Flash of Red and Black
Chapter XXV
I didn't move. Everything was silent to my ears, and the world seemed to stand still. But then the silence faded. I heard the ringing of metal on metal above me and a familiar and unwelcome cackle coming from the trees.
I closed my eyes and took a long, slow breath, forcing my body to calm itself and stop shaking. Then I wiped my face and opened my eyes, looking over the body of the tokubetsu jounin lying in front of me. I reached over and closed his unseeing eyes and said a silent thank you for believing in me, for believing in Konohamaru.
Then, slowly, I stood and looked up at the glee-filled Snake Sanin fighting in the tree branches. Kakashi, Aoba and Raido were engaging Orochimaru while Genma silently stood next to me, unseeing eyes staring down at Ebisu's body. I took another slow breath before clasping my hand on Genma's shoulder, pulling him from his thoughts. Even in the dark, I could see every thought and emotion that rushed across the man's face before he pulled himself together and gave a short nod. He would be able to grieve for his long-time teammate once the mission was over.
With my body no longer shaking and my thoughts and feelings locked away for the moment, I let Kurama's chakra envelop me again, transferring some to Genma before I walked towards the others. Dead snakes littered the ground, but we still had one left to kill.
I flashed up to the battle, and before Orochimaru could react, my fist connected with his face and sent him flying through several tree trunks. Part of me wanted to keep after him, but I had other things to do.
The others around me looked surprised and then worried, but I ignored their looks and took the brief moment to transfer Kurama's chakra to them as I turned to Raido.
"Report," I ordered, and he immediately did as told.
"We met up with your bunshin underground. As we left, we briefly crossed paths with the Suna team. They seemed to have only minor injuries. When we reached the surface, we met up with Shikamaru, Kotetsu and Izumo. Shikamaru relayed the situation to us before ordering us to follow after you. You were trapped in a genjutsu, and Kakashi was getting overrun by snake summons. Ebisu ran ahead to expel the genjutsu and block Orochimaru's attack," he reported, getting quiet at the end despite his tone holding steady. I gave a short nod just before an angry groan sounded from several yards away.
"The fool died for nothing, you know," Orochimaru called as his shadow slowly approached from the darkness. Jaws clenched and I grit my teeth, gripping my weapon tighter.
"I wasn't going to kill you—not that you would die so easily, it seems. I still have some tests that I want to run. If he hadn't gotten in the way, he'd still be alive," he said nonchalantly, as if he was just discussing the weather.
I surged forward again, faster than any of them could follow, and dug my kunai into the snake's shoulder. He was able to dodge just enough to avoid a wound to the chest, but I still hit him with enough force to snap the branch beneath him and send us flying into the ground. Orochimaru groaned again when his back hit the ground hard, and I stood, glaring down at him.
"Then don't miss your fucking target," I spat before jumping up to a branch to dodge the snakes coming from his sleeve. The others immediately jumped to the same branch, and Kakashi grabbed me and pulled me back farther as the others readied themselves for an attack.
"Naruto, calm down," Kakashi said quickly, looking me over, eyes concerned.
"I am. That was one of Sakura's," I said, looking back at him.
I wasn't lying. For the moment, my mind was totally clear and focused on the mission—not revenge, not hate, not pain. We were finishing this.
As if to illustrate my point, a freakish cry of pain came from Orochimaru as he rose from the ground, hand over his shoulder where my kunai was, though the blade was quickly dissolving into the wound it had created.
I glanced at Kakashi and saw understanding flash through his eyes before he moved to join the others, talking to them quickly. At the same moment, I called over to our enemy, drowning out my comrades' hushed exchange.
"It's the job of the next generation to surpass the last, and your time's up, Orochimaru."
"What the hell is this?"
"A creation of the Godaime's pupil. As soon as it gets wet, it dissolves into its poisonous compounds that are only amplified with chakra use," I said as I jumped forward, landing on a branch just above our enemy. "This 'Useless Hokage' isn't your only enemy. The Shinobi Alliance wants your head."
Orochimaru's frown deepened, and even without looking in his eyes, I knew they were burning with anger. But slowly, his expression changed to a smile, and though I could see sweat from pain and exertion glistening on his pale skin, that smile made me uneasy.
"Well if that's who I'm fighting, I suppose there's no need to hold back," he hissed, and then the pattern that had burned across his skin earlier started to expand, turning all of his pale skin to a dark grey as his body shifted and changed. I grit my teeth and hopped back to another branch, putting some distance between us, my eyes trained on him.
In the dim light, I could see his wound trying to heal, the chakra from the Curse Mark working just slightly faster than the poison from Sakura's special kunai. I knew that we would have to bring him down before that wound fully healed or else we would have wasted the best opportunity we had.
Suddenly, Orochimaru jumped up onto the same branch as me, and I readied another kunai as Raido appeared next to me, ready to help me fight the Sanin off. Just as Raido got his footing next to me, snakes as black as the sky grew from Orochimaru's uninjured shoulder and shot at us, their fangs dripping with an equally dark liquid.
Raido dodged quickly, jumping to another branch as he threw his kunai at Orochimaru. The Sanin dodged the kunai as I blocked the fangs of the snake with my weapon, but I couldn't hide my surprise when my kunai started melting as the noxious liquid oozed over its surface.
Grimacing, I forced my dulling blade through the side of the snake's mouth before letting it fall to the ground as I jumped back to join Raido.
"Don't let the venom touch you," I said quickly before dashing forward again, meeting Orochimaru in the air between the branches, Rasengan in hand. I tried to ram the jutsu into the Sanin's ribs on his injured side, but more snakes emerged from his body in the spot that I was about to hit, protecting his body as the snakes were ripped apart. At the same time, Raido slashed the heads off the snakes that were already protruding from the Sanin's body.
However, no sooner had the snakes been seemingly incapacitated than new ones grew to replace them. I grimaced again. Raido and I both jumped away and put distance between ourselves and the Sanin, and I tried to think of a plan to bring him down.
Dodging more snakes as we rushed back, I noticed the wound from Sakura's kunai was healing. Though it was still an obviously severe wound, it was much shallower than it had been before he transformed, so I knew it wouldn't be long before it vanished along with any advantage we managed to gain.
I ground my teeth together and glanced at Raido as he sliced the head off of the same snake he'd already "killed" at least twice. This wouldn't do.
I threw a handful of shuriken, aimed at the wound, but they were all easily knocked away by the Sanin as he pressed forward.
"Be ready," I murmured to Raido quickly, not bothering to look for his reaction as I flashed closer to Orochimaru again, two kunai at the ready.
Snakes immediately shot out at me, but I just continuously slashed at them with one kunai while I tried to gouge my other into the Sanin's body at any opportunity I had—not that Orochimaru allowed me many. However, my flurry of slashes did force the Sanin to ease up the pressure on Raido, leaving him a chance to make his own attack instead of just defending against the regenerating snakes that extended from Orochimaru's left shoulder.
Raido's shuriken whizzed by me, directed towards the Sanin, but the Sanin was able to dodge them all, grinning wildly all the while. However, as a second wave of weapons flew past, one managed to hit its target: a wire on the branch just behind Orochimaru's head.
The moment I heard the shuriken touch the wire, I pushed away from our enemy, just in time to avoid a small blast from paper bombs. The Sanin avoided the blast too, but the bombs weren't meant to injure.
The branch the bombs were fixed to fell away from the tree, tripping several more wires on its way down, triggering explosions and smoke bombs littering the area. The fight zone was clouded with a thick smoke, blacking out what little light was available and filling the area with the smell of ash.
I pushed out of the cloud, landing on a branch a few yards away, waiting for Orochimaru to emerge.
I didn't have to wait long.
He appeared right in front of me, snakes surging towards my neck as he pressed forward. I slashed the heads away as I fell back to another branch, grinding my teeth as a few drops of the venom splashed onto my arm from the snake heads that fell to the ground.
I pushed the pain of my corroding flesh from my mind as I kicked the Sanin back towards the cloud of smoke before the snake heads could revive.
As the Sanin fell back from the force of my kick, he found himself punctured with several senbon, mostly in his steadily-healing wound. Then Genma appeared next to me, and Orochimaru smiled wickedly as he turned to us.
"Did you really think a couple needles would stop my chakra flow?" he chided, making Genma frown. The Sanin's smile only faltered slightly as he pulled the senbon from the wound. In the same moment, I saw the bunshin I'd created in the smoke cloud disappear from behind Orochimaru, but I didn't allow myself to react. Instead I readied myself for another attack.
The senbon fell to the ground as Orochimaru pushed himself towards us, but his smile quickly vanished when he moved, stumbling as he landed on the branch. Genma and I quickly pushed away, throwing senbon and shuriken towards Orochimaru as his face twisted with pain. The snakes blocked our weapons, but the Sanin's shoulders slumped, revealing a senbon dissolving into the back of his shoulder thanks to my bunshin. Genma allowed himself a small smirk, but I kept my eyes trained on our enemy as he broke off what was left of another of Sakura's creations.
Then I surged forward, trying to get a hit on the Sanin before he recovered. I managed to nick the side of his shoulder with my kunai, but he dodged just fast enough to keep me from driving my kunai into his wound. As I fought Orochimaru, Genma sent senbon flying at him from a distance, the smirk not leaving his lips as the area was suddenly filled crows.
I jumped away from the Sanin, dodging an attack from the snakes while throwing a kunai into the branch just behind where I'd been standing, cutting another wire. The paper bombs exploded, making the branch fall from the tree and Orochimaru fall with it.
Before the Sanin could recover, Genma and I threw shuriken at him as he fell. The snakes again defended Orochimaru, but they lost their heads yet again in the process as the Sanin's feet touched the ground.
Raido instantly appeared in front of him, his kokuto slashing up towards Orochimaru's neck. With his snakes not yet regenerated, the Sanin was forced to dodge, but Kakashi's ninken was suddenly biting into him at all sides, preventing him from escaping further as Raido's blade pierced through Orochimaru's wounded shoulder.
The Sanin cried out as the poisoned blade sliced through his already poisoned wounds.
The moment the blade extended through Orochimaru's back, Raido fell back, abandoning his sword, and Kakashi's ninken vanished.
Then a wooden cage suddenly emerged around Orochimaru, trapping him inside.
The regenerating snakes bit into the wood, trying to dissolve the structure with their poison and create an escape, but they weren't fast enough to break through the barrier as Yamato continuously reinforced the structure.
"You're done," I said flatly, throwing the Rasen Shuriken I had just formed. As soon as my attack left my hand, Aoba and Kakashi each sent a Katon towards the cage.
Massive flames erupted and raged around the Sanin, enveloping him in a fierce fire. The combined attack swirled and screeched as it grew, but it wasn't loud enough to drown out the final screams of Orochimaru, the Snake Sanin.
The others turned away from the massive, blinding flame, unable to look at such a light after fighting in so much darkness, but I just stared and watched our enemy turn to ash.
Eventually, only smolders were left of the cage and its contents, and only then did I finally turn away and walk over to the others, their eyes trained on me as I moved.
"The mission is complete," I said, the weight of command in my voice, and slowly the words sunk into the shinobi around me. Then, as if the meaning of my words hit them all at once, they all looked to one another and smiled, some clapping each other on the back.
"How is it on the field?" I asked, turning to Yamato who seemed to suddenly be overwhelmed with fatigue.
"Few enemies were left… when Shikamaru ordered me to leave… Kurama-san had… taken care of most. The numbers coming from below… were shrinking," he reported between gasps for air. I nodded before clasping his shoulder.
"Good work," I told him as I transferred a little of Kurama's chakra to him again, just enough to give him some energy back. He nodded his thanks before letting himself fall down, sitting tiredly.
I walked towards the remains of the cage, ignoring the heat still radiating from it. I stared at the ashen remains for a few moments, not really seeing until Kakashi's hand landed on my shoulder.
Pulled from my thoughts, I reached down and sealed the Sanin's unrecognizable remains into a scroll for an autopsy (not that I was sure anything could even come from an autopsy of such charred remains), before heading to the other lifeless body left on the field.
I just stared for a short moment, before mentally shaking myself.
Now isn't the time, I told myself as I lifted Ebisu's cold corpse from the ground.
"Do you want—"
I shook my head before Kakashi could finish the question. He stood there, looking at me silently for a few moments before giving a small nod.
"Let's go home," I called to the group. They all turned to me with smiles until they saw the body in my arms. Then they sobered and gave short nods, but I saw Genma and Raido glance at one another before slowly approaching me.
"Hokage-sama…" Raido started before trailing off, looking to the other man.
"Hokage-sama, please leave Ebisu to us," Genma said, his eyes strong and nearly concealing the grief behind them. I studied them for a moment before nodding, and they took the body from me before following me as I headed to the first battlefield, Kakashi in step next to me.
I knew his eyes were on me even as his head faced forward, and I could just feel how much he just wanted to reach over and hug me, console me, something, to help keep my thoughts and emotions at bay now that our task was complete, but I just gave a small shake of my head.
"Not yet," I whispered to him, repeating the words in my head for good measure.
Not yet. Not yet, I repeated again and again to myself until the others finally came into view.
"Naruto!" "Hokage-sama!" I heard the shinobi calling happily as our teams approached the now quiet battlefield, Kurama safely back inside me.
However, their cheers and glee quickly faded as we approached. As soon as they were able to see us well enough, Sakura rushed over, glowing hands running over the cold body in Genma's arms.
Kakashi's hand fell onto her shoulder quietly and she looked up, glancing between us before her gaze fell, letting her hands drop to her side.
"Sorry. I—"
"Your special weapons are incredible. It would have been so much harder without them. Thank you, Sakura," I said, not letting her finish. She didn't need to feel guilty. She wasn't the one at fault, and she'd already done more than enough.
"Thanks," she said, looking back up at me, a little pride in her face despite the sadness. I gave a small smile and nodded before looking around. Everyone was gathered around us now, exhausted and quiet.
I closed my eyes and took a breath for a second before looking at them all again, my emotions in order for the moment and my title of Hokage flowing through my aura.
"Good work, everyone. Gather your supplies. We're going home," I ordered, and immediately everyone nodded and moved to leave.
I went ahead of them, Kakashi still hovering silently next to me. His eyes were still on me, but it still wasn't time to break.
Not yet. Not yet, I reminded myself as we crossed the battlefield that was littered with enemy corpses. There were quiet whispers behind me, solemn but at the same time relieved.
We were slow-moving on our way back, and after only a few hours, I called for everyone to stop and rest, and though everyone was anxious to return, they went about preparing tents and fires for food, knowing they were too exhausted to go on without rest.
"Are you alright, Hokage-sama?" Hojo-san asked next to me as we sat in front of the fire once she finished inspecting the wound on my arm. It had pretty much healed, so she just wrapped it and left it alone, letting it heal the rest of the way on its own.
Though no one else around the fire moved, I felt their eyes on me.
"I'm fine, Hojo-san," I said, giving her a small smile before turning to everyone else. "You should rest. I'll take the first watch," I called, loud enough to be heard by the people surrounding the other fires too.
The others agreed quickly, all exhausted. Hojo-san nodded too after a moment, but the others next to me waited and studied me a while longer.
But Shikamaru sighed, apparently giving in, and tapped Ino and Sakura on the shoulder. They hesitated, but then followed his lead, heading off to their tents. Sai and Yamato followed shortly after, but Kakashi didn't budge.
"You need to rest too," I said, looking over at him.
"I can go a while longer," he replied, eyes trained on the fire, though I knew it was me he was paying attention to, not the flames.
"Don't make me worry more. Please," I barely whispered. Kakashi stiffened, and I could see his eyes widen, but then he gave a small nod and stood. Apparently going to his tent, but then I felt a warm weight on my back. I couldn't help smiling just a little.
It wasn't long before I heard him breathing deeply behind me as he fell asleep.
This chapter was about twice as long when I wrote it last night, but I didn't feel like it flowed quite right. So, the second part of it will be the next chapter. I will definitely have it up next weekend at the latest, but I'm going to try to get it up today or tomorrow.
Thank you sooooooo much for reading the story so far! I never imagined that I would get a story with so many reviews or followers! I'm so happy that so many people are enjoying my story! So just thank you times a million and I hope you'll be looking forward to the next chapter.