Thank you, thank you for so many lovely insightful reviews and reactions. They make me so very happy.
Also, to my darling who pointed out that I suck at summaries: No hurt feelings hun, lol! I know I'm so bad at them! NewRageInc was lovely enough to do me the favor of writing me a new one! Send all hugs and kisses her way!
I want to answer all my reviewers on here all the time and I have to restrain myself because my AN would be so long if I let myself do that. So please know, I do read the reviews I so want to show my appreciation. Please accept this chapter as my huge thank you! So many lovely kind people read this stuff and I am very thankful for that.
Much much love, Inky
P.S This is the chapter that I began this story with... this is where the whole thing took off. So this has been rewritten, cropped, tossed, restarted so many times. This and the very first chapter are the two things that started this world. *throws it at you all and hides*
Breathless and stunned Hinata stared at him, wide eyes darkening with comprehension, with terror and panic. Below it, swirling like a pit of snakes in murky water rolled anger, muscled and vibrant.
"What... did you say?"
Kabuto looked at her long and hard, his eyes hidden in the glare of the evening suns on his spectacles, mouth pursed with displeasure.
"Surely you must know that there is no way your master will escape this encounter unscathed- alive even?"
Hinata felt the air entering and leaving her mouth in soft half breaths that tasted of acid. "Kabuto-"
"The Scaled Worm is a powerful opponent, and although your master is a formidable foe, let us be honest." He faced her then, surveying her paling face, her lips pressing thinly together. "This is your chance to escape, before the Worm thinks of you. Before it considers you a good piece of property to maintain. Run. Run while they are engaged in tearing each other's throats out."
The room dimmed, a cloud thick and gray rolled through the sky and over the twin suns above in the blazing orange and red of the heavens. The shadow slid over the dining hall, covering the splatters of food in it's opaque hues as it passed through the giant window panes.
The lanterns glimmered more brightly on the walls and Hinata's gaze slid to the double doors behind Kabuto where Sasuke and Lord Utterance had vanished.
"My..." Hinata began, and balked at the word master. Jaw tightening she fixed Kabuto with a straight unwavering stare. "Sasuke is not as easily bested as you seem to think." Slowly she took a step back, and Kabuto stirred, his spine straightening. His gaze flickering from her fingers twitching faintly to the tightness of her shoulders and back.
"No one has defeated my master in nearly a thousand years." He whispered, eyes widening as her gaze darted from his face to the door behind him again.
"Do not be a fool." His body shifted and Hinata flinched at the sudden spread of his stance, at the rising hands already half curled into the unlocking pattern of magic. "You would do well to run from here! As far as you can get before they realize you have is a kindness I am doing you!"
"Kindness." Hinata whispered back, eyes darting over the dining hall, double checking that no servants lingered to feel the tightening of magical molecules floating in the vastness of the space.
Kindness was Sasuke's arms holding her in the storm, letting her bury her face into his neck and breathe in the scent of magic and mint. Kindness was his irritated glare at being hounded by Amaterasu but still patting his head whenever he came close.
Kindness was him arming her before going into the battle that might end him, while wounded and silent. Unwilling to demand the tears that would heal him lest it put a target on her back.
Oh Sasuke... please... forgive me.
"Let me through those doors." She turned back to the blonde in time to catch his unabashed shock. More firmly she drew in a breath, "Let me through, Kabuto."
"I did not think you so foolish." He shook his head, and the unlocking twist of his fingers had the whole room singing with magic. At his hip the sword appeared in a sudden tangle of bright light, long and curved, shining a deep gold hue.
Hinata bit her lip, her hands loose at her sides as she contemplated what she was about to do.
"Please, don't make me fight you to get through. I beg you."
On the other side of that door Sasuke stood alone. Even if he had figured out what the Scaled Worm had done to him with the people of the Rot he would still be blind sided.
Something about the way the blonde smiled sadly before her now told her there was a high chance that it was clever. Clever enough to have him sure of his master's victory. If he was so certain he must know enough about it to make an educated guess.
I need to get to him. I need to get to him now.
"The Star is the End. The one who will destroy us all." Kabuto snapped, and his hand gripping the hilt of his magicked sword flexed expertly. Despite his scholarly appearance Hinata had not forgotten the familiar way his body moved in a battle dance.
"You would risk your life to save one who calls you slave? One who would end all of our lives if he accomplishes his goals? Surely you must see the lack of sense in that."
Hinata breathed in deeply, and the molecules of magic in the air began to dance to her call. Kabuto let his mouth fall open as he watched her hair begin to shudder at the touch of an unseen breeze, her pale eyes narrowing as her fingers flexed with the tension of an incoming bout.
"That is not all he is."
It was the last thing she said before his eyes grew sad and his jaw set in determination.
The explosion of her magic was a blast of cold air and the torches went out in the fury of it. Her fingers flared as she threw her hand out and a shield sprang to life around her in the familiar see through bubble of glass. His sword slamming home against it sent a lightning storm of power through the dining room and the blast of energy scattered dishes, food and candles chaotically over the floor.
The once expansive space seemed suddenly too small and Hinata strained hard, watching Kabuto grunt against her shield, teeth gritted and eyes narrowed, muscles tight at his neck and throat.
"I cannot let you pass. I cannot let you in there. He would know I let it happen. He would make me pay."
Hinata let out a soft breath of indignation, digging deep into herself, into the parts of her that were raw and furious. The part of her that could see Sasuke splayed on the ground in a pool of silver, his limbs unmoving, his chest still.
With a grunt she shifted, her shield wavered and disappeared. Kabuto's sword slammed down at her as she dodged, kicking hard into his chest and sending him flying backwards with a choked gasp of air. The hilt barely held between his desperate fingers.
Before he could gather his feet beneath him Hinata flung herself over the overturned half of the table and threw herself beneath the tablecloth covered end still standing. Behind her the room groaned with the pull of magic from his sword. The gold of the blade shuddered and spit out a long endless chain glowing the same warm honey hue. It crackled with energy and killing intent, slashing at the marble where she had stood and cracking it as Kabuto brandished it over his head.
Breathless she scrambled beneath her cover. Listening as he landed on the table top above. It groaned beneath his weight. The whipping gold chain lashed loudly and she flinched as the debris of more marble floor cracked and exploded to her right.
Heart pounding she scrambled further down the table length lined with chairs slightly askew, her brain struggling to come up with a plan, a strategy, something.
Sasuke had known.
He had left the bow here instead of taking it with him. He had armed her should things go badly. The bow had never been for him. He had said as much.
What a fool I am.
Stone shattered to her right and she winced. So much care he had taken with her in the last few days. So much thought. Hinata grit her teeth. She flinched as Kabuto's golden chain slammed into the marble again and again, shattering smooth pristine stone to dust and flecks of razor sharp rock went flying.
"Come out!"
His shout was furious, as if he couldn't believe she would be so foolish as to fight him. To want to battle for a prize as feeble as freeing her captor.
A small tired part of her mourned for him, for his desperation and fear. For his inability to understand.
Grabbing the bow and quiver Hinata drew an arrow, pressing her fingers to the black feathers of the fletching. For a moment she watched as a chair was pulled from beneath the table violently and thrown to shatter out of the way by the golden chain.
Sasuke.
She would get to him. She had no option. She had told him her new Calling was his well being. She had spit it in his face with her hurt feelings and she was a Hawk Eyed heir. There was no room for going back on her word with the blood that pumped in her veins.
I'm coming.
Feeling more calm than she had in days she rolled out from under the table, arrow notched, eyes fixed on Kabuto's open target. Her magic fanned her hair in a mess of darkness around her face as it imbued the arrow with her desires.
Kabuto's eyes had a second to widen and his lungs a snatch of air to breathe.
And then she let the arrow fly.
The pulse in his neck was starting to become less of a throb and more of a crippling agony. The moment his hand had landed so forcefully on Lord Utterance and his hanging weight had made the muscle of his arm strain he could hardly ignore the deep ache that pulsed through his nerves. It was the undeniable shift of an iceberg with the bruise at his neck being the tip and the unavoidable mammoth hiding beneath his skin, invisible.
Training for years under the tutelage of Obito and Kakashi had not prepared him to be anything other than stubborn, at least. And so, swallowing the flinch as the pain intensified and ebbed like the tide he followed at Lord Utterance's heels. Around them the indiscriminate snap and pop of electricity lit the hall with flashes of magic every few steps as a reminder that beneath his calm veneer there was a tempest brewing.
The Chattels who had vanished as he and Lord Utterance departed the Gallery appeared further down the hall, standing in a row like dolls. As one their eyes turned studiously in the direction of their Lord's rapid steps and together they moved from the wall and to the side bowing low. He ushered past them and took the door knob in hand.
The door was itself inconspicuous in the sense that it looked like all the other doors that lined the hall every dozen or so feet. It's wooden face was painted white, it's trim was a gaudy overzealous gold and the metal knob shone with a recently polished glimmer.
"Ensure that we are not disturbed, Chattels. I daresay our master will want privacy for this unexpected engagement."
The tone was not to be ignored and Sasuke's magic rippled from him in displeasure despite his face remaining calm.
"I suggest you step forward. You are required less and less the further on this journey we go. Don't make yourself become less than useless and fade into irritant." It went without saying what Sasuke intended to do with anything that vexed him.
The Chattels remained still. Their eyes flickered from their Lord to the Star in their midst with displeasure. Lord Utterance did as he was told and moved within the room, face expressionless and the last thing Sasuke saw was the three disarming smiles on the bruised faces of his slaves.
Frowning deeply he turned away as the Lord closed the door behind him and froze at the sight of what awaited him.
The door frame sunk in and meshed with the bones of the mountain. Before him lay the buzzing and whistling sounds of a jungle, with the heat and the humidity covering his already sweaty skin in a layer of moisture.
Light was dim, and tinged a cool blue despite the heat. Looking straight up to find it's unsuccesful source Sasuke felt himself stagger within once more. The room, and he realized a large part of the enormous endless palace was not palace at all but jungle. They had carved the heart of the mountain out, making it an empty cone that gaped to the heavens above and allowed the weather of the high peak to tumble down the inside of their hiding place.
This jungle was not young. It had all the twisted vines and wide trunks of ancient beings. The trills of birds he did not recognize and the humming whir of insects that buzzed and called through the thick air. Lord Utterance watched him from the shadows, his red robes subdued to a dull purple in the twilight.
"This is the favorite abode of the Scaled Worm." He waved a hand slowly in an effort to display the vast wild that hid behind a polished corridor door. "Here the sun never shines too bright, nor does it get cold enough to sustain snow." He paused.
Smells of resin and flowers, of wild earth and citrus had wafted through the halls of the palace every few steps and now Sasuke understood why. Of course there had been the smells of the wild in the elegant decadence of the human carved world beyond the corridor's many doors. The palace was but a pretty package, the monster still preferred it's wild terrain.
A foreboding feeling of being prey settled heavily onto his shoulders.
"Follow me." Lord Utterance murmured when Sasuke did not reply and turning away he began the careful trek through the forest, finding a path that was well worn and familiar to his feet, requiring less light to maneuver.
"I would refrain from touching anything if you can avoid it." He added as the jungle sighed and swallowed them whole. "At times things here like to grab back."
Kabuto's sword took the arrow hard across the blade, the sparks of magic against magic were nearly blinding and he gasped, stumbling back at the force of the projectile, nearly losing his footing on the table as he stumbled.
Hinata had already drawn again as he batted away the magicked arrow and swung his blade. The golden chain snapped like a whip to reach her. Panic lit his face as he watched her twist out of the way in an elegant spin that took his breath away, loosing another arrow at him with the precision and calm of someone determined, and sure. Someone deadly.
With another arrow notched Hinata turned to the flaring coils of golden chain and eyes narrowed the bowstring snapped hard, flaring a silver white of magic as the arrow collided with his own weapon, pinning the chain irrevocably to the marble ground, shattering the stone with the blow.
Stunned Kabuto took a step back, wrenching on the chain only to find it immobile. Eyes wide he turned, just in time to see Hinata notching another arrow, arm pulling back, hair flaring in the force of her magic, the sparkling silver of her power a glittering mess over the arrow as it concentrated on the shaft and metal head. She would not miss, this she knew. She could not. Her blood demanded she hit her target dead on.
"Stop!"
Frozen the two lethal figures turned to the end of the Dining Hall where Anko stood, eyes wide. Breathless and pale, she pressed a hand to her stomach where her recent wound surely throbbed. "H-Hinata! What are you-?"
"Anko." Hinata's voice was low and strained, her arm unwaveringly still and aimed at Kabuto's face. "Please. Tell him to stand down and I will not slay him where he stands."
Kabuto shook his head. "I cannot let you pass. The Scaled Worm cannot be defeated... I will die slowly when he..." His voice shook and for the first time the fear dominated his face, setting his eyes to glowing.
Hinata stiffened, fighting against the desire to lower her weapon.
Anko looked back and forth between the two warriors in stalemate, her hand on her sword more out of habit than actual use. In her state there were few things she could do to stop them. Face twisting in panic she stared at Hinata. "...did... did your master encounter the Rot Clan on the way here, Hinata. Because if he did-"
"They wounded him, but he recovered." Hinata murmured, then more impatiently. "I have no time for this. Let me through or I will-" She strained on the bowstring , feeling her own heart ache at the thought of what she was theatening. Before her Kabuto flinched.
"Go." Anko whispered suddenly, making both Kabuto and Hinata turn to her sharply in surprise.
"If you think... if he might..." Anko stared at Hinata uncertainly. "If you think he can kill that demon. Or even wound him." She grit her teeth. "If you can help him. Go."
Kabuto spluttered. "Anko! He cannot be defeated-"
Hinata lowered her bow, confusion evident on her face.
"Go!" Anko snapped, waving a hand at her impatiently. "Go before it's too late."
"Thank you!" Tears welled in her eyes as she rushed past Kabuto who was staring at his comrade with mouth open, disbelief stilling his limbs. He watched Anko's tight grip on her sword hilt, her eyes clear and mournful in the sudden rush of light from the evening suns beyond the tall windows.
"What is this madness?" Kabuto whispered. "How sorely you have disappointed me this day."
"You're not the only one suffering disappointment, Kabuto." Anko smiled back. "I never took you for a coward despite your fear. The Star is the best bet to ever having him slain, you know this. We have waited for this chance all our lives."
With a flick of his sword the arrow no longer magicked to the marble floor released the elegant ribbon of gold chain with a snap.
"I just want to survive." Kabuto sighed, shaking his head as he let the magic tremble and break apart into a million firefly lights that faded away in a breath as his shoulders slumped. "I just want to live."
"There's a difference you know." Anko's smile turned sad. "Living and surviving. They are not the same thing."
As his shoulders began to shake she struggled to stand before him, ignoring the pinch and pull of her recent stitches as she gathered him into her arms.
Breathing through the humidity was strangely similar to drowning. Sasuke shoved the soaking locks of black hair from his face with impatience as he followed after the Lord's unwavering trek through the jungle path. Not touching things was easier said than done and more than once he had to raise his magic to stop a creature or creeping thing from sliding around him, oily and dark in the shadows. The darkness was menacing in a way that nothing of the wild on the Veil had thus far been.
They had not been walking for long when the path began to widen and Sasuke eyed the worn grooves that rose in concave raw clay along the path. It was wider than a man was tall laying on his back and smooth as though something large and round had been pushed through it. It had decimated the jungle ground, tearing roots, pushing back greenery with what appeared to be constant travel.
Unlike his usual mannerism Lord Utterance seemed strangely subdued. His walk remained calm and his shoulders straight but where he had continually filled the silence with chatter before this silence in contrast was stark. Sasuke kept his eyes on him. The mild throb of pain at his neck that seemed to never fully disappear anymore had burned to a manageable ache for the time being.
"It is rather a pity that you are not more patient. Patience is a virtue, Little Star. Are angels no longer taught to pursue the virtues with the same vigor that they are supposed to outrun their vices?"
Sasuke grit his teeth hard together at the sudden change from Lord Star to Little Star and felt the pressure around them change with his sudden furious magic.
Words, sharp as blades filled his mouth and stopped before being born, aborted on his tongue when his eyes drifted past Lord Utterance to the clearing before them.
The light from the hole above was no longer blocked by the trees and for that reason he could see the shadowy blue of the inner mountain walls. Up high above was the mouth of the crater that had appeared to top the mountain range. It's insides as well as it's outer lips lined with the icing sugar white of snow.
In the twilight brightness he turned to the clearing, watching as from enormous holes sunk into the forest ground steam rose in billowing clouds. Breathing in spurts and smelling strong of minerals as the clouds drifted.
"It is the heart of the mountain. It burns and so it's anger heats the jungle, waters it with it's mineral rich geysers, strengthens it to grow." Lord Utterance commented, watching as Sasuke surveyed the clearing slowly, noting the hissing spit of superheated water rise through metal grates over the holes to protect against an accidental fall.
One of the indentations was lined more heavily with vegetation and shone strangely in the light. It took him a moment to realize that it was covered not in metal criss cross bars but in smooth hardly visible glass.
Standing just at it's edge Sasuke glared down past his vague reflection into a pit perhaps a hundred feet below carved into the black slate and glowing from was not a geyser, it was a vault.
At the very bottom was the hoard of a thousand years.
Treasure sat in reckless piles. Gold coins, cups, shields adorned in precious jewels. Swords of every kind and make thrown carelessly in heaps. Chests overflowing with glittering rocks covered in dust still able to shine despite their neglect. Clothing, in velvet, silk and embroidered in the same ghastly gold that bedecked the Worm's dominion still draped in rotting piles around the bones of fallen and ignored bodies. It was a pit meant to demonstrate the wealth, the lack of need and the mercilessness of his host. The glass was an order- see but do not touch.
Sasuke looked up, face impassive and eyes dark stones unreadable in the half light. Lord Utterance watched with obvious interest, manic focus on his every feature. The Lord's long thick tongue slid from between his lips and flicked at the corner of his mouth, split down the middle as he slurped it back.
"You need to stop wasting my time." Sasuke's tone was more calm than it had been in days and for that reason alone the Lord raised an eyebrow, noting a difference in his stance and gaze. No more playing.
So be it.
"No one is wasting anything, Little Star." Lord Utterance almost laughed. "You are very unlike your brother, you know this?"
Sasuke's silence spoke his distaste louder than any words he could say. Smiling coyly Lord Utterance sighed, brushing the darkness of his hair back from his shoulders with long fingers that seemed suddenly alien and strange.
"He was a much quieter being when he came through. Although I wonder if that was because he entered my domain with an entourage of mutated half breeds all desperate to protect him. Absolutely dependant on the ichor he gave them like pups to their mother's teat."
Standing perfectly still Sasuke felt his wings flinch as his suspicions were finally confirmed.
"So it was you all along." Behind him a geyser spat and hissed angrily, showering his feathers in warm water that sparkled in the last rays of light coming from the shadowy tops of the crater above.
"Certainly, but let us not be foolish and pretend you did not guess some time ago. What held you back, Little Star? What kept you from ripping the Scaled Worm apart in that Dining Hall?" He spread his arms wide, motioning to himself, face poised with curiosity.
Something about the glittering yellow of his eyes and the slice of black pupil glowing in the darkness where he stood made Sasuke's insides writhe and voice terse he murmured, "I have need of your services."
The Worm's grin revealed at last the flat front teeth of a viper and the incisors long on either side of his mouth, but for the right where one had been broken off at a horrible uneven angle leaving it jagged.
"Ah, yes. Searching for your brother." He sighed, and he cocked his head in a way that displayed how unnaturally flexible his neck was. "Danzo told me you would come, he told me and I did not believe him."
Sasuke's sudden stillness was more of a sign of his shock than anything else he could have done. Dark eyes perfectly still he stared, earning himself another vile grin from the slowly widening mouth of his host.
"Danzo is dead." Sasuke bit out. He had seen the place of his Soul Tree. The dark dust that permeated the heavenly soil which should have nurtured the next generation. His however had poisoned the heavens. A black inkblot in the swimming indigo and navy of the sky. His darkness would take a millennia to be cleansed away from the forest.
"Oh, naive Little Uchiha." The Worm laughed and a hiss lingered as he cackled. "Come now. Did your big brother take all the brains in the family? I no longer have a Soul Tree, and yet here we are, chatting up a storm."
Slowly Sasuke slid a foot back to even his stance, mouth dry as he gazed at the ever widening maw, at the eyes too large now in the man's face. Quickly, fighting through the hollow throb of pain at his neck Sasuke began to take apart this information, realizing with every passing second how much he did not know.
"You're a Profane." A fallen star so happy to embrace the darkness of sin that the Soul Tree succumbed to the vileness and disappeared. Excommunicated or executed were the only two options for such beings, and it had been hundreds of years since the last. Unless he was right, and Danzo like the Worm lived severed from his realm.
Sasuke bit any more words from his tongue and kept silent, studying the slowly thickening body of Lord Utterance starting to press against the billowing red robes.
"Ah." He sighed deeply, closing his massive eyes . "Look at you saying the word like it's something to spit out of your mouth. Did it taste acrid on your tongue? They must have forgotten me if it took you so long to say it. No one speaks of the genius and insane Orochimaru in the realm of angels anymore? I suppose they wouldn't to you. They wouldn't want you figuring out what would happen to you if you didn't die slaying your brother."
Sasuke's jaw tightened then, watching as the robes straining against the growing bulk of the Scaled Worm began to rip. His pale face with grotesque nightmarish features patterned as though wrinkled in precise overlapping ivory skin like armor.
"I know what I am." Sasuke's voice left no room for argument despite the roll of his stomach at the growing stench of the massive snake starting to appear before him. The sickly sweet decay of flesh was pervasive and he was not surprised. Once felled, once dark winged and hateful an angel had only so much time before the hatred consumed him. He had never seen a full transformation, had never even heard of it.
Most died long before this, but if Orochimaru was the Scaled Worm, hoarder of wondrous healing potions and elixirs then it made sense he would have found ways to keep himself alive year after year, century after century. Putrefying himself into rotting animated mummification.
"No you don't, Little Star. No you don't. If you did you would not have come to me. You would not have come searching for your brother. Your wings would not be black because you would know. You would know that Danzo is alive- or at least that's the last I heard from Hell itself. And you would know that when your brother passed through here, much like you searching for a fallen star his wings..." Orochimaru smiled ever wider, gaining height with each passing second as his scales thickened to armor and a frill of black leather reminiscent of Sasuke's black wings flared around his snake head. "...his wings, unlike yours...were white."
"Enough of this." Sharp as a stab of lightning through the heavens Sasuke's magic sprouted hard and fast, ripping the air at his hand and solidifying in a flicker of spastic energy into a long shining katana, angry and bitter. Ready to bite.
"All that comes from the mouth of a Profane is vileness." He lifted the blade, setting himself obstinately against the agony growing at his neck. "Slaying you is a waste of my time, but leaving you seems a sin in and of itself."
Laughter rippled from the snake then, hissing cackles that echoed in the vastness of the mountain's hollow chest.
"Oh, Little Star- how very wrong you are. I like to gamble you see- and in my last bet I hoped to have you brought to me, so I could tear that heart from you and live another century. The Rot Clan left their people and I either got a host of new slaves or I got you on a platter. The odds were so in my favor but it seems I am doubly lucky for you came to me. Proving Danzo right you showed up. He will be unhappy that I have disrupted you from your task of annihilating your brother but, no matter." He was panting now, a thick ugly scaled fatness with dripping fangs and rotting coils.
"You showed up here anyway. On your own two feet no less, covered in Rot and talking. Able to even use your magic. That was a little hiccup. But still..."
The Scaled Worm let it's ebony black frill like a mane around it's head shimmer and hiss. It rattled menacingly as his smile broadened wide. His voice grew breathy with excitement. Tongue slipping from between his lips to taste the air so heavy with the flavor of Sasuke's sweat.
"Still, I will give you credit where credit is due. You should have crawled off the Rot begging for death and yet here I am, two days into pushing my magic into you through that hole in your neck and only now are you starting to succumb. That Uchiha blood I think, will taste very sweet indeed."
The pain shot through Sasuke again, as if acknowledgement of the poison in his neck was all the foul ache needed to start it's unbridled campaign towards killing him. Grunting against the sudden onslaught of agony Sasuke strained to keep his sword up, hair dancing as electricity shimmered up and down it's long shining blade.
"You are a fool if you think I will let you touch me without slaughtering you first." The valiant words came out hard, even as fear trickled slow into his heart at the sight of a black twisting pattern on his skin spreading. He didn't have to ask to know what the poison would do when it covered him completely. It was safe to guess it would hurt, and it would end him.
Panting Orochimaru tasted the air over and over as he laughed, a hysterical noise lacking in all calmness.
"I do hope you thrash a bit at least. Do try. I do so love it when they thrash."
Without warning he threw himself at the Star, mouth wide in a smile insane with anticipation, seemingly unfazed by Sasuke's defiant raised blade.
The Chattels guarding the door at the very end of the hall was as good as a sign and Hinata did not take the time to let them speak, to argue or fight.
Projectile magic had never been her forte but with Sasuke's arrows it seemed to flow naturally into the wood, twining with the shaft of the bow, twisting within the fibres of the arrows. Drawing as she ran forward she didn't pause, didn't slow. They had only a moment to gasp, eyes widening in their similar bruised faces before Hinata's arrow flew.
Slamming home into the door behind them the magic erupted in an explosion of energy hot and furious and all three flew like the rag dolls they looked so much like. They slammed into the wall of the corridor in front of them, sliding into a heap on the ground, eyes closed and heads bleeding.
"Forgive me." Hinata whispered softly, ripping open the door and staring with flabbergasted eyes at the jungle that croaked and moaned from within.
Hands tightening around the bow in her hands she glanced just once at the Chattels on the floor and stepped inside, slamming the door closed behind her.
The darkness was thick enough to resemble a night clear of clouds with a shining shattered moon to make everything glow.
Tangled vines crawled over the trees and huge leafy plants swayed in the warm wet breeze. Roughly Hinata's gaze scanned the vegetation before her, finding the pattern of a well worn path among the trees.
If there was one thing she knew it was that her heart had never felt so heavy since leaving her sister bleeding on the crater of Sasuke's collision with the Veil. Her breath was choking her, partly due to the humidity but also the growing apprehension that she was going to arrive too late.
The image, replaying in her mind in painful clarity dragged itself across her thoughts. Sasuke splayed on the ground, silver coursing over the soil, wings askew and painfully broken. Chest still. Silent.
Terror of a kind she had not thought she could feel was making her veins dilate and adrenaline was pumping through her so quickly she felt dizzy. It was too much to comprehend, that feeling of fear, of her insides turning to ice and her body breaking out in a freezing sweat that made her limbs shudder. Shoving aside the picture in her head she threw herself into the jungle, her ears tuning into the crash and burn of an obvious battle in the distance.
There was no silence in the forest. Everything seemed to sigh and breathe. Birds called to each other in maniacal laughter and frogs croaked loud and ominous in the shadows. Eyes peered at her intently from the darkness, hissing and whispering.
Lightning and screams coming from a beastly throat echoed through the trees, bouncing off the molecules of water so densely packing the air in humidity making her doubt for a moment that she was heading in the right direction.
Standing still in the quiet, listening to the buzzing flies and the gentle hiss of something that sounded much like the hotsprings of home in the distance Hinata snapped her head sharply, hearing the sudden crack of trunks breaking following by the chirping angry roar of Sasuke's magic tearing to life in the distance once more.
Poised as she was to listen she jumped, her bow snapping to her ankle where something suddenly snatched at her foot and in her shock she loosed an arrow, it's crack as it hit home a sharp whip sound in the semi silence.
Stumbling back, she tripped, feeling more delicate touches on her calves that in the dim light she managed to make out were twisting vines like snakes moving forward eerily, unrelenting despite her arrow pinning one such plant to the ground where it had taken hold of her.
She watched with horror as the arrow was taken by the vines, twisted until the shaft snapped loud in the eerie quiet and it took her no time at all to imagine what her own bones would sound like should the vines get a good enough grip.
Grunting hard she launched herself to her feet and with her hand up her shield snapped to life around her. It hissed with the effort of sustaining her safety as she slammed through the foliage and found the path past the tightly knotted vegetation trying to take her life.
No longer trying to be subtle the vines thickened to less than tiny twisting tendrils into furious thick trunks that slammed into her shield and knocked her nearly to her knees as the magic strained against the onslaught.
More and more of them flowed from the sides of the path until her vision was all frantic twisting plants, flowers in brilliant red bloomed like mouths with many pollen covered teeth, and panicking Hinata cried out, throwing all her weight into one last push through the foliage.
She came out of the jungle with a grunt of pain as another vine snatched at her ankles. It cracked through her shield with force and with the air knocked out of her lungs, she slammed into the clearing ground hardly making a sound.
Kicking viciously she scrambled back from the jungle edge and watched in confusion as the vines retreated, only understanding what was happening when she heard the sudden monstrous cackle of a hissing laugh behind her.
Slowly she turned, looking over her shoulder with the same horrible feeling in her gut that she felt when a branch proved untrustworthy while climbing and the ground reached up to break her in a fall.
Mouth dry her all seeing eyes took in the image before her and within her mind nightmares from childhood exploded, dreams that had woken her screaming and sweating came to life before her very eyes like a bloodstain spreading on white robes.
The body of the thing had no end. It was as thick as an ancient tree trunk, the stench of it powerful as the muscles beneath the endless white and green scales that covered it. From wounds on it's bunching and twitching muscled length blood black as oil and just as fetid gushed in thick oozing spills.
It's head was simply a giant gaping mouth, it's eyes too big even for it's large monstrosity. All golden glow and a slit of black pupil narrowed with obvious excitement. It's maw stood open as it laughed, tongue long and split snapping out to taste the air before it as the thick leather frills of black ebony around it's head flared and rattled loudly.
"Surrender, Little Star! I am doing you a favor, do you not know? The hatred would eat you." And the snake launched. All of it's enormous body shifted and Hinata scrambled out of the way of it's monstrosity coiling and releasing as it pushed itself with the unrelenting force of a freight train.
It was then through the steaming clouds of the geysers that Hinata saw him. Crouched he was a hawk felled from the sky, black feathers glinting in the half light. His gaze was shrouded by a silver mess of blood coming down on one side of his face. Teeth gritted tightly Sasuke's hand flicked out at his side and as the snake came crashing for him his fingers spit and sparked with lightning before roaring to life in the shape of a long glittering sword.
The light made shadows flail and twirl on his face. In the flickering flash she could see, the black lace pattern of darkness that overtook half of his face not covered in the silver of his ichor.
He dodged the snapping maw of his opponent with a stumble that was alarming. His movements usually so elegant and effortless clearly costing much more than he could give as he twisted and shunted the creature away from him with his lightning imbued blade.
It hardly seemed to faze the Worm as it crashed into the outskirts of the clearing, levelling massive trees and flattening forest as it writhed itself back up.
"You proud Uchiha could not handle succumbing wholeheartedly to the darkness. Give in now. There is no one to save you, no one to put a stop to the hate inside you. It is a pity that no one who loves you is left. No one to turn the tide back on your own destruction."
The body of the snake twisted then hard and his brutal stinking tail came slamming around, decimating the clearing edge.
Sasuke had been still too long, his chest rising and falling in an attempt to catch his breath. The crack of the snake's body slamming into him sent him flying forward, catching himself hard on uneven ground and before he could gather his feet under him the loops of serpentine body were tightening around him, heedless of the cuts his wings inflicted, or the blast of magic bruising and wounding as he struggled in the tightening hold.
"Oh..." Orochimaru sighed deeply, his tongue slithering out between his one broken fang and the glinting off white of the venom drenched other. "Oh, I do so like it when they thrash."
Sasuke stared forward, looking at the yellow glowing eyes, face twisted into a snarl reflected in the shining orbs.
"It is really too bad that you were unable to discover all the truths that the heavens hid from you before you came here. If you had known that your brother was after the real threat- that he was heading to Hell's Maw to enter the Third Realm to look for Danzo, would you have ended here?" He cocked his heavy snake head then. "I suppose we will always wonder, won't we? Or rather, I will."
Squeezing now, Sasuke gasped, feeling the tightening of his ribs, the pulse of his heart in his veins stuttering. Faintly he grasped at the threads of magic, dark gaze flickering a crimson red that made the snake pause, yellow eyes widening.
"What?" Orochimaru gasped, stunned by the sudden flare of scarlet in his prey's gaze. "The Crimson Eye?"
Hinata felt her body move, felt herself throw her weight onto her knees- for it would take too long to push herself to her feet. She felt the arrow in her fingers and the fletching that sliced her skin as she nocked the arrow into place.
The pulse of her heart was a drum beat in her ears so loud she could hear nothing else, see nothing else but Sasuke's glowing red gaze, the snarl on his face an expression she never wanted to see again.
And although she felt it, the air in her lungs drawing in breath, her arm pulling the string back screaming at the force, inside she was quiet and small. She watched with tear filled eyes that were at once stunned by the feeling roaring to life inside her and yet basking in it.
That nightmare was going to take Sasuke from her.
Firmly, quietly the magic in her spiraled to life in a blazing heat of animosity so savage it sparked in flaming chaos over the arrow shaft. In her fingers it glowed bright as a star in the dim haze of steam and darkness, drawing both the Worm's gaze and Sasuke's in shock.
You can't have him.
Hair fanning in a wave of black silk around her face, Hawk Eyes glinting pearls in the light of her shining arrow she glared across the expanse of jungle ground past clouds of white into the Worm's stunned yellow eyes.
He's mine.
The arrow erupted from her bow with a whistle to shatter eardrums. Orochimaru had just enough time to widen his gaze before her arrow, sparkling a thousnad gold hues, sliced through his eye with force her bow should not have been capable of. The explosion of black blood erupted with the shriek of agony to shake the very mountain. In the sudden thrashing chaos of so much creature shaking Sasuke shoved forward, sword twirling elegant as a string of silk in water.
The flashing hungry lightning erupted as he slammed onto the Worm's head and with a blow that threw black blood in a tsunami wave to challenge the spitting light of his lightning the second eye burst- ruined completely.
Tossing his huge head the Worm sent Sasuke flying and Hinata gasped as he hit the ground hard before her, panting heavily and covered in his blood and the rotting stink of the Worm's own.
"Slave! Filth! Rotting walking corpse that you are! How dare you?!" Orochimaru shrieked, it's endless coils of scaled muscle thrashing and churning as it flailed blindly.
Hinata gasped, feeling Sasuke slam into her hard and stumble, his body a burning furnace against hers.
There was not enough air in the world to fill her lungs and desperately she gripped his face in her hands, heart aching at the dark pattern etched into his white blood stained skin. "Sasuke! You- you're burning!" Before she could say more Sasuke slammed a hand over her mouth, glaring over his shoulder at the blinded creature behind him.
The snake froze, tongue flicking out rhythmically as it listened. From it's eye the arrow Hinata had lodged pulsed like a heart beat in soft gold, lighting the gore of his face.
"Oh, I can smell you." He hissed, blind head turning this way and that as he listened. "I can hear you, dead thing that you are. Sweet smelling thing. Rotting thing. I will tear you apart, you will weep for days, you will beg for your mother, I will make you wish you were never born."
"Why are you here?" Sasuke panted, shoving her behind him as his wings rose to block her, black eyes fixed determinedly on the approaching bleeding monster before them. "You should have run."
Orochimaru's snake mouth grinned at the sound. "Oh... oh can it be? The slave so hated, so ill treated... Can it be I hear... affection?"
Hinata started at the snake's words, her hands fumbling with another arrow as it slid slowly forward.
"Oh Little Star, you should have known better than to bring a loved thing here. I will make you listen to her begging for death. Like a bloom I will take her apart, petal by petal until she knows her innards as well as her own face."
A growl so deep in his chest it reverated in Hinata's own left Sasuke's throat and his magic flared again. His gaze switching from black to flashing crimson red that shone from his face in a frightening glow.
In his hand lightning hissed and popped. Hinata stumbled back at the feel of it licking at her skin. Before she could cry out for him to stop he was gone, a flash of light and screaming thunder through the haze of steam. The snake shot forward with a flick of it's tongue, batting at him with it's huge body making Sasuke flip expertly out of the way, landing with a stumble that hinted at his weariness.
It was a sea of scales, an endless twisting tangle of muscled reptile and as Sasuke launched towards the snake it thrashed it's tail. Hinata threw herself out of the way, barely escaping being flattened by the monstrosity of it's body.
The snake was paying her no mind however, busy listening to the roaring hiss of Sasuke's lightning imbued hands. Hinata ducked again as another coil bunched together and with a carefully timed roll passed beneath it, barely avoiding being crushed.
With a gasp she shoved herself to her feet, fear making her spine tingle as her boots slid on smooth glass. She looked down at the Scaled Worm's treasure hoard so far below. It glinted strangely in the half light, and with her stomach tight at the thought of falling down she let out a breath, eyes widening.
Mind working hard she looked up, watching as Sasuke was thrown like a piece of debris from the snake's head and with a crash rolled to a stop on the forest ground, body trembling as he pushed himself up.
His face was half covered in darkness and Hinata's gaze only had to land on him for a moment to make up her mind.
"I'm over here." She couldn't shout and thankfully it was not necessary. In the pause Orochimaru stilled, head turned towards her.
"Are you, now?" He whispered, and his tongue flicked long and monstrous from his mouth. Sasuke grunted hard, face paling as he watched the monster turn from him and begin the slow slide towards Hinata standing in the center of the glass covered pit.
"I will make everything you have ever loved regret your name." His voice was calm as his enormous girth slid slowly forward, coil upon coil of muscle and scales and stench. Hinata shook furiously, her body a quivering leaf in a blasting wind and with trembling hands she lifted the bow up, watching with trepidation as the arrow shuddered in her grip.
Realizing what she was doing Sasuke breathed in sharply, straining to stand under the immense pressure of poison magic coursing through his body.
"Hinata!" His scream drowned as her arrow flew, slicing into the snake's cheek and with a savage roar of fury Orochimaru threw himself blindly forward.
At the last possible second Hinata gasped, flinging herself sideways to the edge of the pit just as the snake's weight shattered the glass beneath her feet. Her ribs shot through with agony as she slammed onto the side. Her hands fumbled on the vegetation to grab hold of something, anything while the endless fall of Orochimaru's shrieking body slid past her in thrashing panicked train.
"No!" His roar echoed from below as he fell through the air like a piece of string caught in a breeze. "No!"
Vindictive, his tail flicked hard in her direction and Hinata had just a second to close her eyes as the slam of it exploded stars in her vision and with a cry she felt her hand slip.
Terror at the fall, at the endless suspension in the air that would come before being slammed to the ground where the demon worm below now thrashed and roared ate her insides. Closing her eyes tight she felt the shriek claw it's way up her throat at the same time that something grabbed hold of her hand.
With a sudden taut stop that knocked the air out of her lungs she slammed hard into the wall of the pit, blinking up at Sasuke straining to hold her from the screaming thunder of the snake below thrashing in it's gold and jewels.
"You idiot." Sasuke grunted through gritted teeth, pulling hard, wings flat to the ground behind him to steady himself from slipping over the edge. Hinata paid him no mind, hyperventilating as he slowly dragged her up and breathless they collapsed in a heap on the floor. With her cheek at his neck she sobbed, feeling the burn of his skin urging her to push up to her knees.
"Sasuke! Sasuke, what is this?" The tears were pouring down her face, wasted. Wings splayed at painful angles; he was a smear of black tar on the tangled shrubbery of the jungle clearing.
From below the sounds of the Worm seemed distant. It was no longer the end of a whip but a tired dying worm in too hot a sun. Still it thrashed weakly, blood smearing his golden hoard in it's putrid darkness. "Daughter of slime, Rot bred filth!" His cries were echoes up from the pit and Hinata glanced at it, the terror just barely contained beneath her skin.
Sasuke's heart beat at irregular stuttering rhythms and the black crawled, a continuous spreading poison in a beautiful pattern of curling swirling twists that might as well have been ropes to strangle, or knives to slice.
The black was consuming most of his face, and breath coming in short spurts he gazed up at her, brow furrowed, the new flash of his red gaze making his stare more piercing.
"Why did you come here?" It was a whisper. Hardly audible as she pulled him into her arms, tears dripping off her chin. "Sasuke! What do I do? Tell me what to do!" Sobs strangled her voice as his eyes closed and his body went limp.
"No." Breathless Hinata pressed her ear to his chest, listening for that continuous stuttering throb, hearing it flutter and struggle, a bird too tired to fight, too tangled in nets to fly.
Panic was threatening to tsunami over her completely when a familiar growl had her turning her head to the shadows of the jungle and with a start she let out a cry of recognition as Amaterasu's solid form ripped through the tangling foliage, teeth snapping vines apart and glowing gold eyes furious.
At his heels Anko and Kabuto appeared, faces pale and twisted in terror that fluttered to a stop at the sight of Hinata with Sasuke in her arms.
"Anko!" Her voice was a thousand beautiful windows breaking, her tears rivers. "Anko, please! Help me!"
Kabuto stared at the scene, not daring to get closer with his ears warning him that at the lip of the pit the thing of his nightmares frothed, hissing and cursing and bleeding his hatred.
"The Worm... it has fallen?" he whispered.
Together the girls gathered Sasuke and with some shaking effort and the tearing of Anko's stitches managed to get him largely on Amaterasu's back.
"The beast tore out of it's shed and came barreling in here when we heard the Worm roar." Anko grunted, her lips so pale and eyes so wide she was hardly recognizable. "We just followed it. Kabuto! Come!"
Snapping out of his stunned reverie the blonde turned and helping steady Sasuke on the horkney's back stared at the pattern on his pale skin, wincing visibly.
"Please." Hinata wiped at her face roughly with her sleeve as they led her through the clouds of spitting geysers towards a rock wall hidden by the trees. "Please, Kabuto. Help me. Please."
Eyes wide in his face Kabuto stared at her and finding a door amongst the foliage he grunted, throwing his shoulder into it hard and flinging it open with a crash.
"The poison... he gave it to the Rot people and if they got it in him there is not much that will stop it." He frowned as they hurried down the dark cave, Amaterasu groaning under the immense weight of Sasuke's wings dragging behind him.
"There must be something." Anko snapped. "With all the blasted things that creature hoards. Kabuto you must know of something."
"I..." he paused, looking at them both, face in a decided grimace. "Perhaps. Anko, you know where to go. I'll meet you there."
Somehow, through passages Hinata had never seen they ended at Kabuto's Dispensary and like before Anko stumbled in, holding a bleeding torso in one hand and face pale. Gasping painfully she shoved hard, pushing Kabuto's work table aside so that Hinata could lower Sasuke from Amaterasu's back to the stone floor.
Tears were streaming from her face and desperately she tore them from her cheeks, pressing them into his mouth with shaking hands.
Panting and pressing hard on the opened stitches of her torso Anko watched.
"Tears." she whispered. "Of course he kept you close... But Hinata." Anko winced, hands on her knees as she caught her breath by the door. "I..if the Worm poisoned him with his own fang, I do not know that there is anything which will..."
"I can slow it down." Hinata interrupted, watching the pouring black markings slow their travel over Sasuke's pale skin. "I can give Kabuto time to come back."
Confusedly Anko watched, her mouth opening in surprise as she absorbed the desperation in Hinata's shaking hands. The minutes passed and Hinata's trembling body, her fingers ripping the tears from her lashes and pressing them to the star's mouth never slowed, never calmed. Gently she pushed his hair back from his forehead, her breath never ceasing its desperate rhythm.
"Sasuke, please. Please, please." Her chant was continuous, frantic.
Like the sun's waning light bleeding into the evening black of night through the window the realization entered Anko's head slowly, delicately.
"You..." she whispered, eyes wide . Unconcerned by her words Hinata remained focused on Sasuke, on slowing the markings relentless war on his skin. "Are you...in love with-?"
"I'm back." Kabuto's voice called sharply and Anko spun to see him enter, gripping a tiny glass vial in his hand, it's shimmering liquid like star light captured beneath it's wax covered stopper.
Hinata and Anko both froze at the sight of the bottle.
"I am a healer, and an inventor of cures." Kabuto muttered firmly, eyeing the travelling scrawl of black flames on Sasuke's skin. Turning his eyes back to Hinata he rubbed his face to smear away the sweat beading on his forehead.
"This is it. This is the only thing I know that will slow down poison from a Profane. The tears of an innocent star, shed in joy, untainted."
He held up the bottle. Behind Hinata the light of the suns blasted through the wooden mesh carved in swirls strangely like the pattern that crawled over Sasuke's skin, glinting on the contents within the vial.
"He's the Vindicator." His grip on the bottle tightened so that Hinata worried it would crack beneath his furious clenching fingers. "He's supposed to destroy our world, end our lives and those of all those who live here." Kabuto's gaze was the same feral fire that had sparked at their earlier confrontation and Hinata slid from her knees to a crouch, her hands tight fists at her sides. Behind her Amaterasu gave a low threatening growl.
"Give me the bottle, Kabuto."
"Kabuto." Anko whispered warningly, seeing something in Hinata's stance to merit her wary tone.
"Tell me why he should live." Kabuto shook his head again, ignoring his comrade behind him. "Tell me."
"If he is the Vindicator," Hinata did not hesitate, did not think, did not stop to breathe. "Then the death of the Veil rests on him alone. If that was true the realm would not be in it's last breaths. Look out there." She pointed towards the window . "The Rot spreads. If there's anyone that knows how to heal this..." she swallowed, hoping against hope that she was right. "...it will be the one ordained to destroy it."
Kabuto glared, blinking rapidly behind his smudged spectacles.
"A creator of the poison also knows the antidote." Kabuto whispered softly, staring at the bottle in his hand. It was one of the first things Orochimaru had beaten into his head.
Anko sighed. "What if he refuses? What if he wants to destroy it?"
Hinata extended her hand firmly towards Kabuto. "He won't." Her voice shook, not with a lack of conviction but a knot of panic as her eyes flickered to the scrawl of black on Sasuke's face. "Please." Chin trembling, lashes wet with dew she breathed out softly. "Please give it to me. Don't make me fight you again."
The seconds stretched endlessly before them, Kabuto's eyes fixated on Hinata's tear filled gaze, his distrust growing with every breath.
Finally losing all patience Hinata launched forward. "Rasu!"
He did not need to be told twice. The horkney threw himself hard towards Kabuto, teeth bared and the blonde gasped, feeling Hinata's fingers snatch the bottle as he and Anko flung themselves from the Dispensary and Rasu's snarling teeth.
Without giving them a chance to do more than cry out from the other end of the hall Hinata slammed the door, throwing the bolt into place.
"Hinata!" Kabuto's cry was muted from the other side of the door as he banged on the wood. "Hinata, wait! It could slay you! It takes as much as gives- wait!"
It mattered not, in her hands Hinata studied the vial for a moment, breathing in the the scent of petrichor that rose from the tiny glass container as she cracked the seal before pressing it to Sasuke's lips and tossing the empty thing aside.
"Please, don't." She hardly breathed, focused completely on the feel of the heart within his chest still pulsing. "Please don't do this."
For a moment there was nothing, just her heart rushing in her ears and her tears dripping onto his face.
And then there was a pull. Slow at first, right at the base of her neck, at the pit of her stomach, at the place where her heart beat. A tug, and then a tearing of heat and life and breath as magic, as life itself was pulled from her body into his.
Hinata gasped, squinting as the black of the poison seemed to shimmer with her tears. The feeling was not so much unpleasant but overwhelming, a tension that she had not felt before rising over every limb, making her knees weak and her chest ache.
It was only when she closed her eyes against it that the pull turned from a tug to a tidal wave, sweeping her away- dragging her relentlessly into the depths of him.
TBC