Chapter 14- Lachrymose
Everything else had faded around him. He could not feel the pain of his fingers digging into the side of the tree. Only his own heartbeat was audible to him as he stared at Sasuke's falling form. Time itself seemed to slow down around him, as though it wanted him to witness what he was seeing in every agonizing, excruciating detail. The sound of Sasuke's body striking the ground seemed to reverberate throughout the entire clearing, like the sound of nearby thunder to Naruto's ears.
Orochimaru sneered wickedly as he stared down at the unconscious Sasuke, quite proud of his new catches. His intention had just been to find the Uchiha, but then Sakura had to come out of nowhere. Her Kinzokuton was a wild card that he wanted for a later time. But for now, they both needed to grow. To lust for power. Once they both had that, then eventually they would seek him out.
"Hm? And just who do we have here, now?" he wondered aloud as another presence registered on his awareness. He turned and the oily smile slipped away as he saw the Uchiha and Haruno's remaining teammate. "Oh, it's just y-"
But his dismissal stopped mid-word as he noticed Naruto's eyes, the silvery Doujutsu, for the first time. Instantly, he was enraptured by the beauty, the pure elegance those eyes gave off. By comparison, the Sharingan was nothing more than an ugly weed to this beautiful rose. Even without being told, Orochimaru knew, to the twisted core of his warped and depraved being, there was no other Bloodline Limit like this one; this was something infinitely rarer.
Those shattered mirrors reflected his likeness; for what seemed like an eternity, the snake Sannin stared into his cracked and distorted image. It was like a snake staring at its own reflection, swaying as it looked at itself, unable to comprehend what it was seeing.
His eyes followed Naruto's as the boy slowly moved over to Sasuke's prone form, not once taking his sight off of those wonderful irises.
Orochimaru wanted those eyes as much as he wanted the Sharingan. After all, he always had a soft spot for Doujutsu.
Naruto stood over Sasuke, arms hung loosely at his side. He didn't know how long he stared at his teammate's face, or why he did in the first place. Why, at that moment, did he suddenly care about his rival's wellbeing? It was weird staring emotionlessly at his anti-thesis and the person so much like him.
"What did you do to Sasuke?" Naruto asked, his voice cold but calm, hands balling into fists.
Orochimaru didn't answer, only continuing to stare enviously at Naruto's eyes.
He could only wonder what they could do. Even then, the ex-Sannin's mind raced with hundreds, thousands of ideas, each more fantastic than the last. Could he be staring at something more powerful than the Sharingan, perhaps? Orochimaru had to know. Even if it had only been a matter of seconds since he had first beheld this wondrous Limit, the suspense was truly agonizing for him.
"Damn it!" Naruto's voice became more biting, and the air suddenly became heavy with chakra and cold air. "Answer me! What did you do to them!"
Orochimaru was finally forced to take his eyes off of the silvery Doujutsu, as the very air around the boy turned cold. Chakra was rising off of Naruto, not only distorting the air at first, but as the seconds ticked by, it became… visible. Like silvery smoke gently rising into the air.
Naruto dropped his sight to the ground, covering his eyes in shadow. Orochimaru blinked, surprised as silver shards fell from his eyes like snow, dissolving into nothingness before they even reached the ground.
Then the snake Sannin took a step back as everything turned violent. The chakra exploded outward as the boy's hair turned into a head-full of metallic silver strands, his whisker marks becoming more defined, looking less like birthmarks and more like scratched metal.
"ANSWER ME!" Naruto roared as he raised his head, a spinning Sharingan with silver pupils set in his eyes, on the background of yet another mirror.
Orochimaru almost leapt backwards in utter shock. In all his years, he had never seen such a thing as this. This couldn't be a true Sharingan. Yet, there it was, spinning like the genuine article.
I'll kill him! Naruto thought menacingly. I want more! I WANT MORE!
The chakra turned even more violent then, almost screaming as it tore itself from his body. The air around him snapped and crackled with the cold as the enraged Naruto dug for even more from his infinite reserves, finally turning so cold that frost began to form.
"What… is this?" Orochimaru was awestruck as he raised his hands to shield his face from the sudden, biting chill.
Whatever it was, it was vicious, menacing, and every second that passed that viciousness only increased. The raw emotion flowing within the chakra was sickening. Orochimaru had always claimed that Death was the only thing he feared, but even he could not help but feel threatened by this display. At the same time, he could not remember the last time he had been so… exhilarated. He could feel his blood boiling despite the cold as he waited for a battle sure to eclipse even Sasuke-kun's to begin.
Naruto could feel the raw, biting cold pierce his skin as two pairs of lines appeared over his face. One pair high on his cheekbones; the other at his temples. Liquid silver, almost like his tears, fell from the slits. In one second, a sharp pain pierced his head, and the slits opened wide, revealing a truly grotesque sight: two more sets of eyes had formed.
Across the clearing, Orochimaru narrowed his eyes. This clearly was not an ordinary Limit; he had seen many things, but nothing like this. Could this be…?
The snake-like shinobi's eyes flew wide. The only time he had seen a Limit even remotely like this one had been during his time in Akatsuki. But that was… Could he be witnessing another Transcendent Limit, one of the legendary Three Great Doujutsu?
The shards drifted out of the new eyes, revealing Yamato's coal-black eyes in the set on his temples, and Iruka's brown eyes in the set on his cheeks. In that instant, lightning danced around him, adding to his already impressive display. Silver and actinic-blue clashed and danced together, possibly in the most vibrant display one could ever be host to.
"Not even the Rin'negan…" Orochimaru breathed in awe, standing straight and calm despite the torrent of power that washed over the clearing, making his hair sway behind him. "I could never have hoped to hold such power. But now, it is so close within my reach. Out of everyone to hold such power, I would have never dreamed it was you." His grin was psychotic, insane, as he licked his lips in anticipation. "Uzumaki Naruto, show me this power!"
As if in answer his challenge, all of the lightning around him was suddenly sucked into Naruto's hands. It danced and coiled around them with greater power than any Raiton master could ever hope to command.
Naruto charged forward, a trail of lightning and static in his wake.
Orochimaru flashed through five hand-seals faster than the eye could track. "Wind Release: Windstorm Arrows!"
Naruto jumped into the air, his arm of lightning pulled back. Even as he did, his Sharingan automatically copied Orochimaru's jutsu, storing it away for later use.
Orochimaru held out his hand, his other just above it, and chakra charging between them. Wind collected in that same space, sharpening and becoming more violent.
Time seemed to slow for both of them as Orochimaru thrust his hands forward, the jutsu loaded with as much chakra as he could put into it. Naruto likewise channeled every ampere of lighting that he could produce into his right hand. The two attacks met, wind and lighting dancing around the other, as the two fighters struggled for dominance.
-0-
Hinata sat quietly against a tree, hugging her legs as she stared off into space. Shino and Kiba were a short distance away, preparing the campsite they had chosen while she herself used her Byakugan to act as watchwoman.
By nature, she was a nervous person. And in a forest like this, where the possibility of becoming a midday snack for some giant predator was very real, her already frail nerves couldn't help but be ever further on-edge. The first thirty minutes within the forest had been the roughest ever in her short life. The looming threat of another genin team attacking her own was not something that would help her sleep. Hinata just wanted to get out of here.
But at the same time, she wanted to show everybody that she wasn't so weak. She wanted Naruto-kun to see how strong she could be; she wanted to prove to her family she was someone more than they had painted her to be. Maybe… she could even gain her father's approval.
She looked up at the canopy above, as sunlight filtered into long, visible beams through the leaves. Several fell on her face, illuminating her from within the shadows.
Hinata nearly jumped in fright as something passed across her expanse of sight. Nervously she stood up, preparing herself to either defend or run for her teammates' help. Turning towards the spot she saw it, she dropped into a rough Gentle Fist stance.
Staring at what had entered her sight, Hinata dropped her stance and gazed with awe at what she saw: a butterfly nearly the size of a dinner plate that had landed on the trunk of a nearby tree. Its iridescent wings were a crimson of the deepest shade; it looked as if an artist had painted them with a brush dipped in blood.
"That is a beautiful butterfly," a stoic voice said.
Having stayed with her team for a long enough time, Hinata knew what to expect from them. Kiba was brash and loud, even more so than Naruto-kun. Shino was quiet and reserved, yet also showed an unparallel loyalty to his team.
Shino also had a habit of appearing out of nowhere and startling her badly, but Hinata had fortunately gotten use to that.
She turned towards her teammate, and then back to the butterfly with a bright smile.
"Yes, it is," she quietly agreed.
"It's called the Blood-Covered Lady," Shino began to explain. "It's a very rare species, found only in this forest."
"What a sad name to give it," Hinata muttered to herself.
"Indeed, even the legend behind that name is a sad one. It is said that the Blood-Covered Lady used to be a gentle lavender color, but it turned into its present red when a lady forged a deal with the goddess Amaterasu. She pricked her finger, and the drop of blood was said to have stained the butterfly's wings for the rest of eternity."
"Why'd she prick h-her finger?" the Hyuuga asked. Shino was perhaps the last person that she would have expected to be the type for legends.
"The legend claims that she did so to save the life of the one she loved," Shino answered calmly. "Butterflies, and the ephemerality of their existence, are often used as a symbol for the transience of life. However, the story deviates from there. One ending has it that the lady died shortly afterward as the cost for her lover's life; another claims that she eventually found another person to love; while the final version says she lived a happy ending with the person she saved."
Hinata stayed silent as she continued to stare at the butterfly. She never would have thought such a creature would have such a story behind it. Was the story true? If so, it would have been wonderful if the lady had lived with a happy ending; after all, stories needed a happy ending.
The Blood-Covered Lady gently pushed off its perch and slowly, but gracefully, flittered through the air. As it came up to Hinata, it gently hovered near her, tempting the young girl to stick out her hand for it to land on. She obliged, and the butterfly gently landed on her open hands, folding and closing its wings.
It was not often that Shino smiled, but Hinata could see the ghost of one cross his face. Hinata herself sadly smiled, holding such a beautiful tragedy in her hands.
"That's good luck," Shino said.
"Yes," Hinata told him airily, still keeping her eyes on the insect she was holding.
The crimson butterfly gently took off, gracefully spiraling through the air as it went past the canopy. Hinata continued to stare at the spot it had disappeared to, feeling like the luckiest person on the planet.
"We found a protected campsite," Shino told her, interrupting the sudden quiet that fell on the clearing.
Hinata finally turned to him and quickly nodded. Shino turned to leave, and she followed, but she couldn't help but look behind her back to the spot where she had first laid eyes upon the crimson butterfly.
It had been an omen, Hinata knew that much for certain. But was it bad or good? Was she herself to become a blood-covered lady herself? And if she was, who was going to save her?
-0-
Both combatants were blown backwards by the force of the two attacks. Naruto landed some distance, and while Orochimaru had only budged a scant handful of inches, his arm was feeling the effects of several thousand volts of true electricity surging through it.
"You little brat," Orochimaru said amusedly.
Naruto leapt back to his feet, his hands flashing through seals, even as he dashed toward the would-be snake. With the final seal, three Wood Clones burst from of his back and launched into the air, wooden spikes raining down onto their target below.
"Mokuton as well?" Orochimaru muttered in quiet shock.
He easily dodged the assault by jumping backward, the ground he had been standing on skewered by the rain of spears, but the clones were already giving chase as they hit the ground running, yet more wooden weapons launching at the Sannin. Orochimaru leaped out of the way as the real Naruto appeared out of the air above him, another lightning strike to fire. The explosion was dodged, but simultaneously the three wood clones jumped at him. Orochimaru sneered at their presumptuousness, a snake slithering out of his sleeve, and in the next instant, all three of the clones were blasted into splinters.
Orochimaru had to admit he was being pushed when he had thought that he wouldn't be. He was actually having to push his own skills to low jounin level, just to keep ahead of the silver-eyed boy's furious attacks. Without a doubt, Naruto-kun was far from a normal genin. He already knew of the Kyuubi the boy contained, but he had had no clue at all the boy also possessed a Limit such as this.
He immediately halted his pondering as Naruto appeared out of the smoke from behind him, both of his arms pulled backwards and holding a fan of white-glowing kunai each.
In that instant, Orochimaru could see Naruto's eyes had changed again. The pair on his temples had become a stormy blue, while the original now held the Byakugan, and the set on bottom were an eye color he couldn't immediately identify.
"How very interesting," the snake master chuckled to himself, disappearing in a blur as Naruto threw the kunai, pock-marking the area in front of him full of craters.
The blond then yanked out a shuriken and in a split-second shoved the metal full of as much chakra as he possibly could. The throwing star literally swelled with the Howaido Chakra pumped into it, expanding until it reached a size even larger than the average Fuuma shuriken. With the Byakugan guiding him, he threw it to his right, barely missing Orochimaru as the Sannin pushed himself off the tree, the super dense chakra and the trail of destruction that followed it passing harmlessly underneath him by mere fractions of an inch.
Orochimaru came to a landing on all fours, and then only to leap out of the way again as his landing space suddenly sprouted jagged ice, then off of another tree as a sphere of ice exploded against it.
"This is incredible!" Orochimaru shouted in glee.
As he fell in the air, he sent an arm towards Naruto, stretching it out at high speeds. Naruto exchanged his Byakugan for Sharingan and dodge-rolled out of the way of the attack. Orochimaru merely used that failure as leverage to yank himself toward the blond, a viper already out of his sleeve and rearing to bite. Naruto jumped out of the way as Orochimaru impacted the ground with enough force to blast up a cloud of debris.
The blond grabbed hold of a nearby branch and swung himself on top of it. At that second, Orochimaru burst out of the smoke cloud, a blurring image left behind in his wake. He darted up the side of a tree and landed next to Naruto, a punch at the ready. His target barely caught sight of him with his Sharingan and tried to dodge, but was sent flying through the tree nonetheless. Orochimaru leaped through the hole he had made, already delivering another punch into Naruto's gut, but the silver-blond had switched out his Howaido Chakra for the Hyakurai again, retaliating the blow with enough raw electricity to power the Hokage Tower into his enemy.
Orochimaru landed a distance away, his arm numb and sparking as he watched Naruto slam into another tree hard enough to splinter the back.
"Clever little brat," Orochimaru almost complimented, impressed despite himself at the boy's ingenuity.
Naruto pulled himself out of the wreckage of a tree, limping as he stood up and tried to pathetically walk to his opponent. His legs were bent in an awkward position, clearly a sign of broken bones in various places.
"I… I can't lose," the boy muttered. "I… have to stop you for hurting my precious people."
The former Sannin's entertained smile was wiped off his face as he heard a sickening crack come from Naruto. His legs were straightening out and repairing themselves right before his eyes.
Naruto began walking, picking up speed as his legs slowly healed themselves. Finally, with one last snap from his bones, he all out sprinted.
"Faster," Naruto yelled to himself as he closed the large gap between him and Orochimaru. "Faster! FASTER!"
As he saw the oncoming boy, Orochimaru jumped back, smiling creepily with one hand trailing, a snake already slithering out of the sleeve to bite Naruto as he ran towards him. But then suddenly, a spike of chakra launched off of Naruto, and the boy disappeared in a blur and a loud crack. The next instant, Orochimaru turned towards his extended hand with wide eyes as he found it severed at the elbow. Much to his surprise, his arm was completely shredded, almost exploding into hundreds of bloody chunks by what seemed like an invisible opponent.
Looking behind himself, Orochimaru found what happened. Naruto's sandals and the legs of his pants had been completely destroyed, and in their place were his… legs. From Naruto's knees on downward, his legs now vaguely resembled the hind legs of a horse, in that he now had hooves instead of feet, and that the foot bones had elongated until his heels had become like a second reversed knee.
However, the similarity to a horse's legs- or for that matter, the legs of any other creature Orochimaru had ever seen- ended there. While the heel continued on to jut out in a wicked-looking spike, instead of reaching up from that raised ankle to connect straight to his knees, his legs repeated that same grotesque configuration twice more, pointing forward, then back, and then forward again to finally reach his thighs. From the knee itself, however, the flesh had actually forked into three separate pieces, the centerpiece forming the misshapen zigzag, like an obscene Jacob's ladder, while the other two simply stretched down over either side to connect to the middle of his foot bones, partway between his ankles and hooves.
It was a configuration designed for speed, the leverage afforded by the multiple joints intended to propel him at incredible velocities. Every square inch of the surface shown with silvery skin, utterly radiating with silver chakra.
"There's no doubt now," Orochimaru breathed, his eyes alight with cruel desire as he cradled the bloody stump of his arm. "This must be a Transcendent Limit… Just like the Rin'negan…"
Naruto's answer was to disappear. With his one instant, Orochimaru leaped to one side as the base of the tree behind him exploded and toppled over. As the smoke cleared, it revealed Naruto standing over the devastated stump, his face bloodied and body covered in scratches.
"You've gotten faster," Orochimaru observed, jumping up onto a branch. "But what is speed when you still can't control it?"
Naruto's unspoken answer was to flash lightning-fast through the seals his Sharingan had seen Orochimaru perform before. The snake man himself blinked, and then breathed in surprise as wind collected in the silver-blonde's hand; Naruto-kun's Sharingan truly was as real as it could come.
What followed was not the same as Orochimaru's earlier attack, but instead so much more. With his augmented chakra, from Naruto's outstretched hand was launched a great volley, an almost literal wall of arrows of wind chakra. Orochimaru had only enough time to curse before his body was then shredded by the attack. The clone dissolved, no longer able to hold itself together in the face of so much damage as it collapsed into a puddle of mud. But Naruto already knew what his opponent was planning, and leapt an ungodly height into the air, a Wind Release: Great Breakthrough ripping through the earth he had just been standing on.
Naruto landed on a branch and immediately kicked off it as if fired from a cannon, disappearing in a blur of speed and smashing into Orochimaru where he stood, even as the snake Sannin attempted to cast another Ninjutsu one-handed. Orochimaru hurled the boy off, but before he could do anything further, Naruto's form disappeared in yet another burst of speed, reappearing at his opponent's back, his mutated feet doing their job. Lightning flashed quickly within his hand, and hurled it all into Orochimaru, the man screaming aloud with pain. But that was revealed as yet another Earth Clone, as it too dissolved into harmless mud.
Before he could realize his opponent's whereabouts, distracted by the clone in front of him, Naruto found his head suddenly smashed into the ground. Orochimaru pressed down on the boy's head, pinning him to the ground as his foot pressed firmly onto his back. Both his hands and feet were coated liberally with chakra, not wanting to get blasted back again by what he had clearly identified as a Body-Manipulation Limit that centered around bioelectricity
"Incredible… Just incredible," Orochimaru said, smiling to himself. "Your speed is excellent, but even you have to stop if you wish to attack, and if you do keep moving you'll just run into something. That's its weakness. Even your Sharingan can't see at those speeds."
As it was, the only warning he had was the sudden compression of Naruto's chakra before he was suddenly blown several feet into the air by a concussive wave of almost physical chakra. Even before the snake Sannin could crash to the earth, Naruto's form blurred before several sharp spears of ice suddenly pierced Orochimaru's body in multiple places. The silver-eyed boy reappeared in front of him again even as the pain could only begin to register, a kick by one of those grossly deformed legs already aiming for his head. It struck with such force that the ground beneath them while a sickening crunch rang out through the air, signature of breaking bone and a shattered skull.
Naruto landed at the same time as Orochimaru's corpse. He turned towards it, only for his eyes to widen as the misshapen lump of its head smiled at him and the corpse began to glow, and then a massive explosion ripped through the area. Sasuke's makeshift bomb earlier may as well been a firecracker compared to that!
Orochimaru half rose, half slithered out of the ground, sneering as the smoke cleared. That had been a bit more vicious than he had wanted, but this battle had been impressive enough as it was, already. It was difficult to tell just what level Naruto-kun could really fight at. One moment, he could be fighting on the level of a mid-ranked jounin, while others he could be as low as a mere chuunin.
The smoke cleared to reveal a spinning dome of water near the center area of the explosion, like a water version of the Hyuugas' infamous Heavenly Spin. Orochimaru grimaced, narrowing his eyes, genuinely no expecting all of these various tricks that the blond clearly had up his sleeve.
Suddenly, the dome ruptured, the water exploding outward in all directions while freezing into hundreds of jagged shards of ice that slashed out over the entire clearing. Orochimaru dropped back down fluidly into the ground, barely avoiding the barrage before any damage could be done.
Naruto panted heavily. He had only barely survived the Clone Great Explosion, not an easy feat considering the technique's considerable radius of damage. It was also only because of that same speed that allowed him to race through the seals for Ice Release: Ice Shards. Too bad it had missed the snake-freak, considering the lack of blood to be found in the surrounding devastation.
But then a burning sensation suddenly shot through his entire body, then a piercing pain through his legs and feet. Stifling a scream, he dropped down to his hands. Agony shot through him, and he collapsed to the ground with an aggrieved howl. His body semiconsciously curled itself into a fetal ball, as if trying to hold itself together.
Orochimaru melted cautiously out of a tree, his senses suddenly no longer sensing that violent chakra. He was unsure whether to be relieved or annoyed as he saw Naruto writhing on the ground, and stepped fully out of the tree.
"It seems playtime is finally over," Orochimaru muttered to himself, upset that his fun had been cut short by the apparent weakness of this mystical new Limit. All of that speed and obvious shape changing seemed to place a tremendous strain on the body, and Naruto-kun's tolerance for pain appeared to have finally been reached. "How depressing. And I had been having so much fun, too."
Amidst the pain, Naruto craned his head out to look. Only his original eyes remained on his face; the others melted off of his face to reveal unblemished flesh, even as Orochimaru watched. The irises were shattered, but they would no change into any Limit; they would not even respond to any commands, mental or via his chakra, that he could give them. The silver armor that had encased his legs melted off, the limbs now once again their normal human shape. His hair had faded from metallic silver-white, back to its original blond; his whiskers reassumed their normal, birthmark-like appearance.
Orochimaru shook his head sadly, disappointed as he crouched next to his newest fascination. Naruto feared for his life; not even Zabuza had made him so afraid.
"I would have never guessed," Orochimaru said, as much to himself as to the boy. "I never would have thought you, out of all of them, would have had such an incredible gift."
He lifted Naruto up by the throat with his only remaining hand. "Please… Tell me the name of this wonderful Limit of yours, and I will spare your teammates. The Sharingan is no longer of any use to me, not now that I have seen yours, nor is the Kinzokuton girl. They have now become… burdensome. For now, all you need is to tell me the name of your Limit."
Naruto gagged against pressure on his windpipe. If it meant he had to reveal his Limit to this snake-freak in order to save Sasuke and Sakura-chan, then…
"Kyo… Kyoukagan," Naruto choked, his mind starved of oxygen and flashing in and out of unconsciousness.
Orochimaru smiled eerily. "Such a splendid name as well. How very poetic."
He released Naruto, dropping him to the ground as he turned the other way. "I'll spare you of my little seals. I have no intention of spoiling such a magnificent prize; unlike so many others, it is… unnecessary." He stopped and looked over to his shoulder, wearing another one of his twisted smiles. "Eventually, you will come to me, just as Sasuke-kun and Sakura-chan will come to me. I will give you everything you have desired, Naruto-kun."
It would not be the last time that Naruto ever saw the monster. Orochimaru disappeared in a blink, a sinister laughter reverberating throughout the clearing behind him.
Naruto dragged himself painfully to a nearby tree, spasms of pain shooting throughout his body even with the slightest movement. It took all of his will power he could muster not to scream aloud.
His legs, most especially, were by far the worst off; he could barely even feel them through the red-hot agony, much less move them. His head felt like it could split apart at any second, like a stake was being driven slowly through his skull.
Using his arms, which hurt only slightly less than all the rest of him, he managed to pull himself into a leaning position against the tree just before another spasm fired through him, twisting his face in even more pain. Even the pain's passing made him gasp for air, taking it in big gulps, only to be struck almost instantly by another wave. Perhaps Orochimaru killing him might have even been more merciful compared to this!
"Someone… Anyone… Make it stop," he whimpered to himself, a silver tear slipping unnoticed down his face.
Strangely, as soon as he said that, a warm, soothing sensation flowed through his body, calming the pain and bringing him back from the brink of unconsciousness. At the same time, it felt like a hand was gently rubbing the side of his face, as if to comfort him.
Eyes closed as he felt the sensation, Naruto hoped against hope that he was merely hallucinating from the pain. But then he opened his eyes, and regretted it. The Kyuubi stood before him. As usual, she acted as sumptuous as possible, all the while maintaining her air of superiority. She seemed even smugger than usual now, but even if that were the case, there would be now way that she would show it- it was… inelegant to brag.
"How are you?" she asked as she rubbed his face with the back of her hand.
Instinctively, Naruto said the first thing that came to mind, albeit more sleepily than he intended, "What do you want?"
The Kyuubi simply clucked her tongue in response, shaking her head reprovingly. Whatever concernedness that gesture might have displayed, however, was negated by the cunning smile on her face. "Such distrust, Naruto-kun! I'm simply saving your life, that's all. It was I that cut you off from the Kyoukagan during your fight with the man-snake. I believe you would recall that burning sensation you felt, which lasted for only a matter of seconds?"
"Bitch," snapped Naruto, his head lolling to one side, he was so tired and sore.
"I had little choice, otherwise you would have lost yourself completely to the Kyoukagan," she said matter-of-factly, her face softening in false affection. She held Naruto's head gently in her hands, angling his face up to look into her ruby eyes. "Weren't you begging for more power? Didn't you demand for it?"
"I… wanted to save them," Naruto murmured, his eyes half-lidded as he groggily began to realize how hard it was getting to hold onto consciousness right now.
Kyuubi shook her head. She pulled Naruto closer. "I could have given you power. Do you see? This is what happens, the price you pay for flying too close to the light."
She leaned forward and gently kissed him on the forehead. As she pulled back, Naruto could feel a warm sensation running gently through his body.
"Let's talk more in a… better environment," she said.
The idea of going to sleep was so very enticing to the boy, even if he wanted to be absolutely nowhere near Kyuubi. But… he did like the idea of going to see Haku again. With a noticeable amount of reluctance, the Jinchuuriki closed his eyes.
Sleep came faster than he would have liked.
-0-
As he opened his eyes, Naruto could see himself reflected in the familiar mirrored sewer of his mind. The last time he had been here, the place had been much brighter; the mirrors had repaired themselves, and the water had become cleaner and more silvery looking. He remembered liking the sight of a beautiful mind compared to this seemingly rat-infested place. (Although he seriously doubted there actually were any rats in here. At least he hoped not. The idea of rats inside his own mind was something that Naruto really didn't want to think too deeply into.)
But now, the realm had returned back to its original state of darkness, shattered mirrors, and cloudy water.
Naruto sighed as he stood up, conspicuously free any pain. He trudged slowly through the shin-deep, murky water; the red light at the end of the tunnel guiding him to where he knew Kyuubi's antechamber and prison lay.
The walk somehow seemed shorter than previous times, but that could probably just be because he had been this way before. Stepping carefully into view of the massive chamber, he was nonetheless enveloped by the terrifying ambience of what lay beyond the gilded gate, heightened as it was by a pair of almost glowing crimson eyes, each much larger than Naruto himself, that stared at him from the other side.
"Welcome back, Naruto-kun," a gentle voice greeted.
And there, standing to the side of the enormous cage with a true smile on his face, Naruto found Haku welcoming him. Clad in a kimono as white as the fresh-fallen snow, the dark-haired boy seemed almost to glow against the darkness. From behind the pillar-sized bars, the Kyuubi narrowed her eyes and emerged from the darkness, her forehead pressing against the gilded bars.
"Haku!" Naruto yelled out, grinning wide enough for his face to split into two. "It's so great to see you again! …Even if it was just a half-an hour ago…"
"Yes, it is pleasant," Haku happily agreed.
"Naruto, get away from that boy!" Kyuubi's snarling voice snapped out. Both boys turned to her, Naruto's face a mixture of confusion and anger at the vixen's interruption. Not that said vixen noticed, staring as she was at Haku with anger and almost seething hatred. "He's the reason why you almost lost yourself to the Kyoukagan!"
"What the hell's she complaining about now?" Naruto yelled, rubbing the side of his face in aggravation. He turned to Haku, asking in a more normal tone, "Do you know, Haku?"
But then his expression turned to confusion as the dark-haired boy looked sadly down toward the water below, his hands held almost demurely behind his back.
"Haku?" Naruto tried to ask. "What's wrong?"
Said boy shook his head sadly, clearly trying to fight back tears. "I'm… so sorry, Naruto-kun. I don't want you to lose yourself because of your own power, but if you ask, I can only oblige."
"Huh? What do you mean?"
Kyuubi sneered knowingly, whatever pretenses of civility she had shown before wiped away by her true self. "It's because he is what represents the Kyoukagan here in your mind, brat. If you had continued to use that damnable power of yours, you would have lost it all. Everything! And nobody would have been able to save you."
"What?!"
Kyuubi sighed in aggravation. "Fine. Let me explain it then in a way that your feeble mind can understand. If you had delved any deeper into that power, the result would have been the same as using the higher stages of my own power: your character, your personality would have been replaced by another mind entirely."
"Wait," Naruto interjected. "You mean using the Kyoukagan is like using your own power?!"
Kyuubi nodded haughtily, now that that was out in the open Naruto clearly would be far more cautious in relying on his precious Transcendent Limit. Both blond and fox turned to Haku.
Haku sighed. "The Kyuubi and I… We two are like the two sides of a single coin. One of us might be considered a representation of the light, while the other is representative of the darkness. Constantly, we struggle between on another for the right to be the one to give you our power. I do not want dominance so much as the Kyuubi does, however both of us will give you power only if you ask for it. You are a being of gray, Naruto-kun. A being of the twilight, neither light nor dark. You have the choice, which power to use…" Haku closed his eyes. "But at the same time, you must also choose which cost you must pay in order to use that power."
"Cost?" Naruto asked. "You mean I have to give something up in order to use the Kyoukagan?"
Haku nodded. "Not only the Kyoukagan. The same goes for the Kyuubi's power as well." Kyuubi snorted in derision, but if the two even heard her, they gave no sign. "Do you remember what I had said? The cost for either is quite great."
Naruto narrowed his eyes, not liking where this was going. "What's the cost?"
Kyuubi grinned wickedly as she answered for them. "The price of the Kyoukagan is your human sanity."
"While the price of the Kyuubi's power is your humanity itself," Haku rejoined, eying the Kyuubi's high-and-mightiness with a certain amount of distaste. Its pride so completely deflated by that one statement, the demon turned away in anger and disgust.
Naruto had to look away from either of them as his mind tried to wrap itself around the shock of what he had just heard. His hands tightened into fists, clenching tight as he finally began to realize that no matter which path to power he took, something had to be given up. The world always seemed to be against him, even in this. Just when he had thought he finally had something that could give him the power he had always so desperately grasped for, it had to turn around and bite him in the ass. Was he really so cursed, to forever be so despised and left weak?
"Naruto-kun." The boy looked up at the sadly-smiling Haku. "That is the truly beautiful thing about curses. Even though they may harm you when you use them, at the same time, they can only make you stronger as well."
"But… why can't I get stronger? No matter what I use, it'll only kill me in the end," the blond sniffled, trying his best not to let the frustrated tears flow.
"Not if you use it correctly, Naruto-kun," Haku replied, a fresh glimmer of hope flashing across Naruto's face with the words. "As I said, you are a being of the twilight; neither light nor dark. You have the power to choose. As long as you do not delve too deeply into one or the other half, the other will always be there to rescue you. The Kyuubi saved you this time, did you know?"
"Oh… yeah," Naruto grumbled as he turned to find Kyuubi looking at him expectantly. He remembered now what she had said before he had fallen asleep, about how she cut him off from the Kyoukagan during his fight. Never had he pegged the vixen to be someone who actually cared about his well-being!
That's right. Continue to be delusional and think I actually care for you, Kyuubi mused to herself. It took every shred of willpower she possessed not to let triumph show on her vulpine face. It only means that I am a step closer to finally escaping this wretched prison. And then… I will finally have my revenge against that fool Madara, and Konoha as well!
With great reluctance, Naruto finally spoke, "I suppose I should thank you." The expression on his face was as if something excruciatingly foul-smelling had just been passed underneath his nose.
"I had been hoping for something more polite," the enormous vixen stated primly, clearly intending to milk her place on the moral high ground this time for all it was worth. "But I suppose that will have to do. For the moment, anyway."
"Why don't you just appreciate that I actually complimented you for once?" Naruto snapped back. "Or did one of your tails happen to get stuck up your ass?"
Kyuubi's eye turned a dangerous look upon him, the slitted pupil and blood-red iris giving off an almost incandescent glow. If looks could truly kill, under that glare a lesser being would have been instantly reduced to nothing more or less than a steaming pile of shredded meat. However, Naruto was indeed anything but lesser.
With an arrogant huff, Kyuubi disdainfully turned the other way. Naruto smirked; point to him. So far, he was managing to eke out a narrow win against the Kyuubi in witty comebacks.
"Naruto-kun," Haku spoke. The whiskered boy turned his attention away from harassing Kyuubi in order to listen to his dead friend. "I hate to admit so, but indeed must use Kyuubi-sama's power from time to time."
"What did you say?!" Naruto quickly yelled, wondering if Haku must have used drugs back when he was alive. Almost as if he were read the blond's mind, Haku shook his head negative.
"Ah, yes!" Kyuubi smirked, returning her attention back to the two outside of her cage. "This brings us back to our next point. During your battle with the man-snake, you were on the verge of unlocking the higher echelons of power that your Kyoukagan offers." She sighed.
Naruto blinked, turning his full attention onto the giant vixen, his interest unusually piqued by her words.
"Because of the state of your mind you had descended into by such usage of the Kyoukagan," she continued, "I was forced to inject some of my own chakra into your coils, in order to prevent you from being lost to it. Unfortunately, this caused severe damage to your chakra coils; like throwing water onto a sizzling hot pan of oil, the two chakras, the Kyoukagan's and mine, cancelled each other out violently. Although the Kyoukagan caused much more damage to your body overall in the end…" she added, almost as an after thought.
"What are you getting at?" the cursed boy questioned, his face an expression of cold seriousness.
"It means that your coils were caused enough damage that an ordinary shinobi would be put out of commission for a considerably long time. Months, at the minimum, if not whole years." Kyuubi shook her vulpine head in annoyance, beginning to tire of explaining something as asinine as this. "But thankfully, you are not normal. My chakra can heal the coils in less than a day. The catch is, however, that you have to use it."
"So, I have to use your chakra?" Naruto repeated, making the demon look towards him. "What happens if I don't?"
"Simple," she answered, laying down on her haunches as if bored. "It would take weeks for your body to recover if you don't. But then there's also the threat of not fully recovering."
"That is where the Kyuubi comes in," Haku interjected, earning him a stern glare from the demon vixen for his disrespect. "She would be able to heal the damage that I caused."
"You didn't…" Naruto hurriedly tried to comfort, but Haku shook his head firmly.
"Do you remember?" he gently asked. "I am what represents the Kyoukagan within you. It is indeed my fault, Naruto-kun."
Naruto couldn't help but tear his gaze away from Haku toward the water he was standing in. He honestly didn't know what to say to that.
Unlike so many others, his whole life was now being driven by the choices he was making. It was a crash course on trade-offs and compromise of the worst sort. He couldn't help but wish he was normal like everyone else, where he never had to worry about his own decisions backfiring on him, very possibly harm to him and to everyone else.
But before anything else now, he had to survive. The choice now was to give up one thing in exchange for another, all for the sake of saving Sasuke and Sakura-chan.
Numbly he walked over the Kyuubi, much to the vixen's delight. A victorious smirk wanted to steal over her face, but she kept it reined in for the threat of scaring off the boy. Finally, after so much poking and prodding at him, now it was finally her turn to press her influence upon him.
His gait seemed almost submissive as he stepped next to the entrance to the cage, a silver tear slipping free to fall along the side of his face. He was doing exactly what she wanted, and it only tore at him the more he thought about it.
"So what's going to happen now?" he asked, pausing within a foot of her cage.
Even though she did not show it, Kyuubi's aggravation shot up high enough that if that fool Shukaku were to be nearby, she would have gleefully choked the incompetent tanuki until its head popped off like a stuffed animal. Too damned long had she waited to gift Naruto with her power, and now the little shit had stopped within a foot of her cage! It was like dangling a fish in between a cat's eyes and watching it go cross-eyed! It was humiliating!
But when she spoke, the Kyuubi's voice held none of the antagonism that it always leaked, even though she wanted nothing more than to throw a bitingly sarcastic comment at him. "You are going to lose your ability to use the Kyoukagan for a time. Unleashed as it was, it was causing you significant damage, and the fastest way that I can heal you is to suppress it for now."
"There goes all of my power," Naruto muttered, wiping away the tears on his cheeks with the sleeve of his jacket.
Kyuubi snorted, offended by those words. "My power, brat, has an arsenal of abilities as numerous as the Kyoukagan's. Don't assume I am going to leave you with nothing at all." She paused as she remembered one last thing, "Keep in mind, however, that as long as my chakra runs through your coils more heavier than usual, the color of your eyes will be different. At least you won't have to wear those damned goggles."
Naruto perked up at that briefly, then his face fell again. He turned back to Haku, pulling out the gentle boy's goggles, shards and all. Haku didn't recognize what he was seeing at first, as Naruto held them out, but after a second, realization dawned on him.
"I'm sorry. They were broken in my last fight with Shizuka." Naruto gingerly fingered the one unbroken lens. "I didn't mean… I wasn't… I didn't want them to get broken."
"It's alright," Haku told him softly, smiling again out of sheer amusement. "They served me well when I served under Zabuza-san. I'm only glad that they've been just as useful to you as they have been to me."
"I'll make sure they get fixed." The blond clenched the broken eyewear in his hand, before returning them carefully to his pocket. His smile- his true smile- slowly began to shine upon his face again. "I promise."
Haku nodded, his smile becoming even more graceful and warm. It made him feel warmhearted knowing Naruto-kun would keep his word, just as he always did. Even after his own death, the blond still thought of him.
That one picture of Naruto looking at him with his true smile revealed so much about his spirit. The beauty of Naruto's soul shamed the moon and even the stars; every flower would seem wilted, compared to his heart. Without a doubt, his soul was purer than even Haku's. Perhaps that was why he was caught in the gray, between the light and the darkness, able to choose but never be tainted by either.
Naruto turned back to Kyuubi, the fox now in her human form and tapping her foot impatiently. Faint ripples spread out on the water she stood on with every tap of her foot.
"Stop taking your sweet time!" she chastised. She had waited far too long for this! If she was forced to wait any longer, she was sure she would likely begin rip her hair out.
"Sorry," Naruto groused, grimacing at her impatience. "Aren't we a little moody today?" A light then seemed to light up between his eyes. A light that Umino Iruka both knew and dreaded, as it signified that Naruto had just discovered a new and horrible way to prank something. "Don't tell me you're…" he mocked gasped, "PMS-ing?!"
Okay, as far as pranks went, that one had been rather tame. But all the same, a deep blush as red as her hair shot over her entire face, both out of embarrassment and of anger (though more of the latter than the former). "You little brat!" she hissed. "Now get over here before I lose my temper!"
Naruto gulped as he all but teleported the last foot of distance between them. He stood there ramrod-straight, and Kyuubi slowly and carefully raised her right hand through the bars. His breath quickened as the pads of her fingers touched his cheeks gently, a warm sensation beginning to spread throughout his body. He could feel the raw, burning chakra moving through her fingertips and into his coils, but it was so mild compared to the two times he had used it before.
His breath caught in his throat as emotions foreign to him suddenly sprang up in his being: a love that he never tasted as he had grown up under the villagers' hateful gazes, happiness and unbridled joy, accomplishment, and want and a sense of true belonging, a place where he knew he was always welcome. But then he looked into Kyuubi's seemingly calm face, and he knew that she was only adding those feelings into the mix, to make him want to come back for more. That did not stop the feelings from being as addictive as any drug, however.
Kyuubi smiled slyly as she saw Naruto relax. She had snagged him as well as any fish on a baited hook. If anyone were to ask, she would admit, freely and gladly, that she was a manipulative bitch. But what could she do? He had to stay away from that damnable Limit of his; otherwise, she would never be able to exert control on him. But if things continued like this, eventually she might even be able to convince him to release her. Even he was nowhere near foolish enough, yet, but perhaps someday…
A tear slid down Naruto's face, not silver but a warm tear that he hadn't cried since the battle with Haku. She was so cruel, to make him agonize over these emotions he was like this. He wanted to delve even more into her intoxicating power, to feel more of these emotions he had always wished he could taste. But the memory of his precious people waiting for him was enough to bring him back to reality: he stood in the presence of one of the most evil beings in existence, and she would do anything, anything in order to get her way.
He took a step back, away from the Kyuubi's touch and the emotions he had always wished for so desperately. When he opened his now crimson eyes with dark pupils, utter loathing permeated them, even though his face betrayed any emotion.
"Don't you remember what I told you?" she said, slowly sticking her hand through the bars again.
He didn't resist as she tenderly grabbed his hand, clenching his eyes shut in an attempt to block out more tears as those forbidden emotions raced through his body. No chakra channeled through her hand, but Naruto somehow already knew she had already given him enough to heal.
"I know you even more deeply than you know yourself," she told him softly. "None of your so-called precious people can ever know you as intimately as I do. I can give everything you have ever wanted. Don't deny yourself, Naruto. Don't deny me."
Her hand retracted back into the cage, leaving Naruto by himself. He shivered at the sudden cold that greeted his hand, longing for the warmth Kyuubi had taken with her.
Face unreadable, Kyuubi turned and began to walk back into the depths of her cage.
Out of instinct, Naruto jumped forward, "WAIT!" only to run into an invisible barrier in between the golden bars. He struggled, pushed against it, trying desperately to break through, every movement he made causing ripples to spread out against the barrier's transparent surface.
As if that somehow managed to draw her interest, Kyuubi glanced over her shoulder to the boy pressing himself against the shield. His wanting eyes locked with hers, begging, pleading for more, but she merely turned and vanished in the shadowy darkness.
Naruto's eyes widened, his strength seeming to just leave his body as she disappeared. He collapsed to his knees with a splash, the water lapped at his legs and feet.
Realization after realization struck at him. He had lost. The Kyuubi had won this time; he had danced happily right into her trap, and into her hand. All she had needed, all that she had ever needed was only a mere inch of leverage, and she had taken full advantage of it all. She had screwed with his emotions, and he had let her. It was so addicting, so sweet, even now; what he wouldn't give, just to feel those feelings one more time.
The world around him lurched and twisted sideways: a sign of consciousness returning to him. He paid no heed, however; he was just too broken to care. Even as he blinked his eyes open in the real world, he was in the same position: down on his knees, staring straight ahead but looking at nothing. All around him was the torn and battered landscape from his fight with Orochimaru, and the unconscious forms of his teammates.
Roaring out his frustration, his rage and hatred of his own helplessness, Naruto slammed his fist into the ground beneath him. Augmented by the crimson chakra surging through him, the earth buckled, unable to absorb the blow as it gave way, cratering. Then he broke out into quiet sobbing, warm wet tears running down his face, filled with all the raw emotions he felt.
After what felt like an eternity, Naruto choked back on his tears, hugging himself as he shivered. He couldn't think straight; anytime he tried to return to the present, those feelings just kept flooding back to him.
Kyuubi… Never had he thought anything, any living thing could be so cruel. She had no compassion, no decency, no honor. Just herself, and her selfish goals.
With the last dregs of his strength, Naruto crawled over to a nearby tree, leaning against it as fresh tears rolled down his face. He was so tired. Emotionally, physically, mentally, he just felt drained. His body no longer ached, but his heart felt as though a knife had been driven through it.
He didn't care if someone came and killed him right now. He just wanted to sleep. To escape it all. And with that, Uzumaki Naruto, closed his eyes and fell to sleep.
Kill Joy no Jutsu (A.K.A. Author's Note): Well, here's the next chapter of Shattered Eyes. It's not my longest, but the short amount of action offered was extreme, and the character development was pretty darn good, if I do say so myself.
This was one of those more emotional moments, especially for Naruto. Without a doubt, having his emotions screwed with was possibly the cruelest thing that could have happened to him. Kyuubi is a bitch- make absolutely no mistake. There is a reason why a Kyuubi/Naruto pairing is nigh impossible for this story.
That's right, Naruto has lost the Kyoukagan for a short time, but in its place is Kyuubi's chakra. If you don't know, there's enough chakra there that his eye color is crimson, but not enough that his eyes are slitted.
Next chapter won't be the Sound Team/Naruto fight, but it will involve even more character development, and the copying of a new Bloodline Limit. But as to what that is, I won't tell you. I can only say is that you all will like it. It should also be much longer than this chapter, so it might be a while before we see it. As a matter of fact, scratch that; the next chapter is going to be incredibly long, and therefore won't be coming out for a long while. Oh, I almost forgot to mention. We're going to possibly see an Iruka/Orochimaru fight. Wouldn't you pay to see that? At least it would make it worth the wait.
Originally, this chapter was supposed to come out on Thanksgiving weekend. Well, that got screwed to high hell! Ended up that the corrections took a while, and it took me a couple of days just to go through and fix everything after my beta reader sent the chapter back to me.
One of the major changes that pushed the release of the chapter was the addition of Naruto's legs and their new look. My beta suggested something a bit more inhuman as my last set, which only involved the feet, was much more conservative and not nearly as intimidating. I obliged and my beta reader wrote up the scene as he was correcting the story. If you have ever read Claymore, or watched the anime, then those legs should look familiar; it's my beta reader's homage to Claymore. But no, this isn't a crossover (just saying this so nobody gets the wrong idea), just paying homage to a manga that we both really like.
The good news is that we have an original move!
Original Techniques:
Fuuton: Boufuuya (Wind Release: Windstorm Arrows)- Ninjutsu- Low B-Rank- An elemental wind jutsu; it's the perfect move for a person with said elemental alignment. Originally created for the purpose of wind manipulation, any other user is likely to lower the jutsu's effectiveness. It creates a loose ball of wind in the palm of a user's hand (not to be confused with the Rasengan which uses a lot more chakra, control, and power), and when the required amount of power has been reached, the user can fire small blades of wind only the size of a washer. Despite their size, they're incredibly sharp; and the key of the jutsu is to unleash several arrows at one time. Skilled users can maintain the wind, and fire arrows whenever necessary.
