FicWad

Okay, just so you know there is a small torture scene inserted into this section, as well as a depiction of child killing. I tried to keep it as tasteful as I could. But they aren't tasteful subjects.

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

... Break Down ...
... by IWCT ...
... Part Two: Eagle ...

It’s funny to know that he has a warm meal to come home to after this. A hot shower to wash off the grit. A home in the village. Friends who care. Someone who cares about more than the mission. Someone who is distanced from this blood of his, pooling on the lacquered wooden floor as he desperately grasps his arm. The warm comfort he thinks of must be a dream. A dream he has to protect at any cost.

The boy (and yes, it is a real boy, years younger than he was when he made jounin) smirks, black eyes and black hair and black clothes. He is a little shadow. A shadow that snuck up behind him while he was crushing an adult’s heart, only to stab his arm with a kunai. And he’s just a genin.

“We protect our own,” he says loudly.

His female teammate grins with sharp fangs, standing protectively over the body of their fallen sensei. He knows how Konoha organizes its genin squads. Where’s the third one?

The air screams a warning as metal slashes through it with wild abandon. He flips backwards and his wounded arm closes around the throat of the shuriken throwing genin.

“Itachi-kun!”

“He’s got it covered, Shisui-kun. Protect the princess. I’m gonna try to fix sensei!” The girl is stupid, speaking of the dead like they can be brought back. Speaking her orders out loud. But he was an idiot for having concentrated on the adult before making certain that the kids couldn’t get in the way.

His arm is squeezing tightly, and the boy (Shukaku’s pity, but this kid can’t be much older than five. What the Hell is Konoha thinking?!) is going blue around the lips. Wind howls around the fingers of his free hand, and he brings them up and drives them into the boy’s stomach. There are three seconds, where the skin’s elasticity is tested and ripped to shreds by the small concentrated tornadoes. And then he’s holding onto the pillow from the princess’ bed, and it explodes in a blast of feathers as the wind rips into it.

“Shit! Itachi-kun, are you alright?”

The dark haired child is bleeding on the bed, his lined face white with pain, and his teammate makes the fatal mistake of rushing to his side. “What was that?!”

“It’s Sand’s Wind Rider,” the girl grunts, trying not to breath in the feathery storm. “Close combat with wind element techniques, and typically rips his opponents apart with wind. Itachi-kun’s lucky to have thought of the replacement technique. Asuma-san told us during the briefing not to engage him if he showed up, and get back up instead. At least he’s typically known for working alone, that’s what Asuma-san said, right, sensei?” she shakes the bloody, broken body. “Where’s that freaky ANBU guy who’s supposed to be back-up?!” the girl’s voice has climbed to a near shriek.

The one called Itachi is the only one who thinks like a ninja, because he shoves Shisui away, croaking breathlessly: “He’sss use -- the feathers -- cover. Shisui -- the Princess!”

But it’s too late. He’s in front of the terrified girl. Only she’s not terrified. She’s only five. She doesn’t know what death is yet. His gloved hands grab her dark hair. His tanto-gato slices through her soft white neck. Blood sprays everywhere. His mission is complete and the genin Shisui screams in horror. One less child in the line of succession in the Fire Country. Eventually they will topple.

He breaks through the nearest paper screen, and then cuts a wall to pieces. The castle is situated on a cliff above the forest. He plummets. Smearing his fingers with blood from his arm he quickly shouts: “Kuchiyosek no jutsu!”

Akahane catches him, his massive wings beating strongly in the night air. The giant hawk isn’t the Sky Lord, but they have a good working relationship. The summoned bird chuckles as he holds on tightly. “Caught yourself a little lamb, did you?”

“Well, the hunt was good,” he breathes out. “I’m gaining notoriety, too.”

…

He re-reads the scroll, and then passes it over to his wife. The Third nods. She looks troubled. His gaze is focused inscrutably inwards. She looks imploringly over to her Kazekage. They think she’s pregnant, she whispers. She wants her husband to live to see fatherhood.

He stands, and nods to the Third. He accepts the mission, and the promotion that will come with it if he succeeds. The scroll is placed on the desk. They leave. His former captain’s mask still glints next to the scroll, shining like a white beacon.

That night she hugs him from behind, wrapping his arms tight to his sides as she yells at him, burying her head in his shoulder blades. He stares out the window at Suna, washed in blue and white from the moon. It is incredibly beautiful. It takes his breath away. More than her names and desperate anger can hope to affect him.

Eventually she begins to sob the same word over and over. Why, why, why.

He looks at Suna, and states quietly that his captain is selling Suna’s secrets to other villages. If he kills the former ANBU before vital information is delivered, then he can protect the village. That’s what matters. Protecting Suna. Protecting her. Keeping the village strong for his children. That’s all that really matters, in the end.

The captain was an interrogation specialist! She reminds him. The plan he and the Third cooked up relies on his body being stronger than anyone should have to test.

All ANBU captains go through a trial by fire, he replies, turning to kiss her tear soaked face. That’s why the ANBU is the arm of the Kazekage. The true Iron Sword of Law. And the captain betrayed Suna. There is no worse crime. It’s his duty to bring death to the man.

And after? She asks, not willing to be assuaged with the platitudes tonight.

If it helps Suna, then it’s his duty to fill the vacancy his captain has left. He serves the Third.

…

This was not going to plan, he thinks as the needle is jammed into his arm. Truth serum, he is told. And a few other things. Mostly experimental, but as the captain comments, he’s the perfect guinea pig. He’s always lived on the edge, and is stubborn as a mule.

His captain and a shroud swathed ninja from the Earth Country, who takes the information the captain provides in small trickles, have a small hut on the outskirts of Soushomo, a fairly large city and close to the border. They don’t really need information from him. They have the captain for that. No, he is just the toy lab rat.

The swathed ninja has a younger counterpart who joins their merry little party over the days. He grins at the Sand nin strapped to the chair, and makes comments about how beautiful Suna red hair is. The older Rock nin tells him that rape only happens if the specimen is particularly uncooperative. He shouldn’t get excited. The captain says nothing, and just checks that the chakra draining seals are still perfect.

…

He’s been there two weeks. His collarbone is broken. There are cuts and burns all over his skin. One of his eyes was nearly taken before the Rock nin reminded his apprentice that the specimen needed to be as physically intact as possible. He’s gotten used to the sensation of choking on his own blood.

When the three are together, the daily abuse is fairly thorough. The real danger is when his captors come alone. Each of the three has their own requirements from his body, and alone they become uncontrolled.

His captain beats him black and blue with his bare fists on occasion. On others he’ll light up, and offer the prisoner a cigarette. Apparently part of using him is personal to the Captain. The Captain’s son blew himself apart trying to master the bloody typhoon.

The boy from Rock is just a sadist. Simple and twisted as a corkscrew. He does all the cuts, and burns. When they’re alone, his feverish black eyes sparkle with delight, and he usually sits on the Sand nin’s lap, practically dry humping. Sometimes he slaps his victim’s head back and forth, before putting long painted fingers through the Suna red hair, and crooning praise for his pet. Other times he is merely satisfied with licking up the blood, kissing the burns, and biting the Sand nin’s bare throat. For some reason, this reminds the Wind Rider of desperate kunochi, and he imagines women hanging from beheading wire as the torture apprentice grinds his hard on into the captive lap.

The old Rock nin is the true professional. He is the most dangerous. The boy enjoys this too much, and the ANBU captain has made this too personal. The rock nin has the same degree of detachment from the situation that he has cultivated to deal with the two weeks of pain. When the robed stranger comes, he asks questions. All eventually lead back to the Third, and how the Third operates. Suna’s Wind Rider ignores the questions, and concentrates on the chemicals that the Rock nin pumps into his system.

Mind control drugs, the old man tells him honestly, a funny clicking sound suggesting that his carefully prepared wrappings are covering a face full of sharp teeth. He is not the Third, but the Wind Rider would be an asset for Rock during the war. And if he can break the hold of the drugs, then it will be fun to watch as his mind melts.

…

Mind control. It takes up most of his thoughts now. He whispers it during one of the sessions with the boy. The boy stills, and the smirks, lifting his lolling head by a fist full of hair.

“So that’s what the old man is up to. You’re to be our puppet. The village’s doll. How delicious,” and the boy grabs his cracked and bleeding lips, and kisses him, shoving his tongue into the man’s mouth. “Don’t worry, doll. I’ll always play with you.”

He gives no resistance. No encouragement. It’s the easiest way to deal with everything. His mind leaves his body in a way. He’s watching all his captors from various corners as they work out their frustration/lust/theories on the body strapped to the chair. He’s only jolted out of whatever state he’s escaped to when they move his body to the uncomplicated hole in the ground that serves as the latrine. Even when they feed him he’s not participating. He supposes Baki would chuckle, and call this some big group masturbation, trying to take his mind off the pain eating at him from his spine.

Some of the drugs pumped into him cause him to hallucinate. Butchered bodies, rivers of blood. He’s back at the front lines with his friends. And they all die one after another, until Suna is bathed in blood. And he’s failed. There is nothing worse. Nothing. Suna is the most important thing in the world.

One day the boy comes in, with his henna covered fingers, black eyes, and hair pulled back in that tight green and brown ponytail. He toys with the Wind Rider’s body, but it’s more like foreplay at this point.

“Respond, doll,” the boy smirks before kissing his Sand nin.

He kisses back, unable to refuse the order. It’s more like a wrestling match between the two, than a real kiss. He’s fully back in his body, trapped there, and responding the only way he knows how. The boy chuckles as he pulls himself away, licking his lips. “Well, well. Used to dominating, are you? And here I thought you were just a broken little sub who didn’t know how to please properly.”

The boy pushes on his collar bone, and his stomach turns inside out. There’s nothing to spill, but the sickening pain makes him dry retch.

“Stop that, doll, it’s disgusting,” his captor commands off-handedly.

He stops in mid-heave. His eyes are wide, the thin lines of kohl gone. He’s sweating and shaking with pain and what could only be termed as fear. The sadist grins. He knows the drugs must have reached their potential. Besides, the lovely body has been weakened by two weeks with little sleep, little food, and constant abuse.

“Don’t try to escape, doll. You can scream if you want, though.”

The ties are undone, and he falls from the chair to the ground. He must have blacked out for a moment then, because he’s on his hands and knees, and the boy is in front of him, stroking an erection that only gets harder has the Rock nin looks over the captive.

“Now, obey, doll. It’s going to be very unpleasant if you don’t please me. Come here, and let’s see how good that aggressive little mouth of yours is. On your hands and knees.”

He doesn’t think he has the strength at that point to stand, so that order is just fine. He reaches the rock nin, and rocks back on his knees to look up at the torture shinobi. The boy grins, before seeing something in his doll’s hand. “What is that?”

The Sand nin lifts the scrap of paper for inspection. Horror covers the boy’s face as he sees the ripped seal that should be draining the prisoner’s chakra. But the hand has already slammed into his stomach, and blood is suddenly bubbling in his body, little bubbles of air appearing, and whipping themselves into millions of miniature cyclones. He doesn’t have the breath to scream, as his lungs are ripped apart, and blood begins to seep from his pores.

The Wind Rider gasps as he finishes, and nearly blacks out again. Instead he rises shakily to his feet, and moves to tie the corpse to the chair. “Don’t put your faith in drugs, /doll/. I’m from Sand,” he tells the brat angrily. “We invented poison. You’d never have made it as an interrogator, anyway. You get too involved. You don’t know what orders to give. Too bad for you that you were so easily manipulated. Would have been cleaner if you were the Captain.”

He breathes carefully, trying to scrub the feeling of slime from his sweaty skin. Now for the waiting game. The chakra seals have all been disabled. He’s rearranged the torture chamber to fit his liking. The hallucinations are only creeping at the corners of his eyes. He waits in a corner.

The captain walks into the poisoned trip wire strung across the door, and he’s on him. The sickle bladed wind detaches the bastard’s head. Normally he doesn’t take trophies, but he wants proof. The old Rock nin can pick up the mess himself. The mission’s complete, and that’s all that matters. He walks out into the heat of the desert. Never before has he missed Shukaku’s land more.

…

He passes out in a cave used for border guards re-supply. He comes to hearing voices and seeing firelight. He passes out again. That’s how he spend the next however long, drifting in and out of consciousness (at least he hopes that he’s drifting. He’d hate to think that the giant snake slithering over his body while singing nursery rhymes is really there. Or the fox that has plucked out his eyeballs and is juggling them is a reality).

“Sensei! Come quick! There’s someone back here!” he winces, hearing a girl’s voice, and tries to roll away, only jarring his collar bone, which promptly has him spewing bile all over his bare chest.

Kindly hands turn him over, and he feels the wash of a healer’s chakra. Someone calls for blankets, and he feels someone cleaning up the mess. Sadly, all he can see are the shadows in Shukaku’s star filled eyes.

“Someone roughed him up good. Is he one of ours? Yuri-chan, see if you can get Hana-chan back here. He’s going to need the warmth of those dogs of hers. Where’s Nara?” The voice is deep and full of compassion.

“He went with Hana-chan, sensei. He’s still trying to compile that herb compendium, you know,” the girl who speaks drawls, and doesn’t sound like she approves.

“Sensei,” a quiet voice quivers. “I don’t think -- look at the forehead plate I found. We might be in a lot of trouble.”

There is a pause, and then someone lets out a controlled breath. “Yes, Yuri-chan, but get Hana-chan anyway.”

“Why? He’s only some Suna trash,” drawling girl asks.

“Hey, there’s something else back here -- gah! He has a head with him,” a third girl says in horror. He thinks it’s the one who found him in the first place. His world is filled with fire and flowers.

“How clean is the cut, Nami-chan?” the man asks.

“Really clean. Must have been done with a sword. No kunai is long enough to sever a head without ripping through.”

Finally he manages to summon up enough breath to whisper something. “Mission. Tell Sandaime. I did it.”

“Rest, kid,” the man tells him. “We can’t exactly walk into Sunagakure to carry that message to the Kazekage.”

“Rock?” he asks.

“Leaf. Medic nin training group,” the nice voice replies.

“Sensei, don’t tell him that stuff! He’ll use it against--,”

“Yoshino-chan, he’s drugged up to the eyeballs, and he’s pushed himself too far under these injuries. He’s not a threat at the moment. We’ll be long gone before he can do anything,” the warmth and care is still in the voice, but so is the steel will of a dagger.

“What the fuck is that bastard doing here!?”

“Ah, Hana-chan, you’ve met this man before. Nara-kun, come both of you, sit down by the fire.”

“Fang Girl,” he mutters deliriously. “But I killed that lamb already. Did that genin coat the kunai with something?”

“No,” Fang Girl’s snarls sound a lot more dangerous when he’s helpless. “Shisui-kun’s stupid like that.”

“Is this the guy?” another male voice asks.

“Yeah, he killed sensei right in front of us,” Fang Girl spits. “Let’s leave him here to rot.”

“Now, now,” the nice voice says calmly. “This is not only a great exercise for you all, but it we can now cover the lesson on ethics in a practical situation.”

“Yes, sensei,” Fang Girl says unhappily.

“Here we have a man who is about to die. Our code of ethics says that we must treat him. Now, this is complicated by the fact that he is an enemy. We aren’t in a campaign against Sand at the moment, but we have been in the past, and we probably will be in the future. If we heal him he’ll most likely kill our friends in the future, he might have already killed someone important to you. Our goal is to save human life. So what do we do?”

“We’d be saving more lives if we killed him,” Fang Girl said smugly.

“Would we? How many lives has he protected from death?”

“None!”

“You, Itachi-kun, and Shisui-kun are still alive, aren’t you?” the second man questions.

Fang Girl falters, then picks up her argument. “But our teacher, the little girl --,”

“Your teacher. Was in the way. As for the girl. She was,” he fights for breath, trying to keep his voice even. “A mission.”

“She was five years old!” Fang Girl yells.

“You’re just children. If you think that. Ask your friend. The one who thinks like a shinobi. Pillow boy.”

“Itachi-kun,” for some reason there’s sadness in Fang Girl’s voice. “He’s got his hands full.”

“He knows about missions,” the Sand nin gasps. “You fulfill the mission at any cost.”

“Really now?” the group’s teacher asks, more to himself. “But we’re medic nin. What is our mission?”

“Catalogue desert plants,” a girl pipes up.

“Would healing him interfere with this mission?” the man asks.

There is a chorus of sullen “no”s.

“So we are brought back to the ethical problem. We are bound to save life. What will do more damage? Healing him, or letting him alone until the next Suna patrol finds him.”

“Third option,” the Sand nin croaks. “You kill me. Slit throat. Heart Stab. Take your pick.”

There is a chorus of gasps. The Yuri girl stutters that it would be in cold blood.

“It’s a quicker death. Than leaving me here. To be eaten by beetles,” the red haired man replies.

“Asuma-san said you were known as the most ruthless man in your village,” Fang Girl says. “Perhaps you should get a taste of your own medicine.”

“From the looks of it he’s had that taste already, and more,” the other man chuckles, as if it’s all some big joke.

“Tell me,” he asks. “If I were the White Fang. Would you have the same problems. Deciding what to do?”

“The White Fang’s dead,” the medic says sharply. “He didn’t understand what missions were.”

“I’m trying to give an example. That you can relate to. I don’t know if you feel the same. Way about Sand’s Wind Rider,” the title almost makes him laugh. “As we do about Leaf’s White Fang. But one of my teachers. Lost her son and daughter-in-law. To the White Fang. She’s one of our best medic nin. She would never treat a Leaf nin.”

“Lucky for you, we’re not her, then,” the compassionate man says.

“Would your Slug Princess do the same?”

“Tsunade? Possibly. I would like to think she’s better than that, though,” he replies quietly. “Besides, I want a chance to see if I can pull out all those hallucinogens in your body. It’ll be a challenge.”

“But sensei, we already know that if he lives more people will die,” Nami-chan protests.

“Really. Why does the mission to kill a five-year old girl matter so much to you?” the medic asks him.

“Because she grows up. And orders the people of the Wind slaughtered. Just like her father,” he replies dreamily. “Because Suna’s losses. Come from the Fire Country’s diayamo. Because if it’s not her who dies. It could be my students. My friends. My Kazekage. My wife.”

“And that’s why we heal him. Because if he dies, it’s possible that all of them die. That’s why we heal everyone who is hurt. Go to sleep. It will take us a few days to patch you up.”

“Mmm.”

…

“You have a wife?” Fang Girl asks a day later. He still can’t see her, but at least he can breathe again, thanks to the group of healers. She’s watching over him while the others go out to hunt snakes for lunch.

“Yes.”

“She’s a shinobi, too? A good one, I suppose. Someone who can match you.”

“Shukaku’s pity, no!” he replies.

“Why not?” Fang Girl asks, confused by his vehemence.

“Kunochi, all Suna shinobi, we’re just kunai targets. From the minute we get our headbands we’re marked by Shukaku for death. My wife isn’t one of Shukaku’s victims.”

“What is Shukaku’s pity?”

“Non-existant,” he replies, smiling, remembering the last Star Watching Festival.

“You know, we’re not stupid enough to worship the byuuki,” Fang Girl says contemptuously.

“That’s because you’ve never met one. Shukaku is the desert. Wind and Sand,” he replies. “If you’re ever unlucky enough to meet one of the other eight, you’ll understand.”

She is exasperated, and turns away. He watches the light filtering into the cave as the sun moves across the sky. The illusions around his eyes are beginning to fade. Eventually the rest of the squad returns. He is given some snake flesh, and a lot of water. He drifts off to sleep.

He wakes again when it’s dark, and the two men are talking among themselves. He still can’t see them properly, but he can hear them.

“So, you think he was tortured? They could just be regular battle wounds.”

“Not likely Nara-kun. But we only have to worry about his body. Suna can deal with whatever’s wrong in his mind after all that.”

“Hmmph. If he thinks that Sharingan prodigy of the Uchiha is the ideal shinobi they must encourage warped points of views in Suna. Bet he’d get along with Hakate Kakashi.”

“Suna shinobi have to be ruthless, Nara-kun. They don’t have the man power of the other Hidden Villages. Only Mist has fewer shinobi. This war looks bad at our end. It’s got to be a waking nightmare for the Sand Village. The only reason the Wind Country is so big is because no one else wants to occupy the forsaken desert. They don’t have the people or resources that we do.

“Imagine what that’s like. Then imagine keeping your place as one of the top two Hidden Villages with no extras. They’ve suffered fewer losses than the rest of us, but fewer losses to us means a bigger percent of the population to them. We haven’t seen any Sand kunochi in the last year of engagements. You know what that means, you only pretend to be stupid, Nara-kun.”

“You’ve been listening to Tsunade-sama too much,” there was a hint of chuckle there, and then quiet. “So, we heal this guy, and let him go back home because his village might be wiped out in a generation, anyway.”

“They’ve got to be bleeding white. They have both Rock and us pressing them on the North and East. They had Mist sneaking in from the sea until we flattened the Water Country two years back. I think the only reason they’ve held together this long is because their Kazekage is so damn strong. At this rate Rock will fall before Sand does. And hopefully all the daimyo will feel that their pride has been assuaged, and we can go back to being people for a while.”

“Now, Dan-sempai, we’re always people, even in war time.”

“Wrong, Nara-kun. You may be older than the girls, but most of them know: This war has nothing to do with the shinobi who are the weapons being used. We’re all mighty chakra gods to civilians. But gods that have no use other than fighting. The daimyo don’t see us as any better than those super chakra weapons people talk about developing.”

“The jinchuuryki,” Nara-kun sounds pensive. “Do you think Sand’s going to use that Shukaku thing? They are the only one, other than Mist, to have the ability to make a jinchuuryki at their finger tips right now.”

“Why do you think I’m so scared of the idea of Sand being pushed to the edge? If they make a jinchuuryki out of that demon of theirs, all bets are off. Konoha might be destroyed. Besides, Shukaku is the most unpredictable byuuki. It might protect Suna and Wind. It might destroy all the countries. We don’t know, and can’t risk it. I’m just worried that Fire’s Lord isn’t cautious enough to think about this when he gives the Hokage the orders to destroy all threats to the Fire Country.”

“You don’t approve of the Sandaime, do you, Dan?”

“He has memorized more techniques than any other man in history. His personal students are incredible prodigies. Even the ones that were thought hopeless. But he believes that a shinobi’s loyalty should be to their village, and then their country. I believe that a shinobi’s loyalty should be to one another. Because in the end, we’re the only ones who have a hope of understanding what we put ourselves through. Perhaps we’re both wrong. But there isn’t enough compassion in the world for those who stand up and fight. For those who end up dead for another man’s pride.”

“Heh. Careful Orochimaru-sama doesn’t hear you say that. He may stop you from seeing Tsunade-sama, in case you taint her.”

“Feh. Nara-kun, Orochimaru-sama is rarely even in the village any more. His research will hopefully keep him outside of Konoha’s walls. Pity about that Anko girl, but if he wants come back to teach her I can’t say anything. At least,” the medic pauses, and then continues confidently. “Until I’m the Yondaime.”

“Ah, the ambitious shinobi of Konoha,” Nara-kun agrees. “If we can’t all be geniuses then we haven’t worked hard enough, have we?”

“Yeah,” the medic sounds sad like Fang Girl. “Generations of murderous geniuses. We shouldn’t be allowing these kids be considered genin until at least eleven.”

“They say the ANBU is sniffing around Uchiha Itachi, you know. They at least waited until the kid had an age in the double digits before taking Hatake Kakashi,” Nara sighs.

“Yamanaka told you?”

“Yeah. They wanted him, but he refused. But it makes you wonder how young our children will be when the spooks look for fresh meat.”

“I really wish you hadn’t said that. Look on the bright side: No Nara would ever be caught dead in the ANBU. Any more than our possession Yamanaka geniuses.”

“Ever wonder if the spooks feel anything?” Nara asks eventually.

“Mmm? Well, they must, mustn’t they? They are only human, after all.”

“Sometimes, when I see Hakate-san, I’m not so sure. Uchiha Itachi’s getting that way, too, and he’s only barely mastered that Sharingan of his.”

“Yeah, well, Hakate’s had a screw loose since he found his father, and after what happened to Obito-kun, I think that the only place for the guy is with the spooks. As for the Uchiha boy, he’s an Uchiha. Radical fanaticism runs in the blood. They only know one way to serve Konoha, and that’s up to those red eyeballs in gore. That’s the problem with having a blood line limit that’s close to, but not as good as the Byakugan.”

“Don’t make me get into those Hyuuga twins, Dan-sensei,” Nara laughed hollowly. “There’s something off about the entire clan. Bloodline limits can’t be copied, no matter how much studying is done.”

“Do you know something I should know, Nara-kun?”

“Nothing for certain. I just find that Hyuuga not letting anyone but clan members heal them to be a fairly paranoid point of view.”

“Everyone’s welcome to their secrets. We are shinobi, after all. Come, I’ll wake Yuri-chan and Hana-chan for the next watch. Get some sleep.”

…

By the end of the week he is capable of walking again. As the Leaf shinobi start to pack up their camp, he shuffles to the open air. The sun hits his weak eyes, sending a cloud of translucent butterflies bursting around him. He closes his eyes again, and just breathes in the bright morning air of the desert. A breeze comes up from the west. This far north Shukaku’s Breath isn’t as terrifying. But there will be a sandstorm in half a day.

He lets the harsh warmth ruffle his hair. His bare arms rise with the morning sun, stretching out to touch the crisp blue of the sky. The kunai he carries with him slides into his left palm. Blood flashes in the air. A “thank you” to Shukaku for teaching him how to survive the recent horror years ago. And blood for the summon. He needs Nari, but the swift kestrel is the most playful and capricious of the Sky Lord’s servants that he has ever encountered. The more blood the easier it will be to call her.

He slams his bloody palm against the air after he forms the seals, and the brown bird with blue lightning streaks in her feathers appears in a blast of smoke.

“Why, it’s the Typhoon himself!” she grins, her beak agape. “Sky Lord, but you’ve aged since I last saw you. Akahane says you’ve grown into a right proper eagle, my little sparrow. Killing lambs and everything.”

“We do what we have to, to defend the nest,” he shrugs noncommittally. “And I have to get this man’s head to the Sandaime,” he lifts the captain by the hair. “Will you do it, Lightning Wings? I’m not up to returning to Suna for some time.”

“Ain’t got anything on my plate half so fun as dropping a severed head in on that damn group of vulture bait you call a council. And I’ll tell ‘em you’re still alive. Want me to send one of my chickies to sing your sweet praises to that pussy cat you’ve been wooing?”

“Why not? It’s not like she’ll kill me any less for getting myself fucked up so bad, than she will for me sending a bird to annoy her,” he sighs tiredly.

“Sure, this’ll be great fun!” Nari grabs the Captain’s rotting head in her strong talons, warping the flesh and skin, and begins to flap higher to gain altitude, before shooting across the sky like a bolt of lightning.

He turns around to see the head medic appraising him.

“We need to get you a shirt. And I suppose I’ll have to heal that slice, will I?”

“Just a bandage. And a sandstorm is going to hit a little after noon,” he replies, and totters back into the cave.

…

He’s alone when Nari comes streaking back. “You need to get back to Suna. Right. Now,” she tells him, hovering, none of her reckless playfulness coming to the fore.

He only pauses to grab his forehead protector, and tie that around his neck. Then he’s running past that slouching man named Nara.

“Hey stop! You’ll undo all our work!”

“I am going home,” he yells over his shoulder, preparing to jump, when his body freezes, and turns around all on its own. He walks up to Nara, who is holding the oddest hand seal.

“What’s going on?” the man asks, rubbing his dark stubble as if he isn’t certain that he’s done the right thing. The Sand nin finds his hand rubbing his own clean-shaven cheek. “We haven’t finished extracting the drugs, let alone healing the burns. You’re trying to break your collar bone again? And your legs in the bargain?”

“We don’t have time for this!” Nari shrieks above them.

He tries to gesture up at the agitated bird. “Suna’s being attacked, if Nari’s behavior is any indication. Now. Let. Me. Go! I have to get home.”

“You’ll kill your--,”

“The only reason you aren’t on the ground right now, Nara-san, looking for your eyeballs, is that you’ve treated me far more decently than I expected. Don’t push it,” he snarls, just as Nari dives at the Leaf nin.

Nara jumps back, losing hold of the shadow he wrapped around the Sand shinobi, and with that the Wind Rider is just gone. The bird breaks off the attack, and follows. Nara rocks back on his heels. His squad leader steps out from behind a rock with a water bottle. “It’s good that he’s leaving, anyway,” the medic sighs. “We’ve completed our mission as well as we can, and the information he’s given us belongs in the hands of the Sandaime.”

“He gave you information?”

“Underneath the underneath, Nara-kun. It’s what he didn’t say. Besides, he told me what his captors were looking for on accident. This is very serious. You have no idea. Come on, let’s get going.”

“What’s going on?”

“If I’m right there might be one less kage in the world by sun rise. Come on! It’s two days before we are safe in Konoha. We don’t have time for this.”

…

It wasn’t an attack. He wishes it had been, as he collapses in the ANBU hut. Suna is boiling with people like an over-turned ant hill. He’s been challenged five times by men who’ve served under him all their careers. He spends another day in an interrogation chamber. But it doesn’t matter. They have to be certain.

Suna. The Hidden Village. Suna. The Village of Shinobi. Suna. Protected by the Wind’s Shadow. Only not any more. The world has fallen. The Kazekage, master of Iron Sand, wielder of the Iron Sword of Law, is missing. He has been missing for nearly two weeks. No one knows where he is.

He walks home like a puppet with his strings breaking. It doesn’t matter any more that he has been missing for four weeks. That he still has flashes of illusions at the edges of his vision. Nothing matters. His Kazekage is missing.

…

He shuts up the doctors with a glare. His formerly frozen blue-green irises are gone. The pupils have contracted to a permanent size. He’ll never get back the vision he once had (they’ve told him that he’ll be completely blind in the dark, and bright light will not be a pleasant surprise), but the illusions are gone. That’s all that matters. The skin on the bottom of his feet (he wore most of that off running to Suna, which was stupid beyond stupid) is regrowing. Everything else has been stitched up or bandaged. His wife isn’t here, and at this moment she’s the only one who can stop him.

He gets out of the hospital bed, gets dressed in the mesh and earthy browns he prefers, and walks (limps) the streets of Suna, taking the pulse of the city. He winds up at his house, and sneaks in to grab his falcon’s mask. Then he walks into the council chamber, pushes past the guards, and opens the doors himself. The old and young men look up, surprised, and uncertain like lost sheep. One rises to question querulously what he thinks he’s doing.

Why, he’s the Captain of the ANBU. The Kazekage is missing. He thinks he’s giving the report on the situation, and pulling all of the search efforts together to co-ordinate the damn thing. In other words, he’s being useful. What about them?!

His hands slam down on the table top, and he begins to harangue the councilors under the grim expressions of the First and Second’s statues. So far the only division in Suna that’s doing what it’s supposed to is the Medical division.

And they aren’t doing a spectacular job at that, Chiyo-sama comments dryly, eyeing his bandaged form with an expression that says she’ll put him back in the hospital kicking and screaming after she’s done having fun listening to him yell at the venerable sages.

The ANBU, and consequently the Suna police force, are running around like headless chickens, he continues. Now, this is understandable, as the ANBU didn’t have a functioning captain until this morning. But why didn’t they appoint a temporary captain in the absence of someone at the head of the elite corps of shinobi?!

The treasury is trying to put commerce at a stand still until they can see which way the wind blows. Which would be a great tactic, only Suna lives and breathes trade. They need the merchants going about their daily business! Things are hard enough with the war slowing travel, don’t make it worse by shutting down the village. Whoever kidnapped the Third is long gone, rumors are going to spread if they don’t act normally.

He goes down the list of councilors, and then yells at the secretaries to bring him all the bingo books, and someone who can organize more than two things at once. He wants a full break down of everything.

And they can find him in the infirmary, ward B, Chiyo-sama cuts in, hauling him toward the hospital by the ear.

…

He doesn’t like the look she’s giving him. She just quietly traces the new scars traveling his body as he lies in bed, energy sapped by the long days. Legs to hips. Hips to chest. Chest to neck. Neck to back. Back to arms. She traces them all with cool fingers. Her teal eyes are dull.

She says she wishes she could hate their kazekage for telling him to do that. But he was always so kind to her. To them. The Third will return, won’t he? she pleads with her husband. He will return just like her husband has, right? A little scarred and battered, maybe. But he’ll return so she can yell at him, right?

He just rolls over and holds her tightly against him. He can feel the small swell where their child is, pressing against his (still fairly hollow) stomach. He can imagine that the three hearts, his, hers, and the baby’s, are beating together filled with hope. His hand wraps in her hair. If the Third doesn’t return, he murmurs, how can he be their child’s godfather? The Third would never miss an opportunity to spoil a child like that.

That’s how it all works out. Under the ruthlessness, under the killer, under the torturer, under the wind riding shinobi, he is just a story teller. Creating a lovely fiction for anyone who needs to hear it.

That night he dreams of Shukaku wrapping his tail around the Third, and swallowing the Kazekage whole. He wakes up in the middle of the night, and reminds himself that he doesn’t believe in omens. Another wonderful piece of fiction.

…

It’s been months. He’s pulled things together, gotten Suna back under control. The council has decided to ignore the Wind Country’s diayamo for now. The civilian wants troops on the border, and they have none to spare. Too many are already hunting for the Third. He’s not certain if it’s the best they can do, but he, like everyone else, still retains hope that the Third will be coming back.

Until then, the world has stopped. Underneath the daily activity of the village, Suna is broken, and only waiting faithfully for the Sandaime to repair her. Despair covers the village. He finds himself wandering into the deepest cave bored into Suna’s cliff, and looking at Shukaku’s prison. It should have been a warning sign that standing near that murderous, hate filled object made him feel slightly better about life, and able to face the day.

…

Sometimes he brings his wife to see the demon’s container. She doesn’t like it, and says that Shukaku scared her enough in the stories. She feels as if the pot is watching her, which is ridiculous, right? Right? His silence never reassures her.

Sometimes he is alone in the cliff. Did Shukaku ever willingly protect the village? he wonders. In all of the stories Shukaku has done his best to destroy it. Except for the first shaman, who tricked Shukaku into the pot in the first place. Shukaku obeyed the blind monk, and was even friends with the man, as much as something of Shukaku’s nature can be friends.

Sometimes he sees Sasori, rolling his eyes and looking grumpy as he waits outside the cavern for his grandmother. Chiyo-sama is the only one who truly knows anything about Shukaku any more. Oh, the sealing technique has been passed down, but Chiyo-sama’s father was the last shaman the sand village has known, and he told his daughter /everything/. When she dies, the knowledge will go with her. No one wants to know about demons any more. Sasori certainly doesn’t. He’s like all other people in the village. Centered around his hobbies and interests, fully in the modern world, with no time for the Wind and Sand.

…

The poisoned needles whistle through the air. The only rain in Suna is always a deadly one. The puppeteering troupe move their fingers like dancing men, holding the western wall against the horde of Leaf nin.

While Suna’s world shattered, Konoha pressed against the Rock Village. Now only Suna stands to rival the Hidden Village of the Leaves. He should have known, he thinks angrily, blasting air from his palms and sending men flying. The war could end right here and now, with the destruction of the village.

Baki blasts past him, the wind blades he so loves clenched in two fists. Leaf nin scream, terrified yells or pain and agony as they are sliced open from the outside. Throwing stars whiz through the air, shrieking the pain they intend to inflict. Kage bushin pop in and out of existence. By the east gate a group of expert leaf shinobi repel all attackers, steadily pushing inward from the center of a green whirlwind.

His fingers are bleeding from the number of summons he has had to make. Akahane is flying over him, lending him chakra as he calls on all the hawks and falcons he’s ever met, blasting this way and that with the sickle winds. He wishes they had a shinobi who had signed the weasel contract. But the last kid who did that has died a long time ago with the rest of his genin cell, so he’ll have to make do on his own.

Stars tilt and wheel overhead. The eastern defenders call for back up against one crazy taijitsu master, a jack of all trades, and one of Konoha’s famous genjitsu adepts. He dodges to the left as fire balls rain down from above. Akahane zips to the right and then Nari’s zoomed into the three men who all have the same dark hair and wheeling red eyes.

Had the same wheeling red eyes, because Nari likes the taste of eyes, and that’s what she goes for first. He leaves the summoned birds to the three fire fiends, and rushes to the East Gate. Something green comes hurtling at him, and he ducks, shoving his hands up, and catching the leg as it goes over his head. With a quick shove he helps the man continue on, to land head first on the rock behind him.

And then cigarette smoke coils on the air, and bright razor wing knuckle dusters are coming in under his guard. He flips backwards, throwing shuriken at razor wing /man/, before slamming his fist into someone’s cheek. His men are on the ground, either dead, or locked in their own minds so deeply that there isn’t any difference. He concentrates on keeping his chakra rooted in his feet. He’s used so much already he doesn’t have much to worry about from the genjistu user.

And here she is in front of him. Another red eye, wrapped in so much white she’s just asking him to throw shuriken at her. The black throwing stars are blocked by the razor wings, and he’s kicked from behind by that green /thing/. His spine screams and he’s back in the hut. Seals form, dredging up the last trickles of his chakra. Dark is descending in purple and orange, and he knows his sight is lost.

The wind doesn’t care. It whips around him from the ground, upward, a cyclone shield. It knocks the green idiot away. The genjitsu girl screams as his deflected stars whiz around to strike her in the back. High above, Akahane shrieks. Wind spills from his wings and he plummets, sharp beak covered in blood, and slams into his summoner, a flash of pure chakra.

He opens his eyes, glowing blue, and grabs the wind. Where he glares, his chakra forms invisible blades, shields, and cyclones. The green creature jumps at him, and is knocked back into the bedrock. Razor wing man has already grabbed the genjitsu girl, and he hops over to the beast, who is still trying to get up. Rock shatters as wind blades scream towards the trio. Razor Wings jumps back, and he’s tempted to follow, but there’s screaming, and Baki appears in a cloud of smoke, yelling that there’s a kuchiyosek snake nearly crushing the Puppeteers on the west.

He jumps and runs across Suna’s roofs, just in time to see the purple head of a monster Akahane’s fading consciousness identifies as King Manda. A black haired man stands arrogantly on the top of the snake rearing over the West wall. The purple of the brilliant desert sunset bathes him in a royal swath of color, making him one with the snake.

He hasn’t a hope. He knows that man is only too likely his superior, if he can both summon and control the ever hungry serpent king. But he has the energy now. He’ll remember Akahane as he can when this is all over.

“Kuchiyosek no jitsu!” His bleeding fingers shove into the air above his head, chakra flowing through the blood to establish a gateway to another world. There is a crash of displaced air, and then the giant shadow is stretching from one edge of the sky to the other. He sinks to his knees on the roof of choice. Massive black wings beat once, creating a thunder clap, and a hooked beak lines up with the massive serpent’s head. The fluffy white neck feathers of the huge vulture whistle as the Sky Lord wheels over the battle.

“Manda! Eagle Queen sends her best greetings. She’s been looking for your worthless flesh. I am afraid I shall have to deprive my wife of feasting on your carcass, however. I’m just too peckish, and you’re outside your forest,” the great bird booms over the heads of the humans, causing most to fall to the ground, covering their ears. The lord vulture dives for the snake, who rears, exposing poisonous fangs.

He’s only glad that the sounds of the death and the destruction are covered by massive wing beats. Sky Lord will lead the snake away from Suna’s walls. He can rest for a moment up here, on this roof top, gathering strength. He doesn’t have the chakra left to do anything monumental after summoning the Sky Lord.

Nari appears before he’s ready, a mess of bloody starlings, ravens, crows, and hawks following her like the beacon she is, her markings glowing unearthly blue.

“C’mon, Sparrow. Take from us! We’re not as self sacrificial as Akahane, but connecting the Earth and Sky with you little human is fun!” she crows, shoving energy into his beaten body.

The east wall shakes, and he’s running back, ignoring the lack of moon. Baki falls in behind him. Then his quiet student, kunai surrounding Yashamaru in a floating fence, jumps in from the side. Men from the ANBU fall in behind their faction. Somehow, by instinct, they know that the big push will come from the east, while the west is occupied by the kuchiyosek battle. That snake was merely a feint all along. A massive, purple, poisonous feint that could crush Suna on its own.

He’s high. Chakra is in him, sustaining him, surrounding him with the winds. He’s going to pay for what he’s using tonight. But later. Now he’s as close to being the Sky Lord, to being Akahane, as he can. They rush at the smoke, ignoring blood and intestines underfoot. They’ve all stepped on enough brains since they entered the war.

Wind howls around his arms as the group drops down, to confront the white masked group of Leaf nin. ANBU. Mainly. Razor Wing Man is there, too, cigarette dangling. Nara is slouched against the east wall, next to a woman who reminds him strongly of Fang Girl, except Fang Girl never had a giant wolf by her side. His eyes roam the group opposing them. Baki can take two at once. So can Yashamaru. His ANBU boys can take on the majority of the white masked team. But his bad eyes zero in on a shorter, slimmer spook, with a thatch of white hair above a red striped mask.

“Nari,” he murmurs. “Either that’s the ghost of Konoha’s White Fang, or a relative. The rumored Hatake Kakashi, likely. You all: go for the eyes.”

They leap as one being. Kunai fly from his quiet student, some deflected, some hitting their targets. Darkness unwraps from the wall, and he jumps to the left as the blob that is Nara-san shifts his weight. He remembers that pose, and angrily thrusts his wind covered fist forward, ducking under the other targets. The horizontal cyclone screams through the air to nail Nara-kun to the wall, impaling his shoulder.

The wind shrieks, and that’s his only warning. He jumps high, twisting over the same technique, and comes face to mask with the pale blob that is the second White Fang. He can’t see the eyes behind that white expanse, but he imagines they are empty. His fingers begin to form seals, and the ANBU mirrors his actions. Two sickle winds slam into each other, breaking apart.

He lands hard on the first step of the inner wall. His hands form seals in shadow, and he nearly is kicked in the back of the head, saving himself only by rolling forward, his feet kicking back to tangle in the fellow ANBU’s legs, bringing him crashing to the stone of the giant steps. He flips back up, and lands on the man’s stomach, cyclones swirling around his fingers and he drives the tearing winds towards the white face. A large boulder shatters and blows apart under the ripping winds.

He internally curses the art of replacement, and sticks his fist backwards into the armored stomach that just appeared behind him. He pivots, and rushes at the lithe ninja, hand seals forming behind his back, until he can bring the wind blades into existence to strike at the leaf shinobi. The man whisks away to the left. Three kage bushin poof into existence and head straight for him.

He privately thanks the genetics that gave the ANBU prodigy such a fair head of hair, or his weak eyes wouldn’t be able to track him in the dark. The wind whispers the locations to him, and his left blade slices through two clones, as the right stabs into the chest of the real thing, with the familiar squelch and thunk when the wind is dispersed by running into bone. The third kage bushin slams into the side of his face with a punch that spins him backwards with its force.

Then the sky lights on fire, and the earth heaves. He whips around to look. Someone lit the residential district on fire, he thinks dazedly, as another building bulges outwards and explodes with a rush of flame. His kohl lined eyes widen, and the wind shrieks for him. The step crumbles as his anger forces his chakra to sharpen the breezes surrounding him, turning him into a man surrounded by moving blades.

Below Baki pushes the massive wolf off his chest, slashing the thing’s face with his wind blades. Nari screams an angry battle cry. And then both bird and man are off, following the rage possessed form of Suna’s Wind Rider, who barely touches the roofs under his leaping feet. The flames billow in the sprawling South Side. Leaf nin are swarming. Kunai are flying. Mothers and children are dropping like flies.

The world falls. The light gives him back some vision, but it washes everyone in gold. Each woman who falls is his wife. Each scream is her last. His fingers brush together, press, release in unconscious patterns of death.

He lands on a chuunin’s back, forcing his chakra down like a fist, breaking the boy’s spine. The first two men he grabs explode as the air in their lungs unites from right to left to rip the leaf nin apart. He dives instinctively under the shuriken. His fist shoots out, and releases. The cyclone tears through the street, sucking the fire in as it rips into the shinobi foolish enough to try to stop him.

He moves like a striking hawk, jumping, diving, falling, and grabbing only to release as blood fountains in the air. He was never so effective on the front. But this is different. This is Suna. It is precious to him, and he will destroy everything to keep the village whole.

The civilians are clearing the buildings and area as fast as they can. Fearing both the fire, and the man who fans the flames with wind, ripping into anyone who stands still long enough for hitae-ate to be identified. A scream, and he whirls to see her holding the burnt corpse of some child. Her eyes, large and teal, meet his black pin-pricks. Wind whips around him, carrying drops of blood in a curtain of red mist. The bloody typhoon.

Bright white light bursts over the village. She’s still staring at him. The leaf nin jump away. A voice, amplified by chakra, rings over Suna. They have until noon tomorrow to decide what they want to do. If they don’t surrender, Suna will be no more. He hears the message, but he’s too locked into the horror visible in her eyes.