Shikamaru's fight progresses in much the same way, with the Nara forfeiting at the point where everyone is expecting the KO. The uproar seems almost bigger than after the first time Sakura watched the fight, and she can't help but wonder whether it's because of the dramatic endings of the prior two fights.
Kankuro – predictably – forfeits before he even gets down to the arena, and Sakura exchanges a look with Kakashi; it's not a good move for Suna, politically, particularly with such a large audience. Knowing what she knows now, the idea of a kage's son and a representative of Suna's famous Puppet Corps all-but chickening-out of a match is not a wise choice considering the secondary purpose of the Chunin Exams.
("Any ideas?" Sakura asks him quietly, lips barely moving, and it's only Kakashi's enhanced hearing that lets him catch her words over the roar of the crowd.
"Some." Kakashi confesses as he considers the Kazekage's children. "None of them good."
A jinchuuriki with a nearly endless chakra supply, a Wind manipulator – meaning that Temari's reserves, despite the showing she gave, would've been largely untouched thanks to the fact that she wasn't creating wind, rather manipulating it with her fan, which required far less chakra – and a puppet master who chose humiliation over letting the Aburame bleed him dry of chakra.
It seems…intentional, somehow, though he's sure that if he were to say that to his therapist, he'd get scolded for paranoia.
Sakura just sighs, a quiet 'thought so' slipping out, then she turns away.)
Still though, when Sasuke's match gets called, she's surprised at how different Sasuke fights now, compared to his fight with Gaara her first time around. Unlike the mix of Academy style, brute force, and misremembered pieces of Clan kata he was known for before, he's using the Uchiha Style as if he's been practicing it since birth, moving with the same grace she recalls Shisui displaying in ROOT, even if Sasuke as he is now still has only half the speed of his cousin.
She watches, ignoring Kakashi's silent gloating beside her, as Sasuke shifts from a feint to a kick and uses the moment his shin blocks his mouth from sight to spit a decent sized fireball straight at Gaara.
While Sasuke was never bad at taijutsu, having a Style uniquely tailored to his chakra nature at his full disposal only makes him better, and she feels an odd itch in her palms as she watches Sasuke fight.
It takes her a few seconds to realise that she wants to spar with him. Properly, this time.
While Shin is proficient in the Uchiha Style, it's not his default attack style. And Shisui was always too scared to hurt them to ever go full out against her or Sai in taijutsu. Somehow, she doubts Sasuke would have the same compunctions, and she feels a grin pull at her lips.
Still, she might be appreciative of it, but the change is drastic enough for others to notice, and she sees the exact moment the jounin around them register the style Sasuke is using.
"Did you-?!" Asuma starts, and Sakura realises that her reflexive reaction any time the man opens his mouth is to frown, which she wonders at. Then, Asuma finishes his sentence, and she suddenly understands the reflex. "The kid shouldn't be using that style, Kakashi. You want to paint an even bigger target on his back?"
Kakashi tenses beside her, at yet another jab at his teaching, at his decisions regarding his students. She feels his pain especially sharply because she was the one to suggest he teach the style to Sasuke. She's indirectly the reason he's being questioned again, and she finds herself speaking before she even realises it.
"Just because a Clan was killed doesn't mean that everybody who knew them was, too." She points out, fighting to keep her voice level. "Sasuke deserves to have a link to his family and his Clan's history. I personally think it's very wise of Kakashi to make sure Sasuke can wield the tools his heritage grants him. Especially if he's going to get hunted for them regardless."
She can see the reaction her words draw from the other sensei, but Kakashi relaxes at her side and that's all that matters. She nudges him subtly, a quiet reassurance, and feels him lean into her in turn. She doesn't know what brought on the distrust Asuma and Kurenai treat Kakashi's teaching with, but she's not going to let it stand.
She takes a leaf out of Shin's book and staunchly ignores any attempts at catching her attention from either of the two, choosing to turn her focus back to the match.
Down in the arena, Sasuke is throwing around fire techniques so hot, she can feel the heat on her face as high up in the stands as they are, but they're not enough to fully melt Gaara's sand yet.
Then, Sasuke appears to grow frustrated and launches two kunai half-way up the wall of the arena, flash-stepping to stand on the protruding handles as he flashes through seals. Gaara's sand stretches out, almost a full twenty metres away from the Suna-nin's sand shield, and then Sasuke waves his hands around and the remaining mist from Haku and Sai's battle collapses, condensing into a sizeable sphere of water right in front of Sasuke, which he promptly launches at the sand tendril Gaara had sent after him.
The sand slows and stills, waterlogged as it is, then Sasuke grins and spits out even more water, directing it at the half-dome around Gaara, then finally draws his sword.
In the split-second between the moment the water hits Gaara's shield and the sand's reflexive reaction, Sasuke is suddenly there, almost in Gaara's guard, sword drawn, the metal chirping with lightning chakra.
He stabs forward, into the place where Sakura instinctively knows his sword will find Gaara's left shoulder, and she's not the only one whose breath catches when the lightning-imbued sword pierces through the sand.
A scream, hoarse, hollow and bloodcurdling rings out, and for a single second, everything is still.
Then, the impenetrable defence catches up and the dome around Gaara closes fully just as the part facing Sasuke suddenly grows spikes, and the Uchiha is too slow to fully dodge the spike that rips into his thigh and right shoulder.
Sasuke jumps back, visibly wary, left hand flying to his shoulder and coming away heavily stained with blood. Sakura is on her feet, heart in her throat as she watches Sasuke stumble just as Gaara starts laughing.
Oh no.
The black eye that forms in the dome, and the blue cursed-seal markings that form on the limb that suddenly stretches from the sand are straight from Sakura's nightmares.
The genjutsu that suddenly slams into them makes Sakura's nightmares look tame in comparison.
She should've guessed that just because Kabuto was dead wouldn't change this part of the Invasion's strategy: the Temple of Nirvana technique was slow-acting and almost gentle in comparison to whatever this is, but it makes sense that the Village of Sound would have more than just one ninja specialising in genjutsu. Starting off a mass invasion with psychological warfare is also considerably smarter than just putting the whole arena to sleep, if she did say so herself.
Still, Sakura has perfect chakra control and has sparred with Inosuke enough times to recognise the nightmares her mind conjures naturally from those forced upon her. She doesn't give the illusion more than a moment of her attention before brutally ripping it from her mind, and when she blinks her eyes open, she's glad to know that it doesn't seem like more than a couple of seconds have passed.
The only change is the Suna and Oto shinobi who are now free of their disguises and slaughtering mindlessly through the stands of Konoha shinobi, because this illusion is considerably harder to break than the one from her original timeline, and that means that Konoha shinobi's reaction time is delayed. The dread that pools in her stomach at that realisation feels like cement.
"Kakashi!" Sakura calls desperately, ducking under the swipe of a gauntlet not unlike Dosu's, darting forward when the momentum of the man's arm leaves his chest open. Chakra sharpens the tips of her fingers and she stabs two of them into the space between the man's third and fourth rip, then carrying the motion upwards, extending the chakra into his heart.
The Oto-nin drops, and she barely pauses to wipe her fingers on her pants before turning to try and locate her taicho.
"The cubs!" Kakashi calls, a hint of panic in his voice as he fends off two Suna-nin while Kurenai tries to rouse Asuma from the genjutsu.
"On it!" Sakura yells back, sending Kakashi one last glance before she launches herself off the gallery and towards the genin balcony.
She sticks to the wall, dodges a puppet and kicks out with a foot to shatter it, the wood no match for Tsunade strength.
She bites into the meat of her palm and presses her bloodied hand against the wall. Ryu, Yu, and Chie appear, no smoke to hide them because of Sakura's iron-fisted rationing of her chakra, and the tigers stick to the wall with ease despite the less than ideal summoning location.
"Anyone with a Suna and Oto headband is an enemy." She greets them curtly, aware that every second she wastes is a second the genin are in danger. "Ryu, Yu, to Sasuke, he needs help with the jinchuuriki. Chie-chan, go stealth and find senpai. Be careful, all of you, and see you soon."
They split off, and Sakura throws herself into the genin balcony just in time to go feet-first into the shoulders of an Oto-nin with a knife to Shikamaru's throat while Sai ducks in and disembowels the man with his tanto.
Shikamaru drops, staggering away and covering his mouth at the sight of the nin's insides outside.
"Aneue." Sai greets, and there's a calm to him that sets him apart from Shikamaru, a certain battle-readiness that proves, beyond his greater skill or formal speech pattern, that he is not a normal genin. "Situation?"
"Sand and Sound attacked." Sakura relays as she bends down to wake Shino and Neji. She doesn't miss the fact that Temari and Kankuro are conspicuously absent from the balcony, but she shifts her attention to Naruto and wakes him, too.
By the time the genin are all awake and she's repeated herself two more times, she's also come to the realisation that she's not sending any of them after Gaara.
"Shino-kun, has your team learned how to break others from a genjutsu?" she asks the Aburame, and she tries not to think about the fact that all of her peers plus Neji are looking to her for orders. She is their superior, technically, but a part of her mind still finds it bizarre.
At Shino's nod, she squares her shoulders.
"Find your teammates and try to break out as many Konoha chunin and above as you can. Neji-san, Shikamaru-san, find your teams and go to the Academy – it's still in session, and the chunin won't be able to fight off enemy-nin and keep an eye on the kids. Naruto-kun, go with them." She rattles off.
"But, sensei-!" Naruto starts, but Sakura has neither the time nor the patience to humour him when she knows the only thing between Gaara and Sasuke are her summons.
"No, Naruto." She snaps. "Go to the Academy. Use your clones to protect any civilians who are out on the streets. Do not argue with me on this."
When the genin just stare at her, she scowls and barks "Go!" until they finally scatter.
Sakura takes a second to take a breath, then turns to Sai, pulling him into a quick side-hug, both for the affection and to pull him out of the way of a stray shuriken. "Be careful, otouto."
"You too, aneue." He murmurs, squeezing her briefly then spinning away to catch the Suna-nin trying to sneak up on them with his tanto.
Sakura leaves him to it, leaping off the balcony and finally dropping down next to Sasuke – it has been barely two minutes since she left Kakashi, but in a battle like this, every seconds counts, and those two minutes felt like a small eternity.
"Sasuke!"
"Sasuke!"
Sasuke jerks and chances a glance to the side, momentarily taking his eyes off the transforming thing that had once been a boy, trusting the tigers to cover his moment of inattention.
Sakura-sensei lands beside him, her mouth set in a grim line and her eyes hard as she studies Gaara.
"Gaara is the jinchuuriki of the One-Tails." She announces, forgoing a greeting and not allowing Sasuke the time to fully absorb that bombshell before she adds, "We need to stop his transformation."
"How?!" Sasuke demands in turn, because all he's managed in his match was annoying Gaara, that much he can admit. Sakura frowns, dodges a swipe from the sand claw and Shunshins closer to him.
"What's the hottest fire you can make?" she asks, not dropping her eyes from where her summons are keeping the jinchuuriki busy, though she pales when one of them is batted away like he weighs nothing and smacks wetly into the wall, disappearing in a puff of smoke milliseconds after his body hits the ground.
"I don't know!" Sasuke snaps, voice edged with fear when he glances around and sees the various battles taking place, and he doesn't understand.
Sakura-sensei pushes him aside, taking the brunt of the sand claw that slams into where they were both standing a split-second earlier, then she's back beside Sasuke and glaring, and Sasuke makes himself think.
"Maroon." He offers, and Sakura's frown deepens.
"Not enough." She murmurs, blood dribbling from her mouth and nose and staining the side of her flak jacket a muddy brown. "Can you keep him distracted for a few seconds? Yu, get Shin down here!"
Distraction. Sasuke can do that.
Sakura disappears, and when she shows up again, she's on her knees with her hands pressed to the ground, and Sasuke watches as vines stretch out from the ground and wrap around the dome Gaara is now fully encased in, multiplying like a macabre kraken until they wrap around the monster's limbs and pin them down.
Shin touches down on the beast's other side then, his cheek and neck bleeding freely and his hair shorter than Sasuke last remembers it, but there's a smile on his face that Sasuke hasn't seen before, and for the first time since he met Shin, Sasuke feels a shiver of fear crest down his spine.
"I dismissed Yu, he was a mess." He greets, then ducks a swipe from a tendril that gets free before it gets restrained again. "What do you need?"
"Turn sand to glass!" Sakura-sensei calls, her voice strained and her eyes screwed shut in concentration as she visibly struggles to keep Gaara contained. "Fast!"
Shin grows serious like a switch has been flipped, and he takes a deep breath to settle himself then begins flashing through unfamiliar signs with a speed Sasuke's only seen Kakashi use.
"Katon: Gōka Messhitsu." Shin murmurs before he takes another breath and slowly breathes out.
Electric blue flame spills from his mouth, a controlled stream instead of a wild fireball, and Sasuke's dumbfounded brain absently remembers his tutor telling him that that colour starts at 2700 Celsius.
He only remembers one person ever using that colour, too; remembers a boy who was as good as a brother showing him that 'real Uchiha get a whole rainbow of flames!' but after a few years at the Academy, Sasuke realised that it wasn't Shisui's Uchiha-ness that allowed him to have a rainbow of fire colours, but his insane control over his chakra.
Shin had been able to go toe-to-toe with Kakashi, and he's told Sasuke that he used to know Shisui, but him knowing that technique…
Sasuke's thoughts are forcefully derailed when Gaara's sand starts to crystallise, but before it has a chance to liquefy completely, Shin cuts off the fire jutsu and flashes through more seals. This time, his exhale doesn't bring with it fire, but a gust of wind, and Sasuke can tell even without seeing the effects firsthand that this technique is stronger still, Wind being Shin's preferred element.
Preferred, but not unique, Sasuke realises, and he ignores the twinge of fear he feels at that realisation in lieu of admiring how the molten sand sets into a translucent mockery of a bauble, with Gaara trapped firmly inside.
"He's going to run out of oxygen soon." he points out absently, almost without conscious input from his brain, and he feels somewhat disconnected from his body when he turns to see what Sakura and Shin were going to do about that fact.
There's a conflicted expression on his sensei's face, a mix of concern and vindictive satisfaction before she wipes the latter away, as if worried he'd see.
"Naruto and the Rookies are guarding the Academy and civilian schools." She relays, and he knows that he's not hearing his peer, but his superior officer right then. "Go to them. Your part in this fight is done, Sasuke."
"And what will you do?" Sasuke asks before he does as ordered, and Sakura looks both amused and annoyed at the fact that he's still there.
Surprisingly, it is not Sakura who answers, but Sai, who seems to materialise at his brother's side, bloodied and singed, but wearing a grin much like Shin's and he doesn't seem to care that Sasuke sees.
"Make sure nobody cracks our bauble." His teammate replies, turning as if summoned to meet blades with a Suna-nin who'd snuck up to appear to do just that.
"I could-!" Sasuke starts, but Sakura flash-steps to his side and smacks her palm to his mouth, effectively silencing him.
"You and Naruto both, I swear. This is non-negotiable. Get out of here." She orders, her gaze and voice colder than usual, before that same, slightly unnerving grin grows on her face, as if she's physically unable to hold it back anymore. "We've got it handled."
Hiruzen wonders where he'd gone wrong, to have ended up where he is, facing his old student whom he'd once considered his son and knowing that the other wants nothing more than to see him dead.
"You and Danzo were always more alike than either of you cared to admit." Orochimaru croons, always one for talking during the battles he cared most about, sickly-sweet poison dripping from his lips, "And you've proven that by all-but orchestrating your very own downfall."
"I haven't fallen yet, Orochimaru." Hiruzen denies, ducking under Orochimaru's katana and throwing fire balls at his old student. "And I am not as careless as Danzo, you'd do well to remember that."
"That may have been the case, once, but you have been in power too long, sensei." Orochimaru laughs, and the concession doesn't feel like the win it should, and Hiruzen feels uneasy even as he darts out of the way of poisonous fangs and lashing tails. "You've grown blind to the fact that you're not the only one who knows how to hide and bide his time and use others to do your dirty work for you."
"If you're speaking of yourself, you have never been particularly subtle in your wish to usurp me." Hiruzen throws back, summoning Enma and sending another gust of fire at Orochimaru, though he just melts and remerges a few feet to the left.
"I am not." He denies, and there's a mocking light in those unnerving golden eyes, as if he's taunting Hiruzen for knowing something he doesn't. "But since we're on the subject, not only have you driven me away with your delusion, but you've been dismissive, too arrogant after your dear friend's fall from grace to account for the saplings that sprouted once the old, rotten roots were ripped out."
Hiruzen freezes, earning a deep gash in his side from Kusanagi even as Enma steps forward to parry a moment later, but Orochimaru catches his moment of inattention and laughs again, the sound sharp and cruel and mocking and familiar enough to break Hiruzen's heart all over again.
"The very children who brought your dear Danzo down have also given me their blessing to do with you as you rightfully deserve." Orochimaru croons, twisting in a way that shouldn't be humanly possible to avoid Enma's staff, and the glint in his eyes tells Sarutobi that he's fully aware he knows just what children he means.
Hiruzen had suspected. He thought he'd had them cornered. He knew the girl wouldn't do anything while her brothers were vulnerable, though he'd kept an eye out just in case. But she hadn't done anything, hadn't retaliated after the mission with Lizard, had kept her head down and done the duty he'd assigned her.
Had obeyed.
And he'd believed the façade, like the fool his first mistake of a student has always accused him of being.
"The great Sarutobi Hiruzen, the Professor, the man who has led the Village through two wars and made it prosper still." Orochimaru lilts, always one for the dramatics, and Hiruzen watches as one of his snakes sinks its teeth into Enma's neck.
No.
"The same man who prevented a civil war by culling the Clan that helped build the very throne on which you sit–" when Hiruzen jerks his eyes from his friend and summon of five decades to meet Orochimaru's cruel golden gaze, his student smiles, sly and serpentine, "–oh, yes, I know about your little deal with Itachi-kun, truly devious of you, sensei. Eradicate your competition while throwing your tool to the wolves, ostracised and leprous to the Village he'd sacrificed everything to protect."
Orochimaru laughs again, and then he's suddenly in front of Hiruzen, one cold, pale hand stroking briefly over his cheek while another sinks a blade into his stomach and twists.
"And yet, for all your wisdom, you failed to account for the viciousness of the sprouts who you foolishly allowed to live after ROOT fell." He whispers, and, bizarrely, steps back, giving Hiruzen the time to collect himself and remove the blade Orochimaru had stabbed him with.
Only to freeze when his hand recognises the leather beneath his fingers as the gift he'd given Orochimaru upon the boy's promotion to chunin what feels like a lifetime ago.
"What was it? Sentiment? Arrogance?" Orochimaru asks as he watches his face, no doubt to track his reaction to the realisation that Orochimaru had kept the gift all those years, as if they aren't in the middle of an invasion he had orchestrated, engaged in what would surely be a battle to the death.
"Have you not learnt that the most dangerous shinobi is the one who has nothing left to lose?" Orochimaru pushes, smiling suddenly, and this expression is the most genuine one he's shown so far, and Hiruzen hates himself for the fact that he still knows the man well enough to realise that. "Danzo was right, you know, in his own, naïve way. I was made strong by my blood, by my suffering, by my love, but I did not reach my full potential until I lost everything."
Hiruzen wants to scoff, but he doesn't have enough breath in his lungs for the action, and the blade he pulls out is shiny with more than just his blood.
"I see you doubting me, sensei." Orochimaru murmurs, and his eyes have narrowed to slits now, the lilting, mocking tone finally gone. "The monster people use to scare their children to sleep with, capable of love? But I was, I suppose, in my own way."
The worst thing, Hiruzen muses as his vision greys around the edges, is that he knows that.
"I loved Tsunade, once. I loved Jiraiya. Sakumo. You, even, in my youth. And then I lost them all. One. By. One." The sharpness is back, and this time, Orochimaru isn't laughing, isn't even smiling.
There is contempt in his eyes, bitter loathing and disappointed ambition, and Hiruzen realises that the past tense his student had used was more than just a linguistic quirk when he adds, sharper than even the knife he'd stabbed through Hiruzen's liver, "And I was better for it."
"How does it feel, sensei?" Orochimaru queries when Hiruzen falls to his knees, his legs unable to support his weight anymore, his hands shaking so much the knife clatters onto the roof between them. "To know that your own student will be the one to finally bring you down? To know that one of Tsunade's line wishes you dead? That she wields the Mokuton, just as wildly and instinctively as Hashirama? Or that Sakumo's kin survives, not just in little Kakashi? That he has found a home here, right under your nose, right in this Village you once made hate us both?"
Hiruzen isn't sure what he's hearing, isn't sure he trusts his ears at this point, his senses dulled by the poison rampaging through his body and the weight of all his failures crashing down around him. Still, he supports his weight with one hand while his other shakes as it curls through seals, once, twice, three times before he feels the chakra drain and knows his life is all but forfeit.
"Truly, old man, have you forgotten the age-old adage? 'The enemy of my enemy is my friend', no?" Orochimaru carries on, unaware of Hiruzen's final betrayal, his tone almost conversational as he crouches down a few feet away, doubtless to satisfy whatever perversion has twisted him to the point where he needs to watch Hiruzen like a hawk during his final moments. "It just so happens that in your long, long life, you've made a lot of enemies."
As Hiruzen's vision fades, he feels Orochimaru come closer, a blurry splash of pale skin and purple stopping mere inches from him, catching him as he lists to the side.
"I just happen to be the most successful one." Orochimaru whispers in his ear, withdrawing his grip and letting Hiruzen fall listlessly onto the roof, before adding, quiet and final, "Goodbye, Hiruzen-sensei."
The last things Hiruzen hears is the whoosh of air and Orochimaru's scream as the Shinigami finally descends, pure white chakra burning and blinding and unforgiving as it rips his soul from his body.
But Hiruzen comes easily, aware that he's lived a long life and comforted by the knowledge that he'll be taking at least part of Orochimaru with him to hell.
There is a lull in the fighting in his sector of the audience stands, and Gai finally allows himself to take a breather and look down.
He had been heading for the contestants' balcony when Kakashi's young assistant had tackled the Oto-nin then broke three of the genin out of the genjutsu with nary a touch and a flex of her chakra. He'd heard the peculiar order to protect the Academy and civilians, had wondered why she didn't give any order to Kakashi's other student.
The dark-haired teen that made the Uchiha look expressive had stayed where he was when the others took off, made eye-contact with the girl, and his face had lost any trace of a smile or childish curiosity. Instead, he nodded like a soldier might at a general, murmured something Gai hadn't been able to catch, and met the oncoming Suna-nin without a hint of fear or hesitation.
From then, Gai was vaguely aware of the girl and the Uchiha-boy teaming up to incapacitate the Ichibi host, but he missed the moment when the free-raging-junchuuriki became a trapped-in-a-bauble jinchuuriki.
There was always something…off, about Kakashi's partner, even as far back as when he first met her, when an ANBU agent that barely reached his elbow had knocked on his door and asked for the key to Kakashi's apartment with only the briefest of explanations given as to Kakashi's state.
But it's only now, as he stands and watches her fight in the moment's breather that his sector emptying of Suna or Oto-nin has granted them, that he's getting the full picture.
The girl stands on the ruined grounds of the arena, back-to-back with two other boys – one of Kakashi's, Tenten's preliminary opponent, and one Gai had never seen before, though he looks to be the oldest of the lot.
Gai notices two things in quick succession: one, the trio appears to be guarding the trapped jinchuuriki, and two, there are corpses strewn around them.
Suna and Oto shinobi alike, though the former had decreased in frequency once the number of bodies around the trio had entered double-digits, and stopped entirely once it reached two dozen.
Gai knows that Konoha is famed for its teamwork.
The Sannin, Hatake Sakumo, Ino-Shika-Cho configurations, even the Shodaime and Uchiha Madara's legendary partnership – they were all Konoha-born and raised, and their teamwork is, to this day, a thing of legend.
Yet the trio below are taking the notion of 'teamwork' to a whole new level.
They're moving less like individuals and more like cogs in one machine, blending together seamlessly like they've been doing it for decades, always somehow in the right place at the right time. Gai watches as Kakashi's student crouches, a scroll on his bent knee, and at the same time as his knee hits the ground, the girl is in front of him, a vicious Earth jutsu crushing the legs of two incoming Oto-nin.
The silver-haired teen is cutting down viciously on her other side, chakra-edged katana shooting off gusts of deep-cutting wind, dismembering the shinobi who come too close. Sticking so close to a formation should be restrictive, should put them at risk due to staying stationary, but it feels more like they've set up a kill-box, like the ones in more danger are those who dare approach.
Gai blinks, and the pile of dead bodies around the trio is pushing at thirty by now, yet none of them pause or seem in the least disturbed by the havoc they're wreaking. Instead, Gai watches as Kakashi's student turns where he's still crouched and stabs a kunai into the eye of a shinobi who's rolled past the eldest's wide swing. Just as the boy's kunai buries itself to the hilt in the shinobi's eye, the girl slams her palms against the ground and the man sinks into the dirt and disappears from sight. The duo doesn't pause to so much as nod at each other before switching to yet another position in their formation and turning their attention to the next enemy.
The worst thing, in Gai's opinion, is how methodical they are. Neither their forms nor their attacks are textbook, but the blows they deal are all calculated, aimed with deadly precision to be as efficient as possible – a senbon to the eye, a kunai to the throat, a kick to the temple, a knife to the groin, a katana to the femoral artery – ticking off vital points like a mockery of a child's game, or a hunter-nin's exam.
There is no respect for the sanctity of life in their motions.
Then, as another wave of Oto-nin approaches, one of the few dozen still fighting, the girl crouches down, and her partners hide her from sight for a few crucial seconds, then the handful of approaching shinobi stumble and freeze, their legs caught in a water jutsu that turns the water at their feet sticky and viscous. A few slip away, a convenient kawarimi or a secret technique allowing them free from the trap at their feet, but more than half remain, hands flying through seals for distance-jutsu once they realise their approach was foiled.
But, on some unseen command, a cartoon eagle peels itself from Kakashi's artist's scroll, easily ten feet tall with a wingspan of double that, and the trio hop onto its back just as its beak opens and something black spills out, drenching the trapped shinobi below.
It's not ink, which is Gai's first suspicion – the liquid is far too thick and reflective, but he doesn't want to entertain what the other possibility could be.
The choice of ignorance is stolen from him when the silver-haired boy leans over the edge of the eagle and a blaze of fire bursts from his mouth, taking the form of the head of a dragon for one grotesquely suspended moment before it flies towards the trapped, oil-covered shinobi and the corpses around them and catches.
Gai hears the screams, but they sound distant, muted.
He's staring at the trio of childrenkidsmurderersmonsters-! and his shock at what he just witnessed has frozen every muscle in his body.
There was not even a moment's pause in their movements, not so much as a flicker of hesitation, nor a thought spared for mercy or regret.
He watches, transfixed, as the previously-trapped jinchuuriki breaks free and the sand claw that slams into the cartoon eagle, pushing it off course, but before it can crush the eagle's passengers, a sharp, fifty-feet tall ice-spike tears into the claw and spreads, freezing it in place. He watches as the silver-haired teen launches himself off the dropping eagle and towards the lower-level galleries that are still bustling with activity, while the other two slide down the ice column and land next to the Kiri-nin Kakashi's student had fought. They land on solid ground just as the ice cracks around the sand claw and the monster escapes its shackles the second time, the jinchuuriki snarling and enraged.
There's movement to his left as something dashes past him, and Gai doesn't even have time to call out before Kakashi launches himself off the edge of the viewing gallery and towards his student and kouhai, lightning chirping in his hand. Kakashi, usually so controlled when fighting, had been vicious and snarling, using techniques Gai had never seen and seeming almost personally wronged by every Oto and Suna-nin that crossed his path, and it's only now that he drives his Chidori into the sand claw and lands between his student and kouhai in a protective position that Gai realises the reason behind the change.
Still, Kakashi finding something to care about again is not as disturbing as his young charges.
And Gai had known, somewhere in the back of his mind, that he should've trusted his gut the first time he laid eyes on Kakashi's brother-sister duo with dead eyes and enough blood on their hands to drown a small village.
Because now, now, there is ice in his veins and dread in his stomach and fear in his heart when he thinks of what he just witnessed.
Those were not children raised in peace time.
Those were not children at all.
"Duck!" Sakura shouts as Gaara's sand-whip lashes out, the perfect height to behead all three of them in one fell swoop if they lose focus for even a moment.
She's not sure why Haku is still here, why he bothered to help them, but she's not about to look a gift horse in the mouth, particularly when it likely saved her life.
She hears the chirping of birds before she feels Kakashi's chakra and she pushes Sai into Haku and jumps away, drawing the claw after her, giving Kakashi the surface he needs to bury his Chidori into the sand-limb and separate the claw from the dome, buying them precious seconds to breathe.
Sakura's also adamantly not thinking about the wet sound Ryu's head had made when it smacked against the wall, nor the wounded, broken whine that had left Yu's throat when his brother had unsummoned himself. That is a concern for when she can spare more than half a second to anything other than fight-defend-kill-! because if she breaks now, she's not sure she'll survive this battle.
She's already nursing a concerningly deep cut in her left side and her head is ringing, having gotten hit with a knee to the jaw that had her biting through her cheek and lip and made her too slow to move out of the way of the elbow blow to the temple that had followed.
"If we're containing a jinchuuriki, we can't stay here." Kakashi calls, fingers flying almost unnaturally fast through the seals of a Water jutsu. A water dragon coalesces between them and Gaara, an odd pinkish tint to the water that Sakura tries her best not to think about, before the dragon charges towards Gaara and douses his sand liberally in water.
"Arranging an exit!" Sakura throws back, waiting for the moment Haku joins the fray to freeze more of the sand with his Hyouton before she jumps towards the arena wall, gathers chakra in her fist, and slams it against the stone.
She feels her knuckles crunch, having grown too unused to using the technique to remember to shield her bones from the impact, but her control on her chakra is still perfect as she releases it in a controlled network on a twenty-feet diameter into the wall. The stone crumbles, the façade groans, but as the lower part of the wall falls away, the upper levels don't so much as shake, and Sakura breathes a sigh of relief.
Then, she's plastering her back against the wall as Kakashi shoots past, Gaara on his tail, blind to anything but this taicho-shaped annoyance.
Sakura chances a glance at Sai and Haku, sees them both shoot her worried and considering glances respectfully, and forces a smile.
"Stay together and survive." She tells them, urging her facial muscles to drop the frown and make her smile more genuine. "Haku-san, I know this is not your fight, and I know I can't ask this of you, but look after Sai, please."
Then, not waiting to hear what either boy has to say to that, she gives chase after Gaara and Kakashi, hoping against hope that they will manage to contain the Ichibi without Naruto's Power-of-Friendship to help them this time.
Well.
Yamato was able to contain Naruto's four-tail form. Time to see whether her bastardisation of Wood Release would measure up.
"Look after Sai, please."
In the rush of battle and fighting, Haku still finds a moment to ponder the sheer absurdity of the words; he wonders, with no small degree of bafflement, in what reality Sai is the one who needs looking after.
They've been meeting up almost every other day for the last month, and in that time, Haku has learned that Sai is fiercely independent and scarily competent. The softness of the boy who'd sat in a meadow and drew flowers while waiting for his teammate to wake up is still there, but so is the sharpness of the shinobi who hadn't hesitated to assassinate a civilian crime lord on the word of an enemy-nin.
Sai does not need 'looking after'.
But-
-Haku muses, almost surprised at how unsurprised he is as he watches Sai shrug off and throw the outer layer of his kimono at an Oto-nin who'd made the mistake of grabbing it, the garment catching fire moments later, what was likely an explosive tag tucked in a pocket going off as soon as the fabric is off Sai's back-
-But, there's a promise in the look in Sai's eyes, in the curve of his sharp smile, in the splash of scarlet against stark white teeth. Sai is contained, quiet, almost shy at first impression, but here, now, he looks free, and Haku's unnervingly reminded of Zabuza-san.
His musings take less than two seconds total, and once the Oto-nin who'd grabbed Sai's kimono runs off to put himself out, Haku's treated to what was hiding beneath Sai's kimono.
Dozens, if not hundreds of stark black tattoos crowd together on every visible inch of Sai's bare skin - the invisible too, Haku's willing to bet. He watches, entranced, as tigers, eagles, mice, mythical creatures – he watches as tens of them peel off from Sai's arms and rush the Oto and Suna-nin that have been gathering around them for the last few seconds, the shapes black and white and cartoonish, but the snapping jaws and the blood they draw very much real.
There's a metaphor there, Haku thinks, if he were to pause long enough to contemplate it – something about deceptive strength and deceitful appearances, both in the art and the artist, but he's forced out of his head and made to pay attention when Sai takes to the sky.
His creatures take on the form of birds, barely the size of eagles, maybe even smaller, but they take to the air and freeze, hovering at staggered heights, becoming a mockery of stairs that Sai takes full advantage of.
On the final step before the edge of the wall, Sai pauses, smile sharp and eyes dancing as he glances back at Haku.
"You coming?" He calls, voice light and lilting, as if they weren't in the middle of an invasion, as if there weren't enemy shinobi all around them, as if Haku were someone he's known and fought besides for years instead of mere weeks.
Yet Haku finds himself helpless to do anything but follow along, catching up while Sai sends another wave of creatures peeling off his skin to stall the Oto-nin who tried to go after Haku, the eagles they used as steps snapping to motion and putting their claws and beaks to use when a Suna-nin tries to use them the same way they had.
Haku reaches the final step before the one Sai is perched on, and Sai shoots him another one of those quicksilver grins, eyes glittering with mischief and destructive potential and Haku is lost.
Then, Sai is reaching down, grabbing the lapels of Haku's kimono and pulling him up at the same time as he leans down. Sai crushes their mouths together, the kiss electrifying and hungry and full of teeth and tasting of blood and Haku wants more even as he shoves his shock aside and kisses back, just as hungry, just as greedy.
Sai pulls away all too soon, a laugh spilling from his lips as he lets go of Haku's kimono and leaps off the bird and onto the wall, the tattoos on his skin peeling off and taking shape around him, heralding his approach with dozens of snapping jaws and growling beasts.
"Keep up!" He teases as he jumps off the edge of the arena wall, straight into a group of incoming Oto-nin on the other side.
Haku stays still for a moment too long, having to duck a spray of shuriken someone throws at him from god knows where. His lips are tingling and his heart is beating in double time and he knows with unquestionable certainty that he doesn't have the self-restraint needed to resist writing to Sai once they go their separate ways this time around.
But, more than that, he knows that if he wants anything more from the raven, he has to make sure that Sai will survive to give him more.
With an answering sharp smile tugging at his lips, chakra singing beneath his skin, he throws a barrage of senbon at an oncoming shinobi and jumps over the wall too, landing back-to-back with Sai, ready to rain destruction on the idiots who decided to stage an invasion during his vacation to Leaf.
Look after Sai, his sister had asked.
Yeah, he will, alright. But for his own reasons.