The plant creature felt like shadows and the icy humidity of wet earth in winter. More the absence of heat than the bone fires Akane had slowly grown to know. It seemed to be on the very edge of her perception, and Akane only knew what it was because what else could it be?
You didn't have to be a genius to put those things together.
Akane would never be the smartest person in a room.
She'd made her peace with that young, as Samantha. When other kids would celebrate A's and B's and Samantha would be grateful all of her hard work paid off with C's because it meant that at least she passed. Not resenting those who got good grades without seeming to even try was something her grandmother had talked her through before she passed.
People had different strengths and weaknesses. You just had to understand your own.
Samantha may have been terrible in school, but she was usually one of the most athletic girls around. She'd never been shy or had any problem making friends or talking to new people, something a lot of smarter kids did struggle with. Samantha was also good at being in charge, something that didn't require as much intelligence as it did patience and understanding the people around you. That, and the understanding of what the goal actually was-which was often the simplest part of it all.
Simplicity was where Akane shined.
Simple plans with steady clear steps that would get her to her goals with enough time and effort. Only she knew she didn't seem to have much time to stop Zetsu, and she didn't know if there was enough effort on her part she could leverage against the ancient evil plant thing that was trying to bring back its crazy, chakra sucking god.
Especially with Izuna compromised.
It had been in their shrine.
Sequestered away in a Sharingan locked room Akane wasn't technically supposed to know about, but that Naoya ensured she could access on the off chance she ever needed a good place to hide. Her brother's protectiveness didn't often prove so useful, but Akane had known where Izuna had been, feeling him underground as she had, and that thing had been in there with him. She'd done her best to run clear across the compound, but it had left before she reached the entrance-and Izuna was more important, especially considering what his death would do to Madara.
It didn't go too far though-barely out of the clans compound wall.
Akane didn't think one creature could keep two clans at war for centuries without learning a few tricks, and it didn't surprise her that it could hide from Izuna. It must have a way around Sharingan sight. She hadn't wanted her suspicion to be true. But it had left before Akane could make it clear across the compound, and she knew any reasons for that thing to spend any dedicated time around Madara's younger brother had to be part of its scheme to keep the Uchiha and Senju at eachothers throats.
Akane hadn't been sure how to express her concern once she confirmed that Izuna seemed fine, physically at least. Still-one didn't need to be a genius to know that Izuna had become a ticking time bomb for the ceasefire meeting.
She'd even risked floating the idea that there was a saboteur. She was a lone, Sharingan less Kunochi and far away enough from the rest of the resting Uchiha that it would be the perfect moment to capture or kill her if the thing had a direct line to Izuna. Akane had held her stance open and relaxed, not like she was ready to encase herself in a cage of fire at a moment's notice.
Instead of attacking her, Izuna had jumped to the conclusion that there was a Senju attempting sabotage without any prompting.
Now, Akane could admit that there were some Uchiha who would find a way to blame the Senju for their toddler wetting the bed, but Izuna was far too well trained to be so bullheaded at such a crucial moment. Especially when there were plenty of unhappy Uchiha grumbling about the ceasefire in their clan, and Akane would clearly have a much easier time getting wind of an Uchiha saboteur.
Akane didn't know what to do-except for the part where she was pretty sure she already knew what she would be doing.
K-I-S-S, Akane reminded herself sternly-Keep it simple stupid. There was an ancient plant thing working out a plot to trap her clan into staying at war when Akane was so close to Konoha she could almost taste it. It may have been more complicated than Akane preferred, and riskier still-but a plan was better than nothing.
If she was an ancient evil Venus flytrap, Akane would ensure sabotage by planting a ticking time bomb on both sides. She knew exactly where the Uchiha's was, but she could only vaguely guess at the second. It may have been anime bullshit afoot that the first Hokage's only remaining brother killed Madaras, but it was just as likely that it was the evil plant shit making moves in the dark. Akane just had to bring those moves to light.
The Uchiha Senju meeting place was an abandoned shrine.
Both clans had been at war with each other long enough that there was almost a standard protocol in place for ceasefires, brief as they tended to be. The longest stretch on record was six months a good two hundred years before.
The location was known only to those of the mainline-just in case a fellow Uchiha with a Magenkyo took exception to the idea that they would have any treatings with the enemy. It was apparently what had happened on their first attempt at a ceasefire-and had driven the future clan heads even further into paranoia about its location.
If Izuna hadn't been compromised, he would have never handed it over so easily. But she wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth. She'd have her mother double check the location-that was definitely the kind of 'important Uchiha history' her mentor would know.
Akane had gone to wake her family, considering there was only so much she could do on her own-and explain her suspicions of a Saboteur ruining the ceasefire and the first step of her new plan. She couldn't exactly explain about the plant creature, but Izuna being compromised was a given once he'd shared the meeting location, which her mother left to confirm, and she could justify her suspicions with what she had sensed-Shinobi were a paranoid bunch.
Her plan did not go over too well with her family-especially her brothers. Naoya, who was due to leave for a mission at sunrise, was particularly unimpressed.
"No." Her oldest brother said firmly, "You're not going off into the forest after some mysterious shinobi with the ability to put a genjutsu on a Magenkyo holder."
"I wouldn't be going after the Saboteur!" Akane protested, "I'll just be monitoring them and seeing if they try anything on the Senju."
"No." Her oldest brother repeated, immovable as a wall."If they do attack, are you trying to say you wouldn't interfere? Are you lying to me or yourself Akane?"
Akane forced herself to pause, take a deep breath, and remind herself that her condition from her last mission hadn't just been difficult for her. She'd cost Naoya an eye just to bring her home. She wouldn't lie to herself and pretend that only her brothers were apprehensive about her return to the field. If it hadn't been for Konoha, for the end of the war that had marked every step of her current life, Akane might have hesitated.
"I'll take Akio and any of my former squad mates in the compound." Akane compromised begrudgingly. She wasn't asking his permission-she was going. All she could do was try to make the decision more palatable to him.
For one, single-heart stopping moment, it looked like Naoya wanted to cry.
Akane had seen the expression on her mother countless times as a child, and Naoya was the one who looked most like her. He even had the wavy hair only Akemi had shared as well. Her other siblings, and herself, took after their father. Spiky Uchiha hair, and rounder features compared to the delicacy of their mothers.
All Uchiha were enviously symmetrical, something in their DNA was just consistent across the board, not to mention their coloring, it was a rare Uchiha that had anything other than black. But features differed greatly in the clan. High cheekbones versus low, full lips, thin ones, upturned noses, wide and thin ones, eyes slanted high or low, hair wavy, curly, or pin straight.
The Uchiha standard of beauty was slightly different from those of her current era. Beauty marks were especially prized in the clan if found on the face. It didn't matter how flawless a face was if it didn't have the natural adornment of a mole to elevate it. Before he'd lost the eye, the biggest difference between Naoya's face and their mothers was eye shape and a small mole under her mothers right eye. It had skipped their generation, but the twins both had it.
The expression, the tightness around their mouths, as their lashes trembled-it almost convinced Akane she was wrong. That the last thing she should do was head out before the diplomatic party and try to ensure both parties reached the shrine alive.
It wasn't that she'd never seen Naoya cry. It was that she'd never made the deliberate choice to hurt him badly enough to bring him to tears.
But it was for Konoha.
For a world where Uchiha and Senju didn't kill each other at first sight and she might get to hold on to her family and friends just a little longer in a world that kept trying to take them away from her.
So it had to be done.
"I'm sorry," Akane said, because she was, "But I have to do this."
Naoya but his lip. "Daiki owes me a favor, I'll ask him to take my mission and I'm going with you."
Considering Akane couldn't really know what she was walking into, she would hardly turn down the help. Besides, even if he didn't have a Name in the battlefield-Naoya was kind of a big deal. He was the best weapons user in the clan, a fact that often stung Lineage Shinobi who worked their asses off for the same goal. Between his skill and Magenkyo, Akane would gladly have her brother along.
"That's fine," She agreed easily, "I think Uncle Makoto is in the clan too, I'll take all the help I can get."
"I don't suppose you'll promise to stay close?" Akio asked, trying to use gruffness to mask his fear for her.
"I'll do my best," Akane told her older brothers, but as any shinobi knew-nothing was guaranteed once a battle began.
Akane meditated as she monitored Zetsu, the thing hadn't moved since it had ambushed Izuna-and it didn't until the darkness of the night began to fall away. It didn't move by itself-following the bonfire of an Uchiha that Akane couldn't quite put a face to as it left.
They followed just before dawn.
The diplomatic party of Uchiha would take longer. They had to wear the ceremonial clothes that were harder to move in, and the agreed time for negotiation was when the sun was at mid peak.
The shrine wasn't terribly far away, but Akane-and her team of makeshift Uchiha, were trying to keep pace with a surprisingly fast creature and shinobi.
Akane could sense when they got within range of the Senju party. It was suspiciously convenient when one of the Senju dropped away from the party-almost as suspicious as when the guy stood still even as the unknown Uchiha they'd been following all morning raised his sword to take the old looking guys life from behind-No shinobi worth their salt wouldn't recognize the shift in the air from someone raising a sword.
Naoya speared the hand holding the sword aloft of the Uchiha Akane finally got close enough to to be recognized as one of Izuna's squad mates. Akio, meanwhile, used some kunai to wrap some of the thicker Uchiha wire around the old Senjus middle and yank him towards relative safety.
Except that the guy just went completely limp and managed to knock himself out on his own scabbard, which was just embarrassing.
Ken, Izuna's squad mate, wasn't happy about their entrance and interruption of his assasination until Akane informed him that Izuna was compromised and any orders he'd given were suspect. He didn't really believe them, Akane could tell, but considering the incoming Senju party no doubt looking for their wayward member, and the fact that he was outnumbered five to one-ken surrendered his sword.
The creature, who had watched their interruption of his plan, stayed disquietingly still.
It was deeply strange to present the Senju with their unconscious member, Hashirama's uncle Kazuya Senju, evidently-and claim that there had been enemy action confirmed to have given an unlawful order in order to prevent the ceasefire, knowing damn well only the lack of heavy wounds on Kazuya, the assurance from Hashirama's healing jutsu-and the boundless desire for peace of the Senju clan head was the only reason they weren't lobbing jutsu and weapons at each other.
Stranger still for the nervous anticipation thrumming through Akane about the enemy only a few feet away from them no one else was aware of.
The abandoned shrine the Uchiha and Senju had been using for their ceasefires for decades looked like a stiff breeze could knock it over. But Akane was still really grateful to see the thing because it meant she could stop experiencing the painfully awkward and suspicious silence from the Senju diplomatic party.
Even if she did have to explain her presence to her clan head and the Uchiha diplomatic party. It was bad form on her behalf, parties were usually balanced excruciatingly over passive aggressive summon messages. The Senju party had wanted to bring Hashirama's new wife Mito, and so Madara had been forced to bring Misaki.
The idea was to commit to the same number of important hostages as a sign of good faith. The Uchiha were very lucky to be dealing with the closest thing the elemental nations had to a hippie, as the breach of etiquette didn't seem to bother the Senju Clan head too much, judging by his beaming smile.
Of course-just when the tension was finally beginning to die down, Kazuya Senju woke up-and unlike the blank faced puppet with no self preservation skills they'd witnessed in the Forrest, the latest version was quite sure he'd just been fighting for his life against an Uchiha death squad.
Something almost shimmered in the air, and Touka Senju attacked Akane, who'd been sure to put herself in range once she'd seen the hatred written on Kazuya Senjus face. She would have minded more if she hadn't been expecting it.
Her father had almost lost his life, and Akane could almost see the shape of Zetsus plan. A beloved Senju Elder mysteriously disappearing before the ceasefire with the Uchiha did not look great-and tempers had been running high even before the most awkward trip to a shrine in history and the old guy waking up and being crabby about having been knocked out and lying his little heart out.
Plus she could almost confirm that Zetsu could do something to people, maybe compound negative emotion, or something to that effect.
Akane batted the other Kunochi away with a kick that wasn't exactly kind, but gave her the perfect opportunity to do a couple of back springs towards the evil plant thing and use the the hands she had on the floor to create a ring of fiery death around it.
The creature was forced out of the ground-to the naked surprise of both diplomatic parties.
"Ladies and gentlemen," Akane said in her best announcer voice-the sheer tension of the day so far had her kind of manic, "The saboteur I sensed in the clan last night-and the guy who's compromised your elder and Izuna."
In a perfect world, Mito would have used her fancy Uzumaki chains to hold the creature down while Akane barbecued it.
It was not a perfect world.
Instead the creature aimed itself at the Senju elder and possessed him. Promptly making the ground began to shake.
Kazuya Senju was apparently a very gifted earth user who had to be getting some sort of buff from his possession, considering the attacks he was managing to block and the fact that he even managed to send sharp rows of stone spikes through the once wooden floor. The poor shrine probably wouldn't survive the battle.
Akane was deeply disappointed that she couldn't turn the plant thing to ash while it held the Senju hostage. Not that her brothers, who stepped back to guard her, would have necessarily given her the chance.
Not with all the heavy hitters of the diplomatic parties and her current status as a fragile porcelain doll in their hearts. She was pretty sure she'd given them heart attacks with the way she'd chosen to reveal their hidden enemy-but the melodrama had done it's part and distracted her audience from using each other as target practice, so she didn't regret her actions.
Ken and Uncle Makoto stepped forward, falling into the practiced formations most Uchiha squads started training with.
But Izuna didn't react right. He should have moved to complete the formation-but instead he backed up closer to Misaki. Maybe the others weren't as hyper aware of Izuna as Akane was, but she knew-instinct buzzing that Izuna, ticking time bomb that he was, was about to go off.
And then-before Akane could warn anyone, Izuna set off a kanton jutsu at the Zetsu possessed old man, forcing a too close Misaki to dodge closer to the Senju or risk more than singed sleeves. More specifically closer to the white haired bastard who'd been the reason for Akanes first long term hospital visit.
Tobirama Senju then proceeded to turn, disregarding the actual enemy possessing his uncle-and stab Misaki right in the chest.
The shock almost caused Touka Senju a leg, Uncle Makoto an arm, and did cost Ken Uchiha a finger.
But those were things Akane learned after. Despite the devastation of his last attack-Misaki's death had clearly been what Zetsu had been waiting on-because he finally abandoned the old Senju and fled staring into the ground.
Akanes cremation tried to follow but she only got one of its feet turned to ash once he dived underground and far enough away from Akane she could keep the intensity of the burn.
Akanes goal had been clear; ensure the ceasefire was signed. The steps to it had been simple, keep anyone from dying enroute to the shrine, expose the existence of the Saboteur and give the clans a common enemy. The final one was to ensure everyone got home-and it had failed.
Misaki had been a good person. Perhaps not the most gifted shinobi, but she was a dedicated older sister, a genuine and kind soul-someone many Lineage clan mates would call a friend for good reason.
And she'd died.
Fallen to the obvious ploy Akane had been too stupid to put together-because if Akane hadn't interfiered and exposed the existence of the plant creature, then of course the death of Uchiha Madaras fiancé would be enough keep the Senju and Uchiha at war.
The ceasefire was signed-but Misaki's life had been its cost.
Akane tried to tell herself it was worth it. She hated how easy it was to believe.
X
Zetsu, spying on Uchiha clan gossip: The Uchiha clan really adores Madaras fiancée. It would be a shame if something were to happen to her (que evil laughter)
Also Zetsu, behind on Uchiha clan gossip: Madaras fiancée is dead by Tobirama Senjus blade. The clans will never know peace! (More evil laughter)
And yes Akane cannot remember his name for the death of her, solely because I thought it was funny. About Zetsus powers according to me-white zetsu is still on black Zetsus R board so I reasoned out some extra stuff-like could he secretly mildly possess people and not strictly mind control them but like augment their negative feelings(he can do the feelings part in general), plant subliminal commands, and read mind(But I think that is canon).
Y'all this chapter took my lunch money, hit me with every yo'mama joke, shredded my self esteem, and then claimed to have no memory of bullying me in high school. This is version four of it-and I'm throwing in the towel.
Seriously-it was rough-also time zone shenanigans, I'm six hours away from when I usually post and I have no idea if it's Monday for y'all but I squeaked this in while it was Monday for me.
I admit that I felt kind of bad for making Misaki just to kill her off, but like plot demands blood sacrifice apparently. I did it to like half of Akanes immediate family too, so like-that ships been sailed.
What do y'all think of my fight scenes? I'm not the best at them but I tried.