The Nine Tales of Naruto: Ni-ban

Chapter Three: The Running Darkness

Getting cracked in the head a second time was not something I enjoyed. I hated it. My head ached and my vision swam. There was a pounding that surfaced soon after my eyes opened again. The place I found myself was too dark to see. I began to wonder what would befall me now. I was in the hands of my enemies, the last I knew. Then there was a point where I was breaking free. But now? What was happening now? No explosions could be heard. No sounds of war reached me. Either I am too far away to hear or I am being held underground.

I began replaying the events that led to this. Joining Orochimaru. Finding Fujiko. Becoming comrades and family with the other outcasts. The mocking and humiliation suffered at the hands of the Leaf village. In my search to figure if my path was the correct one, my memories showed me I was correct. But something in me felt lost. Like I was missing something here. What was I not seeing?

My head began to clear more and my eyes adjusted to the darkness around me. For the first time I realized I was not alone. Low moaning came to me and I saw the shapes of other prisoners. Men, woman and children filled other cells in this dark space. They were in worse shape then I was.

"Hey." I said. My voice was dry and cracked from disuse. I must have been out a long time. I cleared my throat and tried again. "Hey. Can anyone here talk?" A few kids cried. Seemed I sounded scary to them. A woman tried to calm them and then spoke to me.

"Who is it?" She asked. "What do you want?" I tried to clear my throat a bit more, smacking my lips that  were dry and cracking. "I am Naruto." it cracked again. My voice didn't sound like me. The woman moved over and looked me over. "Naruto. Is it really you? Get us out of here." My hands were still bound to a chair. The woman sounded familiar and when I listened better and really looked  at her I realized everyone in the cell was a member of Orochimaru's army. It seemed they had captured many of his soldiers.

I looked the woman in the eyes and nodded. "I will get us out of here. It will take some time but it will be done." The woman smiled and loosened my bonds. The ropes remained on my wrists and legs to simulate me still captured. Then I closed my eyes and began to think. It didn't take long for the Kyuubi to intervene. He didn't speak. Not right away at least. First he only watched me as I stood before him. Then he found a way to replay some of my memories of the past few days of the war. He studied them and then looked back at me.

His eyes shone with a new kind of darkness. His lips rose into a smile. "My boy. We have some training to do." He said. I looked at him and a shiver moved up my spine. Inside my head a new hellish training began to take place. I can not even describe what was happening. From the outside of my body the other cellmates heard growls and felt my chakra grow and shrink. Cuts appeared on me from face to foot. Nothing was spared the torture I endured. A few of the Leaf ninja came to inspect what was going on. Many believed it was a jutsu to kill me if I were ever captured.

If it were anyone else they would have been dead. Then the darkness came. The cell grew darker and fluctuated between visible to pitch black. The other cell occupants scuttled as far away from me as they could. But the confines to the cell would prove to be their undoing.

While darkness seemed to close in around the Leaf, deaths of friends and family. Loved ones never to see each other again. Lives that will be missed amassing around every corner of the village. Konohamaru and his friends struggle to come to terms with the realization that nothing is the same. Kids lay in the streets. Some he didn't recognize. Some that he knew were the enemy but still he mourned them. His eyes stung from the smoke and fresh tears threatening to fall.

Moegi moves closer to console her friend. Udon looks around in the same shock as their leader. How could this happen? He remembered when he was just walking down this street heading to the ramen shop with his friends. He was happy to meet Naruto there. He was happy. Happy? What did that feel like again? it seemed like a life time since last he smiled. How could Naruto do this to them?