Disclaimer: I own nothing

By the way, if you want to see an interesting and well-written 'what-if' about Gohan's Dilemma, check out Gohan's Dilemma: Sasuke's Grudge by BLAD3s7. Also know that if you want to write something similar, or do a fan art or whatever, feel free. Just don't forget to give credit where credit is due and send me the link so I can see it too! ^_^

Gohan landed next to Sakura. He'd been watching the entire battle from the skies high above. The two warring kunoichi had never noticed him. There had been a few times when Gohan had been ready to intervene, like when Sakura looked to have been killed by the Doki, but he managed to restrain himself and not do anything. A big part of being a teacher was learning when to step back, have faith in the student, and let them dig themselves out of their own holes.

Gohan's faith hadn't been misplaced. Ever since the Chuunin Exams, when he'd learned that he'd neglected to train Sakura's reflexes, Gohan had been wondering if he'd handicapped her, dooming her to constantly hold back, even in situations where she could get killed. Apparently Sakura had found a way around that. He made a mental note to work with her some more when he got the chance.

"Good job, Sakura," he said to the sleeping girl, scooping her up in his arms and floating down to the forest floor. He set her down in the cleft of some roots and stepped back, giving her one fond smile, then launched into the sky again and shot for wherever the others were. The Sound Four were a dangerous bunch that much was true, but Sasuke would be even more so if he ever got that second level thing that Jiroubou had displayed. It had made Jiroubou, an otherwise mediocre threat, powerful enough to necessitate an ascension to Super Saiyan. How much more dangerous would Sasuke or someone like him be? Gohan shuddered and tried not to think about it. "Please don't let me be too late!"

Sakon dashed through the trees, trying hard to make it through to the other side of the forest and the Valley of the End that lay beyond. If he could just clear that valley…if he could just make it.

He lurched as the barrel suddenly heaved on his back. Sakon stumbled, missed a step, and plummeted for the ground. He threw the barrel away and landed heavily on all fours. The barrel crashed to the ground a few feet away and shattered. Amid the sawdust, Sasuke stood up and faced Sakon.

The Sound Four leader whistled and grinned appreciatively. "Wow," he said as the seal's markings fade from the other boy's face. "Not too shabby."

Sasuke glanced down at his hand and made a fist, eyes dark and flinty, relishing the power that was suddenly coursing through him, energizing him better than any stimulant or other kind of drug. "I feel…powerful," Sasuke said.

"You are, now," Sakon answered, standing. "Now go. The Valley of the End is just ahead. Get across it and you're home free. And I suggest you hurry. A group of ninja from your old village is heading right for us."

"Then let them come," Sasuke said. "I'll kill them."

"No!" Sakon said emphatically. "They have to be hunter-nin. ANBU. Do you really think you can take down a squad of ANBU?"

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. "I have to test my power at some point don't I?"

"Then do it later!" Sakon insisted. "If you get caught here, if you die now, then it'll have all been for nothing and you'll never get your shot at your brother! Is that what you want? To get killed here, dying like a dog because you were to stupid to know when to run and when to fight?"

Sasuke punched Sakon in the face, driving him to his knees and grabbing him by the shirt, lifting him up to eye level. "Never speak to me like that again," Sasuke growled. "Now let's get going." He let Sakon slump to the dirt.

"No can do," Sakon replied. "There's still two more of them coming after us. I'll stay here and stall them. You go on ahead." He passed a small slip of paper to Sasuke. "Map to the hideout. Don't lose it or I'll kill you myself."

"Suit yourself," Sasuke replied and made to leap away.

"Sasuke!" Kakashi called, landing right behind them, Naruto right beside. "Don't move! On orders from Senju Tsunade, the Godaime Hokage of Konohagakure, I am placing you under arrest!"

Sasuke turned back, openly smiling, though the humor didn't reach his eyes. "A squad of ANBU, huh?" He asked Sakon, his words sarcastic and derisive. "This is hardly an ANBU squad. It's just Kakashi and the Dead Last."

Both the Konoha-nin looked pained by the very real scorn in Sasuke's voice.

"Sasuke," Naruto murmured, looking hurt. "Sasuke" he called louder. "Come back! Don't do this! Don't make us drag you back!"

"Drag me back?" Sasuke scoffed, turning his back on them. "Like you could." He blurred up and into the trees.

"Dammit!" Kakashi snarled, moving to jump after him.

"Ah ah ah," Sakon said, getting in the way. "You have to go through me first."

"Naruto, I'm going on ahead," Kakashi said. "Can you handle him?"

"Better believe it!" Naruto shot back, making a hand seal. "Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!" A swarm of Naruto clones filled the area and rushed Sakon, screening Kakashi from view, who did a fast Henge to look like Naruto and jumped in among the melee before dashing after Sasuke and dropping the transformation.

Sakon fended off that first wave of clones without too much trouble but found himself ringed by clones again, all of them looking none too friendly about it either. "Oh?" He said, raising an eyebrow. "Now this is interesting. Kage Bunshin no Jutsu? Maybe Sasuke was wrong when he called you the Dead Last?"

"Damn straight he was!" Naruto shouted back. "And I'll prove it to you!"

"And then what? Will you kill Sasuke? Will you be able to?"

"No," Naruto replied. "But I know that already. I know I can't fight him with the intent to kill. That's why Kakashi-sensei went after him. If there's anyone who can bring Sasuke back, it's him. I'll put my faith in him to do it." Cerulean blue eyes became intense and sharp. "Just like he put his faith in me to kick your ass!"

"Interesting," Sakon said with a sneer. "Let's test it out, shall we? I'll show you just how misplaced your sensei's faith really is!" Naruto and Sakon charged right at each other, howling warcries to the heavens.

Meanwhile, Kidoumaru had found himself in a rather awkward position. When he'd been bounding between trees, trying to shake Yamato from finding him after that botched bow shot, he'd lost sight of the Konoha-nin altogether. It was a nerve-wracking situation for Kidoumaru. He generally wasn't much of a close-range fighter, preferring to kill his enemies at a distance with his Kekkei Genkai and his bow. Even now Yamato could be sneaking up on him, to ambush him from somewhere in the trees.

"Yah!" he yelped, spinning around when a rustling made him jump. His bow twanged on instinct and a bird dropped from the leaves and hit the ground, most of its body simply blown away by the speeding arrow. "A bird? Dammit, getting twitchy. Gotta calm down. Wait a second. Why am I so twitchy anyway?" He thought about it for a second then came up with an answer. "Killing intent. That bastard. He's leaking killing intent so subtly he's playing on my emotions. Gotta calm down…" the six-armed shinobi took a few steadying breaths and managed to start to discern the killing intent from his own jangling nerves. "Bastard," he snarled when he finally got enough control. "No way in hell he's an ordinary jounin. Maybe he's that experiment that Sakon mentioned earlier?"

"Feeling a little nervous?" Tenzou asked.

Kidoumaru spun around but found no one behind him.

"I'm not over there."

He spun again. Nothing. He was still alone.

"Not over there either."

Something moved in the leaves. Kidoumaru let fly when he saw what he thought was a human shape. The shape exploded and rained wood slivers down on the lower boughs of the trees. "So close," Tenzou said, "but that was just a Moku Bunshin."

"Moku Bunshin? So you are that experiment!"

"Took you long enough."

"What? I thought it was something else! Genjutsu maybe."

"Then you have a long way to go as a shinobi," Tenzou's disembodied voice said, coming from all sides around Kidoumaru. "And that's something that will get you killed today."

"Show yourself, coward!" Kidoumaru bellowed, loosing an arrow. It whizzed into the trees and didn't hit anything but leaves and air.

"Missed me."

"Bastard."

"You still haven't figured it out?"

"Figured what out!"

"Where I am."

"Obviously! Or I wouldn't be trying to hit you like this!" Kidoumaru shouted, letting fly in a direction where he thought the voice had come from. Again he hit nothing. "Dammit. Where the hell are you!"

"I'm everywhere," Tenzou replied, "and nowhere."

"What is this, riddle time?" Kidoumaru asked.

"You look like a semi-intelligent boy," Tenzou answered. "Surely you can figure it out."

Kidoumaru glanced around, looking at every detail, fingers playing nervously on his bow. His eyes widened when he realized what was going on. "The trees," he whispered.

"Very good," Tenzou said, voice just as bodiless as it had been before. "I knew you could do it."

"Don't treat me like a little kid," Kidoumaru growled. "I'm not someone who can be taken down by some piece of shit trash. All your doing is melding with the trees. You use Mokuton, so that means you can control wood with chakra. It stands to reason that you can meld with them and travel within their cells like we would move through trees normally. I'm guessing that you're transferring from tree to tree by the root systems."

"Right. I'm impressed, Oto-nin. That's exactly how I'm doing it. A tree, in order to grow tall, must have a very extensive and well-laid root system. Those roots touch each other at some point or other and gives me a route between two trees."

Kidoumaru was about to retort when he suddenly stopped as he came to a realization. "No," he whispered as he took in the thousands of trees that surrounded him. "No way!"

"Now you fully understand your situation," Tenzou's voice said. "I am everywhere and nowhere. Try as you might, you can't hit me, can't see me, can't hear me, can't feel me. But I can see, hear, feel, and hit you." The tree's wood burst to life, ensnaring Kidoumaru before he even had a chance to move. The bark at his feet rippled and Tenzou rose from it, as if he was climbing out of the pool. His motions were just as casual as if he were taking a walk down the street.

Kidoumaru inhaled involuntarily when he caught sight of the white porcelain on Tenzou's face. "ANBU," he whispered. "It can't be." Tenzou reached up and removed his mask, baring his grim frown and iron gaze. He was a far cry from the competent but friendly jounin he'd been. His eyes held no mercy in them.

"ANBU Operations Code, Part 3, Combat Operations, Chapter 3, Regulation 22," Tenzou said tonelessly, reciting from memory something that had been drilled into him since day one of ANBU training. "In the event of identity compromise, the agent shall make every endeavor to restore cover. Methods include, but are not limited to, torture, blackmail, and assassination techniques."

Kidoumaru was suddenly very, very, aware of the kunai in Tenzou's hand. "No! Wait! Don't!"

Tenzou didn't hesitate, didn't even blink. "Do you know why ANBU has so many casualties?" he asked. Kidoumaru didn't even have enough room to shake his head. "Because we're called on to do the tough missions. We are the ones who are trained to kill missing-nin, Kage, and even," here he met Kidoumaru's eyes, "rogue Sannin. A kid like you doesn't stand a chance."

"L-L-LONG LIVE OROCHI…."

Kidoumaru gagged as his throat opened like a spigot, the terrible gash spilling his blood onto his robes. It soaked through in seconds, running in rivulets down the wood that bound every hand, every arm, every joint he had. A few moments later, the wood holding him up vanished as if it had never been there and the Sound Four member dropped to the ground. He stayed for a second before a dying spasm made him slip off the branch and plummet to the dirt far below.

He bounced once when he hit and was still.

Kakashi burst from the tree line, soaring over a rolling grassy plain. It was wide, probably two miles across at the very least, and Sasuke was already getting close to the halfway mark. He was just a black speck in the distance, running hard, leaning forward into his steps, allowing his arms to dangle behind him.

'I'm not that far behind him,' Kakashi wondered, 'How did he get so far out in front?' Genjutsu maybe? He frowned beneath his mask when the justu to release a genjutsu turned up nothing. So it was real. Sasuke really was that much faster. 'Or am I that much slower?' He shook it off. There was no way he was slower than Sasuke, if only because he was so much taller. He could eat up much more ground than Sasuke's chicken legs.

Kakashi's chakra pooled in his feet and he bounded forward with renewed speed.

Sasuke noticed when he glanced back over his shoulder. There was no cover around and the Valley of the End was coming up fast. He had to get to it and cross it before Kakashi caught up to him. As the seconds stretched into minutes, Sasuke realized that he wasn't going to make it. Kakashi's longer legs were serving him well. At least Naruto wasn't following. Two on one, even if one of the others was the Dead Last, weren't favorable odds. Naruto was nothing if not persistent and he would've harried Sasuke long enough for Kakashi to disable the young Avenger.

But if it was just Kakashi and no one else…it was conceivable that Sasuke could beat him. Sasuke had pressured Kakashi during the bell test all those months…that lifetime ago…and that was without he recent enhancements. They might just give him the boost that he needed to prevail.

Sasuke dug his feet in and slid to a stop.

Kakashi couldn't believe what he was seeing. Sasuke had stopped and was waiting for him. 'What are you doing, Sasuke?' Kakashi asked silently. 'Are you really that far gone that you believe you could defeat a jounin yourself?' He shook off the thought and tugged up the hirai-ate, baring the Sharingan to the outside world.

He stopped as well.

For a minute, they just stared at each other, neither moving. Sasuke met Kakashi's eyes without fear. He had no need to fear the Sharingan. After all, Sasuke had one himself and they both knew that it took a Sharingan to counter a Sharingan. If anything, Sasuke's immature Sharingan was on par with Kakashi's if only because Kakashi wasn't a genetic Uchiha. What they could do with that eye was another story. Kakashi had had his for years, Sasuke only a few months. In this battle of the ocular enhancements, Kakashi had experience on his side and that would be all he needed.

"And so the pretender arrives," Sasuke said finally, breaking the pregnant silence.

"Pretender?" Kakashi asked.

"That eye. It's not yours. You've stolen the eye from another. That's why you're a pretender."

Kakashi's anger boiled, despite his attempt to control it. "This eye was gifted to me by my closest friend in the entire world. He had no need of it and I did. So now I experience the world for both of us. Don't presume to understand me, Uchiha Sasuke. You know nothing about me." The venom in his voice was enough to cause a flicker of doubt cross Sasuke's face.

"An Uchiha would never abandon the Sharingan," Sasuke said, defiant.

"You don't know that," Kakashi snapped. "Now you're coming with me. Peacefully. Otherwise you're going to find out why I'm called Sharingan Kakashi!" A wind rustled the long grasses of the plain, the strands of foliage waving like an ocean.

Again, silence except for the rasp of leaves.

Sasuke snorted then let out of a few barks of confident laughter. "I'm not going anywhere with you," he chuckled. "I'm following my own path. If you can't understand that, then you can't hope to defeat me!"

There it was, in black and white.

In that instant, when the final defiant word left Sasuke's lips, Kakashi knew. There was no other alternative. With a heavy weight settling itself on his shoulders, Kakashi mentally moved Sasuke from the 'wayward student' column into the 'enemy' column. "Then you leave me no choice, Sasuke," Kakashi said finally. "If you won't come back peacefully, then I'm taking you in by force. I've given you more than enough chances, more than I would've any other enemy, but you've crossed a line now. Last chance."

Sasuke didn't miss the explicit use of the word enemy and he knew Kakashi wouldn't be holding back. And that was fine with him. He could handle it. He had to. Kakashi was standing in the way of him getting to Orochimaru and obstacles were only things to be surmounted.

Sasuke didn't answer. He simply drew a pair of kunai and held them up, Sharingan blazing.

The sorrow in Kakashi's chest almost made him give up. Almost. Instead, Kakashi took that sorrow and killed it. He closed his eyes and exhaled. When he did, he killed everything that made him human. Love, fear, hatred, passion, anger, sorrow, and the myriad of other emotions that separated a human from an animal, Kakashi killed them all and locked them away in the steel mental safe he hadn't used since the war.

When he opened his eyes again, only a second later, he was what a shinobi should be. A tool. He was a weapon to be wielded as his Kage saw fit. His Kage had ordered Uchiha Sasuke to be brought back alive or to bring his head back as proof of death. It was the only way Kakashi would fight Sasuke. If he fought as he had for the last decade or so, he would hold back. He couldn't hold back. Too much had been lost to get to this point. The opportunity couldn't be squandered.

Sasuke actually recoiled at the deadly look in his former sensei's eyes. Was this the true Kakashi, Sasuke wondered? Kakashi had always seemed like a capable but absent-minded jounin. All those excuses about being late, all the smutty books he read, the gags he pulled like the Sennen Goroshi. None of that was before him now. Kakashi's eyes were sharp, sharper than kunai edges. He held himself easily but the quiet tension betrayed his ability to close the gap quickly and gash Sasuke's throat.

Maybe he couldn't win.

Sasuke quashed that thought. He had to win. Had to. If he didn't then this opportunity would be lost to him forever. They exploded into motion in the same instant and in that same instant, they played out an entire duel as the Sharingan they possessed analyzed all the possible moves and the minds connected to those Sharingan devised ways around them.

Sasuke flicked his kunai at Kakashi's head. The jounin was already in motion before the knives left Sasuke's hand, the second knife hidden in the first's shadow. Kakashi flung a return knife and a shuriken volley, somehow managing to do both with one hand, and put on a burst of speed. He closed in from Sasuke's left as the knife drove for Sasuke's face and the stars looped to Sasuke's right.

The rear was open.

Sasuke allowed himself to fall backwards, the knife flashing by inches above his nose. Sasuke realized he made a mistake when he saw Kakashi dropping towards him from out of the sun. He flung himself into a wild spinning dodge, corkscrewing wildly in the air, using the momentum to send a kick at Kakashi's head.

The jounin didn't bother with dodging.

"Ninpou! Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!"

A second Kakashi appeared on the first's back, catching Sasuke's leg and hurling him through the air. The clone leaped after the flying genin as the original sped along the ground, pulling ahead. He leaped up right as Sasuke started down, tailed hotly by the clone.

Sasuke screamed as he was caught in the middle between two thunderous kicks.

Sasuke popped.

A log covered in explosive tags replaced him. The two Kakashi joined hands and the clone hurled his creator clear right as the blast consumed Bunshin and log alike, filling the air where they'd been with prickly shrapnel.

Kakashi landed in a skid, hands already flashing.

Sasuke appeared behind him, the Tiger seal already in place.

"Katon! Goukakyuu no Jutsu!"

"Doton! Doryuuha!"

A wave of mud rose up behind Kakashi right as Sasuke released his fireball. The mud hissed and steamed angrily before the flames and steam died away, revealing an elegant curve of fired earth.

The next jutsu was identical.

"CHIDORI!"

The screaming of two thousand birds filled the clearing. The mud wall exploded as the two Raiton jutsu smashed right through it as if it wasn't there. The techniques clashed and merged. The ball of lighting grew too chaotic to control and exploded, shaking the plains once again.

Kakashi and Sasuke had both gotten clear at the last instant and stood facing each other as if they had never fought. The only signs of the battle were the mound of shattered mud and the jagged splinters of wood littering the area.

They sprinted at each other again when a third voice rang out.

"Teshi Sendan!"

Both combatants split apart as white blurs shot between them. Sasuke only caught the oblong shape, but Kakashi clearly saw them. 'Finger bones?' he asked himself. 'I wonder…'

They landed and faced their assailant. He, or at least Kakashi thought it was a he, was effeminate, tall and willowy with soft features that would melt many a woman in her shoes. His hair was white and hung down near his jaw line, parted in the center, with a clump or two tied off by red ornaments. Kakashi had no doubt this newcomer was an enemy. He wore the robes and purple rope that matched the ones the other four had had.

"Who are you?" Sasuke demanded as Kakashi retreated a few paces to keep both enemies in front of him.

"I am called Kimimaro," the other said, voice soft. "Uchiha Sasuke, I have come to lead to you to Orochimaru-sama."

Sasuke half-dropped his combat stance. Kakashi would've capitalized on it to subdue him, but not with the unknown there. He was dangerous, that much was for certain. The fact that he'd managed to sneak up on them like that, when both of them were fully on guard, spoke volumes to his skill. Until Kakashi knew more, the best course of action would be to wait and see what happened.

"Orochimaru is dead," Kakashi called. "Killed in battle by Son Gohan!"

Kimimaro's eyes flickered over Kakashi and the jounin felt his skin crawl. No kid should've had eyes like that. They were the flat, lifeless kind that veterans of many battles tended to get. They were the eyes Kakashi himself now had. "Believe what you want, Sharingan Kakashi," the other said simply before going back to staring at Sasuke.

"Not going to call me trash like your other friends?" Kakashi asked.

Again, Kimimaro's lifeless eyes flickered over the jounin but he made no move to answer. "Uchiha Sasuke, the Valley of the End and the border is two and a half miles behind me. If you wish to cross, then you must do so soon."

"What's going on with Orochimaru?" Sasuke demanded. "I've heard he's alive and dead. He can't be two at once. If I don't know for certain, he can forget about training me!"

"That is something you must discover for yourself," Kimimaro replied, voice soft but very audible. "If I tell you he's alive, then the Copy-Nin will refute me and you would doubt still. Nor can I convince you he lives while you doubt even now. If you wish to discover Orochimaru-sama's fate, then you must see with your own eyes."

A long white sword appeared in Kimimaro's hand. Kakashi's eyes narrowed. The Sharingan had caught it. That was a bone that had come through the boy's wrist. "So one did survive," he murmured.

"I see you have heard of my clan," Kimimaro observed. "Though it will do you no good."

"I've only heard rumors," Kakashi admitted. "I heard that there were a group with the Kekkei Genkai that allowed them to control their calcium output. In doing so, they discovered that they could make bones as hard as steel in any shape they wished. Looks like that wasn't a rumor."

"Indeed it was not. I am the last of that clan." He tugged his shirt open, revealing the three wispy lines of the Cursed Seal of Earth, which was second only to the Heaven one that Sasuke bore. "Uchiha Sasuke, go. I will handle the Copy-Nin and join you later."

"I can handle this," Sasuke shot back.

"I will handle this," Kimimaro said in a tone that brooked no room for argument. "You are too valuable to risk in a fight with someone far above your caliber. I will handle him. You go."

Sasuke looked like he would argue for a second or two more then sighed. "Fine. But don't come crying to me for help."

"I will require none," Kimimaro replied evenly.

Sasuke leaped, trying to land behind Kimimaro. Kakashi was in motion the second his Sharingan picked up the rippling in Sasuke's muscles beneath his skin. He raced to close the gap and nearly died because of it.

"Tsubaki no Mai."

A thin white line filled the left side of Kakashi's vision. He knew what it was in an instant and was in motion even before that. He rolled and leaned at the same time, positioning his body to spin and slam his elbow into the back of Kimimaro's head.

The sword arced down from the stab, sweeping to cut open Kakashi's belly. He clasped both hands around the blade, allowing the considerable momentum of Kimimaro's swing to throw him clear.

Sasuke was already retreating. Kakashi glanced at the genin's retreating back, watching the red and white fan of the Uchiha clan fade into the distance.

"You do not have time to be concerned for your student's safety," Kimimaro told him.

"It's not them I'm worried about," Kakashi replied. 'It's me,' he added silently.

Naruto grunted as Sakon landed a heavy blow but the determined blond shrugged the blow off and powered through, slamming his fist into the other boy's chin. The leader of the Sound Four staggered but recovered just as Naruto tried to kick him in the face.

His own kick took Naruto in the chest and flung him into a tree. Body met bark with a sickening crunch. Naruto slumped, holding his shoulder, but the pain didn't diminish the glare of determination that he sent Sakon's way.

"Is that all you have?" Sakon asked.

"Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!"

Sakon raised one eyebrow when he saw the amount of clones that surrounded him. "Oh? You can still make this many? It won't do you any good. It hasn't the past two times."

The clones made no answer, instead leaping high into the air, or running up the sides of trees and vaulting. Sakon wondered what they were up to for a second. He realized what they were doing when every clone, and there were hundreds of them, produced two handfuls of shuriken. "Oh shit," he muttered.

"Shihouhappou Shuriken!"

The sky turned dark with flying steel.

A blast of chakra blew every shuriken out of the sky, or turned it back on its originator. Clone after clone burst like fireworks, laying thick haze over the area. The remaining Naruto clones traded apprehensive glances. Somehow, they knew that that wasn't enough to kill that guy.

"This is ridiculous," a new voice said. "You're using the second level and me for one little kid?"

"Ah shut up! Where's the fun in fighting if you don't go a little crazy?"

When the smoke cleared, it revealed to figures. One was the guy Naruto had been fighting up to this point and the other was someone else that looked the same. "Who's that?" Naruto muttered.

"Who me?" the new arrival asked. "Name's Ukon. My idiot brother here decided that he wanted to have a little fun and woke me up." Naruto took in the brothers. They were identical, right down to the silvery hair and demonic grins, but while both currently resembled some nightmarish goblin with reddish skin and steel limbs, the sides were reversed. One's metal arm was on the left, the other on the right. The same went for the horns as well. Each sported a single horn jutting from one side of their forehead.

Naruto suddenly put two and two together.

"Is this that Cursed Seal thing?" he asked them.

Both Ukon and Sakon looked startled. "And what would a dumb blonde like you know about that, huh?" Sakon asked.

"Because I've seen it before," Naruto answered. Even though Gohan hadn't looked like this when his seal had activated, Naruto would never forget that feeling of hollow apprehension in his gut. Despite his bravado and pranks, Naruto was actually a very intelligent young man and it was showing. Somehow, he couldn't explain how, he knew that this was a Cursed Seal effect. It also helped that he had that hollow apprehension now, sitting in his stomach like a lead ball.

"Impossible," Sakon said. "No one has seen a second level seal and lived to tell about it."

"Well now he does, idiot!" Ukon shouted, belting his brother in the head. "Use your head for once, you imbecile!" He glared at Naruto. "I'm afraid we're going to have to kill you now. Can't have anyone finding out about us now can we?"

"Try it!" Naruto shouted.

Ukon grinned. "As you wish."

The blow hammered into Naruto's nose. He felt his nose break, white-hot pain flaring behind his eyes, stars bursting in his vision. Naruto hadn't seen the attack. Nothing. One minute he was standing there, the next he was being hammered into a tree.

'How?'

That was all Naruto had time to wonder about before a second blow, from Sakon this time, hammered into his gut. Naruto screamed in pain as his gorge rose and spilled out over his lips. The fist pinning him to the tree vanished, allowing Naruto to spill, winded, into the dirt. He lay, winded, gagging, and coughing as Sakon and Ukon stood over him, laughing.

"Aw, you broke it, Sakon," Ukon chortled. He knelt and bashed Naruto in the back of his already-bruised skull. "Hey in there, can you hear me? What are you doing chasing after us anyway?"

"They're trying to stop Sasuke from reaching Orochimaru-sama," Sakon told him.

"Oh?" Ukon asked. "Really? Hm, then let me tell you something." He grabbed Naruto by the hair and lifted him to eye level. Naruto's face looked like hell with bile and blood mixing on his chin, staining his orange jumpsuit.

But his eyes shone defiant still.

"Still some fight in you? Good. Now listen, trash," Ukon said, "Sasuke is lost to you. He's coming with us and he'll get more power with Orochimaru-sama than he ever would have with you." He leaned in close. "And there's nothing you can do…to…stop…it."

He drove Naruto's face into the dirt and mashed it in with a foot, laughing all the while. They turned to go, the Cursed Seal's transformation fading from their bodies.

They froze in mid stride.

Naruto was on his feet, breathing heavily, shoulders slumped, but he was erect and his eyes were still as defiant as they had ever been. "Sasuke…" Naruto panted, "will…never…join…Orochimaru. We'll stop him…stop you."

"How is he standing?" Sakon asked as they again transformed into their second level.

"I don't know, but he won't be for long!"

Ukon shot forward like a bullet, fully expecting to impale Naruto on his metal hand.

Naruto's hand shot up and grabbed Ukon's, twisting it painfully. Ukon had to roll with it, lest he break his own wrist with his momentum. He landed flat on his back. "I won't let Sasuke join you," Naruto wheezed. "We won't let him." He staggered but broke into a run, sprinting straight at Sakon, who looked very apprehensive about Naruto's sudden adeptness.

Suddenly he stopped and staggered backwards, screaming in pain as something hit him hard from the inside. To Naruto's horror, Ukon's head sprouted from his shoulder, stretching grotesquely as it came out until it stood out from his shoulder like a bad pimple.

Ukon leered at him.

"Guess what, little fly?" he said, grinning. "You've stepped into our web."

Yes I know this is way late. Understand, though, I'm getting ready to graduate college and I'm sure you other alums out there know what that's like. In addition, some of my classes are starting to come down on us pretty hard with projects and that kind of thing coming due and finals are in two weeks...oh crap. Finals are in two weeks! Oh boy. This is gonna be fun.

Glossary

Doton: Doryuuha (Earth Style: Earth Flow Wave): It's a big wave of mud. Which was baked into clay. Nothing too special here.

Tsubaki no Mai (Dance of the Camellia): One of Kimimaro's attack routines involving his humurus bone as a sword and lots of stabbing. One of several 'dances' he uses.

Shihouhappou Shuriken (All Directions Shuriken): Naruto makes a lot of Kage Bunshin and they all throw shuriken. Much more frightening when you do the math on it. Each hand can hold four shuriken. Four times two is eight. Eight times...let's say we use Naruto's max (so far) of roughly two thousand clones. Two thousand times eight is sixteen thousand shuriken coming at you. All at once. Yeah, good luck dodging that.