Chapter 32: Confrontation! Akatsuki vs. Water!
"No eyes, over."
Kyoske's voice was shrill over the walkie and it made me flinch while Hideki groaned.
"Kyoske, for the last time, be serious." Hideki grumbled.
"You didn't say over, over." Kyoske said a moment later which only made me want to somehow travel through the walkie just to choke him.
"Kyoske!" I growled.
"Okay, okay." Kyoske sighed.
Our journey to the Akatsuki had led us to The Land of Rivers, which was a rather sleepy and small village near the Sand Village and also happened to be a good distance from our own village. All it really did was solidify just how long we would have to travel back with Karin and the only way to make it through sane we all agreed was to have her unconscious through all of it.
Now we were at one of their hideouts, which was quite literally a hole in the wall of sorts. No front door, no seals for miles which meant that it was newly constructed and it certainly looked it. The surrounding area was relatively untouched and it was miles away from the main village. It was clearly nothing more than a resting place for them.
"Do you see anything?" Kyoske asked. "I'm getting a little bored with all this people watching."
Nothing had happened in the past half an hour and it took everything in me to keep from saying that we didn't need a reminder. I swallowed it, focusing instead on the hideout and my surroundings, listening for anything out of the ordinary. The hideout was our only lead, the only piece of solid information other than the identities of the members we had encountered. It had filled us with some sort of certainty, that we would find something or someone out here in the middle of nowhere but so far, it was proving to be a resounding nothing.
"It doesn't make any sense." Hideki said. "Nothing. Not one thing."
I closed my eyes and envisioned the Byakugan. I focused my chakra to one of my eyes and when I opened one, the Byakugan activated and I could see through the stone walls of the hideout. But, there was no one inside, no one lying in wait, just an empty hideout.
I sighed when suddenly I felt something behind me and I swung around, drawing a kunai and steadying myself to strike. Except, nothing was there. I stared out into an equally empty forest, with nothing but empty branches, and scurrying forest creatures running and flying around. Nothing out of the ordinary and certainly not anything that could hurt me.
I was turning back to the hideout when something white shot up from the ground and I gasped as a face shot out from the white mass. Well, half of it was white and the other was black. One was an actual face while the other had a yellow eye and the faint lining of a nose and a mouth.
"What are you doing?" The creature asked.
I screamed and fell back, but managed to catch myself before I completely face planted onto the ground. I dug my kunai into the side of a tree and managed to slow myself down just enough to jump to another branch.
The body above was like a Venus flytrap of sorts and the more their body rose up from the branch, the more menacing the plant with jagged teeth surrounding their body looked. They had green, moss-like colored hair, but it looked darker on the black side compared to the white side. It was wearing the same kimono as the other Akatsuki members, except it's plant-like top-half stretched out the collar even more. It stood fully on the branch and I realized with slight horror that it had to have some sort of merging nature technique that gave it that ability to appear from the very edge of a thin tree branch.
"You scared her." A deeper voice from within the creature growled and I shivered. No mouth had moved at all and yet, a voice had spoken, clear as day.
"I didn't mean to." The white part said. "I was just wondering why she was hanging up in this tree."
I pulled a kunai out of my pocket and gripped it in my hand. I wasn't sure what this creature was, but I wasn't about to let it get away. It was clearly an Akatsuki member.
"Who are you?!" I demanded, my voice shaking slightly. I wasn't usually scared, but there was just something about this creature, about the way one of its eyes seemed dead and the other seedy.
"That's our line." The white part said.
I threw the kunai and just as it was about to make contact, the flytrap snapped shut, my kunai ricocheted off of the hard shell. My eyes widened as the deep voice chuckled and I realized that it was emanating from the dark side.
"Miyuki? Are you alright?" Kyoske's asked. I reached up and was about to take off my headset when the black side followed my hand and extended a hand, which made me freeze.
That was when I caught a quick glance of it, a white bubble growing on my sleeve and by the time I looked down at it, the small bubble had grown several sizes bigger and was making its way around my body, constricting me. I gasped and struggled, but the struggling made it worse somehow, which only aggravated me. A head popped out from the white mass and I gasped as I made out the white part except this one had matching white hair.
"There's no escaping now." The head said, a hand snaking under my hair and yanking at my headset. It popped right out and the hand held it up so that the other body could see.
"I pulled it out." The white part said and glanced toward the dark side.
"About time." The black side grumbled.
I groaned in response, struggling against the hold, but quickly finding it pointless. The more I struggled, the tighter the hold became. But, I wasn't done yet.
I flicked my wrist and soon the white mass surrounding me began to shake before snakes broke through, a whole swarm of snapping, hissing snakes that thrashed around, breaking the white mass to nothingness within minutes before they turned on the creature before me, all of them darting forward. A few smashed into the branch the creature was standing on and it jumped back, swatting a few other snakes away but more came. They grappled until the creature jumped onto the other side of the clearing and merged against a tree trunk before the snakes could grab at it.
I took a breath, retracting the snakes back up my sleeve and eyed my surroundings, looking for it again. Whatever it was, it was able to make its chakra undetectable and already I could feel how big of a pain that was.
"That was fun." The white part's voice drifted from above and I looked up, gritting my teeth. It was sitting on the branches above me, looking down, the white part wearing a sarcastic smile while the black side merely stared at me.
I started making hand signs, not even waiting.
"Fire style! Fireball Jutsu!" I sent a fireball in their direction and watched as it rolled, singing everything in its path. It looked like a direct hit but when the attack lost its steam, they were still sitting in the exact same spot.
"I think she's trying to kill us." The white part said.
"Let her try." The black side grumbled.
"Where's Karin?" I shouted.
"Karin?" The white side asked, sounding surprised.
"Where is she?" I spat.
"She isn't here." The black side said.
"She made the boss angry." The white part said. "She's not one of us anymore."
I arched an eyebrow. Itachi kicked her out? I remembered how she had clung to him before, calling after him and always watching him. He never seemed to care much, but with as much as she clearly cared about him, for him to just kick her to the side…
I glanced down and made out a shifting in the bushes below. It wasn't long until Kyoske peeked out and I fought the urge to smile. Good, the boys were close and getting ready to strike. All I had to do was keep this creature busy a little bit longer and pray that it didn't sense the boys.
"What did she do?" I asked.
The white part was about to answer me when the black part cut it off.
"Classified." It growled and I balled my hands into tight fists at my sides.
"There's more of them running around." The white part said, it's eye moving around the forest. It was then that the boys chose to strike and Kyoske shot out first, drawing his sword as he got closer. The creature turned to face him but as it did that, Hideki shot out from above and was making hand signs, a water jutsu.
"Water Style! Raging Waves!"
The attack was heading right for the creature but instead of moving, it waited until the last second. Right before Kyoske was about to strike and right before Hideki's attack was set to hit, the creature split in two, the white part and black part diving in different directions, completely missing both attacks. The black part landed a few feet below while the white part jumped a branches above, merging half of its body into the tree, it's eye wide and looking like it was ready to flee.
"It split in two!" Kyoske gasped.
The split sides were missing arms and legs but I watched as the limbs formed with ease and as the black body rose to its feet, the white one remained half submerged into the tree branch.
"It can regenerate too." Hideki said.
"What are you idiots doing?"
I swung around to face the new voice and found Karin standing at the forest floor, her hands on her hips, her eyes narrow as they looked between all of us.
"Karin!" The white body shouted. "These shinobi are after you! Run away!"
"Let them come then." Karin huffed. "I'm not afraid of a bunch of spoiled brats."
"What a miracle you're not licking your wounds." I called out to her, earning a dark look in the process.
"Excuse me?" She hissed.
"Heard your boyfriend kicked you out." I said.
She arched an eyebrow and looked at the white and black bodies before looking back at me. Except, when she looked back at me, she was biting back a smile.
"Boyfriend?" She asked.
"Now she wants to play dumb." Kyoske said, wiping his mouth.
"Allow us to remind you then." Hideki said. "Water Style! Raging Waves!"
He fired his attack at Karin who dodged it easily but I ran right after and tackled her to the ground. Before the black body could turn to help, Kyoske was on him, tackling him into the tree he was standing on, but losing him as his body merged into the bark.
"No!" Karin grunted, kicking me back. "Zetsu, focus on those two idiots! This one is mine."
A fiery pain began in my shoulder and as much as I wanted to place a hand over it and try to squeeze the pain away, I had to keep moving. She went to kick me again, this time in my face and I caught her foot, pushing her back, but throwing myself off balance in the process. I fell back just as she caught herself from falling while the boys battled that creature above. But like me, they didn't seem to be making much of a dent.
"I wouldn't focus on them." Karin said and flicked her hand, a pipe shooting down. She swiped it at me and I dodged it but felt the rush of air blow past me. It slammed into the trees behind me and I heard it break clean through, the tree groaning as it began to fall over.
I jumped to the side, panting now as the ground rumbled beneath my feet. Karin smirked at me, flicking both of her wrists, two pipes shooting out from her sleeves.
"How does it feel?" I breathed, steadying myself.
She narrowed her eyes. "How does what feel?"
I smirked at her. "Heard Itachi kicked you out."
"Kicked me out of what?" Karin growled, but before I could answer, she glanced at the creature in the trees, the one she had called Zetsu, and rolled her eyes.
"I was never part of that stupid group anyway." Karin said before running toward me.
It was hand to hand combat and I braced myself, pulling out a kunai and we went at it, our weapons clanging sharply against each other. It went on for a few minutes, but it was clear that we were equally matched and it was starting to get old. I pushed her back and made hand signs.
"Water Style! Syrup Trap!" I shot the sticky liquid forward as Karin was trying to regain her footing, except when my attack landed, she was unaffected and I knew that she had found the only hiccup in the attack by building chakra in her feet. She shot toward me again, but I was still prepared and as she brought her pole down to strike me, I dodged it with a water clone.
Her attack exploded and I watched from the bushes as it sent chunks of earth up into the air before letting it all rain back down. She stood in the center of it all, covered in dirt and panting heavily.
"Striking Shadow Snakes!" I shouted, extending both of my arms as thick, pythons shot out from my sleeves, their hissing and snapping mouths aimed right at Karin. A few wrapped tightly around her body, making her drop her poles and the others hovered around her head.
"Don't move." I said.
"Or what?" Karin growled, struggling against the impossible hold.
"I can crush every bone in your body with just one thought." I said. "So, I'd choose what I say and do wisely if I were you."
Karin smirked. "That the best threat you have?"
I glared at her which only made her laugh.
"You know, I have news for you too!" Karin laughed. "Except mine isn't a lie."
"I don't care." I growled, tightening my grip around her body.
She grunted, still managing to chuckle. "Actually, I think you will."
I tensed up, but told myself that whatever she had to tell me wasn't anything important. She was just talking to talk. Just trying to stall time. I had to end it all now, capture her so that we could flee.
"Itachi was in Konoha recently."
I stiffened, but she didn't catch it and if she did, she paid it no mind.
"And he ran into his baby brother." Karin said, her lips snaking into a smile.
Itachi had gone to Konoha? When? He had run into Sasuke? How? My mind raced and my heart was beating so quickly, so loudly, that I was sure she could hear it from where she stood, even over the sounds of the boys fighting above.
"They had a nice little reunion because the little brat bit off more than he could chew." Karin said. "But don't worry, Itachi set him down a few notches."
"What did you do to him?!" I spat, unable to control it. As big of a jerk as Sasuke had been, I didn't want him to be hurt. Just the thought made me sick and worried.
Karin's smile turned deadly. "Why don't you ask Itachi yourself?"
I felt a shiver snake down my spine as a gentle breeze flowed by. It was impossible that he was anywhere close by because I couldn't sense him, but if Karin was speaking the way she was, he had to be close enough to hear us.
"I'll stick to you." I grumbled.
"Wrong answer." Karin said and before I could respond, snakes shot out from the collar of her cloak and I gasped as they shot toward me, catching me before I could react. I was stunned, but managed to keep my own grip on her even as she ensnared me in hers.
"H-how…" I breathed, it was impossible really. A technique like that really only had one source and that was Orochimaru. I thought back to the first time I had encountered Karin outside of Orochimaru's alleged hideout and how she had reacted when I had tried to tie them both together. But, how else could she have learned such a technique?
Karin narrowed her eyes at me. "I should just kill you now."
"Where did you learn that?" I spat.
She arched an eyebrow.
"Where did you learn that technique from?" I said again, my voice firmer.
"Why bother asking questions you already know the answers too?" A deep voice called from above and I looked up only to find Itachi standing on a tree branch, his eyes holding the Sharingan. My heart sank in response and I stared up at him gawking.
"Let her be stupid." Karin grumbled.
"Itachi!" Zetsu shouted.
I glanced over at him and saw that Kyoske was on his knees, panting. Hideki was trapped in the same white mass I had been trapped in and he struggled against it with all his might, grunting.
"You trained with Orochimaru." I said, my voice shaky as I looked back at Karin. "That's the only way."
She said nothing, just continued to stare at me with an indifferent expression on her face. It bothered me, that look and I found that what I really wanted was to wipe it off of her face. The longer she stayed quiet, the more agitated I became and I had to chew the inside of my cheek to keep myself sane. But it hit me then, that sharp pull of familiarity that always burned between Karin and I. I could feel the dreams and memories bubbling to the surface. The girl with red eyes and her hateful stare. Her small body running out to the puddle of blood and guts strewn across the floor.
Karin's body burst into a flock of black crows and her jutsu exploded into a cloud of dust. I called back the snakes and jumped to higher ground just so that I could see better only to have her appearing a few feet away from me, a pole extended. I barely managed to dodge it in time and watched it slide past me, piercing straight through the tree bark. It was accompanied with the strong blast of wind that made the tree shake and others snap as the winds continued on, dying off somewhere deep in the forest.
It hit me then, like a rush. It was more than a dream. It was more than a shaky memory. I remembered the moment with the little boy and the red-eyed girl perfectly. It was real. I stared at Karin in a new light, feeling everything flood back to me all at once. Of course she had learned the technique because Orochimaru had taught her it before he had taught me. She had always been there, I realized. I had just never noticed her before because I had been so focused on Orochimaru.
"I know you." I breathed, my eyes wide.
Karin's eyes widened just a fraction of a second, but then settled back into their angry expression.
"Congratulations." She grunted before pushing away from me and steadying another pole.
The failed experiment. The one that Orochimaru had abandoned because he thought he had found something better. Jiraiya's words came back to me and my head was spinning as everything seemed to piece together. I wasn't sure where my memories of Karin ended, but I knew there was quite a chunk where she wasn't there at all and I remembered how that had made me feel, her not being there. It had been less of a competition.
"He abandoned you." I said. "That's why you hate him."
Her eyes narrowed in response.
"He abandoned you…left you…left you for dead."
"Shut up."
"He did, didn't he?" I asked.
"SHUT UP!" Karin said, charging for me with her pole raised.
I narrowed my eyes, knowing that now was the perfect opportunity to complete the mission. I made hand signs and instantly watched as the thick and heavy mist rolled in from the small pond a few yards away. Karin ignored it and instead focused on me and as she jumped up, ready to strike, I made more hand signs, building chakra around my body and when she was close enough I extended my palms toward her, the chakra surrounding my body turning electric as it shot forward.
"Karin!" Zetsu shouted.
Below, his loss of attention gave the boys just the time they needed. Kyoske moved first, kicking Zetsu back before Hideki performed the same technique on him, except he discharged his by extending his fingers.
Karin dropped, her body twitching and I was reaching down to throw her over my shoulder when I felt the heat of an incoming attack and looked up only to see a massive fireball heading in my direction. I grabbed her by the end of her collar and we dropped to the forest floor.
"Miyuki!" Kyoske called.
"I'm fine." I called back, pulling Karin''s twitching body closer to mine. I looked up only to see Itachi standing above, his eyes dark as they looked down at me. Hideki made hand signs and with the passing breeze and thick mist rolled in, giving us time to flee. I hoisted Karin onto my back and grunted because as light as she looked, she was a little heavy.
We ran for a few minutes, jumping from tree branch to tree branch and I would be lying if I didn't say that my heart was in my throat. I could feel Itachi behind us and knew that he wouldn't let us get too far. It wasn't long until I felt a familiar heat behind us and a quick glance back revealed a massive fireball tumbling toward us, seeming to grow bigger and bigger the closer it grew. It was impossible to dodge and pointless to summon a clone.
Hideki acted first, pulling Kyoske and I to the ground where the heat from the fireball was even worse. Kyoske was ready to protest when Hideki formed hand signs before slamming his hands onto the ground, his fingers digging into the earth.
"Earth Release! Rock Shield!" He pulled the ground beneath him up, revealing a huge slab of rock that rose up just in time to meet the full impact of the Itachi's massive fireball. The only issue was, as soon as it made contact, the rock began to crack, pieces of it falling off. A second later, it exploded, but we had braced ourselves beforehand. We went flying back in different directions and I felt Karin's body tumble out of my hands. I hit the ground hard, my head slamming against the earth and grunted. I started coughing from the thick smoke hanging in the air and struggled to see through it. I heard the sound of beating wings and looked up, making out a shadow through the heavy smoke.
"What did you do to Sasuke?" I breathed.
He said nothing and as the smoke slowly began to clear, I found that he was standing a few feet away, his Sharingan activated and his expression empty of all emotion.
"I think the better question is…what is he going to do to you?" Karin coughed.
I looked over and found that she had rolled a few feet away from me too and she was on her hands and knees coughing harshly onto the ground. She had recovered quicker than I had expected and it wasn't until I pushed myself up to my hands and feet that I realized that I was all alone with the two of them. I couldn't sense the boys anywhere but I knew that I didn't have time to try and feel them out further.
"I'm not afraid of him." I managed, surprising myself with how confident I sounded.
They both said nothing. Karin kept coughing while Itachi shifted in his spot, his eyes narrowing slightly. He moved first, his hands sliding out from his sleeves and forming quick hand signs.
"Water Style! Water Bomb Jutsu!" Itachi shouted before letting out a powerful stream of water from his mouth. I dodged it easily but not before a Shadow Clone of him appeared in front of me and delivered a powerful punch right into my stomach. I coughed, flying back and landing hard once again.
"Serves…you…right." Karin panted, wiping her mouth with her sleeve as Itachi's shadow clone landed beside her.
I glared at her, thinking back to Project Zero and all that Jiraiya had told me. If the other half was dead, I would be too and every time we had the great misfortune of running into each other, she'd come close to killing me but would never pull through. It made perfect sense.
"How'd you manage to stay alive?" I called out to her.
She arched an eyebrow before her eyes turned stormy.
"Back off!" She growled through gritted teeth.
"It's just a question." I managed before she threw herself at me. We were going at it again but she was even faster than before and managed to get a few hits in. Her last hit made me skid back and as I struggled to get a good footing, Itachi's clone came right after and he was even worse and at the last moment, his hand swiped past my head before he reached down and grabbed me by the back of my neck, holding me in place. I looked up without thinking and knew from the moment I made eye contact that I was trapped.
The setting changed completely. I wasn't in a forest anymore, I was in a desert with a blood red sky and black, inky clouds above. The ground was hard and the air was cold, enough to make me shiver.
"I needed to give us time to talk." Itachi said.
My body was numb and I could feel the feeling draining away from my feet. I was tipping over but instead managed to slip down to my knees. I glanced up and saw Itachi standing just a few steps away from me.
"About?" I panted.
"You know about Project Zero now?" Itachi asked.
"If I do?"
"It's about time." Itachi said and I looked up at him, at the stormy Sharingan in his eyes.
"She can't kill me because she'll die too?"
"Though I admit she's a bit reckless about it at times."
"How did she survive?"
"I helped her."
"And now she owes you."
"It's a bit more complicated than that."
"What did you do to Sasuke?"
He was silent at first, and I realized he was studying me. It made the hairs on my arms stand on edge and I bit my bottom lip, fearing the worst.
"I'm not here to talk about my brother." Itachi said.
I fought against the numbness in my body but it was getting harder. The more I struggled against it, the number I became.
"Then what do you want to talk about?" I growled.
"You don't look like them." Itachi said suddenly.
I grunted. "Look like who?"
"Your siblings."
A sharp pain shot across my chest as the memories fluttered in the back of my skull. The Obanji massacre. Our home in flames across the night sky. My siblings standing above me as the warmth of my blood flooded across my chest and pooled underneath me. Then there was little Sayuri, the look on her face, her blood splashing across my skin.
I shook it off, struggling to stay in whatever moment Itachi had captured me in.
"How do you know them?" I asked. A stupid question. A clan killer knowing another clan killer? It sounded like something that required a network of some kind. Regardless, I felt the familiar flick of rage flaring up inside of me at the thought of them. I had never thought of them much in the end. I knew they would always be one step ahead of me, so fighting them was out of the question. No amount of training could give me a better footing over them. It was the certainty of my failure that stopped me from really hating them, from even blaming them. I had spent many nights in the orphanage trying to figure out why they had done it but found that it was only a waste of time. They had always been a mystery to me, my older siblings, always to themselves.
"They wanted to join the Akatsuki." Itachi said.
My stomach tightened. Of course they had. "And you accepted them?"
"It's not my decision to make…but no we didn't."
"Why are you telling me this?" I snapped. "I don't care about them."
"Because they seem to care an awfully lot about you." Itachi said and what surprised me was how his voice made the blood in my veins run cold. My siblings asking for me? I wondered then if they had been surprised when I had survived their attack. I wondered what had kept them from coming and finishing me off. It was a lot like Sasuke wondering why he was the only one who had survived but at the same time we were on total opposite sides of the spectrum.
"I don't care." I said.
"No, you do." Itachi said. "You're like him that way. Maybe that's why you click so well."
I looked up at him then, heat rising to me cheeks but not before I felt a sharp pain dig its way into my shoulder. I gasped, tears welling up in my eyes. I looked down at my shoulder, my eyes widening when I realized it was a rusting, metal spike.
I cried out, feeling the fiery pain burning throughout my shoulder. I couldn't move my arm and I looked back at Itachi, a light sweat dotting my brow. It had gotten even darker in our desert surrounding and now his face was hidden, on his Sharingan was visible. I knew I was trapped in his Genjutsu and that somehow I had to snap out of it.
I just had to figure out how.
