Holy shit, I'm back on the, "two chapters in two days," train. Love it when that happens. This would have been out earlier today, but after I got home from work I took a nap...and consequently woke up feeling even MORE tired than I had before. I hate that shit.
Review response time!
1. OneLunchMan: I'm not going that route entirely, but yes, I'm definitely borrowing elements of that methodology. Past and present and future, the lateral timeline...all things are bound to the revelations of Samsara. The Wheel turns as the Wheel wills, the God-Emperor dies by the hand of his own creation, and all of life's failures bind themselves away from the true trail that must be undertaken. That is the path I tread.
2. SaKreD4LIFE: They will, but, "they," will not. What secrets does that blue lodestone hold? Will we ever manage to find out? Why did Kishimoto consider, "aliens from the moon," as the final antagonists of Naruto?
We just don't know.
3. Drake Vallion: That's right. Antal Dara, whose role in the heavens is unrevealed as of yet but who mentioned to the Kyuubi that its role is to, "interfere with destiny," is still alive...somehow. I'm sure I'll come up with an explanation later. And Neji...that poor bastard. At least he didn't have to suffer any more.
4. ForeverFallen76: Thanks for the compliment! And, yeah, even though NaruHina was literally all that anybody saw coming from a million miles away, it just...doesn't sit right with me. I don't know, I just can't really accept it. I'm trying to evolve the relationship incrementally, and thank you for making me feel like I'm succeeding. Itachi and "Maya" are another element that I wish others dealt with in fic, because Itachi is one of my favorite characters and he deserves better.
Until I decide to be cruel, that is.
5. Noahendless: Thanks, it's something I've been trying to figure out how to implement for a while now. We'll see where I really take it from here, but don't expect too much, I guess? I'm still trying to work the fic out in my head, as well as on paper.
As of this chapter's posting, Within the Straws I Grasp has reached 209 reviews, 254 favorites, and 392 followers! Thank you for your support, and please enjoy this chapter.
Let's get this trainwreck moving.
Naruto woke up with his head in Tayuya's lap, one of her hands running through his long hair. He hadn't gotten it cut since before leaving Konoha on his year-and-some-change training trip, and while it didn't grow as quickly as Neji's or Ino's did, he'd definitely gained about six inches of blond length that Tayuya had a habit of playing with when she thought he was asleep.
"Mm...feels good." He mumbled.
"Are you awake now?" She asked, a question which he didn't respond to. "You've been out for a day and a half."
"I what?" His eyes shot open, staring straight at Tayuya's.
"You've been sleeping for almost two days."
"I have? Normally, I recover from chakra exhaustion a lot faster...maybe it's got something to do with the sealing method I used? I don't know."
"Well whatever the fuck it is, you're back. It worked, too, just so you know."
"It did?"
"Yeah, Neji's practically smiling. I won't lie to you, it's making me pretty fuckin' uncomfortable."
"Well, put up with it." Naruto chastised her. "And get used to having friends. It was one thing when they were being nice because I was with you, but now you're my girlfriend and Tsunade obaa-chan made you an official Jounin of Konoha, so you outrank most of them. Alliance...that's not enough. Friendship, bonds between people? That's what makes a strong village, and a strong ninja. If there's no common ground of trust, then the whole system will fall apart as soon as whoever is in charge dies. That's why Orochimaru is going to fail, and why the five Great Nations are so strong."
It was also the reason why he tried his best to be kind to people. It did a lot more good to have as many friends, and few enemies, as possible. Despite his status as a prankster and a pariah, he'd turned his image around after defeating Gaara during the Chunin Exams. Then, he'd successfully brought Sasuke back after what was officially labelled a kidnapping. While he'd likely been written off or forgotten by many people during his lengthy absence, he was sure that his image would never actually get worse while he wasn't there to send his public relations ratings down the toilet.
"Thanks for the business ethics lesson." Tayuya grinned, mocking him lightly. "I'll keep that in mind. Now, would you mind getting off of me?"
"Yes, I would, actually. Your thighs are really comfy, but I guess I could get convinced to move...maybe."
"Oh, hell. What do I need to do?"
Before she could react, his head shot up to kiss her, stopping just short of a painful tooth-to-tooth impact as his lips met hers. Stunned as she was, she didn't resist when his head fell straight back down into her lap. Her body shook slightly from the impact, something that she noticed he took some small amount of glee in...but she relaxed, content to let him get away with it. They were dating, weren't they? He could get by with it this time.
"Hmm...you need to accept that I'm not moving. That's what you need to do. Did you lay down next to me at night?"
"Of course." Nothing would deprive her from her favorite space-heater. The vegetation in Kusa no Kuni was tall and thick, and the dense forestry kept a fair amount of light out, making it much colder than in Hi no Kuni's spacious forests or rolling hills. He'd spoiled her, and now she needed the heat he provided at night.
Naruto smiled at that, one arm reaching up to cup the back of Tayuya's head. As he tipped her down, he moved himself up, meeting her for a much softer, gentler kiss.
"I love you." He said after they separated. "Nothing is ever going to take you from me."
It was far from the first time he'd said those words during their time together, but every instance felt just as special to her. His overprotectiveness of her after, in his words, "the clusterfuck that was Kiri," had faded back into his general, authentic sense of care. They kept themselves open and honest with each other, and that communication had allowed him to ease into his previous self; the only difference was that he no longer closeted his feelings off from her, and always told her when something was on his mind.
Warm spring days like this, just days from summer, but not quite there yet...Tayuya almost wished that they could remain alone, out there, forever.
From a distance, the rest of their group watched. Three of the four men remained passive, and while Hinata's heart broke a little at seeing her crush with someone else, he looked too happy for her to be upset with anyone except herself. Sakura and Maya both thought to themselves that it would be nice to be shown that kind of affection, ever, let alone when other people might be in a near vicinity. Sakura, in particular, wished that Sasuke would just ask her out already.
Sai watched with intent, as something Naruto had said truly struck a nerve in him. "If there's no common ground of trust, then the whole system will fall apart as soon as whoever is in charge dies." Immediately, he had thought of Danzo, and the Ne program as a whole; the only trust, between teammates in the roots of Konoha's great tree, was that they would be left behind if they fell behind, or eliminated if they became a liability. That was as true for Sai as anyone else, despite the painter's status as his master's protege.
Did that mean Ne, as a cause, was destined for failure? Danzo held the loyalty of his subordinates, soldiers who would just as quickly die for the man as fight for him, but Naruto's charismatic words resonated inside of Sai's brain. Blood for blood, life for life, Ne understood teamwork...but not camraderie. Friendship was as foreign to the raised-from-birth ninja as any other feeling was, be it anger or grief or the ability to hold a grudge.
It would not come easily, but Sai told himself that he would begin to venture into the world of friend-making. If it was something that his Taicho believed in, something the future Hokage claimed would make him strong, then was it not Sai's duty to support him and follow his lead?
The bonds of friendship will make ninja strong. Sai committed the thought to memory, and thanked Danzo for sending him on a mission with such an enlightening Taicho as Uzumaki Naruto.
They'd been in the field for three months, traversing around minor and major nations to destroy each of Orochimaru's secret bases one by one. The cool September air
"You know, I liked how secret bases worked in Pokemon." Naruto said. "You could only have one. This, though...this is bullshit."
"Okay, piss-for-brains, I've held off on this question for a long time, but...when the hell did you get all the time to play those video games?"
"I skipped school. Sometimes I even went into school with a system and played them."
"Naruto..." Sakura said his name with exasperation. "You're an idiot."
"Hey, sorry that I was more interested in playing strategy games than in learning weaponized biochemistry. I probably should have paid attention, since the next time I cleaned a bathroom I mixed bleach, ammonia and chlorine..."
"Literally, what the fuck." Tayuya's insults didn't end there, though. The highlights of her tirade included, "shit-festered maggot dick," "you are the reason that the gods died," and the mammoth, "you ass-jacked moron whose cunt-crunching brain fucking died of shame and rotted in your piss-ridden skull."
Kitamon no Tayuya had no problems with expressing herself comfortably. Everyone else, sans Naruto, seemed slightly uncomfortable with the ease of her speech.
"Oh, that's nothing. This other time..." He began, inviting even more trouble into his eardrums.
"Naruto."
"Yes, dear?"
"Shut up, or I'm going to kill you."
The blond grinned like a madman. "You'll need to make me stop, then. Good luck with that, by the way."
"We're coming up on one of Orochimaru's main bases." Itachi said. "Unless operational silence means nothing to you, I'd suggest quiet."
"Main base or not, I see no reason why we shouldn't move the same way we always have." Several Kage Bunshin appeared, moving away from the group.
They would prep the back half of a group of Exit seals; their companion halves, the Door seals, were kept on slips of paper in one of Naruto's scrolls. The danger of possibly encountering Orochimaru mandated that they have some sort of getaway.
If all truth was to be told, though, Naruto wanted the White Snake to be here. He wanted to carve into Orochimaru's flesh, before he killed the man, just how much sadness and suffering he'd wrought in the world. He wanted blood for Sasuke, for Kimimaro, for Jiraiya. He wanted blood for Kakashi, for the Sandaime, for his father. For the families of all his victims, and the victims themselves. He wanted blood for the pain Orochimaru had given to Tayuya. And, as he remembered how a song went, he smiled inwardly; Bon Scott was right.
"If you want blood...you've got it."
In the time following the gods' deaths, a fair amount of technology and history had been lost, save for those precious few people who'd carefully recorded everything they could. Certain weapons of war no longer existed, Naruto had never seen a, "gun," or a, "tank," and perhaps it was intentional that no creation manuals survived the destruction of the ancient order. Other mysteries included the Biju, constructs of chakra who historically outdated the Rikudo Sennin's first appearance two thousand years ago. Perhaps, then, it was through the Biju that the sage had discovered chakra in himself, and thereby in all humans?
Naruto shook those thoughts from his mind. He could reminisce about technology from the past at another time, after this base was destroyed and its cursed, victimized inhabitants were put down out of mercy.
Nobody deserved to live the life of a test subject, their very existence dependent on the whims of another human being.
"So, how do you think they're doing?" Jiraiya asked.
"Well, we haven't heard back from them so far, so...I'm going to assume that they're doing alright." Tsunade answered. "Now get out of my window."
Jiraiya had been sitting in the windowsill that had practically been made to accommodate him years earlier, when he'd been a child and a student on the Sandaime's team. Standing up, and feeling the sunshine and breeze coming in through the open window, he grinned. Walking around to stand in front of his former teammate, he responded in the that way only he could.
"Aw, and here I thought you might want to snuggle up, hime-sama."
"In your dreams, maybe."
"No, you don't have your Genjutsu on in my dreams. You can fool my eyes, but not my brain or my heart. Vanity is a sin, madame Hokage..."
"So is lechery, but I don't see you offering penance for your crimes of morality."
"Crime of passion, Tsunade. To say that a straight man, such as myself, shouldn't be remotely aroused by you...that's lunacy. Implying that something is immoral means that it goes against my better nature, but you should know better than anyone that my lewd side is my better nature."
"And to think that I won't beat you into the ground for that, that's stupidity too. As to be expected from Jiraiya, Lord Commander of the Dunce Corps. May your perverted glory live forever in infamy, and may you get a swift kick to the balls every time you peep on a woman in an onsen."
"There's not many left that I'm allowed in. You know that, right? I have to perform some of the most advanced henge on the planet if I want to make sure that I don't get thrown out right after checking in. They know all my usual disguises, and it makes me sad. There are worse things than the pleasures of the flesh."
"Said, of course, by a man who's devoted his life to them. What was that Naruto told me about, something you said on the way to finding me...something about the three W's? 'Avoid wine, women, and worthless spending.' And then he caught you, not even fifteen minutes later, having spent his money on a pair of courtesans and a case of sake from the southeastern region of Hi no Kuni?"
"Well, when you put it like that, it makes me sound like a hypocrite."
"You numbskull, you are a hypocrite. Do you remember the battle at the Tetsuga Plains? You told us to run away and get help, and then you managed to kill them all before we could come back. You had a sword shoved through your gut, six kunai in your back, there was a shuriken stuck in your forehead after it bit through your hitai-ate, and you were still standing like nothing was wrong in the world."
"Konoha emphasizes that ninja fight harder when they're fighting to protect people who they care about. It just so happens, amazingly, that I care about you, and I used to care about Orochimaru."
"Not that you could ever show it normally. You tried to steal my underwear, and you kept challenging Orochimaru to fights until you got beaten into the ground."
"What can I say? I was a stupid kid."
Jiraiya looked like he was going to talk more, but he was interrupted by a flying paper crane. Without needing to open it, he knew that it was a message from Konan; he still had to learn what that message was, however. Taking the crane and unfolding it carefully, the two Sannin were shown a chakra-projected image of Konan.
"Jiraiya-sensei! Naruto and...in trouble. I've been track..."
It looked like most of the message had been eaten up to allow the origami craft to travel, but Jiraiya kept listening.
"Itachi...backing them...Otogakure main base..."
With the kind of speed possessed only by a man whose blood has turned to ice, Jiraiya crumpled up the paper and set it on fire. The projection of his younger lover disappeared, and Tsunade looked at him with a raised eyebrow.
"Your girl isn't just one of those orphans you raised and taught...but she's a member of the Akatsuki? Are you fucking-"
"Now is not the time, Tsunade. You heard her message, the same as I did. So unless you want to keep me here, I'm going to Oto, and I'm going to get those kids the hell out of there."
She relented, thankfully silent.
"I'll see you when I get back." He offered. "We'll talk as much as you want, after that."
The political ramifications here were astounding, and not in a good way. Orochimaru was one of the most dangerous nukenin Konoha had ever produced, ranked alongside Uchiha Madara and his 'second coming,' Itachi. She had inadvertently sent against him: one of his former kunoichi, two members of the Hyuuga clan, the last remaining loyal Uchiha, her apprentice, the village's only Jinchuriki, and the man's own son.
If he got his hands on any of them...no, she couldn't think like that. She had to trust in them.
It was no secret to her that Sai was her second bastard son; nobody else in Konoha had that shade of skin, and she'd felt the henge over his eyes that made them appear wholly black.
If she lost any one of those ninja, then the metaphorical walls would come crumbling down around her.
They had split up, against Naruto's personal will. Itachi, Maya, Hinata, and Neji had branched off, leaving the original Genin of Team Seven with Tayuya and Sai. The quintet had walked down the hallways, finding them eerily empty, before they came into a medium-sized room carved out from the ground around them. Entering it, they found it to be just as unoccupied as the ones they'd passed earlier.
"Why do I get the feeling that even though there's more of us, we're less protected?" Sakura asked. "I mean, for god's sake, we have Naruto and Sasuke. And I'm Tsunade-sama's apprentice, and Tayuya-san is a Jounin, and Sai is an Anbu."
"Maybe you just feel a little outclassed?" Sai offered. "Your primary role is to be a medic, not to fight on the front lines. While you've received training from the Hokage, she was also not very effective outside of Taijutsu. I would suggest talking to your former Jounin-sensei and learning elemental techniques from him."
"Sai, Sakura, be quiet. We don't want to-"
"Alert someone?" Orochimaru's voice rang out behind them, finishing Naruto's sentence. "You've gotten taller, all of you. It's nice to see you again, Tayuya-chan. You got rid of my Infuin, didn't you? That's a shame."
"I finally felt free." Tayuya said, her hands trembling. "I finally thought that every last part of the filth you made me feel when I used that seal, or acted on your orders, was gone."
This was the first time she'd come face-to-face with her former master since Jiraiya had found her in the decapitated forest. Though she no longer owed him fealty, forced by a seal or otherwise, the sheer weight of his presence was shaking her faith in herself.
"Tayuya...if you can't fight, stay back. I'll make sure he can't get to you, no matter what."
"Strong words. You know, Naruto-kun, you remind me very much of Jiraiya...though, I will say, you're certainly a more accomplished ninja than he was at your age. He grew up in a time of war, and it shaped his desire for peace. He wants to eliminate hatred from the world, so that we can all live in harmony. You, though...you've beaten four Jinchuriki. You killed an immortal. The demon inside of you must love having you as its host, driving your rage so deep into the world. You can hide behind your kindness and your love, the Will of Fire, and whatever else you choose, but the truth is obvious. You seek the brutality of battle. You want to exert your dominance over all life, over this life."
"You've talked enough." Naruto said. "It's time to settle things."
Naruto thought back to how life had felt above the ground, before entering this base. How today was warm, for mid-September, but not unbearably so; the wind had been cool and gentle on his cheeks, and the sun high overhead. It was beautiful. Releasing the Slog Seal, Naruto's thoughts were the same as the beasts inside of him.
Today was a good day to die.