Finally, the face-off with the Akatsuki is upon us! :D (and is almost over)
Thanks again to everyone who reads and reviews! 8D
Moonlttiger – yes, he is dead :P I don't think she'll be too troubled…she hates his guts XP
MidnightheartXxX – I think that was the longest fight scene I've written to date -_-" we shall see what the aftermath will be in…
Five…
Four…
Three…
Two…
One…
ACTION!
**Chapter 20** (WTF chapter TWENTY? Good grief…)
"Pein-sama!"
Shannon's head snapped up to see Tobi cowering behind a block of crumbled concrete pillar, his single visible eye wide with shock.
She wrenched her shadow spears from Pein's mutilated body, letting it slump to the ground, utterly lifeless. She took one last look at his dull Rinnegan eyes before turning her attention back to the orange-masked man.
Tobi saw the look in her eyes - one of cold fury that sent chills down his spine. The shadow tendrils whipped around her body like dark snakes, dripping blood. Leader-sama's blood. In a second, he had disappeared from sight again, wishing to be anywhere away from the scary girl.
Shannon snorted derisively as the orange-masked Akatsuki scampered away. Her eyes slowly melted from blood red to their usual dark green. Her blood pounded through her temples, her head throbbing painfully. She swayed a little from exhaustion, but caught herself. She looked down at her defeated adversary once more, frowning slightly.
There was a small amount of guilt for robbing yet another living being of their life, but that sympathy was quickly squashed when she remembered all the pain he had caused her and her comrades. He had sent demons to kill them off. He had kidnapped her mother. Those were things she could never forgive.
She looked at his bloodied corpse and felt a wave of relief wash over her. Pein wouldn't be able to make anyone suffer anymore. Another thought suddenly struck her – with the Akatsuki eliminated, was there really any need for her to accompany the Konoha nin back to their universe?
Before she could ponder this too deeply, an outraged scream brought her sharply back to the present.
Shannon's head whipped around to the source of the almost inhuman screech, and found herself coming face to face with Kisame's rapidly approaching blade. Her eyes widened for a second as the scene played itself out slowly, almost in slow-motion.
Sai was sprinting after his runaway opponent, a whole team of ink lions bounding behind him. Shannon saw Kisame's eyes glance over his fallen leader before snapping back to her, his face twisted in a furious snarl. His gigantic sword was raised high over his shoulder, ready for the one blow it would need to separate her head from her shoulders.
Shannon immediately knew that Sai wouldn't be able to reach the enraged swordsman in time. Acting on pure instinct, her shadow tendrils shot out again, as if of their own accord. Kisame's eyes widened for a second before the first dark projectile struck him in the shoulder, another knocking his precious weapon from his grasp.
Kisame tried to regain his fallen sword, but the momentum of his charge carried him further forward still, right into Shannon's deadly shadow spikes. It was only a matter of seconds before he joined his leader in a bloody mess on the ground. Shannon flinched slightly at the unexpected attack before she raised her eyes back to Sai.
He had stopped a few meters away, regarding her thoughtfully. She nodded at him, and he returned the gesture before leaping back into the fray to assist the others. Shannon once again surveyed the battlefield – things had seemed to have calmed down quite substantially.
Hinata had finished off Deidara relatively quickly – the blonde bomber lay motionless on the ground, missing his arms – and was now assisting Naruto with Zetsu, who had managed to split himself in half to fight the both of them simultaneously. Kakuzu was nowhere in sight.
Sasuke and Itachi were still fighting, but from what Shannon could tell they were both nearing the end of it. Itachi was favouring his left arm quite badly, one of his blazing red eyes swollen shut. Sasuke was bleeding heavily from various large wounds along his back and sides. But neither of them looked willing to quit just yet.
Lee seemed to be managing very well against Sasori and his puppets – out of the previous ten, only three were left standing. Sakura had finally managed to get Konan pinned down to a single spot, by using kunai to tack the majority of her paper to the ground and surrounding area.
And then between Sai and Shikamaru, Hidan was quickly defeated and left in a multitude of profanity-uttering pieces, strewn over the battlefield. Shikamaru turned around and caught sight of Shannon watching him. She must have looked a little worse for wear, because he started towards her with a worried expression on his face.
Suddenly, Shannon was struck by a bout of dizziness, swaying wildly on her feet. Her hand flew to her head to try and calm the throbbing in her temples, but the light-headedness just grew stronger. All of her shadows retracted themselves automatically, causing Shannon to lose the last means of support she had. She saw Shikamaru running towards her, calling her name.
And then she was falling. Her vision went black. She never felt herself hit the ground.
This chapter was more to tie up the loose ends from the previous one than anything else…
The next one will be a lot more substantial :D
But I guess you'll only find out if you review ;)
And please, if anyone has any ideas regarding Rebellion, please let me know :D