Chapter 26: : Assertion
Sasuke blinked at the rickety boards above him. The pale light of dawn crept into the creaky room through large, glass windows near his head. The night hadn't treated him well. Every couple hours, Sasuke would jerk awake, a sickly, prickle teasing his neck and the nerves in his arms. He switched between the dream world and the real world like a light bulb, on and off. Sasuke sighed, placing the back of his palm over his eyes.
The dark planks of wood squeaked as Naruto rolled over in the bunk above him, and the man below Sasuke began to snore. Sasuke looked to the side blankly and wearily noted the seven rows of bed stacks on his left, each with their own sleeping citizens.
Sasuke lurched forward to sit and whacked his head against Naruto bunk. Rubbing the pain away with his right palm and pushing the plush, blue sleeping bag off himself, he looked around at the other residents. Some grunted and rolled over, but none awoke.
He carefully swung himself onto the creaky, vertical ladder and peered up at at the bunk Naruto slept in.
"Oi, Naruto." He whispered harshly.
The boy smacked his lips together and rolled over in his sleep. Sasuke smacked his head, hard. The blonde jerked awake aburptly and Sasuke clamped his hand firmly over his mouth to smother the inevitable yelling. Naruto flailed widly, like a fish out of water, muffled curses whispering up from under the hand.
"Shhh!" Sasuke put a finger to his lips and scowled at his catch.
"Get up," he hissed, "and keep it down." He slowly removed his hand from Naruto's face and wiped it on his boxers. He carefully hopped to the cold wooden floor and began to rummage around his bunk for his pants.
Naruto pulled himself up, squinted into the unwelcome light and scratched his stomach. By the time, he had finished pulling on his shirt, Sasuke already stood in the doorway, his sleeping bag rolled up and tucked under his arm.
"Hurry up." The dark-haired boy mouthed.
Naruto grumbled silently and preceded to roll up his own sleeping bag. After struggling with the draw-string for a couple minutes, Naruto jumped down from the bunk.
"Why are we leaving so early?" He whispered hashly at Sasuke.
"I want to get the Kouji thing over with as soon as possible." He muttered as they walked out of the dorm and down the hall. "We can keep our stuff in our lockers here for the day, until we find Kouji; then pick it up when we come back this way, and get out of this aera quickly." In truth, Sasuke just wanted to leave. He felt uneasy, like behind every pebble was someone shadowing him.
Naruot yawned widely.
"Do you even think this Kouji guy will be up this early?"
"No, but we can question the townspeople, find out everything we need to know and get this businedd over with."
They turnned down another hall and to the right, into the locker room.Hundreds of spacious, gray metal rectangles lined the walls like trees in a forest.
"What if Sakura-chan isn't awake?"
"Then we'll sneak into her dorm and wake her." Sasuke replied casually as he openned his locker and pulled out his backpack.
Naruto blushed brightly.
"Are you sure that's even allowed?!" He fumbled clumbsily with his lock.
"Since when do you care?"
"It just seems… wrong." Naruto heaved his backpack out of the small cubby, onto the thin wooden bench and began to shove his sleeping roll inside.
"Well, it's not like we have a choice." Sasuke dug into a side pocket and pulled out his shuriken holster and his kunai satchel.
"What are you doing?" Naruto glared quizzically at his friend as Sasuke strapped the kunai pack around his waist, just below the stainless steel knife, the only weapon he carried everywhere.
"Just being careful." Sasuke replied as he adjusted the shuriken holster around his right thigh.
"Are you okay?" Naruto muttered. He looked at Sasuke as though concerned for his sanity.
"Of course I am."
Still unsure, Narutodug into his own backpack for his weapons. As much as he hated to admit it, Sasuke had a knack for these things. Naruto wasn't about to lose or be caught off guard and unprepared, and the six-inch dagger strapped to his hip wouldn't do much if they ever got attacked. He grabbed his own shuriken holster and kunai satchel and hastely buckled them on. Sasuke shoved his backpack into his locker, spun the combinationand turnned to leave the room.
"Wait up, you bastard!" Naruto yelped as he pulled his pack into the locker again and dashed after Sasuke.
The common room bustled with busy people; the chairs and sofas scattered around the place held happy customers all yammering about this or that. Sakura didn't happen to be any of them.
"Nope. I didn't think she'd be up this early." Sasuke muttered. "Go get her."
"What!?" Naruto yapped. "Why me?"
"It'll take less time if only one of us goes, and you're better at Henge no Jutsu than me." Sasuke grumbled matter-of-factly.
Naruto cursed his friend as he meandered to a desolute corner.
"Henge!" He whispered, transforming himself into the chipper, pigtailed girl. He looked catiously around to see if anyone noticed. All the other guest were too busy giggling about their own lives to pay attention. Sasuke leaned against the wall and tapped his foot impatiently, and Naruto slipped secretively into the girl's dorm.
He tiptoed down a bright hall, past the girl's bath and bathroom and shimied up to the door where the hall ended. Slowly, Naruto peered into the sleeping quarters. Smaller than the boys dorm, this room carriedonly three or four rows of bunks. Not many women were there, only a twenty-something lady asleep in the second bunk of row two, a portly one on the bottom bunk of row four and a familiar red mass on the top of bunk three.
Naruto grinned brightly and dashed over to the third row.
"Oi! Sakura-chan!" He whispered frantic and cheerful as he clambered up the wooden bunk and peered at her like an exotic animal in the zoo. The back of her head flowed in locks of pink over her pillow and her red sleeping bag had been pulled up all the way to her neck. She groaned slightly.
"Eh?" She muttered mundanely.
"Sasuke wants us to get this mission over with."
Sakura rolled over and found herself staring into Naruto's sunshiney girl face. She pulled herself up, sleeping bag and all and blinked at her chipper friend.
"He's crazy." She muttered, wriggling for warmth. She sighed, squeezed her arm out of the sleeping bag and reached for her clothes. As she pulled her red tank top from the small pile at the foot of her bed, she looked to the side to see Naruto still gawking at her.
"Do you mind!" She snapped and twacked him on the head.
Naruto waited outside with Sasuke until Sakura emerged, still pulling on her left shoe. She looked at them both, at the kunai backs and the shuriken holsters, and cocked a quizzical eyebrow.
"What's going on?"
"Nothing, don't worry about it." Sasuke muttered as he ehaded for the door through the common room.
Sakura looked to Naruto, who just shrugged. Together the three began their treck to the Hidden Cloud Village. The path there was easy, paved with stones, and user-friendly. Many people, especially those with carriages of goods dashed up and down the road.
The street climbed up through tree covered hills, until it came to the base of a sierra, at the point wghere two particularly large mountains met, the path slid between them like a river. For two miles, the road curved around the large rocks and, finally, openned up at the foot of a valley.
"Oh wow!!" Sakura exclaimed.
Embedded withing the mountainside, in the sprawling valley, lay the Village Hidden in the Clouds. The white rock path they had been walking turned into a white rock bridge over a clear bottom river and webbed out to become the streets of the town. The buildings looked like little pagodas or shrines, with wooden beams and red tile roofs, and layers themselves up the rocky face, ending in a large temple-shaped building with the symbol "Lightning" upon it. This Raikage's domain sat directly under the chins of five enormous faces, carved into the mountains side, all watching over their precious little country. Amoung the houses and the white path, curved the shallow river that ran through the city and around it, apssing under them as Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura walked over the bridge and into this impressive landscape.
"Don't forget, you guys." Sakura hissed under her breath. "Absolutly no definable skills! If they find out we're from Konoha, they'll keep us as hostages to use against Tsunade."
"That doesn't sound so bad." Naruto muttered as the continued into the town.
"Really? You want to end up like Ibiki-san?" Sakura snapped.
Naruto grimaced at the mere memory of the specialty jounin's burns and deformations.
"Like I said, " Sakura continued, "Nothing! No Rasengan…" She glared at Naruto. "… and no Sharingan." She glared at Sasuke. Sasuke stuck his hands in his pockets and, disgruntled, looked up at the bright sky. She wasn't helping his pemontions any.
As they walked down a main street, shops had just begun to open. Signs flipped from "closed" to "open" and old frail hands placed oranges onto their wooden shelves. Some man on a ladder was stringing paper lamps across the road.
Naruto and Sakura "ooohed" and "aaahed" at the picturesque scenery, but Sasuke couldn't enjoy it if he wanted to. The bizarre feeling creeping along his spine had shot up like a geyser. Every stray leaf made him twitch and he constantly checked over his shoulder.
"C'mon, you two." He grumbled. "Let's go look for Kouji."
"Awwww! No way!" Naruto whimpered, "We just got here!"
"And how many times are we going to get a chance like this?" Sakura cried. "C'mon Sasuke. Let's just look around for a little bit and then we'll begin our search."
Sasuke rubbed the back of his neck irritably, and, before he could retaliate, Naruto and Sakura had skipped off to go see the sights.
"Neh? Sakura-chan, where do you want to go first?" Naruto sang as they skidded to a hlt in front of a tourist guide map.
"I want to go to the park." She hummed as she traced a trail on the map with her finger.
"The park!?" Naruto made a disgusted face. "That's boring! I wanna get ramen!"
"Stupid!" Sakura twacked him on the head. Naruto yelped and covered his swollen temple. "Parks aren't boring!"
Sasuke walked up behind them, defeatedly.
"Sasuke!" Sakura wheeled on him. "Naruto wants to get ramen, but I wanna go to the park!"
Sasuke looked down at the pair of eager faces staring up at him, like a pair of five year-olds.
"Well, it's early." He decided, rubbing his neck again. "I don't think a ramen place will be open."
"Yeah!" Sakura threw up her arms in celebration. Naruto sulked and pouted.
"The park it is!" She exclaimed. "C'mon you guys!"
"Fine! But after this we're getting ramen!" Naruto dashed after her as the two galloped off like children in an amusement park, Sasuke trudging along behind like an annoyed parent.
To Naruto, this park was like any park. It had all the same trees, all the same grass with a river running through it and the same old white rock paths. But it seemed to make Sakura come alive. Her face glowed as she skipped along the path, the green leaves cascading down around them, soft sheets of light draping down in ever changing patterns through the long branches.
Like Sorano, this park was covered in cherry trees. With spring over and out of the way, they weren't in bloom, but their seeds lay about everywhere on the bright path. Every now and then, Sakura would bend to pick one up.
"What the hell are you doing that for?" Naruto grumbled. His stomach whined from their lack of breakfast and the soft waft of something savory drifted in the air.
"For fun," She responded gleefully as she stuck three more into her pocket, "they may have some medicinal value I don't yet know of. I collected some from Sorano too."
"Doctors are crazy people." Naruto muttered as he rubbed his stomach. Behind them, Sasuke agreed in silence. "Are you done yet? I'm starved."
"Yeah, yeah. Stop complaining." She stretched and turnned around. "Let's go get ramen then."
"Yeah!" Naruto cheered and began to dash back.
"And he says I'm crazy," Sakura muttered. Silently, Sasuke agreed to this too. "C'mon," Sakura prompted to the silent statue-like Sasuke, "we don't want to lose him." And they dashed after the crazy maniac.
Naruto slowed as he reached the middle another white stone bridge. Disgruntled, he wheeled around at his two friends chugging slowly behind him.
"Hurry up." He grumbled as they caught up with him. Sakura put a hand on the railing.
"Are you sure you know where your going?" She wheezed. The altitude still hadn't settled in her and her breath drew raggedly for a moment.
"Of course, I do!" He cried, brightly and turned to leave. Her took two steps and stopped short, frozen a still frame photo.
"Naruto?" Sakura looked curiously at him.
Then Sasuke felt it; a huge concious pressure fell upon his shoulders. Suddenly the premonition he'd had was no longer a premontion; it was pure textbook fact. Someone was watching them, with beady eyes full of an intent to kill.
Naruto instictively put his hand into the kunai pack and latched onto one of the daggers. Sasuke wheeled around and together the two stepped backward, sandwiching Sakura protectively.
"Eh?" Sakura wondered as she looked back and forth between them. "What's going on?"
"You feel it to, don't you?" Sasuke whispered to Naruto as he put a hand on into his shuriken holster.
"Yeah." Naruto tightened his grip around a kunai.
Sakura blinked in bewilderment, but said nothing.
"We know you're out there!" Sasuke called. "Show yourself!"
A brisk breeze blew through the park. Several swift dark object leapt out of trees, out from under the bridge, and out of bushes, and swirled around them, uncircling the three. Within a millisecond, they were completely surrounded. Sasuke glared around at their attackers. None seemed older than seventeen and the youngest had be eleven. They all wore black, in various chapes and forms, with two common traits. One was an emblem that looked like a rose and the other was the official hitai-ate of The Hidden Cloud. All the attackers bore arms; kunais, shuriken, katana for a few, but none attacked.
Sasuke looked around at them, waiting for a reason to move. At a count of fifteen, beating them all would be unrealistic without their signature techniques.
"You're quite good."
Sasuke's head snapped in front of him. Naruto and Sakura turnned to look as well. An armored, brown boot landed with a thud on the stone walkway as the speaker stepped out of the shadow of the trees. The trees uncovered a boy, not much older than themselves and just as tall as Sasuke, dressed in mesh covered in loose brown clothing. His spikey brown hair had been pulled back to a tuft of ponytail and the base of his neck, his bright amber eyes held authority. Sakura took one look at him and couldn't help blushing. She quickly looked away.
He's the bad guy, remember? She squinted, but couldn't help looking at him again.
He walked like a general amoungst his troops and the ring of ninja around him seemed to treat him as such, because all eyes were on him as though waiting for his command. Unlike his minions, he had no rose badge and no hitai-ate.
Naruto turned around and focused on this aparent leader. Sasuke's muscles tensed as he realized that this mysterious boy was glaring at him and only him.
"Who are you?" Sasuke hissed, the bones in his hand teitching with anticipation. "and what do you want from us?"
"Huh.." The boy scoffed. "I suppose it's customary to give one's own name first." He smirked. "My name is Kouji."
Naruto yelped. Sasuke blinked widely. Sakura finally understand what the girls in Sorano Fuuka were squealing about. Before they had time to respond, Kouji was speaking again.
"… but you don't need to tell me who you are…"
Whew, Naruto sighed, Akari must've told him about us…
"…You're the bastard who beat up my subordinates in Sorano."
Naruto did a double-take.
"What?" He muttered, but, at second glance, realized none of it had been directed at him. The entire conversation lay between the few feet seperating Kouji from Sasuke.
Kouji held up a photograph and threw it at Sasuke's feet. The vivid picture portrayed himself, hair tied back, after work in Sorano. Sasuke looked up at Kouji, who was now giving him a death glare.
This guy's good, Sasuke thought, not only does he have subordinates, I didn't even see the photo until he threw it at me.
"No one beats up my team." Kouji seethed, cracking his knuckles, "except me. You desecrate this hair style. I'll teach you a lesson about picking on my friends."
"Sasuke," Sakura grabbed his arm.
"Don't do it!" She whispered. "Without the Sharingan, he'll-"
Sasuke held out a hand to silence her.
"On one condition," Sasuke called out to his challenger. Kouji looked at him suspiciously.
"What?"
Sasuke stitched his eyebrows together in unswayed determination.
"We'll settle this man-to-man. You don't touch my friends, I don't touch yours."
Kouji smirked.
"Agreed. Let us begin."
Author's Note: dun dun dun! Boy, that chapter was lame! I really expected it to go farther but the damn thing got so long, I just couldn't take it anymore! Besides, it took so long to write. I apologize for all spelling errors, my word processor just died on me. It won't spellcheck a damn thing anymore. Don't worry, it won't deter me from releasing chapters; it's just a major pain in the ass. I'd like to thank Tatsu no Houou for his support. I tortured him endlessly as we debated over the intricate details of this story, and, as a result, he now knows pretty much everything. Kakashi fangirls, don't kill him trying to find out when the man shows up! :P
About Kakashi: I've been getting a TON of questions about Kakashi. Don't worry, I haven't forgotten about him. :3 who could? I happen to know the exact date, place and time where is actions will take effect, so relax! :P
About Kouji: Some people have asked about him and all I can say is: kukuku...... you'll find out about him when you find out about him. and I do love the mini ponytail. If you want to know what it looks like, see the back of Takuto's head from Full Moon wo Sagashite.
Next Chapter: A raging battle begins! An unexpected ally or a stingy double-crosser?