one_long_mission

"..." he was about to reply, but paused and closed his mouth, eyebrows curving into a deep frown.

"If I am not back within the next half-hour, or if anyone happens within your radius of sight, step in and follow... but be wary." he added, only because she was a comrade. "...there may be traps within. I wouldn't put it past the Founder to have set up ways to keep those not of Uchiha blood from entering or proceeding safely." there was no hesitation as he bit into his thumb and claimed her hand to smear it upon her knuckles. "This'll have to do if anything's rigged."

Had he been alone, he would not have needed to worry. If he -had- been alone, he also might have come across that band of 18 Shourisha.

"I'll be off." he turned away then, and headed into the temple. He did stop where the gates may just have been when it stood whole, head bowing in silent prayer, and then disappeared in the darkness of the ruins...

For a long, long time afterwards, only the wind blew, and the only sounds were birds overhead... It had been slightly more than a half-hour, and there was no sign of Sasuke.

Inside the temple, as she advanced within, she might feel much malevolence as well as a tingling upon her knuckles. There were indeed traps, an horrid genjutsu activating upon her entry, although it appeared faded, perhaps thanks to either the blood's presence, or the seal's strength having faded.

There were more traps along the long stairs that descended underground, and once she reached the bottom, there was an altar in front of a stone door, engraved with the Uchiha crest, torches with everburning fire set at each side.

The door laid slightly ajar, and in another, large torchlit room was Sasuke, sitting and staring with deep-red sharingan at what seemed to be.... a large blank tablet.

"Ah--" She didn't protest the smear of blood beyond that, though her brows furrowed deeply that he wanted her to remain here. Very well, she would. They had come too far for him to abandon her now... And after they had spent the entire night all but nose-to-nose, she couldn't help but feel like that meant something.

Stubbornly, she forced it out of her mind, trying to ignore the cooling warmth of his blood against her knuckles, settling in to a pose for meditation beneath cover. It was fairly easy to keep time as such, slightly harder to keep her thoughts from drifting to how good it had felt to have him roll over and press his nose into her neck.

But when the allotted time had passed, she moved without hesitation beyond that of caution into the temple itself, taking careful stock of the temple itself. Whether it was the blood on her knuckles or her own blood (if the rumors saying the Uchiha and Hyuuga had once been related...) but she could definitely sense that she was not welcome here by the temple itself.

Once she found him... she remained wary, only taking a single step into the room he was in. "Sasuke?"

He looked over briefly, acknowledging he had heard her, before returning to staring the tablet, not moving from the spot where he sat at. His eyes did move, so he was perhaps reading it.

In the room, there were large engravings, the Uchiha clan symbols ruling over the walls. There was also a larger-than-life Sharingan engraved upon the wall at the back of the tablet.

There was a smaller tome right where Neji had entered, and she could see names scrawled over its pages.

Madara Uchiha
Naoto Uchiha
Kagami Uchiha
Fugaku Uchiha

They were all written in blood, and of course she would see the somewhat fresh sheen upon the latest name at the bottom of the page.

Sasuke Uchiha.

It seemed to be some sort of guestbook. Another larger tome -it looked also blank from where she stood- could be spotted at the back of the room.

Five names written in blood... The emphasis of the blood wasn't lost on her as her eyes swept the rest of the inner sanctum, noting the tomes, the seemingly blank tablets.

She could have asked him what he was doing, could have approached and attempted to read the tablets or perhaps page through the tomes. But even without the temple's own traps blatantly informing her that she didn't belong, she wouldn't. This was not her clan or her family. Instead, she took a seat cross-legged on the floor near the door, settling in for meditation. He would call for her attention when he was ready. If he wished to explain, she would listen, but she would not pry until after they were already gone.

Time seemed to stretch... until...

The room burst into a flash of brilliant light, rock bursting to pieces. Fragments flew, the force of the blow making the other's robes flutter about wildly. There was a scowl upon his features, and he walked to the other tome, taking it from where it stood.

Calling out his blade, he tied the sheath to another rope belt he had, storing the book where the weapon had been only after swearing blood from his thumb across the pages that were on display.

After this, as the dust from the tablet's destruction had yet to settle, he halted before her. "It's over."

"Gygh!"

The sudden light brought her back to herself with an all-too-quick abruptness, trained reflex more than intent bringing her arms up to guard her face as her Chakra-enhanced eyes tried to piece together just exactly what was happening. Sasuke was uninjured, and all she'd sustained were a few minor scrapes from the flying rock. She rose to her feet as he did, remaining wary and her weight lowered as if she might attack. She'd have suspected a Shourisha attack, but instead...

"What is?" Her eyes met his without flinching, alarm forced away from her expression as her throat worked, fighting the inhaled dust, though she refused to cough.

"Everything." he seemed largely unnafected, red eyes unwavering. There seemed to be a purplish glow around him as he passed her by, blade sectionning the book as he went, and then whipping back onto the book. The first slice had separated his name from the others above, and the second had cut through the other names, slicing them in half.

As the lower part of the book hit the floor, the shock sent it tilting, only the first page laid open. At the bottom of it, in old, slightly flecked but thick blood...

Madara Uchiha

"Everything is over... and now it begins anew!" he turned back to her once he had stepped out of the room, eyes not sporting the usual tomoe, instead, they were strangely-shaped criss-crossing circles.

She inhaled sharply at the sight of his eyes, the lingering dust leaving her coughing and covering her mouth. Those eyes... He seemed different, terribly different, and she didn't know what she could do or who this would affect. More than anything she resented how helpless she was, how little she actually knew about this.

Instead, she only fell into step behind him. "Explain."

"I can't." he shook his head. "But I hold truth and knowledge, and I will take death before sharing any." this was as much as he could say.

As soon as they were out of range, he ordered her aside -just in case- and used a strange, never-seen jutsu, black flames launching themselves at the stone door and sealing it... or had they? They burned and burned even as they headed up the stairs, even after they were out of sight...

Surprisingly, as they emerged, Sasuke knelt before what may have been the sacred gate, if this wasn't rubble, and for all it appeared had started praying, eyes closed.

Her brow furrowed as she studied his mannerisms. Whatever had happened down there had changed him, and she had no way of knowing just yet if it was for the better or not. Instead, she exhaled and nodded, following after him. That jutsu was something never before seen, something almost beautiful in its overwhelming destruction.

She stood behind him as he prayed, activating her Byakugan again for a sweep of the area.

"Sasuke," she murmured, lowering her weight as she canvased the entire area, head turning more by reflex than actual need. "We need to get moving. There's a large force headed in this direction. Between fifty and sixty Shourisha."

This prompted a dry laugh from him. "So then, they were already made aware? This can't be a coincidence." his eyes had shifted back to his normal sharingan, in which nothing could be read but destruction and, strangely enough, a pinch of reverence.

"And you say we need to get moving?" he scoffed, leaping onto the highest pillar of rubble. "Those fools never learned to read then, if they don't know the prophecy." that odd purple chakra seemed to ooze out of him permanently now. "Time for them to bow to their undoer!"

He was not moving. Fifty to sixty Shourisha were headed their way and he was not moving. It could be folly, but he looked so firmly determined that it just might not be.

"Fifty-six," she amended a moment later, visible surprise crossing her face as he only made himself more of a target. That purple Chakra was... odd. Even without her Byakugan, she could almost see it wreathing around him, leaving her breath strangely tight in her throat.

"Sasuke, even you cannot take an entire platoon," she pointed out, leaping up to the narrow pillar beside him and touching his elbow warningly. "We must get back and warn our village."

"Reality is only what you perceive, and you haven't perceived nearly enough." he hardly seemed to mind that the advancing platoon was on the horizon. "I told you this was over. The new era has begun!" his voice was akin to a thunderclap, and those eyes were fearless.

"Why warn the village at all? Once I'm done with them, they won't be able to move..." his tone was icy. "If they love hostilities, I'll feed them that until they burst."

She shook lightly, catching sight of his expression. Whatever he had seen in that temple... Suicide was not an option, especially not when it would take her with him.

She didn't vocally apologize, even though she was aware it would shatter whatever tentative camaraderie they had managed to build. She only struck, quickly, bringing up one hand in an attempt to target a pressure point on the side of his head to produce unconsciousness.

She had masterfully masked her intent. had he felt the most minuscule hint of a threat towards him, he would have been able to stop her attempt, and from then on, things would have gotten only worse.
He, however, was clueless to her intent.

Suicide? He was not intending such a thing, and he also had no intention to take her down with him. He had a plan, a destiny... but then?

Then... everything suddenly went dark. He did not even feel himself lose balance as he lost consciousness.
Just as she had planned...

She was quick to catch him, clutching him to her with perhaps surprising strength as she used her Chakra to simply run down the side of the pillar. A moment to shift their positions to carry him piggy-back, and she was off at a dead sprint. From what she could see behind her, they hadn't noticed his attempt at grandeur atop the pillar, but she couldn't be sure.

So she just ran, back the way they had come, as far as she could until the Shourisha were beyond the scope of her vision. Sasuke should be waking up soon enough, and she wouldn't be surprised were he to attack her.

And stir he did, groaning lightly as he shifted, awareness slowly coming back.

At first he was lost, wondering if the enemy's attack had not gotten him, but then he remembered. No enemy at all was yet in range. The only one who could have done so, was...
A scowl drew itself upon his face as he gathered chakra for an unforgiving chidori. How dare she!? Letting her stick with him had been a miserable idea after all!

The moment she sensed his Chakra, she dropped to one knee and released her grip on his legs. Her own stopped momentum should send him hurling forward overtop her like a macabre game of leapfrog gone wrong. In an instant, she was on her feet, hands raised before her as adrenaline spiked and Chakra fueled her eyes. She had beaten him before, but that strange purple Chakra...

She wasn't certain if she could do it again.

The electricity chirped madly as he stood after rolling to the ground, eyes red with -she may be thankful- the three-tomoe sharingan. "On whose side are you?" he hissed, enraged. "If you were that scared of a battle, nothing kept you from HIDING and shaking in the shadows!" apparently, he was still convinced he could have taken up that platoon... alone if he had to.

"Fifty-six against two!" she snarled, lowering her weight further. With that lightning technique crackling like that, she'd have to open with the speed of Rokujuuyonshuu from the very beginning. "We do not have the supplies to take on an army, Uchiha Sasuke, and if we fall, there is no one to warn Michi of their impending arrival."

She obviously didn't believe that he could take that platoon. What single person could?

"Then why are you still standing here and not running to warn them?" he asked, keeping his stance, ready to go against her if she moved towards him and meet her with that lightning. "Fifty-six against me isn't even a challenge!" those red eyes had a sheen like glistening, fresh blood for an instant.

"I will not permit you to hurl yourself against an overwhelmingly numerically superior foe. You may weaken them, you may cull their numbers, but they will kill you. And I am not about to see that happen."

"Kill me? Kill me!?" he was outraged. "I could go against a force twice as massive and emerge victorious! You clearly underestimate me, Hyuuga!" he spat out, the chidori still chirping angrily.

"Or it is you who overestimate your own ability," she returned without missing a beat, flexing her palm open. "Will you kill me to take your chance to die against a platoon, Uchiha Sasuke? You will need to."

As shocking as it may have been, after a second, eyes narrowed, the chidori faded. His scowl only was more venomous though.
As far gone as he might have seemed at first, he was not willing to kill her. "You're annoying." he snorted.

"...and it looks like we have a village to warn."

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