Title: Whirlpool of Love
Beta reader: xxShadowheartxx
Author: TheRoadrunner
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto
Chapter X – The third party
Uchiha assembly room (approximately 30 minutes prior to the coup d'état)
"Fugaku-sama, you wanted to be informed when Itachi-san returned," an Uchiha member reported, bowing his head in front of his clan's leader.
"That's very good news. Fetch him! I want to speak to him immediately," Fugaku ordered, grinning from ear to ear.
"Hai, Fukagu-sama," the Uchiha responded and vanished through the wide portal at the end of the large room. Fugaku was standing on a podium at the end of the assembly room, thinking about his clan's glorious future … and his own. Engrossed in his thoughts, he didn't notice Itachi's arrival until the same called him.
"Ah Itachi, you're back, alive and well. Tell me, how did you kill him?" The clan leader asked eagerly.
Itachi remained silent for a few seconds before he dropped his weasel-like ANBU mask. "Neither did I kill nor attack him," he answered, emotionless.
Fugaku grimaced after hearing his son's insubordination and shook his head. "Itachi, you're a failure, like your mother and your brother. You three are much too influenced by the Yondaime and his family. It seems it was a grave mistake to put my trust in you. You can't see the Uchiha clan's proper place. And with that, you lose all your worth for the clan."
"I see. Ultimately, it is you who can't see our clan's place. To preserve our clan … and our family … I will kill you!" Itachi said. Activating his full matured Sharingan took only a blink of a second, then he unleashed a volley of deadly shuriken on his insane father, which were stored in two seals on his wrists. The storm of sharp metal flew directly through the Uchiha clan's leader, embedding themselves on the wooden wall behind him.
"Useless," Fugaku muttered, bored by the poor attempt to kill him.
"Genjutsu? How?" Itachi thought, nervously. He never expected to be trapped in one, as he was nearly the best Genjutsu user in his clan. Nearly. "Shisui!"
"That's right, my dear friend. You were trapped in my Genjutsu as soon as your miserable feet stepped in this room," Shisui explained, after flickering to Fugaku's right.
"Shisui-kun proved to be a reliable person. He will have a big future, unlike you," Fugaku smirked and placed a hand on the shinobi to his right.
Before the clan leader could say another word, a new Uchiha member stormed into the assembly room and said, in between his grasps for breath, "Fugaku-sama! I was on station on the south border as the Hokage's personal … *pant* … ANBU squad crossed our checkpoint. The Yondaime looked like shit ... like a really old man. I didn't nearly recognize him. The ANBUs were frantic and rushed to the hospital. We should report everything unusual today, so I left my post."
"Well done! You will be rewarded for you service. We will commence with the operation as planned," Fugaku said, his good mood from before returning instantly, "and Shisui, you may dispose of this traitor."
"I won't let you go!" Itachi shouted and lunged for another attack with his shuriken, but was unsuccessful again.
"You won't be able to leave that room until you've killed me, and thus, escaping the Genjutsu I placed upon you. Give up, Itachi. You cannot win," Shisui reasoned, while Fugaku and the now terrified Uchiha messenger left the room.
"Then I guess don't have another choice but to cut through you," Itachi stated, while drawing the katana on his back.
In front of the Uchiha assembly hall
"Fugaku-san, we have heard from the Yondaime's demise. The high council is very pleased. We took the liberty to round up every capable Uchiha," a council member announced.
The clan leader nodded, content with the sight in front of him. Over 180 battle-capable members of his clan stood there. It was a rough mix, consisting of: normal Shinobi, members of the Konoha Keimu Butai [Konoha Military Police Force] and a few ANBUs.
Inside the crowd, Kimiko was being interrogated by one of her best friends, "Kimi-chan, what's going on? Your father is in the council. You should know something!"
"I'm as curious as you, Yui-chan. He's left me totally in the dark," Kimiko shrugged, stopping their conversation when the noise around them decreased. She looked forward, and saw their clan leader standing on a makeshift podium.
"My fellow clansmen and clanswomen, we have gathered here today to announce the beginning of a new era for our proud clan. You may not aware of it, but Konoha's higher echelons suppressed our clan's growth since this very village's founding. Today is the day we will take what should have be our to begin with. We will shatter the shackles of suppression and injustice!" Fugaku spoke, while gesticulating to increase his propaganda's effect. A/N: Presently, the Uchiha clan is utmost chauvinistic. It's normally that Fugaku would address men before women.
At first, only a few Uchiha's in the crowd shouted enthusiasticly. However, one by one, they all joined the cheering to avoid attracting attention. Little did they know, that the few enthusiastic ones were especially chosen and instructed.
"As we speak, our finest shinobi had already attacked the master behind the present's plan to enslave our rights and freedom! The Yondaime Hokage is dead!" The clan leader announced.
"Kimi-chan, what's going on?" Yui asked nervously.
"I don't know, though I'm sure I won't like where this meeting's leading to," Kimiko answered, slightly uncomfortable.
"Every one of you will be assigned to a squad with an unique mission. Tomorrow, the Uchiha clan will be ruling over Konohagakure as it is our birth right. Make our clan and our descendants proud," Fugaku finished his speech and rose his fist towards the sky. Hearing the chants of the Uchiha's great name was like music in his ear. His thoughts drifted away to the life he would lead from tomorrow on. Uchiha Fugaku, great Godaime Hokage of Konohagakure, revered Leader of the even more revered Uchiha clan.
But before he forgot it, he had a sort of a special mission to assign. He walked to the nearest commanding officer, instructed with the assignment and deployment of their squads, and asked, "I need four people for a secret mission."
The officer flipped through his notepad, filled with the many names of the present Uchiha. "If it is such an important mission, I can create a squad, consisting of two ANBU and two Jōnin. Though, we will miss those forces elsewhere."
Just at that moment, a group of three Uchiha strolled past them. Fugaku found the trio very curious. The first one complained about the lack of food at this meeting, whereas the second one tried to feel up nearby Uchiha kunoichi, unsuccessfully. The last one, well he was plain crazy, as he was babbling about the Uchiha clan's bright future, reciting the propaganda from two minutes ago.
Fugaku smirked and pointed his finger towards the trio and ordered, "I want them."
The officer scratched his forehead and looked unsure about his leader's choice, "Do you really want them? They are the worst scum, a stain on the reputation of our proud clan. The middle one was even indented in consequence of sexual assault. That poor girl was even an Uchiha."
"They are fine, perfectly fine. Assign them a squad commander and give them this envelope. Everything is explained inside," Fugaku ordered, giving the officer the envelope, who just shrugged and proceeded with his task.
"Everything went according to my plan. Maybe those three idiots may be able to kill that dreaded woman and Namikaze's boy. Maybe only one of them … And should they fail, I can't say it will be huge loss for the clan. A typical win-win situation!" The clan leader thought, while he watched the first squads move in to battle.
Back to present time
Yugao opened her eyes, slowly, seeing dust and plaster fluttering from the ceiling. She also noticed the weight on her back, which pinned her down to the ground.
"Where we are, and what happened?" She asked, dumbfounded. She had been completely sure, both of them would die there.
Naruto rose up to his feet and observed the familiar room they were in. Yugao stood up too, patting the thick layer of pulverized plaster away, which stained her stark black pants. Seeing the curious look in her eyes and the tilting of her head, he gave her the explanation she asked for, "That's a secret room in my home's basement. It was especially fortified, at fact that saved our lives."
She looked around, astonished by the various items in the room. "There are so many weapons in here, sufficient to conquer a small country. What is in these scrolls?" The purple-haired kunoichi asked, curiously.
"Those are part of my mother's stuff, or you can say her legacy. Theories about sealing techniques no 'normal' mortal would be able to understand. Regarding the weapon, and it's for these, that we are actually here in the first place," Naruto explained, weighting a three-bladed kunai with a sealing tag in his hand. "This guy was also the reason we survived the explosion. It has my own specified technique formula imprinted."
Yugao gasped after digesting the latest information. Not only was the room filled with several crates, containing dozens of the Hokage's customized kunai, but Naruto was actually capable of performing the legendary Hiraishin no Jutsu.
"I didn't know that you were able to perform-" Yugao admired, but was interrupted by Naruto's interjection.
"And it's utmost crucial that nobody learns of it. I have a plan, though it would only work if we have the moment of surprise. The most concentration of the enemy's forces are around the Hokage tower. However, the area is vast and open, normally a good place to use the Hiraishin to its fullest. Sadly, we have only three backpacks with customized kunai, barely enough to cover the area for one attack," Naruto argued, throwing the backpacks to Yugao, who caught them, dumbfounded.
"But … the other ones? Can't we use them?" The kunoichi asked, while she threw two backpacks about each shoulder.
"That's not possible. They are wearing my father's marking and wouldn't work for me. I had to place my own tags on them, though that task would take few hours. We will be fine, I promise," the blonde reassured and placed his hand on Yugao's arm, transporting both of them outside via the Space–Time Ninjutsu. A/N: You can assume that Minato and Naruto had placed some tags around their home.
With grief, he looked at what was left of his home. A few scorched timbers and a mass of cinders indicated where a wonderful home had stood not even thirty minutes ago.
"Let's go, Cat," the, now homeless, blonde announced, turning away from the remnants of his childhood place.
"Wait, why do I have to carry all these bags?" Yugao asked, puzzled.
"Huh? That was the sole reason I took you along," Naruto said, putting his trademark grin on his face.
"Well, thanks," the purple-haired ANBU deadpanned.
After executing a brutal speed run, Yugao and Naruto were able to reach the area in front of the Hokage tower in less than three minutes. They took cover on a nearby roof, observing the battle that took its place on the plaza in front of the famous administrative building.
"Tell me what you see, Cat," Naruto asked, totally perplexed.
"I … I don't know. What the hell is going on? Those guy's are definitely member of the Root division," Yugao answered, equally puzzled.
"Then tell me, why are they attacking both the Uchiha and our forces?" He asked, tilting his head to better show his confusion.
"Sorry, Naruto-sama. I've no idea," the kunoichi admitted.
"Naruto-sama?" he asked, amused.
"Well, you're capable of using it. I thought it would be inappropriate to refer to you otherwise," she reasoned without revealing any hint of the technique itself.
"I'm Naruto. I don't want to be called otherwise. At least not from my comrades, who are going through hell with me. Those people who are speaking with me only for their own gain, well they are allowed to break their tongues," the blonde argued.
"I understand, Naruto," Yugao said, surely smiling behind her mask. She surprised how their supreme leader's son turned out. She had seen him often since her appointment to the Hokage's personal squad eight years ago and noticed the dubious people who tried to affiliate with him to get closer to the Hokage and his wife. Regarding the situation Naruto turned out to be utmost grounded.
"Danzo isn't doing anything without purpose. He never does. He might just want to exploit the overall confusion to take the hat for himself," Naruto theorized grimly.
The female ANBU gasped after hearing the heavy accusation of treason. "And what will we do now?"
"First of all, I am going to confirm my theory. If I am right, then they should be very eager to see me," the blonde grinned.
"I'm Namikaze Naruto, under the authority of the Yondaime Hokage, cease your fighting at this instant. Otherwise, you will be regarded as traitors and will be treated accordingly," Naruto shouted, never backing down or searching for cover while kunai, shuriken and other forms of weaponry flew through the air, missing his head only by inches.
One Root ANBU turned around, charging at the blonde shinobi with a tantō (short sword) in his hand.
"You are performing a serious crime by assaulting a fellow shinobi of Konohag-" Naruto warned, but couldn't finish his sentence, when the ANBU thrust the small sword at his left breast, effectively piercing his heart. Though no blood escaped from the wound and in a second later the Naruto replica exploded in a cloud of smoke.
"Well?" Yugao asked.
"It seems I was right. We will execute our plan as discussed," the blonde responded and shook his head.
"Cat!" A new voice shouted and landed beside the duo on the roof.
"Eagle! Shouldn't you be with Kushina-sama?" Yugao asked, bewildered by the appearance of her ANBU colleague.
"We had encountered no problems so far and Kushina-sama insisted on sending me away to support the main battle at the Hokage tower," Eagle explained.
"My blabbermouth of a mother. I bet she pestered you until you're gone voluntarily," Naruto sighed, receiving a mild nod from the ANBU. "But you can help us, here."
"What can I do?" Eagle asked eagerly.
"I want that you deliver a message to the commanding officer of our shinobi, there," Naruto said, pointing at a couple of loyal shinobi while they tried to defend the area around the Hokage tower. "They're ordered to fall back slowly. Deliver the message and take four shinobi with you to support Cat with her task," he formulated the order to him.
After a simple nod, eagle jumped from the roof to execute his orders. Naruto was content with the ANBUs around him. They didn't ask those stupid questions he would have certainly receivied, if a group of Chūnin would have followed him. He returned his gaze at the noisy battle 200 yards [~180 meters] away.
"I'll draw them closer, we have only this one chance," Naruto announced, rising from his feet to engage the vicious three-party battle in front of him.
"Naruto!" Yugao shouted, "Don't you dare die!"
The blonde turned his head and smiled at her, "I don't plan to … because after this, I've got to take care of a certain person."
"Achoo!" Kushina sneezed and rubbed her nose, earning some comical glances of the shinobi around here.
"What's wrong? We have a village to evacuate. Don't slack off!" The redhead warned, while a crimson blush warmed her face because of the unwanted attention.
Right now, Kushina was supervising the evacuation of the civilians. Her familiar presence alone gave the people the necessary hope, that their beloved home would still exist in the next day. The overall evacuation progressed at a steady pace, but not as fast as Kushina had planned for. The village's shelters were from the time of the revered Sandaime Hokage back when he had commanded the Hidden Leaf. A lot of things happened since then. Under Minato's rule, the village prospered beyond recognition and the population increased vastly. The sheer amount of people, fearing for their life, was enough to overburden the capacity of the shelter's entrance.
"A plain old bottleneck wrecks the whole schedule. Crap!" Kushina grimaced, forgetting for one or two seconds to put on her most reassuring smile to calm down the people. Her deception had no ill intentions. It was rather a white lie, because a panic would surely cause people to die.
"Kushina-sama, did you really think it was wise to send Hawk away? There are only Bull and me plus four additional Chūnin to provide overall protection. I cannot promise anything if we are attacked by more than two squads," Taji expressed her concerns about the imperfect, personal resources.
"We will need only another thirty minutes before the evacuation process will be completed. I can only hope that Fugaku is the greedy man he is, then he will use the majority of his clan to conquer the Hokage tower. The civilians and the evacuation party have no real strategic value," Kushina reasoned, mostly to reassure herself, that nothing bad would happen.
Her assessment of the situation was mostly right. The high council of the Uchiha clan had never intended to capture civilians and use them as hostages. For that, their numbers of battle-capable clan-members were far to low. The evacuation party was actually useful for their overall objective, because every shinobi deployed to help with the evacuation procedure, was unable to engage the Uchiha forces in the main battle. Ultimately, she was wrong in one point and that was her own strategic value. Fugaku hated Kushina with passion, though he never showed the hostility in public places. The clan leader made the redhead responsible for 'corrupting' his wife and polluting her with peaceful ideals. To take revenge on that dreaded woman, he gave every Uchiha squad, deployed for battle, a secondary objective: Capture Namikaze Kushina, dead or alive.
And as if fate was not tragic enough on that very day, three lone Uchiha squads made it through to the evacuation area, each of them more eager than the next to execute their orders.
A/N: Chapter 10 is out and Danzo has joined the battle for the Hokage position. Chapters will be short for a while, so that I can provide weekly updates in spite of my apartment search.
For this fic, I drafted a plot, consisting of six arcs. We are currently in the middle of the second arc and there are three or four chapters needed to bring the current one to conclusion. However, I wondered about the increasing amount of favs and alerts, combined with the stagnating reviews. Right now, there are 463 favs and 351 alerts, resulting in approximately ~ 600 unique followers. Now, I did a small math and that was maybe a mistake. By 155 reviews, that would mean: 25% reviewed once and 0,03 reviews per follower and chapter. Though these numbers are not totally right, because there are a lot of anonymous reviewers. At this place I want to thank Hades252 2 because of his constant and unique reviews. I would have contacted you via pm, but you're an anonymous user, so that's not possible.
My point is, that I will take a break after the second arc and focus on another project. Though I don't want my message be misinterpreted. I don't want to bribe anyone to review in exchange for an update, because that's nothing an author should do. It's actually not very helpful to receive a simple 'good' or 'I like it' when I'm asking you what you liked and what not. It's my first project and I want to improve. Well, I better stop here. Nevertheless, chapter 11 will be published starting next week.
PS: maaka oro asked if Kushina is pregnant. I won't tell and Kushina doesn't know, because it's to early for her to tell :P
Roadrunner