Zetsu looks up at his enemies, and his enemies glare back down at him. The bodies of the slain lie abandoned in the temple courtyard and on the temple stairs. All the white zetsu are dead, killed by Kimimaro's Bone Dance Jutsu. Gaara's sobs and his siblings' sniffles carry clearly to where Kushina kneels, perched on the edge of a platform made of sand. Kushina glares down at Zetsu, imagining how best to turn him into a salad.
Kushina glances over to see how Naruto and Sasuke are doing. They do not look much different. One of the medics sees Kushina looking and shoots her an encouraging smile.
Kushina turns her attention back to Zetsu. A tree starts to grow up out of the ground underneath Zetsu, lifting him into the air.
"Ready…" says Fugaku, lifting a hand.
"On three," says Nagato, raising his hand.
"One…" says Fugaku, slowly, his rinnegan spinning.
Kushina, realizing they are planning a combo attack, takes a deep breath and forces herself to calm down. She will see what they do, and if their attack fails, she will attack Zetsu herself.
"Two…" says Nagato, rising slightly higher into the air.
Kushina glances over at Naruto again. Still no sign of him and Sasuke waking up.
"Three." Nagato and Fugaku say together. "Universal/Almighty Push."
Zetsu is hit by a wall of air. It pushes him backwards, into the ground. The ground explodes under the force of Nagato and Fugaku's attack, creating a crater the size of a small house. Zetsu lies in an ugly black blob in the centre of the crater.
Kushina raises her chakra chains and sends them in a deadly volley, down into the crater. A purple and white barrier stops her chains in their tracks. It looks familiar…
Kushina watches, annoyed and impressed as the purple and white barrier pulls Zetsu into its centre and disintergrates him. Then the barrier vanishes with a pop, leaving a pile of ash that used to be Zetsu behind.
As the barrier vanishes, it reveals Naruto and Sasuke, floating in the air on the far side of the crater. Sasuke has pigtails in her hair, and her left arm is no longer bandaged.
Kushina turns to look at the sand platform they were on a second ago. "How?" she asks. "What? When?"
Sasuke retreats behind Naruto, a shy blush on her face. "When is the right question," she giggles nervously.
"THAT was artistic!" yells Deidara. "You kids know how to destroy stuff, un!"
"Aw, thanks," says Naruto, taking the complement rather than point out that they didn't actually cause an explosion, which seems to be the type of art Deidara likes best.
"That was NOT art, you stupid brat!" snaps Sasori, irritated. "Art is eternal beauty, not a fleeting moment of destruction, or whatever you seem to think it is!"
"Don't be silly," says Konan reasonably. "Art is perfectly folded paper."
"WRONG!" says Minato. "Art is Kushina's homemade ramen!"
"Art is any good ramen," corrects Naruto.
"Art is a perfectly arranged garden," counters the First Hokage.
"My mustache is art," says Fugaku, crossing his arms and nodding.
"Paintings and drawings are art!" insists Sai, frowning at everyone else.
"You are all wrong!" shouts Deidara, angry.
"Actually, everyone is right," interrupts Shisui, reasonably. Everyone turns to look at him. "What? Are none of you here aware of the true nature of art?" He shakes his head and immediately winces slightly. "Art is unique to everyone. Everyone in the whole world has a different perspective on what art is. Art cannot be narrowed down to one specific thing because art is a reflection of the artist's soul."
The Second Hokage claps solemnly. "Well said, Uchiha. I'm beginning to think you might be related to Kagami."
"They are from the same clan, Tobirama," points out Lord First.
"Kagami is my Grandfather," says Shisui. "But that has nothing to do with art. See, everyone here has a different idea of what art is, and that's normal. After all, Sasori, Deidara: if you two had the same art style, you'd be competitors. As it is, your art styles are complementary opposites."
"I'm done listening to this," says Sasori. His body begins to crumble into white flakes. "I'm going to go back to being dead. Remember me as a great artist."
"I will!" calls Kankuro, enthusiastically. "I will take care of your puppets and use your puppets, and learn how to make my own puppets…"
"Good boy," says Sasori, as his soul floats out of the reanimated body. "And don't ever reanimate me again!" Sasori's soul vanishes, leaving behind a dead body in a pile of white ash.
"Well," says Fugaku. "That's that over. Finally. Good job, Sasuke and Naruto."
"What happened?" demands Kushina, unable to contain her curiosity. "HOW did you get from there to there so fast AND cast the jutsu in less than a second?"
"WELL!" Naruto grins and starts making hand signs. "We had a chat with the Sage of Six Paths and then what happens next is the more important part, 'teabyo." Then Naruto makes two hand signs that are unfamiliar to Kushina followed by the Half-Ram Seal. "Flash-Back No Jutsu!"
The temple vanishes, and is replaced by a white void. Nearby, Kushina sees Naruto another standing beside another Sasuke, who is sitting awkwardly in the void.
"What did that old geezer mean, we'll know what to do?" growls Sasuke, flexing her left arm. "Well, at least he healed my arm. Now we just have to wait for the healers to heal our stab wounds so we can wake up."
"In the meantime, we should make a plan!" says Naruto, sitting down beside Sasuke. "If only we had more time, 'tebayo."
"Time…" sighs Sasuke, blowing up a lock of hair. "You need to finish that time stop jutsu."
"Yeah, if I could finish it before they heal us, we could stop time and then kill Zetsu before he knows what hit him, dattebayo," says Naruto glumly. "But I've been working on that jutsu for aaaaages and I still can't do it."
"Have you tried speeding up time for yourself so much that it looks to you like time has stopped?" asks Sasuke, equally glumly.
"Yeah, I messed up and ended up slowing down time instead," says Naruto. "I turned that mistake into the Temporal Distortion."
"Couldn't we use that against Zetsu?" asks Sasuke.
"He's so strong he'll break out of it," says Naruto. "Besides, I need to hold that one in place while it's up and my shadow clone can't hold it for as long as it will take you and me to cast the zetsu killer seal. I'm not as awesome as Iruka-nisan, 'tebayo."
"No one is as awesome as Iruka sensei," says Sasuke. Then her eyes widen. "I just had an idea! What if you used the hand seals from the Flashback no Jutsu?"
"I'm confused," Ikkaku interrupts. "How do Iruka and the Flashback no Jutsu connect?"
"Iruka's kid invented it," explains Naruto. "Back to the flashback!"
The flashback unpauses. (Kushina didn't even notice it was paused.) Naruto crosses his arms and screws up his face in thought. Finally, he grins brilliantly. "Sasuke, I am so glad we're teaching you fuuinjutsu!" He starts making hand signs. He adds in the two strange hand signs from the Flashback no Jutsu. When he is finished, Naruto grins. "I think that's right. I'm going to try it, 'tebayo!" Naruto pulls out a paint brush and slowly paints a seal on the ground.
"You really are slow," scoff Sasuke. "No wonder you rely on punching people in an actual fight."
Naruto sniffs and says, quite defensively, "Kakashi sensei says my mum is slow at drawing seals too."
Sasuke pulls an angry face. "Your mum can pull giant chains made of chakra out of her ass! She doesn't need ordinary seals!"
"Technically she pulls them out of her back," points out Naruto, weaving hand signs. "Fuuin: Time Stop." He lays his hands on the seal and activates it. The seal glows and Naruto vanishes, only to reappear behind Sasuke, who now has pigtails in her hair.
Sasuke puts her hand to her hair. "Why do you have hair ties?" she demands.
"Hinata," says Naruto, shrugging.
Sasuke sighs. "I walked right into that. How long does it last?"
"Exactly three minutes, 'tebayo," says Naruto. "Now, we'd better see if I can cast it on both of us." Naruto walks around to the front of Sasuke and draws the seal on the ground between them. "Put your hands on the seal." Naruto tells Sasuke. Sasuke does so and Naruto weaves the hand signs once more. "Fuuin: Time Stop!" Says Naruto as he lays his hands on top of Sasuke's and activates the seal.
At that moment, they are woken by the healers. They awaken to a frozen battlefield, with relieved healers paused above them.
Naruto and Sasuke sit up and grin at each other. Sasuke pulls the bandage off her arm.
"Your hair is still in pigtails!" giggles Naruto.
Sasuke puts up her hand to touch her hair. She laughs. "Let's go kill Zetsu."
"Let's find the masked man," says Naruto. "I want to pull his pants down."
Sasuke floats up into the air and looks around. "There he is," she says, pointing down at the ground. "He's dead. It would be a bit weird to pull a dead guy's pants down."
"What about that guy?" asks Naruto, pointing at the roof of the temple. A man is sitting on the roof of the temple, watching the battle with an amused smile on his face.
"Yes," says Sasuke, sticking her nose in the air haughtily. "That's what he gets for just sitting around and watching rather than helping." They fly over to the roof of the temple and yank the man's pants down. The man is wearing boxer shorts with cartoon pictures of the bijuu all over them. Sasuke giggles. "I kinda like this guy."
Naruto grins. "Maybe he was watching us for the Sage of Six Paths or something. Now let's go deal with Zetsu."
The two kids fly over to zetsu and cast their jutsu again. The time stop seal ends as they are activating their zetsu-killing jutsu.
"And that's pretty much what happened," says Naruto, ending the jutsu.
"Um…" says Lord First, a little nervously. Everyone turns to look at him and sees Lord First, Lord Second, Mito and Gengetsu all huddled together with expressions of fear and concern on their faces. "About the guy on the Temple roof…"
"I did not appreciate having my pants pulled down," says the man on the Temple roof, his voice echoing across the temple courtyard.
"Heeey, Madara," says Lord First, grinning nervously. "How are you?"