Fragments
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Hurry up
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Sasuke watched breathlessly as Orochimaru rushed Naruto. He might not show it, but he felt terror for the first time since he had come here. The fourth had told him about Orochimaru, about just how dangerous the man had been. And how much it took out of the fourth to beat him.
Suddenly Orochimaru's direction changed, as two rasengan collided with his face and chest respectively.
He flew away in a tight spiral and slammed into a tree. Sadly it just spread more mud along the trees, as Orochimaru apparently had decided that attacking them directly would be a rather foolish move.
Another version of him stepped from the shadows and stared at Naruto in shock. "You... two rasengan... in less than a second..." He glared at Naruto, eyes filled with hatred.
Naruto smirked confidently. "Hey, maybe you would do better if you attacked us in your real form?" He taunted the monster. Sasuke wanted to say something, but Naruto had the right idea, they needed to face the real deal, if Sasuke or Sakura wanted to be of any use... no matter how terrifying that would be.
Orochimaru relaxed again. "You brats sure have a mouth on you." He looked at each in turn. "Not that you don't deserve that mouth I suppose. To crush my clones like this... to... force... me to fight like this. Impressive, very impressive. I came for the Uchiha, but maybe you would like to..." A kunai from Sakura ended this clone as well, as it slammed into his throat.
"No? A pity." His voice appeared directly behind Sasuke. He whirled around, kunai and sharingan ready. Orochimaru's head shot at him, at speeds a normal genin wouldn't even be able to comprehend, speeds even Sasuke would have had trouble following if he were really twelve.
However, he had fought Madara to a standstill, more or less, and even if his body couldn't quite keep up, his eyes could. The mangekyo flared for a second, draining most of Sasuke's chakra in one attack. Damn, he missed the Kyuubi. Still, Orochimaru recoiled in horror and screamed as he must have felt as if the black fire really had hit him. Sasuke couldn't waste what chakra he had on that though. Even a second of it would have drained him dry.
"That's the real one!" Naruto shouted, quite unnecessary really. Sakura had moved before Naruto even finished, just as Orochimaru used some sort of technique to escape the black fire he thought himself trapped in Sakura appeared to slam her kunai into his face. The force of the blow threw the head far, far away from her, far enough to give Naruto a shot at it with the a raseshuriken. Where had he learned that anyway? Without his father... oh wow, he had to develop it himself. Very impressive.
From his position he could see Orochimaru's eyes widen as the sphere of utter destruction barreled down on him. And the quick, cruel smile, just before it hit. He whirled around, searching for wherever the snake managed to hide. Sakura and Naruto also searched the area, not trusting the snake to die.
A second later a new form moved out of the forest, decidedly the worse for wear. "I must admit, this fight isn't like I expected at all. The amount of damage you managed to do..." He glanced at Sasuke. "The techniques you use." He smiled at them all, licking his lips. "I think I'll have to take you all in."
"Orochimaru!" Anko growled. Where had she come from? No matter, she could help them against him.
"Oh, Anko." He seemed amused. "Come to help the dear little genin take me down?" But Sasuke could see the annoyance written all over his face. Orochimaru couldn't stay anymore. With Anko as backup he couldn't hope to defeat them.
"You three get back, I'll deal with him." Anko growled, ignoring Orochimaru words.
He looked at her in surprise. "Oh? You aren't here to help them? Hmm how amusing."
Sasuke remained where he stood, no way would he let Anko fight Orochimaru on her own. Sakura and Naruto also stayed right were they were.
"What's wrong with you kids? Get out of here while yous till can!" Anko shouted at them.
Smirking Sasuke jumped beside her. "Nah, I couldn't in good conscience let my big sis fight that bastard on her own." He told her with a grin. Anko flinched for a second and seemed to stumble.
"Oh my, looks like she isn't used to such words. Regret returning to Konoha Anko? Why don't you join me again? I promise I'll take good care of you." Orochimaru smirked.
Naruto for his part frowned at Anko, thinking hard it looked like.
Anko stared at Sasuke. "What... what the hell?" She whispered. "I never... and what's with the fourth? And I never babysat you..." She shook her head. Clearly spooked by whatever just happened.
"Don't worry about it now, we have some snake bastard to kill." Naruto ordered.
"Hell yeah, I have this awesome idea for a human skin vest. I bet he'd make awesome material." Sakura shouted, once again using disturbing mental images as a weapon. He hoped that, that was what she was doing at least.
Orochimaru stared at them for a few seconds then sighed. "I guess I can't get you today." He glared at Sasuke. "And I doubt I could get you with a seal either and even if I could... you seem to have forgotten your mission, a pity that you would hold your clan in such poor memory."
Sasuke stared flatly at him. "That's all? A thinly veiled insult? That's all you can come up with? Geez, I honestly wonder how you managed to convince so many people to follow you."
Shrugging Orochimaru took a step back. "I'm better when I think there's an actual chance to sway the target. We'll see each other again though, don't ever forget that."
"Oh no! You don't!" Anko screamed, trying to follow him, but Naruto caught her before she even managed to take one step.
"Let him go, you can't beat him and I don't know if we all together could stop him if he wants to get away." He told her calmly.
Anko rounded on him. "You little bastard, let me go. I need to kill him, if your father had just taken me with him... I could have killed him, I should have killed him! And now here you are ruining... what the fuck am I talking about?" She recoiled and held her head, moaning. "I... the fourth never killed Orochimaru! He died sealing the fox into Naruto." She glanced at Naruto, just for confirmation of that fact.
Breathing heavily she looked at Sasuke. "And... and your father died in the massacre... not, not sealing the fox in you... what? What's going on? Why do I remember... why do I think I remember..." She sunk to her knees, still cradling her head. Shit, he had to do something about this breakdown.
"What's going on?" Sakura asked worriedly. "Is this what I think it is?" Sasuke ignored her, instead he sat down beside Anko and hugged her. Somehow that seemed to help.
"I dunno, bleed over from his world, the same happened with Ebisu." Naruto answered her. "But, that hadn't been anything like this. It's almost as if her memories are bleeding together..."
"Anko? It's alright big sis. I'm here for you." Sasuke whispered in her ear. Maybe, just maybe he could have his big sister back, his big sister, not somebody who looked a lot like her. He grimaced as he realized what he just thought. He couldn't do that to Anko, just because he wanted his version back he couldn't kill this version. He had already done it to himself, no need to add more victims to his headcount.
"I'm not... but... I..." Anko stammered, and whimpered as more memories seemed to invade her head. "That... that seems nice." She whispered. Sasuke had no idea what she remembered, but he had many happy memories of her. Ones where she laughed with him, Naruto and Sakura.
Ones where they laughed together, he had heard stories about Anko's pranks... maybe this wouldn't be outright murder? If she only gained the memories, but retained her old ones? Would it change her? Would it be so bad?
He continued to cradle the older woman. Naruto and Sakura remained alert for anything out of the ordinary.
"Shh. It will be alright." He whispered into Anko's ear. He remembered her doing something similar, when she had been drafted for babysitting duty the first time. So long ago... his mother had been so worried about Anko doing something to him, corrupting him. But Anko had been far too worried about doing something wrong for that to even be a danger.
"I... what's happening to me?" Anko whimpered. "I remember... I remember babysitting you like this." She smiled weakly. "I remember being so outraged that the fourth killed Orochimaru... I... why do I remember stuff like that. It's not real!"
"It is for me. Or was, till..." He trailed off.
Anko held on to him like a lifeline. What the hell just happened?
-o-
Naruto glanced at Anko and Sasuke. So the memory thing happened again. It just seemed to be much worse for Anko, who seemed to remember the stuff much more vivid than Ebisu had. He looked at Sakura who shrugged helplessly, she had no idea what went wrong either. Did she know about Ebisu? Probably not, she had actually been drunk that time after all.
But if that spread, if more and more people remembered more and more time-lines, then... well what did that mean? Would Orochimaru get memories of a time where he ruled the world? Would Sasuke get memories from Sakura's world and go crazy?
Would Sakura get some from his and go sane... saner?
Or would she stiffen up, look with panic stricken eyes at something on the forest floor and seem to be on the edge of a nervous break down?
He looked at the floor, nothing there. So why did she seem so panicked? "Sakura! What's wrong?"
She didn't take her eyes from the ground. "Don't you see that?" She asked, her panic making her voice tremble. "That hexapod on the ground! Don't you realize what that means?"
"There's nothing there Sakura." He tried to calm her down. For a second he thought it worked, but while Sakura calmed somewhat, for a second. She immediately had anther problem.
"Oh great, now I'm hallucinating as well. On top of being as crazy as I am normally." She glared at him. "And don't try to deny it. I know I'm crazy."
He hadn't actually planed on arguing that. Maybe that she had reasons to be that way, but not that she wasn't crazy. "Hey, it's just that encounter with Orochimaru, nothing more."
At least he hoped she just had a stress reaction. Because the implication if it turned out to be something else... he didn't want to think about it.
"Things sorted out? At least somewhat?" Sasuke asked Anko, loud enough for them to hear.
"I... yes, I think they are... geez time travel, weird memories... though I'm not really complaining. Most of these are pretty nice." Anko smiled down at Naruto and ruffled his hair. Then blinked in confusion and stared at her hand. Sasuke grinned widely.
"Good. We need to get out of here and talk to the Hokage. He needs to know that you have gotten all these memories." Sasuke said to her.
"He knows about the memories, or at least that it's possible." Naruto told them as he sat down beside them. "Ebisu had a similar experience."
They looked at him, all of them did. "And when were you going to tell us about that?"
"When we had some time and I thought about it. Seriously, it didn't seem that important with all the stuff going on. The Hokage knew about it. Shouldn't that be enough?" He defended himself.
Sakura nodded quickly. "I suppose that's enough, still we need to go and get out of here, this is giving me hallucinations."
All agreed and moved out and silence reigned between them all for a while. Anko seemed busy sorting out the new memories, occasionally smiling brightly as something particularly good happened to her.
"Oh... oh my... but Itachi is certainly good." She leered at one point. Naruto really wanted to say something, but from Anko he actually expected an observation like that. It fit her, like it didn't fit other people around him.
Soon they arrived at the tower. He could feel other genin already in there. He wondered how many travelers made it, after all they didn't have all that many non traveler groups to take the scrolls from.
He felt a bit bad about the groups from Konoha, if they stumbled upon a traveler group, they would have been beaten rather badly. Unless the traveler didn't have the chakra reserves and only massive chakra draining techniques. But really, who didn't have a few low level techniques? Even he had a few of those. And taijutsu should always be an option, especially with how fast they grew used to their bodies again.
Nobody waited for them around the tower, a combination of the few groups entered into the second exam and the speed with which they had reached the tower.
They entered and activated the scrolls. Instead of Iruka, Kakashi greeted them, just as planed. He looked at Anko in surprise. "Hmm what happened?" He sighed.
"I'm having memories of living in his world." Anko said, much calmer, now that she had some time to sort things out. "And damn... some of the stuff I know remember is totally weird. I mean Itachi not..." She glanced at Sasuke. "Not doing the stupid shit he did here? He's actually pretty cool... and sexy, definitely sexy." She looked down at Sasuke. "You know little brother. It's a pity I do consider you a little brother, otherwise I would so kidnap you and do unspeakable things to you." She smiled widely.
Sasuke smirked in response. "I wouldn't mind really, if I didn't consider you to be my big sister."
An eyebrow rose on Anko's face. "You know... that opens up quite the window of opportunity."
Sasuke, who had prepared to leave the room, to talk to Kakashi in private stopped moving. "Uhh... what opportunity?" He asked warily.
"Oh, you know? All the kink of incest with none of the social stigma." Anko giggled and snuggled up to him.
Naruto had to fight hard to not break out laughing as Sasuke locked up and froze on the spot. A second later Naruto asked himself why he fought laughing, Sakura didn't even try, Anko didn't try and Kakashi probably hid it beneath his mask. So he laughed right into Sasuke's face. "Bwahahaha, finally! Comeuppance for your perverted ways!"
"Finally! Revenge!" Anko agreed ready. "Never, ever mess with big sis, I thought I taught you that, twerp." Anko smirked, only to stop short. "Whu? I... oh shit. It's taking over!" She said shocked.
That brought them all up short. "We really need to see the Hokage then, this could be dangerous." Kakashi said, quickly ushering them on.
Anko shook her head, but didn't fight him. "No, that's not what I mean. What I mean is I liked that interaction in my memories, the friendship, the... " She swallowed the word. "Anyway, I want it to take over. I want to act that way. But it's not me, not exactly." She frowned, as they quickly walked through the tower. "Gah, I don't know how to explain it, it's weird having two different lives in your head. Especially if they are so different."
"I can't imagine." Kakashi muttered, looking at them all strangely.
Sakura hadn't said much since she saw whatever she had seen, she seemed very, very worried about it for some reason.
They entered a room somewhere in the tower, Naruto hadn't paid much attention the Hokage sat in the middle of it, reading a scroll and whatever he was reading, it seemed to worry him. As they entered he looked up. "Team seven." He sighed. "I'm hereby removing you from the exam and promote you to special jonin." They blinked, they hadn't expected that.
"Huh? What's wrong?" Sasuke asked. Sure they had expected that they wouldn't enter the last part of the exam, but at least the prelims... if they would even be held that is, they should have at least waited for them. Naruto agreed with Sasuke there, if that actually had been his objection.
Sakura looked bleakly at the scroll. "People are hallucinating things aren't they? Things that aren't really there. And not just a few people." She asked.
The Hokage looked at her sharply and nodded. "Not just that. Dreams, memories, all over Konoha... I got a messenger hawk with this scroll hours ago. The same happens in the capital, much more frequent than here, but that's mostly because there are more people there. And, now that more and more people experience it several ninja stepped up... they suffered from the same. It started about a week after you three left the academy."
He looked at them a tired frown on his face. "Orochimaru attacked you, so we can say with some certainty he hasn't been affected yet. But what happens if he is affected? And what does this mean?" He shook his head. "I'm too old to deal with this. I've already talked to Jirayia, he's made his way here a bit earlier than expected."
Naruto frowned. "He also had memories? What were they like?"
"Pretty much what you told us about your world, but there were a few deviations. Nothing major, maybe just the different perspective."
Naruto considered that, and looked at the old man. "What about the others affected, are they connected to us too?" He glanced at Kakashi, shouldn't he have gotten memories too then?
"No, most aren't and they don't remember much about you. One of them dreams about an assault on Sand, with a village hidden in the Silence." The old man told them. Sakura's eyes widened at that.
"It sounds like Temari's..."
Nodding the Hokage agreed with her. "Yes, that could fit with her description of Leaf attacking them. Or not, but there are a lot of different memories. Some are similar or the same, maybe distorted through their perspectives. I bet the other villages are the same. In any case, I'm too old to deal with this. We need Tsunade here... maybe she'll have memories too."
"Hopefully not from my world." Sakura whispered.
Sasuke glanced at Anko. "Could it be that it affects people close to us the most?" He asked.
Kakashi shook his head. "I would have been affected then, you used your techniques quite liberally around me, but I haven't had any strange dreams."
Anko shrugged. "I didn't have any either, not until I suddenly had the memories of another life shoved into my head."
Kakashi looked at her uncomfortably, then at Sakura. "Yes, well. I like my head the way it is, please, none of you get any strange ideas."
Sakura smirked at him. "Oh, but I liked that time when we were lovers, I'll always keep it in fond memories." She grimaced a second later. "On the other hand, I would prefer to spare you the shitty years before we were desperate, lonely and fucked up enough to fuck each other senseless captain."
Kakashi looked decidedly green. "I appreciate that Sakura." He nodded, slowly.
Anko stared at Sakura in something akin to... respect? It didn't matter, the Hokage cleared his throat.
"In any case. We need Tsunade here, we need somebody who's still young, still strong, to deal with this mess, before it becomes any worse." He explained. "We need to know what's happening... and if your... travels... had anything to do with it."
Naruto wanted to defend himself, say that he hadn't planed on going into the past, but he realized that the Hokage didn't mean it like that.
"Hey brat." Jirayia greeted him from behind. "So I heard you perfected the rasengan?"
Naruto whirled around, and tackle hugged the older man. Damn he had missed the pervert. "Hey, super pervert." He returned the greeting, fighting the tears.
Jirayia's hand fell on his head. "Something tells me I haven't remembered everything that happens to me in your world." He muttered. He nodded at Sakura neutrally. Sasuke got a quick glare, before he managed to reign it in.
"So, the old man tell me he needs Tsunade here to deal with this mess, and that you three should be able to find her." He grinned at them, trying not to show his resentment for Sasuke.
"Well, yeah. But that was before whatever is happening happened. Who knows where she is now. She might even be on her way to Konoha, like you for example." Sasuke added to the conversation.
"Or eaten by a freaking hexapod." Sakura muttered.
The Hokage nodded. "That's why you'll accompany Jirayia. He'll be able to track Tsunade even if your memory proves wrong."
And keep an eye on them of course. Naruto thought to himself. Jirayia seemed a bit subdued, strangely enough. Naruto wondered why, if he didn't remember dying, why would he feel bad about anything?
"We don't have much time. Several packs have been readied for you. You'll leave as soon as possible. Anko, Kakashi. I don't have to mention that you won't lose a word about this." The Hokage said. Both nodded quickly. "Good. And to you, good luck. I'll have to deal with the fallout in the village." He stood up.
Sakura suddenly spoke up. "It's not just hallucinations is it?" She asked, dread filling her voice.
With a sigh the old man let himself fall down into the chair again. "It's nothing bad, but today there was a new stall at the market, it belonged to nobody, in fact, nobody could even remember seeing it built. But it came fully equipped."
Silence reigned. If a stall could suddenly appear, what else could? Sakura whimpered.
-o-
Sakura followed Jirayia and the boys, as they walked ahead of her, apparently without a worry in the world. Or maybe they just were better at hiding it. For her part, she jumped at every shadow, just like back home. Always worried that some sort of monster would jump out of the trees and kill her. Her and her teammates.
Of course this was silly. Even if a monster did somehow appear, it would die to them far faster than they would die to it. Hell, with Jirayia here they had enough power to thrash anything but a freaking army of hexapods. Nothing she could think of would be able to touch them, but still she worried. If only one hexapod made it soon there would be more. Those freaky things just never seemed to stop making more of themselves.
"Sakura, would you calm down? You are freaking all of us out." Naruto complained, loudly. She wanted to tell him to shut up and be quite, before they heard them, but stopped herself. There weren't any monsters, not yet at any rate.
"Sorry, just. I'm still freaked out about the stall just appearing out of nowhere." She confessed. The Hokage had ushered them out as fast as possible, citing the need to prepare for Tsunade and a lot of other things. She didn't envy him. With all this going on he had just gained a monstrous workload.
If only paperwork was the worst of it. But he had to make decisions, which would be much, much worse than pushing paper around.
"And that hallucination?" Sasuke asked worriedly.
"Yeah, that too. What if one of those things comes here? They multiply! All on their own. What if Hinata gets the memories of my Hinata? What if they drive her insane and she does it too?" She realized she was panicking and crushed the fear ruthlessly. She couldn't afford to worry panic if this happened.
"We are in a very different situation though." Jirayia pointed out. "Not only are Naruto and Sasuke not defecting, they are stronger than ever. There's no earth shattering war that drives the other villages into raiding etc." He smiled reassuringly at her. "Really, the entire political situation is far different from your home. I doubt something like that can happen here."
"I would just like to point out that we have other realities apparently influencing this one." Sakura glared at him. "Can you imagine what amount of chaos that could mean?"
Jirayia grimaced, oh yeah he could and he tried to distract her from it. "I know, and we need to find a solution. But fretting over it doesn't help. It doesn't help at all."
Sakura sighed and hung her head. "I'm sorry, but back home, paranoia kept me alive... or maybe better hyper-paranoia."
"I figured as much." Jirayia said, giving her a weak grin. "But it will only make things harder here."
"There's the village, Tsunade left it just a day or two before we arrived here last time... we are probably early this time though." Naruto spoke up, pointing at the small city.
"We'll ask around for her. I assume you all can gather information?" Sakura nodded, not the way he gathered them, hanging out in brothels and the like, but she could gather information. Sasuke and Naruto nodded as well.
"Ok, then we split up, each of us searches a different part of the city." Jirayia pulled out a map and showed them their assigned sectors. "If you find a hint of Tsunade just try to confirm it, we meet here in the evening." He pointed at a hotel.
Again all three nodded. "Ok, then get going."
Sakura jumped up and jogged into the city, where Naruto and Jirayia would ask people more or less openly, Sakura preferred to trust her own senses and her ability to stay hidden.
She briefly wondered how Sasuke gathered information, probably whored himself out to pretty women, similar to Jirayia and Naruto, the only difference being he got paid for it, while Naruto and Jirayia had to pay.
She quickly found herself around the worst part of town, the rundown little shops, the stink of sex, disease and poverty. She rushed from building to build always listening for anything that could give her a hint that Tsunade had already made her way here and proceeded to lose a lot of money.
But nobody whispered about the Legendary Sucker and Sakura had to ask Tsunade this time. That nickname couldn't just be about the gambling right? It had to be about...
"Damn, that dream's been disturbing." Somebody muttered. She didn't recognize the voice, but the subject matter hit a bit too close to home.
"Another one of those?" Another voice asked.
"Yeah, again with the weird woman running all over the town screwing everybody to death."
Sakura looked at the building the two men talked, that better be just a strange wet dream, because if that actually happened in a reality and if that reality somehow were transported into this she would officially declare the universe insane and work on ending the world herself.
"Weird man, how often did that happen then?" The second voice asked.
"Third time this year." Came the answer and Sakura lost all interest, just a wet dream then, good. She wouldn't have to end the world for reality being stupid. She might have to kill the freak in there for being more disturbed than her, but not the entire world.
-o-
"She isn't here yet." Sakura told them as they sat down in the evening.
Sasuke nodded, he had concluded that as well. Nobody had lost a lot of money in the city of late, especially not a pretty woman.
Jirayia nodded as well. "Yes, however I talked to somebody who heard about her a few days travel from here. There's some sort of sickness in that town and some woman showed up and started healing the people there."
"Makes sense. That would explain the money she lost here last time." Naruto agreed.
"So, we stay the night and move to the town tomorrow?" Sakura asked.
"Seems like a good idea, there's one obvious road to the town, so even if they move here tomorrow we should stumble over them." Jirayia agreed. "And if they move somewhere else, we need to go to the town anyway to follow them."
"Good, I need some sleep." Sasuke yawned, talking to so many people always drained him. He didn't mind talking to strangers, but it just got annoying pretty fast if you had the same conversation over and over again.
"Ok, we get up at dawn tomorrow then." Jirayia instructed them, he acted, unconsciously, as if they needed babysitting, or maybe the Hokage told him to keep an eye on them? In either case that was also annoying. But Sasuke didn't mention it, not worth the hassle.
Soon they all were ready to sleep. Jirayia hadn't bothered getting two rooms. Sakura didn't exactly care who saw her naked and both him and Naruto were mature enough not to freak out. Though how Jirayia knew about that... eh, probably asked Kakashi.
They laid down and went to sleep. As soon as Sakura's head hit her pillow she was out. Sasuke kinda envied her that skill, to instantly fall asleep. He couldn't do that, he could enter a kind of daze, when he needed to get some quick rest, but not real sleep. Jirayia also could just make himself fall asleep.
Sasuke looked at Naruto in the weak light of the moon. The other boy laid there, eyes still open, staring at the ceiling. Shuffling his futon a bit he moved closer to Naruto.
"It's kinda unfair, the way they can just fall asleep like that isn't it?" He asked, just to make some noise. He wanted to, needed to talk about what was happening.
"Heh, yeah." Naruto agreed.
"What do you think? What's going on?" Sasuke asked quietly.
"I have no idea. All I know is that it's not good... and it might be our fault." Naruto answered, his voice tired, though not from lack of sleep.
"Think we can do anything about it?"
Naruto slowly shook his head. "Maybe, if we knew more about what's happening."
Sakura whimpered silently in her futon. Both of them looked at her, but neither moved. Sakura wouldn't appreciate being woken by them.
"But as it is." Naruto continued, after Sakura went quiet again. "We aren't getting Tsunade because she can do anything. We are getting her because she's younger and can deal with the stress of reality collapsing around her better than the third... not much better though."
Nodding Sasuke stared at the ceiling. "You would be a better choice then."
Naruto shuffled slightly a humorless snort escaped him. "But nobody would want me in the position. Not yet. I've done nothing to really inspire people. Sure I got points for catching Haku and Zabuza. But that's not enough to justify giving me the position. And time-travel won't make people more confident in me."
He had a point there, sadly. Sakura whimpered again, he could see her hold a bottle, hugging it almost like a safety line.
"So, we are calling Tsunade to make sure there's a Konoha left for you to rule then?" Sasuke tried to joke.
"Hehe, probably." Naruto chuckled, though the fact that it just might be true...
"Ino." Sakura cried out, not loud enough to wake Jirayia, but more than loud enough to catch their attention. Sasuke could see tears run down her face.
"Damn... she's so goddamn confident when she's awake, but she breaks down in her sleep." Sasuke whispered. Then again, he had seen behind her facade a few times now. All the aspects of her personality screamed broken. But she didn't have anybody she could trust in, nobody to really confide in, nobody to heal her.
Naruto stood up, grabbed his futon and moved it right next to Sakura's. In a move that would be suicide to anybody else, anybody who couldn't regenerate a punctured lung at least. And geez there was a disturbing image. Him attempting to kill Naruto.
Sakura woke up as soon as Naruto had flopped his futon down and her kunai immediately went for Naruto's throat. Naruto had barely been able to deflect the blade. Instead he moved into a hug, effectively immobilizing Sakura.
Sakura seemed shocked for a second, but somehow she relaxed. And then the waterworks went on and she cried into Naruto's chest, holding onto him as if he were the only thing keeping her standing, maybe he was.
Sasuke moved behind her unsure what he would do, but suddenly he found himself dragged into the hug. "Don't... don't even do that again, don't defect, don't go insane. Please don't do it. I couldn't... I couldn't go on. I can barely go on as it is. Most of the time I just want to crawl into a dark place, and drink myself to death." She whispered into Naruto's chest. "I just... this is..." She hiccuped, unsure how how to go on. "If these things from my world show up... we need you. You two, you are the only people I know who could stop them. If you... if you go join them. If you disappear, then Ino and Kakashi and Lee and Kiba and Neji and, and, and..." She sobbed into Naruto's shirt and dragged both of them onto the ground with her.
Awkwardly he slipped his arms around her. He wanted to say something, anything. But nothing came to mind. He wanted to rock her back and forth, but the inclusion of Naruto in the hug made that impossible, so they just sat there, while Sakura cried. Pouring out all the pain she carried with her. Naruto didn't look much better. He soundlessly opened his mouth and closed it, again and again. Searching for anything to make it better, but failing. He looked ready to cry himself actually.
After ten minutes it seemed Sakura had calmed down, at least the crying stopped, but she didn't let go of them if anything she held on tighter. "Don't go, please don't go." She whispered.
"We won't." Naruto promised, finally having found something to say. Sasuke nodded, she might not be his girlfriend, she might never be. But she was his teammate and his friend, no matter what happened and how she acted.
"Let's get back to sleep." He said and tried to let go, somehow Sakura managed to grip him harder.
"NO! Please, I... I don't want to dream." She cried.
Naruto coughed. "Well we'll be able to hug again once we are on the ground, but we need to move the futons just a bit closer." He explained, squeezing her shoulder reassuringly.
"I... yes, of course." Sakura took a deep breath and let them go, watching as if she expected them to disappear now, that she had dared to let go. Watching them like a hawk, watching for that betrayal she expected from them.
Instead he and Naruto moved their futon right next to hers and laid down again, Sakura between them. When she drew them against her he honestly expected some lewd remark, but she simply laid her head on his chest and closed her eyes.
He looked at Naruto, who shrugged weakly. He didn't really get it either. Soon Sakura had fallen asleep again. This time no whimpers escaped her, she simply smiled, sometimes drawing Naruto closer to her, sometimes Sasuke. Always making sure they didn't stray too far from her.
"Well, this is kinda uncomfortable." Naruto whispered.
"Yes." Sasuke replied. "Not that bad though."
"Not bad, just... I wouldn't want to go to sleep like this often." Naruto agreed.
"Jirayia didn't wake up?" Sasuke asked, slowly petting Sakura's head. He couldn't see Jirayia's futon from his position.
"He's gone, probably wanted to give us some privacy here." Naruto reported.
"Good, well... let's get some sleep.. and hope she doesn't kill us in the morning." Sasuke joked.
"I don't think we have to worry about that anymore." Naruto grinned back, though he seemed doubtful. Just because Sakura showed a moment of vulnerability right after a nightmare, didn't mean she wouldn't return to her persona the next morning.
-o-
He had been right, Sakura shortly after waking up had returned to her brash, insulting and perverted persona. He also noticed however that her alcohol consumption had been reduced by roughly twenty percent. He counted that as a major victory. Though he supposed she could just be conserving her resources.
They were on the road, making good time, training as much as possible, throwing punches and kicks at each other, while maintaining a good speed. Actually after a, more or less, good night of sleep the urgency they all had felt yesterday had worn off. Reality was still in danger of unraveling, but they couldn't really do anything about it. At least for now, so why worry about it?
They could find Tsunade, they could train and they would focus on that, instead of doom and gloom in form of the probable end of the world. Especially Sakura seemed to be cheerful this morning. Repressing that thought with all the might of her considerable mind.
They didn't meet anybody on the road, or better anybody important. They met a few travelers with good news. Tsunade still remained in the village and would probably remain for at least a week longer. The sick were recovering, but there were some people from the surrounding villages who came in every day or two, who also needed to be healed. The initial flood had slowed to a trickle however and soon nobody would be coming anymore. Or at least people thought so. Tsunade would move on once she had enough money and no serious injuries remained though, whether people came for help or not.
They reached the village late in the evening, tired, worn and beat up. Sakura didn't even have enough chakra left to heal herself. But that just meant they had an excuse to go to Tsunade, not that they needed one, but having one was nice.
Quickly they found themselves in a large building, maybe a barn or something. A lot of people were laid out on pallets, some moaning quietly, but most people simply seemed to be recovering from whatever it was that hit them.
Tsunade strode through them, uncaring of the occasional bloody pallet. Which answered the question of whether or not she had been affected by whatever was happening. She had been affected, the only question that remained was whether this would be good, or bad.
"Hello Tsunade. It's been a while." Jirayia greeted her. She sighed and looked up at him. When her eyes fell on Naruto they widened. She glared at him, as expected and she nearly wept at the sight of Sakura.
-o-
Ino suppressed the scream she nearly let lose as her eyes flew open. She had another dream, this one far less nebulous than the others, most of the others. Just like the last few dreams she could remember a few bits of this dream... bits she really would rather forget. She wasn't interested in Sakura that way! Not at all! So there was no way, she would have sex with her!
She looked around the forest. Shikamaru had taken first watch and lazily scanned every approach to their hideout. Not that she expected many people to still be around and hunt them. On the first day this team from rain showed up and their leader just walked up grinned at them, spike his killing intent, nothing like Sakura's, but still damn scary and took their scroll. They hadn't been able to do anything. He just walked in grinned at them and took the scroll.
Since then they stumbled upon a few other teams with similar experiences. The team from sound had just stared at them and muttered something about freaky high speed girls. They seemed glad to still be alive. She would have expected them to have met Sakura, but they mentioned a blond girl, not pink haired. So that had been out.
Either way, they were out. Only one day remained of the second task and they hadn't found one other team with a scroll. General consensus amongst the teams they encountered had been that a few teams had been so overwhelmingly powerful they had simply taken every scroll available and gone on to the tower. What remained where the normal teams, strong, but not nearly strong enough to stand against those super teams.
And since Ino had slept in Sakura's arms, just before the exam she had those weird freaky sex dreams about Sakura. They weren't even pretty in them. In fact both her and Sakura were really ugly. Scars and sometimes open wounds were the norm, their hair had been cut or burned off! But then, the sex had been strange, nothing like she ever imagined, even when she idly fantasied about what it would be like with a woman.
It felt more... like a way to be close to each other, more like a hug than sex really. But it definitely was sex and thinking about it weirded Ino out so she stopped and banished all thoughts about the matter out of her head.
She looked at their watch, nearly time for her to take over anyway. "Hey! Shika, my turn." She whispered at him. Just because no humans were, probably, out to get them anymore didn't mean that the animals weren't still out to get them.
He nodded and wordlessly left his place. "Anything happen?" She asked and stretched.
"I thought I saw a weird thing... eight legs really large, lots of claws, but it disappeared without any trace, must have imagined it. Or it's really good at hiding." He shrugged. "In either case not much we can do about it."
Ino nodded and took her position. She had never heard about a creature like that, but with the forest the way it was, somebody had probably strapped swords on a giant spider. Why anybody would do that she had no idea, but she bet somebody had thought about it.
-o-
Orochimaru sneezed as he walked back to his base. This fight really had freaked him out. Those children had been far stronger than he had expected. In addition Kabuto's defection and his disrespect. Something had changed, something fundamental, but he couldn't place his finger on what had changed. And why.
But he would have to find out and soon, or all his plans would fail, no doubt about that at all. Maybe he would even have to scrap the invasion totally. And he really didn't want to do that, he had invested far too much time into it. But if other ninja from Konoha had gained such a boost, if other allies had decided to betray him, it would end up in an unmitigated disaster.
No, he couldn't risk that, he would need to double check all his plans, as annoying as that would be. And if he found some serious flaws... he would have to stop the invasion, no way around that. Only if that proved to be necessary though, only then. He could salvage this he just knew he could.
-o-
Kabuto smiled as he watched the adorable little critters frolic through the woods. Truly they were magnificent creatures. Elegant, strong, communicative and deadly. It slashed it's claw at at a tree and managed to cut it in two, behind it another of it's kind ran around sniffling for prey.
Sadly no prey would be around anytime soon, these creatures were, for now, trapped between the worlds. He could let them out, but it would drain a considerable amount of his power and in time they would break out anyway, so Kabuto didn't really consider it.
What he did consider were the implications of their existence. In this new world they would cause quite the havoc, he had no doubt. The only question was, did he want them to cause it?
Certainly he enjoyed human suffering quite a bit. But to have suffering to enjoy you needed humans, if these things spread too far, too fast there wouldn't be many humans left soon. A lot of suffering true, but Kabuto could think farther ahead than a few years, he had been around for a long time after all. No, these things should stay where they were for now. In fact, he watched as a statue crossed over, this development endangered his plans considerably, he hadn't counted on the world to become so accessible.
"What to do? What to do?" He asked himself and turned back to his captive, one of Sasori's underlings. "So, tell me. What do you know about your master?"
-o-
"Jirayia." Tsunade sighed. "I honestly didn't think you would show up so soon... and with them in tow."
"And I didn't expect you to be over your fear of blood." He replied. "Anything we can do to help?"
She glared at Sasuke. "You can get him out of here, I don't deal with..."
"He's not like you remember." Naruto quickly defended Sasuke. "He hasn't betrayed Konoha ever."
"He did it twice." Tsunade growled. "Don't defend the little bastard."
Sakura chuckled weakly. "He's not that Sasuke, not even close." She added to Sasuke's defense.
"It's alright, if she doesn't want me here, I'll leave. Konoha needs her... maybe the whole world." Sasuke smiled serenely at Tsunade. It seemed to shake even the hard woman.
"I... fine he can stay, I suppose I can't blame him for bad dreams." Tsunade grumbled. "And I suppose Haruno can go and help the guys over there, they are over the worst. I assume these dreams affect you too?" She asked.
They looked at each other. "Depends on which dreams." Naruto said, peering at one patient, he looked pretty bad, but overall he seemed to recover. "In my world things worked out more or less ok, in her world... not so much."
Tsunade nodded and frowned in slight confusion when Naruto mentioned worlds. "Yes, then she gets to tend to those who are recovering. There's no way I'll let her near a critical case, hell even if she remembered every medical technique I taught her, I wouldn't trust her with the critical cases."
"I don't remember volunteering." Sakura sneered, but she did move towards the sick.
"So, can I assume you want me to come back and become Hokage? Before Orochimaru kills the third?"
"More or less, though it has more to do with the general situation than that." Jirayia confirmed. "We aren't the only people affected."
"No really? The entire country is affected, the rich as well as the poor. It's a small wonder there hasn't been a panic. Dreams, memories, some people act totally different than before... that number is small though, very small. Mostly ninja." Tsunade explained.
"Uhh, how do you know about that?" Sasuke asked, how had she heard from all those people?
Tsunade rolled her eyes. "I'm a healer. You'd be surprised just what people are willing to tell us while we make sure they survive another night." She turned back to Jirayia. "Fine, I accept. I suspect I couldn't go against his wishes anyhow." She pointed at Naruto.
In the background a man screamed as Sakura did something painful to him. Tsunade didn't seem bothered. In fact, she seemed to approve. "Hit him harder if he tries again, if you have to break bones don't hesitate, I can just knit them back together." She shouted at Sakura. Ten seconds later another pained scream could be heard, just after the sickening crunch of breaking bones.
Sasuke winced, but if he read the situation right the pervert had it coming.
Jirayia in the meantime had stared at Tsunade. "Uhh... that... I honestly expected this to be harder." He confessed. "Not that I'm complaining, but I somehow feel disappointed. I thought maybe we would have some sort of training done, an awesome duel with Orochimaru and, you know. Something more exciting than, 'yes I'll do it.'"
Tsunade raised an eyebrow. "If you have the memories as well, then didn't we do this already?"
Jirayia's and Naruto's shoulders slumped in defeat. "Yes." Both muttered at once. Apparently Naruto also wanted a repeat.
"Hmm... how did you know about Sakura anyway? And you said something about me defecting twice?" Sasuke interjected.
Glaring at hi Tsunade moved on to the next patient. "I've actually got two sets of memories, one I guess from the same world she got her memories from... and I really don't like to think about that one. It's... painful, very painful. And one from his place." She smiled fondly. "I like that one. I like it very much. There are painful parts there too. But for the most part it's nice."
Naruto nodded eagerly. "I know right? In the end everything worked out more or less alright... well beside the part where the pervert here died. But he won't do that here." He narrowed his eyes at Jirayia. "Hear that pervert, no dieing."
"I'm not planning to brat." Came the swift reply.
"Yeah, no Icha Icha books would be a real loss." Sakura confirmed after she had made her round. "Where's your apprentice anyway Tsunade?" She asked. "Wouldn't she be better for this? I mean I've only been training under you for a month or so."
"Shizune is resting, this plague is pretty bad, can't remember ever seeing anything like it actually. Going by the new memories, this hadn't been nearly so bad the last time I came through her. Just the common cold, maybe a bit stronger." Tsunade answered.
Sasuke frowned, he didn't like the sound of that. Glancing at Naruto and Sakura they didn't seem to like it much either.
"So, what do you think happened?" Sakura asked.
"Well, logically there are several different explanations." Tsunade answered. "One. This world is different from yours and the sickness is simply stronger. Two, it has somehow crossed from a different world. Or three, somebody made is stronger, for whatever twisted reason."
She finished with the last patient and gestured for them to follow her. "In either case, we can only do our best and hope it's enough." The walked through the building and up some stairs, shortly reaching a cozy little office overlooking the entire area. In a corner Shizune and Tonton were sleeping.
Tsunade grabbed a bottle of sake and poured each of them a cup. Sakura eagerly grabbed hers and downed it in one gulp, holding it out for Tsunade to refill. Sasuke looked somewhat skeptical at his.
Grinning Tsunade took a sip from her own cup. "What? You should be old enough to drink shouldn't you?" She asked.
Naruto also hadn't touched his cup. "Not really." He answered and glanced at Sakura. "She shouldn't drink. Honestly the only reason nobody says anything is because she doesn't actually seem drunk. And nobody tells ninja they aren't allowed to drink of course."
"Eh, they do actually. If they have to tell you. If they can claim they didn't see you though..." She chuckled and downed a new cup.
Jirayia only sipped on his cup. "Nobody's gonna think bad of you for drinking one cup." He told them, then turned to Tsunade. "Are you sure you want to become Hokage? This isn't something you should do just because dream you did it. You have to want the job."
Looking at Shizune Tsunade nodded. "I know, but Jirayia, have you seen the country? Really seen it? Have you listened to the people?" She stared at him, as he shifted around, uncomfortably. "I have, these memories and dreams. They unnerve people. Hell they unnerve you!" She stared into the alcohol in her cup. "Something needs to be done. Somebody has to find a way to stop whatever is happening. And if I want to stop it I need power, power the Hokage might have, power I don't have as just Tsunade."
Sasuke had to agree with her, that made quite a bit of sense.
"We don't know anything about what's happening. Sakura is the only one who might have an idea. But she didn't pay attention when things were explained to her." Naruto offered the bleak position they had found themselves in.
Tsunade nodded. "I've thought that would be the case. Well, my first order as Hokage would be for somebody to find out what the hell happened, and how to stop it from happening. Wait, didn't pay attention when things where explained to her? What do you mean?" Tsunade looked at him with narrowed eyes.
"Oh, well. In our case it's not exactly dreams... or even memories... uhh I think?" Naruto looked at his teammates.
"Well, the transfer should be fairly complete, memories, personality etc." Sakura shrugged. "But it could be that if we just transfer memories that's already the case, so who knows."
Naruto nodded. "Well, our memories are way better than most others I suspect."
Frowning, Tsunade looked at them closely. "Again, what do you mean?" She almost growled.
"What he wants to say is, that we remember traveling from our home worlds here." Sasuke explained. "We don't know if it's just memories or something more that had been send here though." Mostly because they avoided thinking about it. But if they were merely memories then they didn't kill the kids they were before, just... gave them another perspective...
"So you are saying this whole mess is your fault then?" Tsunade asked, her face dangerously blank.
Jirayia shook his head. "I doubt it, from what we saw at the chunin exam they weren't the only ones. And nobody can tell who came back first. That might be the real culprit. Or somebody from this side might be manipulating things, trying to pull something from another world."
Team seven looked at each other. "Madara." They muttered as one. "If anybody would try something stupid like that it would be him." Sakura said. "He has a flair for stupid and overly elaborate plans. Loves them to death."
"How would you know?" Tsunade asked, glaring at Sakura for the first time, since the girl entered her vision.
"Because he offered me a way out of that hellhole. I'm twenty five... or something close to that, didn't exactly keep time the last few years." Sakura grinned right back at Tsunade, who sunk into her chair.
"Good god, twenty five years... in that world? You... how did you survive?" She looked shaken, far more shaken than Sasuke had expected, he thought he understood, but if Tsunade reacted like that...
"Luck. Luck and friends willing to die for me." Sakura muttered, grabbing the bottle and emptying it in one gulp.
Tsunade nodded. "Yeah, I... I can see that." She stared at her hands. "And I suppose I can understand why you would be working for Madara, can't be worse than Danzo, that bastard is just as bad as him, if not worse."
"Another reason for you to become Hokage, we can't allow Danzo to take that position. Not now, not ever." Jirayia agreed.
Tsunade shot him a glare. "I agreed already, no need to try and make me want to take the job anymore."
He shrugged. "Sorry, I had that argument prepared and all. I wanted to use it too."
"Ok, so once we are done here you return and we start looking for Madara, we should be able to find him relatively easy right? I mean we practically know where his bases are." Sasuke put in.
Tsunade once again glared at him, but got herself under control very fast. "Sounds like the best plan we have at the moment, except for one minor detail. Who do you think can actually take Madara here?"
Sasuke opened his mouth to answer, but closed it again, he glanced at Naruto who coughed into his hand. Even Sakura looked elsewhere. Sasuke looked back at Tsunade. "Uhh... you know I hadn't thought that far ahead."
Chuckling Jirayia rolled his eyes. "You three are good... no better than good, you three are incredible. But against somebody like Madara, I fear your bodies lack the power to take him on. It's a small miracle you could keep Orochimaru occupied as long as you did."
Naruto snorted. "Not really, if he had just shown himself we would have had him."
Raised eyebrows met that remark. "Ok, maybe he would have been very stupid to face us head on after this, still... we could take him."
Shaking her head Sakura turned back to the two Sanin. "We'll need to train obviously, but we also need to stop whatever is happening." She grimaced. "If it can be stopped. I'm worried that whatever happened, it's only going to get worse."
Looking at Jirayia and Tsunade they shared that fear. And now that Sakura had said it, Sasuke felt the same fear come over him as well. Naruto seemed unaffected at first glance, but Sasuke could see the tiny frown, the fine lines on his face that said he didn't like this at all.
"Well, even if it does get worse, we'll just make the best of it. At the moment it looks as if everybody who came through is good right?" Naruto grinned, trying to take away the heavy atmosphere. Sadly he failed.
"At the moment. What happens if either of you suddenly gets the memories of my Sasuke or Naruto?" Sakura asked. And suddenly her eyes widened as she realized what she just said. She rounded on them almost immediately. "And don't take that as an invitation, because if you do I'll fucking kill you!" She shouted in their faces, produced a new bottle of sake, this time from her own stash and emptied it immediately.
Though Sasuke had a feeling that she would do something to herself right after she killed them. Hmm, if that were the case he should get Ino to intervene if there was so much as a hint that he would become Sakura's Sasuke.
"Understood." He told her seriously.
Naruto grimaced in the background. "No way!"
Tsunade pinched her nose. "You brats give me a headache and I'm not just talking about the memories. Why don't you go to bed? We'll talk more in the morning."
Sasuke nodded, that couldn't hurt, could it?
Sakura pulled out her sleeping bag and another bottle, she held as if her life depended on it and pushed herself into one corner of the room. Soon she had fallen fast asleep, her back against the wall. Naruto and Sasuke himself had opted to sleep closer to Shizune, where they had a better view of the warehouse and they were the farthest away from Sakura. Even though Sasuke didn't know whether she would like that or not.
With the newest revelation however, maybe giving her a bit of space for herself would be best. If she had new nightmares and woke up from them, they could still go over to her.
-o-
Kabuto frowned as he sat on the roof above the Konoha nin. On the one hand closing whatever pulled the various memories and creatures from where ever they came would also prevent anybody from following him.
On the other it meant that the fear and confusion gripping these lands would stop as well. And that meant he would have less fun.
He looked at his hands, until a third appeared. On the third hand, whoever made these rips in reality, if somebody indeed did make them and they weren't just a natural part of traveling to parallel worlds, would be extremely powerful, maybe powerful enough to challenge even Kabuto. And that just wouldn't do, he liked being the strongest monster around these parts.
Hmm, decisions decisions. The third hand disappeared again. In any case, before he could make any decisions of this magnitude he needed more information and that meant searching out Madara.
He grinned, if Madara wasn't the one behind this and he hadn't gotten an extreme power up, then annoying him should be fun.
After all, just messing with the "good" guys got so boring after a while. They just stopped reacting and went and died... they just couldn't take playing rough.
-o-
Well, I hope the fight against Orochimaru wasn't too disappointing. But he's not stupid enough to face off against all three of them and Anko, while he doesn't have a clear idea what they are capable of.
In any case, to prevent myself from burning out and deteriorating my writing quality even further I'm going on vacation, no more chapters for two weeks.(Well, one more chapter of expectations)
After that it's only one chapter per week since 20k words a week are hell on me and will burn me out sooner rather than later.