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| - Chapter 12 – Promises xXxXx ( Sasuke’s Pov ) Hefting Sakura onto my back I ignored the dull throbbing in my right arm and the unease that had been plaguing my mind since we entered, it was growing stronger now and I was afraid to wonder exactly why. There was no options now, the way back was out of the question, I’d heard the monsters clambering and groaning behind the heavy door we had entered, I hadn’t noticed it before but somehow the assumed mindless things had led me to this room, someone had planned all this out and trapped us like rats. We had been expected. Let’s go Sasuke-kun… Another worrying factor was that voice, it was getting stronger now, less like a ghastly whisper choked out, and more like how we had whispered to each other when we were captured…that frightened, scared tone… I quelled the ensuing memories before they could rise up, I could brood on my failures during another time in another place. I opened the rusted blood stained iron door before me and stepped into the next circle of hell I had unwittingly entered. xXxXx ( Neji’s Pov ) I silently followed my cousin and the Uchiha’s brats to the genin tournament taking place today, I had heard about these events but had never taken part in one, Gai-sensei was one of the few teachers who believed such tournaments gave away ones abilities. That was probably why I couldn’t see the energetic green loving Lee here, no doubt he wouldn’t bring his team here if Gai had not, that was probably for the best. After all, it’s been three years since we’ve met, and our last meeting had not been under the best circumstances, Hinata had just went missing, shortly after I had made my peace with her and swore to live up to my duty as her guardian. The Irony hadn’t been lost on me, I had blamed my self, for not being strong enough, for not being there, for putting her in that wounded condition, and when Gai-sensei and Lee had attempted to comfort me I lashed out at them. I said things I cannot take back, things I deeply regret. And that’s when Hiashi offered to train me, with Hinata missing and presumed dead and Hanabi’s condition he saw me as the future heir, and for three long years groomed me into the perfect assassin and attempted to instilled his insane beliefs into me. My eyes wondered lazily from the ‘battle’ ground to the approaching chakra signature it was well concealed, but I was better trained. “Leave now and I’ll spare your life.” I solemnly told my would be assassin, I really didn’t enjoy the needless bloodshed of my kin. “Hyuga Neji, for crimes against the Hyuga you are to be disposed of.” I voice returned my solemn tone flatly as I heard the distinct sound of a blade being drawn, I hadn’t bothered activating my Byakugan it wouldn’t be necessary. “So you came for me ?” I asked somewhat surprised, had the fool Hiashi really come to the realisation that I was now in his way of killing Hanabi and thought to use the ninja’s who couldn’t get past me and kill an almost blind girl to kill me instead. No. Activating my Byakugan I noticed several Hyuga in the area, most no doubt planning to kill Hanabi whilst I was distracted. The fools. xXxXx ( Asuka’s Pov ) It finally came to our turn to fight, we were the very last team to fight in the preliminary round, so far no team has really stood out, mainly I think because they are trying to hide their true abilities. A lot of the teams that had entered I noticed weren’t official Genin squads like ours, but friends in make shift teams that shared common interests, for example the team we were to face now were called Earth force and appeared to be made up of all earth ninjutsu users. It seemed stupid t ignore balance and rely so heavily on a single ideal, but before our training we were the same, I only wanted Lightning ninjutsu, Hanabi Fire and Jin earth. Surprisingly it was Hanabi who took charge and decided our strategy, despite Jin having organised everything. The tournament rules were simple, each team elects one ninja to fight, and is allowed one switch per match, when two ninja from one team are unable to continue the match is over, the third teammate is sadly left with the duty of caring for their comrades. “Alright, Jin you’re up first since Earth is you’re element, Asuka you’re the sub, lightning should be able to trump them and you’ll have Jin’s match to watch out for any tricks they might use.” Explained Hanabi, proving she was the only one who listened during our tactics lessons. “Can the first member of team Jin enter the ring.” Announced the unusually authoritive voice of Iruka, and with a wink Jin was gone from the side lines into the fray. xXxXx ( Sasuke’s Pov ) A sinister hissing noise began to fill the maze like room I was now in, well it wasn’t exactly a room, I was now in a large cavern of sorts it seemed to be at least fifty metres high in some places and the floor was a mind boggling maze I was currently exploring, had my chakra not been blocked it would be easy to traverse, but the walls were too high and too smooth to climb without chakra. That hissing sound unnerved me and sent a chill down my spine, it sounded as if a thousand snakes were hissing simultaneously, or just one big one, but summons couldn’t survive without constant chakra input, however minor after the initial summon it was still vital. It’s not a summon… It could have been lying but I didn’t see what it would gain by doing so, I checked my left pouch thankful I hadn’t wasted my exploding tag kunai earlier. I was going to need them. Movement to my right caught my eye, and a second later to my left, what I had once thought were parts of the maze had begun to move, that explained why the maze seemed to change as I progressed through it. This wasn’t good, was there more than one. I didn’t want to find out, I began sprinting down the maze taking any direction randomly, ignoring how several ‘walls’ suddenly began to move around me. I avoided looking upwards, the last time I had I saw several snake heads rising up toward the cavern roof. Afraid of Snakes Sasuke-kun… Ignoring the voice I threw myself roughly to the left narrowly dodging one of the head snake’s attempts to devour me, I was mildly horrified to see the thing had torn a huge trench where I had been moments before. Time to use the Kunai. Without hesitating I let several kunai fly in the directs of any snakes surrounding me, the resulting explosion had little to no effect on there tough and thick hides. The explosions did light up the caver though and it let me get a glimpse of the jagged rocks hanging from the cavern roof. You’ll kill yourself too… It was only now that I noticed that there had been no maze in this room at all it had been all gigantic snakes, and in the furthest corner of the room from me I saw the exit. Maybe it was natural after spending hours around whatever it was that managed to block my Chakra, but it was no longer completely blocked, the stinging in my left eye told me my Sharingan had awoken in it, it felt different than usual but it would give me the chance I needed. I let the last of my kunai fly into the air towards the roof, if I could avoid the falling debris, the man-eating monster Snakes and reach the other end of the enormous cavern before the exit’s blocked… I might survive yet. xXxXx ( Jin’s Pov ) Mental note; do not strike a pose, however awesome it may be, after defeating an opponent in a tag team match. I’d also have a nice scar on my cheek to also remind me of this lesson, I’d only noticed the Karma wielders assault at the last possible moment, whoever he was he’d been aiming to kill me, which is totally uncool on his part. Looking into his white eyes I realised for the first time, to my embarrassment, that he was a Hyuga…that was not an accident. With one deft movement I freed my Nunchaku from my belt and in a complex flurry of swings loaded the weapon into a comfortable fighting stance, now I meant business, this fool wouldn’t know what hit him, it’ll just be like bam pow and he’ll be all ‘Was that Kami’ and furthermore… “For the last time Jin please leave the arena, drawing blood is an instant K.O.” bellowed Iruka having seemingly reached the end of his patience. “Wait. What ?” I asked somewhat stupidly, I couldn’t comprehend losing for this it’s just a scratch after all, just got to calmly explain it to Iruka-sensei and everything will be just fine, nice and calm and politely now. “Are you freakin’ kidding me, it’s just a scratch !” I roared back at Iruka, apparently the link between my brain and mouth is a bit dodgy right now. “Jin Ken !” came Iruka’s infuriated call, however the source of the Instructors anger was not purely due at me. In fact the brunt of it came thanks due to the cheerful Kakashi, one of the three judges as luck would have it, giving me the thumps up in between giving some innovative hand signals that looked suspiciously like a large chested woman; the feared sexy jutsu, unknowingly to me infamous after Naruto forgot to use the clouds in his second Chunin Exam. Neither Tsunade, Iruka or any of the senior ninja had not been amused…Jiraiya on the other hand. I understood the Kakashi-sensei’s brilliant advice at once. The end result, of course, was both Kakashi and I sitting outside the academy grounds with a warning to never show there faces at the tournaments again. Kakashi giggled at the faces part and said something about a spare mask in your size. xXxXx ( Sasuke’s Pov ) I felt a strangled choked half laugh half sob burst free from my throat accompanied by a mouth of the bitter copper liquid I recognised as my blood. Another crimson spot was added to the dirty stone floor paling in comparison to the growing pool beneath my left arm, that bastard Snake had almost taken the whole arm off. I’d narrowly made it through and had had to ignore dodging all but the life threatening attacks to make it through the cavern quick enough, one the creatures had managed to glance me with one of it’s fang before I got out, and of course by glance I mean tore a gaping hole in my left shoulder. We, myself and Sakura, had several other cuts and grazes from falling debris; and most likely internal damage too judging from the whole spitting up blood, not quite sure how that happened though, might be simply from over exhortation, I had never expected in my wildest nightmares to have to come this far without Chakra no matter how paranoid people claimed me to be. Sakura had yet to wake up but her condition was starting to look better. So why am I laughing so hard while I’m wrapping up this likely lethal wound. Not bad Sasuke-kun… That was it; it was those voices that kept me going through this all, the voices of the two woman whose death was by fault, maybe not directly but I’d promised to protect them both and failed. The voices reminded me I was on the path of redemption, if it was even possible. I made two promises to Chidori, the first had been the naïve promise to protect her; the electric blue haired girl had been my first love, challenged me during the Chunin exams and we’d formed a two man team together as was tradition in the Chunin exams whenever they were held in Lightning Country, we’d succeeded and become Chunin together. She’d given me my first(real) kiss in front of the gigantic crowd. To caught up the excitement of passing in what was rumoured to be the toughest place to graduate I failed to notice her chakra flickering violently until it was nothing but a whisper; I had suddenly felt a horrible sense of hollowness known only to ninja when they lose a deep bond. I’d found her near death and she’d hastily drawn her family summoning contract on my arm…in her own blood and given me the necklace she’d always worn; she was the last of a clan she couldn’t even remember and this had been what Akatsuki was searching for, Ying was the Akatsuki member whom stole bloodlines and his brother Yang stole Summoning contacts and other forbidden family jutsu. She made me promise to live…for the both of us. And I’d almost failed straight away, charging after Yang and his grunts I cut a bloody swath through his weaker men fuelled on be my cursed seal and newly evolved Sharingan. I almost died and certainly would have had Kakashi not came to my rescue, but even still I’d only been able to leave a small cut on his shoulder in exchange for the three large parallel scars running down my back. The other voice belongs to the former Hyuga Princess Hinata, Hanabi’s older and seemingly forgotten sister. Well I defiantly have not forgotten her. Shortly after the first Chunin exam I attended I was confronted by a group going by the name the sound four, I’d been cocky and tried to fight them single handed, after I rejected there generous offer though they greatly stepped up there game, I didn’t stand a chance. Someone did notice and come to my aid thought, Team 8. After we were soundly defeated though the ninja took both myself and Hinata, she’d been taken for her Byakugan, back to the Sound. I was later told that Shino somehow regained consciousness and followed us, but I never saw him again after our fight. During our captivity Hinata and I formed a strong relationship, not romantic; all of us excluding the most insane i.e. Naruto and Sakura had yet to gain an interest in such things. She nursed me when the cursed seal attempted to overpower me, I protected her when someone tried to take advantage of her. I promised to always protect her, sadly while I could deal with other horny or greedy slaves I couldn’t protect her from Orochimaru. The twisted snake man had noticed our companionship and had decided to test Hinata with a curse mark, the sick man wanted us to reproduce Sharingan\Byakugan babies for him. The last time I saw her alive was when she was dragged kicking and screaming for me to help her into Orochimaru’s private chamber, that’s what first promoted my physical training, the Oro-twisted brand of Chakra collars stopped me from doing anything more than kicking and screaming either. Now I had a promise to her sister. No to me precious person Hanabi, and to all my other precious people, Naruto, Itachi, Kakashi, Sakura, Asuka and Jin my team; Mother, Father and anyone else in Konoha who needs me or ever will. Come Sasuke-kun… Lets meet…Again… I could see the exit now, at the end of the corridor, sunlight streaming in, my salvation or my doom, whichever I’m eager to find out and punish whoever has been misusing their voices. xXxXx
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