Sai walked calmly down the streets of Konohagakure, his pace was leisurely as his mind wandered idly. His companion had grated his nerves for wining earlier so now he would just have to sit in the clearing and wait for him to get back. There was no way he could break away from his ink snakes, especially since he was injured and the Kyuubi wasn't healing him. But he wasn't going to bleed to death or anything like that either.
A familiar mop of pink hair turned a corner in front of him and Sai contemplated actually going after her before he went into a food shop and ordered himself something from the menu.
Naruto could wait ten minutes…
Naruto's heart pounded loudly in his ears when he locked eyes with the red Mangekyo Sharingan swirls he recognized all too well. They twisted lazily upon noticing his stare but did no more than that. Naruto concentrated on breathing when he realized that the only thing he could see of his enemy were his red eyes and, if he were to blink Naruto would lose him entirely in the dark forest (when had the sun set?) and that thought terrified him.
His chest heaved and he discreetly tried to break one of the ink snakes wrapped around his right wrist with a kunai he had retrieved earlier when Sai wasn't looking. His right side was hidden from the dark haired beings powerful eyes so he hoped he wouldn't notice Naruto hopelessly trying to break free.
"If a kunai is able to break those things then they mustn't be all that powerful." And Naruto turned his head up slowly to see an ANBU guard standing over him with a posture that was all too familiar to Naruto.
It was of someone that didn't like him, at all.
Naruto didn't take his eyes off of the shinobi that now stood over him. Itachi had yet to make a move and so Naruto felt he was more in danger of being attacked by someone that was supposed to ensure his safety more than the Akatsuki member. At least Itachi wouldn't kill him; the organization needs Naruto alive after all.
"Could ya help me out of these?" Naruto indicated the snake around his chest with the nod of his head.
The ANBU bent down and reached a gloved hand out; his white mask was the shape of a dog and hid his face from Naruto's worried eyes. He held in a scream as the man prodded his temporary stitches roughly.
"Does that hurt?" asked the ANBU needlessly, his voice cold and Naruto knew that no other Konoha shinobi were around the help him. Either that or they too were Kyuubi-vessel haters and wouldn't think twice about his death.
When Naruto failed to respond the ANBU pulled his fist back and slammed it into the place over Naruto's right rib where the slash was the worst—the deepest, most blood spilling place. Naruto couldn't stop a little sound from escaping his mouth as he tried to double over with pain that flooded his system and made him forget about everything except for the creature slithering through his system, lurching when prompted by the ANBU but still there, always there. Naruto had always lived with Pain, he even began to think of it as a monster that lived within his body: mostly its target was his heart since the Kyuubi always healed his wounds but now it was allowed to linger in the rest of his body, the creature had been allowed to move more freely since Naruto was five when a group of villagers came together and beat him within an inch of his life.
Naruto thought for a moment that he wished Iruka hadn't saved him that sad night on his fifth birthday, the fifth anniversary of the Kyuubi's 'death'.
He felt his body heave with another blow and he winced, trying to fight the ink snakes, trying to curl into a little ball so his weak ass wouldn't have to take anymore of Pain screaming through his system with pure glee.
Naruto was so utterly helpless, so defenseless because of Sai's stupid ink snakes and his own weak stature. There was nothing he could do. Nothing to defend himself from the ANBU. He was completely at the man's mercy.
And the ANBU had none for him.
Sai left the small restaurant with his plate half full, an uneasy feeling in his gut making it impossible to eat anymore. He needed to find Sakura and get back to Naruto soon.
The teen walked out of the area of the village and headed toward the hospital. Sakura was probably finished with her lunch break and had been heading back to the hospital when Sai had seen her. He began to wonder if he should have just caught up with her then. Things might have gone so much differently if he had.
"Excuse me," Sai walked up to the main desk and smiled at the woman in a traditional white nurse uniform who sat behind aforementioned large desk, "Is Sakura-san here?"
"Yes, you just missed her." The nurse frowned, "It's horrible; a ninja came back with all the bones in the left side of his body broken."
Sai merely smiled at her, "Is she working on him?"
The nurse seemed baffled by his blatant disregard for the ninja she had spoken of but answered him anyway with a positive.
"When will she be available?" Sai continued, unperturbed by the woman's shock. Who cared about what civilians thought? Not Sai.
"Whenever the man is no longer critical and others can take her place I suppose. Is your need to see her urgent?"
"Oh very, Naruto is hurt and his miraculous healing isn't working at the moment."
"Oh no," her eyes widened and genuine concern lit up on her face. She was one of the people that treated Naruto ever since he was little and she had come to care for the impulsive teen. It was her worst fear that Naruto would someday get damaged beyond repair, that he would be brought into the hospital broken beyond fixing: she had been one of the few people that would even bother to help Naruto when Iruka had brought him into the hospital with tears leaking out of his brown eyes, begging for help and finding only cold shoulders. She had been the first to step forward, to stop being a hateful monster and help a poor child innocent and blamed for a horrible crime he could not have committed. Two other nurses and a doctor had aided the blonde and he had steadily gained more and more friends in the hospital—he now had more friends then enemies in the place. "Will he be alright?"
"Yeah, he's fine," Sai waved a hand dismissively, "He doesn't want to come here so I offered to get Sakura to do the stitches."
"Stitches?" the woman looked horrified and Sai was touched by her concern for the blonde—he didn't see it often at all in civilians. "Is he bleeding badly? I can do the stitches…"
"Nah, not even when the gash was completely open. I stitched him up before I came here but I used thread for clothes and I don't think they will stay together under regular circumstances, let alone with what Naruto will do when he's got them."
The woman looked slightly more relaxed even though she had almost lost it when she heard that regular thread—of all things—had been used to close the injury. "Yes, I know how he is. What training ground is he in? I'll send Dr. Haruno there as soon as she is free."
"I believe it was the first one, with the three logs? Naruto said that it has sentimental value to him, or something like that."
The woman nodded her head and watched the ninja gracefully walk away, the powerful muscles of his back flexing and relaxing as he left—ninjas all have this way of walking, a way that no civilian could ever hope to have because they are so deadly and so sneaky about it. She found herself staring at the door where he had gone through for a couple of seconds longer then completely necessary and she blushed while standing to go see Sakura and inform her of what the nurse now knew.
Naruto took a very shaky breath after the ANBU had gotten done sinking his kunai in-between his stitches and sliding it across the bone a little before pulling it back out. The man was now kneeling in front of the blonde, eyes completely focused on what he was doing as he tortured the Kyuubi vessel.
He wished he could just kill the brat and solve all of their problems but he knew better then to do that. The Hokage would kill him without a trail and with her own bare hands, probably by crushing his skull between her hands or by some slow and painful medical thing since she is the best medic-nin ever.
Naruto held in another scream and waited for an opportunity to arise where he could try to do something to the ANBU. Anything would be better then just sitting there and taking it like a fucking bitch. Naruto ignored the pain as the ANBU did something else—he had been through so much worse—and he felt his body move before his mind had even finished thinking of what it wanted to do. The ANBU let his wrist get too close to Naruto's mouth and the teen had bitten him, his sharp teeth slicing through the thick cloth and shredded skin but just barely missed a vital artery. The ANBU cried out in shock while he yanked his wrist, trying to shake Naruto off. But Naruto hung on, using every last bit of strength to keep his bottom teeth within the man's flesh while his upper teeth gouged the bottom of the ANBU's thumb where it met with the rest of his hand.
The ANBU slammed his fist into the back of Naruto's head, cursing the jinchuuriki angrily as he viciously pulled on Naruto's hair. Naruto took the pain, took the blows to his wound, just so he wouldn't let go, just so the ANBU wouldn't have free reign over him.
Naruto was the type to fight to the end after all.
The taste of copper filled his mouth and he blew the ANBU's blood in between his lips with distaste as its smell filled his nose and made him gag. The ANBU became furious when he saw the blonde spit out his blood and he raised the kunai in his free hand, ready to kill the defenseless ninja with a single and shameful blow.
Suddenly Naruto felt all the tension in the hand fall away, his closed eyes slowly opened to see the ANBU's hand still firmly pinched between his teeth but the rest of the man was lying limply from where his body had crashed against the three logs in the middle of the field. Naruto looked down at the wrist, the clean cut made by a katana with a deadly sharp blade spilled blood in a single drizzle and Naruto spat it out, his stomach heaving with disgust when he remembered the finger twitching, muscles pulling and he felt the tendon twitch in his mouth.
His vision swirled as he looked around for the person that had saved him from death but his restricted neck movements didn't let him glance behind him so he couldn't look everywhere. Naruto's eyes widened when they swept the forest to his left and he remembered that Itachi was nearby…and no longer in the forest.
He gulped slowly when he felt a hand gently place itself on the back of his neck and he felt warm breath raise the hairs there.
Sai stared up at the sky, debating on whether he should go to the clearing and keep Naruto company or wait on the stairs of the hospital for Sakura to show up and take her to the clearing so that there would be no confusion as to where to go.
The uneasy feeling in his gut was suddenly amplified and he looked nervously in the direction Naruto was waiting bound by his ink snakes.
Naruto was more then helpless; anyone could come up and kill him if they wanted to since Naruto couldn't make hand signs with them bound at his sides. Not to mention they could have the snakes remove themselves from the ground if they know which hand sign to use. It wasn't likely but it was possible.
Sai stood and frowned. Maybe he was just being paranoid. He had never had 'gut feelings' before and he didn't know whether he should do what Naruto would do and rush head long into the situation or if he should ignore it like his whole life's training and wait for Sakura. Priorities made getting Sakura to Naruto without delay was first and so he went with what he was trained to do and sat back down on the warm stairs. The sun beat down on his head and his black hair absorbed and retained the heat but Sai ignored it.
Sakura desperately pumped healing chakra into the man in front of her, trying so hard to keep his heart beating while the rest of the medic-nins repaired his broken bones and put more blood into his body. There was so much blood; it coated her in a thin blanket of smelly and coagulating substance that made her want to retch with disgust. But she couldn't, she had to focus on keeping this man alive.
There had been a trap inside his left arm set for healing chakra and had exploded the appendage into nothing-ness. No one had been injured but Sakura had been covered in his stinky blood and clots of other mush that was so disintegrated that it couldn't even be considered as bone and muscle anymore. None of the women and men in the room had ever seen anything like that before but they didn't hesitate either—working in a ninja hospital for as long as they have had a strange effect on them, they never hesitate anymore, they just do what needs to be done without a second thought. Hinata had searched the body very quickly and found three more traps; she disabled them as the rest of the medics concentrated on keeping the man alive.
Sakura felt the man's heart lurch and she concentrated the tiniest bit more chakra into the organ. She couldn't stand it! Her chakra reserves were getting low (having been at this for about ten minutes would do that) and she had to adjust the level she was pumping into the man every time his heart started beating faster on its own or slowed even the slightest: too much help from chakra on a working heart would stop it while too little will let it stop on its own—obviously it's not an easy task. The less chakra Sakura has the harder it gets to adjust and she had to do so the moment after the heart changed rhythms.
And the worst part was that she was the only medic in the room that could do this so precisely. On another, more stable patient almost everyone present in the room could manage with different amounts of difficulty depending on how great of a shinobi they were but she was the only one who could switch her flow so quickly, the only one that could sense the change almost instantly and react without conscious thought.
And Sakura was getting really tired.
Itachi had only acted when the foolish man decided he was going to kill Naruto. In an instant he had come out and sliced the man's hand off with one hand and with the other he punched the ANBU in the kidneys hard enough to kill and sent the man flying across the training ground where he had slammed into the three logs there—a sickening crack told Itachi that his spine had broken and that there was no way he could still be alive. Itachi now stood behind Naruto and watched the boy look around himself; he was amused that he had landed out of the boy's sight. The Uchiha slid his hand out of his sleeves and let his fingers curl gently around Naruto's tan neck. He felt the teen stiffen at the touch, Naruto's body immediately aware of his presence and reacting so strongly to his gentle touch. Sensitive, nerve endings very active…
Itachi found himself liking this picture. Naruto with his half naked body bound before him, his body stilling at his touch, his eyes widening with fear while Itachi felt such a power over him, over this jinchuuriki's life that he was intoxicated by it. He liked this feeling, he craved more of it almost instantly but he squashed it just as quickly as it had swept over him.
He didn't have time for the petty things that he wanted.
The Uchiha slid slowly into a squat behind Naruto and examined the snake that was resting its head on a tan shoulder. He knew already that they didn't send information back to their creator or else the ninja would have already come back from the ANBU attacking (which is why Itachi didn't step in sooner). Now all he needed to know was if he could get the snakes to release their teeth from the ground and continue to have Naruto securely bound or if he should just go ahead and destroy them. The original plan was for Itachi to capture Naruto in his Mangekyo and the Kisame would tie him up as quickly as possible because Itachi would go blind if he overused his imperfect Sharingan.
Itachi kept his hand on the back of Naruto's neck—feeling the hot skin ripple with muscles as the hairs stood on end as best as they could while they were pressed against tan skin by a pale hand—as he examined the snakes more closely with his normal Sharingan and noted that the snakes seemed to be made of ink. He placed a kunai near to head of the one on Naruto's shoulder and it hissed a warning at him. He raised an eyebrow at the sound before nudging the creature with the tip. He scrapped a little ink from the creation and it bit the tip off his kunai, swallowed the metal, and then returned to its lazy perch. Itachi watched with his Sharingan as the kunai tip melted inside of the creature and he now knew better then to let the thing bite his finger.
Itachi moved to squat in front of Naruto—weary of his mouth—and stared the blonde down with an emotionless expression. The Akatsuki member called out for his partner softly without taking his eyes away from Naruto's. The teenage shinobi broke away from Itachi's gaze to glance nervously at Kisame and Itachi looked at the man too, having already decided he had won that little contest that had been silently started between the two. In the silence that followed Naruto glaring at Itachi (despite the immense fear twisting his gut) Kisame decided that he felt like talking.
"Whatcha need?" Kisame finally asked just before Naruto could demand for a rematch from Itachi.
"Do you recognize these?" Itachi indicated the ink snakes and brought his fingers close to Naruto's mouth without thinking. The blonde snapped his teeth and Itachi jerked his hand back instinctively and his fingertips barely made it out of Naruto's mouth intact.
Kisame chuckled at the display, "He's vicious, ne?" he chuckled again at Itachi's hateful glare but he didn't stop talking, "Do you remember the idea of him being tied up and on your bed with his legs spread wide open…?"
Itachi stood slowly—both men ignored Naruto's horror filled eyes and voice as he yelled at Kisame—and took a single step toward Kisame. The blue skinned man backed away five steps and apologized while trying to suppress a smile that would start a fight that he probably wouldn't win. Breaking down into a fit of giggles while a very dangerous person is trying to kill you wouldn't help you in staying alive.
"Just look at the bonds," hissed Itachi in a surprisingly normal voice. Only someone fluent in Uchiha Speech would be able to tell he was annoyed: Kisame, having been partnered with Itachi for more then two years, and Naruto, who obviously knew Uchiha Sasuke very well, both understood Uchiha Speech remarkably well and they both caught the warning. Naruto hoped Kisame would ignore that warning and continue but it turns out that his luck isn't that good.
"Yeah, sure," Kisame tried to haul Naruto to his feet using his upper arm and was rewarded with a sharp bite and an utter failure to lift the blonde's ass from the ground. "Why you little…" Kisame was about to attack Naruto when Itachi informed Kisame that the things binding Naruto were firmly lodged into the ground.
"We would have left already had I been able to pick him up," he finished with a bored tone, the anger had completely left his Uchiha Speech and now all that remained was annoyance, that was imperceptible to people who were not exposed to Uchiha's for prolonged periods of time.
"Yeah, right." Kisame shook his hand out and looked at the damage; there was none, Naruto's teeth had been unable to pierce his flesh in time. The man knelt beside Naruto and looked at one of the snakes closely while keeping everything well away from them. His rolled over the one on Naruto's torso—the longest snake on the teen—and noticed how the snake was keeping its tail in its own mouth to stay there. "Hn, I know what this is."
After a long moment of silence Itachi spoke in monotone, "What?" all traces of annoyance or any other emotion had left his voice.
"Just a lil ink snake thing, nasty buggers for sure. I learned all about them a while ago 'cause a Konoha ANBU attacked me before I joined the Akatsuki and used one of the fuckers to capture me. There was only one so I ended up using brute force to break it but it was hard as hell and there's a lot more on this brat. I researched a lil about them when I joined the Akatsuki just found some reliable information 'bout them before we left the base to get here."
"Do you know how to make them move?"
"Yeah, you gotta use the seal of the tiger and channel a certain amount of chakra behind it or else the lil things will ignore you or kill who ever their binding."
"We can't risk Naruto-kun's life."
"Yeah, yeah," Kisame waved a dismissive hand, "I got perfect chakra control, he'll be fine."
"Do it," Itachi ordered and watched as Kisame closed his eyes and made the symbol for tiger.
"Don't I get a say in this?" Naruto squeaked, not knowing what he could do to get out of this predicament. But, of course, he was ignored completely.
Kisame took a breath and whispered how he wanted the ink snakes to bind Naruto without staying in the ground anymore. Naruto watched with horror as the ink snakes shifted against him, debating whether they should listen to the one commanding them now or if they should just kill Naruto. They dislodged their head from the ground and for one horrible moment the three shinobi thought they were going to strike Naruto. But they were being good ink snakes and the ones on Naruto's wrists slithered swiftly up to the one around his torso and wrapped around the thicker one there, forcing his hands to be balled up on either side of his chest. He tried to move them together but couldn't. The ones on his ankles twisted around each other and bound his legs together easily. Naruto was now trapped and mobile.
Oh joy.
An: okay, so I would like some help. This title no longer matches the story, and I can't think of anything new. So, if you have any ideas for me then I would really appreciate hearing them!
