A New Way of Ninja, (Naruto)

30: Not Dead, Not Alive

[OP: "Cold is the Night"--The Oh Hellos]

The heroes looked and saw Naruto and Hinata were by Neji.

"We're too late!" Momo gasped. "Oh no..." She covered her mouth.

"I think I'm gonna throw up," Camie said, covering her mouth also.

The boys didn't say anything.

"Hey." Shine ran and grabbed Momo's arm. "It might not be too late."

"Huh?" Momo said.

"It's amazing what He can do," Shine said. "I've seen it before. We can at least try. Come. I refuse  to let this be the end of it. The whole point of us removing the curse mark was so that he didn't have to die for this reason!" [That and Naruto healed Might Guy but couldn't heal Neji because...different injuries? I guess that makes sense.]

Momo didn't understand how she could be so fierce at the idea of death itself, but Shine started to lead her towards Neji, and the others followed.

Mabui followed also, but really because she had nothing else to do.

Hinata was talking to Naruto, but she'd just stopped and glanced up at them.

Then she stood up, holding Naruto's hand.

"We have to keep fighting," she said.

Naruto nodded. "Yeah."

Then he let go and walked forward, to where Sakura was.

"Sasuke will be here any sec..." Camie said in a small voice. "I still felt like I'm gonna be sick."

Hinata turned to them, her face betraying she was upset. "I'm sorry... I just...feel like if you'd been close to us, maybe this wouldn't have happened, but that's a selfish thought."

"Babe, can you get the spikes out of him?" Shine asked Wally. "I think I'll throw up if I try."

"Yeah...sure...don't look," Wally said.

The all glanced way, except for Mabui, who had, of course, the training of a ninja not to be squeamish about this kind of thing.

Wally pulled out the spikes at top speed, and then he said, "You can look now."

"He looks a bit more peaceful after that..." Hinata said.

"Hinata, go help the others," Shine said. "Leave Neji to us."

She nodded and walked away.

"Let's move him," Shine said.

So they did, back to their shield.

"I suppose it might be that he's not dead yet," Momo said. "It takes a bit for... Well, we can try."

She held out her hands and began to murmur some words. Her hands glowed.

Shine put her hand on Neji's head. "We did not come this far to lose you now. Come back to us."

"I just realized, since you removed his curse mark, we have no way to know if he's dead yet or not," Dabi remarked.

Mabui had a strange look, but she was too stunned to ask them what they were doing. She looked back at the Tailed Beast. "Is that Madara?"

"One of 'em is," Bakugo said darkly. "And Obito. The punks. Oh, and look, there's the other one."

Sasuke had just appeared.

"I can't believe he had the nerve to show up here," Shoto said.

"Those of you who are not helping, you can go keep an eye on things," Shine said. "I want to follow the action."