02-05-2007, 05:44 AM
... is the reason I haven't been around lately. Well, that, and Uni, and Shinobido (which, while not perfect, is pretty nifty), not necessarily in that order.
There was originally supposed to be more of it, but I decided to stick with one major even per 'short' and stuck the rest in the ideas file for later perusal. Still took me three rewrites to get it somewhat decent.
Complete with blatant cliches galore.
---
Dancing flames, reaching up into the night sky, the rising columns of smoke akin to fingers grasping the firmament to rip it asunder.
The ground littered with blood. Littered with ash. Littered with embers of still sparking steel and charcoal skeletons of domiciles.
And the skies open up with a torrent, racing down to bathe it all in tears.
The human will is a wondrous, frightening thing. Strong enough, and it can let you move mountains, overcome any adversity, walk where others invariably fall ... for a price.
With the rain, a will of fire sputters. Flickers.
And dies.
---
Foxes Wild
third in the Kyuubi Chronicles line
by Griever
Disclaimer: goes here ^_^.
---
It's old.
In truth, nobody knows just how old.
Once upon a time, it was rumored to be cursed, but such tales didn't survive the test of time. Not with the sheer span between then and now. Back when the woods were lush, and there was water aplenty ...
Now?
A crater of barren ground in a landscape of such, on a spire of stone, in the land of endless sands. Baked for day upon day, upon week, upon month, upon year, upon decade ... and so on into the centennial ranges. The springs are no more, the woods are less than a memory ... and yet, the crater endures.
By right, erosion should have dealt it a crushing blow ... but somehow, no such thing seems to have affected it.
There is, as they say, a grain of truth to every myth.
Even those long since gone into the sands.
In the middle of a barren waste, days from any settlement, human or otherwise, the winds stir.
They roll.
They roar.
As a crackling, shimmering bolt of Otherness splits the heavens and earth for an instant so brief, it would have been considered an illusion.
The loud crack and whoosh of displaced air that follows is no illusion, though, and for a moment the winds dance as if directed by demons, slicing stone, scattering of sand, and tearing clouds asunder.
Then, as if never having been gone at all, silence falls. Complete, and total.
A footfall. Rough tread on equally rough stone.
Shambling and hesitant.
Followed by another.
And another.
And a third one, more certain, more decisive.
Eyes look to the South and East, seeing beyond the horizon, ignorant of the blistering heat coming down from the heavens.
A minute passes, turning into a half, then a full hour ...
Hands clench, filled with a profound sense of emptiness and wrongness.
Legs tense.
And, like the wind, the figure is gone.
Little more than a spot of blackness against the white sands.
It has a grave to rob.
Its own.
***
A bonfire, over a month ago.
A demon.
A kunoichi.
On the way back 'home'.
"Ne, Kyuubi?"
With a bag of bloody metal.
"What, no 'bastard'?"
And a trussed up prisoner.
"Saa ... if I asked you to give me a reason, would you promise?"
Crackling memories, and the scent of ash on the wind.
"Promise? Promise what, ku-no-ichi?"
"I want to belong. For once, I want to belong."
A cause. Not her cause, but one she'd chosen to follow of her own free will.
It feels ... odd ... to have one of those again.
At least, one that isn't focused on getting revenge.
Eyes open to a long familiar ceiling of a sparsely furnished room. Bare walls, few decorative knick-knacks, a picture or two.
She wonders if this is any better than the years of being obsessed with a snake-bastard.
Maybe.
Just maybe.
***
Sometimes, a trickle is all it takes.
Strength.
If only they had the strength.
Once upon a time, they were titans. Once upon a time, they were a force, no, a Force to be reckoned with. They had the strength. And the will to use it. Enough to carve out a place for themselves in this lush, fruitful land, and go as far as to nearly make it their own.
Now?
What did they have left but withered shadows of their former glory?
The unholy terror of a lifetime, leaving nothing but fire and destruction in its wake, now cheerfully mocking them with its presence.
One of their greatest weapons turning upon itself in a fit of egoism and madness.
A steady decline of their power, with mongrels snapping at heels to grab even the least shreds of it.
But there were ways.
They remember.
All things documented. All things written down. Sealed up, nice and tight, in the deep darkness at the bottom of the Archives. Condemned, forbidden, undisturbed save for one instance. And one that took care of itself on its own.
They ask themselves: "See?"
They nod, and smile, and grin.
After all, this has to be a sign; They needn't bother themselves with that mishap. Such things take care of themselves. It is the way of things.
And these are desperate times.
Desperate times call for desperate measures.
For silent footsteps, and moonless nights, and blackened faces.
For things that are not quite legitimate.
After all, it's for the good of the Village.
And if it lets them remove another problem, while fixing the first, well then, that's just being efficient.
So they call, and he relays, and gives orders ...
... and on a moonless night, on silent footsteps, face blackened, a figure treads.
Strength is needed. A weapon is needed. Another has been broken.
To gather the pieces, to melt them down, to re-forge them ...
... and then, the Leaf will have its weapon, once again.
To enter is a triviality. To infiltrate, not much of a challenge.
The figure knows how these minds think, knows how they operate. It knows how they were trained, knows what they know, knows _more_ than they know.
To incapacitate is a exercise at best, and to weave a genjutsu around the two insensate, unconscious nins is little more than a formality.
Porcelain masks glinting in the lighting of the hall reflect its passage, the eyes behind them closed in forced slumber.
*Ker-clack*
Unlocked.
The soundless opening of a door.
*Beep*
*Beep*
*Beep*
Inky black hair. Bandages. Unresponsive, comatose, but still restrained. What skin is visible is pale enough to almost seem as if it were glowing in the relative darkness.
"It seems we were fated to meet after all, Uchiha Sasuke-kun."
Inky black hair. Eyes as pitch. Burnished metal on his brow, and face darkened with soot. His cloths black, plain, utilitarian, nondescript. Smiling.
Sometimes, a trickle is more than enough.
*Crack*
***
The quiet clues her in first, before anything else can.
By itself, it isn't enough, but it's a start.
There's just something missing, something not consciously noticed but nonetheless there.
And anyway, she knows this sort of quiet, though it's been a while since she's been exposed to it. She may be a medic first and foremost, but that changes nothing in that she's also a ninja. A kunoichi of Konohagakure.
Genjutsu are chakra constructs. Insidious, crafty things that guide the mind into patterns their originator desires them to.
With a sound akin to that of glass breaking, and a sensation like cold drops of water falling behind her collar, the illusion around her shatters ...
It's the smell that hits first.
Thick, cloying, and just plain _wrong_ in place of what should have been sterile and antiseptic.
More jarring, though, is the sense of profound _emptiness_ that suddenly comes over her, as if the place were no more than an empty ... shell ...
*Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee*
The sound is a concerto of unitone, almost wailing, echoing through the halls in simple, mechanical efficiency.
A timeless instant of monochrome, flickering electrical lighting, and plain concrete walls that reverb with the keening noise. Shifting shadows. And the smell.
Not of blood. Or rather, not just of blood.
Slaughter.
The medic in her despairs and disbelieves, and room after room after room ...
... by the end of the mind numbing realization, Shizune is very hard pressed not to retch.
***
There's nothing gradual about it. No momentary befuddlement, no partial lucidity.
Just a wall with consciousness on one side, and a blankness on the other.
Maybe because he doesn't dream. Hasn't in longer than he can pin down, exactly. And he likes it like that.
Dreams rarely meant anything 'good' back when he still used to have them, and he isn't really fond of them.
About as fond as he is of dogs, actually.
About as fond as he is of somebody knocking on his door at two in the wee hours of the morning.
It's annoying, and an interruption, and he hates interruptions.
Doesn't seem to change the situation any, though, or keep them from happening. As if getting used to this damn body wasn't hard enough without them.
Get up, grumble and snarl a little, pull on whatever's on hand and meander through the dark apartment.
Put hand through the door.
Yank it open, with a growl of "WHAT?!" that reaches all the way into the subsonic and shakes a few windows. Doors. Metal railings.
Little angry there, aren't we?
Place is fucking deserted anyway, so it isn't like there'd be any neighbors who'll complain. Even if the most that'd have gotten them would have been a free case of cranial trauma. At best.
***
He's keeping pace.
It's almost, _almost_ more than he can manage. Which, truth be told, fills him with a mute sort of disbelief.
He knows what the boy is, of course. How could he not? It ... resonates ... with a part of him that he'd really, really rather not think about at the moment. Despite being useful, the sheer amount of unfortunate memories connected to those strings of genetic code makes it difficult for Tenzo to contemplate.
Still, a genin, even one trained by a Sannin, and a Jinchuuriki to boot, pressing an ANBU's speed to the limits ... it's certainly impressive.
Almost enough to let him ignore the nervous tic his face developed after Uzumaki's ... creative ... way of greeting late-night messengers.
Unnerving.
Considering that he and Mitarashi-kun were listed as having cashed in on the bounty for _Orochimaru's_ head, more than unnerving.
Then they're there, freefalling and skidding against a wall, coming down in front of the Village's hospital - the Hokage's pride and joy, as it were - and the moody teenager Tenzo woke up not ten minutes ago ... changes.
That's the best way he can describe it, really, even in his own mind. There's nothing overt, nothing tangible, not even a fluctuation of his chakra - what he shows of it, at least - but the resonance ...
Suddenly, the experienced ANBU wants nothing more than to get at least a few hundred feet worth of distance between the two of them.
"That's a _lot_ of death," Uzumaki says.
Tenzo can't stop himself from shivering at the faint tones of ... appreciation in that voice.
***
She thought she'd dealt with it. Thought she finally had it under control, finally managed to get on top of the demons in her own mind ...
"... we've got whatever assets we could get on this short a notice scouring the village, the Hunter-nin squads on the Wall ..."
She thought wrong.
This, maybe more than any other place in Konohagakure no Sato, was _her_ place. Where she'd put her heart and soul into her work ...
It was fortunate that Shizune understood her shishou well enough to anticipate this sort of problem.
"Ne. Ne. Ne. Ho-ka-ge," a voice beside her singsongs, making her jerk in barely concealed surprise, startling Shizune out of her report. "How rude. The party's over, and you only now invite me? Cruel, cruel woman."
Her apprentice pales. She told her, unlike her _student_. It's been too long with just the two of them for Tsunade not to tell Shizune, even with the occasional misunderstanding and difference in opinion. Fortunately, save for the two, now three of them, the roof is otherwise deserted.
"That was ... quick," she comments, feigning nonchalance.
If anything, the last week and a half had taught her one thing. The kitsune doesn't care about being rude, or other people replying in kind. It doesn't matter. Kyuubi, in his own words, doesn't _need_ a pathetic excuse like that to 'end' someone. She doesn't know whether to be happy, or afraid of that.
Speaking of which ...
"Where's ... ?"
"Messenger-boy is off playing around down below," Kyuubi said, grinning. "Wouldn't know a copy from his ass."
"What? Not even Kage Bunshin are that accurate to someone," Shizune bit her tongue before she could complete said sentence.
"Not that accurate to someone who's been my 'minder' for as long as I've been 'back'? Pfeh. Don't insult me. Jigoku's sake, the kusogaki could do it with no problems," sneered the Youkai.
... well, she had a faint hope that he wasn't aware of Tenzo watching him. There it goes, crashing and burning.
"... what the hell are you wearing?"
Naruto's body blinks back at her, momentarily thrown, then looks down and shrugs.
Fishnet shirt, rust colored vest and pants, woven sandals ... it just, somehow, doesn't mesh and fits at the same time.
"Blame Mitarashi. She was the one you sent out to get me something to wear instead of the clothes looted from Oto."
***
Straight blade.
No guard.
Blackened, non-reflective, and perfectly _sharp_.
The night itself wrapped around them.
Scent the wind. Feel it. The sky boils above, the earth shudders, and within ...
... flame.
Driving on, guided by a dozen pairs of eyes.
There!
The sound carries, up through the soles and into the mind, driving one arm out to the side in a sharp, violent arc.
Steel scrapes against stone. Sparks fly.
The flaring of a single candle in the darkness, before it's snuffed out.
*Drip*
*Drip*
*Drip*
Behind a wall, a body slumps to the floor.
Straight blade.
No guard.
Blackened, non-reflective, and perfectly _sharp_.
Made to cut, made to pierce, made to kill.
The flame burns brighter and brighter.
***
"This is it? Well ... can't say I'm surprised, really."
The Legendary Toad-Hermit Jiraiya doesn't claim to have seen it all, despite occasional rumblings to the contrary. Never has, never will, and knows the sheer impossibility of that sort of claim.
It's what keeps him going. Not an obsessive desire to know it _all_, but a deeply rooted will to make the most of what he has and see as much of this world as he can. It's wonderful, and it's terrible, and it keeps him still mostly sane with every plodding step along the stream of time's progression.
In that way, he and his onetime friend were always polar opposites when it came to approaches towards living. To Orochimaru, it's always been a death sentence in waiting, which was something he was driven to avoid so badly that he turned it, and himself, into a twisted mockery.
Jiraiya's, on the other hand, can be summed up in three simple words to live by.
Life is strength.
Keeping that in mind, he's seen a lot.
Some days, though, the realization that this journey of discovery will, undoubtedly, involve new and extremely unpleasant moments makes him reconsider said approach.
He's always been one to trust his instincts, to a degree that would likely astound anyone who ever found out. Over the years and through enough experiences to fill a dozen lifetimes, he's honed it into a powerful tool. To him, in fact, it's the _most_ powerful tool in his arsenal.
And instinct is telling him he's standing in the middle of something very, very nasty. Not just because of the blood on the walls and floor, or the bodies, or even the distinct off feeling about the lingering chakra in the air.
Out behind his back, other Konoha nin are busy with the cleanup, if you can call it that.
This, though, is where whatever it was that happened started.
Seal scribbled walls - some of them his work - and no windows, broken medical monitoring equipment, snapped restrains and a broken bed-frame.
And a body.
One that looks like it was mauled by a lawnmower, then flash fried into a husk looking as if it were months, if not years old.
The corpses of the two ANBU who'd been stationed outside were in similar condition, though maybe not to such an extent.
And there's that odd undercurrent of tension hanging in the air. One that's an old, old acquaintance.
It proves true a moment later, when a sensation that has his hair stand on end and his eyes widen sweeps over him, passing on through and past as if it were a wave cresting over the Village. Or like the concentric pattern of disturbance when a raindrop *plinks* into a still body of water.
***
A dancing, whirling, stifling vortex of chakra.
The source, emaciated and mottled with flecks of golden light the design of which makes it appear as thought they were in the process of strangling their 'host', leaning on a straight, black blade the tip of which digs into the soil.
Questing, seeking tendrils of virulent purple seep into the ground as the conflagration around this one-man epicenter intensifies.
*Beep*
"Sasuke-kun ..."
*Beep*
"You're stronger than this, Sasuke-kun. Now that you're away from that place, now that you're back."
*Beep*
"Please, wake up. It's finally over, so please wake up. Now that you can finally try to be happy. Jiraiya-sama's report said Itachi is dead, so you don't have to lock yourself away anymore."
*Beep*
"Itachi is dead."
*Beep*
"Itachi is dead."
*Beep*
"Itachi is dead."
*Beep*
"It seems we were fated to meet after all, Uchiha Sasuke-kun."
Only one remains. One part, one piece, one working, of the two which were supposed to complete him.
He will not be denied.
***
It isn't subtle. In fact, there isn't even a token attempt at making it less of a glaring beacon to anyone with even the least refined ability to sense chakra.
In a Hidden Village, that's quite a bit of the population.
She's ahead of them, though. Simply because she doesn't need the huge beacon.
The painful twinge in the back of her neck is enough.
It's why she isn't even remotely surprised _where_ she's heading towards.
When the flare finally fades, Mitarashi Anko is perched atop a power pole, looking towards a sector of Konoha that's been defunct and deserted for years now.
And she still doesn't know what it is that makes her more uneasy about the situation. The fact that she'd almost managed to close the chapter of her life involving her old teacher and his get? Or the fact the bundle strapped to her back seemed to be almost humming.
"What the hell am I supposed to do with this, bastard?"
A hand travels back to free the wrappings from around the bundle's top.
"Learn to use it. It would be a shame to let something like that gather dust."
She grasps the revealed hilt.
"Swords were never really my thing."
It really is humming, the leather beneath her palm vibrating in a way that could be almost described as eager.
"Learn to appreciate the irony, then. You keep what you kill."
The sword goes perfectly still, but she clearly feels tension mounting ...
Then she's moving, synapses burning, muscles pumping as she plummets downwards, actually running along the pole she was perched on in a full out sprint.
Kunai, windmill shuriken, senbon, and a variety of other thrown projectiles slam into the pole, coming uncomfortably close and in some cases actually skittering from her reinforced longcoat before she's jumping, pushing off from her erstwhile perch and raceway, tumbling through the air to roll across a rooftop and disappear beneath its far lip.
She's still moving when she hits the ground, skidding backwards even as hands come up to brandish a pair of kunai, darting to and fro in a frantic effort that has oncoming projectiles being slapped out of the air by either them or her coat sleeves' ceramic inlays.
When she's finally stopped, panting somewhat, eyes warily scanning her surroundings, she doesn't register what she's seeing for the first little while.
She spends a second merely annoyed by the obstructions to her field of view, though in the back of her mind there's a note being made of where they are and that they'd likely make good cover if need be.
Which is when _what_ they are registers, and she curses. Briefly. Viciously. Entirely appropriately considering the situation.
It's also the reason why, when the darkness of the now moonless, cloudy night that covers the skyline is interrupted here and there by something, she doesn't dismiss it out of hand.
Though she's wishing. Boy is she wishing.
Her back against the side of one, and surrounded by an entire clan graveyard's worth of coffins that had seemingly sprouted up out of the ground, with pair upon pair of crimson eyes glaring down at her, Anko's finds herself thinking that this is either going to be a very long night, or a very very short one.
A giant toad dropping down onto a group of her assailants, demolishing the building that serves as their perch in the process tilts the odds towards the former by at least a little bit ...
***
"It shouldn't have worked," Jiraiya says, bringing his ever present scroll holder up in a parry. It's big, it's bulky, it's likely got more reinforcing seals on it than a castle rampart.
Projectiles, and even the occasional Katon, don't really do much against it. There's a reason for the densetsu tag his name's earned. Legendary isn't just for show, or talking himself into some pretty little thing's panties, after all.
On his own, he's a force to be reckoned with. And this time around, he's hardly on his own.
"Well, obviously, there's something you've overlooked!"
Tsunade is furious and it shows. A head pops like an overripe melon, dirt and strips of flesh and bone showering outwards from the point of impact.
"The damn Edo Tensei isn't just a Jutsu! It's not even a single ritual, but a whole slew of them. It can't be used offhand, not without preparation, not on such a scale, not ... behind you!"
She twists out of the way in an impossibly fast dodge, the kodachi still managing to slip into her guard but barely drawing even a faint line of blood along her flank as she wheels around to retaliate ...
... and the blow goes wide, or rather, goes through where the head of her attacker should be, if she hadn't taken it off not a minute ago. In its place, she can see the macabre spectacle of dirt and flesh and skin and slivers of bone drawing slowly upwards, reforming grotesquely into their prior form ...
... before the body is ripped apart, into charred, sizzling chunks.
"Actually, Hebi-yarou did it when I was fighting him, though that was only one person," Kyuubi's hand trails ash and wisps of youki. "Besides, he's doing it wrong. And at this sort of scale? Pathetic little maggot has to be burning on the inside just to keep all that chakra he shoved into himself down at your hospital flowing, not to mention contained. And as soon as he's _out_, he's done. Just keep them contained, and from killing too many people on the off chance that they can feed themselves."
The kitsune grins wickedly, looking straight at Tsunade.
"Just kill them."
The spike of killing intent went right past the rational bits of her brain, to the place that was as old as humanity itself, and seemed to take up residence.
"One after another, or all in one go, it doesn't matter one way or the other."
Wisps of youki drift from his hands, trailing backwards, over his shoulders, and slowly intermingling with chakra.
"And if they get up again, then just _kill_ them again, no matter how many times."
A quartet of Kage Bunshin slowly wind their way into existence, then momentarily shift to be replaced by four large, white furred, crimson eyed foxes.
"We can do that, can't we, Ho-ka-ge-chan?"
***
He's always been proud of his eyes. That they were just that tiny bit better, just that tiny bit more accurate. That they'd never, ever lied to him, or tried to sugar-coat the world.
For the first time in his life, Hyuuga Neji wishes he could afford to turn them off.
It's the vilest thing he's ever seen.
Dirt and chakra and dead flesh breathing and moving and wanting nothing more than to _kill_.
... he doesn't though.
Some would say he'd just cold like that.
Efficient.
The very embodiment of the idea that is 'shinobi'.
But it has less to do with that, and more to do with the first of these mockeries he's encountered that night was just getting done slaughtering its way through a nursery.
***
The last time he'd seen this sort of intensity was three years back, during the invasion of the Sound and Sand, and that time he was the one playing nursemaid to the Academy students.
This time, he's in the thick of it ...
And deep inside, he's afraid.
It's why he hasn't gone on to become Jounin. It's what scares him, more than anything else in the world.
He slams through the door, armored shoulder of the vest shattering through without much in the way of problems, just as a lash of chakra laden razor wire carves its way through the space above him, going through wood and metal like a hot knife through butter. Rolling, scrambling, tossing off a spread of kunai and caltrops behind him he dashes through the dark, dusty interior.
They follow.
He's good at running, though. Good at delaying, stalling, keeping them occupied. For a onetime prankster, these things are second nature, or even closer than that.
And he's out, his pursuers occupied inside for the moment, with Bunshins and annoying little tricks and traps that don't really _hurt_ ...
... but then, that isn't their purpose.
He doesn't pause, doesn't even turn around, before reaching a length of wire camouflaged better than the traps inside are - and he knows his camouflage. You didn't run pranks past the noses of the old Uchiha Police Force on a regular basis without being damn good at that.
He's grabbing for it.
Pulsing his chakra through his hand and fingers.
Vaulting over the top of a low stone wall as the explosive tags spread through the old place go off, multiple blasts filling its insides with concussive waves as well as sharp and pointy bits of metal before bringing the whole two story building down on those within and grinning, grinning, _grinning_ so hard his scar aches.
He's afraid of this, more than anything else in the world.
Because, when he can't fight it anymore?
When it takes over?
When he totally loses control?
He _likes_ it.
And right now Umino Iruka ...
... Chuunin of Konohagakure no Sato ...
... is ...
... _loving_ it.
***
It's funny how she doesn't feel any pain.
The wound is hardly clean - rather, it's ragged edged, ugly, and winding its way just barely past an artery as it twists and turns along flesh. That had been what one of her attackers was aiming for in the first place, and she doesn't know _how_ she'd managed to try and dodge as quickly as she had. Or why her mind decided one sacrifice to be more affordable than the other.
Or, no.
She realizes well and good the reason for the latter.
It's selfish, really, but she knows that most things in life are.
Her parents aren't ninja.
So, to protect them; to do what she can so that these murdering dogs wearing human guise never get within even a kunai's throw of them ...
The pill is one that works quickly, and directly, but only for a comparatively brief time period. The second one is less effective, and a stimulant rather than a painkiller ...
She pops the first one, gives her Jounin-sensei the best glare she can muster in her current state, even as her teammates struggle to give them a moment of relative peace, and speaks.
Or rather, demands.
Her words as devoid of inflection and numb to her ears as her soul feels at the prospect of coming home to a dead family.
"I can still fight. Cauterize it."
He doesn't argue. She can tell he wants to. Argue. Yell. Protest. Give impassioned speeches about nothing being unsalvageable and if she'd be willing to fall back and ...
... his face is uncharacteristically grim as he nods and does it anyway.
It still doesn't hurt.
It doesn't hurt, but for some reason, she's screaming her lungs out as the kunai against her face is pumped with hot chakra and flesh sizzles.
It doesn't hurt when she gets back up, leaning on his shoulder, one side of her face and her neck and one shoulder wrapped in bandages.
It doesn't hurt when she leaps up, her mind a calculating machine of angles and velocities, her hands both steady and her aim still miraculously unerring, despite the lack of stereoscopic vision.
Her Village needs her.
Her Team needs her.
Her Family needs her.
If it's for them, no matter what it is, Tenten will never hurt.
***
"Having fun yet, ku-no-ichi?"
The voice infuriates her.
Annoys her.
And, oddly, comforts her.
Though she'll never let on about that last bit.
"Aho. About time you showed up."
Panting.
In a field of nicked, scarred, marred and sliced coffins.
And blood.
"See? You're using it after all."
Swordhilt clutched in her hands, blade inverted, tip digging into the ground as she half-kneels, leaning against it.
"... because I'm out of anything and everything else, bastard," she grunts out, hauling herself back to her feet, tatters of her coat hanging listlessly from her shoulders and only really kept together by whatever reinforcements she'd had sewn into it. "But yeah, it works out, somehow. Great edge on it."
"Good, I'd hate to have to look for a replacement because someone got careless," he growls. "So try not to die."
"How disappointing. You're not sticking around?"
"No, I think it's about high time to finish."
She gives him a measuring look. He shrugs.
"You ought to know, ku-no-ichi. How to kill a snake. Just cut off the head."
And he's gone.
Anko sways for a moment, pressing one hand against a nearby coffin to steady herself, her grip on the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi firm ...
A growl.
Slinking from the shadows, a pair of familiar foxes joins her, their white fur matted with blood.
"Yeah, well, you do that, aho. You do that," she chuckles, cracking her neck with a satisfying series of pops. "And I'll help finish up here."
They move to follow, before she stops and glares.
It's a glare full of burning determination, and a promise of pain.
"Feh. Bastard. How high am I going to go if I'm leaning on you? What use am I if I can't stand on my own?"
She has a place to belong. A cause she'd chosen to follow.
Now she wants to _earn_ it.
"Gotta let a girl show off a little too, you know?"
The blade flashes out, a motion so swift and sure and _no_ she hasn't practiced it but it feels like the blade is an extension of her Self anyway.
It feels natural.
It feels like blood.
It feels like the essence, distilled, of a single concept.
To Cut.
"I'm a leaf in the wind."
The kunoichi yanks her blade loose, bringing it about in a vicious arc that separates a would-be assailant's head from the rest of him, then comes down to split the torso in twain.
"So _watch_!"
A half-step, half-jump. A foot planted on the shoulder of another one that tried to blindside her. A perfect spin, her arms dragging a silver and crimson trail through the air and slash another, and another, and another ...
"Me!"
... until it's a discord of motion and stillness, silence and noise, peace and unmatched violence.
"Soar!"
Sometimes, the person you need to prove yourself to is the one you see in the mirror every day.
***
He's seen better.
And he's seen worse.
He's also seen a helluva lot better, as well as a helluva lot worse.
They never affect him much, though, so he just walks on through.
No big thing. Just another little Genjutsu.
One of these days, he should show these people what a real Demon Illusion looks like.
Oh well.
There's time for that later.
More appropriate occasions as well.
Into and through the house, out the back, into the garden.
It used to be clean, and well kept, and pristine ... some of which still shows.
Some.
Not that he gives very much of a damn.
Not really.
He isn't here to sightsee, really, and he's had more than enough of that whole vengeful dead clinging to life concept with the Nibi.
Every.
Single.
Damn.
Time.
It gets annoying.
And if this were just what the snake-bastard had done, it wouldn't be as problematic. But no, this brat has to be different and mess with something that draws so damn much attention!
Just lucky the damn cat isn't roaming about, he supposes, since this'd draw her like an oversized catnip chewtoy.
He should know, he's pulled that one on her a while ago.
Attention returns to the here and now, though.
The garden.
Out below a wooden jetty and a lake.
Three of them.
Two like the ones outside of this secluded little corner of the massacre.
That last one, though.
Kyuubi takes his time to let out a brief, amused chuckle.
Gaunt.
Stringy, messy, grey hair, more of which lies at his feet in clumps than hangs from his head.
Hollow cheeks, and skin lined and cracked with wear and age that hadn't been there even a few hours ago.
And covered, literally covered, with simmering golden designs that creep and move and shift with every single breath of his.
One hand loosely grasping a straight, black bladed ninja-to.
Empty eye sockets staring off into space.
Mouth moving, saying something faint into the distance ...
... the two others, one man, one woman, move.
Swiftly, surely, effectively coming in from two different directions in a matter of moments.
Then there are two piles of ash, a circle of ground scorched bare, and a couple of brief flicks as he shakes the flecks of still burning hot embers from his hands.
And he's close to the softly rocking form.
"... aniki? I'm strong ... aniki ... aren't I? Say that I'm strong ... mother, father ... please?"
How ... disappointing.
Uchiha Sasuke dies as he lived, completely and utterly alone.
It only takes a single kunai.
Then the sky opens up, and Kyuubi smirks, seeing that the night isn't a complete and total loss.
He does, after all, and paradoxically enough for a being of fire, love the rain.
***
Morning dawns, and the rain continues to fall ...
... which reflects the atmosphere of the moment just fine, Tsunade supposes.
It was only with the end of the bloody interlude that her work truly started, after all. Moving the injured, and there were a lot of those, both civilian and nin, into the emergency center within the Hokage Tower. Getting on top of the situation. Calming people down, which proved, to date, the most daunting of her tasks.
For one reason or another Mitarashi decided, sometime around six in the AM, to occupy the couch in her office and was merrily snoring away. As well as irrevocably staining the leather, but she didn't have it in her to take the extra effort and throw her out on her ass, cute as it was.
Feeling every year of her age, she reflected in a rare moment of temporary peace, sucked. And she is, there and then, going through just that.
"Is that everything?"
"For the moment, yes," her assistant is as tired as herself, or looks to be at any rate.
And prospects weren't good. Despite relatively rapid intervention, the death toll was well in the hundreds. Mostly among the civilians, but the shinobi of Konohagakure weren't spared either. It was almost as bad as three years ago had been, in fact ... and that took a lot of juggling to straighten out, not to mention getting the Village back on track.
"Where the hell is Haruno, anyway?"
She wonders out loud, head drooping for a moment.
"I sent her to rest, Tsunade-sama," Shizune replies after a moment. "Her family ... she isn't taking it well."
The Godaime sighs, then nods, though that's more to herself than to her assistant.
Damnit, she needs sleep. And maybe, just maybe, this will all turn out to have been an extremely unpleasant dream.
She hopes.
***
"I could smell you half a block away, dead man," he says, entering the apartment as he does so. The unexpected occupant doesn't startle, but that could pretty much mean anything. "What the hell do you want?"
And Kyuubi, despite a somewhat entertaining evening, isn't really in the mood for guessing games.
The man is tall, lean, and dark haired.
"Not surprised?"
"Seen it before. Don't get ahead of yourself, though. I know how to make dead _stay_ dead. Didn't expect the magatama," the kitsune mentions, noting the bead-like adornment sitting right on top of the man's collar bone. "So, somebody found out I'm not gone? That was fast."
"You really ain't the brat, are you?"
"Want me to rip off your leg and beat you to death with it? I'd expect you could take a lot of punishment, considering that little gem of yours, and I'm not quite done de-stressing yet."
"Whoa, easy. Look, I'm not here to fight. I'm just supposed to pass along a message, since ..."
"... you're native, sort of. Used to be. Resonance. I know, I know, now kindly get on with it before I lose my temper."
"Well, my new boss says to tell you that, and I quote - they had him Seal the damn thing to the nines as soon as they found out you were indisposed. Things aren't quite off kilter yet, but he'd rather not lose his summer home so while he can't hop over and get you because of some sort of sympathetic dissonance thing, he's got something of his in here that'll let you cut through the Seals without much of a problem. Also, if you don't manage it within the six months, you're hosting poker night next time."
"Right," Kyuubi muttered, rubbing his head in exasperation. "Right. Because it's never just _one_ thing. Of course. I'm going to kick Susanoo's white-haired, trigram sprouting ass into next century for this shit when I see him. That it?"
"Yup."
"Then piss off, and try not to let anyone see you. We've had enough with the raising of the dead for one night."
Kyuubi growls, but otherwise appears utterly and totally calm. Composed. Perfectly at ease, even.
Knowing that there are times when discretion is the better part of valor, especially in the presence of something that was already seriously scary shit back when it was just lurking in the background of the brat, Momochi Zabuza does just that.
"Aw, to fuck with it, I'm not in any mood to think about this shit," Kyuubi growls to himself, tossing the oblong bundle he's been carrying around for the past hour onto the ratty couch, cleaning up the bloodstains by virtue of flash frying them, and incidentally his clothes as well, into ash, and finally rambling on towards the bedroom.
He collapses.
Tomorrow.
He'd deal with whatever the smug ass wanted then.
Right now, sleep sounds oh so much better.
***
'Boy on the bike, what are you like
As you cycle round the town?
You're going up, you're going down
You're going nowhere
It's not as if they're paying you
It's not as if its fun
At least not anymore
When your legs are black and blue
It's time to take a break
When your legs are black and blue
It's time to take a holiday'
-'Fox in the Snow', Rasputina
***
***
***
EPILOGUE
***
As if he didn't have enough problems.
Looking to the crimson-dusk of this Jigoku-Realm's sky, he growls his frustration, even as he quickens his pace. Here, things are never simple. They haven't been simple since he'd come out from under his mother's protection ... but that was simply the way it went in the place of unfettered Souls.
But then, he'd always managed to find some way of dealing with whatever problems presented themselves. That wasn't going to change now, either.
Around him, the camp slowly sunk into night, though here one could harldy tell by something as trivial as the amount of light the crimson skies shed.
Yorimasa, as much as he is an annoying, scheming, wasteful bastard, tends to run a tight army and usually pays well and on time. The last bit being more important than the first, more often than not, was reason enough for spending as much time as they had in his employ.
The Nue is weak, though.
He strides past the innermost encampment's silken walls, shoving a stray Inu-Youkai out of the way and almost, _almost_ getting a challenge in return ...
Spineless cowards, the lot of that get!
Pity.
He's in the mood for some mindless violence.
Then he's free, free of the stench of their collective youki, free of the wall, and free of the need to uphold this annoying form ...
... free to run.
A three-tailed streak of rust, little more than a shadow in a landscape painted through stark whites and blacks and blood-reds.
As expected, the others aren't there.
It doesn't really bother him. Better that than ripping one-another apart in frustration. Still, it's a starting point, and gathering the lot together immediately will see them away from the bastard and his host of carrion mongers.
It doesn't take a genius to know when something is about to fall apart, and the Nue's oh so precious legion is well set to do just that.
He knows where they are, roughly. He always does.
Still, he feels the wind as he runs ...
... and it brings him violence. The faint burning of youki, the universal copper of blood ...
... it doesn't take long to get there. Not long at all.
Not long at all before he's clawing, and biting, and trailing ash from rust-colored fur coated in freshly spilled blood.
There are a dozen of the pathetic wretches, always prowling, always hunting, always _hungry_ for magatama and flesh and youki in their near-mindless drive. It's surprising that there are only so few, really, considering that they're the effective bulk of the conquering army ...
... likely didn't feel like sharing a meal.
"Myobu."
Her white fur is running red with blood, most of it her own, and she can hardly stand. Despite this, she growls. The pathetic little ragtag group of local Rei cowers behind this equally pathetic spectacle.
"I should just finish you off for this," he growls out, tails lashing. "For the sheer stupidity of it!"
But he doesn't. They all have their ... foibles. The idiot healer never could become as ... efficient at some things as he and Koryo. She'd never been able to develop the appropriate us-and-them mentality ...
... but then, that was why he was leader.
And speaking of mentality ...
"Koryo," he growls, flaring some of his Youki as he circles around the huddled group. The chuckle in the air beside him doesn't come as a surprise, nor is the shimmer in the air there cause of any. "Get your smug ass out here where I can yell at you!"
"Oya, oya, taicho! No call for that! No call at all!"
The grey, shimmering kitsune fades into visibility, protesting all the while, his expression a study in innocence that's about as genuine as any of the Nue's promises had been.
"Shut up before I spay you, 'Ko-chan'," the rust of his fur flares, momentarily reducing the Gaki-blood and bits of flesh lodged here and there on his body to ash. Flickers of flame trail from paws and tails, over the ground, disappearing into the corpses. Koryo does as he's told. Good choice. "Now listen."
A few moments later Koryo's form is gone again, trailing through the Ether to track down the other six of the pack.
A bit after that, Myobu's insensate body resting across his back, the three-tails considers the Rei.
They're worthless. Scared shitless, clad in things that had never been intended for travel and are little more than rags now ... he's seen them before, he realizes. And gives a dry, mirthless chuckle.
Well.
Maybe the fool little healer isn't quite so foolish ... or maybe it's just luck.
He can use this.
He _will_ use this.
It's too good not to use.
First, though, he has to see about getting these maggots as well as his pack away before the idiot Nue realized he was missing a dozen of his most ... pfeh ... loyal vermin.
Then they'll wait, and maybe help along a little until Yorimasa's oh-so-grand legion turns on itself - something so obvious only someone as arrogant as the Nue could miss it - and play the noble beasts while brining the 'rightful rulers' back to this shattered land.
After all, his employment contract was terminated no more than an hour ago.
He's Nogitsune of the Kyuubi. He's entitled to being a mean-spirited little ass every once in a while. Especially if it means getting himself a fiefdom.
Before the thought is done, though, light flares in his vision ...
... and the body of Uzumaki Naruto bolts upwards, throwing the covers of the bed aside, momentarily red eyes fading back into icy-blue.
The Kyuubi no Kitsune glares at the dawning sun as its rays bathe Konohagakure in a golden glow.
He hates how the sun always, _always_ gets him in the face every morning.
On general principle if nothing else. It's just the way he is.
But at the moment, that irritation is shoved aside by something else.
Dreams.
He's having _dreams_ again.
He hates having dreams.
They're never -ever- a good sign.
        ***
END foxes wild
        ***
---
Sleep now.
-Griever
When tact is required, use brute force. When force is required, use greater force.
When the greatest force is required, use your head. Surprise is everything. - The Book of Cataclysm
There was originally supposed to be more of it, but I decided to stick with one major even per 'short' and stuck the rest in the ideas file for later perusal. Still took me three rewrites to get it somewhat decent.
Complete with blatant cliches galore.
---
Dancing flames, reaching up into the night sky, the rising columns of smoke akin to fingers grasping the firmament to rip it asunder.
The ground littered with blood. Littered with ash. Littered with embers of still sparking steel and charcoal skeletons of domiciles.
And the skies open up with a torrent, racing down to bathe it all in tears.
The human will is a wondrous, frightening thing. Strong enough, and it can let you move mountains, overcome any adversity, walk where others invariably fall ... for a price.
With the rain, a will of fire sputters. Flickers.
And dies.
---
Foxes Wild
third in the Kyuubi Chronicles line
by Griever
Disclaimer: goes here ^_^.
---
It's old.
In truth, nobody knows just how old.
Once upon a time, it was rumored to be cursed, but such tales didn't survive the test of time. Not with the sheer span between then and now. Back when the woods were lush, and there was water aplenty ...
Now?
A crater of barren ground in a landscape of such, on a spire of stone, in the land of endless sands. Baked for day upon day, upon week, upon month, upon year, upon decade ... and so on into the centennial ranges. The springs are no more, the woods are less than a memory ... and yet, the crater endures.
By right, erosion should have dealt it a crushing blow ... but somehow, no such thing seems to have affected it.
There is, as they say, a grain of truth to every myth.
Even those long since gone into the sands.
In the middle of a barren waste, days from any settlement, human or otherwise, the winds stir.
They roll.
They roar.
As a crackling, shimmering bolt of Otherness splits the heavens and earth for an instant so brief, it would have been considered an illusion.
The loud crack and whoosh of displaced air that follows is no illusion, though, and for a moment the winds dance as if directed by demons, slicing stone, scattering of sand, and tearing clouds asunder.
Then, as if never having been gone at all, silence falls. Complete, and total.
A footfall. Rough tread on equally rough stone.
Shambling and hesitant.
Followed by another.
And another.
And a third one, more certain, more decisive.
Eyes look to the South and East, seeing beyond the horizon, ignorant of the blistering heat coming down from the heavens.
A minute passes, turning into a half, then a full hour ...
Hands clench, filled with a profound sense of emptiness and wrongness.
Legs tense.
And, like the wind, the figure is gone.
Little more than a spot of blackness against the white sands.
It has a grave to rob.
Its own.
***
A bonfire, over a month ago.
A demon.
A kunoichi.
On the way back 'home'.
"Ne, Kyuubi?"
With a bag of bloody metal.
"What, no 'bastard'?"
And a trussed up prisoner.
"Saa ... if I asked you to give me a reason, would you promise?"
Crackling memories, and the scent of ash on the wind.
"Promise? Promise what, ku-no-ichi?"
"I want to belong. For once, I want to belong."
A cause. Not her cause, but one she'd chosen to follow of her own free will.
It feels ... odd ... to have one of those again.
At least, one that isn't focused on getting revenge.
Eyes open to a long familiar ceiling of a sparsely furnished room. Bare walls, few decorative knick-knacks, a picture or two.
She wonders if this is any better than the years of being obsessed with a snake-bastard.
Maybe.
Just maybe.
***
Sometimes, a trickle is all it takes.
Strength.
If only they had the strength.
Once upon a time, they were titans. Once upon a time, they were a force, no, a Force to be reckoned with. They had the strength. And the will to use it. Enough to carve out a place for themselves in this lush, fruitful land, and go as far as to nearly make it their own.
Now?
What did they have left but withered shadows of their former glory?
The unholy terror of a lifetime, leaving nothing but fire and destruction in its wake, now cheerfully mocking them with its presence.
One of their greatest weapons turning upon itself in a fit of egoism and madness.
A steady decline of their power, with mongrels snapping at heels to grab even the least shreds of it.
But there were ways.
They remember.
All things documented. All things written down. Sealed up, nice and tight, in the deep darkness at the bottom of the Archives. Condemned, forbidden, undisturbed save for one instance. And one that took care of itself on its own.
They ask themselves: "See?"
They nod, and smile, and grin.
After all, this has to be a sign; They needn't bother themselves with that mishap. Such things take care of themselves. It is the way of things.
And these are desperate times.
Desperate times call for desperate measures.
For silent footsteps, and moonless nights, and blackened faces.
For things that are not quite legitimate.
After all, it's for the good of the Village.
And if it lets them remove another problem, while fixing the first, well then, that's just being efficient.
So they call, and he relays, and gives orders ...
... and on a moonless night, on silent footsteps, face blackened, a figure treads.
Strength is needed. A weapon is needed. Another has been broken.
To gather the pieces, to melt them down, to re-forge them ...
... and then, the Leaf will have its weapon, once again.
To enter is a triviality. To infiltrate, not much of a challenge.
The figure knows how these minds think, knows how they operate. It knows how they were trained, knows what they know, knows _more_ than they know.
To incapacitate is a exercise at best, and to weave a genjutsu around the two insensate, unconscious nins is little more than a formality.
Porcelain masks glinting in the lighting of the hall reflect its passage, the eyes behind them closed in forced slumber.
*Ker-clack*
Unlocked.
The soundless opening of a door.
*Beep*
*Beep*
*Beep*
Inky black hair. Bandages. Unresponsive, comatose, but still restrained. What skin is visible is pale enough to almost seem as if it were glowing in the relative darkness.
"It seems we were fated to meet after all, Uchiha Sasuke-kun."
Inky black hair. Eyes as pitch. Burnished metal on his brow, and face darkened with soot. His cloths black, plain, utilitarian, nondescript. Smiling.
Sometimes, a trickle is more than enough.
*Crack*
***
The quiet clues her in first, before anything else can.
By itself, it isn't enough, but it's a start.
There's just something missing, something not consciously noticed but nonetheless there.
And anyway, she knows this sort of quiet, though it's been a while since she's been exposed to it. She may be a medic first and foremost, but that changes nothing in that she's also a ninja. A kunoichi of Konohagakure.
Genjutsu are chakra constructs. Insidious, crafty things that guide the mind into patterns their originator desires them to.
With a sound akin to that of glass breaking, and a sensation like cold drops of water falling behind her collar, the illusion around her shatters ...
It's the smell that hits first.
Thick, cloying, and just plain _wrong_ in place of what should have been sterile and antiseptic.
More jarring, though, is the sense of profound _emptiness_ that suddenly comes over her, as if the place were no more than an empty ... shell ...
*Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee*
The sound is a concerto of unitone, almost wailing, echoing through the halls in simple, mechanical efficiency.
A timeless instant of monochrome, flickering electrical lighting, and plain concrete walls that reverb with the keening noise. Shifting shadows. And the smell.
Not of blood. Or rather, not just of blood.
Slaughter.
The medic in her despairs and disbelieves, and room after room after room ...
... by the end of the mind numbing realization, Shizune is very hard pressed not to retch.
***
There's nothing gradual about it. No momentary befuddlement, no partial lucidity.
Just a wall with consciousness on one side, and a blankness on the other.
Maybe because he doesn't dream. Hasn't in longer than he can pin down, exactly. And he likes it like that.
Dreams rarely meant anything 'good' back when he still used to have them, and he isn't really fond of them.
About as fond as he is of dogs, actually.
About as fond as he is of somebody knocking on his door at two in the wee hours of the morning.
It's annoying, and an interruption, and he hates interruptions.
Doesn't seem to change the situation any, though, or keep them from happening. As if getting used to this damn body wasn't hard enough without them.
Get up, grumble and snarl a little, pull on whatever's on hand and meander through the dark apartment.
Put hand through the door.
Yank it open, with a growl of "WHAT?!" that reaches all the way into the subsonic and shakes a few windows. Doors. Metal railings.
Little angry there, aren't we?
Place is fucking deserted anyway, so it isn't like there'd be any neighbors who'll complain. Even if the most that'd have gotten them would have been a free case of cranial trauma. At best.
***
He's keeping pace.
It's almost, _almost_ more than he can manage. Which, truth be told, fills him with a mute sort of disbelief.
He knows what the boy is, of course. How could he not? It ... resonates ... with a part of him that he'd really, really rather not think about at the moment. Despite being useful, the sheer amount of unfortunate memories connected to those strings of genetic code makes it difficult for Tenzo to contemplate.
Still, a genin, even one trained by a Sannin, and a Jinchuuriki to boot, pressing an ANBU's speed to the limits ... it's certainly impressive.
Almost enough to let him ignore the nervous tic his face developed after Uzumaki's ... creative ... way of greeting late-night messengers.
Unnerving.
Considering that he and Mitarashi-kun were listed as having cashed in on the bounty for _Orochimaru's_ head, more than unnerving.
Then they're there, freefalling and skidding against a wall, coming down in front of the Village's hospital - the Hokage's pride and joy, as it were - and the moody teenager Tenzo woke up not ten minutes ago ... changes.
That's the best way he can describe it, really, even in his own mind. There's nothing overt, nothing tangible, not even a fluctuation of his chakra - what he shows of it, at least - but the resonance ...
Suddenly, the experienced ANBU wants nothing more than to get at least a few hundred feet worth of distance between the two of them.
"That's a _lot_ of death," Uzumaki says.
Tenzo can't stop himself from shivering at the faint tones of ... appreciation in that voice.
***
She thought she'd dealt with it. Thought she finally had it under control, finally managed to get on top of the demons in her own mind ...
"... we've got whatever assets we could get on this short a notice scouring the village, the Hunter-nin squads on the Wall ..."
She thought wrong.
This, maybe more than any other place in Konohagakure no Sato, was _her_ place. Where she'd put her heart and soul into her work ...
It was fortunate that Shizune understood her shishou well enough to anticipate this sort of problem.
"Ne. Ne. Ne. Ho-ka-ge," a voice beside her singsongs, making her jerk in barely concealed surprise, startling Shizune out of her report. "How rude. The party's over, and you only now invite me? Cruel, cruel woman."
Her apprentice pales. She told her, unlike her _student_. It's been too long with just the two of them for Tsunade not to tell Shizune, even with the occasional misunderstanding and difference in opinion. Fortunately, save for the two, now three of them, the roof is otherwise deserted.
"That was ... quick," she comments, feigning nonchalance.
If anything, the last week and a half had taught her one thing. The kitsune doesn't care about being rude, or other people replying in kind. It doesn't matter. Kyuubi, in his own words, doesn't _need_ a pathetic excuse like that to 'end' someone. She doesn't know whether to be happy, or afraid of that.
Speaking of which ...
"Where's ... ?"
"Messenger-boy is off playing around down below," Kyuubi said, grinning. "Wouldn't know a copy from his ass."
"What? Not even Kage Bunshin are that accurate to someone," Shizune bit her tongue before she could complete said sentence.
"Not that accurate to someone who's been my 'minder' for as long as I've been 'back'? Pfeh. Don't insult me. Jigoku's sake, the kusogaki could do it with no problems," sneered the Youkai.
... well, she had a faint hope that he wasn't aware of Tenzo watching him. There it goes, crashing and burning.
"... what the hell are you wearing?"
Naruto's body blinks back at her, momentarily thrown, then looks down and shrugs.
Fishnet shirt, rust colored vest and pants, woven sandals ... it just, somehow, doesn't mesh and fits at the same time.
"Blame Mitarashi. She was the one you sent out to get me something to wear instead of the clothes looted from Oto."
***
Straight blade.
No guard.
Blackened, non-reflective, and perfectly _sharp_.
The night itself wrapped around them.
Scent the wind. Feel it. The sky boils above, the earth shudders, and within ...
... flame.
Driving on, guided by a dozen pairs of eyes.
There!
The sound carries, up through the soles and into the mind, driving one arm out to the side in a sharp, violent arc.
Steel scrapes against stone. Sparks fly.
The flaring of a single candle in the darkness, before it's snuffed out.
*Drip*
*Drip*
*Drip*
Behind a wall, a body slumps to the floor.
Straight blade.
No guard.
Blackened, non-reflective, and perfectly _sharp_.
Made to cut, made to pierce, made to kill.
The flame burns brighter and brighter.
***
"This is it? Well ... can't say I'm surprised, really."
The Legendary Toad-Hermit Jiraiya doesn't claim to have seen it all, despite occasional rumblings to the contrary. Never has, never will, and knows the sheer impossibility of that sort of claim.
It's what keeps him going. Not an obsessive desire to know it _all_, but a deeply rooted will to make the most of what he has and see as much of this world as he can. It's wonderful, and it's terrible, and it keeps him still mostly sane with every plodding step along the stream of time's progression.
In that way, he and his onetime friend were always polar opposites when it came to approaches towards living. To Orochimaru, it's always been a death sentence in waiting, which was something he was driven to avoid so badly that he turned it, and himself, into a twisted mockery.
Jiraiya's, on the other hand, can be summed up in three simple words to live by.
Life is strength.
Keeping that in mind, he's seen a lot.
Some days, though, the realization that this journey of discovery will, undoubtedly, involve new and extremely unpleasant moments makes him reconsider said approach.
He's always been one to trust his instincts, to a degree that would likely astound anyone who ever found out. Over the years and through enough experiences to fill a dozen lifetimes, he's honed it into a powerful tool. To him, in fact, it's the _most_ powerful tool in his arsenal.
And instinct is telling him he's standing in the middle of something very, very nasty. Not just because of the blood on the walls and floor, or the bodies, or even the distinct off feeling about the lingering chakra in the air.
Out behind his back, other Konoha nin are busy with the cleanup, if you can call it that.
This, though, is where whatever it was that happened started.
Seal scribbled walls - some of them his work - and no windows, broken medical monitoring equipment, snapped restrains and a broken bed-frame.
And a body.
One that looks like it was mauled by a lawnmower, then flash fried into a husk looking as if it were months, if not years old.
The corpses of the two ANBU who'd been stationed outside were in similar condition, though maybe not to such an extent.
And there's that odd undercurrent of tension hanging in the air. One that's an old, old acquaintance.
It proves true a moment later, when a sensation that has his hair stand on end and his eyes widen sweeps over him, passing on through and past as if it were a wave cresting over the Village. Or like the concentric pattern of disturbance when a raindrop *plinks* into a still body of water.
***
A dancing, whirling, stifling vortex of chakra.
The source, emaciated and mottled with flecks of golden light the design of which makes it appear as thought they were in the process of strangling their 'host', leaning on a straight, black blade the tip of which digs into the soil.
Questing, seeking tendrils of virulent purple seep into the ground as the conflagration around this one-man epicenter intensifies.
*Beep*
"Sasuke-kun ..."
*Beep*
"You're stronger than this, Sasuke-kun. Now that you're away from that place, now that you're back."
*Beep*
"Please, wake up. It's finally over, so please wake up. Now that you can finally try to be happy. Jiraiya-sama's report said Itachi is dead, so you don't have to lock yourself away anymore."
*Beep*
"Itachi is dead."
*Beep*
"Itachi is dead."
*Beep*
"Itachi is dead."
*Beep*
"It seems we were fated to meet after all, Uchiha Sasuke-kun."
Only one remains. One part, one piece, one working, of the two which were supposed to complete him.
He will not be denied.
***
It isn't subtle. In fact, there isn't even a token attempt at making it less of a glaring beacon to anyone with even the least refined ability to sense chakra.
In a Hidden Village, that's quite a bit of the population.
She's ahead of them, though. Simply because she doesn't need the huge beacon.
The painful twinge in the back of her neck is enough.
It's why she isn't even remotely surprised _where_ she's heading towards.
When the flare finally fades, Mitarashi Anko is perched atop a power pole, looking towards a sector of Konoha that's been defunct and deserted for years now.
And she still doesn't know what it is that makes her more uneasy about the situation. The fact that she'd almost managed to close the chapter of her life involving her old teacher and his get? Or the fact the bundle strapped to her back seemed to be almost humming.
"What the hell am I supposed to do with this, bastard?"
A hand travels back to free the wrappings from around the bundle's top.
"Learn to use it. It would be a shame to let something like that gather dust."
She grasps the revealed hilt.
"Swords were never really my thing."
It really is humming, the leather beneath her palm vibrating in a way that could be almost described as eager.
"Learn to appreciate the irony, then. You keep what you kill."
The sword goes perfectly still, but she clearly feels tension mounting ...
Then she's moving, synapses burning, muscles pumping as she plummets downwards, actually running along the pole she was perched on in a full out sprint.
Kunai, windmill shuriken, senbon, and a variety of other thrown projectiles slam into the pole, coming uncomfortably close and in some cases actually skittering from her reinforced longcoat before she's jumping, pushing off from her erstwhile perch and raceway, tumbling through the air to roll across a rooftop and disappear beneath its far lip.
She's still moving when she hits the ground, skidding backwards even as hands come up to brandish a pair of kunai, darting to and fro in a frantic effort that has oncoming projectiles being slapped out of the air by either them or her coat sleeves' ceramic inlays.
When she's finally stopped, panting somewhat, eyes warily scanning her surroundings, she doesn't register what she's seeing for the first little while.
She spends a second merely annoyed by the obstructions to her field of view, though in the back of her mind there's a note being made of where they are and that they'd likely make good cover if need be.
Which is when _what_ they are registers, and she curses. Briefly. Viciously. Entirely appropriately considering the situation.
It's also the reason why, when the darkness of the now moonless, cloudy night that covers the skyline is interrupted here and there by something, she doesn't dismiss it out of hand.
Though she's wishing. Boy is she wishing.
Her back against the side of one, and surrounded by an entire clan graveyard's worth of coffins that had seemingly sprouted up out of the ground, with pair upon pair of crimson eyes glaring down at her, Anko's finds herself thinking that this is either going to be a very long night, or a very very short one.
A giant toad dropping down onto a group of her assailants, demolishing the building that serves as their perch in the process tilts the odds towards the former by at least a little bit ...
***
"It shouldn't have worked," Jiraiya says, bringing his ever present scroll holder up in a parry. It's big, it's bulky, it's likely got more reinforcing seals on it than a castle rampart.
Projectiles, and even the occasional Katon, don't really do much against it. There's a reason for the densetsu tag his name's earned. Legendary isn't just for show, or talking himself into some pretty little thing's panties, after all.
On his own, he's a force to be reckoned with. And this time around, he's hardly on his own.
"Well, obviously, there's something you've overlooked!"
Tsunade is furious and it shows. A head pops like an overripe melon, dirt and strips of flesh and bone showering outwards from the point of impact.
"The damn Edo Tensei isn't just a Jutsu! It's not even a single ritual, but a whole slew of them. It can't be used offhand, not without preparation, not on such a scale, not ... behind you!"
She twists out of the way in an impossibly fast dodge, the kodachi still managing to slip into her guard but barely drawing even a faint line of blood along her flank as she wheels around to retaliate ...
... and the blow goes wide, or rather, goes through where the head of her attacker should be, if she hadn't taken it off not a minute ago. In its place, she can see the macabre spectacle of dirt and flesh and skin and slivers of bone drawing slowly upwards, reforming grotesquely into their prior form ...
... before the body is ripped apart, into charred, sizzling chunks.
"Actually, Hebi-yarou did it when I was fighting him, though that was only one person," Kyuubi's hand trails ash and wisps of youki. "Besides, he's doing it wrong. And at this sort of scale? Pathetic little maggot has to be burning on the inside just to keep all that chakra he shoved into himself down at your hospital flowing, not to mention contained. And as soon as he's _out_, he's done. Just keep them contained, and from killing too many people on the off chance that they can feed themselves."
The kitsune grins wickedly, looking straight at Tsunade.
"Just kill them."
The spike of killing intent went right past the rational bits of her brain, to the place that was as old as humanity itself, and seemed to take up residence.
"One after another, or all in one go, it doesn't matter one way or the other."
Wisps of youki drift from his hands, trailing backwards, over his shoulders, and slowly intermingling with chakra.
"And if they get up again, then just _kill_ them again, no matter how many times."
A quartet of Kage Bunshin slowly wind their way into existence, then momentarily shift to be replaced by four large, white furred, crimson eyed foxes.
"We can do that, can't we, Ho-ka-ge-chan?"
***
He's always been proud of his eyes. That they were just that tiny bit better, just that tiny bit more accurate. That they'd never, ever lied to him, or tried to sugar-coat the world.
For the first time in his life, Hyuuga Neji wishes he could afford to turn them off.
It's the vilest thing he's ever seen.
Dirt and chakra and dead flesh breathing and moving and wanting nothing more than to _kill_.
... he doesn't though.
Some would say he'd just cold like that.
Efficient.
The very embodiment of the idea that is 'shinobi'.
But it has less to do with that, and more to do with the first of these mockeries he's encountered that night was just getting done slaughtering its way through a nursery.
***
The last time he'd seen this sort of intensity was three years back, during the invasion of the Sound and Sand, and that time he was the one playing nursemaid to the Academy students.
This time, he's in the thick of it ...
And deep inside, he's afraid.
It's why he hasn't gone on to become Jounin. It's what scares him, more than anything else in the world.
He slams through the door, armored shoulder of the vest shattering through without much in the way of problems, just as a lash of chakra laden razor wire carves its way through the space above him, going through wood and metal like a hot knife through butter. Rolling, scrambling, tossing off a spread of kunai and caltrops behind him he dashes through the dark, dusty interior.
They follow.
He's good at running, though. Good at delaying, stalling, keeping them occupied. For a onetime prankster, these things are second nature, or even closer than that.
And he's out, his pursuers occupied inside for the moment, with Bunshins and annoying little tricks and traps that don't really _hurt_ ...
... but then, that isn't their purpose.
He doesn't pause, doesn't even turn around, before reaching a length of wire camouflaged better than the traps inside are - and he knows his camouflage. You didn't run pranks past the noses of the old Uchiha Police Force on a regular basis without being damn good at that.
He's grabbing for it.
Pulsing his chakra through his hand and fingers.
Vaulting over the top of a low stone wall as the explosive tags spread through the old place go off, multiple blasts filling its insides with concussive waves as well as sharp and pointy bits of metal before bringing the whole two story building down on those within and grinning, grinning, _grinning_ so hard his scar aches.
He's afraid of this, more than anything else in the world.
Because, when he can't fight it anymore?
When it takes over?
When he totally loses control?
He _likes_ it.
And right now Umino Iruka ...
... Chuunin of Konohagakure no Sato ...
... is ...
... _loving_ it.
***
It's funny how she doesn't feel any pain.
The wound is hardly clean - rather, it's ragged edged, ugly, and winding its way just barely past an artery as it twists and turns along flesh. That had been what one of her attackers was aiming for in the first place, and she doesn't know _how_ she'd managed to try and dodge as quickly as she had. Or why her mind decided one sacrifice to be more affordable than the other.
Or, no.
She realizes well and good the reason for the latter.
It's selfish, really, but she knows that most things in life are.
Her parents aren't ninja.
So, to protect them; to do what she can so that these murdering dogs wearing human guise never get within even a kunai's throw of them ...
The pill is one that works quickly, and directly, but only for a comparatively brief time period. The second one is less effective, and a stimulant rather than a painkiller ...
She pops the first one, gives her Jounin-sensei the best glare she can muster in her current state, even as her teammates struggle to give them a moment of relative peace, and speaks.
Or rather, demands.
Her words as devoid of inflection and numb to her ears as her soul feels at the prospect of coming home to a dead family.
"I can still fight. Cauterize it."
He doesn't argue. She can tell he wants to. Argue. Yell. Protest. Give impassioned speeches about nothing being unsalvageable and if she'd be willing to fall back and ...
... his face is uncharacteristically grim as he nods and does it anyway.
It still doesn't hurt.
It doesn't hurt, but for some reason, she's screaming her lungs out as the kunai against her face is pumped with hot chakra and flesh sizzles.
It doesn't hurt when she gets back up, leaning on his shoulder, one side of her face and her neck and one shoulder wrapped in bandages.
It doesn't hurt when she leaps up, her mind a calculating machine of angles and velocities, her hands both steady and her aim still miraculously unerring, despite the lack of stereoscopic vision.
Her Village needs her.
Her Team needs her.
Her Family needs her.
If it's for them, no matter what it is, Tenten will never hurt.
***
"Having fun yet, ku-no-ichi?"
The voice infuriates her.
Annoys her.
And, oddly, comforts her.
Though she'll never let on about that last bit.
"Aho. About time you showed up."
Panting.
In a field of nicked, scarred, marred and sliced coffins.
And blood.
"See? You're using it after all."
Swordhilt clutched in her hands, blade inverted, tip digging into the ground as she half-kneels, leaning against it.
"... because I'm out of anything and everything else, bastard," she grunts out, hauling herself back to her feet, tatters of her coat hanging listlessly from her shoulders and only really kept together by whatever reinforcements she'd had sewn into it. "But yeah, it works out, somehow. Great edge on it."
"Good, I'd hate to have to look for a replacement because someone got careless," he growls. "So try not to die."
"How disappointing. You're not sticking around?"
"No, I think it's about high time to finish."
She gives him a measuring look. He shrugs.
"You ought to know, ku-no-ichi. How to kill a snake. Just cut off the head."
And he's gone.
Anko sways for a moment, pressing one hand against a nearby coffin to steady herself, her grip on the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi firm ...
A growl.
Slinking from the shadows, a pair of familiar foxes joins her, their white fur matted with blood.
"Yeah, well, you do that, aho. You do that," she chuckles, cracking her neck with a satisfying series of pops. "And I'll help finish up here."
They move to follow, before she stops and glares.
It's a glare full of burning determination, and a promise of pain.
"Feh. Bastard. How high am I going to go if I'm leaning on you? What use am I if I can't stand on my own?"
She has a place to belong. A cause she'd chosen to follow.
Now she wants to _earn_ it.
"Gotta let a girl show off a little too, you know?"
The blade flashes out, a motion so swift and sure and _no_ she hasn't practiced it but it feels like the blade is an extension of her Self anyway.
It feels natural.
It feels like blood.
It feels like the essence, distilled, of a single concept.
To Cut.
"I'm a leaf in the wind."
The kunoichi yanks her blade loose, bringing it about in a vicious arc that separates a would-be assailant's head from the rest of him, then comes down to split the torso in twain.
"So _watch_!"
A half-step, half-jump. A foot planted on the shoulder of another one that tried to blindside her. A perfect spin, her arms dragging a silver and crimson trail through the air and slash another, and another, and another ...
"Me!"
... until it's a discord of motion and stillness, silence and noise, peace and unmatched violence.
"Soar!"
Sometimes, the person you need to prove yourself to is the one you see in the mirror every day.
***
He's seen better.
And he's seen worse.
He's also seen a helluva lot better, as well as a helluva lot worse.
They never affect him much, though, so he just walks on through.
No big thing. Just another little Genjutsu.
One of these days, he should show these people what a real Demon Illusion looks like.
Oh well.
There's time for that later.
More appropriate occasions as well.
Into and through the house, out the back, into the garden.
It used to be clean, and well kept, and pristine ... some of which still shows.
Some.
Not that he gives very much of a damn.
Not really.
He isn't here to sightsee, really, and he's had more than enough of that whole vengeful dead clinging to life concept with the Nibi.
Every.
Single.
Damn.
Time.
It gets annoying.
And if this were just what the snake-bastard had done, it wouldn't be as problematic. But no, this brat has to be different and mess with something that draws so damn much attention!
Just lucky the damn cat isn't roaming about, he supposes, since this'd draw her like an oversized catnip chewtoy.
He should know, he's pulled that one on her a while ago.
Attention returns to the here and now, though.
The garden.
Out below a wooden jetty and a lake.
Three of them.
Two like the ones outside of this secluded little corner of the massacre.
That last one, though.
Kyuubi takes his time to let out a brief, amused chuckle.
Gaunt.
Stringy, messy, grey hair, more of which lies at his feet in clumps than hangs from his head.
Hollow cheeks, and skin lined and cracked with wear and age that hadn't been there even a few hours ago.
And covered, literally covered, with simmering golden designs that creep and move and shift with every single breath of his.
One hand loosely grasping a straight, black bladed ninja-to.
Empty eye sockets staring off into space.
Mouth moving, saying something faint into the distance ...
... the two others, one man, one woman, move.
Swiftly, surely, effectively coming in from two different directions in a matter of moments.
Then there are two piles of ash, a circle of ground scorched bare, and a couple of brief flicks as he shakes the flecks of still burning hot embers from his hands.
And he's close to the softly rocking form.
"... aniki? I'm strong ... aniki ... aren't I? Say that I'm strong ... mother, father ... please?"
How ... disappointing.
Uchiha Sasuke dies as he lived, completely and utterly alone.
It only takes a single kunai.
Then the sky opens up, and Kyuubi smirks, seeing that the night isn't a complete and total loss.
He does, after all, and paradoxically enough for a being of fire, love the rain.
***
Morning dawns, and the rain continues to fall ...
... which reflects the atmosphere of the moment just fine, Tsunade supposes.
It was only with the end of the bloody interlude that her work truly started, after all. Moving the injured, and there were a lot of those, both civilian and nin, into the emergency center within the Hokage Tower. Getting on top of the situation. Calming people down, which proved, to date, the most daunting of her tasks.
For one reason or another Mitarashi decided, sometime around six in the AM, to occupy the couch in her office and was merrily snoring away. As well as irrevocably staining the leather, but she didn't have it in her to take the extra effort and throw her out on her ass, cute as it was.
Feeling every year of her age, she reflected in a rare moment of temporary peace, sucked. And she is, there and then, going through just that.
"Is that everything?"
"For the moment, yes," her assistant is as tired as herself, or looks to be at any rate.
And prospects weren't good. Despite relatively rapid intervention, the death toll was well in the hundreds. Mostly among the civilians, but the shinobi of Konohagakure weren't spared either. It was almost as bad as three years ago had been, in fact ... and that took a lot of juggling to straighten out, not to mention getting the Village back on track.
"Where the hell is Haruno, anyway?"
She wonders out loud, head drooping for a moment.
"I sent her to rest, Tsunade-sama," Shizune replies after a moment. "Her family ... she isn't taking it well."
The Godaime sighs, then nods, though that's more to herself than to her assistant.
Damnit, she needs sleep. And maybe, just maybe, this will all turn out to have been an extremely unpleasant dream.
She hopes.
***
"I could smell you half a block away, dead man," he says, entering the apartment as he does so. The unexpected occupant doesn't startle, but that could pretty much mean anything. "What the hell do you want?"
And Kyuubi, despite a somewhat entertaining evening, isn't really in the mood for guessing games.
The man is tall, lean, and dark haired.
"Not surprised?"
"Seen it before. Don't get ahead of yourself, though. I know how to make dead _stay_ dead. Didn't expect the magatama," the kitsune mentions, noting the bead-like adornment sitting right on top of the man's collar bone. "So, somebody found out I'm not gone? That was fast."
"You really ain't the brat, are you?"
"Want me to rip off your leg and beat you to death with it? I'd expect you could take a lot of punishment, considering that little gem of yours, and I'm not quite done de-stressing yet."
"Whoa, easy. Look, I'm not here to fight. I'm just supposed to pass along a message, since ..."
"... you're native, sort of. Used to be. Resonance. I know, I know, now kindly get on with it before I lose my temper."
"Well, my new boss says to tell you that, and I quote - they had him Seal the damn thing to the nines as soon as they found out you were indisposed. Things aren't quite off kilter yet, but he'd rather not lose his summer home so while he can't hop over and get you because of some sort of sympathetic dissonance thing, he's got something of his in here that'll let you cut through the Seals without much of a problem. Also, if you don't manage it within the six months, you're hosting poker night next time."
"Right," Kyuubi muttered, rubbing his head in exasperation. "Right. Because it's never just _one_ thing. Of course. I'm going to kick Susanoo's white-haired, trigram sprouting ass into next century for this shit when I see him. That it?"
"Yup."
"Then piss off, and try not to let anyone see you. We've had enough with the raising of the dead for one night."
Kyuubi growls, but otherwise appears utterly and totally calm. Composed. Perfectly at ease, even.
Knowing that there are times when discretion is the better part of valor, especially in the presence of something that was already seriously scary shit back when it was just lurking in the background of the brat, Momochi Zabuza does just that.
"Aw, to fuck with it, I'm not in any mood to think about this shit," Kyuubi growls to himself, tossing the oblong bundle he's been carrying around for the past hour onto the ratty couch, cleaning up the bloodstains by virtue of flash frying them, and incidentally his clothes as well, into ash, and finally rambling on towards the bedroom.
He collapses.
Tomorrow.
He'd deal with whatever the smug ass wanted then.
Right now, sleep sounds oh so much better.
***
'Boy on the bike, what are you like
As you cycle round the town?
You're going up, you're going down
You're going nowhere
It's not as if they're paying you
It's not as if its fun
At least not anymore
When your legs are black and blue
It's time to take a break
When your legs are black and blue
It's time to take a holiday'
-'Fox in the Snow', Rasputina
***
***
***
EPILOGUE
***
As if he didn't have enough problems.
Looking to the crimson-dusk of this Jigoku-Realm's sky, he growls his frustration, even as he quickens his pace. Here, things are never simple. They haven't been simple since he'd come out from under his mother's protection ... but that was simply the way it went in the place of unfettered Souls.
But then, he'd always managed to find some way of dealing with whatever problems presented themselves. That wasn't going to change now, either.
Around him, the camp slowly sunk into night, though here one could harldy tell by something as trivial as the amount of light the crimson skies shed.
Yorimasa, as much as he is an annoying, scheming, wasteful bastard, tends to run a tight army and usually pays well and on time. The last bit being more important than the first, more often than not, was reason enough for spending as much time as they had in his employ.
The Nue is weak, though.
He strides past the innermost encampment's silken walls, shoving a stray Inu-Youkai out of the way and almost, _almost_ getting a challenge in return ...
Spineless cowards, the lot of that get!
Pity.
He's in the mood for some mindless violence.
Then he's free, free of the stench of their collective youki, free of the wall, and free of the need to uphold this annoying form ...
... free to run.
A three-tailed streak of rust, little more than a shadow in a landscape painted through stark whites and blacks and blood-reds.
As expected, the others aren't there.
It doesn't really bother him. Better that than ripping one-another apart in frustration. Still, it's a starting point, and gathering the lot together immediately will see them away from the bastard and his host of carrion mongers.
It doesn't take a genius to know when something is about to fall apart, and the Nue's oh so precious legion is well set to do just that.
He knows where they are, roughly. He always does.
Still, he feels the wind as he runs ...
... and it brings him violence. The faint burning of youki, the universal copper of blood ...
... it doesn't take long to get there. Not long at all.
Not long at all before he's clawing, and biting, and trailing ash from rust-colored fur coated in freshly spilled blood.
There are a dozen of the pathetic wretches, always prowling, always hunting, always _hungry_ for magatama and flesh and youki in their near-mindless drive. It's surprising that there are only so few, really, considering that they're the effective bulk of the conquering army ...
... likely didn't feel like sharing a meal.
"Myobu."
Her white fur is running red with blood, most of it her own, and she can hardly stand. Despite this, she growls. The pathetic little ragtag group of local Rei cowers behind this equally pathetic spectacle.
"I should just finish you off for this," he growls out, tails lashing. "For the sheer stupidity of it!"
But he doesn't. They all have their ... foibles. The idiot healer never could become as ... efficient at some things as he and Koryo. She'd never been able to develop the appropriate us-and-them mentality ...
... but then, that was why he was leader.
And speaking of mentality ...
"Koryo," he growls, flaring some of his Youki as he circles around the huddled group. The chuckle in the air beside him doesn't come as a surprise, nor is the shimmer in the air there cause of any. "Get your smug ass out here where I can yell at you!"
"Oya, oya, taicho! No call for that! No call at all!"
The grey, shimmering kitsune fades into visibility, protesting all the while, his expression a study in innocence that's about as genuine as any of the Nue's promises had been.
"Shut up before I spay you, 'Ko-chan'," the rust of his fur flares, momentarily reducing the Gaki-blood and bits of flesh lodged here and there on his body to ash. Flickers of flame trail from paws and tails, over the ground, disappearing into the corpses. Koryo does as he's told. Good choice. "Now listen."
A few moments later Koryo's form is gone again, trailing through the Ether to track down the other six of the pack.
A bit after that, Myobu's insensate body resting across his back, the three-tails considers the Rei.
They're worthless. Scared shitless, clad in things that had never been intended for travel and are little more than rags now ... he's seen them before, he realizes. And gives a dry, mirthless chuckle.
Well.
Maybe the fool little healer isn't quite so foolish ... or maybe it's just luck.
He can use this.
He _will_ use this.
It's too good not to use.
First, though, he has to see about getting these maggots as well as his pack away before the idiot Nue realized he was missing a dozen of his most ... pfeh ... loyal vermin.
Then they'll wait, and maybe help along a little until Yorimasa's oh-so-grand legion turns on itself - something so obvious only someone as arrogant as the Nue could miss it - and play the noble beasts while brining the 'rightful rulers' back to this shattered land.
After all, his employment contract was terminated no more than an hour ago.
He's Nogitsune of the Kyuubi. He's entitled to being a mean-spirited little ass every once in a while. Especially if it means getting himself a fiefdom.
Before the thought is done, though, light flares in his vision ...
... and the body of Uzumaki Naruto bolts upwards, throwing the covers of the bed aside, momentarily red eyes fading back into icy-blue.
The Kyuubi no Kitsune glares at the dawning sun as its rays bathe Konohagakure in a golden glow.
He hates how the sun always, _always_ gets him in the face every morning.
On general principle if nothing else. It's just the way he is.
But at the moment, that irritation is shoved aside by something else.
Dreams.
He's having _dreams_ again.
He hates having dreams.
They're never -ever- a good sign.
        ***
END foxes wild
        ***
---
Sleep now.
-Griever
When tact is required, use brute force. When force is required, use greater force.
When the greatest force is required, use your head. Surprise is everything. - The Book of Cataclysm
~