Zero Hour, Chapter 14: Blitz
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
Notes: There's a lot going on in this chapter, and that's intentional. I'm not detailing every little thing that happened in canon because, well, it's already canon and you all should be familiar with it. I'm not trying to rush, but I am trying to move things along just a bit so you don't get bored reading things you already know.
The time had finally come. Years of waiting, plotting, biding his time and his strength. It all began now, and Sasuke was more than ready to start the ball rolling.
"Karin, go release Suigetsu. I'll meet you outside," Sasuke said just before they rounded a corner leading to Orochimaru's private wing of the base.
Karin hesitated. Words were not necessary; she knew what was coming, but she didn't have to like it. "...Are you sure about this?"
Lurid eyes watched him with unwavering conviction. He envied her that, the will to move even the thickest stone. All for him. In retrospect, he had to bless his younger self for saving her that day in the Forest of Death. He would need her powers and her loyalty now more than ever.
"It has to be this way. You know that."
Karin sighed. "Just make it fast. I don't sense Kabuto anywhere nearby, but he could come back at any minute. I don't want to run into him, personally."
"Neither do I."
She left him then, and Sasuke took a deep breath. It wasn't that he was afraid or second-guessing his decision. Orochimaru was a cold-hearted beast who'd manipulated him into throwing away his old life to seek power. Sasuke didn't regret his choice, not for a minute, but he did resent how Orochimaru underestimated him even now. He'd toyed with this idea for some time, one of Suigetsu's more sane ideas, if he was being honest. The dead don't talk, and they don't fight back, either.
Most of all, Sasuke wanted to beat Orochimaru at his own game for once.
"If you want to survive Orochimaru, I suggest you start playing the game by your own rules."
Sasuke would do more than survive Orochimaru; he would destroy him. No one would ever control Sasuke, not as long as Itachi was still out there roaming free. Decided, he drew Kusanagi and released his chakra.
The old man was in bed, as usual. His condition had deteriorated, and any day now he would be seeking Sasuke out for a body transfer.
"I knew you'd come," Orochimaru wheezed, sitting up in bed.
A bolt of lightning, frozen, extended from Kusanagi. It crackled and hissed against Orochimaru's wrist. Sasuke let his eyes roam over the intricate seals painted upon Orochimaru's arms. He wondered which of those, if any, Sakura had painted on when she was here. Whatever she'd done hadn't worked.
Sasuke walked further into the room, and Orochimaru struggled to move his hands over his shoulder so as not to suffer impalement from Sasuke's Chidori katana.
"Now you'll see how heartless I can be," he said, letting the Sharingan flood his eyes and watching, dazzled, as the dim room came into stark relief. "Even to you."
Orochimaru glared at him. Blood dribbled from the Sannin's mouth. He was truly in bad shape now. It was almost a pity to have to kill him like this, a sick man alone in his bed. But like Sasuke had told Karin: It had to be this way.
"Orochimaru, I'm stronger than you. I see no reason to let you have my body when I can accomplish what you cannot."
"Bold words for a runt."
Sasuke chuckled. "I guess this runt turned out to be too much for you. When I look at you, I see a washed up old man. You call yourself a genius, but you hide behind the strength of others. That's why you came after me, right? Since Itachi was out of the question, you hunted the runt of the Uchiha. And now look at you."
"Stupid boy. You have no idea what you're saying. You know nothing."
"I know I don't like your style. What do you hope to accomplish with all your experiments? Immortality? Don't delude yourself. Nothing lasts forever."
Orochimaru smiled, narrow and curling. Sasuke would never admit it, but his mentor was at his most terrifying when he was smiling.
"That's where you're wrong, Sasuke. You see, death and immortality are one and the same. To live forever, it's necessary to die first."
"Then I'm happy to grant you eternal life."
"I don't think so."
Sasuke barely had time to avoid Kabuto's attack. He dispelled his Chidori katana and rolled to the right just as Kabuto's chakra scalpel sliced the air where his neck should have been. He swore. Kabuto was supposed to be away all afternoon. It was the reason Sasuke had chosen this day for his escape from Sound.
"Sasuke!"
Karin appeared in the doorway with Suigetsu in tow. Impeccable timing, as always. Sasuke took the opportunity to power up a Chidori and strike Kabuto in the shoulder, but the medic veered at the last minute.
"Traitor!" Kabuto shouted.
"Hey now," Suigetsu said, stepping into the room and placing himself between Sasuke and Kabuto. "Save some for me."
"Reinforcements are on the way," Karin said. "We need to get out of here now."
Sure enough, footsteps sounded somewhere down the hallway, echoing against the damp stone walls. Sasuke spared Orochimaru one last look. The old man was as good as dead as it was, but knowing him he always had something up his sleeve. Sasuke clenched a fist. Itachi was more important than Orochimaru, in any case.
"Let's go," he said, sheathing his sword. "We have more important things to do."
"No way," Kabuto said, taking a step forward.
"Let them go," Orochimaru wheezed.
"Orochimaru-sama..."
Backup Sound shinobi were nearly upon them. Sasuke ushered Suigetsu out the door. Before he could take his leave however, he caught Orochimaru's last words.
"He'll come back to me, anyway. He always does."
Orochimaru's laughter rang in Sasuke's ears as he, Karin, and Suigetsu raced through the Sound base's empty halls.
Screams sounded louder in enclosed spaces. Sakura's assigned nurse handed her a tourniquet, her hands shaking as the patient, a Jounin, thrashed against the combined might of three burly orderlies. Sakura remained silent and strapped the tourniquet to the Jounin's left thigh as high as she could get it. Between his inhuman wails, she could hear liquid dripping through a floor drain.
He'd come in limping, just back from a mission in which the enemy had nicked him with a kunai in the calf. It was just a little cut, but he'd complained of numbness and an uncomfortable tingling traveling up his leg. The pain started soon after, and Sakura admitted him to the emergency room.
His left leg was turning black, like a shadow creeping up and up from his toes. The darkened skin burst, as though something inside were tearing it apart, and the bleeding became overwhelming. Experience told her that whatever he'd been poisoned with was working fast. Too fast.
"Where's that antidote?" Sakura said as she worked to stop the bleeding.
"H-Here," the nurse said, handing her a syringe. "Are you sure this will work?"
"No, but it'll give me time to come up with something that will."
The side effects were similar to those of another poison she'd seen in the recent past, one that had taken her nearly a day to crack with no breaks. Back then, the flesh had flaked away like alligator skin, dead. But this was like gangrene in overdrive. The best she could hope for was a little time to tweak the existing antidote to attack whatever malicious agent threatened the Jounin's life.
Hours later, Sakura's hunger was ravenous and her fingers ached from chakra overuse. This poison had been the trickiest she'd seen in awhile, but somehow she'd managed to come up with a counter agent in time. The Jounin was in bad shape. The skin on his left leg was almost completely rotted, and the muscle underneath had begun to decay as well. The counter agent stopped the poison's progress before it could reach anything vital, and just in time. Now, he was undergoing maggot therapy to remove the dead tissue while medics worked to stimulate new growth. It would be a long and painful process, but he would live and return to practice.
"I'm trying to eat over here, you know," Ino said as she stole a slice of pork belly from Sakura's ramen bowl.
"That's pretty nasty, Sakura-chan. Real maggots?" Naruto said, his voice low and conspiratorial.
"They only attack necrotic flesh," Sai said. "It's a good thing your skull's so thick or they might feast on your brain."
Naruto glared at his teammate. "I'm gonna ram these chopsticks up your ass if you keep that up."
Sakura sighed and stirred her food. She was on her second bowl, having inhaled the first one without really tasting it. All she wanted to do now was sleep, but her mind was restless. Tonight was a special night, after all.
"So, you guys are going after Sasuke finally," Ino said, thoughtful. "You ready?"
All traces of amusement disappeared as the weight of impending reality fell over the members of Team Kakashi. Sakura's eyes fell at the mention of Sasuke. Just over a month had passed since Sasori sent Sakura home after her terrifying escapades. She'd heard not a word from him since, but experience told her that meant little. It was just a matter of time before he would call on her to make good on their deal.
In the meantime, word had gotten out about Sasuke's escape from Sound. Naruto had been ecstatic to know that Orochimaru hadn't succeeded in taking over Sasuke's body, and now Team Kakashi would be free to pursue Sasuke without having to worry about the formidable might of an entire Hidden Village standing in the way.
"Yeah," Naruto said. "We've been ready a long time."
Ino smiled. "Great! Just be careful out there."
Sai smiled his fake smile. "Don't worry, Beautiful. Even Dickless isn't dumb enough to jeopardize this mission."
Sai ducked just in time to avoid a nasty right hook that would have surely broken his nose. Naruto fell out of his stool and toppled to the floor.
"Are you all right, Mr. Future Hokage?" Sai asked, reaching a hand out for Naruto.
"I'm gonna kill you! Sakura-chan, watch my ramen."
Sakura was too shocked to speak. She caught Sai's eye just before he slipped out of Ichiraku's, Naruto hot on his tail.
"You do not look like you're ready to bring Sasuke back."
Sakura blinked, just now remembering that she was alone with Ino. "Huh? Why wouldn't I be?"
Ino gave her a look that made chills run up Sakura's spine. "I don't have to be a mind reader to know you're scared shitless."
"I'm not scared. It's just..."
"...It's just he didn't help you when you needed him most."
Sakura remained silent, unsure what to say. She hadn't thought about Sasuke's deplorable behavior in Sound much since it happened. As if ignoring it would make it all go away. As if he hadn't changed. As if she could still love him blindly and blissfully.
"I don't have time for you right now, Sakura."
"His priorities are different from mine," Sakura said. "From Konoha's. He's immovable."
Ino watched her a moment, silent. "Believe me, Forehead. The last place you want to be is in the path of a charging bull. Getting out of Sound was the best thing that could've happened to you."
"Yeah." Sakura pushed a few cold noodles around her bowl, remembering that night. It seemed so far away now that she was safe again. Safe again because of him. "I won't be caught off guard like that again."
"I hope not," Ino said, taking Sakura's hand in hers. "Because you're way more important than Sasuke. Don't ever forget that. His life isn't worth your or anyone else's death."
Maybe there was a time when Sakura would have told Ino to back off. Once, she would have given her life to help Sasuke, just as she would give it to help Naruto or Sai or Ino herself. But that was before she saw how little Sasuke would care about such a sacrifice. It was before Sasori had reminded her that it was her life to do with as she pleased.
"How much do you value your life?"
"No," Sakura said. "It's not. Which is why I won't hesitate this time. I'll drag him back by his teeth if I have to. No excuses."
Ino smirked. "Just leave him intact enough for me to ask him a few questions."
Sakura nodded and yawned. Her whole body shook with exhaustion from her mad shift at the hospital.
"You look like shit, Sakura," Ino said, leaning her chin in an open palm over the counter. "Rough shift?"
"Rough day. I was at the hospital all day and night working on this poison case."
"Something tricky?"
Sakura ran a hand through her hair. "Yeah, but I had another case a little while back that was similar enough to get me started. The guy probably would've died otherwise."
"Huh, lucky break. Poisons seem like such a gamble. You never know if you'll beat them or not." Ino shrugged.
In her state of lassitude, Sakura let Ino's words hang between them unanswered for a moment. She frowned at the word choice.
"Poisons seem like such a gamble."
And then it hit her. The world around her came to a screeching, silent halt as all thought and reason abandoned her. She dropped her spoon in her ramen bowl with a splash.
"We're back!" Naruto's voice echoed somewhere behind her. "Where's the rest of my ramen?"
Sakura could barely breathe as she finally understood.
"He made quite the gamble on you."
"Hey Ugly, are you all right?" Sai asked, waving a hand before her eyes.
Sakura scrambled out of her seat. Even Sai's black eye didn't stir her natural concern. "I'm fine," she said, forcing a smile. "Just tired. I think I'll get some sleep. I'm beat."
Sai narrowed his eyes.
"Sakura-chan?"
Sakura put a hand on Naruto's shoulder. "I had a long shift. I'll see you guys bright and early for the mission, okay?"
Naruto looked like he wanted to question her, but he let it go. "...Okay. But don't be late, y'know?"
Sakura nodded and made for the exit, but a voice in her head made her hesitate a moment.
"I don't know what you figured out just now, but whatever it is... Can you handle it?"
Sakura paused but didn't look back. She rubbed her wrist where the blood binding seal lay dormant. Like an invisible thread connecting her to Sasori.
"I'll handle it," Sakura communicated to Ino.
She walked out of the ramen shop, determined in her outrage. All this time, this whole time. All those poisonings. All Sasori. It was hard to think. There was probably a calculated reason for why he'd done it, why he continued to do it, but she couldn't hear herself think over the voice in her head screaming for blood.
A nearby building suffered her wrath. Concrete cracked under her fist even without the aid of much chakra. Sakura gritted her teeth and pulled at her hair with the hand that wasn't sore.
"I'm never going back to you," she said to the crumbling wall, breathing through her teeth. "You can't make me. You don't control me."
She clasped her marked wrist; it was warm to the touch. She could almost feel his hands tracing her skin, her hair. Smiling in darkness. His voice whispering her name as he came so close, just a little more...
"I don't want to control you."
But Sakura had always been a terrible liar.
Deidara despised Uchiha Itachi. Almost from the very moment they'd met, he'd hated the guy. No one else in Akatsuki hated Itachi—he kept to himself and he was polite, even to Deidara. That just pissed Deidara off even more. But Itachi's little parlor tricks would never work on Deidara, not anymore. The Sharingan wasn't so great, and Deidara could see through genjutsu now after years of focused training. He'd never had the chance to meet Orochimaru in person, but Deidara felt like the guy had to be a colossal idiot for coveting this stupid punk. Across from Deidara, Uchiha Sasuke panted and bled all over the burning grass, those damn empty eyes still revolting even untainted with the Sharingan.
"Tell me where Itachi is," Sasuke said, taking heavy steps forward.
But Sasuke was no Itachi.
Growling, Deidara released twin clay snakes from his palms, which slithered toward Sasuke. They moved fast, and Sasuke was too spent to avoid them. One bit him in the thigh through his pants, drawing blood. A Chidori current zapped them and they fell, motionless, to the ground. Sasuke fell after them, landing on one knee. Still, he glared daggers through his pain and exhaustion.
Deidara spit blood on the ground, ignoring the metallic taste coating his teeth. "What's the matter? Too weak to be scared? I still got another trick left: The grand finale, yeah."
Sasuke said nothing, those dark, empty eyes boring into Deidara. Unseeing. Unworthy.
"Oi, cut the cool crap. You're as good as dead, punk."
Deidara's words did little to move Sasuke. Like he didn't even hear. Like he wasn't listening. Deidara's body shook with rage.
"You piece of shit. You think you can sit there and underestimate my art? You think you're so much better than me 'cause you got those damned eyes! I hate those condescending eyes! You're not better than me, just like he's not better than me!"
But Sasuke was no Itachi.
"I don't care about your art or your feelings. Just tell me where Itachi is."
Deidara felt like he was coming apart at the seams. All those years of work, all the times he'd told Sasori to fuck off, what the hell did Deidara care about Orochimaru and this stupid game (a game Deidara had never needed, not like his old partner who wasn't as perfect as he liked to believe). All those careful hours spent planning, plotting the end of a kingdom Deidara didn't even believe in. All that time, and nothing had changed: Sasori was still the only one, the only one who could ever understand. Deidara could admit he was wrong (a magician can perform all he likes, but a disbelieving crowd will never see his genius), but he didn't have to like it.
But Sasuke was no Itachi.
Deidara's laugh built from an inaudible chuckle to a full-on cackle. Sasuke bared his teeth, unsure what was coming. So he was human, after all.
"That's your problem: You're afraid of the rules. But there are no rules, yeah."
Deidara ripped his tattered shirt front, exposing the ultimate seal he'd been reserving for his final performance. Breaking the charmed strings binding it, he freed the mouth on his chest and fed it the rest of his clay. Sasuke watched, horrified.
"You should know, no one's immune to my art. Not you...not even me. In death, I'll be come true art. And I'll take you with me!"
Sasuke struggled to stand, understanding what was to happen.
"That's right, Uchiha Sasuke. Fear me, tremble before me. I'll make you see!"
Sasuke ran. He ran like a child runs from reality, from pain and suffering. Fleetingly, Deidara wondered if he'd run like this when Itachi slaughtered their whole family. The thought made him laugh louder, his cachinnations making his whole body tremble. This was true beauty, the edge of a cliff where the point of weightlessness was the perfect moment, the point that made life worth living.
"You'll see," Deidara said, the tongue in his chest curling around the clay and infusing it with what little chakra he had left.
Sasuke was long gone, running far away and blind to the true threat he could not escape now that he'd chosen to oppose Deidara. No matter. Sasori may have had little faith in him in this, but every once in awhile Deidara made plans, too.
Because Sasuke is no Itachi.
"My art is a blast!"
The world went up in flames.
Sakura was walking through a civilian settlement when she felt the earthquake. A tremor reverberated through the earth, and she nearly lost her balance. Team Kakashi and Team 8 had been out searching for signs of Sasuke for the past week, and rumors had led them here. Something told her this disturbance was no coincidence.
Civilians getting in their late afternoon shopping stopped their hunts to gossip about the sudden tremor. A few pointed to something on the horizon, and Sakura followed their gazes. A mushroom cloud rose in the distance somewhere in the forest. Paranoia began to set in. That looked suspiciously like the aftermath of a bomb, not the product of an earthquake or other natural disaster.
Curiosity (or dread) got the better of her, and she headed toward the blast site, regretting it more and more with each step. Still, if Sasuke was somehow involved, she knew Naruto would never forgive her for passing up a chance to find him.
Hah.
Sakura wondered what a reunion with Sasuke would be like now after he'd all but signed her death warrant back in Sound. She wasn't sure she could ever forgive him for his complacency, to hell with his priorities. Was his brother's death more important than her life? Apparently so, and no matter how she spun it Sakura could not get around that bleak truth. Sasuke had betrayed her, just as he'd betrayed Konoha when he left, just as he'd betrayed Naruto when they fought at the Valley of the End. He was not the boy she remembered, but was he still salvageable? She hoped so. But it was neither here nor there. The mission came first; her personal feelings would have to wait until later.
The run to ground zero took about ten minutes. It was a couple miles outside the civilian town, and the closer she got the fewer trees there were upon which to run. The bomb (and she was positive it was a bomb) had razed about a mile or so expanse of forest. Small fires burned, patches of light scattered about like someone had spit them out. Every step closer and she dreaded what she would find.
Stay away, a voice whispered in her ear. It was a voice she had ignored more and more over the past year.
She could not help but draw nearer. And when she found what she'd been looking for, her body moved on autopilot. A person lay in a tangle of limbs some yards from the blast's epicenter, like the blast had thrown him backwards. Sakura rushed to his side, covering her mouth and nose to shield against the tear-inducing smoke permeating the area.
"Oh my god, Deidara."
She'd had a feeling it was him given the wanton destruction of everything in the vicinity. That fact alone almost made her want to get up and walk away like she'd never stumbled upon him in the first place, but she stayed. It couldn't be a coincidence that Deidara was here when Sasuke might be in the area, too.
"You're just another player in this game, and so is Deidara."
Not if he's dead.
Sakura brushed aside Deidara's bangs and studied him. He was shirtless and badly battered. A tattoo on his chest smoked with unseen energy. A jagged scar bisected it as though it could open up at any minute. His torso bore lacerations and burns, and he was losing blood. He was unresponsive.
"Damnit," she swore, removing her gloves and pumping chakra to her fingers.
Inside was not much better. If she didn't know better, she'd say a bomb went off from inside him. She poured more chakra into him, willing herself to work faster. If she'd noticed the blast, surely her teammates had, too.
"...Never thought I'd be glad to see you."
Sakura blinked and found him staring at her through one half-lidded eye. "You're alive."
"Am I?"
She frowned. He shouldn't be alive judging from his state. "I don't know what happened, but it looks like you got lucky." The bad ones always did.
Deidara tried to laugh, but he ended up coughing instead. "It worked!"
"What worked?"
He didn't respond, and Sakura decided just to fix him up enough so that he could fend for himself and answer her questions. Trouble was, it was draining her fast. He'd done quite the number on himself.
"Ow."
Deidara winced as Sakura tried to help him sit up. She'd fixed the worst of his damage but not all of it. The rest he'd have to deal with, and fast. Her teammates couldn't be far off.
"Deidara," she said, taking him by the shoulders. "What happened?"
Deidara cracked his lone visible eye open and smirked at her. "Aren't you a sight for sore eyes, yeah."
"I asked you a question. The least you can do is answer seeing as I just saved your life."
Deidara seemed surprised by this for a moment, and he broke into pained laughter. "Shoulda known. Of course you'd be here."
Sakura let her jaw slacken. "...Are you telling me you planned this? Sasori planned this?"
"Hey, hey, this was a solo act. But I wouldn't put it past him to figure it out, yeah."
Sakura didn't really understand, but she let it go. "Where's Sasuke?"
Deidara made a face and pushed her hands away as he struggled to stand. "Dunno. Hurting, I hope."
"You fought him?" Sakura rose with him and caught his arm when he stumbled, not thinking. "Deidara, what happened?"
Deidara shot her a poisonous look. "Whatever. The little shit ran away like a fucking coward. 'Sides, I cheated my best technique for this." He seemed to fold in on himself, depressed or angry or both. "What a cheap way to get out, having to squander my masterpiece. I can't get that back, y'know."
Sakura shook her head. "Wait, so he's alive?"
Deidara growled and yanked her hand away by the wrist. "Yeah, he's alive. Next time, I'll get him. I already got him, and he just doesn't know it yet. That's what he gets for not taking me seriously, arrogant prick."
The radio in Sakura's ear crackled and Kakashi's voice patched through.
"Sakura, we're headed toward that blast site. I'm assuming you saw it, too. Meet us there."
Sakura pressed down on the receiver in her ear. "Copy that." To Deidara she said, "You need to leave. Now."
"Don't need to tell me twice, yeah." Deidara walked to a nearby tree stump and retrieved a hunk of clay, residue from a previous bomb, perhaps. In moments, he'd molded a bird large enough to fly him away.
Sakura watched him climb atop it, silent. He hesitated.
"Hey, uh, thanks for this." He leaned his weight on one arm, wincing. She hadn't healed everything. "Guess...you're not half bad if you can bring me back after that shit show."
"Oh," Sakura said, not having expected that. This was Deidara, not Sasori. "Well, you're welcome."
He watched her a moment, the look in his eyes unreadable, and Sakura felt uncomfortable. Deidara appeared volatile, reckless, perhaps even stupid at times, but it was all a ruse. This was the real Deidara, a mastermind who knew exactly what he was getting himself into, just as he knew what would come next. Controlled chaos. In a way, he was more terrifying than Sasori could ever be. After all, he'd survived Sasuke's wrath and lived to tell about it.
"Well, I'm a free man now. Dead, just like Sasori said, yeah." The bird he'd created flapped its giant wings and launched him off the ground.
Sakura watched him rise, wondering if she should stop him and turn him in to Konoha but finding no energy to do so. It wouldn't serve anyone's purposes, anyway.
"Be seein' you, Sakura," Deidara said, grinning.
Sakura swallowed and watched him fly away. A small part of her seriously questioned her judgment, but this was how it had to be, she knew. Deidara was more valuable alive than dead. Sasori wasn't the best at making friends.
And after seeing how he'd survived whatever happened here, Sakura was beginning to think she'd prefer Deidara as a friend than as an enemy herself.
"Oooh, you guys are tough!"
Sakura watched the masked Akatsuki as he flapped his arms. Disarming. But the way Naruto's Rasengan had passed right through him was enough reason to dismiss whatever game the guy was playing. This man was dangerous, and he was standing in the way of Team Kakashi's pursuit of Sasuke.
"Genjutsu?" Sakura said, thinking aloud.
"No, I thought so too, but..." Hinata stood to Sakura's right, her Byakugan trained on Tobi.
It had been several days since Sakura had watched Deidara fly away. The hunt for Sasuke continued, fruitless as he and his team eluded capture. Kakashi had deduced that Sasuke must employ a highly skilled sensor type shinobi, because there was no way he could have escaped Team 8's tracking efforts this long. Now, just as the Konoha shinobi were drawing near, Tobi had stopped their progress.
"Shino," Kakashi said.
"Understood."
Shino released a swarm of bugs, which descended on Tobi and covered him from head to toe. Sakura and her teammates prepared to deliver the killing blow while Tobi was distracted, but Hinata gasped.
"H-He's gone!"
Sure enough, the bugs condensed around nothing at all, like Tobi had just disappeared into thin air.
"Impossible..." Sakura said, narrowing her eyes.
But, then again...
"If Tobi can dematerialize himself at will, he should be able to do the same with individual body parts. So our attacks aren't missing, they're slipping right through him," Sakura said, her eyes still trained on the mass of bugs that no longer imprisoned the mysterious Akatsuki. "He's not incorporeal, he's just creating the illusion of incorporeality."
"He's up there!" Hinata pointed to a thick tree just ahead.
The forest here was thick enough to blot out the sun, as though night stretched in perpetuity. Tobi stared down at the Konoha shinobi from his perch, unscathed. Sakura shivered. There was something moribund about him, a lingering stench of death she didn't feel when she was around Sasori or even Orochimaru. Whoever this person was, he was more than he seemed.
A sickening crunching sound emanated from Tobi's perch, and something grew out of the tree branch next to him. A giant Venus flytrap wrapped in a red and black coat emerged from the tree, and Sakura felt her jaw drop. Another Akatsuki, but this one barely looked human.
"What is that thing?" Sakura asked, repulsed.
"It's over," the plant man said. "Itachi is dead. Sasuke won."
A short silence befell the Konoha group. It was unbelievable. From what Sakura knew about Uchiha Itachi, he was revered as one of the strongest shinobi Konoha had ever produced.
Tobi laughed. "Excellent news, Zetsu! Just as I predicted."
"Sasuke collapsed right after. Dropped like a sack of bricks," Zetsu said.
Sakura saw Naruto go from surprised to downright furious. Sasuke's fate was unclear, and until they knew the truth there was no telling what kind of shape their old teammate was in. Sai grabbed Naruto's arm just in case.
"Where the hell is Sasuke?" Naruto shouted as Sai pulled him back.
Zetsu spared Naruto a passing glance, but thought little of the boy.
"I'll play with you again sometime," Tobi said.
Somewhere behind her, Sakura heard Kakashi gasp.
"Sharingan!"
Shocked, Sakura looked closer. It was hard to discern at this distance, but the eerie glow of the Sharingan shined through Tobi's mask as he activated his technique. Like a trick of the light, his body began to swirl, caught up in a dimensional vortex that transported him someplace Sakura knew they could not follow.
"We have to get to Sasuke," Kakashi said, already sprinting after Tobi.
"I'm seeing black fire. Um...four o'clock, about six miles," Hinata said.
"Amaterasu. That's Itachi's technique."
Sakura felt a tremor travel through her body, dreading whatever they'd find. By the time they arrived at the battle site, there was no one around.
"Holy shit," Kiba said, crouching and examining a patch of black fire. "Somethin' tells me you don't wanna roast marshmallows over this stuff."
"There's no sign of Sasuke or Itachi anywhere in the vicinity," Yamato said.
Sakura looked around the stone structure, feeling cold despite the superheated air courtesy of Amaterasu. An Uchiha fan, faded, was emblazoned upon a high-reaching wall. It was cracked down the middle, like something heavy had barrelled into it. Blood spatters peppered the earth, those that hadn't evaporated under Amaterasu's encroaching heat.
"So this is Itachi's power," Sakura said, her eyes watering as she gazed over the expanse of stygian flames.
"Naruto," Sai said nearby.
Naruto was staring at the Uchiha fan on the crumbling stone wall. Tears streamed down his face, and he was silent.
"Naruto!" Sakura said, rushing to his side and taking his hand.
Sai put a hand on his shoulder. "Naruto, you..."
But Naruto said nothing. He simply continued to cry. Sakura's heart broke seeing him like this, too silent. It scared her.
"Oh, Naruto," she said, throwing her arms around him.
Soon after, Sai wrapped his arms around Sakura's. They held onto Naruto, and Sakura felt his tears drip over her bare skin, cold.
They stood there, bound together, until the sun dipped low in the sky.
It had been years since she'd been here, though she had been here before. It was why Tsunade had chosen her to lead a team on this particular mission.
She should have known nothing good could come of it.
Damp, stone walls and a chill that reached the bone were nostalgic. Like home.
"I've missed you, Anko. You've become beautiful."
Anko fell to the floor under the weight of strong arms. She smacked her forehead against the cold, hard stone and swore. Blood dripped from a new gash in her forehead. Still, she willed herself to glare at her old mentor with all the hate she could muster.
"Hatred always did look good on you."
"Fuck you," Anko spat.
Above her, Kabuto slammed her to the ground again. The strain on her shackles was enough to rip her skin, and she hissed.
"You always spoke too freely in front of our master," Kabuto said, his foot digging into Anko's back.
Anko shot her leg out and kicked Kabuto hard in the shin. He cried out and fell to one knee. She'd broken his tibia, and out of the corner of her eye she could make out Kabuto shielding his misshapen leg. Orochimaru remained still.
"Bitch," Kabuto spat.
"Kabuto, manners. Anko is my precious student," Orochimaru said. He leaned over the edge of his bed and took her chin between his fingers. "I ought to let Kabuto break your leg. An eye for an eye, you know."
This close, Anko could see how ill her former teacher looked. His eyes bore dark rings, sunken, and the edges of his lips were red with disease. He looked like something out of a nightmare, especially with his too-long fingers curling around her cheek. Razor tendrils. Despite herself, Anko grew fearful. There had never been a time in her life when she hadn't been afraid of Orochimaru, even when she'd loved him like the father she'd never had.
"But I need you intact."
Kabuto hissed, and Anko could hear the sound of his bones crunching as he mended them. When he was finished, he hauled her up to sit on her knees. Anko struggled, but whatever agent Kabuto had given her when they'd fought earlier had drained her of energy, will, and movement. She felt like a wet noodle.
Face to face with Orochimaru and Kabuto panting in her ear, Anko's fear spiked. "Why am I here? What are you planning?"
Orochimaru bared his teeth in a grin that stretched his sickly lips. They cracked and bled, and Anko followed the glistening drops with her eyes.
"Oh, something grand, my dear." Orochimaru leaned forward, his fingernails digging into Anko's cheeks and drawing blood as she struggled. "But to win the game, sacrifices must be made."
Anko shook. She knew that look too well. Her thrashing intensified, and Kabuto clocked her temple, cracking the bone and sending a rush of pain and blood to her eye.
"Pretty Anko," Orochimaru said, drawing closer. "Be happy. In the end, you're useful to me, just like you always wanted to be."
He kissed her and she tasted his blood. A cold wind rushed down her throat and pooled in the pit of her belly. It expanded and tore at her insides all the way to her toes. Tears stung her eyes and she couldn't breathe.
But in the end, she felt warm.
Warm, alive and dead all at once until she was no longer her, but someone else. The soul transfer took only minutes, and Orochimaru's empty husk collapsed out of bed onto the floor in a bleeding, shriveled mess.
"Orochimaru-sama?" Kabuto asked, loosening his grip on Anko's shoulders.
She put a hand on the bed, a hand with nails longer than they'd been only minutes ago, and pulled herself up. When she turned to face Kabuto, her eyes were golden and bright.
"How do you feel?"
Orochimaru rose to his full height, testing his new body. Already, he could feel it submitting to him, willing, so unlike the others. His eyes narrowed in shape. Purple tears traveled down the length of his nose and stopped, frozen. And his arms. He flexed his fingers over and over again, reveling in the sensation as though it were his first time. And he laughed. Kabuto said nothing, did nothing. Perhaps he was afraid.
Good.
The cursed seal on Orochimaru's neck pulsed and sent warm currents through his body. He had not felt this good in years. Ages.
"I feel whole," Orochimaru said.
Kabuto took a tentative step forward and armed himself with a cheerful smile. "Wonderful. Let me heal that bone in your temple, now."
Orochimaru let him, still taking stock of his new vessel. It was unbelievable how different this was from the others. Sweet, little Anko. It had been incredible foresight to keep her alive.
"I suppose we should thank Sakura for her insight," Kabuto said, adjusting his glasses before bending down to gather up Orochimaru's discarded body in the sheets. "She was right about those bearing your cursed seal being ideally compatible with your essence. I imagine now you can tap into Anko's life force and reclaim what the Hokage stole from you."
"Yes, quite the rare find, that one. Perhaps I underestimated him."
"Him?"
Orochimaru closed his eyes and breathed, stretching the lungs of his new vessel.
"There's no room at the top for lonely little boys, only kings and queens."
"Maybe you did learn something after all, old friend."
Kabuto did not question Orochimaru further. The snake Sannin was prone to cryptic exercises of the mind. When Orochimaru laughed again, Kabuto outright ignored it. Best not to provoke him now when he was at his most unpredictable.
"Kabuto, leave that. The others can clean it up."
Kabuto obeyed and stood. "What's next? Would you like me to continue looking into Sasori's location?"
Orochimaru walked to the door. "Good things come to those who wait, Kabuto. And I've got an eternity."
It happened in the wee hours before dawn. Sakura and her team had only just returned from the botched mission to apprehend Sasuke less than twenty-four hours ago, having lost his trail at the abandoned Uchiha hideout where he'd fought Itachi to the death. Naruto had dragged Sai and Sakura to a bar as soon as they returned to Konoha, insisting they could write up a mission report with a few 'study beers' for company. Sakura and Sai indulged him, knowing he needed the distraction after this utter failure.
Naruto had been unusually quiet until Sai produced his Bingo book and flipped to Itachi's entry. He read aloud the stats and description, and Sakura thought her drink got colder the more Sai read.
"If Itachi was so invincible, how'd Sasuke beat him?"
"Maybe he wasn't as strong as the book says."
No one believed that, but the only person who could confirm it was lost to them all over again. These thoughts had stayed with Sakura when she made it to bed. Now, she jerked awake under the pain of fire in her arm. Sharp eyes squinted in the darkness as she assessed her situation. She was alone and safe.
Rubbing her arm, her fingers fell upon something warm and sticky. Swearing, she turned on a bedside lamp. She was bleeding from the wrist. It was nothing serious, just a light surface abrasion, but it made her shake nonetheless.
Sasori had placed that strange seal on her in this very spot. There was no way this was a coincidence.
"Oh shit."
For a few horrifying seconds, Sakura's mind raced with a million thoughts. Sasori was hurt. Maybe he was dying, or dead already. Maybe Orochimaru had found him unprepared and they were fighting at this very moment.
Good.
Sakura shook her head.
Not good.
Not good at all. She hadn't heard a word from Sasori for over a month, and now that the time to act had come, she was almost relieved. He had to be alive to activate the seal, so there was still time. Dressing and grabbing a pack with supplies she thought she'd need, Sakura remembered to grab her wool traveling coat to brave the northern snows. How much time did she have? Did it even matter? She decided to play it safe and move fast just in case.
Sakura was out the door in a matter of minutes and sprinting over the rooftops toward Ino's place. There was no time for a talk or explanation, so a post-it would have to do.
"Gone to visit a friend. Cover for me."
Totally pathetic, and Sakura actually cringed when she stuck the note to Ino's window, but it would have to do for now. There would be more time to explain when she returned.
And then she froze, wondering if she could remember the necessary hand seals to make this seal summon thing work. Paranoia. She had to calm down. Taking a deep breath, she willed herself to relax a little. Easier said than done when anything could be waiting for her at the bottom of the rabbit's hole. What if Sasori was a prisoner in Sound and she was teleporting herself back into Kabuto's clutches?
Sasori would never be unprepared like that.
Too many thoughts, too many unknowns, but in this Sakura thought she could trust. He wouldn't summon her to her death...
She performed the hand seals just as Sasori had taught her, twenty in all. For a moment nothing happened, and she wondered if she'd made a mistake. But soon her wrist began to tingle and her body warmed, like her blood was beginning to boil. Sakura sucked in a breath and stumbled. She nose-dived off Ino's roof, her mouth open in a silent scream.
Cold ground broke her fall and the air left her lungs. Sakura heaved and inhaled dust. She coughed. The ground was uneven and broken, not like Konoha's cobblestone streets, but it wasn't cold. There was no snow on the ground. Something was wrong.
Sakura pulled herself up and coughed up the rest of the dust in her lungs, looking around. The sun was just breaching the horizon and offered enough light to make out the surroundings. She was no longer in Konoha, but this wasn't Sasori's castle, either. Ruined stone walls reached for the sky a short distance away. They bore the Uchiha fan, dulled and cracked. Sakura's mouth hung open in shock. This was the Uchiha hideout where Sasuke had fought Itachi only yesterday. She swallowed, perplexed, and began to walk toward the structure. Something squelched underfoot.
Sakura looked down and saw blood, fresh from the looks of it. The broken cobblestone and grass beyond it were covered in it. Splatters scattered all around the area to the forest's tree line. A cave was nearby, but the trail didn't extend to it. If Sakura hadn't been trained as a medical ninja, she may have vomited over the disgusting amount of blood all around her. Sunlight crept over the canopy behind her and shed its rays on the scene, illuminating the carnage like morning dew.
"What the hell..."
Nothing made sense. From what she could tell, Sasori wasn't here (nor was anyone else). She checked her wrist. Maybe the seal didn't work. In that case, she had no way to get to him since he'd decided not to tell her how to find him. She wondered if he'd accounted for this possibility.
Wind kicked up and splattered her boots with blood and loose dust. Sakura shielded her eyes from the sudden gale, squinting.
"Need a lift?"
"...Deidara?"
Deidara touched down on a giant owl some yards away, and Sakura jogged toward him. He didn't dismount, and Sakura had to look up to see him.
He rolled his eye. "Don't look at me like that. 'S not like I'm here 'cause I missed you or some shit, yeah."
Without the Akatsuki cloak, Deidara looked much younger. He wore a blue overcoat, short-sleeved, over long, brown shinobi gi. She hadn't thought about it before, but Sakura wondered if he wasn't close to her in age.
"You gonna keep oglin' me or are you getting on?"
Sakura blinked. "I don't understand. Why're you here?"
"You ask a lot of questions. You know, the longer we mess around here, the closer Sasori is to dying. And then we're all screwed, yeah."
"He's alive?" Sakura only noticed the relief in her voice when Deidara narrowed his eyes, suspicious.
"For now. He sent me here to get you."
Sakura nodded and climbed atop the clay bird. There wasn't a lot of room and she was squished against Deidara with her legs dangling over the sides. Her arms hung limp at her sides, like they had nothing to do. Deidara sighed dramatically.
"Hang on or you'll fall. I don't have cooties or anything, yeah."
She wanted to snap at him, but thought better of it. They'd be flying hundreds of feet above the earth, and she didn't trust him not to drop her if she pissed him off. Without a word, Sakura grabbed onto his waist and tucked her legs as close to the bird's sides as possible. By now, the sun was up and making her sweat under her woolen traveling coat.
"How did he know I'd be here?" she asked.
"That seal connects your blood. Since a lot of his blood's down there and it's closer to Konoha than the castle is, it was obvious."
Sakura paled. Something horrible had happened here to cause such spectacular bloodshed. There was no way it was all Sasori's blood or he'd have been dead by now. But now that Sakura knew why she'd ended up here, she wished she didn't.
Deidara launched them into the air just then, and Sakura yelped at the strange sensation. "If you fall I'm not gonna catch you, yeah."
Sakura closed her eyes and willed the queasiness in her stomach to pass. Whether from vertigo or the image of all that blood—Sasori's blood—branded in her mind's eye, she couldn't say. Deidara flew them north at high speed, and Sakura focused on holding on and mentally preparing herself for something bad when they reached Sasori.
The Uchiha hideout and its broken emblems shrank behind her on the horizon.
It's pretty sad that I feel the need to do this, but I just want to pre-empt any negative reviewer commentary about Karin/Taka before it starts. I'm aware that not a lot of people like Karin, which is fine, but I really love her and she is going to play a part in this fic. Please keep any negative opinions you may have about her as a character or my choice to include her to yourselves, if you have them. Incidentally, the same goes for Ino, who will continue to play a role in this fic, too. I'm sure I don't need to explain to anyone why I won't tolerate character bashing of any kind, ever. Thanks.