Kiyomi tried to shake off the feeling of this impending dread of being alone and blind in a room filled to the brim with sick and twisted versions of her friend whom she just chose to abandon to his fate. Even if this was some sick sense of karma kicking her in the ass, it didn't mean that this didn't suck on every level imaginable.
She was so close to pulling this insane shit off, she was alone, her squad had gone on without her as per her orders, she even managed to outwit those twits and find the medicinal food pills she needed to treat her eyesight and facial injuries. And all of that only to end up here, cornered, scared and blind like a bat. Short on just a couple of minutes of time.
A quick rush of air irritated the exposed flesh and nerves in the facial wounds that were slowly healing on Kiyomi's front. Recalling all of the times she had sparred with Naruto, Kiyomi tried remembering any of his taijutsu combinations, his favored patterns she could have predicted and exploited. She knew Naruto's height, if only she could guess the move right, maybe she'd be able to defend somewhat on muscle memory alone.
A shocking clock to her jaw sent Kiyomi slamming into the back wall, the air left her chest and her lungs hurt when she drew breath. Her vision still shrouded in complete darkness. There was just the searing pain in her jaw and the taste of blood in her mouth. A tooth shook loose in Kiyomi's mouth, her tongue clipped on it when it flipped about looking for a comfortable place to rest.
"Ew, I think I hit something sticky, you know!" the clone grunted and shook his hand in the air.
"Her face is all busted up, what are you, blind?" another one grumbled back in return.
"Ewww, don't touch that. And to think that those two-faced villagers hate us when ugly pieces of shit like this exist!" the first complained. Kiyomi could hear their footsteps coming closer.
Fuck time. If only it wasn't this dark, she could see some vague figures, some semblance of positioning, who's attacking, if they're attacking her high or low, from which side, were they armed? Any of this information could save her life right now and spare her from the most embarrassing defeat she's ever experienced.
Kiyomi's hand reached back for her pouch. It got pinned to the ground by the foot of one of the clones. The bastard put some decent weight on it, making Kiyomi cry out in pain.
"Aww, come on, should've let her pull out her weapon, at least. What's she gonna do, you know?" one of the clones mocked the downed Yamanaka heiress, trying to diminish her fleeting sense of self-worth by suggesting that even if she did succeed in her feeble attempts to defend herself, it'd be just as pointless as sitting tight and getting the shit beaten out of her.
The pain on her pinned elbow weakened, the clone must have shifted the weight on the other leg, meaning one thing – he was going for a kick. Despite the impending painful impact hitting her exposed and defenseless jaw, Kiyomi reached for her pouch again, pulling out a kunai blade and swinging it in a wide arc. She could almost feel, not quite see, but imagine, her opponents pulling back. They were like rabid wolves surrounding a bleeding lamb. The lot knew that their prey was weak and it's just a matter of time before they sunk their teeth into its throat. There was no need for any of them to get injured. Especially when even one injury might have cost the squad their numbers.
That's right, Kiyomi recalled, unless Naruto decides to upkeep the strain on his chakra, any hit he lands on these clones might drastically help to improve her terrible odds. And to think that neither of them knew what she had in mind…
"Heh, just gonna stand and swing your knife around, eh?" one of the clones mocked Kiyomi.
"Tsk, her back's to the wall, it's still a drag, you know…" another one grumbled.
"Quietly, don't tip her off…" a voice coming from a third angle sounded almost excited about this little game. "Just a step too loud and she's gonna end you…"
He was right. Their advantage right now was that Kiyomi didn't see them coming and couldn't know when they'd move up to her. If they did something that let too much sound out – she'd be onto their location and could defend herself. That was why they were only attacking her physically and one at a time – the duplicates did their best to stay under her radar. Even something as subtle as pulling ninja tools out of the pouch would have alerted Kiyomi's senses: the sound of steel rubbing against the leather, the leathery rustling when one's hand entered it, the whizz of steel cutting the air and the accelerated breathing of the one throwing them.
"You idiots… You've no idea what I pulled from my pouch, do you?" Kiyomi cleared her throat from the chunks of wet blood with a tone that sounded almost as excited as that which the clones spoke of not too long ago.
The blonde raised her hand up and clenched her fist around the handle of the kunai she held. A loud popping noise suggested that there was something smaller in her hand, in between the palm and the handle. Something she handled carefully up until now and something that was meant to be concealed the whole time up until this moment.
Kiyomi's hand lit up with bright, white light as beams of light rushed from the detonated flash bomb. Just for a brief couple of moments, the room lit up with light as if there was a pocket star located by the western wall and just for that one moment all of the locations of all her enemies inside the room became apparent to Kiyomi. The Yamanaka didn't wait for the blinding effects of the bomb to ward off, now that she knew the approximate location of her enemies she charged ahead.
She tried slamming her shoulder into one of the clones but she only slammed against the ground – it was no longer there. Those bastards picked up on her plan immediately and it was such a good one, it should have worked! Now that it didn't… This might have just been it…
"Shit! That bitch blinded us, you know!" someone grunted from up above. The location and angle of the sounds that the clones let out suggested to Kiyomi that the clones had bounced back up on the ceiling the moment that they got blinded. While they were similarly impaired to Kiyomi, even when the light was burning one's eyes out, it didn't take a prodigy to tell up from down.
"Calm down, that was her last shot, we can finish her off now!" a clone from a different corner cried out, still in pain.
"Shit, guys, did you feel that? We need to wrap this up quick and go down. The first floor needs our help, you know!" another one grumbled.
Kiyomi writhed on the floor before rolling to the side. A blast that threatened to take away her ears just as Deidara's blast took away her sight took the patch of the floor she just laid on away, the result of an explosive tag that she had placed there. While the clones looked confused about the source and the purpose of the explosion, Kiyomi rolled into the hole she had just created. After taking the liberty of crying out in pain of nearly dislocating her shoulder after the fall – she had made a far deeper hole than she had thought – Kiyomi peeled herself off the ground and stumbled to wherever there were no walls to slam herself into.
She had fallen down a stairway of sorts. Bumping into every rail on her way down, every part of her under her neck down to her hips burnt with bruises. Her pills were back in that room! It's back to square one but… As long as her eyes had the appropriate time to recover. There were sounds, sounds of battle, this must have been pretty far down, with any luck Kiyomi would find herself closer to the battle on the first floor…
"I knew this was a terrible idea!" a buff young man with silver mutton chops swung an ax so large that whenever it was swung it threw even the sturdy-built man off a bit. An ax that appeared to be made of steel similar in appearance to marble while coral-textured decorations of lapis stretched out over it with a net formation. Whenever the massive ax swung, handfuls of Dark Naruto clones popped.
"And what exactly was so terrible about moving indoors, hidden from all those hunters?" a taller and far slimmer youth compared to his immensely masculine teammate wondered while he placed a lantern-like artifact on the floor and spikes of coral came out of it, carefully bending around their master and his teammates and only impaling the rushing enemies, protecting the frail but long, pink-wearing young man from more than a few Rasengan coming his way.
"Maybe the fact that we're fighting hunters right now, you fucking pussy!?" the buff axman growled while swinging his ax in a powerful swing that left a roaring, aquatic streak in its trajectory, which exploded outward with all the force of the stormy oceans and sent more clones flying back.
"If you ladies are done being pissy, can I point out the disadvantage in N-U-M-B-E-R-S?" a young woman of violet hair and a combination of a militarized attire that somehow tried to nab the practicality of a military uniform and the flair of something fashion-minded but failed as the young lady wore a black bodysuit under tight-looking, short, teal jacket the back of which stretched out like a tuxedo well past her knees as well as a tall top hat with a playful pin which held it in place during hectic combat encounters with the help of a belt going under her chin.
"All I'm saying is, if Toro used any of that ferocity that his black eyes and shark-teeth vibe up and grew some balls, maybe we wouldn't be plowing through clones of the same guy right now who's likely on some drugs, given his weird eyes…" the strapping axman shrugged while swinging his axe over his shoulder and staring down a lowly handful of Dark Naruto clones that all froze in wait of impending reinforcements.
"Weird? That's right… You hate me too, don't you? Just like everybody else, right? It's not just Konoha… All around the world people are all the same…" one of the clones yelled out, clutching at his chest while tears formed in its black and red eyes.
"Shit, what is it gonna cry now?" the wiry axman tilted his eyebrows in disbelief.
"Do not mind Mouza, hunter, he is a brute who is very well defined by the lowly action of judging someone based on their appearance alone. It is an offense he has committed towards everyone he's met and it doesn't seem like he's on the right path to stop doing it either." The stretchy, extraterrestrial-looking Kirigakure ninja turned to the clone who was talking with a kind expression. It was a feat that he was able to take one up, given his fishy-features and the sharp, pearl-white rows of teeth he packed underneath his slimy and chunky lips.
"It seems like our enemy is a M-O-N-S-T-E-R, I've never seen someone being able to make this many clones that retain this much of their master's power. As a clone user myself, I am impressed…" the sole kunoichi amongst the Kirigakure trio noted at Dark Naruto.
"What are you thinking, Guna?" Toro turned to his more focused on strategy and clever and precise plays teammate.
"I'm thinking that the enemy is now on C-O-O-L. Now is the time to S-M-A-S-H through!" she put her hands together in what would have been a hand seal position but her hands smashed together as if they were made of slime of some sort and splattered all over the floor in front of her, forming a puddle of goop of considerable size which began bubbling and rustling almost immediately after forming.
"Not a bad idea, I'm a bit of what you'd call a smashing enthusiast myself…" Mouza smirked with the right side of his mouth while playfully flipping his gigantic ax off his shoulders. With a forward charge, without even swinging his weapon, just placing it in front, the robust young lad busted through the huffing wall of Dark Naruto clones and looked back at his teammates, wondering if any of them saw his mad charge and thought it was as cool as he perceived it, with an almost bloodthirsty expression of excitement.
"A dopey brute, more like it!" Toro mocked his teammate while the long-reaching spikes of coral returned to a spongy form and retreated within his lantern. The slender fishman then lifted his lantern up like a lance and thrust it forward, all of the steel-hard coral substance formed on one side of his lantern-like a lance, reaching almost to the very end of the corridor he was fighting in, more than capable enough to pierce through any enemy too slow to get out of its way.
Guna's clones engaged in hand-to-hand combat with the Dark Naruto clones, the enemy appeared to struggle against the unique taijutsu style of someone made entirely out of goop that smelled like fish-grease and felt like a chunk of it to hit too. Despite the struggle, the clones appeared to overpower Guna's goop clones by slashing them open with kunai blades but the only victory they've scored was a shallow one for the goop detonated all over their bodies, entrapping them to the doors of the wards and offices located nearby, the ceiling and the up on the walls.
"The path is clear…" Guna looked back at her teammates.
"None of you sound like Naruto…" a weak voice that neither of the Kirigakure trio was familiar with looked back. It was that surprise that forced them to take this threat seriously but only until they got a better look at the condition of the kunoichi that approached them. The poor blonde was busted up from head to toe and her face was best off sunken underneath the handfuls of hair that it hid behind, based on the amount of boiling blood that dripped from it.
"Another hunter?" Mouza tightened the grip on his ax with a rude growl.
"No, it looks like a soul in need of help." Toro shook his head. "There is a headband around her waist, she's from Konoha."
"So what if she has her forehead protector? So did the C-L-O-N-E-S…" Guna pointed out.
"Still, it is unlikely that Konoha ninja would reach out to us. The relationship between our villages hasn't been, how to put it, quaint, these last couple of years… In fact, I do not believe it has been decent ever in recorded history." Toro shrugged.
"All the more reason for her to be a hunter and attack us, decent folks wouldn't come to us for small-talk!" Mouza hustled forward but then stopped when Kiyomi just stopped and lowered her head in a submissive stance, as if looking for noises to react to.
"She does seem injured…" Guna nodded to herself. "Hey, why are you here?"
"Just buying time for my pills to kick in. You guys seemed to be adequate at keeping those clones away while my face heals." Kiyomi grumbled out through the wet clots of blood going up and down her throat that kept making her feel like she was about to throw up at any point.
"Oh, so that's what this bubbling liquid drooping off of your face is, you've taken food pills and it's healing your face…" Toro nodded to himself, helping better understand the oddness of this sudden arrival helped him with acceptance of this curious Konoha kunoichi it seemed. "Very well, feel free to stick around us. We are Team Seahorse from Kirigakure. My name is Murakari Toro, this strapping young lad is Kaimuri Mouza and our lovely strategist with a penchant for spelling the key words she says out is Koshira Guna."
"Hey, don't go around deciding things like that!" Mouza grabbed his taller teammate by the long collar of his separating bodysuit and pulled him in closer as if readying him for a punch in the nose.
"Hmm… Indeed, it is something that the whole T-E-A-M should decide. Still, perhaps keeping the Konoha ninja around while we navigate her home turf could have some uses, after all?" Guna scratched her chin.
"Don't get any wrong ideas. I'm not too fond of teaming up with Kirigakure ninja either." Kiyomi shook her head, looking quite like a ghoul from a creepy urban legend more than the dignified Yamanaka princess that she was at the moment. "It's just that at the moment I've got no better option, I still fully intend to catching up to my squad and to a teammate of ours that we've left behind in the main street beside the hospital."
"That won't do!" Mouza shook his head before turning to his teammates. "The only reason we came to this stupid hospital, to begin with, was to cut some corners and travel with fewer hunter bastards hasslin' us. Now you're telling us we're gonna take in a hitchhiker that intends to go back through the main street we've just crossed over in this shortcut?"
"She is a living M-A-P of Konoha though…" Guna shrugged and crossed her arms over her chest while leaning at her prone to arguments and complaining teammate.
"Plus, it will only take her minutes for her eyesight to return. Having an extra pair of hands helping us out for a symbiotic relationship between our teams, if you will, might come in handy." Toro argued.
"Great Ball Rasengan!" the floor burst with an azure glowing sphere driving right into where Mouza just stood, forcing the giant to raise his ax up to block the chakra sphere of greatly diminished power using which the clones attempted to get the drop on the troublesome Kirigakure ninja which they just couldn't seem to be able to dispose of.
"What is your name, stranger?" Toro turned to Kiyomi while Mouza struggled in a clash with the raging windstorms of the Great Ball Rasengan.
"Yamanaka Kiyomi," Kiyomi replied.
"Find a place to be safe in. We'll be with you in a moment." Toro told her with a kind tone.
"And if your E-Y-E-S start seeing again, feel free to H-E-L-P out!" Guna barked out an order of her own before driving a punch right into her own gut so that she could throw up another pool of her goop from which she'd raise her squadron of goop clones to engage the enemy with.
It was a highly questionable alliance but… For now, it kept breathing out on top of breathing in and that was all that was important.