Disclaimer: I don't Own Naruto.

Ninja Clash! Of Nightmares and Daydreams

.;:Chapter Five: Red:;.

Akari zoned in and out of the ongoing conversation as they walked further and further away from her town. Thoughts of what had just transpired were wiped from her mind the moment Naruto started complaining about not knowing where the hell they were going. Apparently I'm not the only one in the dark. She assumed that Kakashi would fill them all in once they achieved a certain distance away from the palace.

Although she had doubt about that reasoning.

Kakashi and Hitenzo lead the way with Naruto and Sasuke following behind and Akari and Sakura (as well as Yorimaru) took up the rear.

Her senses were at ease at the moment because she tried not to think too much because if she thought too much she'd always end up in a bad position. So now, as her gaze indifferently drifted from tree to ground to tree, she was content; if only for a little while.

Sakura's gaze kept finding Akari and returning to the front, finding her and returning until finally she could stand it no longer. "Hey, Akari?"

"Hmm?" she asked her attention turning directly from the foliage to the pinkette. She seemed out of it but Sakura didn't want to pry…not that much anyway.

"So…that boy," she started nervously, "Who is he exactly?"

Akari started to reply but stopped unsure of how to phrase it.

"If you don't want to answer its okay, I'm just being nosy!" she said quickly shaking her hands in front of herself.

Akari smiled at her reaction, "Well-why did everything suddenly get quiet?" she asked looking ahead of them noticing no one was talking. Talk about being on the spot, she thought.

"Don't mind us!" Naruto grinned, throwing his head back to glance at her.

Funny thing was that even Sasuke looked back as if he wanted to hear this too.

Shrugging she continued, "We were best friends when we were little. I guess he kind of had a crush on me and I guess I did too. You know? Have you ever had a first crush before?" Akari asked the pinkette to her right.

Sakura's gaze quickly darted to the Uchiha in front of Akari and returned them immediately to her bluish-silver haired companion, "I have." She replied blushing slightly.

"Then you know how it is then, but we're not like that anymore though," she said with a small smile looking toward the too blue sky and random clouds up above, "At least I thought anyway."

Sakura didn't speak so Akari decided to add, "He's betrothed you know-"

"What!" she gasped, as if she had heard this for the first time. Now she wished she had just kept quiet.

Akari added the next part quickly, growing weary of the conversation, "To my sister, Revie."

"You're okay with that?" Sakura pushed apparently unaware that the Tsukuyomi Princess no longer wanted to discuss said topic. Topics as such as these got her thinking and she definitely didn't need to do that.

"Yep," she replied with finality in her voice that immediately ended the conversation.

The six travelers were stuck in a stretch of silence that didn't seem to bother Akari because during her time spent alone she enjoyed the silence but deep down she knew she always would hate the loneliness. But this, of course, was different and so she liked this.

Suddenly Akari stopped in her tracks. A familiar sensation ran up her spine and encircled her thoughts. She faintly made out the distant whispers on the wind and she swore they were there. Besides the steady flow of water from the nearby stream to her right, she could hear several bird noises, and something else…but what else?

Someone was calling her name, she swore she heard it before they left the palace grounds, but it couldn't be…

"Kari!"

There it is.

"Kari!"

There it is again!

"I'm here! Right here!"

Revie!

"Kari, I'm right here!"

Akari spun around searching for any sign of Revie anywhere. She was losing her mind. There was no way Revie was here.

She turned back around and could tell those around her were staring at her but she didn't care, her eyes flew to the flock of trees ahead of them and in one particular tree she could make out to orbs staring back at her.

Her breathing caught in her throat as she faintly made out shadows in other surrounding trees but that did not scare her in the slightest. What grabbed her attention was the heavy feeling she got from this one tree. The others were nothing in comparison.

Akari could feel worried grasps at her wrists and panicked voices surrounding her but that all fell on deaf ears. She couldn't look away.

The eyes that looked back at her were dark deep, malicious-

"Red."

Akari's body began to convulse and an intense pain racked through her brain. Everything around her was a haze and the more she tried to see the worse it got. She couldn't control it. The pain was more than enough to send her to her knees but she didn't move. Her feet were glued to the spot. The haze began to deepen until it was just small blotches of color, and then there was nothing at all.

The pain had ceased but she had an off feeling surrounding her. She looked around and she was no longer shrouded in black but nor was she with the others. So where am I? She thought, glancing around.

She was at the edge of land, ahead of her stretched water but farther into the distance you could see three land masses (islands). She blinked and suddenly she was traveling to the one dead center which also happened to be the one further away.

Akari's body was now floating beyond the water and now, she made it to the island, and was traveling inland. Through thousands of trees she finally spotted a gigantic black castle. It was dark and threatening standing alone, towering over the trees that encased it. However still, her body kept moving until she reached the castle and was moving towards the top floor, the sixth floor, and she phased through a window.

There was a girl with long pink hair and silver eyes dressed in a eggshell blue kimono and burgundy obi. Akari instinctively reached out to the girl as the girl reached out to her, but she began fading back away. As she was leaving the girl mouthed the word, "Tea."

Akari felt her conscious being thrown back into her immobile body and now able to move she collapsed to her knees her energy slowly coming back to her. Taking deep breaths she looked up and for a moment she sat paralyzed gazing again into that bloody red gaze waiting to be thrown yet again from her conscious but—it didn't come.

She was perplexed it was as if those eyes had triggered something but he didn't administer the realm.

Wait! If I was being pulled into something that must mean that some of my own clansmen….

Shaking her head she stood but wobbled her gaze fixated on the one in front of her, it was as if no one else existed all she could see was the eyes—the red staring back at her. She could hear nothing but the repetition of old memories floating through her head, memories of her and of her elder brother. His smiling faces coaxing her to chase him, and she would follow after him, wishing she could catch him. Why am I reliving these things now? Those eyes they seem so familiar, but why?

In an all too sudden movement the eyes moved from their place hidden in the leaves. A black cloak whipped out behind the figure as if he were the grim reaper coming to get her. Akari didn't move the figure was getting close; it was as if it were floating in slow motion to get to her.

It held a gloved hand out as if beckoning her to come to it, she reached out, completely unaware of herself, movements, or surroundings.

They were red like Itachi's sharingan, so she felt safe but on the edge of a cliff at the same time. This person wasn't Itachi; she was sure of that the closer he got. This person, wanted her dead, she could sense the bloodlust but still could not move away. She didn't question it, didn't try to. Her mind was fuzzy at this point and she knew now that they were barely two feet apart and closing, that resistance is futile.

An enormous crashing sound and a poof startled Akari from her frozen state. Looking around to her left she could see Kakashi engaging in combat with the cloaked figure she assumed to be a man. He had saved her life—just a moment ago she was mere inches away from death and she just stood there without moving. She was transfixed and immobile but she was paralyzed no longer and it was about time she joined her comrades that were fighting those who surrounded them.

Standing up, she took a quick survey of the area. She noticed that before she really wasn't paying an attention to her surroundings, apparently the road they were walking on was pretty wide, the perfect place for combat. That made her think that Kakashi had counted on the ambush, the man was obviously a genius. Okay…there were way more ninja hiding than I had guessed but that's no real problem. I need to help but first things first—Hitenzo!

"Yorimaru!" she called her trusty companion, he knowing what to do launched himself on the first person he saw that presented a threat to the old noble man. A moment later she was positioned right at another attacker's feet. With a quick scissor kick, he was on the ground clutching his face.

Damn, I aimed for his chest…oh well.

"Go!" Yorimaru grabbed a mouth full of Hitenzo's robes and bounded off into some random location. Sighing with relief she turned just in time to deflect a kunai aimed for her neck. The perpetrator flashed her a triumphant smile to which she growled in response. "I thought it was a rule that ugly people shouldn't smile." Ten feet, she thought measuring their distance.

Irritated he launched several suriken to only to have her smirk and repel them with her steel senbon. This fight wasn't going anywhere; she needed to finish it quick. She ran straight towards him, he grinned just as he shot two kunai into her shoulders. Her body dropped to the ground in a heap.

"It's over."

Poof!

"Subsitution!" he exclaimed, turning just as the Princess delivered her finishing blow to the back of his neck.

"I wasn't even going my normal speed," she said to no one in particular.

"Alright Akari," she said aloud,

The others seemed to be doing alright from what she could hear, but she was still a bit worried. There's too many. There were probably over a hundred ninja not counting the ones she just had taken down. She didn't intend on using anymore chakra but she knew if this fight dragged out, they wouldn't be able to put up much of a fight in the long run. She really had to move.

Using her speed to her advantage, she zigzagged through at least six ninja, hitting pressure points that sent them to the ground immediately. No time to have fun now. Although she hated them she reached into her back pouch and pulled out two kunai. She jumped what she guessed to be four feet and pinned the one guy who was planning to sneak attack Sakura. Like she'd let that happen.

"Hey Sasuke!" she called just as his latest opponent fell at his feet.

"What?" he said dodging a fist, then slamming his own fist into his random opponent.

"Can you tell how many are in those trees up there?" she asked, throwing the dreaded kunai at the seemingly endless sea of ninja. She kneed one brown haired guy, but she could have sworn she took this guy down already. Could they be…

"Ten—no eleven," he stated his eyes locking on the chakra signals, "I can't see how it matters though,"

Akari round house kicked someone and tripped two, "Why is that?"

"Most of them are clones…we established that when you went a-wall," he stated impassively.

"Well!" she scowled, "They just keep coming," she said deciding to keep the conversation going, "It seems that only a few of them are really worth fighting…the others aren't really trying."

"I know."

"Naruto!" she shouted, over to a corner of brightly clothed Naruto clones, "You got any bright ideas?"

"Yeah, Let's kick some butt!" he exclaimed proudly punching an opposing clone in the face, "That's all there is to it."

She sighed, "Yeah, well that was the plan ten minutes ago—before we knew we were dealing with possible infinitely many clones."

He shrugged and went about his 'butt kicking' like a true Naruto.

"We need something that could take them all out in one blast…" Sakura added from the right, "Sasuke, you can use your fire ball jutsu!"

"No, we need something that could take them all out," he turned his head to Akari. "The Fire Ball Jutsu wouldn't be enough."

A smile crept on to her face in reply, he knew her so well, "I've got this—cover me and then you may want to get out of the way."

She made a bee line to the nearest tree deflecting numerous suriken and kunai on her way. Pouring chakra into her feet she began to climb the tree having to use her lightning like speed to dodge the weapons that were thrown her way. Less than a second later she was at the top of what looked to be one of tallest trees around. After quickly drawing hands signs she launched herself off the tree with enough force to place her above center of the chaos. Her body seemed to float in mid air as she weaved final hand signs. She took a gratifying deep breath. This is it!

"Water Style! Serpent's Venom Jutsu!"

The moment he heard those words Kakashi's head snapped up along with that of his cloaked opponent and they both moved for shelter. Kakashi smiled, what have they been teaching her?

Sasuke watched from a tree as millions or maybe billions of too fast moving rain droplets showered down on their opponents destroying them in an instance. He had to admit, she was pretty interesting-pretty strong that is for a spoiled princess.

He turned his head to face her just as Akari landed on the branch beside him.

"You never mentioned you used water style too," he told her his face full of its usual blankness.

She smiled and stepped closer to him (he had to look down to look her in the eye), "You never asked. I can use fire style too!"

"You can?"

"Nope, but it would be cool if I could though wouldn't it?" she smiled wider, probably proud of her quick work.

"Hn," he replied stepping back to lean against the tree's trunk.

"You do realize don't you?"

He raised an eyebrow in question, "Realize what?"

"'Hn' Isn't a word," she smirked coming to rest beside him. He sent her a smirk in return.

"How long is this going to last?"

"Not much longer now…I don't think anyway," she placed a finger to her cheek, "This is my first time actually using that jutsu."

He blinked and decided to look away from the girl; a random thought crossed his mind.

Naruto was right she isn't…ugly…

N/A: Yo! So did you like? Oh sorry its shorter than usual…but life happens! I decided to do something I've never done before….

Sneak Preview: Chapter Six: Tea, Traitors & The Journey

The moment the two had started their battle of words, Akari wasn't too concerned about what he was actually saying. Honestly she didn't really care. Of course, all that changed when he said something he really shouldn't have. If you wanted to piss her off that was difinitely the way to go. Akari didn't like to take things personally but in this case she was willing to make an exception.

No Akari, she thought to herself, you should not do this—yeah maybe you heard wrong.

Her eyes went from his furiously narrowed eyes to that great big scowl on his alabaster face.

Nope, she thought, he definitely said it.

"Say it again," she hissed, staring down his cold eyes stepping closer, "I dare you."

She narrowed her eyes, damn he said it again.

The instance the second string of words escaped his lips Akari had her mind made up…

Comrade or not Uchiha had to go.