Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto nor Sekirei, all characters, thoughts and ideas that exist in this story that were taken from the original works belong to their specific creators, Masashi Kishimoto and Sakurako Gokurakuin. Only original thoughts and or characters created in this story are my own.
Author's Notes: I've come to realize I've made a rather upsetting mistake. I labeled my hideouts: Alpha, Beta, Charlie and Delta Points… that's incorrect. That's combining the Greek Alphabet with the NATO one. Charlie should have been gamma or beta should have been bravo. Considering the original intent I will be sticking with the Greek Alphabet here on out.
This chapter is… well… It's hard to judge how you will all react to it. I told you once before that one of Naruto's Sekirei would be incredibly unique and out there. Well this chapter is that chapter. Welcome everyone to Naruto's last official Sekirei that I had planned. The scenes in this chapter were envisioned long before I ever put pen to paper so to speak. It's been a long time coming. There's actually two things in this chapter that had been envisioned long before I ever put pen to paper. ^_^
Finally I'll be pulling in some more references from the Nasuverse, this won't be for some time yet but I figured I'd give you a heads up. There won't be any heroic spirits, or mages, etc., No Ether Liners either or anything of the sort, over-powered pieces of crap that they are. However there are some interesting aspects about the overall Nasuverse, specifically in reference to the planets, that I plan on incorporating into my story.
On that note I would love to speak with a Nasuverse expert that knows everything Nasuverse to work some stuff out. The wikia is good but it doesn't give me enough details in certain areas. I can't go into more detail here without spoiling future elements.
Review Responses: Glad everyone agreed with the handling of the doctor and liked the development between Miya and Naruto. Really trying to build a strong and real relationship there since Miya is, at least for me in the context of my story, a hard character to pair up with anyone. She comes with baggage no one else does, in a position of power over virtually everyone else and doesn't really come across as a character that'll play second fiddle to anyone, even Naruto. I'm not female so I doubt her interaction will be exactly as a females would be but I'm hoping that I'm at least portraying some sort of 'real' relationship development that's not too far off real life and not the standard 'Love at First Sight' shtick that all the other Sekirei have.
Chapter 21: Chime
A scream of frustration broke Blanc's immersion in her book. She had been incredibly fascinated by what it was she had been reading. There was so much to learn of this world that she felt she could read from now until the moment she died of old age and still not cover everything.
She set her book, 'How to Please your Lover,' down and looked over at the desk where the scream had originated. She started in surprise as she realized there was a rather large new addition to their room. Had she really been so absorbed in her book that she hadn't noticed the giant metal case being lugged into the room?
The cry itself had come from Hanabi as she hammered on a keyboard in futility. Naruto's wife glared at the screen as if trying to will it to work properly. Beside her was Naruto. He had a hand on her shoulder and was rubbing it comfortingly, although the small smile on his face made him look as if he was about break out into laughter at any moment.
"What's wrong?" Blanc asked as she got up and hovered over to their side.
"Ah, sorry Blanc, I hope we didn't disturb you." Naruto said apologetically as he glanced over at his newest Sekirei.
"It's no problem." Blanc replied.
Hanabi wasn't in the mood to be so apologetic, "This stupid piece of junk is worthless! How are you supposed to get it to do anything? I swear if Arthain just tricked me to into buying a 40,000,000 yen piece of shit I'm going to tear his core out and shove it down his throat!"
Blanc blinked in surprise. That was a lot of money.
"Arthain?" That was a name Blanc hadn't heard in over a month. Had he stuck around? She had been under the impression that he was long gone.
"It seems that we're still connected on some level because he is a clone of me." Naruto said as he turned to face Blanc fully, "He still gets the memories of some of the clones that I dispel, although Sasha appears not to get any. Even Arthain doesn't get all the memories of all my clones. Only certain ones it appears. The connection between us, while still there, appears to have frayed quite a bit. It'll probably snap any day now." It was probably due to Naruto's chakra inside the clone being replaced by the chakra from the core. Their situation was so unique he still wasn't sure what to make of it, "Anyways Hanabi has been looking around for computer equipment for a couple weeks now. She saw how easily Matsu could get information with them so she wanted to do the same. I usually send a clone with her in case she needs help carrying stuff back. Apparently Arthain got wind of what she was doing and sent a letter to us addressed to her. It had a list of equipment she should buy if she wanted to 'dig up the dirty secrets of others' as he put it."
"Oh, so that's what this is." Blanc said as she eyed the server enclosure. "He had her buy an entire server." Well that explained the cost. Depending on the quality and the power behind it 40,000,000 yen could be used up pretty quickly. It would eat power up just as quickly, hopefully Naruto had talked it over with Miya first otherwise Sekirei No. 01 would break Naruto's knee caps when she saw her next electricity bill.
"You know what this is?" Hanabi asked as she whirled around in her seat.
"Yes, it's a server farm. I can't tell what's in it because it's locked up but I have read over one-hundred and fifty three different manuals and guides on computer hardware and software so I recognize what this is." Blanc replied.
"…" Naruto and Hanabi just stared at her silently.
"What?" Blanc asked.
Instantly Hanabi was behind the petite Sekirei and began to push her towards the chair. "Blanc my dear, you're my new best friend. Please, have a seat."
Blanc let herself be guided into the chair before the screen. When she got a look at what was on the desk she realized there were actually two monitors. Both were BenQ XL2420TX monitors. The dual 24-inch screens were not the top of the line but they were very good quality monitors, they weren't cheap either. It also appeared that Arthain was a Razer fanatic. The keyboard was a Razer DeathStalker, the mouse was a Naga, the mouse pad was a Vespula and there was even a Tiamat Headset for whatever reason. Blanc was surprised that the case wasn't also made by Razer, although that was probably only because the company didn't make computer cases. The case in this instance was a HAF X. She'd have to go into the system settings to figure out what the specifications were. The computer was connected to the server rack through fiber optic cabling.
Well if Arthain was anything, at least he was stylish. He knew how to pick interesting looking computer equipment.
"There is some information I need to get from this place called the Internet." Hanabi said as she shot the screen a quick glare, "I have no idea what an 'Internet' is or a 'Web Browser,' you know what those are right? I can't seem to get this thing to work!"
Blanc stared at the screen and sighed, "I know what those are. Hanabi-san… is the computer plugged in?" She asked as she stared at two completely blank and empty screens.
"Of course it is! I'm not 'that' bad." Hanabi said indignantly.
Blank looked down at the computer case. The lights were all off and the panel covering the power button was still hiding it. Being very careful not to crack a smile Blanc reached over and slid the panel to the left. The panel had been hiding three buttons, two small ones and a larger one with the power symbol on it. She pushed the largest of the three and a hum filled the room as the computer turned on.
"You need to turn it on before you can do anything." Blanc said without any emotion in her voice.
Hanabi blushed and coughed in embarrassment. While Blanc may have schooled herself Naruto felt no compulsion. The blonde-haired shinobi fell over laughing and began to roll around on the floor.
"Naruto-kun! That's not funny!" Hanabi shouted as she glared down at her husband in embarrassment.
Blanc just shook her head in amusement and then started in surprise when the computer booted to the operating system in under two seconds. That was fast. Fast also described how quickly Hanabi's patience with Naruto ran out, there was a loud 'oomph' from behind her as Hanabi kicked her husband in annoyance.
There wasn't any password or login for the system and it booted straight in. She would have to change that later. No security on a computer was a bad thing; she'd need to add encryption to the drives as well. Blanc quickly went to work rifling through the system settings.
Naruto and Hanabi both stopped what they were doing and gazed on in amazement as window after window flashed across the monitors. They could barely follow what was going on. Blanc's hands were literally a blur as the danced across the keyboard.
"Well he steered you right." Blanc said as she flashed through the systems settings. She accessed the remote desktop application and jumped over to the server on the second screen. "What you have here is an amazing piece of machinery." She was pretty current on the latest inventions and advancements in computers. She was no brain Sekirei so she couldn't access computers directly but outside of those particular Sekirei she was probably the most computer literate of them all.
"What did I end up buying?" Hanabi asked curiously.
"The computer itself is dual-cpu. Each CPU has twenty-four cores with hyper-threading enabled. That machine alone can do ninety-six simultaneous actions. At the current stock clock speed of 3.6 Giga Hertz we're talking hundreds of billions of instructions a second. A hundred and twenty-eight gigs of DDR5 2600 RAM, the operating system is striped across two solid-state drives, there is a petabyte worth of space on the SAN in Raid-5! There are even three video cards in tri-SLI configuration!" This was ridiculous, especially the video cards, what did they need 3 for? Each one cost over a hundred thousand yen. This much power in a personal computer was way beyond over-kill and she hadn't even started in on the server itself. If the information she was reading was correct there were thirty-two blade servers in that server enclosure.
Blanc paused to look over at Naruto and Hanabi. A sweat drop rolled down the back of her head as she realized there were question marks bouncing all around their heads, they looked completely lost and clueless.
"Ah… could you please repeat that in plain Japanese?" Naruto asked. He couldn't make heads or tails of what Blanc was saying, but it sounded cool. He was going to assume she knew what she was talking about because she lost him at dual-cpu.
Hanabi nodded in agreement. She had absolutely no clue what Blanc had said but she 'had' understood a little more than Naruto. She had only gotten lost at hyper-threading.
"Um, well. This computer is powerful and the server is powerful, very powerful. If you want something done, it will do it with ease and ask for more." Blanc summed it up succinctly. She really wanted to explore it some more. This was almost as fun as reading or being with her Ashikabi.
And if she were to get electronic books and sit in Naruto's lap she could do it all at the same time!
"So it can use this 'Web Browser' to explore the 'Internet?'" Hanabi asked curiously.
Blanc gave her a deadpanned look. "If all you wanted was to explore the internet you could do that from your phones."
"What!?" Naruto and Hanabi shouted in surprise.
Ignoring their shocked looks she turned back to the computer screen, "What information are you looking for?" Blanc asked.
Hanabi's flustered look was quickly wiped away. "I want everything on the company that owns the Hospital I was staying at." She growled as memories of what happened in that Hospital room flashed across her mind again. "I want to know every single little detail, and then I'm going to kill a certain someone." This was the perfect time to go through with this plan.
Things had been quiet since the end of the second stage of the Sekirei Plan. Minaka had said he wanted everyone to have a break before he dove into the third stage. Naruto and Hanabi figured they knew what the truth was; the manipulative bastard still needed some time to bring Japan entirely under his thumb.
He had taken the capital easily enough; he already had most of it before anyways as MBI. Other major centers were quick to follow as well. The issue was the country-side. While it was peaceful for the most part there were still certain areas that refused to pay taxes or follow his laws.
Some of the laws were actually hair raising in what they allowed. Anyone designated as a 'Sekirei' or 'Pillar' was allowed to circumvent the law without any consequences or penalties. What it essentially meant was that a Sekirei, any Sekirei, could full out murder a dozen babies in front of thousands and walk away without any sort of consequences under the law. Of course they were only going to walk away provided the crowd didn't tear them apart for doing that but that was an entirely separate matter.
An interesting loophole however was that Ashikabi were still fully restricted by the law. This meant any Ashikabi found guilty of ordering such an action would of course have the full weight of the law brought down on them.
And then there was what that madman was doing to Shinto Teito. Hanabi had no clue what was going on in that man's mind but entire sections of Shinto Teito and the surrounding area were being demolished and rebuilt. She couldn't figure out for the life of her why. In one case Minaka had demolished an entire mall just to shift it, and a road that fed into it, a few meters to the right.
Hanabi knew that they were going to have to move against Minaka soon but the incident at the Hospital and the issue of Uzume's blackmail needed a resolution first.
The two of them, Naruto and Hanabi, had also tried everything to figure out who those 'mysterious Sekirei' that Takami had mentioned but so far neither of them could figure out anything. Every attempt at getting information had turned up nothing. There were never any witnesses to their movements, only a trail of bodies that Minaka was quick to blame on the rebels that opposed his rule.
Ultimately they had decided to focus their attention in a direction where it would get results.
To that end Hanabi had become focused entirely on finding out whom it had been that had given the order to experiment on her. She had tried multiple attempts at getting information the old fashion way by asking around but no one she spoke with knew anything, or if they did they simply decided not to reveal it.
She wasn't really one for espionage and information gathering like that anyways. She was more of an in-your-face politician or assassin. Information gathering was not her specialty.
That was Naruto's specialty and what he had spent his time on, when he wasn't relaxing and pranking people. Despite his sometimes boisterous attitude, or perhaps because of it, it was very easy for him to get information out of people. Unless you knew him very well one would never suspect him of espionage. He was simply 'too' in your face.
The network he had started up was still in its infancy stages so it hadn't turned up much as of yet. Hanabi stilled pestered him about it, she wanted any information she could get her hands on, but he had been mum thus far. He was always like that with information; it was something he had picked up from Jiraiya. He never acted on half-baked information so he would always keep what he knew close to his chest until he a clear picture.
Or at least something relatively useful that had been confirmed by multiple sources that could be worked with.
"Oh, I see why you have all this now; you wouldn't be able to get that through your phone." What Hanabi wanted was to hack into various databases and networks to gain all the information she could on a company, one that was a rival of MBI if she recalled correctly.
Still she didn't need THIS much power to do that, although it would make it much easier.
"Is it possible to hack into the computer networks like what Matsu does?" Naruto asked.
Blanc shrugged, "I don't know, I can try. I know how it's done but I can't access any networks that are completely disconnected from the Internet." She had read several books, including 'Hacking for Dummies: A Guide for Hacking into Military Networks' by Minaka Hiroto. "Everything that is connected to it though…" Blanc eyed the server enclosure up and down, "Well it won't be today but I'll be able to get it. At least I know there won't be any limitations on our end."
"Thank you Blanc!" Hanabi said as she hugged Blanc tightly from behind. The blue haired Sekirei blushed in embarrassment.
"I'll have to find some way to reward you tonight!" Naruto said with a grin.
"She can have my place tonight; I'll convince Yume to trade with her." Hanabi said as she flashed her husband a smile.
Blanc flushed more deeply this time, but for an entirely different reason. Maybe she'd be able to put to use some of the things she had read this morning.
x~X~x
Night had fallen around Uzume as she stood silently on the building across the street from a bookstore. Her veiled hood and cloth billowed gently in the evening breeze. Her eyes were filled with remorse and sadness as she tried to harden her resolve for what was to come.
She had told Kakizaki her decision yesterday. She had waited as long as she could to give the answer; it had been several weeks since she had been given the ultimatum. It wasn't a decision she had come to easily or lightly. She had known what her decision would be if she hadn't been able to find a way to save Chiho on her own. She had simply stalled for time and tried to look for alternative methods.
She had found none.
Due to her history with them MBI was out of the question and she didn't know of anyone or any institution that had anywhere near the level of technology required to save her Chiho. She had entertained the idea of speaking with Naruto for a bit but as amazing and interesting as her friend was; his specialty didn't really lie in the area of health and medicine.
And if Naruto started to move differently because of something she said she had no doubt that Higa would instantly act and punish her. She'd be lucky if Higa didn't outright kill Chiho, especially after recent events.
That was at least one piece of good news. She hadn't been able to stop a smirk from forming when she found out what happened during Hanabi's 'operation'. Apparently Higa had flown into a rage when he had heard. She didn't know what happened in there, from the sounds of it neither did Higa, but what they did know was that Hanabi was alive and all those that had been a part of the operation were dead.
Although the smirk hadn't lasted long when she realized what it meant for her. After Higa had found out what happened in that Hospital room with Hanabi he had called to give her an ultimatum. If she failed to terminate Naruto's Sekirei they wouldn't just throw Chiho out onto the street, she'd be killed.
To make matters worse Higa had added Hanabi to the list of Sekirei she was supposed to terminate.
Higa couldn't go after Hanabi personally because all it would take is a thorough analysis of the machine and alarms bells would instantly start to go off. Higa had been forced to quietly cover that incident up.
And now here she was waiting for Naruto's Sekirei Blanc to leave the bookstore she was in. She had been in there most of the day but Uzume knew she had to come out soon. The store would close in a few minutes and she would be forced to leave.
Then Uzume would terminate her.
She had decided on Blanc for a single simple reason. She cared more for Hanabi, Yume and Akitsu than she did Blanc. She had known those three longer.
Naruto was several blocks down scarfing down ramen at a ramen stand he had found. The pace at which he was inhaling that food was so astounding that it had the ramen stand's owner's eyes bulging, even now. He was already on his fifteenth bowl. Uzume didn't know how he could eat so much and she would probably never find out.
After today Naruto would be out to kill her, he had already killed for far less. It was a sacrifice she was willing to make. As much as she cared about Naruto, Hanabi and his Sekirei, Chiho ultimately eclipsed them all.
The details were sketchy on how Naruto had taken down Mutsu and beaten Mikogami Hayato but everyone assumed that his Sekirei had done most of the work. MBI records corroborated most of this as their satellites had caught Naruto's Sekirei taking out the majority of Mikogami's. Everything that happened within that dome that had encircled the mansion however had remained a mystery.
What was fact was that Naruto had somehow managed to steal one of Mikogami's Sekirei and he had managed to kill Mutsu. This made many players in the Sekirei game nervous as no one wanted to lose their Sekirei and no one knew how he had managed to take out one of the strongest Sekirei in this game.
Movement and a flash of blue and white drew Uzume's attention back to the bookstore. She could see her target now. Blanc was just leaving the store and carried several books in her arms. Her axe was nowhere to be seen. She was far less dangerous without that. Uzume would have to take her out almost instantly. She needed to be done before Naruto even realized Blanc had been attacked.
In a single motion Uzume lunged from the rooftop and shot towards her target. Time seemed to slow down as Uzume streaked through the air. Her vision became hyper-focused and she noticed every single detail of her target. She could pick out each individual strand of hair, every pour on her face, the slight coloring in her cheeks, even the shocked look in her eyes as she stared right at her.
She even noticed Hanabi exiting the store next door.
Shit!
She hadn't known Hanabi was here as well but there was no time to back out. She had to end Blanc now, instantly. Uzume used her chakra to manipulate her veil. Six tendrils shot out and wrapped themselves around Blanc's body. She yanked on them and forced Blanc's limbs apart. Her books clattered to the ground.
"God damnit you bitch! What the hell is this!" Blanc shouted as she struggled against the restraints.
Uzume would have to move fast, she could already feel Blanc overpowering her. The small Sekirei was unbelievably strong. She wrapped her last strip of cloth around her right arm and formed it into a drill. "I'm sorry." Uzume said softly as she thrust the drill into Blanc's chest.
Blood splattered across Uzume's face and body as her drill pierced flesh.
But it wasn't Blanc she had hit.
Uzume could only stare in shock and horror. This was impossible; this should not have been possible. He had been over four blocks away. She never wanted to kill him. She never wanted to hurt him. But no matter how much she tried to deny it, the truth stood there before her with murder in his eyes.
And her arm through his heart.
Naruto cough up some blood as he glared at the veiled Sekirei. He raised a shaky hand and gripped her arm tightly, "I will NOT allow anyone else I care for to die! NEVER AGAIN!" Naruto roared as he violently ripped Uzume's arm from his chest. A fountain of blood gushed from the wound but Naruto seemed heedless to the injury.
To make matters worse Blanc had finally ripped her arms and legs free from her restraints. She had failed to take down Blanc and she knew Naruto would never give her a second chance. She had failed, and now her Ashikabi was going to die.
A swirling ball of energy suddenly appeared in Naruto's hands. Before Uzume could even think of retreating Naruto lashed out. "Futon: Rasengan!" Naruto shouted as he slammed the wind enhanced Rasengan into Uzume's chest.
Uzume could only look on as death approached her. At least she didn't have to worry about choosing between Chiho and Naruto anymore.
"NO! NARUTO-KUN STOP!" Hanabi screamed out in a panic as she rushed towards them.
As pain tore through her body Uzume idly noted that Hanabi's eyes looked strange. Naruto's attack lifted her body from the sidewalk and threw it across the street. Uzume slammed into the wall of the convenience store across the way and slid boneless to the ground.
Naruto and Hanabi quickly bolted across the street, each for different reasons.
Naruto didn't know why Hanabi had cried out but the panic in her voice caused him to react anyways. He had tried to stop the attack the moment Hanabi had screamed but it had been too late. The damage had already been done. He wanted to know what it was she had seen that caused her to scream like that.
Naruto could only grimace as he stared at the nasty wound in the chest of the assailant. He could see her ribcage, what was left of it anyways. Her muscles were shredded and her organs were exposed. Thankfully none of them were damaged but it would only be time before she bled out.
She had minutes at most; MBI would never get to her on time.
"Why did you stop me Hanabi?" Naruto asked as he kneeled down before the dying Sekirei.
"Because I know who this is, and so do you." Hanabi said as she reached out and pulled back the veil that covered the Sekirei's head.
It was Uzume.
Naruto almost went into shock when Uzume's pain stricken face filled his view. Hanabi must have seen this the moment she had activated her bloodline. She tried to stop him from killing someone he cared about.
Naruto felt like he had just been punched in the stomach by Tsunade. To save one precious person he had just killed another.
"Why… why Ramen damn it! WHY!?" Naruto shouted. He didn't understand why Uzume would do this, they were friends, they laughed together, cried together, pranked Miya together.
Uzume coughed up some blood and smiled at Naruto, "I guess we're both pretty messed up now huh bro?" Uzume gasped out. She tried to reach out to touch Naruto but failed, her arm fell limp to the ground.
Blanc made her way over and grimaced at the bloody sight. That was a painful way to go. As much as she hated being attacked like that, this was a little much for payback. Her concern shifted to her Ashikabi, her eyes widened in surprise. The hole in his chest was closing at an incredible rate. The heart that had been destroyed was already restored.
"It was Kakizaki wasn't it." Hanabi said softly. It only made sense. She knew Uzume was being blackmailed. She knew that said person was Kakizaki and that he worked for some big shot who owned the Hospital that Chiho was being treated at. She just hadn't realized Kakizaki had forced Uzume to target Naruto and his Sekirei.
Hanabi was kicking herself right now. She should have realized that whoever manipulated Kakizaki from behind the scenes would retaliate in some way after what she had done at the Hospital.
Uzume started to laugh but was cut short as she coughed up more blood, "H-He's scared of you bro." Uzume gasped out, she wasn't referring to Kakizaki in this instance, but his employer. "He's absolutely terrified that you're gonna come for him."
"And 'he' threatened Chiho to force you to attack Naruto's Sekirei." Hanabi finished for her. Uzume nodded slightly, she was too weak to respond to Hanabi's question. "Who is he?" She asked, she had a feeling that Uzume hadn't been referring to Kakizaki.
Naruto snarled and punched the cement sidewalk. The ground shook as the sidewalk splintered and cracked under the force of his blow, "No… No I won't allow this to happen again!" Naruto growled as he reached for his shoulder activated the seal there.
Uzume gathered her strength to speak, "It's… too late for me bro… please… look after Chiho." Uzume knew she was going to die. She only had a minute left at most.
"Don't you dare die on me! I refuse to lose anyone else!" Naruto shouted at Uzume as he unfurled half a dozen scrolls across the sidewalk. "Blanc, Hanabi, keep the bystanders away. I don't care what you do." He barked out the orders. Some people had started to filter into the street to see what the commotion was about.
"Alright." Blanc said as she brought forth her axe from the seal on her body used to store the axe so she didn't need to carry something so obnoxiously large everywhere she went.
Hanabi began to pump enough chakra through her hands so that they began to glow a vibrant blue color and held them at the ready.
The onlookers got the picture and made sure to keep their distance.
"Bro I-."
"Shut up, don't talk, save your strength, I'm not going to let you die on me!" Naruto shouted as he picked up Uzume's dying body and placed her in the center of the six scrolls. Each one had been stretched out so that they overlapped each other at the center and were equal distance apart from one another.
"What-."
"I said shut up." Naruto interrupted her again as he pulled out a strange spherical device from his shoulder. It looked like a perfectly round clear quartz crystal. "Hanabi you said that Chiho's body lacks the ability to produce enough chakra to survive right?" Naruto demanded.
"Yes?"
"Well I just solved her chakra problem." Naruto said as held the quartz crystal just above Uzume's Sekirei Core which was situated directly over the center of the six scrolls.
The two of them, Blanc and Hanabi, stared at Naruto in surprise as they finally realized what it was he was going to do. He was going to transfer Uzume's Sekirei Core from her now ruined body into Chiho's dying one.
"I can't heal your body but I can save your core, and your consciousness. You want to be with Chiho? I'll make sure you're with Chiho forever and ever. You can tease her all you like when you're inside her." Naruto said as he activated the seals on the scrolls and went to work directing the chakra. "So don't you dare die on me! I'm not going to take care of Chiho, you are! So you better damn well live through this!"
Tears began to form in Uzume's eyes and a fierce determination arose from within. What Naruto was proposing should be impossible, but it should also be impossible to live after she rammed her arm through his heart, and she could see that it had already fully healed. It should have been impossible for him to steal Blanc and free Kusano. It should have been impossible for him to do a lot of things, but he did them anyways.
So Uzume held on to hope that once again Naruto could do the impossible. She didn't want to die. She wanted to live on, to be with Chiho, Naruto and everyone else.
A sharp pain ripped through her body as she felt her essence get drawn from her. She cried out in agony but she held on to hope. She clung on desperately to life. She wasn't going to lie down and die here, Chiho needed her.
The pain began to ebb almost as soon as it started. It was a very odd feeling she had now, or rather it was like she couldn't feel anything at all. She felt herself get drawn upwards and into, something. She knew it was the quartz orb. It had to be.
A warm feeling suddenly rushed through her consciousness. She didn't know what it was but it felt safe and comforting. Naruto must have succeeded; she would believe that he had. She closed her mind and drifted off to sleep. She would believe that when she awoke, she would be with Chiho.
Naruto stood up and held the quartz orb in his hand and sighed with relief. The hard part was done. Now all he had to do was get this to Chiho and he could transfer Uzume into her, provided Chiho accepted. That was the easy part. It had taken all of his knowledge and skill to pull it off. It had to be done quickly and it had to be done perfectly. The seals he used were all two-dimensional. He had to use them to form a three-dimensional sealing array on the spot inside the quartz orb with modifications to take into account hosting a living consciousness.
He had also done it within ten seconds. He risked losing Uzume if he took any longer.
It was probably his finest and most difficult Fuinjutsu achievement to date, barring the reality defying one.
The only issue was that the quartz orb was never meant to hold something like this. He could always see fracture lines beginning to appear in it. He had to get this to Chiho within the hour otherwise Uzume was going to be lost.
"Naruto-kun, we have company!" Hanabi shouted, her voice was laced with anger as she saw two Sekirei descend from the sky and land near them.
"Wow, that was impressive." One of the new comers said. Naruto turned to regard them. There were two of them, both female. He had been so busy with the sealing that he hadn't noticed their approach. He should have though, they were both Sekirei, thankfully Hanabi had noticed their arrival.
He didn't recognize them, but Hanabi did, instantly. Hanabi had been glaring daggers at the two women since she noticed them, "Naruto-kun! These are the two that ambushed me at Delta Point!"
Naruto's eyes widened. Something clicked in his mind, memories of Hanabi's verbal description. Now he recognized them. He remembered Hanabi describing what her assailants looked like. These two matched her description exactly.
"I'm so glad you remember us cupcake. The names Ichiya and your eyes are as freaky as ever." Said the Sekirei with purple and yellow body suit that did nothing to hide her ample breasts.
"I'm Toyotama, and I'm afraid our Ashikabi wants that crystal you have there in your hands." Toyotama said as she whirled her staff around, "We were sent to make sure Uzume carried out her orders and to terminate her if she faltered but you handled that for us."
"We had planned to kill the bitch anyways after our Ashikabi was finished with her so thank you for saving us the trouble." Ichiya said with a smirk on her face. She placed a hand on her hip and stretched her hand out. "But like Toyotama said, hand over the crystal and we'll let you be on your way."
"How about I grind you into mulch!" Blanc growled as she whipped around to face off against the two women.
"Leave them to me Blanc; I have a score to settle with them." Hanabi spat out.
"Oh, you want a rematch? If I recall you were the one to run away from us." Ichiya said with a smirk. Although they hadn't been in any condition to continue fighting either there was no reason for Hanabi to know that.
The both of them had trained hard ever since that day to get revenge on Hanabi.
"Leave." Naruto said quietly.
"You think we'll just-." Toyotama started.
"Not you." Naruto said with a deathly calmness as he turned to Hanabi and held the crystal out to her. "Hanabi bring this to Chiho, take Blanc with you."
"You want me to just run…" The words died in Hanabi's throat as she saw what lurked within the depths of those cerulean eyes. She swallowed hard and quickly took the crystal. "Come on Blanc, we need to leave."
"No way I'm-."
Hanabi was at her side in an instant, "We NEED to leave NOW." Hanabi hissed and she literally dragged Blanc away. Hanabi had only seen that look in Naruto's eyes once before but she would never forget it. She had seen it shortly before he had left on a self-assigned mission. It had been just days after Otogakure Shinobi had had infiltrated one of their compounds. Just days after Naruto had seen what was left of Darui and Tenten.
Oto no Kuni had disappeared several days later. The entire country had been turned into a crater. Most people just assumed it had been Madara.
Hanabi knew better.
"Don't think we're going to let you just walk away with that!" Ichiya shouted as she shot towards Hanabi.
She didn't make it two steps before Naruto cratered her into the street. Asphalt and dust shot into the air as fractures rippled outwards from the impact zone. His fist left a deep imprint in her back where he hit her.
"I have wanted to meet you two for a long time." Naruto said quietly as he gazed down at Ichiya dispassionately. "Please don't go so soon. There is so much for us to… discuss."
"You bastard!" Toyotama shouted as she swung her staff at Naruto with all the force she could muster.
The air screamed and shockwaves rippled around the staff as it hurtled towards the blonde-haired shinobi. Naruto simply held up a single hand and caught the staff before it reached him. There was a loud thunderclap as it slapped into the palm of his hand and stopped dead. His clothes billowed around him from the force of the shockwave.
But Naruto himself hadn't been moved an inch.
He gripped the staff tightly, his knuckles went white as indentations and cracks began to appear in the wood. His arm was as hard as steel and no matter how hard Toyotama pulled on her staff she couldn't remove it from Naruto's grasp.
The ground beneath Naruto cracked and splintered as a massive surge of chakra erupted around him. His clothing billowed upwards as his chakra began to surge off him in powerful waves. "You two put my wife into the hospital." Naruto whispered softly, oddly everyone could hear him perfectly clear; it was like nature itself decided to hold its breath. His eyes were emotionless as he stared at Ichiya who was only now picking herself off the ground.
Ichiya picked herself up from the crater and settled into a fighting stance. She wasn't going to let some stupid Ashikabi get the best of her a second time. She analyzed Naruto to try and find an opening to attack him from when she noticed something disconcerting.
His eyes.
He was looking at her but he didn't see her. In his eyes there was no Ichiya, there was no Sekirei, there was no woman.
When he looked at her, he saw nothing.
For the first time in her life she felt completely worthless. Whenever someone looked at something there was always some form of recognition. It would be judged and rated based on everything else that's been seen over the course of a person's life. It is usually a subconscious process and usually no one notices what they are doing unless something strange or unusual appears. Even dirt was recognized, judged and rated, although usually not very high unless you were into agriculture
But right now, in that man's eyes, she was not recognized, or judged, or rated. She was lower than dirt. In his eyes she was completely and utterly worthless.
Ichiya couldn't take it, that look in his eyes, she needed to erase it, make him acknowledge her existence. She exploded in anger, "How dare you think you're better than me!" She screamed and shot forward at breakneck speeds.
She covered the ground in an instant but Naruto was faster. Quicker than you could blink Naruto retaliated with Toyotama's staff. He whipped it around and slammed it into Ichiya's side before she reached him. There was a sickening crack as Ichiya's ribs caved in.
Toyotama hadn't let go of her staff when Naruto had swung. The unfortunate Sekirei was whipped through the air with ease. When her staff hit Ichiya the impacted jarred her grip loose. With a yelp of surprise she was thrown across the street and into the outer wall of the bookstore.
Ichiya collapsed to her knees and held her side. She coughed and gasped as pain shot through her body. She had been lucky that her ribs hadn't punctured her lungs but a good four of them were broken.
Naruto discarded the staff behind him, "Get up." Naruto said as he gazed down at Ichiya emotionlessly, "Get up you pathetic waste of space."
"I'll fucking kill you." Ichiya gasped out as she glared at Naruto.
Naruto didn't bother with a verbal response. He reached out and palmed her face. With an iron grip he lifted her off the ground. "You do not fear me." Ichiya glared at him definitely, "You will." Naruto said calmly and whipped her across the street.
Mortar and brick cascaded down Toyotama's body as she pried herself from the wall she had flown into. She bit off a curse as she glared over at the man responsible for this. She only had time to widen her eyes in surprise before Ichiya slammed into her and she was forced back into the wall.
Naruto slowly made his way across the street. Each step he took caused the ground to crack and splinter. His chakra stilled poured off his body in waves, giving him an ethereal look.
The crowd that had begun to gather when Uzume had attacked was quickly getting larger by the minute. The commotion had brought everyone in the vicinity here to see what was going on. Naruto did not care, he was beyond caring. They would soon wish they hadn't come.
He stopped in the center of the street. His power glowed so vibrantly it provided more luminosity than the streetlights. He watched patiently as Toyotama and Ichiya pulled themselves from the wall.
"Do you know what exists beyond sheer terror?" Naruto asked calmly.
"Fuck you." Ichiya spat out. Anger coursed through her body at the thought of a mere human tossing her around like a rag doll. But behind all that anger, fear began to take hold.
"There's no damn way you're just an Ashikabi!" Toyotama accused him as she eyed her staff that laid upon the ground behind Naruto. She wanted to retrieve it but she doubted the glowing light show would let her.
"Then this will be a unique experience. Let me show you what exists beyond that boundary." Naruto said as he began to concentrate.
Did you bring the barbeque sauce Kurama? Naruto asked.
Sweet and sour, actually, and yes I did. Kurama replied viciously. He had been waiting for this day almost as long as Naruto.
There are two lovely dishes for you to try out. Enjoy this meal. Naruto replied.
"Gladly." Kurama said as he took control of Naruto's body. The blue glow that surrounded Naruto suddenly shifted colors and became a sickening red. His eyes changed from brilliant blue to a malevolent red and glowed with an eerie light.
An overwhelmingly powerful killing intent rolled off Naruto's body, filling the area. The people that had been gathering in the general vicinity instantly fainted. The two Sekirei that were the focus of Naruto and Kurama's hatred began to tremble in fear.
Neither of them knew what it was they were looking at but they knew one thing for certain.
It wasn't human.
"W-What the hell are you!" Toyotama gasped out as her body began to tremble with uncontrollable fear.
"I am what all nightmares aspire to be." Kurama said as the chakra around him intensified. "I am a being beyond your ability to comprehend." The chakra completely enveloped Kurama hiding him from view.
"I AM…" A titanic surge of power erupted from the spot where Kurama had been and spiked hundreds of feet into the air. Like flames taken straight from the deepest pits of hell his power danced in the night sky.
An enormous whirlwind of power and chakra surged in the street covering it from side to side. "KURAMA!" He roared out in a deafening voice as the power coalesced into a single mighty form.
That of an eighteen story tall nine-tailed demon fox.
"And I am the incarnation of destruction!"
The street was a wide double-lane boulevard but it was far too small to contain Kurama's complete form. The buildings that lined the street were crushed as they buckled under his weight and the pressure of his power. The tops of skyscrapers were knocked clean off as his tails whipped out behind him. His paws sank deep into the street, the asphalt that was designed for vehicles not being able to withstand his full might. Water mains burst and the underground subway tunnel collapsed.
And all across the city the people of Shinto Teito began to flee for their lives. Panic and terror griped the city as Kurama's power and killing intent swept over it like a maelstrom. The police didn't even bother responding. They just threw their guns away and fled.
If the killing intent had been bad before, it was beyond imagining now. If Kurama hadn't sent all the civilians near him into blissful slumber with his earlier display of raw power, what he was radiating now would have killed them. Their hearts would have stopped dead.
The only ones nearby that were still conscious were Ichiya and Toyotama and they were beginning to wish they had followed the others into blissful slumber.
And just when they thought things couldn't get any worse Kurama opened his mouth and roared. Gale force winds and sonic vibrations rippled outwards causing the walls of nearby stores, the ones that hadn't already been crushed, to collapse and windows and doors to buckle and blow out.
The nine-tailed demon fox leveled is malevolent gaze upon the two hapless Sekirei before him. A terrify grin creased his face, "Dinner time." The glee in his voice was palpable.
Before the two Sekirei could respond Kurama opened his maw and chomped down on Ichiya. There was a sickening crunch as bones broke and flesh was rent asunder.
Kurama jerked his head up and opened his mouth. The mangled remains of Ichiya flew out but before it could go anywhere Kurama caught her body in his mouth again and proceeded to devoured her. The sound of crunching bone and tearing flesh could was nearly unbearable to listen to.
Toyotama was frozen stiff. She could only stare on in horror as her partner was eaten alive before her. Sheer terror ripped through her body and robbed her ability to speak or act. As Kurama leveled his gaze on her once more the only thoughts that raced through her mind were ones of disbelief.
There was no way this could be real. This had to be a nightmare.
"So delicious." Kurama said with a vicious grin. "I wonder if you'll taste just as delectable."
Toyotama couldn't breathe, she couldn't think. He bodily functions began to shut down as an overwhelming darkness began to consume her mind. She never noticed, and no longer cared, that she had soiled herself. Even her terror had fled from her mind. Something else began to engulf her. The very cells in her body began to rebel against the whole as they attacked and consumed each other in their attempt to flee the nightmare before them. She began to hallucinate, seeing things that weren't there. Reality itself seemed to lose all color and shape.
Kurama sniffed in and wrinkled his nose at the odorous smell emanating from Toyotama, "Disgusting human. I think I'll barbeque you first." Kurama growled. Kurama spat out a glob of fire and sent it hurtling into the Sekirei. There was a massive explosion as the fireball detonated on contact. All Toyotama could do was just stare up at Kurama emotionlessly as her flesh cooked under the intense flame. She would have been rolling around on the ground in agony, if her body had been capable of responding to external stimuli. Even the nerves in her body had begun to rebel as they twisted and snapped. She couldn't feel anything anymore. "Ah, much better. The smell of cooked human is always such a wonderful thing." Kurama murmured as he went in for the second half of his feast.
Toyotama didn't even notice.
x~X~x
"Holy shit!" Blanc cried out as an enormous amount of killing intent slammed into her. She almost wanted to just curl up into a ball and die it was so bad. She looked back and could only gape as she saw Kurama rise up from between the buildings. "Naruto let HIM out?!"
"Keep moving!" Hanabi snapped as she pulled on Blanc's arm. "The further we get away the easier it'll be to resist, just focus on Chiho, on healing her."
They were over five miles away from Naruto now. Hanabi had a feeling this would happen, she was certain she knew what happened to Oto no Kuni. Naruto had wiped it off the face of the planet with a Bijūdama. She doubted he'd go that far inside Shinto Teito, there were too many people he cared about here, but she had known beyond a shadow of a doubt that Kurama was going to come out to play.
"He let KURAMA out to play in Shinto Teito!?" Blanc asked in incredulously, voicing Hanabi's thoughts, as she quickly followed Naruto's wife. She was kind of glad Hanabi had dragged her along. Now she didn't really need any incentive to run away.
"I take it you've met him already?" Hanabi asked. She hadn't been aware of that. She knew Yume had met Kurama, but she hadn't been aware of Akitsu and Blanc.
"Yes, Naruto tried to share some of his clone's memories with me and I got pulled into his mind. Bastard joked about eating me." Blanc grumbled, her anger and embarrassment from back then helped to counter-act some of the killing intent she was feeling now.
After Blanc had found out about Kurama Naruto had taken her and Akitsu aside and explained a few things about him. About what he was like, what he had done, and what he was capable of.
Blanc had accepted everything readily enough. She had already met him so knowing what he was like didn't really jade her perception of him now, although it did help her prepare for what she was seeing and experiencing now.
Akitsu had just shrugged and said her Ashikabi was her Ashikabi. Blanc didn't really know if Akitsu truly understood what it was Naruto was trying to tell her but even if Akitsu did, she probably wouldn't have cared. After everything Naruto had done for Akitsu he could do no wrong in her eyes.
Hanabi almost tripped, "Kurama? Joke?" She'd have to see it to believe it. He had definitely mellowed out after befriending Naruto but enough to joke? With someone he hadn't known for very long? That was something Hanabi wasn't quite capable of believing.
It's not that she thought Blanc was lying; she would just need proof before she accepted it.
"Well he doesn't seem to be in a joking mood now." Blanc glanced back. Her view was blocked as they were forced to smaller buildings with lower rooftops. She could still feel Kurama's presence but it was muted now.
"No, no he's not." Hanabi said. A thought struck her and her eyes narrowed, "Blanc, there are two Sekirei guards at the Hospital. They both probably belong to Kakizaki, or his employer, since they seem to be a constant presence in the area. Can you take them out? I don't want someone interrupting us later." She remembered seeing them during her time at the Hospital; she had ignored them at the time because there was no need to concern herself with them.
That was no longer the case.
"Not a problem."
"Good, because we're here." Hanabi said as they crested the last roof. There was a street between them and the parking lot for the Hospital. They could see the front entrance from here and Blanc's targets. They were obviously Sekirei from the way they dressed, the weapons they carried.
"Take those two out." Hanabi said as she pointed at the two Sekirei, "I'll circle around back and make my way into Chiho's room. You can join me or you can stay on guard out here afterwards, it's up to you."
She entrusted their defeat to Blanc since she didn't want to risk the quartz crystal getting damaged if she went into battle.
"This won't take long." Blanc said as she focused her gaze on the Sekirei wearing the sleeveless kimono. She left blue orbs of energy behind as she swiped her hand in front of her. "Gefahrlich Stern!" Blanc shouted as she slammed the axe into the cluster of orbs.
The orbs screamed through the air as they converged on Blanc's target. The blue haired Sekirei didn't wait for the orbs to hit before she made her second move. Using her boots as propulsion she launched herself at the second Sekirei. She broke the sound barrier and quickly overtook the orbs of light she had launched.
Before the Sekirei with the nun-chucks could even respond Blanc barreled into her, shoulder first, at super-sonic speeds. Blanc felt the Sekirei's chest collapse as her shoulder broke all the ribs in her target's chest. Blanc wasn't finished however as the force of her moment wasn't stopped so easily. There was a bone crunching sound as the Sekirei was slammed into the side of the Hospital.
As Blanc settled back to the ground multiple explosions behind her signaled the end of the first Sekirei. A quick glance at the Sekirei she had hit with her Gefahrlich Stern was all she needed to confirm that Sekirei was deactivated. That level of attack wouldn't kill her, but she wasn't getting up again anytime soon, not with those burns.
Blanc returned her attention to the Sekirei she had slammed into the Hospital. This one was unconscious. The blue haired Sekirei pulled her downed opponent from the wall and laid her on the grass. A cursory glance at the back of her neck confirmed her deactivation.
"Well that was certainly quicker than I had anticipated." Hanabi said as she appeared at Blanc's side. She was originally going to go on ahead and let Blanc catch up but it was over so fast she felt that they might as well go together.
Hanabi found herself re-evaluating Blanc's combat potential. She was strong, fast, versatile, and sturdy. She suffered almost no damage from hitting that Sekirei at super-sonic speeds whereas her opponent is going to be in a lot of pain for quite some time.
Blanc did have one critical flaw that was easily exploited but of the few Sekirei that knew what to look for and could exploit it, only one of them wasn't a close friend or companion of her husband.
"Perhaps they should have trained more." Blanc said as she put away her axe. If they were going through the window it probably wouldn't fit anyways.
"Maybe..." Hanabi trailed off, although she doubted any training these two could have done would have helped them survive that level of a surprise attack. "Let's go."
Blanc quickly fell into step behind Hanabi as the latter made her way around the side of the Hospital to the back. Chiho's room was several floors up. Hanabi quickly ran up the side of the wall to the window of her friend's room.
The window was open, good, that made things easier.
Hanabi glanced down at Blanc and pointed at the window before she quickly made her way inside. The lights were off in the room, which was of no surprise. It was pretty late now. The bookstore had closed only a couple hours before midnight. Chiho liked to have fresh air breeze into her room while she slept. Being five floors up the worst she had to worry about was insects, which were few and far between in a city like Shinto Teito.
There was a noise at the window as Blanc clasped onto the edge and hoisted herself into the room.
"So she's Chiho." Blanc whispered so as to not disturb the girl. Blanc had never visited her; she hadn't really felt the need. She had her books, she had her sisters, she had her Ashikabi and now she had her computer. She was happy with everything she already had.
But Blanc had heard a lot about her from the conversations with Uzume at the dinner table or from Hanabi whenever she returned from one of her visits with her friend.
"Yes." Hanabi said as she approached Chiho's bedside.
A yellow flash momentarily blinded Blanc. She cursed and rubbed her eyes to clear the spots. Her eyes had been adjusted to the darkness so the sudden flash of light had been moderately painful.
"Oh good you're here already." Naruto said with a sigh of relief.
"Ichiya and Toyotama?" Hanabi asked.
Naruto grimaced, "Erm, I'd rather not talk about that. I'm probably going to have indigestion."
That train of thought made him recall something from earlier, Really Kurama? 'I am the incarnation of destruction'? Naruto asked his tenant. To him it sounded incredibly corny.
Hey, it sounded imposing at the time so I went with it. Kurama defended himself. What was I supposed to say? Hi! I'm the Tooth Fairy?
You didn't really need to say anything at all.
When you get out as little as I do you need to make a big deal of it. Kurama fired back.
"Kurama didn't really eat them did he?" Blanc asked in apprehension. Sure he had been joking with her when he had asked to eat her in Naruto's mindscape but considering how angry he had been back there she wouldn't be the least bit surprised if he had.
"The sacrifices one must make to keep one's inner furry happy." Naruto said with a dramatic sigh. Blanc blanched and turned away. That response conjured up more than one disturbing image.
"Hanabi-chan? Naruto-kun?" Chiho asked quietly as she roused from her slumber. Naruto and Hanabi were at her side instantly. There were tears in Chiho's eyes as she looked up at them. "Uzume-chan is…"
"Right here." Naruto said as he took the crystal orb from Hanabi. There were definitely more cracks and fractures in it than before. The crystal wouldn't last much longer. "I'm sorry, it's my fault Uzume is..."
Chiho reached out and touched the side of Naruto's face. She gave him a gentle smile, "Don't be sorry." Her gaze rested on the crystal, "Uzume-chan is in there?" Chiho asked softly.
Naruto gave her a sad smile and handed her the crystal, "Yes, her power, her consciousness, everything that made Uzume, Uzume."
Chiho cradled the crystal orb to her chest and smiled at it. "Yes, I can feel her in here." Chiho knew that warmth anywhere. Even if Naruto hadn't said anything, she would have known that this was Uzume.
"I'm sorry, the crystal won't last very long." Naruto whispered, "When it breaks Uzume will disappear. The only way I know how to save her is to place her inside a new body."
"I'll do it." Chiho replied firmly. There was fierceness in her eyes Naruto had never seen before.
Naruto's look became serious, "Are you sure? This isn't a decision to make lightly. Once made, it can never be unmade." He wanted to be absolutely sure that Chiho wanted to share a body with Uzume.
"I love Uzume-chan, I don't want to be separated from her. If she needs a new body I'll gladly accept her into my own. Having her inside me is hardly a burden Naruto-kun." Chiho said as she beamed a smile at the blonde-haired Shinobi.
Naruto laughed softly, "Thank you Chiho, and I have a surprise for you as well. With Uzume inside you Hanabi can cure you of your illness." Naruto said with grin.
"Really?" Chiho asked hope and eagerness in her voice. To be able to walk again, to be able to go outside and enjoy the sunshine on her own two feet. It was something she had dreamed of for so long.
"Yes, umm, also I'll need you to take off your shirt and hold the crystal between your breasts. The Sekirei's core is normally located in the center of the chest and I don't want to risk complications by trying to do the transfer through cloth." Naruto replied as he moved around to the other side of the bed.
Chiho quickly complied and pulled her shirt up over her head. She tossed the shirt to the side of the bed and held the crystal tightly to her chest. The light color in her cheeks made her look cute in the dim light that filtered in through the window. Chiho was embarrassed at being exposed in front of Naruto but if there was a man she wanted to show herself to Naruto would be him.
Naruto bent over the bed and placed his hands on top of the crystal. He ignored the gentle swell of Chiho's breasts. This wasn't the time to get distracted by them, even if they were quite lovely and he very much wanted to plant kisses…
Naruto shook his head and concentrated on the task at hand, this was no time to be distracted by his perverted side.
The crystal contained inside it a complex three-dimensional array made up bits and pieces of six two-dimensional arrays. Unlike his transfer of Yashmia's core to Hanabi or what the Namikaze couple had done with Yuri and Iris this was a complete transfer. Everything would copy over.
Realistically Hanabi was an incomplete Sekirei, she had the powers, and the bond, but most of the complex functionality that was built into a Sekirei did not exist within her.
Chiho would be a complete Sekirei. While there were some aspects of the sealing array he would have liked to not include in the transfer, there was no way he could have guaranteed the complete and total transfer of Uzume's consciousness without including everything else that made her a Sekirei. It was an unfortunate requirement if he wanted to include Uzume's complete consciousness. Normally a Sekirei's consciousness wasn't attached to the seal itself, it was merely affected by it. He had to create a new component to add to the Sekirei sealing array so that it could house a foreign consciousness. Thankfully he had a template to work from, himself.
While he transferred Uzume's core, consciousness, the sealing array and everything else from the orb into Chiho Hanabi would be busy smoothing out the flow of chakra inside Chiho's body. She would also help link up the core with Chiho's own chakra network.
Naruto activated the seal and went to work. As it unravelled he channeled it downwards into Chiho's body. He couldn't see what was going on but he could feel the Sekirei sealing array flowed into her body. He could sense as the various parts unravelled and flowed into the various parts of her body.
"Interesting, the sealing array is actually adapting itself to its new body." Hanabi murmured as she witnessed what was going on. If Hanabi didn't know better she would have assumed that the sealing itself had an awareness.
Hanabi thought about that and realized that may not be too far from the truth. The sealing array was attached to Uzume's Core and her consciousness. Chiho had been Uzume's Ashikabi before this. It wouldn't be too much of a stretch to think that it was Uzume that was unconsciously adjusting the sealing array to better fit Chiho.
"Sometimes I think I could spend a lifetime analyzing this sealing array and still never come close to unravelling all of its secrets." Naruto said as he worked on bringing Uzume's core from the crystal. It was the last component he had to bring across.
"I almost wish I could convince you not to even try." Hanabi replied as she made a couple of incisions in Chiho's chakra circulatory system. She began to redirect the severed ends to locking mechanism on the Sekirei Core. "I don't think anyone should have the knowledge and capability of replicating something like this."
"I have no intention of replicating it." Naruto replied as he finalized the connection between the chakra coils and the Sekirei Core.
"I know." Hanabi said distractedly as she watched the chakra from the core flow into Chiho's coils. This was actually the most dangerous part. Uzume's chakra was different from Chiho's, there could be some rather nasty consequences of mixing the two.
"Any problems?" Naruto asked.
"None that…" Hanabi frowned and quickly jerked a hand over to Chiho's abdomen. "Not any more at least. It's interesting to watch, the chakra from the Sekirei core has almost completely replaced Chiho's. I don't think her chakra producing organs ever fully developed; at least they didn't fully develop the ability to produce chakra. Their normal functions are perfectly fine." Hanabi said as she watched those organs stopped producing chakra entirely and began to rely exclusively on chakra from the core. "I don't think there will be any more complications. The body seems to have realized it doesn't need to produce chakra anymore and has fully accepted the chakra from the Sekirei core."
Naruto retrieved the crystal orb, it was badly cracked now but it was still in one piece, it wouldn't hold a Sekirei core ever again, "How do you feel Chiho?" Naruto asked as he looked at her.
"Bro, you are amazing!" Chiho said with awe and happiness.
"Uzume!" Hanabi gasped. "Where's Chiho?"
"I'm here." Chiho replied with a blush.
"That's going to get confusing." Naruto muttered as he brushed a hand through his hair, "Glad it worked out though." No need to tell them this was completely experimental, on the fly, and totally shouldn't have worked. Naruto grinned at them, "Congratulations, you're now Sekirei No. 10, Chiho."
"Chime."
"What?" Naruto asked in confusion.
"We've decided on Chime." Chime responded. "Since Uzume and I are together now as one, our names should be joined as well. Chi-ho and Uzu-me. The first part of my name and the last part of hers, Chime."
"Chime…" Naruto tasted the word on his lips. After a moment he nodded and grinned, "I like it." He glanced over at his wife and the grin left his face, "What's wrong Hanabi?" Naruto asked in concern.
Hanabi had a rather serious expression on her face. Naruto hoped that a complication hadn't arisen.
"She's a full-fledged Sekirei now right?" Hanabi said after a moment of silence.
"Well yes, the entire Sekirei sealing array and Core was transferred. Unlike you she is 100% Sekirei."
Hanabi quickly shifted to the head of the bed and tilted Chime's head to the side. She pulled her forward and looked at the nape of her neck. A small frown creased her face.
"What's wrong Hanabi-chan?" Chime asked in concern.
"No crest." Hanabi said as she stared at the smooth unmarked skin, "She's an unwinged Sekirei." She turned to look at Naruto. "Naruto-kun, wing her now."
Naruto coughed on his spit at the abrupt demand, "Wait what? What about your whole issue with me shacking up with the entire city?" He had no issues with it personally. He liked both Uzume and Chiho. Having both of them in the same body could only be fun. However he already had four women and Hanabi was basically telling him to take a fifth?
"Naruto-kun!" Hanabi growled, "I refuse to let some random stranger put his paws all over my friend!"
Naruto started to protest, "I'm not just going to force myself on her. I didn't just take out Mikogami to replace him with my-."
He was cut off as Chime grabbed the collar of his shirt, yanked him his head down and captured his lips with her own. His complaints died instantly and he leaned into the kiss. Her lips tasted sweet as the two passionately kissed each other.
A dozen brilliant delicate white wings erupted from Chime's back as the two continued their kiss. The wings were curved and waved gently in the breeze coming from the window. The room was bathed in a soft white light.
After what seemed like an eternity the two separated and the wings faded away. Chime panted softly, her face flushed with excitement.
"That was better than I had imagined." Chime said with a soft smile. She had always wondered what it would be like to kiss a man, in particular to kiss Naruto-kun. Ever since that night Naruto-kun visited Hanabi.
"I enjoyed it as well." Naruto always enjoyed kissing pretty women and Chime was definitely at least that.
Chime smiled up at him, "Well bro, I think it's time for round two, there's two of us in here now, you need to work twice as hard to please us." Chime said as she dragged Naruto's head back down for a second passionate kiss.
Hanabi smiled at Chime and Naruto and turned to Blanc, "We should get going."
"What about Naruto?" Blanc asked curiously as she watched Chime stick her tongue into Naruto's mouth.
"I think they're going to be busy for a while." Hanabi said as she grabbed Blanc's shoulders and guided her towards the window.
Naruto broke the kiss and looked up at Hanabi, "You're leaving me here?"
"Have fun Chime!" Hanabi said as Blanc climbed out the window and jumped to the ground below.
"Hey wait a minute." Naruto started to protest. As much as he wanted this, wasn't this a little soon?
Unfortunately Chime didn't think so as the bed sheet rose up and wrapped itself around Naruto's arms. Using her new found powers, and Uzume's experience, Chime used the bed sheet to force Naruto down onto the bed beside her.
"I have a bad feeling about this." Naruto said as the bed sheets forced his arms apart and tied his wrists to the headboard. "A very bad feeling."
"Don't worry bro, it'll become a very 'good' feeling soon." Chime said as she pulled her pants off and tossed them to the side with her shirt. Naruto didn't really have the chance to truly appreciate Chime until now but he could only admire her modest, yet shapely, breasts and the flawless sanctuary between her legs.
Hanabi grinned and gave Naruto one final wave farewell, "Don't be late for breakfast! You know how Miya-san hates tardiness." Hanabi said and climbed out the window.
"Hey Hanabi! Wait… oh my… "
Author's Notes: So what did everyone think of this chapter? Chime! I was debating on leaving her name as Chiho but in reality it really is more of a combination of the two instead of just one or the other. They can swap who's in control at a moment's notice but both are constantly aware of the other, and what they are thinking. Their emotions also merged into one.
I also bet no one saw it coming. Not until this chapter. This is my unique take on curing Chiho. This chapter is ALSO why I put Hanabi in the Hospital. Because she was hospitalized Chiho, Hanabi, Uzume and Naruto all became very close so that when it came time for the winging, Hanabi wanted it, Naruto was fine with it, Uzume wanted it and Chiho wanted it. No need to build any sort of relationship because it's already there. The whole Higa thing was just a side tidbit that I used to help kick start Hanabi's digging for information, and to antagonize you my readers, hehe, nothing like a bit of drama and suspense to garner a reaction.
Also Kurama… well… That was another scene I've always wanted to write long before I put pen to paper. No one ever has Naruto go Kyubi in their stories, not any that I've read anyways. It's kinda sad. I wanted to write a scene where Kyubi appears in the middle of Shinto Teito and I wanted to write a scene depicting everyone literally shitting their pants and running as a result. I couldn't just toss it in anywhere though. I needed a good reason, I didn't want to just make one up just for the sake of having him go "BAM! I'M THE BOOGEY MAN!" so I figured the best place to write it in was alongside the whole Uzume scene.