that ensued reminded Naruto so much of Sasuke.
Two of Naruto's clones jumped suddenly out from their hiding place somewhere behind Itachi, weapons in hand, as if everything had been practiced.
It barely took a flick of the wrist and Itachi had impaled and effectively dispatched the clones.
"I've got no chance if it's just one-on-one, but if there's more than one person, you attack from behind."
"I see you've learned a little bit about fighting the sharingan. You must know what to do when fighting alone…but then, why aren't you running?" Itachi ask in a monotone, not even bothering to bat and eyelash.
Naruto managed to make himself calm down enough to throw his head back and laugh a few times out loud, "Because when you're fighting me, there could be anywhere from one to one thousand opponents. Besides," he continued, growing suddenly somber, "I can't afford to run this time. Sasuke is searching for you, so by capturing you I'll find Sasuke!"
Itachi stared blankly for several minutes and Naruto dared not interrupt the silence.
"What is it about my little brother that makes you care for him so much? He is a rogue ninja who abandoned you and your village."
Naruto's serious face spoke volumes in and of itself, "Sasuke is like a brother to me and I'm a better one than you ever were!"
For a moment, in the most miniscule of seconds, if Naruto had not been so distracted by formulating a plan to fight, he could have seen a small ripple in Itachi's facial muscles, the evidence of the rarest creatures among the Uchiha people: a smile.
Naruto growled and burst forward with the aid of chakra, flying towards Itachi.
Itachi's cloak began disintegrating, separating into a flock of ravens.
"Shit!" Naruto cursed, coming to a halt.
"I don't have time to play with you, Uzumaki Naruto, I need your help."
The ravens came soaring down towards him, circling him, and stilling his movement. He could only see black, with the occasional flicker of light that shone through the breaks in feathers. Soon even that disappeared. His mind began to grow hazy and his thoughts ceased to make sense to him until at last he drifted into unconsciousness.
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A rush of memories flooded his brain as a clone was dispersed by Sasuke, "I found him!"
His team shot surprised looks at him at the sudden outburst and the news.
"Which way?" Kiba asked.
Naruto jumped from the branch he landed on and veered sharply left, "This way – follow me!" "You're not running away from me this time, Sasuke you bastard."
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"I'll take your eyes slowly, foolish little brother…" Itachi's eyes suddenly grew wide and his hand clenched the fabric above his chest. He abruptly lurched forward, covering his mouth as he hacked up large amounts of his own blood.
Sasuke stood still, using the time to catch his breath and work out his next plan.
Itachi slowly brought his hand away from his mouth, staring at it as if it were alien to his body. He looked up, letting his bloodied hand fall to his side.
Itachi's sasanoo roared in the silence.
A tagged kunai rip through the air at the beast. Right as the kunai came in contact with the technique, the tag exploded. Sasuke watched with contained horror as the smoke cleared and the beast was left undamaged but with a sore temper. He dropped to his knees, cradling his head in his hands when a force inside him pushed and shoved outward, demanding to be given power and free reign. Snakes emerged and sped towards Itachi.
Itachi stood unmoved, even when the huge snakes were mere feet away from swallowing him whole. His sasanoo beheaded each of the snakes and thrust his sword through Orochimaru's emerged body. He smirked, if only to anger his younger brother, "Surely, little Sasuke, you've got something better to fight me with."
Itachi coughed more, nearly doubling over at the effort and barely had the energy to look up, "Your eyes belong to me now, foolish little brother. I'll take them slowly…I want to savor this and hear your scream as the pain overwhelms you and you cry for help." He shuffled forward, willing one leg to step in front of the other.
For a minute Sasuke panicked, taking a step back before he pulled out a scroll, smearing his blood across its surface, and sent a rain of kunai towards Itachi. The sasanoo blocked every move. Sasuke stared wide eyed as he realized he had nothing left to use against his opponent. He was out of chakra and weapons, and both his mind and his body were exhausted.
"My eyes, Sasuke," Itachi called out, his bloody right hand stretched out in a zombie-like fashion as he shuffled ever forward.
Sasuke snarled and drew his katana. "DIE!" he scream, jumping into the air and holding his sword high above his head, ready to thrust it down the moment he was in position. His attack was blocked by Itachi's sasanoo jutsu, spinning his sword off to the side and throwing him back against a stone wall where he slumped to the ground. Itachi was growing closer – ever closer. Sasuke scrambled up to his feet, using the wall to support himself, and tried to take a step back. He was a cornered animal with nowhere to run, but his eyes could not be pried from staring at his deranged older brother whose damaged appearance, blood covered hand, and chin painted in red only served to add to the intimidation. He sucked in a sharp breath of air as Itachi came within touching distance. His eyes followed Itachi's right hand like a magnet, watching clumps of blood and coughed up flesh drip from his palm. Itachi whispered a string of words. He heard them but paid them no attention; they passed through his ear and stored themselves for examination in the afterlife. Sasuke shrank back, flattening himself as much as he could against the stone wall. His lungs refused to work anymore; they had gotten jammed mid-way between taking another breath. His heart made up for the dysfunctional organ, though. Were it not for the hand that was inches away from his eyes now, he would have taken note that it pounded faster and louder than he thought humanly possible. He kept his eyes staring straight ahead now; his mind was in such frenzy that he couldn't will his body to move one way or the other. Two fingers came to rest rudely on his forehead, poking right between his eyes. They held there for a moment, before the arm holding them became slack and the two fingers slid around his nose and down the side of his face. Itachi's body slumped forward – his neck cracking loudly as it hit the wall at an awkward angle – and his body turned due to the impact until he was lying on the ground, face turned skywards.
Sasuke remained standing against the wall, eyes wide. Blood ran down his face where Itachi's hand had touched him. It trickled and slid down his face, tickling his cheek and seeping into his left eye – he didn't take notice the tingling or the slight burning sensation that accompanied it. His organs had yet to return to their normal functioning and his brain was so overloaded that all the nerve signals had become clogged up. Somewhere, in the back of his mind, a place that was hazy and slightly disorienting, though profusely less congested, he realized that he had finally, after a lifetime of preparation and suffering, killed his brother. A smile crept slowly across his mouth. His eyes sought out Itachi's body, verifying that he was indeed dead, before they closed softly and Sasuke fell to the ground in a bought of unconsciousness.
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Yamato crouched on the ground on one knee, hands together in a seal as his mokuton jutsu followed their opponent. Beads of sweat formed from pressure and frustration as every time his wood wrapped around the orange-masked ninja, the man would disappear, only to reappear moments later, inches away from where he was last thought to have been.
"Damn it!" Naruto cursed under his breath as he watched the idle battle. Every attack they had thrown as the masked Akatsuki member had been for naught as the man, Tobi, vanished as their attacked were supposed to hit. He brought his hands together quickly, creating two kage bushin and sent them into the fray. They circled Tobi, looking for an opening, an opportunity. Yamato wrapped wood around the man. At the same instant the man reappeared a few feet away. "There!" The clones shouted inside their head simultaneously and they lunged forward with bare hands and grabbed Tobi's arms. The orange-masked ninja had the effrontery to freeze in surprise as the third Naruto came running at him from the front, a vicious ball of compact, swirling chakra in his palm. Tobi disappeared the instant before the ball of blue chakra made contact, and instead the rasengan was thrust into the Naruto-counterparts. Naruto's eyes widened as both clones vanished and Tobi appeared behind him, delivering a swift chop to the back of his head. There was a resounding pop heard through the small clearing and everyone halted in their assault.
"N-Naruto!" Hinata cried out, wondering just what had happened. There had only been three Naruto's total when he made the kage bushin, but all three of them had just disappeared in a cloud of smoke, with no sign of the real Naruto in any direction.
"What the-?!" Kiba barked as he too noticed the same thing when all of Naruto's scent vanished.
Kakashi glanced to Shino who, too, seemed distraught by the sudden disappearance of their comrade. "It seems Naruto has wondered off on his own and left us with a clone."
"Idiot!" Sakura yelled, hitting her own forehead as if it would somehow pound the truth into her head that Naruto would forevermore be nothing but Konoha's number one unpredictable, idiot ninja.
"Hmm, maybe Naruto has more balls that I originally confirmed…" Sai voiced more to himself than to anyone else in a thoughtful posture.
"That cheeky bastard! Who does he think he is going off by himself in search of Sasuke?!" Kiba yelled, his words accompanied by Akamaru's fierce bark.
"I am part of this mission too…I must make up for not being there last time to catch Sasuke." Shino mentioned in monotone, his grudge showing through just a bit.
"We should finish this battle quickly so that we can find Naruto and get back on Sasuke's track." Kakashi commented.
"I will take care of this…" Shino spoke, lifting his hand out. A swarm of bugs flew out of his sleeve and dove towards Tobi.
"Eeew…" Tobi squealed, dancing around as many bugs as he could, hopping from tree branch to tree branch.
The bugs spread out around him. "Swarm," Shino called out softly, activating his secret insect globe technique. His bugs swarmed Tobi, covering the overgrown child with little black bugs from head to toe and sucking out all the man's chakra.
"Yamato!" Kakashi called out.
"Roger!" Yamato confirmed, again sending his mokuton towards Tobi at frightening speeds.
"How are we doing Shino?" Kakashi asked.
"He's still there."
"Hinata?"
"I-I have him i-in my s-sight, sir!" She confirmed.
"How can this be?" Shino questioned.
Hinata's small gasp and quiet words explained everything, "He just – just di-disappeared!"
A few seconds later, the Konoha leaf-nin spotted the slippery orange-masked ninja on top of a high tree branch. "Oh, hey guys!" He yelled excitedly, waving a hand about wildly with unexplained enthusiasm.
Kiba growled and was about to lunge, but Kakashi held him back with a scowl on his face, staring at the tree limb immediately next to their opponent.
"Zuzuzu…" a plant like figure grew from the tree bark, opening slightly so that two eyes could be seen through the two jaw-like sides. The plant – person – thing was obviously not natural, but their opponent acted as if nothing were out of the ordinary.
"Well?" Tobi asked.
"What the hell is that?" Kiba yelled, pointing a finger at the offending.
"In the book Kabuto gave us, it says he is another member of Akatsuki –"
Sakura growled inwardly, "We don't have time to deal with another—" She stopped her speech as his report travel down to their ears.
The plant-like human answered as if none of the other leaf-nin were there "Sasuke won!" The first voice announced brightly. Another voice came from the darker half of the man's body, "Uchiha Itachi is dead."
Nearly every member on the leaf team gasped in shock at the news.
"Whoa! Didn't see that one coming!" Tobi exclaimed, applauding the twist.
"Also…" the darker voice began, only to be cut of by the more optimistic of his two personas, "Itachi has captured the Kyuubi jinchuriki and had locked him up. Sasuke will be joining him soon."
Sakura was nearly cut in half upon hearing this. Kakashi frowned, as did Yamato, and several of the 'Rookie 9' gasped in shock.
"Na-Naruto…" Hinata faltered, her eyes growing teary.
"Well," Tobi continued, bright as ever and seemingly immune to the depression that suddenly swept over the leaf-nin, "I guess that means my job here is done." He shrugged once and looked down at the Konoha ninja, "Bye guys, I had a real fun time playing! Maybe we could arrange a play date in the near future!" He waved furiously, no doubt with a huge, disgusting grin hidden behind that horrendous orange mask, before he simply disappeared and the plant-like Akatsuki submerged back into the tree.
"Wha – what do we do now, Kakashi-sensei?" Sakura asked breathlessly, still trying to swallow the fact that both of her teammates and friends had been captured.
Kakashi scowled at the place Tobi and the second Akatsuki had been before turning to his group. "I suppose we go back to Konoha to regroup. Naruto's been captured and we have no information concerning his whereabouts."
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Naruto blinked his eyes open, groggily looking about the near dark room until his eyes rested on the small crack under the door where light peered through. There were voices outside accompanying the shadows that sometimes blocked out the light from under the door. Keys twisted in the lock and Naruto pulled himself fully from his hazy mind, preparing for anything.
The door opened and a large guard passed through the door, looking down at him for several seconds before he turned to the side and pointed at another set of chains that were bolted to the floor. "Put him over there."
A second guard was carrying a limp body over his shoulder and walked past the first guard.
Naruto stared at the prisoner, wondering who he was –maybe he was another jinchuriki that the Akatsuki were going to remove a biju from. The prisoner's blood-matted black hair shifted and revealed his pale, bloody face and closed eyes. Naruto's eyes widened. He jerked at his chains, trying vainly to free himself. "Sasuke!"
The large guard shot him a glare, "Quiet, Kyuubi, don't wake up our little Uchiha before we get the chance to subdue his chakra."
Naruto growled. Do doubt, if Kyuubi had not been further repress inside of him by the Akatsuki, he would have grown six tails then and there and torn the whole base down. "Why the hell is Sasuke here?! Let him go before I kick all your asses!"
The second guard dropped Sasuke unceremoniously to the stone floor and clamped the shackles around Sasuke's wrists and ankles, making sure he wouldn't get free. He then pulled out a syringe and stabbed it into Sasuke's neck, injecting the full amount into the unconscious Uchiha's system.
"Sasuke, you bastard, wake up and kick their balls! You're pathetic! How can you get captured too! Wake UP!" Naruto roared, struggling with barely contained furry. He could understand why Akatsuki wanted to capture him – he was a jinchuriki, for crying out loud – but Sasuke had nothing to do with Akatsuki at all, except for his older brother who had defected to the group many years ago. But that was insignificant. They couldn't take Sasuke.
Sasuke groaned, a wave of pain from his battle with Itachi washing over him. There was a loud, obnoxious, and annoying voiced that was echoing around him and ringing in his ears, pulling him from his relaxing and blissful state of sleep. He opened his eyes slowly and looked around. There were two guards: the man in front of him was rather short and had a deep scar running across his forehead and down his left cheek. The second one was a giant of a man whose head rose at least a foot higher that the doorway and who looked as if he could rip a man's head off with just a flex of his biceps. The last person in the room was the one yelling and was chained to the floor, as he had found himself to be. The person was in the shadow cast by the larger guard, so he could not make out his features, but that voice he would recognize anywhere.
"Snap out of it! Use your damn sharingan and bust us out of here before the drug spreads through your whole system and shuts down your chakra!" the voice yelled.
The large guard snarled and walked up to Naruto. "I told you to be quiet, you little shit!" He slammed his foot into Naruto's ribs.
Naruto doubled over, eyes wide and breath being forced out of him as a sliver of blood dripped from him mouth. He recovered quickly though, scowling fiercely and tried to use the few inches of slack chain to swing his foot around and knock the man's legs from underneath him. There wasn't quite enough chain and his leg was stopped far before it could touch the guard.
The guard laughed at the attempt and pulled his fist back to deliver a punch. The guard stopped right before he could swing, his expression showing surprise a moment before he collapsed forward to the ground right beside Naruto, a kunai made of paper sticking out of the back of his neck. Naruto snapped his head up to the doorway where two figures stood. One, a man with orange hair and multiple piercings accompanied by blue, multi-ringed eyes. The other was a woman only a few inches shorter, her blue hair decorated with a delicate paper flower. The paper-made kunai pulled itself out of the dead guard's back and separated into little pieces, swimming through the air until they returned to the woman. The orange-haired man spoke commandingly, looking to the remaining guard, "Take your fellow guard and leave."
The man nodded and walked over to his fallen friend, "Of course, Leader."
"Pain…" Naruto breathed out, oddly subdued.
Pain all but ignored Naruto and walked to Sasuke, staring down at him calculatingly. There was a shuffle of chains to his right, but he paid the Kyuubi jinchuriki not a thought.
"What do you want?!" Naruto growled.
Sasuke returned Pain's unfaltering gaze.
The orange-haired ninja crouched down to eye level with the captured Uchiha, reaching his hand out and holding Sasuke's chin.
"Get your filthy hand off Sasuke, you bastard!"
Sasuke tried to shake out of the older man's grasp, but Pain held fast. "Uchiha Madara believes I am a mere pawn in the palm of his greater plan. But his game is not mine; I will not blindly do as he says."
Naruto struggled once more against his bonds even though they cut into his wrists, "What are you talking about?! Madara is dead!"
Pain's eyes narrowed, though he showed no other signs of hearing the blond.
"What does that have to do with me?" Sasuke ground out, furious at Akatsuki for capturing him and at himself for being weak enough to be captured.
"Madara wants you alive – he needs you to fight his war against Konoha. You know something important – something Madara needs – something Itachi told you before he died."
Pain stared into Sasuke's eyes, daring him to stay silent and promising pain if words were not brought forth.
Sasuke, livid, spit suddenly into pains face, "Screw you."
Pain was silent and merely closed his eyes. When he opened them again, Sasuke was staring back at him with taken aback, red eyes, his own face was emotionless and spit-free. "Now, now, Sasuke, there's no need to be hasty. You've just arrived and already you're throwing genjutsu at us." Sasuke snarled as Pain threw his head to the side roughly and stood. "I'm afraid that is going to cost you."
Sasuke glowered and Naruto let loose a string of unmentionable profanities.
"If I see you lay one hand on Sasuke, you're going to wish you were dead after what I do to you!"
Pain walked through the metal door, followed by Konan, signaling to the remaining two guards, "See to it that the jinchuriki loses his eyesight so we won't have a problem should there arise a need for more…intense interrogation."
"Yes, Leader."
Naruto grew still and silent and both he and Sasuke stared in alarm as the guards nodded and smiled, looking to their blond victim like a predator zeroing in on its prey. They stalked forward, one of the two pulling out and twirling a kunai.
"Wh-what?" Naruto stuttered, desperately trying to extricate himself from the shackles in his panic.
"Seems like his bark's worse than his bite." The second guard chuckled as the first held his kunai up to Naruto's throat threateningly.
The blond shivered unconsciously as the dim light from the doorway highlighted a violet liquid that dripped from the weapon and splashed deafeningly to the stone floor.
"I'm not scared of you…" Naruto forced his retort.
Sasuke seemed to snap out of the panic-induced trance he had been in at the words.
The guard holding the kunai broke out in a vicious smile, one that displayed all of his yellowed and chipped teeth, "See this kunai? It's covered in a poison that makes every wound hurt a hell of a lot more than it should. I'm sure getting your eyes slashed through is pretty painful by itself, but this…" he said, holding the kunai closer to Naruto's neck so that it made a small cut that felt as if his entire neck has been cut in half, "…this would be a living hell."
Naruto nervously flashed his eyes towards Sasuke, who looked back with a nervous scowl. "Sasuke won't tell you anything, no matter what you do!" He threatened, stalling for time.
The second guard stepped forward and yanked Naruto's head back by his blond locks, holding his head still.
"Stop…" Sasuke mumbled out, barely audible even in the small, cave-like cell.
The guard brandishing the kunai stepped forward.
"Stop it." He said again, loud enough to be heard.
Naruto struggled against his chains, eyes wide and fearful.
"Stop!" Sasuke shouted, growing louder and more frantic as the kunai was raised to Naruto's eye.
The guard holding Naruto still laughed, "You can thank your friend, Sasuke, for this."
The kunai was pulled back in order to gain more speed and power.
Sasuke yanked against his restraints, "Stop! I –"
The kunai's razor sharp edge flew forward, gleaming with the pain-multiplying poison.
"Take my eyes instead!" Sasuke finally yelled, his words bouncing off the walls around him and his eye shut tightly in case he had not stopped the guards. It wasn't until his voice bounced off the adjacent wall and flew back to him that he realized what he had said.
The kunai had stopped mere centimeters in front of Naruto's clamped shut eyes. "What was that?" The guard gripping the kunai hissed.
Naruto inched open one of his eyes when the pain did not come, still holding his pent up breath.
"I was the one who cast the genjutsu, so take my eyes!" Sasuke shouted quickly before he had the nerve to change his mind.
The two guards glanced at each other, and the guard with the kunai looked back to Sasuke, "Leader instructed us to take the Kyuubi's eyes, but I hate your eyes, the same ones Itachi possessed. Each time he looked at me it felt as if they were piercing and reading into my soul." He drew back his kunai and turned, locking onto his new prey. "Leader won't mind – you won't die, anyways." The guard stalked towards Sasuke without another thought, yanking his head back by his black hair. "Writhe in the pain you've brought upon yourself." The guard slashed at Sasuke eyes without another word.
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A beautiful blue colored bird flew through the rainy sky as quickly as possible, weaving around the larger drops of rain until he came to his favorite tree branch – one that sheltered him sufficiently from the ever present rain. He would have chirped happily upon arriving, but he would not lose his juicy worm by doing so. He took a couple step towards the center of the tree, where he would be even more sheltered from the rain if the wind so happened to blow, and snapped his head back, throwing the worm into the back of his mouth so he could wholly consume it. He gulped twice, just to be sure, and chirped in satisfaction, already turning around and looking to the ground for another meal.
A scream filled the entire forest and city. The voice was raw and filled with a most palpable pain imaginable. It reverberated off the trunks of each tree, shook the small pebbles lining the wet ground, and seemed to still even the rain drops. A flock of birds, including the little blue bird, took off in flight to find a more peaceful location while other animals retreated to the relative safety of their homes. They all knew that sound. Their instincts warned them of the pure, unadulterated pain that dripped from that scream and the one that followed.