AN

DarkRavie: Any chapter where I'm just baiting to something bigger is always good, snicker

Caliko: so your fav is Ita and second is Dei? Ouch- Dei isn't long for this fic- even if he lasts against Kakashi he has almost NO chance against Ka, Saku, AND Ita… But hopefully I'll have enough of an abundance of bad boys once all the characters are introduced and moving…

Serenity Maxwell: That's good to hear, returning readers are a necessity- hehe. Anyway, once this battle is over I can start introducing the ramp up to full scale war on Akatsuki.

Dang, this story is on 6 C2s now, and it's over 7k hits- SWEET, also, I now own a PS2, and much sleep will be lost- once can stand my roommates enough to spend time in my room enough to enjoy it…

End AN

Kurenai turned to Hinata, "What do you see?"

"It's strange; this guys chakara flow is abnormal-"

"He's got five hearts-" Anko started.

"Four," Itachi yelled over.

"Damn brats," Kakuzu muttered. Letting his body all but fly apart as pieces of him moved in different directions, and four odd masses with masks, two of them began making seals, a ball of fire and lightning merged together and launched towards Shino, who jumped absurdly high even for a chakara assisted jump, as he came down he ran into melee with Kakuzu. Kakuzu pulled himself into one general body again and parried each of Shino's punches, finally taking both fists and ramming them into Shino's abdomen, sending him flying back. Kiba ran quickly and caught him by the arms before he could crash into the ground. Yet Shino smiled as Kiba helped him to his feet. Shino turned to Hinata who smiled and nodded in reply. This time she ran foreword and brought Kakuzu into Melee.

"What is this," he chuckled as came into Melee range, "Wear me down one at a time so the last can finish me off?"

Hinata's eyes went white as she re-activated the Byakugan. Kakuzu suddenly recognized her eyes and took a more serious stance, "I haven't fought a Byakugan in ages," he smiled, "You'll find my 'usual' structure to be a little harder to follow." To demonstrate a mask flew from his back forming a humanoid shape, from it began to form a series of seals. Hinata did her best to keep Kakuzu's attention on her aggressive assault, and still keep an eye on the earth chakara that was building by the mask. She jumped away just as Kakuzu finished his jutsu and moved to use it. Kakuzu turned to follow with a bit of shock. Hinata's attacks now grew more steady, testing his defenses, she was feeling him out, he realized. This young brat might be serious challenge-

Suddenly Kakuzu felt a pain shooting through his body- his heart- his heart of wind was dying- something was eating it away- 'Chakara insects' But as he realized this his attention slipped. Hinata made her move, with lightning speed and eerie precision, she hit- not with punches, with soft touches, piercing chops, and full hand shoves. Kakuzu coughed up blood- she'd sealed off one of his hearts- it was still beating- but being cut off from the rest of his body, his heart of earth literally fell off, mask and all, and began to shrivel.

Just as Kakuzu began to suspect, Anko made her move, slipping in with an assassin's stealth and stabbing him with one of her kunai, she plunged it into his body and- not hitting the heart where it should have been- twisting the blade until it made contact- now his heart of fire stopped beating.

Kakuzu pulled himself away, only to turn and face Kiba and Akumaru glowing with red chakara from soldier pills. They both snarled like rabid dogs, putting two hands together he plunged them into his chest and pierced his heart of lightning. Kakuzu fell to one knee, bile and bile spilling from his open mouth. His forehead touched the ground, and his body stopped moving.

The shriveled heart of earth rolled to one side, portions on that side manipulated at the earth like caterpillar feet. Slowly crawling away unnoticed.

itITitITit

Itachi was amazed at the speed with which Sakura worked, in less than a minute his slashed arm was healed, and in only another minute, he was feeling stronger. She finished by putting everything back into her pack, "Naruto knew- didn't he, from the beginning?"

She didn't look up when she asked him, and she refused to still, she wanted to hear the words. She knew Sasuke had left to gain the strength to kill him, yet she was now confronted with evidence that he wasn't the bad guy. "I'm sorry, it wasn't planned in advance, we merely took the opportunity at hand, and used it, Sasuke was caught in the middle."

"But shouldn't you have had some idea what would have happened to Sasuke, the pain he was put through, his need for revenge-"

"Should be rightly aimed at Akatsuki itself, not me." With that Itachi took off his Akatsuki cloak at last, and dropped it on the ground, as well as the ring.

kaKAkaKAka

Kakashi had all but watched as Deidara thought he was tricking Kakashi, placing bombs into the earth as he made rushing attacks at Kakashi, then hit the ground as he moved back. It was time to demonstrate. Just as Itachi took off his cloak and walked over with Sakura. Kakashi opened his eye a little wider and Deidara could just barely realize what Kakashi was trying to demonstrate-

"Mangekyu Sharingan!" Deidara moved in with another series of slightly larger and more potent birds, his C4 collection, no longer worried in the slightest about conserving for his fight with Gaara. However at this point Sakura rushed in and slammed her fist into Deidara's chest. There was a distinct cracking sound, common to rib injuries, and even Kakashi winced at the pain Deidara felt. Deidara barely had time to think to jump back as he realized he'd dropped his clay pigeons. Jumping back in time the explosion blew Sakura off her feet, and if not for Itachi's swift intervention, would have severely injured her. Still she was slightly burnt by her brief exposure to Deidara's explosives. Itachi landed, missing another of Deidara's mines, with Sakura in his arms. Landing in front of Kakashi he handed her to him, "even with your new Mangekyu Sharingan, you're better off leaving this to me until you're fully healed- besides, she needs attention or the burns may permanently scar her.

Kakashi nodded and took Sakura under one arm and ran back to give Itachi more space against Deidara. Deidara was holding his chest with a significant look of pain. Suddenly he flicked his wrist, and slide down another clay creature, this time a spider, he threw it at Itachi and the sharpened legs flew through the air even faster than his birds. Yet as Itachi dodged the incommig clay spider, Deidara prepared his large bird for its last flight, as it came crashing down behind Itachi, Itachi caught the barest glimpse in his peripheral as he moved around the spiders. Recognizing Deidara's commands by his chakara he sent a massive surge of Chakara to his legs and pushed towards the spiders instead, slashing through it with Kisame's sword. The sword cut into Deidara, but he managed to stop the impact fast enough to keep from being run through. With Itachi right in his face, and his sword caught partially into his chest, Deidara felt his life slowly draining away- "You WON'T mock my art, art is life, art is death- art is NOW!"

As he said this, his body expanded, bulging out in all directions, he was forming his final and ultimate piece, self-annihilation. Itachi's eyes opened fully as he came to this conclusion. Itachi pushed harder o the sword, until he felt it push further, when he put another burst of chakara into it and push through Deidara's body- "You won't get away!" Deidara screamed, blood dripping down his chin, his bird impacted the ground at to explode simultaneously with him as Itachi finished pushing through and past Deidara. Curling up with his momentum and even using the force at the edge of the explosion with a buffer of chakara to shield him a little at the back, he nearly FLEW away from Deidara's blast, wiping out a good portion of the forest, and blasting everyone back… Including the last remnant of Kakuzu- crawling away- until Deidara's blast caught up with it…

saSAsaSAsa

Sasori gaped as he jumped away from Deidara's blast- as he did so he was forced to leap away from the last pieces of Hiruko. Sasori cursed to himself, he would have trouble finding a puppet as general purpose as Hiruko has been to replace him. And it wasn't Deidara's fault, those brats and their team word has steadily forced him out of his shell. This fight was no longer worth the trouble, "Hidan, make you're amends because this battle is not salvageable."

Hidan looked from the body switcher, who he had only narrowly dodged her last attempt- to the shadow user, who seemed to be running out of energy. "Let me just kill one of them!" Hidan yelled back.

Sasori waved him off, "Fine, but I won't be the one to come back to put your pieces back together when they're done."

Hidan looked around as everyone else was recovering from the scatter effect of Deidara's blast, "Shit, I hope my god will accept Deidara and Kakuzu's deaths instead."

Hidan sighed as he jumped away towards Sasori, almost hoping they would follow him, give him one last chance to kill any of them. Instead they all seemed to accept their escape, and slowly began to leave, the last of them watching for any changes that might signify giving chase.

naNAnaNAna

Naruto smiled, that went well, he had been worried when so many Akatsuki member's had been there- but that was exactly why he'd asked for the team he had, Shikarmaru was a genius who could solve almost any problem, and both Neiji and Hinata had the Byakugan, Kiba's nose, Itachi and Kakashi's eye. Thankfully neither The Leader nor Kohan showed up. They still knew next to nothing about them.

Naruto kept in back and kept an eye out for any signs of chase, when at last the gate to Konaha came into view Naruto let himself breathe a sigh of relief. Itachi fell behind to talk to Naruto.

"We have to find Sasuke."

"Sasuke-" Naruto paused, "You're right… Akatsuki will have to back down for a while after this, we'll use this time to find and save Sasuke, I promised Sakura I would…"