A Wolf and A Tiger

Chapter 7

Battles, Battles Everywhere

The group had been traveling for a while now, probably a hundred miles from the village at least, the trees lined up perfectly for them to continually jump from one to the next in perfect sync, Kiba, then Shikamaru, Lee, Zen-Aku, Choji, and finally Alyssa coming in from behind. It wasn't until Akamaru whimpered that anyone said anything though, "Akamaru is smelling blood somewhere nearby," Kiba said before taking more sniffs, "here's what happened, the sent of two newcomers converged on Sasuke and four others, Sasuke's group moved on while the two stayed."

"Just as I thought, Sasuke's got an escort," Shikamaru said with some distain in his voice, "since Akamaru smelled blood, my guess is there was a battle between Sasuke's group and the two newcomers, if we go to the sight where they fought we might be able to gather useful information. Course we can't just rush in, it might be a trap, so when we get closer we'll go into full reconnaissance mode and take it slowly," he guessed part of what would happen if they went after to where the battle took place just to gather some useful information on the enemy.

"And while we're doing that, Sasuke would have crossed out of the boarder of the Land of Fire and out of our hands" Alyssa finished what the Nara was thinking, too much of a delay could result in them failing the mission, but not getting information on an opponent when able is a risky gamble.

Shikamaru seemed to be in deep thought about it for a moment before Zen-Aku decided to help a bit, "my shadow clones can learn and gain experience, and when dispelled that information is given to me, also my shadow form can get there quicker than anybody else," he informed.

"Good plan, alright, Zen-Aku will send a shadow clone to the area where the battle was fought while the rest of us continue pursuit, have it report back everything it learns about the enemy and the two they fought," Shikamaru ordered allowing Zen-Aku to make the clone and send it. "One thing for the rest of you, these guys have already been in one fight, so they'll be on their guard and unless they're complete idiots, they'll have to know there'll be more ninja on their trail, there's a good chance of encountering some booby traps or an ambush up ahead. So from this point on, we proceed with caution, I want everybody, not just Akamaru, to put all your senses on full alert, if you catch a trace of anything suspicious sound the alarm, we want to find these guys before they find us," Shikamaru told the squad as they continued moving.

Akamaru took a few sniffs and relayed the information to Kiba, "the enemy's sent is here, all around us, everyone stop," they all landed in a perfect line on a single branch looking for anything suspicious, Zen-Aku, Alyssa, and Shikamaru found it first though.

"Look up in the tree, see that," Shikamaru ordered and they did to find a sealing tag on it, "it's a perimeter barrier, a type of trap ninjutsu, there's a delay after the perimeter is breached giving the victim enough time to get to the center of the area for the full effect."

"It's a tricky jutsu, but the design is in a familiar art style, I can dispel it instead of us wasting time going around it," Zen-Aku said pointedly before getting the go ahead from Shikamaru to do it instead of going around, it didn't take long once he replaced the chakra link with his own.

With his clone however was a different story, while Kiba warned them about the trap, the clone of Zen-Aku just made it to the battle site and saw the state that the area was in, the place looked like a hurricane had gone through and destroyed or severely damaged everything. Trees were cut with deep and wide gashes in them, kunai and shuriken were imbedded in trees and four people were there, two were laying down, one was standing watching over those laying down while another one was leaning over one of those laying down healing him. The one healing one of the one's laying down was Shizune, Tsunade's apprentice, when she noticed him arrive is when he was finally regarded, "Zen-Aku, what are you doing here, this area is dangerous, Raido and Genma are badly injured," she informed.

"I can see that," Zen-Aku said in a growl as he stepped towards the two injured jonin, "the hokage sent a few of us on a mission to retrieve Sasuke, who defected and joined the group they most likely fought, are they well enough to speak on what happened or at least travel."

Genma coughed and drew attention to him, "you won't win… they're monsters… none of the… jutsu they used… was beyond the powers of mere shinobi… if you go after them… you'll only be killed," Genma strained to get out before going into a small coughing fit from his injuries.

"Genma, that's enough talking," Shizune ordered while she finished stabilizing Raido, "Zen-Aku, I'm guessing you're just a clone, go back and tell the rest of your squad that they really do need not engage the enemy, two jonin couldn't defeat them, so you genin don't have the strength."

"Never underestimate those that have a goal in mind, take your teammate back to the village, let us handle the rescue mission," with that said, Zen-Aku dispersed in a cloud of smoke and sent his experiences to the original, it was a shame that he didn't learn anything useful, but he tried.

The original Zen-Aku just got done deactivating the perimeter barrier when his clone's memories returned to him, "the barrier is deactivated, and my clone's memories have returned, the two that went against Sasuke's escort was Genma and Raido, two of our own jonin, they're badly injured."

"Damn, and here I was hoping they'd be two inexperienced chunin level guys that at least took one of them out, but it can't be helped, now we need to be extra careful as we proceed forward, they were able to take on two jonin level shinobi," Shikamaru advised as they jumped off.

They were jumping along the trees through the barrier until they were finally past it and going at a little slower pace to watch out for traps, it wasn't until Kiba gave the silent hand signal to halt that they did, he pointed down to the ground and let the others follow his hand at what he saw. They all saw a woman setting up a set of trip wire traps, she wore a sound ninja uniform and must be one of those that took Sasuke given the sash that distinctly reminded them of Orochimaru, her hair was red and she was grumbling to herself over something.

"Dumb ass Sakon, thinking that I'm fine after going to a level two curse mark just because I'm an Uzumaki, I should gut him, see if he still has that condescending tone when I'm through with him, the dumb fucker probably just once some quality time with his other gay gaggle of snake groupies." She muttered to herself as she put up the camouflage trap, the others were a few hundred meters away relaxing knowing that she could handle the traps herself, she cursed her Uzumaki heritage sometimes, but knew it was better to have an Uzumaki heritage than any other.

"I'll take her on, I'm the only one here that can, she's an Uzumaki meaning she has high chakra reserves, high than the rest of you have, the rest of you go and chase after the others," Zen-Aku ordered towards Shikamaru before receiving a nod from him and a motion for them to follow.

"Be careful, and don't do anything stupid," Alyssa ordered as she kissed his cheek as she passed him, she jumped ahead as fast as she could after that, they didn't worry about noise so they easily tipped off the female ninja she was about to act when a shadow appeared before her.

This shadow soon formed into a wolfman of some kind that brought out a dagger with three holes in it and charged, the ninja had barely any time and only barely managed to bring out her own flute and bringing it up to block the strike by the wolf duke org, "fancy meeting you here cousin."

The girl was obviously put off guard a little by the statement given the way her strength slipped for a moment before pushing back on his flute with her own, "I've never seen you before dipshit, what kind of fucker that goes around in a wolf mask thinks he's my cousin," she insulted.

Zen-Aku brought out his crescent blade in a flash and swiped as she backflipped away from the swing, "simple, since you're an Uzumaki, I guess that automatically makes us cousins doesn't it, unless there's a different relation between us, have you ever heard of Kushina Uzumaki?"

"Yeah I know of her ya little bitch, she's my older sister, my mom told me she had to go to your crappy village for some great honor, found out later that the 'honor' was to become a jinchuriki, then when our home village was destroyed, we left, what's it to ya," she hissed back.

"Well, than allow me to introduce myself," he said before stabbing his blade into the ground and bowing before his senior family member, "my name is Zen-Aku Uzumaki, son of your sister, Kushina Uzumaki, I hope we can get along with one another," he raised his head to look at her.

The woman was obviously stunned by this, given her wide eyes as she backed up a bit, she reeked of fear at seeing him, "no, I refuse to believe she had a kid, I refuse to believe that there's another Uzumaki other than me and my sister Karin, I refuse to believe it," her fearful look left.

"Believe what you want, but the truth is the truth auntie, but I'd rather not have to fight another Uzumaki if I can help it, so it's your choice, either fight and lose or step down and wait here until I take back the Uchiha from the snake," Zen-Aku offered bluntly as he grabbed his crescent blade.

"I wish I could dipshit, but this curse mark makes me do whatever lord Orochimaru wants, I can't just deny that, especially after all he's done for me, gave me and my sister a home, took us in and gave us power so that we'll never feel helpless again, I can't abandon the mission," she said.

"Very well auntie, but don't say I didn't warn you," he said as pull his blade form the ground and began charging for his aunt, she brought up her flute to try and play a melody, but he was already on her and in one swift fluid motion, she was cut in a long diagonal cut along her torso. She fell to the ground and was instantly defeated before she could do anything, before she could even activate her curse mark and fight back it was over, her eyes closed but her heartbeat was still there, he made sure that it was only blood loss that she fell from, no vital wounds. He made a shadow clone and had it tend to her wounds and do something about that curse mark while he went ahead and followed after the rest of the squad, it didn't take long to reach their point, and that is when he saw Lee and Kiba lose pathetically against a fat man.

The fat man noticed him arrive, "so you beat Tayuya, I knew that bitch was weaker than she let on, now I get to fight the weakling who killed her, what a letdown," the fat man said before slamming his hands on the ground, "earth style barrier, earth dome prison."

The earth began to rumble and crack before Choji jumped forward, "expansion jutsu," his torso grew in size until it was the size of a ball, "human bolder," he took in his arms and legs and spun around like a top making a good cover to disappear into the woods nearby to hide a moment.

"We're running out of time," Shikamaru stated as they sat in a circle, "there's no choice, we've got to split up, with most of our chakra taken away, even with the five of us, he's not going to be easy to take out, and with every second, Sasuke gets closer to the boarder and out of reach."

"So we should split into two groups, one to stop him and one to go after Sasuke's group," Alyssa surmised as she crouched next to Zen-Aku to remain hidden from this fat man, who just all of a sudden slammed his right hand on the ground to cause an earthquake and find their location.

"Naruto, you take Hinata, Kiba, and Choji and head after Sasuke, Lee and I will stay behind and take care of this guy," Shikamaru ordered as he kneeled down and got into position to use his shadow possession jutsu, though the effectiveness at this point was debatable.

"What are you going to do, play with my shadow again, don't waste my time kid, you already showed me your little parlor trick and once was enough," the fat man sneered at them as he stood there and barely acknowledged them in strength given his stance.

"That's funny, I seem to recall somebody here getting taken in by that parlor trick," Shikamaru replied as he sent out his shadow and a second one to come at the fat man from behind, the fat man smirked before slamming his hand onto the ground and disappeared into the ground.

Alyssa activated her Byakugan and tried to locate him, before Kiba sniffed him out just as he left the ground behind them, the man touched the ground again and brought forth a huge bolder, "earth style, sphere of graves," he called out as he held it over his head before throwing it. They dodged easily enough before Shikamaru was grabbed by the man and held upside down, "you're in charge of this little ragtag bunch am I right, when you've got an idiot for a leader the hole team suffers, ya know what I mean," he asked with a smirk on his face. "You don't wanna follow a guy like this," he started to spin the boy with one hand, "let me get rid of him for ya," he tossed the boy to his far left forcing Choji to catch him by using his human bolder to get to the tree he was headed for and stop spinning to cushion the blow. "Awe, I try to help you guys out and look what ya do, I don't know which is more pathetic, the fool or those that follow him, tell ya what, you don't wanna keep working under this glum face little shadow lover, I'll just kill ya now and put you out of your misery."

Choji rose up from leaning against the tree he used to catch Shikamaru and put on his most serious face, "I'll handle him, this guy is mine," the others looked to be about to protest, "he's mine I said," he stated again before taking out a brown bag from his weapons pouch. "Shikamaru, take these food pills for everyone," the shadow user gave him a look that asked a silent question, "u-huh, don't worry I've got my secret weapon with me," Choji walked to the front of the group, looking ready for a fight, and what a fight it was going to be.

"Oh this is priceless, you think I'm going to wait forever," the man charged at them, "enough of this, I'm going to take you all out right here," Choji took out a three set container containing three different pills and actually stopped the man after eating a green pill.

"Shikamaru take everyone and get out of here," Choji actually ordered of the team leader, "what did the five of us join together for, if we lose Sasuke we'll be just what this guy says we are, a stupid idiot of a leader and his band of rejects, get out of here, go already."

"Alright, let's move you guys," Shikamaru ordered as they all left Choji there to fend for himself in a battle of strength, this was obviously going to be a contest of strength that could easily be decided by other means as well if the two fighters had any agility as well. As they were traveling Shikamaru took out the brown bag he got from Choji and tossed it to Zen-Aku, "a parting gift from Choji, I'm sure you're battle with that Uzumaki woman was tiring as well, eat up," the battle with Tayuya wasn't really hard, but the duke org appreciated the gesture.

"Shikamaru, that pill that we saw Choji take back there, it seemed like some kind of last minute trump card, do you really think he can win," Alyssa asked, she had all kind of faith in her friends just as she did in her old life, but that didn't mean she wasn't worried regardless.

"Yeah, I mean he said he had some sort of secret weapon on him," Kiba asked as he fed Akamaru some food pill as well after Zen-Aku tossed him the bag, those pills are great for long time war rations, or in the case of chasing a team that took a member of your team hostage, sort of.

"Don't worry, Choji's got a plan up his sleeve, he brought along with him the Akimichi clan's secret triple threat, pills that grant a person explosive power, there are three of them, green, yellow, and red, the amount of energy that each of those pills contains is absolutely massive. Any pill that works that well though, always comes with side effects," Shikamaru informed as they continued onwards, you could tell he was worried for his friend, the side effect of the pills must be far greater than Kiba and Lee realize given their attitude.

Akamaru wined as they were traveling, "I know, I was just thinking the same thing myself, listen guys, you know how Akamaru can tell an enemies strength just by his scent right, he's pretty sure that Choji can't take on that gargantuan alone, just those pills to help him."

"He might be right to be, the strength of Choji's youth seems to be far weaker than that of his opponent, and if Neji were here he'd say that the other guy's strength is an unknown, and that the chances of beating him would be zero, which is often the case in battle," Lee commented.

"Lee's right, that's just how a battle is, we knew from the beginning that this mission wasn't going to be child's play, it's life or death, I've already anticipated the worst case scenario in which case each of us fights alone, and if we're not ready to lay down our lives, we won't reach Sasuke. Choji is good enough to hold his own, but he's not got a lot of confidence, he thinks out of all of us he's the weakest link," Shikamaru stated, it wasn't wrong, the boy did think of himself as the weakest link, but there are more ways to be the weak link than one.

"That's because the guy kind of is, I mean anyone can see that, that's pretty much the whole reason he stayed behind back there, because he wanted to be of some kind of use to us," Kiba commented and just made himself look more like a fool after all of this.

"Not so, the amount of raw power that he has is far greater than others know, the only thing is that he needs to work in his own self-confidence, he has to eat so much because his family's clan jutsu requires a lot of energy to work," Zen-Aku commented, he knew strength when he saw it.

"He's right, there's a reason why Shikamaru chose Choji for this mission, this mission requires not only speed but also strength, and Shikamaru knew this going in, which is why Choji stayed behind, it's likely he was the strongest, so Choji stayed to fight the strongest," Alyssa guessed.

"Hold," Shikamaru ordered and they all stopped and jumped to the ground where he took a kunai and made a mark, "it's for Choji, he did say he'd catch up, trust me he will beat that guy, and after he does he'll come find us," after the mark they left and moved to catch up to their charges.

Kiba did leave something though, probably words of inspiration or something, but it was time to go and so they went as fast at they could, it didn't take long before Shikamaru got a feeling though, it was a very bad feeling, and it put Zen-Aku's instincts into overdrive at that feeling. Soon came another bark and another warning before Alyssa activated her Byakugan, "that's strange, we've been traveling for quite some time and haven't run into any more traps, what's your assessment Shikamaru," Alyssa asked, she looked to Zen-Aku and he nodded in agreement.

"It looks to me that we've been underestimated, they're cocky and think we're all dead now, and their big guy is the only one following them, they don't need to set a trap for their own man, do they, so now we can take them by surprise," Shikamaru guessed before they made a quick plan.

Zen-Aku was going to use the transformation jutsu to turn into the fat man from before and trick the enemy into giving him the container since he was the biggest and strongest physically compared to the two left, the others hung back a good distance as they traveled as to not be seen. They each had roles as well and got into position just as the fat man arrived to the others, "he was, but he's just arrived," the man with six arms like a spider said as the fat man came from behind a tree branch, obviously it was this guy who was the sensor of the group, or a similar technique.

"Well it's about time, you were gone a while, what took you so long," a man with a head on his back and silver hair that seemed to be the leader of the group asked, probably has heightened perception thanks to the other senses he's getting fed to him from that other head as well.

"Sorry, it took longer than I thought to eat all those loser's chakra, too long," the fat man said in a perfect imitation of his voice, making sure that his voice didn't waver a bit as the hopped through the trees, almost on the waiting ambush ahead of them.

"Since you're back, take the coffin, that's your job isn't it," the six armed man ordered before tossing the coffin to him, he caught it with ease as he was watched by the two, the easy way he caught it must have confirmed for them he was who he said since they relaxed at the sight.

"Have to say, I was a little worried there for a moment, those brats seemed to have taken out Tayuya, for a moment we had doubts you'd be able to take them out," the silver haired one commented and made the fat one scoff at the implication of him being weak.

"Don't mistake me for her," he said just as they reached the final step for the trap to spring, in an instant he turned on his heel and jumped back from the two others as they turned back shocked that he left before coming to a stop to turn around and move on the traitor for turning on them. Only to be met with the rest of their foes, the only one to go down was the six armed man though, Alyssa made short work of him by attacking him from behind where he couldn't react and hit all of his chakra points with her signature tiger style fighting, when it was over, he was frozen.

The silver haired man turned back to get the coffin back only to have to dodge several kicks from Lee by backflipping away from the boy before stopping from his shadow being caught by Shikamaru, just in time to take a hit from the pair of Kiba and Akamaru in his sides. At this point Lee came back in with a large kick to the head behind the silver haired man making him knock heads with the front one causing even more disorientation, this allowed Shikamaru to unveil his new technique, the shadow strangle jutsu to strangle him.

The six armed man was still frozen, well, more like paralyzed from the numerous blows he received, so he wasn't able to react when Alyssa came up behind him with a kunai in her hands, her old self would never have done what she's about to do, but she knew she wasn't her anymore. Taking the kunai, she brought it up while also taking her left free hand and wrapping it around his forehead to steady it before cutting the neck of the six armed man open with the blade, she watched him and made sure he died from the cut before looking to the two headed man.

Shikamaru just used his new jutsu to strangle him, the guy went to stage two curse mark to try and get out of it through sheer force of physical strength, too bad he forgot about the others, so at the last second of forcing the shadow off him, he was attacked by Kiba, Akamaru, and Lee.

Lee with a primary lotus kick sending him into the combining power of Kiba and Akamaru attacking his sides, before Lee going in to finish the primary lotus in the full set, slamming his head straight into the ground and breaking his neck instantly killing him and his brain dead brother.

"Good, now that we've gotten them taken care of, let's head back and pick up Choji on the way," Shikamaru suggested as he made his way to where Zen-Aku was waiting with the coffin right next to him, it was obvious that their mission was now accomplished, enemy dead or captured.

Just as Zen-Aku was about to speak, he sensed something, "EVERYONE MOVE," he yelled before the worst happened, pillars of bone sprung from everywhere and impaled most of his team, worst of all was Alyssa with a wound in the left shoulder and right lower abdomen and grazed her arm. His worry for Alyssa took presentence over the mission so he left the coffin's side and raced to her side as fast as he could and arrived before she could fall from the trees and cradled her while bringing out his flute to play the song to help the deer heal her when she grabbed his hand.

"Don't worry about me… look behind you," Alyssa strained to say and made him turn to see a man with white hair in a loose kimono standing next to the coffin, seeing his job done for the moment, he picked up the coffin and left while carrying it away seemingly with ease. "Go… chase him… complete the mission," she ordered him while pointing in the direction they took off, she seriously wanted him to go chase after their mission goal, he took quick notice on who could do what and noticed only Lee and Shikamaru able to stand and fight.

"Shikamaru," Zen-Aku called over to the squad leader while reaching into Alyssa's pouch for the recorded device, he gave it to the boy as he arrived, "play that for her until I return, either that or until she recovers, Lee, you're with me, we're getting the damn Uchiha back." He didn't even wait for a reply before taking off, though he could tell Lee was right behind him as he chased down the soon to be dead man, they got to a clearing just as the coffin exploded, Sasuke didn't look like he used to, his hair was lighter and a little longer, his skin an unhealthy brown.

"Sasuke, we've come to take you back to the village, we beat this white haired guy and we'll be able to go," Lee stated as he got into his stance, Sasuke's response was to take off in a completely different direction than the leaf village, "where is he going, that is not the way."

"Doesn't matter, you take on the bone guy, I'm going after Uchiha, he's the cause of all of this, so he's the one that will pay," Zen-Aku ordered before making to give chase, the white haired man tried to block his path, received a Kurama sized paw for his troubles though.

Zen-Aku didn't stay back to watch Lee start the fight with the bone guy, just left with the sole focus on chasing after Sasuke, and boy did he chase him, chased him through the woods, into the mouth of a cave, it tried to trick him with memories of his past, but he pushed through them. By the time he made it out of the cave, they were at a valley with two huge stone statues across from each other, one of Madara Uchiha, the other of the first hokage, the top of Madara is where Sasuke stopped, and Zen-Aku stopped on the first hokage's.

"I suggest you come quietly, I'm in a bad mood since your new friends hurt Alyssa," Zen-Aku suggested with a growl, he saw the boy turn towards him from where he was facing the other direction, he turned slowly and let the org see the eyes, one normal, the other one not so much.

"So it's you, hopeless little knucklehead," Sasuke commented in his direction and made him growl a little bit, "she sent you huh," a moment more passed between them, "like I already told Sakura, it's over, just leave me alone," that made Zen-Aku bare his teeth like a seething animal. "Hehehe, look at you, what's with the angry face," he said with a chuckle, "or is that even an angry face, I can't tell," another chuckle and he was now signing his own death warrant, his little power trip has hurt Alyssa, so Zen-Aku was going to teach him a lesson.

"You have very few choices Sasuke," the org growled out with clenched fists, "you come back to the village willingly and we can pass this off as a power trip because of the curse mark as long as you don't do anything like this again, I won't have to come and get you, and you won't like that. You could resist, resist in a very futile manner where I reveal the secrets of my training that makes your Sharingan useless against me, I win and beat you bloody before bringing your mangled and broken body before Tsunade so she can pass judgement for desertion. The final option is that we fight, we fight until one of us drops dead, most likely you seeing as how the last time we fought I barely tried and you were trying your best, so if I actually tried with going against this new power of yours, we might be even, or I might kill you. Those are the standard options, the nonstandard option is what I'd like, you caused Alyssa to get injured really badly, so instead of fighting you and showing you how outmatched you truly are, I could just make you suffer to the point of wishing for death before release."

"I thought I warned you about acting all high and mighty, this will be nothing like when we fought before, it might be even at first, but I'll eventually win, something you'll never be able to do after today," Sasuke yelled the last part as he rushed to where the org was and made to punch his gut.

To counter, Zen-Aku grabbed the fist at the last second, just grabbed it, didn't show any signs of grabbing it either, nothing that let Sasuke even predict that he'd grab it, "I told you Uchiha, I have been training in something that makes your Sharingan useless against me." Now Sasuke actually did activate his Sharingan to aim for a right kick to the side of Zen-Aku's head, but in a flash the org grabbed it and countered with a straight high kick to the chin of the Uchiha before using the same leg to whip the boy into the face of his ancestor's statue.

The boy seemed to be stuck there in shock at not even seeing the kick coming, didn't see anything to predict what was coming, "how, I never even saw you move," Sasuke asked before jumping out of the wall and making quick hand signs, "fire style, fireball jutsu." The fireball spewed the org's way in a huge blaze thanks to the curse mark enhancement, but it wasn't enough since Zen-Aku summoned his crescent blade and sent his crescent wave to disrupt the fire with a barrage of crescent energy blades. The org unsummoned his blade as Sasuke launched himself from the water between he statues and aimed for Zen-Aku with a barrage of punches and kicks, all blocked or dodged with ease, on the last strike the org grabbed the boy's hand with his left and punched his gut with the right.

"You still haven't figured it out yet have you," he said before elbowing Sasuke's chin before striking his jaw with the same hand and sending a cocked back fist with it afterwards, a little slower pace but easy to do with such a disoriented Uchiha thanks to what he's done. The boy was sent blown back to the edge of the first's head, "I've been training to beat you since we were little, training day and night to beat the Sharingan, but I could never win against it, so I decided to delve farther into what makes it so great, I looked through everything I could. Discovered that there is no prediction of the future, it's simply reading your opponent's muscle tension, movements, breathing, and even heart rate, you use that to simply see instinctively where your opponent will strike, how to block, and the best way to counter."

Sasuke began charging again and sent his left leg to strike at Zen-Aku's jaw, but it was blocked by a simple left hand before he had to block the right leg coming down on his head with the right arm before kicking his face in from his upside down position and kicking his gut. The boy was again sent back towards the edge of the first hokage's head, he was trying to get back up, he was being shaky about it, but still rising, "what are you saying, you've actually found a way to beat the Sharingan, don't make me laugh loser," he said.

"I have actually," Zen-Aku stated and Sasuke's eyes grew wide at that, "you see, your eyes have the same weakness as any other eyes, they can't perceive what they can't see, so if you can't see muscle tension, movements, breathing, heart rate, you can't instinctively see what to do." Zen-Aku was on Sasuke faster than the boy could see with his shadow form technique, even implanting his fist into the boy's gut before Sasuke knew it, "it also helps that my body has been trained to be faster and stronger than yours, that helps with reaction speed as well." Next was a left cross aimed for Sasuke's jaw, it worked because the boy took the hit that he could do nothing to stop before being backhanded with the same hand before receiving a right knee to the gut that made the boy hunch over only to receive a right elbow to his right cheek. Zen-Aku then basically just sent a volley of punches right for Sasuke's gut, sternum, chest, and collar bone before high kicking him back towards Madara's statue, this was no longer a fight, it was more like a massacre going down, the org almost laughed at the inside joke, almost.

The physical beatdown that Sasuke was experiencing despite his power up had a different effect on him though, the trauma his body was experiencing added to his already active curse mark seemed to have reacted with his curse mark, it forced an evolution in it and gained him a tomoe. This he thought he could use to his advantage since he saw a difference in his sight, bugs seemed to have moved slower, so without really thinking, he charged at the loser and let his full instinct take over, beginning the attack with a jumping roundhouse kick that was ducked under.

Sasuke followed that up by repeatedly kicking at Zen-Aku as he blocked them all, before going in for a barrage of punches that were also blocked, however when Zen-Aku tried to attack he found the same thing was happening for him, his attacks were also blocked, meaning his eyes see more. So it was time to step up this game, so faster moves and more concentration, so when Sasuke went in for a right cross before spinning with it and roundhouse kicking him while in the air, Zen-Aku blocked them before spinning himself and trying to implant his foot in the chin of the boy. Only for it to barely graze him at the last second when the Uchiha flipped backwards, but at least he was now in perfect position to take a mule kick from the other leg that connected with the boy's face and sending him crashing to the ground for the trouble. He got up quickly enough before making some hand signs, "fire style: dragon flame jutsu," before spewing a torrent of flames form his mouth directed for the org, he dodged by flipping off the statue sideways in what looked like slow motion while sending org lightning for the boy.

Sasuke only barely dodged by jumping from the statue as well and exchanging blows with the org on the way down, and when they hit the bottom they split off and ran along the water exchanging blows as they ran, even moving away from each other several times to gain momentum when colliding. It was on the final time that they finally made it to the end of the good sized lake that was at the end of the statues, they stopped by at the far rock wall, slamming into it with enough force to make parts of it crumble before charging each other again, but Zen-Aku was done holding back. Sasuke made to do a kick in the dynamic entry style that Guy does, but it was knocked away by the org with his right hand before making it look like he was going for a left punch, when the Uchiha made to block it, he raised his foot at the last second to kick the boy in the face. This allowed him to send the punch below where he was originally aiming and into the gut of Sasuke instead of the chest, he was sent rolling across the side of the rock wall until he could right himself and started running to away to think up a good plan, he was chased for it. Sasuke used a fire style: fire ball jutsu to slow the org down, it did nothing with the chase other then making the org drop down to the water and start chasing the boy, he seemed to be going all the way back over to the statues, probably planning on using the terrain to his advantage. It was time to unveil his own technique, Zen-Aku performed the hand signs, "wind style: gale palm," before thrusting his palm forward and shooting a stream of pressurized air in Sasuke's direction, he barely dodged leading him to repeat the process until they reached the statues.

Sasuke was the first to arrive so he enacted his plan to use the chidori on Zen-Aku, using the speed of freefalling to help him, the org just kept charging at him while Sasuke hit the water sending it everywhere like a bomb going off before charging for him again with a left hand of lightning. Zen-Aku was charging with nothing protecting himself other than his dark wolf armor, but when Sasuke got right on him and was about to plunge the chidori in him, the org grabbed it at the last second and made it slam into the water instead and created a huge explosion of water. This obviously blinded the Uchiha from the onslaught of punches that Zen-Aku unleashed upon him with huge force, the same force that beat Tsunade when they had made that bet, and by the end of it, Sasuke was not in good shape by any means, had several bones broken by now at least.

"Give up Sasuke, you can't win, you should know that by now at least," Zen-Aku stated as he calmly bent down to pick the Uchiha up by the throat, "I'd actually prefer not to beat you anymore than needed, but if you continue to resist, I'll be happy to finish you off."

Sasuke gave him a look that screamed in defiance, so he was about to deliver one last punch until he was forced to let go of Sasuke and jump back to the leg of the other statue as Sasuke dropped to the ground, what forced to do so was a glowing hand that belonged to Kabuto, puppet of the snake. "Well, I never thought I'd meet you here Naruto, or is it Zen-Aku," Kabuto asked with a chakra coated hand in a ready position, his lord had told him to go help retrieve Sasuke, saying that one of the ninja there might be able to take on the sound ninja easily and take Sasuke back, so he was sent as backup.

"Kabuto, I knew that the sound must have sent a spy into the ranks of the leaf, it didn't make any sense for you to go as far as you did and then just give up either, but you can't win either you know, if the Uchiha couldn't what makes you think you can," Zen-Aku asked as he got ready.

Kabuto knew that the org had a point, even now the org's strength was growing according to their spies, so there would be a very good chance that the medical ninja couldn't take him on in a straight fight, so he opted to retreat instead, "ninja art: dead soul jutsu," he called out. He summoned two freshly made corpses that he brought and send them after him instead while he threw smoke bombs down and took Sasuke while the org was distracted, dealing with the two corpses that only barely slowed him down long enough to lose sight of them.

The corpses were dispatched by his crescent blade cutting one while the other blocked for a moment before he too was also cut up by cutting through the blade that blocked the crescent blade in the first place, when Zen-Aku turned back to attack them, only to find both gone. "Hmph, cowards, but I can't track them if I don't know which rout they took, damn that Kabuto," he growled before turning around and unsummoning his crescent blade, then he noticed Kakashi had just arrived, "took you long enough, were you all the backup Tsunade could send."

"She doesn't know I'm here, or at least she only suspects, what happened to Sasuke," Kakashi asked as he began to walk up with Pakkun the ninja hound at his side, taking note of the lack of damage to the surrounding area that he thought would be much worse.

"Gone, at the last moment he received help from Kabuto who used a distraction to escape," Zen-Aku reported almost robotically, this was really the first time he failed a mission, well, failed a mission and wasn't killed or sent back inside a mask at the end of it, he hated it.

"Sorry, I know it must be hard, this must be your first failed mission," Kakashi acknowledged sadly, the org nodded his head yes, it would be too difficult to explain the specifics, "well come on then, we should report to lady Tsunade, and on the way we'll see how Alyssa's doing."

"She got pierced in several different spots, I know how she's doing, but thanks for the sentiment," Zen-Aku left Kakashi standing there after that, he was going to check on Alyssa anyways, but he didn't need someone asking how she's doing, he was realistic person, honorable but realistic.