Fire: Another chapter! Yay!
Sasuke: What are you so proud of? I did all the work.
Fire: (points to self) I did some work.
Sasuke: (stares at Fire) ...
Fire: Okay, I helped.
Tobi: Are you finally going to get to these today, Fire-sama? (holds up a huge bag of reviews)
Fire: --;; Um...on with the story!
Sasuke: At least read one.
Fire: I've read them! Um...I just...
Kisame: Fire's too lazy to reply.
Fire: I swear I'll do it! Just you wait! You'll all be receiving replies from me!
Sasuke: Can we continue on with the story now?
Fire: (sighs defeatedly) Yes.
Tobi: (looks around) You're talking to me?
Fire: (stares at Tobi) ...
Tobi: Yes! (pulls chapter 20 onto the screen)
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Chapter 20: Harmful Rivalry
'Here, another day has passed. Summer has arrived and soon it will rain again. No, I'm not well. Is that enough normalcy for you? Last night, I dreamed you were by my side, listening to these useless words. But nonetheless, we were happy. If only you would return... If only you would stay by my side... I promise I will become better, stronger. I will become someone who wouldn't make you cry. I will work harder. So please, if you haven't left my world yet, return to me.'
By the time Kakashi arrived, the smoke had died down. The bodies of casualties—killed with poisoned kunai that could only belong to Akasuna no Sasori—lay between the sidewalk where he stood and the burning food stands. But even though the stench of wood filled the air, he couldn't see Sasori anywhere. 'Sasori...' His whole body shook with the thought of Sasori being nearby. The murderous intentions from days earlier still hadn't subsided.
He still wanted to kill him.
And now, he had even more of a reason to kill him.
He had thought about it for the last few days. Ideas on how he could kill Sasori without being too obvious that he had wanted him dead. And without Sakura hating him for it. Raising a child on her own wouldn't be easy.
'Suiryuudan no jutsu!' The dragon of water rose from the pipes within the stands and crashed over the smouldering restaurants, sweeping the dead out of sight. Kakashi sighed at the destruction. He had thought that Sakura had the Suna-nin under control, but if she did... 'Then she's responsible for this?' Kakashi thought for a moment before shaking the idea out of his head. 'No! She can't be!' It was ridiculous! Sakura couldn't be responsible for something like this. But if she wasn't, that meant...
"Sasori..." The stressed growl rumbled angrily from Kakashi's throat. He had tried to hide his killer intent, but now...now there was no need to suppress it anymore. "Pakkun!" He turned to the ninken at his side. He had momentarily forgotten that he had summoned him. When he was running to so many fires, he had summoned Pakkun to help find the most damaged areas. Now he needed him to find something else.
"He's in that direction." Pakkun lifted a small paw and pointed. He didn't even need to hear Kakashi say it. Kakashi's mental, 'Where is that bastard Sasori?' was loud enough to penetrate his canine skull.
And the grey-haired jounin was gone before Pakkun could say another word. Like "be careful. He's still on the rampage." However, the small ninken knew that danger wouldn't be a problem. That dark face which had turned to him... Such killer intent that even the ninken shook immobilized. He had never seen Kakashi like this before. Such anger... Kakashi would definitely kill Sasori as soon as he saw him.
People scattered irrationally around him, running in all directions—including at his puppets and at him—but it was useless. Either way, Sasori was going to catch them. Either way, he was going to kill them. He had destroyed an entire country with his techniques. He couldn't use that technique anymore, but that didn't mean he still couldn't do it! A simple village like this...he wouldn't permit even a single survivor! 'Run! It's futile!' Sasori's crazed thoughts spilled across his laughing consciousness. 'I'll still catch you!' No one could escape Akasuna no Sasori!
Women, children, the innocent citizens of Konoha, he didn't care who they were! His puppets tore out their throats with equal indiscrimination. His poison had no restraint against targets. If they ran, he broke their legs. If they fought back, he broke their arms. If they tried to reason with him, he crushed their heads. The dismangled bodies of the dead and dying carpeted the ground, crunching beneath his feet as he walked. The thick scent of pain and blood saturating the air brought back memories and emotions that he hadn't felt for almost a year. It was the only thing that Sakura wouldn't allow him to do.
It was the satisfaction that could only be obtained through killing.
And he wanted to feel it for as long as possible.
Sasori had already marked his next target. The frantic human couldn't get away. His puppet was too fast! As he sent the Sannin hitokugutsu forwards, he could already see the blood gushing from—
'Kuchiyose: Tsuiga no Jutsu!'
His arm stopped in mid-air, in mid-swing. Orochimaru and his other puppet stood frozen. He couldn't move his arm. The sharp teeth of seven ninken sank into his muscles, locking them in place. 'Kakashi!' There was only one person who could use this technique. "You're early." He forced calm words out, even though he wanted to rip Kakashi's skin from his body. "Do you keep my scent in a vial, just in case?" From what he knew about Kakashi's technique, he needed a way for the ninken to find the target. His blood, or his opponent's blood was especially effective, but it just had to be a distinguishing scent.
"Scent?" Kakashi's fuzzy thoughts could barely take in what Sasori was saying. "I don't need your scent. I don't need anything when you're the only one in this village who smells strongly of wood and blood!"
"Hn." He should have known that it was something simple like that. "You've found me, but..." As soon as Sasori closed his eyes, he could see where the ninken were. The slight weights on his limbs, the large rows of teeth on his shoulders and arms, the one on his head... These minor differences were enough for him to judge where they were and how big they were. "You think you can stop me!" With a single swing of his arms, he threw them aside. "Konoha gaki!" And launched at Kakashi. "If you want Sakura so much, try to take her from me!"
Because that was the only reason why Kakashi would want to hurt him.
Over the last few weeks, Kakashi's transparent feelings had only sunk further into the village's consciousness. There was no other reason for everyone to shun him. A sensei can never be with his student.
Then, Sasori stole everyone's attention with Sakura's lie. The Suna-nin saw everything clearly.
"I'll kill you long before then!" Sasori wouldn't let Kakashi relax for even one moment!
'Senei jashu!'
Kakashi leapt back, his eyes catching onto the movement of the Sannin puppet a moment before the snakes flew at him. Sasori was using himself as a distraction. He had to remember that the puppets were also out here, and they were both going to attack him. 'Three against me...' But Sasori was his true opponent! He had to focus on the puppetmaster, not on the puppets!
"Kuso!" The Konoha jounin pulled the hitai-ate from his eye, but even with the sharingan, he couldn't predict the simultaneous movements of three opponents. As he pushed the regular kugutsu aside, Orochimaru's kusanagi flew past his head, slicing off parts of his hair before he managed to slide out of the way. But as he knocked the sword away, Sasori's presence by his side—with poisoned weapons in his hand—was already there.
'I have to think of something!' As he tried to see everything, the Suna-nin was already planning his next attack. If he couldn't attack Sasori... He couldn't run away forever!
Besides, he still wanted to kill Sasori.
'Senei Ta Jashu!'
Snakes hurtled at Kakashi, but he was ready. He raised the kunai in his hand, decapitating the barrage before they could hit him. However, Sasori had planned for this moment. He knew that the same attack wouldn't work on Kakashi, not on someone with the sharingan, not on someone who had the same ability as Itachi, the ability to see through, understand, and copy an attack with one glance.
'Nan no Kaizou!'
"Kakashi," Sasori said with disappointment in his voice as he shook his head at the jounin. The Konoha-nin was bound with a human rope, the Orochimaru puppet's body tightened around the grey-haired jounin. "I thought it would have been more interesting." He pulled a kunai from his sleeves... "How disappointing." ...and plunged the poison-coated blade into Kakashi's chest.
Warm blood enveloped his hand for a moment before Sasori realized that something was wrong.
"Interesting?" The voice came from behind him!
'Kawarimi!' Sasori turned, pushing himself away from the log as Kakashi's kunai dragged across his shoulders. "K-kuso!" The unnatural pain of a human body filled his senses. "Kakashi," he growled angrily as he glared at the jounin. But there was nothing he could do. He could barely see. All he could see was pain. All he could hear was pain. All he could taste was blood.
"Too much humanity, Sasori-kun?" Kakashi didn't have to look to see the falling puppets. With such a minor injury, Sasori was overwhelmed. For someone who had the unfeeling body of a puppet for over twenty years, his human body was his own enemy. "Let me..." He pulled a kunai from the wall, one of many that Sasori had thrown earlier, to kill the scattering villagers. "...end it for you."
"End?" Sasori didn't have the sense of humour to laugh. "I'll end it for you!"
"Nani?" Orochimaru appeared between them. 'When? How is he controlling the hitokugutsu?' No matter how Kakashi looked at it, Orochimaru was moving on his own!
"I don't need to move to kill you!" All he needed was to see where Kakashi was. The rest will be left to his puppet half.
'Don't need to move?' The chakra strings were almost unnoticeable, but if he concentrated, he could see that they weren't attached to Sasori's hands. They were attached to... "Sasori, you..." It couldn't be! "You..."
"See it now!" Sasori tore the cloak from his body. "I can't lose to you!" The shoulder blades on his back was enough to defeat Kakashi. "Ima..." Orochimaru clicked with anticipation. "Shi-ne!"
The distance from the outskirts of Konoha to the core of the village was too great. Even running, she couldn't get there fast enough. She had to move faster. She had to get there soon! If she didn't... She didn't want to think about what would happen if she didn't. Sasori hardly listened to her. She didn't know what she could do. He was already tearing his freedom from her hands. She couldn't control him anymore, not really.
"Sasori!" She called for him as soon as she came to the edge of the destruction. Bodies lay everywhere. The buildings around her smouldered with recently extinguished fires. Ash and blood stained the ground, absorbing her footprints into the massacre with every step. 'You didn't do this, did you?' She thought she had more control over him. He couldn't... This couldn't be... "Sasori!" Not even her medical ninjutsu could save them. These people were already dead.
And Sasori wasn't there.
The pink-haired medic-nin ran forwards. If he wasn't here, she had to continue onwards. She had to find him! She had to find him before he killed anyone else. If she didn't know that he was responsible for this destruction, she knew now. The poison on those kunai, the ease and speed with which this part of the village was destroyed, the panic that still stained the air, all this could only be accomplished by Sasori. If it was Deidara, he would have had blown up the entire village with a single sculpture.
'Sasori, when I find you, I'm going to crush your hands!' She would make sure that he could never make another puppet again!
Kakashi couldn't believe it. Even though he was looking at them, he couldn't believe it. But his eyes kept poking him, telling him that it was true. 'No. Sasori's human!' But humans didn't have unnatural limbs like that! Those were the artificial wings of a puppet! 'He's...' Sasori was truly inhuman.
"Magnificent, aren't they?" Sasori could already see Kakashi's defeat. After waiting so many years, he could finally kill him! He could finally have vengeance!
There were many different reasons for the current members of Akatsuki to join the organization. Sasori didn't know all their reasons. Whether it was money like Kakuzu, religion like Hidan, or just plain power, Sasori didn't know. All he knew was that he wanted vengeance.
When his parents returned from the war, they were dead. Kakashi couldn't possibly have known the thoughts that ran through his young mind when they died. At that time, he was almost indifferent. He was too young to really understand. Parents who were preoccupied with the war, leaving him to be raised by his grandmother... He didn't feel much for them. But the hatred grew. As time passed, as he grew older, he wanted vengeance for wrecking his life. He wanted to kill the White Fang of Konoha.
But that man was already dead.
"Do you know much much I hate you!" Sasori shouted as he battled the pain clouding his vision. Orochimaru was a good puppet, but a good puppet was nothing without a good puppetmaster. "How much I want to kill you!"
Sasori knew that Kakashi wanted to kill him. He had done everything to make Kakashi hate him. He didn't want Kakashi to like him, and more than anything, he didn't want to like Kakashi. Coming to Konoha, keeping him away from Sakura, hurting Sakura, becoming someone that everyone trusted and making everyone hate Kakashi. It was going so well until Sakura came up with this lie.
Destroying Konoha was a small obstacle, if only to hurt Kakashi!
"Shi-ne! Shi-ne! Go to hell, Kakashi!"
'There are no breaks in Orochimaru's attacks. How do I get pass him to Sasori?' Kakashi tried everything, including slicing off the Sannin's arms, but as soon as they fell from the hitokugutsu, the limbs flew back to the puppet's shoulders. 'Kunai?' There were already several stuck in the Sannin's body. 'Then, I have no choice!'
Although he was lying. He had plenty of other techniques at his disposal, over a thousand! But he didn't want to believe that he wanted to hurt someone Sakura loved.
'Raikiri!'
However, he was still going to use this technique...
...to kill him.
The Sannin still stood in the middle of the street, ready to kill Kakashi, but within the moment, the hitokugutsu stood alone. Kakashi had disappeared.
'Shunshin no jutsu?' But Sasori knew that it wasn't shunshin. It was...
The deafening shriek of birds burst through his lower abdomen, sending blood splashing across the air. Sasori's world reddened as he twisted his head around to see Kakashi's obvious satisfaction at his open stomach glaring at him...
...before the jounin pulled his hand away, and Sasori collapsed to the ground.
The redhead glared up at the grey-haired man. If only he wasn't human, he could... 'Kuso.' His mind wouldn't think straight. Pain overwhelmed him. There was nothing he could do. The blue vines of lightning thrashing relentlessly around Kakashi screeched for his death. And the jounin's deranged eyes held no chance for mercy.
He was going to die.
Sakura waded through the destruction, but there was no sign of anyone. No one alive. There wasn't even a slight clue that could lead her to Sasori. 'And he's...fighting?' She couldn't see it, and there was no reason for her thinking he could be fighting, but there was the faint quiver in her chest, tugging at her, insisting that Sasori was in danger.
"P—" The first sign of life amongst these ruined streets. "Pakkun!" She skidded to a stop before she could step on the ninken. "Pakkun, what are you doing here?" 'Kakashi-sensei must be close.' And the urgent calls from Sasori suddenly became more frantic.
The ninken shivered pitifully. "Sakura," he said as he looked up at the medic-nin. "Kakashi..." His whole body shook with fear. "You have to stop him! He's going to..." The ninken could barely keep his nerves together. He had never seen such a frightening Kakashi before. "...kill Sasori."
'No.' The pink-haired girl couldn't believe it. Sasori wasn't dangerous. There was no reason to kill him! 'I have control over Sasori. He couldn't...' Even though she suspected Sasori, he couldn't be responsible for this!
"Kakashi-sensei..." She couldn't let Kakashi hurt an innocent man! "Where is he!"
Sakura's shout sent Pakkun jumping into the air. "He's that way," the ninken said quickly as he pointed down a street cluttered with unmoving bodies.
'Kakashi-sensei...' Sakura tore down the street, her chakra gathering at her feet, giving her more speed than before. 'Onegai...' She couldn't let him hurt Sasori. "Kakashi-sensei!" She shouted as the grey-haired jounin came into view. "Yamete!"
Her superhuman fist smashed into her sensei's head before she realized it. Kakashi flew, suspended in the air for a horrific moment before his body crashed to the ground, grating across the sidewalk before coming to a stop. Sakura could only stare, waiting for the sight of red spreading from her sensei's head.
But there was none.
"Kakashi-sensei," she said shakily as she waited for him to rise. If he wasn't hurt badly, he shouldn't lie there and scare her. "Kakashi-sensei, I knew it couldn't be Sasori." The jounin was shaking, trying to rise as she continued speaking. More than anything, she wanted to avoid explaining why she had to hit him. So, she had to say something, anything else, just to take the pressure off that topic! "It wasn't Sasori. I knew it couldn't be Sasori." She rambled on, her thoughts flying out of her head before she could speak, sending useless, senseless words pass her lips. "It was... It was you! You destroyed Konoha, Kakashi-sensei!" Her irrational mind came to that conclusion naturally after seeing the destruction around her.
"N-nani?" Kakashi sat up, staring at Sakura. "Me?" He didn't do it! "It was Sasori!"
"You attacked Sasori!" Pakkun had told her that Kakashi was going to kill Sasori. She hadn't wanted to believe the ninken, but Sasori was lying on the ground. Bleeding! "I knew it couldn't be Sasori! He wouldn't do something like—"
"And I would?" Kakashi couldn't believe that his student would accuse him of something like destroying Konoha and killing innocent people. Without a reason! "I'm Kakashi." He would never do something like that.
And Sakura knew it. As she glared at her sensei, she knew that it wasn't him. But that left...
"You!" She turned to the Suna-nin. "I knew it was you! You destroyed Konoha!" She stomped angrily on Sasori's chest. "The kunai all belonged to you! Look at the poison on this!" As soon as she tried to heal a corpse, she knew. No one in Konoha used poison like this!
"Sakura!" Sasori shouted as blood splurted from his wound. "Sakura, I'm bleeding! You should at least heal me before stomping on me!"
"Heal you? I'm going to kill you! How can you destroy Konoha?" Don't you think about your actions?" Sakura's foot ground the bleeding wound into the street. "I'm going to crush you in half!" She raised her foot, ready to kill Sasori.
But before she could stomp down, her body froze. Her leg, her arms, her head... Her body refused to move. 'Kanashibari?'
"Sakura, stop. You're going to kill him."
"That's the idea!" She shouted at the voice, even though she had never yelled at him before. "Sasuke-kun!"
Even without turning around, she knew that the Keimu Butai, Sasuke's Keimu Butai was there. The ANBU were there. Tsunade was there. The rampage was over.
And she couldn't even punish Sasori for his actions.
End Chapter 20
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Fire's English tidbits for those who care:
Hm...it took me a while to figure out what to write for this week, so here's something. When to use metaphors and when to use similies. When comparing something, you always have the choice between a metaphor and a similie. If you don't remember what those are, a metaphor is a comparison of two things without the words "like" or "as." A similie is a comparison of two things with the words "like" or "as." For example, "Orochimaru's like a snake," is a similie comparing Orochimaru to a snake, but "Orochimaru's a snake," is a metaphor comparing Orochimaru to a snake. So now that we have the explanations, when do we use them? When depends entirely on what the purpose of your sentence is. The choice lies in how strong you want the imagery. The imagery in a metaphor is much stronger than that of a similie. In the first example, Orochimaru is still Orochimaru. The fact that he is like a snake isn't too strong. But in the second example, Orochimaru becomes a snake. The imagery is much stronger than a regular comparison. Not only does snakes come to mind, but the association between Orochimaru and snakes become stronger.
Fire's babbling:
Sakura: (shaking angry fists at Fire) You should have let me kill him!
Fire: Um...
Sakura: He can't just destroy the village whenever he feels like it!
Sasori: (hiding behind Deidara) ...
Sakura: Stop hiding and let me kill you!
Sasuke: He's not going to die.
Sakura: But, Sasuke-kun...
Naruto: When are you bringing me back?
Fire: O.O;;; Um...I'm leaving now. (runs away)
Sasuke: Remember to leave us a review, or... (activates sharingan)
Sakura: (pushes Deidara out of the way and reaches for Sasori) Shannaro!
Deidara: (watches Sakura chase Sasori around the window, shakes head and turns to see a Sasuke with red sharingan) I think I'll just leave now, yeah. --;;
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