The sun had barely crested the hills when Akari had woken sitting up on the dusty bed cover. She groaned realizing that she'd bled over the sheets and that they had stuck to her side cracked and stale. The room was chilled with a draft filing in under the door creeping along the floorboards. She slid her bare feet to the floor shuffling towards the bathroom which she was currently praying had running water still. The tub was ringed with yellow stains and brown water marks lingering on the bottom. She made a face staring down at it rubbing the back of her neck. Her side still stung where she'd ripped the sheets from her skin and honestly she'd hoped to clean the wound out and bandage it. She reached for the handle turning it a fraction. A dark thick sticky blob surged from the faucet plopping into the basin. The pipes made a few loud clanging noises through the walls chugging the water from the heater underground until finally it sprayed out violently for a brief moment. The water's flow slowed to an even strength after a few minutes and turned from a dirty tan to a clean clear liquid. As much as she'd hated Kakazu the man had made sure the base had made enough money to keep it running even after most of the Akatsuki had died.
It had taken a good while to clean out the mud packed mixture she had used to stop the bleeding. She'd caked it on good, mainly because it had been so deep, and cleaning out the wound was rightfully painful. She ground her teeth against the lights flashing behind her eyes as she dabbed a ripped wet cloth from her pants into the wound. She drained the tub and let the chilly air dry her skin. She'd found bandages under Itachi's bed and wrapped those tightly around her ribs before walking out to sit on the dusty old couch. She needed a game plan. The minute she left the safety of the hideout and the base grounds she knew that the ROOT would continue tracking her. Akari knew that they wouldn't stop until she was dead but she really wanted to neutralize the situation without killing anyone else. The problem was that she wasn't sure how to get around it without getting seriously injured in the process. She had to be prepared to get out there and take them on headstrong and she needed to do it before they found her. It basically was hunting season and the ROOT were now fair game. She'd saved up enough chakra from resting that her reserve was pretty safe as well. She was going to need it and this was all she could do at this moment. It was attack or be attacked.
Kakashi and Sasuke were by no means taking their time to travel to the area in which Taki had left Akari. Sasuke was slightly off kilter running as hard and fast as he could in order to keep up with his teacher. There was an uneasy feeling in his chest that had settled there as soon as he'd learned that Akari was in trouble. It was painful and yet he felt a certain part of him stir in anger that anyone had even dared think they could hurt her. He was angry that someone had even tried. He was pretty sure Kakashi was about to have a heart attack as fast as he was moving through the trees. The sun had faded into a desolate muggy fog that was thick and covering a good part of their line of vision. Sasuke was sending out feelers as a way to keep in tune with the surroundings about them. He knew the old man had meant business when he'd moved his headband up to reveal his Sharingan eye. Sasuke himself had popped a soldier pill in preparation for what was in store. ROOT core members were not an easy fight. They would drag them down even as a two man team and exhaust their strength until the very end of the fight. They were both skilled but so were ROOT and Sasuke wasn't taking any chances.
As they moved they were nearing a large body of water that ran along the edge of the country here. The fog was steaming off the water in an eerie atmosphere giving Kakashi an uneasy feeling. He was worried about his daughter and he was worried about his student but if he had to pick between the two he knew that Sasuke could hold his own. His first concern on this mission was to find and secure Akari. He had never been one for overly touchy feelings and it was unnerving that he had such a strong pull coursing through his veins at the moment. There was a heavy combination of anger and fear because he had never seen Akari fight. Sure, they told him she was an ANBU, but what did that really mean? Would she be able to take on four ROOT core members without assistance? Anyone would struggle with something like that and Taki had said that she was injured. That meant a leak in chakra which she'd need to rest and regenerate. He was heavily concerned that she didn't have the time to do that which meant that they needed to find her and quickly.
Sasuke was moving almost directly behind him in unison with his teacher like when he'd been younger. Kakashi was focusing on burning through the forest ahead of them when Sasuke pulled to a sudden stop on a tree branch and grabbed his teacher's sleeve. Kakashi halted his motions immediately. Sasuke felt a surge in the area around them with multiple chakras and he glanced around searching for a sign of them. There were definitely moving this way and fast. Kakashi heard it first before he realized what was going on; he grabbed Sasuke's head forcing it down just before a violent razor sharp wind blew past them cutting them in a few places. The gale force wind caught an object of some kind forcing it tumbling and churning out onto the lake's surface. The object skidded over the water like a skipping rock before rolling and catching itself in a half crouch. Sasuke realized before Kakashi that it was Akari. He made to move but his teacher caught him. She was breathing heavily her clothes torn and several places on her were bloody as she stayed herself on the water's surface. There was a long cut across her cheek bleeding down her neck and her knuckles were torn open from hand to hand combat. Akari took a deep breath as two ROOT members reached the edge of the lake and smirked. The one laughed putting his hands on his hips watching her.
"Have you had enough?" he asked grinning. The other ROOT member chuckled running a hand through his hair but he didn't look any better off than Akari had. She'd been tearing into him more than the ROOT that had sent the razor wind.
"I'm telling you…just drop this." She said in a tired voice her eyes wary.
"Orders are orders brat. You have to die. The village can't know about half the missions you completed." The other ROOT joined in.
"I'm pretty sure no one needs to know that we had two spies in the Akatsuki." He laughed. "It's a shame you're both going to die for the village you were being forced to protect."
"Itachi protected the village because he loved it. I hate you but not the people who are innocent." She snapped her hands in fists. She stopped stiffening when she heard a rustling sound from river's bank. The ROOT core turned to look to their right where they saw a small child huddled in the pebbles trying to hide. The wind ROOT laughed and reached for the child snatching him up by his auburn hair. He hauled the boy in front of him shaking him to force him to his knees. The other member grinned pulling a kunai putting it to the kids throat.
"Wrong place, wrong time kid. So, what's it going to be Akari? Will you let us kill a kid?"
"Your life for the boys…or maybe we should just kill you both?" the other held the shaking boy as the one put the blade to his throat.
"Let him go." Akari said in a definitive voice. Sasuke knew that Kakashi had used the same tone with him more than once when he'd done some very stupid things.
"What'll it be Akari?" he started to draw blood on the boy's skin.
"LET. HIM. GO." She raised her voice as Kakashi and Sasuke watched her eyes turn a violently swirling red.
"Three, Two…" He jerked his arm back to slice the boy open.
That was when all shit hit the fan.
Akari was instantaneous in her reaction. Kakashi had started to move but failed to match his daughters speed and Sasuke had hauled him back to avoid getting caught in the fray. Akari had formed a solid lightening blade extended about a foot from her fist and appeared directly in front of the ROOT holding the boy captive. She literally slammed her fist into his chest the blade protruding out the back spraying an array of blood over the trees and pebbles behind them. She was face to face with the man now her eyes level with him.
"You will never kill a child again." She yanked her hand back leaving a hole in the man's chest where he struggled to breath. He coughed falling a few steps back before collapsing. She grabbed the boy with her clean hand and shoved him back behind herself protecting him the lightening blade still charged and crackling at her side.
"You and me. This ends here." She said as her eyes began to shift taking on the Mangekyo Sharingan as she turned to fully face her opponent. The ROOT looked somewhat shaken but was trying to hide it by squaring his shoulders narrowing his eyes at her.
"Let's see how Hatake Kakashi's daughter really fights."
Sasuke wanted to move and interject into the fight but he wasn't sure how. He figured at this point it was Akari's fight and he should let her finish it out. He glanced at Kakashi waiting for some sort of helping signal. He needed the go ahead. Kakashi seemed hesitant to head onto the battlefield as well.
Akari was not a member of the ANBU by accident. She had literally grown up with the ROOT as her primary teachers and the Akatsuki as her secondary continuance. Danzo had always underestimated her strengths and constantly placed her in positions where she'd had to downplay her advantages to keep herself hidden. It was rare that she'd been allowed to use the lightening form chakra which she balanced so well for fear that Kakashi would notice it. However, in this instance there was no holding back. She was able for the first time in her life to go full force at a ROOT core member. There was a lot of hate and anger built up deep inside her soul and it was about to come pouring out like fireworks. This man in particular she remembered well. He'd held her down and…there had been one too many things that had taken place in the ROOT barracks that had permanently changed Akari as a child. This man deserved a lot worse than what he was about to get but her main focus was the child. She caught a glimmer out of the corner of her eyes, in the trees, a metal work hit by the sun. Sasuke.
"Get the kid out of here!" she ordered him. Kakashi raised an eyebrow. Someone was ordering Sasuke around. The funny thing was his student obeyed her. Sasuke jumped down to meet the boy scooping him up in his arms.
"You're going to be alright." He said in a softer voice than he normally used.
"Get away from the water!" she snapped as the ROOT charged her. Kakashi realized where she was going with this and grabbed Sasuke pulling him back off the pebbles which had sand and water soaked into the ground beneath them. A sort of static was building quickly in the air. The ROOT member charged her throwing punches, landing a good four or five, making a fury mount in Kakashi. He was struck however by his daughter's ability to withstand the hits. She did not fight like a kunoichi. She was not being forced back and she was not taking purely defensive and evasive strategies to combat the ROOT. Instead she was drawing him into the water where she formed a second chakra lightening blade. Now wielding two extended and almost perfectly controlled lighting blades Akari stood on open water. The energy crackled around her while her Sharingan swirled focused and unfocused switching between forms.
"I will KILL YOU!" the man shouted rushing her. He raised his fist high and backed it with a massive amount of chakra similar to the fashion that Sakura often used but something happened. Akari swung her arms up using the blades as a line of defense. She successfully was blocking his attack in a stalemate matching his strength. She hunkered her shoulders into the block as he grit his teeth.
"There are a lot of things I hate you for…" she whispered but Kakashi and Sasuke could hear her. "But I hate you most for the night when I turned nine…you can burn in hell and Danzo isn't here to save you." There was a sudden force of tension in the air that Kakashi stepped back protecting Sasuke and the boy. He spread his arms out afraid of what was about to happen. The sky overhead was turning and roiling over itself with a dark patch of clouds over the lake.
"What…but you…you never finished that jutsu…" the man tried to half turn and break into a fast run. Akari smirked and threw her arms down at her sides letting just the tips of the lightening blades touch the water's edge.
…
Lightening flashed from the sky meeting the water at exactly the same striking points where her blades skimmed the surface. Kakashi felt his eyes widen in shock. The entire lake lit in a fury of electric shock. The water danced in places as if it were being yanked up by unknown forces. In others the water steamed making horrible hissing noises. The whole lake was a light show of electricity and chakra. She had literally created a means to electrocute the man with. A scream split his throat as his skin was boiled by the heat coming off the water. Lightning struck him twice before the entire storm stopped immediately. Akari was breathing hard the lightning blades gone but her hands were still in fists. Her eyes had faded back to blue but there was a small trickle of blood bubbling at her right eye. The man's body steamed sizzling under his burnt clothes before toppling over sideways hitting the water with a resounding thud. He sank slowly to the bottom. Sasuke had hidden the boy's face against his shoulder to shield him from seeing what had happened but it hadn't spared him.
"A-akari…" Kakashi said slowly taking a tenitive step forward. He put his arm out as a gesture of calm. "It's quiet over now…you might want to take it easy." His voice was steady and firm.
"Took you long enough." She sighed out meeting her father's eyes.
