I do not win, I defeat.
silverdiadems
Chapter Two: the darkness is our kingdom
a/n: OMG. The feedback from this has been AMAZING. Thank you! I normally wouldn't put an author's note at the top of the page, but I've received over 30 follows, and 3 reviews and a couple of faves :) Thanks everyone for opening up to
this idea. Special thanks to ScarletloveFever for leaving a long review of what you thought about the idea. Glad you liked it.
-the darkness is our kingdom-
"Do you understand? You are not to injure, harm, or assault the target in any manner, no matter how dangerous he is. The target is to be returned to Konoha for rehabilitation. You will leave in two hours."
Sarutobi Hiruzen narrowed his eyes at the shinobi in front of him. Team Itachi had always been the strongest of the ANBU teams, and Hiruzen was confident that they'd be able to take on the task at hand.
"We understand, Hokage-sama," Uchiha Itachi spoke in his velvet tongue, glancing briefly at his teammates before nodding at his superior in confirmation.
"Then be dismissed." Hiruzen nodded at the shinobi, who immediately Shunshined out. The captain, cloaked in his grey ANBU uniform remained standing in front of him.
"Itachi," Hiruzen greeted, nodding at the young leader. "What do you wish to talk to me about?"
"The Uchiha will want details on this mission, Hokage-sama," Itachi said, removing his ANBU mask and clearing his throat. "Do you wish me to tell them that this mission involves the recapture of the Byakugan? The Uchiha will surely be curious at the loss
of a shinobi with a kekkei genkai."
Hiruzen sighed, massaging his temple. The Naras couldn't blame him if they borrowed their signature word, would they? "How troublesome," The Hokage admitted, looking at the young boy.
And that was al he was really, a young boy. Itachi was young, but Hiruzen couldn't help but think he was born into the wrong family. When working with the young adult to cease the Uchiha Clan's quench for power, he had learned the boy to be a soft-hearted,
kind child.
And there was that, too. The Uchiha Clan was still unstable, and Hiruzen could only hold off Danzo and the council for so long before they overruled his decision.
"Do not speak of the Byakugan Shinobi," he instructed Itachi. The boy nodded. "In doing so the Uchiha might pay special attention to the shinobi, once he comes subdued into Konoha. We do not want the Uchiha to act and attempt to eliminate the shinobi."
"Understood."
Hiruzen smiled sadly, gesturing towards the door. "Go now, Itachi. I promise that things will clear up soon."
Itachi halted, his back facing the old man on his way to the door. He turned slightly before continuing his way out the door. The footsteps soon vanished, and Hiruzen knew Itachi had used the ShunShin.
Sighing, the Hokage picked up the piles of paperwork that piled on his desk. He placed the first one in front of him and began to read.
-the darkness is our kingdom-
Deidara had left her room an hour or so prior, so Sakura was left alone in her room when all the lights turned out and the darkness took over.
She was tired, but her eyes stayed wide open, their pupiless gaze looking back at her as Sakura stared at her dark, shadowed reflection in the moonlight.
She could almost imagine the outline of a sharp jaw, a face that wasn't her own, and long, dark hair that would settle neatly around the shinobi's shoulders. His eyes just like her own. White, with the soft hints of soft lavender.
She had known little of the shinobi whose eyes she looked at herself with. She wondered where he was now. Probably up there in the sky somewhere, she though dryly. Probably somewhere in the deepest pits of hell hating her and her very existence, hating
her homeland for taking away his life and his eyes.
"Ah well," Sakura sighed, dropping the mirror on her bedside with a clang. She fell back onto her bed, the hair fanning out behind her as she listened to the sound of her own breathing.
It was quite hot in Iwa this time of the year, and Sakura listened intently to the only sound in the room; the sound of the whirling fan. It helped out a lot in the hot temperatures that Iwagakure could reach in summer, as it was currently January- the
peak of the heat.
Sleeping was almost impossible in the heat, and Sakura could feel her skin grow clammy as she lay on her bed. She continued to toss and turn but her eyes would not become tired, would not close.
Sakura attempted to force herself into sleep, but her mind kept wandering, kept thinking, while her eyes stayed open without a sign of fatigue. As her eyes stared pointlessly in front of her, her mind raced with strategies, possibilities, and options.
Her current object of thought: the Byakugan. Or more specifically, Konoha's reaction to having one of their most prestigious kekkei genkai stolen right underneath their nose. Iwagakure's fake alliance with the village hidden in the leaves had been clever,
to gain the trust of the very village they would betray moments later.
When Deidara and his teammates came back with the Hyuga shinobi, Sakura praised her own handiwork.
She was a prodigy. A born genius.
After all, she was very smart.
Deidara might have had the firepower, but Sakura was all the brains. She calculated every step ahead, and if her opponent ever felt they had the advantage- she had already planned the thirty-six ways the fight would end.
In theory, she was a paper-ninja.
A ninja who was destined to sit behind a desk filing mission reports and writing down interrogation notes. She would forever be locked up as her job as secretary. Sakura could see it happening.
But then, something changed.
The Byakugan was a key factor in Sakura's life that she hadn't anticipated. Having the ability to access this kekkei genkai would change things in her future- drastically. Even if she wanted to grow old and fat without training, the council would have
placed her on mission after mission because of her all-seeing eyes.
And then there was her father. Sakura predicted, no, Sakura knew he would push her to the limits with physical training instead of mental.
She gritted her teeth in frustration. She thought she had her future all planned out until her Father had to go mess everything up.
Sakura sighed, and rolled over.
She knew she wouldn't be getting any sleep tonight.
-the darkness is our kingdom-
As predicted, her father took her into their private training grounds the next morning.
When Deidara had knocked to tell her to wake up, Sakura was already up and running, popping soldier pills into her mouth like candy at crushing them in her teeth. She grimaced at their bitter, earthy taste as her thirst, fatigue and hunger disappeared
with a single chew.
She pulled on a black singlet top and leggings that ended below her knee. The morning air still held some cold from the night, but it wasn't cold enough to postpone training any further. She tied her hitai-ate around her forehead, tapping the metal and
posing in the mirror.
Her smile vanished as soon as she turned away from her reflection.
She walked to the armoury, where she promptly gathered her equipment for the training session. Pulling on a pair of practical shinobi boots, Sakura slipped her twin silver daggers in the holsters hidden in the boot.
She grabbed a pouch full of shiruken, and pulled her weapon summoning scroll from its canister in one of the many shelves in the armoury. She jumped up and down a few times, making sure all weapons were secured and wouldn't harm her agility and speed
in the spar.
Walking briskly down the corridors, Sakura reached the courtyard located at the heart of the Kirasaki Mansion, a wide hundred by hundred metre field.
Her father was already there, and Sakura acknowledged his presence by simply nodding, no emotion slipping through her gaze. Her father nodded in approval.
"Sakura," he greeted, as she set her tools down on the ground next to her in a clang. "I trust you slept well."
"I did, Father," Sakura dutifully replied.
"Good. We'll be working with your newly required asset," he said, smirking at his daughter's pearly eyes.
Sakura nodded.
"We're going to play hide and seek," her father crooned, almost mockingly at his youngest. Sakura shot him a thunderous look and he ignored her.
"Blindfold yourself. You'll find me with only the use of your Byakugan. I'll-"
"No."
Her father paused. Sakura gnawed on her lip. Wrong thing to say.
"No? Sakura, please explain."
She sighed, unsealing her silver-bladed katana from its scroll and twirling it for good measure. She slipped it into its canister at the back of her back in two swift flicks of her wrist. "No matter what you say Father, these eyes will never be mine.
They belong rightly to the Konoha shinobi who-"
"Silence."
She shut her mouth, slipping her forehead protector oven her vision so she couldn't see her Father's face. The word grew dark and ambiguous, as her ability to see disappeared.
"No daughter of mine will deny what belongs to her and only to her. We'll begin training now."
Sakura ducked her head in affirmation. I'll never be your daughter.
With the Byakugan activated the world turned into a mix of chakra and blue. She could feel the small glowing auras of their servants and the large powerful presences of both Deidara and her Father.
She stood absolutely still, trying to grasp her surroundings by sending out waves of chakra and having them reflect back at her, mapping an image in her mind of where she was.
She shifted minutely to the right. "This way should be the South Wing," she thought aloud, muttering softly under her breath. "And that the east."
She stepped cautiously, one foot after the other. This was nothing like the last time she had used the Byakugan- for then the market place had been alive with people and chakra, but now the world was empty around her.
Waling faster as she gained confidence in her surroundings and her ability, Sakura grasped a sense of direction as she manoeuvred through the servants, and locating her Father briskly. She opened the door to the library, pulling off her hitai-ate to reveal
her father.
"Nicely done," her Father commented. "Though you could have been faster."
She glared at the ground.
"Round two."
He vanished in a puff of smoke, and Sakura retied her hitai-ate.
Her eyes widened at the presence of a large chakra signature, and she broadened her field of sight, tracking and pinning down its location. She turned abruptly as sharp flares of chakra appeared in her mind, and she concentrated on sensing, expanding
her chakra sense to cover 50 metres, 100, 50, 20…
"Four chakra signatures at level five," she muttered, tutting. Not her father but ANBU class shinobi.
A team of four shinobi, she mused. Most likely from Konoha or Iwagakure, she thought, based on their elemental signatures.
She eliminated Iwagakure shinobi immediately as an option, for they sent out their ANBU in squadrons of six, while Konoha shinobi travelled in squadrons of four, matching the shinobi's presences she sensed.
The fastest way would be to teleport directly to them, she thought, but that would drain her chakra considerably. Sakura knew her strengths, and stamina wasn't one of them. She had no chance against fire-type ANBU shinobi.
Her mind raced, and she abandoned her training in favour of the intruders.
Konoha shinobi. 4. Fire typs, earth types. Three have chakra pulsing in their eyes- Uchiha, Hyuga shinobi? Optical based kekkei genkai. Mission type- sending four fire type doujutsu wielding shinobi for what purpose?
"Think, think," she muttered. She had to get their objective right, or she would be rushing into a battle with no knowledge of the enemy or the reason they were here.
Assassination? No, wasting valuable shinobi who use doujutsu on one mission would be impractical and not logical. All team members are slim, light, carrying no chakra-based weapons… a kidnaping? All agile and most likely fast for their builds, these shinobi are designed for assassination and retrieval.
But what for?
Konoha shinobi. Iwagakure. Hyuga, Uchiha, doujutsu, Byakugan, assassination, slim, tall, light…
"Of course," she breathed pulling the silk ribbon from her eyes. "A life for a life. Or, to put it literally an eye for an eye."
Ah. So that was it. Sakura frowned.
"Too easy," she muttered, pulling out her blade. "Almost if they wanted to be found."
She was right again. They wanted her to be able to sense their presence, wanted her to walk right into their open trap. She laughed slightly.
Pulling one of her silver blades from its hidden sheath in her boot, she aimed at the trees surrounding the mansion that she could see the shinobi from. Flicking her wrist, the kunai sang, slicing through the air.
Sakura smirked. "All's well that ends well."
-the darkness is our kingdom-
Itachi could feel the strain from the Sharingan's drain on his chakra reserves.
He watched every figure in the house, his eyes pinpointed and locked onto their chakra signatures. He could hear Shisui sigh from behind him.
"We done yet? Nothing's happened."
"No," Itachi murmured back.
It all happened too fast. Shisui's eyes widened, his eyes shifting into blood red as he somersaulted backwards and out of the tree he sat on to avoid the blade, landing with a thump on the floor.
It flew on behind him, and Itachi caught it by the handle, spinning in before examining it carefully.
"It was aimed for you," Itachi observed quietly, flipping the blade over to read the inscripted name.
"Sa…ku…ra," he muttered, reading the hiragana characters. "Sakura."
Shisui gathered himself and rejoined Itachi on the branch. "How'd they aim from all the way there-" he pointed at the mansion. "-to here?"
Itachi's eyes faded from the dim glow of the Sharingan and into soft black. A distance of 436 metres, with an accuracy of 98.99%, travelling at 2k/per minute…
"Byakugan," Itachi hissed, as Shisui gave a grunt in acknowledgement. He flipped the blade over again, rereading the name.
"It seems we have our mysterious shinobi."
-the darkness is our kingdom-
a/n: oh my lord I'm sorry.
This was meant to be an ACTION FILLED, BADASS chapter but I ended up filling it with a bunch of filler in order to shape this alternate reality a little more. I wanted Sakura's guilt of taking another shinobi's prized possession in there, her hateful
relationship with her father and her exploring the Byakugan to be in this chapter. As well as a bunch of hokage and Itachi shit.
I've read a lot of fics on Hinata and Neji and seeing how the author's portray 'Byakugan vision' and I attempted to throw a twist to it.
So, if a shinobi with the Byakugan is blindfolded (their Byakugan is activated), they can only see chakra patterns and not colour, etc.
If they are not blindfolded, they can see normally with the added bonus chakra patterns.
For me, the Byakugan works like echolocation. To see objects with the Byakugan the users sends out waves of chakra and the chakra bounces off objects and back to the user, forming a sense of location. It's basically 'seeing with chakra'.
Anyways, next chapter will be what I intended this chapter to be.
Toodles. Review please! I want your thoughts on this idea. Reviews may lead to faster updates. *winks
Tourmaline Sword
Word count: 2337