Itachi was sorely disappointed in his team; he should have checked the fucking sewers himself. He checked the blueprints, trusted his men to report accurate information. It would be a long, long time before his tracking team won his trust over. It was so obvious they should have realized it, instead of walking right past it.
Why would a drain be in a sewer?
Underneath the blueprints of Konoha's sewer tunnels, there should be nothing but rock, sand, and dirt. So why was there a drain in the middle of one of the damn sewers? This was a juvenile mistake, one that he wouldn't forgive for some time.
He had Sasuke and Naruto flanking his sides with Aburame and Inuzuka behind them. It took the forces of Haruno, Sai, and a senior captain to keep Neji Hyuga from coming with them. Unquestionably, beside himself these four men were the most talented when faced with the brashness of danger.
Sasuke and Naruto were serving as the lookouts as Inuzuka, as quietly as he could, lifted the heavy yet loose drain cap. Aburame quickly descended into the depth of the hole, Itachi following behind him closely, and then Sasuke.
"Clear," Shino whispered and Naruto soon joined them. Kiba would stay behind and trail them slowly in case a surprise reinforcement was needed, or if he needed to retreat and call for more back-up.
Sasuke took the lead, as he found himself closest to the smaller dug-out tunnel inside the large hidden away room carved from rock that they found themselves in. How long had the Akatsuki been working to create a vast and complex hide-out such as this? The group must have been together for much longer than originally anticipated.
Itachi followed his brother's example and quickly crouched behind him to make his way through the uneven tunnel. The fact that they had yet to come across either of the two men reported to be here along with the heiress, indicated that the hide-out must be larger than realized. Logically, someone would think one member would serve as the lookout while the other stayed with the target.
He heard Uzumaki and Aburame behind them, which was not a good thing; because it meant that they were making too much noise in such a quiet place. Last thing he wanted was to let the Akatsuki members know they were there.
Suddenly Sasuke gasped as he basically flew out of the rest of the tunnel and, tipping Itachi off that something bad was happening.
When Itachi's vision was clear and he crawled out behind Sasuke, his stomach flipped over in disgust with a foul taste rising in the back of his throat. With what he was seeing, he felt guilty that he didn't get to her sooner.
Sasuke had already flung himself without thought towards the man that was desperately beating on the heiress.
-halo-
She watched with blurry eyes as Tobi slowly walked closer and closer towards her. He was angry, she knew this might happen. Already she had backed up against a wall; still she tried to somehow go through it, anything to get further away from him. Fight. She will fight him, she can fight, her family made sure she knew how.
Tobi said nothing, just kept taking one step at a time towards her.
Her bottom was bleeding; she hadn't even realized how hard she was biting down on it. Mentally she readied herself for the fight of her life, trying to think of things she could do to quickly disable him. But she was weak, only a handful of times had she ever won in a spar.
It didn't matter, she had to do this, she couldn't allow herself to die here.
"I'm so-so-so sorry Tobi…"
"Shut. Up."
Then he launched himself towards her, making her gasp just as she felt the pain in her head as his fist tangled in her hair and slammed her head back into the rock wall. Automatically her hands tried to fend him off. She pulled and strained, but blow after blow kept raining down her face, her head, shoulders, chest and stomach.
Next thing she knew she was being hurdled through the air to land harshly on her hip a few feet from where she had just been. She turned her head just in time for him to land a perfect punch to the middle of her chest, making it difficult to breathe.
She started kicking at anything, blindly blocking herself from his murderous attack, she scratched at whatever she came in contact with. But her consciousness was fading, he was killing her. Her body was weak, tired, and just wanted to rest. Pushing her muscles to their limits, she shoved at him but he just wouldn't move, wouldn't stop.
Her lungs clenched tightly as another huge force crashed into her, and then suddenly she was there alone. Bleeding, broken, limply lying on her back. Her head moved, there were so many sparkles and stars everywhere, and black, so much black.
Blinking, she tried looking again. Black. It was…it was…
Where she found the strength she didn't know, all she knew was that he was there, and that she managed to sit up to face him.
He was there, crouching next to her, looking her over. She forgot completely of her nude state as she pushed herself into him. Openly crying and squeezing him to her body as hard as she possible could, he came for her after all. He was here. She had never been happier in her life to see someone as the man she was clinging to now.
-halo-
Itachi also rushed towards the man recognized as Tobi who was savagely beating on the heiress. He watched as Sasuke flung himself towards the man who was crazily hitting her, rolling them both away from Hinata and starting to brawl on their own.
Immediately he checked for the other member, where was he?
Nothing, he could see or sense nothing. Quickly he made his way to the girl whose eyes had him motivated this entire day, checking her over. She was naked, her body riddled with marks, her face was quickly swelling up, but she was at least conscious.
He caught her eyes taking him in, and before he knew it she was nuzzling her head against his neck as her arms tightly wound themselves around his frame. She was whispering, he couldn't make out what she was saying. Tighter and tighter she pulled herself against him.
His gaze caught Uzumaki's as the boy quickly helped Sasuke who had just pinned Tobi face-down on the ground, then nodded towards Aburame to get something to cover the heiress with.
It caught him off guard to hear her whispered words finally.
"I knew you would come, I knew it." She was crying, still desperately holding onto him. He brought one hand to the nape of her neck slowly, letting her know that he wouldn't hurt her, while his other arm slowly slid around her waist. Then she did something unexpectedly, she giggled.
His entire body froze as the sounds of her small laughter washed over him. The girl was crying and laughing at the same time, she was happy. She was half dead and as happy as could be, he guessed being that close to death a victim should be happy to have their life spared.
"I knew you would come," she kept whispering.
Shino slowly walked up towards them with a brown discarded robe, probably from the earlier bank robbery. Itachi tried pulling away from her to accept the cloth, but she cried out and whimpered, whispering something new.
"Don't leave me, please don't ever leave. Just don't leave me alone, please."
Quickly he placed his arms back around her, not knowing what else to do. He needed to get her out of there so his team could search for the other member. And get her to a hospital.
Shino just placed the robe around her and stood beside them, silently looking for the other reported member. Were they given inaccurate information? Kiba arrived and helped Sasuke lead Madara out to the waiting officers in the sewers.
"Hey there," Naruto said quietly as he approached Itachi and the heiress, "Can you walk, miss?"
Itachi felt her body shudder and still she pressed herself closer to him. He felt more than heard her whisper. He pulled away from her, finally getting a good look at her face. There were several places where swelling was already starting to flare up, she looked so scared too. He'd had several victims look at him the same way she was now, but this felt different. His gut clenched, it was painful to see this girl so broken like this. Her naked flesh pressed so closely against his body didn't even enter his mind, only concern for her.
Naruto and Itachi were the ones to get her through the small tunnel; she was greatly favoring her left side, as though her right hip was injured in some manner. They needed to get her medical treatment as soon as possible. Hinata seemed to only trust Itachi, and the only other male she didn't squirm away from was the ever friendly Uzumaki. But she was still shy towards him, she definitely preferred Itachi. Naruto hoisted her carefully up to Itachi who reached out his hands for her to get her into the sewers. Then he carried her the rest of the way to the waiting ambulance.
He glanced up, watching the ambulance rushing away from the scene to take her to a local hospital, and caught amazing colors of the sunset dancing down over them. It was beautiful. The lost look and devastation on her face tore at him when he told her that he couldn't go with her. She was one case that he would always remember. Always.