Stepping among the headstones, Sasuke Uchiha wondered what he did to deserve the friends he has. The other seven were stumbling ahead of him, picking their way through overgrown brush and ignoring the moss covered statues as they slunk further and further into the graveyard. Kiba, the idiot, was leading the pack (and wasn't that an ironic thought), his brash voice cutting through the murky gloom the full moon overhead casted.
"I think the mausoleum is this way."
"I do not believe you should be leading us. Why? Because Sasuke-san should be far more familiar with these grounds." Ah, and there's Shino, sensible as always. His comment dragged attention back to the young teen and Sasuke grimaced. Shino's not wrong, this cemetery does hold the Uchiha crypt - their destination - and he had visited time and again with his mother. Father and his brother rarely came, the CEO of Uchiha Inc. and his renowned heir hardly had that kind of time.
"Humph. Well, you heard the man. Lead on, bastard."
Sasuke wondered if he should point out his parents wedding bands (again) but withheld the scathing comment. The mutt would only ignore him (again). Sighing, he made his way to the front, shivering from the mist hugging the ground and making the cemetery more ominous than they usually were at eleven PM.
"I can't believe we're missing Tenten's Halloween party for this." Ino whined. She, Sakura and Hinata were bundled close to Choji and Shikamaru, taking advantage of the heat the former emitted.
"You agreed that this would be cool!" Kiba automatically retorted.
Shikamaru huffed. "Troublesome. Ghosts don't exist and nor do demons. This whole 'ritual' is a scam, nothing's going to happen."
While Sasuke would normally agree with the lazy genius he was...curious. The Uchiha family was old, with antiqued beliefs spanning back to the mighty Izanagi. Their most aged scrolls told tales of tengu and kitsune, of Uchiha bonding and manipulating demons to their bidding. More recently, Sasuke's great great grandfather - Madara Uchiha - had apparently achieved a summoning, just as Sasuke and his friends sought to do tonight. Why Madara had wanted to summon a demon, Sasuke wasn't sure, but it didn't change the fact that he had disappeared the night he had decided to do so.
Collectively, the family believed the old codger had finally fallen off his rocker and disappeared to anonymously die in a ditch somewhere. For a select few, Sasuke included, they wondered if he had achieved his goal.
Sudden inhaling from his group of friends told Sasuke that his feet had instinctively guided him to the imposing resting place for deceased Uchiha. Onyx gleamed menacingly in the moonlight, bouncing between arched columns and the carefully sculpted images of old legends. The heavy doors displayed Izanagi and the forming of his children: Susanoo, the storm god, Amaterasu, goddess of the sun, and Tsukuyomi, the god of the moon. The trio were all bowing before him near the bottom of the doors, leaving the deity the main center of the carvings where he hoisted the legendary Totsuka blade.
"Sasuke-kun, your family is terrifying." Sakura finally decided. Coming from the girl that had been chasing after him since primary school, even Sasuke could grudgingly agree.
"Come on, the foyer should be big enough."
"What kind of crypt has a foyer?" Kiba muttered, Shino letting out a grunt of agreement.
Ignoring the duo, Sasuke fished out the key for the door. The fact that it was formed out of carved onyx and just as divinely decorated as the tomb went unnoticed by no one.
Shy little Hinata even felt the need to pipe up, "Not even the Hyūga's look like this."
"Isn't it made out of marble? Plus you cremate your dead." Shikamaru muttered, nodding at her squeaking confirmation.
Sasuke would be offended at the comparison, but he wasn't ignorant. The Hyūga was old blood, and just as successful as his own family. Less wealthy, yes, but they had a more diverse skill set among their relatives.
The door lock suddenly clicked,drawing his attention. Sasuke frowned at his introspective behavior before shrugging it off. They were close to midnight on Halloween and bout to invoke a demon, of course he would be more thoughtful.
Choji let out a low whistle as the foyer was revealed. While the walls were still onyx, the floor was a tiled black obsidian that gleamed under their flashlights. Reaching a hand into his pocket, Sasuke pulled out his pack of matches and went through the motions of lighting the oil lamps. Such an ancient structure lacked modern electricity, and he highly doubted it would ever possess it.
"I can see where the vampire rumors come from." Shikamaru observed.
"When you said you knew a place, you sure don't fuck around, Uchiha." Kiba added. Sasuke shot them the glare their comments deserved before the dog lover held his hands up in surrender. Shikamaru simply stared back, a faint smirk pulling at his lips. Sasuke still didn't understand while he put up with them.
"Right then." Kiba suddenly clapped his hands together before pulling off his backpack. The brunet dug around before shoving a pack of chalk, black candles and a wooden bowl into Shino's exasperated hands. He had been the one pushing the idea the most, so it had been up to him to get any supplies needed.
"Okay, so the ritual goes like this…"
In the aftermath of pentagram drawing, blood mixing, Sakura's complaints of sanitary conditions accompanied by many alcohol wipes on the knife, burning herbs and lighting candles, Sasuke was firmly tired of the whole ideal. Midnight was fast approaching, Kiba had handed him a Latin phrase (curse his father and his multilingual lessons) and they had all taken places around the circle, evenly spaced according to Shikamaru's assessing eyes. Hinata seemed to be quaking in her boots - quite literally, Sasuke observed as he stared at the brown leather. Sakura was just exasperated, joined by a long-suffering Shino, while Choji looked vaguely excited. Shikamaru had his ever-present bored expression displayed and Kiba… Kiba was the opposite of Hinata, vibrating in excitement as he was.
Sasuke wasn't sure what he was displaying, but he was vaguely certain it was annoyance. As for Ino...
"Alright, let's fucking do this. Are you guys ready?" Surprisingly the Kiba-like question had come from the blonde. Her despair over missing a party (the party, she would say) had been evidently replaced with enthusiasm for the occult practice they were about to partake in. The cheeky wink and expansive grin Kiba shot her was rather nauseating - really, while Sasuke was glad she had gotten over him, the blonde should stop pogoing between Kiba and that freak, Sai.
...Ino had strange taste in men, he reflected.
Unfortunately Sakura shared no such reserves and the fangirl was still lusting after him. He'd sympathize more with Shikamaru's plight, were he not questioning the man's sanity. Sakura was pretty and intelligent, yes. She was also impulsive and insane.
"Tell me when to start." Sasuke sighed, glancing pointedly at the slim watch decorating Hinata's delicate wrist. She was by far the best girl he had ever met, and no small part of his assessment was due to her disinterest in Sasuke himself.
There was a few beats of silence as she stared determinedly at her watch before speaking. "N-now."
The phrase, while rather lengthy, was an easy read and Sasuke zoomed through the pronunciations. He was passively translating it as he went, believing that Kiba had simply grabbed a rough translation that would prove to be a dud. "Quacumque die invocavero te, magne laruam dolo flammis. Suscipe, quaesumus, in animas nostras, et patres tui et servies aurata aedes ad te dignum putamus…"
Wait, what? Sasuke furrowed his eyebrows and he continued speaking, questioning where Kiba had actually found this phrase. It almost sounded like a they were pleading to become a demon's servant. Soon he was coming to the end, not noticing as his fellow teens seemed to twitch, all staring entranced as the cheap chalk outlines of the pentagram seemed to…spark, of all things.
"K-Kiba?" Hinata stuttered once Sasuke's rambling came to a close. The Hyūga heir was wide-eyed, quaking more intensely than before they had even begun. The rest of their group was similar pale-faced and anxious, staring at the chalk as the sparks seemed to coalesce into a dim orange glow.
"Where the hell did you get this, dumbass?" Sasuke growled, finishing his translating and paling at the words he had just uttered. It was a plea of servitude and the Uchiha was glowering at the brunet. Kiba himself opened his mouth to answer but before anything could be said the pentagram's light increased drastically, blinding the eight teens.
"Shit!" Coming from the rather mild Choji, Sasuke grimly echoed his sentiments.
"Ooh, a servant ritual? What kind of shitty lives do you guys lead?"
What? Sasuke's head was pounding, his eyes were searing, and that was not a voice he recognized. As he slowly adjusted from the bright flash, Sasuke noticed that the pentagram was no longer glowing orange - no, now it was transmitting an eerie red light. Squinting, the Uchiha noticed that in place of the bowl that had been placed at the center of the star was a pair of feet. Clawed feet, for that matter.
Eyes trailing slowly up, Sasuke took note of dark pants, an open orange jacket, and a bared muscled chest. The male had ragged clothes, worn and torn like Sasuke had seen some homeless people don, though his physique was something to take notice of. Finally resting his eyes on the male's face, Sasuke withheld the urge to gap. Blond, blue-eyed and beautiful, the stranger would gain countless double-takes were he to walk down the street.
Not only because of the golden, white-tipped fox ears either.
"What?" Sasuke croaked, because what?! Fox ears? What the f-
"Well, you all offered your blood so that a demon looking for an underling can choose you, right?" The blond responded, no doubt thinking Sasuke was responding to his previous statement.
"What the fuck?" Kiba finished his cut off thought.
"Is that a tail?!" Ino screeched, directly across from Sasuke and in the perfect position to assess such a thing.
"Eh?" The blond tilted his head cutely - and no Sasuke, the demon you just summoned is not cute, what the hell is wrong with you?
"Kiba…" Shikamaru drawled, a dangerous undertone to his normally lackadaisical voice.
"I just followed the instructions! It said demon ritual not, 'I want to sell my soul' ritual!" Kiba tried to defend, as if that was the main issue. Well, it was a large part of the issue, but the other part was that the dumbass' ritual had actually worked.
"Wow you're an idiot. It's Halloween, what did you expect to happen?" The demon questioned with a chuckle, reaching up a - holy shit he has claws on his nails too - hand to rub the back of his head. The blond turned his head to stare at the dog lover, giving Sasuke a perfect view of his profile and wow, Sasuke, you're so fucked.
I'd like to be. He admitted to the little voice inside his head. Damn, he was starting to sound like Sakura.
"Uh, nothing? I didn't think demons were real!"
"Rude. I'm plenty real." The blond even added a faint sniffle as he seemingly grabbed the place where his heart would be if he was human. Which he's not, Sasuke, stop staring at his abs.
At the dubious glances he was receiving the blond frowned. "What? Did you expect some vicious, blood soaked hellhound or something? I do enjoy cleanliness, believe it."
"Who are you anyway? You don't match any demon I've heard of." Shikamaru questioned, because of course he would. The genius was confronted with a real demon, and he questioned why he wasn't on any online site or referenced in the bible.
"Oh, my name's Naruto. Underling of the Kyūbi no Yōko and all that jazz." Naruto waved an absent hand before his nonchalant features suddenly sharpened, staring down at the wooden bowl Sasuke realized he was holding. They had all bled into it, per Kiba's demands, and now Naruto was sniffing it curiously, dipping a claw into it. The blond followed that action by licking at his finger and- Sasuke, get a grip.
"Huh. An Uchiha? Madara's gonna be happy."
"Madara? Great great grandfather Madara?" Sasuke snapped, his hormones easing back at Naruto's words.
"...grandfather?" Naruto questioned, startlingly blue eyes meeting black squarely. Sasuke held the stare for a long moment before he watched as the demon started cackling, hunching over and holding his stomach. "Grandpa! Oh, he's gonna hate that! Tobirama's never gonna let him live that down. Well. Live is a relative term, but anyway."
Wiping at his eyes, Naruto sent a fang-toothed grin Sasuke's way (why did he hear Sakura squealing doki, doki in his mind?) before glancing at the rest of his friend. "Well, good luck with accidently selling your servitude. I'll be taking your sacrifices for testing. Later~!"
With a wink at Sasuke and another bright flash of light, the demon was gone.
Silence pervaded the tomb for countless minutes before Sakura let out a growl. "Kiba…"
"I didn't mean to!" He yelped, dodging out of the way of her leading fist. He didn't see the following one.
Fin
Translation
Quacumque die invocavero te, magne laruam dolo flammis. Suscipe, quaesumus, in animas nostras, et patres tui et servies aurata aedes ad te dignum putamus. - I call upon you, great spectre of flames and trickery. Receive our sacrifice and conscript our souls into your gilded halls to serve you and those you deem worthy.
Notes
Whilst I did do some research into summoning - and looking up protection stones and such things - the Latin is completely bogus and I made it up on the spot. Ignoring that, I hope you all enjoyed this.