Author's section

I DON'T OWN NARUTO, IT BELONGS TO MASASHI KISHIMOTO

This one's my longest!

"Kyubi talking"

'Kyubi thinking'

"Normal speech"

'Characters thinking'

Author's note:

Sorry for any mistakes.

Now with the story

"A NINJA'S LIFE"

Chapter 21

"There's no scroll on him." Naruto said to his two comrades, as he threw the unconscious rain ninja dismissively on the floor with an empty 'thud'. Sasuke glared at the blond.

"We were supposed to wait till he attacked." Sakura reprimanded, frowning at the whiskered genin.

"He had been following us for twenty minutes and I got tired of waiting." Naruto responded with his hands in his pockets, turning the ninja face up with a not so gentle kick, making visible the bloody face and cracked mouth apparatus.

"It would have been inconvenient if his team might have been with him." The Uchiha said neutrally, but his eyes showed he was clearly irritated.

"Well, they weren't. I made sure of it." The blond replied, kneeling down to look at the fallen genin closer.

"What are we going to do with him?" Sakura asked, glancing the ninja.

"We leave him here and keep moving." The Uchiha said in a decisive tone, turning to go.

"We can't do that! He could get eaten or something." The pink haired girl said.

"Then what do you want us to do? We can't stay with him and wait for his team to-" a moan was emitted by the rain genin, who was beginning to open his eyes.

"Where the hell…" the disorientated brunette muttered. He looked at team seven. Then his eyes widened and he quickly leapt backwards, away from the three genins. Sakura and Sasuke fell into their fighting stances.

"You!" he exclaimed angrily, pointing at Naruto. "You were the one who punched me!"

"Well, you were the one who was stalking us." The blond said lazily. The ninja glared at the blond.

"You will pay for this!" He threatened as he retreated rapidly through the woods. Team seven watched him disappear behind a tree.

"That solves our problem." Naruto commented, turning to his teammates. The dark haired Uchiha looked at him repressively.

"Next time you consult with us before deciding to launch unexpectedly at any enemy." He said. Naruto didn't respond and instead, he looked away from him, making the Uchiha angry.

"Listen moron! We can't have doing as you wish. We need you to cooperate with us so we can pas-" Sasuke stopped short in the middle of his words, as the air started to blew hard on them.

"It's an attack!" Naruto exclaimed, as the air started getting so thick he could feel it hitting his body with great pressure. The blowing wind was getting more violent by the moment. Team seven started to be pushed backwards.

"Quick! Get out of its way!" The Uchiha yelled over the now roaring air current, but the only way it seemed they could go was the direction the wind was taking them. If they try to jump now, the force will blew them away easily. Sakura continued to slide on the ground, being overpowered by the wind blast.

"Damn." Naruto felt himself saying but the wind carried his words away. He was trying to stick himself to the ground with chakra did little to maintain him in place against the powerful attack. . He looked at his comrades. They too had used chakra to stick to the ground but it seemed useless. 'The attack is been working for a while now and it does not seems to recede.' His feet were skipping the ground slowly. 'Time for a new tactic.' Naruto put his hands together in front of him, fingers pointing in the opposite direction of the wind. He sent a big amount of chakra through his fingers, but as soon as the chakra appeared it was engulfed and taken away by the strong wind.

'Shit!' he cursed mentally. Sasuke was now three feet away from him than he was a second earlier, Sakura being behind him with her arms in front of her face, being that the wind had been cutting their clothes and had started to cut their flesh. He closed his eyes and focus chakra again in his fingers, this time a much greater quantity. It was the first time Naruto was going to spend much chakra in an attack. 'Cut through it!' he thought before his chakra surged from his fingers. The chakra countered the great pressure, making Naruto's arms shot upwards, the rest of his prepared chakra following and effectively disrupting the wind's curse.

Sound returned. Naruto heard Sakura and Sasuke's grunts after hitting the ground. The stream of air once hitting them with crushing force was now a gentle breeze that slowly died away.

"What was that?" Sakura asked, once she recovered her breath and stood up.

"There's time for questions later." Sasuke said, looking around anxiously. "Right now someone just attacked us and they might do it again."

"It's just one." Naruto turned towards a tree, eyes narrowed. "And she is right there." Sakura and Sasuke craned their necks to see the person standing on one of the many enormous branches the forest possessed. Team seven took their stances when the grass ninja stood up and jumped off the branch, landing gently on the ground.

"That was quite a technique you pulled. Was it your first try with shape manipulation?"" The long, dark haired woman complimented, her mouth twisting upwards in a smile. Naruto didn't respond. 'She's the one from earlier.' The blond thought to himself, remembering how he didn't notice her coming from behind.

"It seemed to be." She continued. Team seven stood in their places, not moving a muscle. Something about this person made them feel very anxious.

"It's a shame my jutsu couldn't separate you." The grass ninja commented. "That way I could finish you faster. Oh, well." She put her hand inside her pouch and produced an earth scroll, attracting Sasuke's attention to it.

"Hmmm, so you want my scroll." She purred, her black eyes fixed on the Uchiha. A long, pink tongue came out of her mouth and licked her lips. "Let's fight for it, then. Me against the three of you." She raised her hand holding the scroll in front of her face. Her mouth opened too wide to be normal and she started pushing the dark blue scroll into her mouth and down her throat. She turned her head in the middle of the process for the kids to take a better look. The three genins look with disgusted faces as the shape of the scroll crept down the woman's trachea. 'What is wrong with her?' Sakura wondered as the ninja gulped, signalizing that the scroll was now inside her stomach.

"Are you ready?" the woman asked. Sasuke and Sakura got out of their trance and took out a kunai. Naruto stood still, expecting the enemy to attack first. "Let's begin then." Team seven expected their new enemy to launch at them, or make hand seals to perform another wind jutsu; but instead the dark eyed woman took her right hand to her face and pulled the skin around her right eye. A green, slitted pupil was in the place where the woman's dark eye was supposed to be, but before the genins could even react, something even more powerful than the earlier wind attack hit them.

'What?' Naruto thought confused. In a second, a tremendous chill had run up and down and up again in his spine. Somehow, he had just seen a preview of his own death by action of a kunai. 'That was… What was that?' He looked at his comrades to see if they had felt it too, but it turned out that he needed to do a lot of effort to move his neck. 'What is this?' He asked himself, even more confused now. The fox stirred in his mind.

"Kanashibari no jutsu*." Kyubi said. Naruto was too concerned with his body to see that the fox had a wicked grin in his face. "It concentrates killer intent to apply fear into an enemy. Those who are too weak are completely paralyzed. Like your petty friends..." Naruto glanced at Sasuke and Sakura from the corner of his eyes. The poor girl was crying with an empty look in her eyes, it seemed that she had forgotten how to breathe, while Sasuke had just returned what he ate earlier in the day.

"…Like you." The fox added with a malicious smirk.

"Shut it." Naruto said through gritted teeth. The enemy was taking three kunai from her pouch when her attention was drawn to the blond. She cocked an eyebrow.

"Just caught off guard-" Naruto took a step to the front with visible effort. Sasuke seemed to be struggling too. 'I'm stronger than this.' "Gah!" His mind started rejecting the paralysis. 'Snap out of it!' He shook his head brusquely until he felt all his senses and movements returned to normal.

"There." He said, laughing. A trickle of sweat got into his eye but he didn't mind it. Sasuke looked at him while still in his own shock. The rain ninja turned to him.

"Congratulations, your sheer will annulled a jounin-level jutsu." She said. Naruto stopped laughing, when he heard Sasuke growl. The Uchiha had just stabbed himself on the right leg with his own knife; this seemed to clear away the effect of the paralysis too. Naruto exchanged a look with Sasuke, who had now activated his sharingan and went quickly towards Sakura to help her to her knees. Naruto turned to the enemy.

"Let me show you a jounin-level jutsu of my own." He crossed his fingers. "Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!" Ten Narutos appeared out of nowhere after the smoke cleared. The woman, again, rose her eyebrow. The clones launched at the enemy, while the real one helped Sasuke to lift Sakura and fled the scene.

"Clever." She said out loud, performing a series of hand signs and bursting flames from her mouth and her hands, dispelling all the shadow clones. "This is getting fun."

"She can also use fire jutsus." Naruto informed as soon as the memories of all his ten clones reached him. Sakura was just getting out of her stupor.

"Shhh." Sasuke urged, his hands trembling slightly. "She might hear us."

"She already knows where we are." Naruto said, standing up, and looking around. "If she doesn't find us by the blood trails, she will by your fear." The raven haired boy glared at the blond.

"It's too obvious for even you to hide it." The blond said. 'When did his sharingan changed?' Naruto wondered at the sight of two commas plastered in each red pupil of the Uchiha. A gasp came from Sakura, letting them know she had use of her mind again.

"What was that?" She asked, her cheeks shiny by her recent tears. Sasuke was about to tell her to not worry about that now, but the pink haired girl was distracted by another thing. "Sasuke-kun! Your leg." She exclaimed.

"Yeah, Sasuke thought it was a good idea to stab himself in the leg. That's a perfect strategy when you want to run away, you know?" Naruto said only half interested in the conversation; he was thinking how they will confront the rain ninja. Sasuke didn't respond, he was still comparing their ways of snapping out of the jutsu. He felt a warm feeling in his leg.

"What are you…" He trailed off, feeling the pain flowing away. Sakura had her hands over his wound, a green glow over her. Naruto was also staring. After a few seconds, the pain was completely gone.

"I've just close up the wound." Sakura said, examining the reddened skin of the Uchiha. The boys also glanced at it. "Luckily it wasn't too deep, and there wasn't nerve damage. It is closed up now, you might feel a bit of discomfort, but you can move as normal."

"When did you learn that?" Sasuke asked, standing up and flexing his leg.

"I found some books in the library. After reading them, I decided to give it a try and I've been practicing for some time now." The pink haired girl explained. "I thought I could help the team by learning this."

"Well you certainly have." Sasuke said looking at Sakura in the eyes before turning away. If the girl wasn't so affected by the witnessing-your-own-dead jutsu, she would have blushed.

"Something's coming." Naruto said, looking at some thick bushes.

"Is she again?" Sakura asked anxiously. Naruto shook his head.

"It's bigger." Sasuke responded, taking some shuriken from his back pouch. A slithering noise was accompanied by the crackling of dry leaves, what followed, none of team seven's young members were expecting. A forty feet tall snake, maybe more given that its body was curled around itself, hurled at the genins. Team seven immediately jumped away in different directions from the snake, as its long, white fangs grew closer. The abnormally big reptile chose to go after Sasuke, enlarging its jaw even more. For some reason, the vision of the snake's eyes made the Uchiha's gut boil with extreme uneasiness. He screamed in fear, something he haven't done in a very long time, taking all the shuriken and kunai he could get with his fingers and throwing them with as much force as he could at the snake's head.

All of Sasuke's weapons hit the snake, along with some of Naruto and Sakura's, penetrating in its slimy skin and yellow eyes. The animal let out a screech of pain and wavered for a moment, before collapsing on the ground where it laid immobile.

"Shitty luck we're having, eh?" Naruto said, landing on the broad snake's body, with his hands in his waist as he analyzed the large specimen.

"Are you okay?" Sakura asked as she approached Sasuke. The boy was panting heavily and soaked in cold sweat. The Uchiha nodded, taking deep breaths and trying to make them as discrete as he could, but something caught his eye that make him more nervous that he already was.

"Naruto get off of it!" The Uchiha yelled, his sharingan eyes fixed in something coming from the snake's insides. Naruto turned to the point the raven haired boy was looking and had to gasp. The head from the ninja that had attacked them just a moment ago was protruding from the dead animal.

"Our fight hasn't finished yet." The woman said, covered in slime, her long tongue grotesquely wavering in front of her. Sasuke and Sakura took a step back, as did the blond.

"What kind of freak are you?!" he said, recovering first of the tree and aiming a punch at her face. The black haired grass ninja did nothing to block it and just received flat on her face. Naruto felt her jaw move out of place, but then it moved to its proper place back again. The blond's eyes opened in surprise.

"You've got a strong hit." The ninja said, then launched kick at the blond's head. Luckily, the blond blocked it with his forearms. "And you're fast, but not enough for this." She twisted around and with the back of her hand smacked the blond in the face. The blond only had time to widen his eyes before he was sent flying against the trunk of a very wide tree, hitting it with his back.

"Naruto!" Sakura screamed. The grass ninja's eyes directed to the remaining team members.

"Now is your turn." The long haired woman's body started to elongate, coiling around the branch that directed to the boy and girl's position rapidly. Sakura took a step backwards but the Uchiha stood still in his place, eyes wide and mouth hanging open, looking with a terrified expression at the approaching figure. The pink haired girl yelled at him. She took his arm and pulled, trying to make him jump out of the way, but she only got him to take a step back; the curling form of the grass ninja stopped her strange way of advancing and jump at the two genins. Sakura closed her eyes and screamed.

"Eat this you creep!" The pink haired girl heard the blond yell, then a crashing sound. She opened her eyes to see a heavily bruised Naruto on the right part of the face standing in the branch in front of her, where the ninja freak was supposed to be. Sakura looked to the left, where big whole had been made in bark of a tree, lying in the debris was the form of the grass ninja.

"I never thought the great Uchiha Sasuke would stand still, shitting his pants, waiting for the strike to come." Naruto said, but not in his usual mocking tone; this one was serious and angry. Sasuke stared at his feet and didn't respond, making the blond angrier.

"We're in the middle of a fucking fig-" Naruto pivoted in his place, and extended a hand, grabbing an average-sized snake that came flying at him. The animal squirmed in his hand.

"I'm fucking tired of your snakes!" The blond yelled towards the tree the grass ninja had crashed and throwing the snake back. Something was wrong, there wasn't chakra signals coming from that direction. 'From above!' The blond moved just in time. The dark haired woman had come from above, bullet-like, smashing against the thick branch Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura were standing and destroying it completely. The blond landed sideways from a tree, sticking to it with chakra. Having been standing just a few feet away from the crash, Sakura and Sasuke lost their balance as the branch disappeared, but managed to leap towards another source of support. Naruto looked down, where the ninja was supposed to be but knew she was hiding somewhere else by now.

"Your speed has increased considerably." The woman said from her hiding site. The whiskered kid turned left, where the voice was coming from and jumped to the nearest branch.

"Fast enough for you now?" Naruto said, taking two kunai and throwing them towards the bushes to his left.

"Perhaps." Two simultaneous 'thuds' were heard, as the knifes hit the trunk behind the bushes. 'I was sure she-' Naruto had to stop thinking, as he turned rapidly and grabbed the woman's punch.

"You're one strong kid." The dark eyed ninja said with a smile. Naruto sent a kick to her ribs, but she used her right leg to block it. "I'll kill you first." She made various hand signs with her left hand and, before the blond had time to step back, dark-brown mud was shot from her mouth with incredible force, hitting the blond directly in his chest; sending him flying backwards until he hit the trunk (for the second time).

"Fire and earth jutsus? How the hell you do that?" Naruto asked in an annoyed tone, as he struggled to take the mud off, but it had solidified in an instant.

"You won't live to know." The grass ninja launched forward, kunai in hand aiming at the blond's exposed neck. 'Shit!' The blond thought, striving to get free. Six shuriken were directed her way; she had to halt in order not to get pierce by the sharp weapons.

Sasuke and Sakura landed in front of the ninja. Sakura took a step towards the blond, eying the grass shinobi nervously in case she was suddenly going to attack her, but the female ninja didn't seem to mind as she was looking at the Uchiha expectantly so the pink haired kunoichi went to help the whiskered boy.

"Don't worry Naruto I'll help you out of here." Sakura said, kneeling besides a confused Naruto, and taking out a kunai. Sakura started to press her kunai into the solidified mud and fracturing it, being careful not to stab Naruto accidentally in the process, repeating it every time she successfully managed to cause a deep fissure on the surface.

"Good." The blond said, as he smiled. "I knew you wouldn't stay stoned forever. Take me out of here and we will kick her as-"

"Quiet Naruto!" Sasuke ordered, not looking at him, his onyx eyes fixed in the female shinobi. Naruto's smiled dissipated and his eyebrows furrowed.

"What?"

"Listen." Sasuke begun at the foreign ninja. "I'll give you what you want." The boy took the heaven scroll from his pouch and held it in front of him. "And you'll live us alone." He threw the scroll over the female ninja. Naruto was too shocked by Sasuke's words to say anything and Sakura stopped scraping. 'What's with Sasuke-kun?'

"Interesting." The dark haired genin said, a crooked smile on her lips. She had now the scroll in her hand. "You're survival instinct overpass your pride." Sasuke flinched at her words, but maintained a straight face.

"You got our scroll." Sasuke continued, feeling his male teammate's eyes boring in the back of his head. 'It's the smartest move.' He told himself. "Now go away." Instead of getting away, the grass ninja chortled.

"I'm afraid your wrong, Sasuke-kun." The female ninja purred. Suddenly, the white scroll began to burn with purple flames. Sakura watch at it in shock. The Uchiha couldn't believe she was just burning it. "This is not what I want." Her features began to change. Her fangs became sharper, becoming visible over her lips, and she had now a twisted grin, making her face more grotesque than ever. For a moment, her neck seemed to have elongated, but it stopped as the grass monster turn around. A Naruto clone was coming at her at high speed.

"What a nuisance you are." She grunted. The clone flung a punch at her face and the grass ninja caught it tightly with her hand, much like the real Naruto had done earlier with her. Before the kage bunshin could do another move, the long haired female connected a punch directly to it's face. She let go of his hand, expecting the clone to disappear with her punch. A pair of hands grabbed her shoulders tightly. 'What?!' The Naruto bunshin was still there, as solid and real as ever. 'So young and he can already make durable kage bunshins.' She thought, taken aback, as the bunshin rammed its knee in her gut. The air was knocked out of her lungs but she recovered rapidly. Straightening quickly, she grabbed the head of the bunshin with both hands, and pressed, the face of the clone contracting into a wince until it puffed out of existence.

"You sure are a talented boy." The female kunoichi said, her calm tone of voice changed into a tense one, as if she was annoyed. She turned again to face her preys. "To maintain a shadow clone hidden all this time without me not-" Before she could finish her sentence, Naruto came at her as fast as his body let him with the chakra weights annulled, and dig his fist in the freak's face. Naruto wanted to take advantage of his opponent's surprise, so he retreated his hand immediately and ducked, permitting him send a kick at the girl's already beaten gut and send her flying into the air.

"I'm not done yet!" He screamed, jumping and reaching the beaten ninja. He raised his hands and joined them tightly. 'This kid is impressing.' The grass kunoichi thought as the blond thrust his double fist into her face. The blow was thrown so hard that the female ninja went through the thick branch they all had been standing previously and continued to fall into the canopy. Sakura, Sasuke and Naruto heard the breaking branches as the ninja passed through them. The blond turned abruptly towards his two teammates. Sakura watched him in awe and also did Sasuke.

"You think you're superior than any of us." The blond said in a neutral tone, but the Uchiha can see his eyes full of anger and… disappointment? "You're always so confident in your abilities." Sasuke lowered his eyes, not being able to look at his teammate in the eye. "But in real battle, when you are really needed to fight for your life, you turn into a fucking-."

"Coward." Sakura finished. Sasuke turned his eyes to look at her in disbelief. The pink haired girl had tears adorning the sides of her pupils. Sasuke never thought that Sakura was capable of pronouncing a word against him. But it appeared she did. And with good reason. 'I'm a coward.' The boy finally admitted. Sasuke looked at his feet. 'Just like they say. I am scared.' Sasuke's head was low, his dark hair shadowing his eyes.

"I-I'm s-"

"Don't you apologize!" Naruto interrupted, giving one more step forward. Sasuke looked at him. Naruto pointed down, towards the direction the snake nin had fallen. "All you need to do is fight with all your strength and promise me and Sakura this won't happen ever again." Sasuke stared at his teammates. The Uchiha closed his eyes and lowered his head for a long time. Sakura and Naruto waited expectantly. Finally, the young avenger raised his head. The blond and the pink haired girl were glad to see his new sharingan swirling and the look of determination on the Uchiha's face.

"I promise."

'I'm getting tired of this!' an annoyed Orochimaru, under his female grass nin cover, thought. He was actually fighting the two male members of team seven. Initially, when the blond brat had knocked him into the forest floor, he was determined to finish the kid for good after he had interrupted him on applying the curse seal on the Uchiha kid when he had been so close. When he had returned up the high forest trees again, he found Sasuke determined to fight him. Delighted that he could test the abilities of the young Uchiha, the snake's sannin bad temper dissipated and he begun to enjoy being target of the Uchiha's most clever attacks and combos. Yes, he was definitively the worthy heir of the Uchihas. Now that he had seen that, he was ready to mark him as his successor. But the same problem that arose before was present now as well. That Naruto. He wouldn't let him get near the Uchiha. They had worked together against him, summoning the most amazing teamwork abilities. While Sasuke performed far ranged attacks like his fire jutsus the blond did the close-ranged attacks, given his superior speed and strength. 'He's truly something.' Orochimaru had to admit. The blond didn't seem to run out of energy and kept encouraging the Uchiha. 'Reminds me of someone.' The snake sannin thought.

The snake ninja was now dodging the blond's attacks and the Uchiha's fire projectiles. A moment before he had distracted and was caught in Sasuke's wired shuriken, that he wisely mixed with a fire attack and managed to cause some damage to Orochimaru's outer skin. Now part of the female ninja's face was peeled off and his real face was visible. At this, team seven had to stop to stare in horror at this new attribute of their opponent and wonder if the grass ninja was really human.

'This is taking too long.' The snake ninja thought, watching the darkening sky. He still needed to impersonate the sound team sensei and there was a chance that Konoha shinobi found the three faceless bodies of the grass ninjas. That is if they looked well around the village. Fortunately Kabuto found them a good hiding place. His slitted pupils switched to team seven's female member for a moment. The pink haired girl was watching the fight intently at a safe distance, like her partners have told her. Orochimaru dismissed her. She didn't have any importance. He looked at the blond that had just landed on a branch near the panting Uchiha. He'll have to take him out first, that way the Uchiha would be an easier prey.

Naruto eyed Sasuke carefully. The raven haired boy was panting heavily. 'No surprise.' The blond thought, noticing the tiredness rising in him. 'He's been using his fire jutsus more than ever.'

"You should finish this soon, kit." The fox said in his mind. "Your friend won't stand much longer. He's not like you."

"I know that." The blond retorted, dodging a few snakes thrown his way. The only problem was that the blond didn't know how. This opponent was far stronger than Zabuza himself. The fox chuckled, sensing the boy's distress.

"You might remember our deal. You promised you would let me out a few times." Naruto perched himself in another branch.

"…" the blond didn't want to let the fox out right now for various reasons. First of all, he didn't know how it would be, being he had never let the fox out. Also he didn't want Sasuke and Sakura to presence whatever going to happen when Kyuubi showed himself. "I don't need you. I can do this." The fox stayed silent for a while.

"We'll see." Was what the Kyuubi said before becoming silent again. Naruto was about to protest when Sasuke said

"Katon, Housenka no Jutsu*" Small balls of fire erupted from Sasuke's mouth towards the grass ninja. The shinobi narrowly evaded them by moving out of the fireball's way. Naruto watched his friend closely, trying to make out what he was trying to do. He caught Sakura's eye and she nodded. 'Oh. So the trap is ready.' Naruto started throwing kunai and shuriken, helping guide the freak ninja towards the trap's location. Sasuke's new sharingan helped him predict better the movements of his opponent, and so he knew where to direct his fireball to make the snake ninja move where he wanted to. In a few seconds, the ninja was in place. Sakura cut a string with her kunai. Dozens of kunai started raining from every angle towards the attacker. The ninja leapt into the air, deflecting some of the weapons with a kunai in her hand. Sasuke took advantage of his distraction and threw his two giant shuriken with attached string at the ninja. The shurikens past the shinobi and secured his hands, bringing him down towards a wide branch and pinning him to it. Naruto took out a kunai and waited for Sasuke to finish. The Uchiha was finishing his final seal.

"Katon, Ryuuka no Jutsu!*" A powerful beam of fire came from Sasuke's mouth rapidly, illuminating the now dark forest. It hit the grass ninja directly. The roars of the fire deafened the screams of pain of the snake shinobi. Sakura looked away and waited for the attack to be over. It took two full minutes before the sharingan users' attack died out. When it happened, Naruto plunged rapidly towards the roasted body of the snake ninja and stuck his kunai firmly on the twitching ninja's heart, determined to kill him. After this done, the ninja stopped moving and became still. Naruto kept staring at the body, expecting it to do something. Sakura landed in the branch next to a very tired Sasuke.

"Is she…" she trailed off, looking at the body.

"Off course she is." Sasuke said, wiping his sweat in his sleeve. "Must be some kind of monster to survive that." Naruto turned his head to his comrades and grinned.

"Not even a monster could survive this." The blond said. He stood up. "Now, who is going to help me take her scroll out of her stomach?"

"That's sick, dobe." Sasuke said with a smile, sitting down.

"Sick or not, I think you should be the one to do it. After all you made us loos-"

"NARUTO! WATCH OUT!" Sakura screamed. Sasuke rapidly got to his feet, his face pale. Naruto could sense something was not right. He looked over at the body. It was now covered in mud and melting. A cold shrill ran up and down and up his Before he could turn around, he sensed someone behind him. He turned around just in time to see the face. His face. Two purple stripes climbed down from each one of his eyes. His skin was the palest one he'd ever seen. And those same eyes he'd seen earlier before. Slitted and golden. His pale hand grabbed his neck tightly, lifting him up, face to face with the monster.

"It was entertaining." He hissed, his lips twisted into a malicious smile. "But now you've become a pest." He raised his other arm and enveloped it with chakra. "This won't kill you immediately." His hand plunged towards Naruto. The blond could feel a tremendous pain as the hand ripped through his chest. He didn't scream, the shock was too much. Something warm and wet poured all over his lower chest. He knew it was blood. He could hear Sakura's and Sasuke's scream. They sounded like they were miles away. The pain was the same when the monster took his arm out of him. Naruto didn't move. He started to feel drowsy. He saw the monster's lip move but he couldn't hear anything anymore. Naruto was thrown away, into the trees, until he hit one with his back and fell some more, finally stopping when he fell on one branch. Everything seemed in slow motion. He lay there, his head in the direction of his comrades and the monster. A puddle of blood was forming underneath him. His eyelids felt so heavy. Through half-lidded eyes he saw the new ninja jumping towards his friends, saying something to them. The puddle was getting larger. He closed his eyes, unconsciousness was getting to him.

"Let me out." The fox said. Naruto could barely hear him. "Let me out." He repeated. Naruto had no strength to even respond to him. "If you don't let me out…" Kyuubi warned. "Your friends will die." Naruto made one last effort to see his friends. His eyes opened just enough to let Naruto see the snake freak bite Sasuke. He fell but Sakura caught him. "LET ME OUT!" Demanded the fox.

'Fine.'

Sakura was besides the kneeling Uchiha, tears falling freely over her cheeks.

"You better listen, Sasuke-kun, while you're still conscious." The snake-looking man said. "Pass this test. Show me everything you can do. When you feel ready and want more power, seek for me, Orochimaru-sama." Sasuke had his hands on his neck, where Orochimaru had bitten him. It hurt like hell. He didn't think he could stand the pain, and it only got worse. Sasuke started screaming. He screamed his lungs out. 'Please make it stop!' He thought desperately. Someone seemed to heard his words because he immediately fell unconscious given the great pain he was in.

"Sasuke-kun?" Sakura asked meekly, putting her hands over the boy's neck where to droplets of crimson blood scurried down his neck. Her hands glowed green and the two incisions in the boy's neck disappeared. "Sasuke-kun!" she sobbed, shaking the unconscious from of the raven haired avenger, but he didn't move. The so called Orochimaru was saying something but she didn't pay attention. The only thing she noticed was the snake ninja drifting slowly into the branch. There was a very strong surge of chakra near her. Sakura looked around, trying to locate the source of the energy. It came from the direction Naruto's body was. Something came at breakneck speed towards her position. Orochimaru, or what was visible of him being all his body except his head was already inside the branch, also noticed. 'This chakra.' Something with long fingernails grabbed Orochimaru's head.

"What?!" he gasped. Trying to look behind him, but the force of the grip didn't let him. He felt himself being lifted out of the branch, fingernails digging hard on his scalp. Once he was fully outside of the branch, the one grabbing his head turned him around. The snake nin eyes widened when he saw a pair of slitted, red pupils looking angrily at him.

"K-Kyu-" Naruto didn't let him finish that word by connecting his fist on his mouth. The great force sent the snake sannin flying through the forest, knocking the trees his pale body met down. Sakura watched the blond with her mouth wide open. There was some sort of dark orange layer all around his body with what seemed like a tail switching around on his posterior part, making the blond a bright orange spot in the darkness of the forest. His blond hair looked wilder than normal, his whiskers were deeper and darker, his fangs had elongated, his hands had longer fingernails, the right part of his chest where the whole was supposed to be, was healing rapidly. Right now, under a veil of smoke, his muscle was regenerating at an impressing rate. He looked at her, and she noticed his red eyes.

"Sakura." He said, approaching her. Sakura could feel the overwhelming sensation of his chakra as he came nearer. She couldn't help feeling anxious.

"He did something to Sasuke-kun." She said shakily. Naruto looked over at Sasuke and a surge of new chakra came from him.

"Here." He said, showing a small revolting insect in his hand. He took her open hand and put the tiny insect in it. Her skin felt warm against the contact of the orange chakra. The pink haired girl looked at the tiny insect, revolting in her hand frantically, as if something was making it nervous. The insect made an attempt to escape but Sakura caught it in her hand. In normal circumstances Sakura would have retracted in disgust, but right now, she just looked at it and wondered the reason for her weird comrade to do that.

"Shino and Shikamaru have the same bugs. If any of them is smashed, the other bugs will come for it, guiding the way to the person who smashed it." he explained.

"Take Sasuke and yourself somewhere safe. It will guide Shino and Shikamaru to you when you kill it. They will help you. But don't kill it now because it's too dark for them to follow. Wait till there's sunlight. Got it?" Sakura nodded. She looked from the insect in her hand to the blond.

"W-What about you?"

"I'll stay with this son of a bitch." He spat. "Now go." Sakura nodded slowly, not daring to disobey. Sakura turned to Sasuke. She grabbed his arm and put it around her neck. Naruto turned as soon as she started leaping from branch to branch, each time lower, making their way to the forest floor.

"Let's rip him apart!" An exhilarated Kyuubi urged. Naruto darted through the branches, following the snake scent, and using his new ability to see in the dark. A second tail was beginning to form at the memory of Sasuke's immobile body.

He got to Orochimaru in less than a minute. The snake sannin hadn't tried to escape this time, feeling curious as to how the Jinchuriki will act under its prisoner influence. He wiped the trail of blood going down his chin. 'Wouldn't imagine that that idiot of the Yondaime would have the guts to imprison the nine tailed beast on a child.' He watched the orange point come closer. 'He's gain some of my respect.' Naruto was now standing on the same branch Orochimaru was. The blond was glaring at him, while the snake nin had a playful smirk on his face.

"I knew you were something else." The man said. Naruto gritted his teeth, his second tail now complete. "Now, show me what you can do." The blond lunged forward, towards his enemy. He threw attacks furiously, not really thinking about a strategy. He just knew one think. He would kill the freak who had hurt Sasuke, and he was going to enjoy it. The fox laughed at his dark thoughts, encouraging him and giving him sick ideas of how to kill someone as slow as possible, inflicting as much pain as possible.

Naruto's attacks were very potent. When Orochimaru dodged his blows, he would accidentally knock out a tree, or disintegrate a branch. He didn't care. Naruto was getting frustrated that the snake dodged his every attack.

"I'll lend you more power." Kyuubi said. "This is not enough, you have to take it ALL!" Naruto complied much to Kyuubi's delight. Another tail appeared and he could feel the difference. Orochimaru was having hard times evading his brutal attacks, until finally the blond got him. He was sent flying again, but this time Naruto didn't stop. He leapt forward, going for him and kept beating him up. Orochimaru was now cornered against his raw power; that new power that ran all through his veins. Naruto smiled. He felt warm inside. 'I don't have enough chakra to keep this up!' Orochimaru thought alarmed. He had done a lot of summons, and the curse seal to top it all. 'This kid might actually kill me!' The snake had summoned one of his most powerful snakes but it was easily discarded by Naruto. The man was now running away from the Kyuubi container, trying to escape his attacks.

"That's right you better run." Naruto said in a voice that didn't seem his own. "I'm going to have fun maiming you." He laughed sadistically. Naruto applied chakra to his feet and managed to caught up with the fleeing man and grab him by his throat.

"Or maybe I should just break your neck." He pondered, a cruel smirk adorning his transformed face. Orochimaru needed to think quickly. An itching by his arm where a tattoo was located signalized let him now the jounins had found the bodies. But escaping this demon was first. He made a few hand signs and his body started to melt and gain a brown color. Naruto clenched his fist, hoping he could break his neck before he could escape. But nothing cracked, just pure mud running down his hands. Naruto turned around, where he could feel Orochimaru's presence, but a new snake blocked his way. The blond killed it easily, by sending one of his chakra tails to go through the snake's throat. Now that the snake was down, he was going for the snake master. Orochimaru was doing the same thing again. Drifting through a tree trunk. Naruto hurried, hoping to do what he did the first time. But when he reached the tree, Orochimaru had just disappeared. Naruto punched through the tree in fury, maybe he was still in the tree, but he was already gone.

"FUCK!" he screamed. Anger boiling in him. It took a moment for him to stop cursing. Well, at least he is gone. Naruto tried to suppress the fox's chakra, but it was proving difficult.

"He's gone already." He said in his mind. "There's no need for you chakra now." But the chakra was still there. It felt even more powerful.

"Kyuubi! Didn't you hear me?" he said, entering his mind. "I said I don't need your chakra anymo-" His mental voice died down to the fox's hauling and screaming. Kyuubi was ganging against the bars.

"Take more chakra!" he screamed. Naruto had to take a few steps back, fearing the gate might break. "TAKE! AND WE WILL KILL EVERYBODY!" Naruto had to cover his ears from the noise. Right now there were three orange chains tied around him, they seemed to come down from Kyuubi's cage. But there was now another one that was trying to get to Naruto. The blond gasped.

"STOP IT KYUUBI!" the blond roared, but the Kyuubi only laughed.

"ONE MORE!" Kyuubi howled desperately. "ONE MORE AND I'LL TAKE OVER!!" Naruto was scared now. His control felt like slipping. He needed to do something. The chain was coiling itself around Naruto's leg. The blond stood still and closed his eyes. He tried calm the power he controlled down.

"C'mon." He said out loud. Feeling the chakra around him getting hotter and hotter. Kyuubi couldn't take over. He needed to return to his team. He needed to help Sasuke. And he could not do this if Kyuubi ruled over him. Somehow, the memory of Sasuke needing help made the chain loose around Naruto's foot.

"NO!" Kyuubi screamed. "NO! NO! NO!" The more Naruto thought about Sasuke needing his help, the more the chain recoiled. The fox kept screaming, as the chain vanished under the water and Kyuubi's cage. Now that that chain was gone, Naruto felt more in control.

"Now get these three chains off me." He demanded. They slowly got away from him. All at the same time. Naruto could feel the orange chakra getting out of his system and his usual blue one again present.

"DAMN HUMAN! THE GREAT KYUUBI WAS SUPPOSED TO COME BACK! I'LL MAKE YOU PAY! I'LL PLAGUE YOUR MIND UNTIL YOU CAN'T STAND IT ANYMORE! YOU'LL BEG TO ME TO MAKE THE NIGHTMARES STOP! I SWEAR! THE GREAT KYUUBI IS COMING BACK! YOU HEAR ME? THE GREAT KYUUBI IS COMING BA-" Naruto was back on his original state. But weariness like never before was taking over him. He started lose consciousness as the Kyuubi continued to bellow.

*Kanashibari no jutsu – Body freeze jutsu

*Katon, Housenka no Jutsu – Fire element, phoenix fire technique

*Katon, Ryuuka no Jutsu – Fire element, dragon fire technique.

Author's section

REVIEW

C'ya later

- Patty