Anonymoose: Just for that, I'm going to make Naruto fall madly in love with Jirobo. Lmfao. Kidding. Though, Naruto's not incapable of love. She loves Konohamaru, Hiruzen, and Minato. She just happens to be a fucked up person, that's it. Also, nope. The only people who know about Naruto being in ROOT are Danzo, Minato, Hiruzen, and Shisui.
Ps. I've got a tiny present for you this chapter. :'D
I don't own Naruto. Enjoy.
Tazuna's back was against a tree. Sakura guarded his front, Sasuke his left, and Naruto his right.
Both of the masked girl's teammates were armed with a single kunai.
'Like those'll protect you from that big ass sword.' Naruto thought cynically.
The redhead pulled the axe bass slung over her shoulder, (honestly having forgotten it was there), and channeled chakra into it. Her naturally potent Uzumaki chakra forced it to change form. Danzo's relentless beatings of flawless chakra control changed the shape of the instrument entirely.
The redhead's guitar reformed into a wicked giant half scissor blade. It had silver guitar strings traveling down its length, a crescent-shaped hilt, and a slightly curved, razor point. The entire blade was a glittering black, yet, the underside was shimmering silver.
Wrapping both hands around her new blade, Naruto hardened her resolve, vowing not to get distracted.
Sasuke and Sakura watched Kakashi and Zabuza circle each other carefully, sharp eyes never leaving their opponent.
Naruto ogled Zabuza's scarred chest.
'Wait.'
Naruto blinked.
She told herself she wouldn't get distracted!
'The fuck am I doing!?' She thought, abhorred.
'I believe you are acting as a female kit in first heat.' Kyuubi spoke up suddenly.
The redhead nearly face planted. Which would've been sad, because she wasn't even moving.
'Did you just say I'm getting horny for the first time?' Naruto asked flatly.
'I would not use such vulgar words, but yes. Yes I did.'
'What the hell? No I'm not!' The redhead snapped.
Kyuubi snorted.
Naruto balked.
'Did you... did you just laugh...?'
'I did not realize your stupidity could reach this magnitude.' The fox sniffed haughtily.
'Don't change the subject!' Naruto huffed indignantly.
The beast ignored her, snickering to itself within it's cage.
The redhead wondered when they had become so comfortable with one another.
"Secret Art: Hidden Mist Jutsu!" Zabuza hissed, flooding the clearing with a thick fog that swallowed his form.
Naruto snapped to attention, focusing once again on the matter at hand.
"I-I can't see...!" Sakura panicked.
"No shit sherlock." Tazuna grumbled under his breath.
Sweat lined Sasuke's dark brows.
"He's a master of silent killing. So keep your eyes peeled." Kakashi ordered.
A sudden image of a bowl full of bloody peeled human eyeballs flashed in Naruto's head.
'Dude... why a bowl, and not a jar?' She snickered quietly.
Wait...
What the...
Naruto shook the gruesome image away.
'Focus Naruto! Jeez...'
"He'll come after me first, but that doesn't mean you can relax. Not even for a second." The scarecrow finished.
The genin, (Sasuke and Sakura), marveled at how cool Kakashi looked in that moment, though, neither would admit to doing it.
'Has Kakashi-sensei always been that hot...?'
Naruto nearly smacked her forehead.
'What the hell is with me all of a sudden?'
'You are-'
'I'm not in fucking heat you damn fox!'
"The spine... clavicle, lungs, stomach, liver, heart... and brain..." Zabuza's voice echoed eerily across the clearing. "So many choices. Heh. Wonder which ones I should choose...?"
A massive killing intent wove itself through the mist, spreading like a heinous disease, looming over everything with the imminent threat of death.
It only made the redhead become more on guard.
'My senses are dulled... I can't see... smell... and I can barely hear nature itself... he's good...'
Naruto noted Sasuke began quivering slightly, eyeing his kunai as if he'd slit his own throat with it. Sakura looked one short breath from wetting herself and passing out, her knees knocking together in her fear.
"Hey." Kakashi called, glancing back at his students over his shoulder.
He eye smiled.
"Don't worry. I never let my comrades die."
"You shouldn't lie to the poor brats like that, Copycat!"
Zabuza shot out of the mist from behind the scarecrow, sword positioned to halve the man with one swing.
Kakashi whipped around, deflecting the gigantic cleaver blade with his kunai and brute strength alone.
The two men struggled to overpower each other.
"Heh." Zabuza's bandages twisted around his mouth as he grinned savagely.
Kakashi's ebony eye widened.
"No-"
A Zabuza clone lept over the two men, straight for the genin.
Two more came shooting from the mist, approaching either side of Tazuna.
Sasuke jabbed at his clone with his kunai, but the clone merely grabbed his wrist, and tossed the Uchiha over it's shoulder.
The Uchiha soared, and was swallowed by the mist, grunting in pain as he landed harshly a ways off.
"Sas-"
The clone that jumped over Kakashi and Zabuza landed before the pinkette, cutting off her startled cry.
He cocked his sword back like a bat, black eyes bright with cruelty.
Sakura went sheet white, staring up at him, frozen in pure terror.
"You are absolutely pitiful." The clone sneered.
Tears pooled into her mint eyes.
He swung his cleaver.
Clang!
Naruto's scissor blade clashed with the third clone's.
"You're good kid." The clone smirked.
Naruto flushed.
Wait...
No.
'Pull it together Uzumaki. What would Shisui say if he saw you? You're a ROOT shinobi. Hormones are bloody redundant!'
The redhead returned the hidden smirk.
"Thanks."
She used all of her strength to force her locked sword past the clone's guard, and forced the tip of her blade into it's unsuspecting chin.
She flickered out of existence before it could even collapse into water.
Naruto reappeared again behind the first clone, swinging her sword fluidly, chopping off everything from the shoulders up.
The clones eyes bulged mid-swing.
Thrown off balance, his blade titled so the flat of his sword slammed into Sakura's head, instead of severing it.
The pinkette screamed as she was sent flying to the right from the sure force of the blow.
Sakura skipped like a stone across the grass, her head smacking into the ground, instantly knocking her out as she rolled to a stop.
Two puddles wet the grass at nearly the same time.
Naruto had killed them both in under ten seconds.
'Wait... the last clone...!'
Naruto froze.
The redhead looked down.
She stared at the huge blade protruding from the center of her abdomen.
"U-ugh...!" Naruto grunted.
Scarlet spilled from her lips.
"Naruto!" Kakashi exclaimed, kicking away the original Zabuza.
But, the Mist nin wouldn't have any of it.
"Worry about your own skin, Copycat!"
The scarecrow ducked under the blur that had attempted to behead him.
'I thought he was a master of silent killing? That's an awful lot of shit talking for a man who should be quiet...'
"Damnit!" Kakashi cursed, ripping up his hitai-ate, and engaging Zabuza in a brutal taijutsu duel.
"Hahahahahahaha!" Zabuza cackled, dodging the scarecrow's furious assault. "I get to see the sharingan so early in the fight? Why Kakashi, I'm honored!"
Naruto duly watched her blood drip off the tip of the clone's Kubikiribocho.
"What's the matter kid?" The clone behind her taunted. "Have you never been stabbed before? You so shocked you can't even give me a scream? Does it hurt?"
Plop. Plop. Plop.
Her blood speckled the earth.
The redhead smiled.
"Blood Release: Bloody Needles..." She rasped.
The red droplets on the ground, and the face of the sword rose up, forming tiny little needles in the air.
"What the-"
They shot at the clone behind her.
Her back was drenched in water a moment later, her blood having shot through the clone's head.
"You saved me the trouble of cutting myself to acess blood." Naruto said cooly. "Thanks dude."
The redhead pressed a hand over her bleeding middle, honestly not even really feeling it. It was such a simple injury, almost like being pinched to her. Actually...Not even really that much. Like pricking your finger slightly on a piece of paper.
Sasuke stumbled from within the mist, finally finding his way back to his teammates.
He gaped at the blood spurting between Naruto's fingers as she held her middle closed.
She waved off his horror.
"It's nothing Uchiha." Naruto assured. "I took care of the clones. They're made of water."
"It doesn't look like nothing." Sasuke swallowed.
'Oh yeah, didn't the old cripple say Sasuke was the one to find his dad's corpse? Poor bastard probably hasn't seen so much blood since then. Must be traumatic.'
Naruto shrugged.
"Where's Sakura?" Sasuke asked, skin looking nearly transparent.
The redhead hitched a thumb over her shoulder.
The Uchiha squinted, just making out Sakura's crumpled form quite a few feet away.
"Don't be a dumbass." Naruto muttered, freezing the Uchiha who made to run off.
"I got her. Just get back in position in case no-brow sexy pants over there decides to make more water clones."
The Uchiha scowled for more than one reason, but knew the sense in the redhead's words, and stormed back over to the bridge builder's left.
Sasuke's face suddenly flashed with skepticism for a brief moment.
"Wait... did you just say Zabuza is se-"
The redhead quickly rounded the queasy looking Tazuna to avoid being questioned.
Naruto unsealed a scroll from her upper arm, a storage seal hidden among the the sharp, bold, and swirling symbols there.
Naruto opened the scroll, two large squirts of red flew out with a poof of smoke, taking on humanoid forms as they splattered across the grass.
Blood clones heaved themselves from the puddle, Naruto's colors and features appearing across their shimmering surfaces.
Sasuke gawked.
"You called boss?" One of the clones drawled, climbing to her feet.
"Get Haruno." The original ordered.
The first clone grumbled to herself, shuffling over to the unconscious pinkette.
The other clone wordlessly rounded the tree. Her back was to Tazuna's, who was wide eyed.
"I-is that... a-are they..."
"Made of blood?" Naruto finished. She nodded once. "Yeah old man, they're blood."
"Oh." Tazuna's voice was faint.
'He's probably in shock.'
"That's gross." He finished.
Naruto shrugged, and commanded her blood to stitch her leaking wound closed until Kyuubi could heal her.
She couldn't afford to accelerate his chakra flow to fix herself. She didn't want to deal with the questions that would follow such an action.
Sighing softly, Naruto cleared her thoughts, frowning slightly in concentration.
The redhead flipped her scissor blade around, getting a feel for it once more, placing both hands around the crescent hilt.
Tuning in her ears, Naruto heard the clashing of weapons, grunts of pain, and fists meeting various body parts.
Her blood clone shambled back over to her, Sakura slung like a sack of potatoes over her shoulder. Naruto didn't complain when the clone rudely shoved her hand in her shuriken pouch, retrieving her smelling salts. The clone dropped the pinkette unceremoniously onto the forest floor, sank into a crouch, and lazily waved the salts under the pinkette's nose.
Sakura's face scrunched up, but she didn't wake up.
Irritated, the clone smacked the hell out of her, jolting her awake.
Sasuke and Tazuna flinched at the sharp sound.
"Ow!" Sakura yelped, rubbing her stinging red cheek indignantly. "Naruto what the hell!?"
"Che." The clone rolled her eyes, getting up, and joining her clone sister to guard Tazuna's back.
Sakura stumbled to her feet with the help of the tree behind them, rubbing the back of her head and grimacing deeply.
"I feel like an elephant sat on my head..." The pinkette mumbled bleakly.
"More like you got bitchslapped by a giant sword." Naruto muttered.
Sakura flushed.
The red in Sakura's cheeks made Naruto think of blood covered walls, and her hands dripping with the metallic fluids.
The redhead frowned.
'Why am I so unfocused today...? I feel as if something's wrong...'
'Never mind that, fool.' The fox said, surprisingly serious. 'Survive this, and you may explore that matter.'
'As much as I don't want to admit it, you're right... I need to calm down, and focus.'
'Of course I'm right. I'm always right.' Kyuubi stated.
Naruto ignored the fox.
The redhead pursed her lips. 'Remember your training Naruto...'
The cynical part of Naruto reminded her she couldn't rememberher training, and that she had always reacted automatically in combat.
The redhead shook her head again.
Naruto's eyes narrowed, trying to glimpse through the mist, but it was too thick.
Annoyed that she couldn't see anything, and knowing Kakashi was on to her being way above genin level, she forced wind chakra from her tenketsu, the artificial gust blowing away the white gloom blanketing the atmosphere.
Sasuke stiffened, just catching enough of the taijutsu battle to see Zabuza attempt to split Kakashi in two from the skull down.
The scarecrow danced back, the tip of Kubikiribocho nicking his chest, drawing a thin line of red.
"Water Style: Water Volley Jutsu!" The Mist shinobi pulled his bandages from his lips, his cheeks filling with liquid.
The scarecrow lept to the right, successfully rolling to his feet, and completing a series of fluid back handsprings as Zabuza spat a volley of destructive water balls at him.
They pelted the ground, creating craters two feet deep within the earth.
Kakashi found his feet again, atop a lake about thirty feet from the genin's position.
"Heh." Zabuza chuckled. "You're a fool Kakashi. You should watch where you're going."
Hands shot up from the lake, clamping around the Copy nin's ankles.
Kakashi's eyes bulged.
Zabuza disappeared with water shunshin, materializing once again beside the silver haired male.
He made a hand sign.
"Water Style: Water Prison Jutsu!"
"Tch!" Naruto gritted, watching her Sensei become engulfed by an orb of water, Zabuza's hand holding it in place.
"That can't be good..." Tazuna mumbled weakly.
"Oh no..." Sakura whispered helplessly.
Sasuke glared.
Zabuza pulled the bandages back over his mouth, but you could still tell he was grinning something wicked.
The water clone that had grabbed Kakashi pulled itself to the surface, stepping towards the genin. Five more dragged themselves onto the bank of the lake from the still waters, eyes twinkling with malicious intent.
Sasuke clenched his kunai tighter, sliding into his Uchiha taijutsu form. Sakura did the same, though, a simple academy form.
"Get out of here!" Kakashi shouted. "It's over! I got caught, but the clones can't go far from his original body! So take Tazuna and run!"
"You underestimate us, Kakashi-sensei." Naruto drawled.
The scarecrow recoiled slightly in shock.
"Y-yeah!" Sakura agreed. "Sensei, you said those who fail the mission are scum, but those who abandon their comrades are worse than scum."
"I'm not scum." Sasuke scowled.
"That settles it then." Naruto declared. "We fight, right Tazuna?"
The redhead threw a look over her shoulder.
The bridge builder nodded and shrugged.
"I'd feel bad if your sensei died because of me. You kids are strong. I was wrong to think anything less."
Naruto nodded in thanks.
'I've never failed a mission. And I don't plan to start.'
"Stick to Kakashi's formation guys. Its solid. And I've got blood clones at our backs." The redhead said.
"Who made you leader?" Sakura nearly sneered.
"Yeah, dobe." Sasuke grunted.
She looked over at her teammates, causing them to flinch at the devilish appearance her eyes had taken on.
"I did."
Naruto made a handsign, summoning a large scroll from the center of her back. She stabbed her scissor blade into the earth at her right, and pulled the scroll from her skin through her jumpsuit, earning a few disgusted looks.
Not that she cared.
Honestly, it was kind of funny.
"Might wanna close your mouth." The redhead suggested facetiously, chuckling at Zabuza.
"And why would I do that, little girl?" The Mist shinobi scoffed.
" 'Cause things are about to get messy."
She forcefully threw the scroll at the original Zabuza, though, it soared over his head, and froze several feet in the air.
"Blood Release: Deluge of Blood!"
The large scroll uncoiled with a poof, a mass of bloody droplets pouring out of it, and raining down heavily into the lake below, dying crystal waters with deep red.
The scroll was obliterated by an invisible force once it's purpose was fulfilled.
"That is just... Kami... why did I hire such lunatics?" Tazuna grumbled.
"What the hell...?" Zabuza hissed, trying to blink away the blood suddenly filling up, and burning his eyes. But it was pointless, as it was drenching him to the bone.
"Cover me Haruno, Uchiha." Naruto muttered.
"Hn." Sasuke grunted, obviously irritated being ordered around.
"Don't think you're so cool, Naruto." Sakura huffed. "Sasuke-kun was rookie of the year!"
Naruto's red and black eyes crinkled as she smiled cruelly beneath her mask.
"And I'm a murderer."
Sakura lost a bit of color, but held her kunai with a strong resolve.
'Pinky has potential... Ugh. I just wish she wasn't so fucking annoying.'
"What are you doing?" Zabuza barked at his six clones. "Kill the brats. I'm tired of watching these ignorant little fools play shinobi!"
"Oh you have no idea what this 'brat' is capable of." Naruto retorted darkly, her fingers elegantly weaving through handseals.
The bloody lake began vibrating, Naruto's blood cells devouring the water atoms, taking over.
Kakashi looked down at the lake, astonished.
Zabuza was just extremely peeved.
He couldn't summon water clones because the lake wasn't water anymore, but if he released the Copy nin, he'd be killed.
'Heh. Sorry sexy. You'll be dead no matter what you do. But... It really is a shame though...'
The water clones darted at the genin all at once, two of them breaking off to go right and left, rounding the tree to attack Tazuna's back.
They were quickly dispatched by Naruto's hidden blood clones.
One of Naruto's blood clones came back around to complete the triangular formation team seven formed as the original hung back, crafting her technique skillfully.
The four remaining water clones unsurprisingly, went for Sakura.
Naruto's blood clone snatched up the scissor blade behind her, still stabbed into the earth at her original's side.
Sakura clumsily ducked under the flash of Kubikiribocho, Sasuke stabbing the attacking clone in the kidney. As it dispelled, giving cover in the form of a splash, the pinkette launched her kunai into the middle of the one behind it's throat.
Four down.
Two to go.
Naruto's clone shunshined behind one of the remaining clone's, bisecting it's upper half from it's legs with a lethargic stroke of her blade.
Sakura pulled out a shuriken, and threw it at the last clone. The water clone simply tilted it's head, dodging.
The pinkette smirked.
Sasuke appeared behind it with impressive speed, quickly slitting it's throat.
The last of the water splashed onto the grass.
"I'm still working on this, but I'm pretty close..." The redhead murmured. "You'll be the first to see, and die by it, Mr. No-brow Sexy Pants."
Naruto completed her handseals.
"Blood Release: Corpse Titan."
The redhead slowly separated her clasped hands, raising her right hand slowly, fingers curled in a claw-like formation.
The earth rumbled furiously.
Naruto's two blood clones flashed to Tazuna's side, keeping him upright.
"Thank you." The old drunk muttered gruffly.
Sasuke and Sakura were knocked to the ground, holding on to the tree behind Tazuna for leverage.
Naruto attached her feet to the forest floor with chakra.
"Wh-what the hell is this!?" Zabuza exclaimed, trying to stay atop the blood as it thrashed with the force of Naruto's power.
"Oh my Kami!" Sakura screeched.
Sasuke sucked in a sharp breath.
Naruto smirked.
Gradually, a behemoth hand rose out of the blood, made of the metallic fluid itself.
It seized Zabuza's body from behind.
Naruto clenched her fist.
The blood hand tightened around the Mist nin, slowly crushing him. Zabuza yelled in pain, a symphony of snapping bones filling the air.
Naruto, not used to commanding such a large amount of blood, was literally the color of paper. Black smudges of death were stained beneath her devil's eyes, and she was feeling the fresh wound at her middle more than she thought was possible.
'Damnit! I'm tired...? I need more training...'
An entire arm of blood rose from the red lake, followed by a shoulder.
Naruto's vision blurred.
Sakura and Tazuna vomited as the strong scent of copper weighed the air down.
Sasuke seemed to want to join them.
Zabuza was forced to release Kakashi from his jutsu, as the hand encasing him held him as high as a two story building. The scarecrow took a moment to fix his hitai-ate as the Mist nin's jutsu imploded.
With a grunt, Kakashi fell roughly to his feet, and scrambled off of the lake, running over to his genin, ebony eye beyond bugged out.
Another hand crept onto the surface of the blood, clawing it's way up, and pulling along a humanoid torso that looked distinctly female.
It was incomplete. Naruto's titan had no substance but blood.
Though, the redhead planned to change that. And soon.
She just needed the bones of a certain redheaded Habanero.
As soon as Naruto gestured for her titan to pull Zabuza in two, a senbon zipped out of the trees with frightening precision.
It lodged itself deeply into the wailing Mist nin's throat, slumping him instantly, killing him.
Naruto's blood clones flew at their original, summoning another large scroll, this one empty, from the original's back.
Naruto's titan collapsed thunderously as she canceled the technique.
Zabuza crashed into the bloody lake, disappearing beneath the thick surface.
The clones approached the lake carefully, just in case the Mist nin was somehow still alive, and lingered for a moment.
Nothing happened.
Assured, they sealed the entire blood lake into the scroll, the red mass spiraled up, roaring like a livid tornado, before it was sucked into the scroll, and sealed cleanly away.
A Hunter nin wearing a Mist issued mask appeared across the clearing, armed with large senbon.
"Thank you all." The Hunter called softly, in a lilting voice. "I've been tracking this one for quite some time." He gestured to the dead Zabuza lying at the bottom of the bloody pit that used to be a lake.
"Now if you'll excuse me," The Hunter flashed to Zabuza's side, picking him up and slinging him over his shoulder. "I must dispose of the body."
Frowning, Kakashi took a step forward. "Now hold on just a sec-"
The Hunter nin shunshined.
"Damn...!" The scarecrow muttered.
Naruto fell to one knee.
"Naruto...?" Sakura questioned uncertainly.
"Dobe?" Sasuke grunted.
"Are you alright, Naruto-chan?" Kakashi called, squatting at her side, ebony eye concerned.
Tazuna looked incredibly confused, and pale.
Panting, the redhead scowled, ignoring her teammates and Sensei.
Her blood clones returned to her side, sealing the scroll containing the blood lake into her back.
"Boss, you don't look so good..." One of them murmured.
"Probably just anemia." The other offered.
'Apparently, I'm still weak... Looks like I'll have to pay Danzo a visit after this mission...' Naruto thought. 'I'll never use the word hate lightly, but that decrepit cripple isn't good for anything but power.'
She smirked.
'Stupid old cripple. I will not be manipulated again...'
Kakashi caught her as she dropped in a dead faint.
-I am so sorry my fight scenes are so atrocious. T^T
- The scissor blade is inspired by Ryuko from Kill la Kill's Rending Scissors. I don't own any of these. (You should look 'em up because I was terrible at describing them).
-Bloody Needles is totally Crona Gorgon's attack (to which and whom I do NOT own).
'Til next time.