Smallville/Naruto

Seizing the Future

Disclaimer: I do not own Smallville or Naruto; Smallville is owned by Warner Brothers television and its creators Alfred Gough and Miles Millar and is based on 'Superman' created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, the Manga series' Naruto' is owned by its creator Masashi Kishimoto and all characters featured in Naruto are the property of said author, all Smallville characters are owned by DC comics.

This work is strictly for Fan enjoyment and no profit is derived from it.

Fanfiction Written by; Dean Donnell.

Chapter 10

Clark had been sent to help capture a murderer in a Tanzuka town and would likely be gone for a good portion of the day leaving Tayuya on her own for the day, there wasn't much for her to do so she decided to find a quiet spot and get in some flute practice.

As she sat practicing Tayuya found that a few people stopped to listen to the melody, and from the looks on their faces they thought that she was pretty good with a flute.

Okay, Tayuya thought with a smirk looks like I have an audience, one that gets to live this time, in that case let's see if I can impress them enough that they'll be talking about my music for ages to come.

Tayuya paused for a moment, then began to play the most complicated non genjutsu melody she knew, one that would really demonstrate her skill with the musical instrument of her choice, the assembled listeners all listened, totally rapt as she seemed to produce the beautiful music so effortlessly.

As she finished the piece her small but very attentive audience broke into applause, this was one of the rare occasions that Tayuya actually found herself blushing.

"Play another," somebody called out.

Ah what the hell, Tayuya thought to herself why not?

However, as she was putting the flute to her lips a large group of shinobi ran past, among them Tayuya recognized a number that she knew were skilled in water style ninjutsu, and they seemed to be in a hurry, this stirred her curiosity, even as an ominous feeling settled in the pit of her stomach.

Lowering her flute and putting it away she ran after them as fast as she could on her recently healed legs, as she did she began to pick up the smell of smoke and before long an apartment building came into view, smoke and flames were leaking out of nearly every one of its windows.

The shinobi Tayuya had seen before were all fighting the blaze, using water style jutsus to draw water from any available source and direct it onto the flames, they were keeping it contained, but it would be a while before they managed to put it out and the flames were quickly spreading to the upper floors as well.

For a moment Tayuya was frozen with fear, images of the village of her birth in flames flashing through her mind; then she snapped out of it as a specific sound reached her ears.

It was a woman apparently a young mother calling out desperately somewhere off to her left.

"My baby," the woman screamed, tears in her eyes as one of the shinobi from before tried to restrain her so as to keep her from running back into the flames "please, my son is still in there, let me save him."

As soon as she heard that Tayuya knew she had to put her fears and doubts aside, she remembered what it had felt like to lose her mother to the bandits, how that had torn her apart inside, and now here was a mother about to lose her child if nobody did anything.

To hell with being afraid Tayuya told herself sternly as she steeled her will to hell with feeling sorry for myself and doubting myself that shit aint me, if I want to be a better person-a hero, then now's the time to start being that hero.

Tayuya took a few deep breaths to try and get her shaking under control, then called out to the woman in what she hoped was a brave sounding and reassuring voice.

"Don't worry; I'll find him for you."

Then, pushing her fear down as hard as she could Tayuya ran into the burning building with one of the shinobi who were fighting the blaze desperately trying to catch up with her in order to keep her from doing something so borderline suicidal, however as she entered the inferno he stopped his pursuit.

Tayuya had something in mind that would allow her to get through those flames alive, a technique she was already using when she plunged into that hell of flames and smoke and heat and noise, the same technique that had allowed her to survive having a forest dropped on her by Temari.

All truly advanced shinobi knew a technique that allowed them to block a steel blade or similarly powerful melee weapon with their bare arm or hand if the need should arise.

This was done by focusing Chakra into that part of the body, allowing it to block the strike as though it was made of steel, and reducing the damage done from a severed limb to a minor gash, Tayuya knew this technique herself of course.

When Temari had brought the forest down on her Tayuya had, in her desperation to survive combined that technique with what barrier ninjutsu she could manage on her own and applied it to her entire body in order to shield herself from fatal injury.

Because of this the logs, all of which had landed on top of her legs while she was still conscious had still caused plenty of muscle damage doing so but the bones in Tayuya's legs hadn't actually fractured until after she had lost consciousness and was unable to maintain her spur of the moment technique any longer.

This technique had saved her from being squashed, but the strain from using it meant that it should be used only when absolutely necessary, after all, although her cracked ribs had come from a log hitting her there, the concussion she had suffered in that incident had in fact not come from a blow to the head, neither had her loss of consciousness.

The hemorrhaging in her lungs had happened a half minute before that, when she had taken one of Temari's wind blasts to her chest.

As it was now Tayuya could feel the strain from using the jutsu that she now called her Chakra Armor building in her head as this technique kept her from suffering life threatening burns, she was going to have a headache after this; that was for sure.

As she climbed floor after floor Tayuya finally heard the sound of a young child crying.

"Stay calm," she called loudly over the roar of the flames "it'll be okay, I'm gonna get you out of here, but you're gonna have to keep making some noise so I can find you okay."

"Save me, please," the child speaking couldn't have been much older than three, Tayuya moved in the direction of the voice as fast as she dared until finally she was right beside the terrified toddler and scooped him up.

"Hold on tight okay," she told the child, extending her Chakra armor to protect him too as he complied with her instructions "It's time to get out of this hellhole."

Tayuya began heading toward the nearest window, but as she was halfway there she heard the ceiling above her begin to give way, acting on instinct she crouched low over the child she was rescuing, shielding him from the flaming debris falling on both of them with her own body.

The agony that Tayuya felt in that moment was blindingly intense as the small bits of burning wood seared her back in spite of her Chakra Armor, she cried out in agony as her skin was scorched, fighting the urge to vomit or pass out from the pain.

Pulling herself shakily to her feet, Tayuya ran the rest of the way to the window, kicking out what was left of the already shattered glass, then, focusing Chakra into the soles of her feet she stepped one foot out the window until that foot made contact with the outside of the building, then her other leg once the first stuck to the surface, and then she leaned forward until she was crouching on the side of the building.

Standing 'up' Tayuya began running down the side of the burning building, dodging jets of flame that emerged from shattered windows and cracks in the wall and clinging on to the young boy she carried as she went.

The strain from using this technique combined with her Chakra Armor was really making her head pound and black spots were starting to appear in front of her eyes as her recently healed legs felt like they were on fire from the strain she was putting on them.

What was worse, Tayuya could hear the structure of the building starting to creak, and she could feel it shifting under her, she put on an extra burst of speed, the sooner she was off this death trap the better.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity Tayuya reached the ground, quickly getting a safe distance from the now nearly gutted apartment complex she somehow managed in spite of what she had just gone through to find the strength to shakily walk up to the boy's mother, her legs threatening to give out the whole way.

"Here," Tayuya told her gently as she passed the woman's son to her "I saved him just like I said I would."

"Thank you," the woman praised Tayuya as she hugged her son "thank you so much."

As this was happening Tayuya was aware of a couple of medic Nin running in her direction carrying a stretcher as they came.

A moment later Tayuya heard a loud crash behind her as the stricken building finally collapsed, she could feel her own strength starting to give out on her too.

Holy shit, Tayuya thought as her vision began to grow dark around the edges; that was too fucking close.

Then Tayuya felt her knees give way underneath her as everything went black.