Ok, so here's the second half, the longer half at that, of "Death Awaits". Sorry it took so long. Hope my writing didn't suffer. I did this entire thing in a few hours. Let me know if you think it's subparr. ; ) And you know the rest of the talk by now.
Sasuke was consumed by the thought of death. It had been an unthinkable happening to the genius Uchiha. He had to defeat his traitorous brother first. He couldn't die till then. But the images he had seen, the images of death that emanated from their opponent were too much. Such intent to kill, such austerity of death, was too much for the raven haired boy to bear. His mind was not on a fight anymore but on living at any cost. That thought drove him to do the unthinkable.
With painful slowness Sasuke's hand dipped into his pouch and grasped Team Seven's scroll of heaven. A small part of his brain was screaming at him not to do it but imminent death tends to silence all thoughts that might prevent the body from getting out of the situation. So with a shaking hand Sasuke produced the scroll and held it out towards their opponent.
"Here, you can have the scroll. Please, take it and leave us alone." Shame ripped through Sasuke's conscience but again the thought of life pushed it aside. Anything to get them out of there.
Their opponent smiled and took a step forward.
A kunai imbedded itself in the trunk a few inches away from the enemies foot. Sasuke gasped. Was his plan going down the drain that fast? His head whipped around to find the source of the kunai.
Naruto was up again. His breathing was labored and his face looked pale but there was no mistaking the look in his eyes. He glared at Sasuke accusingly as if he had just betrayed Naruto personally. "Damn you Sasuke. What do you think you're doing?" Naruto asked. Sasuke could feel the heat of his gaze on him.
"You're going to give this freak our scroll because you're a little scared?" Naruto asked. "You're more pathetic then I thought Sasuke."
Naruto had overstepped his bounds as far as Sasuke was concerned. The Uchiha glared death at his teammate. 'What the hell? How dare you!' Sasuke thought. "You shut up Naruto!"
Further bickering was forestalled when their opponent laughed. "You're smarter then I thought Sasuke-kun. The only hope the prey has from a predator is to hand over something else to eat to save itself."
Sasuke looked away from Naruto and threw the scroll towards their enemy. It was the only way.
A black and gold blur snatched the scroll from mid air then hit a tree trunk and bounced back to Sasuke's branch. Sasuke was beside himself. 'How dare he interfere, I'm trying to save us,' Sasuke thought as Naruto landed next to him. "Don't interfere idiot!"
A fist came up and slammed Sasuke in the side of the head, knocking him backwards. Sasuke staggered and yelled at his teammate. "Why you...Why'd you do that?!"
"Because," Naruto said, his whole body shaking with rage, "You're scared, and the Sasuke I've come to know does not get scared. I did it because you deserve it!"
A kunai appeared in each of Naruto's hand's and he leapt off the branch towards their enemy. "If Sasuke won't fight you then I WILL!"
Naruto's yell brought Sakura out of her stupor and she gasped when the first thing she saw through her tears was a flying Naruto cocked and ready for battle. She found her voice quickly. "NARUTO!"
Sasuke yelled at him too. "No, run Naruto!"
Naruto ignored them, continuing his arc towards their tormentor. 'I've lost faith in you Sasuke,' he thought as he came down on his opponent. He never reached him however. A gesture and a bit of chakra produced a shockwave that knocked Naruto in the opposite direction. Naruto bounced right back, this time loosing his kunai along with six shuriken.
The man smiled as he easily dodged the weapons. With incredible speed he met the flying blond in mid air, launching two fists into the boy's gut with enough force to cause him to break through two tree branches before coming to a stop again.
Naruto spit out blood and sucked air greedily into his lungs. The unexpected blow had knocked the wind clean out of him. It took him almost a minute to recover from the shock. 'Damn he's strong,' Naruto thought as he flinched at the pain in his gut when he stood. But he was determined to beat this man.
He focused his chakra to his legs and sprinted at high speed along the tree branch. When he reached the end he launched himself out into space towards the next tree. He bounced like a pachinko ball from tree branch to tree branch. Sakura could hardly follow his progress. Even Sasuke was having trouble. Naruto's opponent on the other hand had no problem following the boy's flight. He delivered another powerful blow to Naruto when he came in at him.
Naruto hit a tree trunk and a spiderweb of cracks burst out from where he hit. He slumped down in a small heap as he struggled again to regain his breath.
His opponent smiled his evil smile again. "What a cute prey," he said in a sing song voice. Naruto's anger spiked when the words reached his ears.
The Hidden Grass nin almost didn't have time to react to Naruto's next move. The boy stood abruptly, forming hand seals as he rose. A huge intake of breath and a surge of chakra announced his intentions.
A massive wall of fire leapt across the gap between the two combatants so fast that it a lesser ninja would have been roasted alive in a second. Naruto's opponent was fast enough however. A leap upwards took him away from the flames but only for a short time. Naruto followed the man's flight upwards with his fiery breath, nipping at the man's heals the entire way.
Sasuke and Sakura were hit with the backwash from the attack, the super heated air drying the tear's from Sakura's face and singeing Sasuke's hair. The two watched in awe as Naruto followed his opponent upwards with his attack. They had never seen someone redirect their aim while using a fire jutsu. 'One of the Karyuu Endan's better points,' Sasuke thought as the back of his mind compared Naruto's attack with his own Ryuuka no Jutsu.
As quickly as it had come Naruto's attack ended. His opponent dropped back down to another branch, a little further away this time as his former branch was mostly ash and charred wood now. 'This one is more powerful then I thought.'
Naruto walked forward through the remaining small fires his jutsu had created until he stood at the edge of his charred branch. Heat waves and embers swirled around him as if an invisible wind was creating a miniature tornado around the boy. A feral grin spread across his face and his eyes, which had been closed until then, snapped open to reveal pupils very different from his usual blue orbs.
Naruto felt the power, it burned through his chakra system like fire, leaking out in a fine swirling vein of light orange. He had gotten a taste of this power before but had turned away from it, afraid of what it could mean. Now he welcomed it. His hands came together in a familiar seal. With an explosion of chakra shadow clones appeared and multiplied faster and to greater numbers then ever before. Soon there were clones covering almost every part of the trees around the current battle ground. Sasuke made a quick count and lost track at around five hundred. Sakura and Sasuke almost forgot to breath. "Amazing," Sakura whispered. "This is Naruto?"
Naruto's opponent was equally startled and amazed. He hadn't expected anything like this. But unlike Naruto's teammates he knew what Naruto had done. 'So this is Kyuubi's vessel,' he thought, 'how interesting. That would explain where he has been for the last twelve years. I know those face marks. So, Jiriaya has a new student.'
"You're mine," Naruto announced. Each clone produced shuriken and launched them at the lone Grass nin. Together they formed a series of seals and shouted as one. "Shuriken Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!"
What had started out as five hundred shuriken quickly turned into ten thousand. The sky went black with the small whirling missiles. Trees fell before them and his opponent's tree almost disappeared underneath the attack.
"Alright! That should have done it," about two dozen Narutos stated at once. The clone armies happiness was short lived. The black haired opponent was nowhere to be seen. "What the? Where did he go?" With a fizzle and a huge puff of smoke the clones disappeared. It was the wrong move. Something wet and slimy snagged Naruto around the belly as soon as the last clone had vanished. Naruto suddenly found himself immobilized in the air. He kicked and screamed but nothing happened. He turned in mid air to find his opponent standing behind him, the man's tongue was what was wrapped around him.
It was all over quickly. Naruto fell to the ground, a new seal in place over the nine tails seal. With his power source gone Naruto went limp. The man turned, apparently unfazed by his battle with Naruto, to face Sasuke.
Anko was making good time through the woods. She was searching for him. For the man that had ruined her life and who was now apparently trying to ruin her exam. Trees passed in a blur as she sought him out. She could feel him there, somewhere ahead of her. 'I'm close,'she thought.
Another sense suddenly rang an alarm in her head. There was someone slightly ahead of her but moving with her. The person stopped so she stopped. Another feeling triggered a response in her brain. She smiled and leapt forward. The person ahead of her waited until she landed next to him. She nodded to him and spoke.
"You are also here for the same reason am I right?"
The man nodded. "It is my responsibility now. You do not need to continue."
Anko snarled back. "It is my responsibility! This is my exam and he was my teacher. He betrayed me and so it is my duty to stop him."
The man turned away from her and looked forward, towards the presence that they sought. "You have a reason I know but the Hokage has sent me to deal with him. I too was betrayed by him and in this case I have the stronger claim.
Anko's anger fizzled out. The man was right. "Fine, I leave him to you," She said as she vanished.
Sasuke was totally drained. He had fought the man at his best and it still wasn't enough. He didn't really expect it to be enough after he had seen what Naruto had done but if that idiot was willing to fight then Sasuke had no reason not to try as well. His brother's last words only added fire to his new resolve. But in the end even the famous Uchiha could not beat him.
As he watched the man broke away from the metal wires that bound him to the burnt tree. No one should have been able to survive a direct hit from a fire jutsu that strong but here he was, walking away with half his face gone. The man's fists came together and a sudden weight fell on the raven haired boy's shoulders, forcing him down to his knees.
When the man spoke it was with a different voice. "I'm impressed that you managed to use the sharingan so well at such an age. You live up to the name Uchiha. I want you after all. You two are definitely brothers. Your eyes show more potential then Itachi's though."
Sasuke sucked in a startled breath. "Who are you?!"
The man smiled as he pulled Team Seven's scroll from his pouch. "I am Orochimaru. If you wish to see me again get through this exam." The scroll began to burn in his hands. Soon all that was left was a pile of ash.
"A farewell present then," Orochimaru said. His hands came together in a strange seal and his head shot upwards, his neck lengthening and shooting towards the still paralyzed Sasuke.
A voice echoed through the trees as Orochimaru closed in. "Ninpo Kuchiyose, Yatai Kuzushi no Jutsu!"
Orochimaru reeled back. "This jutsu!"
The dark haired man got his extended neck out of the way just in time to avoid being crushed by a giant frog that suddenly appeared between himself and his target.
"Long time no see, Orochimaru."
The man's neck returned to normal and he glared up at the man that stood atop the frog's head. "Jiriaya."
The two former teammates glared at each other for a few moments. Orochimaru broke the silence with a chuckle. "I did not expect you to interfere here. It makes no difference. I will have my way." His last words faded away in the coming darkness. The man was gone.
Jiriaya sighed and dismounted from the frog which he then proceeded to dismiss. He patted Sasuke on the back and guided him back to Sakura who was tending to a still unconscience Naruto. The old white haired man looked at his student gravely. He had felt the power the boy had released even from a great distance. He had waited too long he decided. He should have introduced Naruto to his latent power earlier. This was the worst possible time to have the powers of the Kyuubi surfacing. "Well it can't be helped," he mumbled. "Come on you two. Let's get you somewhere where you can rest up. I have a feeling you'll need it."
Sasuke was consumed by the thought of death. It had been an unthinkable happening to the genius Uchiha. He had to defeat his traitorous brother first. He couldn't die till then. But the images he had seen, the images of death that emanated from their opponent were too much. Such intent to kill, such austerity of death, was too much for the raven haired boy to bear. His mind was not on a fight anymore but on living at any cost. That thought drove him to do the unthinkable.
With painful slowness Sasuke's hand dipped into his pouch and grasped Team Seven's scroll of heaven. A small part of his brain was screaming at him not to do it but imminent death tends to silence all thoughts that might prevent the body from getting out of the situation. So with a shaking hand Sasuke produced the scroll and held it out towards their opponent.
"Here, you can have the scroll. Please, take it and leave us alone." Shame ripped through Sasuke's conscience but again the thought of life pushed it aside. Anything to get them out of there.
Their opponent smiled and took a step forward.
A kunai imbedded itself in the trunk a few inches away from the enemies foot. Sasuke gasped. Was his plan going down the drain that fast? His head whipped around to find the source of the kunai.
Naruto was up again. His breathing was labored and his face looked pale but there was no mistaking the look in his eyes. He glared at Sasuke accusingly as if he had just betrayed Naruto personally. "Damn you Sasuke. What do you think you're doing?" Naruto asked. Sasuke could feel the heat of his gaze on him.
"You're going to give this freak our scroll because you're a little scared?" Naruto asked. "You're more pathetic then I thought Sasuke."
Naruto had overstepped his bounds as far as Sasuke was concerned. The Uchiha glared death at his teammate. 'What the hell? How dare you!' Sasuke thought. "You shut up Naruto!"
Further bickering was forestalled when their opponent laughed. "You're smarter then I thought Sasuke-kun. The only hope the prey has from a predator is to hand over something else to eat to save itself."
Sasuke looked away from Naruto and threw the scroll towards their enemy. It was the only way.
A black and gold blur snatched the scroll from mid air then hit a tree trunk and bounced back to Sasuke's branch. Sasuke was beside himself. 'How dare he interfere, I'm trying to save us,' Sasuke thought as Naruto landed next to him. "Don't interfere idiot!"
A fist came up and slammed Sasuke in the side of the head, knocking him backwards. Sasuke staggered and yelled at his teammate. "Why you...Why'd you do that?!"
"Because," Naruto said, his whole body shaking with rage, "You're scared, and the Sasuke I've come to know does not get scared. I did it because you deserve it!"
A kunai appeared in each of Naruto's hand's and he leapt off the branch towards their enemy. "If Sasuke won't fight you then I WILL!"
Naruto's yell brought Sakura out of her stupor and she gasped when the first thing she saw through her tears was a flying Naruto cocked and ready for battle. She found her voice quickly. "NARUTO!"
Sasuke yelled at him too. "No, run Naruto!"
Naruto ignored them, continuing his arc towards their tormentor. 'I've lost faith in you Sasuke,' he thought as he came down on his opponent. He never reached him however. A gesture and a bit of chakra produced a shockwave that knocked Naruto in the opposite direction. Naruto bounced right back, this time loosing his kunai along with six shuriken.
The man smiled as he easily dodged the weapons. With incredible speed he met the flying blond in mid air, launching two fists into the boy's gut with enough force to cause him to break through two tree branches before coming to a stop again.
Naruto spit out blood and sucked air greedily into his lungs. The unexpected blow had knocked the wind clean out of him. It took him almost a minute to recover from the shock. 'Damn he's strong,' Naruto thought as he flinched at the pain in his gut when he stood. But he was determined to beat this man.
He focused his chakra to his legs and sprinted at high speed along the tree branch. When he reached the end he launched himself out into space towards the next tree. He bounced like a pachinko ball from tree branch to tree branch. Sakura could hardly follow his progress. Even Sasuke was having trouble. Naruto's opponent on the other hand had no problem following the boy's flight. He delivered another powerful blow to Naruto when he came in at him.
Naruto hit a tree trunk and a spiderweb of cracks burst out from where he hit. He slumped down in a small heap as he struggled again to regain his breath.
His opponent smiled his evil smile again. "What a cute prey," he said in a sing song voice. Naruto's anger spiked when the words reached his ears.
The Hidden Grass nin almost didn't have time to react to Naruto's next move. The boy stood abruptly, forming hand seals as he rose. A huge intake of breath and a surge of chakra announced his intentions.
A massive wall of fire leapt across the gap between the two combatants so fast that it a lesser ninja would have been roasted alive in a second. Naruto's opponent was fast enough however. A leap upwards took him away from the flames but only for a short time. Naruto followed the man's flight upwards with his fiery breath, nipping at the man's heals the entire way.
Sasuke and Sakura were hit with the backwash from the attack, the super heated air drying the tear's from Sakura's face and singeing Sasuke's hair. The two watched in awe as Naruto followed his opponent upwards with his attack. They had never seen someone redirect their aim while using a fire jutsu. 'One of the Karyuu Endan's better points,' Sasuke thought as the back of his mind compared Naruto's attack with his own Ryuuka no Jutsu.
As quickly as it had come Naruto's attack ended. His opponent dropped back down to another branch, a little further away this time as his former branch was mostly ash and charred wood now. 'This one is more powerful then I thought.'
Naruto walked forward through the remaining small fires his jutsu had created until he stood at the edge of his charred branch. Heat waves and embers swirled around him as if an invisible wind was creating a miniature tornado around the boy. A feral grin spread across his face and his eyes, which had been closed until then, snapped open to reveal pupils very different from his usual blue orbs.
Naruto felt the power, it burned through his chakra system like fire, leaking out in a fine swirling vein of light orange. He had gotten a taste of this power before but had turned away from it, afraid of what it could mean. Now he welcomed it. His hands came together in a familiar seal. With an explosion of chakra shadow clones appeared and multiplied faster and to greater numbers then ever before. Soon there were clones covering almost every part of the trees around the current battle ground. Sasuke made a quick count and lost track at around five hundred. Sakura and Sasuke almost forgot to breath. "Amazing," Sakura whispered. "This is Naruto?"
Naruto's opponent was equally startled and amazed. He hadn't expected anything like this. But unlike Naruto's teammates he knew what Naruto had done. 'So this is Kyuubi's vessel,' he thought, 'how interesting. That would explain where he has been for the last twelve years. I know those face marks. So, Jiriaya has a new student.'
"You're mine," Naruto announced. Each clone produced shuriken and launched them at the lone Grass nin. Together they formed a series of seals and shouted as one. "Shuriken Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!"
What had started out as five hundred shuriken quickly turned into ten thousand. The sky went black with the small whirling missiles. Trees fell before them and his opponent's tree almost disappeared underneath the attack.
"Alright! That should have done it," about two dozen Narutos stated at once. The clone armies happiness was short lived. The black haired opponent was nowhere to be seen. "What the? Where did he go?" With a fizzle and a huge puff of smoke the clones disappeared. It was the wrong move. Something wet and slimy snagged Naruto around the belly as soon as the last clone had vanished. Naruto suddenly found himself immobilized in the air. He kicked and screamed but nothing happened. He turned in mid air to find his opponent standing behind him, the man's tongue was what was wrapped around him.
It was all over quickly. Naruto fell to the ground, a new seal in place over the nine tails seal. With his power source gone Naruto went limp. The man turned, apparently unfazed by his battle with Naruto, to face Sasuke.
Anko was making good time through the woods. She was searching for him. For the man that had ruined her life and who was now apparently trying to ruin her exam. Trees passed in a blur as she sought him out. She could feel him there, somewhere ahead of her. 'I'm close,'she thought.
Another sense suddenly rang an alarm in her head. There was someone slightly ahead of her but moving with her. The person stopped so she stopped. Another feeling triggered a response in her brain. She smiled and leapt forward. The person ahead of her waited until she landed next to him. She nodded to him and spoke.
"You are also here for the same reason am I right?"
The man nodded. "It is my responsibility now. You do not need to continue."
Anko snarled back. "It is my responsibility! This is my exam and he was my teacher. He betrayed me and so it is my duty to stop him."
The man turned away from her and looked forward, towards the presence that they sought. "You have a reason I know but the Hokage has sent me to deal with him. I too was betrayed by him and in this case I have the stronger claim.
Anko's anger fizzled out. The man was right. "Fine, I leave him to you," She said as she vanished.
Sasuke was totally drained. He had fought the man at his best and it still wasn't enough. He didn't really expect it to be enough after he had seen what Naruto had done but if that idiot was willing to fight then Sasuke had no reason not to try as well. His brother's last words only added fire to his new resolve. But in the end even the famous Uchiha could not beat him.
As he watched the man broke away from the metal wires that bound him to the burnt tree. No one should have been able to survive a direct hit from a fire jutsu that strong but here he was, walking away with half his face gone. The man's fists came together and a sudden weight fell on the raven haired boy's shoulders, forcing him down to his knees.
When the man spoke it was with a different voice. "I'm impressed that you managed to use the sharingan so well at such an age. You live up to the name Uchiha. I want you after all. You two are definitely brothers. Your eyes show more potential then Itachi's though."
Sasuke sucked in a startled breath. "Who are you?!"
The man smiled as he pulled Team Seven's scroll from his pouch. "I am Orochimaru. If you wish to see me again get through this exam." The scroll began to burn in his hands. Soon all that was left was a pile of ash.
"A farewell present then," Orochimaru said. His hands came together in a strange seal and his head shot upwards, his neck lengthening and shooting towards the still paralyzed Sasuke.
A voice echoed through the trees as Orochimaru closed in. "Ninpo Kuchiyose, Yatai Kuzushi no Jutsu!"
Orochimaru reeled back. "This jutsu!"
The dark haired man got his extended neck out of the way just in time to avoid being crushed by a giant frog that suddenly appeared between himself and his target.
"Long time no see, Orochimaru."
The man's neck returned to normal and he glared up at the man that stood atop the frog's head. "Jiriaya."
The two former teammates glared at each other for a few moments. Orochimaru broke the silence with a chuckle. "I did not expect you to interfere here. It makes no difference. I will have my way." His last words faded away in the coming darkness. The man was gone.
Jiriaya sighed and dismounted from the frog which he then proceeded to dismiss. He patted Sasuke on the back and guided him back to Sakura who was tending to a still unconscience Naruto. The old white haired man looked at his student gravely. He had felt the power the boy had released even from a great distance. He had waited too long he decided. He should have introduced Naruto to his latent power earlier. This was the worst possible time to have the powers of the Kyuubi surfacing. "Well it can't be helped," he mumbled. "Come on you two. Let's get you somewhere where you can rest up. I have a feeling you'll need it."