Well, here's the next chapter! I would like to thank everyone who read and reviewed the first one. You guys rock!
"Hey, Hinata, see anything?"
The members of Team 8 were standing in the middle of the forest surrounding Konoha, the retired ninja they had been assigned to protect standing between the three. Even now, when he no longer did the work of a shinobi, they could still feel the immense amount of chakra emanating from his body. Their job was to get the man safely back to his home, though each of them felt that he needed no protection.
It had been Kiba who had spoken. Once they were a good distance away from the village, Hinata had activated her Bloodline Ability, the Byakugan, to scan the surrounding area. This gave her the ability to see through solid objects, among other things; if anyone was in the immediate area, she would find them.
After taking a good look around, she deactivated the Byakugan. "No, there's no one nearby," she said. "At least not that I can see." Akamaru sniffed to make sure, and, sure enough, there were no strange scents or anything indicating that they were being followed or spied upon.
The man, whose name was Michio, took no interest in the conversation of the three genins. He actually appeared quite bored, and was doing the exciting task of cleaning the wax out of his ears with his pinky. Every now and then he would glance at them, particularly Hinata, but otherwise he appeared to have no interest in anything except the fascinating contents of his ear.
"This mission's a piece of cake!" Kiba said, putting his hands behind his head in a relaxed gesture. Akamaru, who now rested inside his mater's shirt, barked in agreement. Shino, however, shook his head. The two were way too relaxed; just because there weren't any enemies here didn't mean the same for the areas up ahead. When he expressed his concerns to his teammates, however, Kiba just laughed.
"You worry too much, Shino!" He lowered his voice. "You've sensed this guy's chakra. Anyone who wanted to mess with him must be out of their mind!" This was the truth; even Akamaru had whimpered slightly when they had first met the strange ninja.
"I-I agree with Shino," Hinata said, causing both her teammates to look at her. "Even if he is strong, that just means he had a lot of enemies when he was a shinobi, right?" Although neither said anything, it was obvious that they were thinking about her words. After all, most people, shinobi or not, liked to have strong opponents, and this guy was definitely strong. After a moment, Kiba sighed. "Whatever. As long as we keep our eyes peeled, we'll be fine, right? Let's go, Michio!" And, with that, he walked away.
Michio, however, didn't like being treated without the proper respect. Even the Hokage had at least addressed him as 'Michio-san', and he felt that these brats, as he had decided to call them, should do the same. He shuffled along angrily behind them, trying to calm down. Don't let these brats get to you. After all, you've been blessed enough to have the Byakugan delivered right to you. He smiled quietly to himself, going over his plan in his mind.
They walked for quite awhile, and soon they were nearing the newly completed bridge that led to the Country of Waves. "We're almost there, Michio-sama," Hinata said, the old shinobi silently pleased that he was getting at least some respect. By now, the three genins were quite used to their peaceful surroundings; Hinata had stopped using her Byakugan long ago, and even Akamaru had stopped sniffing the air for signs of anything suspicious. Yes, they were quite content, and soon they had seemed to forget that they were even on a mission and were just on a nice, quiet walk.
Big mistake. Just as they were almost at the bridge, five ninjas jumped out of the trees and instantly surrounded them. The forehead protectors, which they all had tied around their right arms, showed that they were all ninjas from the Village Hidden in the Mist. The three genins quickly took a formed a defensive circle around Michio; they were outnumbered, but that had never stopped them before. The other ninjas, however, had formed a circle around them as well.
"Well, I thought this mission was a little too easy," Kiba said, taking out some food pills from his pocket. He gave one to Akamaru, whose fur instantly turned red. He then quickly did a series of hand seals. "Jyuujin Bunshin!" Akamaru transformed into Kiba, and they gave each other a quick look before executing their next move. "Gatsuuga!" The two began swirl, creating two giant tornado-like cyclones. They sped towards two of the five enemy ninjas that were standing close together; a cloud of dust rose as they hit the target. When the debris cleared, however, only two logs were in the place of the two ninjas.
"Damn it! Substitutions!" Kiba said, frustratingly looking around. Shino had used his bugs to try to attack the remaining three only to find that they were substations as well. Hinata, who had remained in front of Michio, used her Byakugan to find the real shinobi. "There!" she said, pointing into a nearby cluster of trees. As if on cue, three ninjas jumped down from the trees: two men and one woman.
"Hmp. We were expecting at least a jounin to be protecting the old man, and what do we find? Three pathetic little genin," One of them said, giving a slight laugh. "You'll hand him over if you know what's good for you."
Kiba smirked. "Thanks for the advice, but we won't be giving him to you anytime soon." He turned to his teammates. "Right?" They both nodded, getting into their own fighting stances. The enemy shinobi just laughed.
"Well, we're just going to have to take him by force." The three spread out in different directions, each one targeting a different genin. Hinata, Kiba, and Shino also spread out to get their fights away from Michio.
Kiba and Akamaru used their Gatsuuga once again on their opponent, only to hit the ground, stirring up even more dirt. "Such petty techniques won't work on me," said a voice from behind them. Kiba turned, just in time to see the ninja swiftly pull out a kunai and cut his arm. He pulled back, clutching his arm. "Damn it. Gijyuu Ninpou Shikyaku no Jutsu!" Quickly recovering from the attack, he used another technique to counter his opponent's. He and Akamaru both used the technique, only to be met by a swarm of shurikans. They both easily dodged it, only to find more buried in the shadow of the first ones. Both of them got hit in several places, causing Akamaru to change back and Kiba to be bleeding from more wounds.
Shino was having similar difficulties with his opponent. He sent out countless bugs, attempting to drain his chakra, but not one of them seemed able to match the enemy's speed. In a flash, the shinobi was standing only a few feet away from Shino. He threw several shurikans, each one embedding itself in Shino's body. Instead of blood, however, only bugs came out of the wounds; he had made a replication out of bugs to fool the enemy. The ninja seemed unimpressed, however, and only sent more shurikans at the real Shino, who was approaching from behind. He wasn't expecting the attack, and got hit on his legs and across his stomach. These are at least jounin level ninja, he thought as he held his stomach wound.
With her Byakugan, Hinata had little difficulty in dodging attacks from weapons like kunai and shurikan. She easily avoided such attacks; as well as being able to see through objects, the Byakugan also allowed her to see almost 360 degrees around. When her opponent, the only woman besides Hinata, noticed this, she decided to try a different tactic. She swiftly did a series of hand seals; Hinata didn't notice fast enough, and was soon trapped within a genjutsu.
She looked around, and noticed that she was standing in the middle of a river. The swift moving water, as well as her surroundings, was surprisingly gray; no other color seemed to be present. On the banks of the river were large trees, blowing in a light breeze and shedding gray leaves. At the roots of some of the trees were whitish-gray flowers, swaying softly in the wind. The world seemed pretty peaceful, except for one thing.
There were no other signs of life.
Even with her Byakugan, all Hinata could see were endless trees and other various plants; yes, the plants were living things, but there were no other humans. Not even any animals could be seen in the never-ending forest of trees. Hinata stood, the gushing waters swirling around her feet, and for the first time she wondered where she was.
Then, before she could react, she was underneath the water, sinking slowly into the depths. She tried to swim, but realized that she couldn't move. She struggled against the raging waters as they continued to pull her down into the darkness that was the bottom of the river. She glanced desperately around, but saw only gray. She couldn't breathe; she could feel herself slowly losing consciousness…
That was when her opponent stuck. She threw a kunai at the trembling girl; it hit its target and sent the helpless Hinata flying backwards, snapping her out of the genjutsu. Before she realized what was happening, she saw four more kunai coming at her. She couldn't move, as she was lying on her back soaring through the air, and could only watch and wait.
Suddenly, a wall of sand appeared in front of her view; she could hear the knives hit the wall and clatter harmlessly on the ground. She was also aware that she was no longer flying in the air nor falling towards the ground, and when she looked down, she saw that she was lying on a blanket of yet more sand. It brought her gently to the ground, giving her time to catch her breath and realize that what she had experienced had only been an illusion.
When she was safely on the ground, she sat up and looked for her savior. She gave a startled cry when she saw that it was the same boy she had bumped into earlier that day.
Gaara of the Sand.
Another look around showed that the other two that had been with him were with her teammates: Temari stood with a giant fan outstretched in one hand in front of Shino, while Kankuro stood slightly behind Kiba, a puppet in front of them. Both Kiba and Shino seemed badly hurt; they were each bleeding in several places. None of the wounds appeared to be severe, though, for they were both still conscious and, in Kiba's case, looking particularly pissed at having his battle interrupted.
"Are you alright?"
She looked up and saw Gaara standing over her, looking down with an emotionless look on his face. Hinata only nodded and started to get up off the sand, only to stop midway. Her face twisted in pain as her hand went to clutch a wound in her chest; the one made from the kunai thrown at her while she was still trapped in the genjutsu.
Gaara moved away from her. "I'll take care of this," he said, his voice as void of emotion as his face. The other ninja, however, had no more intentions of fighting; they each, in turn, threw down a smoke bomb, and soon the whole area was covered in smoke so thick that none of them could see.
When it cleared, they immediately noticed that something was wrong. Not only were the ninja gone, but others as well.
Both Michio and Hinata were missing.
Footnotes:
Jyuujin Bunshin-Half-Beast Clone; used to turn Akamaru into a replication of Kiba.
Gatsuuga-Double Fang Destroyer
Gijyuu Ninpou Shikyaku no Jutsu- Beast Mimicry Ninja Technique, Four Legs
Genjutsu: Illusionary techniques
Author's notes:
If you noticed, there were several references to the actual anime in this chapter. In the earlier episodes, Naruto's team was sent on a mission to protect a bride builder while he was on his way home to the Country of Waves, like how Hinata's team is now protecting Michio (who is a made-up character, no reference to anyone in the series). On the way, they met up with a rouge ninja from the Village Hidden in the Mist. Sound familiar? The shinobi whom they were fighting in this chapter were also from the Hidden Mist Village. The bridge they encountered was the one that the bride builder had completed at the end of the mission. Really, this whole paragraph was probably pointless, but I just wanted to see if anyone noticed.
This chapter ended up being a lot longer than I expected. It's by far the longest chapter I've written for any of my stories.It was pretty fun to write though; it's my first real experience with writing fighting scenes, so I hope they were ok. I wasn't sure whether or not to put the translations for Kiba's attacks, but then again, if you're like me, then you probably don't remember the exact names of them unless you just recently saw the episode(s) in which they were used. But, by now, I'm sure you're tired of my useless babbling, so as always, please review so I know what you think! -yawn- I really need to stop putting these chapters out so late at night…
