Disclaimer: I do NOT own any of the characters written here. They are own by their respective owners. Nuff' said.
Warning: This is rated M for a reason (blood, gore, extreme violence, language, and possible adult themes/lemons, etc.) Some of the characters will be a little OC.
Now on with chapter seventeen
The Black Leaves
Chapter 17
Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura were currently resting on the ground and sweating bullets and eating their lunch. This was their third week of doing lame D-rank missions combined with Kakashi's strange training regimen. For some unknown reason, Kakashi enjoyed combining the boring as Hell D-rank missions with random training moments. He had them try painting a house without using using any ladders, thus forcing them to learn how to use chakra to stick to the surface.
Not really a problem for Naruto or the Prayer.
That coupled with constant D-rank missions, one after the other, was starting to cause Team Seven to become weary and tired of the boredom, repetition, and the tough training.
Today, they had just finished their third mission for the day and were about to take a break for lunch, when Naruto decided to voice his opinion on their situation.
"This sucks!" He shouted at the sky. "I'm a ninja now. I shouldn't have to earn my pay by walking some stupid mutts!" He shouted while pointing in the direction of the old lady's house the team just left. The woman had asked for a ninja team to help her walk her fifteen dogs since she had become too old to do so on her own.
"I should be out defeating enemy ninja, finding enemy secrets, patrolling the boarder, anything but this idiotic crap!" Naruto ranted.
"Please, shut-up Naruto. Your bitching isn't going to make our missions any more interesting," Sakura said calmly while sipping on her tea. "Besides, we're genin. It's not like the council or Hokage would allow some rookies take on assassination or espionage jobs right off the bat."
Sasuke and the Prayer nodded their heads while sipping on their respective drinks as well.
"Scree?" Baby tilted her body sideways in a confused manner. "Screeeeee!" She shouted upwards, mimicking her father in a more happy tone.
When Naruto introduced Baby to his team, he was quit surprised by their calm reactions. After meeting something like the Prayer and witnessing the effects and denizens of Otherworld; a space alien just was not that surprising. Especially if it was with Naruto.
Though, the normal humans on Naruto's team were a tad surprised when Baby had latched itself onto the head of a dog almost as big as Sasuke and drained it dry in less than a minute. After that, Sasuke, Sakura and Kakashi decided to give the fission metroid a wide birth. Luckily for Team Seven, the old lady never noticed her one dog missing.
"I know, Sakura. But it's just so boring doing this crap. I'd do almost anything but another D-rank mission." Naruto said with a sigh of defeat. He sat down and began to eat his lunch.
Just as the team was finishing their respective meals; Kakashi suddenly appeared in a puff of white smoke.
"Good news." He said with his trademark eye-smile. Nobody paid him any attention and continued to finish their lunch.
"Doesn't anybody want to know what the good news is?" Kakashi asked.
"No offense Kakashi-sensei but every time you have said there was 'good news', all it was, was another D-rank mission that you were able to devise some unholy training for." Sakura stated bluntly.
Once again, the genin of Team Seven all nodded their heads in agreement then took a sip of their tea.
"Why am I the sensei of such cruel children?" Kakashi whined comically.
"Because your a dirty and lazy pervert and your not the number one character in the series." Naruto said with a smile. Everyone disregarded the last part of Naruto's comment, but the first part pissed Kakashi off a little.
"Just for that, your going to be the one to carry all of our supplies, Naruto." Kakashi said in a threatning tone.
"Wait, supplies? Are we going somewhere, Kakashi-sensei?" Sasuke asked while Naruto grumbled about slave driving jonin.
Kakashi's threatening gaze softened and turned into his weird eye-smile, "Meet me at the mission briefing room when your all finished with your lunches, and I'll explain." And with that, Kakashi puffed away in another white cloud of chakra.
"Do any of you ever get the feeling that Kakashi does that jutsu just to try and impress us?" Sasuke asked the group.
"Not...working." The Prayer stated. The genin all nodded their heads in agreement.
A few minutes later; Team Seven arrived at the mission briefing room located on the second floor of the Hokage tower. The room was just a little bigger than the Hokage's office and had three long tables set into a half square-like shape. A chunin sat at each table with the Hokage also sitting in the center table.
The table on the left was meant for villagers and civilians to place orders for ninja, normally around the mid C-rank to low D-rank mission area. Higher rank missions were given directly from the council or the Hokage himself.
The table across from the left table was where ninja were given their pay stub and where the costs for missions was collected.
The middle table was where missions were handed out to the ninja teams that were either requested or needed for whatever mission.
When Team Seven arrived, they saw their sensei standing next to an old man with a half empty bottle in his hand.
"So are these the so called 'ninja', who will be protecting me?" He asked with a small hint of a drunken slur. "A kid with a duck's ass haircut, another wearing neon orange, a chick that looks like the spokesperson for a candy store, and a flying blob? They look down right useless." He turned to complain at the chunin on duty about the team and failed to notice the Prayer suddenly enter the room.
"What...about...us?" She spoke sweetly. The old man turned around and prepared to make a smart alleck reply, but decided against it when he spotted the monster. The genin could not help but smile at the old man's pale face.
"N-nothing," He whimpered as the Prayer took her spot next to Naruto.
"So, what's the mission, gramps?" Naruto asked the Hokage.
"Idiot! You shouldn't speak that way to the Hokage!" Sakura shouted while brandishing her mighty fist. She was about to clock the blond, but Baby hovered between the two and screeched threateningly at the pink haired kunoichi. Causing her to back off.
Nobody was going to mess with Baby's daddy!
"It's alright Sakura-chan," The Hokage said while waving off the 'gramps' comment. He was the only person alive that was allowed to call Sakura '-chan'; him and Ms. Haruno. "The mission is a simple low C-rank escort mission. You will be escorting Tazuna-san to his home in the Land of Waves. He is a master bridge builder and might be targeted by small thieves and criminals. No problem for a team lead by Kakashi."
"Correct Hokage-sama. I think this will be a great experience for my team, and the will get to know a bit the world outside the village." Kakashi said while bowing in respect. He then turned to face his team, "Go and get ready to leave. Bring about a months worth of supplies because right after Tazuna-san is returned home safely, it's training outside the village." He grinned at the downcast reactions from his students.
"Meet us at the village gates in an hour and a half," And with that, Kakashi and Tazuna calmly left the breifing room.
After said amount of time had passed; all of Team Seven was surprisingly at the meeting place on time, even Kakashi.
"Let's head out to Wave!" Naruto shouted out while striking a pose and pointing straight down the only road that lead to Konoha. This caused Baby to mimic his actions and coo while pointing one of her little pincers in the same direction as Naruto's finger. The Prayer let out a soft, almost inaudible giggle that went unheard by the others.
"Do you even have a clue as to which way Wave is?" Sasuke asked in false interest.
"I have absolutely no idea!" Naruto replied, still with the same enthusiasm. "But I bet it's that way!" He continued pointing down the road.
"Idiot." Sakura mumbled under her breath.
"Alright team; let's go," Kakashi said and began to lead his team to their destination.
The instant that Konoha disappeared from view, Naruto leapt up onto a tree branch and bent his spine backwards while sighing deeply. Baby flew up next to her daddy and tried to imitate him, only to do a backwards flip in the air and make herself dizzy.
"What are you doing now, Naruto?" Sakura asked in a tired tone.
"Nothing. Just stretching." Naruto said in a 'isn't it obvious?' tone.
"While your up there, Naruto," Kakashi spoke up. "You can be our scout and alert us to any trouble ahead." Kakashi was expecting Naruto to complain about carrying everybodies supplies, conveniently stuffed inside three back-packs, and being forced to pay attention to his surroundings and thus being unable to goof off.
Instead, Naruto simply grinned and nodded his head.
The group continued on their way without any trouble at all what so ever. The trip was relatively boring for everyone, including Baby, who was riding on top of Naruto's head and cooing happily. The sun was shining, birds were singing, and rabbits were going at it like, well, rabbits.
Over all, it was a good day. That is, untill Naruto shouted for everyone to stop moving.
"What is it Naruto?" Kakashi asked with a bit of urgency in his voice. One thing he did not like, was being the target of an unknown enemy.
"I smell something," Said orange ninja whispered softly. He sniffed the air twice before leaping down onto the dirt pathway. He landed on all fours and began to crawl around while sniffing the ground.
The way he crawled on the ground, with his arms and legs spread out, made Naruto look somewhat lizard-like.
"What the Hell is that boy doing?" Tazuna asked in a gruffly irritated voice. The only response he got was a loud 'shh' from the still sniffing Naruto.
Naruto halted at a small puddle between Sasuke and Kakashi. He could smell the clean water and the scent of humans; which would not be considered unusual considering the location of the puddle in the road. People were bound to step into it eventually.
What caught Naruto's attention however, was a much different scent. This particular smell caused alarms to start ringing inside his mind.
The instant said warnings started, a metallic gauntlet burst forth from the puddle and aimed the claws attached to said gauntlet at Naruto's face! Naruto yanked his head back and flipped backwards and landed a short distance away.
Two male figures with Kirigakure headbands rose out of the water. A deep horizontal gash ran along the length of their headbands, proving that they had defected from their village and were considered missing-nin. One of the ninja wore a torn black cloak while the other wore the traditional wear of chunin level ninja. Both wore a gauntlet on a hand connected to each other by a shuriken chain.
The ninja with the cloak had his gauntlet on his right hand with the other ninja wearing his gauntlet on his right hand. The scent that alarmed Naruto was coming from the two unknown Kirigakure ninja.
"Who might you two be?" Kakashi asked calmly while Sakura, Sasuke and the Prayer stealthily moved to form a protective formation around Tazuna.
Naruto was in an unusual battle stance. His legs were spread widely with his back lined nearly parallel to the ground. He had one hand on the ground and the other held level with his head with the fingers curled into a claw-like fashion. His lips were curled back into a furious snarl and he was emitted a light growl from the back of his throat. He already did not like these two ninjas.
"We are the Demon Brothers of the Land of Wave," The one wearing the cloak spoke up.
"And, we're gonna' kill all of you!" The other brother said as they both charged at Kakashi. Who simply stood there uninterested.
As the brothers charged at the jonin; Naruto charged at them.
The brothers quickly parted to allow their chain to lengthen and continued towards Kakashi. Naruto saw how the chain was trailing behind the brothers just a little bit; but it was enough for the symbiote host.
The Demon Brothers were just passing Kakashi, with the chain just a few centimeters behind; when Naruto reached out and grabbed the shuriken chain with his left hand. He ignored the pain caused by the spiked chain piercing his young flesh and gave a hard yank.
The men were caught off gaurd as the sudden force of being pulled backwards and their legs kept going while the rest of them were pulled back. Thus, causing them to kick their legs out from underneath themselves and falling flat on their backs, hard.
"What the!" The vest wearing brother shouted from his prone position. His brother turned over and saw Naruto holding the chain.
"Damn brat!" The cloaked sibling shouted, "You take care of this guy; I'll handle the blond bastard!" He quickly disconnected his end of the chain.
Both leapt off the ground and attacked their respective targets.
For the legendary copy ninja; the fight was over rather quickly. He simply dodged a few strikes and delivered a good blow to the back of the man's neck, effectively knocking him out.
Naruto's fight, on the other hand was a little more difficult. It was a Konoha genin versus a Kiri chunin; some trouble was to be expected.
The brother charged right at the genin, hoping that his chunin rank and his primed-to-strike claws would scare the child too much for him to make a move. However, he was unaware of Naruto's symbiotic enhancements.
Such as, his enhanced reflexes and increased strength. Which were put into good use when the missing-nin approached his target.
The chunin swung his gauntlet down only for it to be caught in Naruto's left hand. The momentum he had gained by his charge was used against him as a fist was thrust upward into his gut and he was hurled over the genin. He was then thrown through the air and slammed upside down into a tree. Upon impact, the man burst into a spray of water.
"Die, old man!" A voice from behind Sasuke said. He turned around while, at the same time, drawing a kunai and blocked the incoming gauntlet from making contact with the cowering Tazuna. Thinking quickly, Sakura leapt over the old man and delivered a powerful hammer fist to the man's temple. This caused the man to stumble back while holding his now throbbing head and growl in frustration.
He removed his hand just in time to see Sasuke's foot smash into his face and effectively turn his lights out.
"Great job, team." Kakashi praised while he tied the two brothers to a tree using some reinforced steel cords. He removed their gauntlets and inspected the weapons. "It was a good thing Naruto found these guys before they could get the drop on us. There is a very potent poison coating these claws. If one of those two were to get any one of us with these thing; the poison would have killed us before we could get any medical help."
This caused Sasuke and Sakura to edge away from the deadly weapons.
Naruto, however, gave a small twitch as he say a small trail of blood run down the cloaked brother's face. He could feel the all too familiar gnawing in his gut slowly grow. He quickly took off the packs he was carrying and opened his. He reached inside and pulled out a large chunk of chocolate about the same size as Kakashi's head, plus the wierd sideways hair.
He quickly devoured the chocolate it a manner similar to a starving man. The rest of the party stared at Naruto in confusion. Naruto finished off the chocolate and lifted his gaze back at his sensei.
"You were saying, Kakashi-sensei?" Naruto said as if nothing unusual had happened. But the instant his eyes fell on the trickling blood, once again, he gave a slight twitch and the hunger pains started up again.
Naruto was only giving a third of his attention as Kakashi interrogated the ninja then suggested that the team, plus Tazuna, camp for the night and wait for Konoha ninja to come and retrieve the Demon Brothers.
"SCREEE!" Baby suddenly charged from her hiding spot and slammed into the stomach of the man that attacked her daddy. Just before the whole confrontation, Baby had chased down a squirrel, drained it, then returned to the group just as the man had charged at Naruto.
She wanted to hurt the person that attempted to hurt her father, but was a little attimidated by the metal claws he wore. The scent coming off of them scared her a little.
Kakashi explained to his team what the brothers had told him. They spoke of a large crime boss by the name of Gato and how he had gained complete control over the village that Tazuna resided in. Gato had placed heavy taxes on almost everything possible and forced the people to pay for 'protection' money against his own men gussied as enemy ninja. He used every illegal way possible to obtain the villagers money; ranging from extreme mob-like tactics to hiring prostitutes and illegal slave trade.
The team set up their tents; one for Tazuna and Kakashi to share, one for Naruto, Baby and Sasuke, and a third tent for Nightmare and Sakura.
The ninja team drew straws to determine who would take the first watch for the night, then decided who would go next and so on with a game of rock-paper-scissors. Kakashi would have the first watch, then Nightmare, followed by Sasuke, then Sakura, and ending with Naruto taking the last watch.
The group ate their respective rations and discussed what they were going to do about their mission.
"This mission is obviously not a one that a team of genin can handle," Kakashi pointed out. "We should head back to Konoha and have a much better equipped and experienced team take care of this."
"But we can't pay for a ninja team of such high caliber!" Tazuna was quick to say. "As they had already told you; our village can barely survive right now under Gato's control. It took over a month's salary from every able-bodied person in the village just to afford your team." He sighed in shame and depression.
A little put off by being indirectly called cheap, Sakura interjected. "But Kakashi-sensei, we have already started this mission and promised to take Tazuna back to his home. Also, wouldn't it look bad on our record if we failed to complete this mission?"
"That may be true but-,"
"I will not allow such a blemish to appear on my record, Kakashi-sensei," Sakura stated defiantly. Sasuke nodded with a firm expression on his face. His older brother never failed to complete a mission, no matter how impossible the odds, and Sasuke himself was not about to let such a thing to happen and shame the Uchiha name.
Naruto, who was paying not even half of his attention to the conversation, gave a small hum in agreement. The Prayer simply nodded her head, she and her creator were too preoccupied with Naruto's sudden change of behavior.
"Very well, since your all so adiment on it. We will continue with our mission untill it becomes too much for any of us to handle." Kakashi announced.
After, the whole group sans Kakashi went into their tents and tried to get some sleep. Naruto had incredible trouble in that task. The symbiotes desire to feed continued to grow stronger with every passing second.
This terrified Naruto beyond all belief. For one, he had been eating almost all of the chocolate in the Land of Fire in an effort to repress the symbiotic desire to feed on living tissue. The other reason, was that he feared for the lives of his teammates and, kind of, the client.
So, for the next several hours Naruto did not sleep and focused all of his waining energy on suppressing urge to sink his teeth into his tent-mate's skull. Finally, the pain became too much for the youth and Naruto slowly passed out, more afraid now then ever. Or at least he thought he was a sleep.
A few minutes later, the sound of Sakura's whispering voice woke him up. Only, Naruto did not open his eyes; someone else did. His head involuntarily turned to look at the front of the tent. Sakura's shadow moved out from in front of the tent and disappeared from view.
Naruto's body slowly rose from his laying position and moved in front of the tent's zipper. He willed his body to stop moving, but it was like he was watching a first-person documentary of his own actions.
It took Naruto a moment to realize that he was watching Venom's actions while controlling his body.
Venom stared at the zipper for a moment with a tilted head. He looked at the small gap between the two halves of the zipper at the top of the tent. Venom raised a still human hand up to the gap and poked a finger through it. He then forced the finger down, pulled the zipper down as well.
Naruto was confused. Here, the dangerous monster of Konoha was not attempting to eat the closest prey, namely Sasuke, but instead was trying to open up a tent.
Venom made his way through the opening and closed his eyes. When he opened them, Naruto noticed a major difference in his vision. First thing he took note of was that everything now was bathed in a red-ish hue. When Venom's gaze focused on the two rogue chunin; Naruto learned of the second ability granted to all symbiotes.
Naruto, and Venom, could see the innards of the enemy ninja. Now, understand, they could not see right through the persons' bodies; but parts of their internal organs, bones and vital veins and arteries could be seen through suddenly translucent flesh. Their whole bodies were not translucent, only the areas directly over every vital part of the human body.
Basically, Venom had the perfect vision for every predator in existence. To be able to see what parts of the prey that must be damaged to provide a quick death so as not to ruin the meal by rupturing organs like the colon and bladder. A quicker death also meant less damage to the predator as well.
Venom kept his gaze on the two brothers and slowly stalked towards them as the hunger in his stomach grew stronger. Luckily for Venom, his prey was tied up and sleeping; this just made the task of feeding on their brains that much easier.
It took Naruto a few seconds to realize that the stories the villagers and symbiotes told of the insanity and inhuman brutality were not entirely valid. Looking back at the multiple times Venom took control; Naruto never felt any purely negative emotions. Sure, there was anger at times, but that was because Venom had been attacked. The one thing that Naruto always, always felt whenever Venom would take over, was hunger. The desire to feed. There was no malice or hatred; sans Mizuki's failed assassination attempt.
Naruto also noted that Venom never went on a blind rampage but instead, singled out a target, hunt it, catch it, then devour it. Venom always ate whatever he killed; he never killed just for the sole purpose of taking a life. He killed to eat and for no other reason beyond that.
Naruto's mental eyes widened in realization. Venom wasn't somehow turned into an insane killing machine, but an animal. Nothing more, nothing less. Venom was doing what every other predator in existence; hunting prey and protecting itself. And since Naruto was Venom's host; the symbiote must have seen Naruto as himself.
Venom, still using Naruto's body, stalked towards his prey and lowered his body to all fours. He sniffed the brother without the cloak and circled the tree they were tied too, while on all fours. He crouched down in front of the sleeping brothers and focused his vision on the most nutritious part of the brain, the frontal lobe.
Venom gripped the man's shoulders tightly and reared his head back before opening his jaws wider than humanly possible. His teeth quickly morphed into the mixed matched and yellow-ish fangs belonging to the symbiote. Suddenly, Naruto's head snapped forward and the large, mishapping fangs impacted the man's skull with enough force to crack it wide open and sending a fang straight into his brain; killing him instantly.
Venom kept his fangs embedded in the dead man's skull and allowed the blood and cerebral fluids flow into his mouth and down his throat. He kept his mouth there until the flowing cerebral fluids came to a halt. He ripped his fangs, along with most of the front of the man's skull. Venom grabbed the top part of the new opening and pulled it clean off. Leaving the brain completely exposed, along with some blood and cerebral fluids that had pooled around it. Making the inside of the skull look like the bowl of a morbid soup.
Naruto was in complete disgust at what was about to happen. He thought that he had come to terms with the knowledge that he was going to have to kill and eat still living beings to survive; but he could not have been more wrong.
As Venom gorged himself on the brothers; Naruto tried to look away as he saw from his own point of view, his feasting on another human. Just because it was inevitable did not mean Naruto was ready t embrace it; but oh, how he wished he was more prepared for the horrid experience.
Unfortunately, the loud and crude sounds of fabric and flesh being torn apart and the crunching of bones caused all but Tazuna and Baby to wake. The sounds of movement and whispering inside the tents caught Venom's attention. He looked from the tent back to the half eaten other brother; he had already eaten his fill with the first one and was in the middle of feasting on the cloaked brother.
Venom quickly grabbed the still remaining legs of his meal and gave a powerful yank; the force of which tore the lower half of the corpse off of the still tied up remains of the upper half. Realizing that time was of the essence; Venom dragged the remains into the bushes, leaving behind a trail of meat and blood.
He had just dragged it out of sight when the rest of Naruto's team burst out from their tents and caught a glimpse at the carnage. The whole campsite was covered in splashes of blood and pieces of meat.
"Sakura, Sasuke, go find Naruto! Nightmare, protect Tazuna! I don't want whatever did this to get anybody else, so we will meet back here in ten minutes. Go!" Kakashi commanded with perfect clarity. He looked out over the horizon and saw the first rays of the morning sun peeking behind. 'Only one hour until the retrieval team arrives. I hope my team can stay alive that long.'
Sasuke and Sakura quickly disappeared into the surrounding forest, weapons in hand. The Prayer walked into the tent that Tazuna was sleeping in; said tent smelled strongly of alcohol. Kakashi investigated the surrounding area for any thing that could be used as evidence as to what did this. It was a difficult for Kakashi to find anything of use in the bloody mess; all that remained was the half eaten corpse of one of the brothers and the upper half of the other.
He continued to search the surrounding area for any sign of an outsider entering the campsite, but found none. But he did notice a trail of blood and meat leaving the campsite and vanishing into the surrounding woods. Before investigating further, he waited for Sasuke and Sakura to return from their search; hopefully with Naruto with them.
After the allotted time had passed, Sasuke and Sakura returned to the campsite without Naruto.
"We couldn't find any sign of him, Kakashi-sensei," Sasuke said with a small amount of desperation hidden in his voice.
"I might have," Kakashi said solemnly as he knelt down at the thick trail of blood leaving the campsite. Both Sakura and Sasuke's demure dampened drastically when Kakashi made that statement. "I want both of you to stay here with Nightmare and protect Tazuna. When back up arrives, I want you to inform them of where I am going. Understood?"
The genin nodded their heads and took up protective positions hidden in the trees, while Kakashi made his way through the forest.
He had to move slowly and low to the ground so that he could still see the bloody trail through the thick foliage of the forest. He opted to not use his little flashlight, for fear of alerting his presence to whatever brute tore apart the enemy ninja. After traveling several feet, Kakashi would halt all movement then send a large amount of chakra to his ears to listen for any unnatural sounds.
The amount of light continued to increase as Kakashi continued on ward through the brightning forest. Suddenly, the trail of blood came to a halt and all signs of whatever attacked the camp, or Naruto was gone.
Kakashi kept his focus and searched along the surrounding area for clues to his student's location. He searched for at least five minutes before feelings of desperation and depression began to set in. 'I've failed!' He kept repeating inside his head. After an incident that involved the loss of the love of his life and his best friend; Kakashi swore that he would do everything humanly possible to keep his squad/teammates alive and well.
And he just failed that personal, life long, mission with the loss of Naruto. With his very first squad.
His searching became a little more frantic as the sun nearly cleared the horizon. Kakashi was about to give up on finding Naruto on his own, when a familiar groan reached his ears.
Kakashi forced his way through some bramble and thorn bushes to see Naruto sitting in the middle of a small patch of earth, clear of any foliage. His clothes were ripped and torn in several places but were still in rather good condition. His face, chest and stomach were covered in a combination of blood and vomit and he was holding his stomach and head.
After regaining control of his body, Naruto couldn't help but regurgitate half of what Venom had eaten. After nearly upchucking his own stomach was when Kakashi burst out from bahind some bramble. The sudden shock sent Naruto tumbling backwards and nailing the back of his head with a tree.
A half hour later; Kakashi, Naruto, the rest of Team Seven, Baby, and three jounin back up ninja were all sitting around where the camp fire had been burning last night. Tazuna was, unsurprisingly, still snoring loudly in his tent.
"Explain to use exactly what happened," One of the extra jounin emphasised. Luckily, he was talking to the biggest prankster of Konoha; and one of the best lieiers. Who don't become the best prankster without being able to come up with a believable lie.
"I don't really remember. It happened so fast." Naruto groaned while holding his still pounding head.
"Tell us everything you know."
"Alright," Naruto nodded his head. "I had just left our tent; right after Sakura told me it was my turn to take watch. I sat down near the fire and quietly kept an eye on the Demon Brothers while they slept." Naruto allowed his gaze to wonder over to the remains of the two siblings and gave a false shudder.
He rubbed the back of his sore head and continued. "Only a few minutes after I got settled down. Something hit me in the back of the head and I guess I was knocked out for a short while, because the next thing I knew. I was covored in blood and the Demon Brothers were like that." He jabbed a finger in the directions of the remains.
"My stomach got a little upset from the sight and, well, I throw up," Naruto turned a tad red at that admittion. "Before I could wake Kakashi-sensei and the others; something grabbed my legs and dragged into the forest. I guess whatever attacked got scared and let me go when Kakashi-sensei came along."
Another jounin came up, "Did you so who or what did this?"
"Sorry, but I saw nobody."
An hour or so later the jounin had taken the remains of the Demon Brothers and left Team Seven, plus Baby and a fully energiezed Tazuna, to continue their mission.
For the rest of the trip Naruto was very quiet and this worried everyone including Baby. Who was trying to snuggle up next to her father in an effort to make him feel better. Sakura was going to say something to him, but was stopped by Kakashi.
"Naruto's going through a rough emotional ordeal right now. He's probably feeling that he failed us for not keeping the Demon Brothers alive and worrying about what could have happened if we had been the ones attacked." He whispered to his female student.
In reality, Naruto was simply trying to get a piece of bone out from between his teeth.
So, I'm done with chapta' seventeen...I've got nothin' else to say to y'all.
Remember to read, review, send your thoughts and ideas, valuables, women, dignity, and pie. At least send pie. Please send pie!
I like pie.
Master Tyrant, out!