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Title: New Wind Nation ~ 新風国
Chapter 10: Missing-nin Kurosuki Raiga ~ By my side (part 3/5)
Notes: Revised 07/2014.
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All he can ever see are their backs. As they turn away and deny his existence, as they turn away and flee in terror… Why do they always turn their backs on him?
Why is he always alone?
You are not alone. I am here. I will always be by your side. I will always protect you...
Whose voice is that?
He didn't know. There was no chance to wonder. Something screeched in his mind, and he couldn't hold on anymore.
/~/~
As the last of the rock avalanche ended and only clouds of dust remained in the air, the Sand and Leaf shinobi tried to take in their surroundings, coughing a little. "Karasu got busted after all," Kankuro cursed under his breath, examining the crushed limbs and dented body of his puppet. He raised his voice to call out to the others, "Hey, taicho, pipsqueak? You alive?"
"Coward!" Gai snarled, gently laying down Neji and Tenten. Fortunately, they had ended up on opposite ends of the new rock field.
Baki was nearer, and he also did not look entirely pleased as he dumped Naruto to the ground. "We're alive," he called back.
"Where's Gaara?" Naruto asked, looking around frantically while easing Lee off his shoulder. "Didn't he run too?"
Baki's frown deepened as he scanned the area, carefully keeping some of his attention on Gai. 'Gaara is not very strong in physical aspects,' he thought. 'In fact, he rarely makes any movement in combat. He may not have had time to react. But Shukaku would protect him all the same…'
"Gaara! Gaara, are you alright?" Naruto yelled, running up to the edge of the rock field. He continued trying to get a response as he climbed onto the boulders, but Baki ignored him, instead looking up in search of Raiga.
Having checked on his students and moved a little further from the battlefield, Gai approached Baki with a furious, determined expression. "Give me the antidote," he demanded.
"Not until our mission is complete," Baki replied calmly. "If there are complications, we will give you a half-dose in three hours, which will buy—"
"Don't play with my students' lives, you—!" Guy protested at the same time.
But both of them were abruptly cut off by an incredible surge of bloodlust and killer intent. Even as seasoned jonin, both froze, breathless.
'This is…Shukaku…' Baki realized, horrified.
A giant claw of sand burst from among the rocks, sending shrapnel and dust flying. With a yell, Naruto scrambled back as the cliff collapsed behind him, another landslide starting as a towering shape coalesced in the haze.
Something shrieked madly.
"Finally! Finally, I'm out!" the mad voice cackled.
As the dust parted, a monstrous figure emerged – a giant raccoon formed out of sand, with a long tail and purple veins across its body. Its yellow eyes glowed as it began to claw its way up the cliff, shrieking and laughing.
"I'll kill you all!" it swore gleefully.
Grabbing Naruto by the scruff, Baki hauled him away from the edge of the cliff — just in time, as a giant claw raked over the place he had been, gouging deep furrows in the stone. Naruto stared wide-eyed at the biju, and Baki had to wonder if he finally understood the full gravity of Gaara's situation.
"What is that?" Gai couldn't help ask, crouching protectively in front of his students. 'This feeling… It's the same as twelve years ago,' he thought.
"The One-Tailed Shukaku," Baki replied tonelessly, dragging Naruto further back.
"A biju?" Gai repeated. "You brought that here?" 'You let it near my students?' he wanted to say.
Above them, Raiga stared in surprise as well. He had not expected this, but in the end, it didn't really matter. "Demons don't need burials at all," he muttered to himself, gripping his swords tighter. "No matter what you are, you'll fall before my Ikazuchi no Kiba!"
Building up lightning-natured chakra until it glowed around him, Raiga raised his swords to the sky and let the energy surge upward. For a moment, lightning danced between the clouds, building before suddenly releasing — bright bolts flashing as they rained down on the monstrous form of Shukaku.
The demon shuddered, but only for a moment before laughing madly again. "Too bad! Wrong! Wrong!" it jeered. "Won't work!"
Its yellow eyes pinned Raiga in place as it opened its jaws wide and sucked in air, its belly expanding. Its sharp-toothed slasher grin widened. "Futon: Renkudan!" it rumbled. Raiga's eyes widened and, finally pulling himself free of its overwhelming killing intent, he tried to run.
The demon punched itself in the stomach, sending a giant ball of compressed air and chakra shooting out of its jaws. The giant bullet crashed into the mountain, boulders, shrapnel and dust filling the air. Rumbling like thunder, an entire section of the cliff began to collapse. Shukaku only continued to laugh even as the landslide collided with its body.
"This is our best chance. We have to run," Baki decided. Grabbing Naruto by the arm, he tried to haul the genin to his feet and drag him away, but Naruto refused to move. "What are you doing? Hurry!" Baki urged.
Naruto shook his head slowly. "That's… Gaara?" he wondered. He shook his head again. "No, that's not Gaara at all. That must be the demon inside him, the one that's always lying to him." Naruto's eyes widened with realization, and he spun around to face Baki, a determined expression on his face. "Sensei! We have to help him!"
Baki stared at him. "What?" he asked, momentarily speechless. "What are you babbling about? There's nothing we can do! We have to run or we'll die right here."
"What about Gaara?" Naruto demanded. "What about everyone in the mine? We have to do something!"
"Take responsibility," Gai agreed darkly. "You brought that here and allowed it to be released. You should be prepared to face the consequences."
Naruto's attention turned to Gai as he spoke, just remembering that he and his students were there as well. Reaching into his pouch, he pulled out a small canister made of a hollow bamboo segment. "What are you doing?" Baki protested, but Naruto ignored him, tossing the flagon to Gai.
"It's the antidote. Give them each a fourth of what's inside," he instructed, turning away. Gai's gaze lingered on his tense back, but after a moment he nodded sharply and, pocketing the container in his pouch, picked up his students and dashed away.
"Fool!" Baki hissed, but he too backed away and fled.
"I'm going to stop it," Naruto declared, speaking to himself, for his own sake, now. "Gaara's in there. I… I just have to reach him, and he'll stop it." Naruto's hands shook as he clenched them into fists. 'I have to believe in Gaara,' he thought, desperately and just a little wryly. 'I don't have any other choice…'
Shukaku's gargantuan head reared back and it opened its mouth to emit another cackle. "He died! He died!" it laughed, finding no sign of Raiga. Instead, it turned slowly in search of new targets. A wave of killer intent crashed into Naruto as its attention focused on him. Its poison-yellow eyes flared and its jaws parted in a parody of a grin.
"Found you!" Shukaku crowed. "You! You! I know you!"
Naruto shuddered, his lungs seizing under the murderous aura of the biju. His hand trembled wildly as he reached into his weapon pouch. Wrapping his fist tightly around the hilt of a kunai, he ripped the weapon free and pointed it at the monstrous form.
Throwing his head back, Naruto glared up at the demon.
"That's right! Of course you know me! I'm Gaara's teammate, the one who's been by his side!" he yelled. "My name is Naruto! Remember it! I won't run! I'll be staying with Gaara from now on, so you'll be seeing me again, as many times as it takes! Now, give Gaara back!"
His words echoed across the mountain as Shukaku fell ominously still. Its form shuddered. Leveling its malevolent eyes on him, it roared, sending gale winds sweeping across the mountain side.
The prospect — the very thought — of facing such a beast should have been enough to send him running, but Naruto refused to back down. Shukaku had also shown Naruto the one thing that would drive him on. There, on its wide forehead, was the still figure of his friend. Gaara was almost entirely submerged in the sand that made up Shukaku's form, only his head and torso visible. His eyes were closed — unconscious. He seemed impossibly far away.
"Gaara!" Naruto yelled, though even he didn't believe it would be enough. This wasn't a fairytale after all. "Gaara! You've got to wake up! You have to wake up and make it stop!"
Shukaku laughed. "He can't hear! Your voice won't reach! Not even when you scream and beg…" it told him, its voice carrying a terrifying promise.
"Then I'll wake him up myself!" Naruto swore.
Inside, he was still trembling.
'How? How? How can I reach him? I've got nothing that can go against a biju! I'm just a genin. I'm just a human!' Even the kunai in his hand shook. It seemed laughable compared to the behemoth in front of him.
His eyes slid to it, its gleaming edge.
'No. No! I am a ninja! I am a shinobi of Hidden Sand! I have all I need — with our wind style ninjutsu, there's no limit to what we can achieve!'
One step, another, and Naruto was suddenly charging at the biju full-stop. Shukaku laughed mockingly, sweeping one giant arm at him as if batting away a fly.
"Futon: Shinkujin," Naruto called out, breathing wind-natured chakra over his kunai. The translucent chakra infused the short weapon, extending its blade to several times its length and increasing its sharpness.
Drawing his arm back, Naruto threw it with all his strength. It spun through the air, end over end, forming a disk that cut into the giant sand arm like a buzzsaw. The chakra-infused blade was not quite enough to cut through the entire thick limb, but it went in deep, the force of the blow momentarily startling and unbalancing Shukaku.
Not slowing down in his sprint, Naruto pushed chakra into his feet and jumped high into the air, toward the biju's head.
Shukaku screeched, more in fury than in pain, and swung its other arm, the open claw heading straight for Naruto. His eyes flitted to it for just an instance before focusing again on his goal — Gaara, between its glaring eyes, ahead and above him.
At the apex of his jump, Naruto stretched out his hand — but Gaara was still out of reach, and Shukaku's massive claw was closing in on him. The biju's bloodthirsty grin widened in anticipation.
"As if that'll stop me!" Naruto barked, clapping his hands together. "Futon: Reppusho!"
Unlike the proper use of the technique, the gale burst to life behind and below Naruto, hitting him in the back and sending him flying — as it had with so many bandits on their previous missions. That force of the pressure at his back made Naruto grit his teeth, but it was the boost he needed.
"Gaara! Wake up!" Naruto yelled.
Shukaku screeched, but it was a moment too late, and Naruto collided with Gaara, jolting him suddenly, startlingly awake.
The changeover rippled through the monstrous form, the biju's chakra disappearing and releasing the mass of sand. Losing its shape, it flowed away, over the mountainside, the two boys carried along by the flow.
'How's that, Mom?' Naruto thought fuzzily as his vision darkened and he fell toward unconsciousness. 'I flew.'
/~/~
For a long time, Gaara could only lay still, looking up into the sky as sunset began to dye it violet, orange, and red. His head shifted a little and his eyes drifted to Naruto, partly draped over him and unconscious. 'It seems like he's not wounded… There's no blood,' he thought.
The odd, suspended stillness broke as a figure appeared nearby and jumped to land beside them. Gaara turned his gaze to his team leader, studying the man as Baki observed him in return.
"What happened?" Baki asked finally, whatever emotions he was feeling carefully hidden.
Gaara thought for a moment. "I was knocked unconscious," he answered slowly. "There was a feeling of drifting away… and of other thoughts mixing with my own."
'Shukaku's will leaking through the seal?' Baki thought. 'It's been a long time since that last occurred… We got off easy, if he was able to repress it again after waking up. Was its hold on him weaker this time?'
He remembered vividly the last time Shukaku had been able to take control of Gaara — the massive sand raccoon had rampaged through the village, and only the Kazekage's Gold Dust had finally forced it to retreat once more.
"Shukaku again appeared, in its own form," Baki informed Gaara, still observing the boy carefully.
Gaara stared back, showing no surprise. Baki sighed, flipping through a short series of seals and laying a glowing hand on Naruto's back. "Not injuries," he said, then snorted. "The little moron refused to leave you. He must be the luckiest fool in the world to have actually managed to get through to you. I wouldn't count on him being so lucky again."
With a quiet grunt, Gaara managed to sit up and scoot back to sit against a boulder half-submerged in the sand, shifting so that Naruto lay against his shoulder. The other boy mumbled quietly in his sleep. "R-ramen…" he moaned and flailed weakly. Gaara's lips twitched, and he lowered his head, hiding his expression.
"Taicho," Gaara said, startling Baki quite badly. He had never previously acknowledged anyone as his superior, not even the Kazekage. "My chakra is returning quickly, though I can't move. You should find Kankuro."
Baki stared for a moment, unsure how to respond. "Yes," he said slowly. "I doubt anyone will come looking too soon, even those Leaf-nin." 'Since Naruto had to go and given that jonin our best bargaining chip,' he thought. 'Though I suppose it might work out for the best. We're hardly equipped to deal with them too.' Standing, Baki couldn't help add, "I'll need to hurry if I want to catch Kankuro before he runs all the way to the Land of Snow."
Glancing back, he met Gaara's wide-eyed stare. "Y-Yes," Gaara agreed almost hesitantly.
'I can't believe I said that. Making a joke with Gaara? That brat is really rubbing off on me,' Baki thought, a bit horrified, as he flickered away.
Gaara watched him go, still a little discomfited. The sky was almost completely dark when he finally looked away, distracted by Naruto suddenly squirming.
"Ramen?" Naruto mumbled into Gaara's shirt, where he had left a spot of drool.
"No," Gaara replied simply.
Blearily, Naruto looked up and stared for a moment. "Gaara?" he tried instead. His face scrunched up sleepily. "Wha' happen'? I feel… beat," he grumbled, stifling a groan as he sat up on his own. His gaze cleared and sharpened as he studied his teammate. "And what happened to you? You look… tired too."
The two locked stares for a moment before Naruto's face shifted as he recollected what occurred. "W-wow… uh, just… wow," he stammered. "I…" 'Got really lucky. So lucky,' he thought. 'I can't believe I'm still alive. That was just…'
He felt shaken and almost panicked, like everything he had refused to feel in the face of imminent death was coming back now, when it was already over. In front of him, very faintly, Gaara trembled. It could have been exhaustion. But…
Instead, Naruto grinned widely and said, "I… am awesome. It's too bad no one saw because I was totally amazing just then. That would definitely put me in the Bingo Books!"
Gaara let out a breath, a sigh really — in anyone else, mixed relief and affectionate exasperation. His eyes met Naruto's again, and Naruto suddenly thought he looked tired, not just because of the deep, permanent bags around his eyes. But he also looked somehow better too.
"You really didn't leave, even though you were scared," Gaara murmured to himself. "Even though I almost…"
Naruto frowned and pressed their shoulders together. "I told you, I'm not scared of you anymore," he said almost irritably. "Of course I wasn't just going to leave you with that crazy thing!"
"...I heard you," Gaara admitted. "That's why… I was able to take back control so easily."
Not like before, when Shukaku had to be forcefully repressed. Back then, Gaara hadn't even truly wanted to wake up, to be in control. After all… he had been betrayed by the one person who had shown him kindness. Letting loose the voice in his mind seemed like sweet relief from the pain and despair of it.
"Everyone has always been afraid of me, ever since I was a child," Gaara said quietly. "I wonder… if any of them would have overcome that fear if I had been able to control it back then…"
"It's not your fault," Naruto said quietly but firmly. "Or at least, you're not the only one at fault. Everyone should have done better. And anyway, you were just a kid. Expecting you to control something like that is way too much."
Watching Naruto scowl, upset on his behalf, Gaara nodded in acquiescence, if not agreement. "But still, I have a responsibility," Gaara said, half to himself. "I will control it. So you — and the others — won't have to be afraid anymore. Of it… or of me."
'It.' The monster inside him. When had he started listening to its painful, discordant voice? When had he gotten it confused with the soft, wordless whisper that had once comforted him? Gaara had heard them both, as he lost his grip over Shukaku. Ever since he had started to disagree with it — from the first time, when he tried to refuse to kill Naruto — it had become easier and easier for Gaara to see Shukaku for what it truly was.
He had been mistaken, gravely so. Even if Naruto was right, Gaara still bore a great deal of the guilt for the situation.
"I tried to validate my existence by killing those around me," Gaara admitted. Even having expected such, he felt an almost immeasurable sense of relief when Naruto only continued to watch him with a frown. "I was wrong. It's true that only others can make you feel alive… but not just by their deaths. My sense of self and my existence became so much stronger when you acknowledged me. That's how it's supposed to be, right? That's how bonds work…"
He glanced at Naruto. A bond… he'd had one, once. Or at least, he had thought he had. In the end…
'Please,' Gaara wanted to say, 'please, don't betray me.' But, glancing at Naruto again, he knew it was too late to start doubting him. Naruto, who hadn't run from even Shukaku on a rampage, not to protect someone else from him, but for Gaara's sake...
'I'll trust you too,' Gaara thought. 'Just like you're trusting me. Because we're friends...'
/~/~
Despite Baki's well-founded insinuations, Kankuro had not gone very far.
He had stopped as soon as Shukaku was out of sight, its laughter no longer audible. Balancing on a pine tree, he looked back over his shoulder with a scowl. He shook his head and turned to run again, only to stop and glance back once more.
'Damn it!' Kankuro thought angrily. 'I need to worry about my own skin here! That's demon, a real monster! It's not like it's going to harm Gaara, and the other two are smart enough to just run…' But even as he thought that, Kankuro twitched and scowled. 'Well, Baki-taicho is smart enough, but that shrimp Naruto…'
"Enough! There's nothing I can do anyway!" he yelled, immediately feeling foolish when his voice echoed a little across the empty forest.
'But I should at least check to see what happens,' Kankuro found himself reasoning. 'I mean, I'll have to report on it, and they might get injured or trapped or something… I'll keep my distance and it won't even notice me. ..Right?'
Dropping down to the ground, he began to slink back toward the battlefield, one thought resurfacing. 'What am I doing?' This was all Temari's fault for making him think.
The sun had set and the sky was darkening by the time Kankuro made it back to where Shukaku had appeared. The area was eerily quiet now, only the deep gouges in the mountain side and the ragged remains of the landslide showing what had occurred. Pockets of sand remained in cracks and crevices, but it was continually being carried away by the wind.
"I'm sure this is the place," Kankuro muttered to himself. "But… it's gone. Did Gaara really calm down that easily?" The wind moaned through the crags, and Kankuro felt a shiver go up his spine. 'Or… is it still here?' he thought suddenly.
Immediately, he felt like a fool. "Get a hold of yourself!" he yelled at himself. "It's a giant sand monster! It doesn't sneak or hide!" '… Not outside a desert, anyway.'
"But more to the point, I don't see anyone," Kankuro muttered. "And the landscape got so rearranged, I can't really tell where anyone would be if they… died."
"Kankuro!" a strong voice called out, making the puppeteer jump in surprise. He spun around to find Baki approaching him. Giving him a quick once-over, Baki shook his head. "Well, at least you're fine."
"Uh, yeah," Kankuro squirmed a little. "What about the brats?"
Baki sighed, covering his face with one hand. "They're… alright, more or less. Frankly, I'm amazed that neither was really injured. Both are exhausted though. I left them not too far away," he said, gesturing down the slope. "Now, since you're here, we should try to find Kurosuki Raiga's body. Otherwise, Hidden Mist will most likely refuse to pay the bounty."
"Right…" Kankuro agreed reluctantly, splitting up with Baki to search. 'Great, looking for a psycho killer's body, just what I wanted to do,' he thought sourly, jumping between boulders. He narrowed his eyes against the growing darkness, as night descended on the mountain.
Something moved at the edge of his vision, making Kankuro stumble a little. Spinning around, he threw a shuriken on reflex.
But the weapon only lodged into another boulder. As Kankuro tried to find his opponent, something moved in the shadows behind the large stone. He watched, shocked and confused, as the blurry figure seemed to beckon to him and then disappear, only to reappear in another shadow further away.
"T-taicho!" Kankuro yelled, hoping Baki hadn't gone too far. 'A ghost? Don't tell me this place is cursed now!'
A moment later, Baki flickered next to him, scowl firmly in place. "You're a shinobi, Kankuro," he hissed. "Are you trying to let everyone know where we are?"
"Forget about that," Kankuro replied, eyes still firmly fixed on the strange apparitions. He jabbed his finger in the direction of the shimmering shadows. "Look! Look! What is that?"
Baki's eyes narrowed as he turned in the direction Kankuro was pointing. Again, something seemed to move in the almost pitch-black shadows between the rocks. 'Genjutsu? No, this is something else,' he thought.
"Kankuro, stay back," Baki ordered. Moving cautiously, he stepped forward. As expected, the strange illusion moved a little further back. 'It seems to be leading us somewhere. It might be a trap, but there's no choice but to follow it,' he thought.
The illusion — whatever it was — didn't act like genjutsu. It was indistinct, lacking even a set shape. Instead, it was an almost imperceptible shift of something, almost like the air wavering over hot sand in the desert. 'Mirage,' Baki thought. It seemed to hide from the moonlight, jumping between shadows just at the edge of perception.
Finally, he appeared to reach whatever he was being guided to. The mirage flickered for a moment in every shadow, forming a circle around a large bag of some kind. Gesturing for Kankuro to stay back, Baki approached the sack. As he knelt next to it, the bag suddenly wiggled.
Turning it over, he found a zipper and pulled it down. The bag's sides parted, revealing a pale young boy, who stared up at Baki with strangely calm eyes.
"You found me," the boy said quietly, only turning his head slightly to look Baki in the eye. His appearance was unearthly, almost glowing in the moonlight, his pale hair cut evenly at his chin.
The jonin frowned. "Who are you? Were you the one causing those illusions?" he demanded. Behind him, Kankuro cautiously approached and peered over Baki's shoulder.
"My name is Ranmaru. Yes, I led you here," the boy replied, showing no reaction to Baki's intimidating look. "I can't move on my own, you see. Before… Raiga carried me."
"Eh? This kid is that Kurosuki Raiga's follower?" Kankuro said, leaning in closer. "And what's that ability, anyway? It wasn't like any genjutsu I've seen."
Baki leveled a glare at him, making Kankuro's mouth snap shut, as Ranmaru turned to regard him instead. "It's not genjutsu. It's an ability that I have… I used it to help Raiga in his battles. I can also… see things that are far away," he said.
'He could be dangerous,' Baki thought. 'But he could also be useful. Who knows where Kurosuki got him and just how far his abilities go.' "We'll take you with us," he said, making his decision. "You are now our prisoner, so don't try to escape or fight us." Jerking his head to Kankuro, Baki directed him to carry the child.
Kankuro grumbled as he bent down and lifted Ranmaru easily, carrying him under one arm. 'He's a lot lighter than Karasu,' he thought absently. 'Ah, Karasu… It's gonna take ages to get it back into shape.'
"Should we head back now?" Kankuro asked, trying not to think about the damages to his precious puppet.
Baki shook his head. "We still need to find Kurosuki's body. Our mission isn't complete unless we bring it back — or at least his head, as proof."
"But it's really dark now. Who knows where he ended up," Kankuro whined. 'Hasn't this day been long enough? I don't want to search blindly in the dark.'
Ranmaru looked up at him, tilting his head to one side. "I can show you where Raiga is," he offered.
Both Baki and Kankuro stared at him, the former in consideration, the latter in disbelief. "How do you know?" Kankuro wondered, but Ranmaru offered no reply. "Is your ability some kinda dojutsu? Still, he's got to be far from here…"
Slowly, Ranmaru raised one arm to point. "He's that way."
"His body?" Kankuro repeated.
"Mm," Ranmaru agreed, bobbing his head up and down.
Frowning, Baki crossed his arms and looked down at the child forbiddingly. "More to the point, why should we trust you?"
"I can't do anything to harm you by myself. I can't attack anyone," Ranmaru told him, looking up at the jonin with wide, clear eyes. He looked away just as quickly, letting his hair fall in his face. "Please don't leave me alone," he whispered.
Baki wasn't soft enough to fall for such a thing, but he still chose to proceed, just with caution, to make sure the boy did not lead them off a cliff unawares.
Following Ranmaru's directions, they arrived at the bottom of gorge, where a mass of boulders from the recent battle stood like a grave mound. Looking around, Kankuro's eyes fell on one of Raiga's spiked swords, wedged between two stones.
"Are we… gonna have to dig?" Kankuro asked, distaste clear in his voice.
Baki frowned. "Stand aside," he ordered. Raising his arm, he molded a small amount of chakra and concentrated it. The blade of wind lashed out, cutting through the rocks.
"You should be able to reach him now," Ranmaru said quietly, as clouds of dust billowed out around them. He tugged at Kankuro's sleeve, urging him forward, and the puppet-user complied, coughing and trying to wave the dust away.
He toed at the rubble before his eyes caught on a bit of flesh, just barely visible among the dirt. Setting Ranmaru down next to him, Kankuro began to dig, slowly uncovering one arm. "Hey, taicho! I found it!" he called out over his shoulder, momentarily turning away.
"Raiga," Ranmaru whispered, reaching out to grasp the much larger hand of the missing-nin. "I won't let you die like this. I won't… hold a funeral for you…"
Energy — chakra — glowed faintly as it gathered around him and flowed out into still, buried body. Kankuro spun around, staring in surprise, while Baki moved swiftly toward his subordinate and their prisoner, but it was too late for either to do anything.
Smiling faintly, Ranmaru collapsed, his tiny form sliding off the mound. Lightning crackled and jumped between the rocks, making Kankuro back away, shielding his eyes against the sudden light.
The stones exploded outward, blow away by a strong burst of chakra. Kurosuki Raiga staggered to his feet, one sword still clutched in his hand. Although his clothing was scuffed and torn, with several large blood stains, he didn't seem to have any other injuries — or perhaps they had been healed.
Raiga's dark eyes scanned the scene around him, quickly taking in Kankuro, backing away, Baki, dropping into a fighting stance… and Ranmaru, lying motionless on the ground.
"Ranmaru!" Raiga called out. He started to move toward the boy, but Baki quickly stood between them, molding chakra and holding out a kunai threateningly. Raiga scowled, falling back a little. "Ranmaru! Ranmaru, wake up! Playing dead isn't funny!" he yelled, his voice trembling.
There was no reply, and Raiga's expression quickly morphed into rage. "You bastards! What did you do to him?" he demanded, turning his glare on Baki.
"It was his own doing," Baki said coldly. "He transferred his energy to you… and you came back to life."
Raiga took a step back, raising his empty hand to stare at it in surprise. Green light — like a medical ninjutsu — still lingered in his palm. "Ranmaru…" he whispered, pained.
'He's distracted,' Baki thought, snapping into action. Thrusting one hand forward, he released his wind blade. Unfortunately, he had underestimated Raiga. The missing-nin dodged, just barely, and raised his sword. A lightning bolt crackled along it and struck between them, sending Baki back a step.
"My head's all messed up," Raiga muttered, slouching and letting his hair fall in his face. "I don't understand… why things ended up like this. Whose fault is this? Yours?" Falling back a little, neither Baki nor Kankuro made any move to deny it. "That's right! If you hadn't come, Ranmaru and I would still be together!" Raiga yelled, glaring at them through his bangs.
Moving almost faster than they could follow, he launched a ball of lightning at them. Kankuro scrambled out of the way, while Baki retaliated with a quick burst of wind. Raiga raised his sword and let electricity run through it, cancelling out the wind technique. His furious expression didn't change as he yelled, "I'll have your corpses as tribute at Ranmaru's funeral!" But he was forced back a step, blocking another attack from Baki.
'Lightning is weak to wind,' Baki thought. 'I should be able to wear him down, especially in his condition…'
Sense seemed to finally return to Raiga as the same thought seemed to occur to him. Instead of continuing the battle, he suddenly darted back, retrieving his second sword and jumping up onto a nearby cliff.
"I'll find you," he swore furiously. "The lightning will strike, and I'll kill you all." Before either of the Sand-nin could intercept, he flickered away.
Baki stared after him for a moment, then frowned and turned away sharply. Picking up Ranmaru's still body, he gestured to Kankuro. "Let's go. We need to get back to Gaara and Naruto," he said. "It seems this mission isn't over yet."
/~/~
/~/~
Notes:
I-if you're still reading this, I am amazed. I love you guys. J-just… *sobs* I don't even know what's happening anymore!
N-Naruto beat Shukaku? What the hell? Naruto got really, really lucky. To start with, he didn't beat a demon, he just woke up Gaara. Shukaku would have regenerated its limbs very quickly if Naruto hadn't been able to carry through all the way.
Then, the terrain was in Naruto's favor. The whole battlefield is basically a mountainside, with cliffs here and there. This means that, unlike in the flat forest, Naruto is basically eye-level to Shukaku to start with – which really works in his favor for reaching its head where Gaara is.
Finally, Shukaku basically underestimated and failed to predict Naruto. Who the hell is dumb enough to charge head first? Also, it seemed to have recognized him and wanted to kill him more slowly and painfully. A nice Drilling Air Bullet would have squashed him, but Shukaku was aiming to catch him (it seems?) in its sand.
So, yeah.
/~/~