(And here I am once again. It's a special occasion because it's once again my birthday, and next week I will be off to Disney World for about a week or so. I'm excited for sure. So enjoy what I have for you.)
Squads 7, 10, and Yamato were facing off against the zombified members of the Red Lotus. Naruto and Kakashi went for Zaheer, Yamato, Chouji, and Sasuke went after Ghazan, Asuma, Ino, and Sakura fought P'Li, and Shikamaru was left to deal with Ming-Hua.
Ghazan started using Lavabending at Sasuke and Chouji who jumped back from the ground they were standing on, "I got him!" Chouji used his partial expansion jutsu on his arms to grab Ghazan and hold him in place.
"Good, Chouji, keep him steady." Yamato said.
Ming-Hua was facing Shikamaru, by swinging her water tendrils at him. Luckily for Shikamaru he managed to dodge. When Ming-Hua saw Ghazan was in a bind, she rolled her eyes and stretched her tendrils against Chouji's giant hands making him recoil and loosen his grip.
Ghazan took advantage of this and broke free. He landed beside Ming-Hua who spoke to him, "Honestly, Ghazan, what would you do without me?"
Ghazan smirked, "I ask myself that all the time."
"Move!" She shouted, as Chouji tried to slam his giant fists down on them.
The two jumped away, only for Sasuke to pierce Ghazan with his two swords while channeling Chidori through them, "This'll sting a lot." Ghazan's body was electrocuted from the Chidori attacks. Ghazan fell off the swords, as his damaged body started repairing itself.
Sasuke turned to Yamato, "Captain, use your wood style and trap him."
Yamato nodded, and activated wood style around Ghazan's body putting him inside a wooden cage and off the ground. Ghazan seeing his predicament spoke, "Well, this sure is dejavu."
Asuma, and the girls were fighting P'Li who was using her combustion bending to attack them. Asuma dodged a shot and spoke to himself, "And I thought Kurenai was rough when she's ticked off."
Sakura dodged P'Li's attack and ran up to her using her brute strength to combat her, as the Combustion bender used her own hand to hand skills to fight back, "You fight well for a young woman." P'Li admitted.
"Thanks, but flattery won't save you!" Sakura punched her in the stomach making her fly back into a tree.
The hole in P'Li's stomach started reforming, as she spoke to herself, "This one truly is a worthy opponent. I'll really have to go all out this time." she got back up and resumed fighting Sakura.
As they fought, Ino joined in and used her Firebending against P'Li to keep her back, "You ok, Sakura?" she asked.
"Never better." Sakura replied, as the two girls fought the adult woman.
Meanwhile Shikamaru was dodging Ming-Hua's water tendril strikes, as the woman spoke, "Come on and fight me, you coward!"
"She's even scarier than my mom." Shikamaru told himself, as he continued to dodge her strikes.
"Need a hand?" Chouji asked, as he used his giant hand to swat Ming-Hua back.
Shikamaru saw Chouji, Sasuke, and Asuma join him, "What about Ghazan?" Shikamaru wondered.
"I have a wood clone keeping watch over him." Yamato assured him, as they joined the fight against Ming-Hua.
Sasuke went at the woman who was using her reflexes to avoid his attacks, "Persistent kid, aren't you?" she asked.
"You have no idea, lady." Sasuke answered, while his Sharingan was active.
Ming-Hua took noticed of Sasuke's Space Sword, "I remember that blade all too well. It was the sword of Chief Sokka of the Southern Water Tribe. A fine weapon, but its wielder left much to be desired."
"Talking ill of Avatar Aang's best friend? Now that's just plain rude." Sasuke said, as he continued to fight the waterbender.
As Ming-Hua was about to attack Sasuke again, she suddenly found herself frozen, "Why can't I move my body?!" she glanced behind her seeing Shikamaru forming a hand sign.
"Shadow possession a success." he said.
"What?" she asked, before looking down to see his and hers shadows were connected, "You caught me by shadow?"
"Yeah, and as long as we're linked like this I can make you do anything." Shikamaru explained, as Ming-Hua growled.
Naruto who was already in chakra mode fought Zaheer along side Kakashi. The zombie Airbender spoke, "You are a formidable Avatar, Naruto. I really shouldn't expect any less from a successor of Korra."
"I had plenty of teachers to mold me into the Avatar I am today. Teachers you fought once before." Naruto reminded him.
"Yes. Korra's friends. I will say this, Korra was lucky to have friends like them to pull her out of tight spots she could not get out of alone." Zaheer admitted.
"And so do I." Naruto answered, as he jumped at Zaheer using shadow clones who used Firebending at him.
Zaheer used his Airbending to redirect most of the fireball shots, only for Kakashi to come up from behind and use Raikiri on the Airbender nailing him in the back. Zaheer fell to the ground from the damage and slowly began reforming.
"We have to stop him before he reforms completely." Naruto said, as he went to perform the Energybending move.
Zaheer aimed his hand out to Shikamaru and used the energy he could to blow the smart shinobi off focus releasing Ming Hua from his hold. She quickly jumped over and attacked Naruto and Kakashi allowing Zaheer to fully reform. He Airbended over to Ghazan's cage and destroyed Yamato's wood clone.
"How're you holding up?" Zaheer asked Ghazan.
"I'll be better once I'm out of here." Ghazan answered.
"Just for the record if I had my way I would leave you in here in case you were still on board with doing Orochimaru's bidding." Zaheer stated.
"Understandable," Ghazan replied, as Zaheer used his Airbending to break the wood cage freeing his comrade, "Much better." he said, as the two rejoined the fight.
The members of the Red Lotus stood together feeling ready for another round against their opponents. The shinobi stood together, as Naruto spoke, "We need to bind them together and take them out at the same time."
"Way ahead of you, Naruto." Shikamaru admitted.
"We'll provide a distraction." Kakashi said, as he and the rest of the shinobi prepared themselves and fought the Red Lotus once again.
Orochimaru watched through the eyes of his zombies, and spoke to Kabuto and Zetsu, "Yes. The Red Lotus are holding their own. Destroying the Avatar will be the prize, and killing the rest of them will be an added bonus." Zetsu eyes Orochimaru knowing he was getting so caught up he wasn't the least bit worried of any possible problems that could tip the scale.
Back at the fight, the shinobi were holding the Red Lotus members back as much as they could, but were slowly running low on chakra. Zaheer spoke, "This is it, everyone. We may finally kill the Avatar after so many decades."
"Fine by me." Ming-Hua said, as they were about to destroy the ninja until Naruto launched himself up and chakra arms extended from his body to grab the Red Lotus members and throw them to the ground hard.
As the four benders got up they suddenly found shadowy tendrils piercing their bodies and binding them all together, "I never wanted us to be this close together." Ghazan said.
"You and me both." Ming-Hua agreed.
"How're we?" P'Li wondered, as they saw Shikamaru once again using a shadow jutsu, while another clone of Naruto was supplying him with extra chakra to bind the four powerful benders.
"Very clever of you." Zaheer said.
"Well, with the help of Naruto's chakra to give me this energy boost I can actually hold you all in place." Shikamaru admitted.
"So what're you going to do with us now?" Ming-Hua asked.
"She's right. We're zombies and cannot be killed again." P'Li noted.
"True, except I'm actually going to return you all to the afterlife where you belong." Naruto answered.
"You what?" Ghazan asked.
"Just as Avatar Korra can purify dark spirits, I can use that method to unbind you and send you back to the afterlife. It's where you all belong together."
Zaheer nodded, "Agreed. We were brought back to do someone elses bidding. At least in the afterlife we're free and together." he looked to P'Li who smiled at her lover.
So Naruto started bending water from the closest pond and began energybending it around the Red Lotus members. As Naruto did so the zombified benders started feeling the affects, "I feel really good right now." Ghazan admitted.
"So do I." Ming-Hua agreed.
"Thank you, Naruto. Thank you, everyone" P'Li thanked them.
"You are fine shinobi and fighters. If there's anyone in this world to entrust its safety to it's definitely you and all your comrades." Zaheer stated.
"Thank you, Zaheer. I hope we can meet again when it's my time." Naruto hoped.
"I'd love that. But make sure it's not too soon." Zaheer joked, and Naruto smiled.
Suddenly the spirits of the Red Lotus members left their bodies and returned to the afterlife, while their bodies turned to dust revealing the unfortunate victims who were used as their vessels. Naruto powered down his chakra mode, and spoke to his friends, "The Red Lotus started out as a group of terrorists, they proved to be worthy opponents even to the likes of Shinobi like us in the end. And Zaheer may have almost destroyed Avatar Korra, but he learned form his mistakes and died knowing what he did was wrong." The rest of the shinobi bowed their heads in respect for their opponents.
Back at Orochimaru's hideout, the Sannin was furious once more, "Unbelievable! Not even the Red Lotus can stop a bunch of brats?!"
"It seems the enemies of the Avatar are not as strong as they made themselves out to be." Zetsu said.
Orochimaru turned to him while frowning, "Watch your tone, Zetsu. It's not over until me or Naruto is dead. And it most certainly will not be me."
"Of course." Zetsu replied, as he took his leave.
Kabuto spoke, "With Zaheer and the Red Lotus gone we only have two more undead Benders at our disposal."
"I'm aware of that fact, which is why I saved those two for last." Orochimaru answered.
"And Zetsu?" Kabuto wondered.
"We'll continue to keep him around if he can continue to prove his usefulness. And should he no longer be of use, we'll end him too." Orochimaru promised, as he pondered on how to handle Naruto next time.
(And there you have it. Naruto and his friends have taken down the Red Lotus together, and Orochimaru has two of his original undead benders left. Who will come next and how will Naruto deal? Don't miss the next time. See you then.)