Last time:

Lady Chiyo used Sasori's shock to her advantage and forced Hanara to charge. Sasori's reaction was slow but sudden, forcing Hana to stop abruptly in order not to run into the poisoned tail.

"HANARA, NOW!" Lady Chiyo yelled.


Now:

Hanara jumped high, arms above her head, and landed upside down with the kunai in her fists almost completely inside Sasori's puppet armour. Mission accomplished, she swung off the puppeteer and landed behind him.

'Right, so now I need to tie my chakra threads through the holes of the kunai so that I can drag them all around and essentially cut up the 'body' to pieces...'

And then, there was another stream of senbon that she had to dodge. Luckily, she still had Lady Chiyo controlling her, so she could completely focus on dragging her kunai knives around. Hanara created eight chakra threads, wrapped each one around the hole of the kunais, and pulled, breaking Sasori's armour.

The real Sasori was covered by a black cloth, making him look all the more mysterious as he stood up from his crouched position.

"I should have expected no less from my own granny. No wonder even the girl could dodge my attacks. The witch who could read my moves was steering her with chakra threads," Sasori stated, "And moreover, you took control of Hiruko's tail while you were at it. I only noticed when the tail stalled on me. You did it when you threw those kunai knives, didn't you?"

"Very good," Lady Chiyo smiled, "I made it invisible, but you figured it out."

"Of course. Remember who taught me how to play with puppets? Who drilled the talent into me?" Sasori asked rhetorically, "It was you."

"Yes," Lady Chiyo agreed, "But now, playtime is over."

'So... I guessed right. This must be such a bittersweet moment for her...'

Sasori pulled off the black cloth covering him and smirked, "So you think this will be easy, Granny Chiyo?"

'He doesn't look a day older than me, and I'll be turning 16 in a month! It must be something to do with the fact that his body is literally a puppet.'

"Let me show you my favourite," Sasori continued, pulling out a scroll and unsealing it. "This one was hard for me to finish, but I suppose that's what makes me so fond of it."

And out came a puppet that looked exactly like the Third Kazekage.

"No... that's not..." Granny Chiyo murmured, dumbfounded.

"The Third Kazekage," Hanara muttered, "Master of the Magnet Release. So you're the one that kidnapped him... Wasn't the Sand Village your home? What could they have done, to make you betray them so? You turned the Third Kazekage to a puppet, quite possibly helped Orochimaru kill the Fourth and then attempt to murder the Fifth!"

"I wasn't involved with the Fourth, that was one of my agents. But yeah, Orochimaru and the Akatsuki go way back. We've done some work together."

'Psh, yeah, because one of your agents doing it makes it so much better. But really, how bad could the Sand have been to make Sasori betray them this much?'

"It's time to get started," Sasori smirked, sending his puppet at them.

'If only I had Earth Release. Then I could send soil into the puppet's joints, rendering it useless. I'll have to settle with cutting it up to pieces.'

The puppet's arm extended with a few pops revealing even more limbs with explosive tags on them, but Lady Chiyo let her dodge, until she couldn't. Hanara was essentially trapped with large, exploding, plastic limbs looming over her. But then, Lady Chiyo pulled her out.

"Okay then," Sasori muttered.

One of the many limbs released a purple gas.

Poison.

"HANARA! HOLD YOUR BREATH!" Lady Chiyo yelled.

'That's pointless and is just going to delay my eventual death. Let's hope that my new jutsu is enough.'

Hanara whipped out one of her fans, made it as big as she could, and swung with all her might.

"Wind Style: Derecho!" Hanara exclaimed.

What was released was an intense, frightfully fast, windstorm that travelled straight through the cloud of poisonous gas. It was much stronger than her Wind Scythe, but in a different way. The best way to describe it was a chakra-powered derecho.

Thankfully derecho did its job and the wind diffused the poison until its particles were so small that it couldn't harm anyone.

"Heh," Hanara grunted, "There's a reason I'm a Jonin. Don't worry too much, Lady Chiyo."

Lady Chiyo made her way to Hanara's side, "Wind Style and chakra threads? It's like you were meant to be a Sand Shinobi..."

'Huh. That is true...'

"I'm a proud member of the Hyuga Clan of the Leaf, Lady Chiyo," she said lightly.

Suddenly, there was a wave of kunai attacking them, coming from some latches in Sasori's puppet's arms.

"WIND SCYTHE JUTSU!" Hanara exclaimed, swinging her fan.

The kunais were knocked away with because of the mini tornado that Hanara summoned and parts of the numerous arms were scratched.

"It's time for me to help differently," Lady Chiyo croaked, pulling out two summoning scrolls and unsealing them.

Out came two puppets, one a male and one a female.

"Oh... those..." Sasori murmured, looking a bit nostalgic.

"That's right. The very first puppets you created," Lady Chiyo said, "Mother and Father."

'Mother and Father? Modelled after his parents, perhaps? Were they killed?'

"What do you expect to do with them now? I made them. I know their tricks." Sasori said, looking as if he was actually intrigued.

Lady Chiyo didn't grace that question an answer, instead opting to send the puppets at him.

The puppets' hands were connected with wire and so, as they moved, the ton of arms were cut. But that was all Hanara could tell was happening, because once Sasori realized what the puppets were doing, he moved his puppet so fast that Hana's eyes couldn't follow. It was a miracle Lady Chiyo was actually countering fast enough to cause damage.

And then, it ended as fast as it began. Both puppeteers pulled their puppets back.

"Better speed things along... this is becoming a nuisance," Sasori murmured.

The puppet of the Third Kazekage opened its mouth, letting out a stream of black grains.

Hana's eyes widened. "So the chakra in the puppet is the Third Kazekage's..."

"Satetsu, the Iron Sand," Lady Chiyo said, "Things are going to get messy."

"But... how can that puppet hold chakra?" Hanara asked, "That's the only way it can still use the jutsu, but how?"

"Well that puppet is a human puppet built from a real cadaver. It's like a battery, it kept the chakra it had when it was still alive." Lady Chiyo said.

"Oh, there's more to it than that. Remember, out of everything in my collection, this one is my favourite." Sasori smirked.

'Oh man, why did he have to be smart? Couldn't he go on that typical villain rant about how his techniques are superior?'

"I'll take care of this," Lady Chiyo said, "Hanara, you get out of here."

"What?!" Hanara exclaimed, genuinely surprised.

"I did not expect this. You're no match for him now. Not with this card in play."

"Lady Chiyo, I–"

"Too late," Sasori smirked, launching the puppet right at them. "Iron Sand Shower!"

There was a shower of iron sand.

'The Third Kazekage sure was creative...'

On reflex, Hanara used Eight Trigrams, Rotation, knowing that Lady Chiyo could take care of herself.

And that she did. Lady Chiyo used her Father puppet to block the sand shower.

"So you did fiddle a bit," Sasori noted, "Chakra shield, huh? Quite an upgrade since I last saw em."

Panting, Lady Chiyo tried to spread the hands apart, but couldn't.

"The iron sand," Hanara said, after studying them for a few seconds, "It's got in the joints."

"Heh," Sasori smirked, looking extremely satisfied, "A jutsu you shouldn't just block. You should know that you have to dodge it. Is that it? Saving yourself is all you could manage? The iron sand has seeped into the doll. As long as I have the power of the Third Kazekage, that thing won't last. Now, this time I will attack both of you at once. And, to make sure you really are dead, I'll use my most lethal attack!"

The puppet of the Third Kazekage sent clumps of iron sand that were moving so fast that Hanara's eyes couldn't tell the shapes they were moulded in. All she knew was that they were heading straight for her and Lady Chiyo.

"What do you say to that, witch? One puppet, two people. You can't protect both!" Sasori grinned.


A/N: I hope all of you enjoyed this! I re-wrote it a few times because it didn't feel quite right and while I know I'm updating a bit earlier than expected, I just had a lot of free time these past few days (and my mind kept nagging me to work on an update).

Anyway, this is a response to an anonymous reviewer, so if it isn't you, feel free to ignore and skip to the underlined bit.

From: Guest

:You do realize that naruto doesn't act like this in the anime right? Its these fanfic cliches like sasuke being some emo who is always jealous or some civilian council b***.

From: Guest
-

:What I'm trying to say is you dumb down people around your Mc to make her seem stronger its not good.

I feel like you were being genuine so I'll respond here. Most of Naruto's dialogue was taken directly from the manga, and as someone who's watched the anime and read the manga, I feel like the manga's portrayal of Naruto is much kinder. So, yes, Naruto does act like this.

Now, onto your second point. All the canon scenes' dialogue have also been taken from either the manga, and occasionally, the anime (except for Hanara's, obviously). The only character I might have been dumbing down is Shikamaru, because writing a character with an IQ over 200 is beyond me, not because I want Hanara to seem smarter or stronger.

I hope this helps you see my point of view.

To all my other reviewers:

I see you and appreciate you, even if I haven't responded. Thank you for being so supportive and for offering constructive criticism, because it does help. For the few of you that haven't been so kind, thank you for at least reading this or clicking on it, although I don't really appreciate the tone you use, I try to see things from your perspective.

If you made it this far, thank you! Have a nice day/night!