Chapter 22 Introductions
The once empty living room in an abounded farmhouse was now packed people, it was actually the most humans Meiko Namikaze had ever seen in one place at one time. They were all a few years older then she was about the age of her brother, 18 to 19 years old. There were six men and seven women in the room not counting herself and they were all looking at her as if they could not believe what they had just heard.
"So you have a sister?" asked a tall man with a fur-lined jacket under his ninja vest, his eyes where silted like a some of the demon races, but he did not smell like a demon. He smelled like a dog but the scent was not nature to him like an Inugami.
"Yes, she is Kiba," confirmed Naruto as he looked at the tall man.
"Well, then I guess there is no question that those two other demons where your parents." added another man with black hair pulled back into a tight ponytail. Like all the others his cloths where dirty and stained with what looked to be blood.
"They are." Added Naruto to Shikamaru
"So should we call you Naruto Uzimaki or Naruto Namikaze?" laughed Ino
"Honestly, Ino don't know and at the moment it doesn't matter," answered Naruto
"Namikaze, he is a Namikaze." stated Meiko
"We will worry about that later," restated Naruto
"You know you would have been my neighbor if things had turned out differently," added Ino with a small laugh. "I guess it makes sense why my clan elders keep that house up, they were doing it to honor the 4th Hokage."
"If things had been differently than we would all be gathered together in the Leaf enjoying something to eat right now," stated Kiba as his stomach growled. "Does anyone have any food?"
"I have some but not a lot." offered Meiko "My mom didn't expect me to be feeding so many people when she packed my food supply."
"And how do we know this food isn't poisoned in some way?" inquired a man in a trench coat with a dark sunglasses over his eyes. "This could be just a trap of some kind."
"Shino, we have had some already and none of us have fallen over dead," stated Sakura
"Well, I fell over because of how good the food is." laughed Fu
"Naruto, can you introduce me to everyone?" inquired Meiko as Naruto nodded his head and turned toward a man with long black hair and pale eyes which was standing by the window with a brown hair pulled up into two tight buns. Multiple weapon pouches hung on her hip and legs and she held a kunai in her hands. "That is Neji Hyuga and Tenten."
"Hyuga, you said Hinata Hyuga could have a sister my age?" inquired Meiko
"I believe so," said Naruto as he looked at Hinata "In fact, she is right there. Hinata this is my sister."
"Hello." said Hinata in a shy voice as suddenly she looked at Naruto. "Wait, you said I possibly had a sister, didn't Naruto-kun tell you?"
"I wasn't sure," admitted Naruto as Hinata face became pale white.
"Naruto-kun didn't even know you had a sister for sure." laughed Inner Sakura "Good luck getting his heart when he doesn't even know you."
"I have a sister, Hanabi." confirmed Hinata
"The man in the sunglass is Shino Aburame and beside him is Kiba Inuzuka." Introduce Naruto as Meiko shifted in her seat and looked uncomfortable. "What?"
"Sorry but Aburame and Inuzuka I know those clans," explained Meiko with a gulp.
"I bet your parents talked about the village, they are big clans." said Ino
"They did but I it wasn't just them, those clans are in our history books, well the demon history books." explained Meiko "Those clans where among the worse when it comes to massacring demons in the ancient past. They where the main reasons why I hated so much by people my own age."
"What?" asked Kiba confused at the statement.
"It seems that our ancient ancestors fought against the demons," stated Shino "And did it effectively enough to get written down."
"More than that, we are talking about a lot of bad things." corrected Meiko "At least your clans wasn't the worse, that belonged to Shika the Slayer."
"Shika?" inquired Shikamaru
"Wait, isn't Shika the founder of your clan?" inquired Ino as she looked at her teammate.
"Yes." confirmed Shikamaru as Meiko unknowingly moved back away from Shikamaru. "We call him Shika the Great, he founded our clan and he developed the Justus we use and most importantly he taught us how to use deer to make medicine and other Justus."
"I wouldn't tell that to a demon if I where you." said Meiko as she took a breath. "Believe me, there are more than a few demons mostly Bai Ze who want to kill anyone descended from that monster. They have orders not to but orders are not always followed."
"Wait, Bai Ze isn't that the deer thing that Shizune is?" inquired Ino as she remembered Shikamaru talking about it while they where making their excape from the Leaf.
"Yes." Confirmed Meiko
"Wait, our clan stories say Shika made a deal with the Bai Ze and they showed him the mysteries of the woods and how deer could help his clan grow strong." Stated Shikamaru as Meiko shook her head.
"By deal, you mean enslavement, mass murder and rape then yes made a deal with them." Countered Meiko as Shikamaru blinked as she kept going. "Last year one of our school assignments was to read an eyewitness record of the Shika and his savages attack on the village of Keb. It was horrifying, humans cutting of heads and ripping babies from their mothers before tossing the babies in the air and stabbing them through them with spears. Rapes of young demon girls and the force enslavement of the men, the elders he pumped for information before cutting their throats. It was said that the nearby river ran read with demon blood for seven days and bloated bodies of the dead floated down it."
"Our history says nothing like that," stated Shikamaru
"Well who wants the founder of their clan to be mass murder?" countered Meiko "He is the prime example of what humans did to the ancient demon cities and why the council didn't try another way and instead did all this?"
"You mean mass murder of millions of humans." snapped a blonde hair well endowed woman, she was one of two women who had different ninja vests than anyone else in the room. Their vests where a dirty white and with a single strap over their shoulder. The other woman in similar dress was a red haired woman with tan skin, she was sitting with her leg up. That leg was wrapped and a slight red stain showed that a wound was under it.
"Yes, I just saw what they did to that woman upstairs." Said Meiko "I can't imagine what it is like."
"Well we don't have to imagine." stated the blonde hair woman. "Our sensei sacrifice himself to allow us to escape and they managed to turn one of our own against us."
"What?" asked Naruto
"Let me guess Yugito Nii." added Meiko as everyone once again turned his or her attention to her wondering how she could have known that.
"How do you know that?" inquired Samui
I know her," added Meiko as the others looked at her. "The demons, they would use clones to fake people's death and bring them to our island and keep them until the time was right."
"Clones?" inquired Sakura with a shake of her head "Clones would disappear within hours at the best more than likely minutes."
"Not blood clones," countered Naruto as all eyes turned to him. "They are perfect copies of a person but are almost useless; the clones can last for days if not weeks. However they are useless, they can't move at all and don't even breath, anyone can spot the difference if you are looking at them on the battlefield."
"So these demons somehow switched out people for blood clones and then kept them for years." stated Ino "Why would they do that, it doesn't make much sense."
"It does." countered Shikamaru "They must have done experiments before starting all this and the Jinichinia would be useful in retaking their former villages. But how did they control them?"
"Two ways." answered Meiko as she looked down. "First they had seals on all our arms and if we tried to escape or left the area of our island then everyone would be blown up. To help make sure this worked the second way was to bring a loved one of the Jinchuriki to the island. That is why my Dad was brought and why they brought Hotaru even though she was a normal human when they brought Utakata."
"Wait, I thought both of them where dead." Countered Naruto
"It is a time for bringing back the dead," noted Shino before looking at Meiko. "Tell me something Naruto, is your sister a prisoner or did she turn to our side."
"She is just a child Shino, she had no choice in all this." snapped Sakura as she came to Meiko's defense.
"At her age I had already killed people, we can't give her a free pass because of it." countered Sai "Even so the question needs to be answered."
"She is our guest." answered Naruto and with a slight smile turned to look at his sister. "She is also my baby sister and I am not leaving her alone in a world she doesn't understand."
"Fine, but she better give us some useful information," stated Samui as the Leaf ninjas looked among each other before looking at her.
"Samui, we are not back home I don't think we have much of a say here." stated Karui
"Still she has a point," admitted Neji "If she doesn't give us any information then she is no use to us. She could even turn against us if we run into demons before we reach or destination."
"So what do you think we should do, she is a demon so she is our enemy and in most cases we kill our enemies." Stated Kiba as Naruto stepped in front of his sister, Sakura moved to stand beside him.
"We are not killing my sister." growled Naruto his eyes turning into slits, seeing their friend's eyes turn into slits caused the others to jump back.
"Calm down." ordered Fu to both Naruto and his friends. "We are not going to hurt the kid and Naruto isn't a demon, well not really. He like me had our demons die in us and that is one of the effects. Maybe you didn't notice earlier or had forgotten."
"I see." stated Shino "Still doesn't help answer what we are going to do with her, we could let her go and go to our own hiding spot until we find a cure to this thing. She doesn't know where we are going right?"
"That is one option, but having a living demon answer questions and give us medical samples may be very helpful to finding a cure." added Ino "We only have samples from a dead one and that isn't the same thing."
"I can help." stated Meiko "Demons have a weakness, it is how ancient humans beat the ancient demons."
"What?" inquired Naruto as sister hesitated for a moment before going on.
"Bronze." answered Meiko "Bronze burns our skin. Brass does too but not as bad."
"Bronze? You have got to be kidding me?" stated Karui with a laugh. "That makes no sense."
"It actually does, it explains how humans where able to defeat the demons in the past when we didn't know how to do Justus." countered Shikamaru
"Great all we have to do is radio all the villages and tell them to use bronze weapons to defend themselves," said Hinata
"Radio communication is all but gone and even if we could how many would believe what we are saying." countered Neji as everyone lowered their heads, during the opening days of the outbreak there were multiple people on the radio claiming they had discovered cures and all of them had been useless.
"Still will not help us with the flue and how fast can we start making bronze weapons while we are having trouble finding food." stated Sakura trying to hid a grin which came from putting Hinata down.
"So the question is how many of these weapons are around?" inquired Sai
"Likely not a lot." added Ino "They haven't been used in what centuries?"
"I have one." answered Tenten as she raised her hand.
"So do I." added Neji before explaining. "Tenten gave custom weapons to all of us as a gift but it is more of a show piece, it has our names engraved on the blade and the edge isn't even sharp. It is meant to hang on a wall not for battle."
"So we have two," added Ino
"One." corrected Neji as Ino blinked. "I said it was meant to hang on a wall and that is where mine is, it is hanging on a wall back home."
"I have mine." said Tenten as she opened one of her multiple scrolls and looked at the list of sealed weapons. She opened one of the seals only to have a double bladed battle-ax appear in a puff of smoke. "Damn wrong seal."
"How many weapons does she have?" whispered Meiko to her brother as Tenten kept pulling more and more weapons out. There was so many weapons and all different types most of whom that not even Naruto knew the names of.
"She is a collector and a weapons expert," explained Naruto to his sister. "Last I heard it is in the triple digits."
It took a few minutes until she found the blade. She unsealed the blade; it was rather simple the only thing that stood out was that the blade was a golden bronze instead of normal blue grey steel. The edges where rounded to something that looked like it belonged on a butter knife. Near the hilt was the Leaf symbol while Tenten's name was cut into the bronze.
"So we have a single weapon between all of us," said Ino "Better than nothing but still not good."
"Not for sure, this could all be a fake out and we have only one way to test it." stated Sai as he looked at Meiko who instantly pulled back, pressing her body against the back of the couch. He raised his hand before Naruto could say anything. "I am talking about just touching the tip of the blade to an arm, just to see if it does burn. Sakura can heal the wound so it will not do any real damage."
"I hate to say this Naruto, but he is right," added Shikamaru
The look one Naruto's face told everyone what he thought about that.
"It's ok." Said Meiko as she rolled up her sleeve to show her bare skin, everyone knew that the skin was just the outer edge of a hedge justu and in fact her true skin was fur.
"Alright, I will just press the flat edge of the blade against the skin." explained Tenten as she pulled the blade and moved toward Meiko. Only to have Naruto step between the two.
"Naruto it is the only way." reassured Tenten "I will not hurt here, I will hold it for a second and pull away and Sakura is here to heal her."
"No, I'll do it." said Naruto as he held out his hand. Tenten nodded as she placed the blade in Naruto's open palm. The moment he touched the blade he dropped it in pain and fought down a scream. He held his hand close to his body.
"What the hell!" cursed Naruto as smoke rose up from his hand.
"Naruto!" yelled Sakura as she rushed forward to Naruto and pulled his hand away from his body. Her eyes widened as she saw what had become of his hand. The flesh had become bright red with giant blisters covering the area, in the center the skin had turned a deep red almost black.
"Second and third degree burns?" thought Sakura as she picked up the blade, which had fallen, her skin didn't burn. The only thing she felt was the coldness of the weapon. "How could that happen?"
"What did you put on that thing?" inquired Naruto still fighting back the pain.
"Nothing, I don't know what happened." defended Tenten
"Hold on a second." said Fu as she walked forward. "Sakura hold out the weapon."
Sakura raised an eyebrow but did what she was told. Slowly Fu reached out and touched the tip of the blade with one of her fingers. She jumped back almost knocking over Shikamaru, like Naruto the tip of her finger had suddenly become covered with a bright red blister. Ino walked up and took the blade from Sakura but nothing happened to her, by now Sakura had turned her attention back to Naruto's wound. She began to pump healing chakra on the burn but the chakra was not healing the burn as fast as normal.
"You and Naruto? But no one else?" inquired Ino "Why?"
"Because both of them have demon chakra not human." answered a new voice as Meiko turned her attention toward a new comer. She had bright red hair almost the same shade of her own, her bright red eyes looked at the Meiko who looked back with her own eyes. Meiko tilted her head as she studied the woman.
"You look familiar," stated Meiko which caused everyone to jump a bit as for a brief moment, everyone was worried that Karin had lied to them and she was a demon. "Your eyes are the wrong color but you look like my aunt Mariko."
This time it was Karin's turn eyes to widened as she looked at Meiko with new eyes.
"Aunt Mariko?" inquired Naruto
"Mom's little sister, she has a photo of her on top of the fire place but she died when mom's homeland Whirlpool country fell during war. Mom was already in the Leaf studying to be a ninja when it fell and her sister and the rest of the clan was killed." explained Meiko to her brother and everyone else.
"She lived." added Karin as everyone turned to look at her. "My mother's name was Mariko Uzimaki, she never told me she had a sister."
There was a moment when everyone paused and looked back and forth between Naruto and Meiko and Karin. Aside from the red hair between Meiko and Karin there wasn't much and there was almost nothing between Naruto and Karin.
"Wait…if that is true then you three are cousins." said Sakura
"Wait, if you are our cousin then why didn't your mother go to her sister in the Leaf?" inquired Meiko confused about why the sisters did not reunite after the fall of the Whirlpool.
"Why didn't the Leaf come to the defense of the Whirlpool like they were sworn too?" countered Karin before brushing the idea and the idea that she now had cousins aside. "Doesn't matter, what matter is finding a cure to this flu and a way to turn those turned humans back into demons."
The look on Meiko's face told everyone who saw it, mostly her brother and Sakura what she thought the likely hood of that would be.
"Come on let's get going." said Karin "We should reach the base in a few hours if we leave now."
"Are we sure it is the right time." Said Naruto as Sasuke walked into the room, his eyes widened a bit as he looked at Sasuke.
"Why is he surprised to see Sasuke?" thought Sakura as she read the surprise on her friend's face, it was as if he was seeing something which was supposed to be possible.
"It is dead last or are do you want to wait for your little burn to heal?" inquired Sasuke with a smirk.
No one said much of anything as they searched the house for anything, which could possibly be used in the field. Sakura had first wrapped Naruto's hand in bandages before going off to search the house. While everyone was preparing to leave, Fu walked over to Naruto and whispered into his ear.
"Wasn't he close to death's door?" inquired Fu
"So you saw that too?" inquired Naruto
"I can see through Demon's hedges I can see through human one's too." answered Fu "But how did he heal himself?"
"I have no idea." confirmed Naruto "He was at Death's door and now he seams back in the early phases of the red flu."
"Well something has changed, I have never heard of that happening," said Fu
"Me neither maybe Sakura-chan will know but…" said Naruto
"But how will everyone react, and if they force Sasuke away then we lose this base we are heading to and our hiding spot." finished Fu "Tell your girlfriend after we get a roof over our heads."
"Sakura-chan isn't my girlfriend," answered Naruto as Fu laughed a bit.
"Didn't look that way, when she woke up beside you and rubbed those cute little birthmarks of yours," laughed Fu as Naruto's eyes widened at the news. His face turned red as he imagined what that looked like in his head.
"Are you two done?" asked Suigetsu as he stood by the door with his meat cleaver like sword hanging on his back. "We need to get going."
The sun was just sinking below the horizon as Shizune stood beside the open gate of the Leaf village, the fires had gone out and the transformation of humans into demons where all but done. Still the list of things that needed to be done was massive, power and other basic needed to be restored, some buildings needed redone. Most of all a count of everyone who had been turned and what they had become. An honor guard of demons stood behind her two from each of the twelve demon races, one male and one female in their dress military uniforms.
Watching the gathering of demons from on top of a nearby roof of what appeared to be a normal building was Kakashi Hatake and Rin Nohara. From the outside the building looked like a normal checkpoint where traders would stop and get signed into the village and get directions to the market. This was also where each trader would have their shipments inspected for anything that could hurt the village. It was a rather normal building and something that every village and small town had, but in this case behind the normal function was another mission. It was a front for ANBU teams, which would use it as a stash house for supplies and an entrees to the tunnel network, which ran under the village like a spider web.
"So what is going on?" inquired Kakashi as another group of demons arrived, like the others these group was a made up of four members from each demon race. Then Kakashi noticed that he was wrong there was only three of the deer like Bai Ze. When they arrived, Shizune and the guards behind her all went down on one knee, the party itself bowed aside from eleven of them who remained standing. The Eleven which stood was each a different race and wore more expensive looking cloths then the others.
"The council has arrived to see the village," explained Rin as Shizune rose. "Well beside Dan, I don't see him and he was in charge of the attack on the village."
"So these are the sick monsters who planned this whole thing out?" inquired Kakashi
"Yes." Confirmed Rin as the people who caused so much death entered the village.
"What do you know about them?" inquired Kakashi with a yawn.
"A lot but that can wait." stated Rin as she looked at her watch. "Aside from the time you where knocked out you have been up for at least 37 hours, you need some sleep. Hell I need some sleep."
"You are welcomed to crash at my place." offered Kakashi until he looked toward where his own apartment building would normally be only to see that while not on fire anymore it was clearly a blacken husk of a building. "Well I would if I had one."
"I think at the moment, no one really has a full home." stated Rin "If I remember correctly there is a bunk room below us."
"There was, but it was being remodeled when this whole thing started." stated Kakashi as Rin growled a bit.
"I guess we will have to find a place," said Rin as they moved down the stairs, as they did something caught Rin's eye in one of the side rooms of the building. Someone had set up a makeshift home in the abounded building, there was a sleeping mat and some personal items spread out over the floor. "Found a place."
"There is only one sleeping mat." Inquired Kakashi looked into the room, the thing that jumped out to him was that there was only a single sleeping mat. "I am sure we can find beds, there are more beds then people."
"And how many of those beds had people die in them?" countered Rin "I would rather not fall asleep with the smell of death."
"I am used to it." Admitted Kakashi "But there is only one mat."
"And we are both adults." countered Rin "It isn't like we haven't slept beside each other while on mission, what has changed? Well aside from the fact that we aren't human anymore."
Slowly the two old teammates moved toward the sleeping mat and lied down, instantly Kakashi jumped up causing Rin to laugh.
"You have a tail, now you can't just flop down on a mat as thin as this," laughed Rin as she used one of her arms as pillow. Kakashi could not help but look at his now full-grown teammate who he had thought was dead for so long. Her back was to him, which allowed him to study the woman she had grown into.
"Kakashi, if you want to sleep with me just say it." Stated Rin as Kakashi shook his head a bit.
"I am sure your boyfriend or husband will not be happy if I say yes," stated Kakashi as his teammate laugh.
"I don't have one of those," answered Rin as she rolled over and looked up at the ceiling. "I have been on a handful of dates but none has gone far, well no more than a one night stand."
"Same here." admitted Kakashi
"I don't think so, see one of the main goals in the demon village was to have kids and I can't." explained Rin as Kakashi blinked as he looked at her. He remembered a handful of time when they had sat around the fire. The four of them, Minato-sensie, Obito, Rin and himself would talk about what they would do after the war. Rin had always talked about starting a family and working a hospital healing people. "Well not without a high risk of dying."
"Your heart?" inquired Kakashi with some shame in his voice.
"Yep," confirmed Rin as she tapped her chest where the scar from the wound Kakashi had given her long ago was. "Not many men want to be with someone who they can't have kids with, in demon society kids and carrying on the race means everything. It is the driving force behind the massacring of humanity. Family is everything, the race is everything and humanity is responsible for the death of the great civilizations of the demons in the past. That is what is drilled into demon children from a young age. They want to save their races so they are going to turn their most hated enemies into their own kind."
"Kind of brilliant." admitted Kakashi "They weaken us with their virus and at the same time they virus sets up the process of turning humans into demons."
"And then once humanity is turned all the pure demons will simply blend in with society because with so much death no one kept track who lived, who died and who came into villages as refugees." explained Rin. "It is easy for a pure demon to come into a village and say that their home village was destroyed by the virus. Sure the higher up members like those SOB on the council, Shizune and maybe myself can't blend into society again."
"I don't see how anyone can blame you, you had no choice in helping them." stated Kakashi as Rin rolled back over.
"I hope your right, I am going to get some sleep, you should too tomorrow will be busy." stated Rin, Kakashi sat up for a moment to think before finally lying down. He did not even remember closing his eyes but within seconds, he was asleep.
Well I hope you liked this chapter, I wish to say Happy Fourth of July to my readers in the United States. Now until next time please keep reading. Thanks Wilkins75.