Great googly moogly, I finally have a direction I want to take this arc. And it's going to hurt you a lot more than it's going to hurt me.

Review response:

1. TigrezzTail: A little of both, but mostly the idea of spending any amount of time with Sai and Ayame; he's known them the longest and he thought (mostly incorrectly, in two of three cases) that the women he'd traveled to Kiri with needed both a break from him, and time to recover.

2. NarutoManiac2400: That's definitely a conscious effort. In WTSIG, this fic's spiritual predecessor (which I SWEAR I'm still going to edit/polish so that it's not as awkward for me to read back over it) I wanted just about everyone to get their mostly happy endings & avoided the idea of character death as a tool for character growth. It's a habit to unlearn.

Let's get this trainwreck moving.


"So, far be it from me to question your choices, but do you have a plan?" Kidomaru asked, watching Yuurei and Tayuya return from the wilderness of Mizu no Kuni. "You just killed a lot of people."

Yuurei shrugged, holding Tayuya's limp body with both arms as he descended into Orochimaru's long-unused underground hideaway. Frankly, the demon didn't feel like he needed a plan—as far as he was concerned, everyone in Mizu no Kuni that wasn't one of this safehouse's eight other residents could be killed on sight. Tayuya shifted in his grasp, her walnut-brown eyes ringed with red as she opened them. Though he dismissed it as his imagination, Yuurei thought for a moment that the breadth of those bloody red marks had widened.

"Did something happen?" The redhead asked, shaking her head before registering that she was being stared at.

"You exhausted your chakra right before we made it back. I carried you for the last two minutes or so." Yuurei answered honestly, making no motion to set her down. Though he'd told her to stay behind and rest, he wasn't in the mood to reprimand her for her disobedience; her insistence on coming to the battlefield had allowed Yuurei to witness something remarkable. It had shaken him—whatever dark art Orochimaru had used when he placed his seal on Tayuya, it had adjusted her body to Yuurei's demonic youki.

"I'm sorry, mast—Yuurei." Tayuya's near-slip didn't go unnoticed, but she cared less about Kidomaru's confused expression and more about Yuurei's knowing grin. After transforming for the first time, she'd processed thoughts and feelings that her human side attempted to ignore. She knew it, and so did he; how could he not? He'd undergone the same heaven-defying experience.

"You don't have to be sorry. I was worried about your safety, and Yugito's, and Fu's. But if you're that concerned about fighting by my side...I'll relent, I guess?" Yuurei chuckled, only to attune himself to the seal he'd placed on Yugito three and a half months ago. Despite the calm demeanor she'd shown when briefly parting ways with him, Yuurei could feel her anger. Going out on a limb, he mused that it had more to do with Tayuya's disobedience than his own request that they stay behind. Setting Tayuya down on her feet and allowing her to lead him, the pair walked further into the small safehouse.

A thick aura of murderous intent filled the air on the other side of a door that Yuurei stopped in front of, and it was strong enough to make the blond demon impressed. Sliding the door open, his reflexes were all that kept him from getting his throat crushed by Yugito's clawed hands; his slightly-longer reach allowed him to grip the older Jounin by her forearms, the ferocious expression on her face preparing Tayuya to go on the defensive. Yugito's mismatched eyes were wide and fearsome, and her teeth were bared with a scream she couldn't voice. Her face was less than a hand's distance away from Yuurei's, and it was taking everything in her to resist the urge to try biting him.

The grip that Yuurei held Yugito with wasn't weak, but it lacked the sense of overwhelming strength that she'd become used to seeing him display when his life was threatened. It wasn't that he didn't believe in her strength; it was that he didn't believe in her willingness to kill, and he was right. After several seconds of struggling against a grip that wouldn't let her attack or retreat, her legs gave out from underneath her.

Why did she feel so desperate to stay by his side? Why was she angry, and who was it directed towards? She didn't know. What had he done to her, she asked herself, that demanded this response—to attack him, them?

Was it really a choice?

"I told you that you needed to be more considerate of our feelings," Tayuya said smugly.

"What are you implying?" Yugito grimaced as she spoke, and her redheaded companion's response was to quietly shake her head. Somewhere along the way, Tayuya had lost her skullcap, but the Nibi Jinchuriki put that train of thought on hold as she processed the other woman's sentence. Narrowing her eyes, the first thing that Yugito felt was a surging wave of denial—she knew perfectly well what Tayuya was implying, and there was no way it was real. Firstly, because that would mean Tayuya was effectively admitting it in the open; secondly, she didn't have, or share, those feelings. Not at all. Completely impossible.

Oh, fine. Lie to yourself, then. Matatabi spoke up. Yuurei was only gone for a few hours, and her vessel got this worked up? The lengths some humans would go to...

Shut up! Shut UP! Yugito fumed inwardly as her slack body was swept up into Yuurei's taut arms. His skin and muscles hadn't always been this solid, had they? Did the energy from those he killed work towards giving him an indestructible body that could safely handle his youki at all times? Why was she noticing it? Matatabi rolled her eyes in mockery from within Yugito's seal.

"Tayuya's right," Yuurei said. His firm grip was all that kept Yugito upright, and his arms shifted to bring her closer to him. Pressing his bare chest against her, one of his hands fount the nape of her neck as the other pressed into her back. "I know you're a Jinchuriki, and that means you can handle more than most people, but I wanted you to be safe. I've trusted Sai and Ayame to watch my back for longer than I care to think about, so I told them to come with me. It was selfish of me, and I'm sorry."

"I'm not sure you appreciate the severity of your skill in Fuinjutsu." Tayuya's words came as she slinked forward, gently placing her hands on Yugito's shoulders as she loosely sandwiched Yuurei between them. "The compulsion to stay with you...it's not a question of command or suggestion, it's about wants versus needs. The difference between the seal Orochimaru put on me, and the one you replaced it with...it's night and day."

Though it was terrifying to find someone at Yuurei's young age that could be considered a savant in the esoteric field of Fuinjutsu, his lack of control over that talent could have been considered comedic; whether it was the enslavement seal on Yugito's neck, the modification of the Ichibi's seal before Gaara's death, the fang marks on Tayuya's shoulder, or the Mark of the Beast in Temari's body...he always seemed to underestimate the effect his actions would have. Thinking to herself, Tayuya wondered: was it because, as a demon, he was holding humans to standards they couldn't meet?

"I..." Yuurei was torn between another attempt at an apology, and simple acknowledgement. "...I understand."

There was further conversation to be had, as far as the two women were concerned, but neither of them felt like addressing the elephant in the room. Yugito was currently refusing to admit that elephants even existed, and Tayuya needed to sleep for longer than five minutes in order to live as a functional human. So, in accordance, the redhead pushed Yuurei and Yugito through the doorway they'd been standing in for the last few minutes. Without so much as a "goodnight," the redhead shut the door, walked over to the room's large bed, and unceremoniously dropped on top of it.

"You should rest too." Yuurei spoke softly, letting go of Yugito and looking her in the eye. "I don't know how long we're going to be here, and you might not get another chance to relax for a while."

"What about you?" Yugito asked, concern in her eyes. She appreciated that his actions stemmed from worrying about her, but what good would that do if nobody returned the favor?

"I'm going to keep watch," Yuurei responded.

"In a cloaked underground base?" Yugito questioned, wondering if there was some ulterior motive in the young demon's words—it might've been impossible for him to lie, but Yugito was no stranger to the doublespeak that the majority of ninja used when they spoke. Yuurei could only smile at the question, the light pull at the corners of his mouth moving them upward as he looked at Yugito.

"Someone has to make sure that we'll all stay safe," he countered.

"Let it be one of Orochimaru's goons." Yugito grabbed Yuurei's hand in an attempt to convince him. Though he'd always been somewhat willful, he considered his situation. He'd already upset Yugito once today, and Tayuya had been very blunt in telling him that he needed to think about them more consistently. They weren't prizes to be won and treasure to be guarded—they were people.

"Alright, fine," the demon said as he walked over to the room's lone bed. It was certainly large enough for the three of them. Moving on the opposite side of Tayuya, he got in the middle of the bed before turning to look at the redhead. "You know it's designed for you to lie the other direction, yes?"

"M'kmf," came Tayuya's muffled reply as Yugito moved on Yuurei's other side. "L'm'ln."

"Yes, dear," Yugito said mockingly. Immediately, Tayuya's head shot up.

"Fucking excuse you?" The redhead said in aggravation, only for Yuurei's strong hand to effortlessly pull her completely onto the bed. Under ordinary circumstances, she'd kvetch and moan about it, but she was still too tired to make any real protest. Rolling off of Yuurei's body, Tayuya lied flat on her own section of the bed.

Tomorrow, a new day would begin, and Yuurei had developed a plan: walk to the nearest battlefield and kill everything that moved.


Zabuza stood amid more corpses than he'd seen in a long time, the scene of a complete massacre sprawling out into a killing field before him. It wasn't just loyalists—plenty of rebels had fought and died here. An uneasy feeling lingered in the mist around him, enshrouding his senses and leaving the seasoned swordsman on edge. Something terrible had happened here, beyond the expectations of these soldiers.

Closing his eyes, Zabuza's keirakukei were allowed to sense the energy in the world around him. This was a risky process, as it would temporarily leave him unable to draw on his chakra, but he was alone here; none of these corpses would threaten him. As his meridians filled with ambient energy beneath the darkening sky, Zabuza shivered. Anybody else attempting to make heads or tails of the feedback he was receiving would fall short, only able to tell that a powerful master had fought here, but the Kirigakure no Kaijin was different—he'd felt this presence twice before, in Nami no Kuni.

"The demon." As the Kubikiribouchou shivered, Zabuza's eyes snapped open, and a fierce expression took hold of his face beneath the armor-tape he used to guard it.

That blond brat was here, just like he'd told Kisame and the Mizukage two weeks ago. Quickly closing off his keirakukei from their connection with the world around him, Zabuza took a moment to steady himself before heading northeast. In any event, whether or not the Yondaime Hokage's son was nearby meant nothing to him. Before the civil war was over, before the rebellion was crushed, he would meet the demon on the battlefield and cut his body into ribbons. Only then could Meizu, Gozu, and Haku rest easy in the afterlife.

It wasn't that Zabuza had any love for his long-dead teammates, but they'd been long overdue for a return to Kirigakure, and they'd never gotten the chance to see their homeland again. Even worse, there hadn't been bodies to return to their families—something that Zabuza considered a personal failure. He wanted to do right by his men.

Wherever the demon was, Zabuza wouldn't stop until he'd sent the blond bastard back to hell.


Yuurei reveled in the smell of dead flesh and bloody mist, and his sandworm tooth sank through bodies like a heavy lure into a fishing pond. In the month since he'd come to Mizu no Kuni, he'd lost count of how many people he'd killed on either side of the conflict—not that he'd been counting in the first place. Every day, it seemed the battlefields nearest to Orochimaru's safehouse encroached further south. And, unlike his first foray as a neutral third party, he didn't mind the idea of survivors getting away to send a message to their superiors. If a few irrelevant ninja escaped, then they'd inevitably bring more soldiers to attempt to kill him and each other.

And then he'd kill most of them, too; tt was a vicious, if entertaining, cycle. Standing in the middle of a thin forest that he'd littered with bodies, he couldn't help continuing forward.

"Yugito, Tayuya, to me. Everyone else, fan out and kill any stragglers you feel like." Yuurei felt seven presences move away from him, and two made their way to either side of his back.

Tayuya had taken to standing on his right when she walked with him, and Yugito had chosen to mirror her. It had become second nature to them; ever since the day that they'd arrived, and the temporary fallout it had caused, the pair of women had never been far from Yuurei's side. Though the men of the Sound Four had their questions about that kind of consistent proximity, Sai, Ayame, and Fu all understood. Despite Yuurei's inherent ability to make the natural world avoid him, he had a way of gathering people to him—almost like he was collecting them. Two Jinchuriki, two of Orochimaru's experiments, a Kage, and a little orphan girl who seemed average even when compared to clanless rank-and-file shinobi—he took all kinds.

"Where are we going?" Yugito asked. "None of the survivors went in this direction."

"That's why we're going in this direction," Tayuya replied after a moment of thought. "They're running away, but they don't want to lead us to their base if we follow them. Better to be a live coward than a dead traitor."

Leaving the forest of bodies behind them, the trio eventually came to a natural rock formation; on the end of it was an opening that led to a ravenous canyon and several caves.

"This is probably the rebellion's headquarters," Yuurei said, taking a shot in the dark. He had no proof, but the ravenous canyon that split this once-mighty plateau in half created an imposing image. "Should I make them an offer they can't refuse?"

"Oh, no you don't, asshole. Like we didn't learn to avoid answering your fucking questions after you destroyed an entire village with one explosive seal." Tayuya's face screwed up into an aggravated expression, looking pointedly at the man who'd bound her to him.

"Hey, I'm being serious!" Yuurei's complaint was indignant, and both women took the affronted look on his face as an insult to their intelligence.

"And so was she. If we say yes, you'll kill them all. If we say no, you'll still kill them all," Yugito complained. "Do you ask questions because you like the sound of your voice, or ours?"

Tayuya snorted loudly as Yuurei rolled his eyes, a rare toothy smile cracking the redhead's lips apart A smug smirk had plastered itself on Yugito's face as she refused to look at her fellow blond, even going so far as to turn her face away when he glanced in her direction. Turning away from the opening of the canyon, the young demon put on a serious expression as he looked between his companions.

"Both of you are aware of my grudge with Momochi Zabuza," Yuurei said, "and it's my intention to kill him before leaving this country. If he's working with the rebels, I'll wipe them off the face of the earth. But if not..."

"Amnesty, really? You think someone who's as responsible for as many deaths as you are...can sue for peace?" Tayuya asked, incredulous. Forget Yuurei himself—all eight of his companions, including Yugito and herself, had been complicit in the wholesale slaughter of loyalists and rebels alike.

"Do they really have a choice?" Yuurei answered Tayuya's question with one of his own, and Yugito squeezed her eyes shut as Tayuya began to swear under her breath.

"No...no, they don't," the Nibi Jinchuriki said. "I really hate that you're strong enough for common sense not to matter. I really do."

"In the land where the blind lead the blind, the one-eyed man is king," Yuurei quipped, much to his female companions' consternation.

"That's just a fancy way of saying that might makes right," Tayuya griped. "Which it doesn't."

"Orochimaru?" Yuurei asked.

"Exception, not the rule," Tayuya replied.

"Sanshouo no Hanzo?" Yuurei asked again.

"Freak of nature, bad example." Yugito's denial came even more quickly.

"Sandaime Raikage, Sandaime Hokage, Uchiha Madara, every Jinchuriki ever." Yuurei's unamused stare shifted from Tayuya to Yugito in slow succession. "Might does make right. You've all just convinced yourselves that governance and bureaucracy and civilization somehow trump that fundamental truth. Whoever's fist is biggest, they get to tell other people what to do. And...say, are they trying to sneak up on us? That's cute."

A large group of ninja had moved out from the mouth of the canyon, flanking the party of three in a semicircle that was centered around a tall woman in a form-fitting blue dress with a low neckline. Tayuya wanted to roll her eyes—even now, that woman had to know that many of her fellow rebels were undressing her with their vision. Yugito would have impressed on her the need to avoid judging other women for the way they chose to dress, but she almost couldn't help herself—they were soldiers first, damn it, and eligible bachelorettes second! Unless you were a kunoichi who specialized in those techniques, why dress so provocatively outside of your downtime?

Perhaps it was a blessing that nobody else was privy to Tayuya's internal monologue. Forget the fact that it was because he couldn't be made to give a damn, even Yuurei was more progressive on this issue than she was...and she knew it.

"You've been standing there for a little while," the woman in the blue dress said. Her waist-length hair was a rich enough red to close in on brown, tied in a topknot that did nothing to remove the bangs that framed her picturesque face. "My name is Mei, and I'm the leader of the rebellion. How can we help you?"

Mei's eyes were stunning, a rich green that seemed to glitter like emeralds—and when the passing breeze shifted her hair into her face, covering half of it, she only seemed to become more alluring. Maybe, Tayuya thought—just maybe—this woman did cultivate those kinds of techniques. That would explain her ambivalence to the stares she was being given, and probably received on a daily basis.

What Tayuya didn't seem to realize was that she was the one who was staring.

"I'm here for two things, actually." Yuurei didn't pay the five hundred or so rebels any mind, offering them the same consideration in his thoughts that an ordinary person might spare for a gnat that was vaguely within squashing distance. "First: are you working with Zabuza of the Seven Swordsmen?"

"Fuck that son of a bitch!" A voice in the back of the rebel throng shouted. Mei's face rankled lightly at that outburst, but she resisted turning to deliver a displeased look; from all the reports she'd heard, taking her eyes off of the blond boy in front of her could very well mean death.

"He's one of the Mizukage's right hand men, and the one tasked with suppressing the rebel forces east of Kirigakure. Not exactly a friend of ours," Mei said. Her tight-lipped smile accentuated the statement, and Yuurei nodded in response. The words he said next shook all of the assembled to their cores, save for Yugito and Tayuya, but the two women were hardly immune from his power.

"Alright then. Second: I've come to bargain. So, if you're willing to discuss terms..." Yuurei began walking forward, but his two companions opted not to follow after him. They knew what was coming. "...let's make a deal."

In that near-lifeless section of land, far-removed from—and yet still in the vague vicinity of—Kirigakure, a chill ran down the spine of the world. Frost raced out from beneath the soles of Yuurei's feet; the mist around them was made to freeze into solid sheets of air and ice; the only source of light or warmth in the entire world seemed to reside inside of Yuurei's core. Mei made a move to draw back from the approaching demon, but found that her legs wouldn't answer to her command. Glancing down, she discovered that in the moment the man across from her had spoken, she'd been frozen to the ground beneath her feet.

Yuurei's natural blood-red right eye was starkly bloodshot, its gaze seeming to force everyone ahead of him to stare at it. Equally terrifying was the Sharingan in his left eye socket; though many of the rebels had begun to panic at the sheer threat that Yuurei represented by existing, they quickly became terrified at the realization that they couldn't draw on their chakra to protect themselves.

"As the leader of the rebellion, you'll serve as my collateral," Yuurei said.