Chapter 14

Secret Weapons

Pulleys, hinges, levers, tripwires, and pressure plates. As a habitual and rampant prankster, Naruto had come to see the entire world as his playground of tiny mechanisms to take advantage of. If a store that overcharged him had a hanging sign out front, he saw the sign as the perfect opportunity to rig up a discrete itching powder dispenser that used the shaking caused by people passing underneath to disperse tiny amounts of its contents every time someone enters the store. If the teachers at the academy intentionally screwed up one of his lessons, he would use their desk drawers as a pressure switch to unleash a blast of whatever noxious concoction he could get his hands on. Lesser infractions incurred paint bombs or glitter.

And then he learned he could make a living off this talent.

It opened his eyes to a whole new reality and made him see the world as not just harmless pranks- but a mechanic to harm someone with some unfortunate circumstance at any given moment. Any location, any physical mechanic built into the surroundings, could be used to rig up one of his beautiful machinations of pain and humiliation. It was a challenge to find the right trap for any circumstance, to handle any opponent.

This bridge is his greatest challenge yet.

Architecturally, it's sound, it's solid, and free of the many vices that could leave it open to his trickery. Naruto's many machinations require moving parts, closed spaces, or loose soil. None of that is here, no place to hide his toys, no naturally existing mechanisms to take advantage of as a part of his strategy, and no natural landmarks to reshape and process into a usable form. A blank slate upon which he can only build, but building anything upon it would be all too obvious.

How does one turn an immovable blank slate into a successful trap?

Even Kakashi was dubious on the possibility of it in such a space, at least for the first few hours. They all knew the battle would have to take place here, it was the perfect arena in which their opponents would have an overwhelming elemental advantage. It's also somewhere they would all be required to be as a part of their mission and efforts to complete the bridge and free this country from Gato's grasp. It had to be here, and so, they had to find some way to even the odds against Zabuza and his partner. But could they?

Kakashi's answer came in the form of more and more of Naruto's teeth showing as his grin widens and his clones scattered across the bridge begin to laugh maniacally for the third time that day.

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Yamanaka Ino tends to be underestimated. In more practical shinobi arts, she's certainly subpar, but more advanced and specified arts are more her specialty. When it came to information, none in her generation were nearly as capable as Ino. Her ability to psychologically profile someone within minutes is almost unnatural. Her talent for gossip allows her to gather information from all corners of the village and then compare and contrast varying conflicting rumors, then confirm it through rigorous research. Of course, very few would expect that her close contact with the Anbu and T&I division through her father was one of her most valuable resources, despite her lack of clearance.

She's always been smarter than most gave her credit for between her bouts of fangirlism-induced madness, and her recent research has become some of the most critical proof of that fact.

But what really shocked the clan was one trick in particular she began researching with a dose of help from one of their brother clans, the Akamichi. Those pills are far from a secret for the active shinobi of the Yamanaka clan, but to think someone would dare to produce a less dangerous alternative through their botanical knowledge and the addition of chakra conducting and containing roots of the Senju clan's trees is incredible. Not only has it improved the quality of the Akamichi's pills, with the Hokage's permission to access the roots oft cast aside when Senju trees are cut, but given Ino the component needed to test the next great step in her revolution of her family's jutsu.

She stands at her father's office door, going over her questions and demands thrice more, and with a final burst of confidence, she knocks and call out. "Daddy! I have a few questions regarding my jutsu experiments."

Slowly, the office door opens, and Inoichi stares down at his daughter with scrutinizing eyes. He knew she had approached, and how long she had been standing there. Obviously, she was about to ask for some potentially critical and dangerous information. It wouldn't be the first time.

"… Very well, then. Come right in, princess." He sets the door aside and waves her in, then upon closing it, triggers his silencing seals and returns to his seat. "So, what exactly is it you're working on? I was impressed enough with your new chakra pills, but I suppose that was just step one of your plan, wasn't it?"

She grins almost cockily. "As usual, you don't need our jutsu to read my mind, daddy. Yep, I'm workin on something big." She pulls a scroll from her pocket and slowly unfurls it. "Our clan doesn't really use clones, for the obvious reason of our lack of enough chakra to really take advantage of them. But I noticed something contradicting that in our clan's history." She peeks up from her scroll. "Great grandpa Isao helped the Nidaime make the Kage Bunshin. He provided the necessary components to add their cognitive and recollective ability. He made the Kage Bunshin the ultimate tool for safely collecting intel and providing clones capable of using every skill the original knows."

Inoichi's brow furls. He knew all too well that his grandfather has done this, but he'd never thought much of it. He had aided a Kage, one known to be a grand genius, just as the two that followed him, but… how much had Isao actually provided, and how much of it could be used for their own jutsu? Isao's death was under unknown circumstances. He died young, in combat in the first war, using a technique that none could identify. Could that be...?

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Having breakfast at Tazuna's on the seventh day, one would expect things to be slow and tense. They know Zabuza is most likely to arrive today, and Gato is getting impatient. There's a drastic fight ahead of them, and very little they can do to avoid it.

Instead, their newest arrival, a young boy named Hideki whom Sasuke and Iruka had both rescued, is eagerly chatting away between everyone as he digs into his first real meal in weeks. He rants and rambles about how cool he thinks Sasuke's team and Iruka are, though never commenting on Kakashi, as the man had done nothing in his presence yet. He still has rice stuck to his face as he speaks more with his body than with words, flailing about and trying to mimic everyone's techniques. Of course, both Iruka and Kakashi pick up on signs of the boy already having some impressive physical conditioning, possibly caused by the local poverty and necessity for survival.

His future in Konoha would be bright.

"-and then you-!"

"Ok, that's enough." Sasuke grabs the boy's ankle as he nearly gets kicked in the jaw. Despite his annoyance, he can't help but appreciate how much the boy admires their work. "You're gonna break something at this rate." He releases the boy's foot, and he pouts and drops back into his seat. "Besides, we can be so much cooler than that. We'll have to show you sometime, but there'll be better days for that ahead. Today, we need to finish our mission, and you need to stay here and safe in the meantime."

"H-Hey!" he jumps back from his seat and tries to tower over the seated genin. "Why can't I come? You guys protected me before, why can't you protect me today?"

Naruto ruffles his hair as he stands. "Because the guys we're up against are as tough as us, and we already have to protect Tazuna. We can't protect you both at the battlefield, so you stay here and wait for us to get back, ok?" On his way to the door, he peeks out the window to his left and sees Jiraiya seated in a tree, watching over the house. His skills would be wasted on this bridge today, but he's more than welcome here watching over Tazuna's family and Hideki. Chances of Gato throwing a few thugs their way are pretty likely, of course. But, just in case… "And whatever you do, stay inside. I'll be rigging all the entrances and exits with some of my traps, but staying inside won't trip any of them. I'll disarm them all when we get back."

"Wait.." Nami stumbles towards the door. "What?" Just as she gets there, the door shuts, and a series of seals trigger that lock it up as tight as the Hokage's vault. She rattles the handle a few times, but the glowing seals upon the door gravitate towards the seals tagged onto the doorframe and prevent any more than a millimeter's shift under her meager strength. This seal impacts both the inside and outside of the door, but the seals Naruto then tags the outside with are prepared for anyone who attempts to break in before his return.

Naruto shrugs and turns to walk off without a word, hands deep in his pockets. Tazuna looks between the genin and the door frantically. "A-Are you sure that's a good idea? Like, those aren't gonna blow up like your seals yesterday, right?!"

"Those were designed to blow up. Unless I took that last batch out of the wrong pocket, those ones are designed to stab." He pauses and tilts his head skyward. ".. Was that the left or right jacket pocket?"

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Sarutobi Hiruzen sits at the back of his office, chair swiveled away to take in the ever-enchanting view of the village from his many windows. He'd been the second-longest standing Kage of all time, and it still hadn't gotten old. He'd watched this village grow from it's early days, helped it rise to its current greatness. How many of these buildings had he commissioned? How much larger had this place grown under his watchful eyes and guiding hand? If anything, this would be the one thing his dear departed sensei would be most proud of him for. How much this village has grown and prospered under his rule.

But the greater a tree grows, the more at risk it is of parasites and infections.

Hiruzen grumbles to himself and fiddles with his pipe. Danzo… He's been eerily silent. The man used to hound him constantly for militaristic legislature, or insisting on training shinobi in the morally vacant arts at younger ages. Now he only ever saw the fool either during council meetings or on his rare excursion to his favorite public park to sit beneath the village's oldest sakura tree.

Too silent. The man may be old, but they were same damn age, and Hiruzen would be damned if his workaholic rival had let himself decay into retirement while he had the hat. ROOT still had to be operating, but he was keeping it more covert than ever. ROOT operations in Konoha had gone entirely unspotted for quite some time. No identifiable recruitments, no unauthorized bases uncovered, and no operatives caught in four years. So how was he doing it?

Largely foreign operations? Likely; Eliminating foreign "threats" pre-emptively was always his MO, no matter their innocence.

Bases set outside of Konoha? Maybe some, but not central. He values the village too highly for that. Only other possibility then is he's found a concealment method that his own Anbu lack a workaround for just yet.

Recruit through foreign bases. Collect selected shinobi from high-risk missions, report all units dead. Settle deals with orphanages outside his jurisdiction. Always keep about a third of his forces on hand at home at all times, the rest scattered in foreign bases to receive missions and warn of potential offending parties. Easy for them to run interference while retreating in the event of an unforeseen large attack force. Efficient, inconspicuous if done right, and very difficult to pin down, especially since his bases always have self-destruct protocols that go off with a hair trigger. He always has contingencies for contingencies, traps over-

His head bolts upright as the Will of Fire sparks brilliance.

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Right on cue. Kakashi saunters to the lead of the pack as they approach the bridge, finding cut and bloodstained bodies scattered about the supply stations on their end of the bridge. All brilliantly executed and in the middle of menial labor. Left open to assault with their hands occupied. Textbook, but in such mass at once and at such speed is certainly the work of an expert.

No sense in holding back. He raises his headband and his sharingan spins freely.

"Alright, kids. You know the drill. Defend our man at all costs and pull no punches. Our opponents are true professionals, and they will not hesitate to kill us at any moment." He grumbles as a thin mist develops, approaching the bridge, but leaving most visibility intact for now. "He's taunting us…"

Naruto chuckles and throws his arms behind his head. "Well, if someone taunts you, taunt in kind." He walks right onto the bridge and calls out without a care. "Oy, Captain Steaknife, did ya use that thing to skin the cow ya used for those obnoxious legwarmers? They make my buddy Lee's bright orange ones look good!"

A bark of laughter far across the bridge in thicker fog is followed by the fog slowly thinning to reveal five figures standing across the bridge. At the center of the troop is the great Momochi Zabuza, blade across his shoulders as stares a hole into the back of the second man's head.

Said dead man is none other than the subject of much of Naruto's intel, Rokusho Aoi. His attire, since leaving Konoha, has been modified into a relatively standard Ame skin-tight wetsuit, but sleeveless and faded blue. Upon his back is an upturned umbrella, but much more interesting is the bladeless pommel in his hand. Kakashi's eyes narrow on the blade as lightning sparks between his fingers for just a fraction of a second. Aoi is grinning cluelessly. "Good one, kid! I like your style."

"I'd say the same about you, but your head looks like someone put seaweed through a trash compactor to make a kindergarten theater wig."

Aoi's face contorts with disgust and rage, only to lose that disgust in place of more rage as the two remaining henchmen break into helpless laughter. These two are of course the returning Demon Twins, their chained gauntlet at the ready once more and prepared to rend their foes asunder… as soon as they can pick themselves off the floor. Behind them all, even Zabuza is chuckling and grinning like a madman, despite remaining alert. His masked companion Haku to the rear left is thus far silent.

Zabuza sighs in relief and places his free hand on his hip, shaking his head. "Oh, I needed that one. Thanks, brat. Now, which one of you wants to die first?"

"I'll take them myself." Aoi grunts and steps forwards with a growl, as raw lightning chakra begins to pour from the Raijin no Ken in his right hand.

Kakashi nods and waves forward from his left. "Sasuke, you've got this one." The last loyal Uchiha nods and steps forth without a word.

Aoi snorts and puts on his usual cocky grin. "What? I already said I'd kill all of you myself. You really wanna send this boy to the slaughter on his own?"

Sasuke rolls his neck and smirks. "I'm all we need to take you out. Just try me."

Aoi's smile fades as he narrows a glare Sasuke's way. "Fine… it's your funeral."

Haku leans towards Zabuza and whispers to him. "Uh… aren't we going to divvy up the rest of them and start fighting?"

Zabuza waves her off. "No, no, I wanna see this. I've been waiting so goddamn long to watch this obnoxious son of a bitch die."

Aoi grits his teeth and growls, reaching for the umbrella on his back. "That's it! Everyone dies!" He throws the umbrella skywards and it hovers in the air. While suspended, he shifts through a series of handsigns and grins maliciously. "Jouro Senbon!" The umbrella begins to spin rapidly, unleashing a salvo of senbon in all directions and littering the bridge with them. Nowhere is safe, save for the wall of ice Haku raises to defend herself and Zabuza.

The Demon Brothers both scramble to escape this sudden bout of friendly fire, but end up running in opposite directions and pulling at their already wounded arms, leaving them in prime locations to receive a few dozen senbon each and slump over against the ice wall as the poison coated on the needles sinks in. One calls out from the wall, immobilized and slurring. "You fffuckin' asshole! You better have a fuckin' antidote!"

Aoi chuckles and shakes his head. "Sorry, you're not worth wasting it on. You two outlived your usefulness anyway." Turning back to the Konoha troop he fully expects to be dead, he instead finds a wall of dried mud that caught every senbon flung in their direction. "You've gotta be shitting me."

"We're not."

Aoi just barely ducks to his right in time to avoid a horizontal swipe of Sasuke's own blade, a chokuto with a black and crimson laced tsuka. Looking over his shoulder, he finds the veins in Sasuke's eyes starting to part and seep blood into his onyx irises.

He vaults backwards and draws Raijin no Ken from his belt, swinging into Sasuke's blade and fully expecting the boy to attempt to block with it. Sasuke instead attempts to dodge beneath the blade, seeing the fault in blocking a blade made of pure lightning chakra, but he fails to sweep his blade low enough in time. A powerful shock courses through him, ripping a scream from the genin's throat as he nearly drops off his feet. Seeing an opening to strike, Aoi thrusts his foot into Sasuke's gut and sends him tumbling back across the bridge. "Are you really stupid enough to cross blades with me?!"

Sasuke grunts as he stumbles to his feet, then sheathes his blade at his back. "… You're right. I wanted to test myself in front of one of the Seven Swordsmen, but my blade's just a liability here…" He shifts into his standard combat stance and narrows his eyes. His sharingan is now developed to it's incomplete state, but more than enough to provide the boost he needs. "But I don't need it to kill you."

"Fine then!" He spreads his arms and leaves himself wide open. "Come at me, then!"

Sasuke takes one slow step forward- then streaks forwards with a burst of chakra from his foot, passing by the man's left. Aoi sees this coming and moves to block with his stolen blade, but Sasuke remains just out of its range. He skids to a stop behind Aoi, and despite the mild whiplash he's certain he'll receive, he bolts towards the man's back- aiming for the left still where he'll least expect it. He was right on the money, and gets one good jab in with his Mahiken, stunning the foolish wannabe swordsman and obliterating his guard. "W-What?!"

Sasuke smirks as he lands three more blows with Mahiken in quick succession, and just as Ao manages to power through and swing the Raijin no Ken regardless, he supercharges his Mahiken for just a moment to smack the blade aside with minimal stunning to himself and gets a solid jab to Aoi's right elbow.

Down goes the Raijin no Ken.

Kakashi grins beneath his mask. "And here it comes."

Mahiken is a versatile and powerful skill, but far from the lethal tool of a shinobi. It can debilitate an opponent with ease, but dealing actual damage is something else entirely. Exactly why Sasuke chose to create this next addition to his arsenal.

As the shining blue sparks of electricity in his hands die out, an entirely different spark lights as his hands are shrouded in flame. "Meoruken!" (Burning Fist)

Each following blow in Sasuke's constant flurry lands with searing heat, cooking his flesh and setting the man's clothes ablaze. As Aoi stumbles back from each blow as second degree burns pile up across him, some on the verge of third, he leaves his guard open enough for Sasuke to grab his headband and channel fire chakra into it. This burns the Ame headband onto his forehead and leaves him screaming in agony- just before Sasuke kicks up the Raijin no Ken and catches it. His natural lightning affinity produces a longer blade, which cleaves clean through Aoi's neck and cuts his screams short.

Sasuke scoffs and wipes a few sparse specks of blood from his face as the body drops. "I guess I should seal that head for the bounty, shouldn't I?"

Kakashi nods and tosses the boy a scroll. "Go right ahead."

Off to the side, Zabuza starts a slow clap. "Excellent work, kid. Nice to see that self-important prick get what was comin' to 'em. I'd say you earned that blade…" He slowly starts to grin beneath his mask. "But let's see if you've got what it takes to survive m-"

The entire population of the bridge is silenced as the entire end section of the bridge Zabuza stands on splits in half and folds like a book onto him, slamming shut with incredible speed. Naruto watches his handiwork from atop the mud wall with a grin. Axis placed in the bridge itself during construction two days ago, with two very large weights provided by Tazuna's stocks of raw steel beams marked with gravity seals as the counterweights to force the whole thing to close on itself and crush anyone between the two halves in one swift move-

But it halts short of crushing them as Zabuza wedges them apart with Kubikiriboucho, hanging from his blade's tsuka with a blank, unamused glare. Haku is nowhere to be seen. "… Alright, I'm impressed, brat. But now you've gotta die."