𝕥𝕨𝕠 𝕠𝕗 𝕒 𝕜𝕚𝕟𝕕 ➱ ｎａｒｕｔｏ ｕｚｕｍａｋｉ

𝟎𝟔: 𝐣𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐧𝐞𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐨𝐟 𝐰𝐚𝐯𝐞𝐬!

"stay behind me!"

sakura yelled as she pulled a defensive stance, her hand around a kunai. sasuke put himself before the pair as the enemy closed in. he awaited impact, only for kakashi to appear-- holding both attackers.

naruto snapped out of his trance, bewildered at the sight of his "dead" sensei.

the jonin spoke as he tied the ninja to a tree, "naruto, sorry i didn't help you right away. i didn't mean for you to get hurt. i just didn't think you'd freeze up like that."

in that moment, tazuna let out a sigh of relief-- michiru's eyes narrowing at the man.

"--you're not hurt, are you?"

the fiery haired uzumaki pushed past sasuke, hitting his shoulder as she stood next to naruto.

"it's normal, don't beat yourself up."

he looked to the female, her gaze warm as she sent a smile to her brother-- ruffling his hair in the process. once he'd cheered up a bit, her smile died faster than wisps of smoke dissipated after a candle flame has been snuffed out.

"by the way, mr. tazuna.."

the sudden change of tone in her voice caused the raising of the man's neck hairs, "uh.. y-yeah, what?"

"we need to talk."

—

tazuna, kakashi, and the entirety of squad seven stood around the tree in which the ninja were tied to. they'd learned that their attackers were chunin from the village hidden in the mist, relentless fighters until the end-- no matter the sacrifice.

"how did you know about our ambush?"

michiru let out a small chuckle, "a puddle on a clear day, when it hasn't rained in weeks?"

the drunken old man suddenly spoke up, "in that case, kakashi— why'd you leave it for the genin to do the fighting?"

"--i could've taken them out quickly. but then i'd have learned nothing. i had to know who their target was.."

kakashi's eyes narrowed towards the man.

"and what they were after."

tazuna scoffed, "what are you getting at?"

"when you put in your request, you asked for standard protection from robbers and highway men."

michiru held a kunai as she came closer to the old man, her glare making him shrivel up.

"you didn't say there were ninja looking for you, hunting you down. if we knew this, it would be a b-ranked mission or higher. our task was to simply get you to your destination and protect you while you finished building your bridge. if we knew we'd be fielding attacks from enemy ninja, higher ups would have staffed differently and charged for the cost of a b-ranked mission."

glistening beads of sweat lined his forehead as tazuna kept his eyes on the ground-- every word coming from michiru's mouth being correct.

kakashi and the other watched as the girl continued to unraveled the secret behind their mission.

"apparently, you have your reason, but lying to us is not acceptable. we are now beyond our scope of this mission."

sakura stepped forward, giving a nod to michiru as she spoke.

"we are genin. this is too advanced for our level of training. we should go back-- and i really think we need to treat the uzumakis' wounds and get the poison out as soon as possible. back in our village we can take them to a doctor."

as the attention went to naruto, he grew angry with himself. the blonde boy grunted, his face contorting as he stabbed himself.

"i will never back down again and let someone else rescue me again."

michiru smirked as she held onto her arm-- her sleeve stained with blood and gashed, revealing the previously poison filled cut. disregarding her own injury, she took hold of her brother's hand and began using a medical ninjutsu-- only to realize his would were healing on their own.

she looked down at her arm, the gash closing on its own as well.

hmm..

"am i gonna die?"

she smiled as she finished wrapping up the cut— naruto's eyes still tear filled as he looked to his sister.

"probably."