-Island of Jaya-

-Sky-

-Fifteen Minutes Earlier-

Deidara had been circling down to the ground for quite some time now, but the monotony really didn't bother him. It was certainly much better than the alternative he had just avoided. He tried not to let it be known, but he had a serious problem with lightning. Not that he was afraid of it, or anything like that; it was for entirely practical reasons. His fighting technique had developed to revolve entirely around the use of chakra-infused explosive clay, and that clay was fundamentally Earth-Element in its nature. Because of this, all of his creations and bombs had an unfortunate tendency to malfunction when exposed to lightning-element chakra.

So anyway, after Sky-High Thunderboy up in fairy-land decided to start taking offense to their presence, Deidara had been the first to volunteer to go down after the stone tablet that had been blasted off the clouds and down to the earth below. Granted, Tobi hadn't asked for volunteers; he'd just grabbed Hidan and lobbed him off a cloud, and maybe if Deidara had been just a few seconds faster to speak up then that wouldn't have happened, but, hey, why take all the joy out of life?

Regardless, no way was he going to hang around while some power-crazy 'Thunder God' was going on a bender like that. Seriously, he'd seen the Raikage throw ninjutsu around, and even the greatest lightning-user in the ninja world had nothing on this guy. It was ridiculous. The man had drilled a hole through something like fifty feet of stone and dirt like it hadn't even bothered him. Add onto that teleportation, a perfect defense, some sort of precognition, a seemingly unlimited chakra reserve, limited omniscience for miles around...

Deidara gave a silent salute to the other members of Akatsuki still fighting up above. Have fun up there, assholes. Have yourself a grand old time.

The massive clay bird continued its circling descent. Luckily, his clay, when infused with his chakra, could be made to expand without gaining mass, and the unbelievably large avian form he had created from that clay weighed even less than he did. With his long blond hair kept back by the wind, Deidara focused the scope mounted over his left eye and began to hunt for his target. There was a wonky-looking island far below him. Zoom... Zoom... There was a crater and a glint of gold.

He grinned. The bell had landed on an island, which certainly made his job easier. He was still pretty far up, but if he strained the magnification and steadied himself, he could almost make out…

"SQUAWK!"

"Holy hellfire!" he shouted, scrambling backward in shock. Some sort of fat seagull had snuck up on him and was now flying alongside. What the hell was it doing here? It was strange enough that a bird like this would approach him at all, but what was stranger still was the fact that it was wearing some sort of hat and a full carrying bag was slung over its back. Deidara stared at the bird in confusion, but when no attack seemed imminent, he recalled a few of the explosive jumping bugs that had crawled around from his mount's stomach.

"SQUAWK!" the bird reiterated.

"What the hell do you want, un?"

"SQUAWK!" it leaned in closer and opened its large beak, making an odd sort of dipping motion with its head and waving a wing in his direction. Deidara had always had a sort of affinity for birds, but this was a little ridiculous.

"I don't… What the hell is that supposed to mean, birdbrain?"

"SQUAWK!" it clarified.

"Ah man, I really don't understand this place. It just gets weirder and weirder, un. What, do you want some food or something? Is that it?"

"SQUAWK!" it agreed.

"Okay, okay, hang on a second." Deidara reached into a pouch beneath his robes and pulled out one of the spare fish dumplings they had been experimenting with as rations. Bemusedly, he weighed it in one hand and then tossed it over to the hungry bird, who snatched it out of the air with a snap of its beak, devouring it in moments.

"SQUAWK!" it thanked him.

"Yeah, alright, sounds good. Goodbye, get out of here, un."

"SQUAWK!" it insisted. Deidara watched with fascination as, with an astonishingly dexterous twist of its wing, it reached into the pouch on its back and retrieved a rolled up fold of paper, all the while wobbling wildly from the wing adjustments. It reached out and proffered the paper to him. Unable to help himself, he took it.

"What in the world…? This is some kind of newspaper? You deliver newspapers?!"

"SQUAWK!" it said, and bade him farewell by raising its hat to him with one wing. Then it was off.

Deidara just sat and took that in for a while. Was it possible that the Elemental Kingdoms were the only sane place in the entire world? That was concerning. Eventually, he stuffed the newspaper into a pouch and shook his head to clear it. Right now he had a job to do.

He was descending lower and lower now, and he could finally start making out details of the ground below. The bell had made a huge crater, and it had some natives investigating it- oh, there was Hidan. Good to know he wouldn't have to go hunting for body parts in the ocean again. Idly, Deidara scanned the surrounding landscape. A few more natives scattered about here and there, some ships, and… wait… Zoom... Zoom...

"Oh my, my, my. What a coincidence. I spy, with my little eye, two Konoha headbands! And their owners are just sitting around without a care in the world, un. Oh, you little rodents, are you following us?"

This was exciting. He hadn't had a chance to go crazy in a while, and the only other Akatsuki member around was already occupied. With one hand he reached into his pouch of specially prepared clay, feeling the biological creation that inhabited his arm open its mouth and begin to feed. As it chewed the white clay, Deidara infused it with his chakra. In mere moments it had formed into a myriad of tiny, birdlike creatures.

It looked like Hidan was just sitting around talking to his group of miscreants, but why should Deidara waste a perfectly good surprise attack? Increasing his speed, he let a few of his creations soar away into the wide blue sky.

Let's see how they appreciate art.

Chopper had been gone for more than ten minutes when Usopp spotted something unusual. The cowardly sniper had been glaring suspiciously at the thick clouds for nearly that entire time, half-expecting a giant golden gong or pair of cymbals to hurtle down after the bell. As he watched, the birds of the island were finally starting to settle back in after the immense impact that had startled them.

Though, he could swear that big white bird hadn't been there at all just a little while ago. It was circling around and around like it was looking for something. Kind of an oddly-shaped bird, come to think of it. Curiosity piqued, he grabbed his goggles, lowering them and adjusting his home-made zoom.

Screw you, Sasuke. Yeah, there isn't anything your magic eyeballs can do that can't be reproduced by a little good-old-fashioned human ingenuity, and he had that in bucket-loads. So what if he wasn't a ninja? With a little work, Usopp was sure he could walk on water or breathe fire, too. He just hadn't needed to yet.

Yeah.

Carefully he zoomed in on his target. Then he fiddled with the focus. Then he pulled off his goggles and rubbed his eyes. Then he replaced his goggles and looked again. Then he removed his goggles completely and glared with just his Mark One eyeballs, which were pretty darn good all things considered.

Subduing his pride for a moment, he wandered over to where the two ninjas were chatting by the side of the house. "Hey, you two. What does that look like up there?"

"Wha-?" asked Naruto, peering up into the sky, "The clouds?"

"That's… Huh," said Sasuke. "That looks to me like a guy riding on top of some sort of dumpy-looking lizard-bird thing. Where did he come from?"

"That's just it. I think he came out of the clouds."

"The clouds?" asked Naruto again. "You think he came looking for the guy that fell down here? Or the bell?"

"Wait-" muttered Sasuke, "No… That's an Akatsuki robe!"

"EH?!" cried the sniper, "IT'S THEM?! Shit! We need to get out of here! Quick! Go warn the others! I'll get the Merry ready!"

Beside them, Zoro yawned. Then, he adjusted his position and continued sleeping.

"He's dropped something," said Sasuke. "Something's coming this way. Take cover!"

Anyone who's seen a bird in flight, such as, for example, everyone, can attest to how quickly a bird can move through the air. They glide and then dive unpredictably, dropping like stones only to let out their wings and leap upward with dozens of quick wingbeats. These bombs moved just like that. One could almost believe that the bomber had simply studied the examples in nature for ages, faithfully replicating them until he had an accurate reproduction of a bird in flight. This is because that is exactly what Deidara had done.

None of that mattered to the Straw-Hats. They saw the birds coming their way and dashed for the cover of Cricket's stone house. The clay birds arrowed down, exploding on contact with the ground in immense blasts of flame. Two struck the stone house, and six more scattered themselves across the nearby earth, sending Usopp, Naruto, and Sasuke crashing to the dirt.

Zoro was tossed off the cliff like a ragdoll. No one present could actually tell whether he had woken up or not.

Sasuke recovered first, coming out of his roll with a storm of shuriken. Flying straight up, they were scattered and harmless by the time they reached the bomber, who barely bothered to dodge. The others watched the air carefully, on the lookout for more of the explosive weapons. Soon, the bomber called down from above, his voice faint.

"Well, if it isn't a couple of Konoha lapdogs caught out in the open! Are you the two that Danzou couldn't handle? I'll have to laugh in his face for that later, un." The man paused, cackling, then tossed another handful of the small white pellets from his hands. "I hope you have fun in my open-air exhibition! Welcome to my gallery!"

Sasuke cursed, watching as the bombs began their slow, unpredictable descent. "He's not going to come down here, is he? We need something to fight him at long range. Naruto, I hope you've been doing something really special for the last year."

"Won't know unless I try, huh?" Naruto took a deep breath.

[FUUTON: REPPUU-DAN] - [WIND RELEASE: GALE BULLET]

From his mouth he spat a series of compressed-air bullets contained by a core of his chakra. They shot up towards the bomber at nearly the speed of sound. The Akatsuki madman weaved and spun, wheeling to get higher so that the bullets would slow down by the time they reached him. Still, only a few caused him any danger.

After a moment, Naruto stopped the technique. "Shit! I can get him, I know it, just let me have another shot once we take out those bombs!"

Suddenly, Sasuke remembered something. He turned to Usopp, who was quite some distance away at this point. "Usopp! Didn't they say you were a marksman?"

Usopp looked aghast. "What? Whoa-whoa-whoa! He said he's after you two! I'm not getting in the middle of this!"

"What?! You really think he's going to leave you out when he's done?!"

Sasuke's cries were interrupted as Montblanc Cricket stalked out of his still mostly-intact house. He was covered in rock dust and there was a second red lump forming on his bald head. He didn't look pleased.

"What the hell is this, you louse-ridden cur? You really want to get on my bad side?"

Grabbing a piece of rubble, Cricket chucked it skyward, his immensely muscled physique trained by years of diving and rock-climbing sending the rock after rock up into the air like a trebuchet. They weren't hitting, but they were more things for the bomber to dodge.

Then then bombs arrived. Almost all of them were aiming directly for Sasuke and Naruto. The two ninja slipped back-to-back, Sasuke performing a few quick seals and Naruto clapping both hands together.

[RAITON: DENKO-HODEN] - [LIGHTNING RELEASE: ARC-FLASH]

[FUUTON: REPPUUSHO] - [WIND RELEASE: GALE PALM]

The air above them become a mess. The hemisphere above Naruto filled with lashing blades of wind that tore anything that entered its area apart. Sasuke's half of the sky simply exploded, the air filling with a blinding white light and a release of sound and pressure that threatened to damage all nearby ears. When it all cleared, it became apparent that several of the explosives had hit ground, but none had managed to hurt the two young ninja.

With a growl of frustration, Cricket stopped tossing rocks and ran into his house, grabbing a large stick wrapped in red paper. As soon as he was in the open, he tore the wrapping apart with his teeth and pulled down hard on something inside. A flare shot far up into the sky, expanding into a powerful red light that could be seen easily even in the daytime.

"Hey!" shouted Usopp, still watching from the sidelines, "What are you doing?! You're gonna call the Marines here!"

Cricket paused to spit out some of the flare's red packaging. "I think they already know something's up after that bell landed! I'm calling my friends for help, cause it looks like we'll need it."

Off in the distance, Zoro had finally woken up and climbed back up the cliffside. Taking a stance, he maneuvered one sword into position before slashing the empty air above him.

[36-POUND PHOENIX]

Even cutting through nothing but air the slash sounded like cannonfire. A swirling blade of wind flew up into the sky, but the bomber dodged, narrowly avoiding the unexpected attack.

"Shit. Missed," said Zoro.

Naruto, as the other wind-user in the group, stopped looking around for a moment to stare open-mouthed at the swordsman. "What the hell, man? I thought you guys didn't use jutsu and chakra out here?!"

"What?" responded Zoro, "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Then what the hell was that thing you just did?!"

"I figured this thing out like two weeks ago. I just cut really hard until the slash energy or whatever starts flying at him like a cannon."

As Naruto boggled at the cavalier explanation, Sasuke added his input. "Hey, I don't care what you call it, but I can see chakra, and that was definitely chakra. Now, come on and start paying attention! This guy's gonna get the drop on us!"

Nodding, Naruto made another hand seal. "Alright, let's see how you like my attacks this time, you psychotic asshole." With a rapid-fire explosions of smoke, roughly two dozen shadow clones popped into existence. All of them began immediately performing identical hand seals.

[FUUTON: TAJUU REPPUU-DAN] - [WIND RELEASE: MASS GALE BULLET]

With inhaled breaths, the assorted Narutos filled the air with windy death. Here and there, bombs began to explode as they were ripped to pieces from travelling too close to the myriad waves of wind bullets. The small clone army oriented itself to box the bomber in as best as they could, hoping to push him into making a mistake, but after a while it became clear that his attacks weren't doing much good. The man simply had too much time to dodge incoming jutsu, which let him bob and weave unpredictably. All it was doing was occupying his attention.

Even for a beast like Naruto, sustaining more than twenty wind jutsu simultaneously was a ridiculous drain on his chakra levels. They'd need something more to take out the flying foe, and they just didn't seem to have it.

With the mad bomber distracted, Usopp saw his chance and bolted. Those two ninjas could clearly handle themselves, and he really didn't want to be anywhere near this fight. Dashing towards the ship, he tried his best to outrun the flying creations, but he didn't have much success. As if they were sensing weakness, the nearest one spiraled into a dive, slamming into the ground and erupting in a ball of fire.

Usopp went flying head over heels, tumbling into the dirt. Scrabbling to his feet, he continued to run as if his life depended on it. With a look over his shoulder, he saw more of the strange birds now following him.

"Dammit! NOW you start coming after me?!" he shouted, "Can't you tell I don't want to fight you?! Just leave me alone!"

The birds continued to gain on him. Finally, grabbing his slingshot and a handful of ammunition, he fired a pellet. The nearest bird exploded in a gout of flame.

Huh. That was easy. The other birds immediately started evading to dodge the unexpected attack, but Usopp began firing as quickly as he could reload. Many more of the tiny bird-bombs exploded, blazing a trail of fire as he shot down bombs all the way back toward the bomber himself.

"Usopp!" shouted Sasuke, "Great shots! Take him down and we'll cover for you!"

Whoa, what? Take him down? He wanted to get away from this as soon as possible! In fact, he was right now wasting valuable time that could instead be spent running. Spinning in place, he ignored the black-haired ninja and continued his earlier retreat. At least, until the bomber shouted threats down after him.

"That's right, you little worm!" he yelled, "Run! Run and hide! It's not going to change anything! I'll blast all the dirt off of this rock until I get to you, un!"

Usopp spun in place, readying his slingshot in his best attempt at a defiant pose. "W-well said, Sasuke! Just keep me safe and I, The Great Usopp, mightiest sniper in all the land, will handle the air!" The effect was somewhat ruined by his knees knocking together.

There was laughter from up above followed by another wave of bombs on the wind. Usopp readied his weapon. Beside him, Naruto and Sasuke tried another combination attack that sent two streams of flame and wind shooting up into the sky, engulfing some of the incoming weapons.

Usopp saw his chance, grabbing a round of his special ammunition.

[HISSATSU - GUNPOWDER STAR]

He released the shot and it soared true, flying hundreds of feet up to strike the evading bomber dead on. With an explosion that spat acrid, black smoke, the bomber dropped from his mount. The man in the Akatsuki robe fell toward the ground for several seconds before the gigantic white bird swooped down to catch him.

"Careful!" shouted Sasuke, "He dropped something else again! Keep your eyes peeled!"

Soon, the man was back on top of his bird, whirling around to face them. "Oh, you cheeky little ant! You wanna try fighting with explosives?!" He flung out both arms and another wave of the birds scattered in the wind. "Have fun!"

Usopp laughed, filled with a surprising wave of confidence as the bombs flew his way. This time the weapons spiraled from the beginning, each one moving in an unpredictable barrel-roll as they arced toward him. More pellets flew from his slingshot, and then the explosions began to fill the air once more.

When about half of the flying explosives were left, they suddenly changed directions. Usopp blinked in surprise as his shots missed their mark. It looked like the psychopath had decided to go after the rest of the team after all. Naruto, Sasuke, Cricket, and Zoro readied themselves, but then the bombs changed direction yet again. Half of them made a beeline straight for the Going Merry, and half headed straight for Cricket's house.

"Let's see which one's important to you!" yelled the bomber.

With a curse, Usopp adjusted his aim. The bird-bombs were flying away from him now, but he could still make the shot. He wouldn't let this screwball hurt the Merry! One, two, three, four bombs detonated mid-air before he heard an odd sound behind him. There was a rustling in the grass.

"Usopp!" shouted Sasuke, "Capiche!"

"Capiche?! What the hell's that supposed to mean?" He looked over his shoulder and saw a small white grasshopper-looking bug of the same style as the other bombs, peeking its head out of the grass. There was only the slightest moment to dodge, and then the world went white. He felt the fire and hit the ground in a heap, blacking out. He wasn't sure how much time had passed before someone shook him awake.

"Usopp! Usopp! Are you okay?" asked Sasuke.

His head was spinning. "I'm fine, thanks… how are you today?" Usopp responded. You had to be polite, after all.

With both hands, Sasuke hauled him back to his feet and shook him to his senses. Everything in his body ached.

"Are you okay?" the ninja repeated, "We need you to take him down, Usopp. We can't reach him!"

The sniper blinked back uncertainly, then he remembered something important.

"'Capiche?!'" Usopp shouted, "What the hell was that?!"

"What? Sanji said it meant 'watch your back!'"

"CAPICHE?!"

"Look, I'm sorry, but-"

There was a motion in the grass behind Sasuke.

"CAPICHE! CAPICHE!" the sniper screamed.

Ducking out of Sasuke's grip, Usopp made the quickest quick-draw he had ever performed in his life, catching the grasshopper creature mid-leap. Another blast of fire shook the air, singeing them both.

"Shit," cursed Sasuke, whirling in place. Now his eyes were everywhere, searching the grass for more of the hidden bombs.

The Straw-Hats were in trouble. By staggering his waves of bombs, the Akatsuki member had finally reached full saturation of the area. Each of the people stuck on the ground was forced to see everywhere around them, and wounds were mounting fast. Hemmed in by the hopping insect-creations, Naruto, Cricket, and Zoro soon joined Sasuke and Usopp. On the plus side, it meant they had more eyes to watch all sides. On the minus side, it meant that the bomber had finally succeeded in forcing them into one place.

Bringing his hands together in the seal of the Tiger, Sasuke released a wave of flame from his mouth.

[KATON: HIBASHIRI] - [FIRE RELEASE: RUNNING FLAMES]

The fire danced around them as if someone had poured a barrel of oil in a circle fifty feet wide. From there it began to spread outwards. Before long, they were all at the center of a raging inferno. The grasshopper bugs backed off at first, and a few that tried to proceed through the flames were baked before reaching their targets inside. Some, though, were managing to leap over the fire circle intact. Like magic, a fan of shuriken appeared in the ninja's off-hand, and he began knocking the incoming bugs out of the air.

"Zoro, you and I should handle the ground! The rest of you, take the sky!"

Nodding, the defenders readied their weapons, the light of the flames dancing across their eyes. Usopp readied his slingshot.

He didn't want to look at the Merry. He knew he hadn't destroyed all of the bombs that had been heading its way. He could take a hit or two, but by all that was good in this world he hoped his ship was okay. Slowly, Usopp tuned the world out. He became nothing more than an automated reload and aiming function for his slingshot. He fired pellets with no regard for conserving ammunition, destroying every flying bomb he could manage to take out. He would not let them hurt the Merry. The evasion patterns of the bombs grew wilder and wilder as their numbers thinned.

Vaguely, he was aware that the others were fighting too. A couple of big toads appeared out of nowhere and started jumping into the air, trying to attack the bomber. Things blew up around him, but he hardly noticed. Finally he had a moment of safety, a chance to take a clear shot at the bomber. He aimed his weapon, and then saw another bomb headed for the Merry. He readjusted and fired, protecting the ship.

Something tapped him on the foot. Then it tapped harder. Who was doing that? Sasuke and Zoro were still destroying every bomb that attempted to leap through the fire. Naruto was nearby, looking back and forth for something. Cricket was in front of him, flinging rocks. There was no one left. Shocked out of his daze, Usopp looked down.

A small, white burrowing insect was kicking him repeatedly in his shoe. A second later, a couple more burrowed their way from underneath the ground. Usopp had just an instant of shocked realization before the bug looked up at him, a cartoonish smiley face inscribed on its otherwise featureless clay head.

Above him, Deidara crowed in triumph.

"ART IS A BLAST!"

The last thing Usopp felt before blacking out was Naruto tackling him to the side. Then, the bombs exploded.