EVERYONE GIVE IT UP FOR AKATSUKI'S FAVOURITE FIGHTING SNAKE-MAN!


Days before

Hinata rolled the summoning contract out on her floor, and put a kunai to her finger. She smeared blood across the scroll, then put both hands to the paper, and channeled as much chakra as she could into it. "Summoning jutsu!"

With a poof of smoke, a tawny owl almost as tall as her appeared on top of the contract. It was facing away, but it's head made a full half turn to meet her eyes.

"And whooo." It asked, in an old voice. "Are youuu?"

"Hinata Hyuuga." She said, giving it a low bow. She knew full well that, with the amount of chakra she'd used to summon it, it might be able to do her serious bodily harm if she offended it.

"A Hyuuuuuga, hmm?" It didn't break eye contact. "Well, I can see that much. But youuu have not been officially sworn ontooo this contract, have youuu? Little girls should not go playing with scrolls that are not theirs." It turned its head away.

"Wait!" She cried. "I'm sorry, owl-sama, but there isn't anybody to sign me in."

It's head spun back around to her. "There is no need for 'sir's and 'sama's with me, young madame. Explain what you mean."

"Nobody can introduce me to the contract because there is nobody alive to do so." Hinata explained. "My family...the Hyuuga have all been killed."

"I see." It clicked its beak. "It is as we feared. I apologise for my ruuudeness, lady Hyuuuga. If I may, I would like to take you somewhere. My suuuperiors would like tooo know what youuu know."

"Where are we going?" She asked, wondering how to explain to her team if she went on a long trek.

"Youuu will not have tooo leave this rooom, miss Hinata. Reverse summoning one's summoner is uuusually only done once extreme trust has been placed in them, but on this occasion an exception must be made. Hold ontooo my wings."

Hesitantly, Hinata did as she was asked, burying her hands in the owl's plumage. It made a sound that might have been a cough. "I need tooo be airborne tooo uuuse juuutsuuu. Excuuuse me." It flapped its wings once, and put its claws together. Then there was light.

Hinata went from the closed curtains of her room to blinding sunlight in a split second, and the surprise was enough to make her let go of the owl in shock. That was a mistake, as she was in the air at the time. She began plummeting.

She screamed as her stomach went upwards into her throat and she fell, wind whipping at her clothes as her arms and legs pinwheeled. After a few seconds her inner ninja took over, and she straightened out her limps to maximise her surface area, putting on her Byakugan to better see where on earth she was. Turns out the answer may not have been 'on earth' at all.

She was so far above the ground she couldn't see it, which was bad, and even more confusingly there were giant rocks floating in the air.

She angled for a landing on one of the closer planetoids she could see, only to feel herself slow as the owl grabbed the back of her coat and brought her to a stop.

"Are all Hyuuuga so heavy?" It grumbled, flapping heavily.

"Where are we?" Hinata shouted, past the wind.

"The angel mountains!" It replied. "A place youu'll never find again! Now stop struggling, or I'll looose my grip!"

Eventually it dropped her off on one of the floating rocks, before diving off the side and leaving her to take in her surroundings. Now that she was alone, Hinata could see dozens of birds flying around the 'mountains'. The rocks themselves seemed like self contained biomes; some (like hers) were grassy, some had lakes or waterfalls. Others were forested on all sides, with trees growing downwards to the ground far below.

It was peaceful. Beautiful. And she could feel...something...tickling her skin. It felt almost like the chakra signatures she could pick up from powerful ninja, but her Byakugan couldn't detect anything.

"Natural energy." A voice boomed from behind her. "It is invisible to your eyes. The greatest weakness of your clan is that you fear to blind yourselves, and thus there are many things you do not see."

Hinata turned around and jumped out of her skin.

Facing her were a pair of eyes, each almost as big as her. Their gaze pierced her, and it felt like it could see everything she was and ever had been. It's plumage was a shimmering navy blue. And the eyes, well, there was no other way to say it. They looked like Byakugan.

"My Dojutsu can't see you." Was all she could think to say.

The giant owl leaned backwards. It was stood on a much larger rock at lower elevation. With a better look, it seemed oddly anthropomorphic, humanoid. A bow taller than the Hokage tower was slung over its back, and a scar cut across its beak. "We are not flesh and blood, like you are." It explained. "We are made entirely of senjutsu chakra, and invisible to most dojutsu. Our ability to spot each other sage creatures is, I believe, one of the main reasons the Hyuuga bonded with us." It inclined its head in what might have been a bow. "I am Athena. Matriarch of the Owls."

Hinata went into a full kowtow. "Hinata Hyuuga. It is an honour."

"Hmm." Athena replied. "You would be Hiashi's daughter then. I never met the man, he rarely summoned my brood, but I have learned much of you from my brother."

"Your brother?" Hinata asked.

Athena pointed with one wing. In the distance, squinting with her regular eyes, Hinata could see another owl that must have been at least as large as the one she was talking to. It's head turned to look at her, but quickly turned back away.

"Icarus. He and his immediate family serve your half brother, Neji. He spoke of you often."

Hinata clenched her fists. She began stalking towards the distant figure on reflex before Athena put a wing up in her way. "Peace. You would never reach him anyway, he flies faster than I can."

"Neji is branch family. He isn't supposed to have owl summons." She grit her teeth.

"I suspect Neji does a great many things he is not supposed to do." Athena replied, wryly. "Now please, explain. What has befallen your family? Why have none but your half brother summoned us in five years?"

Hinata took in a deep breath to calm herself. Then she explained what Neji had done.

It took a few minutes, and partway through Athena had turned to look at Icarus in the distance.

"I see." She said, when Hinata had finished. "And what do you intend to do?"

"Kill him."

"That...may be unwise."

"How?" She asked, arms spread. "He killed my family!"

"Do you know why?" Athena pressed.

"What reason would there be?"

"People always have a reason for their actions. If there is no reason; then it is madness."

"Then he must be mad!" Hinata concluded.

Athena shook her head. "My brother would not betray us all for a madman. But he will not explain why he follows Neji. When I pressed him, he gave me this." She brought a wing up to her scarred beak. "We owls are not perfect. But we do try to be wise. If Icarus comes to Neji's aid, it is because he agrees with what he did."

"Do you?" Hinata challenged.

"As I said." Athena replied. "We are not perfect. Knowing what you know, I cannot discern what might make Neji's actions right. If I conclude they were wrong, then I will go and beat some sense into my brother. But not before I understand fully."

"So what do you want then?" Hinata tried not to sulk.

"I will allow you to sign the summoning contract with my family." Decided Athena. "Properly. On the condition that, when you find Neji, you make him explain his reasons. If you believe after you understand his motive that he still deserves death, then make it so. But not before."

Hinata thought about it. Athena had a point. She wanted justice, as much as vengeance. And she could not make that ruling on false information. "I agree."


Present day

"Look out! There's a spider!"

"I see it. Don't worry, it's not a big deal."

"Got it mistress!"

Kudos had decided to keep following them the next day, because apparently their adventure through the woods was 'way more interesting than flying around the mountains all day!'. They were hours into the new day, after leaving the grass ninja tied up in their old camp, but had yet to see anyone. That had not stopped Kudos. Naruto's shadow clones had had to explain to him that he didn't have to wake up team seven every time he spotted a scorpion on a tree a hundred metres away. Now they were awake, however, he saw no reason not to warn them about everything he noticed.

"I spy a hostile genin!" Hinata called out, bringing the four to a stop. Her Byakugan range was greater than Kudos'.

"Woo baby here we go." Naruto grinned.

"Hidden grass. Three hundred metres ahead, and closing." Hinata continued. "I can't see his teammates, so he might be alone or it might be a trap."

"Is he heaven or earth?" Sasuke asked.

"That team was earth." Hinata replied, victoriously.

"Yes! Lets sic him! We can get to the centre days before the deadline at this rate." Naruto started stretching his arms in preparation.

"Patience, Naruto." Sasuke cautioned. "God I sound old...any fight we get into that's fair is a fight where we're taking unnecessary risks. I vote we send a clone of you in alone first to make him think-"

"Snake!" Shouted Kudos. "One hundred metres, getting closer fast!"

"Kudos." Naruto sighed. "Please, stop warning us about the natural wildlife-"

"Wait." Hinata held a hand up. "Snake? I can't see a snake."

"No, big snake!" Kudos was actually panicking. "Very big snake!"

Soon team seven didn't need bat-vision. They could hear the cracking sound of trunks snapping like matchsticks.

"What the-oh no." Hinata blanched. "Sage creature! MOVE!"

The trio scattered as the trees in front of them parted and an absolutely massive snake crashed into their position, opening wide its jaws and snapping up Kudos in one mouthful.

"Sweet merciful Kami what the fuck?" Sasuke landed nearby and flung a brace of kunai, they scattered off the monster's scales.

"Did Kudos just die?" Naruto asked as the snake turned it's eyes on him.

"They desummon when they take too much damage, he'll be traumatised but fine." Hinata explained.

The snake lunged at them again. They separated, jumping off in different directions, but it swung its tail and caught Naruto in midair, slamming him into a nearby tree which he magnetised to with his feet. Water walking training hadn't been for nothing. "So all we need to do is damage it?"

"Enough to kill it, yes!" She replied, as Sasuke launched a fireball at the beast. "But that's a lot of damage! No genin should be able to summon anything this big!"

"If you're such an expert," Sasuke called to her, watching the snake shake off his fireball without much effort. "Then what do we do?"

""Run!" Hinata told them. "Definitely run!"

"Oh I wouldn't do that." Came a perfectly calm, silky smooth voice. "Even if it isn't faster than you, I certainly am."

They looked up. A genin was stood on a branch, far above them. The snake moved back to curl up beneath him, eyeing its prey.

"Is it me or does it look hungry?" Naruto stage whispered.

"The ninja or the snake?" Sasuke returned.

"Yes."

"Who are you?" Hinata called out to him, analysing his chakra network. It was much more developed than any genin's should be.

"An interested party." The man replied, with a smile. "I'm looking for someone willing to betray everyone they love for power. Any takers?"

"You really need to work on your sales pitch, buddy." Sasuke replied, activating his Sharingan.

"Alas, I admit; my people's skills do need some work." Sighed the man. "Most of the people who work for me are already crazy, so they're a lot easier to deal with. But if words won't move you..." His tongue snaked out to lick his lips, then extended faaar longer than it should have been able to. "Then I'll just have to give you a taste."

He looked left and downwards. "No, that doesn't work, i'm the one doing the tasting. Sorry, I'm only so good at the whole one liners thing, that was always Jiraiya's-You know what, I'm going to bite you, that's what's going on, okay?"

He gestured, and the snake darted towards them again.


Somehow, Naruto had ended up fighting big toothy. If he thought about it, his teammates had probably organised that deliberately because they both had nothing to deal with the monster (good luck using rotation on something bigger than a house) but he didn't have time to think about it right now because a giant snake was trying to eat him.

"Multi shadow clone jutsu!" He called, summoning one or two hundred more of himself, and all of him launched at the snake. Their combined momentum was actually enough to force it back, but rather than injuring it that just sent it into a writhing mess that squashed a good lot of the clones before they hit the floor. Those that survived clung to it tenaciously, trying to pry knives and shuriken between its scales.

"The eyes!" He heard Sasuke's voice call out. Immediately, some of his clones jumped for big toothy's face and started stabbing. The snake was clearly an experienced summon; it responded to the threat of ninja on its nose by, quite sensibly, grinding the top of its face into the dirt and dispelling or shaking off all the attackers.

From his left, he heard what had to be Hinata screaming.

Naruto grimaced. He could feel the kyuubi stirring inside his abdomen but he tried to suppress it, fearing what would happen to his allies if he let it loose. He needed a better way. Time to start using that A-rank pay then.

He summoned another two shadow clones and reached into one of the larger pouches in his jacket. This was where he kept his explosive tags. Instead of tearing one off the strip, he unrolled the whole thing. If this doesn't work...

The clones grabbed the roll by either end and charged forwards. Big toothy was squashing all the other Naruto on it, however, and saw the attackers coming. With its tail, it flicked both out of the air, dispelling them. The explosive toilet role (trademark) fluttered to the floor behind the snake, which began to slither rapidly towards Naruto's location, hissing angrily.

Naruto considered using another barrage of shadow clones to push it back, but decided he needed a bit more concussive force. He put his hands together.

"Multi shadow clone jutsu!" Then all of his duplicates ran through the only complicated set of hand seals he'd memorised. "Buffeting wind jutsu!"

The maximum chakra Naruto could put into the C-rank jutsu, times about fifty, erupted a miniature hurricane in the forest. Smaller trees were uprooted, full size ones buckled and cracked. Big toothy was thrown, writhing, backwards along its path, falling in a heap on top of the explosive toilet roll. Naruto staggered backwards on his tree trunk, gasping. So this is what chakra exhaustion feels like.

Grimacing, he dispelled all of his remaining clones to recover the remnants of their chakra, and put his hands into the remote activation sign. Fifty explosive tags detonated right under big toothy with a massive boom.

A cloud of smoke obscured Naruto's vision and he didn't have the chakra to clear it, collapsing backwards against the tree trunk taking in ragged breaths. He could still hear sounds of fighting and he looked sideways, trying to catch a glimpse of his teammates. That's when big toothy erupted from the smoke in front of him. Bruised, with a bloodied patch of missing scales, it was nonetheless both alive and angry, and it was charging full speed at him. He tried to jump away but his chakra control was shot, and all he managed was to limply throw himself off his branch and began falling. The snake, despite his best efforts, still had perfectly functional eyes. It's head lunged out, and it's jaws closed around him with a snap.


About a minute earlier

Sasuke and Hinata charged. Their target raised his eyebrow.

Sasuke went in left, flinging one kunai at his head and swinging another to his knee. Hinata went right, she made a jyuuken strike towards his chest.

And then something happened, and they were both flung backwards.

"Try harder." The man incentivised. "Hickey prizes only go to genin who put the effort in. Bonus victory; abandonment of teammates for rage or personal gain."

The pair glared at him, and ran back in.

The following fight was epic, dramatic, and incredibly well choreographed, if the author had been bothered to describe it.

Sasuke wasn't ashamed to admit that Hinata was the greatest at taijutsu in their whole graduating class (not counting what Rock Lee could do when he started opening gates. Sasuke had seen that once, and wasn't looking forward to taking it on in the exams.) Sasuke himself, thanks to rigorous training with the aforementioned two and also goddamn Itachi, was no slouch either. But this ninja was keeping up with them easily. He moved just fast enough to block or dodge everything they threw at him, and no faster, occasionally throwing out non-lethal strikes of his own to check if they were paying attention. This terrified Sasuke, because in the moments he had to think, he was amazed by his own performance. He had spent hours being taught (on principle) how the Sharingan performed against the Byakugan, but nobody had thought to inform him how well they worked together. Communication was unnecessary; she could see everything he did, and could act on his second-to-second plans without any prompting. On his end, time spent watching her fight with the Sharingan let him perfectly set up situations where she would be best suited to attack.

It was this nigh impeccable teamwork that made it possible to tag the hostile ninja. The end of some razor wire, passed from Hinata to Sasuke during a period of swapping hands with their opponent, was wrapped around the hilt of his kunai and thrown. The ninja dodged left. Then Hinata threw the knife on her end to his left. The ninja grabbed and caught the wire before it reached him, but he didn't have a blade like Kakashi had, and as the kunai looped round to each other he was practically immobilised. By the time he had repelled Hinata's further palm strikes and brought both hands up to snap the wire, Sasuke had already completed the hand seals for the great fireball. The grass man was bathed in fire.

"Do you know any other attack jutsu?" Hinata grumbled, moving back to his position.

"Do you know any attack jutsu at all?" He shot back, then shouted to his left "The eyes!" As a hint to Naruto.

The fire blew out, and the sight it left behind was horrific. The man's skin had been charred and blistered, his clothes in tatters. And then he...sighed?

"Good, I'll give you that." He admitted. "But troublesome."

"Shikimaru?" Sasuke asked on impulse.

"Nope." Said the man. He brought a finger with a worryingly sharp nail to his skin, then, to the disgust of the genin watching, tore the top layer of his skin off.

The completely unharmed form underneath had skin pale as snow, long black hair, and golden eyes with slitted irises.

"Oh no." Mumbled Sasuke.

"Oh yes." Hissed Orochimaru.

Fuck. FuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckFUCK.

We need to get out of here now. Maybe we can distract him with shadow clones long enough to get Naruto and get the fuck out. Hinata's gotta be on the same page, anyone with a modicum of sensible threat assessment would-

Oh.

Oh no.

His Sharingan tracked Hinata, in full 'avenge-my-clan' mode, sprinting straight at the S-class missing-nin at top speed.

By the time he started moving to back her up, she was already in front of Orochimaru.

"Eight trigrams!" She shouted. "Sixty four P-ugh!"

Orochimaru grabbed her by the throat and lifted her up. "Shout the technique name during the technique." He tutted. "Your cousin managed that much at least."

Hinata's eyes widened. Orochimaru grinned, "Oh yes, I've had more than my fair share of encounters with Neji. Lovely boy, pretty eyes. Oh, and that was the abandonment of teammates clause. Ding ding!" He sunk his teeth into her neck. She let out an ear piercing scream. Sasuke was there in a second but Orochimaru was apparently already finished, throwing her limp form at him to catch.

He did so, jumping immediately back out of range (he hoped) and setting her down. That was when he looked to check how Naruto was doing, just in time to watch him get eaten by a giant snake.

"Naruto!" He shouted, voice hoarse, but it only served to attract the attention of the snake, which turned its head to him with a smug fucking expression on its face.

Watching his blond best friend die again, with his other teammate in god knows what condition by his feet, was enough to make Sasuke snap.

A second tomoe came to life in his eyes.

He blasted towards Orochimaru, witnessing everything in greater detail, seeing everything at a faster rate, curling up his fist with a wordless cry of rage. He maintained a merciless barrage for six seconds straight before Orochimaru's neck stretched out, wrapping around Sasuke's body and freezing him in place.

"Well well." Chuckled the snake sannin's head from behind Sasuke's shoulder. "I only wanted one, but with a development like that how can I resist? Reckless abandonment of your teammates, Sasuke. Ding ding!" He bit into the genin.

The pain Sasuke felt was...indescribable. It was like the man's fangs were injecting lava into his veins that spread across more of his body with every passing second. He howled into the trees.


Even from within big toothy's mouth, Naruto heard that shout. Now both his teammates were, at the very least, in incredible pain.

Fine. He told the ball of hatred in his stomach. Do your worst.

And the rage exploded. He put his arms to the top of the snake's mouth and heaved, forcing its jaw open. Snarling, he jumped out the exit provided, grabbing the tip of the snake's nose, demanding the kyuubi to give him even more strength, more more more-

The kyuubi provided. Red aura burning around him, he lifted the entire mass of the monster and flung it over his head, making it slam on its back on top of a cracked tree trunk, impaling it and probably breaking its spine in multiple places. It desummoned. Naruto smelled Sasuke before he saw him and was upon his location in moments, launching a wave of killing intent at his adversary. Orochimaru met that wave, and smiled. "Well hello you."

He unwrapped himself from Sasuke. "I hope you don't mind me doing my thing with your friend here. Unless, wait, were you two a couple, maybe?"

"I'm going to tear you to fucking pieces." Naruto growled.

"I'm going to take that as a yes." Orochimaru hurled Sasuke to the floor some distance away. Naruto, desperately trying to quell the primal rage he was feeling, briefly considered launching himself at the snake sannin, but he eventually settled for darting across to Sasuke's unconscious form, standing over it protectively and baring his teeth.

"So the kyuubi has more self control than his two teammates, will wonders never cease." Orochimaru chuckled. "How cute. Well then, I'll be off. You three take care~" Naruto blinked, and Orochimaru was gone. Taking a few deep breaths, he quelled the red chakra flowing through his system. He nearly passed out from his troubles; the kyuubi had been almost single handedly fueling his body. But through considerable force of will, he was able to crouch down next to his partner without collapsing. "Sasuke? Are you ok?"

The obviously suffering Uchiha cracked open an eye. "Naruto. Is he..."

"He's gone." Naruto breathed, "Are you...do you..."

He could hardly ask 'are you okay'.

"You...suplexed...a hundred metre snake." Came Sasuke's response. He hacked and coughed, and Naruto realised he was laughing. "You...you absolute fucking madman...heh..." his eye closed and he slumped. Naruto checked his pulse but he was definitely alive, the way he shook, tossed and turned was a bit of a giveaway. Naruto grimaced and stood. He knew damn well they wouldn't let him hear the end of it if he forfeit. So, he had to pass the exam. With his two unconscious and suffering and potentially all sorts of messed up teammates. While he only had one of the required scrolls. When he couldn't even afford to make a single shadow clone without knocking himself out.

Backbone of the team, Naruto. Come on.

Sighing, he reached down and pulled Sasuke over one shoulder, winced, and went looking for Hinata.


Wooo boy that was fun. I really considered changing things up further and making Tsunade the bad one, with Orochimaru being the guy they go to to be the new Hokage, but he's just so good at being evil. And yes, both Sasuke and Hinata get cursemarks. Who abandons the village? Do either? Do both? Who knows? Me. I know. And I'm not telling.