Disclaimer: The usual crap. Own nothing
Let's get right into it, eh?
A sliver flash in the moonlight was all the warning given to Hinata that a sword blade was going to end her life. Yoritomo grinned in elation as he watched the weapon pass cleanly through his wife's neck. Blood sprayed everywhere, then Yoritomo's vision flickered, or at least seemed to, and Hinata was gone, no sign of a corpse or anything.
"What?"
"Father behind you!"
Yoritomo's son's warning came too late and the lord felt a fast series of taps on his right shoulder blade. Instantly, his arm went numb and the sword clattered from limp fingers. He spun, arm flopping, and ground his teeth in rage as he saw Hinata standing behind him, looking almost apologetic at having disabled him.
'Disgusting shinobi whore!' he raged, wanting to scream the words at her but knowing that it might make Hinata mad and that would've led to his death if it set her off. Yoritomo was no fool; he knew her stance and her fighting style. It was the Hyuuga Clan's legendary Juuken, the style that was known even in the samurai world for its graceful moves and lethality.
"Now let me pass," Hinata said firmly, confidently, showing a side of her that had never been seen in Lahan before. However, Hinata's friends and family were in danger. There was no time to be timid and hesitate.
Yoritomo whipped out his wakizashi and held it reverse-style in his left hand. He ran at the former Konoha-nin with a scream, but found himself flying backwards without really knowing how he got there. He was vaguely aware that Hinata was spinning like a top, the wall around her grinding itself down like a great drill was pressing down on it.
"Kaiten!"
Hinata slowly came to a stop, stepping up out of the bowl that had been bored in the wall by her chakra. She'd learned the technique years ago, but had never gotten around to using it until just a year before she left Konoha. After that she'd started training judiciously with it, though it was no where near the level of Neji and her father, both of whom could make the technique several feet in diameter and throw around opponents that were nowhere near them. Knowing that she wouldn't get another chance, Hinata vaulted over the wall and poured on the speed, becoming a black blur that was quickly lost among the dark shadows of Lahan.
"F-Father?" Oda asked, eyes wide, as if he was not quite sure what'd happened. His step-mother, his meek and timid step-mother who hardly ever gave the impression that she was a former shinobi, had just gotten past his father…and with what seemed like little effort.
Yoritomo, noting that the tingling in his arm was beginning to lessen just the slightest bit, sheathed his wakizashi and looked out towards the village. His village, which had become his after so much hard work and effort, sweat and blood. Lots of blood too. His rise to power within Lahan hadn't been one of the cleanest in history. No, on the contrary, he'd taken the thief's way up, using the cloak and dagger method. The old lord hadn't…
Explosions again ripped through the night, fiery diadems that billowed high into the sky, plumes of smoke rising as soon as the orange and crimson flames died away. Picking up his katana, Yoritomo glared down at his son, who looked less like the son of a noble and more like the frightened child he was.
"Stay."
Oda flinched at the word as if he himself had just been bitten by his father's keen blade or step-mother's nimble fingers and angry, intimidating eyes. Then he regained himself and nodded, once again the frigid heir to the lord's seat.
As the lord pulled away his ceremonial clothes, he revealed himself to be clad in black lacquered leather armor that gleamed in the backlight of the flames. The katana in his hand slid home, clinking into place, then Yoritomo, flexing his right hand in another effort to stave off the numbness, turned and blinked from existence, moving just as fast as a shinobi.
"Damn them," he growled to himself, "all of these damn shinobi. Especially them! Can't do anything right." He stopped up short and let a grin split his face. "Yes. Friends and family, right? Well then, I'll start with the weakest." He looked around and noticed a whirlwind rising high into the sky near him, bursting into flame as it sucked up the fires and set itself alight. "There. That one." With a snicker, he vanished from the spot he'd been standing on.
Naruto grunted to himself as he flung himself out of the way of another blast of white fire, this one taking on the form of a Karyuu Endan. The serpentine column of flame twisted and came at him again, forcing Naruto to leap into the air, flinging a volley of shuriken to cover his evasion. Again the white dragon missed, but engulfed the shuriken and turned them into little splatters of molten metal. The dragon continued on and slammed into a house, blowing up, the faint screams of the family sheltering there reaching his ears as they were burned to a crisp in seconds.
"Damn you!" Naruto shouted down at Hyotoko. "At least keep the civilians out of this!" The only response he got was a pillar of fire bursting from underground and shooting at him, a flaming bullet that he had no time to avoid. "Fuck." It was all Naruto got out before he was lost from view in crackling white and blue flames.
Hyotoko's lip curled right before he noticed that that the only thing he'd hit was Naruto's jounin vest, the protective clothing warping as the thin metal plates inside deformed under the heat. The flaming missing-nin looked around for his prey but didn't see anything. "Hiding are we?" he asked to thin air as he took a few steps down the street, the earth hissing beneath his feet. Hyotoko passed right by a deeply shadowed spot in the ruins of a house, vacant, that'd been hit by an explosion's shockwave and ripped to pieces. He never noticed a shadow that seemed deeper than the rest.
'Damn it all!' Naruto cursed himself as he watched the flaming man pass by him. 'I was an S-class missing-nin for Kami's sake! How the hell am I having trouble with this bastard!?' Kyuubi's ear twitching was the only response he got from the demon. 'What, no suggestions?'
'Something you have to figure out for yourself brat,' the nine-tailed fox replied.
Naruto's eyebrow twitched. 'Bastard.'
'Runt.'
The blond ordinarily would've responded to that with a tirade, but he decided to ignore the demon and focus on why he was having so much trouble with this guy.
'It's not like I don't have the chakra to handle him. And it's not like the bastard has the chakra to match mine. The only thing keeping him alive right now is that damned kekkei genkai of his. So that means…I'm problem?'
The fox's ear twitched again. Naruto took that as a sign he was on the right track. He tried to remember what set him apart from the time he'd been declared an S-rank missing-nin. And he came up with a big-ass blank.
'Dammit. I hate this thinking stuff. I'm better at improvising.' He pulled a pair of kunai from his pouches, spun them on his fingers, then snapped the knives into a reverse grip. 'Guess I'll just wing it.' Channeling his chakra into the blades and changing the element to wind, extending the edge by about a half-inch, he sped from his hiding place. Hyotoko turned at the last second, just in time to see and avoid the onrushing Jinchuuriki.
The blond sped past, missing, threw one kunai behind him to cover himself again then stopped, shot chakra into his feet and flew back towards the flame man, giving no quarter, slashing wildly with his remaining knife, lashing out with kicks whenever he needed to, pushing Hyotoko back. He missed on a lunge, over extended, planted the hand holding the kunai, then kicked his feet up, right heel soaring for Hyotoko's face, the left angling for the mid-section.
Both attacks were stopped, the blond jounin resisting the urge to scream in pain as his skin was scorched by the sizzling hands of his opponent, but he pushed away regardless, rolling to his feet then whipping his other knife. The weapon dissolved into molten metal when it met a curtain of flame that the other shinobi made with a wave of his hand.
"Not bad, but if weapons and taijutsu are all you have, you'll never beat me!" Hyotoko taunted, his voice condescending, arrogant, his eyes flinty, ice cold despite the heat the rolled over him. In Naruto's mind, he looked like Sasuke. The Sasuke he'd met in Orochimaru's lair, just before he'd revealed himself to kill the Snake Sannin. This guy was a gnat compared to the frightening power of the snake and Naruto had pushed himself to his considerable limit to overcome him. "Never, not in a million years."
Naruto stood, suddenly realizing something.
"I know…" he muttered. Hyotoko read his lips.
"Then why persist?"
"No you stupid bastard. I finally get why I'm having so much damn trouble with you." Naruto's voice was low and dangerous. "It's because I'm holding back."
"What!? You're giving your all! I know you are!"
The blond mass of spikes shook. "No. It's because I don't regard you as a threat. I don't think you can kill me. It's a stupid thing to think when a large part of battle comes down to the chance factor. Even a genin could topple a Kage if he got lucky." Naruto reached up and pulled off his hirai-ate. "No more. I'm not going to fight as a Konoha shinobi. This is a battle of survival, just as every battle is. I can't believe it took me this long to realize." He looked up and his eyes were devoid of mercy, compassion, light, all the things that made Naruto Naruto. He'd regained the intent to kill he'd had as a missing-nin. "Time to die."
Kyuubi's howling laughter cut the air inside his head. 'At last you realize! Just because one man is weaker that the other doesn't mean that he cannot win! You have to go all out, all the time. Remember this feeling Naruto, you'll need to feel it all the time from now on.'
Crimson youki burst into being, flaring around the Jinchuuriki like a storm. Naruto's eyes became crimson, his whisker marks thickened, the wounds he'd gotten healed, and his fingernails became claws. A long tail began waving in the air behind him, then two other tails formed, splitting from the tip and pulling themselves away. Killing intent, thick and palpable, the combined intents of Kyuubi and his host, slammed down on Hyotoko, who began to feel strange.
"Just try it!" He shouted with a confidence he did no feel. Naruto looked him straight in the eye and said one word.
"Isukumi!"
Far from the battles, Itachi and Kisame both started as they felt a sudden spike in the amount of killing intent that was leaking from the battlefield. With eight shinobi going at it, it was certainly in abundance, but this new surge was something that was in a class of its own and it could only belong to one person.
"Naruto-kun has regained his instincts it would seem," Itachi remarked to his partner.
"How do you know it's him?" Kisame asked. He had a hunch it was the Kyuubi kid but still the intent was awesome. It was the last thing he'd expected from the annoying gaki he'd run into a few times. The youki followed a moment later. "Oh. Never mind." He grinned toothily down at the shorter man. "We gonna make our move now?"
"We are," Itachi answered and plunged off the cliff without further answer. Kisame chuckled to himself, doing his best to suppress an impressed whistle. He'd heard the rumors of the Sound missing-nin's killing intent, but until he'd heard from Tobi that Naruto and the missing-nin were one and the same, he didn't believe it. The Sound nin had been rumored to be a tank of the battlefield, slaughtering enemies left and right with little hesitation and all of that backed by a massive amount of killing intent.
Neji cursed as Rai vanished right before his fingers would've made contact. The little bastard was almost impossible to pin down, bouncing all over the place with a crackle of electricity and a rumble of thunder. If Neji could land just one blow on his leg, then it would be over. Rai would be hobbled and wouldn't be anywhere as nimble as he'd been up to that point.
'The million-ryou question is how do I do that without getting fried?'
He threw himself sideways without looking, his Byakugan telling him that Rai was incoming. The speedy shinobi quit moving and faced the shinobi from Konoha.
"Well isn't this an interesting little stalemate?" he asked, popping his knuckles. "I can't hit you and you can't hit me. Odd little draw we've got going isn't it?" Neji's pearly eyes narrowed but he otherwise didn't answer. Rai looked puzzled at the cold snub then shrugged it off. "Whatever, if you want to be a cold bastard, that's your business." He flashed away again and Neji was surrounded by sparks crackling over the ground. Then the battle renewed as Neji was forced to keep moving or get fried.
In a hut on the outskirts of the village, Ren stood up and went to his door, opening it a hair but throwing it wide when he beheld the destruction that had befallen the village he'd chosen to serve. Fires raged in three different places and repeated plumes of dust and smoke were erupting here and there in a fourth location, occasionally turning into a long trail as some pair of combatants with immense physical strength matched fists.
His eyes narrowed when the ronin noticed a presence he knew very well. "Yoritomo," he growled to the air. The mere thought of the treachery committed by that scum set his teeth on edge. Ren turned fingered the kodachi on his hip and bit his lip as he wondered what to do now, for some reason uncertain. If he went now, he would be betraying the lord of the village, and though the lord wasn't his own, it still was central to the code of Bushido. If Ren went now, he would be in volition of every principal he was raised after. On the other hand, while Lahan had never been lavish, since Yoritomo had taken power, it'd gone down hill fast, crime shooting through the roof and bandits like the Four Corners moving into to claim whatever they'd chosen.
A face swam into being before him. Uzumaki Naruto, a shinobi, a member of a sect that Ren had always hated and despised. He'd been surprised when Naruto had seemed to be a decent man who followed his convictions and ideals, though that was only the impression that the ronin got from him.
"But the people…"
The words of Ren's father came back to him. His father had been a strict but loving father, eager to impart his knowledge to his only son. The one thing he'd reiterated over and over again was that no matter your sect, philosophy, or social standing, if you were in a position of power and you didn't put the people first, you were nothing but trash.
Ren decided.
The wooden door of his hut flapped hollowly against its frame, a forlorn clacking noise that seemed to echo after the ronin as he headed into the village. Yes, he would fly in the face of everything he held dear.
"Hang on Uzumaki Naruto-kun. Reinforcements are on the way."
The only sign that Ren had vanished was a little puff of dirt that was quickly blown away by the wind.
Sakura rolled frantically and Enishi's rock shod fist slammed to earth right where she'd been the moment before, making the ground leap and slam into her. The pink-haired kunoichi was bruised and battered, the ribs on her right side paining her like nothing else. She'd taken a glancing blow from the rock-wearing missing-nin and she was sure that at least she had fractures if not breaks, but until she was able to stop and do a diagnostic jutsu, she couldn't be sure. Still, she was noticeably better off than Enishi himself, who had several rather large depressions pressed into his armor and there was a real big one on his back where Sakura had managed to land a nice axe kick. How she'd done it was a mystery even to her, but that didn't matter. She'd done it, she'd hurt him, and that was enough.
"Stop this," she gasped out, not for the first time, as she stood. Of all the Four Corners, Enishi had seemed to be the most mellow and open to talk and she'd been needling at him ever since he'd put that rock armor on. "Come on, do we really need to do this?"
"Tools like us do not need a reason to fight," he replied as he pulled his fist free, a large chuck of earth, turned to rock by the pressure of the hit, stuck to his fist. He waved his arm to try and get rid of it then decided it would be a good club to smash her with and faced the kunoichi, his feet thumping hollowly on the ground beneath him.
Sakura was reminded strongly of Haku, the gentle boy that had worked with Momochi Zabuza way back on Team Seven's first mission. He too had believed that shinobi were nothing but tools and that because of that they were not allowed to have any emotion. It was a similar situation here, she decided, only instead of emotion, it was a reason to fight.
"Enishi-san…"
"Enough!" He snapped out. "I can see what you are trying to do. You're trying to talk me out of this fight. It won't work. Others have tried that tactic and I've crushed them all under my heel. Do you know why I'm a missing-nin?"
Sakura shook her head. How was she supposed to know that? She told the other shinobi as much.
"I am a killer," he stated coldly, without emotion, without remorse. "I have killed to date five hundred shinobi and civilians. Some was on contract, others were just upon my whim."
"What!?" Somehow being a merciless killer didn't fit his image.
The other man smirked. "I can see that you don't see how that's possible. How can someone like me be a cold-blooded killer? He doesn't look like one!" He raised an eyebrow, or rather the rock on him shifted to look like that. "Am I right?"
Sakura could only nod.
Enishi laughed mirthlessly. "That's the idea, kunoichi! I project this calm veneer, this mellow shell, all so that people will be unaware of my true intentions! That's part of the shinobi way, yes? Deceive your enemies, lull them into a false sense of security, then crush them without remorse!" He leveled his rock club at her. "Do you see now? I'm going to crush you, splatter you all over the street, and grind whatever remains into dust! And you know something? I'm going to enjoy myself!" He charged, the ground shaking as his feet rumbled over it, the club coming up, ready to smash her into pieces.
Sakura flung herself backwards onto her hands then pushed off, knifing into the air and spinning with more grace than a gymnast. Shuriken and kunai spun from her fingers as she used her own insane strength and momentum to fling them as hard as she could. The weapons glinted under the silvery light of the moon, streaks of white in the darkness that struck Enishi all over his body as he continued his rush. Rocks all over his body exploded like he'd been hit with a multitude of bombs and blood sprayed from the resulting gaps. Sakura had flung the weapons so hard that she'd pierced the rock and hit the man beneath them. She didn't waste any time, running right at Enishi as he recovered and drove her fist into the side of his head.
The rock exploded and he was sent flying, shaking the ground when he hit and skidded the length of the street. When he reemerged, Sakura saw that she had blown the right side of his rock face clean off, exposing his flesh and that something sharp had cut him in the ruins, since blood was streaming from a gash in his forehead and pooling on some of the remaining stone before leaking down the rest of the way.
Enishi spit out a bit more blood and what looked like a tooth. "It's gonna take more than that to beat me!" he shouted and again the earth began to shake and rumble as he ran at her again. This time Sakura copied him and charged in kind, both of them drawing back for what would probably be some pretty hard hits.
Tenten ducked and the head of the naginata cut the air inches above her head, a hard biting wind slamming into her the moment the spearhead had passed. She staggered, but still had the presence of mind to whip a kunai at Aisha and force the woman to twist out of the way or get hit. She did so and the knife sailed past until Tenten made a few hand seals and the note that was wrapped around the handle exploded.
"Bitch!" Aisha shouted as she formed a wall of wind that swept away the fire, preventing a burn, but she was still knocked to her knees by the shockwave that accompanied the flames. She spun her naginata above her head and the wind flared up, turning into a tornado that swept away the smoke. There was no sign of Tenten. "What the…" She blinked, looked up, and saw Tenten with two open scrolls flapping in her wake. "Oh no!"
"Soshoryuu!"
Weapons poured from both scrolls as Tenten pirouetted in the sky and flung weapons of every conceivable type and size at her, ranging from the biggest manriki kusari Aisha had ever seen to kunai and senbon. Weapon after weapon slammed to earth and Aisha was forced to whip her naginata as fast as she could, deflecting what she could and trying to dodge the rest. She didn't have enough time to summon chakra for a blast of wind. The missing-nin winced as smaller weapons that were hidden in the shadows of the larger ones bit her. When the rain ended and the dust it had kicked up cleared, she was cut and bloody.
"Not done yet!" Tenten shouted and yanked hard on the invisible wires that had been affixed to the ends of the larger weapons. The weapons flew into the air and with only a flick of her fingers, Tenten sent the weapons streaking towards her target. This time though, Aisha was ready. She moved, blurring up the street to stop at a dead end right as the last weapon, a yari, stuck in the earth, quivering. The roofs of the houses to either side and the one her back was against as well, exploded and Aisha looked up and saw three more Tentens hanging in the sky as the original took a running start then vaulted into the sky was well.
"A new technique!" Tenten shouted, each one unfurling a long scroll that she pulled from her weapons pouch. Aisha's eyes widened as she realized what was going to happen. She readied her naginata but a chain shot from nowhere and tangled her arm.
"What!?"
The source was a weighted chain and there was fourth Tenten standing beside her. Aisha realized that Tenten must have made it right before she'd jumped. The three clones had been a distraction to get her attention off the ground. The four airborne kunoichi bit their fingers and swiped them across the back of the scrolls.
"Here's my version of Senbon Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!"
The scrolls exploded and the air was filled with the whipping of senbon as Tenten's attack was unleashed. Aisha screamed in rage and surprise as she was lost from view under the pelting rain. When it was all over, there was only a pile of senbon in the shape of a human that was allowed to fall forward and hit the ground. Tenten landed and dispersed her clones, then doubled over, breathing hard. She was slashed, gashed, and bruised with one hell of headache, but she was relieved to see that all her training had paid off big time. After seeing Naruto's match against the Kusajishi sisters in the Chuunin Exams and the senbon attack that the one kunoichi had had, Tenten had begun to try and learn the technique herself. However, it must have been an original technique because Tenten could find no mention of it in the scrolls in the Shinobi Library or in any of the shops around Konoha that sold technique scrolls. So she'd improvised and this was the result.
"But it's not that jutsu so it's going to need a different name…"
A voice from behind her made her turn.
"If I may, I would suggest Senbonzakura." It was Yoritomo, who was standing behind the kunoichi with black armor and a drawn sword in one hand, the other one tucked behind him. "Since it looked so much like Sakura tree blossoms in this fire." He nodded to the carnage around the two of them.
"What are you doing here?" Tenten asked, none too politely. She really didn't like this guy. Hinata had tried to describe him in a good light but in the Konoha-nin's mind, there was nothing really redeeming about him. He was a scumbag and she didn't like the fact that a friend of hers was married to him.
The leader shrugged. "A lord is not allowed to survey the damages to his village?" he asked, but Tenten didn't miss his right hand tighten on his sword's hilt.
"With no bodyguards? What if they enemy comes after you?"
"And why would they hurt me?"
"You're the leader of the village! The real question is why wouldn't they hurt you?"
"I'll tell you why," the lord answered with a grin, "it's because they wouldn't hurt their benefactor."
Tenten felt like she'd touched an electric wire. "What did you say!?"
Yoritomo scoffed as he walked to a house that had gotten shredded by the battle between Aisha and Tenten, casting a disinterested eye over the rubble, which was nothing but a mix of twisted wood beams and rocks. "How do you think I acquired power in this village my dear? Certainly not by legal means, I assure you. I hired these four buffoons to ambush the lord of the village and kill him. In return I would allow them to raid the traders coming through the village."
He looked back at Tenten, eyes glinting. "A rather brilliant ruse if I do say so myself. I get into power and at the same time, these idiots would have to protect me if they wanted to continue their rather cushy existence."
Tenten felt sick, felt like her feet were going to give out from underneath her. The plan sickened her. "You bastard! How did Konoha not find out about this! Lahan is a strategic trading town between two countries!"
Now the bastard began laughing outright. "You are so stupid!" He shouted. "How could Konoha know!? We're an insignificant town! Strategic yes, but there are countless passes through the mountains and more than one has a town at its base. As long as Iwa does not threaten us, Konoha couldn't care less! And Iwa can't do anything because we sit in Konoha territory and the rivalry between your two villages keeps them even further at bay!"
Yoritomo's face darkened. "Then that wench arrived here and I could see that she would be the death of my plan. If she got word that I had committed this treachery, I would have the ANBU after me as well as the Twelve Guards of Fire from the capital, either one of which is hard to defend against and two is nigh impossible. The Daimyo does not take this kind of thing lightly you know."
"But Hinata-chan got off a message to Konoha," Tenten pointed out.
"Yes and I didn't know she'd done it until you four turned up on my doorstep." He glared at her, pointing his katana. "Perhaps you can enlighten me? Tell me, shinobi, how did that bitch get the message to Konoha?"
Tenten knew that she couldn't give him a straight answer. "Hinata-chan's a Konoha shinobi," the weapons mistress answered. "Stealth and secret communication are our specialties."
The katana lowered. "Indeed. Well, our talking no longer serves a point. You see, the wench has recently grown a spine and now runs to confront the Four…Three Corners. In retaliation for defying me, and to keep my secret safe, I'm going to butcher all four of you and send word to Konoha that you tragically died in combat." He blurred and Tenten was caught off guard before a sword blade appeared and speared through her abdomen.
Blood sprayed all over the road and Yoritomo began laughing madly.
Neji rolled on his shoulder and followed through back onto his feet. Rai skidded to a stop. Both shinobi were breathing heavily and Neji had a cut at the base of his neck where Rai had gotten a lucky hit on his blind spot. Rai's left arm hung limply, the muscles in the shoulder jammed and locked from where Neji had hit him in retaliation.
"Not bad not bad!" Rai cackled. "I'm really enjoying myself here! Last time someone lasted this long was before I left Kumo!"
"Kumo?" Neji repeated. "Was that your village?"
"You bet! Didn't like it there, 'specially with the whole obsession about Konoha's kekkei genkai. Everywhere I went it was 'Sharingan this' 'Byakugan that' and it was so damn frustrating!" He laughed again. "So I killed my squad and went rouge. Haven't regretted my decision for a moment!" He was bouncing from foot to foot, like a hyperactive kid. "Well enough talk! Now…" His hands folded together in a seal sequence. He thrust his left hand forward. "How about this? Raiton! Rairyuuhou!"
A massive blast of lightning shot from his palm and zipped down the street, turning from a river of electricity and plasma to a blast with a dragon's head that would fry Neji to a crisp if it hit him. The prodigy began to spin.
"Kaiten!"
The dragon slammed into the barrier and clamped down hard, bolts of lightning flying everywhere as Neji grunted and increased his rotation and chakra output, increasing the size and diameter of his sphere of charka. The two techniques warred for a moment then the dragon's own chakra was thrown back at it and it dissolved into a mad lightshow of bolts, the writhing power setting some of the surrounding huts alight, adding to those that were already burning.
Neji dissolved the Kaiten, but didn't stop spinning, his hands reaching into his pouches and plucking out the last few shuriken he had. Using his momentum, he threw them as hard as he could, the stars whipping towards Rai.
"Oh come on!"
He vanished and reappeared behind Neji, who timed his spinning to end when he was facing the other shinobi. He lunged with a Juuken strike and Rai backpedaled, looking worried. He stopped far outside Neji's reach, and outside the range of his Hakkeshou.
'Damn. At this rate I'll never hit him!' Neji wanted to scream, then he calmed down and thought it out. 'I need to change Juuken. It's not working. What I need is to be able to tell when he's within my reach then strike as he attacks.' Pearly eyes narrowed. 'I've got it!'
Neji broke his stance, standing up, his arms dangling easily at his side, closing his eyes. He reached out with Hakkeshou, but the range stopped long before it reached Rai, just as he knew it would.
"You can't hit me with that shit!" Rai shouted at him, unable to see the technique, but able to sense it as a faint tingling against his skin. The feeling vanished. "Huh? Did you get rid of the Juuken? Why?"
Neji didn't respond. Instead he was taking calming breaths, in and out as slowly as he could, calming his heartbeat and breathing, trying to extend his Juuken just enough that it ended at his maximum arm reach. Most of the techniques for his style worked by knowing when the enemy was with a range that would allow them to close the distance in an instant, the higher the level the farther the range, and the more speed required. It was said that the true masters of Juuken were able to take down enemy's way outside their arm's reach. Neji was trying to do the exact opposite. He was going to react right as the enemy reached him, right as they committed to the attack.
"Helloooo!" Rai called. "What the hell are you doing!?" He was ignored. The hyper shinobi spat slightly. "Tch. Jeeze, acting all high and mighty. Does he think that if he closes his eyes and ignores me I'll go away? Well, guess I'll just kill him then."
Neji's skin felt charged as his Juuken began to extend, then stopped right where he wanted it. His eyes snapped open, but he controlled the urge to analyze everything. Instead he took in nothing. He would react when the enemy attacked, no sooner no later. He had to be loose, limber, otherwise he would react after the instant that he was under attack and Hyuuga Neji could kiss the world of the living good-bye.
"Ready?" Rai called with a grin. "Get ready, here I come!"
'One hit,' Neji told himself as he relaxed his shoulders. 'One hit to end it.'
Rai vanished.
Neji struck an instant later, the impact of the two shinobi echoing into the sky.
Hyotoko screamed as fast as he could take a breath, scrabbling away from Naruto, who was stalking towards him, three tails flicking with each step. In Hyotoko's mind, however, Naruto was a snarling beast, a monster that was not be attacked, with eyes that glowed like coals from the depths of Hell.
The eyes!
Hyotoko couldn't look away from them. He couldn't no matter how much he wanted to. They were enrapturing and terrifying, beautiful and horrible all at the same time. They scorched him and the fire shinobi knew that they would pursue him wherever he went. He would never avoid them! He was a rabbit before a hawk, nothing but a pig to the slaughter. How stupid was he to fight this monster, this demon!?
Hyotoko's heart was pounding in his chest. He couldn't breath and the killing intent the creature was radiating was slamming down on him in waves. He wanted to rise, but knew that the moment he did, he would lose his head.
"What the hell are you!?" He shouted at the top of his voice, eyes wide with terror. "What are you!?"
"You're worst nightmare," the creature responded, another murderous wave slamming into Hyotoko, stealing what little breath he had and making his limbs turn to jelly and his bowels want to empty.
Finally he couldn't take it anymore, the terror or the killing intent. "Kill me…" he whispered, not daring to scream lest the creature spare him and consign him to this eternal torment, but the words ripped themselves out of him anyway. "KILL ME!"
The demon stood over him now, one claw raised to the heavens that Hyotoko couldn't see. He was too transfixed by the alluring and terrifying eyes. Those eyes! Those awful eyes!
The claw slammed down on him and blood showered everywhere.
Naruto's demon chakra and features faded as he straightened up, staring down at Hyotoko's corpse, which was pushed into the ground, blood splattered underneath him from where his back had burst open from the force, a massive claw-shaped mark burned and pressed into his chest, a testament to just how hard Naruto had hit him.
"So long bastard," Naruto said to the body as stared at it. "Burn in Hell." If someone who knew him from before he'd become the Sound missing-nin saw this they would be horrified at his actions, but they hadn't seen him as the missing-nin. For him, back then, when all he had to rely on was himself and his demon tenant, this was how he'd done things. A near-death experience with trying to be lenient with a cornered Sound-nin had taught him that. Naruto had let the man live and turned his back on him, only to get a knife in the back, literally, and a fist through the stomach right after.
The lesson there had been hard and nearly killed him if not for the Kyuubi usurping his control, one of the only times the fox had done so, and killing the Sound-nin who'd done it. Naruto had had his eyes opened then. One could not show mercy in a world of death and expect to live long. He'd had to relearn that lesson just now.
A feather light touch against his senses made him glare over his shoulder. At the end of the road was his third and fourth least favorite people in the world, right after Orochimaru and Sasuke.
Uchiha Itachi and Hoshigaki Kisame were behind him, cloaks flapping in the wind that blew through the village.
"Uzumaki Naruto," Itachi murmured, Sharingan fixed on the blond Jinchuuriki's face, eyes that Naruto was studiously avoiding. He didn't need to be sucked into Tsukuyomi or set on fire by Amaterasu or something. "How long has it been?"
Naruto tried to move his hand as easily as he could toward his shuriken holster and the few shuriken remaining there. He was tried not to move his cloak in a way that would've indicated he was reaching for a weapon.
"Not so fast, Naruto-kun," Itachi said easily, "I'm not here to fight, merely to talk."
"Keh, speak for yourself, Itachi," Kisame snorted, one hand closing around Samehada's hilt, lifting the massive bandage-wrapped sword from its place on his back. "It's been too long since we had a good rumble and I'm itching for a fight." The shark-man grinned toothily, slamming the weapon to the ground in front of him. "I'm ready to slice off his legs so he can't run from us again and then we drag him to the Leader."
Naruto's hands made a cross-shaped hand seal. "Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!" Smoke exploded from his body, obscuring the entire area and when it cleared, there were close to twenty Narutos all crowded into the narrow street. At some unseen signal they all poured into the sky, cloaks billowing. From each clone spun a volley of shuriken, filling the air with spinning steel. At the same time the clones were landing. In perfect unison, they made another handseal. "Henge!" The smoke cleared and there was again only one Naruto, but the original blond wasted no time in collecting all the shuriken he'd just made.
Kisame's grin never faded as whirled his massive sword, the shuriken clinking harmlessly off its blade. "Nice try brat!" Naruto scowled then jumped as high as he could, going more than double the height of the houses. His arms flashed and released volley after volley. The stars blasted towards the target. Kisame flung his sword into the sky then his fingers began to flash.
"Suiton! Kaihodan!"
An intense stream of water spewed from Kisame's mouth, the speeding jet blasting through the stars, popping them like a child popping bubbles. The jet of water panned from side to side dispersing the rest of the shuriken. When it was all said and done, a thick white smoke hung over the battlefield, obscuring everything.
Kisame looked around, no longer grinning. "Where the hell did that little bastard go?"
Itachi didn't respond. His Sharingan had detected the slightest shift in the haze that had given away Naruto's location. The top of a billowing formation parted and Naruto shot out of it, a glowing blue ball clenched firmly in his right hand.
"Oh hell!" Kisame shouted as he brought up Samehada to try and block the strike.
"Rasengan!"
The hand-held hurricane met the unforgiving blade and the two were obscured by a tornado that sprang up as the Rasengan tried to do its work and burrow through the blade of Samehada. For a second, Itachi really thought that Naruto would bore straight through the special sword, but a second later and the wrappings were shredded and flung away. The scaly blade exposed, the Samehada lost no time in doing what it did best and eating Naruto's chakra, the surface moving and shifting as if it was alive. The blond jounin did something completely contrary to rational thought and grabbed onto the blade. His hand was ripped open and blood sprayed from the lacerations but the jounin spun on his palm anyway, slamming his shin into Kisame's head, lifting the Akatsuki off his feet and flinging him into a pile of toothpicks that had once been a hut.
Naruto straightened up, flexing his wounded hand, flicking the excess blood from it. When Itachi managed to glimpse the wound again, he noted that there was no wound there.
"Your healing abilities never fail to impress, Naruto-kun," he said simply.
"Can it," Naruto snapped, pulling his weapons scroll out and bringing out Kazekiri, his last resort weapon. He only used the blade when he had no other weapons left. Like now.
Itachi raised one hand, palm out. "As I said, Naruto-kun, I'm not here to capture you. Merely to talk."
"About what?" The jounin answered, but he didn't lower the katana. To let his guard down around people like Itachi and Kisame was asking to get his ass captured and the Kyuubi extracted.
Itachi looked him in the eye before Naruto could turn away but for some reason, the blond didn't feel any of the side effects of the powerful dojutsu. It must've showed on his face because the elder Uchiha snorted softly and turned away. "Come. We must talk in private. Away from Kisame and your team."
Despite himself (and the Kyuubi howling warnings in his ear), Naruto sheathed and sealed Kazekiri then trotted after the missing-nin.
Sakura cried out as Enishi landed a solid right hook to her side. The kunoichi swore that she felt her ribs and arm break at the same time. Enishi smiled viciously as he watched the Konoha-nin tumble away head over heels like a rag doll.
The pink-haired kunoichi stopped in a cloud of dirt and staggered upright, her arm dangling limply, her left hand, glowing a faint green, pressed to her right side. Enishi began to charge, bits and pieces of his armor crumbling away from the place where Sakura had bashed him. He was beginning to have more and more gaps in his granite exterior, partly because of Sakura's fists and partly because of the damage those fists wrought. It wasn't enough though, and he still barely felt any of Sakura's blows.
Or so he thought.
Sakura's left fist quit glowing then curled into a fist and she lunged, leather-shrouded knuckles filling Enishi's vision. His feet dug into the ground, ripping it up like a plow, and he grunted as the attack barely grazed the bottom of his jaw. Even with that light blow, the rock there crunched and cracked, some of it falling away. Sakura followed through, her momentum carrying her into a handstand on her good arm, both feet crashing into the rocky missing-nin's face, shattering all the stone on his head and a good portion on his neck.
Enishi screamed, staggering backward as he clutched as his forehead, blood pouring from between his fingers and streaming down his face, make him look like Sakura had smashed an egg over his face or something.
"That's it, bitch," he snarled, looking over his stained fingers. "I'm not holding back anymore!" His thick fingers rolled together and his armor burst off him, the individual stones clattering as they collided.
"What the hell?" Sakura muttered to herself, "what's ditching his armor going to do?"
Enishi made another hand sign and it all became clear to the kunoichi as more rocks flew from all around them, swirled around the missing-nin, then slammed into place against him. When it was done, Sakura was horrified to see that his armor had been renewed and now had no signs of the damage she'd done earlier to him.
"Impossible!"
"Not done yet," Enishi muttered, making more seals. He slammed his palm into the ground. "Doton! Yomi Numa!" The ground exploded, a thick and smelly purple liquid gushing out, washing out the foundations of the few standing huts, making them lean in, wooden islands that were Sakura's only salvation. If she fell into the Swamp of the Underworld, it was all over for her.
'And,' she thought with a smirk, 'him too. 'With his weight, he'll sink like…well, like a rock!' She was proven right when Enishi shot onto the top of a hut moments after using his technique. Somehow, the top of the hut didn't give in. Sakura supposed that he was using some trick with his chakra to distribute his weight, like a snowshoe distributed weight over snow. 'Hope he can't walk on the swamp that way.'
"Are you ready!?" Enishi shouted to her, cracking his knuckles. They sounded like cannon shots as the stones popped.
Sakura pulled out some bandages and broke off a piece of the roof she was standing on, then tied it to her forearm and using the bandages, repeating the process for her upper arm. Splints in place, she waved the injured limb experimentally, found it didn't hurt too bad, and glared at the missing-nin. "Bring it on!"
The two leapt into the sky at the same time, throwing punches at the same time.
I'm back, in case the email announcing the chapter to you in your inbox wasn't enough. School was getting tough and I had to drop writing in order to concentrate more on my studies. Sorry for the wait. However, it's break, so I have naught but free time! Fun right? Anyway, hope you enjoyed the comeback chapter. Keep an eye out for the next one!
Glossary
Raiton Rairyuuhou (Lightning style, Lightning Dragon Cannon): I don't know how accurate that is, since I don't speak Japanese (though I'd love to learn). The user unleashes a river of Lightning chakra that sprouts a dragon head on the end. I'd put it at A-rank, mid-long range. Original jutsu (as far as I know).
Doton: Yomi Numa (Earth Style, Swamp of the Underworld): A jutsu that turns the area into a swap from which nothing can escape. Jiraiya used it against Orochimaru.
Senbonzakura (Thousand Cherry Blossoms): Tenten's version of Sasame's senbon jutsu, but instead of directly making the needles, she makes clones who use her storage scrolls. I stole the name directly from Bleach. It's Byakuya's Zanpakuto and therefore, not mine.
Suiton Kaihodon (Water Style Pressure Cannon): The user spits a high-pressure stream of water from his or her mouth. In Kisame's hands, I think it would be pretty bad to get caught on the other end.
Soshoryuu (Twin Rising Dragons): Tenten uses two of her weapons scrolls to summon every plausible weapon you can imagine (and more than a few implausible ones) and makes them rain down on her opponent. Should she miss, wires can be used to attack again.