the sealed kunai

Chapter 10: Judgment Call

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, and it is picking away at my self-esteem day after day. Why can't I have nice things?

In the woods, miles away from the river he had fallen into, Kiba was sitting under a tree trying to take cover from his pursuing opponents. As he cradled Akamaru's injured and unconscious body he growled to himself, 'If only I'd been stronger! Akamaru would have never gotten hurt if I had been. I can't beat anyone I face, not any real shinobi anyway... I lost to Naruto twice, and now this guy? What am I doing with myself?'

He grabbed the wound on his stomach where he stabbed himself to injure one of his enemies when they attempted a parasitic jutsu to kill him. He couldn't run any further, he knew he wouldn't have gotten much distance anyway.

"So you've finally stopped running?"

Kiba saw that the connected brothers, Sakon and Ukon, coming closer to him, "You were pretty bothersome to try to take down."

Kiba chuckled humorlessly, "Well, it was a good time while it lasted huh?"

The two sound ninja stalked Kiba down to finish the job when a familiar puppet came rushing onto the scene, chattering and scattering the two brothers to separate from one another and dodge.

"Man, is Naruto the only Konoha ninja that doesn't need back-up or something? He bailed you out and now I'm getting the dog-kid out of his situation."

"I take offense to that. Naruto may have assisted me in my battle but I was far from defeated."

The two voices appeared from the trees to reveal Neji and Kankuro, who was using his puppet Karasu, "Thanks for the directions Hyuuga, I might have been a little later otherwise."

Sakon voiced their opinion, "Who the fuck is this with you two Konoha trash?"

Kankuro and Neji looked at one another and Neji gestured for Kankuro to speak, "I am Sabaku no Kankuro. A shinobi of Sunagakure, ally to Konoha, and here to kill you both."

Their attention fell on the wounded Kiba as they heard him hiss in pain due to his injured abdomen, "Go and help out that kid, I'll beat these two myself."

Neji nodded and went to check on Kiba while Kankuro, Kiba grimaced as Neji helped him get in a decent sitting position to examine him with Byakugan, "You two sure made it right in the nick of time. So did you beat that spider guy back there?"

Neji kept scanning the extent of Kiba's wounds, "Naruto arrived and ended our fight before it could escalate any further. It's a good thing too, because I wasn't sure how I would have beaten him, he was incredibly difficult to attack. We caught up to the team afterwards, but when we got there you and Lee were gone."

Kiba chuckled as he watched Kankuro singlehandedly beating back the two Oto twins, "Well it could be worse I suppose. Nobody is dead yet and I'll be fine." He looked up at Neji hopefully, "Right?"

Neji smirked, "Yes, nothing too vital was hit within your wound, it's just enough to inflict decent internal trauma."

"AHHH!"

Kiba looked over to see a second puppet full of blades that used to be part of Karasu. Kiba turned green as he could surmise what had happened, and poor Neji didn't even turn around as he pretty much saw the entire thing happen in its entirety because he had been looking inside of Kiba... Near 360 degrees of vision and x-ray capabilities... yay.

Kiba voiced the opinion of both boys, "Um, okay? Uh, nice finish I guess."

Kankuro watched the blood oozing out of the bottom of his puppet Kuroari (Black Ant) and turned back to them with a smirk, "Thanks. This puppet combination is one of my favorites." He walked over to Kiba and looked him over, "So how is he?"