NejiTen, SasuSaku "Straight On Till Morning" Chapter Five
I've written something like 5,000 words of backstory for this fic. The muse is going nuts. What's more amusing is that I originally imagined this story as only two or three chapters. AHHAHAHAHA.
TITLE: Straight On Till Morning
SERIES: Naruto
CHARACTERS: NejiTen, SasuSaku, Team Gai, Orochimaru, Itachi
RATING: PG-13
WORD COUNT: 3,677
NOTES: No one guessed where the quote was from in the last chapter. LAME. It was from The Ghost and the Darkness. Good movie if you've never seen it.
STRAIGHT ON TILL MORNING
For a long moment she didn’t know where she was. Her left arm felt like it was on fire and the ringing in her head would not quiet down so she could think clearly. She was having a hard time breathing as well, as if there wasn’t enough air to... Air. Her eyes widened and with a thought she sealed off the C Block, stopping the vacuum of air as it was drawn out into space by the damage to the hull of the ship. The throbbing in her left arm lessened somewhat once the seal was in place and she took a deep breath, trying to get her bearings.
The Byakugan had fired on her.
She couldn’t understand why. Her thoughts were still a bit fuzzy but she knew she had hailed the ship, had transmitted her whereabouts. Neji had to have known she was on board, why would he...? A flash of worry lanced through her. Unless something had happened and Neji was no longer in control of the Byakugan.
She paused, unsure of what to do.
A three note tone suddenly sounded in her ear and she winced. It repeated after a few moments and she silenced it with a thought, too off balance and hurting to understand who was hailing her. She needed to regroup, needed to pull her thoughts together. There was something she was supposed to be watching for, something was coming...
A chime sounded in her ear and she felt the docking bay doors opening, allowing someone in through the airlock. There was a brief second where she thought it might be Neji but then she realized, no, the Byakugan was still in orbit and she felt her heart sink. She had dropped the shields and prepared the ship for docking, but it was the Akatsuki that was now attached to her, like a parasite.
“Orochimaru.”
His name sounded in her mind, in the ship’s mind, and the Tsukiyomi reacted to her fear. Mechanical doors slammed shut and locked, lights flipped off, alarm systems were primed, and through it all, Orochimaru stood in her cargo bay and laughed.
“I was unsure before but now I’m certain. You’re here, aren’t you, my pet?”
His voice was oil, a snake’s hiss. Her physical body shivered in it’s computerized cocoon. She could not let him find her. He would take her back, back to his compound, to the room where she could hear no Whispers but her own, where she would create twisted and dark things, cruel weapons, just to have something to talk to. Neji had destroyed those creations when they had broken out of Orochimaru’s compound before, but he would not be there to help her this time. If she was captured alone there was no telling what horrible machines she might give birth to in her madness.
She would kill herself before she let that happen.
Neji walked quickly but steadily towards the starboard weapons bay, his hold on his anger tenuous at best. It could only have been Sasuke or Sakura who had fired on the Tsukiyomi and, of the two, he could guess which of them was more likely. Sasuke had taken the opportunity to try and bring down his brother’s ship and, though Neji could not fault him for wanting revenge for his murdered family, the Byakugan did not belong to Sasuke. He would not see it used as a tool in a grudge match that neither Neji nor his crew had anything to do with. What was worse is that Neji was certain Sasuke would still be firing if Lee hadn’t cut the power to the cannons, which unfortunately also left them practically defenseless with Orochimaru growing closer every minute.
Just before reaching the weapons bay he made a detour into his cabin, kneeling down to pull out a long, thin box from under his bed. He had hidden it there years ago, out of sight of any cameras and away from where even Tenten would look. The box was lead-lined and he had been very careful to not to open it. He had thought never to open it, really. He had taken it on a whim in his escape from Orochimaru’s compound all those years ago. Perhaps he should have destroyed it with the others but, at the time, he had not been sure they would actually survive Orochimaru’s pursuit of them. He had thought that if they were going to die, he was going to take the Torturer with him. With Orochimaru closing in, it seemed the time had come at last to use it.
Pulling back the lid of the box, he gazed down at what looked like a sword, curved slightly and sharp on only one side. The blade was about four feet long and black, like the deepest most part of space. Even now he could not have said what it was made of. The grip was black as well and looked like glass, smooth and shiny. It looked to be an elegant weapon, simple and unadorned, but he knew it was much more than that.
Reaching down, he wrapped his hand around the hilt and drew it forth.
As soon as he touched it, symbols lit up along the length of the blade, engraved in glowing white fire. There was a slight vibration under his palm, a hum of power as the sword came awake and he raised the blade horizontally, reading the runes.
I am the voice in the darkness.
A long time ago, lying near death in Orochimaru’s prison, he’d heard a voice singing in the black. There had been no light in his cell, indeed there had been nothing at all except suddenly that voice. It had been untrained but sweet, singing only a simple lullaby, but as he lay there listening, he understood. He could not die there. He could not allow Gai’s murderer to kill him as well. He had to live, he had to escape, there was still a world out there beyond the cold confines of his cell. There was still beauty, still goodness, still people he cared about. It had been so long since he had heard anything but screaming and the snake’s laughter. If someone could still sing, there in that terrible place, there was still hope.
Neji gripped Nightsong firmly. Tenten had made the sword during her years of torment and slavery under Orochimaru. The Torturer had twisted Tenten’s gift by locking her away, unable to speak, to Whisper, until she had no choice but to create her own companions or go mad with the silence in her head. Months after their escape, she had told him that she had sometimes heard Neji speaking during one of Orochimaru’s torture sessions, when they moved him to a chamber closer to Tenten’s. She could not always understand what Neji said, but his voice had been her anchor, her reminder that she was not completely alone there.
Looking back, he could not be sure what she’d been thinking when she’s created the sword in his hand, but he liked to think it had been meant for him.
Rising to his feet, he turned and headed down the corridor, barely pausing as he took off the comm clipped to his belt and activated it to talk to Lee on the bridge.
“Lee, open the starboard weapons bay door.”
It slid open effortlessly and he moved inside, Nightsong humming in his hand.
Sakura came to all at once. One moment asleep and then the next wide awake. She was still lying on the floor of the weapons bay, her skin cold where it touched the floor. She felt somewhat sore and she mentally cursed Sasuke for hijacking her like that. The thought of him brought a welling of panic inside her. What had he done while she was out?! Twisting slightly, she tilted her head back to look over at the cannon controls when the bay doors slid open with a mechanical hiss and Neji walked in.
He looked like wrath itself and there was a blade in his hand. His pale eyes flickered over her crumbled form before sliding over to where Sasuke stood ready near the cannon. His full body was turned towards Neji and he stood braced as if for impact, dark eyes still angry.
“Why did you stop me?” he growled at the captain. “Itachi is within range. We should be firing.”
Neji’s voice was as hard as metal. “The Byakugan does not answer to you.” His gaze flicked over to Saskura again and she pushed herself up slowly, trying to sit up on her knees. “In any case, your brother is not in control of the Tsukiyomi, Tenten is. You fired on Tenten.”
Sakura gasped, keeping herself upright with one hand against the floor. “Is she alright?”
Neji’s jaw tightened. “I don’t know.” His cold eyes turned back to Sasuke. “You’ve broken the rules of my ship and you attacked one of my crew. By rights, I should kill you.”
Sasuke tensed and shifted onto the balls of his feet. He did not attack though and instead watched Neji warily. The captain stared back at him and Sakura realized suddenly that it was her presence that was keeping Neji from attacking Sasuke with the strange ink-dark sword in his hand. The captain had not expected to find her there.
“We’ll go with you,” she blurted, and both men turned their heads to look at her. “To the Tsukiyomi,” she clarified. Sasuke stilled but Neji lifted his chin, signalling her to continue. She swallowed. “If Tenten is hurt then I can be of help. Sasuke can handle Itachi, whatever has happened to him, and then we can take the Tsukiyomi and be out of your way.” She took a breath, holding Neji’s gaze. “Please. Without bloodshed. Please.”
Neji glanced back at Sasuke who, after a moment, finally relaxed from his battle posture and nodded stiffly. Sakura smothered a sigh of relief.
Suddenly, there was a burst of static from what looked like a comlink on Neji’s belt. Lee’s voice crackled over it. “Captain?”
Neji reached down and unclipped the device. “What is it, Lee?”
“Captain, the Akatsuki has docked with the Tsukiyomi.” Lee sounded anxious. “I couldn’t do anything without hurting the Tsukiyomi as well. I’m sorry, Neji.”
Neji’s grip on the sword in his other hand tightened. “Orochimaru will know she is there. He’ll want to take her back.”
Back, back to his compound, the one Sakura had had Sasuke smuggled out of. She remembered the place, and not fondly.
Lee’s voice crackled over the line. “She won’t let him get far. She can barricade herself inside the ship until we get there.”
“Not if she’s injured,” Neji answered quietly, but he did not press the button to communicate that to Lee. The captain looked over at Sasuke who met his gaze steadily, without fear. Neji lifted the com and spoke to Lee. “Lee, prep the suits,” he ordered. “We’re going for a walk.”
Sakura had never space-walked before and she was pretty sure she never wanted to do so again. The feeling of nothing at all around her, nothing below her was so unsettling that the only thing keeping her from flying into a total panic was the fact that Neji had connected them all together by way of a long tie-line clipped to their suits. No matter what, none of them could drift off, and Sakura hung on to that fact as she floated slowly, ever so slowly across empty space to the Tsukiyomi.
With the Byakugan blocked from docking by the Akatsuki, the only way to reach the Tsukiyomi was to “walk” there and, from what she understood, basically use a special blow torch to penetrate the airlock from the outside and hope Tenten would open the doors for them once they were in.
Neji had the tools they needed slung over his back and he was in the lead, using the small thrusters on his suit to maneuver the line of them over to the Tsukiyomi. She and Sasuke were pulled by his momentum while Lee stayed behind to monitor the situation from the bridge. Right about now, Sakura wished she’d asked to stay behind as well even though she knew that logically she could not. If Tenten really was injured, then she would need a doctor.
Neji had reached the Tsukiyomi’s outer hull and he grabbed on to a long steel bar near the airlock used for maintenance when the the ship was docked planet-side. He clipped a metal tie around the bar to anchor himself and then took the blow torch off his shoulder and started burning a neat door-sized square in the side of the airlock. A moment later, Sasuke reached the bar as well and grabbed on and then turned awkwardly in his bulky suit to look back at her. Whatever he saw on her face made him lift a hand back towards her.
“Sakura.” His voice came through loud and clear over the headset installed in her suit. Her heart tightened in her chest and she raised her arm, letting him pull her the last few feet. She knew, in his own way, that he was apologizing for what had occurred in the weapons room. It may not have been said aloud but that was Sasuke’s way. That he was trying at all was something.
A panel from the ship’s hull abruptly sailed by them and the two of them turned to find Neji motioning at them. Together, the three of them made their way into the airlock, Neji floating over to the door and pressing the release.
Nothing happened.
“Tenten,” he said quietly, knowing that she had to know they were there if she was still interfaced with the ship. Neji had told them that cutting into the ship like that was like cutting into Tenten. He hadn’t wanted to do it but there hadn’t been any other choice. “Open the airlock.”
Sakura felt herself tense as they waited. Were they too late? Had Orochimaru already reached her? But then a light flashed from red to green near the door and it slid back with a hiss. Neji pulled them inside quickly, drawing a blaster from his belt as they floated into the airlock. The room was thankfully empty, however, and the airlock door snapped shut behind them. Oxygen immediately rushed into the room as the pressure stabilized. Once Neji gave them the all-clear, they fumbled out of their suits and drew the guns Neji had supplied them with. They were matching weapons, two laser guns, silver in color, with glowing blue lines etched into them in intricate patterns. The lines seemed to pulse at times, as if they were echoing her heartbeat. They had been Whisper-made by Tenten recently.
Neji had put away the blaster and the black sword was now in his hand as he looked at each of them in turn. “We go together to the interface room. Orochimaru will be headed there if he’s not there already. After that, if you want to pursue Itachi, I will not stop you.” The last was directed at Sasuke who nodded once and she felt her eyebrows lift in surprise. She had thought that as soon as they were aboard he would be off to find Itachi, but perhaps he thought his brother was in the interface room as well. “Orochimaru will have left men to secure the hallways, he won’t have come alone,” Neji continued. “Be on your guard.”
He lifted his blade slightly in a ready position, nodded at the two of them and palmed open the doors leading into the interior of the ship. Gunfire sounded almost immediately and they began the long fight to retake the heart of the Tsukiyomi.
Tenten had shut and locked every door between herself and Orochimaru but it had barely stopped him. He’d planted charges on the doors and had simply blasted his way through them, leaving a man behind every now and then to hold the passageways. Once she thought she’d had him. She had purposefully opened the door to the kitchen area and the moment he’d cautiously stepped inside, she’d slammed the door closed and reversed the oxygen flow out of the room. Instead of suffocating, however, he’d simply pulled out a small, portable oxygen mask and set the charge for the next door, chuckling as if he found her antics amusing. He knew what he was doing to her, the more explosives he used the more damage the ship took and, in turn, the more damage she took. Nothing would show on her physical body, but with her mind interfaced with the ship, it felt like she’d been shot in the chest every time a charge exploded. Neji hacking his way into the airlock had barely registered next to that and she had had to turn her attention away from him as Orochimaru got closer and closer. He was only moments away now and she knew she could not stay in her capsule. He would simply haul the whole thing out of the ship with her still inside.
Taking a breath she faded back into her body and opened her eyes inside the cocoon-bed, staying still as the cover slid over and off. As always, she felt weak upon disconnecting from the ship. Sitting up was a monumental task and immediately she knew. She could not walk.
Tears burning in the back of her eyes, she fumbled herself over the side of the capsule and fell heavily to the floor, muffling the cry that escaped her as she connected with the floor. Shakily pushing herself up on her forearms, she looked around the room. There was nothing. No weapons, nothing except the cocoon and that was no help to her now.
Closing her eyes, she wearily pressed her forehead to the floor. “Shusui, if you’re here, somewhere, I beg of you.” Her voice cracked. “Please help me.”
Overhead the lights went out.
She lifted her head, wide-eyed, and the door to her room slid back revealing Itachi. It was dark in the hallway as well. Apparently the lights had gone out all over the ship. Itachi looked down at her impassively.
“Follow me,” he said and then disappeared. Grunting with effort, she managed to crawl out of the interface room on her belly, using her forearms and her knees to slide herself a foot at a time. Even that exhausted her. She was panting for breath by the time she cleared the doorway.
Down the hall, Itachi reappeared outside another doorway, looked directly at her, and then disappeared again.
Willing herself to keep moving, she slithered down the hallway with painstaking slowness, glancing behind her every so often with each explosion that said Orochimaru was almost upon her. By the time she reached the door Itachi had been standing by, she was practically sobbing, her arms shaking with exhaustion. She was dizzy and her thoughts were starting to scatter as well, a sign that she should have been resting a long time ago.
Hauling herself up against the wall, she reached a hand over her head to palm the door open. It slid back silently and she half-fell inside, just managing to pull her legs in the rest of the way as the door slid closed again. The lights flicked on for her and she wearily got her first good look at the room she had been lead to.
It was an armory.
She Whispered. “On.”
And every mechanized sword, gun, blaster, bow and knife in that room powered on.
It was easy to follow Orocihmaru’s path into the bowels of the ship. He left a trail of destruction as he bombed his way through every locked door. They had picked off eight of Orochimaru’s men and had not come across anymore. Either Orochimaru’s snakes were getting smarter or Neji and his group were catching up.
“The interface room is close,” Sasuke said, his back up against the side of one of the blasted doors. He held his Whispered blaster in both hands, pointed towards the floor. A few feet from him, Sakura made a surprised sound.
“You remember this ship?”
Sasuke looked uncomfortable. “I was here once, when I was very young, before... before.”
“Is there another way to the room? One that would get us there before Orochimaru?” Neji asked quickly. Sasuke blinked and then looked down, thinking.
“To the right,” he said suddenly, nodding towards a small hallway past Neji’s shoulder. “Service corridor. We might make it in time.”
Without a word, Neji plunged into the darkness of the corridor, Sasuke and Sakura right behind. The moment the lights had gone out, Neji had known they were running out of time. Everything felt wrong, dead, and he was certain Tenten was no longer linked to the ship. She would be weak after interfacing with such an advanced system. He had to find her before Orochimaru did. He had to.
He kicked down a flimsy door leading to a maintenance room. They hurried through into the hallway where Neji paused, looking left or right. Each way was clear.
“Which way?” he asked, but Sasuke didn’t answer. Neji glanced over his shoulder to find the other man looking back at him blankly.
“I...” Sasuke shook his head. “I can’t be certain.” Sakura reached out and squeezed his arm.
“We could split up,” she offered. “Search each way?”
“No,” Neji said immediately. “Orochimaru is close. We stay together.”
And then he heard it.
A sweet voice singing softly.
TO BE CONTINUED.
TITLE: Straight On Till Morning
SERIES: Naruto
CHARACTERS: NejiTen, SasuSaku, Team Gai, Orochimaru, Itachi
RATING: PG-13
WORD COUNT: 3,677
NOTES: No one guessed where the quote was from in the last chapter. LAME. It was from The Ghost and the Darkness. Good movie if you've never seen it.
STRAIGHT ON TILL MORNING
For a long moment she didn’t know where she was. Her left arm felt like it was on fire and the ringing in her head would not quiet down so she could think clearly. She was having a hard time breathing as well, as if there wasn’t enough air to... Air. Her eyes widened and with a thought she sealed off the C Block, stopping the vacuum of air as it was drawn out into space by the damage to the hull of the ship. The throbbing in her left arm lessened somewhat once the seal was in place and she took a deep breath, trying to get her bearings.
The Byakugan had fired on her.
She couldn’t understand why. Her thoughts were still a bit fuzzy but she knew she had hailed the ship, had transmitted her whereabouts. Neji had to have known she was on board, why would he...? A flash of worry lanced through her. Unless something had happened and Neji was no longer in control of the Byakugan.
She paused, unsure of what to do.
A three note tone suddenly sounded in her ear and she winced. It repeated after a few moments and she silenced it with a thought, too off balance and hurting to understand who was hailing her. She needed to regroup, needed to pull her thoughts together. There was something she was supposed to be watching for, something was coming...
A chime sounded in her ear and she felt the docking bay doors opening, allowing someone in through the airlock. There was a brief second where she thought it might be Neji but then she realized, no, the Byakugan was still in orbit and she felt her heart sink. She had dropped the shields and prepared the ship for docking, but it was the Akatsuki that was now attached to her, like a parasite.
“Orochimaru.”
His name sounded in her mind, in the ship’s mind, and the Tsukiyomi reacted to her fear. Mechanical doors slammed shut and locked, lights flipped off, alarm systems were primed, and through it all, Orochimaru stood in her cargo bay and laughed.
“I was unsure before but now I’m certain. You’re here, aren’t you, my pet?”
His voice was oil, a snake’s hiss. Her physical body shivered in it’s computerized cocoon. She could not let him find her. He would take her back, back to his compound, to the room where she could hear no Whispers but her own, where she would create twisted and dark things, cruel weapons, just to have something to talk to. Neji had destroyed those creations when they had broken out of Orochimaru’s compound before, but he would not be there to help her this time. If she was captured alone there was no telling what horrible machines she might give birth to in her madness.
She would kill herself before she let that happen.
Neji walked quickly but steadily towards the starboard weapons bay, his hold on his anger tenuous at best. It could only have been Sasuke or Sakura who had fired on the Tsukiyomi and, of the two, he could guess which of them was more likely. Sasuke had taken the opportunity to try and bring down his brother’s ship and, though Neji could not fault him for wanting revenge for his murdered family, the Byakugan did not belong to Sasuke. He would not see it used as a tool in a grudge match that neither Neji nor his crew had anything to do with. What was worse is that Neji was certain Sasuke would still be firing if Lee hadn’t cut the power to the cannons, which unfortunately also left them practically defenseless with Orochimaru growing closer every minute.
Just before reaching the weapons bay he made a detour into his cabin, kneeling down to pull out a long, thin box from under his bed. He had hidden it there years ago, out of sight of any cameras and away from where even Tenten would look. The box was lead-lined and he had been very careful to not to open it. He had thought never to open it, really. He had taken it on a whim in his escape from Orochimaru’s compound all those years ago. Perhaps he should have destroyed it with the others but, at the time, he had not been sure they would actually survive Orochimaru’s pursuit of them. He had thought that if they were going to die, he was going to take the Torturer with him. With Orochimaru closing in, it seemed the time had come at last to use it.
Pulling back the lid of the box, he gazed down at what looked like a sword, curved slightly and sharp on only one side. The blade was about four feet long and black, like the deepest most part of space. Even now he could not have said what it was made of. The grip was black as well and looked like glass, smooth and shiny. It looked to be an elegant weapon, simple and unadorned, but he knew it was much more than that.
Reaching down, he wrapped his hand around the hilt and drew it forth.
As soon as he touched it, symbols lit up along the length of the blade, engraved in glowing white fire. There was a slight vibration under his palm, a hum of power as the sword came awake and he raised the blade horizontally, reading the runes.
I am the voice in the darkness.
A long time ago, lying near death in Orochimaru’s prison, he’d heard a voice singing in the black. There had been no light in his cell, indeed there had been nothing at all except suddenly that voice. It had been untrained but sweet, singing only a simple lullaby, but as he lay there listening, he understood. He could not die there. He could not allow Gai’s murderer to kill him as well. He had to live, he had to escape, there was still a world out there beyond the cold confines of his cell. There was still beauty, still goodness, still people he cared about. It had been so long since he had heard anything but screaming and the snake’s laughter. If someone could still sing, there in that terrible place, there was still hope.
Neji gripped Nightsong firmly. Tenten had made the sword during her years of torment and slavery under Orochimaru. The Torturer had twisted Tenten’s gift by locking her away, unable to speak, to Whisper, until she had no choice but to create her own companions or go mad with the silence in her head. Months after their escape, she had told him that she had sometimes heard Neji speaking during one of Orochimaru’s torture sessions, when they moved him to a chamber closer to Tenten’s. She could not always understand what Neji said, but his voice had been her anchor, her reminder that she was not completely alone there.
Looking back, he could not be sure what she’d been thinking when she’s created the sword in his hand, but he liked to think it had been meant for him.
Rising to his feet, he turned and headed down the corridor, barely pausing as he took off the comm clipped to his belt and activated it to talk to Lee on the bridge.
“Lee, open the starboard weapons bay door.”
It slid open effortlessly and he moved inside, Nightsong humming in his hand.
Sakura came to all at once. One moment asleep and then the next wide awake. She was still lying on the floor of the weapons bay, her skin cold where it touched the floor. She felt somewhat sore and she mentally cursed Sasuke for hijacking her like that. The thought of him brought a welling of panic inside her. What had he done while she was out?! Twisting slightly, she tilted her head back to look over at the cannon controls when the bay doors slid open with a mechanical hiss and Neji walked in.
He looked like wrath itself and there was a blade in his hand. His pale eyes flickered over her crumbled form before sliding over to where Sasuke stood ready near the cannon. His full body was turned towards Neji and he stood braced as if for impact, dark eyes still angry.
“Why did you stop me?” he growled at the captain. “Itachi is within range. We should be firing.”
Neji’s voice was as hard as metal. “The Byakugan does not answer to you.” His gaze flicked over to Saskura again and she pushed herself up slowly, trying to sit up on her knees. “In any case, your brother is not in control of the Tsukiyomi, Tenten is. You fired on Tenten.”
Sakura gasped, keeping herself upright with one hand against the floor. “Is she alright?”
Neji’s jaw tightened. “I don’t know.” His cold eyes turned back to Sasuke. “You’ve broken the rules of my ship and you attacked one of my crew. By rights, I should kill you.”
Sasuke tensed and shifted onto the balls of his feet. He did not attack though and instead watched Neji warily. The captain stared back at him and Sakura realized suddenly that it was her presence that was keeping Neji from attacking Sasuke with the strange ink-dark sword in his hand. The captain had not expected to find her there.
“We’ll go with you,” she blurted, and both men turned their heads to look at her. “To the Tsukiyomi,” she clarified. Sasuke stilled but Neji lifted his chin, signalling her to continue. She swallowed. “If Tenten is hurt then I can be of help. Sasuke can handle Itachi, whatever has happened to him, and then we can take the Tsukiyomi and be out of your way.” She took a breath, holding Neji’s gaze. “Please. Without bloodshed. Please.”
Neji glanced back at Sasuke who, after a moment, finally relaxed from his battle posture and nodded stiffly. Sakura smothered a sigh of relief.
Suddenly, there was a burst of static from what looked like a comlink on Neji’s belt. Lee’s voice crackled over it. “Captain?”
Neji reached down and unclipped the device. “What is it, Lee?”
“Captain, the Akatsuki has docked with the Tsukiyomi.” Lee sounded anxious. “I couldn’t do anything without hurting the Tsukiyomi as well. I’m sorry, Neji.”
Neji’s grip on the sword in his other hand tightened. “Orochimaru will know she is there. He’ll want to take her back.”
Back, back to his compound, the one Sakura had had Sasuke smuggled out of. She remembered the place, and not fondly.
Lee’s voice crackled over the line. “She won’t let him get far. She can barricade herself inside the ship until we get there.”
“Not if she’s injured,” Neji answered quietly, but he did not press the button to communicate that to Lee. The captain looked over at Sasuke who met his gaze steadily, without fear. Neji lifted the com and spoke to Lee. “Lee, prep the suits,” he ordered. “We’re going for a walk.”
Sakura had never space-walked before and she was pretty sure she never wanted to do so again. The feeling of nothing at all around her, nothing below her was so unsettling that the only thing keeping her from flying into a total panic was the fact that Neji had connected them all together by way of a long tie-line clipped to their suits. No matter what, none of them could drift off, and Sakura hung on to that fact as she floated slowly, ever so slowly across empty space to the Tsukiyomi.
With the Byakugan blocked from docking by the Akatsuki, the only way to reach the Tsukiyomi was to “walk” there and, from what she understood, basically use a special blow torch to penetrate the airlock from the outside and hope Tenten would open the doors for them once they were in.
Neji had the tools they needed slung over his back and he was in the lead, using the small thrusters on his suit to maneuver the line of them over to the Tsukiyomi. She and Sasuke were pulled by his momentum while Lee stayed behind to monitor the situation from the bridge. Right about now, Sakura wished she’d asked to stay behind as well even though she knew that logically she could not. If Tenten really was injured, then she would need a doctor.
Neji had reached the Tsukiyomi’s outer hull and he grabbed on to a long steel bar near the airlock used for maintenance when the the ship was docked planet-side. He clipped a metal tie around the bar to anchor himself and then took the blow torch off his shoulder and started burning a neat door-sized square in the side of the airlock. A moment later, Sasuke reached the bar as well and grabbed on and then turned awkwardly in his bulky suit to look back at her. Whatever he saw on her face made him lift a hand back towards her.
“Sakura.” His voice came through loud and clear over the headset installed in her suit. Her heart tightened in her chest and she raised her arm, letting him pull her the last few feet. She knew, in his own way, that he was apologizing for what had occurred in the weapons room. It may not have been said aloud but that was Sasuke’s way. That he was trying at all was something.
A panel from the ship’s hull abruptly sailed by them and the two of them turned to find Neji motioning at them. Together, the three of them made their way into the airlock, Neji floating over to the door and pressing the release.
Nothing happened.
“Tenten,” he said quietly, knowing that she had to know they were there if she was still interfaced with the ship. Neji had told them that cutting into the ship like that was like cutting into Tenten. He hadn’t wanted to do it but there hadn’t been any other choice. “Open the airlock.”
Sakura felt herself tense as they waited. Were they too late? Had Orochimaru already reached her? But then a light flashed from red to green near the door and it slid back with a hiss. Neji pulled them inside quickly, drawing a blaster from his belt as they floated into the airlock. The room was thankfully empty, however, and the airlock door snapped shut behind them. Oxygen immediately rushed into the room as the pressure stabilized. Once Neji gave them the all-clear, they fumbled out of their suits and drew the guns Neji had supplied them with. They were matching weapons, two laser guns, silver in color, with glowing blue lines etched into them in intricate patterns. The lines seemed to pulse at times, as if they were echoing her heartbeat. They had been Whisper-made by Tenten recently.
Neji had put away the blaster and the black sword was now in his hand as he looked at each of them in turn. “We go together to the interface room. Orochimaru will be headed there if he’s not there already. After that, if you want to pursue Itachi, I will not stop you.” The last was directed at Sasuke who nodded once and she felt her eyebrows lift in surprise. She had thought that as soon as they were aboard he would be off to find Itachi, but perhaps he thought his brother was in the interface room as well. “Orochimaru will have left men to secure the hallways, he won’t have come alone,” Neji continued. “Be on your guard.”
He lifted his blade slightly in a ready position, nodded at the two of them and palmed open the doors leading into the interior of the ship. Gunfire sounded almost immediately and they began the long fight to retake the heart of the Tsukiyomi.
Tenten had shut and locked every door between herself and Orochimaru but it had barely stopped him. He’d planted charges on the doors and had simply blasted his way through them, leaving a man behind every now and then to hold the passageways. Once she thought she’d had him. She had purposefully opened the door to the kitchen area and the moment he’d cautiously stepped inside, she’d slammed the door closed and reversed the oxygen flow out of the room. Instead of suffocating, however, he’d simply pulled out a small, portable oxygen mask and set the charge for the next door, chuckling as if he found her antics amusing. He knew what he was doing to her, the more explosives he used the more damage the ship took and, in turn, the more damage she took. Nothing would show on her physical body, but with her mind interfaced with the ship, it felt like she’d been shot in the chest every time a charge exploded. Neji hacking his way into the airlock had barely registered next to that and she had had to turn her attention away from him as Orochimaru got closer and closer. He was only moments away now and she knew she could not stay in her capsule. He would simply haul the whole thing out of the ship with her still inside.
Taking a breath she faded back into her body and opened her eyes inside the cocoon-bed, staying still as the cover slid over and off. As always, she felt weak upon disconnecting from the ship. Sitting up was a monumental task and immediately she knew. She could not walk.
Tears burning in the back of her eyes, she fumbled herself over the side of the capsule and fell heavily to the floor, muffling the cry that escaped her as she connected with the floor. Shakily pushing herself up on her forearms, she looked around the room. There was nothing. No weapons, nothing except the cocoon and that was no help to her now.
Closing her eyes, she wearily pressed her forehead to the floor. “Shusui, if you’re here, somewhere, I beg of you.” Her voice cracked. “Please help me.”
Overhead the lights went out.
She lifted her head, wide-eyed, and the door to her room slid back revealing Itachi. It was dark in the hallway as well. Apparently the lights had gone out all over the ship. Itachi looked down at her impassively.
“Follow me,” he said and then disappeared. Grunting with effort, she managed to crawl out of the interface room on her belly, using her forearms and her knees to slide herself a foot at a time. Even that exhausted her. She was panting for breath by the time she cleared the doorway.
Down the hall, Itachi reappeared outside another doorway, looked directly at her, and then disappeared again.
Willing herself to keep moving, she slithered down the hallway with painstaking slowness, glancing behind her every so often with each explosion that said Orochimaru was almost upon her. By the time she reached the door Itachi had been standing by, she was practically sobbing, her arms shaking with exhaustion. She was dizzy and her thoughts were starting to scatter as well, a sign that she should have been resting a long time ago.
Hauling herself up against the wall, she reached a hand over her head to palm the door open. It slid back silently and she half-fell inside, just managing to pull her legs in the rest of the way as the door slid closed again. The lights flicked on for her and she wearily got her first good look at the room she had been lead to.
It was an armory.
She Whispered. “On.”
And every mechanized sword, gun, blaster, bow and knife in that room powered on.
It was easy to follow Orocihmaru’s path into the bowels of the ship. He left a trail of destruction as he bombed his way through every locked door. They had picked off eight of Orochimaru’s men and had not come across anymore. Either Orochimaru’s snakes were getting smarter or Neji and his group were catching up.
“The interface room is close,” Sasuke said, his back up against the side of one of the blasted doors. He held his Whispered blaster in both hands, pointed towards the floor. A few feet from him, Sakura made a surprised sound.
“You remember this ship?”
Sasuke looked uncomfortable. “I was here once, when I was very young, before... before.”
“Is there another way to the room? One that would get us there before Orochimaru?” Neji asked quickly. Sasuke blinked and then looked down, thinking.
“To the right,” he said suddenly, nodding towards a small hallway past Neji’s shoulder. “Service corridor. We might make it in time.”
Without a word, Neji plunged into the darkness of the corridor, Sasuke and Sakura right behind. The moment the lights had gone out, Neji had known they were running out of time. Everything felt wrong, dead, and he was certain Tenten was no longer linked to the ship. She would be weak after interfacing with such an advanced system. He had to find her before Orochimaru did. He had to.
He kicked down a flimsy door leading to a maintenance room. They hurried through into the hallway where Neji paused, looking left or right. Each way was clear.
“Which way?” he asked, but Sasuke didn’t answer. Neji glanced over his shoulder to find the other man looking back at him blankly.
“I...” Sasuke shook his head. “I can’t be certain.” Sakura reached out and squeezed his arm.
“We could split up,” she offered. “Search each way?”
“No,” Neji said immediately. “Orochimaru is close. We stay together.”
And then he heard it.
A sweet voice singing softly.
TO BE CONTINUED.