Warnings: Kankuro PoV. Language.
Disclaimer: I own no Naruto.

Author's note: does anyone know what kind of magic druids use...? 'cause I don't. I rather forgot. So I'm making it up! (i.e. there's been no research done on the neutral side 'cause I got bored).

Reach.
a tale
of falling higher
and rising lower to the
end.

Epilogue, Kankuro...by Taes

The snow falls softly.

Days ago, there was a call to Gather, a sound brought forth by an Archangel of power, no doubt, for some ridiculous war between the Heavens and Hells.

We of the neutral aspect are free to ignore such Calls, and I suspect most of us did. But such a high order of magic is hard to shrug off, and because that's exactly what we've done, it's led to disorientation while spell-casting—and this, my friends, leads to scarce magic from our side. As such it's earned me a mighty stomachache for lack of food.

But now, it's twilight. The time between... It's my time; it's the gray of day where my powers are strongest.

I smile to myself, deeply amused and all-too willing to pull Karasu's strings. These college-kids wouldn't know what hit 'em...and whatever goodies they've got'd be mine, simple as pie.

Don't look at me like that.

A guy's gotta eat.

Lazily, I adjust Karasu's form with a whispered word and a wave of a Druidic wand. A smile twitches on my lips, I whisper a word to Lady Luck, and a quiet plea to Inari for a fox's fortune.

One or the other's got to respond, I figure, so I may as well dance in both courts.

My eye twitches a little...this's not a good sign...

Maybe I ought to add a prayer to the Great Spirit...

Nah.

That one calls for payback...

I shake my head, and Will the feeling to go away.

The fat boy'll be first.

Karasu slacks with the force of my magic, and a gray light surrounds him, taking the dense and spongy form of a fat, once-muscled human. Black light clothes him, white light fills him, and my puppet learns to dance again at my command.

I twine the chakura-strings around my fingers, and Will my creation to walk.

While I smile from the rooftop above them, Karasu takes his first steps jerkily, and then eases into a heavy walk. Nothing could give his nature away, now...I've perfected the art of puppet-control long ago.

I'm amused.

The fat boy will only see a huge, towering old flab of a guy lurching towards him, and he'll give up all his goodies...heh, it'll be great.

I mouth the words gleefully; "Gi'me your money."

Karasu growls the words, and I comically have him pound one meaty fist into another, open hand.

Pork-butt stares, I can see, and his companions stop.

The girl to his side shrieks; she's a tall blond, just a bit taller than her friend, I notice, and she clutches girlishly at his pudgy arm. Her mouth opens silently, and her lips quiver just a bit. She shakes her head—as if in disbelief.

Haha! Inari must have a sense of humor...Luck wouldn't be near this clever! You see, this brat-girl has a touch of the Gift about her, and here she is, gawping at me like an elementary student. You'd think someone Touched like that'd try and fight a little but—

"Chouji—" her pale blue eyes are wide. "That thing—"

So the fat kid has a name. Figures.

But why are they calling Karasu a—

I close my eyes.

Oh. Shit.

She can see Karasu's nature...so she's just masking her powers.

The pork-rind stares at my poor little puppet like it's a ghoul or something. He opens his mouth, rubs at his beady-little eyes a bit, and puts a 'comforting' hand on the witch's shoulder. "Don't worry, Ino, it'll be—"

Ino? Does he mean Indigo, the youngest brat of the witch clan!

Behind the two, raucous laughter fills the air, and a golden-haired kid smirks. The gray glow of Inari surrounds him, envelops him, and the Kitsune mark brands his round face like nothing else.

Beside him, a black-haired boy steps aside.

The first boy snaps his fingers—it's so like a fox-spirit to be showy—and I can finally see what's been pricking at my senses.

Demons.

Winged, magic-wielding demons.

One is from the second circle of hell, a Realm-Walker—he's a once-human turned on his own kind. The rest are from the fifth circle of the underground...there's a succubus among them, and the rest are Reapers—those who tear reckless souls from this world into the next.

What the fuck's a kitsune-child doing with a brood of demons?

Hastily, I call up Kuroari, a puppet of foul disposition and many weapons. I send her sprawling into the fray, rip down the illusion covering both puppets, and release a string of poison needles—traceless, unnamed stuff only a Druid can make. It'll freeze your blood and turn ya into a vegetable before it kills you—a perfectly natural death, eliciting no challenge from authorities, I think.

The kitsune smiles a little fiercely, showing too many teeth and too much tongue. His laughter calls my attention to him, and I have to wonder—

—how much does Inari care about this kid? If His mark is so heavy around a mere kit...and I try ta attack the brat...that means...

I'm screwed.

Simple as that.

With clear eyes and a heavy head, I call the two puppets to work in tandem, Kuroari falls back while Karasu attacks the hasty blond, the first spinning on the witch with a poison knife.

She shrieks, and the shields her family's built for centuries spring up around her and her meaty boyfriend. But she does nothing.

Good; the brat's got no mettle...that should keep me alive long enough to retreat.

The demons, I know, will either tear my puppets to shreds or they'll leave the Neutral-brat to his own devices, I guess, and I spin Kankuro on them, next, splitting my beautiful puppet open with a huge, magic-powered canon.

The demons'll be gone in seconds if they don't move.

My smile widens, and just as I push Kuroari to speak, a hot, shallow rod pushes into my throat's tender flesh.

Smooth and bemused laughter fills the air, and I sense the Presence of great wings. One hand taps on my shoulder in a thin and steady rhythm, and a lazy, beautiful voice comes to my ears. "Aaahhhh," the exclamation is filled with a timbre so ancient and bright my ears ache to hear. "So Inari's stolen my skill..."

I shudder at the voice.

No one said angels were kind...

The black rod at my throat burns, stinks of Hell's magic and Heaven's so-called grace. I can almost taste the blood magic, the bone and life-purpose seeped in this ugly weapon. I can tell—this is no ordinary angel.

My puppets are stilled. I'm at knife-point—sort of. How much worse could this evening get?

"You're not bad," the angel purrs. "But you should understand, mortal fool...only in the Light's name will I allow you to use marionettes as tools." The angel leans over me, and through peripheral vision I glimpse ice-blue eyes and pale, golden hair.

I can almost taste death.

"Sasori." A low, annoyed voice interrupts. "Let him go." Those words surprise me so much I think I gasp. "He's neutral." the kid continues.

The rod at my throat relaxes, and I stumble free. But the words hang in my head. The kid called him Sasori? Meaning...this angel's Gabriel?

Ohhhh crap. That one's not one known for charity...

But miraculously, the blond Archangel steps aside. His aura is great—terrible—and a choking line of smoke in my eyes. Trying to see past his beautiful face...it's like wrestling with fog.

I sputter a minute, rubbing at my neck uneasily. I don't dare voice the only question running through my head:

Why are Touched-mortals, demons, a kitsune-brat and a fucking angel in the same spot!

"You knew I had him." The low voice continues, and I look his way—ughh, it's the kitsune's friend from before. "I'm not a newborn; I can still handle my own battles!"

The icy-eyed angel shrugs and gracefully takes to the air. His words aren't for the boy, but for me: "See to it that this happens never again, Kankuro of the Sands..." his Presence is masked, but I doubt he's completely left this realm.

From below, the golden-haired Kitsune calls. "Sasuke! Get your ass down here, boy! We've still got pizza to worry about—"

The high-pitched laughter of the succubus fills the air, and the pink-haired girl calls, "Hey! Gray-balls!"

I presume she's talking about me.

"Get down here, sweetie, Naruto's got some questions for you—"

The fox child says something like, "Huh?"

...the black-haired Sasuke pulls my arm none-too-gently to upset my balance, and he pushes me within seconds.

Freefalling is not a good thing, boys and girls. It sucks ass.

But the witch-girl, Ino, has me in her net before I smash to the ground, and it occurs to me—the black-haired kid probably got the witch to get him up the building...he was working together with a supposedly-squealing girl in that short time?

Without me noticing, too.

Color me impressed.

Through face-paint and druidic robes, I scowl at the party, and wordlessly wave my puppets away.

No one moves. The silence is damn annoying.

"I am neutral, you know." I mutter. "So unless you want Inari and Lady Luck biting at your tails—"

The kid, Naruto, smirks a little. "Hah! No shit." he grins. "So, you are neutral. A druid, huh?" the whisker lines on his face are a little too dark for comfort, I decide.

Sasuke—the boy who speaks freely with angels—is behind me again. "So." His smile's as eerie and disturbing as the archangel was. "Tell us, fool." He purrs.

Naruto finishes. "Whatever you know about fox curses..." the blond reaches for his black-haired friend, and it occurs to me—

These two are lovers...reaching for something only they can see.

And that, my friends, is only the beginning of the end.

But it's as much as you get.

fin.

Tell me what you think? This fic took a long time...