Disclaimer: I own the OCs in this fic, the rest is Masashi Kishomoto's. Sorry for any spelling mistakes or any OCCness.

Character age:

Akane, Itachi: 20

Naruto, Sasuke: 15

Shisui: 24

Kakashi: 29

Getting to meet the Tsuchikage had been difficult. First of, Iwa was fully aware I was Yagura's apprentice, kunoichi of the Mist, and Sasuke's face and behavior was screaming 'Uchiha', so Konoha. Two villages Iwa was not fond of. Obviously, the guards were not welcoming, but we had been nothing but obedient to their orders. I had to repeat multiple times I had a letter from Konoha, Suna and Kiri I needed to deliver to the Tsuchikage myself for them to call for the Tsuchikage. After even more hours, we were led to his office, heavily guarded, and when we were in the office, he was sitting at his desk, anbus all around the room in plain sight.

He wanted us to know we would be kill without the shadow of a doubt if we were acting strange.

"So," the Third Tsuchikage, Onoki, started idly, as if it was just a random meeting, "to what do I owe the pleasure of being visited by an Uchiha and the Bijuu Tamer?" I kept my wince to myself at the nickname. Carefully, I pulled out the letter, written in a scroll, from one of my back pouches as I now had two, and handed it to him.

"A letter signed by the Mizukage, Hokage and Suna." He scoffed and with a sign of the head, an anbu grabbed the scroll from my hand and gave it to the Tsuchikage.

"Three villages? What do you want, our help?" a girl snickered smugly on the side, her hands crossed behind her head. I blinked quickly. Kurotsuchi, Fourth Tsuchikage, was standing near her grandfather, a tall and chubby man next to her. I had his name on the tip of my tongue, but I only met him once before so…

I felt Sasuke tensing next to me. The Tsuchikage nonchalantly ripped the scroll into pieces and threw them in the air. I ignored the laughs now echoing in the room and kept staring at the short old man in front of him.

"Iwa doesn't need anything and doesn't give anything to enemy villages." I closed my eyes, and when I opened them once again, my mask was now one of the coldness and a tint of superiority supposed to spark his interest in what was written down.

"I guess coming from you, who fought many wars, they are still your enemies, even if this notion might just make you look like a foolishly stupid grandpa too attached to the past to see how the present is changing."

Was it an insult in disguise? Yes.

Did I just imply Onoki was no longer fitted for the job? Maybe.

Did the laughs stop to be replaced by a heavy tension? Definitely.

"Leave this village immediately," the Tsuchikage ordered us coldly, the death threat in his voice at any more sign of disrespect strongly implied. I bowed, Sasuke following my example, and we let ourselves being 'escorted' to the exit of the village.

Of course, by escorted, I mean knocked out to keep us from seeing too much of the village and to teach us a lesson. I woke up first in a rocky scenery, absolutely no vegetation in sight. It were just pure mountains and rocks all around us.

I gave myself a weak slap to get my spirit back together and went to Sasuke to shake him awake. There was a grunt and he blinked several times, confused.

"Where..." he started hoarsely as he sat up. After clearing his throat, he looked around him. "They didn't kill us or harm us?"

"We need to check for any possible poisoning or, I don't know, trap or bombs around. A direct kill on either of us would spark a real big conflict, even if we're not here as shinobi. But an accident can quickly happen in a foreign land." I frowned and jumped on my feet, grabbed the club in my back and adopted a defensive posture. Seeing that, Sasuke got up too, took his sword and leaned his back against mine to cover my blind spots.

"How many?"

"One," I replied and felt his surprise, even if I couldn't see him. "Big chakra...it's probably one of the jinchuriki."

"Hostile?"

"Can't say."

I stopped breathing for a solid second and gulped when a huge man walked over to us. His right right hand was tucked in his kimono and most of his face was hidden, the kasa on his head shadowing even more his face.

I knew who he was though, and felt the muscles of my body tensed.

That guy was Han, Gobi's jinchuriki, partner to Kokuō. He was recognized for his effort during the war. To be fair, just his height was intimidating. He was towering us by dozens of centimeters and I was pretty sure he could break me with just a punch.

I pinched Sasuke's back to make him understand not to show any sign of hostility.

"Han," I greeted him after taking a deep breath. He stopped in front of me and looked down upon me. I felt a drop of cold sweat running down my back when he started to raise his hand.

I blinked sheepishly when it was stretched out in front of me. After a solid second of internal debate, I took it to shake it. We shook hands and then he pulled mine toward his abdomen.

"You know," I whispered. He nodded quietly and in the blink of an eye, I was in an empty white scenery, Han in front of me, and Kokuō behind him. "Ko...Kokuō I presume?"

"It is an honor to meet you, Yurei." I wrinkled my nose. I wasn't a fan at being called that way. "But perhaps your given name would please you more."

"Akane," I said, "just call me 'Akane', or even 'Uzumaki', just not...by my 'function' I guess?" I straightened up, ramrod straight. "I have already warned Saiken and Isobu of what I am about to tell you."

"Is Isobu fine?" I raised my brow at the dolphin-horse. "The news of the battle in Kiri reached this country."

"Oh. He...he's fine now, he's getting along with his new partner." Han was making me uncomfortable by just staring at me. "Even though...Yagura, my master, and Isobu have been under a powerful genjutsu cast by the Sharingan. I...I broke the genjutsu but..." I looked at my left hand and closed my fist. "Yagura's body didn't handle it, it's how strong it was. Damn, there's a lot to say...you know how Kurama ravaged the Leaf years ago?" The both nodded. "Well...he was controlled by the same guy. He calls himself Uchiha Madara but he's not. He...He's a part of the Akatsuki, an organization of S-rank criminals. You probably know one of them, Deidara?"

"The Bakuton boy."I nodded at Han's first words in my presence.

"Yeah...they wear black cloaks with red clouds and soon, they'll start looking for the Tailed-Beasts."

"Do you know why?"

"Juubi." A heavy silence fell upon us. "They huh...He wants to use the Infinite Tsukuyomi."

"It is not good." Yep, Kokuō was right about this.

"Exactly, this is why I gave a letter to the Tsuchikage coming from three villages. He torn it apart."

"Onoki is far too prideful to want anything to do with another village, especially if it helps or makes peace among the nations."

"Unfortunately, this pride has been reflected on the village for decades and is deeply fixed within the villagers' mind." I looked down at Han's words. No matter the place...was pride really that important?

"Only a major crisis would make him consider working alongside the other nations." Yeah...but if the Fourth Great Shinobi War could be avoided though…

"Anyway, I mainly came to warn you. If the Tsuchikage had authorized me I would have taken a look at your seal but...I don't want to overstep my boundaries even more. Thanks for you time."

"Thank you for coming all the way from Kiri," Han told me with sincerity. I smiled faintly at him.

"It's...normal, considering what I know and how the jinchurikis and bijuus are the targets. Also, they have to seal you in order."

"Rōshi lives in a village two hours away from the border with Ishigakure."

On this, the white scenery turned into the mountains we were in. Han dropped my hand, nodded one last time in my direction and started to leave.

"What just happened?"

"One person done," I told Sasuke, "the next one is near Ishigakure."

"Ishigakure?"

"It's situated in a country between the Land of Earth and the Land of Wind, behind the Land of Rain and the Land of Grass. It's not very known, to be fair I'm surprised it already exist." Here I thought it was created after the war…

"You've been there before?"

"Not me." I pulled a map out of my backpack. No, I didn't put everything in scrolls. "We might just as well go to Suna to see Gaara after, it's on the way." He nodded.

I grunted at the burn on my arm, my left hand covering it. That Rōshi guy knew how to use his lava.

"I don't know what you want from me, but get lost!" he yelled at us with anger.

"We're not looking for troubles, we just want to talk." He didn't like my answer, because I dodged a ball of hot lava, which burned the tree it crashed into.

"I don't care, I have more important things to do. These men have to be stopped." Sasuke perked up at that.

"Men?" Sasuke repeated as I got up.

"Yeah, well we have nothing to do with them, we just want to talk with Son Gokū!" This caught the old man's ears.

"How do you know its name? Who are you?" I rolled my eyes and raised my arms before letting them fall limply on my sides in exasperation.

"As if he didn't already know! If he kept his mouth shut it's because he doesn't give a shit about what I have to say? He thinks the same as Shukaku, that I pretend to be God?"

"No." I raised a brow at the answer and the frown on the man's face. "He just doesn't care about what you want to say."

"Well Kokuō was more cooperative..." I muttered under my breath.

"And if we help you with these 'men', will you listen?" Rōshi scoffed at the idea.

"I don't need you to take care of them." He spun around and left. I clicked my tongue. It did not go well.

"Now what?" the Uchiha asked me stoically.

"He'll hear me out, one way or another," I stated with a hint of irritation in my voice. "He's after some people? Then we are after some people." I cut my thumb open and summoned Seihitsu. "We're tracking unknown people down!" If he could see, he would deadpan at me. I rubbed him under the chin. "Up for the challenge?"

"It doesn't seem like I can make you change your mind." He sniffed the ground around us and raised his head to the west, toward Ishigakure.

As we followed Seihitsu, we explained the situation to him. Except for some low growls, he didn't say much up until we reached the border, said border being an arid mountain chain. Seihitsu growled louder and more threateningly.

"Is there something?" Sasuke asked him, his hands in his pockets.

"I can smell humans and chemicals...but it's faint, almost like it was underground." I narrowed my eyes. "Also, there are hostile presences around."

I started sensing and cursed in my mind. Yep, at least a dozen of enemies around.

From the corner of my eyes, I noticed Sasuke placing his hand over his cursed mark with a grimace on his face. I walked up to him and moved his hand away without a word.

"Did it start a while ago or just now?"

"Maybe fifteen minutes ago," he admitted quietly, "I didn't think much of it."

"I told you anything regarding this mark is important. For all we know, Orochimaru is around to take you away." If there was one thing I had not thought of before taking Sasuke with me on this trip, was that snake still lurking around wanting a new body.

I grabbed my club and stopped the fist of a man. My left eye twitched at the unnatural gray color of his skin and the fangs sticking out of his bottom jaw to his nose.

The curse mark. Then, there was a chance the 'men' Rōshi mentioned were Orochimaru's men and the reason they had to be stopped...might be underground human experiences.

As he moved back to throw another punch at me, at least try to, I slid my left arm over my club, pressed it hard against my abdomen to keep it still and spun around. I caught his neck in the hook of the club. He yelled and the sinister sound of his neck snapping when I stopped spinning abruptly filled my ears. I pushed his body on the ground with a kick and shot a look at Sasuke, who just slashed another man in the chest. Seihitsu was dealing with his own men to take down.

From the corner of my eyes, I spotted another one coming at me. I focused a little on my left arm and narrowed my eyes at the man when the purple ghostly arm of the Shinigami covered mine. I turned around and dived my hand in his stomach when he was just behind me. Unlike with Raiga, I didn't linger over it. Once I felt the warmth the Shinigami was so fond of, I grasped it and torn it away from the body. I wasn't as spent as the first time, proof the training on the Eastern Continent paid off, but I didn't feel any changes.

Needless to say, the fight was not a long one. Sasuke made the last one talk with the Sharingan and quickly slashed his throat.

Seeing him killing that easily...I couldn't help but wonder if, before he knew the truth about old Itachi, old Sasuke was like that too.

He chose to be a shinobi though, the blood on his hands was his choice, not mine, nor was it my responsibility.

"Let's set up camp for the night," I decided as the moon could be seen in the still clear sky. "We've had a long day, we need to rest. I'll take the first watch." We set up camp quickly and found ourselves close to the fire Sasuke made.

"If it's Orochimaru," Sasuke started after long minutes of silence, "do we contact Konoha?"

"Yes," I replied idly, "but we're still going tomorrow. You're better in infiltration, I've already infiltrated one of his lairs before and we can't afford to stay here for too long unless we want Iwa to send us back to our villages in body bags. It' risky, but we're doing it."

He didn't add anything more. When he was sleeping, I wrote a quick note to the Hokage, summoned Uma, gave it to him and asked him to reverse summon himself to Mom. I didn't want him to run in the night.

Let's just say it was tense. Seihitsu led us to the lair. It was literally just meters away from the border with the country of Ishigakure and I was pretty sure the underground spread out to the other country.

There was no noise around, not even the whistle of the wind.

I ordered Seihitsu to hide and stay outside to watch around as we sneaked in, chakra concealing seals on us. I was careful to leave markers behind us.

To be fair, the plan we had was dangerous, terrible and precarious. Free the prisoners and make them leave alive, try not to die. The plan had no real structure to it, Sasuke and I just agreed we needed to free the innocent people there. The worst was we couldn't even blow up the place, because who knew what was in it? I didn't want to be responsible for the destruction of the local fauna and flora because of some weird things Orochimaru was experimenting on.

At least, I couldn't feel any important chakra in the base. Just...weird, altered ones. Probably people with the curse mark.

Sasuke quickly drew a seal on the floor and activated it, showing us any traps around. There were some, but nothing impossible to dodge.

Carefully, we made our way through the base, me never stopping to sense. Suddenly, I grabbed Sasuke by the front of his collar and threw him against the wall, my hand firmly pressed against his mouth

There were sounds nearby. Sounds of a fight. By now, I could feel other people, civilians by the weakness of the chakras. I signaled to Sasuke to follow, away from the fight.

"KILL! I'M GONNA KILL!" Sasuke and I sped up at that.

It wasn't long before we were in a hallway of cells. I wasn't expecting shouts of glee at our sight, but still, the pure fear on their faces, even those of children, made me sigh deeply.

Really, how could old Naruto just let Orochimaru be after everything he'd done? It...children!

"Sasuke, you still have that senbon with the explosive seal on it?"

"Yes," he replied quickly, taking it and going to the lock on my right. I did the same on the left.

"Wait," a man in his forties stated, stretching out his arm when a little girl tried to leave the cell. He stared harshly at me with mistrust. "Who are you?"

"Your saviors I guess, but if you want to stay in Orochimaru's care..." I trailed off. He twitched, and with one last gauging glance, he allowed the little girl and the others to get out of the cell.

I looked in the cells.

There were still people. Or at least, what used to be people. Now it was just corpses starting to rot away. I jogged up to Sasuke.

"How many empty scrolls do you have?" He dug out two black scrolls from his back pouch. I clicked my tongue and put my hand next to his, only one scroll in it. "There are casualties, I'll buy you other ones."

"Sure, but will you have enough space?"

"I'll squeeze them in," I muttered. "Count the survivors and explain them the situation. And please, please, look likable and more than just physically." He scoffed and crossed his arms, turning his back on me. I rolled my eyes and started to go round the cells, sealing the bodies.

I fought the shaking of my hands when it was a little boy's, not older than six, turn. The mother inside of me was having her heart broken.

Once all the bodies securely sealed away, I went behind the group as Sasuke told them we were going to escort them out. I made two clones to check our surroundings, especially the fight we avoided before.

There was nothing for a couple of minutes, where only the sounds of people walking could be heard in the dark hallways. Surprisingly, it wasn't long until I heard someone say they could see the light of outside.

Right at this moment, an explosion shook the base and I knew one of my clone just died as I received a flash of dust and rubble.

"Alright people, run but don't pass Sasuke!" I ordered them sharply, Sasuke taking his katana.

Another explosion echoed and I situated it around the spot we were not that long ago.

Fortunately, we made it out outside in one piece. Unfortunately, my second clone disappeared, telling me we were not the only ones. Rōshi ad been fighting with someone, got out of the base with that someone following him. My clone tried to stop them but got impaled like butter.

"Sasuke, I'm leaving them to you!" I screamed at the teenager, running away to go to the still ongoing fight.

The trees, naked without their leaves in the cold air of December, quickly vanished to be replaced by the bottom of the rocky mountains. I started sensing again and ran up the wall.

They were close.

What was not my surprise to see Rōshi covered by the bijuu cloak, using his ball of lava against…

A monster?

It turned around to look at me. No, from the mad smile, they, he was human. Just...the curse mark was…

"KILL!"

He ran to me. I grabbed a marked kunai and threw it at him. He deflected it in a mad laugh, my kunai flying high in the air. I teleported to it quickly. The...person stopped abruptly and looked around. I took this opportunity to throw another kunai. It dug itself in the blade like black thing on his arm and I teleported to it, placing an Immobility Seal on him.

I widened my eyes when he shattered it completely and I just had the time to create a water shield and freeze it that they were punching it, an energy blast still sending me meters away on the ground.

Okay, I wasn't expecting someone with a curse mark to be that strong, or just to overpower my basic seal that easily.

"Are they okay?" Rōshi asked me sternly with a side glance.

"Yeah, we got them out before the lair was bombed by who-knows-who."

"Deidara." I craned my neck to look up at him, still on the ground. "It was his bombs."

"Gosh, these two are always here when I least expect them to be!"

The thought of Sasuke alone with a group of civilians and the Akatsuki around was far from a pleasant one, but I couldn't really just leave the fight. I jumped on my feet and watched Rōshi's first tail popping out and a cloak of lava engulfed him. He ran toward the thing and they clashed, the injuries the enemy suffered healing themselves.

There had to be a trick to this.

Rōshi jumped back next to me, panting slightly.

"He absorbed my chakra to heal." So that was what it was.

As he ran back to us I stretched out my hand to form my water mirror. With the hook of my club, I pulled it backward the same way Yagura used to do it, and the replica of the monster came out.

"Suiton: Water Mirror Technique!" There was a high-pitched scream as the replica clashed with him. He was thrown back as the replica dispersed itself. Rōshi made a move to attack, but I stopped him with my club. "Wait, something is going on." I felt a drop of sweat rolling down my back as he writhed in pain and agony.

His skin slowly turned back to a regular beige tone and I finally spotted the bright orange hair he had. I couldn't even form a word that he left in a terrified yelp.

He was tall, even in his regular form.

I...I had seen him, somewhere, before.

"Hey, do you know what it was?"

"Orochimaru's Curse Mark," I replied curtly, grabbing his bicep with my left arm.

I was back in that white space, a different duo in front of me. The giant monkey in front of me was pissed, but I didn't have the time.

"A group called the Akatsuki, dressed with black coats with red clouds, will soon be looking for the bijuus to revive the Juubi and cast the Infinite Tsukyomi on the world. Here, done, less that thirty seconds." I stopped the connection and teleported to Sasuke.

The lightning on the blade of his katana grazed my cheek when he killed a man behind me. I crouched on the ground and his free hand leaned on my right shoulder so that he could spin around and kicked the body in the opponent behind him. I stood up once Sasuke was back on the ground.

"Mission accomplished on my side," I told him. "Also, the explosions..."

"The Akatsuki, I know, they flew above us and left."

"Like that?"

"They didn't like black flames." Made more sense. "Anyway, Orochimaru's experiments are in for the kill. Seihitsu is protecting the escapees."

"Understood."

There were many. I was knocking them out or killing them with my club or taijutsu, their levels not needing more efforts on my part. When I saw Sasuke unseal a shadow windmill shuriken, I jumped on the branch of a tree. Even if I could not see it, I knew there were wires connecting his fingers and shuriken.

Then, a shadow windmill was unsealed from each of the four blades, and again from the new four, and again until he had thirty-two of them. Blue lightnings engulfed them as they spun around the targets, enough to paralyze them from the amount used. As a finishing blow, Sasuke aimed his weapons to them, the lightning still there, and when it came down, it made two craters in the ground. Not deep, but wide and long.

I cast a glance at Sasuke. He was slightly panting and the first stage of the Curse Mark was regressing.

"It still uses quite a lot of chakra." I jumped down next to him, looking around us. All dead or almost. Yeah...yeah, Kiri...Sasuke was easily-influenced, he might get a shock once back in Konoha...Kiri way of doing thing...he absorbed it like a sponge absorbs water. "Well, you're not getting out of chakra control exercises anytime soon, lucky for you the ones I know are the best you can have." I wiped the blood from his cheek. "I'll seal the Mangekyou, it's too risky."

"I can deal with it just fine." I retracted my hand.

"It's an easy way out too dangerous, don't make me act as the Uchiha clan Seal Master Sasuke." He grunted and turned his back on me. "So you're not helping me clea...okay," I mumbled as he body-flickered away. "Let's clean this mess up then Akane." I didn't even have…

Most of the bodies were burned to a crisp anyway.

I was in the middle of trying to find a solution when I felt a familiar chakra behind me. I craned my neck back and grinned at Kakashi.

"Ka-kashi!" He raised his hand as a greeting.

"I've just seen Sasuke, he seems to be fine."

"I'm fine too, thanks for asking." He eye-smiled at me.

"You're welcome." I halfheartedly glared at him. I was happy to see him after a year and a half. "Isn't it reckless to be so close to Iwa?"

"I love living dangerously," I replied, accepting the empty scroll he gave me. We quickly sealed the bodies and I was almost skipping as we made our way back to the group. "So, how's Mom and everyone?"

"Akiko-san adopted a dog." I raised my brows. She always refused me pets. "She's alone now, there was a retired ninken at the Inuzuka clinic so she adopted him."

"I see."

"Itachi works at the police station until he's back on missions. Keep it to yourself, but he feels alone now, with Shisui-kun gone too..."

"Heh? Shisui's gone where?"

"Long-term mission. I don't know the details, but he's been gone for three months now, or maybe four." I pondered over that. Yeah, Itachi wasn't going through the easiest of times, with Shisui gone too…

I sighed. I still had a lot on my plate, he was alone but alive and healthy for now.

Once we were back with the group, I smacked Sasuke on the back of his head. He rubbed it with a frown.

"You deserved it." I glanced at the team of medics, led by Shizune-san, examining the survivors, surrounded by anbus. "So?"

"They are being examined and then released, unless they show signs of Orochimaru's experiments on them. Konoha will make sure they're stable to be left on their own." I nodded at Kakashi's explanation. Discreetly, I peeked at a bush on my right. My eyes met Rōshi's. We stared at each other for a long second until he left. "Akane?"

"I'm fine, just thinking back of the joy to prove stubborn old geezer wrong." I lightly punched Sasuke in the shoulder to get his attention. "Time to go."

"Where are you heading now?" Kakashi inquired.

"Suna," his student answered stoically. Kakashi hummed, his chin between his fingers.

"If I'm not wrong, the Chuunin Exams should be soon. The first since the attack."

"Wanna take it?" I asked Sasuke. He deadpanned at me.

"There will be other exams, and Naruto is not even back yet." I smirked.

"Of course, silly me. Kakashi, say 'hi' to everyone." I quickly glanced at Sasuke. "Sasuke says 'hi' to, and we're both fine and we eat well!"

"Don't speak for me!" I grabbed the back on his collar to drag him.

"But I have to translate your feelings!" I could feel the vein popping on his forehead.

"I don't need a translator and I can walk on my own!"

"Stop wounding my feelings!"

"Tsk." I laughed.

Two down, plus the two in Kiri. Four bijuus to go, and I'll figure something out for Kurama once in Konoha.

Now, let's go to the Hidden Sand!

Hey! Thanks for reading and leave a review to tell me what you thought about this chapter! Thanks to NguyetMieu, for the review! And well, you know...Akane's Akane.

Bye!