A/N: lol im too lazy to copy my author note from AO3, but suffice to say MANY APOLOGIES FOR BUILDING UP TO FIGHT SCENES AND THEN SKIPPING THE FIGHT SCENES MY BRAIN JUST COULD NOT FIGHT SCENE!

Hopefully I can write them later and either edit the chapter or make an interlude or something.

As always, thanks for reading! Hope you enjoy!

There's too many players here.

Orochimaru, Oto and Suna, the whole mess with Kusa. Orochimaru impersonated a Kusa team, but that team was found dead.

Now, in the midst of the invasion, the other Kusa team is missing, and-

It's not beyond Orochimaru to kill the people working for him, of course. Kakashi is well aware that most people are considered disposable, to the sannin.

He's also well aware that shinobi are more self-serving than not, his own cute genin aside.

So why would the second Kusa team support him if they know he already killed their comrades?

Or more likely, what could he have promised them-

Ah.

One of the missing Kusa shinobi crosses his path, blind to the threat.

Well that's a little backwards. I wouldn't have expected them to be so highly trusted as to guard the exit.

It would have made more sense, truly, for Kusa to do the snatch, and the Konoha team to guard the exit. The Konoha team could more easily justify their presence, and it would make more sense to muddy the waters as much as possible, especially when the evidence that Kusa was knowingly collaborating with Otogakure is so thin.

Though, perhaps there is something to be said for having a familiar face do the kidnapping. Most of the genin wouldn't have put up much of a fight, seeing a fellow Konoha shinobi.

Well.

At least that'll make getting answers to his questions a bit easier.

Kakashi makes a wide berth around the supposed genin's path, moving to head the boy off.

There's a shout from up ahead- "Someone's approaching-!"

And Kakashi spares half a second to curse chakra-sensors everywhere, before exploding into action.

He signals his hound to catch the one he'd been cutting off as he rockets forwards towards the cry, Sharingan open and one genin dead on the ground before they even see him.

The girl dodges by a hairs' breadth, vibrant red strands fluttering to the ground even as Kakashi pivots, grabbing her wrist and snapping it as he disarms her of her flare.

Her activated flare.

Kakashi dives into a headhunter jutsu, sinking into the earth to bury it before anyone can see.

He explodes from the earth as the girl tries to run,grimacing as she dodges.

She's fumbling another flare, focus split as she tries to keep ahead and still send the alert, but no matter how skilled a sensor she is, Kakashi's faster.

This time, when he catches her wrist, he doesn't let go, kunai coming up-

The bones in her wrist don't grate beneath his fingers.

Kusa does not have a jinchurikki.

His blade stops a twitch away from her pulse, as his grip on her wrist tightens.

The bones do grind then, only half-healed, but…

She's no medic. That's still too fast.

The girl snarls, twisting to the side and letting his blade slice across her throat as she tries to pull her arm free and damn the bones within it.

That wild flurry of red hair as she twists, the sharp glint in her eyes as her shoulder dislocates and the joint at her elbow pops and her wrist snaps all over again-

A lifetime of training keeps Kakashi's grip steady, but the shock still shakes his composure.

"An Uzumaki…?" he can't help but muse, and she freezes.

Not that Kakashi will blame her, he'd quite like to freeze himself, but-

He secures his grip, grabbing her other arm and pinning her.

"What's an Uzumaki doing in Kusa? Or working for Orochimaru, for that matter?"

"Orochi- what? Why would we work for that snake, he killed Iori's team! I knew something was wrong with them, but Shigeri wouldn't listen and then we all had to get interrogated by that guy because of it-!"

"And yet, you are guarding the exit for Orochimaru's men to kidnap one of our genin."

"What-? No, one of your ANBU knew I was a sensor and asked our team to watch this part, to make sure no one came in and to send an alert if we were attacked! They weren't-"

She struggles again, this time clearly trying to turn and face him, but Kakashi doesn't budge. "What was their mask and callsign? If they gave orders to an outside team, and that is a very big if, they would have given their identification for you to tell any other Konoha shinobi you saw to prevent misunderstandings or friendly fire. Do you have these?"

She freezes again, and Kakashi can almost feel her boiling rage beneath his hands. "THAT LYING TWO-FACED BASTARD! FIRST HE KILLS OUR COMRADES AND THEN HE FUCKING USES US TO- LET ME GO- I'M GOING TO RIP HIS GUTS OUT AND SHOVE THEM BACK DOWN HIS THROAT-"

She jerks again, trying to break free, and this time Kakashi loosens his grip, shifting his hand to her shoulder as he smiles brightly. "Maa maa, let's not be hasty. Personally, I'd rather catch our little snake-traitor first, hmm? Perhaps you could help me with that?"

She turns to look at him, and then her gaze drifts further, back to the corpse of her teammate. The anger vanishes in an instant, replaced with something colder.

Internally, Kakashi winces.

"Why should I help you?"

Kakashi sweatdrops. "I suppose sorry doesn't quite cut it here…"

The kick, as ineffectual as it is, probably is wholly deserved.

Kakashi smiles again, a little strained at the edges. "I'm aware I made a hasty judgment call, and we can talk about this later, but I'm sure our little thief has some sort of signal you're meant to respond to as an all-clear, and I'd really prefer to catch them without trying to hunt down all their little backup paths, ne~?"

She jerks her foot out of his grip, and stomps a few paces away, face a rictus of emotions. Kakashi's left eye flickers open, then closed.

…best give her a moment before he pushes again.

He can always catch her if she tries to run, after all.

Hopefully his hound was able to take her other teammate alive like he'd directed.

He really doesn't want to try and tempt that Uzumaki temper a second time, even if she is only a genin.

This is a mess.

The Ichibi crashes into their fight with all the grace of a drunk nukenin, and Kabuto seethes. He's not quite sure how the ichibi, who's supposed to be going wild in the village proper, has managed to get all the way to the outskirts to turn their already-precarious fight into an all-out brawl.

But when he finds out who's responsible, he's going to eviscerate them.

It shouldn't even have been possible for two genin and a handful of shadowclones to have held up the Sound Four as long as they did. He should have been able to make a clean escape with the Yamanaka girl and the idiots who got themselves followed would have stayed behind and cleaned up their own damned mess.

But there's something unnatural about Haruno's fire.

It melts Kidomaru's webs, renders them useless, burns and spreads at a speed that should not be possible, and with every hit the girl takes it burns hotter.

Ukon can't separate from his twin for their usual strategies, his weaker physical constitution struggling to hold up-

Jirobu can't absorb the chakra, screaming something about it burning from the inside-

Kabuto himself feels his skin blister when he runs through the flames, and yet-

The Yamanaka girl in his arms isn't even red.

Where does a bloodline like this even come from?!

There probably aren't even traps anymore with how much of the forest around them is burning, sand crystalizing into glass as the bijuu rampages-

The Ichibi roars in frustration, but the mad laughter comes from behind.

Kabuto turns, catching sight of pink hair amidst the burning trees. She laughs again, wild and sharp, blood smeared across her face, one eye shut, and the fire laughs with her.

Like the Hozuki clan of Mizu, she seems less a person and more the physical embodiment of her element, fire dancing across her skin and blurring-

That's exactly what she is-

The realization sears like the flames surrounding him. It's not some unheard-of kekkei genkai, not entirely-

The Hozuki clan's ability to turn to water, to become water, to control water as part of themselves-

It's the same sort of bloodline.

Fire's just.

Far.

More.

Destructive.

It licks at the tips of her hair as she dances between Jirobu and Kidomaru, ignites down her arm as she catches Sakon by his sash, lashes out from her foot as she kicks back to keep the other two from coming up behind her-

She twists, hefting Sakon even as she brings her foot down, igniting underbrush as she throws him bodily into his teammates, fire still eating through his clothes.

She holds, panting, lone eye turning up to take in the jinchurikki smothering the outer edges of her fire-

"Need a little help, Naruto?" she calls, voice bright and cheery, laughter in her eyes as fire dances over her arms.

Her grin is sharp.

She's not seriously planning to take on the Ichibi-?!

This mission is a failure. It was a failure the moment those idiots let themselves be followed, perhaps even before then, the moment they failed to realize what their target really was. At this point, Kabuto wonders if she'd even stay unconscious long enough to reach the wall, nevermind anything else.

If they even got lucky enough to put her down in the first place.

The information is more important. Orochimaru-sama needs to know what they're actually dealing with. With proper seals and preparation, they can make a trap, something she can't burn her way out of.

There's nothing the Yamanaka can tell him that he hasn't figured out for himself, and if he wants to make it out, she's just deadweight.

Kabuto drops the girl, and turns to run through the gap in the flames that the Ichibi's sand has made.

He needs to get out.

Shikamaru's pretty sure this isn't supposed to be a clearing. In fact, he's 100% certain his family is going to be calling for blood by the end of this, he can't even contemplate how much damage has been done to the forest because if he does he's going to go bury himself in a training ground somewhere his mother will never find him because there's not going to be a moment of peace in the house for the next year-

His thoughts screech to a halt as he catches sight of Ino being tossed to the ground, silver hair glinting as the other shinobi makes a run for it. He makes an aborted leap forward, Team 8's sensei catching his arm as Inuzuka Hana bounds ahead with her hounds.

Trained medic.

Right.

Focus on the plan.

"Choji, we're taking the big guy. Kiba, back up Sasuke. Kurenai-sensei…"

She grimaces. "We're no match for the Ichibi, but Toru and I will do our best to keep it away from you all until you can safely disengage. Try to move your fights away from it, you don't want to be in that crossfire. A lot of the traps have been burned through, this close to the fighting, but be wary of strays."

He nods, turning with Choji towards the mess of fighting.

Shino and Hinata move forward, Hinata following Kiba as Shino fingers a kunai.

Bugs don't like fire. Right.

…neither do I.

Fire makes for a lot of shadows, but they aren't stable. They're not easy to connect to, to grab, constantly flickering and dancing with the wandering flames. Masters like Shiki-ojii can do terrifying things with fire-shadows, ten thousand tiny threads to pluck a man to pieces.

…Shikamaru has never bothered to put in any amount of time into learning something like that. The amount of effort, the amount of focus, it's never seemed worth it. A party-trick for his grandfather's brother to break out during the Fire Festivals and never actually useful.

Suddenly, it seems like a very useful technique to know.

No sense wishing now.

…Where's Natsu?

There's something bright and painful and wrong about Sakura-chan's chakra coils. Her chakra's always looked a little odd, a little different from the other girls… Hinata thinks of the Academy, of Naruto's bright inferno, of the twisted points that make up Shino's modified network, of the starbursts of tenketsu behind Sasuke's eyes, Sakura's strange layers folding beneath her pathways and the deep tenketsu that made Hinata think of nothing more than a still lake with hidden depths. But now her tenketsu seem-

Not swollen, maybe, or bruised, but-

Shimmery?

There's something about her chakra, about her pathways and her tenketsu, and they shimmer like fish scales in sunlight.

Something about her looks like it wants to break and change, grow into something new, flowers blooming beneath her skin, like Hashirama-sama himself, growing and twisting, skin become wood become life-

It looks like dying.

Like she's dancing along a cliff, on the verge of jumping, plunging, becoming something else if she just takes one more step-

With her Byakugan, Hinata can't see the things she can see with her normal eyes. Can't see color or faces, can't see the ground beneath her feet as anything more than an overwhelming pulse of life and chakra that she's long-since learned to filter out and ignore.

It only makes the differences stand out sharper.

There's something shimmering like scales in Sakura-chan's chakra, something fluttering like wings all around them, bright weaves of chakra in every flame, and when Hinata looks with her clan's eyes, she thinks of the stories of dragons.

She looks at Haruno Sakura, through the trees, through the flames, sees chakra as it strives to become something else, and Hinata sees death.

Hinata doesn't understand, not really, not how this is possible, and not why it's happening now, this awakening, this- this becoming.

But if someone doesn't stop her, Haruno Sakura is going to burn herself into something else, death-through-life-twisting-changing-

Hinata runs.

Kiba shouts, her sensei shouts, but with every beat of the battle, the flames shift, wings-upon-wings-upon-wings-

Hinata thinks of the little civilian girl with her uncivilian chakra pathways, thinks of Naruto burning bright enough to blind, and his whole-hearted crush on their pink haired classmate, and her, too scared to talk to either of them.

Hinata thinks of Neji, and her failure, her humiliation, of surrendering because she couldn't hurt him and her family's disgust, disappointment, punishment-

Hinata's a failure. She failed her cousin, her family, her team, herself-

She won't fail Naruto here. She won't fail Sakura-chan either.

She sees death dance on tongues of fire, changes breaking through a surface she can't quite understand, and no matter what she won't let her classmate die.

Hinata flies.

Her juuken strikes true.

Naruto has no idea what's going on.

One moment, he's telling Natsu about Gaara, and trying to reach him to wake him up, and they're coming up with ideas, Natsu's eyes wild and his grin sharp, fire burning higher and higher-

The next-

For a moment everything trembles, the sight of Natsu collapsing, fire sputtering out like a candle burned too low, Naruto feels the Kyuubi's chakra surge, vision fracturing at the edges as-

Hi…na…ta?

He snarls, clawing at the very edges of control as two tails whip in frenzy behind him but he can't hurt Hinata wait-waitwaitwaitwait-

Claws dig into palms as she rolls off of Natsu, panting, eyes wide with her Byakugan active.

Naruto-

Doesn't understand-

Everything cracks, like pieces of his vision are being swallowed up fracture by fracture-

Breathebreathebreathebreathe-

The Ichibi roars.

Naruto roars back.

Jiraiya crashes into a clusterfuck.

Naruto scrambles up the Suna jinchurikki in blind fury, two tails lashing at every attempt to grab him, brushing off every injury like it doesn't exist, skin bubbling with how quickly he's healing over the spears of sand that carve through him like soft clay.

To the side, two jonin work in tandem, trying to use some sort of genjutsu to- hide the battlefield? Or possibly disorient the bijuu, as fruitless an endeavor as that is.

Below, one of the Hyuuga brats drags an unconscious Natsu away from the battle, trembling, eyes wide in adrenaline and fear.

A little further away, Kakashi's third brat and assorted gaggle of classmates struggle against a squad of Orochimaru's Sound shinobi, two of which are clearly in some heightened form of the bastard's curse seal.

Jiraiya ignores the slowly-dying fires around them.

Mostly because if he acknowledges them, he's going to start crying.

He's not responsible for these brats!

He isn't!

They can't blame him for whatever Natsu decides to do!

This isn't coming out of his pay!

He wakes, groggy and aching, to a cacophony of noise.

Voices overlapping, someone shouting right next to his head, some sort of argument. Itching beneath his skin.

It feels too quiet.

…Mother?

An empty silence is the only thing that greets him.

He takes to the trees as soon as they're stable enough to bear his weight again, a flicker through the leaves as he leaps from one to the next.

This has been a disaster, but they can recover from this. The other nations won't take the breach of Konoha's security in such a way lightly, circling Konohagakure like sharks smelling blood in the water.

They'll be able to try again for what they need, and easily too, as Konoha scrambles to protect themselves against other outside threats. And next time, they'll be prepared.

Kabuto whistles, the sharp sounds of a hunting hawk cutting through the forest.

The soft cries of a red-pecked owl echo back.

He changes course slightly, dropping down to greet Karin as the wall comes into view, a dozen different words dancing over his tongue as he decides what to say.

She shuffles nervously, playing with her hair.

Something's wrong.

He doesn't even have a chance to process the crackling lightning before the bloody fist rips through his chest.

The damage reports are extensive, and still pouring in.

The Hokage, dead.

Over half the market district, demolished.

The Administration district, unusable.

The ANBU archives, torn apart.

The Nara forest, over two thirds burned, some of it to the ground.

Orochimaru, escaped.

Sunagakure's Kazekage, missing.

The Daimyo's faith in Konoha: irreparably destroyed.

Danzo scowls at the latest report on the successful re-sealing of the Suna jinchurikki.

Another political problem in the making. Jiraiya should have consulted him before just going ahead and altering the seal of another nation's jinchurikki, when the Kazekage shows his face he'll use that to weasel his way out of paying for damages, what was the fool thinking just restrain it and leave their faulty seals to them-

Danzo sets down the crumpled report, biting the words back as he dismisses his agent.

What's done is done.

It's a more productive use of his time to speak to the others, and figure out their next moves.

Konoha has to be decisive.

They can't afford to be seen as weak, now of all times.