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In the belly of the beast, Naruto struggled. He couldn't get a grip on the snake's slick insides to force his way back to the mouth…
'Why would I want to go back to the mouth? Poisonous fangs that way.'
If he couldn't get out through the hole that already existed, he'd have to make one. His only blades were kunai, though. Cutting that way would take too long. He'd be severely burnt by that point. That in mind, he pulled the one explosive tag he'd been allowed with trembling fingers, despite his restricted state. He kept it close to his chest to keep as much slime off of it as possible, and then stuffed it in his left glove for the same purpose.
"Let's hope I can give it right amount of charge." He'd never been good at using the least amount of chakra possible. Naruto had always been best at making enormous explosions from even cheap tags. But that would kill him in these confined quarters. He grimaced against the pain of the stomach acid around him and wiggled as far in one direction as he could before hooking the glove around his last kunai… which he then drove as far as possible into the side of the beast.
It was hard to tell, but the sinuous rocking movement he'd been feeling seemed to get more violent. Naruto grimaced, wishing for air, and reached his hand through the hole he'd pierced to touch the end of the kunai, feeling wet meat around his hand, stretching and convulsing… and then he lit up just the one finger that touched the ringed end of his kunai with the lightest tinge of neutral chakra.
~~~
"I can't wait any more…"
Aiko bit clean through her lower lip, blood wetting her chin and mixing with the cold rain. She flipped to look into the bathroom, startling Temari. "You can turn them off. Thank you."
Before the girl could respond, Aiko straightened and bounded over the treetops to where she felt that monstrous chakra that nearly obscured team seven's signatures. Anko was mere moments away from reaching them, an ANBU team hot on her heels.
"Anko, I'm coming."
She didn't get a reply. The older girl was doubtlessly a little preoccupied.
~~~
Sakura whined through her teeth, eyes frantic in her skull. She didn't have the time to brush her now-wild hair out of her face, and if she did it would be more likely that she would use the time to address the freely bleeding wound in her shoulder. She had been forced to pull out the kunai pinning her to the tree in order to escape the next hit.
Something twinged in her knee when she bounced off a tree trunk and struggled to get upright, working desperately to clear the area that was being torn apart by whatever the hell that jutsu was. She blinked back tears of pain and fear, feeling cold on the back of her neck.
'This guy… he's a monster! He's no genin.'
She hadn't seen Naruto in almost three minutes- not a very long time in normal circumstances, but seeing as he'd disappeared just before the scariest fight of her life against someone who was obviously toying with Sasuke-kun (and that meant he was far out of her league), she was fucking terrified that he was already dead.
'I can't think about that now!' She strained her muscles, fighting her way through debris and wind that cut and tongues of fire towards her other teammate - what a terrible time for the rain to suddenly stop, but at least nothing was catching fire. She could barely see his silhouette through the mess—he was standing too close, far too close to their monstrous opponent.
Sakura had to have been hallucinating, though, because it looked like his fucking head popped off attached to a taffy neck and stretched out to kiss Sasuke. Inanely, she couldn't help but think, 'You jackass, Sasuke's first kiss was supposed to be mine.' Even though that couldn't be what had happened, and Sasuke's knees were buckling under. She launched off to catch his prone body, muscles screaming, opponent forgotten. That was Sasuke falling. She couldn't let Sasuke fall.
Out of the corner of her eye, it seemed that the man was slowly turning to look at her with a flash of yellow eyes. Couldn't be. No one had yellow eyes. She grit her teeth and reached, ready to grab Sasuke and spring away, she saw someone coming in hot nearby, seconds away, she had backup she was going to be fine and she could find Naruto no baka and hit him for scaring her like that and everything would be fine, it would…
"How annoying," Orochimaru hissed, snatching the little brat right out of the air and ripping out the front of her neck in one smooth motion, stunned green eyes staring up at the warm spray of blood that resulted. Then he let go. The little corpse fell, colliding unpleasantly with tree branches in a tragic flop of soft white limbs and crashing through damp leaves, sending water droplets flying like jewels. "Anko-chan, I didn't expect you to come and ruin my fun so quickly. Did you miss your sensei?"
Anko bared her teeth, determinedly not looking at the tiny body crumpled and awkwardly hanging in the thick underbrush below, swaying slightly from the force of the fall she had just barely arrived too late to prevent. "You evil fucker," she hissed right back. "Don't mock me! You left me like trash. But you're not getting away this time."
Amusement was in every sinuous line of his body. "Oh really," he purred, slipping on a pleasant smile like a mask.
"Yes." She settled the now-unconscious Uchiha boy in the crook of the tree so that he didn't fall, keeping both eyes on Orochimaru. He placidly let her. Unease prickled at the back of her neck- why hadn't he killed this one too? Where was the third kid?
"Did you see the present I gave Sasuke-kun?" the conversational tone made her jerk unpleasantly, feeling as if her skin was pulling and slipping off. 'No, no, no, not another, no no no'… "Don't be jealous, but it's much better than yours."
Her hand instantly clapped onto her seal, where it seemed as if her skin and the muscle and the bone they were on fire and how could she move or even breathe… She gritted her teeth through the pain and pushed it away, flinging a brace of kunai to break his concentration.
It didn't work, but the four man ANBU squad that burst through the treeline baring steel like teeth did distract him a bit… just as a little blonde head bounded into the clearing and took in the tableau.
"Kid!" She hollered. "Grab your teammate up here and get the fuck out, to the tower. Forget the exam."
Orochimaru frowned, dodging the first volley, ducking and weaving between two short swords, some bitch spitting lightning and almost right into the spray of senbon Anko flung. In a flash of movement she barely caught, one of the ANBU was sent jerking violently to collide with a tree trunk.
"What happened to the bastard?" The blonde boy pulled desperately at his teammate. "Wake up, asshole!" His voice broke. "You've gotta help me find Sakura-chan."
Anko flinched, shunshining away from the bright green snake that shot for her face. "Kid, ain't nobody that can help that little girl anymore. Get your friend the fuck out of here! Your sister will meet you. She's close."
"I can't leave her!" he shouted. She grimaced, glancing involuntarily down, down, down to where the little girl with the red dress had fallen. His eyes tracked hers and widened in comprehension, then disbelief.
There was no way to mistake that for unconsciousness.
She didn't have time to deal with his panic attack- no time to cope with his screams of pain that quickly turned to howls of rage. She made time to turn to check when red, red chakra that was sickeningly familiar and almost as traumatizing as that sickly green-black chakra that she had used to admire so much. Wide eyed, she took just one glance at the crouched figure shrouded in unnatural, shit-your-pants-scary demonic chakra.
"Oh ho ho ho. What's thissssss."
"None of your damn business," she barked, rejoining the fight with a fury. That fucker wasn't taking her seriously!
And then he was gone. No shunshin that she saw, no sprint, nothing. He was just gone.
"What the fuck," a confused tenor voice breathed from under a porcelain mask. "Orders, Mitarashi-san?"
She grunted, surveying the situation again. "Escort those two kids to the tower, right now. I'm going to find Hokage-sama."
Her earpiece flickered on. "What's going on, Anko? I can't sense Orochimaru."
She sighed, feeling the adrenaline flood out. Wearily, she put one hand to her head to turn her headset on. "He's gone. I have your brother. He'll be heading to the tower. If you know how, I'd contact that sensei of yours." Dark eyes flickered to the crumpled figure curled into the tree. "I think he's the best seal master in town." She snorted derisively. "Not saying much."
~~~
Aiko clenched her fist around her brother's still hand, back hurting from her leaning position over the hospital bed. They'd been forced to tranquilize him to keep him from wrecking the place up.
She felt numb.
Shouldn't she had been able to do something about this?
'No, no, no,' her mind insisted. 'I couldn't have predicted this. No one could have predicted this. And no one will ever know that I should have known, should have known.'
His little hand was warm in hers. She could feel his heart beat through her fingers.
'Sakura doesn't have a heartbeat,' something traitorous whispered. 'Cold, dead, in the forest. They'll get her in the morning, they said. No hurry, no hurry.'
The door opened and closed quietly. She didn't have to look up to know that her teacher was staring out the window, fingers probably still stained with ink from the emergency sealing he had just performed. She let Naruto's hand slip from her and walked over to wrap her arms around her sensei's waist, burying her face into his flak jacket. He didn't react.
Aiko breathed deeply, searching for something familiar in the warm scent. She knew he used the same weapon polish, but she couldn't pick the scent out at all. He just smelled warm and safe.
Slowly, reluctantly one trembling hand rested gently against her back. For a man of his caliber, the shaking was almost as telling as the fact that he reached for reassurance, no matter how minor.
They waited as the day fled into night, shadows chasing slowly over white sheets on hospital beds.
Sasuke woke up a few hours before Naruto did, just about when she had finally steeled herself to asking if anyone had talked to Sakura's parents ('and told them that she's dead in the leaves, one little leaf in a forest').
"Ugh." The groan caught both of their attention. Aiko untangled herself from the blanket on her shoulders and pushed aside the curtains around Sasuke's bed. He blinked up at her blearily, one hand attached to the base of his neck like a vise. "What happened," he rasped. "That man, in the forest. Who was he?"
"Orochimaru of the Sannin," Kakashi stated quietly, one dark eye intent on the waking boy's reactions. "He…"
"Sakura's dead," Aiko said abruptly. Too abruptly. There was no way to sugar coat that. It would be a waste of time to try. She fell back into the chair beside his bed, pulling her legs up to her chest. "Dead dead dead in the forest."
Her teacher gave her an alarmed look. 'No need,' she thought. 'I'm fine, I was never near him. Don't look at me don't look.'
The brunette pulled in a long, slow, pained breath. "I see." The words were quiet. "And… and Naruto?"
"He's in that bed," sensei pointed to the adjoining room. "He had to be sedated."
Aiko stared at her knees.
"How?" The word had the most emotion she had ever heard in Sasuke's voice before. It wasn't grief, but it was something.
"I wasn't there," sensei said quietly. "I don't know."
"She can't breathe." She said abruptly. "Not without a throat. They left her. We left her. Sensei, are we going to go back and get her?" She hadn't seen it happen, of course. The ANBU had been attempting to calm Naruto down when she arrived. If she had been looking, she would have seen Sasuke's face turn green.
"Aiko, why don't you lie down. I think Sasuke could use a cuddle." He didn't even glare at the man. Sensei patted her head. "I'm going to go talk to the Hokage.
"Okay." Blearily, she untucked her legs and climbed into the bed. Silently, her teammate slid over to give her room underneath the covers. "I'm not tired, you know."
"Hn." Sasuke rolled over to stare at the ceiling.
"I never liked her." He turned his head a little to look at her. She was staring at the place where the wall and ceiling met, eyes dull and almost impassive. "I thought she was annoying and that she didn't take her career seriously. But she was just a little girl." She licked dry lips, weighing the next words. "She was going to get better. She was going to realize that her job was important and she was going to do well. But now she won't. If I'd been better-"
"Shut up." Sasuke wearily closed his eyes, pushing back the strange pain on the juncture of his neck and shoulder that no one had explained yet. He'd thought that freak – Orochimaru, he would remember that name, he would kill that man too because Sasuke didn't care when someone was out of his league, he'd always been second best or worse and he'd never let that stop him before – Anyway, he'd thought that freak had bit him there. Was that really a dream, or did it happen? He didn't want to think about that. He didn't want to think about the man who had beat him around like an Academy brat with laughter on his tongue. And he didn't want to think that the man had killed Sakura.
Weak, pathetic, annoying Sakura. Annoying Sakura who had spent more time on her hair than her kunai. Sakura who had followed him around with stars in her eyes like he was someone worth looking up to. Sakura who had picked all those fights with the idiot for his sake even though he definitely didn't need the help. She'd been weak. Soft. Kind, when it suited her. Bright and innocent.
He pushed away the hurt with the ease of long practice, compartmentalizing the new pain with the old pain that belonged to the little boy in his mind who screamed, screamed, screamed 'why'. The girl beside him turned onto her side and tangled cold fingers into the front of his shirt. He let her. It was weakness, but even Sasuke could forgive a little weakness in the dark.
~~~
Kakashi stood in his shower, head bowed. He'd had to get out of that room. That made three out of three students that he would be referring to the mental health division for a short break. Apparently Aiko wasn't as ready for trauma as he'd thought.
'Am I cursed?' He slowly raised one shaking hand to look at it. 'How the hell did I manage to get another teammate killed? I wasn't even there.'
The drain turned into a whirlpool, sucking out all the liquid and the oxygen and leaving only steam for him to breathe. He didn't mind.
He had already been to a briefing- it wasn't his briefing, but the Hokage had let him linger while someone talked about broken records and a flood in the tower all the way down to the first floor and faceless Rain ninja and a group of Sound ninja that definitely hadn't been genin who had attacked and been killed by the ANBU that swept the forest to make sure everything was clear. They had extracted one unconscious group of students as well as one girl whose teammates were dead. She was in the hospital somewhere, probably scared and alone. He didn't care. He had enough to care about.
Someone had already been sent to retrieve his student's body and arrange it a little more respectfully in case her civilian parents wanted it. They would be contacted in the morning. No use in making them lose sleep.
'I put a twelve year old on the mission stone. That's a new low.'
The night had been a bad one, on all counts.
~~~
Karin Uzumaki stared out her hospital window with wide, red eyes. She'd never been in a room like this before. But then, Konoha was famous for the quality of their medicine, and an orphan like her wouldn't have merited the best her village had to offer anyway.
Her team was dead.
She tried out the thought, remembering the terror she had felt when she realized she was alone in that forest of horrible animals and acid traps, being herded along the river to enemies she could feel but not avoid. It was slightly worse than being in the forest with her teammates, who at least couldn't kill her until the task was over.
If she wasn't so unsure about what was going to happen to her now, she'd be happy she had escaped her teammates. But they were going to kill her if she dared return without them. She had been the mere filler meant to allow the real nin to take the exam in sissy Konoha that would only accept full teams.
One slim hand pressed to her stomach to quiet the rumbling within. She'd been hustled in quickly and efficiently, treated with a pretty glowing hand technique that sealed up all her hurts and erased the splinter break in her shin bone… until they got to the paperwork and found out her name. Karin had no idea why the nurse had been so skeptical, but she had abruptly left the room and started a conversation with someone Karin couldn't see.
"May I come in, Uzumaki-san?"
She jumped a little, and gave the door a suspicious look. "O-of course."
The hand that opened the door was wrinkled, aged, and attached to a face that even she knew. Her face burnt. "H-Hokage-san!" The title was insufficient, but she couldn't refer to a foreign nin as 'sama'. They would skin her alive back home in grass.
The fact that she had been brought in by Orochimaru-sama himself wouldn't matter—he was far too busy to pay much attention to a genin he'd rescued years ago. The old man didn't seem to mind the mild disrespect. He merely smiled at her.
"Forgive me, but when I heard we had an Uzumaki in the hospital, I had to see. The family resemblance is undeniable, young lady."
"W-what?"
"You didn't know?" He indicated for her to follow. "You have the Uzumaki look about you, especially your hair. I think you look even more Uzu than the Uzumaki we have in Konoha."
Her heart stopped. "My family is from Konoha?" She knew nothing about her family. She'd always been a foreigner and an orphan- twice cursed.
"Not originally, no. But Konoha has a long history with the Uzumaki. The wife of one of our founding fathers was an Uzumaki, as well as the late Kushina-chan, who you might know as the Bloody Habanero."
Karin shook her head slowly. "I don't know who that it."
"She very nearly became the fourth Hokage."
Red eyes went wide. Her family sounded kind of awesome. Her family. That was a new phrase.
"Forgive an old man his rambling. Tell me, would you accompany me for a late dinner? I'm afraid I was working late."
~~~
Ino eyed the other blonde kunoichi with distaste. There was just no excuse for hair like that- it looked like straw. The Suna nin gave a smirk in return.
"Ino, if you're done asserting your dominance, they're going to start talking soon." She rolled her eyes at her grumpy teammate.
"Don't be ridiculous, Shikamaru. Not everyone is here yet. We couldn't possibly have beat Sasuke-kun's team in, even if he is slowed down by Forehead girl and Naruto." She raised up onto her toes, scanning the crowd for that shock of black hair.
The tall boy standing by the kunoichi she'd been glaring at gave a snicker. "It's funny when we know more than the natives," he drawled. "You mean the team with the irritatingly loud blonde, right? Don't you know? That team is disqualified."
Ino reddened. "W-what? You take that back! No way."
Teal eyes flashed with amusement, and she heard the other girl's voice for the first time. "Kankuro, play nice. I'm sure she knows what she's talking about." She jerked her head. "Let's go." With a scuff of sandals, the two followed their red-headed teammate to the room where the genin were gathering to hear results.
Chouji shrugged. "It's possible," he offered, caught between being the voice of reason and the peacekeeper. "Naruto could have peeked at a scroll or something. That wouldn't be Sasuke's fault at all."
Shikamaru rolled his eyes. "Troublesome. Who cares?" He shuffled off, quickly followed by her other male teammate. Ino gave one last look around the room and gave up her search as a bad job. 'I'm sure I'll see him soon.'
But team 7 was nowhere to be seen. They sidled up next to their year mates uneasily. Hinata seemed worried too: she had actually activated her Byakugan to search.
"There's only one Konoha team missing," she whispered. "I don't see them anywhere."
Konoha had done very well in the second task—other teams had apparently been overwhelmed by the native flora and fauna.
A cough. "Unfortunately, there are too many teams. We are going to have to have an elimination round."
Ino cursed, bouncing up onto Shikamaru's shoulders so that she could see what was going on. The speaker looked like he was about to fall over from a wasting disease. She wrinkled her nose distastefully.
'Getting through this exam was tough enough. I don't think my team is ready to fight again already.'
They'd nearly gotten their butts handed to them by that Rain team using genjutsu… Shikamaru had spotted it, but it was still close. They had been desperate- it had been the last day and they hadn't so much as seen another team… Aside from the incident where they hid in the bushes and watched that Suna kunoichi's teammate crush an entire grass team alive. She shuddered a little.
'Four Konoha teams, the Sand team, and one Rain… Unless Konoha loses all our fights, we'll be dominating the Finals.' She gave a slightly feral grin. 'That makes 9 matches…'
And as if by divine providence, her match was first. She strutted into the ring… and then deflated at the sight of her opponent. 'He looks so weird!' She didn't have a problem with the color green, exactly, but this fellow leaf nin apparently had terrible taste in everything. 'He desperately needs my help. I hope he fights better than he dresses.'
The boy she was to fight slid into a serious position, left hand upraised and just a hint of a blush across his cheeks. "I am honored by this fight, Yamanaka-san!"
She sighed. 'He's not great at trash talk, either.' "Let's go already!"
Ino was the best kunoichi of her class. She had always been praised for her aggression, creative taijutsu (honed by practice against a real genin for two whole years) and comparative body strength.
But this kid gently, smoothly deflected or flowed around everything she threw at him. She caught a glimpse of one of the Rain nin looking nervous about the quality of genin that Konoha produced. She was starting to feel pretty nervous, too. If she were Shikamaru, this would be where she came up with a clever plan, or used weaponry or something. But she wasn't the planner, and her taijutsu was the strongest non-lethal tool she had. She didn't want to actually hurt a fellow leaf-nin with kunai.
Ino forced herself a little faster, burning desperately to get at least one hit in. The world was a blur around her. She was more insulted than anything that her opponent was clearly avoiding actually fighting her- at the speed he moved, he could have ended the fight already if he actually tried to hit her.
As if he heard her, Rock (and was a silly name, thought the girl named Pig) flew forward in a whirlwind of limbs. "You fought well, Yamanaka-san, but now it is my turn. Konoha Senpu!"
The next thing she knew was waking up groggily to the sight of her teacher. "Did anyone catch the wagon that ran me over?" She sat up, swaying slightly.
"No, but you missed two fights." The scent of salty bbq floated through the air. "You know the guy who beat you? His female teammate beat Kiba, and then that blonde Suna nin you were growling at beat their last teammate."
"Ha, at least one of his teammates bit it," she muttered bitterly. "Who is next?"
"The tallest Suna nin and one of the Leaf genin from the oldest team. Yoroi or something."
The Suna nin won, thoroughly confusing the genin who screeched something about his chakra stealing abilities failing. By the time the next match was announced she could sit up unassisted, which was good because Shikamaru was fighting one of the three Rain nin. He drew the match out for absolutely forever, but eventually won.
"Go Hinata!" Kiba yelled raucously, somehow seeming unaffected by his recent ass-kicking. "He's the shortest kid here!"
Ino winced when she saw the match-up… Hinata was facing that red-headed boy who she had seen gleefully kill an entire team. "I don't like this," she muttered. Asuma gave her an indulgent smile.
"Have more faith in your fellow leaf nin. I'm sure the Hyuuga girl is strong."
Ino rolled her eyes. "Hinata is pretty good, but that guy…" she shuddered. "He killed an entire team in the forest and laughed."
Her teacher scratched his head. "I'm sure she'll be fine. If it looks bad, I'll jump in, okay?"
It did get bad, and she was glad he made that promise. When the mediator tried to stop the match, she shoved at her teacher. Just in time, he grabbed up Hinata and pulled her away from the floating cloud of sand creeping up her arms. The screams were horrible.
Beside Ino, even Shikamaru was pale. "Her hands…" They were a bloody, mangled mess. Mutters of discontent fluttered throughout the small crowd. It looked like she was never going to be able to write again, much less fight. A laugh went up from the tallest Suna nin, the creep in all the facepaint.
The next matches were pretty subdued—Shino drained all of Chouji's chakra and won, a rain nin beat the silver-haired Konoha nin with glasses, and the last Rain nin won her match against the last team mate from the oldest Konoha team.
"Well, I guess that's it.." Ino went to get up, but was stopped by her teacher.
"Hold on." He didn't seem to notice he still had Hinata's blood on his sleeves. "They're going to announce the match-ups ahead of time. We should hear Shikamaru's before we go."
Shikamaru groaned after the first round was announced. "I'm the first match?"
Ino elbowed him. "At least you get to beat up that jackass who laughed at Hinata." She glared across the room. "And you had better!" She scoffed. "I'm already mad that I'm going to have to cheer for the weirdo who beat me. I hate that Sand girl more."
"I wouldn't want to be that panda girl," Chouji muttered.
Ino shuddered. "Agreed. And having to wait til the last round? Talk about pressure."
The girl in question merely looked determined to fight the redhead. Ino would have given up. No point in dying in some stupid competition.