WHOO!! Finally an update from Nare, huh? Sorry about that huge hiatus... School has been horrendous, especially how I have departmental exams coming up... HOWEVER! Apparently writing stories helps in writing essays, so I'll hopefully be updating on here more. Hopefully.
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The demon woke with a light throbbing resounding in his head, making it hard to think straight. Sasuke winced a little as a sudden jab of pain ricocheted over his left temple. When the pain had subsided he sat up, and cracked an eye open. He was sitting on a roof, overlooking a cemetery. No surprises here. He had clambered up there not long ago to hide from whoever had decided to pay his charge a visit. He clawed a nearby tile in frustration. He'd fallen asleep, just like some amateur.
Sasuke stood abruptly, but swayed. I feel like I got drugged... he thought vaguely as he steadied himself. Hopefully not much time had passed in which Naruto could have gotten in trouble. He hasn't changed much.
With caution he sidled over to the edge of the roof and judged the distance to Naruto's window. It wasn't that far. Just the angle was a bit of a problem. Sasuke crouched and gripped the edge of the roof. He was about to propel himself off the roof when he keeled over, nearly fall off the edge, a sharp pain wreaking havoc on his back. The fight earlier had definitely weakened him. But only superficially. Only in this body. As soon as they had returned to his room, Naruto had immediately forced Sasuke to let him bandage the wounds on his back.
Again the demon positioned himself to have the dive, but something caught his eye. Looking straight down and a little to the right, Sasuke saw that, though slightly obscured by a clump of bushes, there was a white line encircling around the building.
Apprehension a fear suddenly blossomed in his chest and he dropped down onto the ground, a few feet away from the line. He walked to it and immediately knew what it was. It was a Spell Pentacle. Cursing he made a run for the wall, scaling it by running straight up it. Reaching Naruto's window where he leaped in, landing on the table.
"Naruto!" he yelled as soon as he was in, scanning the room. It was deserted. Sasuke gritted his teeth. Stepping off the table he observed something white on the floor. He stooped and picked it up. It was a snow white feather. The feather crumbled and fell as dust to the floor at his touch.
Unconsciously, Sasuke's eyes turned red and where he was gazing at the floor was suddenly engulfed in flames. The brilliancy brought the demon back to earth. He quickly doused the fire with a quick counter spell then turn to Naruto's desk. After a few passes over the table he located a blue marker. He was looking for chalk, but the marker would have to do. Why would a teenager have chalk anyway?
Stepping into the centre of the room, Sasuke cleared it of a bag, a few papers and a textbook, throwing all of these onto the bed without much grace or thought of their fate. He was only thinking of his task. Now that the floor was cleared of all obstructions Sasuke uncapped the marker and began to draw on the floor. First he drew one large circle so that it took up the whole space. Next was a pentacle, it fit snugly inside the circle. After drawing another circle, this one inside the pentacle, the demon began to write strange marks and runes inside, making a rough border in the inner most circle. He was soon done this task and made a much smaller pentacle, marking the centre of the circle. Stepping back Sasuke surveyed his work, checking for any spelling mistakes. There were none.
The demon took in a deep breath, closed his eyes, and began to pull power into his left hand. This happened in a matter of seconds, the energy gathered in his hand so dense and full of power it made the air around it spark and crackle. The energy met an apex and Sasuke threw it at the circle, right in the centre of the centre most pentacle. There was a burst of blinding light from the lines of the circle and pentacles, but he didn't close his eyes. He had seen it many times, and besides, it would not harm him.
A few seconds passed and the light disappeared replaced with a girl sitting in the circle. She looked surprised at this and it took her a few seconds to become accustomed to her new surroundings. Finally realizing that Sasuke was there the girl looked up.
"Sasuke-sama!"
Sakura had been summoned. Sasuke grimaced. He would have liked to summon someone from his own command but there had been no time. He didn't even have the right materials to make a cross-veil summoning. In almost response to his lack of equipment, Sasuke dropped the marker back onto the table before Sakura asked him why he had been holding one.
Sakura stood and brushed off her skirt, again looking around the room, but this time including the summoning pentacle into her observations. Her head turned slightly as she read around the circle the runes that the other demon in the room had written there. She looked up again at Sasuke.
"Um, why did you summon me?" she asked, blushing for reasons that eluded and didn't hold any significance to Sasuke. His only goal was to go retrieve Naruto. And he needed Sakura's help in that, even if it was as backup. Third-grade backup at that...
"I'll be enlisting your help as your superior with a A ranked mission," he said quickly, brushing off his left hand in an effort to get the residual magic off of it. Summoning wasn't his forte and it always left a slight itch on the hand he used.
"I'll be happy to help," Sakura replied, perky as ever. Sasuke winced. "What's the mission?" The dark haired demon turned back to the window to jump out again before replying.
"Naruto's been kidnapped."
–
The room was dark and smelt musty. The walls were covered in what looked like moss in the dim light, but Naruto couldn't be sure. Naruto sat curled in the centre of this room, looking vaguely out of the bars that comprised one of his cell's walls. Why he was there, he had no idea. How he had gotten there, he had a better idea of. Having woken up a few hours ago, he had found himself being carried by someone. He hadn't been able to really get a good look at them as they're promptly knocked him out again, but he had noticed something greatly disturbing about them. They had had feathery, white wings.
But why? Naruto thought, rocking lightly back and forth as he stared at the bars. The corridor just out of his cell was only marginally lighter so there wasn't much to look at. Wait! Perhaps this is punishment for summoning Sasuke! A chill went down Naruto's back.
"It's not my fault though!" he exclaimed, looking his balance and falling to the floor as he did. Immediately he rolled up again, the ground being the epitome of grimy.
"What's not your fault?"
Naruto, startled, looked around for where this voice had come from. He found its owner straight in front of him. On the other side of the bars that kept him in the cell he found that there was a person crouching down so that their eyes were at the same level. If he had been able to see his eyes. On their face the person had on a strange orange mask. It was spiraled and the spirals came around where the right eye should have been, forming a small hole. This hole was empty, but Naruto felt that there was indeed an eye there, looking out at him. Other than this brightly coloured mask and the spikey black hair that hallowed around it the person had on a dark, black cloak with red clouds on it.
Naruto, unable to think of anything to say to this strange person, said nothing. This situation continued for a few minutes, neither of them speaking or moving. This strange cold war was ended when Naruto heard footsteps approaching them. He looked away from the orange masked person and saw that there was now another person standing next to them. This one was also wearing a black cloak with red clouds, but that was where the similarities ended. This new person appeared to be female and had bluish purple hair down up in a bun with a flower, golden eyes with thick blue eye shadow around them, and a pierced lower lip. This particular feature would normally lower how well someone would look, but on this woman, Naruto thought it accentuated her beauty.
She was looking straight at him, nearly glaring. Naruto blushed and looked down. He heard fabric rustle and he looked up slightly to see the woman crouch down next to 'Orange Mask' and knock him on the head. This surprised him.
"What are you doing, Tobi?" the woman asked, her face still blank. 'Orange Mask', his name is Tobi Naruto reminded himself, rubbed the top of his head where her fist had made contact with it.
"Tobi was talking to foxy boy," Tobi replied, employing a childish tone. Naruto raised an eyebrow. Foxy boy? Who are you to talk, Mr. I-talk-in-the-first-person. Tobi drew himself up while still in crouching position so that he nearly was as tall as the woman. "Tobi is a good boy!" The woman sighed, exasperated. Naruto felt sorry for her, having to deal with such an idiot.
"I know Tobi. Just don't get in too much trouble. Pein will get angry at you," she said, patting Tobi on the head. Pain? Actual ouch-pain? Naruto thought. If that's some one's name, they're definitely going to be a lot stranger than this Tobi.
"Tobi can't talk to foxy boy?" Tobi asked, cocking his head to one side. All these actions and words reminded Naruto of a small Chihuahua: small, orange and annoying.
"You can talk to him..." the woman said. "Just don't talk too much." The woman rose, looking again at Naruto, making him look down again. "Later go see Deidara, alright?"
"Un!" The woman then left the way she had came, into the darkness. A few moments again passed.
"Who was she?" Naruto asked, deciding to break the silence first.
"Oh? That's Konan-san," Tobi replied. Naruto could practically hear the smile that was probably on his face. Tobi rose a little and changed his posture so that he now sat on the ground instead of crouching. Much better for blood circulation you see?
"So... uhh... where are we?" Naruto asked. He felt apprehensive talking to the people who had kidnapped him, but he really needed to know where he was. And it was this compulsive desire that drove him to get information out of this Tobi.
"I'm not allowed to tell you that." His voice had changed, shocking Naruto. Not only had it deepened, Tobi had also used 'I' not 'Tobi'. It was almost as if it was another personality which had taken hold of him. Naruto laughed lightly, trying to lighten the mood.
"Oh, o-okay," he said. The voice before had sounded blood curdling and for a second he had thought he'd seen a red eye look through the hole in the mask. It reminded him of Sasuke's red eyes. But just where was the emo-bean demon anyway? Naruto sighed and decided that the bars to his cell were probably strong enough to withstand any angry, provoked attack from his bi-polar neighbour.
"So why am I 'foxy-boy' then?" he asked. Before him the strange little man sat still for a few moments, then his head clicked to one side, as if his neck had suddenly snapped from the weight of his...head. Naruto drew back at this creepy gesture. Tobi's shoulders started to shake a little and a soft, yet piercing humming started to emanate from behind the orange mask. It became louder and louder and Naruto realized it was... laughter.
"Ha....ha....ha....HA...HA.....HA!"
The black shoulders were now shaking uncontrollably and Naruto, too scared to move, sat and watched the man named Tobi wither away into insanity. Suddenly, Tobi lunged forward, arms flung through the bars of the dark cell, grouping and swinging towards the captive. Naruto tried to push himself backwards, legs pumping against the cold, stone floor, but it gave too little hold and he was pulled by strong arms towards the cold bars and towards the swirling red eye.
--
Bright, sunny days never ranked highly with Sasuke. Even when he was a small little demon, living a some-what carefree demon life, he'd always hated the way the sun would beat down at him, glowering at him. So it was no surprise that the demon's mood was now worse than merely agitated at his pink head lackey. Another reason for his unhappiness with the sunny day was that there was also very little cloud coverage. So if he was going to fly and not alarm MI6 to so called 'alien activity' he'd have to do it in some extremely secluded location with a number of concealing charms in place.
Sasuke twitched the thick, itching cord away from his neck, rubbing slightly where it had just been. Around his neck hung a heavy slab of carved stone, the grooves in it glimmering slightly. It was one of the aforementioned concealing charms and one of Sasuke's most hated. He understood the fact that the itchy cord that held the charm couldn't go or be changed for a newer, less annoying one, due to certain spells that had been cast on both the charm itself and its partner making it impossible for even a high level demon to separate the two. In fact, only an Overlord would stand a chance of breaking the bond. Powerful stuff, ancient magic.
Sasuke stopped, turned and was nearly bowled into by the smaller, female demon he had enlisted into his forces. Sakura blushed deeply and stepped back a few paces, all the while looking intently at the ground. He was beginning to regret recruiting her as back-up. Just her track record in the Demon Realm as a member of a squad he had led, kept Sasuke from leaving her behind. She was a ditz, no denying it, but she did have a certain aptitude to a few streams of demon magic that Sasuke tended to fail at.
"Where are we now?" asked Sasuke, briskly, before he turned and continued walking up the hill. They were on the side of a sizable hillock overlooking busy London. Around them to the left was mainly flat grassland but to their right was a densely populated forest. A forest with much potential for demon flying activities. Behind him, Sakura stopped for a moment to catch her breath before replying to his demand.
"We're nearly ten miles from the centre of London," she said, "although I'm not sure exactly what National Park this hill is a part of." Sasuke turned slightly and glared back at her. Every second lost was another second that Naruto could be in danger, or in pain, or being tortured, or being... killed.
Calm! Sasuke ordered his hyperventilating brain. He's only been missing for, at a max, nine hours. What's the worst that could happen to him? The demon inwardly cursed his carelessness yet again for letting Naruto get taken right under his nose, though he knew that he would know if Naruto had ...died. Sasuke brought a hand up over his chest and felt the faint throbbing of an active heart. Yes, he would know if something of that nature had happened to the blonde, since, if something did, the same would happen to him. And you're not dead, so nothing bad has happened, he told himself. So just concentrate on what's important.
Breathing deeply, Sasuke looked around for a nice piece of flat land. He found one a few metres from him. Walking up to it he started to scuff away at the grass, making a rough circle. He grimaced at the hardly circular circle he had formed. Back in the academy he would have failed badly if he'd made a circle like this for even a rudimentary spell, but this would have to do.
"Sakura," he said roughly. "Have you got that bag I gave you?"
The pink head girl began rummaging in her own backpack and soon pulled out a smallish, dull orange, drawstring bag. She handed this to Sasuke and he yanked it open. Inside were a few dozen white feathers that he'd collected from Naruto's room earlier. It had been difficult as he couldn't actually touch them, so he'd settled for using some of Naruto's stationary as chopsticks.
Dropping down to the ground in front of his spell circle, Sasuke turned the bag over, shaking it slightly so that the feathers floated down where he wanted them. A few dropped outside of the circle, but the majority made port in it. The feathers stopped falling out and Sasuke threw the bag back to Sakura, not caring if she caught it or not. Yes, the bag had nostalgic qualities but none of them mattered now. The person who'd given it to him no longer remembered him.
Then reaching behind him and into his pocket, Sasuke pulled out a small stake like object. It looked rather like a giant nail, but he always insisted it was a stake. A nail just sounded dumb. Gripping the stake with his right hand he ran his left hand through with it, the blood from the wound splattering onto the feathers in the circle dying them a deep red. Sasuke winced a little as he pulled the stake out of his hand. He'd done this many times, but the feeling of something pulling through his hand always made a chill go down his spine.
"Sasuke-sama!"
Sasuke turned and found Sakura again behind him with a horrified expression on her face. "Wh-what-"
"I would have thought you'd studied blood spells," he said in reply to this expression. He straightened his left arm and tugged at the sleeve so that it was fairly tort. Then with his right hand, he ripped the fabric into a long strip and began wrapping it around his injured hand. He finished quickly, the credit of experience, and turned his attention back to the circle. With authority he placed his right hand, palm down, on the side of the circle closest to him so that only the tip of his middle finger was inside. Taking a deep breath Sasuke reached inside of himself and pulled out his power, channeling it through his hand, into the circle, into the feathers.
There were no runes in the circle which normally spelled disaster but Sasuke had bypassed this law with his blood sacrifice and now he formed the runes in his mind. The circle shone and each of the feathers in it began to float up high above the two demon's heads. Sasuke looked up at them as he held onto the spell, preventing it from evoking just yet. The feathers floated up higher and higher and when they were about five metres above them, Sasuke suddenly relinquished his hold on the spell. The feathers shone brightly, flashing once then they all disintegrated into dust. The dust wafted down and Sasuke caught a handful. Right when he touched them he began to see shards of memory like broken pieces of glass within the waterfall of dust.
White wings.
White hair.
Purple eyes.
A window. Naruto's window. And through the window dropped a tall figure carrying a smaller boy with blonde hair. Naruto.
Sasuke gritted his teeth in anger but let the spell continue to show him the location of the feather's owner. The pieces of glass shattered and reformed into a larger piece. The surface warped and rippled then showed an image of a dark forest. From this viewpoint, the focus of the mirror zoomed in, whirling around then slowed down as it came to an ancient looking castle. The stones that made its foundations looked centuries old, yet it was clear that there were lifeforms there. Sasuke tightened his hold on his magic and tried to make the mirror continue its decent into the castle but when it seemed as though it would work, the image suddenly blurred and disappeared. Sasuke swore and stood.
"Um, Sasuke-sama.... what was that?" Sakura asked.
"It was a rebound," Sasuke replied. "There's a shield around that castle preventing any magical presence from entering without a physical presence." He rocked back on his feet and sat on the ground. Rebounds also tended to leave the caster a bit out of breath. He looked up at Sakura. "Do you know that place"
"Huh? The castle?"
Sasuke nodded. Sakura touched her finger to her chin as she thought if she did. "Yeah. I think so. I think it's Leishtaker Castle." She turned a little to the left and raised an arm. "It's that way."
"Okay," Sasuke mumbled to himself. He stood abruptly and started to walk further up the hill. Behind him he heard Sakura covering the magic circle with surrounding grass and rocks. "Thanks."
Sakura looked up, startled and smiled. "No problem." Sasuke chose to ignore this, as he could think of nothing to say in response. He tensed and large, leathery wings exploded out of his back.
--
Naruto was troubled. His breathing was irregular and he was worried he was in shock. He opened an eye a crack and saw that he was again on stone floor. Damn. Lying on his side on his arm was becoming rather uncomfortable so he sat up and decided to look around. This room looked similar to the cell had last been in, but it was slightly larger and actually had a proper door. Which was now opening.
Naruto drew up quickly to the wall behind him, nearly winding himself. He tried to get up, scared that it was another crazed man coming through the door, but found that his hands were bound together. A quick glance behind told him that there was a thick piece of rope binding around his hands. He tried to yank them apart but the rope was far stronger than the teenager. Giving up, Naruto looked back at the door and hoped his death wouldn't be too painful.
The wooden door creaked open. Naruto caught his breath. And in came a tall man. He had very broad shoulders and there seemed to be a certain blue tinge to his skin. It took Naruto a while to make his way up the black cloaked man, but he was shocked when he got to his face. Along his neck where it attached to his head were long slits, on both sides. And this, coupled with the skin, made Naruto think of sushi. Very dangerous sushi with a huge sword. It twitched.
"Sorry about Tobi earlier. He hadn't taken his medication for today," the blue man said in a very gentlemanly way.
"Th-that's fine," Naruto automatically replied, still shocked. Were those gills real? Naruto shifted uneasily against the wall, glancing up at the blue man. The blue man looked back.
"I'm Kisame, Galanaid Demon, rank Lord," he said.
"Uhh, okay..." Naruto said uneasily. He had been listening to Sasuke's explanation about demons earlier, but he didn't remember anything to do with "Galanaids" or ranks. He took a deep breath, rallying his courage. "W-what's a Galanaid?" he asked.
Kisame blinked a little, apparently surprised. Then he chuckled. "I'd of thought that Vassel you were with earlier would have told you everything," he said, then cleared his throat. "Galanaid is a type of demon who mainly use Water magic. A Lord or Vassal is the rank the demon is. Technically any type of demon can become any rank, but since certain types are better at different things, it gives them advantage."
"So... who's higher? Lord or Vassal?" At first the blue man chuckled, but it seemed to have a sharp edge to it which reminded Naruto that this Kisame was with the people who had kidnapped him. Or demons, as it seemed to be.
"There are four main ranks you can work yourself into: Warlord, Lord, Noble and Servant. Warlord being the highest. In addition to that there are two special ranks: Overlord and Vassal," Kisame said. "Overlords are the leaders of the demon world. In total there can only be nine in existance at any time."
"So then the Vassal is the follower of the Overlord?" Naruto asked. He'd learnt something about Lords and Vassals in his history class, although they didn't talk much about demons.
Kisame nodded. "Very good. Although, the Overlord must elect their own, and only one, demon to become their Vassal." The big man turned and beckoned to Naruto to get up. "Q and A is over for now. Gotta get you to the boss."
Naruto nodded and stood shakily to his feet, walking to the door that Kisame held open.
"So... Sasuke would be a Vassal to an Overlord?" he asked. Kisame's gills flared.
"Sasuke... He...," Kisame started. "You should ask him that yourself." He turned and led the way down the hall. Naruto followed quickly and was engulfed in freezing wind when he stepped out. He shivered and looked around. The way Kisame was going was lit up with flaming torches, but the other way was in complete darkness. A glow howling voice floated up from that way making Naruto shudder involuntarily. He turned and quickly ran after Kisame, not wanting to be left there alone.
Why wouldn't he tell me? Naruto thought as he caught up to Kisame. Who is Sasuke's Overlord...?
--
How was that? Bit rusty? Please give a review as to how I can improve -bows- See you guys in the next chapter~!
