[1017] Are you really all that surprised?
Original drabble by askerian
Act IAct II
Scene I, Sasuke
Scene I, Naruto
Scene II, Shikamaru
Scene II, Sasuke
Scene III, Neji
Scene III, Tenten
Scene IV, Tenten
Scene IV, Sakura
Scene V, Lee
For the first few seconds, everything worked exactly as Tenten had envisioned it. She ran in a wide arc toward the SUV, making sure to keep out of the line of the impending action. The boys atop the abandoned car followed her instructions to get down, and once they were down, Neji floored it, sending his car in a perfect, deadly line. The car slipped alongside the besieged SUV--the side mirror shattered on the grill, the cars were so breathtakingly close--and plowed straight into the largest group of creatures.
And it was in that moment that everything went to hell. In the space between one heartbeat and the next, Neji lost control of his car. It veered out of its safe, straight trajectory, breaks squealing, and slammed into a car that no longer had an owner to miss it.
It sounded as if the world were ending.
Lee and the other kid were shouting, but Tenten could not take the time to hear their words. Instead, she turned and planted her left foot hard into the ground, diverting her momentum from the SUV and toward the new wreck. She leapt over a still-twitching body with shattered limbs and dodged an oozing skull, her adrenaline fueling her speed and fear.
“Neji!”
No response from the car, just the quiet hiss of escaping steam--what it was, she didn’t know or care. She sprinted around to the driver’s side just in time to see the monster on the spider webbed windshield roll off the car and onto the ground, its mangled hands reaching for the driver’s side door all the while.
When it reared up despite its broken legs, its fingers slithering over the dented metal, Tenten swung her crowbar around and jammed the straight end through its right eye. It convulsed for a moment, finally stopping when her follow through pinned it to the asphalt. She yanked her weapon back out of its head with the satisfying crunch of the eye socket cracking.
She spun around, checking her surroundings for anything moving. There was nothing in the immediate vicinity of the ruined car, aside from the thing she had just dispatched. The rest of Neji’s victims were scattered across the pavement like the tail of a comet, two of the bodies completely still, heads beyond salvaging.
Neji had struck seven others aside from the one she had just taken out. One of them was still very near the SUV, and as Tenten watched it pulled itself back towards that vehicle on its stomach, its legs twisted and dragging behind. The remaining six--all with various limbs askew--were watching her. Headed toward her, and Neji.
She risked a glance over her shoulder for her first proper look in the car. The driver’s side window was shattered, some jagged bits of glass still clinging to the edges of the window. Beyond the broken glass and deflated airbags was Neji.
Blood covered near half his face, a long, high cut on his forehead still seeping. The rise and fall of his chest said he was still alive, but the way he was hunched--leaning toward the door, the diagonal strap of his seatbelt uncomfortably high across his neck--proclaimed him unconscious.
There was no time for this crap.
“Neji!” She bellowed his name as she turned around, swapping the fear in her voice for annoyance and anger. The tender skin of her palms burned as she adjusted the heavy crowbar in her grip, readying the makeshift weapon against attack. “Wake up!”
There was no sound of movement behind her. The closest creature was approaching, hobbling on one solid leg and one that threatened to pitch it sideways with every step.
“Neji!” She shifted her weight to her left foot and kicked backward with her right, smashing the ball of her foot into the dented car door. “Wake up you idiot, I need your help!”
Still nothing behind her.
“Tenten!”
She snapped her gaze up and to the left, where Lee himself was torn between bashing whatever he could reach and shooting frantic looks in her direction. The injured boy with him was clumsily swinging the baseball bat, most of his effort spent on staying upright and out of reach of grasping, broken fingers.
“Don’t you dare leave him there alone, you moron!” she shouted back at him. “They’ll kill him if you leave!”
But before she could continue her shouted argument with Lee, there was a long sigh behind her. “Stop,” a weak, dazed voice said, “calling us names.”
Neji was awake.
Relief nearly stole her breath. “You’re the one who can’t drive straight,” she said, stepping away from the car door and toward the unsteady monster. The move would force her hand sooner, but it would give Neji a larger buffer of safety. “Get out of there and help me.”
“I’m bleeding.”
“Stop whining and get the hell out of your car, Hyuuga, or I’m going to let these suckers eat you.”
That actually got her a laugh, and Tenten didn’t fight the grin that lit up her face in response. But there was no time to revel in it. The hobbling creature was only a few feet away, and behind it came more of its kind, some stumbling drunkenly, others crawling or dragging themselves toward them.
She headed straight for the closest creature in six running steps, pulling her shoulders and arms and crowbar back so that when she twisted her hips to straighten out her body, the force of the impact straight across the bridge of its nose sent a satisfying crack across the parking lot.
It dropped, but the crowbar caught, and Tenten nearly lost her grip on her weapon as the creature’s weight dragged it down. She had to do a funny little pirouette to keep her hold on it, hopping gracelessly over the dead thing’s mangled leg. The impact when the head hit the blacktop wasn’t enough to jar the crowbar loose, so she was forced to waste a few precious seconds planting her right foot in what was left of its face in order to pry the weapon out of the skull.
A hand wrapped around her left ankle and pulled.
She twisted as she fell, landing hard on her side instead of her front, giving her a perfect view of a man’s hungry face. And in the moment before she shoved herself upright and crushed in the top of his skull with her newly freed crowbar, the creature bit down on her foot. Pain flared through her toes despite her sneakers.
“Tenten!”
She kicked the dead thing in the face once, twice, until the jaw fell open and she could pull herself free. She scrambled to her feet, pulling the crowbar with her, feeling the ache in her left foot.
Panic raced through her, threatened to smother all thought. Behind her and to the right she could hear Neji trying to get out of the car, his feet slamming into the broken door as he tried to force it open. Ahead and to the left, Lee’s shouting was a wordless sort of roar from the SUV.
Her toes throbbed and burned, and for a moment all Tenten wanted to do was run. Run as far and fast as she could, to a place where none of this was happening. Get on the cross country course and run until the world fell away in a green-brown blur and the only thing that mattered was her heartbeat, her breath, her muscles working under her skin.
But that life was over. And there was no time for her to stop and check, to strip off her shoe and sock and find out whether this life was over, too.
Neji’s life wasn’t over yet, and neither was Lee’s or that hurt kid with him. They were counting on her, and she wasn’t going to let them down while she was still herself.
Tenten breathed in deeply, and when she exhaled, she charged.
Okay, guys, confession time--this is the last scene I really have planned. Will I continue with this universe? Or have I zombied myself out?
It's a good question. Dunno if I have any answers other than I really need to get to bed at a reasonable hour tonight. x_x I hope you guys enjoy it!
Now with Lee piece.
Act IAct II
Scene I, Sasuke
Scene I, Naruto
Scene II, Shikamaru
Scene II, Sasuke
Scene III, Neji
Scene III, Tenten
Scene IV, Tenten
Scene IV, Sakura
Scene V, Lee
For the first few seconds, everything worked exactly as Tenten had envisioned it. She ran in a wide arc toward the SUV, making sure to keep out of the line of the impending action. The boys atop the abandoned car followed her instructions to get down, and once they were down, Neji floored it, sending his car in a perfect, deadly line. The car slipped alongside the besieged SUV--the side mirror shattered on the grill, the cars were so breathtakingly close--and plowed straight into the largest group of creatures.
And it was in that moment that everything went to hell. In the space between one heartbeat and the next, Neji lost control of his car. It veered out of its safe, straight trajectory, breaks squealing, and slammed into a car that no longer had an owner to miss it.
It sounded as if the world were ending.
Lee and the other kid were shouting, but Tenten could not take the time to hear their words. Instead, she turned and planted her left foot hard into the ground, diverting her momentum from the SUV and toward the new wreck. She leapt over a still-twitching body with shattered limbs and dodged an oozing skull, her adrenaline fueling her speed and fear.
“Neji!”
No response from the car, just the quiet hiss of escaping steam--what it was, she didn’t know or care. She sprinted around to the driver’s side just in time to see the monster on the spider webbed windshield roll off the car and onto the ground, its mangled hands reaching for the driver’s side door all the while.
When it reared up despite its broken legs, its fingers slithering over the dented metal, Tenten swung her crowbar around and jammed the straight end through its right eye. It convulsed for a moment, finally stopping when her follow through pinned it to the asphalt. She yanked her weapon back out of its head with the satisfying crunch of the eye socket cracking.
She spun around, checking her surroundings for anything moving. There was nothing in the immediate vicinity of the ruined car, aside from the thing she had just dispatched. The rest of Neji’s victims were scattered across the pavement like the tail of a comet, two of the bodies completely still, heads beyond salvaging.
Neji had struck seven others aside from the one she had just taken out. One of them was still very near the SUV, and as Tenten watched it pulled itself back towards that vehicle on its stomach, its legs twisted and dragging behind. The remaining six--all with various limbs askew--were watching her. Headed toward her, and Neji.
She risked a glance over her shoulder for her first proper look in the car. The driver’s side window was shattered, some jagged bits of glass still clinging to the edges of the window. Beyond the broken glass and deflated airbags was Neji.
Blood covered near half his face, a long, high cut on his forehead still seeping. The rise and fall of his chest said he was still alive, but the way he was hunched--leaning toward the door, the diagonal strap of his seatbelt uncomfortably high across his neck--proclaimed him unconscious.
There was no time for this crap.
“Neji!” She bellowed his name as she turned around, swapping the fear in her voice for annoyance and anger. The tender skin of her palms burned as she adjusted the heavy crowbar in her grip, readying the makeshift weapon against attack. “Wake up!”
There was no sound of movement behind her. The closest creature was approaching, hobbling on one solid leg and one that threatened to pitch it sideways with every step.
“Neji!” She shifted her weight to her left foot and kicked backward with her right, smashing the ball of her foot into the dented car door. “Wake up you idiot, I need your help!”
Still nothing behind her.
“Tenten!”
She snapped her gaze up and to the left, where Lee himself was torn between bashing whatever he could reach and shooting frantic looks in her direction. The injured boy with him was clumsily swinging the baseball bat, most of his effort spent on staying upright and out of reach of grasping, broken fingers.
“Don’t you dare leave him there alone, you moron!” she shouted back at him. “They’ll kill him if you leave!”
But before she could continue her shouted argument with Lee, there was a long sigh behind her. “Stop,” a weak, dazed voice said, “calling us names.”
Neji was awake.
Relief nearly stole her breath. “You’re the one who can’t drive straight,” she said, stepping away from the car door and toward the unsteady monster. The move would force her hand sooner, but it would give Neji a larger buffer of safety. “Get out of there and help me.”
“I’m bleeding.”
“Stop whining and get the hell out of your car, Hyuuga, or I’m going to let these suckers eat you.”
That actually got her a laugh, and Tenten didn’t fight the grin that lit up her face in response. But there was no time to revel in it. The hobbling creature was only a few feet away, and behind it came more of its kind, some stumbling drunkenly, others crawling or dragging themselves toward them.
She headed straight for the closest creature in six running steps, pulling her shoulders and arms and crowbar back so that when she twisted her hips to straighten out her body, the force of the impact straight across the bridge of its nose sent a satisfying crack across the parking lot.
It dropped, but the crowbar caught, and Tenten nearly lost her grip on her weapon as the creature’s weight dragged it down. She had to do a funny little pirouette to keep her hold on it, hopping gracelessly over the dead thing’s mangled leg. The impact when the head hit the blacktop wasn’t enough to jar the crowbar loose, so she was forced to waste a few precious seconds planting her right foot in what was left of its face in order to pry the weapon out of the skull.
A hand wrapped around her left ankle and pulled.
She twisted as she fell, landing hard on her side instead of her front, giving her a perfect view of a man’s hungry face. And in the moment before she shoved herself upright and crushed in the top of his skull with her newly freed crowbar, the creature bit down on her foot. Pain flared through her toes despite her sneakers.
“Tenten!”
She kicked the dead thing in the face once, twice, until the jaw fell open and she could pull herself free. She scrambled to her feet, pulling the crowbar with her, feeling the ache in her left foot.
Panic raced through her, threatened to smother all thought. Behind her and to the right she could hear Neji trying to get out of the car, his feet slamming into the broken door as he tried to force it open. Ahead and to the left, Lee’s shouting was a wordless sort of roar from the SUV.
Her toes throbbed and burned, and for a moment all Tenten wanted to do was run. Run as far and fast as she could, to a place where none of this was happening. Get on the cross country course and run until the world fell away in a green-brown blur and the only thing that mattered was her heartbeat, her breath, her muscles working under her skin.
But that life was over. And there was no time for her to stop and check, to strip off her shoe and sock and find out whether this life was over, too.
Neji’s life wasn’t over yet, and neither was Lee’s or that hurt kid with him. They were counting on her, and she wasn’t going to let them down while she was still herself.
Tenten breathed in deeply, and when she exhaled, she charged.
Okay, guys, confession time--this is the last scene I really have planned. Will I continue with this universe? Or have I zombied myself out?
It's a good question. Dunno if I have any answers other than I really need to get to bed at a reasonable hour tonight. x_x I hope you guys enjoy it!
Now with Lee piece.