Naruto's Kit

Chapter 34

Naruto and Madara stood facing each other, neither moving but still keeping their guard up. Naruto knew he couldn't drag this out for long, as Madara had just destroyed all his shadow clones and he'd never be able to make more that could gather more natural chakra quick enough. He figured that with all the natural chakra already collected and thrust into him at once, he could probably stay in sage mode for at most twelve minutes, and that was pushing his luck. If he didn't do anything about it that is.

'Damn. If only I had a little bit of the kyuubi's chakra left in me still, I'd feel more certain about this.' Naruto thought briefly. Shortly after Akane's release, Tsunade wondered if the fox was completely released or if there was still some minor connection between the two. So she did a chakra scan over the young blonde. The diagnosis said that no red chakra remained in Naruto anymore; now he was truly running on his own power. But because of the absence of so much chakra, his coils compensated by replacing the lost amount with his own. So in essence, Naruto lost all demonic chakra and doubled his own, which was why he could still do all the jutsus he could to the degree he could. However, if he ever ran out, the lack of the secondary chakra source could be disastrous to him.

"Are you not afraid, boy?" Madara asked him, as if to goad him into quivering.

"Afraid of what?"

"Why, the fact that I'm about to kill you and use your tenant to make the world as I see fit."

Naruto smirked. "You can't, and you know it. If you could, you wouldn't be standing here talking about it; you'd just do it. The bad guy always gloats to hide the fact that it's all he really can do." Madara had no reaction. "You've sent several of your team members after me and they've all been defeated, even if not by me. You claim to be tough but you yourself don't do anything, just like Nagato. If anyone here is afraid, it's you."

"Me? Why would I be afraid, boy? I'm older and more experienced than you, plus I'm immortal. So what do I have to be afraid of?" The oldest Uchiha asked.

Sasuke meanwhile laid on the floor to the side of both of them, trying to ignore his pain. 'What are you doing dobe? You should be fighting him off, not chatting with him. Even if fighting him is futile, at least you can go out like a ninja should.'

"Well, It's just a guess I have, but I think Shikamaru himself couldn't make a better one." Naruto said, slowly reaching into his kunai holster. He knew he couldn't hide this, but hopefully draw this out a bit more. "You've got a great ability and could have gathered up all the jinchuuriki by yourself by now if you wanted to. It would have been no problem. But instead you had others do the work for you. There had to be a reason, and I figured you were either lazy, had no offensive techniques, or you were afraid of dealing with the targets directly."

Naruto then took his hand out of the holster, and it was empty. Madara saw this and wondered why he didn't grab a kunai. "Now why would I be afraid of some measly hosts?"

Naruto held in a chuckle. What Madara didn't realize was that since he kept talking about fear, he was basically admitting that was his reason for everything. "I asked myself that too. Why would someone who can't die be afraid of something? The answer's obvious: THE POWER OF A BIJUU IS THE ONLY THING THAT CAN KILL YOU, ISN'T IT?"

Madara stiffened and Sasuke's eye's widened at hearing this. Naruto's grin widened as well. "I'm right, aren't I? That's why you're after the bijuu, aren't you? It's not just so you can do that moon-eye thing Gaara told me about; you're trying to remove the only things that actually threaten you!"