“Don't die.” She implored.
But he was. She was doing all she could to save him, but he wasn't responding. Orochimaru's goon had teared Naruto's heart to shreds.
“Don't die!”
His organism was desperately trying to keep functioning by accelerating his heartbeat, but all that was doing was causing pointless stress to the boy's heart, aggravating the damage and pumping more and more blood in his thoracic cavity. The analytical part of her mind didn't give the child another minute to live.
“Damn it, Don't die!”
It was happening again. A priceless life was slipping away and there was nothing she could do. A young man who had inherited all that made her village the greatest in the world, a bright example of the will of fire her family had given everything to create and protect, and he was slipping away right in front of her.
“I won't let you die! Not again!”
Not like Nawaki. Not like Dan. He had died in her arms, but she had not been there for the strike that had taken him away from her. This time was even worse. She had been there, useless and shivering, crying over thing long past while she let others fight for her sake. Die for her sake.
“No. I won't let it happen!”
Her eyes were so filled with tears she couldn't see Naruto anymore. So she closed them, to better focus inward, her mind perusing at full speed the vast medical knowledges she had gathered in an entire life dedicated to saving lives. Somehow she knew, this was it, the defining moment. Naruto's survival would be the proof that her existence had had a meaning. That all the lives she had taken on the battlefield, all the lives lost because she had deserted her village, all the things she had done and all those she had failed to accomplish... Thirty seconds.
The sum of her life would be weighed on whether or not she managed to save this one life, one final gamble with everything on the line. She would live with him or die with him. Her fate, her life, her very soul was now forever bound to his in her mind.
And she was coming up empty. Ten seconds.
“No no no...” She whimpered.
She couldn't let this happen. But there was nothing she could do! Yes theres was! There was something left, it _had to_. Maybe she wasn't looking at it in the right way? Her skills weren't enough, but there had to be something. She needed this miracle.5, 4, 3...
“Please, Nawaki! Dan! Somebody, help me!” Her head fell on her hand in a desperate prayer. “Grandfather!” She pleaded to her blood.
And it answered.
She lifted her head in wonder. Suddenly she was seeing again, no tears blurring her sight. Even stranger, her eyes were still closed but she was clearly seeing the dying boy in front of her, his face white as a sheet.
NO!
And suddenly Naruto, her world was bathed with light. A shining white light that dug deep into the boy, reaching farther and farther into his being until it caught hold of its prize. It looked like a wispy ball of yellow light, but it was so much more. Something fundamental, essential. But more than anything, strong, full of a dauntless will, but guided by a purpose, an unshakable belief.
It was so... breath-taking. She wanted it for herself. Slowly, the ball was pulled out of the boy, easily floating to her through the channel of light.
Until suddenly, it couldn't advance anymore. The ball was stuck, held back by an invisible force. For an instant the two forces faced each other in an invisible tug-of-war, until something gave on the other side and the yellow ball quickly finished its trip and was promptly absorbed within herself. And when that happened she was filled by warmth, the sensations so intoxicating to a woman who'd had suffered so much heartache in her life it shut out everything else.
Which was why she never saw the second ball which had emerged from the boy's stomach and rushing at her. Blood red, murky and heavy, with black sinews running all over it, it was the antithesis and she was completely blind sided when it intruded upon her mind.
The pleasant feelings she was luxuriating in abruptly vanished, the gentle fire inside her doused with a truckload of toxic waste. Its sickness spread throughout her, twisting in her stomach and making her skin crawl turning her entire body inside out. The drastic change, from her emotional high to absolute revulsion, was too much for the woman and she peaked into blessed oblivion.
*************************
Orochimaru had to admit, the situation was quite puzzling.
From atop his snake he had been too far away to discern what had happened between Tsunade and the Bijuu child. There had been a flash of light and something had seemed to pass between them, but it had not looked like any jutsu he knew. Whatever it had been, it seemed it had accomplished its purposes as the child's chest had started to rise and fall regularly again.
“Ha! I knew the brat would make it!” Jiraiya cheered with his tipycal simple-mindedness, but Orochimaru had long since stopped caring about the man's antic. But the genin...
That child was starting to become a problem. Though it had only been through Kabuto's carelessness that he had succeeded in landing his rasengan, the simple fact he had mastered such a technique while under the tutelage of an incompetent oaf such as Jiraiya was worrying. Given time, the ineffectual genin lying down in front of him might actually grow into a genuine threat and that was not something he could permit. He had to deal with him now. Permanently.
He launched himself toward the fallen blond, quickly dealing with his one-time friend before he could interfere and after the short flight, relished the feeling of his Kusanagi effortlessly running through the child's skull.
One less stone on his path.
He jerked out his blade messily, slicing right through the skull of the finally defunct genin and sending flying his Konoha protector .
“Kuh kuh kuh. And you put so much effort into saving him, Hime.” He hissed as he turned toward his fellow Sannin. “I wonder what kind of face you'd make if you could see him now. It would probably destroy you for good. But don't worry, I'll send you to the afterlife with the belief your last gambit was a success.”
Orochimaru's blade rose high in the hair, the snake Sannin intending to sever the woman's head from her body. “Farewell, Hime.”
Orochimaru struck and suddenly the air was filled with power. An impossibly large chakra manifested itself right behind Orochimaru. Before the Sannin could act a hand flashed out of nowhere and grabbed the Kusanagi, stopping the strike just short of Tsunade's neck and crushing his tongue wrapped over the grip of the sword in the process. Orochimaru hissed out in pained surprised, his head snapping toward his sudden assailant. He was met with the face of Uzumaki Naruto.
Or rather, what was left of his face. The brain was out in the open, the gash left by the Kusanagi plain to see, and yet the boy was still breathing. One orbit was empty, but it only added to the pressure of the blazing glare his other eyes sent at him.
The snake Sannin could not believe his eyes. That boy should have been dead twice over, yet he was the source of the enormous chakra! Even more unbelievable, his wounded flesh was knotting itself together again at a surreal pace.
The snake sannin had witnessed a lot of sickening scenes during his life, a great deal of them manufactured by his hands, but what was before him was so completely out of his expectations it give him pause. He could not react in time to dodge the uppercut the boy threw at him and he suddenly found himself in the air.
How could that be? Why was that genin suddenly so fast and strong? What had Tsunade done to him?
His flight was brutally reversed when Naruto yanked hard on his trapped tongue, readying himself to deliver another powerful punch.
The insolent child had forgotten who he was dealing with.
With a twist of his tongue Orochimaru sent him hurtling in a wide arc, first high in the air and then crashing to the ground at high speed, the rock cracking under his landing. Orochimaru took the opportunity to retrieve his hurt appendage but he was under no illusion that so little damage would defeat the mysterious genin. Sure enough, the boy was soon back on his feet and rocketing toward him. His fingers crossed and suddenly it wasn't one Naruto he was faced by but an entire army.
And as the wave came crashing upon him, the Sannin caught sight of something that changed his world forever.
*************************
What the hell was going on?
Naruto had honestly no idea how he'd gotten here. Last he remembered he'd wiped the damn smirk off Kabuto's face with his rasengan, but after that things had been going too fast for him to really get a handle on the situation.
But he didn't care. Didn't care that he was alive when he really should have been dead or that he was feeling more power running through him than ever before. All that didn't matter in the face of one single thing:
He had to protect Tsunade.
It was that one single-minded thought that moved him as he reached the Snake bastard together with his army of clones, about to unleash a ten thousand hits Naruto combo. However, his fist only swung through air as the bastard suddenly vanished from his sight. Naruto got ready for the counter-attack but nothing come.
“Over here!” shouted a clone, pointing in the direction of the injured Kabuto. Besides him stood his master.
“Kuh kuh kuh. How interesting this day turned out to be.” He smirked nastily as his body sank into the ground” You did very good today, Naruto-kun. you awakened something in the princess that was thought dead for hundred of years.”
”What the hell are you talking about?”
The creepy bastard just kept on smirking.”Keep an eye on her, Naruto-kun. Your life depends on it.” And with that final warning, the Sannin and his underling vanished.
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(Posted Mon, 23 Feb 2009 01:36)
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