A/N: Thanks for the review, fuuku666. Ah, this chapter's pretty much for u… hehez.

The Prophecy Fulfilled

Chapter 2: Getting It Back

Tenten shivered and glared at the open window, its swinging shutters allowing a cold breeze to come in and commence its torture. The 16 year old didn't remember opening it, and in fact recalled shutting it earlier that evening in anticipation for an expected windy night. She walked over and closed the shutters, wondering just how the secure locks had come undone.

Then she shivered again. But the windows were closed now, the air was still, and she wasn't feeling cold. Something was… different, in that house. Something that lingers in murky shadows. Something that could have gone unnoticed if it wanted to. Something that she hadn't felt in a long time. Something that was standing right behind her…

"Where's Hinata?"

She nearly screamed, but a cold hand came over her mouth, for just long enough to calm her down, before it swiftly pulled away. She turned around to meet a pair of scarlet eyes she hadn't seen for a few years. Scarlet eyes that suddenly turned a beautiful midnight black.

"Sasuke." She breathed out, a little in relief, but a little in irrepressible fear too. "You're back."

"Where's Hinata?" Sasuke repeated. Only his lips, nose and shadowed eyes could be seen from under his hood.

"She…" Tenten looked down at her feet and shifted uneasily.

Sasuke didn't have to glare to get Tenten nervous. "She left."

Once again. Without even a word or a questioning expression from the boy, Tenten felt obligated to explain herself, "She… she went to find… him…"

Sasuke allowed a frown to grace his features, "Neji."

Tenten nodded.

"Where?"

"I… don't know. She didn't say anything." Tenten frowned and her voice cracked, "I tried to tell her that… I mean, I tried. I know it may have stopped her. But I couldn't say it…" She finished with a whisper, "I just don't believe that Neji's dead…"

"Who said he was?" Sasuke breathed coldly.

"Everyone". Tenten bit her lower lip and suppressed a tear, then replied a little more fiercely, "You really shouldn't have left if you're supposed to be protecting her."

Sasuke's expression never changed, "I left her to protect her."

Tenten fell silent. She knew about the countless bounties placed on his head, and she knew damn well that Hinata would be worse off with the boy than anywhere else. She looked back up, but Sasuke was gone. She turned around and saw him with his back facing her, staring out at the night sky through the window – which was opened again. Just how he swung the creaky shutters open without so much as a squeak was beyond her. The air outside had turned strangely still and was without a breeze, and Tenten had to wonder if perhaps even the wind felt nervous around him too.

Sasuke looked outside at the quiet, poorly lit town. Sheridon was a dead city at night, though a pleasant peaceful place by day. The raven-haired boy started thinking back to just a few years ago when he had made that promise to Neji.

The Uchihas were next of kin to the Hyuuga clan. Neji was Sasuke's distant cousin, and had went off with the rest of the Hyuuga family to battle with Orochimaru and his Curean warriors. But Neji had left a girl behind with Sasuke to hide and keep safe. Her name was Hinata – Neji's first cousin and heir to the head of the Hyuuga clan. It was essential she stayed alive. Sasuke hadn't seen Neji ever since, but had kept his promise to protect the girl. Long before, and after the Uchiha massacre, Sasuke, as the only remaining survivor, had secretly met up with Neji – one of the few he trusted, and had been living with him in secrecy. It was only natural that Neji would leave the girl with his own trusted cousin. But Orochimaru had somehow found out that there was one Uchiha left, and was hell bent on getting him. The serpent-like man had sent countless ninja warriors out to get him, while at the same time, multiple bounties have been placed on his head by rich family members of the men who had fallen by the swiftness of his hand and the wrath of his sharingan. Hinata was just not safe around him. So he had left her in Sheridon in the care of Tenten – who he knew as a close acquaintance of Neji's.

Hinata had, from the very start, refused to believe what many others have said – that Neji was dead, just like the rest of the Hyuuga clan. The girl had stayed in a shy and silent trance for a long time before recently starting her attempts on setting out to search for her cousin and family. She had done it a couple of times already, but Tenten obviously wasn't enough to stop the girl from leaving this time.

"I watched the news." Tenten suddenly said from behind Sasuke, "Orochimaru's got that $700 million bounty on you."

Sasuke, still looking outside, replied, "The bastard finally gave up on finding me himself. Relying on low-life bounty hunters now."

"So how did you get here?" Tenten asked, remembering that the stoic boy had left for some place rather far away.

"Shuttle."

Tenten squinted suspiciously, "Where… did you park this shuttle…?"

"In your backyard."

Tenten nearly fell over, "WHAT? Uchiha Sasuke! When the cops see a stolen shuttle in my house, it is me they're going to talk to!" Tenten's voice died down, "They… they're coming soon." She whispered, fear rattling her voice, "Orochimaru's men…the Cureans, that is…"

"I know."

Tenten looked up, "How did you kn-"

"Two hundred battleships can give it away." Sasuke turned from the window and made his way upstairs.

Tenten felt fear rip across her body as she shot to the window and peered out.

Not far a distance from the city, a mass of battle troops and some prisoner ships were nearing, and fast.

-

"YES!" Naruto yipped gleefully as Chouji finished off his make-shift repairs. Wires were re-twisted and metal casings were still hot from having been melded together. "Chouji! I knew I could count on you!" Naruto blabbered, "I didn't hire you as our mechanic for nothing! Not like that lazy good-for-nothing combat specialist wannabe…." he trailed off in mumbles, glaring at the still sleeping Shikamaru. Naruto had hired three combat specialists. Lee and Kiba were the best of the lot for air-to-ground combat, while Shika was top of the air-to-air ones. Or at least he was supposed to be. Naruto was beginning to wonder whether he should ever trust score cards again.

"Sakura, set the co-ordinates for Curea." Naruto called to the pink-haired navigator, who nodded back an affirmative, "We better get this ship just like new if it's gonna help us snag Uchiha…"

"Man, Naruto." Kiba interrupted, "Going back there with no Uchiha but a broken-down hovercraft instead… Orochimaru's gonna have your head!"

Naruto glared, "I know that! But it's not just my head he's getting. It's ours. You guys joined me. So we're all in this together!"

"You're just saying that to make yourself feel better!" Kiba snarled.

Lee sighed, "It's dumb cuz it's not like we're his personal bounty hunters or anything. I mean, out of thousands of other ninja hunters out there, he picks on us! Why on earth?"

"Why, you ask?" Kiba scoffed and glared at Naruto, "You see, Lee, out of all those thousands of ninja hunters out there, a certain blonde bird-brain just had to stand up and say 'Oro-dude! We'll get that Uchiha for you! Just count on me, cuz I'm the best bounty hunter in the world!' And so now snake-man's keeping tabs on us! I can't believe he actually got convinced by such a lame speech!"

"Well, sorry!" Naruto whined back in self-defense "I did that so I could persuade him to bounce the bounty up a little…"

"A little?" Sakura sighed, "Naruto, wasn't $200 million enough? You got him to bump it up to $700 million! Now every single ninja bounty hunter in the entire world is out to get Uchiha! And I'm only talking about the ninjas! You know how many non-ninja hunters there are out there too?. We're up against thousands!"

"Exactly!" Naruto revved up the engine, "And so we'll catch Uchiha, get our $700 million, AND get title of best bounty hunters in the world! Can I help making good plans?" He grinned.

"What makes him think we're even going to catch Uchiha?" Kiba asked the others.

"Hey," Naruto blared back, 'We got closer to him than anyone else in the world! He was standing in this very ship, for pete's sake! We're probably the first to have actually seen and talked to him, and even come out alive and well!"

Lee shrugged, "I didn't get to see him."

Kiba and Sakura shook their heads too.

"Wait. Are you saying that you actually saw and talked to him? The Uchiha?" Lee asked, big eyes growing bigger, "What did he look like?"

Sakura got excited, "Is he hot? What's his voice like?"

"Yea," Kiba said, "What'd did he smell like up-close?"

The group stared at the canine-boy.

Naruto scrunched his face up, "What so great about him? And why don't you ask Chouji? He saw Uchiha and came out alive and well too."

Chouji had gone into shock a while ago, and was now balled up and on the floor, rolling back and forth, murmuring something about black hoods and red eyes.

Naruto stared, "Mmm… Okay, maybe just alive… Oh, and Shika? No, wait, he'd probably say he dreamt it or something…"

"WAIT!" Sakura yelled, "Naruto, you seriously talked to him? Saw his face? Held a conversation?.!.!"

Naruto stared with wide eyes and nodded.

"That, like, never happened to anyone else before!" She hollered.

"Well, that's cuz no one else is as great a bounty hunter as I am to have even found him!" Naruto beamed proudly at his piloting skills, earning himself a smack on the head from the pink-haired girl.

The group launched into another series of interrogative questions, but Naruto brushed them off, "Ahh! Stop asking me all these useless questions about that bastard! Let's just get back to Curea and get one step closer to my- I mean, our $700 million!"

Naruto accelerated and took off. Besides, Uchiha had his shuttle and he intended on getting it back.

-

The normally dim, quiet city of Sheridon was in flames that night, lit up like a blazing torch, with screams and cries of pain and fear ghosting the city walkways.

Tenten bit her lip to stop herself from crying, and tightened the clutch she had around the handle of her kunai. She heard the front door of her house crash to the floor, and the heavy clobber of clumsy feet trampling over it. She stayed as still as possible inside the dark, dusty cupboard, not daring to breathe lest someone heard her.

Six Curean soldiers broke down the door upstairs that led to a dark room. One soldier tried a light switch, but it didn't work, so he turned on a torch on his rifle and shone it about.

He dragged the light across a wall in front of him, spotting a cupboard on the far right. For the first second before his light fell on the cupboard, nothing was there at the back wall of the room. He shone back left to double-check before he going to open the cupboard when his torch's light ran over the wall again and he caught a glimpse of a dark hooded silhouette standing in the middle. But it was just a glimpse. He looked back, centering his light on that spot, a pang of fear gripping his heart at the same time – but there was nothing to be seen.

"What the…" He murmured.

"You saw something?" Another soldier asked.

"Nah… I thought I saw-"

"Me?" The men spun around in shock and stared at a shadowy hooded form with a long black cape running down the length of its body.

"What the?.!" One of the soldiers clumsily fired at the figure, who suddenly wasn't there anymore.

"Where'd he go?.!" Another man yelled, the fear painfully obvious in his voice.

"Right here." The dark voice said again, before the soldier felt a sharp object run through his throat.

The others turned and started firing, but at nothing again.

"What is this?.!" One of the soldiers stammered. Another soldier fell to the floor, a large gash in his chest. Two more men had their heads viciously crushed together.

"Back-up!" One of the two remaining men yelled into his communicator as he heard his last comrade fall to the floor, "We need-"

"-You need to say your prayers." The dark voice whispered into the soldier's ear.

-

All the gray-haired general heard was a very loud scream. He winced at its shrillness and rubbed his ear, then pushed his spectacles up the ridge of his nose.

"General Kabuto." A soldier next to him held up an electronic locator, a red dot indicating where six of their soldiers had fallen.

The general and fifteen more men stormed into the house and up into the room, only to find six dead men and an empty cupboard. Downstairs, the backdoor was open.

"After them!" Kabuto yelled when he heard the distinct sound of a shuttle taking off. A few Curean ships chased after it, intending on shooting it down – which they soon did.

-

Sasuke and Tenten weaved through the maze of city walls and alleys after setting the decoy shuttle off. Tenten panted heavily, tears pouring down her face after having seen the dead bodies of some friends she had known. They were the types who would have courageously resisted the Cureans, stick to their beliefs in freedom. But the Cureans obviously didn't care much for that.

"Where are we going?" She stopped, breathing harshly.

"You're going some place else. Away from here." Sasuke seemed to have melted into the shadows of the dark alleyway they were in, as if he was a shadow himself, and it was difficult to see him.

"What about you?" Tenten queried.

"There's another one!" A loud voice from a short distance away yelled, and Tenten turned to see troops of Curean soldiers advancing. She stepped backward in panic, and felt her back hit something that wasn't there before.

She spun around and saw it was Sasuke, who had moved there with his usual speed and stealth.

"I'll distract them."

Tenten managed a small nod before the younger boy moved silently pass her and toward the approaching Cureans, and she quickly ran off without turning back – praying for the boy's safety.

-

Two minutes and twenty-six dead bodies later, Sasuke was staring up at a large prisoner ship, where a few hundred town citizens were being herded in.

Sasuke smiled inwardly as he stealthily entered the crowd. Perhaps a visit to the bustling city of Curea was due. After all, he still had that promise of Neji's he had to keep. The Cureans had something he was put in charge of and he intended on getting it back.

A/N: R&R, peepz. R&R…

-sylver