Chapter 05
Even though he was standing in the middle of it, Naruto thought it all seemed like a dream.
Only moments ago, he had been examining a one-on-one battle between the two biggest attractions in the Tournament, and now a full-blown battle was raging within the walls of the Arena.
The moment the genjutsu had been cast, various experienced forms of ANBU and shinobi rushed out to protect their customers from attack – provided they hadn't gotten caught in the illusion.
Ninja from Sand and Sound stood up in the crowds and removed their disguises before attacking the nearest Leaf nin.
An ANBU cut clear through a pair of Sand-nin as he rushed to save the Hokage, who was battling the Kazekage – and the Kazekage turned out to have been Orochimaru in disguise.
Gaara's brother and sister grabbed the disoriented and injured redhead while making their escape, ninja style over the wall and across the rooftops beyond.
In the distance, Naruto could see the heads of three huge snakes with what looked like bibs tied to their heads.
As the battle raged, Naruto noticed that Sasuke took off after Gaara, seemingly without any encouragement from anyone.
Naruto was brought out of his shocked thoughts by the sound of meat and bone impacting against hard and unyielding stone.
"Naruto-kun!" a loud voice called. "A battle-field is no place for philosophy, we are under attack! I'll defeat more enemies than you can! And if I can't do that, I'll do five thousand hits on the training log! Yosh!"
Naruto turned to see Lee rushing off to fight the next group of ninja, none of whom were Genin, and far more experienced … none of them stood a chance. Along the wall behind him, a headless ninja in Sand uniform lay crumbled, bleeding profusely out the gaping wound where arguably the most vital body part was missing.
'Make up your mind,' Ranma chimed in. 'Stay here and fight, or follow Sasuke to make sure he doesn't get his spoiled ass handed to him.'
"Can't let the bastard get killed," Naruto decided. "Sakura would tear my head off."
Biting a hole in his thumb, Naruto slammed it into the ground.
"Kuchiyose no Jutsu!" a cloud erupted from where he had struck the ground, and as it cleared, two bull-sized toads with dual swords on their backs sat ready. Had Ranma not helped him learn the summoning jutsu, Naruto might have summoned the wrong toad instead of the ones he had been looking for – who knows, he could have summoned Gamagichi or Gamabunta.
"What's up, Boss?" one of them asked.
"Konoha is under attack by Sand and Sound, and I'm gonna follow my team-mate, who is chasing a trio of Sand-nin," Naruto explained. "I don't know you very well, but you gave me the impression that this was the sort of thing you'd enjoy – I need you to make sure I won't get stopped by an enemy, would you do that?"
"Sure thing, Boss," the other toad croaked deeply. "You summoned us, it's your decision."
"Then let's go!" grinned Naruto and jumped out of the room.
The two toads followed closely behind and on either side as he ran across the Arena, up the wall and leaping from rooftop to rooftop.
As he got a better look, Naruto realised that there weren't three giant snakes rampaging through the village, but a three-headed serpent, on top of which landed a toad nearly as big as Gamabunta, also carrying a pair of swords on its back.
During the chase through Konoha, the two toads darted out of the way now and again, followed by the sounds of a brief skirmish, and returned, slashing red liquid from their swords before sheathing them again and catching up with Naruto. At one point, Naruto found himself blocked off from his prey by a quartet of Sound-nin … the two toads ran ahead of Naruto and removed the threat so fast the boy hardly noticed until the enemy ninja were falling to pieces … literally.
'Maybe we could get these guys to show us a few things when this invasion's over,' commented Ranma as they cleared the wall surrounding the village.
Again, the toads abandoned his side for a moment, but were back as he landed on his first tree branch.
Leaping from tree to tree, Naruto briefly wondered why this was happening.
Everything had seemed fine until Gaara's fight – why would anyone attack Konoha?
Would everyone be okay?
More importantly, would Ichiraku's Ramen stand survive the attack?
Leaping from branch to branch, Naruto eventually heard signs of fighting ahead.
Turning the few degrees to the left Naruto honed in on the battle that took place, and found Shino fighting Kankuro.
The boy seemed to have it well in hand, so he signalled for the toads to ignore them and follow him, as he continued to track Sasuke, Temari and Gaara.
A little further along, Ranma warned Naruto about some upcoming traps, the blonde boy leapt higher into the trees and went above them, followed by the toads who had also discovered the explosive tags attached to the trunks in a box pattern that would most likely trigger if anyone came in between them … clever. Hastily put up, but clever nonetheless.
It took a few more minutes to notice the signs of another battle ahead, and once he detected it, Naruto sped up in its direction.
From the sounds of it, Sasuke was not doing well.
The toads, acting on the information Naruto gave them on the situation, rushed in to take care of the redheaded teen - and were stopped by the sand, caught by the sand and crushed by the sand, dispelling them – Naruto winced, they would not forget that, and this would likely make them less cooperative when he summoned one of them again, they might not want to teach him their sword moves!
'Clone,' Ranma recommended. 'And just so you're warned, if I sense something coming that you do not, I'll take control and get us away.'
Crossing his hands in a familiar hand seal, Naruto produced two clones, one of whom he handed an old kunai with five explosive tags attached, and went into hiding – this would be loud.
The second clone darted out and swept Sasuke away, incidentally saving him from being crushed by the monstrous limb of sand that covered Gaara's arm and most of his right side.
Like the original, the clone carrying a protesting Sasuke went into hiding several trees away.
The armed clone, however, darted in and let himself to be caught in Gaara's grotesque grip, and crushed.
At first, there was a moment of eerie silence.
Naruto looked up from his hiding place in a hastily dug hollow under a huge tree, and hurriedly stuffed his dirt-covered fingers in his ears. There were more important things to worry about than hygiene at the moment.
Then the light brightened, flaring up to near blinding levels even in Naruto's hiding place, and a deep noise roared along like a sandstorm, enveloping objects and shaking them thoroughly.
And silence returned.
Peering out of his hole, Naruto saw the destruction created by his explosive notes.
Starting from Gaara's spot, the trees closest to him were burnt to a crisp and knocked over. The next ones were simply ripped out by the roots and were leaning against the next row of trees … provided they could carry them – one or two trees had fallen on weaker trees and snapped them in two or stripped them of branches on one side.
In the middle stood Gaara, bleeding profusely from his right arm, but otherwise unharmed, though he looked dizzy and was undoubtedly bothered by a strong ringing in his ears.
Draped across one of the felled trees was Temari, who seemed to have escaped the onslaught of pressure and heat relatively unscathed.
'That guy sure can take a beating,' Naruto commented.
'Not really, his sand took most of the damage,' Ranma corrected. 'Look at the ground, the sand's receding, as though it's just been up to protect him.'
Gaara, snapping out of the shock and daze of the explosion, started snickering.
The snickering escalated into chuckles, and in a short while, he was up to insane, mentally unstable laughter. 'He's snapped.' Ranma observed.
Removing his jacket, Naruto quickly undid the straps holding his weights in place, and for safekeeping stuffed them all under the tree where he had hidden, leaving him in his black undershirt, orange pants, his blue sandals, with his weapons in place.
"This guy's lost all his marbles," Naruto agreed with Ranma as the redheaded boy continued his laughter and incoherent ranting about confirming his existence and letting 'him' out. "Who needs to be let out? Seems more like someone needs to be locked in …"
Sand started pouring out of the ground.
Naruto had no idea so much sand could be found under the heavy forest.
More and more, the silicate matter poured out, surrounding and burying Gaara, who seemed to have gone into a trance.
Taking a more distinctive form, two trunks of sand rose and merged to split again. One went backwards, while the fatter one went up, thinning out in a pear-like shape that sprouted three more protrusions until a bipedal body with a long tail stood towering above the forest.
"A raccoon?" Naruto guessed as he looked up at the giant form. "With a pimple?"
'Do you need glasses?' Ranma snapped. 'That's not a pimple, it's Gaara! And we need to move – NOW!'
As Naruto did what Ranma told him, one of the massive feet smashed into the ground where the pair had been standing a moment earlier.
"GAAH! STAND STILL WILL YOU?" the shrill, insane voice of the beast bellowed. "I'M FINALLY FREE! I'M GONNA SQUISH YOU, PUNY HUMAN, AND THEN I'LL FIND SOME MORE!"
Ranma, apologising to Naruto for what he was about to do, claimed control of Naruto's body, and used the direct copy of the transport technique Kakashi had unwittingly taught him – not having had time to refine or improve it first.
"WHERE'D HE GO?" the giant sand raccoon shrieked and lifted his feet to check if he'd accidentally stepped on him without knowing or getting to enjoy it. Not finding any trace of him, the raccoon looked towards Konohagakure, a clear source of squishable humans to step on intentionally. "ALL RIGHT! LET THE PARTY BEGIN!"
Several hundred metres above the giant beast, Ranma, in control of Naruto's body, was rapidly descending, the air screaming around him.
'If entering a trance brings this creature out,' Ranma reasoned. 'Then waking him up should end this.'
Ignoring the terrified screams of Naruto in his head, Ranma pulled loose his machete from his lower back, and entered a stance he had used against him more times than he'd like to remember.
"Have at thee," the whisker-faced boy nostalgically intoned. This technique simply wouldn't be the same without such a statement.
-WHUMP!-
The sand creature paused in mid-step as he felt something wrong.
He was lighter for some reason.
Glancing back, he saw his tail disintegrating into a formless mass of sand.
This was quite an unusual thing to experience.
And like most people who have a spontaneous amputation, huge elemental beasts are confused at first.
Then the pain kicks in as the mind processes what has happened.
"GAAAARGH!" the creature shrieked in a bellow that was heard throughout the country, and made those fighting in Konoha shield their ears as they looked up to witness what was happening.
A little more, nothing more than a sliver, fell off the raccoon.
Then some more, and more, and more.
Piece by piece, the huge being fell apart, like a deck of cards set on end, sliced apart like a loaf of bread.
Had the raccoon not been in pain from having so much removed from his conscious control, he might have registered someone impacting Gaara from above with just enough force to knock the boy to his senses.
Alas, as the sand fell apart, all the raccoon could do was screech.
Ranma relinquished control to Naruto, and the boy fell into a falling pile of sand, lessening the effects of his already slowed fall. A few bones bruised, but were swiftly healed.
Below him, Gaara stared up into space, in shock because of the pain he was feeling.
"That was stupid," Naruto grunted at the redhead, struggling for a moment to get on top of the sand instead of sinking into it.
Gaara turned silently, his eyes wide as he stared at him in surprise.
"You had no control over that thing," Naruto continued, relaying information from Ranma. "Are you really that heartless, releasing an uncontrollable beast on hundreds, even thousands of innocent human beings?"
Gaara made no move to argue or confirm this allegation, but a pile of sand rose from the ground, wobbling for a moment and then fell apart.
"And you tired yourself out," continued Naruto. "You've got to learn to pace yourself in a fight … always save some energy for later, because there's no guarantee that using everything at once will let you win.
"This village has already been attacked by a giant beast, and one man managed to defeat it … what made you think your beast would be any different? Because you carried it? Big deal, I carry the Kyuubi no Kitsune, but haven't used it even once in this fight, because I'm not gonna rely on someone else to make me powerful enough to defend my precious ones – and as the future Hokage, I intend on protecting Konoha with my life if need be … that is my nindo."
During his tirade, Naruto saw a small change in Gaara's eyes. He didn't really know what he was rambling on about … things were really just pouring out … maybe he hit his head in his landing? Concussion was supposed to cause one to ramble on about incoherent subjects.
He realised dimly that he had touched on his beliefs, though.
Before any more conversation took place, a black blur and a purple blur appeared on either side of Gaara and moving rapidly on, headed away from battle and out of the country. The blurs were Kankuro and Temari, Ranma informed Naruto – and they had shown genuine concern for their injured team-mate … camaraderie, it was a beautiful thing …
Taking over for a moment, Ranma ducked Naruto's head out of the way of a fist.
"Naruto!" roared an irate Sakura. "You let an enemy escape!"
Then again, team-mates could also be the death of one …
A little behind Sakura, Shikamaru was standing idly by, watching an ugly little dog dig in the sand. Curiously enough, the dog wore a forehead protector with the Lead symbol on it … was it from Kiba's clan? What was it digging for?
"Hi, Sakura," Naruto greeted casually, as though she hadn't just tried to take his head off or yelled at him. "How goes the battle? Exactly how many enemy ninja have you repelled lately?"
"Oy, a little help here, I'm only a cute little puppy," called a deep, gravel-like and serious voice. Naruto's eye twitched momentarily as he realised the dog was a talking dog – one that had just referred to itself as a cute little puppy, only one of which was true, and it wasn't the first or last description.
'It must be a Summoned creature,' Ranma reasoned. 'They seem capable of speech and cognitive thought … though I'm questioning its intelligence if it thinks it's young or cute.'
Looking down a bit from the delusional dog, Naruto saw a black head of hair peeking out of the sand.
"Sasuke-kun!" shrieked Sakura in panic and appeared at the unconscious boy's side faster than the instant transportation technique Ranma had used.
Grumbling lowly at not being appreciated, Naruto started looking for landmarks … he still had his jacket and weights to recover, and they could be buried anywhere.
When Naruto had recovered his property from the sand, after several long minutes of searching and creating Shadow Clones to help, Sakura had finished digging out Sasuke, who had a bump on his head and a mouthful of sand to show for his fight and pursuit.
Naturally, Sakura jumped to the conclusion that Sasuke had destroyed the "demon" and been buried in his exhaustion as the creature fell to pieces, and that Naruto's contribution had been to watch as the three Sand-nin made their escape. Ranma didn't need to tell Naruto to shut up before he said something he might regret, and thus left the girl to her beliefs.
Of course, Naruto had "volunteered" to help carry Sasuke to the hospital … Shikamaru had also "volunteered", and was careful about expressing his displeasure about it.
Sakura had followed Naruto and Shikamaru as they shouldered half of Sasuke's weight each, worrying that the bruise on his head was an indication of something more serious, regardless of what either conscious boy told her. Strangely enough, the girl did not appear to pitch in on any work, but Ranma advised Naruto not to question this as it would only lead to needless violence and pain … their pain.
The distance they had all covered to get to the fight had been surprisingly long for what had felt like a short run at the time, and needing to assist Sasuke all the way was no easy task, especially for Naruto, who had his weights back on. It wasn't to say Sasuke was heavy, just cumbersome.
By the time the quartet and dog arrived in the village, the fighting was over, nearly half the village stood ablaze, and those ninja not injured were either helping the civilians return from hiding, or were zipping around using whatever means they had to put out the fires.
A crack ran across the face of the Sandaime Hokage's mountain portrait, giving Naruto a bad feeling about what else had happened.
Upon entering the hospital, Naruto felt he'd rather be back in battle; at least battle was calmer and more organised.
Injured ninja and civilians were strewn around along the walls – some were even standing.
Doctors and nurses ran back and forth, doing their best to help.
Worried friends and relatives of the injured were harassing the doctors about when they'd have time for them.
It almost surprised Naruto that there wasn't a wall of corpses stacked along the corridor.
The moment a nurse spotted Sasuke, however, three doctors started competing about which of them would have the honour of treating him, while Sakura worriedly followed him.
Naruto saw no further need for him to remain.
He had just stepped outside when he was stopped by Jiraiya, who appeared before him in a blur.
"Come with me," the white-haired pervert stated gravely, and started running up the outside wall of the hospital.
Naruto did as asked, and stopped under the window Jiraiya had stopped next to. Looking inside, Naruto saw a familiar tuft of white beard poke out of a mask connected to a metal lung machine, while a team of doctors were hurrying back and forth in the room.
"He'll survive if they're fast enough," Jiraiya assured. "But he'll never walk again. Before he was put under sedation, he gave the two of us a final mission … we are going out to find the Godaime Hokage, and drag her back by her pigtails if necessary."
"The old man asked for me to do it?" Naruto questioned sceptically.
"Yes," confirmed Jiraiya. "We leave as soon as possible, so you'd better hurry home and pack, I'll be waiting for you at the East Gate."
With his message delivered, the old pervert disappeared in a blur of speed to make his own preparations.
Dropping down to the ground, Naruto started for his apartment … the old man wanted him out of the village for some reason, and arranged for him to come on that mission, Ranma didn't even have to point this out … the question remained: why was it necessary to do that?
As he was thinking this over, he nearly ran into Hinata, who was emerging from behind a corner.
"Naruto-kun," she greeted in a half-timid manner. Her face was still lit up in a blush, though.
"Hinata-chan," Naruto returned. "Are you okay? You weren't hurt in the invasion, right?"
"I'm fine, Naruto-kun," Hinata replied.
"Anyone hurt at all?"
"Only Shino-kun was hurt, Naruto-kun," Hinata answered sadly. "He was poisoned, but his family is treating him now. He'll be fine. Are you doing anything?" as the girl asked this, her face nearly exploded into bright red, as if she had said something completely obscene without realising it.
"I'm packing for a trip," confessed Naruto. "The old man sent me on a mission, but I don't know if I'm supposed to talk about it."
"I understand, Naruto-kun," said Hinata. "How long will you be gone?"
"Don't know," Naruto sighed. "Could be anything from an hour to a few months. I haven't been told all the details yet."
"Oh," a deflated Hinata moaned.
"I'd better go, don't want the old pervert to get impatient," Naruto briefly hugged Hinata in what he hoped was a friendly manner, and ran away. "See you later, Hinata-chan!"
For the second time that day, Naruto ran off, not knowing that he'd left behind a red-glowing girl that could have replaced the sunset in radiance.
Author's Notes: This was a difficult chapter to write … I had a goal in mind for some events, but not a path to follow. I knew I wanted Sarutobi to survive, which meant no Summoning the Shinigami, which meant Sarutobi had to somehow prevent the summoning of the previous Hokage. This meant that Orochimaru would need to be stopped first, and in order to complicate the Tsunade retrieval, he had to survive but have a wound or injury that Kabuto would be unable to fix. In short, there were so many differences to account for, that I could only vaguely use the manga as a guideline.
Credits: Luthorne was a big help in suggesting areas of bad flow, grammar or spelling in this chapter.