Byakuya

Chapter 24

--------------------------------

There were times when Naruto loved his enchanted senses. His pulse was high, adrenalin spreading into his veins as the claws of the hanyou hit the wooden floor, the scraping noise echoing in the almost empty, long wooden halls. Even though the half-beast had already left the bathroom they had been in, he was fast to run after it.

Naruto knew that on clear territory, like plains of grass or the woods, he was easily faster than the hanyou, but the half formed claws sticking out of his geta shoes didn't exactly help him now. They had almost reached the end of the hallway, and someone came around the corner. The hanyou almost ran into the jounin, and the jounin by natural reaction flung several shuriken and kunai towards the beast.

The hanyou jumped against the wall crossing neatly in a 90 degrees angle the hallway they had been running in. The long light yellow claws impeded in the wood and Naruto could see the hanyou's spine twist in a beautiful arch as it regained its balance on the wall, now running completely vertically.

Oh how I would love to rip that spine off, Naruto absently thought as he kicked his geta shoes off as to allow his own claws to protrude forth. He could feel the demon chakra bubbling under his skin, but reined it in. There was no use in alerting all the jounins of the Hokage tower of him, as they would understand him as the threat and probably let the Hanyou slip away.

Besides, not like I need to use chakra to skin this bastard, Naruto said to himself as he almost succeeded in scraping the back of the hanyou. Then a door opened on the wall they were running on, and a surprised Iruka walked out. The hanyou was almost hit by the door but at last minute jumped on the opposite wall, letting out a small growl as it was forced to figure out where to jump next. It had just about started to flee down the hall again when Naruto hurled the kunai in his hand at the half-beast.

It struck it in the face, leaving a long and deep, extremely ugly cut onto the hanyou's cheek. The creature yelped before fleeing into the room Iruka had just come from, pushing another chuunin out of its way. Naruto bore no thought to Iruka as he ran past his old teacher into the room; Naruto knew what he must've looked like, with his fangs and deadly red eyes, thick whiskers and claws on both his feet and his hands.

He must've looked like he was another half-beast himself.

When Naruto ran into the room, he suddenly noticed that he was being watched over ten ninjas, chuunins and jounin, along with the Hokage and Jiraiya. Naruto shook the doubt of his mind and lunged after the hanyou. Somewhere on the back of his mind, he thought he heard Jiraiya order to leave this to him. Naruto ducked behind a chuunin, scrambled around a jounin on his chase after the hanyou. Naruto was stronger and limber than the half-demon, but the hanyou had more control over his body. Naruto almost never chased anything in his transformed form.

The creature ran under the feet of a tall, slouching chuunin and Naruto was once again amazed by the creatures sleekness, with which it ran under a table, before jumping to a wall again, starting to run on the wall vertically again.

Naruto was pretty sure he growled, but all his attention was on the hanyou now. He hurried after the half-beast, his feet morphing even more to the sleek paws of the fox. Sometimes being able to control the transformation was extremely useful, Naruto thought as he doubled his speed, becoming a blur as he easily tackled the hanyou. Naruto grabbed the hanyou by its hind leg, and threw the creature onto the other side of the room, where it met the wooden wall with a crack. It whimpered as it fell down onto the wooden floor, and even though its left leg was obliviously broken, it started to crawl on the floor towards the Hokage, the beasts' nose creased as it tried to concentrate through the pain on its prey.

Naruto hurled across the room easily, backhanding the hanyou with one of his massive claws, looking rather like a cat playing with a mouse.

Naruto's gaze was completely focused on the hanyou now, the way the light seemed to meet the weird mix of fur and skin, and how the half-beast succeeded in twirling in the air smoothly and landing on its feet. It raised its disfigured face that looked like a muzzle, and locked its angry yellow eyes on the Gondaime.

Naruto watched in slow-motion as the hanyou's huge paws left the wooden floor with a scratch and the beast hurled into action. Some of the Jounins and chuunins in the room twirled kunai and shuriken at the beast, seeing it heading towards their Hokage. The half-beast avoided the metal weapons easily, twisting slightly using its back muscles, before righting itself and moving in to attack the Gondaime.

The hanyou was near the Hokage's desk when Naruto caught up with it. Naruto grabbed the creature' left shoulder before ramming a ball of blue energy through the monsters chest.

"RASENGAN!" The chakra enforced hand impaled the torso easily, and where the Chidori was an assassination technique and meant to kill cleanly, Rasengan was another thing. The swirling ball of energy threw blood everywhere, including the Hokage's papers.

Tsunade wiped the blood off her eyes with her hand and glared at Naruto, who had the honesty to look sheepish.

"Oops…?" Naruto said peevishly, more than aware of the astonished looks thrown at him. Drawing a deep breath Naruto forced the Kyuubi's energy under the surface of his own chakra, flinching at the feeling of his feet changing into their usual shape, along with his hands and face.

"What is that thing?" A jounin asked from the side. Naruto wiped some of the blood from his cheek before answering, oblivious to the fact that he missed the trail of blood that started from his forehead down his nose and to his chin.

"A hanyou. Half-demon." Naruto finally answered, while pulling his hand through the torso with a disgusting squelching sound. Naruto threw a look at Tsunade, noticing now for the first time both Hyuuga Hiashi and Hatake Kakashi standing beside her.

"There should still be three more of them. They always more in groups of four; the leader and three subordinates. They've probably been given their own targets inside the village. They're probably starting to—"Naruto's voice was cut off by a very feminine scream from the distance, a voice which Naruto instantly recognized.

Naruto's eyes widened and he uttered one word in a horrified whisper before running as fast as he could towards the scream.

"Sakura."

--------------------------------------

Rock Lee had reacted to the scream before Naruto had. The black haired green-glad teen-ager rushed into the room the scream had come from, only to be met with a surprising sight. In the middle of the round medic examination room was Sakura, her breathing shallow and her body filled with various cuts. She barely hovered on her feet, using her last strength to hold her kunai up; her green eyes shone from under her pink bangs, trying to track the movements of the hanyou.

She was facing the beast, her back against the instalment on which Sasuke lay. Sasuke was strapped on the bed without a shirt, his body covered in black markings and seals, long lines of markings leading into the dark seal of Orochimaru on his left shoulder. Sasuke was looking enraged, trying to break free from his straps to help Sakura, but was unsuccessful as the restraints were designed to hold him on place as the seal examinators made sure that the second seal on top of Orochimaru's seal held.

The two examinators, a brown haired old man in his fifties and a younger woman with black hair, perhaps on her thirties; lay on the stone floor, their throats ripped open. It wasn't until then Lee noticed that the mouth of the strange creature was dripping with blood, the almost pink fangs gleaming in the shallow lighting of the medic examination room.

The hanyou jumped towards Sakura, and in seconds Lee was in front of the pink haired girl, his feet raised so her could kick the hanyou. The fast kick connected with the creatures ribs, sending the dark brown half-human she-hanyou into the stone wall, making some of the shelves filled with herbs fall down. The hanyou scrambled on her feet, and raised her calculating golden eyes to lock with Lee's black angry orbs.

The hanyou jumped, it's running erratic as it bounced from side to side as to confuse her opponent. Lee went to crab the hanyou's neck, but the slim creature jumped to the side with ease even when injured, hissing. Sakura, fighting unconsciousness, sent a bar of shuriken towards the hanyou, all of which it avoided, except for one.

The black shuriken embedded into the hanyou's shoulder, leaving a small trail of blood into her furry skin. The beast didn't waver, and instead set to attack its prey with even more vigour. It wasn't until the brown blur had shot past Lee and Sakura when Lee realized the hanyou had not been attacking Sakura; Sakura had been defending Sasuke from the creature.

"Sasuke-kun!" Sakura yelled as she realized that the hanyou had gotten past her and Lee. The brown beast had almost reached Sasuke who was cursing inside his head, when a red blur appeared before it. The slight spin on Naruto's kick sent the hanyou flying on the other side of the room. This time the hanyou got into its feet slowly, its golden eyes flashing with rage. The beast growled, and Naruto growled back.

Sasuke in his drugged mind was still laughing at himself for getting almost killed by an ugly female, who looked barely human, only to be saved by the dead-last.

The hanyou climbed on her feet, her eyes for the first time showing intelligence and bits of humanity. She slammed her right claw over her shoulder, dipping her claws with her own blood. Naruto glared, knowing that this hanyou had to be of higher class if it was capable of blood type jutsus. Naruto started to gather his chakra under his skin, ready to release the energy at a moment's notice, when he noticed that Kyuubi's chakra was leaking into his own blue one.

What's going on? Naruto thought shocked as his eyes widened and he tried to force the red chakra under the suppressive power of the seal again. It didn't help, and suddenly Naruto was devoured by a sudden dizziness. Oh god, not now! Whatever this is, I don't need it in the middle of the fight!

"Chi; kirinuki no jutsu!" the hanyou bellowed as she drew her hand in a forceful arch across the air before her. Some drops of blood flew on the floor, but they went unnoticed as her attack took effect.

Naruto smirked slightly to himself as he noticed her to use a lower lever blood jutsu. Shielding against the jutsu should be easy enough.

"Ha-seishou; bouei no ryouiki!" Naruto yelled just in time for the normally blue shield come into place in front of Naruto and Sasuke, shielding them from the five diagonal chakra cuts aimed for them.

Except this time the shield wasn't blue; it was purple.

Naruto's eyes were wide as he stared at the purple shield in front of him, his chest rising and falling rapidly as his throat burned and gravity fought to bring him down.

The hanyou looked disgruntled and let out a screech before starting to run towards Naruto and Sasuke. Naruto was defenceless as the she-beast struck him across his face, the five long claws of the hanyou leaving Naruto's face almost unrecognizable.

"Naruto!" Sakura yelled worried from the sidelines where Lee was guarding her.

Naruto raised an arm onto his face to hold his eye; his teeth bared in an expression of pain; his other, healthy eye directed at the hanyou angrily.

Kyuubi's chakra lashed out and a red hand of pure chakra reached out and crabbed the hanyou before bringing her slamming against the floor again and again,

Sakura's green eyes were wide in horror as she watched the horrifying red chakra seep out of Naruto and attack the horrifying creature that had attacked her. The she-beast was slammed onto the stone floor again by the chakra hand Sakura just felt belonged to Naruto. Naruto's face was covered by blood and his eyes were covered by his bangs, and Sakura couldn't help but to wonder what moved through his mind as she flinched at the hanyou's scream.

By the fourth time the hanyou met the floor, the she-beast made no sound anymore, the body only making slight squashing sounds as the innards of the creature mashed and the boned cracked as they broke. Sakura raised her left hand to her mouth, the kunai long forgotten as she tried to force the feeling of nausea down her throat.

Crack

The skull of the creature finally gave in and huge pools of blood started to spread on the stone floor where Naruto slammed it into again and again. Sakura's eyes filled with tears of horror, before she could finally speak.

"YAMETE! IT'S ALREADY DEAD! YAMETE, NARUTO!" Sakura finally yelled and saw as the red hand hesitantly let go of the mutated body. Sakura gave in and turned to throw up against the wall behind her. Lee held her hair for her, his usually face passive and slightly confused.

The air thickened with tension until Sakura couldn't take it anymore and turned to confront Naruto. But instead of finding the hesitant sky-blue eyes she expected to fins, she found to her horror one, animalistic blood red eyes with a slit for a pupil staring back at her. It was then when she noticed Naruto's claws and the thickened whiskers on his golden cheeks. Naruto opened his mouth to speak, but it took Sakura only one look at the white fangs to react.

Sakura screamed.

-----------------------

A/N: Whew! I can't believe it took whole SIX DAYS for me to update! Freaking unbelievable, really. Personally, I'm much-o disappointed with this chapter, but I'm in my 'whatever' moods right now, so I don't really care.

Chi; kirinuki no jutsu—Blood; cuts of blood, don't remember right now, and, umm…

Ha-seishou; bouei no ryouiki—leaf-energy; field of protection.

And don't ask about those dumb-ass jutsus, I figured them in the middle of the –fucking- night…

I'll update in few days I think. And no complaints about my sight/sigh or glasses/classes mistakes thanks, I'm quite aware of them already. My beta's hand is currently broken (or at least I think it still is) so I'm afraid you'll have to wait for better grammar and such.

--Dark

Reviewing doesn't actually hurt, you know.