A/N: Hello! Welcome to Chapter 19. Sorry if you've had trouble finding this fic- I have now boosted the rating to M, as certain situations in this chapter and those following will be quite violent and rather colorful in language. This is the beginning of the main plotline of the story. I'll be publishing this chapter and the next simultaneously (mainly because it's kind of just one chapter cut in half, partly because you've waited so long).
Again, beware of gore and angst in these next few chapters, and beware of coarse language.
Chapter 19
"Red hair," Tetsuo grunted, shoving his elbow into his partner's side.
Dai startled to alertness. "Hah?" he retorted, eyes scanning the crowd of heads convening around the Academy entrance. "Where?"
Tetsuo groaned. "Right there, stupid ass," he said, indicating with a sharp nod. The girl stood far from the others, hands shielding her eyes from the blaring sun.
The shade of her hair was unmistakable. Tetsuo smirked a little. His eye roved over her thin frame, the dark colors she wore and the blank expression on her face. She seemed to be searching for someone, but not having much luck.
"Looks like your rat did pan out after all, Tetsuo-san," Dai mumbled under his breath.
Tetsuo almost hit the man again. "Quit talkin' out loud about that shit, you know how many ears there are in this place?" he hissed. "We were damn lucky to get as far as we've gotten with these henges. Don't go screwing it up!"
It was, indeed, remarkable that they had been able to sneak into the village. Perhaps it was just luck, but Tetsuo wasn't about to test it out. "We need to grab her soon. The rat said she'd always go straight to training grounds ten, so meet me there. Got it?"
Dai sighed. "Yeah, yeah."
He disappeared. Tetsuo turned back around, staring down at the girl with an unreadable expression. "Red hair," he muttered again.
'Naruto must've already taken off,' Charlie thought despondently as she scanned the crowd. 'I hate having to leave him to fend for himself against Mizuki, but it's the only way he'll learn the kage bunshin.'
"You're just angry you can't hit the guy yourself," Minato replied, a laugh in his tone.
Her eyebrow twitched. Glancing around and confirming that she'd already given her due congratulations to everyone, she stepped away from the crowd, deciding to take the all-too-familiar road to her training area. With any luck, Kakashi might be there too. 'I think you're entirely too laid back about this situation,' Charlie couldn't help but point out.
"I know everything will be okay. I've seen your memories, remember? And besides, since you're now a genin, you have no excuse for slacking!"
Hazel eyes widened. That was his plan all along? 'Slacking?! When have I ever-'
"I mean," he interrupted meaningfully, "that it's going to get harder from here on out. So don't attack me for pushing you harder. And congratulations, by the way." His tone turned warmer.
She smiled a little. 'Thanks, Minato.'
When she reached her destination, she sat down in the center of the clearing, only a bit put out that Kakashi wasn't around. Admittedly, he was pretty hard to pin down, and what he did when the trio weren't together was still a mystery. 'Then again,' she thought, grimacing as she stretched her arms above her head, 'I don't think I want to know.'
It was a nice day, she reflected. A good day to have graduated, and a good day to train. The air was still tinged with cold, but the sun brushed it away with warm fingers. Quiet enough, too, if one ignored the sounds of the shopping district a few blocks away.
She stretched her legs out in front of her, and bent forward to touch her toes. She had gotten taller in the year she'd spent here, and it made it all the more difficult. 'Then again, I can't say I'm not in the best shape I've ever been in.'
"You're welcome," her friend piped up helpfully.
'Don't you have anything better to do than read my mind?' she teased lightly. It wasn't often that he stuck around to watch her train- he'd drilled the routine into her often enough.
Minato hummed. "I'm... not sure, actually. I have this gut feeling."
She frowned, glancing around. She for one didn't have any bad vibes. 'What do you mean? Do you sense someone?' It wouldn't be the first time, after all, that he had sensed something before she did.
"Not right now, but- I'm not sure, call it a sixth sense." His voice was heavy with doubt.
'You do realize there are many more than just six senses, right?' Charlie retorted smartly. She got to her feet, bouncing on the balls of her feet to get the blood flowing.
"Charlie, I'm serious," Minato grumbled.
The redhead rolled her eyes. Nothing was supposed to happen today besides the whole debacle with the Forbidden Scroll, anyway. And besides, Kakashi had already trained her and Naruto to exhaustion in situational awareness- surely she would be able to tell if something dangerous was coming her way.
Charlie began running a few warmup laps around the enclosed area, jogging at a moderate pace. 'I wonder which style I should work on today- maybe I can try out those Uchiha moves Sasuke's been teaching me?' she wondered to herself.
She went about doing so, wobbling a bit on her feet at the unfamiliar stance. She'd insisted that Sasuke teach her some of his moves, mostly so that they'd be on an equal playing field when they fought for real, and he'd been all to willing to beat her into the dirt to teach her. Still, it had taken a few weeks, and she was getting a hold of it.
Charlie spent about an hour or so on it before she moved on to her ninjutsu training. She only really knew the Academy ones, but given how weak her clones were, there was much room for improvement.
Eventually, she grew weary of summoning ugly or diseased clones, and gave up on the chakra for the day. She began running again, this time kicking up dust in her wake as she pushed herself to run faster and faster. It was quite difficult to run to exhaustion anymore- she did it so often that the ceiling for her endurance was ever out of reach- but she liked the burn in her legs that came with trying anyway.
Besides, it had grown rather dark out- close to time to go home and get dinner, she suspected. Though the sun set earlier in the day than usual, given the time of year, she still used it as a reference for when to head home. 'For now, though, I think I'll enjoy the cool weat-'
Abruptly, her feet stalled as something blipped on her radar. She'd never been a sensor- but- well, maybe Minato was onto something. Charlie frowned, edging hesitantly towards the nearest tree. Its trunk was nearly twice her width, and hid her easily enough as amber eyes flitted left, right, and center. 'Minato-'
"Something's coming, move n-" He wasn't able to finish the word 'now' as she ducked and rolled, feeling the disturbance of air behind her neck as the short blade of a naginata slammed into the tree. Remarkably, she managed to land on her feet, and whirled in shock as she armed herself with her kunai.
The man was rather thin, but his arms were corded with muscle and his eyes bespoke years of experience. His teeth were as sharp as knives as he gave her a strangely wide grin. "Hello, meal ticket," he said gruffly, and pulled the naginata from the tree with a short grunt.
Charlie smiled nervously. "Hey, now," she muttered, knuckles white on her own weapons. "I don't see any reason to be throwing something like that around. Someone could get hurt." Her eyes narrowed in on his forehead. His hitai-ate had the symbol for Iwa, though he'd driven a deep cut through it. 'A missing nin?!' she thought frantically, leaping backwards and into a tree as he slashed downward with his blade. 'How the hell did he get past the guards?'
"This isn't good, Charlie," Minato voiced worriedly. His tone was much more serious than she was used to. "You need to run. You can't take hi- duck!"
She ducked diligently, and a row of shuriken flew over her head. A chuckle sounded over her shoulder, and she suppressed a shocked squeak as she leaped to the ground. A new man stood in her place, leaning a shoulder against the tree trunk as if he'd always been there.
This man was much bulkier than the first, his dark hair pulled into a low ponytail and a scar running from his eyebrow to his chin. The eye it ran over was covered by an eyepatch. He had a sword that spanned the length of his body tied to his back, though he thankfully hadn't retrieved it yet.
And, just like the other man, this one sported the same stupid grin and the same slashed hitai-ate.
Charlie gritted her teeth. "What, does it take two of you uglies to take down one genin?" she taunted, edging to the right as both of them closed in. 'Who could've sent them? Did someone send them? Do they want to kill me?' Her mind went back to the first blow the man had given. He definitely hadn't been too concerned about her life then...
The thinner one bared his sharp teeth at her. "We're not here to take you down, little girl," he spat, "we're here to-"
To her surprise, the ponytail guy rolled his eye and slapped the man upside the head. "Shut the hell up, Dai. We don't have to explain ourselves to some snot nosed kid. Now..." His smile turned vicious. "Just come with us, Uzumaki, and we won't kill you. Put up a fight, and- well, we can take you dead or alive."
Charlie glared. "So you've been hired, then?" she voiced. 'Why do they think I'm an Uzumaki? Who told them-'
She dodged backwards as Dai lunged at her, and landed on the still pond in the center of the training area.
"We can worry about that later, focus on running away!"
Minato said, his presence flaring in her mind like a beacon.
A beacon...
Taking a shaky breath, Charlie flared her chakra boldly, for once in a long time letting it free from the constraints she bound it with. 'Please, somebody, see me!' she begged mentally.
The two men seemed taken aback by the sudden outflow of chakra, then the ponytail guy scowled. "It's obvious we're not gonna take her peacefully. Let's get this over with before her friends come," he hissed, and threw a barrage of shuriken towards her. Charlie blocked them with one of her knives and shunshinned towards the front gate of the training grounds.
The street outside the area was empty, given the later hour, and she cursed, readying herself to shunshin again. 'If I can just get to people-'
Then, something hard slammed into the back of her head, and she felt her eyes roll in her head as the cold ground rushed up to meet her. 'N-No, I-'
Blackness swallowed her.
Across town, Sarutobi sat watching Naruto through his crystal ball.
Something was niggling at his brain. The situation with Naruto was- well, there's no doubt that it's a bit chaotic, but something else was bothering him.
"Hokage-sama?" Ebisu voiced carefully. His hands twisted together nervously. "Is everything all right?"
The older man hummed noncommittally. Had he missed something? Surely he'd put enough shinobi on Naruto's tail, so maybe-
His back straightened as his eyes flew to the window overlooking his village. 'Something I missed, something I should've expected-'
Charlie's chakra flared so strongly that he felt himself shudder. He was on his feet in a moment, staring out the window as something akin to fear shot down his spine.
'Shit!'
Naruto returned home that night a newly minted ninja.
He was quite proud of that fact. Not only had he proved himself to Iruka-sensei, but Iruka-sensei had proven himself to him. Plus, he had a brand new jutsu under his belt! 'Charlie's gonna be so proud~' he sang to himself as he rounded the corner onto his street.
His footsteps stalled a little as the dim streetlight illuminated someone familiar. "Oh, Kakashi-sensei," Naruto said, a delighted grin spreading his cheeks. "Wanna know what I did?! I have a new jutsu-?"
The blond frowned in confusion at the hardened glint in Kakashi's eye as the man uncrossed his arms and turned to look at him for a long moment. "Naruto-kun, there's something you need to know."
And that is how one of the best nights of his life turned into one of the worst.
Charlie awoke some time later to someone's shoulder in her gut. Hazel eyes blinked blearily as the view of swaying grass made her stomach turn. Her throat was dry and her head beat like a drum. She could feel the hair at her nape hardened with blood and sticking to her skin. She could feel the blood rushing to her head from the awkward position of being carried like a sack of flour.
Most of all, she could feel the fear so potent that it clogged her throat. Whoever carried her had so many bad vibes that even she could sense it.
"Charlie, you're awake," Minato's very voice made her head pound harder, and she almost let slip a groan.
'Wish I wasn't,' she managed to complain.
Minato predictably ignored it. "Try to see where we are."
Lifting her head felt like an impossible task, and she felt a flash of blinding pain in the back of her skull as she did so. Surrounding the party of three were tall trees and a dirt path, and not much else. Charlie mentally cursed. 'Fuck, they've already made it to the forest. Minato, what do I do?'
She couldn't feel the weight of her kunai pouch anymore, either.
"The safest thing you can do is pretend to be unconscious. And hope that wherever they're going is far enough away that they stop for the night," Minato said.
Charlie swallowed. She knew him well enough to tell that from the slightly dulled tone of his voice, he didn't have much confidence in the outcome of this.
"No doubt Hokage-sama is already trying to find us," her blond companion added, trying to lighten the mood.
The redhead closed her eyes and gingerly lifted her arms that hung limply past her shoulders. 'I hope there's a strong, handsome ninja out there who'll catch on to this,' she thought, and tugged out the first red strand of hair. It fell to the forest floor in a slow spiral.
"C-Charlie-" Minato coughed, embarrassed. She could feel the heat of his blush.
'What? If it worked for Kushina...'
"Please stop. This is a serious situation-"
'I'm being serious, Minato,' she growled. 'What else can I do? I'm fucking useless against them.' Her teeth gritted. Useless. All of her training, all of the time she'd spent on taijutsu, ninjutsu, survival techniques, hell, even genjutsu. She was as useless as she'd ever been.
"So, when d'ya think the brat'll wake up?" came Dai's voice from right beside her.
Charlie suppressed a shudder. He must've been the one carrying her. His arm felt like steel around her middle.
"Maybe in an hour, maybe never," came the ponytail man's rough reply.
"You hit her pretty hard," Dai voiced.
Then came the sound of ponytail guy's chuckle. "And? The kid was flaring her chakra. We would've had half the village's shinobi on us in a second if I didn't do something. 'Sides, the client just said he wanted the redhead brought to him- didn't care if she was alive or not."
"Now that I think of it, it was kinda weird how empty those streets were. We got lucky," Dai replied.
Charlie grimaced. 'The streets were only empty because everyone was chasing Naruto! Damn straight you got lucky!'
"Yeah, well, you just keep a tight hold on the kid. We're almost there anyway, then the client can deal with her." Silence resumed.
Charlie blanched; so she wasn't going to get a chance to escape after all. 'One thing they continually tell you in all those crime shows is to never let your kidnapper take you to the secondary location,' she thought, biting her tongue. 'I don't know how strong their employer is, but I know I can't take all three at once. And given that the guy didn't care if he got me alive or dead, he's certainly not going to protect my stupid self. Minato... I think we have to end things here.'
"You realize what this means, right?" Her blond friend's tone was as hard as stone. Charlie gritted her teeth harshly. That was not the voice of the carefree and cheerful person she knew, it was the voice of a hardened shinobi, of a kage. In that moment, she wondered where his head was- was it here, with her? Or was it on a battlefield?
She swallowed the rock in her throat and pushed back the tears building in her eyes. There was so much she wanted to say to him in that moment. Her terror made it hard for her to breathe- was this what true fear felt like? But... regardless of that, regardless of her feelings... she'd always known that something like this could happen. It was only natural to be hunted for who she was, for what she knew. So this... her gaze hardened. This was nothing. Nothing.
And so she repeated that phrase in her head enough for it to take form, enough for it to momentarily quell the fear that churned her stomach. She had no room for fear here. She'd always known that it could come to this.
With a sorrowful, but steel-y heart, she finally thought, 'Maybe I'll die here, but maybe I won't. Minato... I need you to do something for me.'
Hatake Kakashi was many things. He was calm, objective, dangerous, smart, resourceful, and damn hard to defeat.
But now, standing in the Hokage's office alongside Gai, Asuma, and Kurenai, he was pissed. A spitting tiger in a cage, as the Hokage had once called him.
And from the looks of the others in the room, he wasn't doing a very good job of hiding it.
"Obviously, time is of the essence here," Sarutobi said curtly, and handed the mission scroll to the silver haired man. "Kakashi-kun, you'll lead this mission, given your tracking skills. Bring her back to us as soon as possible, and leave the enemy in whatever form you see fit." His dark eyes turned a shade darker. "Do not disappoint me. There is more resting on this mission than you know."
The four jounin bowed and disappeared, stopping at their homes only long enough to stock up on weapons before meeting at the front gate. Kakashi knew all too well what rested on this mission. 'Charlie...' he thought, leaping from rooftop to rooftop.
The wind rustling through his hair did nothing to quell the heat of rage in his gut. 'I'll leave the enemy in pieces,' he thought savagely.
If only to never see that look on Naruto's face again.
Fifteen minutes passed, minutes that felt like a lifetime, before Charlie finally felt comfortable enough with her plan.
The missing nin hadn't said much, though she'd been able to feel ponytail guy's stern eye on her every once in a while. He seemed to be the smarter of the two, she reflected, though perhaps Dai was stronger, given that he was the one carrying her. He certainly could throw a blade around when he wanted to. In order to fight him, she'd have to get in close.
But ponytail guy... he'd never even drawn that big ass sword of his. She had no idea how he'd wield it. She just had to hope that she could take him out before he had a chance to draw it.
"I don't like this plan," Minato muttered. She had an image of him pacing back and forth in her mind, arms crossed and face pinched. It almost made her laugh, if not for the circumstances.
'I don't either. What other choice do we have? I don't want to meet this client of theirs on their terms, I want to meet him on mine.' She needed to know who'd asked for her head. She needed to know why.
The redhead took a deep breath, and reached down, nimble fingers plucking open her captor's kunai pouch and silently withdrawing one.
'Remember the plan, right?' she asked, just to make sure and also to stall.
"I remember the plan. Let's hope it doesn't come to it," Minato replied shortly. He was still in battle mode, and so she forgave him for his curtness.
Baring her teeth, Charlie slammed the kunai into the man's back, hoping that all of those anatomy classes taught her well.
Dai screamed out in pain, knees buckling and arm loosening momentarily, just enough for the small redhead to weasel her way out of his clutches and onto her feet a few yards away. "TETSUO, she stabbed me!" the thin man gasped, hand going to his lower back.
Charlie's eyes narrowed, but then her face smoothed over. From the amount of blood that was now decorating the forest floor, she'd managed to hit a kidney.
Ponytail man, Tetsuo, roared in anger as he threw a barrage of kunai and shuriken in her direction. Her head pulsed painfully as she flipped out of the way, though she knew all too well that Dai, now curled on the ground, was in much more pain. "Your friend will bleed out if you don't get him to a doctor," the redhead said, giving the enraged man a wide berth as veins pulsed in his forehead. She had a bad feeling about this.
"As if I care about a worthless human like that!" Tetsuo shouted, turning his glare on his prostrate friend. His footsteps shook the ground as he stomped over to the weakened man. "Useless people like you... should just die," he continued frigidly.
There was something peculiar about his face then, as though he weren't himself, as though he'd been taken over by some uncaring, malevolent demon. He stared down at his partner with the same disregard as one would stare at a beetle underfoot, or a fly on the wall. Killing intent slammed into her like a freight train, and she realized the dangerous waves were coming from him. She could feel it, could feel the darkness wrapping itself around his body.
'W-Wait- hey, you're not gonna-' "WAIT, YOU-" Charlie cut herself off with a strangled gasp as the one-eyed man pulled the sword from his back and swung downwards. Dai didn't even have time to scream before his head separated from his shoulders.
Charlie felt her knees weaken under her as she watched the head roll a few feet away, the expression a mask of terror and pain. Silence filled the darkened night, as though even the crickets were too afraid to make a noise. "H-How cou-cou-could you-" she whimpered, staring wide-eyed at the scene of gore. Blood soaked through the earth, and there was so much of it, how was there so much of it?! "Why did you..." her voice was small and pained.
The ponytailed man had no expression on his face as he removed his blade from the ground and slung it over his shoulders. His dark eye drilled into her as he said, "Never forget that you started this."
And then, he was charging at her. She squeaked, rolling out of the way as his gigantic sword came crashing down. "You little bitch, I'll kill you for that," Tetsuo growled, his features like some rabid animal.
It was all she could do not to scream as he swung for her again, blade glancing off her cheek and immediately sending rivulets of blood down her face. She winced at the pain, one hand going to the wound and the other gripping the kunai tightly. 'He- he seems to be a heavy hitter, so that means I should- get in close, yeah, get in close,' she thought, her mind whirring in its panic.
The fear of death, she learned, is a potent one.
The blade came down again, and she had enough strength to glance it off her kunai- but just barely. She sent a roundhouse kick towards his face, and her toes barely connected with his chin before he had an iron grip around her ankle. She gaped and, before she could make a sound, he threw her hard into a tree across the path. Her back struck it with enough force that the timber creaked behind her, and for a moment, all she knew was the pain of impact. When her mind caught up again, she was huddled at the base of the felled tree.
Charlie hurried to her feet again, clenching her jaw as the enraged bull of a man advanced. "Y'know what I hate about little village brats who know nothing about this life?" the man ground out, spitting through his teeth. "You act so tough until reality sinks in. Then you're just as useless as ever." A nasty smile curved his lips. "Thankfully, alive or dead, so I guess it doesn't really matter, does it?"
He made a handsign with his free hand, muttered something under his breath, and abruptly, the ground beneath her crumbled. Charlie scrambled for a foothold somewhere, and barely managed to hold on as the earth below her waved. The man didn't seem too concerned with the fact that he, too, was caught up in the quake, and hopped from rock to rock in her direction.
A piece of earth the side of her torso slammed into her, and Charlie yelped as it sent her tumbling backwards on her ass. Another rock slammed into her side, and then she was falling to another rock, another ledge.
She groaned as her body ached, and got to her elbows, head buzzing. The first rock had hit her partially in the head, and blood was seeping into her eyes. Weaker than she would've liked, she tried in vain to wipe it away, cringing as her eyes burned.
'Shit!' she cursed, rolling out of the way a second before his sword came down on her. How could she have forgotten her enemy so quickly?!
He loomed over her like the king of Hell, a smirk on his scarred face and his sword glinting dangerously in the moonlight as he held it above his head. "Stupid little Uzumaki girl. Just know, you made me do this."
The blade came down once more, and her vision faded to black.
Kakashi's hand gripped the strands of ruby red hair he'd collected from the ground as though they were a lifeline.
He should've known someone as clever as Charlie would've thought of this. In any other situation, he would've been proud of her. But as it was, all he could do was hope as the four of them sped through the trees.
It wasn't necessary now. He didn't need her hair to find her. He could smell her. More specifically, he could smell her blood. The scent of it burned his nose like none other.
"Stop," he called, just as the scent began to become overwhelming. He followed it unwillingly down the thin path through the trees until-
'Oh, shit,' he cursed, leaping down from his spot and listening to the silent whoosh as the others did the same.
It was a battleground.
The earth looked like it had been uphended and then set back down again, numerous holes pockmarked the landscape and almost all of the trees surrounding it had been toppled. In the center of the mess lied two prone forms, one much smaller than the other.
Kakashi held his breath as he found himself running, and released it in one loud gasp as he reached the two bodies. The first was a tall, bulky man a bit older than himself, obviously dead with a gaping hole through his chest. The second-
Charlie smiled weakly at him from the ground. Blood covered her face and body, seeped through her red, red hair and pooled beneath her. "Oh, God, Charlie," Kakashi mumbled, wide-eyed as he gazed down at the space where her arm should've been. Just blood, blood everywhere. Where was- where was her-
"It's okay, Kakashi," she said, in a tone that didn't quite fit her.
His gray gaze met ocean blue before hers closed and she grew limp.
hotxhotguy: Heh, heh, hehhhh. Unfortunately for u that is a major part of the plot so I decline to answer. Thank you for your support and claps! 3
Beleg: Short answer is kind of~ I believe certain things need to happen for the characters to develop as people, but I also believe that things would be better a certain way. I hope that makes sense! Thanks for your review!
Guest: I've kind of explained it in this review section before, just haven't had a chance for it to come up in the story much. I view it as half of Minato in the Shinigami with Kurama (because if the Shinigami sucked him in, he had to have taken in the half of Kurama too, otherwise Minato wouldn't have been able to use it in the 4th war), and half of Minato sans Kurama in Charlie. It makes more sense for plot reasons, mostly because it complicates the storyline that's already going to be hella long. I operate right now from that assumption, but things may change to make the story more interesting. I can't really say. Thanks for your review!
Sylvia2343: Yess! It's kind of OC-centric right now, but yay Naruto and the newly formed Team Seven! Thanks for your review :)