Author's note: If swearing is not for you, neither is this chapter. This is the first and only trigger/swearing warning that I will be doing; factor that into your reading decision before continuing on with the story.

"Uzumaki Naruto, genin, Konohagure," Naruto said, lying back on the pillows and glaring at the ceiling.

Orochimaru sighed.

"I just wanted your help in making sure that future jinchuuriki grow up happy," he said tiredly. "I don't want Konoha's secrets; you don't know any that are worthwhile and I already know the ones that you know and many more besides. Even if you did have any, don't you think I could get them from you?"

Naruto flicked his eyes down for a moment, glaring at his interrogator. "I don't talk," he snapped. "You'd get nothing from me."

Orochimaru sighed again. "Maybe this will help," he said.

Reality dripped off the page and Naruto found himself standing in a featureless white room, Orochimaru sitting casually in a chair a few feet away.

"This is a genjutsu, isn't it?" Naruto demanded. "Don't waste your chakra—I'm not telling you anything."

Orochimaru nodded. "Yes, it's a genjutsu," he said. "A harmless one; I just want to make the point that I'm not trying to get you to talk. If I wanted to force information out of you, I could. With some people, that would involve torture." Suddenly the walls were drenched in blood; lightning bolts leaped from the walls and ceiling, converging on Naruto in a standing wave of electricity...which left him unaffected.

"Right now I'm just doing the visual and auditory elements," Orochimaru explained, waving a hand to dismiss the blood and lightning and leave the two of them back in the white room. "I could easily add tactile, olfactory, and taste; some people get remarkably more conversational once they taste their own blood and smell themselves cooking. That wouldn't work on you, though—you're much too stubborn. On the other hand, I could do something like this."

The scene shifted; suddenly they were standing on a rocky beach at the edge of a small river. Anko, Shino, and Hinata were tied to stakes while mustachioed men beat them with wet noodles.

"Oh. The pain," Hinata said casually. "Help me, Naruto-san. Please. Do not allow this pain to continue. Help."

"Or perhaps something like this," Orochimaru said. The scene shifted again; they were sitting in what was obviously intended to be the Hokage's office, but wasn't. The desk was different, the view out the window was too close to the ground, and the room was smaller. Also, the Hokage who was sitting behind the desk was clearly Sarutobi Hiruzen, but he was in the prime of his life, not the grandfatherly man that Naruto had grown up under.

Naruto watched as another Naruto walked in and sat in front of the desk. OtherNaruto looked nervous and sat stiffly.

"Genin Uzumaki reporting as ordered, Hokage-sama," OtherNaruto said.

The Hokage looked up and glared. "Uzumaki-san, you are a terrible person! You have done horrible things! You will be sent to bed with no supper!"

Reality dripped back into existence and Naruto found himself in the hospital bed again.

"What was that for, you jerk?!" he demanded, glaring at Orochimaru. "What is it with you and Anko-sensei, mucking with our heads like that? And I know this trick—we aren't really out, are we? Kai!" Just like he'd done a thousand times in training at the Academy, Naruto pulsed his chakra, forcing it to erupt outwards and shatter the matrix of Orochimaru's genjutsu.

The resulting spike of pain crushed him into the pillow, unable to breathe or even think. Alarms started blaring as the bed's array of chakra-monitor seals went berserk. The pain didn't stop, it just settled into his brain, shutting the world off like a broken lamp and throwing him into spastic convulsions that would have thrown him to the floor if not for the protective bedrails.

"Stupid boy!" Orochimaru snapped, instantly on his feet and at Naruto's side. His hands glowed with green medical chakra as he ran them swiftly down Naruto's body in a quick and professional scan. "I was only making a point, you idiot!"

Medic-nin boiled into the room like ants, two nurses in the lead and a doctor half a step behind them. The first nurse went to the far side of the bed, the doctor and second nurse headed for the near side where Orochimaru stood.

"Full-power chakra pulse to disrupt audio-visual genjutsu, patient chakra reserves drained and in c-fib, poor flow," Orochimaru said, the words coming out in the stacatto rap of a trained first responder reporting to a professional. Even as he spoke, he moved out of the way; there wasn't room to get around the fast-moving doctor and nurse so he leaped for the ceiling, sticking himself face-down above the action.

"Kami-sama damnit, what were you doing using genjutsu on my patient?" the doctor snarled, touching Naruto on the neck and paralyzing the spinal nerves in order to stop his body from convulsing; he went instantly limp from the neck down, although his head kept rolling frenetically back and forth. The nurses were already attaching medical tags to Naruto's chest to get vitals, moving smoothly around his thrashing head.

"Am I needed?" Orochimaru said calmly, not moving from where he clung to the ceiling overhead. "I can provide a transfusion."

"No!" the doctor snapped. "Get the hell out of here!" Before Orochimaru could move, the doctor cursed. "Yes, damnit. Get your ass down here and sit down."

Orochimaru dropped neatly to the floor at the foot of the bed, grabbed the chair, and moved up to the head. Seating himself, he presented his arm to the doctor, palm up. The doctor grabbed his forearm, set his other hand lightly on Naruto's neck, and breathed. Orochimaru stiffened for a moment as the doctor sucked chakra out of him in a river, focusing it, cleaning it, and sliding it smoothly into Naruto's coils.

"Fucking idiot," the doctor muttered under his breath, frowning in concentration as he both refilled and straightened Naruto's coils. Under his touch the convulsions stopped, although Naruto remained unconscious, eyes rolled back in his head with a pinched look of pain around the eyes. "And stupid kami-damned patients who burn their kami-damned coils that are so kami-damned huge we can't even transfuse properly."

"Heartrate 180, BP 90 over 60," the first nurse said calmly.

"C-fib resolved," the second said, her hands continuing to move over the array of sensor tags she'd finished applying down Naruto's limbs. "High CF variance. Torso plus two, peripheral ranges plus six to negative four, left hand zero after LM2, left hand chakra-null. Clearing LM2 now." She stretched Naruto's left arm out, placed one hand on his wrist and the other in the center of his forearm, and pressed down gently. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes in concentration; her hands lit up with green medical chakra as she tried to reopen Naruto's second left-median chakra point.

Orochimaru watched calmly, not reacting to the feeling of his life energy pouring out of him like blood from an arterial spray. Instead he pulled a sealing scroll out of his thigh holster and unsealed a ten-pound bag of medical chakra batteries. "She'll want these, and you'll need to help," he said, reaching awkwardly across his body with his right hand in order to hand the bag to the currently-unoccupied nurse.

The nurse raised an eyebrow but took the bag after a quick glance at the doctor was met with a sharp nod. He held the first battery in his right hand and placed his left on the other nurse's right, lending his own chakra and that from the battery to the effort as they fought to save Naruto's hand. If they couldn't reestablish the chakra flow, the complete lack of chakra in Naruto's hand would cause the tissue to die within minutes, requiring amputation.

o-o-o-o

When the team got home from their run, there was an unspoken hurry. With no words exchanged, Shino went straight to the kitchen and started preparing a quick dinner while Anko and Hinata grabbed a sketchy wash and changed into clean uniforms. By the time the other two were back the tempura was ready and Shino had already wolfed down his portion. Shino got cleaned up while his teammates inhaled their portions and then they all dropped to the floor in the main room, gathered close for a council of war.

"Okay, Shino, give us the layout of those labs," Anko demanded, passing him a stack of paper, a brush, and an already-filled inkstone.

Shino frowned in concentration as he sketched quickly. "The basic layout is like so," he said. "The patient rooms are in this area; again, I'm not entirely sure how many there are. Before that generation of my allies died I went back and reviewed what they had shown me, so at least I can narrow my previous estimate; my best guess is about thirty rooms, but it could be as high as fifty.

"The vivisection area is here," he said, carefully keeping his voice flat as he sketched a large open-plan room with three rectangles in the center. "There are three separate surgical theatres, all adjacent. I noticed some of the personnel moving back and forth between the tables during the operations; they might have been supervisors checking on the work or they might have been researchers doing comparisons—I couldn't tell. This hall leads down to the area with the battery. There are two stairs from the battery room, one on the east wall and one on the west. The battery is in the middle of the room, here. There's ductwork here, here, and here"—he sketched in thin lines through the patient areas, the vivisection room, and directly above the battery. "It's too small for a human and there are multiple sections of screen inside that would prevent even your smaller snakes from passing, sensei, but we might still be able to use it as a listening point or if we needed to disperse airborne toxin."

Anko nodded. "Okay. What's the battery connected to, anything?"

Shino shook his head. "No, nothing. It's just sitting in the middle of the room."

Anko frowned. "That doesn't make a lot of sense. It's in a high security area, so they can't be using it as a refueling depot for the village. And it doesn't make sense that it's a dedicated station for the labs—if it were full that battery would be big enough to run a village, let alone a small hospital."

"More than a village," Shino said. "That thing is just impossibly huge."

Anko thought about it for a bit longer, then shook her head in exasperation. "I don't know. Leave it for now; we need to figure out how we're getting out of here. So. Primary mission objective: all three genin members of Team Anko must reach Konoha alive. Secondary objective: jonin commander of Team Anko reaches Konoha alive. Mission restrictions: if any member of Team Anko cannot reach Konoha, they cannot be taken alive by Sound. Genin members of Team Anko who are killed must have their bodies destroyed in order to prevent Sound from obtaining valuable bloodline abilities. Mission duration: as short as possible. Suggestions?"

"Sensei, we c-c-can't just abandon y—" Hinata started, before Anko cut her off with a slashing gesture.

"Mission parameters are as stated, genin," Anko said coldly. "The three of you are extremely valuable to the village; you will play significant parts in shaping its future. I'm a good ninja and a useful tool, but I am expendable. As genin, one of the things you need to learn is to assess and utilize expendability of valued assets—it's something you'll have to deal with when you're a chunin, much less a clan head. Here's your chance."

Hinata blanched, but recovered gamely. "You have the snake summoning contract, sensei; you must have left a snake behind in the village for communications. If you send a summoning message Leaf can send backup."

"That would be unwise, Hinata-chan," Shino said gently. "If sensei calls the village there are only three options that I can see for what would happen. They could decide to extract us from Sound; the level of force required would be a declaration of war. Alternatively, they could order us to stay in place as spies, at least until they can figure out another way to extract us. Finally, if they thought that escape and rescue were both impossible and doubted our ability to spy without being caught—which, to be honest, I would—then they might order us to suicide."

"Mr. Doom-n-Gloom is right on the money," Anko said grimly. "Aside from that...you're right, Hinata, I did leave a snake in Konoha. And yes, I could summon it and send it back with a message. Problem is, sensei's had the contract longer and the snakes like him better; I'm sure he's asked the snakes to let him know if I make a call. I'm actually reluctant to use the summons at all; I'm not sure if they'd fight for me or for him."

Hinata looked at her in surprise. "Don't almost all your jutsu use snakes, sensei?"

Anko nodded. "Yeah, but most of those are just chakra constructs, they aren't real summons. Not a problem." She turned to her other student. "Shino, how likely is it you could refill Naruto from that battery without it being noticed?"

Shino shook his head. "Effectively zero, sensei. Sneaking a few kikai into those labs once or twice is one thing, but in order to transfer enough chakra to refill Naruto-san I would need a hundred colonies worth, maybe more; there's no way a swarm like that could move through the building without being noticed. Making many trips with fewer kikai is even less likely to pass unnoticed."

Anko nodded grimly. "That's what I thought. Okay, well, I guess we'll have to wait for him to heal naturally. In the meantime, we can scout escape routes and I can train you on escape-oriented jutsu. We'll start on that tomorrow."

"Sensei, on our run I noticed some things that I think might be useful," Hinata said tentatively.

Anko raised an eyebrow. "Oh? Like what?"

Hinata took the brush from Shino and started sketching on some clean paper. A few quick strokes became a rough outline of Sound itself; more careful brushwork marked important features outside it.

"The river that we practiced waterwalking on is too large and open to make a good escape route," she said, her focus on the brush distracting her enough that she didn't stutter or sound tentative. "There's a better option, though," she said. "Right here we passed a large thicket of brambles on the edge of the woods. They're fed by a small stream; there's heavy undergrowth on both sides of the stream for as far as I could see, so if we water-walked up the stream we'd be visible only from above, and on water so as not to leave scent." The brush moved, making an 'x' a few scale miles from the thickets. "There's an underground emergency shelter here—presumably it's the same as Konoha's, intended as a place for civilians to hide in case they need to be evacuated. It's full of clothing, food, weaponry, and other supplies. Next—"

Hinata's all-seeing eyes had noticed a surprising amount of useful items, and it was nearly an hour before the brainstorming session ran down.

"Sensei, I-I had one m-m-more t-th-thought," Hinata said, forcing the words out. She stuttered badly as she described her plan, clearly stressed but determined to push through.

Anko listened in incredulity. "No way in hell," she said when the genin had finished. "Full marks for guts, Hinata, but no way. Not in a million years would I do that."

Shino's disapproval was just as apparent, even past his high collar and glasses. "Truly. Hinata-chan, although I admire the audacity of the suggestion I think it would be a very bad idea for you to do such a thing. No matter how prepared you believe yourself, I believe there could be signficant trauma and psychological scarring."

Hinata took a deep breath and forced herself to settle. "Thank you, Shino-kun," she said. "And you, sensei. I appreciate your concern, but you were the one talking about difficult choices and sacrifice. Do you really think I'm too weak for this?"

Anko looked like she'd been kicked in the gut. "No...," she finally said. "No...you could probably do it. I still think it's a bad idea. Like Shino says, even if you pull it off there could easily be some real damage." She hesitated, then continued. "And...even if you can pull it off, it would really upset me," she admitted quietly.

From sheer habit, Hinata looked at the floor. With her Byakugan on she couldn't avoid meeting her teammates' eyes, but ingrained habit made her head move. "All of you tell me that I'm not weak," she said, her voice so soft and so unsure that they could barely hear it. "I am. In many ways. But this...this, I think I could do. Please, let me do my part."

Shino and Anko looked at each other in dismay. Anko started to argue further but stopped; this was the first time Hinata had really put herself forward in a team setting...no matter how much the idea bothered her, was it really a good plan to shut the girl down? Wouldn't that just make her even less confident in her own abilities, make her less likely to contribute?

Anko blew out a disgusted breath. "Fine," she said. "I hate this idea, but we'll do it. But if we're doing this, we're doing it smart. Here's how it'll work so you know what to be ready for..."

o-o-o-o

"What do you mean, I can't see my trooper?" Anko said dangerously. "If he's asleep, we'll wait."

The doctor shook his head firmly. "No. I will not have him disturbed today. He used a chakra manipulation yesterday that exhausted what chakra he'd managed to rebuild and damaged his chakra system further. No visitors, at all, until he's healed."

Anko's killing intent spread out from her like a freezing cloud. "Hinata?" she asked over her shoulder, not releasing the doctor's eyes.

Behind her, the Hyuuga daughter nodded. "Yes, sensei. Naruto-kun is unconscious right now. His breathing is ragged, his chakra coils almost empty, and the parts of his chakra system that have healed from the burning are...irritated, raw. The doctor is being honest."

The doctor sniffed, not backing down an inch. "Like I'd lie about a patient. And you can drop the intent, girl; I've been threatened by better. Two hours ago, I told the Chuikage to fuck off, so I'm not about to be intimidated by you. Now get out of here, I have rounds and I've wasted enough time on you." He started to turn away but Anko caught his arm in a grip of steel and turned him back.

"What is your name, sensei?" she asked with politeness that barely concealed steely threat.

The doctor paused deliberately, then shrugged his arm out of her grip. "Hashimoto Kade. Now piss off and stop wasting my time." He turned on his heel and strode off.

Anko stared after him, killing intent solidifying around her...and then gradually fading. A reluctant smile spread across her face. "I like him," she said grudgingly. "They drag on the ground when he walks, and I'm surprised they don't strike sparks."

Hinata blushed beet red.

o-o-o-o

"Damnit, Hinata, stop being lazy!" Anko snarled. "I don't care if you're low on chakra, do the technique! You think that you're going to have a chance to rest up in the middle of a battle? If we're going to get out of this place, you need to be stronger than that!"

The morning sun was hot, breakfast had been sketchy, and Anko had been working them mercilessly since dawn. Hinata was shaking and stumbling, but she forced her fingers through the seals. Ram, Tiger, mold the chakra in her belly, visualize... "Suiton: Syrup Trap!" she called. Her body convulsed as though retching and she vomited a stream of pale viscous liquid, swinging her head to coat an area several yards wide in front of her. She couldn't sustain it for more than a few seconds, at which point the flow cut off and she dropped to all fours, panting and dry-heaving.

Anko poked a stick into the syrup and let go; the stick stayed in place, trapped in the goopy liquid. Anko sniffed and nodded grudging satisfaction.

"Acceptable," she said. "Again."

"Sensei, Hinata-chan cannot repeat the technique," Shino said, kneeling beside his teammate. Beside him, the pillar of insects that he'd been building fell apart as soon as he stopped concentrating on it. He laid a gentle hand on Hinata's back, rubbing comforting circles as he glared at their teacher. "We are both suffering from chakra exhaustion and require a break."

Anko gave a put-upon sigh. "Fine. If you can't do more ninjutsu we'll focus on taijutsu. On your feet, both of you." She barely waited for the two exhausted genin to push themselves upright before she blurred forward, landing a palm strike on Shino's chest that sent him tumbling. Hinata dropped down, striking out with two fingers for a tenketsu point in Anko's leg; the jonin leaped over the strike and kicked Hinata in the forehead, knocking the girl flat.

"If I'd been Orochimaru that would have been a full-force kick to the face, not to the hitai-ate," Anko snapped. "C'mon, girl, you can do better. On your feet." Unconcerned, she turned to where Shino was struggling upright. "And you! That's the same attack I used on you our first day! Why weren't you ready for it?"

Shino snarled and attacked, his kikai pincering out to come at her from the sides as he went straight in.

Anko side-kicked him in the belly, dropping him to the ground gasping for breath even as she kawarimied with a nearby log before the kikai could land on her. Twenty yards away, she stood with hands on her hips, eyeing her fallen genin with disapproval.

"Hmph," she said. "Looks like we need to get you some help." She turned to one side. "Oi! Hitoshi! Get over here and help these two out!"

No one spoke, nothing moved.

Anko frowned. "Cut it out, Hitoshi! You were never good enough to hide from me. Now get over here, or I'll tell sensei you still can't hide worth a damn!"

With a sigh, a squat young ninja with a Sound hitai-ate rose up from some nearby bushes. "I was sure I was out of the girl's range," he grumbled, approaching cautiously.

Anko snorted. "You were," she said. "But you still like the same hides, and you were following us when we went out this morning."

Hitoshi looked chagrined at that. "I didn't think you saw me. Where did I slip?"

"You flubbed your jump across that third street," Anko said. "I saw your shadow."

He frowned at that. "No you didn't," he said. "I was careful to keep you between me and the sun."

"In the mirror, doofus," she told him, poking him in the hitai-ate to drive the point home. "I caught it in the window of that haberdashery shop."

"Fine, I'll work on it," he grumbled. "Now, what do you want?"

"Incoming!" Hinata said weakly, pointing into the woods with one hand even as she clumsily levered herself to her feet. Moments later, Orochimaru and a ninja squad walked out of the woods.

"Hello, little bird," Orochimaru said with a smile. "Hitoshi, you're dismissed. Report to Master Shu; tell him you require remedial training on tailing."

Hiroshi blanched but bowed immediately. "Yes, Chuikage-sama," he said, before shunshining away.

"Now," Orochimaru said, smiling beatifically at Team Anko. "Team Anko, this is Team Kaiya. Hinata-san, Shino-san, I'd like to introduce Ichiro-san, Nariko-san, and Sachi-san." He gestured to each genin in turn as he said their names.

Ichiro was old to be a genin, looking at least fourteen; he stood a good four inches taller than Shino and towered over Hinata. He wore a blue bandana tied tight across his head and had thickly-muscled arms crossed over his chest. When Orochimaru pointed to him, the boy gave them a small head toss of acknowledgement and then went back to glaring.

Nariko was almost as tall as her teammate, but where he was bulky she was willowy, with dark hair wrapped into a bun. Her sleeves were wide and long, hanging well past her hands. She smiled politely when introduced, but the smile fell away an instant later.

Sachi was clearly Nariko's sister; her nose was narrower and she was slightly shorter and blockier, but with the right clothes the two could have passed for twins. Unlike her sister, she wore a standard genin uniform, close-fitting in order to not snag on terrain, the only departure from by-the-book being that her equipment belt carried twice the usual number of ammo pouches. As she waited, her fingers tapped lightly across the handles of the tonfa holstered at her hips, clearly eager to use them.

"Like you," Orochimaru said, "Team Kaiya are freshly graduated genin, and this seemed like an excellent opportunity for them to have some training against opponents with whose abilities they aren't intimately familiar. Sparring with them would, of course, be useful to you as well...ah, but the rules of SERE say you aren't allowed to accept any favors, don't they? Well, we'll just have to say that this is terrible mistreatment that was forced upon you against your will."

He turned to the Sound genin squad. "Win, and whichever of you are still standing get paid for three D-ranks. Lose, and you're on punishment duty for a week. Give them ninety seconds, then you may attack. Kaiya, let the children spar on their own unless Anko decides to mix in. All of you, keep it non-lethal unless they escalate." He turned back to the Konoha-nin and gave them a jaunty wave. "Enjoy!" He vanished in a swirl of leaves.

Kaiya ostentatiously looked at her watch. "One," she announced.

Anko cursed and grabbed her genin, pulling them into a fast huddle. Carefully turning her body so as to block Team Kaiya's line of sight, her fingers flashed in rapid handtalk even as she whispered aloud.

"These four are new since I left, so I don't know their abilities," she said intently. 1 3 refill 2,3 from 1. Shino's insects swirled out of his sleeve and started transfering Anko's chakra into himself and Hinata, being careful to stay out of sight of the Sound-nin who stood only a dozen yards away. "Sensei said non-lethal, so they'll be fighting to cripple. Eye-gouging, bone breaks, poison...it's all on the table. Don't hold back; as long as you don't actually kill them, it doesn't matter what you do. It's three on two, so you'll need to take one out quickly. Hinata, run them down for us."

The Hyuuga heiress didn't even pause. "We should target Ichiro-san. By the callouses he's a close-in hard-style taijutsu specialist, and he's got a hairline fracture in his left shin, as though he kicked something too hard. He won't be able to turn well on that foot, and he probably won't kick with it. As to the others, Nariko-san has a pair of chakra ribbons tucked up those sleeves. Hard to tell while they're folded, but they look about fifty feet long. Sachi-san's tonfa are also blowpipes; those pouches are filled with darts and powders—the compositions look like pepper spray, flash powder, and smoke bombs."

Anko nodded. "Watch out for Nariko," she said. "She'll cut with the edges of those ribbons, but she'll also grab and drag you in for one of her teammates to beat on you. Also, at least one of them is going to have genjutsu training; kai if you even suspect you're in one. Remember, this isn't a spar. You can run away, you can set traps, whatever. I'll get involved if things really go south, but that will just bring Kaiya in and things will escalate fast. Now, here's how I want you to start things off..."

"Eighty-two...eighty-three...," Kaiya counted. Her genin were leaning forward, looking excited as they waited for Team Anko to break from their huddle.

Smoke erupted all around the Konoha-nin; Hinata and Shino leaped out, chakra-powered jumps dropping them down on their enemies like twin thunderbolts.

Ichiro went high; two steps forward, turn and leap up to intercept Hinata from behind while she was stuck on a ballistic trajectory. Nariko went to the side, leaping smoothly out and away. The ribbons flashed out of her sleeves, slicing up in an 'X' to cut Shino's Achilles tendons. Sachi shifted, taking up position in front and to the side of her sister with her tonfa ready.

Nariko's ribbons passed completely through Shino without resistance or effect. "Bunshin!" Nariko yelled, immediately kawarimiing away with Sachi a split-second behind her. Seeing his teammates relocate, Ichiro aborted his own assault and kawarimied with a log on the ground a few yards from his launch point.

Kawarimi is an incredibly effective technique for evading an attack, but it has one drawback; the ground you relocate to is never at exactly the same height and angle as where you left from. It's like stepping into an unexpected pothole; it takes a split second to catch your balance and be able to move smoothly again.

Shino and Hinata weren't about to give him that moment. Anko's smoke bombs had given them momentary cover from which to launch their illusionary bunshin clones as a distraction. They used that moment to pick the most likely kawarimi target in the area and shunshin to it; when Ichiro arrived, they were waiting.

Ichiro was a skilled ninja, and well trained in the dangers of kawarimi transit. The instant he appeared he was dropping to the ground and rolling aside, aiming to both move unpredictably and regain his balance quickly. Unfortunately for him, he'd barely even started to bend his knees when a cloud of kikai bugs landed on his face and began forcing themselves into his ears, eyes, nose, and mouth even as they slurped frantically at his chakra.

Despite the horror of the assault, he kept his cool; he spun on his back, legs scything out in a circle around him to keep physical assaults off for an instant while his hands flicked quickly through the handseals for kawarimi. There was a brief shudder of chakra...and nothing happened.

The unprecedented failure of the escape jutsu made him hesitate for just an instant; that was enough time for Hinata to slip around his defensive kicks. A series of Jyuuken strikes sealed off four tenketsu points in his neck and left him face-down, unconscious and paralyzed at the feet of his enemies.

"Threat down," Hinata said, leaping for the trees and trusting Shino to follow. Shino was right on her heels, ordering his kikai out of Ichiro's eyes and mouth as he went.

They barely escaped in time; a barrage of Sachi's blowgun darts flashed through the space behind them, coming so close that the first one sliced a hole in Shino's tunic.

Hinata was just about to touch down on the tree branch she'd been aiming for when Nariko's ribbons reached her; the left one went for her leg as the right one slashed for her neck. She managed to duck her chin fast enough to take the cut across her mouth instead of her throat, but she wasn't fast enough to keep the other from winding around her leg. A moment later she was yanked out of the air and smashed into a tree trunk.

"Hinata-chan!" Shino cried. He barely touched down on the branch before pushing off again, backflipping out into the clear area away from the trees. A series of bunshin trailed in his wake, each of them hurling a mix of kunai and shuriken at Sachi, Nariko, and the area around them.

The kunoichi sisters knew perfectly well that most of the attacks were as illusionary as the bunshin that launched them—it was vanishingly unlikely that any genin had the skill or chakra levels to master an actual clone technique, so the bunshin had to be illusions. The only problem was: which attacks were illusions? The entire area around them was taking fire; there was no safe place to move.

Nariko's chakra ran through her ribbons, and those ribbons were currently wrapped around Hinata; with Hinata's chakra completely inside that of the ribbons Nariko couldn't kawarimi without dropping her ribbons or dropping her enemy. She chose to drop Hinata in mid-air and pull the ribbons back fast; the left whirled into a shield to cover herself and her sister while the right slashed back and forth across Shino's trajectory. The shield blocked her view so she was cutting blind; that was the only thing that kept Shino alive as the razor-sharp chakra-infused ribbon covered his legs and torso in a welter of bloody cuts.

Hinata had felt her ribs crack when she slammed into the tree, but she forced the pain away and made herself concentrate. She was thirty feet up in mid-air, on an arc that would smash her into the ground near the Syrup Trap she'd been practicing earlier. She yanked the ninja wire off her belt and hurled it towards a nearby tree, pushing chakra through it to wind the wire around the trunk. A quick yank changed the direction of her fall, swinging her in a descending arc back towards Nariko and Sachi.

The Sound-nin couldn't see her coming; Nariko's shield was in the way. An instant before she would have hit, Hinata let go of the wire and kawarimied with the log that Ichiro had used earlier.

The kawarimi jutsu exchanges both the position and momentum of two objects; Hinata reached the ground motionless while the log smashed into the ribbon-shield with all the power that her body would have had. There was a muffled yelp and Sachi went tumbling back even as Nariko shunshined away, leaving one of her ribbons behind instead of taking the time to untangle it from the log.

Sachi had taken a hard hit, but she wasn't down; she turned the impact into a series of rolls and tumbles that carried her rapidly to the side and back under the trees. Clouds of smoke exploded in her wake, hiding her exact direction and providing cover for future movement.

Hinata darted into the cloud, her Byakugan allowing her to track her enemy where normal sight was useless. Behind her, she saw Shino touching down safely in the grass. He was bleeding heavily from Nariko's blind slashes, but none of the cuts were disabling. Unfortunately, dodging and parrying the strikes had distracted him enough that he'd lost track of Nariko. Worse, he guessed wrong on which way to look for her; his head turned to the right an instant before she charged out of the trees to his left. She was just outside his field of view as she sent her remaining ribbon licking out at his eyes. Hinata opened her mouth to shout a warning; time seemed to slow down as she watched every nuance play out before she could make her lungs work.

The smirk on Nariko's face said clearer than words that she was already feeling satisfaction at crippling the bug-user.

The way her eyes flicked towards the smoke cloud and the slight crease in her brow said that she was worrying about her sister and starting to plan how she would help dispose of Hinata.

The way her mouth suddenly gaped open in shock said that she couldn't understand how a series of explosive-tag-carrying kikai bugs had just lifted out of the grass in front of her.

Each group of the bugs was moving slower than usual, struggling to lift the weight of a tag. Slower than usual or not, they were fast enough; the first tag went off at head-height under the ribbon, blasting it in half and sending the front part whirling harmlessly aside, well away from its intended target. The second went off at ankle-height, blowing Nariko off her feet and sending her into a rag-doll tumble to land in the Syrup Trap. Even if the sticky jutsu hadn't been there, she was going nowhere: the explosion had broken both her legs.

Shino apparently wasn't satisfied. He darted forward and started kicking the Sound kunoichi repeatedly in the head and chest. "Bitch!" he hissed, killing intent boiling off of him. He knelt down, grabbed Nariko's jaw in his right hand to pin her head in place while his left hand forced her mouth open and pushed an explosive tag in. "Choke on this, you—"

Anko grabbed him by the collar and hurled him away, yanking the tag out of Nariko's mouth and casting it aside before shunshining after Shino. The furious genin hadn't even hit the ground before Anko was on him, planting him face-first in the dirt and locking his arm tight in a punishing submission hold. "Stand down, genin!" she snapped, her voice cracking like a whip. Shino struggled furiously and Anko cranked the hold tighter. "She's fine, Shino! She's fine! Stand down!"

A flicker of movement made Anko glance up. "You too, Kaiya-san! I shut it down, there's been no escalation. Stand down while I deal with this."

Hinata watched, her heart in her mouth as the blonde Sound jonin hesitated for a moment, then nodded and relaxed, putting her tanto away. Anko spoke quietly and, after a few moments, Shino stopped fighting and slumped to the ground. The Hyuuga heiress gave a rueful headshake; she should have had more faith in Shino-kun. He'd clearly been in no danger of anything except getting angry from the way Nariko had cut him!

With her teammate safe, she focused on her own quarry. Her broken ribs meant that Hinata couldn't move as quickly or as smoothly as usual; it took real effort to move soundlessly across the forest floor as she stalked her prey through the smoke clouds. The smoke was no obstacle; she was aware of it, but she could see Sachi ahead just as clearly as if the smoke weren't there. No, the real danger was coughing; Hinata pressed her face into the elbow of her sleeve and breathed carefully. It kept the smoke out of her lungs and, as a bonus, it sopped up the blood that was pouring from her cut lips.

"Give up, Sachi-san," she called softly, the sleeve and the cut muffling her voice. "Both of your teammates are down. Please don't make us hurt you, too."

Sachi shifted, crouching down and turning to face the sound of Hinata's voice. "You're injured and alone, in my smoke," the girl replied quietly. "You're in my house now, little girl." The mask that she'd slipped over her face when she popped the smoke was clearly letting her breathe, but it also made her words indistinct and hard to understand.

Hinata stalked quietly closer, hands raised and ready. She watched as her enemy pressed herself to the trunk of a tree, concealing her outline from any eyes save the Byakugan. Sachi's breathing smoothed out, her chakra becoming calm and still as she cocked her head, clearly listening intently for her prey. She gripped her left-hand tonfa in a reversed grip intended for blocking; the right hand tonfa had been holstered in preference for a kunai.

One... Hinata counted to herself, estimating how long it would take for Sachi to move from her current position to Hinata's. Two...

"Kai!" she yelled, freezing her own chakra in place so that the genjutsu had nothing to grip. The Sachi by the tree vanished as the illusion broke, melting away to reveal the real Sachi in mid-leap.

Hinata stepped smoothly aside, landing a Jyuuken strike on Sachi's left hip as the girl went past. The leg collapsed under her when she landed, sending the Sound-nin tumbling to the ground in a graceless sprawl; Hinata was on her before she could kawarimi. A few quick fingertaps and the tenketsu points in Sachi's neck were sealed, leaving her paralyzed and helpless.

"It was a very fine illusion, Sachi-san," Hinata said comfortingly. "You need to work on your chakra systems, though. They are never still."

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