Naruto was declared the victor of the first fight of the day. He could barely stand as Genma called the match, and he had to be half-carried out of the arena. Naruto had one question as he was being ushered to the medical rooms for treatment. "Is Sasuke here yet?"
No one had seen him.
The rest of the combatants were viewing from a special spectator box. Shikamaru stood with Shino Aburame by the broad window. The sand-nin watched the match from the other side of the room.
"Holy hell, I can hardly believe it," said Shikamaru. "Naruto really pulled that out of the bag."
Shino remained silent, aside from the occasional fluttering of insect wings around him. He wore dark sunglasses and a hooded jacket, shrouding his appearance. Shikamaru didn't usually spend time with the guy, but his other option was the sand-nin.
"Sasuke's still not here," said Shikamaru. "That's an automatic forfeit, right?"
"I believe so," said Shino.
"I can't blame him after that slaughter in the preliminaries," said Shikamaru. "I heard Lee is still all out of whack from that." He looked at the clouds through the window. It was a nice day. "So, I guess you're up next. How are you feeling?"
"Capable," said Shino.
"That guy had a freaky ninjutsu in the preliminaries," said Shikamaru. "Kugutsu no Jutsu, puppet mastery." Shikamaru chuckled and looked over at Shino. "Then again, you had some freaky techniques too."
On the other side of the room, Temari and Kankuro could feel their little brother's bloodlust. In that moment, he wanted only to kill Sasuke Uchiha. His sand was slithering on the floor and twirling in the air around him. Kankuro communicated to Temari in coded sign language.
"The next phase of the plan was supposed to begin during Gaara's match," signed Kankuro.
"We wait for his next match," signed Temari.
"If I use Crow or Salamander's hidden mechanisms during my match, then they'll be less effective during the invasion," signed Kankuro. "I'm going to forfeit."
"If you forfeit now, that will be suspicious," signed Temari. "Just restrict yourself to one puppet. Nobody else knows that you have two."
"I'll throw the match," signed Kankuro. "It's safer that way."
"You're going to screw up and give us away," signed Temari. "You're acting like a weakling, are you afraid to fight?"
Kankuro shot Temari an irritated expression—no sign language required.
Exam proctor Hayate Gekko entered the viewing room. "Match two is being postponed until further notice. We're going to proceed with the next scheduled matchup, Shino Aburame of Konohagakure against Kankuro of Sunagakure. You two ready to fight?"
Shino nodded. Kankuro gave a begrudging nod as well.
After a twenty minute intermission, Shino and Kankuro were positioned on opposite ends of the arena in preparation for their match. The crowd above buzzed with confusion and excitement. First, they had anticipated an easy win for the Hyuga prodigy, but the battle turned out to be a dead heat, decided only by a desperate final maneuver after an impressive display of stamina and shinobi abilities. Few expected much out of the match between Shino and Kankuro, but after the first fight of the day, popular expectations had been essentially thrown out the window. Second, they had anticipated a high-profile match between Sasuke and Gaara, but Sasuke was yet to arrive at the arena. Would he show up at all?
Shino took his hands out of his pockets and focused his chakra, a swarm of Aburame Clan insects thickening around him. Shino and his insects formed a symbiotic relationship, the insects feeding on his chakra as they acted as malleable tools for attack and defense. The buzzing grew louder, and Shino was obscured in the undulating cloud.
Kankuro activated Crow's scroll, casting the chakra strings that brought his puppet to life. Crow had the figure of a tall, humanoid marionette, head cocked, with four arms underneath its cloak. Kankuro flexed his fingers and Crow lurched forward, accelerating toward Shino. Crow opened its mouth and ejected a volley of senbon—Shino dodged to the right—Crow extended a set of scythe blades, charging at Shino and slicing through his perpetual cloud of insects. The insects made it difficult to land a hit, constantly morphing shape and veiling Shino's movements, though one swing came as close as cutting the side of Shino's jacket. He led Crow to a patch of the arena with trees and bushes.
"Let's go, Shino!" said Kiba, invested in his teammate's match. "Damn, that puppet is quick, and it moves so erratically."
"And it's probably rigged with secret mechanisms," said Sakura. "Shino is doing good so far, but how is he going to neutralize it?"
The puppet started slowing down. Kankuro could feel a change in Crow's weight, and a stiffness in the joints. What the…? The insects… Shino's insects had begun infiltrating the puppet, blocking up the joints and holding back its speed and power. Kankuro flicked his hand, and Crow pulled back, but not before firing a smoking grenade. It blasted apart one of the trees, and released a barrage of spring-loaded razors. Shino rolled for cover, avoiding the primary explosion but suffering a wound to his forearm from one of the spinning razors.
Kankuro grinned. That should be deep enough, the paralytic will kick in any second now. Kankuro's poison was designed to immobilize, and potentially kill, often inducing horrifying hallucinations in its victims. He heard a faint buzzing and spotted a large green wasp drifting close. He spotted another. There was a swarm gathering. He felt the first sting in his right leg, grunting in pain as he sliced the wasp with a kunai knife. Kankuro felt like there was acid being injected into his leg, then there was numbness. Damn, these little bastards pack a punch!
He darted away from the swarm of wasps, suffering a second sting to the back while yanking Crow closer. The puppet's mouth unhinged, revealing the nozzle of a flamethrower, and an intense jet of fire sprayed out over the approaching wasps. It wasn't enough to cook all of them, but the attack burned most of the wasps to blackened crisps.
Kankuro turned to see Shino darting out at him from behind a tree, kodachi short sword in hand. "Too slow!" said Kankuro as he whipped Crow around, and showered Shino with poisonous senbon. Shino dodged and deflected a few of the incoming senbon, but the rapidfire attack overwhelmed him, and he was pierced a dozen times across his chest and legs, sending him staggering to the dirt. Shino lay there twitching. "I can hardly believe you aren't paralyzed already by Crow's razor grenade, but this works too, reckless idiot."
Shino's body dissolved into a cloud of Aburame Clan color-shifting beetles.
Kiba, Sakura and Hinata let out a collective sigh of relief.
"A beetle clone!" said Kiba. "Shino! Don't scare me like that, damn it!"
"Look!" said Hinata, gesturing behind Kankuro. The genuine Shino dashed out from behind a boulder for a follow up surprise attack, having stealthily circled around around the arena.
"He timed the clone distraction perfectly!" said Sakura.
Kankuro realized too late that the Shino he had taken down was no more than a decoy. He spun around and spotted the real Shino bringing his kodachi sword down. Kankuro had no time to pull Crow over for his defense, and he only managed to partially counter Shino's attack, suffering a stab wound to his right shoulder as he tried to evade. Argh! How is this guy still running around?! And his sword feels like a worse version of the wasp sting!
In truth, Shino was in considerable pain as he chased down Kankuro to land another hit. The moment his arm had been sliced with the poisonous razor, Shino's collection of medical larvae sprang into action, burrowing into the flesh of his forearm and consuming as much of the toxin as possible. They weren't able to completely eradicate the poison—it was potent—but the quick first-aid was enough to keep Shino in the fight. He could feel it slowly spreading, softening his attacks, making his arms and legs feel heavy.
Shino clashed his kodachi with Kankuro's kunai blade. Kankuro was weakened by the two wasp stings and the kodachi puncture to his shoulder, the venom spreading through his body, on the verge of anaphylaxis. He was losing ground, effectively fighting with one arm while watching out for green wasps. Shino forced him back, not allowing a second for Kankuro to bring Crow into the exchange, but the razor poison persisted, and Shino was feeling the chakra-strain of commanding his insect horde. Shino stumbled. Kankuro hit Shino in the chest with a front kick, and Crow came screeching into the melee, scythe blades out.
"Now I've got you!" said Kankuro. His throat was tight and itchy.
Shino flicked a firefly out of sleeve. The little bug let out a high-pitched whistle, and burst into a blinding glow, illuminating the arena in bright light. Most spectators had to shield their eyes and look away. Kankuro lost sight of Shino, and the bug's whistle made it impossible to track him by sound. Shino ducked under Crow's wild attack, and made one final lunge at Kankuro. Kankuro attempted to retreat to safety, but he was caught across the side by a shallow slash of Shino's kodachi. He cried out in pain. Shino dropped his kodachi, and fell to one knee. The paralytic had overpowered him at last. Both shinobi dropped to the ground.
Neither Shino nor Kankuro had the strength to continue.