Kitsune and Dragon
I don't own Naruto, but Denko is mine.
Chapter 5: The Elements Flare
The next day is when the Konoha shinobi and Tazuna arrived at the bridge they found the workers sprawled across the bridge, either dead or for the majority, just unconscious. An unusually thick mist crept over the bridge that contained a feeling of impending doom. The air became thick with killing intent, so much that the genin struggled to move and even had trouble breathing. They found themselves shaking when a dark voice seemingly came from all sides.
"Ah, Kakashi the Copy-nin who possesses the Sharingan. I must admit that it will be my pleasure to be your executioner. I see you have friends with you, even playing babysitter for all of those brats, ne?"
"You must be Momochi Zabuza, nuke-nin from the Kirigakure, once a member of the Mists Seven Swords." Kakashi says calmly.
"It has been such a long time since we met last, although you didn't have that eye then, now did you?" Zabuza says as if greeting an old friend even as his killing intent easily doubled in its intensity as he slowly walked into view shortly followed by a few other nuke-nins from various villages, one from each Kurenai noticed.
"Sakura, Tenten, protect Tazuna." Kakashi orders as he readied for his fight with the Demon of the Mist.
"Lee, Neji, Denko, take care of the other guys." Gai orders as he walks towards the slight killing intent that could be felt from the land.
"Help them with the nuke-nins. I think Gai or Kakashi might need help." Kurenai says to her team and positions herself in the triangle between the nuke-nin, the killing intent that Gai when to investigate, and Tazuna, ready to help anyone who may need it.
"Lee, Shino, take the Tsuchi nin, Denko, Kumo, Naruto, Hinata, Konoha, Sasuke, Kiri, I'll take the Suna." Neji says getting nods of agreement from the others.
"This ought to be fun killing these Konoha ninjas." the Tsuchi nuke-nin laughs.
"Even better yet, they're genin and think they can beat us!" the Kumo nuke-nin says.
"You'd better watch yourselves, that dark haired kid's an Uchiha, and that blond is the son of Ryu no Denko, those two are Hyuuga's, and this other blond is the Kyuubi." the Konoha nuke-nin warns.
"You know them?" the Suna nuke-nin asks.
"Ha! Know them? I taught them all at the academy at Konoha!"
"So who is this weird gaki with the shades?" the Tsuchi nuke-nin asks.
"He's an Aburame, watch out for those damn bugs, they'll drain your chakra. That stupid looking gaki should be no problem, he can't even do a ninjutsu or genjutsu to save his life." The Konoha nuke-nin says making the others smirk.
"Don't underestimate us or you'll be sorry." Naruto threatens the nuke-nin as all of the genin but Shino smirk at their opponents.
"That's what you think!" the nuke-nin shout as one and the immediate area turned into a death trap for any who dared to even come close. The Tsuchi nuke-nin was apparently very well built as Lee and Shino found out when he threw his long coat revealing bare skin and punching both boys in the gut with surprising speed for a man his size. They quickly rose to their feat to the man's surprise and Lee attacked him with powerful punches and kicks and amazing speed. Shino didn't seem to do anything as he watched the fight and sent a bug clone to the other side of the bridge.
Denko and the Kumo nuke-nin shown impressive speed as they darted around the other fights and across the bridge with kunai flashing sparks as they collided. Then the Kumo nuke-nin started using thunder jutsu and the whole fight changed. "Raimei hebi no jutsu!" (Thunder Snake Jutsu) A large snake made of lightning flew from the nins hands through the air and struck Denko at the base of his neck causing the boy to step back a few steps as the snake filled his body with lightning from the bite. After sustaining the jutsu for a few seconds before letting it die out, apparently from the way he held himself one could tell that he thought the fight was over until he received the surprise of his life. Denko stood where he was left from the jutsu but at first his head was bent and his shoulders were shaking, then he raised his head to reveal that he was actually laughing loudly.
"Ya think that thunder jutsu will actually work on me? Electricity is like food for me, thanks for the light snack. Now let me show you a real thunder jutsu! Raimei dai tsutsu no jutsu!" Denko yells as a focused blast of sound akin to thunder shot from his cupped hands in front of his chest. The blast stuck the nin head-on and sent him flying backwards into the wall of the bridge where the concrete was destroyed and only to steel rods that reinforced it remained and those are what the Kumo nuke-nin slammed into and snapping his spine, effectively paralyzing the man from the waist down.
"Had enough yet?" Denko smirks laying his right hand on the hilt of his kodachi that is strapped to his left hip. "You can't fight anymore with your spine snapped like that."
"You are right and I recognize you as a worthy opponent, but first answer my question and I will give you a gift that I'm sure you will enjoy." The nin says between his gasping and laughing.
"So waddya wanna ask me?"
"When my partner there said that your father is Ryu no Denko, was he telling the truth?"
"Hai."
"Figures, I did owe him a pretty big debt before he left Kumogakure when I was your age. He saved my life and I swore on my life that I would repay him for that." The Kumo nin says chuckling every now and then before he coughed up blood.
"You knew my dad?"
"We were pretty good friends actually before he left saying that he had some business to attend to in Konohagakure and leaving me with my debt unpaid to him. After that- cough- my clan wanted me to kill them so that I would gain their power and skills because our Kekkai Genkai transfers our skills to whoever kills us. Sickening yet useful if you want to keep techniques secret. Now I want to repay my debt- cough- by giving you my jutsu. Please kill me."
"Fine I'll kill ya, demo just because you owe oto-san and you requested to be killed. Say konnichi wa to oto-san for me in the next life." Denko says quietly as he draws the kodachi.
"Arigoto Denko, I will. I am ready and my Kekkai Genkai has started to take effect." The Kumo nuke-nin says exposing his throat and Denko quickly beheads the man who died with a calm smile on his face oblivious to the fighting around him in death. A small sphere of chakra rose from the mans chest and flew into Denko's own chest and spread through his body, healing any injuries and transferring jutsu and chakra to his mind and inner coils.
"Rest in piece." Denko says humbly before turning to the other nuke-nins that were from Ame, Kusa, and Taki and rushing them. "Round two!"
Around Gai are the broken and beaten bodies of mercenaries and hired muscle, some were dead, others unconscious, others were simply in too much pain to move. In his arms is the man that had hired all of these men and apparently had no problems with having them killed, Gatoh as Gai found through some questioning, simply laughed it off saying that having them die on the job meant that he didn't have to pay them, not that he was going to pay most of them anyway.
"You are a strange, little man." Gai says before knocking the man out and slinging Gatoh over his shoulder, obviously not caring if the midget was comfortable or not.
Meanwhile the section of bridge that Kakashi and Zabuza are fighting at is covered by a thick mist that rendered the Sharingan in Kakashi's left eye useless. The Copy nin already was covered by small cuts due to the small vacuum at the tip that cuts him when he avoids the zanbatou by millimeters if that. He also has a large, yet shallow gash on his chest from when Zabuza went straight for the bridge builder and stopped that assault. Wiping some blood from the wound on a scroll, performed a few hand seals, and slammed the scroll into the ground yelling "Underground Pursuit Summoning no Jutsu!" Shortly after that eight or nine dogs of varying sizes and wearing capes burst from the ground at Zabuza's feet and latched on him with their jaws and prevented him from moving.
"If you are wondering how I found you I simply figured that if I couldn't find you by sight, I would have to sniff you out. I will ask you once, do you give up and I allow you to live or should I kill you?" Kakashi asks.
"I never simply give up, I merely change my plans. What exactly could happen if you take me to Konoha?"
"You could be handed over to the Mizukage and most likely tortured and killed, Konoha kills you before giving your body to the Mizukage, or knowing the Hokage like I do, he may have you work off your punishment as a Konoha shinobi. You could get stuck training genin, or maybe you would have to teach kenjutsu, but you would always be under the watch of the ANBU until the Hokage feels that you have earned his trust." Kakashi explains.
"Whatever, I am the Demon of the Bloody Mist, I do not fear death, demo I will let my followers decide their fates. Haku is fighting that Uchiha gaki, I will let him decide my fate."
"Not the answer I was expecting, demo it was good because I didn't want to get any more blood on me." Kakashi says and motions for the inu to release Zabuza as he ties him up and takes the zanbatou. "Now let's try to get the others to stop, shall we?"
"Hai."
"Demonic Ice Mirrors!" the girl known as Haku says and a dome of mirrors made from ice from the water on the bridge and the mist. "I do not wish to kill you but I will become a true shinobi if I must." Haku says as he merges with the nearest ice mirror.
"There is no way I'm going to be killed by the likes of you! Katon: Goukakyuu no Jutsu!" Sasuke blows a large fireball at the mirror Haku is in hopes of at least melting it, but it hardly even makes the ice melt at all.
"You will need something much hotter than that to melt my Demonic Ice Mirrors. Now I will show you true speed." Haku says before she could barely be seen jumping from mirror to mirror throwing senbon at Sasuke who desperately tried to strike back and follow the girl with his eyes as he quickly started to become a human pincushion.
'Kuso! I can't keep up with this girl! She makes it look like I'm standing still!' Sasuke thinks as he focuses chakra to his eyes in an attempt to track the girl as she filled him with senbon, hitting pressure points and preventing joints from working properly. What neither of them noticed was that Sasuke's eyes slowly turning red and eventually revealing to be newly awakened Sharingan. 'Now I can see her movements but I still can't keep up!"
Sasuke managed to scorch the edge of Haku's hakama before two voices stopped both Sasuke and Haku.
"Sasuke, stand down!" "Haku, stop!"
"Hai, Zabuza-sama."
"What do you mean stand down?"
"Sasuke, I'm glad that you have awakened your Sharingan in battle but we need to stop the others." Kakashi explains.
"Fine, I'll stop the baka that are still fighting." Sasuke says trying to move towards the others.
"Haku, tell the others to come to me now." Zabuza commands.
"Hai, Zabuza-sama." Haku says with a small bow before disappearing in a swirl of wind.
"I see that you are still wearing frilly underwear Mizuki-sensei no baka." Hinata smirks after she activated her Byakugan.
"He's still wearing them? I can't believe it! Come on Hinata-chan, let's prank this weirdo 'til he drops!" Naruto laughs.
"I'm ready when you are Naruto-kun."
"You kitsune gaki won't catch me with one of your tricks this time! I still owe you both lots of pain for all of the humiliation and misery that you put me through! And to top it all off, I'll be known as the one who really killed the Kyuubi that was sealed inside of you, Naruto!" Mizuki yells and charges while spinning a Fuuma shuriken in each hand like buzz saws.
"Oh come on Mizuki-baka, nobody could catch the Four Demons of Konoha! We've been pranking people since we were babies." Naruto says with a foxy grin as he effortlessly avoided the shuriken.
"We remember every major prank that we did since we were three. Demo when we dropped your pants in front of the entire village, that was priceless." Hinata laughs as Mizuki tried to strike her numerous times with the spinning shuriken.
"Oi, arigato, I needed a trim. You seem to know just how I like it Mizuki-baka." Hinata laughs as he cuts about an inch of hair on back of her head. Her only response was an increase of the volume of Mizuki's growls of frustration.
"Oi, Hinata-chan, just knock him out, Kakashi-sensei and Zabuza want everyone to stop fighting." Naruto calls to the girl from his perch on the side of the bridge.
"Alright Naruto-kun. You are in my field of divinitation, Hakkeshou: RokujuunYonchou!" Hinata says calmly freezing Mizuki's body and then striking his tenketsu and sealing them. Mizuki falls unconscious even as the shuriken that were spinning in his hands slipped free and cut them both off cleanly before embedding themselves into the ground.
"That looks like it hurt, good thing he was already out when it happened, ne?" Naruto says joining Hinata as she uses basic first aid to stop the bleeding.
"I guess so, demo I never expected that to happen."
"Eh, he'll be fine, at least 'til we get him back home to pay the price for abandoning Konoha like he did. Besides you did great against him Hinata-chan." Naruto says giving her a big hug with arms and tails, oblivious to the remaining fighting around them.
"Arigato, Naruto-kun."
Shino and Lee quickly took care of the Iwa nuke-nin by having Lee attack his front with his amazing speed and strength while Shino attacked his back with his kikai insects. Within minutes the ninja was battered and drained of his chakra, so they decided to attack the other three nins who found themselves surrounded by insects that were draining their chakra, the boy that controlled them, and two genin that moved too fast for them to hit with their steadily weakening bodies and passed out just as Haku showed himself to stop the fighting.
"Zabuza-sama and Kakashi-san called for the fighting to stop. Please help take these men to them so they may be bound." Haku says.
"Yes, kind miss. I will take them all back myself!" Lee says loudly with a solute and hefts three of the men onto his back and shoulders, leaving Shino and Denko who just stared at him before they each grabbed one of the Iwa nins wrists and dragged him back where all of the sensei are standing. When the others saw Lee carrying the three men, his role model started praising him and his teammates quickly acted as if they don't know them out of embarrassment.
Neji's fight ended very quickly, the nin had charged him leaving himself wide open, and needless to say that Neji took advantage of that and closed the Suna-nins tenketsu and striking the man in the temple to knock him out before binding him and dragging him to where he found Kakashi binding Zabuza.
"Oi! Who started the party without us?" Naruto asks as he drags Mizuki by the ankles, one reason being that the man didn't have wrists to grab anymore and simply because he didn't like the guy and wanted him beaten up a little more.
"Is that Mizuki?" Kurenai asks when she saw the man.
"Hai, that's him, but he left part of himself back there." Naruto says as he drops the man next to the others waiting to be bound.
"It's a good thing that we stopped the fighting before too many lives were lost. I accidentally hit a few too hard." Gai says actually being serious.
"The Kumo nin is dead, h- he asked me to kill him and I did what he said. H-he said he knew my oto-san…." Denko says quietly, obviously torn inside.
"It will be alright Denko, come with me. Neji you too." Gai says taking the boys into the forest near the bridge to help him get over his first human kill.
'Niisan killed that guy?' Naruto thinks.
'Everything will be alright Naruto-kun, you'll see. Just try to think positive.' Hinata thinks back to him, reminding him of their bond.
'Hai, I guess so. Hell we could have let Mizuki-baka die from blood loss if we wanted to or if we couldn't stop the bleeding in time.'
Seeing how the kitsune were handling the news of their brother/ friend, Kurenai also decided to take them to talk about handling their first kill when the time came.
"Well, let's get these guys to the prison in town so we know they won't be going anywhere. I'll leave you some food and water and I hope that I can trust you to keep them in line when they wake up?" Kakashi says to everyone and directing the question to Zabuza.
"Hai. Besides we have some questions that I think Gatoh can be 'persuaded' to answer." Zabuza says with a nod of agreement from Haku who had removed her hunter nin mask now that she didn't need it anymore.
"Ah, I was wondering what you looked like under that mask." Kakashi says.
"I only wear it during missions. Why don't you take off your mask?" Haku asks immediately grabbing everybody's attention. When Sasuke saw Haku without her mask on for the first time, his heart fluttered when he noticed her flawless face with brown eyes and quickly looked the other way to hide the slight tinge of pink on his cheeks when Haku felt someone staring at her.
After explaining the deal that Kakashi and Zabuza made to the nuke-nin, it was only Mizuki who opposed the idea of trying to become a Konoha shinobi, even if that was his home village. So Gai and Kakashi took him and the Kumo nins body to a cliff and disposed of them, leaving a marker only for the Kumo nin. When the group got back to Tazuna's house they found that two of Gatoh's thugs tried to kidnap Tsunami and it was Kiba and Akamaru who were left to rest who took care of them, so Kurenai took their weapons and threw them in the same room in jail as Gatoh who was with Zabuza, Haku, and the other nuke-nins. She merely told them to have fun but not to kill.
Naruto and Hinata were quick to form their fur ball after dinner and Denko left as soon he was done to lie on the roof. Tenten stayed with Neji after he explained what happened to Denko and tell her what Gai-sensei had said to them. Gai and Kakashi returned from the body disposal after everyone had finished their own dinner and found plates waiting for them. Kurenai took a worried glance at the fur ball in the corner before discussing the results of the mission with the other jounin.
The extra week that they stayed to help complete the bridge seemed to help greatly for the genin as they worked to get over the deaths on the bridge. Apparently during the time that they were there Naruto took some time and spoke with Inari, Tsunami's son and Tazuna's grandson, and convinced him that not all hero's seem strong on the outside, but it was the strength of their will to do what is right even against overwhelming odds, just as Kaiza had done for the village several times. His words brought out a side of the boy that no one had seen since Kaiza was alive. Inari took it upon himself to tell the rest of the villagers what Naruto had said to him. By the time the bridge was finished a week after the battle, the villagers had ran out anyone who supported Gatoh and destroyed any reminders of his influence on the country. As the Konoha shinobi flew away on Denko-ryu and Tenten was enjoying her somewhat private time with Neji, Tazuna and Inari decided to name the bridge after the one who gave confidence back to the country, The Great Naruto Bridge.
To be continued….
Review responses:
T.O.B. – Thanks for liking the couples, just wait 'til you see what they do later.
Dragon Man 180 – Glad you like how Naruto and Hinata prefer their free time cuddling, they have a strong bond and I don't think the concepts of the birds and the bees so that may come up sometime.
Ash K – thanks for the reviews. You and Dragon Man 180 give not only the best reviews but also the most frequent. Thanks.
Kyuubi-sama – Glad ya like the story, and here's the update you asked to when you review for chapter three!
Turok 1 – Thanks!
Cyber-Porygon – Thanks for the site and for the encouragement to continue the story.
hope master – I'm elaborating a bit more than I have in the past, hell I wrote more in this chapter than I have for about five homework assignments together. Thanks for the review!
Thanks for the reviews everyone and I hope to get many more. The next chapter will be the start of the Chuunin exams, that's where the action really starts. I hope ya guys enjoy the story and review, maybe some of ya can give me some ideas. Oh yea, if you're disappointed about me only naming one of the nuke-nin other than Zabuza and Haku I apologize but I'm not good with names. If you come up with any and send them to me I'll gladly revise the chapter to put the names in and maybe touch up the fight scenes a bit while I'm at it if you have any complaints. Arigato!
Ja ne!
Lightning Bob