Chapter 25: The Temptation of Sound Part One: The Four Sounds
The morning after Tsunade's inauguration found Nara Shikamaru standing before his commander-in-chief at a little after eight in the morning. "Thank you for getting here so quickly Nara-san."
"A summons from the Hokage is usually important. What do you need from me Hokage-sama?"
Holding her folded hand up before her face, the Godaime Hokage leveled a serious stare on Shikamaru. "Late last night, Uchiha Sasuke left our village. I have no doubt that he is headed to the Village Hidden in the Sound." That caused Shikamaru to narrow his eyes, it being a well-known fact that Sound was Orochimaru's personal village.
"He left! Why?"
"Because he was seduced away by Orochimaru."
Shikamaru to a step back in shock, the words tumbling out of his mouth. "Why? How did Orochimaru do it? He is one of the worst missin-nin out there! Why would Sasuke join him?"
"The reason is irrelevant, and time is wasting. I am assigning you your first mission right now."
"You want me to go get him back? As long as I don't run into any opposition, that should be pretty easy."
"True, but highly unlikely. This is not the first time something of this sort has happened. Whatever his plans, Sasuke is integral to them and wants him badly. There is a extremely high probability that Orochimaru has sent his elite henchmen to escort Sasuke to Sound."
"I request only jounin and chunin be assigned to this mission then, if it is going to be as dangerous as you think."
"Sorry, I can't do that. As you are well aware, aside from those who have permanent assignments here, much of our upper echelons are out of the village, including your former sensei Asuma and your father. Furthermore this is a time-sensitive mission. You can only pursue him as far as the Fire-Rice border. Once Sasuke has crossed into Rice Country, we must let him go. Rice is not a prosperous or powerful nation, but invading a sovereign country, even one as minor as Tea could have severe repercussions if we are not operating under the political protections of a contract. You have thirty minutes to assemble as many genin that you deem fit and leave immediately. The only chunin I can allow you to take with you is Naruto. And I believe that you will need him. You know where the Hyuuga Compound is?" Shikamaru nodded. "Take this," she said, pressing a ring into a small pool of wax at the bottom of half-sheet of paper and handing it to him, "and give it to whoever is there. It is authorization to get Naruto, and whoever else you choose. Now get going. Remember, half an hour."
Shikamaru turned to look over his shoulder and offered a smile. "I know that this is going to be troublesome, but it is someone I know, and I can't let it be. I will do everything I can to bring Sasuke back."
The Hokage's seal had granted him access to the Compound without much fuss, and a servant led him to Naruto's room. He recognized Neji sitting outside the door, who followed him into Naruto's room. Hinata was in the main room when he entered. Shikamaru blushed and turned away when he saw her in a brief shirt and panties, under a loosely closed robe.
"Good morning Shikamaru-kun. While it is nice to see you, may I ask what is so important that you would enter my rooms without knocking?"
Looking through the corner of his eye he saw that she had cinched her robe more firmly closed, with an irritated expression on her face. "Ah, sorry, I was told that these were Naruto's rooms."
"They are. His and mine. May I ask what is going on?"
"Sasuke has left the village. The Hokage told me to come get Naruto for a mission to go after him."
Hinata's expression calmed at this and she nodded. "I see."
"Tell him to meet me at the east gate in twenty-two minutes."
"Who else has been assigned?" Neji asked.
"Just him and me, right now. The Hokage told me to find Naruto, but I had assemble the rest of the team myself, limiting myself to any genin I can gather in the next twenty minutes, because of the manpower issues we are having right now." He eyed the two genin. "A pair of Hyuugas would be really useful."
"We can come."
"Excellent. Remember, east gate, twenty-two minutes."
Shikamaru left the Hyuuga, dashing to his next potential recruit. The only genin he knew to virtually any degree were those from his class in the Academy, so he went looking for his former classmates. Shino was out of the village on a mission with his father, wasting six minutes. Choji wasn't home either, and with only six minutes left he left for the gates. He had not found a tracker, Shino and Kiba being the only people he knew to have any expertise in that field
Thirty-two minutes after Shikamaru had left the Hokage Tower, he arrived at the gate, finding his team already there. He was surprised to see Tenten there, armed to the teeth as usual. "I made a clone and sent it to get her. Everyone here is a close-combat fighter, so I figured that someone who specialized at fighting at range would be useful."
"Good thinking Naruto-kun. Anyways,we need to get going. Sasuke has a ten or twelve hour head start on us, so we need to move quickly to catch up."
"One second." Shikamaru tapped his foot impatiently as Naruto pulled out a scroll and unsealed something. Handing out a bunch of radios, he said "strap these on around your necks, with the receptors on the side of your throat. Press a finger to the mic to speak, and everyone within about a mile or so will hear you." Doing as he said, he unwound the earwig and laced it up and over the back of his ear, quickly mimicked by everyone else.
"Unfortunately, we don't have anyone who has expertise in tracking, so we are just going to head north towards Sound and catch them at before they enter Rice Country."
"Actually, Hinata, Tenten or I can track him."
"What do you mean?"
"I can't explain how the technique works, but suffice to say that the trail should be fresh enough for any of us to follow."
"If you say so. Everyone, check your equipment. You were gathered here on short notice, so let me know if you are short on something."
"Tenten-chan can resupply you with just about anything you need," Naruto said, adjusting the length of his baldric.
Three minutes later, the Sasuke Retrieval Team were on their way, in a widely spaced single-file line. Hinata was first in line, using both her Byakugan and spirit threads to lead the team after Sasuke. Next was Shikamaru, who as team captain needed to be forward to judge the terrain and give orders according to what Hinata relayed, and the rest could see any hand signals he made. Third was Naruto, with his speed and shadow clones was best suited to react to an unexpected situation. After him was Tenten who, as their sniper, was best kept away from any fighting. Neji was the rearguard, his Byakugan able to keep an eye on the backtrail and their blind spots.
Outside the gates, to Shikamaru and Neji, all they saw was Hinata close her eyes and slump forward. Shikamaru moved forward to catch her, but was halted by Naruto's out-thrust arm. A moment later, Hinata straightened and reached out to grab air. "Alright, I found his trail!"
Shikamaru looked to Neji who shrugged. Apparently, whatever method that Hinata was using to track Sasuke, it was not a Hyuuga technique. There were so many mysteries surrounding Team Nine that it only came as a mild surprise that one of them would be able to track Sasuke. Between their transforming swords, the odd black costumes that they sometimes wore, and the myriad and seeming random abilities they possessed, he wouldn't put anything past them. At this point, if one of them said that they could they could fly or walk through walls, he would believe them.
In any case, however Hinata was tracking Sasuke, she was on the right trail given the number and complexity of the traps they encountered. Double tripwires, explosive barrier seals and false trails, there was obviously a sealing and trapping expert among them. The presence of the traps confirmed that there was at least one person escorting Sasuke, because many of the traps were beyond anything that had been taught in the Academy.
Shikamaru's team came across a battlefield six hours into the pursuit, signs of at least six, possibly as many as ten combatants having fought there, although there were no bodies. They hurried on past the site, hoping that one or more of their targets had been wounded, necessitating a rest for them. And not half an hour later, Hinata, whose Byakugan was focused forward spied four Sound shinobi paused in a clearing a little ways ahead. The group came to a halt as soon as she saw them. Shikamaru quickly laid out a plan, splitting their team into two, himself and Neji on the first team, with Naruto, Hinata and Tenten on the second. The first team was primarily a diversion, and he wanted to keep Team Nine intact for the moment, their teamwork probably his best weapon at the moment.
Naruto spent a few minutes creating small batches of clones, to keep both the noise and smoke down. Once he had created about two hundred, they spread out, encircling the clearing, hopefully cutting off any escape routes.
Shikamaru and Neji crept in closer to get a better look at the camp, but they were detected after less than a minute but not before they were able to establish that Sasuke was most likely alive within the barrel casket. An explosive-tagged kunai sent the pair tumbling out into the open, a little singed, but otherwise none the worse for the wear. Neji stepped into a ready stance as the four Sound got to their feet.
"Whoa, hold on! We aren't here to fight. We are here to negotiate. My name is Nara Shikamaru, chunin. I am the one in charge here."
"Hah, they sent a chunin and a genin to deal with the Sound Four? I almost feel insulted," the dark-skinned one said.
"We aren't here to fight. We wish to talk. You have one of ours, and we want him back."
"You say you are here to negotiate, but what about your guys surrounding the clearing?" Shikamaru barely had time to blink before the trees that created the border of the clearing exploded, probably killing most if not all of Naruto's clones and forcing Team Nine to enter the open. Naruto and his girls were unharmed, quick enough to outpace the activation of the explosive seals but Shikamaru grimaced nonetheless, displeased about having his plan fall apart so quickly. Or at least that is what he had wanted to the Sound ninja to think.
The arrival of three new enemies instinctively drew their attention, so Shikamaru was able to form the single rat seal and send his shadow flickering across the ground to merge with the four other ninja's shadows.
His victory was short lived when he noticed that one of the grey-haired guy's heads was missing. He barely had time to wonder what was going on when he was struck by a pair of spinning shuriken. His reflexive block broke the Shadow Imitation Technique's hold on the four.
The four enemies wasted no time taking advantage of the Konoha ninja's surprise, The red-haired girl yelled out "Jirobo, take them out!" the largest of the four slamming his palm into the ground, a dome of earth rising too quickly for even Naruto to escape.
The darkness was absolute, Naruto unable to see his hand an inch from his nose. The glow of a Rasengan was normally negligible, but even the little light it emanated was enough compared to the Stygian darkness before. The dome was fairly large as such things went, about eight or ten feet across, and about as high in the center.
"Dammit," Shikamaru muttered, angered by the ease with which he and his team was captured.
Naruto walked up to the wall, examining it closely before taking a step back and driving the Rasengan into the wall as hard as he could. When he made another to examine the damage, he saw that the crater gouged out by his attack was quickly healing, new rock forming to replace what he destroyed.
"I don't think that we will be able to fight our way out. The walls are laced with chakra pathways, which are draining our chakra."
"Devious," Shikamaru said. "It is draining us dry, and doing it quickly. If we do not do something quickly, this guy is gonna kill us."
"Our chakra is not being wasted though. He is absorbing it, making himself stronger," Hinata noted.
"Really? How about we see who handle more chakra then?" Laying his hands on the stone wall, Naruto took a deep breath and started pushing as much chakra as he could into the walls.
"Naruto, I don't think that that is a good idea." Tenten had sat down and was slumped against the wall.
"No, I can do this."
"Naruto-sama, even if you were able to somehow able to overload his technique, he will still have more chakra than he started out with. You are doing nothing but making him stronger right now."
"I said I will do this!"
After a few seconds, when Naruto showed signs of flagging and nothing happened, Shikamaru stepped forward and put his hand on Naruto's shoulder to pull him away from the wall.
"Hey, cut that out. You aren't doing anything but making our opponent stronger."
"Shut up! I am going to beat this guy!" Naruto's expression was locked into a rictus snarl and Shikamaru was almost knocked off his feet when Naruto gave one more full-body heave just as his chakra began to flag, red chakra exploding from his form, splashing against the ceiling and swirling into the dome. Shikamaru skin started stinging instantly, the skin of his upthrown arm reddened and prickling, even as the dome came crashing down, the fat guy stumbling back and screaming.
Naruto fell to his knees, sweating and panting. "Hah, told you I could do it," Naruto said to no one in particular.
Jirobo was still screaming, having fallen to his knees and clutching himself. Livid burns extended from his palms, up his arms and disappeared into his tunic. And then, just as suddenly as the screaming started, it stopped. Blood began trickling from his eyes, ears, nose and mouth as he slumped forward into the dirt, face-down.
Nobody moved for almost a minute and a half, wary for some sort of ruse. But as the seconds ticked away without the slightest twitch, Neji padded forward. Pressing two fingers to his neck, he felt no pulse.
"You killed him Naruto-sama."
Everyone, except perhaps Hinata, gave him an odd look out the corner of their eyes at that. Of course, being a Jinchuuriki, and the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki on top of that, one should expect odd things to happen. Killing with nothing but chakra was a shock even so.
"Well, let's get going then. We have lost enough grounds as is."
"Agreed," Neji assented. Shikamaru led the group out of the clearing into the trees, Jirobo lying forgotten in the dirt. The pursuit team rapidly began closing in on the the three remaining members of the Sound Four, the total absence of traps suspicious, and reasonable at the same time.
"There is no need to set traps behind you, if the only pursuit is friendly," Tenten pointed out.
"The fact that they left only one of their team to deal with all of us means that they are overconfident and that leaves us with an opportunity," Shikamaru continued. "If we give them what they expect to see, then they should not question it. Hopefully."
"So one of us Transforms into that fat bastard, and strike from within, when the time comes."
"Exactly Naruto-kun. As you are the fastest one here, as well as the most durable, you would be the best one of us to do it."
"Because I can heal better and faster than you guys."
"Precisely."
"Glad to know I am appreciated," the blond chunin grumbled. He formed the three seals anyways, and passed Shikamaru and Hinata, catching up to his "teammates." The three Sound ninja looked back at Naruto-as-Jirobo as he finally came into their sight.
"About time you caught up with us," the dark-skinned boy said, the only one who wore a hitai-aite.
"Sorry, it took a little longer to eat their chakra than I had thought it would."
"Don't be so slow you fatty. Hurry up and take the damn coffin dickhead."
"Sure thing," Naruto-as-Jirobo said. But when he reached to take the barrel from the six-armed guy, he turned around and tossed it to the red-haired girl. "Sorry, but I can't let you have this, as you are not Jirobo. Jirobo always tells Tayuya of for her language when she curses."
"I see," Naruto said, allowing the Transformation to fall away. He threw a punch, barely missing a beat, the top set of the other boy's arms raised to block. He crossed his arms to block whatever attack the multi-limbed nin charged up when his cheeks swelled. Naruto was surprised when, instead of a blade of wind, or some kind of weapon shooting forth, he was pinned to the bole of a nearby tree with what appeared to be spider silk, incredibly strong and sticky. Crossed as his arms were, he couldn't reach any of his weapons to free himself. He was relegated to a looker-on as Tenten quickly unlimbered one of her rifles and took aim. She waited as the two Hyuugas, Hinata and Neji, tried to double-team the strange ninja. They barely avoided from colliding headlong into one another as the guy flicked his hands back and fired silken lines, allowing him to swing away out of harms way. Tenten waited until he was facing away from her until she fired, snapping three of his threads with one shot.
Their enemy barely skipped a step when his smooth swing turned into a lurching pivot. He gained control of himself almost immediately, using his top two sets of hands to create a large ball of webbing, hurling it at the two still-soaring Hyuugas, capturing them in a thick cocoon-like web.
Shikamaru was left watching the battle in apprehension. He was a leader and a tactician, his jutsu arsenal limited to his family techniques, useless as long as their enemy remained airborne, unlike Team Nine. He was pretty good with his family jutsu, but had not mastered the Shadow Weaving techniques well enough to lift shadows from the ground into empty air. But he did land a few seconds later, leaving Tenten standing on a branch out in the open and slipped into the shadowy depths of the surrounding foliage. He waited patiently as "Kidomaru of the East Gate" toyed with his teammates, apparently not noticing that he had slipped away. Utilizing every iota of stealth he could summon, he ghosted behind Kidomaru, taking his time, choosing his moment carefully. He dropped from where he was sticking to the underside of a tree branch, planning to try to knock the guy to the forest floor. But his eyes widened in shock as Kidomaru whirled on him, a nasty smile twisting his face. Shikamaru couldn't do anything, falling through air as the Sound shinobi below him wrapped one of his thin lines around his wrist, probably preparing to sling Shikamaru into a nearby tree.
So when Neji came flying out of nowhere, effortlessly parting the deceptively slender line, he contorted his body, altering his fall so he would land on his feet.
"How?" Kidomaru asked in alarm.
"Anything made from chakra is naught but dust on the wind when thrown against the Jyuuken." Shikamaru looked to where Neji and Hinata had landed and found the cocoon to have been burst from the inside. Even as Neji spoke, Hinata was freeing Naruto from his bonds. Shikamaru only smirked as Naruto and Hinata landed in front of Kidomaru as he tried to flee.
"Surrender now and you need not come to harm," Shikamaru said. "You are outnumbered and overmatched." Arms crossed over his chest, he allowed the confident smirk to straighten into a slight frown. "Resist, and you will be killed." The sharp report from one of Tenten's rifles and the explosion of wood at his feet only emphasized his words. "We know that Orochimaru leads your village. In return for information, you will be allowed to reside in Konoha, given asylum. So choose. Fight for a master that will most likely punish you if you return, or return with us, and be provided a decent life."
Looking around at all these warlike men and women, hard of eye and heart, he raised his hands and folded them behind his head in defeat. Neji moved to bind him quickly, hands pulled tight across his back, palms facing out and wrists and fingers bound in ninja wire. As a last resort, should he manage to free himself without losing fingers or hands, Naruto wrapped explosive seals around his six wrists and tied with more wire. If the seal were to be torn, such as in an escape attempt, the seals would detonate, each individually large enough and charged enough to reduce one of the ancient trees surrounding them to so much mulch and sawdust.
Kidomaru was disarmed, relieved of a single kunai pouch. "I make my own weapons," he explained, shrugging. "Let me say one more thing before you guys continue. You seem to be under the impression that Sasuke-sama was kidnapped, or taken hostage, that he is being brought to Orochimaru-sama against his will. That is not true. He is the one who sought us out, seeking the power that Orochimaru-sama can give him. He has joined us of his own volition, free of coercion or duress. Sasuke-sama has immersed himself in darkness because he wanted it. If you want to take him back to your village, you will have to do it by force."
"You lie!" Naruto snarled, fisting his hands in Kidomaru's shirt. "There is no way that Sasuke would leave the village for more power. He is plenty strong as it is! I know it!"
Kidomaru chuckled. "Apparently, you don't know your comrade as well as you think then."
Naruto threw him down to the bark of the branch they were all standing on, huffing in disgust. Hinata put a hand on Naruto's shoulder, pulling him back. "Naruto-kun, we have to go. We can find out whether or not he is telling the truth when we find Sasuke. But we have to get going. Remember, once he crosses the border, he is gone."
"Yeah, I know. Get this piece of shit out of my sight," he growled to his clones.
The squad was on it's way a moment after that, a squad of ten Naruto clones tying Kidomaru against a tree, rigging several traps so that if he slipped his bonds a dozen kunai would be fired at him. On top of that, he was papered head-to-toe with explosive seals, set to detonate should he start actively channeling chakra in the least way. There were seals designed to restrict chakra flow, but Naruto did not have any on his person, and did not have the materials to create any. The ten Naruto shadow clones would remain behind, the traps and tags were only precautionary measures, in case the clones were dispelled. Naruto had never encountered any sort of range limitations on his technique, but now was not the time to find out and have the prisoner escape.
"Naruto-sama, even if what he says is true," Neji said over the radio, "you can save him. You saved me from the darkness, when I didn't believe that there was anything but darkness. If there is anyone who can bring him back to the light, it is you."
Nobody said anything, a sense of slight embarrassment of having accidentally overheard something intimate, not meant to be shared with others, not meant for their ears. The silence stretched awkwardly as they forest rushed by in a green blur, racing to catch up with the two remaining members of the Sound Four.
It didn't take them long to catch up with their targets, weighed down as the girl was with the coffin. The pair was quickly overwhelmed and relieved possession of the barrel containing Sasuke by a combination of Naruto's Shadow Clone Technique and Shikamaru's Shadow Imitation Technique. It was just a matter of splitting the girl and her companion up and then pinning her in place. But their elation at having finally succeeded at reclaiming Sasuke was short lived.
Relieved at having Sasuke back in their grasp, Shikamaru and Naruto, who were standing to either side of the barrel were caught off guard when a white form materialized in between them and launched them from the branch.
The new boy was almost unnaturally pale, his skin almost translucent, hair snow-white. Casually leaning on the barrel he spoke. "Tayuya, Sakon, you who were once two of the Five, have failed. Where are the other two?"
"Kimimaro..." Tayuya whispered, in awe, or fear, echoed by the two-headed boy..
"I asked you a question, Tayuya of the North Gate, Sakon of the West Gate, and I will have answers!"
Team Shikamaru looked at one another in frank surprise. He had dealt with their two strongest members, and then proceeded to utterly ignore them. This was an insult of a magnitude more than Naruto could take. Roaring wordlessly, Naruto threw himself headlong at the interloper. Twisting himself in midair, he blocked Tayuya's punch with crossed arms, easily landing on a nearby branch.
'Fast,' he thought as he saw Kimimaro move behind Tayuya and whisper something in her ear. Naruto could track the man with his eyes without undue difficulty, but he knew that the others wouldn't have such an easy time of it. Sure enough, he was the only one able to follow Kimimaro's passage when he left with the barrel slung under one arm.
Shikamaru stopped himself short of snarling, but his irritation was plain as day. They were close, just a few miles short of the Fire-Rice border, and rapidly running out of time. He had no doubt that he and his team could deal with the two Kimimaro had left behind, but he wasn't sure they could defeat them and catch up to that pasty-faced bastard too. He had managed to avoid splitting the team up thusfar, but he didn't see any other way of completing the mission otherwise now, and he did not like it.
"Naruto, Tenten, Hinata!" he barked. "Go after that guy, now. Neji and I will hold these two back. We do not have enough time for all of us to fight these two guys and be certain of catching up with Sasuke. You three have the best teamwork, and that Kimimaro guys is exceptionally dangerous. You will need all the advantages you can muster against him. DON'T argue!" Shikamaru said when he saw that Naruto was going to. "You three have the best chance of completing the mission out of all of us. Now get going."
Naruto jerked his head in a nod once, grabbed Hinata and Tenten's hands and vanished. Not for the first time, Shikamaru wondered at the trio's strange and wondrous abilities, but shook his head to clear it of extraneous thoughts and focused on the two Sound shinobi in front of him and Neji. Their first two opponents hadn't been terribly impressive, but that did not preclude these two from being stronger. Well, that and they hadn't given Jirobo or Kidomaru much of a chance to fight, unlike now. Two-on-two gave them a much better chance at drawing a fight out than five-on-one did.
"Stick with me, don't let yourself get drawn away if you can avoid it, and don't let either of them get away. Naruto and the others are going to have enough trouble with that Kimimaro guy as is, without having to deal with one of these two." Neji simply nodded, silent. Sakon and Tayuya seemed to be talking between themselves, as they were, and Shikamaru was content to let them. At this point, he was buying time for Naruto and his women, so the longer their enemies spent talking, the better. "We haven't seen anything either of them can do, but can you see anything peculiar about either of them? Anything that might give us a hint as to their abilities?"
"The male has an odd chakra circulatory system, doubled over, almost as if there are two bodies inhabiting the same space. I am not sure what to make of it. My Jyuuken may have less than optimal performance on him."
"So I will take the guy, and you will take the girl."
"I do not see much in the way of weaponry, but I do see what appears to be a flute, or wind instrument of some sort. Logic would dictate that she is most likely a ranged fighter, probably dealing with air or sound as some form of attack."
"I see." Plans were already coming together in his head, attack vectors and maneuvers with which to ensure victory assembling. He would try to get the guy as close to the ground as possible, because up in the canopy, he had to extend his shadow all the way down the tree he was on and up his, severely limiting the range and increasing the 'cast time,' so to speak. He didn't expect to get him to come down much, so he would have to take their height above the ground into account as well.
His thoughts were interrupted by the red-haired girl raising her voice in anger. "I don't give a shit, you damn two-faced turd! I told you, our lives are already forfeit, the only reason we are alive is because Kimimaro doesn't want to have to deal with this garbage. You know that Kimimaro speaks with Orochimaru-sama's voice in these matters."
The two-headed boy said something inaudible in response, causing Tayuya to tense up again. A lightbulb went on over Shikamaru head at Tayuya's shouts. They had already captured one enemy today. Shikamaru was not a greedy person, but the bounties on the heads of Orochimaru's personal hit-squad was likely to be sizable. The intelligence they would offer was nothing to sneer at either. Jirobo was an unavoidable death, but maybe he could talk these two into surrendering.
"Hey!" he yelled over the twenty or so intervening feet. "You seem to be caught between a rock and a hard place. Maybe we can discuss some sort of arrangement here. Jirobo is dead, and Kidomaru has been captured, and is on his way back to Konoha as we speak. If you surrender to us, we can offer you asylum in return for intelligence about the layout of the Sound Village and Orochimaru's plans. I promise you will not be mistreated, and once you have given us what we need, we can establish you within Konoha."
Tayuya laughed. "Are you shitting? For one, who the hell are you to be negotiating our surrender? It looks like we are pretty evenly matched here, since your friends ran off after Kimimaro. Second, I am a loyal shinobi-of-rank of the Village Hidden in the Sound. Third, even us Sound shinobi have a code of honor, and turning traitor at the first sign of resistance is not in it."
"From the way it sounds, no matter what you do, you are going to die, either here at our hands, or at the hands of your master. You would be appropriately compensated for your time and effort, with no fear of torture or execution when you are done."
"I accepted my fate a long time ago. If Orochimaru-sama should deem me unfit for his service, or any Sound shinobi, we would gladly accept his judgment. What you say is true: I will most likely die, no matter what I do, but as long as it is for Orochimaru, then I can accept that."
"Damn," Shikamaru muttered. Speaking out of the corner of his mouth he said to Neji, "it doesn't look like I can talk them out of fighting. If you can, take your opponent alive. If you have to kill her, do so, but they could offer much needed intelligence on Orochimaru and his village."
Neji didn't say anything, but nodded silently. "One last chance," Shikamaru announced. "Come back with us, or fight. But I warn you, should you choose to fight, neither of us will spare you."
"Hah. Let me let you in on a little secret. While that fat bastard Jirobo was physically the strongest of us, and Kidomaru was the smartest, both Sakon and I are stronger overall than they were. So if you think that we will be as easy to beat as they were, you have another thing coming."
"So be it." Drawing a kunai, he flung it by the ring (more out of reflex than anything) as she brought a flute (exactly as Neji had said) up to her lips. His shoulders slumped in disbelief as she whistled a few notes through her flute and three gigantic humanoid creatures were summoned. 'This... this is not good' he thought as the smoke cleared.
"Neji, you got her?"
"Yes. Although there seem to be something odd about her summons, I am ready."
Nodding silently, he dashed along the branch, drawing their attention, allowing Neji to charge, occupying Tayuya's attention so that the two-headed Sakon was the one to attack him. He did not go far, just far enough to prevent Tayuya or Sakon from assisting one another. Of course the same could apply to him and Neji, but with their radios, it should not be too much of an issue.
Shikamaru was quickly scratching his metaphorical head when Sakon apparently absorbed any attacks directed and came through none the worse for the wear. His "huh?" was quickly changed to "oh shit" when Sakon revealed that he was not the only one who inhabited his body. Neji's doubled chakra circulatory system suddenly made a whole lot more sense.
Shikamaru was not a slouch at taijutsu, but he was a far cry from Team Nine in combat ability, and suddenly he was not so sure about his chances of winning. Sakon and Ukon were not so much more skilled in taijutsu that he had no hope of winning, but Ukon's ability to have any part of his body suddenly erupt from Sakon had him at a disadvantage.
'Asuma-sensei always said that your brain was your biggest strength, so put them to use and figure out a way to beat these guys!"
Unfortunately, the brothers were experienced at fighting together and being unpredictable. They were capable of pulling punches when he expected a powerful blow, and kicking with three legs when he expected one. It was almost more than he could do to stay on the defensive and keep his feet. He almost wished that he had not ordered Naruto to go after Sasuke, as he was the most physically imposing one on the team. But he had, so he would have to do what he could.
He had no weapons that could seriously maim with a single blow, no techniques that could kill with single hit. Their strange bloodline also limited the effectiveness of his family's shadow techniques, able to break free by changing who was leading the body. His ninjutsu were all aimed at incapacitating an enemy, setting them up to be knocked down by a teammate. Obviously, that wasn't going to work here. Unable to come up with a workable alternative, he pressed a finger to his throat like Naruto had instructed and radioed Neji.
"Neji, this is Shikamaru. What is your status? Over."
A few seconds passed before Neji replied. "Occupied. Over."
"Well, hurry up and get over here. I have run into trouble. Over."
"How serious? Over."
"Gonna need your help to beat this guy. He has some bizarre bloodline, and I can't hurt ."
"Roger, hold him off for a few minutes. Over"
"Roger. Out."
Neji had been having a hell of a time getting close enough to Tayuya to use his Jyuuken on the girl, the musically-controlled puppets she controlled through her flute stonewalling him. His Jyuuken disrupted and destroyed them easily enough, although they were resummoned within seconds. She was well practiced at fighting with her flute, the instrument hardly hampering her movenemt. The one time that he did get within range of his fingers, she quickly shifted modes of attack, creating a storm of buffeting and slicing gusts, escaping beyond his range when he stopped to defend himself with a Kaiten. It did not take Tayuya long to activate the second level of her Cursed Seal, her skin taking on a dark, earthy tone and growing forward-pointing horns. As soon as she did, she forced her Doki's mouths open, allowing some kind of intangible many-mouthed, worm-like chakra entity to escape. As he quickly found out, just because he could not hit them, it did not mean that they could not hit him. And the fact that his Jyuuken only strengthened them was the icing on the cake.
So if he could not attack the worm-things, and the Doki themselves could not be put down for good, the only chance he had was to take Tayuya out. Of course, that was easier said than done. The Doki had not suffered any penalties to their movement or durability by releasing the worm-things, they had actually gotten faster as Tayuya advanced her Cursed Seal. All in all, he was probably in as bad a position as Shikamaru was.
But knowing that his captain needed him put a whole new spin on things. Before, he was fighting a delaying action, keeping Tayuya occupied with himself so she would not run off and catch Naruto and his partners with their pants down, so to speak. There were four levels to the orthodox Jyuuken, with the Branch Hyuuga taught the first two levels. The first level consisted of the most basic Jyuuken techniques, blunt palm strikes to internal organs and musculature. The second involved the general targeting of individual tenketsu and surgical fingertip needle jabs. The third tier involved Main Branch-specific techniques such as the Eight Trigrams Sixty-Four Palms and the Eight Trigrams Heavenly Spin. The fourth and final level of the Jyuuken was described in the clan archives, but in only the most general terms, without any specific techniques or abilities named.
Up until this point, he had been employing the first tier of the Jyuuken almost exclusively, trying to conserve energy by using unpowered palm thrusts and attacks. That changed quickly. At first, he had been focused on Tayuya's puppets, the Doki, trying to figure out a way to disable them permanently. Now, he did not have the time to try to take Tayuya alive, and went straight for the kill. He waited for the largest of the three demons to charge, ducking under a straight punch, grabbing the thing's wrist and twisting so that when he struck the elbow, it bent in the opposite way it was designed to bend. Wrenching its arm, he forced it to turn away from him or have its arm torn off. Kicking it in the back of the knee, he brought its head within reach and grabbed it by the chin and back of the head, breaking its neck. Maybe inflicting physical damage would work where chakra failed.
He did not stay to find out if his attack had incapacitated his enemy, dashing to Tayuya and the next puppet. He rolled to one side, out of the way of the long-haired Doki's massive mace. A needle jab rendered the demon's hand senseless and sent the weapon tumbling to the ground. This one was quicker, able to break Neji's thumbhold and send him into a nearby tree trunk with a side kick. Regaining his senses, he barely ducked one of the chakra worms heading right for his head and rolled up the trunk, parallel to the ground, chakra channeled to his feet. Apparently he was not the only one who could tree walk, as the now-unarmed Doki thrust at his midsection with its elbow, a move which he parried and answered with a double handed palm thrust. The thing did not stay down, catching itself in a handstand as it's feet was blasted from under it. Righting itself, Neji was forced onto the defensive for several seconds, dodging, blocking and parrying a flurry of fists.
Jumping off of the tree trunk to dodge a chakra worm, he was almost caught by a second one as he landed on a thin branch. Fortunately it broke under him and he caught himself on a lower branch. Tayuya was now about fifteen feet above him, and he quickly regained his altitude. Jumping over a third chakra worm, he continued climbing until he was in the canopy. He had to move fast, lest Tayuya leave him hiding in the leaves and go after Shikamaru or Naruto. As her Doki required line-of-sight from Tayuya to attack, they did not follow him into the leafy heights. He made sure to make enough noise that Tayuya could keep approximate track of him, and she sent the chakra worms after him, as he had expected. Keeping away from them was not difficult, as she was blind-firing them at him.
Every few seconds, he flung a kunai or shuriken at her, making her think that he was trying to break her flute. It didn't work of course, not that he expected it to. But it did make sure that she kept her attention on him.
Generally speaking, a Hyuuga that had to rely on ninjutsu in combat was looked down on, as the prevailing opinion among the Clan leadership was that the Jyuuken should be sufficient for any proper Hyuuga. Of course, one could not pass the Genin Exam, nor be promoted beyond chunin without some nin- and genjutsu. Hinata was an oddity in that she did not take to the Jyuuken and that she used ninjutsu in combat.
In any case, just because Neji did not use ninjutsu in combat did not mean that he did not know any. Creating ten regular clones, he sent them, one at a time, at Tayuya. Of course they did not last long, but they were not supposed to be anything but a distraction. Slowly moving from the last point that he had telegraphed his location, he poised himself above and just behind Tayuya. Silent falling on her, one hand loaded with chakra, he intended to thoroughly scramble her brains by sending a solid slug of chakra through her frontal lobe. He didn't even have time to blink when Tayuya whirled and caught him across the temple with her flute, hard enough to deflect his strike, breaking her nose and dislocating her jaw with the heel of his palm.
Nevertheless, both combatants were knocked from the branch, both landing hard on the forest floor. Neji recovered first, and stumbled over to where Tayuya had landed. He was wary of a trap or trick when she did not move, but the cause was plenty clear when he flipped her over with his foot. Her flute had broken, one of the two jagged ends sticking out of her eye. He barely blinked at the blood pooling around the silvery metal, instead putting two fingers to the side of her throat. Thirty seconds later and no pulse, he concluded that she was dead.
Leaving her in the dirt, he jumped into the branches, seeking his captain. He came on Shikamaru, clearly over matched, but holding his own regardless. He tapped his throat mic twice, signaling that he had arrived. He did not want to give himself away by speaking with Shikamaru, electing to studying their opponent, to choose the best moment for him to enter the battle. It was almost instantly clear that the two brothers were close-combat specialists, something that Shikamaru had already picked up on, and was trying to stay out of the range of their fists, to only limited success. He narrowed his eyes in suspicion when the brothers split, widening in alarm when one of the two brothers actually merged with Shikamaru.
Not waiting to see what the guy could do to Shikamaru like that, he jumped as hard as he could from the underside of a branch, chakra-loaded hand prepared to send a spike of chakra through the second head sticking from Shikamaru's shoulder. The boy was blasted out of Shikamaru and tumbled across the dirt like a rag doll. The other brother wasted no time in rushing to his sibling's side and assimilating him, until he was nothing but an oversized pimple on the back of the first brother's neck.
Placing a hand on Shikamaru's shoulder, he quietly asked if he was okay. Shikamaru straightened and nodded. Wiping blood from his lips with the back of his hand, he stood up. "Be very careful about going hand-to-hand with these guys. As you saw, they can merge themselves with you and damage your insides. He didn't have enough time to do anything much to me."
"Okay, so taijutsu is out. Neither of us have much in the way of offensive ninjutsu or genjutsu, and I somehow doubt that kunai and shuriken are going to cut it."
"Yeah, when they are like that," Shikamaru gestured at the two-headed boy, "they heal minor injuries almost instantly. The only way to kill them is for a one-hit kill. Anything less than instantaneous death they could likely recover from. And whatever you did to that guy, it is wearing off."
And Neji noted, that despite the fact that the spike of chakra should have shredded his brain, the second brother was starting to come to life. "Okay, we gotta act quickly, before the second one gets his act together. Can you pin him with your Shadow Imitation Technique?"
"With only one of them, yes. But they have been getting wary of getting caught by my shadow. And if the second guy wakes up, they can break my technique at will, more or less."
"Okay, then we just have to take them out before he does. Follow my lead."
As both brothers were sharing a single body, and the second brother was still recovering from the brain strike, he thought that there was a good chance that they would not be able to use whatever possession technique they used on Shikamaru. Of course, even without the second brother, the first was still highly proficient in hand-to-hand combat. And as Neji had first suspected, the brothers unique physiology rendered them all but immune to his Jyuuken.
Blunt palm strikes seemed to slow him down for a few seconds, but trying to seal his tenketsu was all but impossible. He was agile and had incredible situational awareness, able to avoid Shikamaru's shadow with not much effort. Even when Neji was able to seal one of his tenketsu, it did not seem to hamper him unduly, and reopened within a few minutes. The only other person he had ever seen to have such unnatural resilience to his Jyuuken was Naruto, and he was pretty certain that this guy did not have a Biju to unseal his tenketsu.
However the guy was doing it, it was not without cost. The boy was starting to run low on chakra, even if it did not seem to affect his performance yet. Even as low as the grey-haired boy was, Neji was hardly better. Between the chase, Jirobo's chakra-stealing technique and his battle with Tayuya, he was running on empty. "Shikamaru, I am running dangerously low on chakra, we have to hurry up and take this guy out before I collapse."
"How much longer can you last?"
"Don't know, but not very long."
Neji was slowing down, hunched over and breathing hard. The two-headed boy grinned, once the Hyuuga was out of the game, he could take the chunin out at his leisure.
Charging Neji, Sakon exchanged a quick flurry of blows, arms stinging from the Hyuuga's Jyuuken, the sensation fading after only a minute or so. The Hyuuga had limited himself to taijutsu, showing no facility for ninjutsu or genjutsu, relying wholly on his Jyuuken. So when he glimpsed the flash of steel and felt the sting of its bite, he shifted tactics quickly. Blocking with the backs of his arms, where there were fewer blood vessels to be cut, warding his attacks away with the fingers and not the palms, he settled into the defensive until he and his opponent had settled into a regular back-and-forth.
Sakon raised his left arm to block a cut, blinking at the sensation of flesh meeting flesh, instead of flesh meeting steel. Looking down, he coughed blood, dripping onto the kunai slipped in between his ribs.
"What the fuck?" he gasped. Twenty feet away, Shikamaru released Neji from his Shadow Binding Technique.
"You didn't notice when Shikamaru took control of my body with his Shadow Binding Technique, and switched the kunai from my left hand to the right. He is right-hand dominant, where I am left."
Falling to one knee, he accepted Shikamaru arm as the two began limping in the direction that Team Nine had left.
OoOoO
A/N: Before anyone asks, yes, I meant to say shinobi-of-rank. It will be explained exactly what that means in the next couple of chapters. Also, it was not my fault it took so long to get this out. Shikamaru was being lazy and didn't want to fight. That and several incidents with some very taxing goats equals me not being to get much screentime to write.