Naruto's Revenge

Chapter 9: Sasori's escape part 1

They all landed, surprised to find Gaara there barely standing.

"Gaara, did you escape?" Kakashi asked.

"No, they let me go."

"Why would they do that?" Ino asked. "I thought Naruto was hellbent on you going with him?"

"He was" Gaara said. "But I slowed him down until you caught up."

"Wait," Sakura said hopefully. "Does that mean he's here?"

"No, he left a while ago."

"Then how did he know we were here?" she asked.

"It would seem Naruto has become quite skilled as a sensor," Kakashi surmised.

"Indeed," Gaara confirmed.

"Well then," Kakashi said. "Allow us to escort you home, Lord Kazekage."

"Just Gaara, no need for formalities."

They made their way to the sand village, Guy carrying Sasori while Kakashi helped Gaara to stand.

"Well, Sasori my man, I guess I'm not as dumb as you think."

...

They walked, Sakura stumbling every so often. "Are you okay?" Ino asked.

"I'm fine," Sakura dismissed. She stumbled once more.

"No you're not. Come on, let me help you." Ino walked over.

Sakura put her arm around Ino, leaning on her for support. "Thank you."

"No problem. And hey, I'm sorry about Naruto."

"It's not your fault. It's mine," she said.

"Hey, no it's not."

"No, it is," Sakura said. "But I'm gonna bring him back, whether he likes it or not."

"Look out!" Kakashi suddenly yelled.

A massive clay bird crashed directly into the middle of the group. They managed to jump out of the way, but not without injury: Akamaru was bleeding.

"Akamaru!" Kiba yelled.

But they were left no time to rest as more clay birds destroyed the surrounding forest.

"Byakugan," Neji said. "I see him! Over there!"

"Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!" Kakashi yelled.

A massive ball of fire bigger than the whole of the group combined launched toward Deidara, incinerating the trees blocking him from view. He maneuvered the clay bird, barely managing to fly over the flaming ball of death, though the immeasurable heat was still felt.

The bird crashed but Deidara jumped off in time to land on his feet. Kakashi exerted all his energy to power the jutsu as much as he did. With ragged breath he fell back, resting against a tree. Tenten threw shuriken. Clay birds flew at her in opposistion to the shuriken. The birds opened their mouths, biting the shuriken and preventing any impact while still flying toward her.

"What?!" she exclaimed.

Neji ran in front of her. "Eight Trigrams Palm Rotation!"
_______________________________________________

Sorry for such a short chapter but I'm hungry and I just wanted to get it out right now. I'll probably release Chapter 10 later today or tomorrow.

I think I'mma start doing shorter chapters since it's easier to get them out faster that way. Part of the reason I take so long to put out another chapter is because of the length - and partly due to the length, I run into "bumps" more often - so I figure if I just put out shorter chapters then I can put them out more often, like one a day or even two, maybe. Idk, it depends.

But yeah, tell me if you'd rather have longer chapters but I release them less or shorter chapters but you get them more often.

I was going to show Tsunade finding out about what Jiraiya did in this chapter - like in the preview in the last chapter - but I forgot about some things I need to include before that can happen, so the Tsunade thing may happen either the next Chapter 10 or Chapter 11.