I do not own Naruto Shippuden or any of the characters.
Infiltration
Ryuu watched as the clones all fell over. He had been a little let down when Sasame tried to poison them all, but as the two unwounded Sound Village Ninja that had been pestering them arrived and Sasame asked if they would take her to Arashi now, he couldn't really blame her. Then, the one with the sheers smashed them into her, knocking her out and sending her flying. Naruto caught her, being the first one to reveal himself, then Ryuu appeared opposite them, blocking their escape. The others all appeared around them, the two Hidden Sound Ninja looking around in confusion, then at the sleeping clones, who all exploded into smoke.
"Oh I see," the one with the sheers said. "Clones. Alright, we'll deal with you ourselves."
"I'd love to see you try it," Ryuu smirked.
The ninja shot forward, only for Ryuu to appear under him, smashing a foot into the underside of his jaw. Then, Ryuu leapt into the air, grabbing him by the back of the shirt and spinning around once before hurling him into the ground head-first. The other ninja, probably the one who controlled spiders, was about to attack Ryuu when Jiraiya appeared, slamming a Rasengan into his gut and launching him backward. He crashed to the ground and bounced and rolled along before slowing to a stop. Ryuu kicked his own opponent to that one before leaning backward, avoiding several kunai from Kagero, who was standing on a boulder off to one side.
"It is time, the antlion appears from beneath the earth, and spreads its wings for only a brief moment," Kagero said. "And with its birth, the Kagero you know dies."
Suddenly, he began to swell, lowering his head as his entire body, including his clothes, turned a dull brown, like an insect's shed skin, or a dried up cocoon. Then, his back split open and chakra began to flood out, companied by the chirping of insects. Then, the chakra began to fade, four chakra wings unfolding from around a small girl with an off-white dress and shoulder-length green hair, the four chakra wings spreading from her back and keeping her airborne. Ryuu stared at them in awe.
"It's...possible?" Ryuu breathed.
"Focus Ryuu," Jiraiya said. "I've got a bad feeling about this."
Ryuu nodded, shifting his attention to the girl the wings were extended from, activating his Sharingan. The girl looked up at them, revealing a light purple metal band around her neck and dull, dark purple eyes.
"Lord Orochimaru has promised that our clan will spread its wings in the sun once again," the girl said. "But for that to happen, I must sacrifice all. I must perform the ninja art I can perform but once in a lifetime."
The wings beat once, sending her up into the air where she began to form hand seals.
"Kagero's Ninja Art, Ephemeral," Kagero said.
Suddenly, the wings shot out, combining into a beam of pure chakra. Ryuu leapt backward, Jiraiya leaping to the side, and the blast crashed down where they had been, shattering the ground but missing them. As they looked up at her, Ryuu noticed that her wings had chunks missing from them, and he could sense that her chakra was fading quickly.
"I believed him," Kagero said, beginning to glow. "I thought it was for the good of the clan. I wanted to believe."
Then, she shot downward, the chakra around her hitting the other two and scattering, all three vanishing as it did. Ryuu stood, looking around and back at Sasame. She was still unconscious. He walked over just as Naruto turned to Tayuya. He had been waiting for this. The entire time he'd been with them, he hadn't said a word to her. But now that they had a moment to rest, it was inevitable that he would have words for her.
"You look really familiar," Naruto said, Ryuu face palming and shaking his head. "Do I know you from somewhere?"
"Are you some kind of idiot or something?" Tayuya asked.
"You could say that," Ryuu said, Sakura nodding in agreement.
"Hey, that's not very nice!" Naruto said. "Just who the hell are you anyway?"
Tayuya stared at the ground for a long while before speaking. "I'm Tayuya. I was a member of the Sound Four who were sent by Lord Orochimaru to escort Sasuke back to Orochimaru. I'm the one you took the coffin back from before Kimimaro stole it from you."
"Oh yeah," Naruto said. "You do look kind of familiar. Hey wait!"
"You're one of Orochimaru's goons!?" Sakura gaped, both drawing kunai and readying themselves.
"I must be missing something," Jiraiya said. "Perhaps you could explain why she's here right now."
"She's been given a second chance by Tsunade," Ryuu said. "She was placed on a team with myself and Fu as a sort of test run to see if she can be trusted. If she can, she's to be allowed to join the Hidden Leaf Village."
"Is that so?" Jiraiya asked. "I notice she doesn't have any tools or weapons. Is she not doing well?"
"Yugao doesn't trust her enough to give her any," Ryuu said. "So far Tayuya has given no reasons not to trust her."
"I see," Jiraiya nodded. "In order for someone to gain your trust, you first have to give it to them."
"That's what I said," Ryuu nodded.
"We can't trust her!" Sakura said. "She works for Orochimaru!"
"No," Ryuu said. "Orochimaru used to torture and rape her."
Everyone stared at him, then at Tayuya, who stared at the ground.
"When she had the option to end it by becoming his bodyguard, she took it, just like anyone would," Ryuu said.
"Except it never stopped," Tayuya said, visibly shaking. "I couldn't leave. If I had, he'd have found me and..."
"She served him out of fear, not loyalty," Ryuu said. "That's why I think she deserves a chance at having a life not serving under Orochimaru."
"You really were afraid of him?" Naruto asked.
"Yes," Tayuya said. "More than anything else in the world."
"I suppose she does deserve a second chance then," Sakura said. "I'm not saying I trust you, but I can at least understand."
"Thank you," Tayuya said.
"Come on," Ryuu said. "Kagero took the others this way."
He began to lead, extending his senses as far as he could and the others followed.
Ryuu watched the entrance to Orochimaru's hideout. He hadn't been able to follow Kagero all the way there. Only get them heading in the right direction. After that, Sasame had woken up and had apologized. Once they had convinced her that there were no hard feelings, she had led them the rest of the way.
"So, who wants to knock?" Ryuu asked.
"I'll go first," Yugao said.
"Hold on," Jiraiya said. "Eight big rats will undoubtedly trip the alarms. Why don't we send in a critter that won't first."
"Good idea," Ryuu nodded, whistling.
After a moment, a brown owl landed on his shoulder. He smiled, stroking its head before pointing to the entrance.
"Can you fly ahead of us and look for traps?" Ryuu asked.
The owl hooted and took off, flying to the entrance and circling, waiting for them. They all walked over, the owl heading inside ahead of them.
"You can control birds?" Jiraiya asked.
"Birds just naturally listen to me," Ryuu shrugged.
As they walked down the fairly cramped hallway, the owl never got more than a few meters ahead of them. Soon, they came to a winding staircase and the owl dropped back to a couple feet in front of Ryuu. Then, they reached the bottom and it landed, three tunnels leaving the room they had found themselves in. Ryuu knelt and stroked the owl's head.
"Thank you for taking us this far," Ryuu said. "You can head on home now."
The owl hooted and turned, fling back out of the hideout as they all turned to the tunnels. Jiraiya was arguing with Naruto and Sakura about his method of choosing a path, setting the end of a pole on the ground and taking the path it pointed to when it fell. Ryuu stepped up beside them.
"Enough," Ryuu said. "Jiraiya, since you're the strongest, you go right alone. Sakura, you Naruto, Sasame, and Fu go straight. Tayuya, Yugao, and myself will all go left."
"Isn't your team a little stacked?" Naruto asked.
"Because Tayuya has to stay with me as per Yugao's orders, and Yugao has to stay with Tayuya as per Tsunade's orders," Ryuu said. "If you want to complain, you're welcome to spend some quality time with Jiraiya."
Naruto shook his head vigorously.
"That's what I thought," Ryuu said. "Everyone be careful."
They all nodded and Fu gave Ryuu a quick kiss before walking into her tunnel, Naruto, Sakura, and Sasame following, Jiraiya taking his own tunnel. Ryuu turned to Yugao, who nodded.
"I'll lead," Yugao said.
The others fell in line, Ryuu behind Yugao and Tayuya behind him, as they walked down the hallway. They remained silent, all eyes scanning the walls, ceiling and floors. Ryuu felt tense. He was certain they should have run into either some traps or some Hidden Sound Shinobi by now. Suddenly, Tayuya grabbed him from behind, her hand plunging into his Ninja Tool pouch and yanking out a kunai. Then, she yanked him backward, making him bend over and hurled it at Yugao. The kunai passed within an inch of the front of Yugao's face, making her leap backward. Then, in the blink of an eye, Yugao had Tayuya against the wall, her sword to her throat, but from where Ryuu had fallen, he could see something Yugao hadn't, which Tayuya obviously had.
"I knew you couldn't be trusted!" Yugao snarled. "Now you'll die!"
"Yugao stop!" Ryuu shouted, Yugao looking over at him. "Look."
He pilled a round smoke bomb out of his pouch and rolled it down the hallway, past where Yugao had been when she jumped backward. Not even a foot beyond where Tayuya had stopped her, the floor suddenly opened up, the smoke bomb dropping as it did. Yugao set Tayuya on her feet, staring at the hole that had smoke coming out of it now. They walked over, looking down as the smoke cleared, seeing bamboo spikes at the bottom, each coated in a thick purple fluid that Ryuu could instantly guess was poison.
"She saved you," Ryuu said.
Yugao said nothing, pulling the kunai out of the wall and handing it back to Ryuu, who put it away.
"The hideout I was in had a lot of these trap floors," Tayuya said. "But it looks like it should be safe on the other side."
"Maybe you should lead, since you know what traps to look for," Yugao said.
Tayuya nodded, backing up then sprinting forward, leaping across the gap. As she landed, she rolled forward, tensing as she stopped and looked around. Nothing. Ryuu leapt across next, landing beside Tayuya and also looking around. He nodded to Yugao who jumped across as well. From there, they continued with Tayuya in the front, Ryuu behind her, and Yugao bringing up the rear, kunai in hand and ready to kill Tayuya at a moment's notice. After a few hundred meters, Tayuya pointed out a trip wire and they all carefully avoided it, then a few hundred feet after it was a pressure plate. Finally, they reached a large set of double doors, a second hallway coming from off to the side. Fu and the others walked over from that one, Naruto and Sakura both looking like they had run a mile in under two minutes.
"Are they okay?" Ryuu asked.
"We had some trouble with a trap door," Fu said.
"We almost did too," Ryuu said. "Tayuya saved Yugao."
Fu smiled at Tayuya and nodded, then looked to the door. As they turned to it, the left door swung open slowly.
"We're being invited in," Ryuu said. "I suppose we might as well not keep them waiting."
Fu nodded and they walked into the room together, the others following. Inside, the room was nearly pitch black, a row of sconces on the sides of pillars lighting a path along the middle of the room, but the rest remained in complete darkness. They couldn't tell how big the room was. But the torches went for a few hundred meters, and the pillars, from what they could see, were at least a hundred feet high. Ryuu and the others scattered into the shadows, Ryuu sinking into the ground and moving to the side of a pillar, far above the sconce, up where the light ended.
"You all certainly took your time getting here," a familiar voice said from somewhere in the shadows.
Ryuu's eyes narrowed as he watched from his spot in the pillar as Kabuto stepped out of the shadows, smiling as he looked around.
"My, there certainly are a lot of you," Kabuto said.
"Kabuto, what are you doing here?" Ryuu asked, Kabuto looking around, trying to find him.
"Is that Ryuu Uchiha?" Kabuto asked.
"It is," Ryuu said.
"Ah, I see," Kabuto nodded. "Well, I suppose I won't be needing this disguise then."
He reached up to his face, pulling and ripping his skin, along with his clothes and hair, off and throwing them away. In his place was Kagero. Ryuu narrowed his eyes.
"Oh, I see," Ryuu said. "So it's you again. And here I thought that jutsu you attacked us with killed you."
"It was supposed to," Kagero said. "However, Kabuto Yakushi healed me before he left to follow Orochimaru and that boy."
"You saw Sasuke?" Ryuu asked.
"They were here for several weeks while Kabuto treated the boy's injuries," Kagero said. "Then they left as soon as the boy was healed. However, Kabuto stayed behind in order to ensure things proceeded as planned. I don't know what plan it was he was working on, but he certainly was not serving Orochimaru."
"Excuse me?" Ryuu asked.
"Kabuto Yakushi revealed to me that Orochimaru had betrayed our clan," Kagero said. "He stole our jutsu and never mean to restore our clan. We were nothing but tools to be used in Orochimaru's experiments. Orochimaru has been using us the entire time. When Kamakiri and Jigumo pleaded with what they thought to be Orochimaru in order to have him save me, the false Orochimaru killed them both."
"False Orochimaru?" Ryuu asked. "Then who is it? And how long ago did Kabuto leave?"
"He left about two hours ago," Kagero said. "You just missed him."
"We could still pick up his trail!" Naruto cheered.
"No," Jiraiya said. "The trail will have gone cold by now. Especially as careful as Kabuto is."
"You never said who the false Orochimaru is," Ryuu said.
"It's Arashi," Kagero said.
"Arashi's alive!?" Sasame gasped.
"Is that Sasame?" Kagero asked, surprise showing on her face. "I see. You've been searching for him, haven't you? You and your cousin were always so close to one another, weren't you? It would be better if you didn't see him now. He's not the Arashi you knew. He's changed."
"He's still my cousin!" Sasame said.
Ryuu grew out of the pillar, dropping to the ground before Kagero and stood. "What will you do now?"
"I will take Sasame to her cousin, if that is her wish," Kagero said. "Or, I can take her to safety."
"Take her to Hanzaki," Yugao said, stepping out of cover. "He can look after her. But don't leave her alone with his men."
Kagero nodded as the others began to step out of cover as well.
"No," Sasame said. "I have to see Arashi."
"Very well," Kagero nodded. "He is through that door."
She gestured to a large metal double door off to her right, and Ryuu walked over to it, reaching out to open it only for it to swing open on its own, Orochimaru walking toward them.
"It's good of you to come, Sasame," Orochimaru said.
"Arashi?" Sasame asked. "Is that you?"
Orochimaru reached up, pulling on his head and pulling it off like a mask, leaving a man with silver hair that hugged his head. He pulled Orochimaru's clothes off too, leaving him in a yellow shirt, a black vest, black forearm warmers, a pair of baggy jeans, and a pair of sandals.
"Arashi!" Sasame shouted, running forward to hug him, only to stop as he held out a hand. "What's wrong Arashi?"
"You're mistaken," Arashi said. "I'm not the Arashi you knew."
Ryuu sensed his chakra suddenly spike and grabbed Sasame, leaping away from him as his skin turned the color of rust, his back suddenly writhing beneath his shirt. Then, his shirt exploded off, a bulging mass of flesh growing out of Arashi's back. As it finished growing, Jigumo and Kamakiri's faces grew out of the mass of flesh on the sides.
"The bodies and skills of the Fuma Clan's strongest jonin have joined, and I have been reborn as the ultimate shinobi," Arashi spoke, his eyes completely white and a wide, sadistic, insane grin covering his face. "Now, let me show you the most powerful Ninjutsu you've ever seen, Sasame."
"Arashi, what have you done to yourself?" Sasame breathed.
"Orochimaru you lousy snake!" Naruto snarled. "I won't forgive him for this no matter what!"
"Is this what you meant when you said Arashi had changed?" Ryuu asked Kagero.
"No," Kagero said. "I didn't know about this. I just meant that he wasn't the kind child she remembered."
"Right," Ryuu nodded. "Alright. I'll take him first. Everyone watch him for any weaknesses and to figure out his patterns."
Everyone nodded and Ryuu activated his Sharingan. Before he could move, however, Sasame grabbed his arm.
"You're not really going to fight him are you?" Sasame asked.
"Sasame, this isn't your cousin," Ryuu said. "It's a test subject of Orochimaru. An amalgam of three corpses, fused together and reanimated for the sole purpose of killing. Arashi is gone."
"No!" Sasame said, stepping past Ryuu only for him to spin her, placing her under a genjutsu and tossing her to Sakura, who ran behind a pillar with her.
Suddenly, Jigumo's face shot outward, a massive grotesque upper body forming under it, connecting it to Arashi. Ryuu drew his tanto as Arashi leapt forward, Jigumo stretching outward in a blur and punching at him. Ryuu flipped over him, stepping off of his back and leaping onto a pillar. Arashi landed beside Jigumo, skidding around and to a stop before leaping at him again. Ryuu leapt off the pillar ahead of another punch and Jigumo turned, spitting out webbing that wrapped around Ryuu's leg, then around his body, cocooning him in seconds.
"What did I say about your pathetic spiders!?" Ryuu shouted, channeling chakra into his tanto and cutting himself free, flipping and landing on the side of a pillar as Arashi leapt at him again.
He flipped over the punch, slashing Jigumo as he passed, blood spraying out of the wound behind Ryuu as Ryuu split him from Jigumo's shoulder to Arashi's hip. Then, Ryuu flipped, landing on his feet and leaping backward, Jigumo's fist cratering the ground, barely missing Ryuu.
"Be careful!" Sakura shouted.
"I know!" Ryuu shouted back, drawing his trench knife as Kamakiri began to grow a body as well, Arashi laughing.
Kamakiri's right arm grew Kamakiri's sheer blades and he lunged, getting them around Ryuu before Ryuu could jump away, only for the sheer blades to crash into Ryuu's tanto and trench knife, stopping. Ryuu grit his teeth as he struggled against the monster's massive strength. Finally, he shoved the blades upward, dropping onto his back as they snapped closed over him, then sank into the floor just ahead of Jigumo's fist, barely escaping. Arashi spun instantly Jigumo spraying his webs at the others, who scattered. Ryuu grew out of the floor behind Arashi and shot forward, dropping into a slide and removing both of Arashi's legs. All three faces screamed in agony, falling onto their backs as Ryuu stood and turned, hurling his tanto into the air and putting his trench knife away forming hand seals.
"Fire Style, Giant Fireball Jutsu!" Ryuu shouted, exhaling a fireball onto Arashi, the fire spreading to Jigumo and Kamakiri as well instantly.
"You got him!" Naruto cheered.
"Look out!" Fu shouted.
Ryuu swore using the Body Flicker Technique to flee, still being hurled away from the body as it exploded. He flipped, crashing down hard beside Fu, then pushed himself up, staring into the flames as a laugh rang out. Then, his gut dropped as a sword he recognized all too well appeared in the center of the flames.
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