The Forgotten Hero (DISCONTINUED)

Chapter 2

Looking down at the frozen team 7, the two Akatsuki laughed. With a hiss, Kakashi spat out two names. "Deidara and Sasori."
The red-haired one smirked, "So you know our names, do you?"
Ignoring Sasori, Kakashi turned to the chunin behind him. "Naruto, Sauske you take Deidara, the blonde one. Sakura, you can fight Sasori with Iruka and I."
The three nod, and move into a fighting stance in front of their given opponent.

With the flick of a hand, Sasori summons a puppet. Instead of going for Iruka or Kakashi, the puppet heads straight for Sakura. Leaping out of the way of the puppet's blade, Sakura lands just behind Kakashi and Iruka. Before either of them can help Sakura, Sasori sends his chakra strings flying at Kakashi. Just in time, he dodged, however, Sasori kept attacking - never allowing him to assist Sakura. Iruka was also busy, defending himself against more of Sasori's puppets, though none were as strong as the one Sakura was fighting.
"Sorry, Sakura!" Iruka called out, "But I don't think we can help you!"
Dodging a punch from the original puppet, Sakura called back, "Don't worry about me! Help Kakashi if you can!"
Defeating the final puppets attacking him, Iruka heeded Sakura's words and went to help Kakashi fight the puppet-master.
So far, neither Kakashi nor Sasori had managed to get a hit on the other, merely keep the other at bay. However, when Iruka joined the battle, Sasori knew that the scales were now in favor of his opponents. On a whim, Sasori got the puppet fighting Sakura to pull out it's secret weapon. That should stop her fighting me, too.
To stop Iruka aiding Kakashi, Sasori got the puppets that had gotten behind the two to attack. Spinning around, Iruka took on the new puppets. "You got to defeat him, Kakashi. The puppet attacks will stop once you do!"
Nodding, Kakashi turned back to face Sasori - ready to continue the fight. With a few more attacks, no progress had been made. Faced with the fact that they were on equal footing, Kakashi decided to use his three-tomoe sharingan. He would not, however use the mangekyou, which would drain his charka by to much and to fast. Pulling up his headband, he opened his left-eye and once again got ready to attack. With the enhancement of the sharingan, Kakashi is a more formidable opponent. Unfortunately for Kakashi, Sasori is still able to block his blows, and doesn't fall for any of Kakashi's tricks.
Sakura's fight against the original puppet is neither going good nor bad. She has suffered a few hits, but nothing that is going to stop her. In return, the puppet to has taken some hits, but not enough to stop it either. This may soon change, though, because Sakura may not know it but the puppet has a final trick up its sleeve.
Iruka is defending Kakashi's back, deflecting any puppets that try to hit him from behind.

With Naruto and Sauske, the fight was tipping slightly in Deidara's favor. As with Naruto, he had made the first attack and had taken a mini-bomb head on. Being Naruto he shook it off, and continued in his attack. This was enough to distract Deidara from Sauske, allowing the latter to get behind Deidara. Unfortunately for him, Deidara was not as oblivious as he had seemed and easily deflect Sauske's kunai. The majority of the fight went much like this, with Naruto slowly getting weaker and weaker, and Sauske's chakra depleting. At their current point in the fight, both were back standing in front of Deidara, getting ready to launch yet another attack. Naruto once again ran head-on at Deidara, prompting him to throw yet another bomb. Sauske appeared behind Deidara and he blocked the attack. However, because of this he had failed to notice that Naruto had poofed after getting hit by the bomb. Feeling a searing pain, he turned to see the Naruto had stabbed him in the shoulder. Wincing, Deidara jumped away from the duo and landed on a nearby tree. Together, the two jumped after him, but didn't leap high enough to reach him. This gave Deidara just enough time to produce more clay. Quickly he formed another bomb - a bomb bigger than all others he had made currently in the fight.

Noticing what Deidara was doing, Sasori abruptly jumped back, much to the confusion of Kakashi. At just that moment, an explosion rocked the ground around the fighting. Looking towards the source they see a new crater in the ground, with a smoking Naruto laying unconscious in the middle.
With an excited expression, Deidara throws his hands up and yells, "Ha! Bullseye!"
Making use of the explosion having distracted Iruka, a puppet came at him and managed to hit him on a neck pressure point. With a groan, Iruka fell to the ground, unconscious. Having just seen almost half of the team get eliminated, Sakura failed to notice that the puppet she was fighting had come back to life. The puppet raced towards her, a needle sticking out of its index finger. Just as the needle pierced Sakura's skin, she hit the puppet with enough force to finally break it. Stumbling back, it collapsed into pieces at the same time Sakura also fell to the ground.
Just before she completely fell into unconsciousness, Sakura uttered two words, "Poppy Draught."
With three out of five of the team now knocked out, it was just Sauske and Kakashi left defending their comrades. Hope was quickly draining from the two, and the Akatsuki could see that. However, the two still had enough determination to make one final assault. With a Naruto-like yell, Sauske ran forwards, a kunai in each hand. Besides him, Kakashi ran towards the second enemy.
Unbeknownst to the four, a masked figure had appeared in the background. Standing besides the bodies of Iruka and Sakura, the man puts a hand on each person. In a transparent swirl, the two disappear. Walking over to Naruto, the figure does the same thing before disappearing in a swirl himself.
Having been pushed back by Deidara and into the crater, Sauske quickly glances back to make sure he doesn't step on Naruto, only to see he has disappeared.
"Kakashi! Naruto's gone!"
Shocked, Deidara and Sasori stop their assault long enough for Kakashi to check that both Iruka and Sakura have disappeared too.
Rounding on the Akatsuki members, Kakashi yells, "Where are they?!"
With a casual shrug, Deidara replies, "We don't know. It's not like we have allies just hiding around."
With a chuckle, Sasori attacks the bewildered Kakashi, who just manages to dodge. At this point, however, nearly all of his chakra has disappeared, even if he has no physical wounds. The same goes for Sauske, and to the Akatsuki members, it looks like it can't go on much longer. Unexpectedly, a swirl appears between the shoulders of Sauske and Kakashi. For a split second, the masked man can be seen, before disappearing once again - taking Kakashi and Sauske with him.
Having no more enemies to fight, Deidara and Sasori move to leave. However, the memory of the masked man remains in both their minds. Seeing him was not good, not good for them at all. It meant that there may just be a spy within the Akatsuki.