Chapter 7!
I would like to thank all the people who have stuck to this story. You guys are awesome!
I've been trying to reveal the shadow's identity, but I always end up not getting to it. Hopefully I can get to it this chapter. Thank you for being patient and calm about it. Here is your reward:
Natsumi woke up from the burning sensation in the back of her throat. Ugh. Time to drink some blood. She hated the fact that she had basically become a vampire. Just the thought that her diet now required to drink a lot of blood in order to keep herself from killing people...
She shuddered at the pictures of those victims of the rogue vampire as they appeared in her head. Sasuke hugged her a bit tighter, pulling her closer. She looked up and saw that her husband was still asleep. Probably just a small reflex of some sort for him.Natsumi thought. Just then, two questions popped into her head:
When is she going to tell her family of her transformation? And: What will Semira do if she found out?
Natsumi's thoughts were interrupted by a flaming in her esophagus. "Damn..." the woman muttered. She looked up at the clock -- 4:30AM. She decided to go and treat the blood thirsty fire in her throat before everyone wakes up. She tried to slip through Sasuke's arms without waking him, but she failed. Natsumi stared up at him as he opened his eyes and stared down at her.
"What is it Nat?" the man asked.
"I just wanted to go out for some fresh air. You know, go and run with the pack for a bit," Natsumi said. She smiled innocently. "I didn't mean to wake you dear, but you had me in a hug."
"Hnn...okay Nat." Sasuke released her from his hug, and she rolled out of bed and kissed him sweetly on the lips.
"Sorry that I woke you up." The woman walked over to the drawer and put her bra back on as well as getting into a pair of black shorts and a midnight blue T-shirt. "Go back to sleep," she whispered to her husband.
"You better not be out too long," Sasuke said. "Your wound may look healed on the outside, but there could still a chance that there is something that may re-open." He watched his wife stop walking toward the glass doors that led to the balcony. She turned around and stared at him, and he stared back, showing her that he was serious.
Natsumi sighed, "I'm not going to open any wounds. Don't worry so much Sasuke. I'm tough -- been raised by wolves remember?"
"Yes, but you were brought up as a lady of the house before you met them."
"Just go back to sleep. I'll be back before you wake up again." Without another word the Niikyo-Uchiha left the room and was on the balcony. Natsumi, ignoring the fact she was barefoot, ran to the end of the balcony and leaped over the railing, falling gracefully onto the leaf-littered forest floor. As soon as she landed on two legs she became a wolf and sprinted into the bushes. She quickly located a rabbit and gave chase, jumping over large rocks and making sharp turns in order to keep her eyes on the prize. The wolf could smell her prey's fear, and then she also heard its pulse...its fast, blood-pumping pulse. With that teasing her, Natsumi gathered some unknown strength and leaped the gap of six meters between her and the rabbit and pounced right on top of it.
Once draining the creature of its blood, the she-wolf picked up the blood-stained whitish-grey rabbit along with her to a spot nearby her wolf pack. The wolf listened to her surroundings, trying to catch her prey moving away. A breeze blew by, and she picked up the scent -- blood. The canine took a step forward toward it, but then it realized that it wasn't just any type of animal's blood...
It was human blood.
Natsumi took control of her wolf self and began to run toward the scent. Being a ninja sworn to protect her village had her running at top speed toward the ever-growing smell of human blood. The back of her throat burned viciously, and she thrust that thought aside. This injured human may be a fellow shinobi, or a villager, and she didn't want to kill anyone like that. The scent was at its strongest when she was only a few meters away. The she-wolf crouched down and peeked trough the gap in the bushes.
There was a woman, who was sitting on the floor with a bloody leg, and she looked at her leg, horrified. She then glanced up at the man before her, and Natsumi couldn't tell who he was since his back was turned to her. The man took a step closer to the injured woman, and she cried, "Stay away from me!"
A loud snarl erupted from Natsumi's throat as she leaped out of the bushes and landed onto the cloaked man's back. The man fell forward due to the wolf's momentum. With lightning quick speed, the man swung his arm at the large wolf. Natsumi was faster and caught the man's wrist in her jaws, and she bit into it. She only did not taste any blood...how strange... The she-wolf looked at the man's face, and his eyes were a deep crimson red, and he had fangs exposed.
A vampire?! Natsumi thought. Shit! She released the man's arm and ducked his second punch. Leaping backwards, she landed only three meters away from the vampire. She barked at him, challenging him to "bring it on". The vampire smirked at her.
"I suppose I can have an appetizer before my meal," he said.
Natsumi growled at him. In a flash he was in front of her, and kicked her to the side of the clearing. The she-wolf struck her back against a tree, and it snapped. She could feel her spine had been hurt badly, and she couldn't move. The wolf growled as the vampire came closer. The pain in her back ceased, and the wolf jumped away from the spot where the man had stomped his foot into the ground, causing a crater to form. When the man looked over at the wolf, there was a woman with long, blood red hair in a blue shirt and black shorts, her crimson eyes glaring at him.
"Oh? Another vampire?" The man's face smiled. "We can she the meal if you like." He waved over to the woman with a broken leg, and she glanced at the other vampire with pleading eyes.
"I'd rather not," the red-haired woman said stiffly.
"You want it all to yourself?"
Natsumi pulled out a hidden kunai. "This 'meal' is a villager of the Hidden Leaf, and as a ninja of this village, I must protect them and kill anyone who harms them." She made a small grin, showing her fangs a bit. "I'll enjoy beating you to a pulp."
"Ahaha! A challenge, eh?" the vampire asked. He got into a crouched stance. "Then let the games begin!" He charged at her, and Natsumi did a cartwheel to dodge it. Pushing off with her hands, she launched herself into the air just before the man crushed the earth where she was at. Natsumi made hand-signs and created three shadow clones. The four split up, and the vampire waited to strike. Once he saw the clones lined up, he slammed his fists into the ground, causing the earth to crack and throwing the clones off their feet. All three clones poofed away, and the place was empty.
"Ha! She probably ran away in fear of my strength." The vampire then turned his attention to where the villager was sitting. His eyes widened when he saw that she was gone, and he roared in rage. "That little red-haired bitch!" Quickly, he sniffed the air, searching for the scent of blood, but he found nothing. "Grrrraaagh!!" He slammed his fist into a tree, tearing it down before he disappeared into the night.
* * *
Natsumi left the hospital where she took the villager. She then began to run toward the house. Hopefully that vampire didn't track down my scent back to the house.... Please be alright everyone...The woman reached the Niikyo-Uchiha household, and everything looked fine. She leaped onto the balcony at the back of the house and entered her room. Natsumi glanced over at the bed, and Sasuke wasn't there. "Damn it," she muttered. She looked around the room and didn't see him.
Something touched her shoulder. She jumped, and when she turned to her right she saw Sasuke. "Don't scare me like that!" she whispered loudly.
"It's nearly seven o' clock in the morning," he said. "I figured that you were downstairs, but I guess I was wrong."
"Well, I was hunting when I smelled human blood..."
Sasuke stared at her while she put her hand to her throat when she mentioned "blood". She seemed to want to remain silent, so he asked, "What happened?"
"Oh...I found a woman with a broken, bloody leg. She was being cornered by a vampire and so I jumped in and--"
"A vampire?! Are you serious Natsumi?" The woman stared at her husband in disbelief. She shook her head from a thought and argued.
"Sasuke! You know darn well that vampires exist! He may have been the killer the ANBU have been looking for!"
"Natsumi! It could've been any other man who likes to prey on women."
This was becoming too much for Natsumi. "I saw fangs, Sasuke! He even had the super strength and speed!"
"Chakra and Transformation Jutsu," he stated.
"He had red eyes, the fangs, the aura...He even called me a vampire...which...I am."
Sasuke suddenly grabbed Natsumi's shoulders and slightly shook her. "Natsumi, listen to yourself! You're saying that you are one of them! What is going on?!"
"I didn't die and healed faster than normal becauseI am a VAMPIRE! I was transformed when whatever...whoever...maybe the vampire that I saw did this to me." Sasuke looked like he wasn't believing any of it. She then yelled into his face, "WHY WON'T YOU BELIEVE ME?!"
"BECAUSE IT CAN'T BE TRUE!" he said. He watched the woman in front of him look at the floor, and he heard her mumble something. She probably figured that he didn't hear since she repeated it louder.
"I'm sorry, but I have to prove it to you..."
Natsumi looked up at Sasuke, and his eyes widened at the sight of her red eyes. She whacked his arms off of her shoulders and gripped them, and the man winced at the force she was using. I don't remember Natsumi being this strong.... The woman then shoved him back, and he flew two meters and landed on the bed, and before he could sit up she was on top of him, pinning him to the bed (that's in about three seconds). Sasuke stared into the woman's red eyes. This is not Natsumi...is it? The Uchiha then realized that she was crying, and before he knew it she was gone and the bathroom door slammed shut and was locked in two seconds. Sasuke sat up and stared at the closed door, and he heard sobbing coming from behind it.
Natsumi was leaning against the wall, and then she sank to the floor and began to cry. She had completely went overboard on the demonstration of her vampirc powers. When she saw the fear in her husband's eyes, she knew instantly that she went too far. It was a good thing that she had better control of her strength -- that shove was a really light one. She also thanked God that she didn't stay on him too long, or that he had any cuts, otherwise she might have... Natsumi hugged her knees and sobbed even more.
A knock came at the door. "Natsumi?" came a muffled voice. "Come on out."
Sasuke heard a choked reply. "No."
"Come on Nat. I'm fine."
She answered a bit louder this time. "I'm not fine! I'm in a very unstable mood. One wrong move can make me hurt you..."
"Natsumi..." Sasuke's voice was soft. "Please, come out here. I know that you are strong enough to control yourself." Natsumi looked at the bathroom door, thinking about what the man on the other side's face looked like. Worried? Sad? She decided to go see for herself.
The door clicked, notifying Sasuke that it was unlocked. He reached for the doorknob and opened the door. When he opened it all the way, Natsumi came up and hugged him. The man waited for a minute before wrapping his arms around her. She rested her head on his shoulder and cried. "I'm sorry, Sasuke...for overdoing it..." she sobbed.
"It's okay..." Sasuke whispered. "It probably would've taken that much to get the fact of what you became to get through my head."
"Um...can you let me go Sasuke? Being this close to your neck...well..."
"Oh, sorry." He released his hug and took a step back. "Do you still need to hunt?"
Natsumi nodded. "Yeah. Tell May that I went to hunt. She probably heard my story and your reactions already." Just then the spoken person's voice came into their heads:
'WHY didn't you tell me Nat?!' Mayume thought-spoke.
'I wasn't sure until last night,' Natsumi answered.
'LAST NIGHT NATSUMI.'
The woman sighed. "I'll be back," Natsumi told Sasuke. She kissed his cheek and ran out on to the balcony and jumped off on to the forest floor. 'Okay, I'm sorry May. I didn't wanna freak you out.'
'Too late. Oh yeah, the kids know too.'
'How?'
'I kinda shouted in surprise when I read your guys' mind.' Mayume's tone sounded rather embarrassed.
'Well, I'll face all of you later. I need to hunt.'
'Alright sis, happy hunting.' Mayume disconnected and got back to what was going on now. Sasuke had just arrived into the living room, and his children began to ask him questions.
"What happened up there?" Yin asked.
"Is Mother really a vampire now?" Nhamo asked.
"Did you get bit?!" Yang asked.
Hunter was the only one who did not ask anything from Sasuke. He simply watched his siblings interrogate their father and inspect him of any injuries. "We heard a giant thud coming from your room," Yin said. "Are you hurt?" She looked the Uchiha over, and then did so a second time. About to go on her third check, Sasuke stopped her saying that he was fine. Mayume stood by Hunter watching the family also.
"Where'd Mom go, May?" Hunter asked his aunt.
The woman side-glanced at him. "She went out to get some food to satisfy herself." Then she addressed the other three teenagers. "Yes, children, Natsumi has become a vampire, but only part. She still has blood flowing in her veins, and so on. I don't know how, but she is normal excluding the extra strength and blood cravings."
The three nodded, understanding their aunt.
"Okay, now that that is out of the way, let's eat some breakfast. Breakfast today shall be the party leftovers, unless you want to cook for yourself." Everyone agreed to the leftover idea and walked into the kitchen to eat.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
It was near the end of the day, and Natsumi was practicing her strength. She specifically chose her training location to be far away -- about five miles -- from the village so she can practice worry-free. She ran to a large boulder and threw a punch at it.
BOOM
The boulder had crumbled into a series of large rocks. Natsumi kicked one that was as large as a work desk up into the air and juggled it like a soccer ball. The woman laughed at this fun game, and then she kicked the small boulder away, sending it 500 meters across the clearing she made and got lodged into the hillside. She picked up another small boulder and kicked that one; it went a meter deeper than the other one.
Now to limit my strength...Natsumi picked up another chunk of the once large boulder and kicked it. It flew only 300 meters. Now how does that compare to Sakura's hits? She tried again.
The boulder landed 200 meters. A smile played on her lips. That seemed like a decent super-strength distance. Time for the hard part, sort of... Acting like I am a human and trying to lift the boulder.Natsumi walked over to the largest chunk of boulder and examined it. This would do. She squatted down and "tried" to lift it.
Nothing. Perfect. She tried again and lifted it about half a meter. This would be chakra-infused strength. Excellent.
Natsumi put the boulder down and looked up at the sky. It looked about six or seven at night. Almost time to go, but the half-vampire wanted to practice her speed. She crouched down, looking ahead of her. As if an invisible person waved a flag or shot their silent pistol that only she could hear, Natsumi sprinted -- sprinted to her, but a blur to a regular person -- into the forest.
Well, that's all for this chapter. I hoped you liked it; I had so much fun writing this chappie. Review please!
~Nat ^^