Shit I've run out of ways to say without further ado...
Eh...
How do I say it in French?
Well one google translate later says it's "Sans plus tarder", but if I've learned one thing from trying to cheat in Spanish II, it's that google translate is never correct...
but it's all I've got so-
Sans plus tarder.
Chapter 16: Twin Promises
"And you're… absolutely sure you don't want both?"
Tenten sighed dramatically, trying her best not to run her hand down her face as she stared blankly into Naruto's sheepish face.
"I am absolutely sure that I don't need both of your scrolls, honestly, I don't even need the one!"
"Well, neither do we." Sasuke held up his team's own earth scroll. "We've already got one of our own, no need to have two, is there? Besides, you said your team had a heaven scroll to start, right?"
"Yeah, I suppose I did." She conceded the point, waving her hand lazily into the air. She had to admit that she quite liked Team 7, but they were all annoying in their own way. "Fine, fine, I'll take your extra scroll, happy?"
"Yep!" Naruto exclaimed with a radiant smile. She noticed Sakura giggle quietly, trying to hide it behind her hand.
"There's no winning an argument with him, unfortunately." The girl's smile became slightly forced. "Believe me, I've tried."
Tenten gave a small chuckle at that, before looking back behind her at the massive expanse of forest, and remembering that her team had only 2 days left in their exam.
She shuddered slightly thinking about the talking to she'd be getting from the resident Hyuga of their team. It certainly didn't help that she'd not shown up to their rendezvous point, and she had a feeling that Neji wasn't going to be taking "Orochimaru showed up" as an excuse.
Which feels kind of unfair, She thought glumly, given that he did show up.
"Well, Alright guys, I'm off." She gave them a mock salute, which they returned, laughing amongst themselves as best they could. "I hope to see you in the next round."
Despite everything, she couldn't help but smile at the team in front of her. They might've technically been enemies, but she silently prayed that their teams wouldn't face each other in the coming rounds.
"We'll be there!" Naruto held his hand out to her, giving her a confident thumbs-up "You'd better watch yourself, Tenten! Team 7's coming for the championship!"
"It's not really a – oh forget it." Sakura sighed, massaging her temples with one hand, and waving goodbye to her with the other.
She returned the gesture, and, no more than a second later, jumped into the woods beyond, rushing into the forest's depths.
/-/
It was a while later before Naruto and the rest of his team were up and moving, and they were being just a bit too slow.
"Oi, you two!"
When Sakura and Sasuke turned to look at him, both of their faces a dusty pink with embarrassment, Naruto couldn't help but growl under his breath.
"This was funny at first, but you two dancing around each other for the last day and a half is starting to get annoying as hell!" Naruto pointed back at them, his finger shaking with rage. "Just talk to each other or something!"
His teammates gaped at him like fish, opening and closing their mouths as they tried to find any retort to his words. Neither of them could, it seemed, as they turned towards one another, not quite meeting each other's gazes.
"W-would you mind if we… stopped for a while?" Sakura spoke up quietly, her eyes darting around the forest floor in a vain attempt to avoid her current predicament.
Naruto's eyes narrowed, but he couldn't help but sigh a second later.
"You have 15 minutes."
/-/
"…"
"…"
"So… uh…"
The girl in front of him coughed awkwardly, and Sasuke himself couldn't help the abject mortification that played upon his face.
Honestly, he thought he had it pretty bad, but the Uchiha couldn't quite imagine what it must've been like for the girl before him, having revealed her thoughts without meaning to.
"I'm sorry, I've never been very… good at talking." Sasuke rubbed the back of his neck with his left hand, suddenly feeling rather hot. "Uhm… do you… even want to talk about this?"
Sakura looked up at him with a flat expression.
"Do I look like I want to talk about it?"
"Not particularly, no."
"You're correct." The girl sighed loudly, pursing her lips. "And yet, if one of us doesn't start talking, we won't get anywhere."
"Y-yeah. Right."
There was another moment of silence, accompanied only by a far-off bug, who seemed determined to try and drown out the silence of the woods with its call. It was a minute or so of that later that Sasuke realized neither of them had even tried to talk.
"Oi! You two!" Naruto's voice called from beyond the clearing, sounding more than a little irate. "5 minutes!"
He could tell, as he looked back towards Sakura's beat red face, that neither of them was going to say anything at all right now. he himself had no idea what he was supposed to say to the girl.
What should I say? I mean, she confessed to me, right? Sasuke's thoughts swam in his head, trying desperately to form some kind of solution. But if I don't feel the same way… or do I!? I don't even know!
"Hey, Sasuke?"
He looked up at the girl before him, who, for the first time since they'd begun speaking, was looking him straight in the eye.
"I have an idea… And, well, I'm not sure if it's the best idea," Sakura admitted, folding her hands just in front of her, and running her thumbs in a circle nervously. "But… I know I can't exactly own up to how I feel right now. So, I'd like to make you a promise."
Huh?
"After the Chuunin Exams are over, and once this whole…" She rubbed her neck with her hand, right over the spot where Orochimaru's mark lay hidden. "Seal thing get's figured out, then… I'd like to talk about all of this, OK?"
Sasuke couldn't help but chuckle a bit as he heard it, causing the girl before him to look up with a small bit of embarrassment.
"W-what?"
"Nothing, It's just…" A small smile blossomed onto his face, and he couldn't help the pride in his breast either. "You seemed really mature, there."
The girl blinked once before her face exploded in color, and he couldn't help but chuckle when she turned her back to him, more than a little embarrassed.
"W-well, anyways, we should be getting back." He could just barely see a smile peeking out from behind her hair. "Wouldn't want that blonde idiot to worry, would we?"
"I suppose we wouldn't." Sasuke smiled back.
In the time it took the two of them to walk back, they discussed what their plans were for the rest of the exam, how they felt about some of the other leaf teams, and about the variety of bugs they'd encountered thus far.
"I can safely say that even if I never see another centipede in my life," Sakura spoke, eyes hard. "It will still be too soon."
"I feel that on a spiritual level."
As they passed through the last couple trees to enter the clearing Naruto sat in, Sasuke couldn't help but feel that the boy was being oddly quiet.
"Hey, guys." Naruto spoke up, waving his hand to the both of them.
"Hey, Naruto!" Sakura spoke, waving her hand back, and sitting down next to the boy.
"What've you been up to while we were away?"
"Nothing really, just watching the perimeter." The boy smiled up at him, but he couldn't help but feel that it was a bit... sedated.
It didn't remind him of a sunny day, not like it usually did.
Sakura's eyes narrowed, and she gave him a nod from behind the boy.
"Yeah, sorry about leaving you over here, I just wanted to talk to Sasuke about our plan for getting to the tower, seeing as how we have both scrolls, and since you're our strongest fighter, I figured you were the best to stay here."
"Eh, don't worry about it." The boy beside them both waved his hand, trying to brush their concerns away. "I get it. It's not a problem."
Sasuke smiled himself, standing up and drawing his bag onto his back.
"Well, we don't have too long before the sun starts to set, shall we be heading out?"
"I suppose we should!" Naruto spoke up, slinging his own bag on and walking to stand next to him.
"Oh, hey, Naruto?"
The boy looked over at him, a curious expression on his face.
"Yeah, man?"
The boy's eyes widened as Sasuke brought a kunai against his neck, not quite biting into it, but enough to threaten more. Sakura's own weapon dug into the boy's spine from behind, keeping him still.
"Mind telling us who you really are?" He spoke coldly, Sharingan spinning into place. "And what you've done with our teammate?"
The boy before them gave a harsh laugh at that, which seemed to echo endlessly among the trees above them.
"How'd you figure me out?"
"The real Naruto would've known what we were really talking about," Sakura spoke calmly. "And he would've known we only had a single scroll!"
"And he would've freaked out if we called him our strongest fighter." Sasuke snickered.
"Hmph, how amusing." The imposter spoke, smiling in a decidedly-not-Naruto kind of way.
A second later, mist exploded out from the boy's body.
Sasuke jumped backwards, making distance in case of a surprise attack. His Sharingan could see through any Genjutsu, but it appeared that the fog that now blanketed the area around them was real.
"Sakura!?"
"I'm here!"
The mist cleared after another moment or so, and he waved his teammate forward, standing back to back with her in the center of the clearing.
"Hehe," A voice echoed along the tree line above them. "They seem to think they can take us, don't they, boys?"
"Hehe, how lucky!"
"Very lucky!"
2 masked ninja landed in front of Sasuke, and from the way Sakura tensed behind him, he imagined another was facing her down as well.
Those in front of him were dressed… oddly would be a nice way to put it. They wore cream colored onesies, which was a clothing choice he felt he just couldn't agree with, and they each both had headbands that indicated they were from the Rain Village. One had a patch of cloth on his face that left his left eye uncovered, and the other just wore a blindfold.
Is that… can he just... not see?
…Honestly I don't even want to know at this point.
Both of them wore the same mask, and judging by the voice of the man on Sakura's side, it seemed he was wearing one as well.
"Well then, we'll ask once just to be nice!" The ninja on his teammates side, who was also apparently this team's leader, spoke up. "Hand over your scroll, unless you all want to bite it!"
A snicker came from behind him, and he felt Sakura relax slightly.
"Alright, I've got this one, Sasuke, you think you can take those two?"
"Pfft," He couldn't help but laugh at the girl's question. "Do you need to ask?"
"Not really," The girl admitted. "I just wanted to give them a chance to repent."
"Yeah, that's what I figured."
"Not gonna' come quietly, ey?" The masked leader spoke up, drawing a kunai out from his pouch. "Fine then, Boys, Gut em'!"
"They don't seem to be repenting." Sasuke spoke as the two ninja facing him charged forwards, their kunai drawn in front of them.
"No. They most certainly do not."
"Well, keep one conscious, we do need to know where Naruto is."
"Got it."
They dashed to meet their opponents.
/-/
"W-what the hell…" The last conscious rain ninja just managed to push himself off the ground, staring into their faces in disbelief. "Why are you brats so strong!?"
"Do you want to take that," Sasuke spoke from beside her. "Or should I?"
"Eh," Sakura pondered for a few moments what she'd even say, and came up with a fat wad of nothing. "I don't have anything. Just tell us where our teammate is so we can knock you out."
"You're not going to let me answer his question?" Sasuke actually sounded a bit hurt.
"I don't really feel like letting this take a long time, if I'm being honest."
"Fine, fine." Sasuke sighed disappointedly, before looking down at the boy below them. "Well you heard her, where's our teammate?"
"I-I'll never tell yo-"
A shuriken impacted the space directly next to the ninja's face.
"He's about 20 meters that way," The boy pointed to his right, his finger shaking. "Tied to a tree about 10 meters off the ground!"
"Alright," As a last bit of humiliation, Sakura reached down and took the Heaven scroll off of their opponent. "Thanks for your help."
Sakura turned towards the forest as she heard Sasuke knock the Amegakure ninja unconscious, taking a few long strides into it.
It only took a moment to start hearing the muffled yelling.
"Quiet down Naruto, I'll be there in a second."
She heard the boy yell something back that may very well have been a response, but it was lost in whatever material was covering his mouth.
When she finally made her way up to the boy, and pulled the makeshift gag off him, Naruto had the nerve to look annoyed with her.
"Took you guys long enough."
"Naruto, it took us maybe 5 minutes."
The boy grumbled something under his breath, which Sakura thought sounded vaguely like "wouldn't have taken me that long", but she decided not to call the boy out on it.
"Alright, well, on the bright side," Sakura raised the Heaven scroll she'd looted from the Rain ninja. "We've got both scrolls now!"
"I guess that's a bright side." Naruto admitted with a pout.
She could tell the boy felt just a little left out, first with her and Sasuke talking to each other, and then missing the fight. She could empathize with that, though, she'd felt like that for far too long. It was only nowadays that she felt strong enough to stand beside the two of them, and every time she caught up, it seemed like they threatened to leave her behind yet again.
She patted the boy on the back, and held her hand out to him.
"C'mon, no pouting," She smiled playfully. "You'll get the chance to prove how strong you are in a day or two."
Naruto looked up at her, still pouting, but nodded, at least acknowledging her point. He took her hand a second later, letting her pull him up, and stood just beside her.
"Where's Sasuke?"
Said boy jumped up on their branch to stand beside them.
"Sorry, I was knocking out that guy from the Rain."
"Oh ok…" Naruto seemed to think about that for a second. "Does anyone else think it's weird that this is an entirely normal conversation we're having? Like, 'oh, someone tried to kill us again, no biggie.'"
They all laughed at that, though Sakura could definitely see where the boy was coming from with that one. It was a bit odd that they were suddenly so used to it, but they'd been assaulted by people trying to kill them 3 times in the last 5 days. It was a bit hard for the concept to still be novel.
It helped that their most recent assailants were the weakest they'd faced so far.
"At this point, it'd probably be best to make our way to the central tower." Sasuke spoke confidently, smiling over at the two of them. "Should we go now, or maybe rest for a bit? We were just in a fight."
"Eh," Sakura weighed the options in her head. "I'm not all that tired, you?"
"I'm fine to go on." Sasuke responded, turning to the third member of their team. "Naruto?"
"I'm good to go!"
"Alright then." Sasuke looked upwards, towards where the tree line parted just enough for them to see the central tower. "Shall we head out, then?"
Sakura smiled, as did Naruto beside her.
"Yeah!"
/-/
"Well, this place is… surprisingly big."
The three members of Team 7 were standing in a decently sized corridor, with two railed walkways just above them on both sides. The room was painted a neutral green color, and there was a scroll on the back wall.
On it was a poem.
"Open the series of Heaven and Earth… Oi! Sasuke!" Naruto shouted out, pointing at his friend. "I totally get what this says, but I don't think you do! Explain it!"
The Uchiha gave him a flat look.
"Why are you like this?"
The Jinchuuriki coughed into his fist.
"Anyways, just… make it make sense!"
"I think it just wants us to open our Heaven and Earth scrolls, right?" Sakura spoke up, sounding pretty sure of herself.
"Yeah, I assume so." Sasuke brought the scrolls out, throwing one over to him. "We'll open them at the same time, ok?"
"Gotcha'!" He nodded back, placing his thumb just underneath the scrolls' seal.
After they'd finished opening the scrolls, there was an explosion of white smoke, from out of which not one, but two familiar figures rose to meet them.
"Hello, Naruto, Everyone."
"Yo, you damned kids."
Zabuza Momochi and Iruka Umino stepped out of the smoke, looking murderous and proud, respectively.
"You brats… took 5 whole days to complete this test!?" Zabuza walked over to them, getting right in their faces.
"Well," Iruka spoke, seeming a bit frightened. "I'm proud of you all. You've done very well."
"If I still had a sword, I'd use it to skin your sorry hides!"
"I think your performance was exemplary, once you've finished here, you can head upstairs to rest for tomorrows battles."
"Look at you all, beat to shit in some kiddie exam!"
"I'm getting whiplash." He whispered to Sasuke.
"Yeah, tell me about it."
"I'm pretty sure this is an interrogation technique."
"Good cop, bad cop?" Sasuke snickered beside him.
"Yeah." He chuckled under his breath.
"Are you two whispering!?"
They shot up, going ramrod straight.
"N-No, sir!"
"Definitely not, sir!"
/-/
As they handed Kin off to the medical team, Zaku couldn't help the feeling of wanting to go with her, just to be sure she'd be alright.
He didn't, however, because he knew doing that would be putting them all at risk.
They were escorted through several rooms in the tower, eventually ending up in front of a small, almost hotel-like room.
"You'll be staying here until tomorrow's fights." Their escort told them, looking completely and utterly bored. "Don't leave the room unless there's an emergency, do not damage any of the items in the room, do not try and go to the exam site on your own, we will come to escort you."
As the man brought them inside, and stepped back out, he wished them luck.
Sitting down on his tiny bed, Zaku couldn't help but think the thing had seen better days.
"Alright, so… step 1, complete, I guess."
"Yeah." His teammate replied quickly, taking his gauntlet off and setting in on the table beside him. The boy had just begun to unwrap the bindings around his face when Zaku spoke up.
"What do we do now?"
"Win." Dosu said simply. "Because it's all that we can do."
It was harsh, but it was true. The reality of their situation was that they could, and probably would, be discarded. Really, it was at their master's leisure, they weren't important pieces of his plan, just a single part.
Just pawns.
There was a ringing in Zaku's ears as he thought that, a small, tiny voice seemed to cry out in the back of his head.
"Hey, Zaku? Can you promise me something?"
"Anything."
"Get out of this place. Get out of here and live your life how you want to, don't let anyone else tell you how to live it."
"I…"
Zaku snapped back to reality, massaging his temples to try and get rid of the lingering pain that rang in his skull.
That same memory again…
"You alright?"
He looked up at Dosu, who was staring right at him.
"Y-yeah, just… some old memories I've been trying to ignore."
"Hmph…" Dosu finished unwrapping his face, and set his headband on the table as well. "Get some rest, you'll need it. The exams start up as soon as the sun rises."
"Yeah… I know." He laid back against the wall behind him, trying not to think about that memory. It wasn't fading like the last one, but seemed to be something he'd recovered for good.
Even still, it was only a piece. He could tell, because every second it seemed he was this close to hearing more of it, to figuring out who was who and what was what, but it eluded him.
He didn't want to think about it, and so of course, he did. It was all he could think about. The thoughts of that voice, that boy's voice, and his own, warred in his head for an hour, two hours, and longer still into the night.
And when morning came, he hadn't slept a wink.
/-/
Anko sat quietly in the camera room, doing her best not to gnaw her fingernails off as she waited as patiently as possible for any information to surface.
It was going poorly.
"Damnit, those kids Jiraiya was watching are back, so where the hell is he!?"
One of the Anbu watching the cameras with her flinched, looking up at her sheepishly.
"Uhm, I'm sure he was just held up with something, ma'am."
"Well he's still goddamned slow!" Anko's teeth ground together as she thought about that man getting up to any more madness while no one was watching him. "Gods, I can see why the Third Hokage had mixed feelings about bringing him on."
"Good to know I'm appreciated."
She turned to see the man she'd been looking for standing in the doorway, covered in leaves, and looking more than a little annoyed.
"Ah. Good, you're here." Anko walked over to him, a flash of anger in her gaze. "Those kids didn't see you?"
Jiraiya seemed mildly offended.
"They were Genin! I'm a world-renowned infiltration expert, if they spotted me, I'd have killed myself on the spot."
"Well, that's good, at least."
"What do you mean at least!?"
I'm going to ignore that.
"What about Orochimaru, did he try and attack them again?"
"He didn't, though I suspect that's because I was there, and even then, some of his cronies still did." Jiraiya looked over at the camera's, pointing to one that focused on a room that held two boys, both from the sound village. "These guys work for Orochimaru, apparently."
Anko rose immediately, bringing a kunai into her left hand.
"Whoa, whoa," The white-maned giant put a hand on her shoulder, stopping her in her tracks. "Where are off to?"
"Are you kidding!?" Her anger flared once more, and she felt the telltale pain of her curse mark swelling onto her neck. "I'm going to go subdue those brats and haul them in for interrogation!"
"Don't be rash!"
Anko couldn't hide the surprise on her face as the man yelled at her. The giant took one of the chair's set up in front of the cameras, drew it behind him, and sat down.
"What do we gain by capturing those two?"
"Are you seriously asking that!?" She was furious now, this man was supposed to be one of Konoha's greatest, and he was questioning her on something as dull as this? "We get information on his plans, what he's here for, we could-"
"And why would they have that information?"
Her stunned silence seemed to be enough for the man, because he continued talking a moment later.
"You didn't get to see them fight, those kids over there, did you?" He pointed towards the screen. "They're Low-Chuunin-level opponents, small fry. There's no way they'd be given any more of the plan than was immediately relevant to them."
"I… I didn't consider that."
"And that's not your fault. Orochimaru's got us all on edge." Jiraiya sighed, drawing out a small bottle from his coat, and taking a drink of it. "I'd imagine facing down anyone else, you'd have figured all of that out on your own. I get it, believe me, I do, but unless we're careful about this, we lose one of our only sources of information about Orochimaru."
Now that, she didn't get.
"How are they sources of information like this?"
"Well, we know that they're working for Orochimaru, right?" Anko nodded to show she was following. "And they're only here for the exams. Therefore, we can assume anyone they interact with in the village is, themselves, an agent of Orochimaru."
When the man laid it out like that, Anko couldn't help but nod in agreement. The plan made sense.
"What I'm proposing is simple. I'll follow those two, or, I guess three, since the third is in one of the medical wings here, and see what I can find out."
"Wouldn't it be easy for Orochimaru to find you? Can't he… recognize your chakra or something?"
"He could, that is true, but at the same time, he'd be able to find someone less adept than me in much less time than it'd take for him to find someone of my caliber." Jiraiya gave a 'what can you do?' kind of gesture. "I'm still the best candidate, even with Orochimaru knowing me and my habits like the back of his hand."
That annoyed Anko a little, if she was being honest, she still wanted to be involved in this case in some way.
"I'd like to do something myself, though." She admitted a second later, deciding it was better to just come out and ask. "What can I do?"
"Hmm…" Jiraiya ran his hand along his chin, seeming a bit hard-pressed to come up with something. A while later, something seemed to dawn on him, and he smiled down at her.
"Actually, there is something you could do." Jiraiya stood, walking to stand just beside her. "Can I see the mark on your neck, just for a second?"
There was a momentary pause as Anko considered that.
"I swear if you try anything-"
"Yeah, even I'm not dumb enough to do that." Jiraiya stepped to stand behind her, moving her hair so that he could get a good look at her neck.
"It takes a second to manifest, give me a moment."
She thought of her darkest times, of her greatest failures, of Orochimaru getting away with all of this, and felt the telltale pain of the curse mark whirl to life on her neck.
"Hmm, so it is the same…"
"What are you talking about?"
"Earlier, when Orochimaru attacked those kids, I think he was trying to give one of them a curse mark."
That got a reaction out of her, and Anko was suddenly out of her seat, anger flowing freely across her face.
"Did he do it!?"
"Unfortunately, I think he did. I watched the battle between Team 7 and those sound ninja, and one of the members had a mark just like this one on their necks."
"So he was after someone? Is it possible that's the only reason he's here at all?"
"No, he wouldn't go this far just to corrupt one kid, he's just figured he can kill two birds with one stone." Jiraiya sounded grim as he rubbed his chin, seemingly deep in thought. "At least, that's what I assume, but it's possible that he's using all of this as a cover for some even grander scheme."
"You just don't think it's that?" She asked as she fixed her hair, bringing it back down over her curse mark, and letting the thing fade as her anger did, replaced instead by curiosity.
"Yeah, I think this is… not the endgame, but his magnum opus, if you catch my meaning. This is what he's been planning for, all these years." Jiraiya sounded oddly confident, and Anko realized with a small bit of sadness that the man had likely been chasing his old friend for decades now, hoping to find out what he really wanted. "Personally, I wish he'd get on with it, I much prefer fighting to strategizing."
Anko laughed.
"Same here, I'm not so much of a thinker, either." Her laughter died down after a few seconds, and she felt some small tension occupy the room. "So, what is it you'd have me do?"
"So, Team 7, on one team, there's the last Uchiha, The Nine-Tails Jinchuuriki," Jiraiya looked down at her, a small smile on his face. "And some random girl."
"Ok… so?"
"Well, some random girl just so happens to be the recipient of a little gift from our friend Orochimaru."
What?
"Why would he give her a curse mark?"
"According to what I could overhear from those three, it was a mistake. The curse mark was meant for Sasuke Uchiha, though even still, I don't know why." He looked over to her, sporting an odd grin. "But, that doesn't matter. What does matter is that I know what you can do to help!"
"Oh?" Anko could tell, now, that this wasn't going to be particularly fun for her. "And what would that be?"
He pointed to the camera feed, where the three members of Team 7 were idly conversing in a small room.
More specifically, he was pointing at a pink haired girl.
"I want you to train her."
End Chapter 16
Hey Hey!
These upcoming battles have been in the works for a few weeks now, and I will say now that they're all going to be different from canon.
Well, most of them, anyways.
Sakura and Sasuke make a promise, though will it be kept, or broken?
Zaku regains a bit more of his memories, but he still can't see the full picture. Meanwhile, Orochimaru's plotting something, and Jiraiya and Anko are hot on his heels.
Or are they...?
Find out next time on Dragon Ball Z!
...
Anyways see you next week.