Chapter 7
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMM!
The explosion thundered through the sand village. Everyone from shop owners to people in their sand homes looked outside to see what all the commotion was about. They all stared in horror as they saw that the Kazekage's mansion had been attacked by an unknown force. The people began to worry among themselves.
"What the hell was that?!"
"I don't know don't ask me!"
"Is the Kazekage okay?!"
At the top of the sand village entrance Crocodile was impressed.
"Nice shot." Crocodile said.
Kumama stood tall and rubbed the back of his head with his cannon arm.
"I MEAN WHAT CAN I SAY? I'M ONE HELL OF A SHOT." Kumama responded.
"Well… Let's go confirm the kill shall we?" Crocodile asked, taking a puff from the cigar.
"AFTER YOU BUDDY! HA HA HA HA!" Kumama laughed.
Crocodile, Kumama, and their share of DEATH subordinates charged the city through the main entrance. On the left and right sides of the city, Uzanda and Onawagi, and their share got ready to move in.
"That was the signal. Charge the city." Uzanda said.
"No way she survived that... easy mission. Let's go." Onawagi ordered.
Uzanda and Onawagi moved their forces in on the city as well. As they move through the city DEATH's followers could do as they please, to whoever they please. They looted shops, attacked civilians, and fought with shinobi.
Crocodile ran through the city chopping down sand shinobi with his golden hook. A sand joinin ran at him head on, who he grabbed with his right hand and drained him of his bodily fluids. Kumama fired shots at almost any building he came across setting the city ablaze and leaving buildings in ruin.
BOOM! BOOM BOOM BOOM! BOOM!
Explosions continued to echo around the city as the attack went on. The three teams all on their way to the Kazekage mansion. Uzanda was stopped in his tracks by a group of sand chunin.
"Look at the forehead band hanging from his neck! He's from the Hidden Rain Village! Are they attacking us?" A chunin asked.
Uzanda looked at them and smiled.
"A bunch of pitiful chunin. I feel bad for your parents. They'll be burying you all quite early." Uzanda said.
As he charged the group of teens a group of Jonin showed up to save them.
"YOU ALL GO CHECK ON THE WOUNDED! WE'LL FIGHT HIM! HE'S OUT OF YOUR ELEMENT!" The Jonin ordered.
"HA HA HA HA HA! I'm out of your element too ironically enough." Uzanda joked.
"We'll see about that! Men! Charge him!"
Uzanda ran towards the men who were on their way to him. He jumped over the first man and jumped off his back to get above the group of men. As he flew above them, he grabbed his two chained needle swords and threw them at them while crossing his arms. The swords fell in a helix pattern leaving the Jonin confused. The two men who were almost hit were able to jump out of the way, but Uzanda landed and lifted his arms in the air, whipping the swords towards the sky, and at the men. They both used their kunai to knock the swords away and threw the kunai at Uzanda who jumped backwards out of the way.
"Fool." Uzanda muttered.
He grabbed the chains and crossed his arms again. This time the chains grabbed the men by the legs.
"AHH!" One of the men yelled.
Uzanda then thew his arms down and the men came falling. They hit the ground and were knocked unconscious by the impact. The chief Jonin noticed the chains were caught around the feet of the fallen ninja.
"QUICK! ATTACK WHILE THE SWORDS ARE TIED AROUND THEM!" The chief ordered.
Uzanda smiled as the four men remaining charged him. He jump kicked the first man and flipped forward to slammed down on another one. He stood up and punched another man to his left two times spun to kick the man to his right in the stomach, he turned back around to high kick the man across the right side of his face then brought his foot back to kick him across the left.
The man he kicked in the stomach had recovered and tried to punch Uzanda who ducked and let the man punch his partner in the face. Uzanda then swept both men off their feet and snatched his swords from under the unconscious soldiers and stabbed the men he just beat while they were on the ground.
The chief had gotten up and ran to punch Uzanda who dodged all his attacks: he dodged left, right, back, down, right, down, and left, before he jumped and grabbed the handles of his swords that sat impaled inside of the two shinobi and used them to propel a double push kick to the chief and sent him flying into a building.
While the chief sat up against the wall, Uzanda sent his swords flying to impale the chief through the wall.
On the other end of the village, Onawagi was in a battle of his own. Ten shinobi surrounded him.
"HE AIN'T GOING NO WHERE! WE GOT HIM!" The commander yelled.
"Ignore the fact that he's blindfolded! It could be a trick!" Another ninja yelled.
"So, the sand doesn't underestimate their opponents I see. For that alone I'll let you all live." Onawagi said calmly.
"You'll let us live? Don't make us laugh!" A ninja said.
All ten sand ninja ran towards Onawagi at once who disappeared. The sand shinobi stood confused.
"Where'd he go?"
"Did he run off?"
"Probably ran away!"
Suddenly a ninja's back was sliced.
"HUUGHHAAAHH!" He yelled before dropping down.
"Huh?! Where did that attack come from?"
Onawagi crept around the men and continued to cut them down. One man, two men, three men, four. Five men cut down in an instant.
"Five men left sir!"
"Damn it! Keep your backs together! He can't cut us if we're like this." A ninja ordered.
The five men put their backs together and looked out for the invisible man. Onawagi walked up to a ninja, while still invisible.
"You really expect this to work?" Onawagi said.
"AHH GET AWAY FROM ME!" The shinobi said while swinging his kunai.
"Where is he?"
"He was right in front of me!"
"Stay sharp men!"
Onawagi took a kunai out of a man's hand and stabbed another man with it.
"He took my kunai!"
All the men took their backs off each other and were in a circle facing each other again. Onawagi appeared in front of a man and let him almost stab him just to disappear and have the man stab an ally.
"I'm sorry! I thought I had him!"
Onawagi re-appeared under the man who stabbed his friend to uppercut him, the impact knocking the man out. Onawagi re-appeared in front of the remaining men.
"Two left… so what will you do?" He asked.
"What will we do? Are you a fool? We're going to kill you!" One of them said while both charged the doctor with kunai.
Onawagi reached out, choked the two men, and lifted them off the ground. The men were choking and struggled to breathe.
"Pitiful… and you said you were going to kill me?" He asked.
Onawagi then slammed the men against each other and let them drop towards the ground before continuing his path towards the Kazekage mansion.
INSIDE THE KAZEKAGE MANSION
The room was partially destroyed with papers, tables, and chairs being scattered throughout the room along with broken sand wall. Garra was the only one standing.
"Is everyone alright?" Garra asked the room.
Everyone looked at Garra then the sand wall he put up to protect them.
"Yeah we're fine I think." Kakashi said.
"How's Vivi?" Garra asked.
Kakashi and Garra both looked over to see Vivi wrapped in Naruto's arms. Naruto opened his eyes and looked down at Vivi, who had her eyes closed as well. She opened them to see Naruto had saved her, as well as Garra.
"I'm… I'm alive…" Vivi said softly.
"Course you are!" Naruto said, "Like we'd let anything happen to you."
Vivi smiled at him. Sasuke, Sakura, and Kakashi all stood up.
"What the hell was that?" Sasuke asked.
As he asked that question, a sand shinobi chunin jumped into the hole in the wall. Explosions filled and sounded through the background.
"Lord Kazekage! Are you okay?" The chunin asked.
"Yes, I'm fine. What's the situation?" Garra asked.
"There's some weird guys attacking the village! Two guys came from the left and right, one with two chain swords, and one blindfolded guy that can disappear. There's also a cannon man and a tall man with a golden hook running through the center of the village!" The chunin explained.
"WHAT?!" Vivi asked.
She pushed off Naruto and ran to the opening to see Crocodile running through the city directly for the mansion. She gasped and covered her mouth and fell on her butt.
"Vivi!" Sakura yelled.
"Cr… cr… cr… Crocodile!" Vivi stuttered.
Naruto wore a serious expression and stood up. Kakashi and Sasuke behind him.
"So, who gets who?" Kakashi asked.
"I'm not fighting anybody." Naruto said.
"Hey, Naruto, now isn't the time for this." Sasuke said.
"I agree. Go without me." Naruto said.
Sasuke and Kakashi stared at Naruto for a moment, looked at the sand elders, then looked at each other and nodded.
"You get the swords man and I get the blindfold guy?" Kakashi asked.
"Yeah." Sasuke answered.
The two-ninja jumped out the hole towards their enemies. The rest of the room stared at the blonde shinobi still standing in the room.
"Naruto what are you doing? Go fight with them!" Sakura said.
"No." Naruto answered, his arms still crossed.
"What do you mean "no"?" Sakura asked, "You don't have a choice here! These men are after Vivi!" Sakura yelled.
"I know that. Which is why I'm waiting on the word." Naruto said.
"The word?" Sakura asked, looking at the knocked over elders, "Excuse him so he can go fight!" Sakura yelled.
"He disrespected this council! After this fight he'll be serving his time in jail!" The elder said.
An explosion on the top of the building changed his entire mood.
"ALL RIGHT DAMN IT YOU'RE EXCUSED!" The elder yelled.
A smile flashed across Naruto's face as he jumped out into the sand streets looking for his enemy.
"CROCODILEEEEEEEE!" Naruto yelled.
ALABASTA DESERT
The Straw Hats rode their running lizards through the desert on their way to Alubarna to wait for their friend Princess Vivi, when they noticed a few sand gliders riding towards them.
"Hm? Hey. Who's that?" Luffy asked.
Usopp used his binoculars to get a closer look and saw that it was royal soldiers.
"It's some royal soldiers! Do you think something happened to Vivi?" Usopp asked.
"Something better not have, I'll kill whoever harms Vivi." Sanji said.
The royal soldiers eventually got close enough for one to speak.
"Straw Hats!" The soldier yelled.
"Yes? What do you want?" Luffy asked.
"Did something happen to Vivi-chan?!" Sanji asked.
"Well erm… yes and no." The soldier answered.
"What happened to Vivi?" Nami asked with a straight face.
"The village in which she attended the meeting could possibly be getting attacked at this very moment! The king as asked us to transport you there to for faster assistance!" The soldier said.
"But isn't she a week away from us? We wouldn't even get close to there in time." Robin added.
"I need to inform the king to change estimated times of travel for different vehicles and people!" The soldier said to himself, he then spoke out loud.
"That's for a journey on foot! With our sand gliders we will get there much faster!" The soldier said.
"We're waiting for Vivi in Alubarna." Luffy said.
The entire squad looked at him in confusion.
"What?!?!" Nami said.
"But sir! Croc –." The soldier was interrupted.
"CROCODILE IS THERE?!" Luffy yelled.
"Yes! That's why we need to get there fast!" The soldier could barely finish before Luffy jumped on a sand glider and made way into the desert.
"Oh great. Come on everybody let's go!" Nami said.
The Straw Hats jumped on the sand gliders and moved through the desert.
SAND VILLAGE
Battle continued to sound throughout the sand as sand jonin and black ops lay throughout the streets. Sasuke jumped from building to building looking for his opponent when a thin sword came flying towards him. He was able to contort his body and flip out the way, but another one came after and grabbed his leg. Sasuke tried to use his snake sword to cut it, to no avail, and was slammed into the ground. Uzanda walked up to him.
"You don't look like a sand shinobi… who might you be?" Uzanda asked.
Sasuke didn't answer, he used his rinnegan to teleport behind Uzanda and tried to kick him, but he dodged it easily. When Uzanda landed his swords came back down to him and he caught them.
"Well that was rude of you." Uzanda said.
"So, this is the sword guy that kid was talking about? This is going to be fun." Sasuke said to himself with a smile.
Uzanda stared at Sasuke who charged him with his sword drawn. The two swords men clashed swords equally.
Sasuke more on the offensive looking for more chances to pierce the hidden mist native. Uzanda blocked most of Sasuke's attacks and attempted to throw him off by tossing one of his swords in the air and continuing to fight with just one.
After a few more blocks Uzanda tugged the airborne sword towards the ground to stab Sasuke from above, but Sasuke did a flip to dodge it and kicked it down towards Uzanda who dodged it barley.
As Uzanda looked at the sword Sasuke attempted to pierce him with an onyx chidori, but Uzanda caught his hand.
"Heh. You're pretty good. This is the chidori isn't it? And those eyes... you wouldn't happen to be an Uchiha would you?" Uzanda asked, smirking.
Sasuke answered with a smirk of his own.
After the brief exchange Uzanda grabbed the chain of his sword that was kicked into the ground and pretended to punch at Sasuke but it was really an attempt to launch the sword at him, which Sasuke saw coming.
He ducked the sword, his arm still in Uzanda's hand, and swept Uzanda off his feet. Uzanda fell on the ground and Sasuke jumped on top of him with his snake sword in his free hand. He raised it towards the sky and slammed it into Uzanda's chest.
The rain swordsman grunted before transforming into a log.
"Tsk. Substitution." Sasuke said.
Uzanda was behind him picking up one of his swords and yanking the chain of another to bring it back to him.
"You're really good, Uchiha, but the real fight starts now." Uzanda said.
Across the village, Kakashi had found who he thought was the blindfolded man and charged him from behind. He attempted to swipe at him, but the man ducked, Kakashi brought the blade down towards the man, but he swayed back and back flipped away to get room.
"Pretty good for wearing a blindfold. What's it for? To taunt your enemies?" Kakashi asked.
"No… not at all… I really can't see. My eyes were taken from me long ago.." Onawagi stated.
"I see." Kakashi said, raising his kunai.
"What is your name warrior?" Onawagi asked.
"Kakashi Hatake. You?" Kakashi answered.
"My name is Onawagi Rinso. Nice to meet you." Onawagi answered.
Onawagi reached into his two pouches on the sides of each of his legs and pulled out the 12" blades that rest there. Onawagi got in his battle stance as Kakashi waited as well.
"What's he doing? Is he waiting for me to move? That must be it. But I can't beat him just standing here. I have to move." Kakashi thought to himself.
Kakashi walked slowly towards the blind man and looked for some sort of opening.
"He'll be EXPECTING me to attack from behind because that's what any man with a brain would do, so, I'll just attack him head on. It's risky, so I'll throw him off then attack him." Kakashi thought.
Kakashi threw a kunai in the air so it landed behind Onawagi, who turned to look in that direction. Kakashi then ran at the man and attempted to hit him with his kunai. Onawagi switched the blades in his hands and thrust them at Kakashi, who barely got out the way. Kakashi jumped out to get room.
"How did he?! How did he know!" Kakashi asked himself.
Onawagi, still in battle stance, turned around.
"Trying to take advantage of my disability? Underestimating your enemy is the number one insult on the battle field. You will not survive this battle." Onawagi said.
Kakashi's face became serious and he charged Onawagi again. Onawagi handled his two blades beautifully and blocked everything Kakashi threw.
Kakashi attempted to thow a left slash, right, then spun around and ducked to sweep him. Both attacks were blocked and Onawagi jumped in the air to dodge the sweep.
Right as Kakashi stood up Onawagi kicked Kakashi in the face then spun around and gave him a hurricane kick that sent him stumbling.
"He's good. Really good. He's obviously a veteran fighter, but even veteran fighter's skills are diminished with disabilities such as blindness. There has to be a reason he fights so well even while blind." Kakashi thought.
Onawagi continued to wait in battle stance.
"Is that all? Did you run away?" Onawagi asked.
Kakashi didn't say anything. Onawagi just waited.
"So, he won't attack me until I attack him, that's for sure. I need to figure out what his secret is!" Kakashi continued to think, "I'll have to attack him again to find a weakness."
Kakashi got up and ran up and started a path to run around Onawagi. The bells jingled.
"No… He's still here." Onawagi said to himself.
Kakashi had started running circles around Onawagi in an attempt to confuse him.
"Really? Running circles around me? You continue to underestimate me… that makes me very upset." Onawagi said.
With those words he disappeared where he stood.
"Huh?" Kakashi said, coming to a complete stop, "Wait!"
SLASH!
Kakashi fell towards the ground while a diagonal line spewing blood came from his chest, but before he hit the ground he turned into a log.
"The substitution jutsu… he told me that jutsu would be a problem." Onawagi said, "Hm?"
The ground below Onawagi rumbled and Kakashi emerged to grab his ankles, but Onawagi jumped in the air and dodged it.
"Nice try, but a rookie mo-." Onawagi was interrupted by Kakashi grabbing him from behind.
"Looks like I wasn't the only one doing any underestimating." Kakashi said before turning them both upsides down and spinning rapidly.
"PRIMARY LOTUS!" Kakashi yelled before slamming against the ground.
The explosion from Kakashi's slam mixed in with the other ones going on. Crocodile and Kumama were still running towards the Kazekage mansion.
"ALMOST THERE CROCODILE-SAN!" Kumama said.
Before Crocodile could speak Naruto jumped in front of him and punched him as hard as he could. Crocodile's entire head turned into sand.
"WHAT!?!?" Naruto said back flipping away.
The sand slowly shaped itself into Crocodile's head again. Crocodile looked down at Naruto with a confused glance.
"Hm? Who's this now?" Crocodile asked.
"Who are these guys?" Naruto asked, looking over at Kumama, "No… what are these guys."
"LOOKS LIKE YOU PICKED THE WRONG FIGHT PUNK!" Kumama yelled, pointing his cannon arm at Naruto, who jumped out of the way.
BOOM!
Naruto jumped onto a building and threw a kunai at Crocodile and it hit him right in the head but didn't do anything. Crocodile took out the kunai and looked up at Naruto annoyed.
"I'm a sand person. These attacks won't do any damage to me." Crocodile said.
"AND I'M A CANNON MAN! NORMAL ATTACKS DON'T HURT ME EITHER!" Kumama said.
Naruto stared at them.
"A sand person? Like Garra? Are you Crocodile?" Naruto asked.
Crocodile and Kumama looked at Naruto, then each other, then back at Naruto.
"You attacked me without even knowing who I was?" Crocodile asked.
"Well I mean you look like a bad guy, so I just assumed heh heh." Naruto chuckled.
"Kill him." Crocodile ordered.
Kumama fired a shot at Naruto who dodged it.
BOOM!
The impact blew the roof off the building. Before Naruto could recover another cannon shot blew him out of the air. Naruto hit the ground hard.
"Grgh." Naruto grunted.
Crocodile appeared over him and tried to impale him with his hook, but Naruto flipped backwards and dodged it. Crocodile continued swinging his hook, but Naruto kept dodging. Crocodile held out his right hand and yelled:
"Quick sand!"
The ground under Naruto stopped him and Crocodile took another swing at him, but he dodged it and grabbed the hook to get launched out of the sand.
While in the air, he charged a rasenshuriken and threw it at the men. Kumama fired two shots out of his cannons and they clashed with Naruto's attack and caused an explosion to cancel each other out, but the extreme wind from Naruto's attack forced Kumama and Crocodile back a little.
Crocodile lowered his guard stared at Naruto.
"You're pretty nimble, but let's see you dodge this." Crocodile lifted his right hand in the air again.
Naruto had a look of confusion on his face.
"DESERT SPADA!" Crocodile yelled while slamming is hand into the ground.
The sand turned into a sharp column of sand that completely sliced anything in the way in half, even the ground was turned into a fissure. Naruto was able to dodge successfully but his success turned to worry as the column was headed for the mansion.
"NO!" Naruto yelled.
SLICE!!!!
When the mansion was hit, it was sliced completely in half. Naruto couldn't believe it. He didn't have time to even be confused, as he felt a cold air on the back of his head, he turned around to see Kumama with a cannon right in his face. Kumama loomed over Naruto with his signature insane smile.
"DIE." Kumama said.
"JET PISTOL!" A voice said.
Kumama looked to the side and was struck by a fist out of no where and sent flying into a building. Crocodile stood with his hook arm in his hand and blew a cloud of smoke. Crocodile's eyes widened with anger as he bit his cigar in half. Crocodile couldn't believe it.
"Impossible..." Crocodile said, "What the hell are you doing here?"
"Woahhhh!! Who-Who are you?!" Naruto asked.
Naruto was amazed and shocked at Luffy turned to face crocodile with a big smile.
On another side of the village, Kakashi looked at Onawagi's body as it lay head first in the sand.
When Kakashi walked over to touch him, he disappeared. Kakashi took a jump back and put his back against a building so he wouldn't be snuck up on. Then a sharp pain hit his shoulder and he bled rapidly.
"Huh?!" Kakashi groaned.
Onawagi appeared in front of him with his head down and a blade in Kakashi's shoulder.
"That was an impressive series of moves you did there, but unfortunately for you, I'm not so easily defeated." Onawagi said, raising his blade, "You're going to die in this battle as I said, but I won't forget your name, Kakashi Hatake."
Before Onawagi could stab Kakashi a giant furry fist grabbed his hand.
"Huh? What's this?" Onawagi asked as he was thrown away from Kakashi. Onawagi flipped and landed, trying to focus until a man tried to axe kick him, but he dodged it, the attack created a sand crater.
"Aye Chopper, looks like we made it just in time to help this poor defenseless old man." Sanji said as he lit a smoke.
Kakashi was stunned at the two.
"I'm not that old... am I?" Kakashi said to himself.
"Who-Who are you two? If I may ask?" Kakashi said.
Sanji and Chopper both smiled at Kakashi.
Sasuke and Uzanda were dueling evenly. The sounds of clanging swords could probably be heard throughout the village. They clashed and then spoke.
"Ugh..You're much better than you should be." Uzanda said.
"I was thinking the same thing." Sasuke said.
"Oh really? I've still got a few tricks up my sleeve!" Uzanda said as he pushed Sasuke to the side using his swords. He turned the rest of the way while throwing a kick that hit Sasuke into the direction of his chains which he wrapped around Sasuke.
Sasuke tried to move but couldn't. Uzanda laughed and then spoke.
"AH HAHAHAHAHAHA! Excellent! Got you right where I want you." Uzanda said, readying to throw his second sword at Sasuke, who was still struggling to move.
"DIE!" Uzanda yelled, throwing his needle sword at Sasuke.
Suddenly, something knocked the needle sword off trajectory and the blade slipped past the chains holding Sasuke, cutting them, and freeing the shinobi.
"WHAT?!" Uzanda yelled as he saw a solid round seed lay next to his sword.
Uzanda traced the trajectory of the seed to...
"FROM THE TOP OF THE SAND GATE?!" Uzanda yelled, looking at the great sand gate.
In the distance, Usopp held a finger up and cheered.
"These new specs are AWESOME! Nobody can escape my sight!" Usopp then began to sing the sniper song.
Uzanda stared at the sand gate way off in the distance then turned his head slowly. A green haired and skeleton swordsman stood in front of Sasuke.
"What do ya say we finish this weirdo off Brook?" Zoro asked.
"Yo ho ho ho ho ho! I have to be careful.. those needle swords could kill me, but I'm already dead! Yo ho ho ho ho ho!!" Brook responded.
Sasuke stared at the two.
"Who are you guys?" Sasuke asked.
Zoro didn't turn around but Brook did.
All three teams yelled in unison.
"WE'RE THE STRAW HAT PIRATES! WE'RE HERE TO SAVE VIVI!"