A/N: Hi guys. So yes, I know I'm supposed to update my other two fics but life happens and I don't have the inspiration and hopefully this fic will be successful enough to earn a lot of reviews and stuff to boost my inspiration and whatever.
Nonetheless, keep an eye out for updates on Save Me and Artificial Intelligence.
Also, this will be a two-shot. This being the shorter of the two chapters. I first want to see how this goes.
XXX
2 hours and 24 minutes before the Annual Purge
"The New Founding Fathers are hoping this year's Purge will be more successful than the previous year's Purge. Two hours and twenty four minutes left on the clock. Interviews with civilians shows that ninety percent of the population is excited to cleanse themselves in this remarkable opportunity to be reborn, free of sin-"
A woman with pink hair, the colour of cherry blossoms, scowled at the telepathic box sitting innocently on a shelf. Her green eyes showed nothing short of fierce disgust at the flashing images portrayed on the television screen. Had she been a lesser woman, she would've thrown her cup of coffee at the black little t.v., officially gaining a spot on the coffee shop's ban list.
"What a bunch of bullshit."
She turned her grass green eyes to gauge her companion's facial expression, the thought of how he too this up fleeting through her mind. Blonde hair stubbornly spiking up in every direction made her want to cringe with sympathy. His dark blue eyes never could hold back on the truth.
"Sasuke's going to participate this year, y'know."
"That's why we're going to his place to stop him, Naruto."
Naruto removed his gaze from the television in favour of studying his friend's face. She was right; they had planned on keeping their black haired friend in the confines of his apartment.
"He'll fight us, Sakura. We're going to have a hard time keeping him off the streets."
"Then what the fuck do you suggest we do?" Naruto flinched at her venomous tone, "are we just gonna let him run the god damned streets on Purge night? I'll be damned if I just sit back and watch him get himself killed. I'm not waiting this god forsaken night out on my fucking own!"
Naruto sneered, slamming his open palm down on the table, making their cups rattle with the force, "Watch your mouth! You're not your mother, Sakura!"
Sakura rolled her eyes at the blonde man sitting in front of her. Standing up from her seat, she placed enough money on the table to pay for both her and Naruto's coffee. Slinging her bag over her shoulder, Sakura placed a hand on her hip, waiting for her companion to get his ass up, "Whatever, Naruto. Mom's much worse."
Naruto sighed before standing up as well, "Sure, grandma Tsunade sure knows how to unleash her vocal fury."
"Exactly; I rest my case."
He nodded, "let's go, we have an hour before lockdown."
Making their way to the exit, the duo stepped into the traffic filled streets, walking down the sidewalk to their destination; Sasuke Uchiha's apartment.
Dark clouds could be seen over head, making the streets seem colder and deadlier. Most citizens were moving about in excitement, getting ready for Purge night. Some making last minute stops at shops to buy extra weapons for the evening.
Naruto watched as a girl with twin buns purchased a scythe from one of the vendors selling weapons. She must've felt him staring, 'cause when she turned to look him straight in the eyes when she received her purchased item, a feral grin slowly started to form on her pale lips. He turned to cast his eyes the other way, fully intended to ignore the maniacal glimmer in her eyes as they walked passed her.
The thunder made Naruto jump slightly in surprise and a light drizzle started to coat the darkening streets. That's when it happened.
One moment Sakura was walking next to him, groaning in frustration from the rain growing heavier by each passing second, oblivious to the crazy bitch with the crazy eyes, then the next she was thrown to the ground, a terrified yelp escaping her mouth. There was a guy hovering over her body, pinning her arms above her head, snickering as Sakura tried to get herself free from his grasp.
Her continuous pleas of help in Naruto's direction made his mind come to a standstill. He didn't think; he only acted. Grabbing the man by his hair, he dragged the bastard off of Sakura's form, punching him square on the nose, "It's not Purge hour yet, you mother fucking cunt!"
He heard high pitched laughter behind him, the sound drowning out the noise of rain splashing endless water drops on the ground. It was the girl with the twin buns laughing.
The guy Naruto just sucker punched, let go of his face in favour of embracing the laughing woman, showing Naruto a bloody smile of his own. The man's white optic lenses and long, dishevelled chocolate brown hair only made him look even crazier.
Naruto growled at the two, spitting on the ground. Turning to help Sakura up, he did a once over on her, noting her bleeding elbows that got scraped on the rough cement of the sidewalk. The rain did nothing but encourage her bleeding. Sakura's trembling fingers caught his, making him scan the area.
"Naruto, we need to leave. Now."
A group of onlookers had their own feral grins, suffocating both him and Sakura with their atmosphere of killing intent. He tugged on her hand lightly, pulling her into a walking motion towards Sasuke's apartment once again.
"Let's go."
They needed to get off the streets, and fast.
XXX
Rain pounded hard against a large window that were covered with dark curtains, draped shut.
A large black duffle bag was placed upon silk brown sheets of a queen sized bed. The room was rather bare, consisting only of a bed, one nightstand and a large dresser.
Pale hands zipped the bag open, revealing its contents to the person. Rifles, handguns and heavy machine guns were lifted out of the bag, each getting a turn of being polished and cleaned by expert fingers.
Black hair spiked comically at the back, resembling a duck's ass. Eyes of the same colour had specks of red blended, making them look hypnotisingly gorgeous. A black vest was stretched over a muscled chest, a few curly black chest hair stuck out at the top.
The man sighed, placing his last polished gun back into the duffle bag. His hands made their way up to his handsome face, rubbing his high cheekbones, 'I need to shave.' Black, hard stubble adorned his jaws.
Checking his wrist watch, he took note of the time. 33 minutes before the commencing of the second Annual Purge, if he wanted to get everything done in time, he had to get off his ass and prepare everything else that was left to do.
Shrugging on a bullet proof vest, he strapped the gear tightly to his chest before pulling a casual dark blue t-shit on, topping it off with a black leather jacket. Strapping on his gun holster to his black jeans, he grabbed a few rounds of ammo for his hand gun that sat snuggle on his right hip in its holster, placing them in their respective pouches. Heavy boots covered his black sock clad feet.
He was ready.
All that was left to do was putting the heavy duffle bag in his car and start scouting the area for his target. Glancing one last time at his wrist watch, he noticed he only had 15 minutes left.
'Maybe I'll start early and get a head start.'
The man was about to head for the garage when urgent knocking could be heard from his only exit, the front door.
'Ignore it.'
The knocking came again.
'Ignore it.'
It wasn't knocking anymore, it was pounding. And he swore if the person on the other side hit the door any harder, it would break off its hinges.
'IGNORE IT!'
Damn it. They were wasting his time. He needed to get to the fucking garage!
"Fuck, Sasuke. Open this fucking door or I swear to god I'll kick it down!"
Sasuke pinched the bridge of his nose, groaning in annoyance. "Go home, Naruto! You should've locked down ages ago!" He yelled back, "it isn't safe."
He could hear Naruto curse over the thunder that boomed through the sky, before another set of violent knocks shook the door, "That was the fucking plan, asshole, but Sakura got hurt and your place was the closest. Now open this mother fucking door you fucking bastard!"
'Sakura's hurt?!' his eyes turned murderous. No one hurt (his) Sakura. He would kill the sorry bastard that touched her. Stomping to the front door, he ripped the door open, standing aside to let the duo enter his humble abode.
Giving the mink haired woman a once over, she seemed pretty fine, but her elbows were scraped and bleeding, her hair soaked and ruffled more than usual and she was trembling even in her pinkie toe. At first he dismissed it as shivers from the cold rain that soaked her and Naruto, but closer inspection revealed to Sasuke that she had a heavily disturbed look in her eyes.
When Sasuke glanced at Naruto to ask what happened, he noticed Naruto's bloody knuckles.
"Some freak thought it would be extremely funny to jump her and scare the living shit out of us. I got him pretty good though, but there was a whole group of them. I think Sakura's being targeted, seeing as they didn't do me any harm."
"Who?"
"No idea, but there was a chick; with twin buns, brown hair. She seemed pretty happy about it."
Sasuke noticed how Sakura's shoulders tensed up at the mention of the brown haired girl. Did she know her?
"Guys, her name's Ten-Ten. She's one of the girls working at the hospital with me, a nurse. For some reason she never liked me. I have no idea what she has against me, but I'm gonna take a guess and say it's because of mom."
Sasuke arched a brow, "your mother?"
Sakura nodded her head, "Yeah, she gave Ten-Ten a warning. The bitch overdosed one of our elderly patients and almost killed the man. Mom moved her to receptionist, saying if she was to make one more mistake, she's fired. You guys know how strict my mom is with being the head doctor of that hospital and all."
Naruto looked confused, "but that's not good enough reason to kill."
"It is, if threatened to have your rank stripped for good." Sakura added.
"It's about to start."
Both Naruto and Sakura turned their heads to look at Sasuke, watching him turn on his flat screen t.v. to watch the news. They all held their breath as the warning screen appeared, reading the words silently, listening to the woman's voice booming through their ears.
"This is not a test. This is your Emergency Broadcasting System announcing the commencement of the Annual Purge sanctioned by the U.S Government. Weapons of class 4 and lower have been authorized for use during the Purge. All other weapons are restricted. Government Officials of ranking 10 have been granted immunity from the Purge and shall not be harmed. Commencing at the siren, any and all crime, including murder, will be legal for 12 continuous hours. Police, Fire and Emergency Medical Services will be unavailable until tomorrow morning until 7 a.m. when the Purge concludes. Blessed be our New Founding Fathers for letting us Purge and cleanse our souls. Blessed be America, a nation reborn. May God be with you all."
The siren that followed made their blood run cold, sending chills up their spines. A second night of horrors unfolding. The Annual Purge.
Naruto belatedly realised they hadn't even locked down yet, and his face paled as the last siren rang through the city.
"Lock everything, now!"
He and Sakura scurried to lock down the apartment, securing it from the inside. Sasuke took a minute to register their fumbling about before grabbing Naruto by the arm, throwing him against a nearby wall, successfully ceasing both their movements.
"I'm going out. You guys should leave and go lock down at home."
"Forget it, bastard! You're not going out there, none of us are!"
Sakura could only nod her head in agreement with Naruto. It would be suicide if they stepped out of the apartment and into the streets. Besides, she was being targeted by Ten-Ten and god only knows who else. It simply wasn't an option.
"Fine. Stay here then. Lock everything up when I'm out this door-"
"But, Sasu-"
"-and activate my security system." Sasuke glared at Sakura when she tried to protest, "It'll hold up until 7 tomorrow morning."
Naruto opened his mouth to yell at Sasuke how stupid he was for wanting to do this, when they heard rapid gun fire down the street. All three quieted down, moving silently to the window to check the streets below trough the pounding of the rain.
"It's them," Sakura's shocked whisper made Sasuke turn his onyx gaze on her. The fear and anger he could see in her eyes made him want to slap her. They were safe in his apartment.
He turned to look down at the streets again, thunder illuminating a girl with twin buns, staring right back up at them. The blood covering her clothes and face made her look even more insane when she smiled sweetly up at them, waving a bloody hand.
Forget that, they're not safe. They had to leave. If that girl knew where he lived, then she probably knows how to break herself in.
'Stupid bitch.'
"We need to leave. It's not safe here anymore."
Naruto turned an incredulous look towards Sasuke, "The fuck, dude? Go out there with them right at your front door? Hell no!"
Sasuke growled, grabbing Naruto by his collar. He was about to punch some sense into his idiot friend when Sakura tackled both of them to the ground. His window shattered, bullets piercing his ceiling, making debris and small shards of glass fall on them. Sakura's screams over the deafening gun fire and thunder made them panic even more, Pushing Sasuke to drag them across the room to get the hell out of there.
He couldn't hear anything besides his pounding heart rushing adrenalin filled blood through his body.
The trio got up to run through the front door, down the stairs to the ground level and through the back exit into the garage.
Sasuke reached his car first, a black GMW. He was suddenly very grateful he customized the car to be bullet proof.
Throwing his duffle bag in the trunk, he grabbed extra two hand guns and presented one to each of his friends before they jumped into the car, Naruto occupying the front seat next to Sasuke and Sakura at the back, making a screeching exit into the street in front of his apartment building.
Sasuke braked into an immediate halt when Ten-Ten and her group of shooters turned to aim their rapid fire machine guns on them. They could hear her giggle with amusement, watching as she started slowly towards them, her scythe resting on her shoulder.
Sakura fiddled nervously with her given handgun, watching with horror as that crazy bitch walked closer to the car.
"Oh, Sa-ku-ra! You gonna run to mommy?" Ten-Ten giggled again, coming to a halt a few feet in front of the car, "Come out and play with me, Sa-ku-ra. Or I'm going straight to your cunt mother to fucking skin her alive!"
Sakura's low growl made the two men in the car turn to look first at her and then at each other with worry. Everybody knew not to piss off Sakura Haruno.
Sakura opened the door so swiftly that neither Naruto nor Sasuke had enough time to stop her. She slammed the door shut, producing a scalpel from her pocket to hold in her right hand. "Over my dead fucking body, you whore!"
Ten-Ten let out a frustrated scream, stomping her way to the pink haired woman. Sakura didn't think twice in engaging the other woman as well, scalpel at the ready. She was going to operate on this bitch and replace her fucking eyes with her damn heart.
Ten-Ten gave a low swing with her heavy scythe, wanting to slice through Sakura's legs, but the pinkette jumped up in time only to tackle the twin bun wearing girl to the ground, her scalpel sinking into the woman's right shoulder.
Sakura smirked as Ten-Ten let out a pained scream, moving to whisper in the girl's ear, "You wanna play? Let's play, bitch. I'll be the doctor and you are my naughty little patient. Time to start removing all those tumours of hatred in your brain, tramp."
Plucking the scalpel from Ten-Ten's shoulder, Sakura aimed to stab the sharp medical tool in the girl's eye but Ten-Ten turned her head to the side, making Sakura cut through her temple.
Naruto and Sasuke could hear Ten-Ten's pained screams echo over the rain filled streets, making them agitated.
Sakura had had enough of this bitch's shit. She grabbed Ten-Ten by the throat, choking the life at the girl, "now you better listen the fuck up, all of you!" She glanced up to look each of Ten-Ten's rookies in the eyes, "if I so much as see you in my line of vision I will slaughter each and every one of you. Do I make myself clear?! I'm a fucking doctor, so I know where it will be the most painful to cut, and I swear to god," She returned her gaze to the choking girl under her, "If you so much as look in my mother's direction, I'll kill you."
And with that, Sakura let go of Ten-Ten. Standing up from her seat on the girl's stomach, she walked slowly back to the car with trembling hands, climbing into the back seat.
"Drive."
Her soft spoken word made Sasuke glance at her through the rare view mirror. When he didn't make a move to even start up the engine, Sakura snarled as she shoved his head against the steering wheel.
"Are you fucking deaf, asshole? I said to drive!"
Naruto shivered at Sakura's violent act against Sasuke. Normally he would've laughed at the raven haired man for getting his ass whipped by their female friend, but he knew Sasuke also understood that Sakura was on the verge of snapping, thus making the black haired man start the engine and drive away from Ten-Ten and her group.
This was going to be one long ass night.