A/N: Aaaaaaaaaannnnnnddd…the aftermath…AND BEYOND! But first…
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto
Chapter 7: Shock
Sasori grinned with cruel ecstasy at the opposing demonic figure, who was still actively and painfully transforming. Leader will be pleased; two jinchuuriki in just one day.
Every member in his organization was assigned a particular Tailed Beast, and to start off with, Sasori, to put quite bluntly, didn't know which Beast his assignment was. Deidara arrogantly claims that he's rubbing off on his own job. Tobi assured it would be okay, but now he no longer had to worry about the inevitability that his shorter colleague was, and still is, wrong. Everyone in the organization had their own perspectives, theories, thoughts, and opinions about how things would look for the puppet master if he didn't figure out his objective quickly and hop to it. But the girl is here now, and he can disregard all of them. It should give the feeling (mentally of course) that some gigantic weight is lifted off his shoulders, but he could savor that feeling for later.
Tayuya kept on all fours as her hair turned lighter and lighter in color, now coming to a hue of ever light pink. With her razor sharp claws, teeth, and her brightly refined slit pupils, she really did look like some sort of savage animal now, rather than the human that Sasori crossed in his scopes earlier.
As her dark aura became more radial and larger in size, the velocity around her began to twist and turn, as if she were controlling the wind. A dust cloud rose in a perfect circular ring around her reformed position and gradually got bigger. A buzzing sound somewhere in the space was gradually getting louder, and was now at the point of sounding like the great vacuum noise of a hurricane.
Her claws scraped the soil that she had her hands on as she tried to fend off the enormous pain of the non-stopping transformation. But she still kept her eyes on the person she wanted to see dead the most. Her face scrunched up into an enraged expression.
Sasori caught a glimpse of something emerging from her backside from out of the corner of his eye. It was bleak-coloured, but it was increasing in length, growing out long and slender while Tayuya tightened her face even more, obviously realizing the pain. Its texture appeared alien; violet static currents seemed to carry throughout the trimmings like some strange electric eel figure. It flicked ever slightly in this direction and that, using flexibility and movement patterns that were surreal.
Was this…a tail? Sasori had never before seen one off of a jinchuuriki, and he had never fought one either, so keep to his guard, he shall.
Then she spoke. "...You…" Her new raspy, hostile voice caused a ripple of disturbance in both the visual and sound of the aura that blanketed her new form. "G-give them back…"
Sasori regarded her with a silent scowl.
"…Give them back…" She repeated herself, her voice increasing in volume and anger.
Sasori raised his tail out in front of him, preparing to swat her with it.
She remained silent for a few more seconds. Then suddenly:
"Give them back, NOW!!" Tayuya disappeared from plain view as well as the entire aura that covered her, and Sasori had not even seen the precise second of when that had happened. But he had barely skimmed with his eyes a trail up to him that was stirring from something unknown until it slammed directly into him in one twenty-fifth of a second.
The two of them collided through the air from the great impact, before the bestial girl kicked off of him with both feet, sending herself one direction, and him in another one, crashing directly through a tree and into another one.
Sasori shook with the strained effort to get back up from that attack. 'This girl…' But the trail shot for him again, and before he knew it, he was back up into the air once more. He was left to plummet back down, but a dark flash shot back and forth from all directions in a zigzag fashion, slamming and swiping him all the way down.
'…she's fast!'
He landed head-first into the open soil from his twenty-foot fall. Dust went everywhere, and once more the sound splintering wood was heard.
Tayuya reappeared into a random spot ahead from out of nothing, and faced him, preparing to launch herself again.
Sasori helped himself up from the ground, and out of pure luck, he still kept in Hiruko, although the old human puppet wasn't looking too healthy at all. His head was hanging down to one side, as the eyes still kept opened to glare right back at her from a side-up awkward perspective.
Sasori also realized another thing. His entire left arm was completely off and gone. She must have torn it off when she continuously pelted him with herself. It will now be harder to hold himself up directly, much less fight.
Needless to say, there was no way he would win with these conditions, not just for the way he was, especially the way she was now.
Tayuya launched herself again, and at the speed that she was going, Sasori was unable to track her with his eyes, so if dodging depended entirely on if you could see the attack coming or not, then he would still get it.
She slammed him from the side, although it could not be seen how she came from this direction. How can she even steer herself?! The two flew a few hundred meters and slid unstopping along the forest floor at a speed of at least ninety miles per hour, Tayuya landing more comfortably, being right on top of Hiruko and riding him along the ground like a dirt sled.
'One punch directly from her in this close of range and I'm screwed!' He barely had enough time to collect even this minor thought with all of the action going on just outside his exterior self.
"I want them back! WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH THEM??!!" She tightened her clawed hand into a fist and drew it back, preparing to use it.
'I'm screwed.'
-CRUNCH-
"Sakon, you down there?!" Jiroubou shouted through cuffed hands over his mouth towards a figure limping west through a dark passage.
The figure stepped out.
"Naw, it's me," Ukon replied through worn breath, heaving his brother fused with his backside. "Get over here, Jiroubou."
As the giant complied, a rattling sound caught both's attention, and they looked up to see Kidomaru fall from above in the trees, crashing through branches on the way down. With his chakra completely extinguished and no silk to spin to support himself (or his fall), travel for the spider shinobi was inconvenient.
"Oomph!" He shouted on impact with the dirt trail.
"Welcome back." Ukon stated as his misfortunate colleague attempted and failed to get up.
"Aw man! You too?" Jiroubou asked, bending over to help his comrade up. He obviously held a bit more sympathy for him than the others did.
"…Extremely…powerful…" Kidomaru struggled over his need for breath.
Ukon took a few small steps in a specific direction, the soil softly patted with each one. "Sakon and I confronted someone tough, too. Woulda' had him if we had taken him together." He scoffed, hinting with the tone of his voice towards his more aggressive brother's foolishness.
"Yeah, don't bet on it." Jiroubou protested. "No offense, but I think the guys who came after us are a little more than even you can handle."
Ukon sneered violently; his nose crinkled up, and turned around to amble towards the unfaithful giant. Jiroubou, fearing for his life, took half a step back in response. There were times where he was thankful for his mouth, and then the others where he just felt like tearing it off.
With much suddenness, a great pulse shot forth and waved over all three of them, grabbing their attention instantaneously. It wasn't a painful feeling, but it was weird, like something was so loud that you would feel your insides rumble. Everyone was silent while they looked around, their heads wandering different directions.
"…Did you feel that?" Ukon asked in a soft tone, his eyes still searching.
"Yeah," Jiroubou answered, being the first one to respond in another half minute. "Feels like a really powerful seal-user was just done in."
"Tayuya? …Surely, you couldn't really be thinking it was Kimimaro."
"Well it wouldn't surprise me; he didn't exactly look in tip-top condition when we left him back at the village."
Everyone stopped again to hear a great rumble, like somewhat of an explosion, further up ahead, about five hundred meters further west. But it sounded much closer than that.
"…What was that?"
"Maybe it was your stomach." Kidomaru teased, dusting his cloth off.
Jiroubou turned to glare at his smart-ass teammate, but Ukon cut them both off.
"By the sound of that impact, I'd speak for all of us when I say we don't want to bump into the person who caused it in our current conditions."
"But it's in the right in the middle of our route to the village. Do we have a choice?"
Ukon frowned and got into his semi-rested position, bending over slightly into a half-crouch. Something that either he or his brother (mostly his brother) did when they were in extreme exhaustion. The times didn't come that often. He pondered hard with his head leaned forward towards the path, glaring it down.
After a few minutes, he gave in and let out a soft sigh with closed eyes.
"Fine then, forward," he issued the command finally. He gave them a stern look as he went along. "But I really hope I'm wrong about what's causing all this."
To keep from re-opening their wounds, and to savor their energy, the three sprinted down the path instead of taking the faster way through the trees, which required even more excess movement.
Ukon clenched his teeth in a troubled thought, his eyes glared with the potency of sharp darts.
'Don't let it be what I think it is… Don't let it happen now…"
Tayuya made no further prolonging to go for the head – pieces of flesh and wood, the occasional tooth and eye, flew everywhere from the demolition point. The impact was devastating and loud.
Tayuya prepared another punch, but unknown even to her, a fair-sized black streak of cloth shot out of one side of the body and into the open, swiftly taking through the air from an invisible lift and landing gracefully a few meters away from the upset demon. As slow as a zombie, the new figure, a humanoid shape with a black, tattered cloak completely covering it from head to toe, rotated its frontal side to get a good look at the creature with his 'own' eyes.
Tayuya faced completely the other way, making no such acknowledgement to the person behind her, and whether she knew that his old shell was no longer operative, she threw punch after punch at the now irreparable puppet that she was still on top of. Every impacting blow made with her phenomenal strength, more dust and pieces flew and extremely loud blasts could be heard for miles, echoing through the canopy.
The shrouded shadow stood stationary and still for a few minutes while it watched silently as she destroyed his once favorite puppet. If he had stuck around in there another minute, things would have looked bad for his precious centre. An expression unrecognizable, he stared through a blank, torn-black rag that covered the head and body. How he was able to see, no one would figure out.
The person blinked underneath it. 'What is she doing to my puppet…?'
Blasts continued to implode from the now unrecognizable wooden pile where the girl's wailing arms mercilessly continued to pulverize. Powerful winds swept back along with the flying dust and debris from the wreckage, failing to move the cloaked shape, but made the rags sway a great deal amongst it.
The collisions' power showed no signs of letting up, but over the deafening sounds, Sasori could still hear the girl screaming violently. "Give them back to me! Give them back, give them back, give them back!!" She repeated again and again with each punch at the increasingly crumpling form below her.
With the last word came the most powerful of the punches; a blinding amount of purple chakra gathered to her lower arm shooting dark rays out of all sides, and she lifted it so high that all of the smaller rocks and twigs around her jumped up into the air with it, and she brought down a terrifying smash to whatever remains of her foe there might have been.
-CRUNCH-
The remains were crushed into nothingness, a crater with a diameter of sixty feet where it once was. The rocks all around her crumbled as well and great cracks continued their spread through the hard ground even after the initial attack. A great wave of energy gave outburst in the form of wind, this time, Sasori held on tight to his shroud with both hands to keep it from flying off. The dark, worn clothing moved in crazy motion in response to the violent cause. After fifteen seconds, his grip on the garbs began to relax, the velocity of the terrifying wind died away.
Dust filled the crater like a cloud so thick. He would have to wait even more to see the outcome. Sasori began his progress towards that exact spot, ambling slowly to avoid causing another commotion. His sandals softly patted the ground with his light steps.
Another minute and the smoke finally cleared out, revealing the faded first impression of a girl, perched on all four in the heart of the pit that she had made. Her growls were weak and cracked while she attempted to hold a threatening composure, her gritted teeth together, but ultimately she closed her mouth and shut her eyes with such a miserable face, even for a monster, that Sasori complied to stop his approach at five feet away from her, the black top of his form tilted downwards to show he was looking at her directly through the ugly sheet.
What he saw afterwards confused him even more. Wrapping her arms around herself, she fell to her knees; tears streamed down her darkened cheeks. Her sharper fangs stuck out of her mouth as her face twitched up every now and then to let out a small sob.
Sasori had realized that he had gotten what he had wanted, but he now considered the fact that this was a bit much. It was pitiful watching this creature, the first person to pose such a great threat to him for years, beat one of his former favorite puppets to a pulp, break down in front of him, and only then cry. But he had a hunch that this cry was not for mercy.
"G-give them…" She persisted to call on to him, her voice to his surprise, became her normal one, although it was much more desperate and soft – without a hint of cruelty. It was somewhat soothing to Sasori's ears. Though she wasn't speaking to him directly, facing another way, it gave him the supposing thought that she may think she was still facing Hiruko. There was something about that particular form she just didn't like. "I loved them so much…and you took them away…f-from me…" It was as if she had two sides. Bold and Timid. Anger and Sadness.
…Good and Evil.
Sasori stared down to her, just as unreadable as he had ever been before through his still concealed face.
"Poor girl. The stress of the fight must have made you delusional. I'm not who you think I am." The voice spoke underneath the severed rag. It was a young man's voice, much lighter on anyone's ears than Hiruko's.
Her slit eyes shot wide open at hearing this tone, gasping at just the time. She snapped her head towards him in shock, causing him to break out of his boldness and shoot backwards. Upon landing, he threw his arm back to reach for a scroll strapped to his back, but this movement was cut short by a panicked voice ringing out from right behind him.
"Where did he go?! Answer me!!" It shouted in demand.
His head twisted itself unnaturally all the way around with a crick to catch a glimpse of Tayuya about to throw a punch just for him.
Sasori felt his whole figure jump. 'I got careless! She's too fast even for me to draw puppets from this distance and angle!'
As he was at the mercy of one of her one-hit wonder blows, a powerful pulsation rang through Tayuya's body once more.
"Nnggh…" She grunted with discomfort. She could feel blood pounding through her ears in response to the violent of the pulsations rapidly increasing in rate.
A sharp pain, like a knife slowly being driven into her spine, caused her to groan in agony. Finding her forced to all four once again, Sasori had a close up view of watching another strange tail force its way out. A gruesome sound went along with it as it peeled itself.
"Another tail." He took this time to swiftly draw a scroll out like he was in a gunslinger showdown movie. But he was interrupted this time by a kunai flying through the air and nailing him in the shoulder joint, dislocating it. He effortlessly pulled it from his torn cloth and turned his head in annoyance.
His scanners caught Ukon straightening himself from throwing position and glared suspiciously at him. Two other figures showed up closely from behind.
Ukon's eyes dilated into olives in panic at what was on the other side, behind the cloaked stranger. Silver lightening was lashing out in all directions with a black fire as its base at a figure that he recognized very well, despite the demonic modifications to her appearance.
He turned back to Sasori, but didn't drop from his terrified look. "You- do you have any idea what you've done?"
Sasori answered to only this with neatly folded arms. "I know what I am going to do. I am fully prepared to end all of you to do it. Is that really what you want?" He spoke with calm, cooled voice.
"Ukon, we better finish this guy quickly before…" Jiroubou cut himself off from his own warning, not wanting to think about what would happen if that thing got loose.
"Y-you don't understand," Kidomaru spoke out in protest against the mystery shinobi's actions. "What's happening to her is a mistake! We're the few only ones left who can fix it, but you have to let us! Get out of the way, NOW!"
Sasori turned his head to face him directly. "You'll…'fix' it? You'll…'take care' of it?" He asked jeeringly, bringing out references from earlier on.
A bead of sweat shone on Kidomaru's face as he gave him an uneasy look. Sasori turned his attention down to an unconscious blond girl lying face-down on the ground next to him. "…That's just what this one said." He nudged the body playfully with his foot.
Jiroubou was the next one to speak up. "Look buddy, your chances of getting away with doing something like this are puny as they are…"
Sasori turned his head back to stare him down silently for half a minute as the girl behind him helplessly continued to transform, engulfed in unnaturally-colored fires. Then he gave his answer.
"You want her," Sasori stated smugly with his arms still folded. "Why don't you make me move?"
All of the opposing glared him down. Being in their weakened states as they are, the last thing they wanted for the day was another fight, so they tried reasoning. This failed horribly. Bluffs probably wouldn't make the situation much better, but Kidomaru gave talking the man out of it one last time.
"Just what do you plan to do with her?" Kidomaru continued, angry at his answer. "You think you can control her? All that power? And what would you do with it anyways?"
A pause.
"You'll see."
"Forget it, Kido. This guy's beyond words. Let's finish it quick, then." Ukon proceeded to rush Sasori, but felt himself fly backwards, being pulled by something invisible. Jiroubou saw him coming, and barely readied himself in time to catch his friend.
Sasori stood still, watching them recoil for their next approach. Grinning from underneath, he knew that if they survived long enough, it was only a matter of time before they found that racing to be the first ones up to him would do little to no good.
Ukon slid off of his bigger ally and unto his feet.
"Did you see that? How are we expected to beat anyone in our previous conditions capable of doing something like that?"
Ukon was getting tired of Jiroubou's pessimism, and he showed it through tone.
"The idea was not up for attack, you ass. I was rushing in for a better look so I could count Tayuya's tendrils." He hissed.
"Okay, okay, fine!" Jiroubou spoke out of both frustration and trying to keep the silver-haired boy calm.
Ukon turned his glare back to his hidden opponent. "Take my word for it," He spoke again to Jiroubou. "I'm not as thick-headed in fights as my brother. Remember, I'm the strategic one. It's all in who has what – brawn or brains."
"Gotcha, I think."
"Never mind that for now. We're in luck – she only has two. But we need to act fast, or Lord Otokage'll be furious."
"Uhh, guys…" They turned their heads to see their six-armed friend suspended fifteen feet above ground; Sasori was holding his wrists outwardly up towards him, using his fingertips. "…HELP!"
Light blue, extremely thin threads of chakra wrapped around the six-armed shinobi, restraining each arm and leg. Strings connected to the strong portions of tree branches around, keeping him supported from all sides so he wouldn't find a way free. Chakra strings were still extremely delicate. So thin in fact that it wasn't visible in Kidomaru, or anyone else's eyes, the strings linked all the way back down to the shrouded enemy's fingertips.
The two sprinted in to aid their comrade. Since he was the lighter, Ukon was the one to pull in faster, running headlong of Jiroubou.
"Hold on, Kidomaru!"
"To what?!" The distressed voice shouted back.
Sasori turned his head glance at the two on-comers, cracking a grin underneath his rags that only he knew of.
"Slow."
Twisting his whole body to his right, Sasori threw his arms towards that direction, and short afterwards, Kidomaru unwillingly followed that direction, airborne.
The other two immediately scraped their heels to a stop, but were too out of shape this time to catch their plummeting colleague. Kidomaru landed, half of his side into Ukon, half into Jiroubou.
"Oh you bastard…" Kidomaru squeezed anger out of his mouth as he lay sprawled out on his back after receiving the impact. Nothing he could hate more than the irony: someone had just bounded him to immobility, like one of his own attacks, but he lacked the chakra to use his own and show the other guy how it felt. But even over this, Kidomaru was far too weak to be as angry as he would usually. Deciding in favor of the greater good, he put all of his leftover energy into sustaining his breath.
Panting, the other two slowly rose up as well, dirt and scratches all over their clothes and bodies. They each closed an eye shut in weariness and pain, but barely held the other one open to their approaching assailant. They were unable to even see what was coming next.
Sasori stepped closer and closer towards the exhausted and overexerted trio with a striking calm pose, taking his time with each step. He never bothered to remove the large black piece of cloth from over his face, giving him a scary appearance. They still didn't know how he managed to see so well through the thick sheet. Wrinkles and bits of dust stained the surface in some areas small and large, but it did nothing to take off of Sasori's cool complexity.
Getting into just the right slab of distance, Sasori halted in front of them, and threw both hands forward towards them. This time, dark blue strings lashed out of the tips of the fingers, and these were thick enough to be seen easily from even that distance. They sprawled out for the remaining Sound Four like hungry serpents, buzzing with power.
They failed completely to evade the attack, and as a result, the strings wrapped themselves around their selected prey, restraining and constricting all movements that they might use to force themselves loose.
Scrunching up his fingers simultaneously and then pulling back hard, Sasori rounded the three up together back-to-back with each other in the ideal captured position. When the straining of the thread ceased, Sasori had them tight in his very own mobile, A – Rank trap. A trap born of his own ingenuity.
The three glared wearily out at Sasori, knowing that it was all they could do now. If they had the strength that they did when they woke the morning before, who knows? But it was too late to dream, now.
Sasori looked them over from the reigns of his sprang trap, his face deadpanned both under and over.
"Did you honestly?" He asked them, scoffing with his breath while doing so.
The three moved their heads up a bit more to glare with more effect at him briefly before hanging them down again. Ukon's silver hair draped over his face apart from the others, who had their eyes closed in weariness and the feeling of surrender.
Sasori jerked his head back to peer at Tayuya, still transforming – right where she should be. And if he wanted it kept that way, it was time to clean up.
Sasori put both of his hands, chakra strings attached to the fingertips, together in a sound clap. "Chakra Seichuu no Jutsu (Chakra Restriction Technique)!"
The dark blue chakra burst into flames, emanating to twice the thickness it was before, and buzzing with ten times the anger. All three of the captives screamed in pain with the threads that they were entangled in burn and constrict them to give them absolutely zero mobility. The technique wrapped itself in, and their heads tangled downward and limp. They were completely unconscious.
Sasori gave the success of the attack a silent stare through a face blackened over by the sheet that clouded it. It was one of the smaller techniques that he used when he did not feel like showing someone the true sources of his art and power. The purpose it serves is constructed mostly for the art of interrogation in mind. Using a specified concentration level of his own chakra, he can create physically irremovable barriers over the subject and give them a designated level of pain of his choosing: burn, shock, a freezing touch. Pins and needles, acid, advantage of claustrophobia through use of constriction, Sasori possesses a vast collection of thoughts.
He slowly dropped his arms back to his sides and prepared to uncover his head, gripping the cloth with his hand. Wrinkles formed on the cloth where his tightening fingers gripped it while he took a step forward towards his new detainees.
"Now how shall I-"
A short blade shot in and stuck into Sasori's backside, causing him to grunt with startle. Without bothering to pull out yet another kunai, he hoisted his whole body into a full spin to face the aggressor, fearing it was Tayuya who had done it.
His face softened from contortion and his hand eased its grip from his guise and fell limp at his side again as he saw someone identical to one of the three he had just dispatched instead.
"Hn." Sasori scoffed lightly. His pose straightened.
The double of Ukon glared at him from one barely opened eye slouched figure, breathing heavily in his stead. He was also dirtied and bloody, some of his wounds had not completely healed from his closer-than-need-be skirmish with Hidan.
"Ahhh. Heh, heh, heh, heh." Sasori couldn't help but chuckle slightly. The scene was positively adorable. This bloodied and beaten boy was taking a turn now in standing against him…a big risk at that.
A grin with blood down the side slowly merged in Sakon's face. "…Aheh…what's so…funny…?" For a reason completely unfounded, he found amusement in the situation. He had been out, woken by a cold sweat, and was now facing something that he sensed was stronger than the last man he had fought.
He continued to look over his foe's black, curtained form. Holding his smirk, he turned his wounded face with closed eyes; sweat trickled at the side of his cheek.
…Much stronger.
Sasori didn't answer to him; his guise kept still and silent while he continued to stare. No weapons at hand, he finally started to approach his aggravator. His sandals lightly patted the soil at a slow erythematic taking to the damaged trail on a now scarred land leading up to his secondary focus.
He drew closer, but Sakon held his ground, a hand followed by a wristband clutched his aching side. Blatantly it had been by some horrible mistake to come out alone in the condition he was in, and he just had to laugh at the overly bold decision.
Step after soft step, the living puppet gained ground. Turning his blanketed head without stopping, it was pretty obvious to the Sound nin that he was checking on Tayuya. Sakon had gone half mad with the thought that that…thing had awakened in the younger girl that had become his love interest…the madness probably having something to do with the fact that he was smiling Death in the shroud-hidden face. But put aside, Tayuya's current changings kind of made her look more attractive in a way.
His warmed thoughts quickly pulled back underground as he jumped at the sight of his advocate's head suddenly snapping back in his direction at ten feet away and gaining.
Sasori continued to trek the path, and Sakon hadn't the slightest clue at what he might try to pull. He just knew that whatever it was, he wasn't good enough to stop it, not in comparison to body conditions between the two.
…-scuff-…
…-scuff-…
…-scuff-…
Sasori's jonin sandals brushed with the ground, each step coming in a period between five seconds. He probably wouldn't make record time.
Sakon knew the game very well. He played it quite a few times when he was taking assassination missions. It was his death coming, and he was prolonging it just for him.
-…scuff-
The final step he heard came to a halt, and Sakon looked up from his crouched figure to see the cloaked Death standing no more than five feet away from him, looking down at his much shorter figure.
Sakon looked wildly around the statue-still man, searching his hands and body for any weapon he would pull. No weapon. He would likely finish him with his bear hands, or use some big-shot jutsu on him.
Wanting, yet not wanting to see how he would pass on, Sakon closed his eyes, his hand still on his side while the other one dangled loosely. His heart began to beat faster, resulting in his panting almost reaching the brink of hyperventilation. Sasori easily caught glimpse of this, as would anyone, but did not show response in anyway.
He stood close and parallel, eying the boy hard. At arms reach, he could just as soon kill him right here. He held his index finger to the spot of the sheet over where his mouth would be in self-reflection to the thought.
The longest minute of pondering went by, and Sasori lowered his finger from his covered face. Another thought had crossed his mind.
"You all amuse me so…" He spoke in a muffled, but noticeably ecstatic voice to the panting boy right in front of him.
Sakon slowly opened his eyes. "What?" He asked in his own snide tone.
Sasori blinked and spoke again. "I won't bother with finishing you off. If you're not going to put up a decent fight, then I see no point in adding you to my collection. However," He turned his head away from him, and towards Tayuya, who was sprouting a third tail, bristling with a combination of the darkest fire and lightening. "I won't bother saving any of you from her, either!"
He burst out laughing cruelly, and before Sakon could even open his mouth in surprise, Sasori was already on his way to a far away tree branch, pulling his body swiftly and effortlessly through the air with the invisible use of chakra strings. Easier than hookshooting.
His raggedy black form landed with success on the destined branch followed by the crash of wood, and Sasori stood straight facing the other way. Leaning his arm against the trunk, he turned his concealed head to face back to the area. There was a good view of Tayuya, the one he had been squaring off with since the early afternoon, the furious aura around her was actively changing from gruesome colors, as she continued to let out a now silent scream from under the almost deafening sound of the immense chakra swirling around her. Three unconscious shinobi were still folded unneatly and rather uncomfortably under the still influence of his special chakra, and a lone figure a few meters away from them barely able to hold himself up with his wounds, glaring weakly at him back.
"Hahaha! If you're still alive by then, perhaps we'll meet again!!" Sasori shouted at him, laughing menacingly as he jumped the branch to the next one over.
And he was gone.
If Sakon had any desire to follow him, he would be far too weak. It was difficult enough maintaining consciousness with a hemorrhage to the head. Not to mention other matters.
Not wasting a second to gawk at the now empty shadowed area high in the trees where Death had taken to, he staggered over as fast as his worn legs could carry him towards the rapidly evolving form that was Tayuya. Drawing near, he attempted to reach for her through her radial cloak, but winced and backed away when the surface sizzled against him. He briefly snapped his head to look at his hand; it was now red and blistered where it was pale only a moment before.
He snapped his head again up to her and called out. "Tayuya! Stop!! It's me, Sakon, don't you remember?!" He struggled at the top of his lungs over the urge to gasp for his breath to make his voice audible over the swooshing and buzzing mixture of her raw power.
She struggled hard with eyes shut tight, her face contorted with veins. She clenched her fangs together so tight that she could completely crumple a kunai if she was holding one with her mouth. Crumple metal.
"Tell that other side to disappear! That's not who you are!! Remember who controls the flute!! Fight it, Tayuya!!"
She let out a loud, painful scream and the aura around her burst outwards like an ultraviolet bomb, kicking up an enormous fog of dust, and blowing Sakon off his feet and away from his position. He flew helplessly through the air and ultimately into the pile of his unconscious teammates. The jutsu that Sasori had placed on them reacted violently, and the dark blue chakra lashed out to seize him as well. Sakon struggled violently to break lose, noticing the horrible pain of the strings coming even before they latched onto him. But he had no chance against the technique of an S – Rank, healthy or not. The chakra swallowed him in, and before his body could recognize what the pain felt like, he had become part of the decrepit pile. Then he analyzed: it felt like lightening constantly chalking him full through his body. Lightning was his anonymous opponent's choosing. It wasn't a personal Sakon favorite.
Barely maintaining consciousness, whether he had been drawn out of it by the jutsu, or by the force of Tayuya's sudden blast of energy, the only thing he could do was watch helplessly from afar while Tayuya finished her transformation. Never before, however, did he see what she would look like when all of the tendrils would emerge. In a way, he found that he was looking forward to that. One last minute's grace before he dies. In fact, he wondered to himself why he tried to convince her to come out of it. Orochimaru would just kill him in some gruesome manner later.
The trees around the girl bent towards her, stretching their gnarled arms towards her as if trying to touch her light. The straining crackle of trunks being halfway uprooted shook alongside her blending, evolving chakra.
The area began to succumb to a great rumble – the greatest there had ever been in the forest of Konoha since the terrible Third Ninja War.
Sakon felt his eyelids grow incredibly heavy. He felt sleepy…sleepy……so…sleepy……so- No! He had to stay awake! He had to witness the birth of the beautiful demon. There was no other option but that one!
To his chagrin, Sakon frowned upon himself as his consciousness dragged away. His eyes grew darker, and his blinks became slow and weary.
One blink…the breaking forest began to blur and fade. His vision grew dark.
Another blink…his eye was unable to open as wide as the last time; the forest cleared for a moment and became blurred again. The loud sounds were drowning out from him…
One final blink……the last thing his eyes vaguely caught as they slowly opened again and pushed the darkness out briefly was another feminine figure standing a ways from him and Tayuya. He only caught two features to help him out: it was slim, about Tayuya's size before Tayuya had her little…alteration, and a blotch of red hair, about Tayuya's exact color, also before she had started to turn, it now having lost almost its entire pink tint.
'Two…Tayuyas?' Sakon smiled grimly, although wincing uncontrollable from the high-level shocks he received through Sasori's damned attack. 'The last thing I'll ever see before dying…are two…Tayuyas…' His vision faded into blackness in this last, humorous moment for Sakon, and he let his head drop down. His silverish hair sprawled out around his face in about the same way (although a different position) as his usually conjoined brother.
Drops of dark blood trickled to the ground in front of him from his face.
The second girl there, whom he had spotted just before passing out, had a hand on her hip. Looking over to the pile of fallen Sound nin, she turned up her nose in a scoff. She then snapped her head over, her eyes shook in fear through a pair of glasses at Tayuya, on both hands and feet, struggling with all her willpower to bare the pain. Bright fires shot up into a great crown off high, and static discharges occurred in this area and that. Three black and violet, whiplash tails wove high in the air, and the other girl estimated about that two of them reached a height of about thirty feet, the third one being the shorter, about half that. Moving with such fluency and flexibility, she didn't even know for sure – maybe they were longer.
But what had taken her aback, more than even the tendrils, was the absolutely, positively, blinding array of chakra coming off of such a tiny source. Chakra that was near half-way to her master's reserves, she was certain. It would explain how she picked it up from so far away, from the North Base in Oto.
She swiftly turned back to the dark backgrounds and cuffed her hand over her mouth. "Orochimaru-sama! Come quickly! I've found it – the source of the disturbance!" She beckoned.
Apart from the aura raging on and the continuous transformation, nothing happened for a minute. A strange wind blew through the hollows of the darker interior of the pass. Then, slow-sounding footsteps treaded through out of the shadows. A pale figure with long, dark hair emerged with his arms neatly folded across his chest. A snake-like grin was wrapped around his face.
He wore an ever-familiar outfit, a long, purple bow was wrapped around his waste, and a weak yellow-colored cloth draped down to his knees.
Looking at what was ahead of him, his grin widened slightly more.
"Kukuku…well done, Karin. I knew you could do it." His voice was as serpentine as his appearance was. Coming out in a quiet, hissing sound, it was clear that he made a point not to raise it often.
Uncrossing his arms, he held an arm up, motioning from behind him. Two Sound jonin immediately heeded the silent call, appearing beside their leader in a flash.
Standing in between the two, Orochimaru cracked his mouth open, and his lower jawbone opened up to five times the length that any human could. Thick, black lines spurted their way out of his mouth like enormous parasites, and took to the ground. Slithering ahead into the area, they immediately followed protocol and spread the search for Tayuya. Moving as swift as black mambas, they gathered around her burning aura, and passed through the surface surprisingly unfazed. Burrowing their own way through the hostile chakra, they slide a few meters into it before brushing with Tayuya's feet. Knowing what they were, they instantly shot upward; scaling her legs, and began to brand themselves into them, following a concrete, singular pattern as they advanced up each one.
In turn, Tayuya felt the pain of the living seal sear into her body, and she yelled in agony, her tails rippling like liquid. The line of Japanese insignias crawled up the surface both her belly and back, shooting into two different directions as soon as they reached her neck. Then they spread lines over her arms and ending at her clawed nails. Tayuya shivered under their ice-cold feel immediately after burning onto her; her Cursed Seal reacting violently and with resistance to them with fire-colored pulsations.
In a moments notice, the two jonin instantly took to their assigned positions adjacent to Tayuya, each standing on the edge of one of the seal designs following up, performing their personal, lightning-fast hand signs in blurred movements too difficult to read. It was clear that this is something they rehearsed.
After some thirty to forty handsigns, they simultaneously slapped both of their palms to the ground, and their light blue chakra signatures rushed up the black trails of seals, each insignia lighting in advance up, leading directly to the girl's body.
Orochimaru folded his arms once more, and smiled on at Tayuya, noticing her pained reaction.
From far away behind a tree, a curtained head peered out only slightly from behind the thick trunk, inspecting what was going on. Someone who was thought to have left hadn't necessarily left.
Gazing silently for a few minutes more at the corrupt Sannin, he stood completely still behind his hiding place, so is not to make his presence known through inadvertent clicking of his puppet body.
'Why did he have to show up here?' He thought, angrily cursing his luck. Arching his hands over his forehead, he used his Zooming Scope feature with his eyes to get a better look. A reeling, whining sound gave way as his pupils dilated widely from under his guise to adjust the vision. 'He's ruining a perfectly good show… Well if he insists on staying, there's no way I can take a jinchuuriki and a former member of Akatsuki with just my power.' He turned his head to get a look at the anguished girl. '…But most of all…'
Sasori gave an invisible, hated glare from under his cloth at the new group looming over his prize before dispersing instantly from his position, disappearing from the area.
"Hm…?" Orochimaru peeked curiously out of the corner of his eye at the tree that Sasori had just left.
"Lord Orochimaru, is there something wrong?" Karin asked.
He turned back to her to give her his signature (creepy) smile. "…No." He replied simply. "Just a trick of the eyes. Everything in this forest looks so very different at night."
Karin nodded nervously and faced back to the ritual that the other jonin were working on; both of them she could sense were on the brink of chakra exhaustion.
"O…Orochi...maru-sama…c-can't…" One of them squeezed out of their breath, doing their best to keep both hands on sealing position. He was tired and scared for his life; if he let go, he would surely be killed – either by the newly emerging Tayuya, or a really pissed off master.
Both of them trembled uncontrollably in both weariness and fear (mostly fear) when Orochimaru walked closer, his face displeased.
"Oh, come now. It isn't really that bad? Look – you're almost there." He calmly chided them while pointing to their objective.
It was true: Tayuya's demonic aura was diminishing at a steady pace, the colors fading out. She also appeared to be loosing some of her monstrous features; her hair assuming its normal length and color, and her muscles and veins were shrinking back to normal size.
The two jonin gave out pitiful grunts of effort in an attempt to throw in the last small specks of their chakra to the jutsu.
Orochimaru finally just rolled his eyes. "Haaaaah…" He let out a weary, exasperated sigh. Couldn't anyone in his village actually pull their own weight?
"Very well, then. Let me show you how it's done." He walked up in between them and bent over. The two instinctively shut their eyes tight, expecting him to kill them in a wink. Orochimaru set a single finger onto a separate seal leading the same way as theirs. His chakra brimmed a much darker color than theirs, approaching Tayuya at a fairer pace.
Suddenly, Tayuya's eyes shot open in an evil, heated glare, sensing his chakra coming for her. Her pupils completely matched Orochimaru's, and he gave her a fanged grin recognizing this as he dug the tip of his finger deeper into the runes on the ground, sending more chakra into her form.
Her entire form lit up in his chakra color, and she growled fanatically trying to keep it away.
"You will disappear until I need your power." Orochimaru hissed in a commanding tone.
His fingernail dug deeper into the line, and the demoness shrieked one brief, final time before every single trace of chakra around her dispersed and blew away a second later.
Unconscious while she was still standing, she fell to the ground; a huge dust cloud covered her appearance from everyone. Three long tentacles stuck up top from the enormous body of dust, flailing wildly, and they had just an empty, extremely black color now that the brilliant, ultraviolet light that supported them with life had left. The three slim shadows gave out one last ripple of movement, and then collapsed to the ground, knocking more dust into the air with their surprising weight and force. Then, they burnt away in black flames and disintegrated into the air.
Orochimaru nonchalantly stood up straight and crossed his arms. Turning his head calmly to the other two jonin, he asked, "See? Now was that really so hard?"
The two didn't answer him – they were lying on the ground, out cold.
Orochimaru shrugged and began a steady descent into the heart of the area. His feet came to a stop, and he looked down at the unconscious redhead, who was lying on her front. She was completely bare. The transformation had been so powerful, that her ascending form must have burnt all her clothes away. Her cap no longer on her head, her hair was back to her normal color and length, although it was sprawled out over the ground in a messy fashion from the trauma. Her darker, altered tone was gone from sight now, replaced by her naturally beautiful, flawless skin.
Unlike most of her body that had gone back to the way it was, she still retained some of her more feral features. She still had her sharp claws, for one.
Orochimaru's eyes moved in to check her Cursed Seal. A dim flame was just finishing its shrivel back into normal size, whistling quietly before fading completely into the black, three way jagged marks that made up her seal.
Not affected by the sight of her nude condition, he maintained a perfectly calm demeanor turning to Karin. "Throw a blanket over her and let's get her back to the village."
"H-hai…" Karin replied, nodding her head in compliance. She did hesitate for a moment, though. He really wanted that…thing back at Oto? Not that she cared much for the girl before she began this hideous metamorphosis, but she really did fear for future if it involved Tayuya.
Taking a white medical cloth in hands, she walked up to Orochimaru's side and threw the sheet into the air, catching Tayuya's limp body on the way down. They both heard a soft groan come out weakly from under, but ignored it.
Knowing how awkward Karin would feel about picking up the naked girl, Orochimaru bent down and carefully picked up the covered, girl-sized lump rolled up in the cloth. Turning around, he left Karin standing behind as he made his way back to his village.
Karin's mouth opened to speak, but she hesitated nervously before actually speaking. "Orochimaru-sama, wh-what about the others – your elite squadron?" She asked, motioning towards the three members, tied up in the dark blue chakra.
Orochimaru didn't stop, or even turn his head to acknowledge her – only kept his grin. "Leave them." He responded. "They have served their purpose to its full potential. I sense that Sasuke-kun has found his own way back to our village."
Her face lit up. Sasuke Uchiha? She had heard of him. The rumors that Orochimaru had selected him for his next body had been true.
She blinked. Turning her head to look back and forth rapidly and in comical fashion, her sight fell on the two fainted jonin.
"…What about them?" She asked again, her voice quieter than before.
He continued walking. "Leave them also. If they make it back to the village, that's their own reward. If they are weak and get eaten by wild animals…I see no perpetual loss." He stopped and turned his head to reveal his golden pupils glowing in the dark. "…Do you?"
Karin flinched and rapidly shook her head. Turning back to give the area one last look, she backed up slowly, and started to follow behind her master, leaving behind six well-bodied shinobi cut from the world, and helpless to follow him themselves.
Darkness and silence.
The caped figure walked through the leaf-dirt road. He didn't know where he'd go, but he just needed to move.
The faint sound of leaves blowing from their given branches on the trees overhead fell to the sound of wind blowing. His cape drifted slightly in response to it as well, the quiet sound of cloth brushing itself added its own enchanting effect.
To say he didn't know where he was going would be understating reality. The brown and green nightmare he was in must run for tens of thousands of acres, and he hadn't the slightest clue where any of the other members were inside of it.
'I can't believe this.' He thought silently to himself, striding up the trail and passing in between two large trees. 'I had her! That's what kills me, I had her!!' He continued walking, getting the exercise that he never saw inside Hiruko. Not that it would do his inalterable body much good anyways.
He put his hand to the left side of his chest, stroking his central core smoothly in an attempt to appease himself with the only part of his body that could feel. It wasn't working. At this rate, someone else will get to the prize before he does – both prizes!
…One he wanted to apprehend as part of his life's goal.
…The other he wanted to kill for himself.
He stopped near a tree with his arms hung down. Then in his own self-frustration, he pounded the trunk with the side of his fist, causing the sound of wood against wood.
"I will kill you, Orochimaru." His voice seeped through clenched teeth. His fist grinded up and down the tree trunk, wood shavings peeled from the bark with his sharp knuckles. "…If I have to go through your subordinates, slaughter an entire village, even kill off my own colleagues of Akatsuki to eliminate the competition, I swear I'll destroy you."
He lowered his head, the curtain draped forward. "Oh yes…and I haven't forgotten about you…my feisty little jinchuuriki." He added in almost a whisper, his words dripped with extra venom.
His shrouded head turned to the stars in the nighttime sky.
A smirk spread invisibly across his face at the sound of gigantic wings flapping. His cloak drifting in the wind, he continued to gaze up at the wide shadow in the sky, a shape he knew all too well, circling over the stars like a living constellation. It appeared bigger as it took lower towards the land.
Sasori nodded silently.
It was time for him to meet up with the others.