Under These Scars

by Okami Rayne

Fate's changed the game but it's not over between the players. With Kusagakure's mission as the final round, Neji's agenda is finding his freedom. Shikamaru's agenda is forgetting his fear. But when an old and unfinished game threatens to pull Shikamaru back into the shadows of his past, Neji must make an impossible choice; his own destiny or Shikamaru's darkness. (Part 4 of BtB)

10. Chapter 10

Disclaimer: NARUTO and its characters were created and are owned by Masashi Kishimoto. Original characters and plot are the property of the author. No copyright infringement intended.

Title: UNDER THESE SCARS

Pairings: ShikaNeji/NejiShika, Shikaku/Yoshino, Kakashi/Genma

Rating: M / R (language, themes, violence etc.)

Genre: Drama/Angst/General

Summary: Fate's changed the game but it's not over between the players. With Kusagakure's mission as the final round, Neji's agenda is finding his freedom. Shikamaru's agenda is forgetting his fear. But when an old and unfinished game threatens to pull Shikamaru back into the shadows of his past, Neji must make an impossible choice; his own destiny or Shikamaru's darkness. NejiShika, ShikaNeji [SEQUEL to Break to Breathe]

Timeline: Shippuden. Neji and Shikamaru aged 17-18 (post-Hidan and Kakuzu arc and pre-Invasion of Pain arc) One week after the events in REQUIEM.

---

UNDER THESE SCARS

by Okami Rayne

Chapter Ten

They were trapped, front and back.

A blockade of collapsed corridor behind and a blockade of collapsed corridor straight ahead.

Neji snarled, slapping his palm up against the rubble. "God damn it!"

Based on the original schematics, there should've been another corridor straight ahead which fed into the underground tunnel leading to the bunker. Only someone had collapsed it. Hours or maybe days earlier, given that the dust had already settled.

"We're trapped," Anii whispered, a hysterical edge cutting sharply into her voice. "We're trapped! You trapped us!"

Neji turned his head, white eyes chilling her into silence. "Who else had access to this facility before the power was cut?"

Anii blinked at him, shook her head. "I…I'm just a lab tech…I don't know…" She hugged the little girl in her arms tighter, her other hand curved in a desperate clutch around the limp fingers of the boy standing in a daze by her side. "I'm just a lab tech…" she said again, tears breaking at the corners of her eyes. "Mika…Mika would've known…"

Expression taut, Neji looked to the children. They looked to him. Not with fear, not with hope or despair…not with anything. Blank faces, hollow eyes. Shock, perhaps.

Perhaps.

Byakugan veins crawling across his temples, Neji glanced up towards the ceiling, scanning the floor above. Half of it had already collapsed to block the escape tunnel, but the rest was intact; a large conference room, large enough that he might be able to blow another hole and not risk bringing too much debris down on their heads.

There's no way I can plough through the rubble ahead…

His jutsu would only serve to choke up the tunnel even more, perhaps collapse it entirely. There was no other way out of here other than up. He scanned beyond the conference room and saw shattered floor-to-ceiling windows leading out onto flat open grounds, a campus teeming with chaos and swamped with chakra. He could just about discern the hot bright glow of Naruto's Rasengan blowing holes through a herd of stampeding beasts.

It was insane out there.

Even so, we'll have to go across open ground…

Something he'd wanted to avoid. He glanced at Anii and the children and touched the mic at his throat. "Naruto, do you copy?"

White noise in his ear, a disheartening hiss. Then a voice. "This is Sai."

Neji's brow ticked upwards. Not the person he'd been expecting but any lifeline would do. "Sai, did you and Sui manage to converge with Naruto and Sakura?"

"Affirmative. Staff survivors and children have been secured in the bunkers. No sign of Ujihara."

"Any sign of Shikamaru or Katsu?"

Sai's signal buzzed out, buried under a hiss of static.

Neji cursed, angled his head sharply. "Sai, repeat that. Is Shikamaru with you?"

"Negative."

The word sank like a cold stone in Neji's gut. He tipped his head back, eyes pressed shut for a moment. He let out a breath. "What's the status report on the enclosures?"

"Electrified. We're in the process of eliminating any and all chimaeras outside of their pens. There are more than we anticipated. We're losing ground."

"Do you need immediate assistance or can you hold out?"

"Immediate assistance."

Again, not the answer he'd been hoping for. Neji pressed his lips, debating. "Give me a moment." He switched the commlink to Team B and began rummaging in his ninja pouch, speaking aloud as he began to pull out the last of his adhesive explosive tags. "Shino, do you copy?"

The answering signal was even worse; the voice that garbled through his earpiece sounded as if it were mumbling through water. "I copy. Situation is—"

"All fucked up," Kiba broke in, an abrasive burst down the line. "When the hell did kids get thrown into this bag of batshit crazy?"

More children.

Neji paused, eyes rolling up in frustration before his gaze sharpened on the ceiling, picking out points. He began to reverse along the corridor and signalled for Anii to do the same, keeping them behind him as he backpedalled. "Shino, switch to a secure line and give me a sit rep, make it fast." The last thing he needed was Inuzuka interjections.

A loud hiss of static as they both switched the commlink to a secure channel. Neji confirmed the answering buzz in his earpiece. "Copy. Go ahead."

"We've failed to infiltrate beyond point of entry."

Neji stilled in shock, his eyes swinging down blindly. "What?"

"We underestimated the scale of the fight and the environment. Schematics gave no indication of the size of the plant enclosures. They're under a cloaking jutsu. We've cleared one and have two more enclosures to cover before we converge on the vents or maintenance routes that'll lead to the basement and subbasements."

Kami above, what a setback. What a disaster. Neji shook his head, assimilating the information fast. "What's your combat readiness?"

Shino hesitated. "Some of us are wounded. All of us are capable of continuing on."

Whether that was fabrication or truth, Neji didn't have time to query. He attached the explosive tags to his last four kunai, looping them around his fingers. "How fast can you clear the remaining enclosures?"

"Depends. Do you want us to search for and evacuate these children?"

Neji froze on that, his breath halting. The question left him torn between the demands of the mission and the demands of his conscience. Their orders were to eliminate the chimaeras, locate the trade route, secure Ujihara and take captive as many scientists as possible. Nothing in the fine print about children. Sai hadn't been wrong earlier – they were a liability.

They're also innocents caught in the crossfire…

If time weren't an issue, that tragic fact might've made a difference. But the two teams weren't just fighting hostile monsters and enemy ninja – they were also fighting the clock. And the clock was winning…so were the monsters, if Sai's last update was any indication.

And we haven't even come across the Kusa-nin yet…

Their absence suggested they'd gone underground with the rest of the scientists when all hell had broken loose on the surface. Anyone left behind was left for dead and deemed expendable; security guards, staff assistants, the odd scientist who hadn't evacuated in time…

And these stray children.

Children…

Sacrifices to both sides. Liabilities. Setbacks. Obstacles.

Did they plant these children deliberately? Knowing they'd distract us from our objectives?

If such was their plan…it was working. Neji cursed, turned a tight angry circle and shot a dark look at the fading seals on the back of his hand.

We're losing more than ground…we're losing time…

And time ticked on, indifferent to the war being waged between his head and heart.

"Hyūga," Shino pressed.

Hyūga Neji. Jōnin.

That's not who he needed to be right now.

Closing his eyes, Neji felt the change as distinctly as a shift of chakra in his system. The walls went up and the wheels went round; concentric circles turning in his heart, turning in his head, dividing conscience and compassion, compartmentalising emotion in a heartbeat, setting an entirely different mind into motion.

Walls within walls. Wheels within wheels.

When he opened his eyes, they were void of conflict, still as ice. "Seal it."

"What?"

"Seal everything," he repeated, flat, cold. "Get Tenten to lock down whatever remains of the facility with her 8 Seals technique but ensure she leaves a barrier pass at each enclosure. Gather whatever children and staff you already have and avert your course back to the chimaera enclosures. Team A require immediate assistance."

There was a four count of utter silence.

"Acknowledge," Neji snapped.

Shino's voice was a thin murmur. "Acknowledged. We'll seal it. What about the basement and subbasements?"

"They aren't going anywhere. Assisting Team A is your top priority, superseding all mission objectives. Confirm you understand this."

"I understand."

"Good. I'll tell Sai you're on your way. Move now." He cut the line without waiting for a response and switched the commlink. "Sai, do you copy?"

"Yes."

"Backup is on the way. I need a clear path to the nearest bunker; I'll be exiting the left wing of the building with a woman and two children in the next minute. I could use an ink-beast entourage."

"Done."

"One other thing."

"Yes?"

"How many incendiary weapons do you have on you?"

A pause, in which Neji assumed Sai was checking.

The seconds passed like minutes.

Sai answered, "Six."

"Get more. Do it now. I have an assignment for you." Neji dropped his hand and twirled the rigged kunai around his fingers, backing up fast now, gesturing for Anii to move further down. "Go to the end of the hallway," he ordered, his voice clipped and sharp. "Do not turn that corner until I call you. When I do, be prepared to run. Go!"

Fumbling over the fear his command inspired, she hastened with the children back down along the corridor. He waited until they rounded the corner. Then he swung the kunai one by one. They lodged as a neat square in the ceiling, explosive seals flaring red.

Five…

Neji leapt back a good few feet.

Four…

He broadened his stance, slid into a braced position.

Three…

Pulled chakra into his palms, a pins-and-needles rush.

Two…

He raised his palm.

One…

The ceiling exploded.

"HAKKE KŪSHŌ!"

In the same instant that the rubble came crashing down, Neji blasted it with his Air Palm, disintegrating chunks of concrete into chalk and dust, blowing it back to clear the exit, eradicating any blockage.

"Anii!" Neji yelled, squinting through the dust.

The woman rounded the corner, came pelting towards him with the girl in her arms and the boy at her side. Neji dropped to a crouch, ordered the boy onto his back and scooped up Anii bridal style, instructing her to hold tight to the girl. Fastening his grip, he lunged off the balls of his feet, thrusting chakra into the kick. He cleared the hole, touched down on the floor above and unloaded his human cargo, shoving them into a run, Byakugan vision stretching far ahead.

"Towards the window! Go! GO!"

Ushering them on, he could see Sai's ink-beasts waiting in the courtyard, their white leonine bodies ready to close ranks around them. Beyond was the battlefield. Beyond was chaos. A campus on fire, pockmarked with Rasengan craters and chakra-punched holes, the violent BOOM of flashbomb detonations roaring over the cacophony of screams, howls and roars. Through the thick glow of chakra, wreathes of smoke and dust hung in a pall, thick and choking.

Neji's eyes cut straight through it, searching for the closest bunker.

There.

A hillock of reinforced ground with a sunken trapdoor. Naruto's clones clustered around it in an orange pack, ready to haul open the door, waving them on wildly.

Anii froze at the threshold, paper-white and shaking. "It's too far…" she blubbered. "I can't. I can't."

"You will," Neji snarled, the threat in his voice as strong as a blow. His tolerance for failure had all but bottomed out. "Now MOVE!" He raised his palm to shove her but the boy caught his hand, a desperate and reflexive movement – a child reaching out to a protector. Stunned, Neji stared down at their joined hands; felt the tightness of the boy's grip and saw the tears filming the wide staring eyes. Despite all former blankness of expression and despite the boy's best efforts to be brave, his small mouth began to quiver.

Kami…

The sight triggered a knee-jerk tightness in Neji's chest – a dangerous slipping of gears. How many children in those locked-down enclosures would be reaching out for someone to save them? Worse still, how many would die believing their fate had been determined by destiny and not by his decision to leave them?

They're dead already, said the cold voice of stillness and ice. Mission.

The walls rose higher and the wheels turned again, reeling in any and all emotion. Neji's expression closed-off entirely, along with all the exits in his mind.

There was no going back.

He shook off the clutch on his hand, grabbed the boy's arm in a rough impersonal grip and shoved Anii on ahead of him. "GO!"

They burst from the building at a dead run, straight into the war zone.

---

They fought like they'd rehearsed it, a lethal choreography. Instinct ruled the microseconds between each rapid-fire movement – every muscle, every fibre, every breath.

Everything...

At closer quarters there was no premeditated thought involved, no direction of consciousness. They waged their war on a level that went beyond the physical. Kakashi hadn't fought with this kind of heightened awareness since his run-in with Hidan and Kakuzu.

And back then, he'd been fighting for his life.

And now?

Steel flashed at the corner of Kakashi's vision, his Sharingan tomoe spinning, catching movement too fast for the human eye to track. No time to avoid, only accommodate. He twisted to redirect the hit. A fine pink mist erupted from his arm. He felt the pain only peripherally, continued on into a flurry of roundhouse attacks, lashing out with a speed that Genma matched blow for blow, blood for blood. The Shiranui foot-jammed all his kicks, returned them to the same effect.

Incredible…

Impossible. The close-quarter combat took on a timeless dimension – limbs blurring, sweat-slick bodies pushing back and forth, searching for openings, rebounding off each other, crashing again in a fury of motion.

Genma…

No. Not Genma. That creature he'd pulled out of the fiery bowels of Tanzaku. Kaika. That man possessed of a suicidal rage, an elemental chaos that flashed brighter and burned hotter than anything Kakashi threw at him.

Even the Chidori…

Chakra crackled between them, the static from Kakashi's lightning attacks having charged the air, electrifying the tension into a strong ozone burn. Black scores ripped up the floor and walls, ash and debris strewn in smoking heaps.

We can't keep doing this…we'll tear this place apart…

And each other in the process.

I have enough chakra for one more hit…two at a push…

First, he needed distance.

Then timing.

He yanked his head back from a senbon-studded fist and spun into a kick. Genma ducked low, came up behind him, feinted left and swung up fast from the right, trying to escape the Sharingan's scope.

Kakashi whipped out his arm, kunai sliding into his waiting fingers.

He spun.

They crashed.

A shower of sparks, kunai scraping.

Their wrists locked, a formidable X that shook and juddered along their arms. Kakashi flexed his fingers around the hilt of his weapon, trying to work some chakra into his fingertips. They were going numb, along with his arm – nerve points twitching, muscles bunching in a spasm.

Damn it!

Genma's feint had been a feint.

Smart.

Kakashi hissed, felt his foot sliding back through a puddle of blood, left leg losing strength. He hadn't even felt the senbons penetrate.

Genma pressed forward, lip curled in a smirk, blood dripping from the corner of his mouth. "Rules of engagement, Reiketsu. I fuck you. You fuck me. All's fair in love and war, right?"

Kakashi clenched his jaw, fighting to keep a clear head.

There's only one way to knock him out of this…

Yes. One way that could end any number of ways.

He's given me no choice…

Shaking hard against the strain of screaming muscles, he scanned the surrounding area, mismatched eyes sweeping over the collapsed roof, the smashed crates, the smouldering mountains of rice. If he had any hope of reaching Genma, he needed to go deeper than skin, deeper than flesh and bone.

He needed more than words, more than actions.

But first, I need him at his limit…

Giving his mind over to the plan, Kakashi let his leg slide back another half-inch and waited for Genma to press the advantage, giving up a quarter-inch of ground with every gasping breath, wincing for effect.

Just as he'd predicted, Genma drove forward.

Perfect.

Instead of shoving back with his body, Kakashi rammed his head forwards and smashed his hitai-ate point-blank into the Shiranui's brow – a percussive BANG guaranteed to burst some stars behind those blazing eyes.

Stunned, Genma's head whipped back.

They broke apart, blades rasping off each other in a hiss.

Hopping back, Kakashi pivoted on his buckling leg and slammed a side-kick towards Genma's stomach, throwing some serious torque behind the blow. Hunching, Genma tucked his belly to avoid the hit – it clipped him, hard enough to take his balance.

Got you.

Just about. Just enough.

Somersaulting backwards, Genma rolled straight back onto his feet, staggering a couple of paces to his left. He grazed the back of his wrist across his forehead, dazed and blinking hard. The skin had split above his eyebrow and blood flowed freely.

Distance accomplished.

Aiming to secure that distance, Kakashi kicked into an aerial back-flip, spine curved in a graceful arch. He felt his ribs twinge sharply but carried on into the dive, suspended upside down in seconds that seemed to stretch, his eyes scanning crates before latching onto Genma. Airborne, he launched a single shuriken and flicked his fingers into a seal. "Gen'ei Tajū Shuriken!"

The lone shuriken replicated into a deadly swarm.

Cursing, Genma brought his kunai to bear and battered away the lethal stars, dodging and deflecting – but he couldn't stop them all. He took a few lacerating hits to arms and thighs that knocked him back several paces, blood spraying in thin ropes.

NOW!

Touching down on the balls of his feet, Kakashi skidded back, widened his stance and gripped his wrist, chakra igniting in a blue-white flare; lighting went ripping down his forearm, snapping and whistling in an electric frenzy at his fist.

"Why don't you pop a pill?" Kakashi taunted above the screeching crackle of his jutsu. "I'll wait."

Murder flashed in Genma's eyes, flames and fury. Flicking the blood from his fingers, the Tokujō made a rapid pattern of seals that Kakashi's Sharingan followed in slow-time, red eye widening in recognition.

That's it.

Exactly what he'd been hoping for.

Chakra flared at Genma's fists, extending into eight glowing senbons that emerged from his knuckles; as corporeal as the blades of a shuko glove. Only when these chakra-senbons hit a human body, they did a hell of a lot more damage than their smaller steel cousins.

Kanashibari…

A paralysing jutsu that could leave an enemy crippled or comatose for weeks; it'd been known to cause permanent neuralgia and nerve damage beyond the scope of medical ninjutsu. Kakashi had only ever seen Genma use it twice in his lifetime. A forbidden technique, the ninjutsu used too much chakra, cost too much energy and risked damaging nerves in the user's hands. At optimal chakra-level, Genma could hurl those things with the accuracy of his usual senbon and regenerate them four times.

Judging by the rate of our fight…he has about enough chakra for two hits…

Which gave him sixteen shots of striking true.

Kakashi only had one.

Make it count.

Genma shot forwards, arms flung to either side.

Gripping his elbow, Kakashi launched into a charge, drawing his arm back like a jousting lance, his voice ripping up out of his throat in a roar. "RAIKIRI!"

"KANASHIBARI!"

Genma swung one arm, let the Kanashibari senbons fly.

Kakashi did nothing to avoid them.

Seconds before impact, his Raikiri cut out in a blinding flash, popping away like a blown fuse – along with Kakashi's entire body. A burst of chakra, a puff of cloud – and a splintered crate smashed to the floor, obliterated by Genma's hit.

A Substitution.

The Tokujō skidded to a halt, eyes flaring wide in outrage.

Kakashi came up behind him in a lightning flicker, his kunai drawn at Genma's throat in the Silent Killing move. He swallowed hard, set his masked lips against Genma's ear and uttered. "I'm sorry, Genma."

Genma barked a dark laugh, baring his throat. "Sorry?" he uttered, pressing his neck into the blade, drawing his own blood. "You will be."

"I know," Kakashi whispered, his throat tight around the words. "But not for this." He tilted the blade away from Genma's throat, avoided the immediate elbow that slammed towards face and caught the Tokujō's chakra-barbed backhander in a steel grip, jerking Genma towards him until their mouths rested a breath apart. "For this."

Their eyes locked on those words. Kakashi's Sharingan flared wide, small black tomoe pinwheeling into a kaleidoscope of red. Genma's eyes widened, his body going rigid.

It's over.

Or at least it should've been.

Stiffening, Genma stared in blank surprise for just a moment. Then he drove his Kanashibari senbons straight into his own side, ripping through flak-jacket and flesh, the agony and shock stalling his brain, pitching it out of the genjutsu and back into reality.

His scream of pain bounced off the walls in an acoustic shatter.

Stunned, Kakashi staggered back, the shock sheeting a cold sweat across his face. It took him a dazed second to realise he'd been clipped by the blow. His eyes dropped down to the gaping wound in his left thigh. It'd just missed the femoral artery.

My god…

Either the nerves had been damaged or he was in shock because he couldn't feel the pain…just watched the blood pump in thick streams. He was pretty sure he could see the yellow-white of bone.

This is madness…

Head snapping up, he watched Genma stagger sideways. He must've been in agony. But even so, the stubborn bastard wouldn't fall. Fuelled either by drugs or pain, he launched forward, a kunai flashing in his grip.

Kakashi had just enough presence of mind to bring his own blade to bear.

They crashed into another deadlock, went skidding back through blood and splinters.

Genma laughed, a hysterical edge shaking in his voice. "Hurts like a bitch." In an instant the amusement left his eyes, a feral rage stealing over his voice. "That bitch. What did you offer her? The same pity fuck you offered me?"

Eyes pinching, Kakashi shook his head, sweat and blood flying from silver-white strands. The fight was going out of him faster than the blood sluicing down his thigh. "Tanzaku…I won't let that happened again…"

Genma paused, jerked his head back. For a fleeting moment, something passed behind those bronze eyes; a shadow of something less destructive than the fire and less consuming than the flames.

A shadow of something sadder…

Something softer…

Something gone too soon…

Genma turned his head, spat blood. When he looked back, the shadow was gone. He leaned in, grinding their kunai until sparks flew from the steel, his voice a cruel murmur. "In what world could you ever hope to save me, Nakamagoroshi no Kakashi?"

Nakamagoroshi. Friend-killer…

The word tore through Kakashi's chest, a screeching Chidori straight through his heart.

"K-Kakashi…"

Rin…Obito…

He faltered, in body and in mind.

Genma took advantage.

A sharp sudden twist and Kakashi felt his forearm and wrist wrenched into a joint-lock that sent a hot spasm screaming along his arm. Arching at the pain, he left his flank wide open. Genma's foot smashed into his bruised ribs and the impact wrenched them apart.

Blood arced into the air, tiny ruby droplets.

Kakashi crashed back against a stack of crates, heard the dry snap of wood and felt a hot flash of pain ripping into his bicep, inches of splintered board slicing into the muscle. His left leg buckled in a numb fold and he had no time to work his arm free.

Genma's fingers knotted into his hair.

The Shiranui slammed the left side of his face up against the opposite crate, keeping his Sharingan at a distance. Leaning in with one arm cupped around his torn side, Genma spoke low and icy in Kakashi's ear, punctuating every sentence by pressing him deeper into the splinters. "You couldn't save Obito. You couldn't save Rin. You couldn't save Itachi. And you couldn't save Sasuke. Come on sensei. What's our lesson?"

Blood snaked down Kakashi's temple, blinding his left eye. It slipped, hot and wet, over his cheek – streaming like bloody tears. Inside, he could feel a different kind of bleeding; a different kind of pain. Shattered ornaments…broken shards of hurt and regret slicing so deep he picked up the razor pieces and turned the same weapons on Genma. "You ought to know," Kakashi growled back, the words like glass in his mouth. "You graduated from the same class with Team Yōkai."

Genma froze on those words, his body stiffening against Kakashi in a single sharp breath. He pulled back for a moment, not blinking, not breathing.

Kakashi glanced out the corner of his grey eye, met that stricken gaze and went straight for the jugular. "Karibi. Naoki."

Genma's expression broke on the last name. And then he howled. A full-throated roar of such uncontrolled fury it hit Kakashi harder than the blow across his jaw, a blow that buckled teeth in their sockets and might've cracked bone.

He felt the skin split, blood soaking his mask.

Genma ripped him out of the crates and threw him across the floor. Kakashi rolled with the momentum, came up on one knee and spun. Genma's foot snapped towards his face. He caught the Shiranui's ankle and gave a savage twist that took Genma's balance. Sweeping out his other foot, Kakashi knocked the Tokujō's standing leg out from beneath him.

Genma dropped hard, twisted on his hip and kicked out.

Kakashi danced out of range, canting slightly on his useless leg, his elbow tucked hard against his side. His eyes narrowed on Genma. "You couldn't save your comrades any more than I could save mine."

Another scream.

Senbon flew from Genma's fingers, along with sparks of blood.

Kakashi jerked his body into an awkward butterfly twist, felt a needle skim his temple. His leg couldn't support his landing. Just as he buckled, Genma rushed him – no finesse but plenty force. The sheer adrenalin-fuelled power behind the bull charge drove Kakashi backwards.

His back hit the brick in a solid SMACK, knocking him breathless.

Genma's bloody hands went around his throat.

Immediately, Kakashi dropped his chin, pinning the Shiranui's thumbs and thwarting the choke. Their eyes locked and Kakashi saw the fever burning black behind Genma's eyes, hot dampness sheeting over the flames.

"No more," the Shiranui uttered, his voice ragged and breaking in his throat. "No one plays with the memories of my team." He gulped a shuddering breath that ran the length of his arms right into his twitching fingers, clamping his grip harder around Kakashi's throat, teeth clenched as if in agony. "The memories of my dead; the memories of my LIFE! Say her name again and I'll rip out your tongue. Say his name again and I'll kill you…god, I'll kill you."

Even with the blood pounding in his head, Kakashi felt the impact of those words ramming straight into the heart of him. And in that instant, clarity came like a knife,cutting away all the confusions and all the complications that Kakashi had allowed to blind him to the clear and simple truth.

Kami…

Those weren't bridges of friendship he saw burning behind Genma's eyes…they were the broken bones of an emotion, a feeling, a bond that should never have been. ANBU would never have condoned it. The higher ups would've crushed it, snuffed it out it. Only they hadn't had the chance because Naoki had supposedly died…leaving Genma to go up in flames, seeking darkness because his light had been stamped out in the cold hard earth.

Why didn't I see? All this time…

In the madness of this moment it all made so much sense. Why Genma had gone into a tailspin at aged 19 – the age he'd lost his team. Why Minato-sensei had taken a personal interest in his training, his recovery. Why Genma had said nothing to Asuma when the Sarutobi had confronted him, choosing to protect the dead over the living because Naoki wasn't just his old ANBU partner.

He was his lover…

Kakashi's eyes flared in shock. "Genma. Naoki is—"

Roaring, Genma yanked him from the wall and slammed him back against a low crate, bending Kakashi backward over the wood. Fighting for balance, Kakashi kept his hands locked at Genma's wrists, his heart thundering in his chest. He couldn't get a toehold. At least not physically. Psychologically, however...

His eyes narrowed on Genma, blood crusting his lashes. "Naoki…" he choked out, his voice a dry scrape. "...isn't…dead…"

Something cracked. In Genma's eyes, in his face…maybe in his head too. It wasn't a neat crack either; it was a messy splintering of emotion. But before Kakashi could register his mistake, his body was snapped upright and slammed to the ground with such back-breaking force his world washed white with pain, threatening a sudden topple into darkness.

A blow to the jaw yanked him back.

Genma knotted his fingers into Kakashi's flak-jacket, hauled the copy-nin half-upright and went at him again and again with his other fist, red-eyed and relentless, tears and blood streaking his gaunt cheeks. "I'll KILL you!" Genma screamed, the tendons in his neck straining, his face twisted in a rictus of pain and fury. "I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU, KAKASHI!"

In that moment, Kakashi believed it. Wondered, in some sad and broken corner of his own mind, whether this type of death is what he deserved…given all the friends he'd lost. All the friends he'd left behind.

"In what world could you ever hope to save me, Nakamagoroshi no Kakashi?"

What world indeed. A world gone red with splashes of hot bright colour bursting behind his eyes, his mouth filling with the taste of blood. This was the world he knew. The world that always lay just behind the gloss of that half-moon smile, that half-moon mind, that consciousness slipping towards a total eclipse.

"You just pull this shit outta your ass, don't you?"

Asuma. A sobering light blowing back the black, washing over the red, a flurry of friends and faces shattering through all the those cold and nameless ANBU masks hanging like ghosts in the back of his mind; Asuma, Kurenai, Gai, Yamato, Naruto, Sakura…

"In what world could you ever hope to save me, Nakamagoroshi no Kakashi?"

In a world that still held those faces; still held those friends...

And I'm not losing anyone else.

Kakashi's eyes snapped open and his hand shot up. He caught Genma's swinging fist in his palm, fingers folding around the red knuckles in a violent grip.

Genma stiffened, jolted by the abrupt halt to his violence.

Kakashi tightened his grip, gazed up through blood-soaked lashes at the man crouching over him…and saw the tears and the madness in his friend's eyes. But somewhere just beyond that madness, just past the murderous fire from all those years ago, Kakashi saw shadows moving once again; those faint wisps of emotion fighting to put out the flames.

"I can't…" Genma choked out, the broken words falling in pieces from his quivering mouth. "I can't…do this again…not again." He laughed, a hollow shivering sound, the tears breaking from his eyes. "He died…he died…"

Kakashi's brows pulled together softly, his grip loosening around Genma's fist. The Tokujō sagged onto his knees, the strength going out of him in a ragged breath. He buried his head in his hands, began to rock. "Please…please…"

That word. That word which Genma never spoke except in dreams, falling from his lips like a tattered prayer. Over and over. A blade into Kakashi's heart, twisting deeper with every chant.

Swallowing thickly, Kakashi drew a breath to speak.

He never got the chance.

The door to the storehouse exploded inwards.

---

The explosions shook the world, rearranged the landscape and turned the tide of the battle. Neji felt it in the smoke-choked air, an inexorable rush of strength and triumph amongst the Konoha-nin. They were finally making some headway.

Six beast enclosures down.

One more pen to go.

The last one, stationed at the far left edge of the battlefield. He needed to reach it fast, eradicate the last of the chimaeras. Time was still against them.

Mission. Mission. Mission.

He was the mission; it was all that filled his mind. The aftershocks of the explosions echoed away around him, lost beneath the sound of his own heartbeat, lost beneath the screams of maimed chimaeras.

Finish it. Finish it.

Neji spread death like an infection, eating up the battlefield, leaving carcasses behind. He cut through the pall as streamline as a blade, dashing in and out of the ruptured enclosures while the Nagu dropped Tenten's firebombs from the watchtowers, obliterating the pens.

Death. Death. Death.

"CHHHAAA!"

The earth rose up like a wave.

Leaping high, Neji rode the crest smashed up by Sakura's punch and hit the ground running, lashing out at a monster and catching it across the thin scaly neck. Blade bit bone, tearing through gristle and flesh. The beast dropped and Neji kept on, weaving his way around a swarm of Shino's insects as they descended on a cluster of fire-breathing monsters.

Death. Death. Death.

He brought it again and again, launching over Rasengan potholes, picking off fallen chimaeras one-by-one, seeing past the choking curtain of dust and earth, seeking out beasts that sought an exit.

Neji cut them off at every turn.

I will not fail.

Gods but they'd come so close. Too close. They'd been desperate, at the point of being overwhelmed. And then Team B had arrived, turning the chimaeras triumph into gruesome death throes.

"GATSŪGA!" Kiba tore past him in a whirlwind of chakra, ploughing into a flock of winged beasts struggling to lift their gruesome bulks off the ground.

Designed to fly.

Destined to fall.

The thought sent a chill through him, along with the bloody feathers swirling in the dust. The sharp plumes cut across his face as he dashed past, drawing pinpricks of blood. He didn't slow, not for a second, carried on in a bee-line towards the last enclosure.

Closer, closer…

A herd of rhino-headed bison came thundering out of a smoking pen, shaggy pelts on fire, chakra flaring from their thick yellow horns. Some of the beasts got caught in the collapsed mesh, electrocuted into a spasm of cooked flesh while others broke the line, trampling over their dying companions, stampeding towards Neji.

He didn't need to avoid them.

A streak of long pale hair flashed at the corner of his vision. "Hold your breath, Neji!"

Ino.

Neji turned his head in time to see the kunoichi springboard off Chōji's giant-sized hand into an aerial spin, scattering rose petals from a sliced confetti pouch. "KIBAKU HANA!"

The flowers turned to fire.

It rained down on the beasts in an explosive shower, burning through hide and blowing off horns, scattering their charge. Fumes filled the air, purple and poisonous. Holding his breath, Neji raced between the gaps in the chimaeras ranks, delivering the killing blows, blood splashing across his robes.

Two of Sai's ink-beasts appeared by his side, covering his flanks.

His kunai flashed left and right.

Beasts fell, choking on poison and their own blood.

Neji exited the purple haze, heard the wet pop of the ink-beasts bursting away. Glancing skyward, he spied Sai circling the battlefield, relaying progress, directing anyone caught fighting blind on the ground.

Fingers slick with blood, Neji touched the mic at his throat. "Sai! You have your target. Go now, while the others are distracted!"

"Understood."

High above the pandemonium of the battle, the great white ink-bird snapped its wings, rocketing away across the campus. An impossible order. Yet he'd just given it. Neji's heart threatened to wrench behind his ribs.

Don't.

He caught himself at the knife's edge of indecision and threw himself back into the fight, back into the black and white requirements of the mission.

Mission. Mission. Mission.

He darted past a pack of dinobirds feeding off a fallen bison. Shuriken sprayed from his fingers. Three beasts fell. Two gave chase, closing in on him, snapping at his heels.

A deafening CLAP, like the hammer of the gods.

Neji didn't have to look back to see Chōji's multi-sized palm come slamming down onto the creatures, squishing them like bugs into the blood-soaked earth. He kept on running, kept on killing, cutting down wounded beasts, a human scythe slashing from side to side.

The last enclosure loomed ahead.

Panting hard, Neji deactivated his Byakugan, preserving chakra as he neared the last stronghold, reaching for his mic. "All teams copy. I'm need assistance at the final enclosure."

Affirmatives down the line, Naruto's husky voice grating out raw and tired, "I'm on my way."

Neji slowed as he approached the electrified enclosure, scanning the tops of the fencing. No smoke billowed skyward, no sounds of chaos or battle.

But the gate was partially open, left ajar.

Frowning, Neji skidded to a halt, kicking up dust and grass. A thicket of trees lined the perimeter fencing, blocking his view. Squinting, he debated reactivating his dōjutsu but felt a warning twinge behind his eyes.

Don't push it.

He needed what was left of his chakra to finish off whatever monsters lay beyond the fence. Edging closer, he strained to detect any sound, heard nothing but his own heartbeat and the dying sounds of the battle at his back. And then he heard the rumble of charging feet. Stiffening, he shot a glance over his shoulder – and relaxed. A crowd of Naruto's shadow-clones thundered to a stop beside him, one of them wheezing hard.

"That was fast," Neji praised, waiting for Naruto to catch his breath.

Offering a crooked grin and a tilted thumb's up, the Uzumaki straightened, shaking off his fatigue. He gave Neji a sharp nod. "Let's do this."

Chakra humming in their veins, they slipped through the gate, ready to finish the fight, ready for anything…except what they found.

Neji stopped dead in his tracks.

What he saw hit him like a punch to the solar plexus.

Dust hung in a low pink mist, tincturing the air a gruesome red…and there, on the ground, strewn in a lake of blood, were the chimaeras. Huge wretched beasts possessing the powerful chests, forelegs and antlered heads of a stag combined with the feathered hindquarters and taloned haunches of a bird of prey. Their cervid muzzles, frozen in a rictus of death, revealed long canine fangs. No blood on those fangs, no breath wheezing in and out of any fallen bodies.

Dead. The entire herd. All twenty of them.

Dead.

But not just dead, demolished…destroyed.

And there, standing over them, his arms red to the elbows…was Shikamaru.

---

The blast took the storehouse door off its hinges. Genma didn't hear it. All he heard was the madness howling around inside his own head. He didn't see the figures move to fill the doorway. All he saw were wheels within wheels, walls within walls, the corridors of his mind stained black and red. So much red. All of it splashed across graffiti faces; features half-glimpsed, one part given and two parts gone.

Gone.

He heard someone calling from the other side of the walls.

"Back off Kakashi." A gruff, deep leathery voice.

He knew that voice. But like everything else unfolding, it was completely lost on him.

Lost. Gone.

Gone like the lights in his life, rising up inside him, phantoms through the fire…the fire…god, there was so much fire in his head…he could feel the heat cracking his skull…a furnace in his brain, eyes boiling in their sockets…

The walls shifted, the wheels turned.

Reality flashed, warped as a hallucination, and he saw Ibiki. Ibiki and someone else…long blond hair…raw-boned features…Yamanaka features…

No…no…

It wasn't him. He couldn't be him. Because he was gone.

"Naoki…isn't dead."

Kakashi's lies. Kakashi's Genjutsu. Hadn't he managed to break it? He'd turned his own ninjutsu on himself to shatter the illusion. He couldn't feel the blood bubbling up between his fingers any more. His blood. Naoki's blood. He could see it all again...pumping through his fingers in hot gushes...

"Shit...never enough time to do it right...to do it over. You know what I'm talking about..."

The world washed out, became fire again. Genma squinted into the blaze…and there, shifting through the orange glow of the flames, he saw silhouettes moving…shapes he didn't know morphing into shapes he knew as well as his own shadow…an immolation of everything he loved…

Karibi.

Naoki.

No…no…

In a bleeding daze, Genma staggered to his feet, reached blindly for his senbons...his mind caught between a memory he couldn't stop and a moment he couldn't see…a moment he couldn't make sense of…his vision blurring the lines between reality and reminiscence.

"Seven times down, eight times up, boys. Team Yōkai never back down." Karibi. Genma searched for her, saw green eyes and a pixie smile, smoke curling from a cigarette.

His vision washed out, washed in again. He saw Ibiki, heard him speaking. "Genma. Back down or we'll put you down."

Down? No. Never down. Because...

"We get up and we get on." Naoki. Genma staggered blindly over that memory, called out hoarsely but heard only his own voice echoing back. "Naoki!"

"Don't you dare speak that name!" A voice screamed that wasn't Ibiki. Another voice. An older voice. A voice Genma knew and didn't like. A voice that rang back to the past...a voice that'd always brought pain to his lover's eyes.

Why…why…?

Recognition struggled past the smoke of insanity, faint as the ashes and dust in the creases of his palms. Karibi's ashes. Naoki's dust…dust of Yamanaka earth and Nara land…not yet buried, not yet burned…because they'd never found Naoki's body…not the first time with ANBU…not the last time with ROOT…

A tearing in his head, in his heart.

"Naoki…isn't dead…"

For two years Genma had wondered, in the darkest saddest parts of his ruined heart, whether that was true. But it couldn't be…it couldn't be true...because if it was…

Then I left him…I left him behind…

Movement. Something – no, someone – coming at him through the flames.

"Ibiki, STOP!" Kakashi.

Kakashi…?

Why the hell was Kakashi in the flames? A protective urge shot up from the bottom of Genma's dazed mind, a sharp spike of sanity, struggling to penetrate the madness, the memories, the mistakes.

Fuck. Did I hurt him?

Made sense, didn't it? He always hurt the ones he loved.

Pain burst in his flank, a hot knifing blow to his torn side.

Sanity went out like a light.

Roaring, Genma swung his senbon-studded fist in a retaliatory strike, totally blind to his attacker – his fuses were blown, his world was dark. The pain came again and he stumbled backwards, arm around his side. He struck something solid and slid to the ground, his senses shortening out. He caught a brief flicker of Kakashi's masked face…stricken and bleeding…saw someone else gazing down at him from a distance…face dark with disapproval…phasing in and out the flames…

"You're coming with us." Again. That voice he knew. That voice he despised.

Inoichi…

Genma's lip pulled back in a sneer, a scream building at the back of his throat.

Ibiki appeared before him, a spectre ghosting in and out of his failing vision, conflict warring across that scarred face. A glint of light arced off a senbon – no, a needle. "I never wanted this," Ibiki murmured, his voice so low it barely carried, a rumble through the smoke. "You left me no choice." Was that regret in his voice?

There was a pinprick of cold heat on the side of Genma's neck.

Then there was nothing.

---

No one moved.

No one breathed.

Neji stared at Shikamaru for a long time without speaking. Ten, twenty, thirty seconds. Red was the defining colour. Through the pink mist of the slaughter, crimson and scarlet shades painted Shikamaru's body in wet glistening strokes, slipping off skin, dripping off cloth. Kami, he was covered in it…like something birthed out of chaos, out of death…

The image struck Neji on a level too deep to be named, too dark to be brought to light.

My gods…

His Byakugan activated as if of its own volition, instinctively pulling at the corners of his eyes, sharpening his vision on the scene. Chakra. Incredible chakra. Dark and strange. Hanging around Shikamaru thick as the blood mist.

What the hell happened here…?

He tried to meet the Nara's gaze, a futile effort. Shikamaru eyes, blank and staring, were fixed on his palms. His fingers twitched in a spasm, sinews and veins striping his skin. He swayed on the spot, hypnotised by the blood on his hands.

Naruto broke the silence, his voice a hoarse rattle. "Shikamaru…"

The shadow-nin blinked, his head coming up fast. He looked across to the Jinchūriki, his eyes focusing in brief recognition before cutting sharply to the side, flaring wide.

Slowed by his shock, Neji clocked the warning too late.

Byakugan orbs swinging right, he caught the scything antlers out the corner of his vision. Saw the huge horned head and the canine jaws, the chakra pumping through the beast's system, extending along the leylines of its skull into the razor tines of the antlers.

He fisted a hand in Naruto's top, yanked the other ninja out of the way.

He needn't have bothered.

The beast stopped short of its charge in a sudden spasm. Blood sluiced into the air, a red-black spurt that ripped a cervid scream from the chimaera's throat. Bewildered, Neji leapt back from the boxing hooves, watched the beast rear up on its talloned hindquarters, a thick black spike protruding from its chest.

Spike?

No. Not a spike. A shadow. A long black tendril lancing up through the chimaera's stomach and out through its chest, impaling it, immobilising it. The beast squirmed, kicked, crashed down into its death throes. The point of the shadow arced, angled and sliced through the underside of the bellowing jaw, spearing up through the mouth and into the brain, ending the struggle in an instant.

An instant.

That's how long it had taken.

Amazed, Neji's eyes flashed back to Shikamaru, rounding in equal parts shock and anger, relief and confusion. Bowled over as if to be sick, the shadow-nin had one hand extended towards the dead beast and the other clamped around his thigh, the breath sloughing in and out of his nose in long streams, lips pressed into a tight line.

Naruto gawked at him. "H-how did you—?"

The rest of Naruto's words were swallowed up in an explosive BOOM.

All three of them hit the ground instinctively.

A heartbeat later Neji felt the rumble of a shockwave rippling through the earth, the force of the distant blast bowing trees, ripping up bushes, scattering shadow and light in a blinding dust-filled haze.

Ash rained down, a grey snowfall on the red earth.

Coughing hard, Naruto crawled over to Shikamaru. "Neji, what the hell was that!?"

Byakugan eyes scanning, Neji gazed past the ruins of the chimaera pens towards the locked-down plant enclosures…no longer saw the domes…only three smoking husks…a dark mushroom cloud blooming skyward, smoke roiling thick and black.

In his mind, a small voice said, What have you done?

In his earbud, Sai's voice said, "Target destroyed."

---

The gust of super-heated wind knocked Kiba and his ninken clean out of the sky, the echo of the explosion going off like a bomb in his head.

The fuck!?

He hit the ground rolling, his jutsu shortening-out. Akamaru landed in a whump beside him, a sharp yelp cutting off in the dog's throat. Somewhere in the distance, yellow fireballs went rocketing skywards beneath umbrella clouds of dust and smoke.

Past the ringing in his ears, Kiba thought he heard someone screaming.

Ino…?

Shit. What in the hell had just happened?

Rocking onto all hours, Kiba hacked up a lungful of blood and dust and scrambled over to his fallen ninken, fear crawling up his throat and into his eyes.

Akamaru wasn't moving.

No. No. Not again…

Visions of his ninken lying at death's door years ago came flooding back. Beating back the fear, he collapsed onto his knees beside his best friend, his voice hoarse and faint. "Akamaru…Akamaru…" His heart stopped dead in his chest as he searched beneath the matted fur for signs of a pulse.

He found it – thin and shallow, but still beating.

A buzzing in his ear and Neji's voice broke through the static. "All Teams copy, evacuate the survivors from the bunkers and get them to the exit point. We're out of time."

Scowling, Kiba glanced at the back of his hand and saw the blue seal fading fast against his skin, faint as an impermanent tattoo. He gripped one of Akamaru's paws, saw the same washed-out blue turning grey against his dog's fur. "Shit."

A shadow fell across them.

Whipping out a kunai, Kiba snapped his head up, irises flashing gold. Too many smells assailed him; smoke, blood, sweat, guts, earth and scents both animal and human. Lips curled in a snarl, he squinted up through a rain of ash and smoke and saw the tall ebony-skinned, cat-eyed Nagu woman gazing down at him, her amber eyes steady and calm.

Braid Lady…

The fight went out of him and he lowered the kunai.

Another buzz and crackle in his ear, Shino's voice this time. "Kiba, do you copy? We're evacuating the scientists and children. Kiba?"

Kiba said nothing, his eyes on his ninken. His brain had stalled, his senses screaming panic. He didn't know what to do. He didn't know what the fuck to do.

"Move," the Nagu woman said.

Blinking back the sting from his eyes, Kiba glared up at her. "The hell did you just say to me?"

She didn't repeat herself. Flicking blood off her weapons, she sheathed her nasty-looking twin khukuri blades and crouched in a movement both sudden and cat-like. She shoved his hands aside. Kiba stiffened automatically but he sensed no threat in her actions, only urgency. Braid Lady touched her hands gently above Akamaru's thick pelt and cocked her head as if listening, her ponytail of dark braids swishing across her shoulder.

"His ribs are fractured," she said, matter-of-fact. "One lung is punctured. He cannot walk."

Kiba frowned at her, his heart in his throat. He swallowed hard. "Then I'll carry him."

She shook her head, cupped her palms above Akamaru's sternum and began to move her lips in a whispering flurry, speaking in a tongue Kiba didn't know and couldn't catch. A pink glow emitted from her hands, slipping between the cracks in her fingers.

Kiba went rigid. "What're you doing?"

Braid Lady shot him a dark look from beneath her lashes, but her lips still moved in that nameless tongue. The amber in her eyes burned darker. Kiba backed off, watched with sick feeling of futility as he trusted his ninken into the hands of a woman he barely knew and trusted less.

C'mon boy…wake up…

The pink light began to fade, throbbing once in a dying pulse before going out altogether. Braid Lady smoothed her hands three times over Akamaru's fur, bit her thumb and streaked her own blood over the area she'd touched.

Akamaru came awake with a jolt, his ribs rising and falling.

A ragged laugh and Kiba pressed his eyes shut, the tension rushing out of him in a great whoosh that took the rest of his strength with it, leaving the shakes behind. "Thank you," he husked, glancing up at the Nagu, his eyes rounding on her. Two of her thick dark braids were threaded with strands of silver.

An effect of her jutsu?

She sprung to her feet before he could say anything and dashed away towards the bunkers, following a silver fox that darted in and out of the smoke. Kiba watched the Nagu go, struggling to find the strength to get the hell up. Akamaru tottered onto his feet, shook out the dust and blood from his pelt and barked, nervous and afraid.

Wincing, Kiba pushed to his feet. "Okay, it's okay."

The screaming came again – a far cry from okay. Kiba turned, searched the smoke-filled battlefield and saw Ino running in the wrong direction; towards the smoke, towards whatever the heck had just been blown sky high.

God dammit…

Was chasing after her crazy skinny ass going to become a thing? Growling a curse, Kiba summoned up the dregs of his strength and started after her at a stilted run, Akamaru bowling ahead of him like a white cannonball.

Tenten shot past him on the back of one of Sai's ink beasts. "Kiba! You're going the wrong way!"

"No shit!" he roared, jogging on. "Ino!"

The little hellcat was gaining ground, leaving him in the dust. Shit. How Ino had the energy to walk let alone power off through the smoke like a god-damn race horse was beyond him. His body was calling it quits one limping stride at a time, muscles seizing up, about ready to drop him on his ass.

As if on cue, his entire body locked up, freezing him on the spot.

"The hell!?" Kiba yelped, his brain sending the signal to pinwheel for balance only to find that he wasn't in danger of collapse.

Akamaru skidded to a halt, wheeled back and barked.

Kiba tried again to move, couldn't.

SHIT!

He had no time to connect the crazy dots. Before he could register how, why or what, his body turned around and began running back the way he'd come – completely out of his control, appearing to move of its own volition.

And then he heard Ino screeching behind him. "SHIKAMARU! LET ME GO!"

Kiba's eyes flared in understanding.

Shadow Possession…

Well, at least Shikamaru was doing all the heavy lifting; there was no way Kiba would've been able to run this fast on his own. Damn, this close to collapse, he wouldn't have been able to run at all.

Used way too much chakra…

Stupid. But hey, he wasn't a strategist. He was a survivalist. Dog-eat-dog. Better him crawling around half-dead than the enemy, right? Made him wonder just how hard they'd had their asses handed to them. They hadn't even managed to reach the lower levels.

No Kusa-nin in sight…but then who the hell killed that kid?

The dagger buried in the boy's throat suggested a human attacker.

Human, huh? What kind of human murders a defenceless kid?

He heard the thunder of approaching feet beside him, looked across to see several of Naruto's clones moving to flank his right side. They were covered head to toe in soot and dirt. One was bleeding. Not a clone.

Glancing out the corner of his eye, Kiba yelled, "Yo! What the hell happened back there? What was that explosion?"

Naruto's lips pressed into a grim line, his gaze set ahead. He said nothing. Never a good sign when the loudmouth goes mute. Kiba tried to turn his head, felt the rigor stiffness of the shadow possession tighten around him.

A second later Neji streaked past without a word, careening towards the bunkers.

Naruto veered after him, picking up speed.

Kiba scowled, felt like he'd just got strapped into a child's seat under adult supervision while the rest of the team got the fast-pass treatment. He didn't like being left outta the loop, even if that loop had taken some messed-up turns towards crazy town.

Movement on his peripheral, closing to either side.

He looked across, saw Ino draw up alongside him on the left, Shikamaru on the right, making Kiba the doggie in the middle. Shikamaru must've planned it that way. Given the wildcat hiss and spit firing outta Ino's mouth, the dog-nin was the buffer between them. Nice. Smooth. Wait a second.

Kiba looked askance at the shadow-nin. "I thought you were banned from using chakra!"

Shikamaru's face was streaked with dust and lines of blood, but his eyes were sharp and clear. He shot Kiba a piercing look. "You complaining?"

"Not really."

"Then shut up. Both of you."

Taken aback, Kiba frowned but didn't push it. They'd all been hit south of the belt by these crazy chimaera curveballs. The shadow-nin had a right to be pissed. Pissed was good. Pissed was fair. Pissed was what Kiba felt in every aching fibre, along with the hot bloodthirsty urge to tear some Kusa-nin heads off – in theory, anyway. Curative chakra and a mouthful of soldier pills would be required to bounce back. Heck, if Shikamaru hadn't shadow-possessed him, he'd have been crawling his way across this wasteland…this mass field of slaughter…

The stench of it filled his nose, thicker than the smoke, the sick-sweet rot of death…

But then something else hit his senses…

Soft and barely there…

The briny smell of salt…

Blinking, he glanced across at Ino, saw the tears slipping down her cheeks, following the dried tracks left by the tears she'd shed hours before…back where they'd found that dead kid…back in the direction she'd been running…back towards the smoke and fire and…

Oh no…

In a heartbeat, Kiba understood…and the understanding left him cold to the bone.

---

The technicolor-haired receptionist was doodling hearts on her yellow pad when Ibiki walked into the waiting room with no intention of waiting. He went straight for Dr Mushi's door.

"Excuse me!" the girl blustered, shooting to her feet and shoving her bright red rhinestone glasses up into her hair. "Do you have an appointment?"

Ibiki stopped, turned his head and cracked a slim icy smile. "I have a condition. And I'm off my medication."

She gawked at him, her wide crystal-blue eyes darting between the solid mahogany door and the solid 6'3ft mass of leather-wrapped nutcase. Ibiki held her gaze, radiating stone-cold crazy with a killer's smile.

He glanced at her nametag. "Sit down, Kimiko."

She sat back down slowly, the skin along her arms raised in a chill.

Ibiki gave a fractional nod. "Good. Stay there."

Without a backward glance he slammed open the doors to Mushi's office, found the mantis-faced shrink at his desk, settled in the cushions of his leather chair with a delicate white teacup half-raised to his lips. The doctor froze, his eyes widening on Ibiki in a brief flash of alarm and consternation. Then his expression went blank. "Kimiko?" he called with impressive calm, setting his cup down.

Ibiki closed the door behind him and locked it.

Mushi sucked a breath to speak, but Ibiki held up a gloved finger in warning. He put his ear to the wood. No sound at all from outside. Soundproof. Encouraging. Not that he thought there'd be much screaming. He'd come for blood, not torture.

Mushi sat very still. "Morino Ibiki," he said quietly. "Is there something I can help you with?"

Ibiki's eyes went to the right side of the room, towards the panels Genma had described back in the interrogation room. "This can go two ways," he said. "Both ways end with me getting what I came here for. The first way will be painless. The second way..." he let the threat hang, his gaze swinging back to the doctor.

A fine sheen of sweat broke out across Mushi's brow, but other than a drop in pallor his face remained remarkably still. He sank a little deeper in his chair, his right shoulder dropping a fraction, fingers no doubt edging towards the panic-button beneath his desk.

Ibiki gave a cold smile. "Those are some dangerous thoughts you're having, doctor. Do you honestly think they'll get through that door faster than I'll get across that desk?"

Mushi swallowed, brought his palms calmly into view and folded them atop the desk. "I'm sure I don't have to tell you how many rules you're in violation of, Morino-san. This breach of code is both unprofessional and unethical."

Amusement flashed dark and bright in Ibiki's eyes, his chuckle rolling across the silence of the room in a deep base rumble. He approached the desk, splayed his palms against the glossy polished wood and looked down into Mushi's chalk-white face.

"Breach of code only applies to those who follow the rules," Ibiki said, whisper soft. "On any other day, we could've had a nice long chat down in T&I about ethical professionalism. I'd be interested to hear all about your extracurricular activities down in the belly of the beast that we above the surface like to call ROOT."

A flicker of panic across those insect features and Mushi squinted at him warily. "What are you talking about?"

"Don't be coy, doctor. Inoichi-san told me everything. About Yamanaka Naoki. About Shuken being alive." And here, the amusement guttered out of Ibiki's eyes, leaving behind a darkness no ANBU mask could ever hope to hide. "Keeping that secret from the Council was your first mistake. Seeing Nara Shikamaru behind their backs was your second."

Mushi was sweating hard now. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"You know my reputation," Ibiki said. "You know what they say about my state of mind, don't you doctor?" Mushi's eyes flitted across the scars on Ibiki's face. He said nothing, but his fingers flinched when Ibiki leaned in closer, casting the doctor entirely in his shadow. "You have a file on Nara Shikamaru. You're going to give me that file or I'm going to start breaking things in your delicate little body that won't ever fit back together again quite the way they should."

A new kind of fear filled Mushi's eyes, only it wasn't quite the horror Ibiki had been expecting. It came tinged with a pinch of anger, a hint of self-righteous indignation burning hot across the doctor's cheeks. Mushi shook his head vehemently. "What you ask is illegal."

"What you did was illegal," Ibiki countered, sliding his fingers along the desk to take up a slim bronze letter opener, stroking his thumb along the point. "The Sandaime forbid you from taking on any Nara shinobi other than Nara Shikaku – isn't that right?"

Whatever colour had risen in Mushi's cheeks drained out again, leaving his skin ashen and waxy. He shook his head again, slower this time. "You don't understand. I didn't…it wasn't…" he stopped to gulp some air and smoothed his hands across his desk as if he could straighten this all out with a few choice words. "That boy came to me in confidence. He doesn't even remember. I helped him. I had experience with—"

Ibiki brought the letter opener down so fast and so sudden Mushi never saw it coming.

A wet THUNK!

For two long seconds, Mushi stared in utter astonishment at the blade pinning his left hand to the desk. Two very long, very quiet, very uncomprehending seconds.

Then he screamed.

A shocked reedy wail that rang with belated pain.

Ibiki grinned like a wolf, showing teeth as he leaned in closer. "Save your explanations for the Council, Mushi. I can get you struck off the medical board faster than I can separate all 14 of the phalanges in your left hand, which I'm going to start doing in the next five seconds if you don't give me what I want."

A saner man might've bluffed on the torture front. But Ibiki had never considered himself sane. And he rarely, if ever, bluffed when it came to torture. He didn't have time to dick around with all the details. Such delays had cost him more than time…they'd cost him people.

Genma.

His fingers tightened around the end of the paper opener, wringing another screech from Mushi as the blade twisted through sinew and delicate bone. The sound of the doctor's screams were nothing compared to the soul-wrenching cries that'd ripped out of Genma's throat the second Inoichi had strapped him down back in T&I.

I can't leave him there for long…

The juice in the needle he'd shot Genma with was a fast-acting psychoactive drug; the equivalent of a chemical genjutsu – maybe worse. Right about now, Inoichi would be attempting to access Genma's mind only to find hallucinations and madness, imaginings and horrors.

Better than the truth…

Silencing that truth now meant throwing Genma under the wheels of the System. The system of lies and half-truths, letting the Shiranui get chewed up by the ruthleses mechanics of hearts and minds too cold to feel. And yet, there was a hot ball of discomfort burning in Ibiki's gut like an ulcer. A feeling he didn't profess to understand and would sooner annihilate than admit to.

Feeling…

That old fuel he used to run on…before he'd become more machine than man, trading in pieces of his soul for rusty knots and iron bolts – held together by something less to do with skin and more to do with scars, a mental hide grown thick, grown tough, grown cold to the touch.

He stared at Mushi's pinned hand…

Stared at the blood dribbling around the point where blade met skin.

Blood. Blood was all he needed to break the seal.

I don't have time for anything else…

Yanking the blade free, Ibiki delivered a backhander to Mushi's jaw which shut him up and shut him down in a single move. The blow snapped the doctor's teeth together with an audible crack, spun the little man from in his chair and saw him go face-down on the floor – out cold.

"Thank you for your cooperation," Ibiki muttered, wiping the blood off the letter opener and onto his palm.

Now for the blood seals.

Turning away from the desk, he approached the blood seal panels, unconcerned about ramifications. Not like Mushi was going to wake up and go running to the Hokage.

He'd only incriminate himself.

Indeed. Mushi's only port of call would be the Council – and Ibiki had every intention of beating the doctor to their door…that is, after he took care of Genma's latest and last ticking bomb.

Kakashi.

---

Katsu hadn't made it out.

Caught up in the fight, Neji hadn't noticed. He'd been too occupied by the safety of his own people and the completion of their objectives. He'd seen the other three Nagu on the battlefield and had simply assumed that Katsu was among them.

Never assume. ANBU – and life – have taught you better than that.

"We're not leaving without Katsu," the Nagu woman, Sui, said. She looked exhausted, but she held her ground with Yuki and Yako to either side of her. "Take your team and go. We will stay behind."

Not the kind of response Neji had been counting on.

What do you expect them to do? Abandon Katsu the way you abandoned those children?

Taking a slow measured breath, Neji took a step back physically and mentally and let his pale eyes roam the periphery of the lab facility. Sai and Naruto kept watch whilst Kiba, Ino and Shikamaru sat on the vine-choked steps whilst Sakura applied butterfly stitches to open wounds. Chōji, Tenten and Shino were busy loading survivors onto the wagons; sixteen children, four scientists and three lab assistants.

Twenty-three survivors.

One hundred and seventy-eight potentially dead given the 200 staff listed at the facility. The numbers spun in Neji's mind. Adding four Nagu to that death toll didn't inspire much confidence or faith in Sui's desire to stay behind.

But she's going to. Along with the other two…

Glancing back, Neji's gaze shifted between the Guardians, searching for weakness in the ranks. They held solid, unwavering in their conviction. No man left behind; certainly not their leader.

"You'll be trapped in here with an unknown number of hostiles," Neji reminded. "There's no telling what systems the Aikoku might've compromised or what traps they might've rigged. Let us regroup, recharge and we'll come back and search for Katsu together."

The fox-faced Yako shook his head.

Yuki measured out the barest hint of a smile and lifted her chin. "No. We stay."

Neji's jaw ticked hard, but he couldn't find fault with their loyalty, even if their logic was off. There were too many variables, too many risks. He lifted his shoulder in resignation. "You have two of our mics and our radio signal. Until we come back to complete the last leg of our mission, you'll be on your own."

Sui gave a single sharp nod. "We're always on our own. You'd best get beyond the barrier before those seals vanish completely." She turned with the rest of the Nagu and began to ascend the stairs back into the rotten bowels of the reception area.

Watching them go, Neji took a hesitant step forward, warring with the moment. It seemed so suicidal. Katsu could be anywhere in that facility. Given how much of it they'd blown to pieces, he might even be dead.

"They won't back down on this, Hyūga," Shikamaru said from his seat at the bottom of the stairway. He was wrapping gauze around his ankle. "It's a Guardian thing. Asuma was the same."

"Asuma," Ino's voice shook on the name, her watery blue eyes fixed on Chōji as he lifted a child onto the back of a wagon and coaxed another forward with gentle hands. "Asuma would never have left children behind."

Neji's chest tightened on those words, the air pressing down on his lungs. "Ino," he said, drawing her gaze towards him. "The mission."

Ino's gaze cleared and sharpened on him, her mouth twisting around the accusation so plain on her face. "Did you order it?" she asked, the words a hoarse tangle in her throat. "Did you have those enclosures rigged to blow?"

Neji held her gaze, said nothing. Now wasn't the time for this long and complicated conversation – or the lies that might be required to contain it. How unfortunate then, that his silence screamed the truth.

Kiba let out a ragged breath, his hands braced on his thighs. "Shit..."

Ino simply stared, the colour draining away from her face. "How could you?"

Shikamaru stopped wrapping his ankle and glanced up through his lashes. "You guys seriously wanna have it out with Neji over collateral damage?"

Kiba gawked at him. "The fuck did you just say? You're talking about kids, Shikamaru."

"Theoretically," the shadow-nin said, waving him off. "You don't know for sure if there were kids in those last two enclosures."

Eyes flashing, Ino shrugged Sakura off and catapulted to her feet, fists balled at her sides, glaring down at the shadow-nin. "You don't know for sure that there weren't any!"

Shikamaru barked a dark incredulous laugh and spread his hands wide, a nasty smile splitting his face. "Well done, Ino. I'm not fucking psychic. Welcome to a classic case of Situation All Fucked Up. Given our objectives, Neji made the right call."

Ino gulped a breath to retaliate but Neji came between them, slashing a hand out to terminate the topic. "This isn't open for discussion."

"It was the wrong call, Neji," Ino spat, eyes blazing blue fire. "You know it was."

Steeling himself against those words, Neji gave a single shake of his head. "No it wasn't."

"How do you—"

"Because I saw it," Neji lied, the lines of his face as cold and unreadable as his voice. "I saw the area. I cleared it. I gave the order. That's my prerogative. Yours is to follow my orders. Not to question them. Not to doubt them. We do what is necessary to complete the mission. That's what we do."

Ino searched his face for a long moment, her lips pressed in a thin trembling line. "Don't lecture me on what we do. You're not my sensei, Neji. My sensei taught me what we do. And part of what we do is consider the generations left behind."

"Yeah, in our own damn village," Shikamaru said, his voice blunt, his gaze pointed as a blade. "These kids aren't children of the Leaf. They're pawns on someone else's board and we just got seriously played."

"And that makes it okay to write them off?" Ino choked out, her voice a shivering whisper that climbed in pitch and volume with each word, drawing attention from the rest of the team. "To treat the innocents like crossfire victims and not give a damn? To turn a blind eye? That's not what Asuma taught us, Shikamaru! That's not what he—"

"Unbelievable," Shikamaru snarled, rising up sharply behind Neji. "Is that what you were doing back there? Following in sensei's footsteps? Going down in a blaze of glory? A little Climbing Silver last ditch effort?"

"Hey!" Kiba snapped, pitching his voice to a low growl so as not to carry. "How about you ease off that nerve?"

"How about you mind your own goddamned business," Shikamaru snapped back, his eyes cutting across to Kiba. "In fact, what the fuck were you gonna do, Kiba? Limp after her into the wreckage? Real fucking smart. Though I'll bet you weren't exactly thinking with your head, were you? Trust you to chase your dick into a deathtrap."

Kiba's face closed off, his eyes flashing gold.

He shot to his feet.

Neji met him halfway into the rise and slammed the heel of his palm against the Inuzuka's chest, knocking him back a step with a finger pinned against the dog-nin's heaving sternum. "Don't even think about it," Neji uttered, stunned by the absurdity of this moment and how fast it had escalated. He thrust out his other arm to bar Shikamaru's aggressive step forward. "You too. Back the hell off, Nara."

Shikamaru lifted his brows in an arch show of amusement before he raised his hands and took a slow mocking step back. He glanced at Ino, lips twisting drily. "See that, Ino? We call it following an order."

Ino shook her head in amazement, but the anger was gone from her eyes, leaving behind a terrible hurt and an aching confusion. "Shikamaru what's wrong with you?"

"What's wrong with me?" the shadow-nin parroted, a bitter half-laugh bursting from his lips. "You come at Neji with this narrow-minded genin-level bullshit and then you shoot me down for saving your ass? You were running into a toxic conflagration! Are you stupid or suicidal?"

"I wasn't—!"

"The hell you weren't," Shikamaru cut in, his chest slamming up against Neji's arm as he stabbed a finger over the Hyūga's shoulder into Ino's stunned face. "Do you seriously believe that protecting someone else's King wins you karmic points with Asuma? It's a little fucking late to show him what you're worth don't you think!?"

"SHIKAMARU!" Chōji roared, his voice demolishing the moment into complete and utter silence.

No one spoke, no one breathed.

The Akimichi stared between his two best friends, stunned beyond words. He wasn't the only one. All eyes turned towards Shikamaru in various levels of shock and disbelief.

A tight gasp and Ino flinched as if the shadow-nin had reached out and struck her. "You bastard," she whispered, her voice trembling on the words. She fell back a step against Sakura, shaking her head as if in a daze. "How can you say that to me?"

Swallowing thickly, Shikamaru glared back at her, eyes wide, nostrils flaring, his expression caught in a chameleon ripple between too many emotions for Neji to guess just what the hell he might've been feeling – let alone thinking – to have said something so cutting, so cruel.

He said nothing further.

Gods, as if he needed to.

Drawing a steady breath, Neji levelled Shikamaru with a cool glare over his shoulder then raised his voice to carry across the pin-drop silence. "Everyone onto the wagons," he ordered. "We move now."

---

Kakashi moved from dream to dream a memory at a time.

Rin and Itachi were running too far ahead; Obito and Sasuke were lagging too far behind. He couldn't risk reaching for one pair without losing sight of the other. He hovered, turning circles, cupping his left eye...blood slipping between his fingers. He'd lost perspective...lost the path...

He couldn't see Minato-sensei.

He couldn't see...anything.

Darkness swept in, left him drifting in and out of consciousness, phasing between the past and present until he felt his mind drawn by the warmth of distant flames, drawn to the silhouette flickering in the firelight. Silver hair, dark eyes cast deep in shadow, a bottomless sadness in place of a soul.

Father…?

The figure turned towards him, but the fire grew too bright.

I can't see you…

The light eclipsed his vision, washed out into darkness once more.

Kakashi's lashes flickered open halfway. He woke up in a room that smelled of damp brick and sterilised equipment, his eyes narrowing against the glare of artificial surgical lights slanting across the room in thick beams. He pressed his eyes shut, didn't open them again…dozed for a while…though he never drifted far. A soft whining sound kept bringing him closer to consciousness again, cutting through the fog in his head, bringing his awareness back…back…

A sharp bark.

Kakashi started at the sound, his brow furrowing in confusion.

Shiba…?

He tried to open his eyes again, managed to crack them open a sliver only to squeeze them shut when his Sharingan gave a vicious twinge. The pain shot like a skewer through his brain, radiating outwards, bringing with it the last fleeting memories of…

Shiba…Genma…the storehouse…Ibiki…Inoichi…

It had all happened so fast…then it had all cut out, like someone had pulled the plug on his brain...or jabbed a needle into his jugular.

Ibiki? Inoichi?

Understanding came crawling back, one sense at a time. The next thing he became aware of was the shadow falling across his closed lids...the presence by his side…a stirring of breath on the humid air…fingers on his arm, feeling around the crook of his elbow as if searching for a vein.

Shiba barked again, a high yelp of panic and frustration.

Kakashi's eyes snapped open.

The woman hovering over him jolted back, her thumb freezing on the plunger of the needle. Conceding all conscious thought to pure instinct, Kakashi slapped her hand away, sent the hypodermic spinning off across the room and chopped her across the neck with a knife-palm.

She crumpled to the floor.

The barking petered into soft canine whimpers and the scratch of nails on wood.

Panting, Kakashi bolted upright on the bed – no, the gurney – shaken and disoriented, his eyes swinging around the small matchbox room. It bore the stark characterless arrangement of one of the ANBU medical rooms. He glanced down at his body, saw that he'd been patched up.

Yeah…and put to sleep. What the hell is going on here?

Frowning, he cupped his throbbing left eye and slid off the gurney on weightless legs, folding into a crouch beside the limp body of the woman. She wore the grey button-down uniform of one of the T&I chūnin.

Torture and Interrogation?

A silver brow sketching upwards, Kakashi felt his anger thawing through the cold shock.

Ibiki.

Or Inoichi.

Or both.

Alright. So that thought was disturbing on all kinds of levels; levels much higher than the immediate floor he found his brain stuck on. He shook his head slowly, trying to bring the pieces together. Inoichi, he might've been able to factor in – what with his connection to Naoki and Naoki's connection to Genma.

But Ibiki?

Round peg, square hole. Ibiki's part in all this had thrown Kakashi into an entirely different headspace. Staring at the woman sprawled at his feet, he felt the desperate urge to call a meeting between all his scattered theories, sit them down in a nice quiet corner of his brain and take a moment to find the plot he'd clearly lost.

Genma…what the hell have you gotten into?

More to the point – what the hell had he gotten into? Whatever threads of suspicion Kakashi had been chasing, he'd never suspected they'd lead to this den of sleeping dogs…where apparently it'd been safer and wiser to let them lie.

"I don't care about letting them lie. I'll keep on kicking every damn dog until one of them yelps something useful."

Kakashi felt a pang at the memory of Asuma's words. To think, Asuma would sooner have choked on the massive hairball of this conspiracy than run away from it with his tail between his legs.

And if you'd followed it as far as I have…is this where it would've led you?

Into unauthorised detainment? One pinprick away from being silenced for gods knows how long?

Knocking me out couldn't be their end game. Way too risky.

T&I had far more invasive ways of silencing mouths and minds, removing sensitive information as if it had never been.

Is that what Inoichi is doing to Naoki?

But why the hell was he doing it under Danzō's orders? Was Ibiki acting on those orders too?

None of this makes sense…

More for the fact that it felt so wrong…so…

God…

Kakashi's brows drew together sharply, Mizugumo's words crawling cold as winter across the landscape of his mind, stealing over his heart.

"It hurts, doesn't it? Having that idealism shattered? Ignorance – or in your case, innocence – is a terrible thing to lose. You'll get over it. I did."

Snarling, he tried to shake off the icy grip of those words. This situation had escalated far beyond his Jōnin jurisdiction, even if he did feel compelled to investigate further – at least he now had everything he needed to take his concerns straight to the Hokage.

But first. I need to find Genma.

A soft nasal whine sounded across the room.

Jerked from his thoughts, Kakashi rounded the gurney at a crouch and found Shiba cowering in a crate, entangled in ropes. He had his tail tucked, eyes rolling wildly for an exit, a puddle of urine trickling from between the slats in the wood.

Kakashi's heart broke a little, his breath seizing hard.

Shiba hated confined spaces – he'd been found abandoned in one as a pup, emaciated and on death's doorstep. It'd taken years of rehabilitation and careful training to break the ninken's psychological associations between confinement and abandonment, cages and death.

Anger flooded through Kakashi.

Dark and scorching, burning away the soul-chilling frost Mizugumo's words had left behind.

His mind sharpened, his perspective cleared. Clawing his fingers around the lock, he tore it clean away with an animal roar, splintering the wood, tearing the skin beneath his nails. He knelt, pulled away the ropes tangling up his ninken's legs.

Shiba crawled forward into his arms, his head on Kakashi's thighs.

The copy-nin bent and pressed his masked lips to Shiba's head, murmured quiet praise and soft apologies, stroking the dog's quivering pelt until the ninken settled against him, the shakes giving away to the odd tremble – until Shiba went completely rigid.

Kakashi froze, his fingers stilling.

The door swung open behind him, hushed voices and confident steps terminating in abrupt stillness and several sharp intakes of breath.

The shocked silence only lasted a second.

"Kakashi-senpai! Stand down, sir!"

Shiba's lips curled back over his fangs, a snarl rattling in his throat. Kakashi grazed his thumb gently along the furrowed fur between his ninken's eyes, his voice very soft and very calm. "Which one of you put my ninken in that crate?"

A dumbfounded pause.

Kakashi glanced up at the metal cabinet, caught the reflection of five chūnin crowding the doorway. Four exchanged brief confused glances at his question whilst the one deepest into the room, a tall red-haired woman, took the lead, inching past the threshold, encouraging the others with a quick hand signal.

The soft scuff of their thread failed to cover the slow scrape of kunai.

"Kakashi-senpai," the redhead said. "Please stand down. You're injured and disorientated. You've suffered severe chakra depletion." Here, her eyes went to the woman out cold on the floor. Her eyes widened and Kakashi could've sworn he heard the cogs cranking in her mind as she thought how to frame a convincing lie. "Our medic was given orders to sedate you and transfer you to the hospital."

Rising in a slow, deliberate stretch, Kakashi took his time working the kinks out of his neck, testing muscles, measuring strength, the stitches in his thigh pulling hard. "You didn't answer my question," he said in the same silky-soft voice.

No response.

No matter.

"Kakashi-senpai. We have our orders. This is your last warning."

Twisting slowly on his heel, Kakashi turned to face them a fraction at a time, his left eye coming into view behind the fall of blood-streaked silver strands – the Sharingan orb glowing hot and red as an ember.

They thought he was outnumbered.

They thought he was weakened.

They should have looked deeper into his eyes.

---

TBC.

Endnotes:

Nakamagoroshi no Kakashi? – Friend-killer Kakashi

Team Yōkai – Genma's first 3-man ANBU team (Kaika/Genma, Karibi, Tenka/Naoki)

Gen'ei Tajū Shuriken - Multiple Phantom Shuriken

Raikiri – Lightning Blade/Cutter (Kakashi's jutsu)

Kanashibari – bound and fastened/temporary feeling of paralysis/sleep paralysis. Literally "bound or fastened in metal," from "kane" (metal) and "shibaru" (to bind, to tie, to fasten). (Genma's jutsu)

Magen: Narakumi no Jutsu – Demonic Illusion: Death Mirage Jutsu (This is a genjutsu that reveals the fears that dwell inside people's hearts. Everyone has an image of the one thing they wouldn't want to ever see. This genjutsu is a technique that draws forth such an image from within the heart and has one mistake it for reality)

Gatsūga – Fang over fang (Kiba's jutsu)

Kibaku Hana – Explosive flower/flower bomb (Ino's jutsu)

A/N: A shorter chapter thrown into the crazy mix! Hello to new reviewers and readers! Many warm thanks to all of you who continue to show your support and love. Your kind words and encouragement mean so much to me. Thank you lovelies, I hope you guys enjoyed this latest chapter. Confused? Fear not. The ride is about to take some sharp turns. I'll catch you on the next update!

A/N (2): Will return to dispatch any hiding typos!