Obito-Sensei Chapter 7
Sacrifice
"Sasuke," Obito said. "Don't move."
Sakura glanced at her teammate, and was surprised to find he was reaching for a knife. Wasn't he scared? His Sharingan was active, fixed upon the man with the scythe.
"Listen," their sensei said. "At this range, he'll be on me before I can get you guys into the Kamui. Then we'll be in serious trouble." He took a step forward, putting another foot between him and his students, and Sakura trembled as she watched the cult's leader grin and ready his weapon. Who fought with a scythe? "You understand? You can't fight him. I'll keep him busy, but you have to look out for yourselves."
"We can take him!" Naruto announced. Below, Sakura could hear the cultists moving. It sounded like some were climbing the walls, with or without chakra. Others were streaming out of the room into the cave system.
"No, you cannot," Obito hissed. "Get out of here first. Find a way out of the caves, or lay low if you can't. Be careful: they're small fry, but there's something weird about all these guys' chakra." He wasn't looking at them: his eyes were fixed on his opponent. Sakura had never seen her sensei so incredibly focused. "Keep each other safe."
"Sensei-," she started to say.
"GO!" Obito barked, and Sakura and her teammates turned and ran. There was a clash of steel behind them, and Sakura stole a glance over her shoulder as they fled. The man in white had leapt towards them, and Obito had intercepted him with his short sword. Her sensei had been right: the enemy had covered the entire distance between them before Sakura had made it a single step. The two men grappled, sword against scythe for the blink of an eye, and then they both fell. Out of sight, and into the cavern full of cultists.
To Sakura's shock, that didn't scare her. Their sensei could definitely take care of himself. Right now, she was a lot more scared for herself.
"Right!" she shouted, and then sprinted down the passage to her left. Naruto and Sasuke both understood right away, and followed her. Their footfalls were silent, but the cultists were not. There was screaming, blades clashing, and a stampede of feet. Obito was in among them, out of sight, and some were clearly leaving to hunt down her and her teammates instead of staying to fight.
The tunnels were a complete labyrinth: Sakura had no idea where she was going. She slowed down, trying to listen, and her teammates came alongside her.
"That was smart, Sakura!" Naruto loudly whispered. "They'll go the wrong way!"
Sasuke shook his head. "We don't know this place: I bet those freaks do. We've only got a minute before they-"
A man with a brown scarf wrapped around his shoulder and swords in both hands turned the corner ahead of them. Both Team Seven and the sudden intruder stopped dead, staring at each other.
The man's face broke into a smile. "See!" he shouted back at an unseen companion. "My right, not yours! Dummy!"
Then he charged, raising both swords over his heads and screaming at the top of his lungs.
Sakura froze, but her teammates didn't. Sasuke moved before either of them, flinging a kunai straight at the cultist. The knife struck the man in the stomach and buried itself up the hilt, and the screaming man staggered, almost losing his footing.
"Get him!" Naruto shouted, charging forward and leaping into the air. The spell broke: Sakura realized just how fast her heart was beating and let out a yell of her own, breaking her paralysis. The man swung both his swords at once, one at Naruto's head and the other at his legs. Sakura threw a kunai and broke into a run, desperate to help; her knife took the man in the hand, and he dropped the sword meant for Naruto's head with a yelp of pain. Naruto took care of the other sword himself, violently kicking out and both knocking it from the man's hand and clocking him in the jaw.
The man staggered backwards and Sasuke jumped past Naruto, kicking off the man's shoulders and sending him tumbling to the ground. His Sharingan was a red blur in the dimness of the cave. Sakura realized the first cultist wasn't his target when the next turned the corner. It was another man, this one unarmed but wearing steel armor.
Sasuke fell in an arc behind the man, and his hand clapped on the cultist's shoulder and dragged him down with him. The new arrival stumbled, off balance, and so fast Sakura could barely believe it Sasuke shoved another kunai through the man's head. The armored man had a thick black mustache, and it twitched he tried to understand what had just happened.
She blinked, and the man fell, his whole body spasming. Sasuke looked to his right, down the corridor, and saw something that obviously shocked him.
"Sakura!" Naruto shouted, turning towards her. "Behind you!" She started to turn, and as she did the man Sasuke had jumped off of kicked at Naruto's ankle, trying to bring him down.
"You little shit!" the man shrieked, one hand impaled and his stomach covered in his own blood. Naruto leapt onto him with an angry yell, and Sakura finished turning away; she trusted Naruto to be able to handle a single wounded man.
There was yet another enemy behind them, coming down the corridor at her. This one was an overweight woman, waving a chokuto in front of her. She eyed Sakura hungrily, and the genin felt a sudden chill run from the top of her head to her toes.
"You made a big mistake coming here," the woman hissed, and swung her sword.
It was a straight, predictable vertical attack with an obvious wind-up, and Sakura's body slipped past it without any hesitation. She was surprised at her own decisiveness: instead of backing up, she'd brought herself closer to the woman. The cultist's eyes went wide and she yelled, swinging horizontally with one hand.
How were you supposed to fight swords again? Sakura couldn't have told someone anything about the academy lessons in that precise second, but she still knew exactly what to do. She'd been trained to fight with her reflexes; if you over-thought a fight, you'd be the one on the ground with a bloody nose afterwards. Ino, Hinata, and her other classmates had taught her that plenty of times.
But in this case, she wouldn't have a bloody nose, Sakura realized. If she messed up, she'd be dead.
So instead of getting cut in half, she twisted and punched out, knocking the woman's hand back and carrying the blade away from her. Her opponent grunted in surprise, taking a step back to swing again. She wasn't an amatuer; she was using the momentum Sakura had given her to attack again.
But her footwork was sloppy.
Right! Leverage! She was inside the woman's guard: the sword wasn't dangerous so long as she interrupted the attacks! Sakura's eyes went wide and she dropped, sweeping the woman's legs out from under her.
Her opponent cursed and fell, and Sakura didn't give her a chance to get back up. She jumped back to her feet and kicked the woman in the face. The cultist's head was tossed back and struck the stone with a sickening crack, and then rolled, insensate, as a pool of blood began steadily spreading beneath her dirty brown hair.
Sakura paused, feeling like she was watching everything over her own shoulder. Was that really it? That had been her first fight?
She'd won?
"Diah!"Yet another enemy turned the corner ahead of her, watching with wide eyes. "You!" He pulled a shuriken from his pocket, and Sakura stumbled back in fear. Someone else with ninja training? She heard Naruto shout something behind her, and reached for the ground on instinct: the man flung his shuriken right at her head.
Her hands wrapped around the sword that had tumbled from the unconscious woman's fingers, and she swung it in blind fear, knocking the shuriken right out of the air. Both Sakura and the man stared at one another. Neither of them were able to believe what had just happened.
"Sakura!" Naruto grabbed her by the shoulder, dragging her back. Her knuckles were white around the sword: she couldn't release it. "We gotta go!"
If Naruto was saying that, the path must have been clear. Sakura didn't have any room or time not to trust him. She turned and ran, putting her back to the enemy and focusing on sprinting. Naruto was in front of her; Sasuke was nowhere in sight.
They jumped over two bodies; one of them was unconscious, but the other was writhing despite fatal wounds. They grabbed at Sakura's heels as she sped past. Parts of the floor were slick with blood.
They rounded the corner, skidding into the turn, and Sakura felt something nick her left arm. There wasn't any time to look. Sasuke was there, stomping down on someone's head. It was the man who'd had a kunai buried in his brain. He was fighting back, trying to snatch the Uchiha's legs and pull him down to the ground.
'Just like the bear.'
Naruto kicked the man in the crotch as hard as he could as they passed, and the man screamed as he skidded several inches along the ground. Sasuke turned and ran with them, and all three genin rushed pell-mell through the tunnel. There were steps behind them; at least one person was chasing them.
Sakura didn't look back. She just focused on running. Straight, left, right, left: the tunnels seemed to go on forever. Behind them, the sound of running grew fainter. They were losing their pursuer. She didn't know how long she ran. It seemed like only a couple seconds, but it was probably much longer.
"Here," Sasuke grunted, diving to the left. There was a crack in the wall, Sakura realized. Maybe even a door? She threw herself into it, with Naruto right behind her.
As Sakura hit the floor and scrambled to the wall, Sasuke glanced back at her, his Sharingan whirling. He grabbed her by the arm.
"Sa-?!" she started, before following his gaze. There was a divot in her arm, and blood was running freely from it. She blinked. When had that happened? She hadn't even noticed. Had that shuriken hit her after all?
Lightning quick, Sasuke ran his hand up her arm and covered his hand in her blood as Sakura watched in shock. Then, he poked his torso out the hole and flung his hand towards the end of the path they'd been fleeing down. Sakura heard blood splatter.
He ducked back in and pressed himself to the wall, putting a finger over his lips.
Sakura and Naruto understood right away and flattened themselves against the wall, trying to steady their breathing. The sound of footsteps grew closer.
Three sets ran past their door, then stopped. Sakura held her breath.
Were they going to turn around?
There was some muttering, and then a moment later the sound of movement resumed. They were going farther down the corridor.
They waited in silence for another ninety seconds, getting control of their breathing. Sakura slumped, sliding down the wall, and winced as her arm protested. The cut was deep, nearly an inch of skin taken from her tricep. Now that the adrenaline was subsiding, it was starting to hurt.
"Nice one, Sasuke," Naruto eventually said, still panting. His face was flushed, and one of his fingernails was bleeding. "They were following the blood?"
Sasuke nodded, and Sakura lowered her head.
"Sorry," she said. "I'm really sorry. That could have been bad."
"Hey, not your fault," Naruto said with a grin. "I'm the one who should apologize. Sorry I left you with two of them." His smile grew a little wider. "Did you really deflect that shuriken? That was cool as hell!"
Sakura blushed. And looked down. She was still holding the sword? She tried to loosen her grip and found it harder than it should have been. "It was an accident," she admitted. "I just panicked and swung."
"Quiet," Sasuke said, and the both of them shut up. "Do you hear that?"
They listened, and what Sasuke was talking about quickly became apparent. The cavern they'd ducked into was small, maybe fifteen feet from wall to wall and about as deep, and there was a depression at one end of it, a small pit that they couldn't see into. There was a sound coming from the pit; a kind of gurgling, like water slowly swirling down a drain.
Naruto crept forward, poking his head over the ledge, and froze. He went pale.
"What?" Sasuke whispered. Naruto turned around. He opened his mouth to say something, and then just shook his head and gestured them over.
Sakura and Sasuke both followed him up and peeked into the pit.
Sakura almost threw up for the second time that day.
There was a woman in the pit, staring up at them with hateful crimson eyes. The gurgling was coming from her. Her cheek was resting on her shoulder, putting her head almost totally horizontal.
No, not resting. Pinned.
A steel spike had been rammed through her, vertically transfixing her whole twisted body. It went through both her cheeks, into her shoulder, down through her entire torso, and then emerged from one thigh, staking her to the ground. Her hands were bound behind her back, leaving her totally unable to rise. The woman shifted and gurgled again: her throat was intact, but her entire chest had to be a mess, Sakura thought.
Why were all these people immortal? It was insane. The bear, all these cultists, and this woman for sure. She looked like a prisoner: maybe she thought they were her captors? Was that why she was looking at them with such hate?
"Are you… okay?" Naruto asked, and the woman's eyes went wide. She gurgled again. Was that a yes? Sakura had no idea. But Naruto took it for one, and jumped down in the pit. It was only two or three feet, and he landed without a sound.
"It's okay," he said, approaching with his hands out. "I'll get you out."
"She might be one of them, Naruto," Sasuke warned. Sakura wasn't sure, and Naruto said exactly why.
"No way they would stick up one of their own people like this," Naruto declared. "If she's alive, we gotta help her."
He reached out, feeling the stake as the woman watched him with wide eyes, and gave it an exploratory tug. Nothing; it was firmly in the ground. That made sense: the woman had wiggled free by now otherwise. Naruto frowned, pulling a spool of ninja wire from one of his pockets, and gingerly wrapped it around the stake, feeding it under the woman's head and grabbing the other end.
"I'm really sorry if I get your cheek," he said with a wince. Then he started to work the wire back and forth, slowly at first and then picking up speed. The sound was quiet but grating, and Sakura nervously looked over his shoulder, keeping an eye on the entrance. She couldn't hear anyone coming, but a couple of the people chasing them had chakra training.
The wire and Naruto's strength made quick work of the stake, and it only took her teammate thirty seconds to saw through the steel. When the wire emerged from the other side, he bundled it up and placed it back in his pocket, and then gingerly took hold of the sharp top protruding from the woman's cheek. As carefully as possible, he slid it out, wincing at the blood covering it.
The moment the stake was clear of the woman's head and her mouth was free, she tried to bite Naruto's nose off with her broken teeth.
Naruto yelped and leapt back, barely avoiding the bite, and the woman laughed. "You little idiot!" she cackled. "I almost got you!"
Naruto was hyperventilating at the near miss, the bloody stake still in his hands, but Sasuke just crossed his arms and sneered. "You're the only idiot here," he said. "If you'd waited for him to actually free you, you might have had a chance."
The woman blinked. "Shut up!" she decided after a moment. "Jashin will free me, and then He will punish you!"
"Who's Jashin?" Sasuke asked. "The guy in white? He's probably already dead."
The woman laughed again. "You really have no idea where you are, do you?" she gasped, blood running from her mouth and the holes in her cheeks. Sakura stared in morbid fascination. "Jashin is God, you little bloodbag. You've stumbled into God's home, and pissed off his followers! You won't even be leaving this place in pieces." She grinned, her broken teeth covered in her own blood. Sakura felt ill. "Especially when Lord Hidan finishes his ritual."
"Hidan?" Naruto asked. "Is he the guy in white?"
"He's God's emissary," the woman groaned. It was like she was enjoying her pain, Sakura thought, looking back at the entrance again. Still no one, but if this conversation went on it would definitely attract someone. "If you haven't shit yourself already, you should be ready to. He's already made all of us like him, and once the sacrifices are made, it'll be permanent!" She squirmed, trying to dislodge herself from the stake, but it remained stuck fast in the stone.
"Sacrifices?" Sasuke asked. Sakura was both amazed and grateful that he could stay focused in a situation like this. Even now, he was gathering information. "You guys are the ones who've been kidnapping the merchants."
"Aren't you fucking clever," the woman sneered.
"But then why are you here, if you're one of them?" Naruto asked, and the woman's eyes narrowed.
"Because those other assholes are heretics. They're not real believers!" she spat blood on Naruto's chest, and he backpedaled in a panic. "Why do you think I haven't screamed yet? They stuck me up like this for killing one of those moneygrubbers! For spilling blood!" Her face twisted into something even more inhuman and Sakura took a step back as well. "What servant of Jashin could condemn another for spilling blood?! Answer me!"
She screamed the final words, and Sakura grabbed Sakura's shoulder. "We gotta go," he said. "He told us to get out of her, but I'm not hearing anything. Obito has probably cleaned up by now." She nodded, and reached down towards Naruto. He turned and took her hand, pulling himself out of the pit, and the three of them turned their back on the screeching woman.
"You're all going to drown!" she shrieked. "You and me and all those bastards, you're all going to drown in a river of blood! Jashin promised me!"
Sakura shivered, and they left the chamber, cautiously making their way back the way they'd come. Sasuke led the way, and Sakura realized he remembered the path perfectly, despite the chaos of the chase. Was that thanks to his Sharingan, she wondered, or was his memory just that good? There was no way she could have found her way back through the maze of tunnels with such confidence.
After only a couple minutes of moving in total silence, they'd made their way back to where it all started. The corridors were empty; there weren't any cultists to be found. Where had they all gone? Was it really possible that their sensei had taken them all down? They couldn't even die.
The sound of clashing steel grew louder and louder as they made their way back, and before Sakura knew it they were in the main chamber. There was still a battle going on, but it sounded like there weren't nearly as many participants as before.
She peaked over the ledge, and found Obito Uchiha awash in a sea of bodies. Her sensei had a fierce expression that she'd never imagined on his face, and he danced among two dozen dismembered and writhing enemies, his focus entirely on his opponent. The sword in his hand left behind a shining afterimage of brilliant chakra.
Hidan, the man in white, was no longer white. One of his arms had been partially severed, and his kimono was in shreds and so stained with blood that it no longer looked like it had ever been anything but crimson. But he was still fighting and laughing, swinging his scythe with one hand as if it weighed nothing. As Sakura watched, he swung at Obito and missed with a furious howl, and the missed strike took a grounded cultist's head off as if there were no skins and bones for the blade to pass through.
The ground was covered in bodies, all still moving and trying to grab Obito. As he danced with Hidan he leapt to and fro, picking up chunks of human beings and tossing them aside with kicks and chakra-enhanced movement. It was like a scene right out of hell.
"Holy shit," Naruto murmured, and Hidan's head snapped up towards them, his eyes manic. Sakura flinched back as the cult leader disengaged from Obito, putting some distance between them and levering his scythe up at the watching genin.
"See?" he asked in a pleasant voice, stomping down on the moaning head of one of his followers. "This is why I don't mind telling you that you're all going to die." He stomped again, and laughed at the chorus of questions asked by the massacred cultists, disembodied heads and people missing all of their limbs or worse shouting questions. "You're all so fucking useless!" he laughed. "Can't even capture some kids fresh from the womb! Soon as this rite is complete, I'm sending all of you to hell, no question!"
"I told you to leave!" Obito shouted up at them, making himself heard over dozens of violent protests. He looked tired, Sakura thought with a start. His face was damp with sweat and his clothes were plastered to his body. Was he running out of chakra? No matter how skilled he was, up against so many opponents at once he must have had to use that intangibility jutsu. Just how much chakra did it take to slip through attacks like that? "Get out of here!"
"Yeah, get out of here!" Hidan cackled. "It'll make you more fun to chase down when we're done!" Obito charged him and their dance began again, the deafening sound of steel on steel filling the air. The fight was too fast for Sakura to follow their movements; it was just a blur of violence. Nonetheless, she was sure that Obito was deflecting or avoiding Hidan's attacks, not just phasing through them.
"He's in trouble," Sasuke muttered, obviously unable to believe it, and Sakura shot him a fearful glance. "That freak is tiring him out."
Hidan didn't look tired, Sakura thought. Not like Obito did. Maybe being immortal also made it impossible for that to happen. If that was the case…
"We can't run," Naruto said, gritting his teeth. "He's right. He'll just chase us down"
"What do we do?!" Sakura asked, feeling panic rising in her chest. Her grip tightened on her stolen sword. "We can't fight him. We can't even help sensei. What do we do?!"
Sasuke pulled two more knives from his hip pouch. "I've got no idea," he admitted. "Let's go."
He jumped down into the cavern, and Naruto and Sakura had no choice but to follow him.
"God, Sasuke, you little idiot!" Obito shouted as soon as they landed, and Sasuke flinched.
Hidan laughed. "Sasuke, you little idiot!" he shrieked in a falsetto. "You think he can defend himself and you at the same time?!" In response, Sasuke threw both his knives; Hidan dodged both of them with the most minimal movements possible, refusing to take his eyes off of Obito.
Sakura's teammate straightened up. Sakura felt a chill as Hidan watched them out of the corner of his eye as he and their sensei fought across the room, Obito desperately driving him back with a flurry of blows that were so fast and vicious that the trail of white chakra they left behind seemed like a solid wall.
If Sasuke felt the same chill, he didn't show it. He started running through handsigns with impressive speed and took in a deep breath.
"Heads up," Naruto said, pulling a knife and another spool of ninja wire as well. Sakura held up her sword.
Katon: Gokakyu No Jutsu.
Sasuke spat a fireball twice his own size, and the sudden heat made Sakura flinch. The jutsu roared forward, torching any cultist on the ground that wasn't able to get out of the way. Both Hidan and Obito saw it coming and leapt out of the way. The jutsu missed entirely.
But as Hidan started to jump, Naruto threw his knife, the wire now tied around its handle. The kunai missed as well, soaring over Hidan's head, but Naruto didn't seem to care: he grabbed Sakura's hand and fastened both it and his own hands on the endpoint of the wire, as if getting ready for something. His hand was warm.
As Sakura watched, gripping tightly by instinct and sword at the ready, Obito noticed the glint of the wire extending from the knife. With the fireball still in between himself and Hidan, obscuring his opponent's sight, he jumped over the jutsu…
And axe-kicked the knife right out of the air, straight into the ground.
The wire suddenly went amazingly taught, and Naruto and Sakura both tightened their grip on its handle, desperate not to let it get away from them. The shining steel string went straight down like a guillotine, and chopped the rest of Hidan's shredded arm off.
Sakura watched in shock as the limb fell away. How had Naruto and Sasuke come up with a plan like that, without sharing a word? How had Obito understood it so quickly? Was that even possible?
"Useless!" Hidan screamed, and to Sakura's horror he kicked a blade from the ground right at them. It spun through the air ready to decapitate Naruto.
She screamed back in both terror and anger and dragged her teammate down, swinging upwards with her sword at the same moment. It connected, and her whole arm went numb from the force of the deflection. The blade slightly changed direction upward and Naruto fell, off balance, thanks to her yanking on his hand.
All that combined was just enough to ensure that instead of losing his head, the Hokage's son only suffered a very unexpected haircut.
"NO!" Obito roared, and drove his blade past the hilt into Hidan's chest, dragging it down and opening the man's entire torso up in an enormous welter of blood. It was an incredible blow, but the man didn't even seem to notice: he kicked Obito in the gut and swung at him wildly with his scythe as their sensei stumbled back, obviously winded. The blade went right through Obito's forearm, and their sensei hissed in pain, grabbing it with his other hand and holding fast before Hidan could complete the cut. As Obito grew intangible and slipped through the blade, his arm bleeding heavily, Sakura felt like she was going to cry.
Sasuke blinked, staring at something Sakura couldn't see.
"Oh god," he said, and Naruto looked up at him, trembling from the near miss.
"Thanks." He squeezed Sakura's hand, and her heart jumped. "What, Sasuke?"
"He's got no heart," Sasuke said faintly. "He's got everything else in there, but no heart." He blinked again, looking around the room. "And…" His eyes narrowed. "There's a chain. From each of their hearts, to the pit."
"A chain?" Sakura asked. She couldn't see anything like that. Sasuke shook his head.
"It's chakra!" he said, breaking into a run. Sakura and Naruto took off after him, keeping their eyes on Hidan and their sensei. The man whose chest had been completely opened up, like a corpse in a morgue, tracked their trajectory and started yelling, even though his lungs had been destroyed.
"Hey!" he shouted, kicking out at Obito and almost losing a foot in the process. "Bad! Ugly little shits! I'm already going to kill you: don't make me do worse!"
'He's freaking out.'
Incredibly, Sakura heard herself giggle.
The man who had reacted to his arm being removed and his chest getting turned into an anatomy lesson by laughing and attacking more ferociously was panicking just from them getting closer to the pit. He was even driving Obito back now, their sensei grunting with obvious effort as he deflected a relentless series of blows from the scythe.
Sasuke reached the pit first and, without a shred of hesitation, dove headfirst into the blood. Naruto skidded to a stop behind him, leaving a trail in the blood that had surrounded it, and stared into the solid red liquid. It was totally opaque, and didn't stir besides the occasional ripple as more blood pulsed out of it. Within a second of Sasuke submerging himself, it was like he'd never existed.
Sakura and Naruto exchanged a glance and turned to face the fight, watching in horror as Hidan pushed their sensei back. Obito was bleeding from a dozen small wounds; even though he had inflicted over thirty fatal injuries on Hidan, the man refused to slow down or give ground. He screamed even with his vocal cords cut, and he swung even as the tendons in his arm were torn to pieces.
It was a nightmare. Sakura felt a tear slip out. She and her teammate started throwing kunai on the same unconscious impulse, desperate to help their teacher. They plucked knives from their packs and hurled them at Hidan at every chance they had. It took the both of them about twenty seconds to run out, and only one of the knives actually landed, sticking in the insane man's knee. Sakura didn't know which one of them had thrown it.
"I think I'll start by turning you inside out!" Hidan screamed. "This was supposed to be a good day before you assholes showed up, you know! Now I'm gonna have to pray for forgiveness for eating your heathen souls without the right seasoning!"
Sakura was numb to it now. This couldn't get much worse.
At that moment, Sasuke surfaced behind them, gasping for air. They both turned back in shock; he was totally coated in blood, and it looked like the blood had become a body for a moment before Sakura and Naruto realized what was happening. They reached down and yanked him out of the pit.
"It's down there!" Sasuke shouted, opening his eyes. One of them was completely red. Had he opened it under the blood? Sakura's stomach flipped yet again. "His heart!" he shouted again, grabbing her arm and squeezing tightly. "It's down there, but it's too deep! I can't reach it! Obito! You've gotta get the heart!"
"HA!" Hidan shrieked. "Yeah, you do that, Uchiha! Leave your kids with me! I'm a great babysitter!"
Obito couldn't reach it.
Sakura looked down at the bloody handprint Sasuke had left on her arm.
Sasuke couldn't reach it.
It was down too deep. How deep could the narrow pit be, if that was the case?
'Nearly four minutes. Very impressive, Sakura.'
Sakura remembered Obito's words and looked back at her sensei, struggling to keep them all alive.
Suddenly, quite suddenly, for a reason she couldn't quite say…
Her terror died down. It grew quiet, buried under the rapid beating of her heart. She looked down at her hand, and dropped her stolen sword.
"I'll get it," she said, and Naruto stared at her.
She took a deep breath, as deep as she could, and jumped.
She would have screamed right away, if not for how horrible the situation was. The blood welcomed her like an old friend, embracing her on all sides completely. As she slipped beneath the surface, the first thing she noticed was how hot it was. Despite coming from a hole in the ground, the blood that now completely surrounded her felt as if it had just left someone's body. It was hot and sticky, and moving through it incredibly difficult.
Sakura felt panic and claustrophobia start to overwhelm her, and almost turned around right there. Instead, she reoriented herself and swam straight down.
'It's hot.'
She didn't want to do this. She just wanted to give up, and it had been less than five seconds. As she swam deeper, the darkness behind her eyelids grew blacker and blacker; the blood blocked so much light that it made the transition to abyssal in less than ten meters.
'It's dark.'
Her arm ached, and she remembered the wound on her tricep. It was full of this blood now. What was going to happen? Would she get infected or something? This was the stuff that had contaminated the lake, and Obito had warned her against getting any of that on her. Wouldn't this be even worse? Her whole body was aching. Swimming through the blood was completely exhausting. It felt like it was trying to push her back to the surface.
"I'm tired.'
How far had she gone already? Fifty meters? How long had it been? Thirty seconds? It was so hard to tell in the midst of everything. She could hold her breath for another two, maybe three minutes, she was sure, but this wasn't like sitting underwater. This was hard, and her heart was beating a panicked rhythm. It was the only thing she could hear.
'You're all going to drown."
Stop it. Don't think. Just swim.
'You're all going to drown in a river of blood.'
Another thirty seconds passed, and Sakura realized she'd overestimated herself. The panic, the growing pressure of the blood, everything was squeezing her lungs dry so much faster than normal. She had to be over a hundred meters down now, and she could feel the pressure of all the blood above her crushing her down farther.
Was everyone already dead up above? Had Hidan already killed them? Was it even worth doing this anymore?
As Sakura considered turning around, she heard a sudden heartbeat.
It wasn't her own. She stopped her descent, going totally still.
The pulse came again. The blood around her stirred; the vibration barely twitched her ears. Blood wasn't a great conductor for sound.
That meant she was close.
She listened one more time, trying to pinpoint the source, and less than a half-second later it came again.
Right below her, she realized. Two, maybe three meters. She dove, forgetting how her lungs were burning, and blindly reached out. Her hands fastened around something slimy.
It was about the size of her head, huge for a heart, and as Sakura brought her other hand down it bucked against her, beating violently. More blood was squeezed out of it as it did, rushing past her hand and joining the rest of the pit.
This was the source of the blood, Sakura realized. This thing had been at the bottom of the pit, steadily filling it up the whole time. She fumbled for her pack, reaching for a knife.
But the moment her hand hit her empty pack, pressing it into her back, she realized her mistake. She'd used up all her knives with Naruto while trying to slow down Hidan.
Sakura felt a brutal red anger far redder than the blood around her take hold of her and she took the heart in both hands, squeezing it as hard as she could. Her finger made deep divots in it, but it kept stubbornly beating, refusing to die. She wasn't strong enough to crush it into paste: this was the heart of a ninja, after all.
Without hesitation, she turned around, tucking the heart to her own chest and swimming for the surface. It felt like the organ was resisting, trying to sink back to the bottom of the pit. Her head was aching: she was running out of oxygen. It only made her kick more viciously, driving herself towards the surface far faster than she'd descended.
'I'm not going to die on my first C-Rank,' Sakura thought to herself, even though she knew this was anything but a C-Rank mission.
'I've got to tell my parents how it went.'
Twenty seconds, thirty. Sakura's whole body was aching, a migraine coming on. She was past her limit. She'd have to take a breath any moment now; her body's instinct to breathe was stronger than her will to keep her mouth shut.
But the darkness behind her eyelids was getting lighter. She was close.
'Don't breathe,' she begged herself, swimming harder. The heart against her chest bucked even more violently. 'Don't breathe."
'Just go!
Sakura breached going almost twenty miles per hour, and even though the blood was loathe to give her up, she forced herself clear out of the pit and beached herself on the bloody stone surrounding it. She heard both her teammates jump back in shock.
They were still alive!
She took a ragged breath, unable to comprehend what was happening and unable to open her eyes. They were stuck close by the sticky blood.
She couldn't see anything, so she decided there was no choice but to trust blindly. She raised the heart over her head in both hands, and called out in desperation.
"SENSEI!" she screamed, and she heard a scuffle, more steel on steel.
"NO!" Hidan howled, and then her arms jerked back as something took the heart right out of her hands.
The omnipresent moaning of the dismembered cultists ceased.
The cavern grew quiet, and Sakura didn't know what had happened. Gingerly, she lowered her arms, waiting for someone to say something or for anything to happen, and tried to wipe some of the blood from her eyes.
Someone else's hand was suddenly there, wiping her eyes clear with some water, and Sakura flinched back, almost sprawling on the stone and blinking wildly. The sudden light was painful after minutes alone in the dark.
"Hey." It was Naruto, standing over her and extending his hand. Sakura blinked, looking at him, behind him. Obito was standing over Hidan, stepping on his open throat; the man was lying on the ground convulsing, his eyes rolling back into his head.
She looked back, and found the heart. It was pinned to the wall of the cave, Obito's short sword transfixing it.
He'd thrown his sword, Sakura realized. Her sensei had thrown his sword and impaled the heart in her hands.
She took Naruto's hand, still staring at the heart. It was beating slower and as she watched, stopped, its lifeblood dripping down the wall to join the rest on the floor.
"Sakura," Obito said, glancing back at her. There was blood running in light trails from both his eyes, and he was as pale as paper. He looked totally exhausted. "Good work."
Sakura smiled at him, and then he fell to one knee, seemingly about to pass out.
"Obito!" Sasuke rushed forward. "Is he-?"
"He's dead," Obito gasped. "With his heart vulnerable like that…" He made a sound that sounded like choking; Sakura realized it might have been a laugh. "He was making a big play, and it backfired on him. Lucky for us."
He tried to stagger to his feet and failed; Sasuke had to catch him before he landed on his face. "The merchants," their sensei said faintly. "They've gotta be here. They were gonna be sacrificed. We've gotta get them."
"We'll get them," Naruto declared. "Actually, I'll get them. You guys rest, okay?" He glanced at Sakura, and she realized that just like Sasuke, she must have looked frightening, entirely coated in blood. "Just… take it easy for a second, okay?"
"Yeah," Sasuke confirmed. "Find them, and shout if you need help." Sakura sat back with an exhausted nod, and Naruto took off, running off into one of the corridors with his boundless energy.
Sakura tried wiping away the blood from her face and gave up after several passes. There was just too much of the stuff. She closed her eyes again, letting her head drop.
She felt like she could fall asleep right there. She was so warm, and so tired. But she couldn't. Even if the danger had passed, the mission wasn't quite completely.
Still, her consciousness drifted. By the time Naruto came back with an excited yell, she was barely able to hear him.
"They're all alive!" he said. "Pretty beat up, but alive!"
"Awesome," Obito said. He looked a little less pale, and he waved off Sasuke as he pulled himself to his feet. "Awesome. Show us the way."