Well, this is the chapter you've all been waiting for!

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Episode 12 – SASUKE vs. KAIYA

Sasuke's heart was heavy with a mixture of feelings. Being known for showing no emotions, he had desperately tried to block them out, but as soon as she appeared, they returned in a fluttery rage. There was no way he could bring himself to fight her, let alone kill her; after all, he loves her.

Sasuke examined Kaiya with his sharingan. His heart skipped a beat when he realized it was the real Kaiya. He was overcome with joy, and then deep sorrow.

She was untouched; not a single scratch on her, so he was surely convinced it was her. Her eyes were still that total shade of glowing red; no emerald in sight. She had her mask pulled up over her nose. She looked calm and prepared, unlike Sasuke.

"You don't have to do this," Sasuke said slowly and deliberately.

Kaiya gave no reply as she began to walk forward. Sasuke swallowed hard as a bead of sweat trickled down his temple.

Her black, high heel boots clonked on the slanted, red tin roof steadily as she walked right up to Sasuke. He immediately took a step back and turned side on.

"Aw, come on, Sasuke," she said sultrily, pulling down her mask and revealing a sexy smile playing on her lips. Her red eyes vanished, revealing her familiar, beautiful, emerald eyes. "After all this time, you're not happy to see me?"

Sasuke gulped as she was now standing inches from him. Her sweet, intoxicating scent filtered through his nostrils and sent shivers down his spine. Oh, how he missed being this close to her.

"I know you've missed me," she whispered into his ear. She then ran her slender fingers down his firm chest. He shuddered at her soft touch.

Sasuke then grabbed her wrist, pulled her hand off his chest and pulled her close.

"I have no time for games," he hissed, flicking Kaiya's arm away. She stood back, faking a hurt expression on her beautiful, tanned face. She turned and walked a few steps before stopping and cocking her head slightly to the side.

"Oh, Sasuke," she sighed mockingly. "I thought you loved me."

She turned so she was facing Sasuke front on, her emerald eyes flashing.

Sasuke's anger came to a boil. He drew his sword and lowered it menacingly toward Kaiya.

Her tauntingly, playful smirk vanished as she narrowed her eyes at Sasuke. Kaiya then reached for her sword and duplicated Sasuke's actions.

"Fine," she grunted.

And with that, both lovers charged at each other, bearing nothing but weapons and determination.

Naruto, ignoring the fact that he was badly beaten and beyond exhausted, ran into the direction to where he had heard Sakura scream. Although, it was just like the blind leading the blind, but that didn't stop him. His lungs were burning and his head was pounding as he weaved through the devastated streets, desperate to find Sakura still alive.

Kaiya swiftly dodged Sasuke's first blow by ducking, and then flipping when he drew his sword down on her.

As she landed, Sasuke was already in the air above her, his sword raised above his head. Kaiya disappeared in an instant and reappeared about 10 feet behind Sasuke.

Sasuke stopped dead in his tracks, his eyes widened in shock as he spun around.

"That all you got?" Kaiya called loudly back to Sasuke.

Sasuke turned around coolly and faced her. She was standing with one her hand on her hip, and her other resting her sword on her shoulder. She slightly tilted her head; her playful smirk danced on her lips.

Sasuke glared at Kaiya as she slid her sword back into her case at her waist. She then pulled out two kunais, stanced and narrowed her eyes at Sasuke.

Before Sasuke could even blink, she charged at him, throwing punches, slices and kicks. One lucky kick knocked the sword out of his hands. It slid across the tin roof and onto the street below. He cursed himself for being so careless against such a strong opponent.

Sasuke deflected some of Kaiya's blows, while others connected with his body, but he managed to hold his own.

Sasuke also threw kicks and punches. They managed to hit each other a somewhat even number of times. Sasuke grew tired of this and back-flipped back to his original fighting spot.

"Aw, what's wrong, Sasuke?" Kaiya taunted, losing her stance and returning to the pose with her hand on her hip. "Can't fight a girl?"

"Sakura?" Naruto panted as he came across the pinkette lying flat on her back at the opposite end in the middle of the street, Kakashi following closely behind him.

She didn't respond.

"Sakura!"

Naruto, despite being exhausted from the run to find her, he sprinted to her, and skidded on his knees to her side. He examined her wounds before even laying a hand on her. There was a huge bloodstain in the middle of her abdomen. A river of blood trickled from the corner of her mouth. She was covered in hundreds of cuts and bruises.

Naruto's eyes grew wide in fears she may already be dead.

"AAARRH!"

Sasuke leapt in the air, infused his chakra into his fist, and threw a punch from above down onto Kaiya. Casually, she leapt out of its path and Sasuke tore through the tin roof, landing hard on the stone floor beneath him.

His body bounced, hard, and skidded on the floor against a wall.

Kaiya leapt down through the hole and landed in a crouched position. She quickly rummaged through her thigh-pouch and whipped out four kunai knives and flicked them toward Sasuke.

BOOOOOM!

The paper bombs attached to the kunais exploded in a violent blast. Kaiya stood up, shielding her eyes from the dust with one hand, triumphantly examining her efforts.

Out of the blue, Sasuke leapt out from the dust cloud, and gripped himself around Kaiya's waist, sending both of them crashing through the stone wall behind her and onto the street below.

…What the—? "Ooof!"

They landed hard and separated due to the impact. Sasuke slid to the left of the street and Kaiya slid to the right.

Suddenly remembering, Sasuke quickly leapt to his feet and rummaged around to find his sword.

Blinded by the dust and debris from blasting them both through the wall, it was difficult to find.

Getting frantic, Sasuke finally felt a stinging sensation in his left palm. He jerked it back, but then reached out again, hoping it to be his sword.

It was.

The smoke overhead from the explosions all around the village became thicker and darker. Sasuke concentrated on breathing steadily to avoid choking.

As the dust cleared, he saw Kaiya stumbling and picking her sorry self up from the dirt. She had a deep gash on her upper right arm. She gripped it as she stood up. Blood seeped from in-between her slender fingers.

"Didn't expect that…" she muttered to herself.

Coolly, she assumed her fighting stance. She seemed to limp a bit as she repositioned herself.

She drew her sword with her bloody hand and again, charged at Sasuke.

Sasuke swiftly threw his sword at her as a distraction and quickly conjured up hand signs.

"Fire Style, Fireball Jutsu!"

He poised his curled fist to his lips and let loose. A huge fireball, bigger than he'd ever summoned before, engulfed the emerald eyes girl, her face wide in shock, and her defenses, down.

A horrible shriek tore from Kaiya's throat as the flames spooled around her entire body.

After violently shaking her, Sakura woke up, startled by Naruto's actions.

"…Naruto? Kakashi?" she whispered, her eyes blinking. Naruto's eyes welled with tears and a relieved smile crossed his lips as he pulled Sakura close into a hug. She groaned in pain.

Naruto let her go immediately. "Sakura, are you hurt?" he asked frantically, looking her up and down with his wet, cerulean eyes.

Instead of answering him, she raised her hand, infused it with a green aura of her chakra and rested in on her stomach. She flinched and her eyes shut themselves tight for a millisecond until the pain subsided and the pain was gone.

CRRAAASHHHH!

Both lovers flew through a small shop on one side of the street at a hundred kilometers an hour. Debris smashed on the ground and showered over them, covering their backs and hair. They lay on the floor, exhausted. The battle had been going on for just under 45 minutes. Sasuke's chakra was starting to wear thin. His left forearm was fractured. Kaiya's right ankle was sprained and she was covered in burns from Sasuke's earlier jutsu. Singed holes were visible in her clothing, exposing burnt and blistering skin.

They strained, groaned and struggled to pull themselves to their feet.

Kaiya stumbled and had to lean on the wall for support due to her ankle. Sasuke leaned against the opposite, partially destroyed wall, hunched over in pain at his broken left arm. Both were wheezing from exhaustion.

Every second that had passed, Sasuke's heart grew heavier with hurt and angst when he had made an attempt to injure Kaiya. He had dreaded this day once Orochimaru had announced these plans of destruction. Every day, he had prayed in his cell for it not to come, but he knew deep down that praying was futile.

As they struggled to catch their breath, Sasuke and Kaiya stared at each other for a few seconds before she leapt at him again. He flinched at how much damage he had caused, especially the burns.

She landed a sweet left hook to Sasuke's cheek, sending him flying through to the abandoned neighbouring shop's wall. His desire to fight had almost diminished; he didn't want to cause anymore harm to her. But what choice did he have?

Sasuke stumbled to his feet.

"Kaiya… wait," Sasuke choked. Surprisingly, she stopped. Out of humanity? Or out of amusement at what Sasuke was about to say?

She said nothing.

"I… I can help you…" he said, his voice steadying. Kaiya snorted.

"I don't need any help," she hissed. "Orochimaru is all the help I need."

"But… y-you'll die," Sasuke said, trying to hide the desperate tone in his voice.

Kaiya stared at him for a few moments.

"How do you think you can help?" she spat, her eyes glaring. Even though the red glow was gone from her eyes, she was still very much under Orochimaru's control.

Sasuke lifted his hand to his left shoulder and ripped a huge slit in his already torn shirt.

"I… I can get rid of your curse-mark," Sasuke offered silently, exposing his bare shoulder where his curse-mark should be.

"You sure you can stand?" Kakashi said, also worried about Sakura's condition. Sure, Sakura was strong, but these clones were definitely stronger. She could've been killed; she could've been one of the hundreds of thousands of others K.I.A today.

Naruto helped her to her feet. After a few seconds, she lifted Naruto's hand away and stood on her own.

Suddenly, a deep, familiar scream echoed through the empty streets. Even though it came from far away from the others, his scream seemed so terrifyingly close.

"Was that… Sasuke…?"

Sasuke howled and doubled over in pain as Kaiya had unexpectedly sprung in front of Sasuke and jammed a kunai deep into his left thigh.

Sasuke grunted and gritted his teeth and waited for the pain to subside a little.

"P-please… listen to me…" Sasuke choked as he raised his head to face hers; her partially burnt face.

Sasuke silently prayed she couldn't see through the make-up he had smeared over his curse-mark. He reached down and yanked the kunai from his thigh and tossed it aside.

"I… I can g-get rid of… of your curse-mark… but… you need t-to listen… listen to m-me…"

Kaiya paused for a second.

He… He can really help me…?

FOOL! Don't listen to him!

…O-Orochimaru?

Yes, child, it is I!

I…I…

Kaiya gripped her head and squeezed her eyes shut.

Don't listen to him! He lies!

But… he—

He LIES! HE LIES!

STOP IT!

She shook her head back and forth. Sasuke could do nothing but stare at this odd behaviour.

HE LIES! KILL HIM!

…NO! I won't list—

KIIIIILL HIIIIIM!

Is… is she trying to fight it…?

Tears started to fall from Kaiya's cheeks. Noticing them, Sasuke reached a hand out to comfort her, but instead, she gripped his wrist with both hands –

"LIAR!" she screeched,

– twirled him around on the heel of her boot and sent him flying up and through the hole they had first crashed through. She then slumped to the ground in pain from her burns.

Sasuke landed hard, uttering a choke of pain, and sprawled across the roof of a nearby building. He skidded along the stone roof and flopped over the edge onto a lower stone roof.

She was now desperately fighting with Orochimaru to take control of her body back, but she was steadily losing.

As Sasuke came to, he heard the uneasy clinking of Kaiya's boots getting closer and closer. He fluttered open his eyes to see her standing on the edge of the higher ledge above him. Sasuke clumsily pulled himself up.

As he squinted up at her, her expression was something he had never seen before.

Kaiya's face was twisted in anger. She bared her teeth, her eyes wild and glaring. Blood constantly trickled out of the corner of her mouth and dripped down to her chin. Her ankle was swollen and she was breathing heavily. Some of her burns had started to blister and bleed.

She jumped down and slowly, but menacingly, limped toward Sasuke, bearing a kunai in her good hand.

"Kaiya…" Sasuke breathed, getting fed up and angry with this whole situation. "You have to… stop this… please! I… I can help you…"

"Liar!" she hissed, throwing the kunai at Sasuke. It dug deeply into his shoulder and he crouched in pain slightly as his features twisted in pain too; though he did not move to retrieve it.

Sasuke steadied himself and walked up to her, limping every so often.

She continued to furiously pelt Sasuke with kunais and shurikens. His body jerked abruptly with every deadly pierce, but Sasuke kept limping toward her, like a zombie. Kunais and shurikens jutted out from every part of his body. Blood was already pouring out of his wounds, but he ignored it.

Kaiya stopped then she realized she had only one kunai left. She gripped it tightly in her hand and stared at him with narrowed, confused eyes as Sasuke stopped inches from her. She groaned in pain as her burns started to take their toll.

He stared into her eyes for a few seconds. Kaiya didn't try to attack him again. She only gazed up with confusion and anger in her emerald eyes. Her twisted face dropped only slightly when Sasuke had approached her. Maybe some of her humanity was still alive in her after all; maybe Orochimaru hadn't won just yet.

"…And why should I?" she seethed, more tears falling, despite her deadly tone.

Slowly, and despite the incredible, searing pain he was enduring, Sasuke lifted his good hand from his unbroken arm and placed it on her cheek. He pulled her in; just close enough for Kaiya to feel his hot breath on her cheek and nose.

"…Because I love you," he breathed, pushing his lips against hers.

What was Sasuke thinking?

Can be break the strong, mental force Orochimaru has over Kaiya with just one kiss?

Or will he completely take over and kill him, and then her?

Will Naruto, Sakura and Kakashi get to Sasuke in time to save him?

Or will they be too late?

Tune into the next chapter to find out!

R&R PWEASE!

Peace, xx