Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto and make no profit from this work of fiction. This disclaimer applies to this and every subsequent chapter of "From the Ashes."
Chapter 01: Ash and Dust
5 September, Year 6 of the Sandaime's Second Reign
Fire. Stinging ash, clashing steel, and below it all, the acrid stench of smoke.
"Hokage-sama! We need to move!" Kakashi twisted sideways, thrusting chakra into the soles of his feet to maintain his balance. Terracotta tiles shattered beneath him as he lunged forward, deflecting a kunai before it could pierce a chuunin's back. Kakashi's ears caught the tell-tale hiss of a primed exploding tag, and he was forced to bodyswap with a branch to avoid the fiery explosion. Flames bloomed in the light of the setting sun, echoing the colors streaked across the sky.
"Yes, we do." The old man ducked and lashed out with his bo staff, the black tails of his hitai-ate trailing an arc behind him. "How is the evacuation progressing?"
ANBU Tiger flickered onto the rooftop, dodging an earth jutsu and knifing a Rock-nin's throat before vanishing back into the streets. The Iwa-nin's partner launched a series of projectiles at their group, forcing them to scatter. Kakashi snatched a poorly-aimed senbon from the air and traced movement though the nearby tree canopy. Sighting his target, he flicked it back in the direction from which it came. He was rewarded by a gasp of pain and seconds later, a meaty thump.
"We've evacuated as many civilians as possible from the East Gate District." Tiger had flickered back onto their rooftop and was giving her report in clipped tones while scanning the streets below. Taking advantage in the lull in the battle, Kakashi reached up to readjust his Hound mask.
"Fighting has moved west to the Bunkyo District and is approaching the hospital. The Uchiha have set up a defensive perimeter on its south end—we're funneling civilians and patients that way, toward Police HQ. Enemy combatants are predicted to move south from the East Gate into Shino District."
Kakashi started, and the Hokage's eyes—deadly sharp despite their halo of wrinkles—snapped to him. Coming to a quick decision, Sarutobi nodded to Kakashi. "Hound, find Naruto. Protect him until the battle is decided."
"Yes, Hokage-sama," Kakashi murmured, drawing a kunai. He launched immediately into a sprint over the rooftops, coiling his chakra tightly to avoid detection. The Konoha Orphanage was located in Shino, in a grove at the southeast border of the village. If the fighting had moved that far—
Tension sang in his muscles, and the world around him blurred.
Shino District was ablaze when Kakashi arrived.
Fires raced through the streets, greedily licking up electric poles and dwellings, catching trees alight, collapsing roofs, and clogging the air with putrid smoke. A window exploded with heat as Kakashi passed, glass shards bursting out to slice into his bare deltoid. A trickle of blood ran down, tracing the spiral of his ANBU tattoo.
Reorienting himself southward toward the orphanage, he resumed his breakneck pace.
It was only once he reached the old wooden building that his gut clenched. Flames had nearly devoured the structure, howling up in a red-orange pillar against the twilight sky. Glass littered the blackened grass circling the orphanage, crunching under Kakashi's sandals, and heat whipped his face as he approached. Scanning the building, he circled toward the back where the flames had not yet destroyed the structure's integrity. Kakashi checked garden door briefly with his palm, then thrust it open and ducked to the side. The blaze flared in the new wave of oxygen, roaring like a tiger chasing wounded prey.
Taking a deep breath of relatively fresh air, Kakashi steeled his nerve and dove through the wreath of flames. He stumbled his way along the hallway, tracing a palm along the wall to guide him through the thick, acidic smoke. He'd just reached the administrative section of the building when his ears picked up a sound beneath the roar of the fire.
"Hey!" Thump, thump. "Hey, what's going on? Let me out! Lemme out!" Thump, thump, thump.
Kakashi's mind stuttered to a halt.
The orphanage staff had locked a child in a burning building.
The orphanage staff had locked a child in a burning building.
A red haze overtook his vision that had nothing to do with his Sharingan.
Someone is going to die for this. Slowly.
"Please! I'll be good, I promise! Please lemme out!"
Kakashi threw himself around another corner, allowing hearing and chakra-sense to guide him through the maze of the burning orphanage. Hurtling a fallen beam, he ran the length of a flame-wreathed hallway, taking a sharp left into the head matron's office. A haze of smoke filled the room. Kakashi doubled over coughing, his cloth mask not enough to filter clean air from the thick ash. He dropped to his stomach, crawling through the slightly clearer air toward the child's screams.
"P-please, lemme out. I'm s-orry—"
Kakashi reached the door on the other side of the room, examining it rapidly.
"Stand back," he barked, and was met by a teary gasp and a scramble of feet from the other side. He counted to three under his breath, then regained his feet, set his stance, and hurled a chakra-fuel kick at the door. It slammed back into the wall, hinges squealing under the strain.
Kakashi peered into the gloom, hyperaware of the flames licking their way into the office.
"Naruto?" he coughed. "Come here, Naruto!"
Slowly, a small figure crept out of the smoke squinting up at him through reddened eyes. Without wasting a second, Kakashi darted forward and snatched him up, turning just as the room exploded into flames.
Pain.
Throbbing, sickening pain, ricocheting through his head.
Kakashi groaned as he woke, throwing a hand up to cover his Hound mask's left eyehole. Fighting back the nausea threatening his stomach, he lurched upright and blinked his good eye open.
The smoke outside lay thicker now, settling like a soft blanket over the orphanage's clearing and cast in an odd orange light. Blinking rapidly to clear his vision, Kakashi craned his head around, searching for the source of the strange illumination.
A hundred yards beyond the orphanage, the towering, centuries-old trees ringing the Village Hidden in the Leaves burned, tossing sparks hundreds of feet into the sky. Even as he watched, wood screamed, snapping with a clap like thunder, and a monstrous limb speared toward the ground. The earth shuddered when it hit.
"Crown fire," Kakashi breathed, heart dropping faster than a thrown kunai.
Every Konoha citizen—hell, even the civilians—knew the dangers of a crown fire. Konohagakure periodically set ground fires to burn the duff from beneath the soaring trees surrounding the village, to prevent unexpected natural fires. That was simply a part of being a ninja in the Land of Fire.
But a crown fire this close, in the middle of the dry season, could destroy the entire village.
A moan from his left wrenched his eyes away from the horror before him. Naruto lay next to him, right arm twisted at an awkward angle and a spectacular bruise forming on his forehead.
Damn. An undignified scramble brought him next to the child, and a hasty inspection of his body revealed no dire injuries. Listening at his chest was worse. His heartbeat was steady, but his lungs wheezed with every breath he took.
Someone is definitely going to die for this.
Carefully gathering the child to his chest, Kakashi pushed yet more chakra into his legs and stood. He grimaced as his quads twinged with fatigue—at this rate, he'd exhaust his chakra within the next hour. Shaking off the tiredness as best he could, Kakashi wove his way through the smoldering junipers ringing Konoha Orphanage.
When they broke the tree line, he caught a glimpse of Konoha proper.
"Gods," he whispered. The boy whimpered and tried to burrow deeper into the safety of his chest. Kakashi ran what was hopefully a soothing hand through the kid's ash-stained hair, never once taking his eyes off the sickening scene laid out before him. The entire south forest was alight, casting a sickly orange glow over the village. Tongues of flame leapt from canopy to rooftop, cracking terracotta tiles and setting the wooden dwellings alight. Battles were highlighted against the backdrop of flames, kunai flying and men being struck back, only to be consumed by the ravenous fire.
And there, to the west—
Where the Hokage Monument used to preside over the village, now lay a mountain of rubble.
Crouched in an alleyway, an unconscious Naruto tucked beneath one arm and a drawn kunai in the other hand, Kakashi cursed himself.
They were making their way painstakingly northward, up past the hospital, which had fallen to what seemed to be a joint invading force of Lightning- and Rock-nin. The fighting was thicker up here—it seemed the invaders had moved into Kin District, not Shino—and the streets were being barricaded. By whose army, Kakashi wasn't sure.
Fading deeper into the shadows of the alley as a clatter of footsteps flew past, Kakashi stretched his senses out for nearby chakra signatures. Once he determined the area was clear, he hefted Naruto's limp form higher. The boy's breathing had evened out on the trek northward, but Kakashi was still concerned for his lungs. Smoke inhalation could be ten times more deadly than burns.
Setting aside those worries for now to focus on the more immediate threat, he moved out of his sheltering alley and into the eerily silent streets.
A step forward, creep along the wall, wait for a gap in the flames, move—avoid the chakra signature, duck behind the fence, stick to the shadows—
Freeze!
Heart beating rapidly, he waited for the Lightning squad to move past. Muscle memory carried him through many of the movements, but winding his way through the backstreets of Konoha gave him something to focus on beside the half-dead child in his arms or the fate of his village. If the enemy had moved this far into Leaf territory, it didn't seem like the battle would have a favorable outcome.
And the fire—if the fire couldn't be contained, there might not be a village to fight for. Konoha built mainly with wood. If the crown fire moved north, into the village…
Don't think. Just move.
Turning one last corner, he reached out again for chakra signatures. Finding none, he took a chance and leapt to the roof, speeding north.
Shit!
Kakashi leapt backward, clenching Naruto to his chest as a tree branch collapsed beneath him. Embers licked at his Hound mask and scorched a line along his right forearm. He retreated to an empty road, again watching the shifting flames. One of the enemy ninja had to be using a fire jutsu—there was no other way the forest fire could have spread to the northern end of the village so quickly. Only the eastern flank and part of the western were yet open—the east presumably left clear for the invaders' retreat, and the west was closing rapidly.
He avoided looking at the village.
A gap appeared in the flames, and Kakashi shot forward. He ducked as a tongue of flame shot out, twisted sideways—
The gap in the flames was closing, he would barely make it in time—
"Help! Mama, Papa, help!"
A child's voice, screaming for help.
Kakashi skidded to a stop, heels kicking up tracks of dust in the heat-cracked earth, watching helplessly as a curtain of flame swallowed his escape route. He spun a tight circle, clutching Naruto closely, arms spasming at the continued effort. Kakashi scanned the area in front of him in a practiced manner, but came up with nothing. With a scowl and a quick surge of chakra, he snapped the chakra string binding the Hound mask to his face. It clung for a moment longer before tumbling to the ground, the bone-white porcelain shattering without the connection to his chakra to reinforce it. Range of vision widened, he swept the area with his Sharingan. A child's signature would be small, easy to overlook in the orange light of the flames and the dark shadows of the smoke—
There! Crouched in the lee of a building a block away, completely surrounded by hissing flame, two small figures with barely-developed chakra coils.
Kakashi shifted Naruto's weight minutely, eyeing the dance of the flames. His limbs trembled with adrenaline and fatigue. He would only get one shot at this, and he had to get those kids out before—
Flames spun, and Kakashi moved.
Left foot down, lunge through the flames, right foot down in the flame-vaccuum, snatch up the dark-eyed boy sheltering the pale-haired girl behind him, shift his grip, grab the girl, shoot up before the gap closed-
Flames kissed the bottom of his sandal as he tumbled onto the rooftop.
I made it, he thought, not moving. He'd give himself five seconds. Five seconds to just lie there and breathe, and make sure he was still alive after that desperate stunt.
When his self-imposed time limit expired, Kakashi sighed and rolled over heavily onto his back, exposing the children lying beneath him to the relatively fresher air away from the fire. This building was stone, one of few, and would therefore hold them for a few minutes—long enough to inspect his charges.
Naruto lay unnervingly still, but a quick check ensured that his heartbeat was strong, if a little fast, and he was breathing easily. Even as he watched, a twist of red chakra coiled beneath the boy's skin, cocooning his broken arm. Kakashi scrutinized Naruto a moment more, ensuring the chakra wasn't harming him, before turning to the next child.
Visual inspection informed him the dark-eyed boy was streaked with ash and that minor burns speckled his face, hands, and forearms. One darker burn drew a line across his right cheek, and might scar if he wasn't careful. Kakashi gathered chakra into his palms and ran the same check he had on Naruto, determining the boy had inhaled a minimal amount of smoke, and would be safe for a while longer.
He moved on to the girl.
She wasn't breathing.
"Damnit!" he snarled, ripping down his soot-clogged mask. He took a moment to confirm a lack of heartbeat before throwing himself into chest compressions. Basic first-aid was part of the Academy program, but every ANBU partnered with a medic-nin for a week during training to learn a few odd tricks…
Carefully, never letting his rhythm falter, he threaded two strings of chakra from his fingertips down into her heart.
Slowly, slowly. Too much will kill her…
One thread connected to the upper right side of her heart, one to the lower left-
And shift.
Chakra morphed into lightning, drawing a charge across the girl's failing heart. Her back arced off the roof, muscles straining, spine ready to snap—and she fell limply to the ground.
Kakashi withdrew his hands and lowered his ear to her thin chest—
Tha-thump. Tha-thump.
—and breathed out a strained laugh. He moved his ear to her mouth, where air puffed reassuringly from her lungs.
Kakashi sighed in relief, then straightened and began the logistical nightmare of carrying three unconscious children across a warzone.
AN:
I never want to describe fire ever again. Although, I do find it morbidly ironic that Fire Country's Hidden Village burned to the ground.
I might continue this—I have a few ideas going forward, but no solid plot yet.
Anyway, feedback is awesome. This is unbeta'd, so let me know what you think. (Was everyone in character, was the pacing or flow odd, was it interesting even though there was barely any dialogue and way too much fire, etc.)
Peace,
Quinn
Edited 5/15/15: Punctuation, formatting, and general word choice errors.