Note: Well, I see the tongue being cut out got some attention in the comments. I see lots of wtfs, hopefully those are the good kind of wtfs and you all liked the idea XD. It hurt my soul to write the last chapter as well as this one, but I suppose I'm in a dark mood. Hopefully, fluff/comfort is coming next chapter??? I'll try.

Thank you so much for your reviews WarFlower, UltimateGenius, and Suzuya107. They're much-appreciated . Answer to Ultimate's question in this chapter, answer to War's is soon to come.

I hope you all enjoy this chapter!

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Neji entered the building as quickly as he could, reflecting the attacks coming at him from all sides. He easily kicked away and blocked the pressure points of the doctors or aids who tried to attack him, shoving them to the side in preference of Sasuke. He didn't need to be distracted right now.

Even without his byakugan, he would have probably been able to find Sasuke easily. There was a strange gurgling sound coming from downstairs, almost like he was trying to scream but couldn't. Did they have him gagged?

As he burst in through the door, he nearly froze at what he saw. Sasuke was tied to a chair, blood pouring in huge amounts out of his mouth. The man in front of him, large and bulky, was shoving a rag in his mouth as if to slow the bleeding. Sasuke's eyes were covered, but the tears flowing messily down his cheeks as he seemingly choked on the rag showed his panic more than enough. His fingers were flexing out, the younger boy's head immediately focusing on the doorway as he saw him burst in.

It was like Sasuke went into an entirely new mode of panic when he heard the door unlock. He looked like he was trying to scream, but no noise came out besides small gurgles of blood. He turned towards Neji with a pure look of pleading.

Neji wasn't sure he liked seeing his rival beg to him so pitifully. It didn't sit right.

The man with the rag straightened up as he saw Neji, leaving the rag stuffed into Sasuke's mouth. He tossed something onto a table beside him, and Neji felt his heart skip a beat as he realized what it was. It was about a third of Sasuke's tongue. The teen covered his mouth momentarily in disgust, only stopping when he saw the others move in for an attack.

Neji dodged to the side as he realized all three of them were on him. He growled a bit-- tongue wounds were very serious. He couldn't spend time fighting these three, not to mention the fact they were three full-grown ninja and he was only a teen. "Sasuke! It's Neji. We'll get you out of here soon. Just hold on a bit longer!" he commanded.

He moved to the side, hoping to lure the three out of the room. When he only got amused looks, he glared. It was as if they couldn't be bothered. 'Damn it', he mentally cursed, running back upstairs and yelling into the village, "Akatsuki! Over here! Quick! He's seriously injured!" knowing very well he was no match for the three, even with his advanced skills.

Back up came quickly, but with one extra person. While he did see the Akatsuki come running forward, he noticed Kisame carrying a silver-haired ninja. It was clear he was being held as a hostage, as the rest of the village seemed hesitant to attack while he was in Kisame's hold. The strange thing was, the man didn't seem to be fighting to escape at all.

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Kisame rushed in along with Nagato and Konan. They easily got past the opening rooms, commanding Neji, "Go gather everyone else up! If he's truly as hurt as you say, we have to leave with him now."

The boy ran off to do as he was told, Kisame entering the room with Nagato and Konan right behind him. "Give us Sasuke, or the old man gets it!" he barked.

Kakashi gave an unimpressed look as he was held down by the shark-ninja, blade against his throat. Who did he think he was calling an old man?

Ibiki and Inoichi seemed to back down, but Danzo gave no such obedience. It seemed he didn't care if he had to risk the silver-haired man as he came whirling towards them. Luckily, Kisame didn't have to lift a finger. He was dead via Pain's attack before he had the chance to slice Kakashi.

Pain growled as he saw the man move to attack them, ending him with a single attack. After all, it was only one elderly ninja. His eyes were seemingly glowing with rage, "You dare to lay a finger on my son? I'll show you, interrogators, what real pain is!" hand becoming widespread as he attacked.

Konan moved over to Sasuke as Nagato dealt with the other three, quickly moving to untie him. The moment she touched his wrist to begin undoing his bindings, however, he began squirming and pulling away from her in terror. His head whipped the other way around, seemingly trying his best to distance himself from her. Her heart ached as she saw the pure terror responses coming from him, the purple-haired woman gently raising her hands up to remove his blindfold.

Sasuke whipped his head back and forth, seemingly trying his best to shove the woman's hands off him. It was only when it was removed and he realized who it was that he seemed to stop struggling. Instead, a fresh set of tears poured from his eyes. Konan had never seen him so broken down, not in the entirety of knowing him.

She worked to untie his arms and ankles, quickly noticing the terrible burns and welts covering his body. It looked as though he had been burned and beat pretty harshly in the few hours it had taken them to arrive. She pulled him up gently, noticing the way he hissed and pulled away at every touch. She carefully traded off with Kisame, taking the hostage so that the much bulkier man could carry Sasuke.

She quickly picked up the lost extremity she had noticed on the table using her paper, trying not to think about it as she placed it in her pocket. The ones who had been torturing Sasuke were dead, all three of them. The one with the bandages had been searched by one of Nagato's six paths, a disturbing amount of Sharingan found up his arm. One was also in his covered eye. They didn't have anywhere to put them but doubted leaving them was a good idea. As such, they were forced to settle with destroying them all as quickly as they could.

Kisame frowned as they quickly finished, feeling Sasuke clinging onto his shoulder as though he were once more a mere six-year-old. He could see the blood dribbling out of the rag in his mouth as they left, the man taking it from his mouth now that the rag had soaked up as much as it was going to. He leaned the crying teen's head forward, instructing as they ran for the front gates, "Don't swallow. Spit it out." knowing it would be easy for him to drown on his own blood if he swallowed it.

As they arrived, they spotted the rest of the Akatsuki at the front gates. They were still fighting off multiple attacks from raging leaf and sand ninja alike without much trouble. Taking a second glance, however, they noticed specifically four people were missing. Where were Neji, Hinata, Naruto, and Gaara?

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Neji had gathered up most of the others without much of a problem. It had only become difficult when he spotted where Hinata was. He supposed Kisame had broken off from his group with her when he had been called. This probably wasn't the best idea, considering Hinata was one of the few people in their family with remaining blood relatives.

He found her standing in a park. The same one the Akatsuki had previously found Naruto, Sasuke, and Gaara playing in. She was standing with her hands up to her chest, pupil's dilated and body shaking. He ran for her, of course. "Hinata! We've got to move. Sasuke's been injured terribly. What are you doing?"

Neji watched as she shakily pointed to across the park. Neji's heart skipped a beat for the second time today.

"Hanabi?"

The little girl, currently eight years old, sat crouched under a table. She looked like she was hiding from the sights of the attackers, much to both the elder Hyuuga's pain. Upon hearing her name, however, she quickly turned around in a fighting pose. The little girl gave a snarl, byakugan activated and glaring in a warning.

Hinata took a step forward, towards her little sister. Nagato had always assured her that Hanabi was fine, but to see it with her own eyes was completely different. This was the baby girl she had left behind? She looked so...angry. Aggressive. Threatening.

Neji rested a hand on Hinata's shoulders, shaking his head back and forth at his cousin. They couldn't do this right now. They had to focus on Sasuke.

Hanabi seemed to be sizing the two up, looking them up and down. These were definitely not her clansmen. It was a pretty good chance they weren't in the main family if they were missing-nin. As such, she decided to try defending herself against unknown Hyuuga the way she had always been taught. She began forming hand seals, and in a mere moment, the boy grabbed his head in pain, low groans escaping him as he cried out. She frowned. So it seemed the girl wasn't part of the branch family then-- she didn't have the caged bird seal. "Back off, or I'll leave it on and kill him!" she threatened.

The young Hyuuga wasn't prepared as the elder spoke with shock, holding onto the crumbling boy. "Stop it, Hanabi! That's enough!" forming seals to undo the activation. It took a moment, but eventually, Hinata overpowered Hanabi's activation. The little girl looked at the elder Hyuuga, dumbfounded. But, how did she know the hand signs to undo it? Only adults and high ranking Hyuuga children were supposed to know how to activate and deactivate it!

Neji had tumbled over in pain after it was activated, the boy grabbing onto his head as he felt a heavy headache take over him. This was Hanabi? This was the sweet little bundle of joy they had left behind? Suddenly, their roles were reversed, and Hinata was the one tugging Neji alone. "Nii-San. You're right. We need to leave and focus on Sasuke. I'm sorry! Just- we have to go." she tugged his groaning form along. This wasn't a very good day, far from it. She headed back to the front gates as she heard Sasori calling in the distance, doing her best to pry herself away from the bewildered Hyuuga heiress.

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Nagato was forced to leave Sasuke in the care of the others as he went to go look for Naruto and Gaara. He left the two Hyuuga teens to Sasori.

Nagato figured it would be best for him to go after Naruto and Gaara, after all, if their tailed beasts were released then he was the only one able to subdue them since Itachi wasn't there. It was pretty easy to find Gaara, the boy standing leaned over in an alleyway, head buried in his hands, but sand surrounding him on high alert. "Gaara! Come here, we need to go!" he called.

The younger boy slowly lifted his head from his hands, taking a deep breath as he leaned on the wall. At first, he didn't reply, worrying Nagato. "Gaara, are you alright?" slowly moving through the sand.

He was surprised as he felt the sand whip towards him, grabbing his six path's boy in a crushing hold. It would hurt if he wasn't a puppet. Gaara didn't seem to make the connection, however, the boy burying his head deeper in his hands as he saw his sand grab Nagato. "Stay away!" he commanded in a scratchy voice.

His father gave a confused look but stopped in his tracks. "What's wrong? Are you hurt?"

Gaara shook his head, clenching his own hair in his hands. "It's going on its own again. It's hurting people. I'm hurting people. His blood lust is back!" his voice sounding strained as he dropped to his knees. He trembled a bit, "Kurama was seeping through Naruto. He was possessed. Shukaku got excited seeing Naruto's killing and wanted to come out. He's back to trying to make me kill people. I don't want to give in to the bloodlust again."

Nagato took a few careful steps forward, beginning to understand the situation. "No, Gaara. You aren't going to give back in. You can do it. You've done it for years." he tried to soothe his fears. "You said Kurama is possessing Naruto? Do you know where he is?"

Unfortunately, that only seemed to fuel Gaara's pain more. "I tried! I tried to make him stop! I didn't mean to hurt Naruto! Kurama and Shukaku always fight when they're near. I didn't mean to!"

It was only then that Nagato spotted a pretty roughed up Naruto laying a few feet away. He didn't look like he was injured terribly, though. Luckily, it looked like it was only a few scratches and bruises. Naruto's self-healing must have kicked in. "Gaara, it's alright. He's not hurt too much. He's just unconscious. He's still alive." finally getting close enough to lay a hand on his back. "Calm down. Just calm down." he activated his rinnegan, putting the tailed beast's chakra down in hopes of relaxing Gaara easier.

It seemed to work fairly well, the boy's breathing slowly evening out. "He's...not dead? I didn't kill him?" the younger red-head asked. He was pulled up, a comforting hand rested on his shoulder.

"No. He's still alive. He'll be alright. We all will be. We just need to hurry back to the village, or at least a stopping point to heal up." he nodded a bit, one of his other six paths picking up Naruto and resting him on their back.