The base was in total chaos.
As Orochimaru walked through the corridors, he eventually arrived at the laboratory where he had left Naruto the day before. The place had been mostly locked down, a few of his shinobi guarding it; the scientists were still allowed, but were too scared to come in there. As he entered the room, he saw that not all of them avoided the place.
"O-Orochimaru-sama…"
Orochimaru eyed the white-haired teenager, before slowly moving his eyes to the corpse on his feet. "I heard what happened. Basically a suicide, wasn't it?"
Kabuto nodded, trying to hide his nervousness. "Y-Yes, sir. It seems Kisa-sensei tried to do the transplants on himself, but…"
"I can see the results. How foolish, I thought he was better than that." Orochimaru had a look of mock disappointment, as if making fun of his now dead subordinate. Chuckling a bit, he ordered Kabuto to leave the room.
Before leaving, the young man stopped a bit to give a last look to the body of his deceased master. As good as he was at hiding his emotions, though, Kabuto's eyes glinted a bit for a moment; Orochimaru noticed, and couldn't help smirking. Such a treacherous boy, and at such a young age…
As the boy left, Orochimaru looked back at the corpse and walked closer. During the times of the Second War, such a sight would make him unable to sleep for days, maybe weeks. Nowadays, however, he couldn't help but seeing the corpse with nothing but the cold interest a scientist looks at an experiment; almost as if it never had life in the first place.
Kisa's body was full of what seemed like cuts, really deep cuts which still had a bit of blood flowing from them. Strangely enough, from within these cuts multiple black threads were showing instead of his insides—or rather, they were his insides. His mouth, still a bit opened, had the same material coming from them. The man's face was also a lot paler, whether it was because of the death or the transplant Orochimaru didn't know. Looking at the side of the body, Orochimaru saw a syringe—most likely how Kisa had injected the material.
Or rather, how it was injected into Kisa.
Kisa was smart enough to know that such an archaic procedure would not suffice with those materials. There was no way he would try it. If the person who did it thought Orochimaru would fall for such a trick, then it was someone really inexperienced.
Disregarding that small mistake, Orochimaru decided to 'inspect' the corpse anyway. Crouching down, he analyzed each detail of it. He had to admit that, to someone so inexperienced, it was a really well done work. Yet, for all he had seen and done over the years, Orochimaru could tell when someone did experiments on himself and when they did on others.
This definitely was done by someone else.
"Kukuku, you were naïve. You focused so much on the bigger snake; you didn't notice the smaller one till it bit you."
Orochimaru had known for a long time about Kisa's intentions, yet made no mention of it. He was still useful after all; he planned to dispose of him only when he found someone on par. Of course, the idea was impossible now; still, he was impressed with this Kabuto. He was shaping up to be a useful ally… Or a dangerous enemy.
He had to remember to keep an eye on him.
As he took his eyes off the corpse, his eyes passed briefly at the cooling tank containing Naruto's unconscious form. This proved to be crucial as, in that glance, Orochimaru noticed there was something wrong in there. He frowned and stood up, walking to the tank.
As he stood in front of it, he could see the water on the cooling tank was different. As he watched it, the substance seemed to be moving almost like an oceanic current, flowing around the tank—and with more intensity around Naruto. It kind of reminded him of a storm, with the boy being the center of it. Placing his hand on the glass, Orochimaru confirmed that there was something different: he could feel something pounding on the glass from the inside, as if trying to break free.
Well, if it wanted to be freed, Orochimaru would grant its wish.
Drawing his Kusanagi sword, Orochimaru slashed at the glass. He didn't actually break it, making only a small crack; still, thanks to the intense pressure of the unknown substance, that small crack was enough to make it explode outwards. Even before the glass actually burst, Orochimaru was already reaching forward to grab Naruto's body. As he instinctively jumped back after achieving his goal, he looked in awe as the substance flowed out of the now-broken tank with the strength of a river.
A red, liquid-like substance.
As he looked at it, he could immediately recognize what it was. The same substance he had first seen and 'experimented' with eight years prior, when making the seal of Naruto's substitute in Konoha; and had constantly seen the years after, oozing out of the boy whenever they made experiments to harness the Kyuubi's power.
It was the Kyuubi's chakra.
Orochimaru's mind was racing, trying to comprehend what happened. Had the seal failed? No, he saw the seal act and stop the Kyuubi's chakra during the transplant; the fact it was successful was proof of it. But then, what…
Quickly tilting his head down to look at the boy, his eyes widened as he looked him over. White hair, slightly bicolored skin… The boy was just like he was before the experiment, not even the whisker marks had returned—strange, he had thought they had disappeared due to the lack of contact between the boy and the Kyuubi; he was wrong apparently. But this is what unnerved the Snake Sannin: he was exactly like before the experiment.
The stitches had disappeared.
Orochimaru couldn't believe it. There was no way for that accursed chakra to remove the transplants once they were completed, it was just impossible. But maybe…
Setting the boy on the floor Orochimaru idly noticed the doors opening and a few of his guards entering, probably because they heard the destruction of the tank. He paid them no attention, though, as he raised his sword and, with a swift movement, sliced open the boy's arm. Even unconscious Naruto groaned in pain, which was ignored by Orochimaru; opening a bit more the wound, he observed the black threads inside his body.
He almost sighed in relief.
As he removed his hands from the gash, he noticed as the pool of demonic chakra seemed to have crawled to them and a bit of it was slowly seeping in the wound. Pulling the boy's body away of the chakra's range, he watched in fascination as threads seemed to raise up from the wound, stitching the flesh together to close it; but what truly surprised him was when the area turned a pale white—almost as pale as his skin—and seemed to become liquid. The 'liquid skin' seemed to merge and, when it turned back to solid, the wound was no more; not even a scar remained of it. The stitches too disappeared, going back to inside the body.
It was an unexpected development, but a really interesting one too.
"Sir, is everything all right?"
Turning around, Orochimaru glanced at a scientist that had entered the room. He couldn't remember the man's name, but remembered he had partaken in Naruto's experiments.
"Call the researchers; I have a few tests I wish to conduct right now. Also, I need to store this quickly." He motioned for the pool of red chakra, and the scientist understood. It was common for them to store the leftover from the experiments in especially designed containers they had created over the years; still, he had never seen that much at once.
As the man left the room, Orochimaru stood carrying Naruto as he walked after him. "What about him, Orochimaru-sama?"
Stopping, he turned his head to look at his soldiers, who were looking at Kisa's corpse. He had forgotten about it. "Store the body in the morgue. I might find some use for it later."
With that he left, the soldiers soon following with the body after removing it from the red chakra.
"Is he going to wake up soon?"
"Probably"
"Are you sure?"
"No"
"Is he ok?"
It was in the middle of this rather intelligent debate that consciousness started to return to Naruto. Groaning a bit, he found it was difficult for him to move; opening his eyes slowly, things were too unfocused for him to grasp his surroundings.
"There is your answer."
Naruto faintly remembered that voice, and turned his eyes a bit at its direction. As his vision started to clear, he managed to recognize the person as the same boy who made him unconscious in the first place.
"Kimimaro, you bastard!"
Gaining strength from who knows where, he jumped out of the bed—he was in a bed?—and stood in front of him, his arms in a fighting stance. However, his sudden strength was short lived; pain from the abrupt movement overcame his body and, with a cry, he fell to the floor. Kimimaro didn't even move, just watching him with little more than contempt.
"Hey! You shouldn't be jumping like this!"
As he felt someone touch him, Naruto finally noticed that there was someone else in the room besides Kimimaro. Looking up, he was met by the vision of a girl; her dark hair stopped right before her shoulders. Like with Kimimaro earlier, he didn't remember meeting her before.
As she helped Naruto back to the bed, she turned back to the other occupant of the room. "You didn't say that you knew him, Kimimaro-kun."
Kimimaro seemed to shrug a bit—though it was almost imperceptible—before answering. "I don't 'know' him, and I prefer not to. It would be better if you didn't either, Haku." As he turned and walked to the door, he called back to her. "I will go notify Orochimaru-sama about his awakening; stay here and watch him. And try not talking much to him."
A few moments after he left, Naruto groaned a bit. "Jerkass" The boy was becoming even more dislikable in his eyes.
He raised his head when he heard the sound of someone giggling. Looking to the side he noticed the girl—Haku, Kimimaro had called her—sitting on the side of the room, a hand over her mouth to avoid the sounds. She didn't look like Kimimaro or the others; he really didn't know what she was doing in such a place.
She looked at him, noticing he was looking at her. "Sorry."
"Why are you here, Haku?"
She looked surprised at hearing this. "What do you mean?"
"Why is someone like you following a bastard like Orochimaru?"
Her eyes widened in surprise at hearing Naruto's disrespect towards their master. She soon forgot about Kimimaro's warning. "A tool shouldn't refer to its owner like that."
This was Naruto's time to be surprised; and a moment later, angry. "I am not a tool! Nor is that bastard my owner, got it?"
She was confused by his reaction. Shouldn't he be happy? "Then… What is your purpose?" Seeing Naruto's confused look, she continued. "It is… painful. Not having a purpose, not having anything to live for. People like me and Kimimaro, people with bloodline powers—Kekkei Genkai. Our only purpose is to serve others, to become tools for those who are willing to use us; otherwise, we don't need to live."
She stopped for a moment, remembering the moments before Orochimaru appeared to her; the feeling of hopelessness, when that man was about to kill her. She had no purpose during that time, she had no motive to cling to her life. Looking at the boy's direction, and seeing he had his head down, she continued. "I can see in your eyes. You are like me; you too will need a purpose. You should be happy that Orochimaru-sama accepted you; you should be grateful to him."
Naruto listened calmly, not showing any reaction. As he noticed she had finished, he raised his head to look at him. She felt a shiver run through her; his eyes were cold, a tranquil fury present in them.
"You are an idiot" The voice was so calm, yet so full of anger; Haku felt the urge to hide away from him. "Was it Orochimaru who convinced you of that crap? Are you telling me you want someone, even someone like him, to control your own life?"
"This is…"
"Shut up!" Naruto shouted, scaring the girl. "We aren't tools! We can decide things for ourselves! We don't need to follow the first scumbag we see to have a purpose." He stopped for a moment, calming down a bit. After a while, he added. "Even if what you say is true, even if we are tools; we can choose our owner, or rather, we can be our own owners."
As he stopped, he heard the sound of footsteps approaching. Surely enough, the door opened to reveal Kabuto and Kimimaro.
"Well, it seems like you two got a bit too heated in your conversation. We could hear the shouts from outside." Naruto looked at them, noticing that Kimimaro was glaring at him. He probably heard what he said, great. "Haku-chan, could you please accompany Kimimaro now? I need to talk alone with Naruto."
The girl stood up, visibly shaking, and hesitantly followed after Kimimaro. Before leaving the room, she stopped and looked at Naruto for a moment. The sound of the door closing signified she had left.
Kabuto walked over to a chair near Naruto's bed, pulling out a scroll. Naruto recognized the symbol in front of it and his eyes narrowed.
"Wasn't it Kisa who was supposed to be teaching it to me?"
Kabuto merely chuckled at it. "Kisa-sensei suffered an accident and died. From now on, I will be your new sensei." Naruto felt a shiver at the teenager's words; he talked way too casually about his sensei's death.
"But I won't be teaching you puppetry right now. I want to show you something first. Raise your hand."
At the 'innocent' request, Naruto complied. He didn't expect for Kabuto to draw a kunai and slash his arm off.
Nor did he expect what was inside it.
"What is it you have found?"
Orochimaru stood patiently, his scientists gathered in his throne room. One of them, the one he had chosen to substitute Kisa for now, was in front of them. The man was a bit more confident than Kisa, at least—he didn't fidget as much as the man used to in these meetings.
"Well, Orochimaru-sama, we have conducted the experiments on the boy like you ordered. We believe we know what happened to him."
Orochimaru was interested now. He had expected them to ask for more time; he had to admit he truly underestimated them. Maybe Kisa wasn't that much needed after all. "I'm listening."
"Your seal was totally destroyed when we inspected the bo—C-Calm down, sir. I'm not saying it was your fault, n-never!" Orochimaru stopped the killer intent. It was almost a reflex. "I… I also looked over at the seal design you left with us; the seal was powerful, really a majestic work, but it had a flaw. While it could block high amounts of chakra, t-the Kyuubi's is stronger than that of a normal person."
Orochimaru straightened up, understanding what he was saying. "So, the Kyuubi pumped so much chakra that the seal broke?"
The man nodded. "Luckily the transplant was already completed and assimilated in the body. Still, we can't understand why that amount of chakra was expelled by the body; we believe it may be because of the Senju material from the earlier transplant."
Orochimaru nodded. It was not uncommon for the boy's body to reject a bit of the Kyuubi's chakra during the experiments; the problem was the amount he had expelled this time. He had a feeling it wasn't just Zetsu's material; his instincts, which had helped him so many times in the wars, were telling him that there was something else.
Something much more complex to that rejection.
Deciding to question that later, he returned to the scientists. "What about the regeneration? Did you find anything?"
The scientist nodded. "We believe it may also have to do with the Senju material. We analyzed what remained of it, and we found that it has a great regenerative potential; more so than a normal human's skin. The contact it had with that big amount of Kyuubi's chakra may have caused an almost instantaneous regeneration."
Orochimaru was surprised at this development. He had guessed the Kyuubi's chakra had something to do with it; it was already common knowledge that it gave Naruto an advanced healing factor, but not something as extreme as what he had seen. He would have to delve further into it.
"I want you to confirm that theory." As the scientists looked back at him, not really understanding, he continued. "I took advantage of the regeneration to… stock on the boy's genetic material. I have already sent a bit of the boy's flesh to the laboratory; you have my permission to access the Kyuubi's chakra storage. I want you to prove that theory of yours." He stopped for a moment, focusing a glare on them and allowing for a bit of his killer intent to flow. He could see the men were starting to sweat and tremble. "Next time I see you, I want to have results ready."
Almost immediately, the scientists saluted him and left hurriedly. Orochimaru couldn't help but smirk: intimidation was really a great way to 'motivate' them. And a fun one too.
The smirk soon left his face as he started thinking on the new set of information. The Kyuubi's interference was something that could actually work in his favor. With a few changes in the seal, he could make it so that the Kyuubi's chakra would be held back until the transplant's acceptance. If he could make the seal hold this much, he would not only stop the Kyuubi from interfering in his plans, but he could also have an almost endless supply of the Kyuubi's chakra if the boy kept rejecting it.
Multiple thoughts about how he could take advantage of this situation ran through his head. He could implant it on his pawns, creating an army of pseudo-jinchuriki; such an army could be useful tp keep Konoha and the Akatsuki away from him. Moreover, what really delighted Orochimaru was the scientific advantage it would create; with the regenerative power of the Kyuubi's chakra, he could raise the survival rate of his experiments. He wouldn't have to worry about his experiments dying all the time.
Of course, it would take some time until he could make his plan work; he had to research ways to implement the chakra on others. He remembered stories of people who tried to forcefully take the power of a bijuu, mostly by eating their meat, and died. But then, he actually had a past experiment that could serve as the basis for his new idea; someone who had harnessed such a power and was still alive.
An experiment he hadn't seen in eight years.
With this point already covered, his mind went back to the other information he had received.
"If I had known you would be this full of surprises, I would have taken more samples, Zetsu." Thought Orochimaru with a frown.
First he discovered the man—if he could be called it—had the DNA of Hashirama Senju, now he discovered the man could basically regenerate. What was next, he could create an army of real clones?
Sarcasm apart, this new info alerted him of something that he had feared for a long while.
He knew next to nothing about his former colleagues.
In an organization composed of missing-nins, betrayal was not something unexpected. Everyone had to be always prepared, even a newcomer like Itachi had quickly learned that. And the best way to prepare yourself in a battle was by keeping the surprise factor in your side; in other words, you couldn't let the others know all the tricks you had. He himself had hidden many of his abilities from the other members; however, the opposite was also true.
No one knew what Pain could do, he himself had no idea of the full extent of the man's power—and just the bit he knew left him scared of what more the man had. He had no doubt that experienced shinobi like Kakuzu and Sasori had also hid their true powers, the same for Konan and Kisame. The only one that could be an exception is Hidan; even then, the man was not an S-rank for nothing—though Orochimaru had no doubt he could beat him easily if it ever came to that.
This also raised a bit of apprehension regarding Naruto. He had already made plans, strategies on how to counter the boy's abilities should he ever rebel against him. But now that there were so many unknown variables thrown in the mix, his plans could possibly be endangered.
He would have to keep an eye on the Akatsuki and get as much information as possible about its members.
Silence.
Only the sound of their footsteps was heard.
It was like this when Kimimaro and Haku set out of Naruto's room, walking in the direction of Orochimaru's chambers. Although the boy was sort of grateful for the silence, he was also a bit worried by it. Haku only stayed this quiet when something was in her mind and, considering the discussion she had with Naruto earlier, he could imagine what she was thinking about.
And he was right. Haku paid no attention to her surroundings, Naruto's words echoing in her head. Could he be right? Could her be something other than a tool, could she decide her own destiny?
"We are not tools." Kimimaro stopped, and so did she, when the almost inaudible whisper escaped her mouth. The Kaguya looked at her, a frown on his face.
"What did you say, Haku?"
"N-Nothing. I was just thinkin-"
"Then stop it." Haku was surprised, even more so when she saw how serious Kimimaro was. "You are thinking about what Naruto said, aren't you? I told you not to talk to him, now you know why. His stupid ideas will get him nowhere, and it only bring you problems if you listen to them. Just believe in Orochimaru-sama, he-"
"But what if he is right?" Haku shouted suddenly, surprising the Kaguya. "Sorry. But what if we don't need to follow Orochimaru?"
"Did you forget that he saved your life?" He asked calmly. "That should be enough reason for you to serve him. I will not argue further with you; if you want to continue serving him, so be it." As he approached her, he raised his hand, a bone protruding from it. The bone grew, stopping inches away from her face. "But if you try going against him, I will not show you mercy."
Turning, Kimimaro started walking again. He preferred not to do it; the girl was very much like him, he didn't want to hurt her. However, Orochimaru-sama stood above those petty feelings: if she did rebel, he would not hesitate to strike her down.
Haku kept in place, scared a bit by the threat; soon she finally calmed and resumed walking. However, the ideas implanted by Naruto's words kept in her head.
When she saw Orochimaru, she knew Naruto was right. She couldn't follow him.
And she wouldn't.
Well, here is the new chapter. I was in a hurry to put this up, so I don't think it got as good as it could be.
I thank everyone who encourage me through reviews and PMs. I know I didn't do everything I said I would in the last chapter, but my ideas started changing while I wrote the chapter. To answer a common question:
No, I don't intend on having Naruto gain the Hyoton and Mokuton. Like Dyoudo said, it would make the character too overpowered and remove the fun of the story. Which challenge could he face if he had every powerful ability ever? I may change my mind on the Mokuton, which is why I left in the air this possiblity during the Zetsu transplant.
IMPORTANT: I won't be able to update for about a month, since I will be travelling to Canada in a few hours. I wanted to get this chapter out before I left, and I promise I will try revising it when I come back. Till then, good reading!
Next chapter highlights(this time it will be right): Time-skip, the end of Naruto's transplants, and the start of Naruto's escape.