Hey guys! I'm really sorry about the wait for this, but I've been working on a few other things. So yeah, I hope that you've all been waiting to finally find out the purpose of all of these guys to get called to Japan. At long last, right!
I got a question about why the line-up is only males, but there is a reason for that. I hope that the beginning of this chapter confuses the fool out you and makes you want to wait for the next part. The second part explains what's going on a bit, and even introduces a majorly important person for the story. Enjoy!
One last thing, I'll be available to become a beta-reader in just a few days, so if anyone is looking for one, I'll put it up when I'm eligible. I hope that you'd think of me when you were looking for one, since I get a lot of compliments on my writing style and few number of mistakes when I put a chapter out. It's never perfect, but it's as close as I'll get! I'll put it in my next update when I'm available, so keep me in mind fellow authors!
Disclaimer:
Naruto: Woah man, put the gun down.
Kiba: Why? It's not like I'm going to miss.
Naruto: That's why I'm worried! You're pointing it at me!
Kiba: Well, you were trying to get me to say that AMB11 doesn't own Naruto. Wait... Crap!
Naruto: Haha! I win!
Kiba: That's it, I'm shooting!
Naruto: AHHHHH! *Runs away*
Chapter 4: Sound
Screams reverberated down the halls; pleas for God were heard by every prisoner. The voice, she believes, was of her neighbor, and the rattling of chains was most definitely not him moving to the bars to get his meal. The smells of sweat and urine hit her nostrils, causing an involuntary twitching of her eyebrows. The cloying stench had been clogging the air like fog for days, always making her feel light headed and clumsy. Even when she was called to relieve herself, she'd always lean on the man next door, but her support had finally vanished, it seemed.
Footsteps marched heavily down the corridor, the smell of soap cutting through the sickening air; the light from the doorway burned her retinas. She shut her eyes, biting her already scabbed lip, and pulled her legs tighter to her, effectively cutting off entry into her personal space in case they decided to pay a visit to her cell. She scratched at the cross, long since painted and partially peeled, buried under a layer of dirt and dust, and uttered a prayer under her breath. There was a loud bang from next door, followed by a thud, and a slamming gate. The sweet, metallic scent of blood replaced that of the perfumed soap, and then all was silent again once the footsteps had echoed out into the hall.
Hinata closed her glistening opalescent eyes and wiped at the grime that coated her pale cheeks and shuffled closer to the bars. She whistled quietly into the miserable prison, and waited for anyone that was still alive to whistle back. It was silent for a few moments as the other women behind bars woke up or simply waited to make sure it was safe to respond. One whistle after another echoed quietly in the stone corridor between the prisons lined up along the wall in a hypnotic song, one voice blending with another faultlessly. Hinata counted each voice as it rang, made it to four, not counting herself, and knew that only the original five that had been brought here were still alive.
Hinata watched as a shock of pink squeezed through the bars of the cell across from hers, the young girl falling to the ground once she'd escaped the bars holding her inside. The young girl picked herself up off of the ground and scurried over to the cell beside hers, helping pull the older blonde through the bars.
"Sakura, Ino!" Hinata pushed herself into the corridor, covering her face when the light seeping in through the window at the end of the short hall burned her retinas. She crept through the inky darkness, ignoring that with every step she took, her bare feet splashed through some unknown liquid that reached up to her ankles in some spots on the uneven floor.
She jumped when a hand touched her bare arm, but relaxed when she turned to the brunette that was trying her hardest not to fall to the ground smiled at her and continued to use her arm to steady herself. The loud noise of draining water filled the silence when the four of them met in the center of the long room and latched onto each other's arms to hold themselves up in the current.
"Where's Temari?" Sakura's pink hair was tied back with a strip of cloth torn from her shirt.
"She wasn't feeling well yesterday. She's probably asleep." The brunette on Hinata's left spoke quietly, but her voice was loud enough to be heard over the sound of rushing water. Tenten blinked her brown eyes owlishly when a bit more light flooded the room in a flash, and ducked her head so that the matted-brown waves that cascaded down her back would block the sun.
Hinata relished in the friendly human touch of another's hand in hers, tears wanting to break the barrier and run down her face, but she blinked them back behind the gate and stood strongly with the other girls in front of her. Ino shared a small story of her old town that she was planning to return to when they got out, and that she would want all of them to go with her. Hinata whispered another prayer under her breath when everyone else had grown quiet.
"May someone find us soon, and keep us safe until we go." Everyone whispered a conjoined 'Amen' before lowering their heads in respect. A drunken song spun into a melody none of them had ever heard, the words in a language they didn't understand. The pitch was nearly perfect, but the occasional sob that would break through a note fought hard to ruin the melody of the feverish young woman.
Ino, Sakura, Tenten, and Hinata faced each other in the gloom and released each other on a silent count of three, and hurried back to their cells. Temari sang from her cell, laying sprawled across the wooden plank that was in each prisoner's room to keep them out of the water that ran continuously across the floor. Her voice carried the Egyptian lullaby throughout the stone room, locked inside with the five girls that had been taken. Not a single girl bothered to wipe the tears when they fell at the sound of her voice as it spun a beautiful web in the darkness of their prison.
Hinata whistled quietly when a melody repeated in the song, the other girls quickly joining into the haunting song.
"Quiet in there." The voice seemed confused, as if he didn't want them to stop, but still told them to anyway. Their guard was never harsh, so when the girls continued in their song from the other side of the door, Itachi let them with no argument, and sat back and listened as the prisoners sang their fear away.
"So, who's that guy?" Naruto slung his carry-on over his shoulder as the young man made his way out of the back of the plane, his sunglasses glinting eerily when he turned his head to look at the blonde. The brunette put his hands in the pockets on the back of his jeans and exited the plane quickly.
"Who knows?" Kiba packed his headphones into his bag and zipped Akamaru into his second carry-on, leaving just a bit of it open for the dog to breathe. "I'd rather know how long he's been here, but we're not likely to find out. Why is everyone here a freak?"
The two noisy individuals made their way to the unloading dock to meet up with the rest of the people they'd traveled with, ignoring the pack of girls in high school uniforms following them around. Naruto dumped his stuff to the ground and stretched his back, groaning pleasantly when it popped loudly.
"So, what's your name Shades?"
"Shino." Naruto nodded when he realized he wasn't going to get more of an answer.
"You know us, right?" Shino just nodded. "Alright then, saves us the effort of introduction. Before I make myself feel really stupid, I'm not the only one that sees the pack of little girls stalking us, right?"
"Nah, they've been following us since we got off the plane." Shikamaru leaned back against the scanner behind him and yawned loudly. "Guess we're popular here. That or the fact that we look like giants is freaking them out. Well except for the kid, Shorty-McGee, and Red Eyes." Sasuke glared at the tall teen, and turned when he heard a loud squeal from behind a row of chairs and someone speaking in rapid Japanese.
"Should I be glad I don't speak Japanese?" Sasuke got his bag off of the luggage carrier and hurried after the group when they were called for at the door by a taxi driver.
"Depends, do you care about girls thinking about what they'd wish you'd do to them." Neji loaded Sasuke's bag into the extremely large taxi, a yellow limo practically, and shut the trunk. Sasuke groaned in irritation at the humorless joke and pushed Naruto into the seat of the taxi so he could get inside himself.
"Hey, where's the kid?" All of the men packed into the vehicle froze. "Crap, don't tell me we lost him." Shikamaru bumped his head when he sat up too quickly. Sasuke, Kiba, Naruto, Shino, Shikamaru, and Neji stared at each other for a moment.
"Why are we so worried about this? If he's here I'm sure he can take care of himself." Neji pushed Naruto over a bit to make more room for himself between the blonde and Sasuke as he spoke. Shikamaru tucked his legs as close to himself as he could to keep from kicking the long-haired brunette across from him, elbowing Shino and Kiba in the process.
"He's a twelve year old, he's deaf, and he's armed in a foreign country." Kiba whispered the last part in case their driver spoke English.
"It also looks like he called shotgun." Shikamaru stretched his neck to look up into the front seat where the driver was babbling on to the small red-head in Japanese, who looked like he was too small to even ride in the front of the vehicle, his feet not touching the ground below him.
"So not cool kid." Kiba scratched at the tattoos on his cheeks, his words carrying the message that every older male in the vehicle had secretly been thinking.
The car pulled up to the gate in front of an enormous, industrial-looking building and halted while the gate slid open. Neji peered out of the window and whistled. "Big place."
"I wonder if this is where we're going to be staying. It looks like a factory." Shikamaru kicked his feet up into Neji's lap absentmindedly and put his arms on top of the seat behind Kiba and Shino, ignoring the three glares aimed his way.
"Creepy lawn gnome they got though." Kiba pointed to the man standing outside the grand entrance to the building. He had long black hair that put even Neji's to shame, reaching the small of his back. His eyes were an eerie green, outlined with excess amounts of purple eye shadow and black eye liner. He was wearing a typical business suit, the tie hanging loosely from his neck and several buttons undone on the front of his shirt, revealing more of his almost sickly pale skin. He smiled as the car pulled up, and swung his arms wide in greeting.
The car skid to a stop at the end of the long drive way, and the creepy man paid the driver when he exited the vehicle. The group piled out of the car and unloaded their bags quickly before the man hurried over to them, his spine-chilling smile still sitting on his face.
"Welcome! I'm Orochimaru, the head of Sound Inc. It's an honor to have people as talented as you come at my request, and it pleases me that all of you accepted the invitation. Let's go inside to finish this, then. I'll have people come collect your belongings." He spoke with a thick Japanese accent, a few of his words sounding strange to the people that spoke English as a native language. Orochimaru ushered the men inside of the building, and immediately through the factory part of the building and back to an area that seemed to have been newly renovated. They filed down a long hallway, Orochimaru leading them into an impossibly large office on the left side of the hall and shutting the door behind them.
"Nice office Mr. O." Kiba plopped down on the snakeskin couch that was up against the wall, Gaara sitting down beside him soon after and kicking his boot-clad feet up onto a very expensive looking glass table.
"Why are we here, Orochimaru?" Sasuke leaned against the door of the office and focused on the odd-looking man that was shuffling a few papers on his desk.
"To be blunt," His voice lost the humorous tone, "You're all the best at what you do and willing to do anything, and I need you to do a few jobs for me."
"We're here to be hired help? No way." Naruto sat on the edge of a table that had an ancient vase sitting on it and crossed his arms across his chest.
"No, of course not Uzumaki-san. You won't be working for money, and the people you'll be taking out are all people that are trying to smuggle in on my business or destroy my company without getting caught by the law." Orochimaru clicked a button on a remote and a screen slid down behind him. Sasuke hit the light beside the door just as a slide-show flickered to life on the screen.
"Movie time boys." Kiba threw his arm over the back of the couch, but pulled it back slowly when Gaara glared at him.
"Now, I've written most of this out on the screen for Sabaku-san, but if you would help me out Uzumaki-san and translate a few things for me."
"Sabaku? Oh! The kid? Yeah, sure, but how'd you know I could-"
"I did my research on all of you Uzumaki-san. I'd never hire some random thugs to protect my place of business. Now, down to business. I've paid for all of you to come out to Japan, and considering you were all over the world, it wasn't cheap." Orochimaru paused until he had everyone's attention before continuing. "Thank you. You all are incredible at what you do, and you're all driven by some sort of goal. I will be able to help you achieve these goals in exchange for your assistance." He clicked to the first slide on the screen, the green light lighting up the entire room in an eerie glow.
It was a graph of what looked like business sales. "Sound Inc. is one of the largest manufacturing companies in the world. We distribute different types of weapons all over the world, mainly supplying large militia services, and quite a few underground clients in countries like Russia and smaller countries in Asia. Lately, I've had a few other companies from these smaller countries try to sabotage my business and cause an incident." The screen changed to one of a mugshot picture of a man with piercings all over his face and hair dyed the same orange as Naruto's jeans, then to another of an albino man with eyes the color of Sasuke's contacts and white hair, and finally to a group photo of three people; one a man with green hair and incredibly tan skin on one half of his face, the other side as pale as the white's of his eyes from what looked like a burn; another man that looked exactly like Gaara aside from the piercings and tattoo, and the third a man with a hood covering black hair and tattoos of what looked like stitches crossing scars all over his face, his eyes an incredible shade of green.
"These are the people trying to get me to shut down, and start a war between Japan and several other countries in the eastern hemisphere at the same time. They want to get rid of the competition and then supply the war themselves from their smaller businesses through underground weapon dealers. I want to hire you all out to form a team to attack these companies when they strike, and destroy their businesses permanently in a way that appears to be an accident to keep myself from legal action. In turn, I will offer you protection from the law while you are here, since most of you are on the run or being watched by the government currently. After my company is safe, you will get your reward and I'll return you home safely."
"You said you know what our goals are. How are you going to help each of us get what we want?" Neji clenched his hands into fists and crossed his arms across his chest. He narrowed his pale blue eyes at the grinning snake in front of him.
"Oh, well either a lead that will take you to what you want." He glanced at Neji and Sasuke. "Or maybe some information about a few things from the past that may have ruined you." His made-up eyes peered at Naruto and Kiba. "Where somebody important is, perhaps." Gaara glared at the man when Naruto relayed the message. "Or maybe just payment for those of you who want to be here." Orochimaru smirked and leaned back in his chair when Shino nodded almost imperceptibly and Shikamaru eyes sparked with interest.
"I'm in. If this guy's protecting me from the law for the time being, I can actually stay in one place for a while." Kiba scooted to the edge of the couch and leaned his elbows on his knees while he looked at all of the people he'd met just days ago. Shino nodded in agreement, just the slightest dip of his head.
"It does sound like a good idea. We do a few jobs, avoid a war, and get paid to do it. I've been looking for a good mental exercise for a while anyways. Life's been pretty boring lately." Shikamaru crossed his long legs in front of him and leaned back in the arm chair, the front two legs coming up off of the ground. Sasuke and Neji nodded simultaneously, but otherwise remained lost in thought. Naruto closed his eyes and considered the offer.
He knew that the government was watching him, keeping track of his every move. It's all because he lost it so long ago. He's the way he was now because of that, and he still wasn't sure what happened to cause his alternate personality and incredible strength to appear, but this man that he'd never met held promise in telling him exactly what happened if he just did a few dirty jobs.
"I'll do it." Naruto looked to Gaara, the last to answer and asked him if he was interested. Orochimaru turned to him expectantly along with the rest of the newly formed team.
'I'm here aren't I?' Naruto smiled.
"He's in."
Orochimaru clapped his hands together and smiled again. "Welcome to team Konoha then!"
. . . . . .
End Chapter 4!
Time for your character.
. . . . . .
Hyuga, Neji:
Age: 22
Height/Weight: 6'0"/225
Origin: Asia/Bhutan
Appearance: Long, brown hair that is loosely tied in a traditionally-fashioned low ponytail that ends at the middle of his back. Pale blue eyes. Fair-to-moderate skin. Traditional clan tattoo on his forehead. He covers his tattoo and the top of his head with a bandanna (usually white). He often wears a mix of traditional Asian clothing and modern clothing. His left ear is pierced at the top. Above average height, broad shoulders, muscularly built. Wears bandages over his hands in an attempt to keep them unharmed.
Background: Born in Paro, Bhutan. Trained from the age of 3 to be a martial arts expert, specializing in Gentle Fist, a clan specialty. He excelled in any type of fighting, and was often thrown out of schools early in life because of this. He was incredibly intelligent, and was destined to take over the city's defense systems in place of his father after he graduated from a local college. His uncle, his father's twin brother, was secretly under watch by an underground drug market leader due to an old debt. His father was killed by mistake, and the murderers fled the country. He was sent away to England for his studies soon after, and attended Cambridge for four years while studying a multitude of different interests, including: languages and law. During his college years, he began hiring out his special services for anything from street fights to underground busts in an attempt to find his father's killers. He's been arrested 5 times due to different violent situations in 4 different countries, but has never been held for more than 48 hours each time. He continues to work as hired help throughout the western hemisphere.
Cause of Insanity: Murder of his father
Current Location: London, England
Family/Relations: Younger Cousin (Location unknown)-was taken by his father's murderers. Father (deceased)-killed in place of his uncle.
Personality: He is stiff, and relatively difficult to get along with, but will give someone respect when they've earned it from him. He doesn't hold grudges against anyone except his father's killer, and deems anyone unable to rival him in strength a weakling. He holds those who hire him out as useless unless they can give him the information he wants. He is nearly fearless, and would do anything for his cousin, Hinata, whom he loves greatly. He is very chivalrous and often considered chauvinistic.
Special Skills: Gentle Fist, martial arts, above average tactical skills
1. Alright! So now we know why they're in Japan, and Shino randomly walking out of the plane without anyone knowing he was even on it? Stalkerish? Haha.
2. So, I hope you are all excited to find out what happens next, but unfortunately, there will be a few filler chapters before anything else happens. I know, I know! Curse you AMB11! Right?
3. If you can tell me who Orochimaru's competition are, the people that were showed in the slideshow, I'll put your name in the next chapter in the author's note!
4. So, Itachi? Right. Sasuke, this is going to be so screwed up. Have fun!
5. Let me know if you liked this chapter! Oh, and check out my SasuNaru fic. You'll Surrender Eventually. It's pretty popular, and I think it's pretty good. It's a male Sasuke and female Naruto pairing, so if you're cool with that and are enjoying any of my other works, I'd take a look at it!
6. This one is just meant to be a thanks, so... Thank you to my readers!
R & R, Love AMB11!
