It was four against nine. Piece of cake. Itachi - overachiever that he is - went down to the camp during the night to observe the ninja at closer range to spot any weaknesses and flaws they displayed. Despite knowing how good Itachi's stealth skills were, he received a stern scolding from Naruto for putting his life in danger without informing the group.
And so the group had a rough knowledge of the trappers, the medics and the brute-force ninja in the group.
Naruto would be taking the hulking brute of a ninja who - if his lack of a shirt gave any indication - didn't need any clothes or armour to protect himself from attacks. Or there were simply none that fit him.
Naruto's ANBU form only appeared to be six foot high. However, if you were to try and actually touch him above, say, wat appeared to be his waist, you would reach nothing but air and a shimmering after image. The area that Naruto could be touched in was equal to his ordinary size. Fighting against such a large opponent would be his forte; someone that big wouldn't really have much need for accuracy, and so Naruto would be hard to hit. Taking him down should be less of a difficulty and more of a lengthy annoyance.
Itachi would assist Naruto by putting the brute under a Genjutsu using his Sharingan, before moving on to two ninja who had been reported to work together to bounce needle-sharp fragments of poisoned stone between each other - and through the enemy. His agility and Sharingan would help him avoid them in order to take them down.
Anko was practically salivating over the chance to "bash in the skulls" of three 'tough' looking tattooed guys, who other than the obscene references to sex written across their forearms showed no indication of being able to hold off Anko's wrath.
Genma was significantly less excited to deal with a man who seemed to like removing random parts of his body and using them as weapons. His swordsmanship should make messy work of him.
The remaining two rogue ninja were only really useful for medic and healing and wouldn't be much of a distraction to the ANBU as they took down the bigger threats. They also hoped to capture one or both of them and take them back to Konoha for interrogation.
As the bandits trudged carelessly through the unfamiliar territory, their minds were focused only on pillaging the belongings of someone who worked hard for it. As suspected, they continued to linger within Fire country, no doubt still flushed with success from all their previous raids, and seeking more.
As their minds wandered, ANBU captain Fox - returned to his six foot glory - gave a silent hand signal, and the four ninja hidden above them slid down to surround them.
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To credit their ninja skills, the group of bandits responded acceptably fast.
Not quick enough to stop Ankos' fist going through one's head, but fast enough that the ninja behind him managed to avoid the same fate.
In the same second, Itachi had the hulking brute stumbling in a disorientating Genjutsu, seeing multiples of everything. Naruto immediately pounced, engaging the giant and successfully taunting him to the side and away from the group.
Itachi then turned to his designated opponents. They had already circled around him to face each other, ready to play ping-pong with deadly precision. They didn't know, however, that they were already in their own personal Genjutsu. Itachis' spinning eyes had already made it appear that he was half a metre to the left of where he actually was. Not such a great shift that they would notice easily, but a great advantage on the Uchiha's part.
It was almost boring. Dodging was something simple to Itachi, and avoiding the rock needles was easy.
He found his attention turning to the wellbeing of his team mates, and he glanced over at Genma to see that he was faring fine against his unusual opponent, albeit being slightly disgusted that the man was using his own tongue as a whip.
Twisting, he caught a glance at the bloody carnage on Anko's side of the battlefield. There was nothing unusual there either.
Itachi turned his covered Uchiha eyes towards the nin on his left, trapping her in her own Genjuutsu. Distracted so, she missed her 'catch,' her hands stuttered uselessly as the projectiles she was meant to catch struck her in the chest. Her counterpart gave a small cry of shock as she watched the woman go down.
Satisfied he had neutralized the duo effectively, Itachi took a brief opportunity to re-inspect the battlefield. He caught movement out of the corner of his eye. Naruto's ogre of an opponent had - through either luck, skill, or lacking brain size - thrown off his Genjutsu, and was slamming his gigantic hammer towards the dodging Fox ANBU with alarming accuracy.
Itachi swiftly moved his hands into a seal to replace the Genjutsu on the brute just as his eyes locked with Naruto's through his mask.
In a split second, Itachi was on the ground with the Fox on top of him. Before he had time to register his sudden impact with the ground, even faster than even his eyes could track, Naruto had moved again, gone from his chest and now standing over the motionless body of Itachi's remaining opponent.
It was quiet, their portion of the battleground stilled, the only sound being the cackling and whooping from Anko as she played with the final surviving ninja.
Itachi turned to see Naruto's former opponent fall to the ground with a great thud, grasping limply at a gaping hole in his chest.
Naruto had literally torn straight through him to reach him.
Blinking his red eyes and still trying to process what had happened, Itachi noted that Anko had already bound one of the medics, the other lying dead at her feet.
"Idiot." Growled Naruto, his voice still disguised as a deep, nondescript baritone. He dropped the limp woman to the ground unceremoniously as he pounced again on the Uchiha, clenching the front of Itachi's robes in his fist. The Henge of his ANBU form flickered as his charka flashed with his emotions.
"You had your opponents, I had mine. I can deal with one guy, no matter what the size. You nearly got a face full of needles. Your eyes wouldn't do you any good blind." He poked him in the forehead viciously, absolutely furious.
Itachi felt his cheeks flush in shame as he was scolded. He knew he had been foolish. He had allowed himself to become overconfident in his eyes' ability, believing he could command the battlefield with his sight. He had been wrong, and it had nearly cost him dearly.
He was hoisted to his feet by the not-so-tiny fist, half dragged by scowling Captain over to the captive.
"Anko, stop playing with your food." Naruto droned as he reached them. "Hurry up and bind her so we can leave"
Anko took the fingers out of the girls mouth, her left eye squinted as she scrutinized the Captain with a pout.
Genma approached nonchalantly from where his opponent lay dying, disgruntledly wiping saliva off his face. He soon caught the mood, and his eyes switched curiously from Anko to Naruto.
"You're a bit grumpy." Anko grumbled suspiciously. She straightened from her crouch.
The medic in the centre of this tension looked overwhelmed by the slaughter of her group and Anko's insane disposition. But Anko wasn't interested in her pet anymore. Instead she pounced on her Captain.
"Hey,-" Naruto mumbled, but Anko had already pulled the mask off his face, cancelling the Genjutsu. Everyone ignored the gasp from the medic as Naruto shrunk to his normal, tiny size, rubbing his eyes as the shady hood was pulled back.
Anko firmly ran her hands over his face, behind his ears, his neck and shoulders. He mumbled and tried to pull away from her, but she just firmly gripped his arms in her hands. As they slid down his arm they encountered resistance, and she reversed her grip, roughly pulling up his ANBU sleeve to reveal four of the small needles buried in his thin wrist.
Although only a few beads of blood dripped from the wounds, it was hard to miss the green tint to Naruto's veins just around the point of impact.
"Anko?" The boy's voice cracked, worried by the flat look on Anko's usually sadistic face. She ignored him, instead swiftly plucking one needle from a wrist that barely twitched. In a millisecond, the weapon was shoved under the alarmed medic's nose.
"What's on this!" Screamed Anko, pressing the weapon against the terrified girls nose, her other hand fisting her hair tightly.
"I- uh." The medic choked on her words until Genma pulled Anko back from leaning on the woman's throat. "I think it's n-nightlock. Tomoko uses that poison a lot, she gets it from a flower in Iwa…" The girl shifted uncomfortably, trying to move away from the enraged masked ANBU.
"The antidote, where is it?" Scowled Anko, fingers wrapping again around the girls throat. Genma had already moved to the corpses of the poison users, searching their pockets and packs.
"I- I don't know-" Her words were cut off as she fell face first into the floor as Anko disappeared. She and Itachi joined Genma in rifling through the bodies of the dead needle nin.
"There's nothing here!" Spat Anko as she smashed the only two vials she found - both ink - into the ground. She rounded on the medic again. "No one who uses poison doesn't carry the antidote to it!" She screamed. "Where is it?"
"She-Tomoko and Hanako had a resistance to it! They - uh - dosed themselves to make themselves immune to it! They didn't like wasting poison on antidotes they didn't need…" Her tongue licked nervously at her lips and her eyes darted, searching for escape
Anko glared so flatly at the answer that the girl flinched. Or that may have been because Anko drove a fist through her chest at the exact same moment.
There was silence as the now dead medic's blood dripped off Anko's clenched fist.
…
"Nice job, Anko. Now we have no captives." Genma broke the silence in a seemingly casual voice, although his body was tense.
Scowling, Anko rounded on Naruto, who was curiously examining his wounds. She grabbed the tiny boys' shoulders tightly, yelling in his face.
"Do you feel sick? Dizzy?" She was almost hysterical.
Naruto peered wide-eyed up at her. "I feel fine, Anko-chan. Except my arm is a little sore." He peered down at his still-dripping wound. "I don't think the poison has spread very far." He fingered the greenish vein.
Anko took a shuddering breath.
"Let's leave." Itachi said, glancing around, resting a hand on Anko's shoulder. "We need to fix Naruto-Taichou's wounds, and here isn't the best place for that."
Lock-jawed, Anko nodded, hoisting Naruto over one shoulder.
"Anko-chan!" Naruto cried, indignant. "Put me down! 'Tach-kun! Don't call me 'Taichou!'" The blonde ninja had to resort to pouting over the purple-haired ninja's shoulder, kicking his legs back and forth.
Anko jumped to the trees, leaving Genma and Itachi to swiftly dispose of their enemies bodies.
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... …
Anko wasted no time finding a semi-secluded spot before tossing Naruto somewhat gently to the ground, rummaging in her backpack for bandages and anti-venoms.
Itachi left to scout the area and Genma assisted by awkwardly holding the stuff that Anko thrust into his arms.
Naruto just sat dazedly, watching the ninja run around hysterically with a hint of amusement. He gave up his arm without protest to Anko, who removed the needles and unsealed an analysis scroll. She was no medic-nin, but her former Sensei had been endlessly interested in science, and it was impossible to have not picked up a few things about medics and the human body here and there.
She commanded Genma to press a bandage to the newly-bleeding arm of his Captain, who smiled up at him brightly, unaffected by the tense atmosphere. Genma smiled weakly back.
"It's spreading." She noted, thumbing gently over the greening veins, barely but noticeably larger than the last time. The holes themselves had already closed, thanks to the Kyuubi, leaving a spidery web of green veins. She withdrew a clean bandage and used it to tie a tourniquet on Naruto's upper arm.
Naruto crinkled his nose. "This tingles." He complained, tugging at the bandage before his hand was slapped away.
Anko dripped the poisoned needle into the centre of the scroll, reading the characters and diagrams that materialised. Her frown deepened.
"What is it?" Itachi inquired, having returned from his scouting of the area.
Anko didn't spare him a glance. "I'm not sure. Definitely plant-based, so that medic could be right. But even if it is Nightlock, the it only grows all the way in Iwa. That means we need to get back to Konoha, they'll have them in the greenhouse." She turned back to Naruto, taking his forearm again.
"I'll take a blood sample to see the percentage of poison in the blood, then we will know how fast it can travel. We'll probably need to put him to sleep to slow his heart and reduce its spread." Naruto grumbled a bit at Anko's words.
"What about the Nine Tails, how is it reacting to the poison?" Itachi inquired, having returned from his scouting. He phrased the answer to both Naruto and Anko both, not sure who would have an answer
Naruto was the one who answered.
"I can feel it reacting to it. I can feel it's chakra working on it." He scratched absently at his wrist.
Activating his Sharingan, Itachi could see he was right. While his eyes couldn't see Chakra the same way as the Byakugan, he could sense the malevolent chakra pooling at the injury.
Anko used her fingers to create a chakra scalpel, nicking the boys' vein open, quickly allowing a drop of blood to fall to a new sheet of examination parchment before it was sealed by the Kyuubi's Chakra. Anko studied the new results with a deepening frown. "What the fu-?"
"What is it?" Itachi interrupted, his hands over Naruto's ears. Naruto rolled his eyes in exasperation.
"There's no indication of poison at all." She scowled, glancing between the boys tainted arm and the negative results.
"...What?" Asked Genma curiously.
Anko hissed angrily. "The results say there is no poison in his blood at all!"
"Well... there is..." Genma prodded Naruto's tainted arm.
"Yes, idiot, I know that!" Anko kicked out at his leg. She sighed, flopping back. She looked completely stumped. Genma fidgeted, exchanging a glance with the equally helpless Itachi.
Naruto was prodding his arm, eyes close to his skin.
"What if its' not in the blood?" He asked.
Anko cocked her head, glancing sideways at him. "You mean like, in the tissue?" Naruto nodded his confirmation. "No, see, if that were the case, it wouldn't be following the veins in that green colour, it'd just make a bruising pattern. It has to be the blood."
"No, look." Naruto disagreed. He took a sharp thumb nail to his wrist, the whole team flinching as he sliced his skin and peeled it back, exposing the pulsing vein. After a twitch, Anko came closer to have a look.
"Oh." Anko leaned in. The vein - normally a light pink - was coloured a dark grey around the area of impact. Normally, poisons wouldn't drastically affect the veins in case they destroyed their means of transport, instead taking an easy ride to vital organs and attacking them. This poison, however, clearly wasn't taking the same route.
"It's in the vein" Anko frowned. "It's actually eating its way through the vein, not going through the blood at all. This is really unusual - killing like this is far slower than using the blood stream, but ridiculously difficult to stop. Stopping the blood flow will be useless." She tore the now superfluous bandage from Naruto's forearm with a scowl.
"What can we do then?" Asked Itachi. "Do we still put him to sleep?
"No!" Anko exploded in frustration, throwing her hands in the air. "That won't help at all! This poison will move at the same rate regardless of blood flow."
Anko clucked her tongue in disappointment as her eyes swept over her minimal healing items. "Not much we can do." She grimaced. "If it was blood, we could tourniquet it off, or draw out the poison using bleeding. The only thing that can stop it is if we take off his arm."
"You're not cutting my arm off." Naruto eyes snapped up sharply, suddenly slitted red. Anko jerked back slightly.
"N-no, of course not." She agreed. Naruto settled down and twitched his head sideways, watching the group.
She frowned, fingering the anti-venoms she had. "This will be completely useless, blood poisons only" She growled, setting the jar aside dejectedly.
Anko grunted before grabbing another vial and forcing it into Naruto's mouth. "Drink that. It's the only think I have that might help slow the poison down." She looked frustrated as Naruto gulped down the potion.
"Let's keep moving. I'll check back to him in an hour to see how far it has spread. Then we can see what we're dealing with." Anko suggested, as she swiftly marked the end of the green tint in his arm with a line.
Naruto tugged on her sleeve
"It's fine, Anko-chan." Naruto piped up. "I'm not dying yet. Not even close. We've done our mission, lets' head back to Konoha and nothing will go wrong. Promise." He smiled, eyes brightening.
Anko huffed, turning away from his bright little face. "Let's leave now, then." She decided, her voice still tense.
"Okay." Agreed Naruto, as though he weren't the Captain of the team. He hopped up, reaching for Itachi's clenched hand.
"Come on, Lets' go." Naruto said to the still motionless group.
He smoothed Itachi's fingers out of a fist before laceing his small fingers with the bigger ones. He tugged at the still tense hand, making it clear that he wanted to walk and not be carried. Anko swiftly jammed their things back into her bag before she shoved Genma in their direction and followed after the Captain and comrade.
Even though they raced through the trees at the same pace they always did, Genma, Anko and Itachi couldn't help but scrutinize their tiny Captain intensely, looking for any sign of distress.
Every time he scratched his arm, or shifted in discomfort, one or all of his team members twitched. They were all on edge.
It was going to be a long hour.
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Anko's eyes flittered to the sun every few tense minutes, tracking it's painful ascent into the sky. At exactly the hour mark she barked out a command for halt, and the group dropped into a clearing below.
Itachi, who had stayed close to Naruto during their travel, gently tugged the Fox mask from his face, releasing the Genjuutsu. Anko wasted no time revealing his wrist again, digging out a measuring stick.
The other two ninja watched silently as she measured the distance the taint had spread from her original mark.
"Three millimetres." She sighed, pursing her lips. "Not good, but slower than I expected. This kind of thing is meant to be a couple of hour ordeal. I guess the Kyuubi's chakra really is working to stop it."
"Yeah." Murmured the blonde boy in agreement, absently scratching his green tinged arm. "I can feel it."
A brief silence fell over the group.
"We need to keep moving." Anko said as she stood. Genma nodded and Itachi reached to pick up Naruto, who struggled from his grip with a glare.
"No, let him run." Anko said, interrupting before Itachi could scold the boy. "The poison won't accelerate with increased heart rate like a blood poison would. It's like a corrosion. Exercise could actually do good and allow the Kyuubi's chakra to move around and stop the poison better."
Itachi relented, eyebrow twitching as Naruto stuck out his tongue at the older child.
And so the group launched off into the trees, travelling faster and with more urgency than they had on the way to the mission.
As the wind ruffled his hair and trees flashed past, Itachi did some mental calculations on the potential spread of the poison in the young boys' body.
After reaching the same conclusion after three attempts, he took a deep shuddering breath as they flew through the air, trying to clear his mind, but didn't voice his findings.
He was sure by the tightness of Anko's brow that she already knew.