Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Misplaced Timing ❯ Drawing out a fox. ( Chapter 3 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Naruto blinked several times as he returned from the mental-thrashing of the Kyuubi, finding his situation unchanged.

He was still held stiffly within Yamato's cage and being hauled around like a piece of lumber, rushing past tree after tree, and they soon entered a section of Konoha he did not recognize.

It went further still after several moments when the trees began to fade from mildly healthy to desperately clinging to life.

They strayed toward the largest of these that happened to be pressed up against a length of towering rock ahead and made no motion to slow down.

Naruto's eyes widened as Yamato carried onward at top speed and clenched them shut in preparation for a collision.

Moment's later and no sudden jarring motion had him tentatively crack one eyelid open and then the other, staring at the dark tunnel walls around them in confusion; the genjutsu seal worked it's illusion very well for those without the answering key to see through it, and each of the ANBU who were a part of ROOT had that key as part of another seal at the back of their tongues.

The hidden entrance to ROOT could never be spoken of to those outside of the group, exactly as Danzo had prepared it.

Gotta get free before this takes a sudden turn for the- oh, crap, Naruto's thoughts were interrupted as they emerged into a large open space filled with more mask-wearing ANBU, and standing directly in their center, the very man he had been concerned about from the on-set.

"There you are." Kakashi stated as he finally entered the training ground clearing, mildly put out that it had taken so long to find his potential-charge.

Sasuke was still standing in place with a contemplative expression on his dark features, and he turned toward the elder shinobi but said nothing as he was approached. Unlike the orange-clad idiot he had seen wrapped up and carried away earlier, he kept his guard up and reached for one of the kunai at his back cautiously.

Kakashi noticed the reaction and slowed, raising his hands in a showing of peace. "Calm down," he said softly. Sasuke eyeballed him and took a step back, sliding into a fighting stance he had learned before from his brot- that man had killed his entire family, he corrected himself.

Kakashi did not like how this was starting off.

"Relax, Uchiha. I'm not here to fight you." He said.

Sasuke tensed at his last name and gripped the kunai tighter, mistrust clear in his eyes.

The Jounin sighed and slowly drew back the hitai-ate over his left-eye, opening it up and displaying the red energy and trio of black tomoe therein.

Sasuke let out a shout at seeing the Sharingan again so soon after the destruction of his entire family and his arm holding the kunai began to tremble. He wanted to turn and look away with every passing moment, but a paralyzed numbness swept through his body as if trapped.

Kakashi felt even more mystified then before over this reaction to what he had thought might be a comforting sight. What exactly am I doing wrong here? He silently asked.

Striding forward he noticed how the Uchiha survivor looked torn between which action to take, an almost desperate reflection in his dark eyes over fleeing or fighting.

With only a foot of distance separating them the boy went with both of actions; his kunai was thrown with as much force and accuracy as he could through the shaking, and even as his arm was descending he pivoted on one foot and turned to race off in the other direction.

Kakashi caught the object in mid-motion with one hand and dashed forward, slipping past and then turning to catch the child by the shoulders, and dropping down to one knee in the process of maybe two seconds. "What troubles you so?" he questioned in a quiet, calm tone.

Sasuke trembled slightly in his grip and managed a low snarl of something, glaring at the Sharingan with a look of mingled hatred and burning terror for what it had last brought upon him.

Reaching up with one hand to cover it with his forehead protector again, Kakashi stared down at him and repeated his question.

Sasuke went silent, hands balled up into fists.

Lowering his head with a sigh Kakashi released the boy and stood up. "I know you miss your family dearly, and I had hoped to raise you and train you in lieu of your father and brother to do it." He stated, hoping that clarifying why he was there might finally get them on the same ground.

He did catch how Sasuke made a noise of objection at the end of that statement and yet his feet remained firmly planted where he stood, not moving an inch.

"If you change your mind and decide to talk to me, I'll be waiting at the edge of the Uchiha district."

Stepping around him Kakashi made the hand-seal for the Body Flicker technique and paused in mid motion as the child murmured something beneath his breath.

"Hm?"

Sasuke repeated himself just barely louder. "I can't hear you." The Jounin lied having clearly heard the words the first time.

He waited for the boy to turn and face him, and Sasuke finally did so and said in a loud and angry tone, "Why? Why would you want to?"

Kakashi tilted his head to the side. "Do I need a reason to help?" he asked.

Sasuke managed a fairly accurate glare at him.

"Okay, yes." He amended a moment later before growing silent for several seconds, debating the reasoning over one more time in his own mind before giving it to the boy.

"One of your uncles... Obito Uchiha was one of my teammates a long time ago. We didn't often get along until... his final mission. He sacrificed himself to save both my life and our other teammate, and even gave up his newly awoken Sharingan for me at the end. I've never had the chance to repay his sacrifice, and I never will now that his clan, your clan, is gone... not unless I help you." His voice grew somewhat faint as he visualized that day and the events therein.

"... You're just using me to make your guilt go away." Sasuke stated in a quiet but no less angry tone.

Kakashi startled him by laughing grimly. "In a way I am, yes." He conceded.

Before the child could say anything he continued in a kinder tone.

"But, I genuinely want to see you live a long life, Sasuke. I want you to rebuild your clan when you've grown old enough for that responsibility, and I want you to be capable of killing anyone that tries to kill or otherwise stop you before that point," he said firmly.

Sasuke pondered that. He wanted to make his bro- that man pay dearly for destroying his family, and to do that he would need a lot of time and training to grow strong enough. He had always been so far behind, never reaching the same heights at the same ages as the other shinobi.

"... I'll do it." He said quietly.

"You will?" Kakashi asked.

Sasuke nodded his head reluctantly and Kakashi smiled sadly beneath the mask overlapping his lower face. "Then let's gather up the paperwork and go visit the Hokage." He stated.

The child nodded his head before saying, "Just don't carry me away like that fox-face did the idiot."

Set down before Danzo and the other ANBU, Naruto looked around with some degree of panic starting to work it's way to the surface. What the hell is Yamato doing? He thought.

"... Leave us." Danzo ordered, and the gathered ROOT members shunshined away, leaving just the two of them in the area.

"So you came back in time." He stated in an empty tone, devoid of emotion.

Naruto felt his blood run cold at those words and his eyes widened. "Yes, that confirms it. I had to see with my own eyes your reaction. I can feel the chakra flowing through your veins, I can all but taste the difference between the poison and honey nature of the Kyuubi and yourself... just how sweet the chakra has become from even a day ago," he continued.

"I've been watching you from the day you were imbued with it, with the overpowering hatred that would overlap your natural innocence. To think you could survive another nigh-on-nine years from now and become so powerful... it chills me to the bone at that thought." He stated.

The pain that Naruto had felt upon hearing that the Sandaime had been spying on his mind for several years now redoubled, and a nauseating sensation pushed through him at the very idea that Danzo Shimura had been watching him in even more disturbing ways.

"The details of this day that I have mined from you will serve Konoha for years to come; Contingents sent out to capture the one-tails child before it becomes an able tool of Sunagakure, contingents trained adequately against and sent out to kill the Ame brats that Hanzo failed to do so shortly ago... and of course ridding the shinobi world of the Legendary Sannin one at a time." He concluded.

Striding forward to where the boy was held, Danzo looked down into the burning, stricken eyes with only satisfaction reflected from his own.

"The only problem lies in your life, I'm afraid. We can not risk you escaping from Tenzo's cage and running off to do something stupid and foolish to Konoha's survival, such as becoming captured by this Akatsuki." Raising his good hand to his robes and delving inward, Danzo drew out a simple kunai as he drew in a lungful of air.

A moment afterward and he breathed it out along the kunai, transforming it into a long blade of wind elemental chakra wrapped about a steel frame. "Goodbye, jinchuriki."

Kakashi stared at him blankly. "What?" he asked.

Sasuke repeated himself.

"Fox-face? Idiot? Do you mean an ANBU member?" the Jounin questioned. Sasuke nodded his head. "Someone from ANBU dragged off someone you consider an idiot," the Copy Ninja stated.

"Who else would run around in orange, shouting 'believe it!' all the time?" Sasuke questioned in annoyance.

It took a moment for that to click into place. What reason does an ANBU member have to take that kind of jutsu against Naruto? He thought, grimacing.

"Right. We'll have to postpone the paperwork. Hop on!" leaning over and offering his shoulder to the child he waited for Sasuke to climb up. The boy made a face at being toted around like a five year old and stated that firmly.

"Okay then, express it is." Turning and scooping Sasuke up into his arms, Kakashi gave him only a moment to grip on tightly even as he protested before shunshining toward the Hokage's office.

Wood exploded outward and knocked the elder shinobi backwards several feet, having to use his left arm and the large sealing device wrapped around it to shield his face. With pupils turned into crosses from the union of Sage mode and Kyuubi chakra, Naruto dropped to the ground with a low growl.

That was entirely too close, boy! the fox's voice howled within his mind.

No, really? Naruto shot back at it. He had barely had the time to draw on the natural energies around him for the transformation before triggering the fox's power. All it took was a few cracks in the wood from being siphoned on to shatter without the Senju-crystal to empower the cage's effects, as Yamato had done in the future.

Danzo looked at the change in the boy's facial features and felt the change in his chakra, shaking his head at the futility of it.

Drawing in another breath, as though he were preparing another Wind Release jutsu in order to mask the dojutsu he was truly about to use, Danzo had the misfortune of not recognizing the signs of a senjutsu user.

His mind-controlling dojutsu still slammed into Naruto as he had intended regardless, but he found a series of walls in place that fought against it; the first was Naruto's own degree of hardened stubbornness, with the second being Sage mode, and the third the Kyuubi's own will rising up.

Naruto twitched as Danzo silently ordered him to stand down. His body tensed up as it remained locked in place but the fire in his eyes never cooled. It's a dojutsu you fool! Stop wasting my chakra fighting it and concentrate on extended range attacks! the Kyuubi snarled at him.

Naruto ignored it and finally got one of his limbs to respond as Danzo approached cautiously, sword raised before him.

Than release my tails and be done of this task! the tailed beast ordered. Naruto grimaced as the dark red chakra began filtering into the air around him, bubbling up to the surface into an ethereal pair of tails.

Danzo halted as the malignant energy began to come forth, and leaped backwards as claws of chakra wrapped over the boys hands and the hitherto-unknown-freed arm slashed at him at a vicious speed.

With his main tactic taken out Danzo drew in a breath of air and thrust the tip of his blade into the ground to free up his hands. It had been a long-since era that he had any need of hand-seals, but the time was now upon him again.

Discarding the damaged black shell around his arm-seal he went through the motions and exhaled sharply at the area where the boy was stuck at, utilizing the Wind Release: Vacuum Sphere and sending seven sharp blasts of chakra forward

Naruto slashed two of them from the air and knocked a third with one of his tails before the remaining four slammed into his flesh with the force of a hail of deadly senbon needles- thin and strong enough to pierce the shield-like nature of the red chakra around his body.

Gritting his teeth together to deny Danzo the pleasure of hearing his pain, Naruto pushed harder against the restriction holding him in place and managed to tear loose his other arm and shoulder.

Taking up the blade again Danzo shunshined around behind the enemy and slammed the tip of the sword into the upper-middle of the spine- again succeeding in driving through the shield, though it hardly lasted before the two tails knocked it free and attempted to wrap about his arm.

The ROOT commander danced back with another shunshine from its reach and collected his sword again, unharmed save for some corrosion toward the tip. "Nnrghhaaaaarh!" with a strangled cry-turned-roar, Naruto produced a sound-wave strong enough to literally knock him off his feet.

Watching the boy soar aimlessly toward a wall the elder shinobi again shunshined forward and took aim for the moment when his target hit, and the jarring collision slammed Naruto's head back against the hardened wall even as a mark of his chakra and body was left behind in it, allowing Danzo's blade to thrust for his heart directly afterward.

This time the red chakra gathered before the point of contact and the weapon was deflected to the side, and Naruto howled again at him from almost point-blank range.

The sonic roar picked Danzo up and threw him across the room. Gotcha you son of a- what the hell? He thought in disbelief and anger as the elder shinobi broke free with the aide of his Wind Release: Stream.

If you don't finish him now I'll take over this fight for you, boy! the Kyuubi warned lowly.

Naruto scowled.

Alright! He thought back, and now able to summon a pair of Shadow Clones with his hands freed up- albeit without the chakra shield or tails yet manifested-, Naruto thrust out his right hand and gathered into it the Rasengan.

The others repeated the motion one by one until each held their fathers technique in one hand.

"Ready?" one asked.

"Of course." The others answered.

Performing the same shunshine technique, his duplicates vanished and reappeared so that between the three of them a triangle was formed around where Danzo touched down, surrounding him.

He looked around at them with no sign of emotion on his face, despite recognizing the Fourth's last perfected jutsu. "... You would force me to go so far," he murmured, passing his blade to the sealed hand and reaching up to burn away the bandages around his face.

When they crumbled to ash he opened his eye and surveyed the trio with his modified Sharingan.

"Come, then, and die impaled one by one." Danzo stated.

End Chapter Three.
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