Sasuke paused in the hallway. Tobi appeared in front of him without a sound, but it was clear he knew someone was nearby.

"What do you want, Tobi?" he said.

Tobi didn't bother with greetings. "I'm going out for a little while. Wait for me to return before you remove the bandages."

"Are you activating the Zetsu?"

"No. There's been a slight change of plans. The leader of Amegakure is in Suna. There is something from that village I need, and getting it will be much easier without her interference."

"That's got nothing to do with me."

"You will wait. I know you're restless, but your task will be much easier once the Allied Shinobi Force is preoccupied. The Kazekage already suspects a spy in Suna, and I believe the presence of Ame's leader will force the matter."

Sasuke snorted. "If you think you have Orochimaru under control, you're a fool. You may regret letting him do whatever he wants."

Tobi glanced up at the ceiling, where Zetsu was waiting quietly. He acknowledged the plant being with a nod.

"Wait," Tobi repeated. "Once it all comes out, we can begin."

Tobi knew the only reason Konan appeared away from home was because she wanted him to know. He originally intended to hunt the Rinnegan after setting the Zetsu army loose on the world, but this was too good of an opportunity to pass up.

She was baiting him. And he didn't care.

But now, something didn't seem right. He'd expected a trap. He hadn't expected to reach Nagato's resting place with no resistance whatsoever. It was… far too easy.

Tobi cast his eye warily around the magnificent tomb, scanning the shadows hung all around the graves of the two former Akatsuki leaders.

The perfectly preserved bodies of Nagato and Yahiko lay side-by-side on a vast bed of paper roses, overlooked by angels carved into the marble wall behind them. He scoffed at such an extravagant display of mourning. Because of her misplaced loyalty to these two, Konan had followed Nagato's example in defying him. Why couldn't she understand that assisting with Tsuki no Me would enable her to see them alive again?

Tobi jumped and landed in between the two bodies, tense and alert for any traps. He crouched down beside Nagato and scanned over him carefully. There didn't seem to be anything. No wires, no paper bombs, no illusions, no substitution. It was his real corpse. Tobi moved his hand over Nagato's peacefully smiling face.

Ah. Of course.

The eyes were missing. The sunken eyelids gave the white-haired, skeletal-looking body an even more ghastly appearance.

"You won't find them in Ame," someone said calmly.

Tobi quickly jumped off the shrine and looked around for the speaker. He stepped out from behind a marble pillar and gave Tobi a smile that mimicked the one on the corpse.

Nagato's face was fuller, younger-looking, and his hair was flaming red instead of a dead white. His purple eyes etched with bizarre black rings were an echo of the very eyes Tobi was searching for.

"I knew you would come for them, so I took and hid them somewhere," Nagato continued. "I am the only one who knows where they are now."

Tobi stood stiffly, appraising him. He narrowed his one visible eye. "I suppose I just have to make you tell me, then."

"You can try," Nagato's smile widened slowly. "Genjutsu won't work—even the shadow of a Rinnegan I have now would render it useless. I am Edo Tensei, so you can't kill or hurt me, and even if you could, I still wouldn't tell. You're better off giving up."

"We will definitely see you on the battlefield later, Madara." Another voice came from behind him, and Tobi whirled around. "For now, it is in your best interest to leave this village in peace. Don't you think?" Itachi said.

Tobi cursed internally. Without the power of the Rinnegan, he knew he would not fare well against Nagato and Itachi at the same time, especially as Edo Tensei. Even with the Rinnegan, it would be a challenge. And if it wasn't even here—how would he ever be able to find it?

There was only one choice. Nagato and Itachi would have to be put out of the way first. He would have to seal them, or get Orochimaru to put them back under control.

"Tch," Tobi said. "It's just one thing after another."

There was another option, actually. He knew where Konan was, and where Sasuke was. And both of them had bodies that could die.

But it seemed Nagato and Itachi were willing to let him go. Why would they, knowing Konan was out there alone—knowing Sasuke was already in his grasp? They might even know Orochimaru was in Suna.

Tobi's whole body was tense, ready to move at the slightest sign of attack. He moved his eye back and forth between Nagato and Itachi. A cold silence filled the cavernous room.

Itachi on his left, and Nagato on the right. There was nothing else keeping him in this room except for physical stone walls, which could easily be passed through. Not to mention if it came down to it, he could always teleport away on the spot. He could risk prodding a bit more.

"I'm surprised," he said carefully. "You knew I would come here, yet you chose to confront me directly, instead of trying to catch me in a trap."

"Who said this isn't a trap?" Itachi asked.

Tobi tensed and swept his Sharingan around the room again. He still couldn't sense anything, not even a genjutsu. He narrowed his eye at Itachi. "You want to face me now, then?"

"Only if necessary," Itachi said. "We had to confront you directly so you would not try to ransack Ame in search of the Rinnegan. If you do anything to threaten the village, we will stop you."

"I see now. You know you can't beat me here without risking extensive damage to the village above us. That is why you're willing to let me go, even though many more people will die in the war I'm about to start. Pathetic."

"We've lost the right to weigh lives and say one loss is more acceptable than another," Nagato said with a faint smile. "We proved ourselves failures in that area long ago. Ne, Itachi?"

"You are wrong to think stopping you would stop the war, at any rate," Itachi said. "Even though his end goals are different, I'm sure Orochimaru would find a use for the army you handed over to him."

Tobi growled. "How much have the two of you figured out about our plans?"

They didn't answer. Not that he'd expected them to. They would give away nothing.

"Well, never mind. I can guess you already know a lot, and that hiding the Rinnegan is only part of your interfering. But I have cards in my hand, too. Sasuke. The little Naruto. And now, Konan." He turned back to examine Nagato. "Are you sure there aren't lives you'd be willing to weigh against the Rinnegan?"

When neither of them flinched, Tobi realized they had been waiting for him to make this move. Nagato didn't appear to be fazed at all by the threat. He just smiled contentedly and said, "You underestimate them."

Sasuke slashed out with his sword, feeling the impact as each stroke went smoothly through a training dummy. He paused, listening. One, two, three, four, five. Each of the dummies fell neatly where he cut them. Sasuke stood from his stance and sheathed his sword. He had hit all five without missing this time.

"Oh? You're not going to fry them all to finish it off?" he heard White Zetsu's perpetually amused voice.

"Why are you here?" Sasuke said, annoyed.

"No reason," White Zetsu said in a singsong tone. "Just thought you might be interested in hearing something."

Sasuke frowned. Something about Zetsu felt different from normal. "Where is your other half? What is going on?"

"You finally noticed, huh? You are improving. Tobi has gone to fetch the Rinnegan, and Orochimaru will be back here soon to upgrade my clones, and everyone's getting ready to start the war~! I'm here to watch over you until you can fly by yourself, little bird."

Sasuke thought for a moment, head tilted slightly to one side. Tobi and Black Zetsu were both out. "So, you're saying we are the only ones here right now?"

"Eh… well…"

Sasuke smiled and tugged off the bandages blindfolding him.

Sasuke slowly opened his eyes. He activated his new Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan. After all those days of darkness, even the gloom inside the training room seemed bright.

"What are you—"

Amaterasu!

Naruto stared at the ceiling of his room so hard it was almost as if he hoped to burn a hole through it. He couldn't sleep.

Konan had, as she'd promised, been there when they returned for the day from Mount Myoboku. But he still hadn't had the chance to speak with her alone. She hadn't seemed very concerned that the Wind Daimyo and Baki had all but flatly refused her invitation. She'd stayed with them all day, exchanging polite courtesies and trading the occasional concealed barb with Yamaguchi. Naruto couldn't be nearly as patient. He wanted to ask her what the plan was. There was more. He just knew it.

What if he went to Konan right now and said he'd come along, no matter what anyone else said?

Naruto bit his lip. It would be reckless, depending on how well the Alliance would react to him leaving without permission. It was dangerous to go to a place he'd never been with someone he didn't know, especially when that person was a former enemy, and the place was where his teacher had died.

If the idea had been suggested before he'd been captured by Madara, Naruto probably wouldn't have even considered it. Now, though... being careful wasn't going to get him any closer to going home. He probably wasn't safer in Suna than in Ame. Being careful hadn't really helped him that much so far.

Naruto let out a long, slow breath and got out of bed. He made a kage bunshin and had it crawl under the covers and pretend to be asleep.

He snuck out of his room and used a henge to make himself look like one of the many Suna chuunin he had seen running errands around the Administration building. It wasn't a very sophisticated disguise, but hopefully it would be enough to get him out to the upper floors without being challenged.

The hall was dark. Ever since the others left, it was just him and Yamato on this floor, but that was hardly a cause for relief. Naruto knew Yamato was the biggest obstacle to him sneaking around. He usually left Naruto alone in the evenings, which meant the bunshin ploy probably wouldn't be discovered, but he didn't know what Yamato did with his free time. He had no idea if the man would be in his own room, somewhere else in the Administration building, or in town.

Keeping his senses fully alert, Naruto crept up the stair that led to the upper floors. He scaled the stairs and ended up in one of the building's curved hallways without a problem. Either Yamato wasn't down here, or he'd somehow missed Naruto sneaking out.

It wasn't as dark here as down below, but things were still very quiet. Naruto started walking briskly, as if he had somewhere particular to be, just in case someone spotted him.

Another problem occurred to him now that he'd made it this far. He didn't actually know where Konan was staying. Seeing as she was an unexpected guest, there was a good chance she wasn't even in this building. It would make more sense for her to be at one of the inns in town.

Naruto clenched his hands to stave off the rising sense of frustration. He couldn't give up now. If he discovered Konan wasn't here, he would figure out what to do after that.

Naruto climbed another set of stairs, heading vaguely in the direction of Gaara's apartment and the fanciest guest rooms. If she wasn't there, she probably wasn't in this building at all.

He tensed up when he saw a member of the Daimyo's guard walking in the other direction. Naruto glanced at him but quickly looked away, trying his best to look natural. The guard looked at him but didn't pass comment.

That was another thing: the Wind Daimyo was staying up here, too. Technically Naruto could go where he wanted, but it would be really hard to explain why he was sneaking around in disguise near the Daimyo's suite at night. The closer he got to the guest rooms, the higher the chance was of running into one of his entourage.

Paradoxically, the first thing Naruto noticed when he reached the top floor was how deserted it looked. The silence lay heavy in the hall like cold, dead air.

He stood still for a moment and closed his eyes, tentatively trying to reach for any energy external to himself, the way Fukasaku taught him. He couldn't feel anything, but he was still bad at sensing Natural Energy. Naruto continued on, sidling along with his back pressed to the wall.

He heard a soft thump from up ahead and froze, looking back and forth to figure out where the sound had come from.

A door was slightly ajar, and he knew at once that had to be it. He wanted to investigate, but… this was increasingly feeling like a bad idea.

Thinking about it realistically, there was no reason this floor would be completely empty. This was starting to feel like a late-night horror flick he'd watched one time. That taught him he shouldn't go near slightly-open doors to check out mysterious noises, but run as fast as possible in the other direction instead.

...No. He was a shinobi. If something strange was going on, and there was a possibility of Suna or the Wind Daimyo being in danger because of it, he had to do something about it. Naruto walked toward the door slowly and pushed it open with a trembling hand.

The first thing he saw was the body of the Wind Daimyo, splayed out right inside the doorway. The space from his chest up to his head was nothing more than a messy, gaping hole, as if something had crawled out from inside his body and left the dead shell behind. His fine silk robes were soaked with blood.

Naruto clamped his hands over his mouth to fight against the urge to scream or vomit. Further back, the room held clear signs of a struggle. There were overturned pieces of furniture, kunai stuck in the ceiling and walls, and twisted bits of wood sticking out of the floor.

But the worst of it was the sight of the familiar black-haired shinobi in front of him. Orochimaru turned around leisurely. Naruto's eyes darted from the snake man's face down to his feet, where Yamato lay. The Wood-style user looked very pale, and his eyes were closed. A gigantic snake wrapped all around his body with its fangs dug deeply into his neck.

"Oh?" Orochimaru said in his dry, raspy voice. "So there was a little rat snooping around."

The killing intent in the room spiked, and Naruto winced. This was just like that time in the Forest of Death. He lost control of his henge and felt his knees shake violently, but he managed to keep standing.

"Let him go," Naruto said roughly. He pulled out a kunai and got into a defensive stance.

Orochimaru chuckled. "You still know how to make a nuisance out of yourself, don't you? But maybe I should thank you. You've saved me a bit of time by coming here."

Snakes crawled out of Orochimaru's sleeves and uncoiled on the floor, hissing lightly. Yamato's eyes wrenched open and he looked at Naruto blearily. He lifted his head, a movement that seemed to be costing him quite a bit of effort. The snake's venom was taking a heavy toll on him.

"Naruto… run," he whispered weakly.

Naruto's arms and legs were trembling, but he stood his ground, holding a kunai up in front of him in a defensive posture. Awash as he was in Orochimaru's killing intent, it was a wonder that he could move at all. Frantic memories played in the back of his mind: the Forest of Death and Orochimaru's wide, pale smile; Sasuke hunched over in pain; the older Sasuke's look of shock, hands covered in Naruto's blood; a glowing red eye peering out from a spiral mask. They all melded together in a confused sequence. Just like last time, the sheer weight of that killing intent made it difficult to string coherent thoughts together.

Orochimaru hummed leisurely, breaking through his rapidly spiraling thoughts. "What to do about this little situation? I wanted to leave without you being any the wiser. This will not be as elegant as I hoped, but I suppose there's no point worrying about that now."

Naruto glanced down at Yamato's strained face, still fixed on him like he wanted to shout out, but couldn't. Freeing Yamato would have to come first if either of them were going to get out of this.

"What do you want with Moku-oji?" Naruto tried to say strongly, but it came out as more of a croak. "It's me you're after, isn't it? So just leave him out of this."

"They're always so self-centered at this age." Orochimaru chuckled. "Not everything has to be about you, Naruto-kun. You are still just a diversion for the time being."

"Why did you bring me here?" Naruto demanded. He felt a stirring of anger in the pit of his stomach and immediately tried to grab on to it. Anything to chase out the heavy cold of Orochimaru's presence. "Madara told me. You came up with the time-travel jutsu and made this Nagato guy perform it. But I don't understand why you wanted to do that! Even Madara said he didn't know."

"It's an experiment, nothing more than that. I wanted to know what would happen if I took an imprint of a living soul and put it into a new vessel." Orochimaru lifted his palms in a shrug. "Would the mind stay the same? Would the memories be intact? Would it start to diverge after a time? I am very interested in those questions. I could even re-create the same person, and set them along different paths to see how their souls change as a result. This isn't the same thing as genetic cloning, you understand," Orochimaru continued as Naruto went increasingly blank. "In fact, it is the opposite. Instead of the body being duplicated, it is the mind; the mental and spiritual energies that make up part of a person's chakra. You are only the first trial, of course."

"First? Does that mean you're going to do it again?"

Orochimaru pulled out a kunai with a paper tag attached to it and twirled it lazily. "A first attempt is rarely ideal. I was able to create an even better container for you and the Kyuubi than the already formidable one you were born with. But since I was not fully present, you were able to escape."

Naruto didn't have to try to reach for his anger anymore as he glared at the snake, his fear receding. He barely understood most of what Orochimaru was saying, but he was completely familiar with the attitude.

"I'm not just some thing you can play with. Neither is the Kyuubi." Naruto glanced from the kunai in Orochimaru's hand down to Yamato's face. He dived under Orochimaru's guard just as the snake Sannin threw the kunai at his head.

Naruto ducked, and the kunai whizzed past sharply, sticking into the floor behind him. The tag didn't explode the way he expected it to, but there was no time to wonder about that.

He skidded down beside Yamato and started stabbing the glistening coils wrapped around the older nin's prone body, trying to get the giant snake to release him. It was disgusting, but he forced himself to not stop. He tried to stab the snake in the head, but was so worried the knife might miss and hit Yamato that he didn't put in enough force, and merely scratched its scales instead.

Yamato grunted in pain as the snake removed its fangs from his neck and spat at Naruto angrily. His efforts were working. The snake writhed in agony, bleeding from multiple wounds in its body. Its grip on Yamato loosened, and it tossed its head back and forth in confusion.

Naruto tugged on Yamato's arm. "Come on, Moku-oji! you have to—"

A hard kick caught him in the side, and Naruto flew into the room's stucco wall hard enough to put a web of deep cracks in it. He rolled on to all fours, coughing. A barrage of smaller snakes came after him and started to wrap around his arms and legs, but Naruto quickly scrambled to his feet and flung most of them off. A stinging pain registered in his mind and he saw that a small one had dug its fangs into his left hand and wouldn't let go. He took a deep breath and pulled it out roughly with his other hand, flinging the snake back across the room in the direction of its master. He took just a second to examine the small oozing holes in his hand, worriedly noting they weren't healing up as quickly as they should have been.

"Why are you just laying around, Moku-oji?" Naruto yelled.

Yamato didn't respond. That was not a good sign.

"Damn it! Taijuu Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!"

Naruto filled the room with as many clones as possible to make a buffer between himself and Orochimaru. It wasn't a permanent solution, but they would buy him a little time. If Yamato was unable to move, the only other option was to cause enough commotion to make other people come running. Punching a hole through one of the most important buildings in the village with a big, flashy attack would do the trick.

Naruto turned to the crack in the wall and held out his uninjured hand to one of his clones. Bright, swirling chakra started whirling in his hand just as he heard dozens of clones popping behind him, yelling and cursing as they went down.

"Rasengan!"

The wall exploded outward, just as loud and attention-grabbing as he hoped. Naruto wasted no time jumping down to the street. His plan hinged on Orochimaru following him instead of staying with Yamato, which was risky, but it was the only way he could get Yamato out of danger without facing Orochimaru directly. He could only bank on the old snake wanting to silence him. Naruto had a plan to make sure he would follow.

"Attack! Attack!" Naruto yelled, running around the perimeter of the Administration building, where he was sure there would be guards. "Sound the alarm! Orochimaru of the Sannin is attacking the village! Creepy old snake guy at large! HEYYY!"

"Oi, what's all that noise down there?"

"What is that brat yelling about—"

"There's been an explosion! The Administration building!"

"Get the captain! We're under attack!"

Snickering and satisfied with his work for the time being, Naruto skidded to a stop in the shadow of a nearby tower that was the same curved style as the other buildings in the village. He examined his hand again. The holes were still there, and the area around the bite was numb and discolored.

Naruto drew another kunai and paused. The only way he knew to get rid of poison was the rather inelegant method of making a gaping, bleeding wound to flush it out, and Kakashi-sensei had told him not to do that again. Still, with his healing ability and weird body, it probably wouldn't be dangerous.

"You're persistent, I'll give you that," a silky voice said. Naruto jumped back when Orochimaru emerged from the shadows. "But you're giving me more trouble than I have time for right now."

Snakes shot out of Orochimaru's sleeves toward Naruto and he ducked underneath them, crouched down, and—

A sick, burning feeling washed over him, leaving an uncomfortable pins-and-needles prickling behind. Naruto's legs wobbled, and as he tried to stand back up, he lost his balance and fell face first onto the dusty street.

Get back up! he ordered himself, and tried to move his arms. They moved sluggishly, inching up in small twitches as if only half-listening to the commands from his brain. He pushed himself up a little, but his unstable arms couldn't take the weight and they dropped him back down onto the sandy ground.

"You were able to resist the poison for longer than I expected," he heard Orochimaru coming closer. The snake Sannin's sandals skritched in the sand beside his head, and Naruto lifted his face to try to glare at him. "I suppose it shouldn't be a surprise, since you have the Kyuubi. I can't fully take the credit for this one. This is a poison Kabuto discovered that suppresses the Shodai's cells. Don't worry, it will wear off after a little while."

Naruto turned his head as far as he could and saw Orochimaru looming over him with another tagged kunai in his hand.

"I'd have preferred to do this later, but your friends in Akatsuki aren't leaving me much time. I can't take you back with me now, but I'll call for you later," Orochimaru said. Naruto flinched as the snake raised the kunai over his head as if to stab.

He took in a sharp breath at the impact. The knife went into the base of his skull. Naruto expected to feel excruciating pain, but whether it was the poison or for some other reason, he felt nothing. He cried out in protest anyway and tried to roll away, but his body didn't respond.

"This command tag will bring you back into my control, like the Edo Tensei summons," Orochimaru informed him calmly. "If you don't want that to happen, you should make sure you come right away when I call you, so that I don't have to resort to overriding your will."

The roiling anger in Naruto's stomach felt like it was spreading through his veins, down to the tips of his fingers and toes. He wanted it to burn away all the poison so he could at least get in one good punch to the bastard's smirking face.

"Finally. That's the look you should have had all along." Orochimaru chuckled. "I look forward to seeing how you turn out. Goodbye for now." He stood from his crouched position and walked away, indifferent to the glare boring into his back.