Chapter 12
Obito reached his hand out.
"So, finally the conflict ends." Jiraiya sighed contently.
And grabbed Naruto by the neck roughly, choking him.
"Obito!" Minato cried out, taking out a kunai by fatherly instinct.
"Minato!" Kushina grabbed his arm, "Calm down..."
He realized that he had grabbed a kunai and sheepishly sat down, putting it back into his weapons pouch. "Sorry, Obito, I wasn't thinking straight."
"It's okay, sensei," Obito sniffed, "Just being an ass as usual."
"I'm happy standing on this side of the fence, the path I chose, choices I've made, I'd do it all again if I could."
"Don't... make me repeat myself," Naruto ground out, "If you really believe that... then."
"Quit daydreaming about what it would've been if you had become hokage!" Naruto punched Obito, sending him careening backwards.
When Obito looked up again, his younger self replaced Naruto. "The person Rin wanted to stand next to and watch over, wasn't that... It was Obito Uchiha."
The landscape changed to a forest where Minato and Kakashi were waiting for himself and Rin.
"Are these like... my guilty feelings?" Obito asked.
"It does seem like deep down, you regret your actions." Tsunade commented.
"Rin..." Obito turned his head to see Rin running past, his old self in tow.
Three Obitos stood behind him, transforming into Minato, Kakashi and Rin.
His younger self in front of him held out a hand, "You know, as you are now, Rin wouldn't even throw a glance in your direction, because the person she wanted to watch over and stand next to was Uchiha Obito."
"It's time you put an end to this façade, because no matter what happens, you're still... Obito Uchiha!" Naruto grabbed his hand and pulled gingerly, "Quit the shy guy routine and just get your ass over here!"
Outside the mindscape, the shinobis finally won the chakra tug of war, as the tailed beast's chakra escaped from within Obito.
"They did it!" Rin bounced happily in her seat.
Obito lay on the ground, defeated. Looking up at the sky and to the moon, he held out a hand, "Rin..."
"The void in his heart that he tried to fill alone, is starting to close." Hiruzen nodded.
"You don't have to do everything alone, Obito." Rin clasped his hand and grabbed Kakashi's hands, so that all three of their hands were on top of each other's, "We're here for you all the way."
Kakashi nodded, "Got that, dead last?"
Obito's lip trembled as he nodded, "Y-yeah!"
"So, have you finally found out who you are?" Minato asked.
Obito rubbed his eyes, "I'm Obito Uchiha, damn straight!"
Sasuke surged forwards to Obito, sword drawn and ready to end the war. "Sasuke, wait!"
Obito watched as Sasuke charged towards him.
"Wait! No!" Minato shouted, standing up.
"So, this is how it ends huh?"
But before Sasuke could land the decisive blow, Kakashi appeared atop Obito, "Sasuke, we can save the talk for later, sorry for barging in all of a sudden, but... he was once my friend and contemporary. Let me take responsibility."
"Kakashi sensei! But now he's-," Naruto was cut short as Kakashi lunged forwards with his kunai.
Only to be stopped by Minato. "Obito, when the chakra was being pulled out, I saw the inside of your heart. It looks like my son gave you quite a nagging talking-to. It looks like he inherited that trait from his mother."
"I don't want to see my students killing each other." Minato smiled, before feeling an intense murderous intent from behind him.
Kushina cracked her knuckles, laughing slowly, "So, you think I'm naggy, do ya?"
"C-calm down, Kushina. I was just kidding... yeah know?" Minato held both hands up, but that didn't stop him from getting punched by her.
"But that was originally your role," Minato looked at Kakashi, "The one that really understands him and can say anything, I believe that's you, his friend, Kakashi."
Obito spoke for the first time since he was defeated, "Rin was... Rin was the only light in my life. After losing Rin, the world I saw changed. It became a pitch-black hell, I had no hopes for this world. I walked this world in Madara's stead, but that only served to deepen my confliction."
"Even with this Sharingan, in the end, I wasn't able to see anything. There was nothing at all."
"Fool, the Sharingan isn't some omniscient technique that allows you to shape the future, you must actively do it yourself!" Fugaku clenched his fists.
"But don't we have the Izanami and-." Mikoto put a hand around Itachi's mouth.
"Let your father have his moment, Itachi." Mikoto sweat-dropped.
"I thought this world was a hell, as well." Kakashi looked down at Obito, "I thought I had lost you... and I lost Rin soon after that, and then I even lost Minato sensei as well... however."
"I don't know for certain either, but, I strained my eyes in trying to see. Through this Sharingan that you gave me, I felt like I'd be able to see."
"Alright, when can I give this eye to Kakashi?" Obito laughed, "He deserves it more than I do."
"Are you speaking of Naruto? Are you going to tell me why his path won't fail?!"
"No... there's a chance Naruto might fail as well. Nobody is infallible." Jiraiya stated.
"He might fail as well, nonetheless." Kakashi looked down at Obito, "What I can say is that he's less likely to fail than you were."
"Why?" Obito asked.
"Because if it seems like he's about to stumble," Kakashi stood up straighter, "I'll be there to help him."
"You've grown up so well, Kakashi." Minato pat his back, "A splendid ninja, your father would be proud."
Kakashi nodded, looking at the screen.
"W-why would you help him?"
"He won't give up on his dreams, or bow down to reality. Because he's that kind of guy. Plus, he draws in comrades, if it seems like he's about to stumble, they'll be there to help him. And the more support there is, the closer his goal becomes. That's how you differ."
In the dark night sky, the moon now covered by the clouds; a large sparkling light could be seen in the distance. "Can something like that really exist in this pitch-black hell?"
"Even you should have been to see if you tried to look. You and I carry the same eyes, after all."
"If you had trusted friends by your side, your hopes would have taken shape, you perhaps would have been able to see."
Kakashi looked over to where Naruto held the large Rasenshuriken, "That's what I believe, Obito."
"Thanks, Kakashi." Obito cried a little.
"We'll be there for you, when you need us."
"His eyes finally see the light." Fugaku smiled, nodding to himself.
The screen fizzled, signaling the change of memory. The screen showed a panting Hashirama and a immobilized Madara. "Grandfather finally managed to stop Madara, took him long enough." Tsunade coughed.
Obito made hand-seals similar to the one Nagato made.
"T-that's the... rebirth technique, right?" Jiraiya asked.
"Spot on." Naruto answered.
"Not in my wildest dream did I ever think that I would walk the exact same path he did." Obito wheezed, "Samara of Heavenly Life."
"I think I finally understand the reason why Nagato betrayed me." Obito panted, "When the feelings and emotions of a group of people become unified, it really does become quite a powerful device. Seeing as how both Nagato and Naruto were Jiraiya's disciples, it'd be fair to say that Jiraiya is the one who defeated me."
"Well, if you put it that way..." Jiraiya puffed his chest, "You could say I am the prophesied savior!"
Tsunade and Hiruzen scoffed, amused.
"H-hey!" Jiraiya flushed red.
"Sensei... he was also your mentor, and the man who trained you to become hokage, since I, who was your disciple, gave up on becoming hokage and failed to resonate my feelings and emotions with my comrades, I no longer have to the right, to meet up with Rin in the afterlife."
"And you're okay with this? Continue living and pay penance for the sins you've committed." Kakashi asked, wide-eyed.
Obito laughed, "No... that would simply be taking the easy way out."
"Don't give up this time, Obito." Minato told his student.
"I won't!" Obito gripped his fist.
Before Obito could finish his technique, he was grabbed from the ground beneath him as a black Zetsu appeared, "I'll help you pay your penance!"
"Obito!" Rin cupped her mouth.
"What's happening?!"
"Madara... is coming back to life." Naruto shook out.
Madara laughed, "Naruto, words can't express the thanks I owe you. By simultaneously extracting all the tailed beasts from Obito, you've saved me the hassle of weakening him to a vulnerable state."
"No hard feelings, Obito, this has always been my one and only purpose." Black Zetsu slowly said.
The technique was initiated as steam wafted from Madara's body, laughing madly.
"Oh god..." Kushina held on to Minato.
"At last... I can fight at full strength. Amazing! This sensation of having an actual body! Feeling my blood boil, feeling my skin crawl as I crush skulls!" Madara's heart thumped wildly in his chest as he looked over his new body.
But as his new body became finalized, Madara's eyes started crackling away until they were hollow sockets.
"Looks like his reanimation eyes didn't carry over to- dear god! What's that?!" Jiraiya pointed to the screen.
"I'm going to be sick."
Minato covered Kushina's eyes, "Ugh... It's better if you not looked at this, Kushina."
"Is it because Madara has a really hot body? I mean, you're toned, Minato... but is Madara defined?"
"K-Kushina! Not the time!"
"The man who learns to wield both the power of the Uchiha and the Senju shall come to know ecstasy. Which one do you think I settled on?" Madara has Hashirama's face implanted onto his left breast.
"Looks like you delved into some rather nefarious things after leaving the village."
Madara leapt forwards, killing multiple shinobi that were in his way, grabbing Hashirama by the neck and absorbing his chakra, "I'd be lying if I said things have been going according to my plan, but beggars can't be chooses, right?"
"He's absorbing Hashirama's sage chakra..." Jiraiya looked as the face implanted onto Madara, slowly gained the sage markings.
"Sasuke!" Mikoto looked on as her son leapt in front of Madara, trying to cut him down with his blade, "This reckless idiot, taking after his father..."
Fugaku sunk into his seat.
"We won't get a better chance than this!" Sasuke shouted, "After we take your life, you can enjoy your one way trip to hell! I'm going to make you regret abandoning your reanimation form... die!"
Madara let the sword pierce his bicep, grabbing the hand with his free hand. "I can sense it... Your Mangekyo Sharingan, you have the straight swirl... I see why your movements are so fluid, your eyes will suffice until I get my Rinnegan back."
"What just happened?!" Kakashi asked, sweating heavily.
"Madara..." Obito huffed, "Has come back to life."
"You've fulfilled your purpose, Obito. And now that you've used the Samsara, you aren't long for this world. Your duties are now complete, as such... I'll be taking this left eye of yours." Black Zetsu reached down to Obito's Rinnegan.
"Don't you dare touch him!" Minato jumped from his seat.
Black Zetsu merged with Obito, like a parasite. "As long as we share this symbiotic relationship, Obito will continue to live. Until he breathes his final breath, I'll make use of this body to impede you in anyways I can, at least now, he'll be put to good use."
"Gross! Get off my body!" Obito protested.
Madara stood atop a shinobi's body, offhandedly absorbing the fallen shinobi's chakra. He looked over the tailed beasts, "It's about time, I... hung down you filthy monsters."
"I hate to admit it... but that is a seriously cool pose." Kushina awed.
The scene changed again to Madara being pummeled by the tailed beasts, hit by paws and hooves, sent flying around the battlefield.
"Damn, he's getting destroyed." Obito commented. "Does he go down so easily?"
"You wish..." Naruto joked.
Before Gaara could fully seal Madara away, his blue Susano'o was activated as it pushed itself out. "This is what happens when you give your pets too much freedom, time to put the leashes back on all of you."
The beasts used their tails to repeatedly smash down onto where Madara was, creating a large crater in the ground.
"His arms!" Rin pointed, "Or... well, an arm."
"At least you've injured him." Fugaku said.
A white Zetsu appeared on the ground, "Apologies for my delay, lord Madara."
Madara cut off the Zetsu's hand and reattached it to himself, and at the same time implanted a Rinnegan into his right eye socket.
"Now... the real fun begins."
Madara started cackling like a mad-man before using a summoning technique, and back at Obito's end, the Gedo Statue erupted from his back as it vanished. But not before Kakashi could land a Kamui on it.
The Black Zetsu tried reaching for Obito's Rinnegan but was stopped midway. "Just give it up already, you're not long for this world anyway."
"This left eye is merely a rental you got from Nagato, it's time to return it to its rightful owner. There have only been to people capable of awakening the Rinnegan, the hermit of Six Paths and Madara Uchiha. Someone of your pedigree was never meant to keep something like this long term."
The screen changed back to Madara.
"His injuries have healed..."
"That's the result of him absorbing the sage chakra." Jiraiya said grimly.
"The tailed beasts are being blown back!" Tsunade yelled.
"See..." Madara made a hand-sign which made the Gedo Statue creak it's mouth open. "All they needed was to be tamed a bit. Now they'll be much more willing to go on their leashes."
Chains shot out of the Gedo's mouth as they latched onto the tailed beasts. "Now then, time to extract the nine tails and the eight tails from their hosts."
"Kurama!" Naruto shouted.
"Shit... This is really bad!" Minato whispered.
"Naruto!" Kushina yelled as everyone saw the nine tails get ripped from Naruto.
"B-but if the nine tails is taken from you, you can't be here..." Jiraiya said, "You should be dead..."
Naruto was sped away by Gaara, as he tried his best to relay the plan the nine tails had told him, before it was sucked away by the Gedo Statue.
While Tobirama was distracting Madara, Sasuke leapt from behind but was trapped midair by an unknown force.
"This world... the world created by Hashirama is full of inconsistency and incongruity." Madara picked up Sasuke's blade, "You have to sacrifice one to protect another."
"Be it a close friend, brother or even my child." Madara moved the blade to Sasuke's chest.
"No! No!" Mikoto wailed.
Fugaku closed his eyes when he heard the wet squelching of the blade cutting into his son.
"I gave you more than ample time to do something." Madara said as he ran Sasuke through the length of the blade. "Such a pity."
"Sasuke!" Mikoto wailed, sobbing, tears streaking down her face.
Kushina was crying equally as hard as she saw Naruto's lifeless body being carried by Gaara.
Gaara landed in front of Sakura and Tsunade, "I have no time to get into the details! Hokage, you're coming along. Naruto has no choice but to recuperate on the way!"
"Hang on! Don't give up now! I will... defiantly save you!" Sakura's hands glowed faintly green before it fizzled out.
"She's running out of chakra." Tsunade grit her teeth.
The screen showed both Naruto and Sasuke side by side. Naruto's face turning deathly pale while Sasuke bled out on the ground.
Minato gripped his son's hand tighter while Fugaku put his hand into prayer, comforting Mikoto while she cried.
"S-so, what's plan now?! You have a plan, right!?" Minato asked quickly.
"I was unconscious, but from what I heard, you saved me, dad." Naruto smiled.
"Then! What about Sasuke!?" Mikoto wailed.
"He was saved, by whom I'm not sure, cause..." Naruto pointed to himself, "Kinda unconscious."
Mikoto and Fugaku accepted that answer, because as long as their son was safe, then that was all that mattered. The world could burn for all they cared.
"Where are we going?!" Sakura yelled over the winds.
"To where the fourth hokage is."
"How long would it take us to get there?"
"It's still kilometers away!"
Sakura pulled down Naruto's shirt and made a scalpel with her fingertips, cutting a slit into Naruto's side-chest, she reached in a manually pumped his heart, "I'm not going to just allow someone to die so easily on my watch!"
Gaara wrapped a tendril of sand around Sakura as he sped up considerably. "I'm taking off!"
The screen changed to show Karin tearing through the wooden construct.
"Another Uzumaki?" Kushina asked, wiping her teary eyes.
"I need t'get to Sasuke! Move it, asshole!" Chains rampaged through and crushed the wood like sticks.
"No way... damn! You go, Karin!" Suigetsu watched.
"The same power as Kushina Uzumaki." Orochimaru analyzed, chuckling to himself.
"Madara... he's absorbing the entire Gedo Statue." Hiruzen looked on in horror as Madara assumed a new form.
Madara's hair turned white as a cloak with magatama symbols appeared. Six truth-seeker orbs floated behind him as he held on to a black staff. "So, this is the power of the Six Paths, all that's missing is the left eye..."
"They're nearing Minato..." Kushina watched as Sakura gave Naruto mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. "Don't die, Naruto! Your dream is right in front of your eyes."
"You two are quite stubborn..." The Black Zetsu sighed as he watched Minato and Kakashi charge up their signature attacks.
Naruto landed in front of Minato, still unconscious. "This is a message from Naruto's nine tails, "Fourth hokage! If you put the half of the nine tails that's inside of you into Naruto..." Then you can save him!"
"Kakashi, please take care of him." Minato casted a quick glance to Black Zetsu.
Before Minato could transfer his nine tails into Naruto, he was interrupted by Black Zetsu.
"You're late, Black Zetsu, so I decided to come here."
"We're doomed." Obito moaned.
"He's the harbinger..." Kakashi clenched his fists, "of despair."
"As long as lord Madara is here, even if I leave this body, you all can't do a thing to me." Black Zetsu started leaving Obito but was held back by him.
Obito panted as he forced Black Zetsu to latch onto his body. "Not just yet... Madara, I want a word with you."
Madara held out a hand, "I want to rise above all this and create a new world! With the infinite Tsukuyomi, I will realize my dream of creating a world with no chakra. In the end, I will have the most powerful chakra, and I will lead the way!"
"And that's what you are, you are me! Not Obito."
"Piss off!" Obito yelled.
"Uchiha Obito had the chakra of the Uchiha! And he competed with Hatake Kakashi and wanted to be hokage! But all that power was make believe, so he lost everything. This is hell! Have you forgotten?!"
"Come!" Madara extended an invitation, "Come, Madara!"
"Even now, you are still the savior!"
"Oh crap, Obito's going to join Madara, again!"
"Don't worry," Obito ground out, "I won't! Trust me."
Obito walked up to Madara and plunged a hand into his midriff.
"Yeah! Get fucked!" Obito cheered before he covered his mouth, "S-sorry..." He grinned.
"I'll overlook it this time." Minato smiled, "You made it back, after all, right; Obito?"
"I'm back." Obito nodded.
"A person who leads others, as long as he's able to climb over his own corpse, would never climb over the corpses of his comrades."
"Leaving everything up to someone by giving them your name and having them pretend to be you, is not the same as entrusting to a comrade." Obito's truth-seeker orb started changing shape, "Now, I understand. I am not you."
"Give it your all, Obito!" Rin cheered, "Show us all what saving the world is supposed to look like!"
The staff of the Six Paths formed in his hands, "Who I am now, is the man who wanted to be called hokage... Uchiha Obito!"
Obito started crying, so did Minato... so did Kakashi, who gave a approving nod. "No longer lost..."
It took some time for everyone to collect themselves, Obito especially.
"Obito, at last. You've finally come back to yourself." Minato beamed.
"I'm sorry for everything, sensei. I-I'll do everything I can to make up for it, in this time!"
Inoichi took a deep breath and started his technique once more.
Madara tried attacking Obito but slipped right through him. Obito managed to take some of the one tails and the eight tails chakra. "Kakashi! Bring Naruto to the time-space dimension!"
"Naruto's there now!" Kakashi flickered to where Obito was standing up. "Now if you can get over there, you'll be able to save Naruto, right?!"
"Yeah. Leave it to me." Obito panted. "And this time, I'm the lead."
"And you're the backup, Kakashi."
"It's been a long time since we've brought out the old two-man cell. Don't get sloppy Obito."
Minato couldn't help the smile growing on his face.
Fugaku nodded, "Give Madara hell." He stood up and clenched his fist, "Show him the power of the Uchiha!"
Kakashi and Obito both activated Kamui as the truth-seeker orb flew towards them, "I never thought both of them would use Kamui at the same time. They were able to teleport at twice the speed."
"Take care of my son, Obito."
Sakura got into a defensive position as she saw Obito arrive, "Can I trust you?!"
Obito slowly ambled forwards, "For a long time now, I haven't been able to walk a straight and honest path... But now, finally."
"I've come around." Obito put a hand to Naruto's chest.
"That's... Guy!" Kakashi looked in awe.
"For once, I'm happy to see you..."
"Are you alright, Kakashi?" Guy smiled.