Author's Note:
Recap:
Smiling Torin folded his arms. "Everything you do effects her. You're good, then you're sister continues to survive reasonably. You fight back, she pays for it. The same vise versa," he replied, smirking.
Yichi felt her heart skip half a beat but then her gaze narrowed. "You're bluffing."
"Am I?" Torin challenged, his fingers forming a set of seals.
"Yes." She replied, her eyes hard.
He merely smiled before holding the last seal. And then the screams could be heard echoing down the hall…
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"You want our help?" the Hyuuga scoffed. "Why?"
Itachi's coal gaze darkened. "Because Sakura will die without it."
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"How do we know Sakura is even alive?" Neji asked coldly. He could see Naruto's tensed figure with his Byakuugan activated, and knew that the hyperactive ninja was listening to every word. "I'm not a fool Itachi. This could just be a ploy to lure us to the Akatsuki."
Itachi's chrisom eyes narrowed. "It could be, but it isn't. Sakura has been taken by someone far worse than even Pein. His name is Torin Akaidetsu," Itachi said quietly.
"The Akaidetsu were killed off after the destruction of the Star village," Hinata said, her lilac eyes cold as they challenged the Uchiha's sharingan. "Just like the Yakamichi."
He sighed irately. "Things never become extinct. They just go into hiding. The Akaidetsu clan is no exception; Torin survived. As to the Yakamichi… you can't tell me that they're gone. I know two of them personally. Yichi Yakamichi… and Sakura." Itachi replied cooly.
"That's not possible." Nejji returned, his own gaze like steel. "Sakura is a Haruno; her kekkei genkai has no relation to the Halo clan. Moreso, Yichi Yakamichi was the Mizukage of Mist who disappeared years ago after a battle with a missing ninja. Anbu found her body later, mangled and destroyed almost completely. She can not be alive."
Itachi's patience was running then. Pulling out a file, he tossed it to Neji. "An illusion pulled off by the Akatsuki."
"What is it?" Hinata asked quietly to her cousin, her Byakuugan scanning over the papers for some trap, but they held nothing but ink in them. Her open palm traced the Uchiha's movements as her cousin opened it and began to read quickly. He didn't reply, yet she noticed a flaring of his chakra network, a sign of anger.
"This is Sakura's Konoha file…." Neji answered through grit teeth. "And it seems that the Uchiha is telling the truth. It also has recent pictures of her from somewhere in Rain Country."
"Then we better shut up so we can get working on a plan to save her," Naruto said, jumping down with Kiri in his arms. His cerulean eyes glanced at Hinata, then to the girl as the Hyuuga heiress's eyes rew concerned. The younger girl's cheeks were flushed heavily, and her skin was covered with a sheen of sweat.
"Indeed." Itachi agreed, staring at the two as his eyes narrowed. So… there was another demon host as well. Saving the information, he studied the chakra flow. Nekomata, it seemed, had finally resurfaced. And it was her prescience that was making the child sick.
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"Stop it!" Yichi shouted, unable to take the screams anymore.
Torin released the handseal with a dark smile. His dark eyes seemed amused by her outburst. Walking over to stare into her lilac gaze, he smirked cruelly. "That was only a taste of what she'll get next time, Yichi… I know you," the Akaidetsu said with a malicious smile. "And I know that you are always plotting something. Do any of it here, Sakura will be the one who takes the hits for it By the same token, don't follow instructions and it will be the same."
"You.." She swallowed the curse as she saw his fingers twitch back toward the seal.
Chuckling dryly, Torin shook his head. "You're a fast learner. So know this. The pain will never be enough to kill her. But it will make her wish she were dead every second. It's a small benefit of my bloodline, the Tetsu Akai."
She shook her head sadly. The Red Seal bloodline was a tampering ability. It allowed the members of its clan to activate and control seals that they came in contact with. The least of which was the Yakamichi cursed seal. Rumor said it could even control a curse mark, like Sasuke Uchia had been given, but no one had ever seen it done. The only limit was that it could not control demon sealings or elemental; those were too strong of a bond to be manipulated.
Tetsu Akai's effects were similar to a genjutsu in the fact that they could not kill. But that was no to say that they did not inflict damage. She had experienced the torturous effects first hand, enough to know that they were like the Tsukuyomi if activated far enough. And one would bleed from them before rehealing... assuming you were not dead from its other attributes.
Flinching away from his touch as he reached out to touch her face, Yichi turned away. Withdrawing, Torin motioned to his guards. "Put chakra restraints on her and then let her loose," he ordered. "And keep an eye on her."
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Sakura took a shuddering breath as she pressed her back up against the cool wall. The cold stone was relief, if only minimal, to the harsh burning in her. The pain she had experienced was like fire burning throughout her body as her skin was flayed alive. Nothing she had experienced, even in training for Anbu with Ibiki, could have prepared her for it.
As it slowly retreated, she got to her feet. She could feel that her chakra reserves had been replenished sufficiently for a fight. "Let's go kill this bastard." She murmured feeling the power of her Yakamichi. Summoning the brilliant red bands, the kunoichi sent them slashing for the door. A hand suddenly seized her shoulder, putting pressure on the seal so that it bled. She sank to her knees as the acidic like feeling continued to burn in her shoulder as Torin smiled wickedly. "Sadly, my parents were married," he mused. "Now… what was it that you were saying a moment ago? Something about killing me? I doubt you can even move."
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R&R please! And because I feel happy that I got so many new readers and reviewers, I've decided to add a preview to the next chapter, titled "First Base".
"She needs to be sealed."
"What?"
"The child. She is sick because of the Nibi's prescience within her body. Her frame is too young to handle the cat's chakra unsealed," Itachi replied. "The Unholy Fire, as the Akatsuki calls it, is what is making her fever so dangerous. It is likely that she has not woken because she is battling the cat for dominance."
Hinata turned to Kiri as Naruto set her down. Her nearly white eyes scanned over the girls system. There were traces of another color within the girl's network, but it was difficult to see the navy against the black. Laying her hand on the girls forehead, she mentally counted to five before placing the hand against her own wrist. It was hot, dangerously so. "Neji…"
He shook his head, eyes closing. "None of us have the potential to seal. Hiashi never taught myself or my cousin that art. I can tell that Uchiha-san does not either," he stated cooly.
"He doesn't. But I can," a quiet voice replied as a breeze swept through the area and the leaves swirled….
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"You're power is pathetic… you'll never be able to fight the effects of the Akaidetsu, even with you're healing abilities. But I am willing to make a deal, Sakura."
She stared at him through eyes like stone. "What deal could you possibly offer me that I would accept?"
"How about one that guarantees Yichi's life?"