DISCLAIMER: Naruto does not belong to me. If it did, it wouldn't be so good.
Chapter 7
It was a relatively cold night for Konoha. The silence enveloped everything. All the villagers were sleeping peacefully and the guards were watching for enemies on the border lines unaware of the events that were going to be held inside. Even our steps were so soft that only a strong ninja would be able to hear them and that was possible only if he concentrated hard. But it was a time of peace, so except the few guards who did their usual patrols, had let their guards down and slept with the feeling of safety.
The rustle of the leaves along with the singing of the water of a small river nearby which was more like a stream were the only sounds in the area. I felt the soft breeze in my hair and watched the fair hair of my 'companion' of my 'walk' playing with the air. Then I studied his face. He was calm, surprisingly calm like he knew something similar with this would happen for a long time.
Feeling my intensive stare, he broke the silence (like always)
"I told obaa-chan to have a better security system but she didn't listen"
"Hn"
It was indeed much easier than I thought it would be to break out of the jail. The plan was simple, too simple someone would say but effective…
When the guard came to bring me my food, I knocked him out with a simple hit on the back of his neck. What kind of guard is so easily hit? Don't ask me I'm wondering myself. I doubt he ranked above a chuunin. This peace thing had definitely had a bad influence on ninjas. All of them were so sure that because Konoha was the strongest village there was nothing to be afraid.
Not a wise thing to do…
Anyway, I just took the keys from his pants and passed them through the bars. After that, things were even easier. I unlocked the door and transferred the guard in the cell and locked him in. Then I walked to the front door. None of the prisoners made a sound. Were they afraid of me? I guess so… I opened the door with the keys and stepped outside. I passed the other guard who was sleeping on a chair in front of the door. Was his job to stop any prisoner from coming out? Konoha had surely become pathetic.
The 'difficult' part was over. It was time for the second stage, to find him. I detected his charka and started to follow it like a dog. Okay, not exactly like a dog… my charka detection skills weren't the best but they were good enough to find him. Besides, he was in my cell just a few hours ago. I still had a good feeling of his energy.
What happened next, I'm not exactly sure. Everything happened too fast. While I was searching for him he jumped in front of me, told me that he was waiting for me and scowled me for being late. Then he said to follow him to a place not too close to the village to not harm or destroy anyone or anything.
Now what do you make out of this? Naruto is different than before. He was smarter and could read me like an open book. He knew all along my intentions. And I thought that the old Naruto was annoying…
So as I was saying, I followed him to a place away from the village. We were walking like friends going to the park while in truth we were going somewhere to finish some old busyness. Only one of us would leave that place… the moon guided us with its faint light to a rather small clearing. The trees covered the sky and the whole area around us. The only 'clear' place was a circle with an about 20m diameter, in which we were standing. We stood facing each other and studied the area around us. I then noticed that we were in the training grounds. At the spot were team 7 used to train in particular. Anyone can imagine the irony.
"So it ends were it began" I said
"Is there really no other way to settle this?" he asked hoping to change my mind.
"No there isn't. You knew from the very beginning that all would end like this"
"This doesn't mean that I have to like it"
"Of course you don't like it, you are dying tonight"
"I know"
Now that was something I never thought he would say. Was he going to lose on purpose to not kill me? Would he sacrifice his life for mine? I couldn't let that happen. I wanted to kill him on a real fight were both of us would do his best and I would win fair and square. A fake win is not a win at all. Because in the end this fight was not really for me to cut our bonds but to prove who was the best.
"You are not going to hold back, do you hear me?" I demanded
"Don't worry I won't" he said smiling sadly. I didn't like that smile at all. That smile didn't belong to Naruto. My suspicions were higher than before but I didn't comment it.
I turned my attention back to our upcoming fight instead of the reasons of Naruto's strange behavior. I activated my Sharigan and locked my eyes with him. I'm sure that he, just like me, thought about all the time we passed together, as little children, as teenagers and now as full adults.
And in a mere second, everything began…
We both ran towards the other. Ninja usually use more sneaky methods but assassination was not our goal. I threw him some shuriken but he evaded them easily. I threw some more and I saw him jumping high. While being on the air it's difficult to make any movements, so I threw him a few more. One of them stamped him on his chest but he disappeared with a characteristic sound 'poof'.
He reappeared next to me and tried to land a kick on my face but I deflected it with my right arm. Then I stopped a punch coming with my left arm and kicked him to the stomach sending him to the air. He flipped though gracefully and sent me 3 kunai. When they came close to me however they multiplied and about 20 to 30 kunai came my way. I caught the first to and with them I deflected all the others.
In the meantime, he landed on a tree. I saw him making a series of hand's seals and I recognized them as seals of a water attack. I immediately started doing some too. Serpent, Dragon, Rabbit, Tiger…
The two dragons, one made of fire and one made of water crashed to each other creating a thick smoke which we used as a covering in order to prepare our next move.
We were just playing around to test the power of each other but soon we got lost in our fight. One punch succeeded another, the next just came right after the other. Small scratches turned to wounds, clothes laid on the ground ripped off us during the battle. Sweat covered us and created mud with the dust on our bodies.
The area was not ruled by silence anymore. The sound of metal clashing on metal, of metal piercing human skin, of fire burning the withered grass, of water wiping out the flames, of electricity crushing the ground, of wind slaying the tress, of the shaking earth, of our fast breath because of the need of more air in our lungs made a warlike music.
The fight continued for…I don't know how long, seconds…minutes…hours…Time had frozen, cause time didn't matter. This 'dance' was our last; time was not a matter of attention.
I didn't use the cursed seal and he didn't use the charka of Kyubi. Even thou the two of them had merged there was a different feeling when his was using the energy of his 'friend'. Kyubi's energy was cold and terrifying while Naruto's was warm and gentle. I guess we wanted this fight to be between us and without the help of outsiders.
He was stronger than ever, just like I had predicted. His strategies were unusual and thus difficult to read, but then again what else would someone expect from the number one surprising ninja of Konoha? He didn't use any genjustsu. Not that it passed from my mind that he would. He always sucked on genjustsu. However he had learned new moves and his ninjutsu list though not long had a variety from different elements. He mostly used wind attacks because he was wind nature of course. His taijutsu had improved dramatically. He had worked well on his speed and the element of surprised was on of the keys of his tactics.
Fortunately in the previous years I had learned new moves too. I mostly used fire and lightning jutsus but I used different elements too. My speed was as good as his and my little use of genjutsu and my Sharigan could match his stamina.
I blocked a punch and jumped backwards but just when I started doing some seals, I felt a kick on my back and saw the Naruto in front of me disappearing in smoke. It was difficult to know if the Naruto I was fighting with was the real one. He used his bushins all the time and made them to transform in various things around the area. The huge amount of energy he had also enabled him to use them for a long time. The one that kicked me had used henge to become a leaf on a tree.
For once again, simplicity showed its efficiency.
He landed one more punch on my face but it wasn't as strong as his previous ones. I had noticed that his attacked were becoming weaker and weaker each passing minute for some time. My suspicions returned again. Of course it didn't cross my mind for him to have the strength of Sakura but the last punch was relatively weak. Was he exhausted all ready? His stamina was supposed to exceed mine much but I wasn't that tired…
That's when I noticed his breath. It was sharp and too quick. In the beginning I thought it was because of the battle but my breath was way slower than his.
I felt pain on my arm and I realized I was thinking too much. I watched as a tornado full with chakra came closer to me and decided to move out of the way if I wanted to stay in one piece. I managed to evade but not without a few new scratches on my body. I immediately sent him a few lightning spheres but he blocked them with a wind barrier.
I saw him wincing with pain and I wondered again. Why did he feel hurt? He was wounded but nothing too serious. Even if they hurt he would be able to hide the pain. He was a shinobi after all…In addition, he wasn't hit by the last attack and it wasn't even that strong so he didn't use much energy to block it. However he looked deeply in pain. Why?
He began his next attack but I let my guard completely down. I just stood defenseless in the middle of the field lost in my thoughts. Fortunately he noticed my unwillingness for fight and he stopped his attack just in time to not hit me.
"Why did you stopped?" he asked confused "What's wrong?"
"I was supposed to ask this"
"What to you mean?"
"What's going on?" I wanted to know what the hell was going on with Naruto that exact moment.
"What do you mean? I don't understand what the heck you want to know"
"You know exactly what I mean. Why did you look so hurt right now? And come to think of it you look pained for some time now!"
"We were fighting Sasuke for Kami's sake. I'm full of wounds, it's only natural!"
"No it's not. None of your wounds it's major. Now tell me what's wrong. I'm sick of being unaware of the situation"
"Are you sure you want to know?" his voice became a whispered
"Damn it Naruto, I'm trying to convince to tell me for so long, what you think?" my voice dropped too
"I thought you would already figure it out"
"Figure out what? Don't play with me such games; you know I don't like them"
"Haven't you seen him with your Sharigan?"
"Seen him? who are y…" and then it clanged
I focused my eyes on Naruto and I saw him. I saw Kyubi no kitsune in him.
"But…but you said you had merged!"
"We are merged, or at least our chakras are merged. There were just some side effects, I f we can called them like that, that we didn't expect"
"What kind of side effects?"
"I thought you just saw them!"
"Naruto!" I growled
"Okay, okay, calm down. The seal was supposed to be designed so that I would merge with Kyubi as you already know"
"Supposed?"
"Will you let me finish this already? Stop interrupting me all the time!"
"Okay! Go ahead"
"As I was saying, kyubi was supposed to be gone and leave his energy to me. Obviously this did not happen. As you have seen he is still inside of me. Our chakra have been merged but for some reason he stayed"
"What's the problem with that? He was always in you, what's so different?"
"Well you see, now his energy belongs to me or at least as much energy as my body can take. I don't need to ask him for help anymore since it's mine. I guess he considers it as stealing his energy and he is kind of jealous you could say, so he is disturbing me all the time"
"Disturbing?"
"More like attacking me from the inside to destroy me as a 'punishment' or taking over my body…"
"What?"
"Heh…heh…heh" he just said scratching the back of his head
"Does anyone else know?"
"No"
"Why didn't you tell me earlier?"
"I didn't want to"
"Why? Don't tell me it was I-don't-want-to-make-anyone-worry-about-me"
"Is something wrong with that?"
"No…it's just…"I released a heavy sigh "Are you sure he won't merge with you at the future?"
"Yes"
Neither spoke for a while
"Sasuke"
"Hmmm?"
"I want to show something"
"What?"
"I want to prove that I'm telling the truth"
"But I believe you"
"I don't care, I just want to show you. You've got a problem with that?" he said bitterly
"No"
"Good, now come into me"
"Huh?"
"I don't know how to call it. Don't you remember how you came to Kyubi's cage with your Sharigan the other time?"
"Oh that…you could explain it from the beginning dobe…"
"Why? What did you think I meant?"
"Nothing…" but my red cheeks gave me away
"Arrrrrrrrrrg….you are such a perverted! And then they call me one!'
"No I'm not. Besides, you could use other words" I said defending myself "You shouldn't use dirty words"
"I didn't know how it's called and there are no dirty words, just dirty minds. I don't remember who told me that though."
"Didn't know?" I asked avoiding his later statement "Does this mean that you now know?" I said smirking
"Teme…I bet you don't know that yourself!"
"Of course I know, it's called…um…well it's called…"
"See?" Darn he got me on that one
"Shut up!"
"Anyway are you coming or not?"
"Hn"
I appeared in the mind of Naruto and saw him standing next to me. I saw piles around us and a few paths.
"This way" he said
I followed him until we reached the cage of the great demon. I saw him hovering behind his bars and the tag writing 'seal'. This time something was different though. I saw marks on the walls around me made by claws and dried blood from place to place. The air was even colder than the previous time. Also the bars weren't in a good shape either. Parts were missing and the tag itself was torn on the edges.
"Nice decoration" I said sarcastically
"Hey, stupid fox" I heard Naruto yelling "I want to show Sasuke some certain memories, you know which I mean…"
"And why would I do that? You've got almost all my energy and can use it whenever you want. Why should I do anything else for you?"
"Let's just say it's a goodbye gift"
"Hmmm. Alright I don't see why not. A goodbye gift then." A goodbye gift? But didn't Naruto sayt that Kyubi wasn't going to leave? I hope he doesn't hide anything else. I was about to ask him but he anticipated me.
"Ready?" he turned to me
"Yeah" I answered uncertainly
Then a white dazzling light appeared and…
A/N: you'll find out next time!
