Kakashi and Toshida continue leaping from tree to tree on their way home. Kakashi awaits Toshida's next few words, as the climax of Toshida's back story has finally arrived. All that Kakashi has wanted to know about Toshida's past is about to be heard.
Toshida continues on his way pausing for a minute to collect his thoughts, as this part of his life has always been more of a touchy subject for him. As he closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, he prepares to proceed with his story.
Suddenly, more than a thousand voices echo in Toshida's head, screaming at the top of their lungs as the beg and plead, referring to Toshida in general as well as an anonymous third party. Toshida clutches at the sides of his head as the voices become louder and louder, driving him to the brink of insanity before the voices become his primary focus. The voices are joined by the sounds of rushing water and clanging metal echoing louder and louder. Once again Toshida falls from the trees, hitting the ground hard as the voices have become too much for him to brush off. Toshida grunts and screams as he rolls on the ground in agony, tortured by the sounds that haunt his mind.
"What's wrong!" Kakashi says, as he lands beside Toshida apprehensive about how to act in front of the panicking shinobi.
"THEY WON'T . . . JUST SHUT UP!" Toshida screams, "THEY'RE TOO LOUD! TOO LOUD!" Toshida writhes around on the ground clutching at his head and screaming his lungs out as his elbows and forehead dig into the soft dirt of the forest floor.
After several minutes of struggling to regain control over his own mind, Toshida raises his head up to see the tip of a kunai aimed right between his eyes. Kakashi looks down the blade at Toshida with a focused and determined look on his face, his sharingan eye revealed as he has readied himself for battle.
"Is there a problem?" The cold shinobi asks.
"No . . . I don't think so . . ." Toshida replies as he brushes off the dirt from his frame. "It has never been that bad before. I could hear them all . . . screaming at once. I don't understand. Screams, metal clashing, running water . . ." Toshida's ears soon focus in on the sound of rushing water that has still not faded from his ears. "Do you hear that?" He asks.
"What?" Kakashi replies.
"The water. Do you hear water somewhere?"
Kakashi focuses on the surrounding area, and the faint sound of rushing water soon reveals itself to Kakashi's ears. "Yes. I hear it now."
"But I don't know where any streams are around here. Actually I am not sure where here is." Toshida looks around the surrounding area and their location soon becomes evident to the Sin shinobi. "No . . . we can't be . . ."
Without warning, Toshida leaps to his feet and with great haste, makes his way just west of where the two shinobi had stopped. As he can see a bright shade of green through the trees shining into his eyes, he increases his speed until he arrives just outside of the forest. Looking out into the great beyond, Toshida can see a bright green field with a stream running through it. The end of the large plateau is a set of rolling hills with the first being more than fifty meters high. The glistening of rusted shuriken is still visible in the clear light of the day time, like a hundred sparks of light across the green plain.
"We're here . . . already." Toshida says, just as Kakashi catches up to him.
"Where? What is this?"
"This Kakashi . . . Is Tarawa Creek."
Toshida Gaiden Chapter 12: The Battle of Tarawa Creek
"This is Tarawa Creek?" Kakashi asks. "I have never seen it before."
Toshida does not answer and instead begins to walk into the center of the massive field. As he walks further and further into the field, memories of war time floods back into Toshida's mind. Toshida can see ghostly images of soldiers from the leaf and cloud battling one another to the death around him. Bodies lay strewn across the battlefield as if they were cattle, and the river runs red as if it were blood. Toshida comes to a particular spot wear a thick spear blade lay half buried in the ground. As Toshida leans down, prone to one knee, he reaches out and grabs the arched spear head. As he touches the blade with his right hand, his left rubs against the scar at the base of his hairline. The sound of the blade slamming hard against his skin still echoes in his head. He looks to his right and can see the ghostly image of a young boy dying on the ground staring deep into his eyes as he breathes his last breaths. Toshida closes his eyes as he begins to tear up, just before the shinobi in him regains control.
Kakashi stands over Toshida watching the young man's reaction. "What happened here? It's time that you told me."
Toshida grimaces as a deep scowl befalls his face. He stands to his feet and begins walking south ignoring Kakashi's request.
"Don't ignore me Toshida!" Kakashi sternly demands. "I want to know what the hell happened here and YOU are going to tell me."
"We should get moving again Kakashi. No more stories. That's what your dirty books are for." Toshida replies angrily.
"Damn you Toshida!. I have put up with all the crap you can throw at me and now I am demanding that you tell me just WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED HERE!" Kakashi scolds.
Toshida stops in his tracks but does not turn around. He lowers his for a moment and looks around the area before finally turning his head around just enough to make eye contact with Kakashi. "Go to hell Kakashi." Toshida says firmly before turning around and continuing along his way.
"Why you little . . ." Kakashi does not finish his sentence before he charges Toshida from behind tackling the shinobi to the ground and knocking the both of them down the nearby hill.
The two roll down the hill fighting for position over the other as both have had enough of each others company. Toshida gets the advantage and without hesitation delivers a strong right hook to Kakashi's face. Kakashi retaliates with a quick jab to Toshida's injured side, knocking him off balance enough for Kakashi to reverse the advantage and straddle the shinobi. Kakashi winds up and floors Toshida with a powerful left hand, partially driving the back of Toshida's head several inches into the ground. Kakashi the grabs Toshida by the shoulders lifting him slightly off the ground and staring deep into the shinobi's eyes.
"TELL ME YOU BASTARD!" Kakashi's screams, showing the hidden angry side of the often calm and calculated jounin. "TELL ME WHAT YOU DID TO MY COMRADES!"
Toshida's eyes begin to tear up as for the first time, Toshida seems to be giving in to his often sealed up emotions. He shakes his head and firmly rids his face of the sadness that it once displayed and his anger returns. "YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENED SO BAD YOU SON OF A BITCH!"
"YES DAMMIT!"
"FINE THEN!" Toshida says as he reaches up and clasps the sides of Kakashi's head in his hands causing Kakashi to immediately try to remove them. He soon finds out however, that Toshida's grip is almost inhumanly strong. Toshida's eyes begin to glow as the ryuugan begins to take control over. His eyes glare deep into Kakashi's and Kakashi finds himself drawn to the center of the black slitted pupil amidst the green and yellow iris. "THEN ALLOW ME TO SHOW YOU WHAT HAPPENED!" Toshida eyes glow brighter than ever before sending Kakashi into a hypnotic trance. "RYUUGAN! (Dragons' eye)" Toshida shouts, as Kakashi falls into a deep trance. Kakashi's mind begins to cloud . . . and his vision fades to white.
Kakashi slowly opens his eyes after what feels like hours. He can see only the dirt and grass of the area as he has been face down the whole time. He shakes of the cloudy feeling in his head to the best of his ability but is still left with an unshakable feeling of euphoria. He stands to his feet and looks around his general area looking for Toshida.
"Toshida?" He asks out loud. "Toshida?" He says again loudly, garnering no response. "I swear when I get my hands on that little . . ." Kakashi does not finish his sentence as the sword of horses can be heard in the distance. He turns around to see the open battlefield in front of him with sporadic patches of crimson strewn across the battlefield and almost no shuriken laying before him. He looks to his left along the south end of the battlefield where he can see hundreds of shinobi lined up in ranks awaiting orders several dozen meters from their base camp. The ranks consist of numerous jounin, chuunin and a number of genin all standing focused forward as they await their next command. As Kakashi does his best to remain stealthy on his way to the ranks, he notices that all of the shinobi are from the leaf village. As Kakashi looks across the battlefield he can see a large number of shinobi composing a defensive position along the top of the fifty meter high hill. It is then that Kakashi realizes what is going on.
"This . . . this is the battle. But . . . how is this possible?" Kakashi's thought process is quickly interrupted as a jounin steps in front of the ranks and begins delivering orders.
(Music: Queue "Survival Examination" from the Naruto OST II)
"All right. We have been here long enough. We have suffered almost as many casualties as the cloud village has. If we are to obtain a valuable staging ground for a large scale assault on our enemy then we need to seize this battlefield. And we have pushed the cloud back to that hill." The jounin turns and points to the hill across the battlefield revealing the family crest of the Uchiha clan across his arm and back. "All that is left, is for us to take this hill, and the battle is ours. We have lost many comrades on this battlefield . . . and today . . . we will make sure that all of their sacrifices have not been in vain. LET US END THIS BATTLE!"
The entire formation of leaf shinobi erupts in a cheer as they raise their fists and weapons such as, swords, spears and naginata's to the sky, screaming like a band of merciless marauders. Two of the chuunin in the ranks silent converse with one another shortly after the cheering stops. They too, are from the Uchiha clan.
"What do you think is going to happen today aniki? (Older brother)"
"I am not sure. We have been trying to get this hill for the last week. I hope today we are able to finally pull through and take it over. I am getting a little tired of the same old routine."
"Yea I agree. It sure would be nice if Itachi-san were here."
"Are you kidding? The kid may be a prodigy but he is only what? Eight? Maybe nine years old? Let him stay at home till he is old enough. His time for bloodshed will come."
The shinobi ranks begin to ready themselves for the assault while on the other side of the battlefield a young Toshida lays along the ground just barely peering over the hill top as he looks across to the leaf ranks.
"Their sure is a lot of shinobi!" Toshida thinks to himself, "Hmpf. I can't wait." A smile of excitement comes over the young shinobi's face as he awaits the leaf village's attack.
A cloud jounin lay crouched on the top of the hill as numerous other ranks stand above him or stand crouched in front of the other ranks. The cloud uses the tactic to conceal their numbers until the moment of their charge is at hand. To the leaf, they can only make out roughly one hundred shinobi making up the ranks guarding the hill. But laying down hidden on the other side of the hill and crouched amongst the front of the ranks, lay more then three hundred shinobi. A compliment of more then fifty shinobi comprises a detachment of archers all standing at the ready with arrow quivers across their backs and several arrows implanted in the ground in front of them.
The jounin then speaks. "All right everyone, they are going to rush hard and they are going to rush fast. We need to hold our positions as long as possible. The leafs are unpredictable, so we are going to try and use archers this time to hold them off. We also have a number of shinobi that will use lightning jutsu's to hold them off as well. We cannot afford to let this hill go. If this hill falls, then the cloud village may never recover. Fight hard . . . and fight well today, and maybe we can return home as heroes."
The ranks of cloud shinobi offer no great cheer like the leaf village. Instead they remain focused and silent to conceal their numbers yet again. And before any of them can really react, the leaf village begins to advance at a fast walk.
(Authors Note: This is a rather important scene for the story and in order to full understand the atmosphere of the scene, I strongly recommend that anyone reading it, check out the following song in order to get the full feeling.)
(Music: Queue "Tenth Man Down" By Nightwish)
Kakashi tries to stop the leaf shinobi from advancing toward the hill but sound finds the futility in his actions as the leaf shinobi simply walk through Kakashi as if he isn't even there.
The leaf village advances slowly until the reach the half way median in the battlefield. The front of the ranks are composed by shinobi with spear-like weapons as they lead the entire army. The following ranks are comprised of numerous shinobi of all ranks and arsenals. The ranks then split into two sections. The first cluster being made up of spear wielding shinobi and their following ranks. The second group is composed of the reserve forces. In between the two groups stands a firing line of two dozen shinobi, most of them wearing the Uchiha crest. It is only after the two groups have fully segregated themselves that the entire army stops their advance, falling just behind the three quarter mark of the battlefield.
(Music Time: 00:35)
The leader of the leaf army them gives out a loud order to all those in the firing line. "ALL RIGHT COMRADES! UNLEASH HELL!"
The entire firing line then proceeds to unleash a lightning fast sequenceof hand seals in almost perfect unison in speed. The shinobi then finish with different hand seals and unleash a fiery onslaught the likes of which the cloud shinobi had never seen before.
(Music Time: 00:42)
"KATON!" The entire firing line shouts.
"GOUKAKYUU NO JUTSU!" (Grand fireball technique)
"HOUSENKA NO JUTSU!" (Phoenix fire technique)
"KARYUU ENDAN!" (Fire Dragon blast)
"RYUUKA NO JUTSU!"(Dragon fire technique)
Are only some of the jutsu's shouted out as streams of fire blaze toward the hill topaccompanied by large and small blasts of fire that completely devastate the top of the hill, obliterating a large number of the cloud shinobi at the front of the line. Toshida cowers his head down and guards his face as the fire burns just above him. Toshida can feel the heat of the fire seeping through the very soil underneath himand the heat soon becomes too much for many of the shinobi to handle. And the leave their posts and retreat down the hill just out of range of the fiery onslaught, tripping over dozens of other shinobi as they retreat.
(Music time: 00:49)
The front of the leaf village ranks then begin to charge toward the hill as the cloud shinobi's front ranks begin to break. Wave after wave, hundreds of leaf shinobi begin running at full speed toward the base of the hill with kunai raised as waves of flame spew out from behind them.
"FIRE! FIRE!" One of the cloud jounin's screams to the archers at the bottom of the hill who are more then happy to oblige.
The entire compliment of archers then unleash an enormous wave of arrows into the air that soon rain upon the charging leaf shinobi. The arrows wisp through the area, allowing the sound of the arrows slicing the air to echo across the battlefield.
(Music Time: 01:24)
The wave of arrows befalls the charging ranks of leaf shinobi incapacitating a large number of them as razor sharp arrows pierce the flesh of their arms, legs and torsos and a number of unfortunate leaf shinobi quickly find out that their head protectors are not enough to stop a hailstorm of cloud village arrows
The leaf village continues to charge as the arrows rain down and fire shoots out from behind them. The reserve army set behind the firing line then begins to charge as well. Now the cloud village is looking down the face of more then three hundred charging shinobi. The fiery storm continues to obliterate the top of the mountain, preventing any cloud shinobi from getting close enough to use any jutsu against the charging army.
(Music Time: 01:55)
The cloud archers soon begin to run out of arrows as they continuously fire volley after volley into the charging masses. Many of the leaf shinobi struck by arrows have continued on their charge paying their injuries almost no attention.
"Shit!" The cloud leader shouts. "This isn't looking good." The cloud leader then soon thinks over his possible options in this case. And as of right now, they are very limited. "All right . . . EVERYONE FALL BACK!"
The ranks of the cloud shinobi become silent as they cannot believe what they are being asked to do. After the surprise begins to fade, many of the cloud village shinobi follow orders and begin to retreat.
"NO!" Toshida shouts. "WE HAVE TO FIGHT!"
"Forget it kid! We have no vantage point here! The battle is theirs!" One of the jounin replies.
"Forget this!" Toshida says to himself as he reaches into one of his pouches pulling out a scroll from his vest. Toshida unravels the scroll along the ground, revealing a complex summoning scroll. "I hope fathers' scroll can work in this case." Toshida bites down on his right thumb drawing blood as he swipes it along a segment of the scroll. Boar, dog, bird, monkey, ram, Toshida finishes the seal sequence and slams his hand down hard on the scroll.
"Kuchiyose no jutsu!" (Summoning technique) After a brief puff of smoke, Toshida reveals an entire row of kunai standing upward with the point at a seventy-degree angle pointing toward the top of the hill, all held in place by an enormous rack, holding more then one hundred kunai on its three separate levels. Each kunai has an exploding tag tied to small ring at the bottom of the kunai and a second scroll wrapped around the handle of the dagger.
"HAHA! IT WORKED!" Toshida says, with a childish giddiness.
"What the hell is that?" One of the cloud shinobi asks.
"It's a modified sword rack set up with a crap load of kunai. Each of them is attached to an exploding tag."
"But what is the other scroll for?"
"It contains a chakra control jutsu that regulates the weight of the kunai making them much lighter then a regular kunai." Toshida picks up one of the kunai and tosses it lightly into the air to demonstrate. The kunai then floats down to earth as if it were a leaf in the wind. Toshida then places the kunai back into the rack. "See? This way I can use my next jutsu to send all of these kunai over the hill and far enough to the firing line in order to attack them. As soon as they are high enough, I can release the jutsu that is affecting the kunai and they will drop from the sky. At the same time the exploding tags will be triggered and we should have one heck of a show . . . according to my father."
"You mean you have never tried this move?"
"Ummm . . . no. I never really had a reason to try it." Toshida says as he scratches the back of his head.
"But after that, then what do we do? You got any bright ideas after that kid? All that this will do is slow then down a little bit."
"But if we can get them to stop assaulting the hill top then we can focus our efforts."
"Who the hell are you kid?" Another jounin asks. "You sure as hell aint the product of our academy at your age."
"Please sir, at least let me tell you my idea."
The cloud jounin sighs slightly as he listens to Toshida's plan silently. After a few moments the cloud village shinobi line up behind Toshida as he readies his attack. Toshida then claps his hands together and readies his jutsu as he stands crouched on one knee. Dragon, tiger, dog, hare, rat, ox.
(Music Time: 02:13)
"Hyoutetsu Arashi no jutsu!" (Iron hailstorm technique) The kunai then take off from the rack leaving behind a brief flash of fire and a trail of smoke. Like a hundred bottle rockets spewing high into the air, the leaf shinobi take almost no notice of the maelstrom swirling high above them.
"KAI! (Release) Toshida shouts as the kunai reach their vertical apex. The kunai then suddenly switch direction abruptly and begin falling to earth at high speed. It is only then that the leaf shinobi take notice as the large number of kunai rains down upon their ranks, exploding at various points of their descent. Some explode seven feet in the air, and others as soon as they impact the ground. The charging leaf shinobi then focus their efforts on avoiding the exploding kunai, causing them to briefly disrupt their charge toward the hill. The leaf's firing line then focuses on using their fire jutsu's to destroy as many of the kunai as they speed toward the ground.
The cloud village then lines up as high up the hill as they can get, waiting for all of the leaf villages fire attacks to stop. When the attacks stop, the cloud village takes action.
(Music Time: 02:32)
The entire cloud village army lines up in an enormous gathering giving the appearance of a shinobi cloud. All shinobi then bring their kunai to the ready as they await the word to attack.
"All right! Remember, we need everyone to produce as many clones as they can without wasting too much chakra. Go for a minimum of three and ten if you can. Remember to spread out across the hill . . . AND RUN LIKE HELL!" One of the cloud jounin says as he moves to the front of the group.
Toshida finds himself in the middle of the crowded mass of cloud shinobi, not even reaching the shoulders of many of the shinobi. He gets bumped back and forth as the shinobi pack tighter and tighter, hiding their numbers.
"NOW!" The jounin leader calls. The cloud army readies their kunai to their sides and readies for their assault. Toshida reaches behind and clutches the handles of his newly acquired blades and quickly removes them from their scabbards. He takes a look along the clean and flawless steel and then focuses attention ahead, closing his eyes and controlling his breaths as his anxiety begins to swell.
"READY!" The jounin shouts, as all shinobi then create a massive army of regular clones to confuse the leaf's as they have instantly more then quadrupled their fighting force. The atmosphere is a nervous one as the cloud shinobi begin to fan out across the base of the hill and then the order is finally given.
"CHARGE!" The words echo across the cloud lines and the cloud army begins to run up and over the hill.
(Music Time: 02:46)
The leaf army is caught off guard as the illusion of almost a thousand cloud shinobi charging over the hill seems to take up almost the whole horizon. The soldiers scream as they charge and the echoing of footsteps can be heard all around. The leaf shinobi panic, and begin to retreat from the way they came.
The firing line of shinobi cease their bombardment as they too begin to fall back. Eventually the entire leaf army is falling back toward their base camp almost a kilometer away. However, as soon as the army reaches a line of shinobi near the back of the line, they begin to slow their retreat.
(Music Time: 03:40)
The scene pans upward from the feet of the leaf shinobi and as soon as the faces of the shinobi becomes visible, the reasoning for the leaf's halt becomes evident.
"Nice try!" One of the shinobi says in a calm and calculated voice, as the eyes of the Hyuuga clan's Byakugan is soon seen glaring across the battlefield, revealing to the leaf army, the cloud villages attempt at deception.
(Music Time: 03:49)
The leaf village soon turns around abruptly falling back into ranks like a well-oiled machine ready to do battle with the charging cloud shinobi. The leaf village then wastes no time and they too begin to charge against the cloud army. Soon the entire battlefield is filled with shinobi as they bare down on one another.
Toshida ducks and weaves between the rest of the charging cloud shinobi as he tries to get a better vantage point of his targets. He even runs right between the legs of some of the taller shinobi, showing off his intense speed and agility that may soon prove to be his biggest advantage.
(Music Time: 04:27)
The two armies then collide in the middle of the battlefield, knocking one another over as a hail storm of fists, kunai, kicks and shuriken fills the battlefield in a collage of indecipherable humanity. The leaf shinobi strike aimlessly unable to decipher human from clone as numerous bunshins are dispersed upon impact while the real shinobi are left with an element of surprise. A leaf shinobi strikes what turns out to be a clone and he falls victim to a strike from one of the real shinobi in the group. When the leaf shinobi learn of what is going on, they begin attacking randomly trying to filter out the clones. They soon realize the problem with the tactic as they end up hitting glancing blows on real shinobi and are too focused on trying to disperse more clones that they do not give the real shinobi the attention they require, and soon fall victim to their retaliatory actions.
Toshida runs through the crowd on his way toward the Hyuuga's who are easily ignoring the clones and taking out the real shinobi. As Toshida runs by two sets of shinobi fighting, he uses his decorative blades and slashes the Achilles tendon of the two leaf shinobi as he runs by, allowing his comrades to kill the leafs with ease. Toshida does the same to numerous other shinobi, striking and slashing at vulnerable areas as he passes by, using his small size to give his comrades the advantage, never killing any of the shinobi as he strikes at their legs, abdomen shoulders and groin. As Toshida nears the back of the battle, having not once been given any attention by the leafs due to his small stature. He moves quickly and virtually unnoticed by any unoccupied leaf shinobi. Toshida can finally see the marauding Hyuuga's that are decimating the cloud fighting force. He moves in as fast as he can to try and surprise one of the Hyuuga's, choosing one of the younger ones closer to him roughly only twelve years old. Toshida moves in with lightning fast speed and comes up behind the Hyuuga attempting a lateral slash across the base of the shinobi's spine, Toshida closes his eyes almost out of excitement as he awaits the firm resistance of the shinobi's musculature against his blade, and the coarse sound of screams mixed with the rendering of flesh. But that sound is replaced by the clashing of cold steel.
When Toshida opens his eyes, he can see the Hyuuga holding a kunai behind his back, blocking Toshida's strike while the shinobi focuses his attention on successfully slaying the shinobi he has been combating. As the Hyuuga delivers the death blow to his opponent, he turns his head around making eye contact with the surprised Toshida. The Hyuuga's white eyes pierce straight through Toshida, filling him with a fear he has never felt before as he parries away Toshida's blade almost knocking the boy off his feet. The Hyuuga turns to face Toshida and readies himself in the trademark stance of the gentle fist fighting style with a smirk across his face as he addresses Toshida.
"Sorry kid, but this is where you die."