"You guys are on your own again. Keep each other safe." Jiraiya said with one last grin as he turned away from the group and began walking back towards the village.
They had been travelling for almost a week. Taking their time, staying away from the roads. They weren't being hunted anymore by Kakashi, but now, they knew Kiri had it out for them. Naruto had been thinking about what Kakashi had said to him, about having to take a life. He had been mulling it over in his mind this past week. It had been weighing on him slightly. He hadn't intended to kill the Kiri ninja, he was trying to break through his armor and put too much force in it.
They had stopped to make camp for the night. Naruto was absentmindedly poking at a cup of instant ramen, barely eating his food, just staring at it's contents. Hinata took notice and sat herself next to him.
"Are you ok, Naruto-kun?" she asked, concern in her voice. He blinked quickly and looked up a her with a small smile.
"Yeah I'm ok." He said unconvincingly, even he knew it. Hinata put her hand on his and kissed him on the cheek.
"It's ok, you can tell me." She said. He hesitated a moment and sighed.
"I was just… thinking about those kiri ninja we fought. I… didn't mean to kill him. It was my first kill. It still feels weird." He said, placing his other hand over his chest. Hinata looked down sadly. She may not have directly killed the man she had fought but it was her fault that he was dead.
"What are you whining about? We're ninja, it's our job to kill people." Sasuke piped up from across the fire they had built. Naruto grit his teeth.
"And you felt nothing when you killed your opponent?" Naruto asked, getting angry.
"I did feel something. But I didn't let it bother me, it's just the way it is. I didn't enjoy it, but I'm not going to wallow in self pity because of it." He said, taking a bite of his food.
Hinata frowned over at him. She knew he was right, but he didn't have to be so harsh about it. To her surprise, Naruto let out a deep breath.
"Yeah, you're right." he said, uncharacteristically, looking down sadly.
"Sasuke-san, there was no need for rudeness." Haku said as he approached the camp fire. He had been off gathering some natural herbs for medicine. He turned to Naruto, "Naruto-san, allow me tell you something." He sat down next to him. "Zabuza-san always said I was too soft. I am a killer, trained by Zabuza-san in the art of silent killing and yet, I do not enjoy killing anybody and would rather incapacitate." He pulled out a senbon. "These are not normally designed for killing a target, but disabling them. If you do not wish to kill, then you must find a way not to."
"But… what about when you killed that guy, the one who attacked Zabuza?" Naruto asked, remembering the feel of the warm blood that had covered his face, he shuddered a bit. Haku's face darkened.
"Those who threaten people who are precious to me will feel my full wrath. If I must kill to protect someone I care about, then I will." He said firmly but gently.
"I think I get it." Naruto said slowly. He did feel a bit better about it. It made sense to him, it was just as Kakashi-sensei had said. If it came down to a choice between us or them, he felt like he would be able to do it again.
"Good." Haku smiled, "Do not dwell on these things, Naruto-san."
"Thanks Haku." Naruto said with a goofy grin.
"We should probably get some sleep, Naruto-kun" Hinata advised, they had a tough road ahead of them. "We will be passing near Oto, they are a new and unknown village, we will need to tread carefully."
Sasuke placed a hand on his shoulder, the mark was starting to burn. Whoever the man was that given him this mark, was getting closer. He shrugged off the thought, it didn't matter, he had made his choice, he wasn't going to allow this thing to control him.
Sasuke took the first watch as they settled down for the evening. None of them noticed the dark figures, observing them from a distance.
A figure sat in a small, dark room. Dim light coming from the few candles that were hung on the wall. The figure was looking through some scrolls, with a wicked smile on his pale white face. He heard a knock at the door.
"What is it?" The man asked. The door opened to reveal a silver haired man with glasses. His hair was tied back behind his head. He wore a purple ninja outfit.
"Orochimaru-sama" the grey haired man began, "our scouts have found Sasuke Uchiha on the edge of our the country, he'll be passing by shortly with his companions."
Orochimaru smiled. "Very good Kabuto. Send a welcoming party to greet them. I want Sasuke-kun brought back alive, do what you wish with the others."
Kabuto smirked, "He's traveling with some rare companions. The Kyuubi for one, as well as the last Hyuuga and an ice element user. Are you sure you wouldn't rather have them as experiments?"
Orochimaru chuckled, "I have no need for the Kyuubi, get rid of him, it will annoy the Akatsuki, which is always entertaining." He said with a smirk, "I wouldn't mind having her eyes, but I don't need the girl. As for the ice user, I've got plenty of them, the mist is all too willing to get rid of their bloodline users." He licked his lips, the only thing he cared for was Uchiha blood. The Sharingan was the real prize, but, one of his experiments could certainly benefit from the Byakugan.
"If I may, Orochimaru-sama?" Kabuto asked, "I could use the Byakugan myself, it would make my medical procedures much easier."
"Ku, ku, ku, do as you like." He said as Kabuto bowed as he left the small room, closing the door behind him. He walked through the maze-like hideout until he reached a room where four figures were sitting around.
"I have a job for you four." Kabuto said.
"Fuck off four eyes, I don't take orders from you." a red headed girl said.
"Tayuya, a lady should not speak that way." A very large man with a mohawk said.
"Stinking fat-ass." She said in his direction.
"These orders come directly from Orochimaru-sama." He said with an annoyed expressions on his face. 'Insubordinate bitch' he thought. "He wants the four of you to go and… escort Sasuke Uchiha back to this compound. He is not to be harmed, is that clear?" He glared at the four of them.
One teen, with seemingly another head behind his normal one, with neck length silver hair covering half his face smirked.
"He should come willingly, but if he doesn't, convince him." Kabuto added. "Now, he is traveling with three companions. I want the girls eyes, I don't care what else happens after that."
The same boy from before smirked again, this was going to be fun.
"What's so special about her eyes?" Tayuya asked.
"She has the Byakugan."
A darker skinned boy with black hair tied behind his head smirked. It was a perfect opponent for him.
"Any questions?" Kabuto asked with a smirk. None of them responded as they quickly left the base.
Naruto was leading the group through the trees. They wanted to get out of the land of sound as quickly as possible. They were traveling in a diamond formation. Naruto in the front, Haku on the left, Sasuke on the right and Hinata bringing up the rear.
"Do you see them, Naruto?" Sasuke asked from behind him.
"Yeah, there's four of them, they've been keeping an eye on us for quite some time now. They shouldn't be able to take us by surprise, keep an eye on them anyway."
"There's a lot of really big spider webs around here…" Hinata said with a shiver.
"Afraid of spiders Hinata?" Naruto asked teasingly "Don't worry I'll protect you fro-"
"Naruto-kun watch out!" Hinata interrupted him as she spotted dozens of kunai, with explosive tags attached, head straight towards him. They all exploded with him at the center. The group looked in horror until the smoke cleared and Naruto was standing there with barrier of ice surrounding him. He withdrew his outstretched arms and let out a breath.
"Phew, that was close." He let the barrier of ice down. "Thanks for teaching me that, Haku." He said with a grin. Haku quickly threw some senbon needles at some incoming kunai, stopping them in their tracks as they exploded. Sasuke, with a quick sword swipe, deflected some more kunai as he made a second swipe, cutting all the tags in half, nullifying their explosives. Hinata's palms began to glow with light as she waved them around quickly, creating a dome around her of chakra as some explosive kunai collided with the sphere and exploding.
"Shugo Hakke Rokujuyon Sho (Protecting Eight Trigrams Sixty-Four Palms)" she said, repelling the blast. They all jumped back and placed themselves in a circle, facing outward. The four of them stood back to back as four figures began to emerge from the forest, surrounding them.
"This is the pussy we're supposed to be bringing back to Orochimaru-sama?" a red headed girl said.
"Tayuya, a lady should not talk like that." A larger boy with a mohawk replied.
"Shut it fatass." She responded.
"They are better than they look, blocking our previous attack." A silver haired boy with what looked like two heads responded, "Might have to go all out. Although…" He leered at Hinata, "She's a pretty one, wouldn't want to hurt her too badly." He said with a smirk.
"I'll take care of her, Sakon. She'd probably just kick your ass." The last boy spoke up, shrugging his six arms with a smirk.
"Don't forget Kabuto wants her eyes, Kidomaru. I wouldn't mind the rest of her either…" He said while licking his lips slightly.
Hinata shivered under his gaze and Naruto frowned but still looked confident.
"If you lay a single hand on her… I'll kill you." Naruto said, glaring at Sakon. The boy chuckled.
"Big words, but can you back them up?" He replied. "Jirobo, soften them up a bit will ya?" He nodded towards the larger one.
"Ah." Was all he said before he started to go through a series of hand signs.
"Doton Kekkai: Dorō Dōmu (Earth Release Barrier: Earth Prison Dome of Magnificent Nothingness)" The earth began to rise up around the group, surrounding them. A great dome made of rock and earth surrounded them all.
"Really? An earth dome? That's all they can do?" Naruto chuckled as he created a rasengan and slammed it into the nearest wall only for it to completely absorb the impact. "What the?" He looked shocked.
"The walls are coated in his chakra." Hinata said, looking around. "It's creating a barrier around the dome, I can't see out of it." She answered looking around. She suddenly began to feel a pull on her chakra. The group looked around as they realized what was happening, their chakra was being syphoned out.
"Go to sleep little ninja's. We only want Sasuke-sama." They heard Sakon's voice from outside the dome. Everyone looked over to Sasuke who looked back at them blankly.
"What's he talking about Sasuke?" Naruto asked.
"No idea." He said with a shrug.
"The man who gave you that mark said something about you seeking him out." Haku piped up.
"And?" Sasuke asked.
"Do you intend to betray us and go to him?" Haku asked.
"There's no way Sasuke would do that." Naruto answered quickly, Hinata nodded in suit. Sasuke was shocked for a moment, they had that much trust in him? He looked Haku in the eye and smirked.
"No way in hell." He replied. Haku nodded. "Naruto-san, is there a way to get out of here?" he turned to Naruto.
"Sure, it'll be easy, watch." Naruto began to focus his earth affinity chakra around him. The dome began to shake.
Jirobo looked in surprise at the dome he was holding.
"What's going on?" Sakon asked, seeing his teammates reaction.
"I can't hold them for much longer." JIrobo said flatly.
"Tch, useless dickhead." Tayuya replied, readying her flute.
"Guess we'll have to fight them huh?" Kidomaru answered, creating some gold arrows from his mouth.
"Heh, heh, heh, should be fun." Sakon said, parting the hair that was covering one of his eyes.
The dome shook as Naruto gave a quick yell and it exploded outwards, the four of them standing in battle stances.
Kidomaru launched an arrow at each of the members. Hinata evaded her arrow so it landed in the ground. Naruto grabbed his out of thin air and crushed it in his hand. Sasuke used his sword and split it in half while Haku created an ice spear that collided with it. Tayuya pulled a small ocarina out of her pack. This instrument was different and a special one, she had created it to only serve one purpose. She began playing a soft melody on the instrument. Naruto and the group suddenly began to feel very tired, eyes getting heavier.
"Genjutsu…" Naruto thought as he tried desperately to keep himself awake. He took a frantic look around, he could see Hinata and Sasuke also fighting the spell, even though they should be immune to genjutsu.
"Seems like it's working." Naruto could hear Sakon sneer at them. He fell down to one knee, doing his best to keep his eyes open, but it was becoming hopeless. "Even with those special eyes of theirs, seems like sound based genjutsu will still work." He said with a chuckle.
Naruto watched as Sakon came closer to him and delivered a hard kick to his face as he laughed, Naruto landed hard on the ground and could only look around, he felt too tired to move his body.
Sasuke's eyes were almost closed, he had his sword in the ground, barely holding himself up. Hinata was down on her knees, her eyes no longer had the byakugan veins next to them and were barely open. Haku was on all fours, gritting his teeth.
'I… can't…' Naruto thought, as his vision started to blur. Sasuke gave him a hard look, one that meant don't give in. 'I'm...sorry…everyone...I….can't….' were his final thoughts before his vision finally went black and he drifted off to sleep.
Tayuya stopped playing her flute when she saw all four of them finally close their eyes and collapse to the floor.
"What trash." She commented, before walking over to the now unconscious group.
"I'm going to enjoy this" Sakon said with a smirk as he walked over to Hinata and looked over her body for a moment. She was young, but she would do fine, it was always nice to break in a new one.
"Kidomaru, tie them." Sakon said. The spider-like boy complied and began expelling spider webs from his mouth.
Naruto could still hear voices as he woke up in his mindscape, Kurama sitting there, watching him.
"You need to wake up kit. Bad things are going to happen to your mate if you don't" Kurama said to him.
"I know that!" Naruto said frantically as he could hear Sakon's voice in his head. 'I'm going to enjoy this.' Naruto's eyes darkened. He looked to Kurama.
"Can you wake me up?" Naruto asked.
"Not directly. But if you let me, I can take over for you, how does that sound?" he asked. Naruto didn't like the idea of the fox being in control while he couldn't do anything about it. Even though he had been there for him, he wasn't fond of this idea.
'Kidomaru, tie them.' He heard the voice again. Naruto grit his teeth, there was no time for this.
"Do it." Naruto said.
Kidomaru was about to start tying up Naruto when he felt a sudden surge of chakra from the boy and lept back, flinging the web at him. Naruto's red eyes flew open and used his claws to slice the web to pieces. He jumped up and bit his thumb, slamming it onto the ground.
"Kuchiyose" Naruto said with the foxes voice. There was a puff of smoke, the sound four looked on in shock as the smoke cleared and a pack of large foxes stood next to Naruto. All of them standing taller than the boy, five of them in total.
"Distract these guys for a little while, I need to get these kids to safety." Kurama said through Naruto's voice.
"Is that you, Kurama?" an orange fox with a scar over it's right eye asked, sniffing Naruto.
"Yes, this is my host." He replied hurriedly, as he blocked an incoming golden arrow. He growled at the man who threw it. "Ritsuko, with me, help me carry these ones to safety." He began to pick up Sasuke over his shoulder and place it on the white fox. The four other foxes charged at the sound four. They had ferocious speed and attack power. Kidomaru had one of his arms latched onto and torn off by one of the foxes, he cried out in pain and lept back. Tayuya carefully dodged the fox but was being pressured too hard to continue playing her flute. Jirobo began to wrestle with one of the foxes, holding it in a tight grip while Sakon was starting to lose a bit of ground and took a large gash to his chest.
"Are they alright?" Ritsuko asked.
"Just unconscious, those four are something else." Kurama replied as he began to lift up Haku and place him on top of the foxes back. He walked over to Hinata and began to lift her up gently.
'Be careful with her…'' Kurama heard Naruto's voice in his head and growled.
'I know what I'm doing' He thought back with an annoyed expression.
"Something special about that one?" Ritsuko asked.
"She's my host's mate." He responded to which Ritsuko chuckled before she began running off.
Naruto ran alongside the fox as they could hear the sounds of battle continuing from behind them. 'Just hold on a bit longer my kin, we will return to help' Kurama thought as they pushed through the forests to find somewhere safe.
A/N: See everyone Friday :)