Forgotten

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from Naruto (Shippuden). This is a story inspired by the original made up for entertainment purposes only. - Krystal

Chapter 44: Rescue Mission

They arrived in front of a large boulder with a seal on it blocking the entrance to what seemed like a large cave from the outside. Yuki got closer to the seal to inspect it. She had a lot knowledge on these artifacts as she had accessed to many different libraries through her travel and retained most of the information she read, including the ones of seals. As she explained the type of seal it was, Naruto grew impatient as they were taking more time to plan. Yuki could sense the Kyuubi's chakra boiling up. Yuki placed her hand on his shoulder to calm him down as Gai's team departed in different directions to where the other seals were. Only when all five seals were peeled off at the same time would they be able to break into the cave. Knowing that they were the fastest ninjas, they took on the job. Kakashi finally received the signal to peel off the seal. As he did, Sakura went ahead and punched the boulder blocking their way, crushing it into dust. Yuki smiled at that. Tsunade seemingly took her under her wing and nurtured another Tsunade in the process.

As the dust was clearing up, Kakashi received news that Gai's team wasn't going to be able to join up with them just yet. They didn't give them the details, but told him to not worry about them as they would deal with it and join up with them later. Yuki bit her lip, feeling anxious about it. However, there was obviously more danger lurking ahead of them. She couldn't be distracted by her worries.

"I sense two chakra bodies in there. I can't sense…" She said as she saw it through the dust.

Gaara. He was lying there, on the ground, beneath an Akatsuki with blonde hair who didn't look much older than her. She couldn't sense Gaara's chakra for a reason. He was lifeless. Naruto was angered by the sight. Without much thought, he charged at the Akatsuki who then flew up in the air with what looked like a bird grabbing Gaara's dead body in the process.

"Deidara, don't overdo it." The second Akatsuki reminded him.

"Hm." Deidara replied as he took off.

Naruto lost control and the Kyuubi chakra started seeping out. He then went on a wild chase. The rest of them were about to follow, but they were stopped by that second Akatsuki. Chiyo gave sign for Kakashi and Yuki to go ahead after Naruto and the blonde Akatsuki, as Sakura would remain with her. That was when Yuki realized who that second Akatsuki was: Sasori. She gritted her teeth as she thought she should be stay back as well. However, Chiyo told her:

"This is a family problem. Sakura is enough for me to deal with him."

"Stay safe." Kakashi told them as he headed out with Yuki after Naruto.

"I'll keep her safe." Chiyo promised Kakashi.

Naruto was only a little bit ahead of them. He was being extremely careless during his chase as he was angered and couldn't see the bigger picture. Kakashi kept calling out to him to tell him to slow down. However, he didn't listen and kept increasing his speed instead.

"Do you think you flash yourself closer to him to try to reason with him? Do you have enough chakra?" Kakashi asked Yuki as he could sense that she was still a little exhausted from her previous teleportation.

"Even if I don't have enough, we don't have much choice do we?" Yuki replied as she threw her kunai at great velocity towards Naruto and flashed herself right behind him catching the kunai before it stroke anything.

"Oi, Naruto. You need to calm yourself down. I don't want to say it myself, but Gaara is already dead. Rushing things doesn't mean you can bring him back in one piece."

"BUT…" Naruto said loudly.

"I understand how you feel. I hate that Deidara just as much as you right now, but I also know that getting angry won't get me anywhere. So please, let's regroup and figure out together how we can take Gaara's body back."

"He's not dead…" Naruto said as tears were filling up his eyes.

"He… Naruto, even if he was alive, we need to plan this properly to bring him back."

Naruto, unwillingly still, slowed down a bit to which Deidara responded by sending some bombs down towards them. As they passed by her, Yuki could tell that they were made of clay. She grabbed Naruto's arm and flashed them back to Kakashi avoiding getting hit by the clay bombs.

"He's really trying to provoke us." Kakashi said as they moved forward.

"The bombs are made of clay, I could defuse them with my lightning jutsu." Yuki told him.

"That bird he's flying must be made of clay too. Do you think you could reach it with your lightning jutsu?"

"I would need to get closer." Yuki replied as she pulled out the kunai with her seal on.

"Be careful. I know you are good, but he's also an S-rank criminal." Kakashi reminded her.

She nodded as she threw her kunai as strongly as possible to get as close as possible to Deidara. She flashed herself to that great height and readied herself to use her lightning jutsu. Before she could strike him, Deidara flew higher and dropped a much larger clay bomb toward her.

"Ha, that won't work on me!" He yelled as he released the bomb to explode.

The blast was quite large, causing the earth to shake a bit. Yuki managed to barely get away by pulling herself away with a rope towards a tree that had grown out of the rocks. She didn't have enough time to flash herself back to Kakashi and Naruto. In the process, she was slightly burnt by the explosion on her right shoulder. Kakashi and Naruto caught up to her during that time.

"Are you alright, Yuki?" Kakashi asked.

"I'll survive." Yuki replied as she tended to her wound while still chasing Deidara alongside with the two of them.

"I have something that could bring him down, but I need time and I also need to get closer." Kakashi said as his sharingan eye changed.

"Mangekyo?" Yuki asked.

"Only recently. I can send him to another dimension, but my aim for this is still a little off, especially at this distance." Kakashi explained as he sped up.

"Kamui."

"Exactly."

"I don't understand what you are both saying, but Kakashi-sensei, I'm begging you to hurry up."

"Naruto, I don't have as much chakra as you do. It, unfortunately, takes me time to do this on top on maintaining the speed to catch up to him." Kakashi told him, exasperated.

They went on like this a for a bit. Yuki was also recovering her chakra as they were chasing Deidara. At times, she would close her eyes and focus on what was going on in the cave with Chiyo and Sakura, she could still sense both their chakra. It reassured her.

"Yuki. Don't lose focus on what's ahead of us. Have faith in them instead." Kakashi said as she saw her closing her eyes from time to time. "Sakura isn't a child anymore, nor is Naruto or the rest of Gai's team. They might not have the experience you have, but they can hold their own now. They've been able to do so for a while now."

"Kakashi-sensei! Is it ready yet?" Naruto asked impatiently as he had taken the lead.

"Just about." Kakashi replied as he opened his eye.

The sky then warped around Deidara. He was getting sucked into this vacuum in the sky. Confused, but mostly scared, Deidara tried his best to move away from the eye of the warp. He struggled. Eventually, the warping hole stopped only able to detach Deidara's arm from the rest of his body. Kakashi was trying to aim for his head, but it failed. Nonetheless, it did slow him down and brought him closer to the ground. It was within Yuki's reach to destroy his clay bird with a lightning laser beam. In the process, Gaara's body dropped from the sky and Naruto went ahead and caught it, bringing Gaara to a gentle landing on the ground.

"Gaara! Wake up!" He kept yelling.

Deidara was only a few meters away, but could barely move because of the hard landing on the ground and his missing arm. He laughed at Naruto.

"You truly are a fool. He's dead! He ain't waking up!" Deidara told him, provoking an angry Naruto even further.

As Yuki and Kakashi both arrived on scene, they were confronted to Naruto, in his one-tail state, ripping apart what looked to be a clay clone from Deidara. Angered by the fact that he was unable to exact his revenge, the Kyuubi's chakra seeped through revealing a second tail on the chakra cloak.

"Naruto!" Kakashi yelled out. "You need to learn how to control yourself! Getting angry won't solve anything."

Naruto ignored his words as a third tail emerged. Kakashi rushed over with a seal tag that Jiraiya had given him, instructing him to place it on Naruto before the fourth tail appeared. He was a second too late. That fourth tail emerged and Naruto started going into a rampage. He could no longer recognize who was a foe and who was a friend. Kakashi had to take a few steps back to avoid getting injured by Naruto. Yuki brought Gaara's body to a safe location before joining with Kakashi.

"Jiraiya was heavily injured after his fourth tail emerged. I should have pulled this out sooner." Kakashi told Yuki.

"I saw Jiraiya right after the incident. We still have time, but not much though. I don't know if the seal works on a fifth tail state."

"We need to hold him down so that I can get to him."

"Leave that to me." Yuki told him as she thought to create an ice cage to imprison Naruto for a while.

She jumped right above Naruto and used her ice jutsu to slam him down within the ice cage. She landed on it and infused her chakra into the cage to allow for the bars to become nearly unbreakable. Kakashi quickly came in and placed the seal on Naruto's head. Before the seal could completely suppress the Kyuubi's chakra, Naruto managed to shatter the cage making Yuki fly off of it. Using that much chakra within such a short period of time exhausted her and she started losing consciousness in her flight. Before she could hit anything hard, she was caught by no other than Neji who had arrived on scene right at that moment with the rest of Gai's team. She let out a sigh of relief. Meanwhile, Naruto was returning to his normal self minus the few injuries that were left after the cloak was removed from his body.

"Neji, do you mind bringing me over to Naruto?" Yuki asked him.

He sighed, but did as he was told. Naruto barely woke up when he heard snickers coming from behind a tree. Deidara was still there, finding the whole situation amusing. As he made his appearance, Naruto tried to attack him once again. Yuki put her hand on his shoulder and made him stay.

"Hm. Nine-tailed kid, why don't you give me another show like that. When you enter that mode, it seems like you can understand my art. Hm." Deidara said with a smirk on his face.

As he said those words, Sakura and Chiyo made their appearance at the scene as well. Deidara looked shocked. If they had made it back, it had to mean that his partner was defeated. He cursed under his breath before biting into some clay.

"You are all going in a BOOM!" He yelled.

"We need to all get away." Neji told everyone. "He's about to blow up."

"I'll show you what art is!" Deidara continued to threaten them.

"We can just kill him now!" Naruto said angrily.

"No, if we touch him now, he'll go off like a bomb." Neji explained.

"You are all too late! Art is an explosion!" Deidara yelled as he swelled up to the point where he could destroy a whole nation with him.

As the explosion was about to go off, it somehow vanished in mid air. Yuki looked back and saw Kakashi collapse onto his knee behind her. Kamui. He did it just in time. It drained him though. Two was definitely his limit for the time being. He pulled his forehead protector back onto his eye before hitting the ground and sighing.

"You saved us all, Kakashi." Gai told him as he lent him some support to sit back up.

Everybody let out a sigh of relief. Lee then brought Gaara's body to all of them, his eyes filled with tears. They went back a long way. They were enemies. They were friends. They were rivals. Gaara was someone who made Lee challenge himself even further. Naruto stumbled and made his way next to Lee and Gaara's immobile body. He grabbed Gaara's hand. It was so cold.

"Sakura-chan... He's not dead, right?" He asked her as he was crying. "He can't be. He finally... He finally became Kazekage and was acknowledged by people. He can't die."

Sakura walked over and looked down at Gaara's corpse. She shook her head as tears streamed down her face. Yuki looked away. She bit her lip as she tried to hold her tears back. She wondered if she had decided differently back then, if she decided to stay in Sunagakure... Would Gaara still be alive? As she closed her eyes, the tears started pouring. She could make a difference. She clenched her fists as she prepared herself to transfer her life to Gaara. Neji noticed. He held her back for a second. She shook him off.

"Naruto..." Yuki started.

"Let me have a look at him." Chiyo interrupted her as she knew what Yuki wanted to do.

Chiyo kneeled down by Gaara. She started to transfer her life energy into him.

"I've made many mistakes in my life. This is the least that I can do. I am responsible for his death in a sense after all."

"How..." Naruto started as he realized what she was doing when looking at everybody's facial expression.

Chiyo, however, was severely poisoned after her fight against Sasori. She nearly collapsed as she was transferring her life energy into Gaara. Naruto reached out his hand to her.

"You..." She started.

"Use my chakra." Naruto told her.

"Just place your hands on top of mine." Chiyo instructed him. "Naruto... I'm glad Gaara met someone like you. Yuki... don't take your life so lightly. Cherish it. When you get to my age, death will be at your doorstep, only then should you sacrifice your own life."

Yuki's lips trembled as she found it hard to give Chiyo a reply. She simply nodded as her heart was wrenching. Her whole body felt weak as she felt so helpless in that situation. Neji walked over and wrapped his arms around her shoulders. She turned her head towards him as she leaned in to find comfort. She could no longer watch the scene. She could only hear Chiyo's chukle, filled with life still, and murmuring audibly:

"The future is going to be very different from what I have known."

Yuki then sensed Chiyo's chakra dissipating slowly as Gaara's chakra slowly grew until all was his. She finally looked at them. Sakura was on the ground, crying and hugging the now deceased Chiyo whose smile was still drawn on her face. As peaceful as Chiyo looked in her death, for a short moment, the whole forest was at peace as well as everyone took a minute of silence in honor of her sacrifice for the future.

End of Chapter 44

Thank you for reading this chapter.

I hope you enjoyed it.

Let me know what you thought of it in the review section.

xox

Krystal