Chapter 84 The enemy of my enemy is also my name

In another time or place Kakashi might have been impressed with seeing a battle between two legends like Orochimaru and Jiraiya but now was not that time, especially since he was currently trying not to get eaten by a huge snake summons.

Kakashi was leaping from tree to tree as a snake, large enough to eat him in one go, was chasing him. Apparently he wasn't worth the effort to fight first hand or he was just an annoyance. Kakashi wasn't sure what was more insulting but at the moment he had more important things to worry about than his hurt pride. He knew enough about snakes from training with Anko to know how they moved and hunted so he had been able to keep ahead of the beast. He landed and knew that he couldn't keep this up for long, so crouching down he already started his hand seals as he waited making himself bait. He didn't have to wait long as the serpent shot out at him its jaws wide open.

Kakashi jumped as high as he could in the last possible moment, for a split second there he had been afraid that he had waited too long as he felt the rush of the large snake go by him. He could feel the bottom of his feet just grave the scales of its back. He kept up the hand seals as he finished just as his feet planted on the trunk of the tree and pushed off. He looked as the snake was trying to turn quickly but Kakashi was finished. The electrical energy had been gathered as he aimed for the 'neck' area as the head was out of range.

Although he would have to remember to ask Anko were the 'neck' of a snake really was.

"Raikiri!" He shouted using the legendary attack of his own making. People said he had cut a bolt of lightning with this technique, well that story wasn't technically true but only he knew the full story behind that. His attack was however good enough to at least cut through the flesh of the snake as the head and part of it was severed and a split second later it disappeared.

Kakashi was able to take a breather as he saw Orochimaru and Jiraiya still battling it out as he was not even registering on their radar. That was just as well for him as he took a moment to find a decent advantage. Now was the perfect time to try out a technique he hadn't used in actual combat. Mainly because it was too dangerous for him as it took a long time to charge up and so far he could only use it once before all his charka ran out. He had meant to train it even more and increase his charka levels but being a full time parent and teacher didn't allow for him to train until he dropped.

That and he honestly had no need to train this technique until now, but looking at how things were he was seriously reconsidering it. He sat down hidden by the leaves of a tree as he closed his sharingan eye as he put his hands into a seal and concentrated. Even though he had the sharingan he wasn't an Uchiha so there was knowledge he just didn't have. The technique he had discovered by accident as the day he had lost a good friend something had happened.

To this day he still couldn't understand what happened that day, he had blacked out but something had happened to his eye. It had taken him months to figure it out and just as long to figure out what to do with it. Which had caused him to pass out from its use but that had been years ago. He was confident he could pull this off at least once, well fairly confident he just needed an opening.

"You've gotten slow with age Jiraiya," Orochimaru smirked as he extended an arm like a snake to strike at the toad sage, the white haired old friend of his jumped out of the way to counter with a kunai thrown to make Orochimaru move.

"What are you talking about, I'm just hitting my prime," Jiraiya told him whipping his long hair around like a tail as several large strands of spiky hair flew out like solid pieces of iron. "Maybe if you didn't keep stealing the bodies of others to stay off death you'd get some real wisdom with actual age."

"I'll stick with my vast knowledge of jutsu," Orochimaru countered, "Plus the day will soon come when you're nothing but a bag of bones in the ground and I'll still be alive and stronger than ever."

"If you call what you do 'living' that is," Jiraiya muttered to himself. He was disgusted with Orochimaru's unnatural way of living. Plus he had to admit that Orochimaru was just as fast as he had been over twenty years ago and although Jiraiya knew he wasn't over the hill yet, he had slowed.

He could feel the aches and pains that came with a long life as a ninja, the injuries that piled up over time wore you down. He wasn't as fast or strong as he had been in the peak of his youth but he did have something he hadn't back then. He had much more experience and knowledge, his skills were sharper and he had learned patience.

The only problem was that Orochimaru had gained all that while keeping a younger body, things were certainly not in his favor but then Jiraiya always knew he never did things the easy way so there was no point in starting now. He grinned to himself hoping that whatever Kakashi was up to would help turn the tide. He knew the man was back there in the trees just waiting for an opening of some kind. Well whatever kind of opening the man needed, Jiraiya would make sure that he got it.

-Naruto and Gaara-

Naruto had figured that with Gaara by his side this Kimimaro guy wouldn't stand a chance, that had been fifteen minutes ago and he was quickly rethinking that. So far he had sent nearly an army of clones against the guy and he just mowed them down like they were nothing. Then again the guy could grow freaking bone weapons out of any part of his body, something that Naruto felt was cheating.

His dad had told him to use his clones to study an opponent but the only thing he could figure out was that the guy was a lot faster and stronger than he looked. In a straight up fight Naruto knew he would lose the guy was just too good and he fought like a man with nothing to lose.

He barely defended at all and he just went all out on his attacks.

Gaara wasn't doing much better as the young man avoided Gaara's sand attacks. In fact Naruto thought that he saw the red headed boy actually getting frustrated.

"Damn it this sucks!" Naruto shouted out as he had to make even more clones, their enemy was going through them nearly as fast as he could make them although he had a lot of chakra he had never seen just how many he could make at one time. Of course he was pretty sure this many wasn't a problem but they couldn't keep this up eventually one of them would run out of chakra but the boy they were fighting was still going strong.

"He is a bit annoying in not dying," Gaara admitted.

"I have walked with death for so long now I no longer fear it, I have embraced my death," Kimimaro stated hearing their conversation as he kicked another clone out of existence and quickly dodged Gaara's attack. "As long as my death can served a purpose for Orochimaru-sama then I will gladly walk into death's embrace."

"Great strong and crazy," Naruto muttered to himself, they really needed something to throw at this teen. "Hey keep him busy for a second."

Gaara nodded as he gestured with his hands making his sand attack from several different directions, Kimimaro with great skill and agility dodged and attacked with blades made of bone. Although the blades did cut the sand it only slowed it down as Gaara kept the rest of it going. While this was going on Naruto was gathering his chakra, he created several more clones as he sent them against the teen.

"You will not stop me with such things," Kimimaro told him seeing the new clones. He easily dispatched two of them but when the third attacked he noticed something. This one had come straight at him but it was when he was attacking that something seemed odd. There was no defense at all and he felt something dangerous about this one.

"Got ya," The clone said and instead of disappearing this clone exploded.

"Yeah! Didn't know I could make those did you?" Naruto shouted out grinning under his mask. But when the smoke from the explosion and other clones being caught in the explosion was gone there was a large bone shield.

"Oh come on!" Naruto got ready to make more, if he had to he would send a whole group of explosive clones at him there was no way his bones could be hard enough to survive that.

Kimimaro felt the pain from the explosion although he had been saved from most of the effects he still felt some damage from it. His body wouldn't hold out much longer and he needed take this more serious as he could guess what Naruto would try next. Since he was going to die anyway he had to go all out. He released the seal on his chest as black lines started to cover his body as he activated the first level. Already the pain was being numbed as his body was filled with energy.

"Oh man I don't know what he did but I don't like it," Naruto moaned out as their enemy suddenly leapt at them with a lot more speed and agility than he had a moment ago. "I knew it was bad!" Naruto shouted out as he and Gaara jumped away as the boy actually smashed through the thick branch.

More bones came out of him sticking out like a demonic porcupine as he ran at Naruto.

"Of course he goes for me," Naruto muttered putting his blade. "Take this, wind blade!"

He sent the chakra through the short sword as a thin blade of wind chakra was sent flying at their enemy. For Kimimaro the attacked seemed slowed down thanks to his increased reaction time. He dodge the chakra as it passed by him. He then created a large lance of his bones ready to impale Naruto but it never got that close. Just as it was about to hit him a wall of sand cam up and stopped the attack.

"Thanks Gaara!" Naruto called out jumping over the wall and tried an attack from above but the bones on Kimimaro's back blocked his blade, he made a small cut in them but nothing really deep. He frowned those bones were a lot tougher than he thought they would be. He quickly jumped out of the way from the counter attack as Gaara sent out small balls of sands like bullets.

Kimimaro took several hits to his skin as the sand felt more like rocks slamming into his body than sand. He teen took a knee as he looked at the two of them. It looked like he would have to go all out in order to deal with this problem. He was fine with that, as long as his mission was complete than it would be all worth it. He was preparing to unleash his second level of the seal with a laugh disrupted them all.

"Well ain't this just a sight," A laughing voice called out as they all looked at the new comer.

Kisame had just walked into this fight after he and Itachi split up, his sword had been twitching into this direction as some nice chakra was calling out to his wrapped up sword. When he came in and saw who was fighting he felt it was his lucky day. So he came out walking with his sword resting on his shoulder grinning like a shark.

"Oh crap you got to be kidding me," Naruto really didn't believe it. He knew that clothing the man was wearing although he had never seen him in person he had been filled in on a lot of details by Jiraiya during the time he spent with him. So he knew what to look out for, he also remembered that Jiraiya told him that if he was ever face to face with an Akatsuki member, he was to just run.

"Who are you?" Kimimaro didn't like the battle being interrupted but he needed to know if this man was a threat or not. But the look on his blue shark like face he could feel a sense of danger from the man, he had a look of a man whose hands were covered in the blood of others.

"You don't know of the famous Kisame Hoshigaki? Well I'm disappointed but I guess a runt like you hasn't lived long enough to know much of the world." Kisame told him and then looked to Gaara and Naruto. "So both the One Tails and the Nine Tails together, this should be fun. I'm supposed to take you both back but I think as long as you're breathing that's fine."

"These two are marked for death by Orochimaru," Kimimaro told him.

"Ah so you work for that old slippery Snake then? He used to work with us in the past but then Itachi kicked his ass and he ran with his tails between his legs," Kisame laughed.

That wasn't the best thing to do as Kimimaro would not stand for anyone insulting Orochimaru.

"You take back those words!"

Kisame knew he had just touched a nerve. "Make me brat, because that old Snake is a coward who ran off when he couldn't get Itachi's eyes for his own. Never did care for his pale ass anyway, he never was good enough for our group. Now why don't you get out of here I have to take them with me."

Kimimaro roared out in rage as his mission had just been forgotten for the moment. He would deal with this intruder and then deal with the other two before time ran out.

"Oh good I was hoping to spill some blood today," Kisame really did think today was shaping up to be a good day.

"I don't know what's going on and I really hate to say this, but we should get to the others and warn them as soon as possible while they're busy." Naruto told Gaara. Although he didn't want to just turn tail and run himself but if one of these guys took down his dad he knew that he didn't stand much of a chance. Plus there was only one here, there were always supposed to be at least two of them, that meant another was around here as well.

He thought about his team and Gaara's siblings if the other one ran into them they would be in serious trouble. Gaara looked at him for a quick moment before nodding his head, he wasn't sure who the new enemy was but Naruto did seem to have an idea. So he went along with Naruto's idea to find the others as both of them quickly left before either of the other two changed their minds.

-Sakura and Sasuke-

Sasuke had to admit that he didn't like how the fight was going, although their enemies didn't seem to be that much older than them they were strong for their age. The large boy he was fighting was like a mountain and the fact that he used earth techniques seemed to fit. Sakura was holding her own against the red head although the girls fight seemed to have taken on a more personal air to it.

Both of them were throwing insults at each other the entire time.

Sasuke dodged an attack by Jirobo as he used his sword for a counter, the other boy may be larger but he was surprisingly agile for his size as he just managed to dodge the sweep of his blade.

So far Sasuke was having a hard time trying to get through the boy's defenses, the earth style that the guy was using. Sasuke had tried a few different fire techniques but always earth was used as either a wall or a shield. To make matters worse he had just a lot of offensive ones to match, Sasuke had to dodge the hard stones and earth that were sometimes literally thrown at him by the much larger boy.

Sasuke knew that he would have to push himself harder to get a decent blow, already he was planning as his eyes were studying the boy. The earth techniques were something that he had little experience with although he had read up on them. They were very solid and strong jutsus that had a lot of potential for defense and offence as he had found out. The trick was that they were limited they were too 'rigid' to be applied to changes or suddenly shifted like other element types.

He had to make the boy commit to an attack and either throw something new and unexpected or just smash through it. The technique that he learned from Kakashi on that one month of training between the chunin exams would be perfect but he had to be precise. Lightning was perfect to use against earth so he just had to get just the right opening.

Sakura closed the distance between her and the red head as she brought out her tonfas, she swung with the left as the girl blocked it with a kunai, Sakura didn't stop her movements as she spun around to attack with her right weapon to the girl's side. Tayuya got clipped by the metal weapon as she snarled at the girl. She threw her kunai as Sakura used one of her weapons to swat it away. Tayuya cursed her out as she threw several more small knives at her as Sakura did the same for each and every one.

Sakura was glad that Anko had trained her in that, although with Anko she used a lot more and threw them even harder. She had said that if Sakura wanted to use a weapon like the tonfa she had to learn how to use it to its full effect. Those had been a long and painful training lessons under Anko but they were showing their results in this battle.

"You little shank, I'm going to feed you those damn things," Tayuya was getting irritated by the pink haired girl with how she wasn't going down. Plus she hated that hair, she looked so girly that it made her sick that this was considered a kunoichi.

"You know I think I've had enough of that mouth of yours, time to wash it and the rest of you out," Sakura quickly put her weapons away as she quickly as she could started her hand seals.

"Aqua Tower," Sakura shouted out as her palm hit the ground. This was a move she had used in the chunin exams as a tower of water shot out of the ground as it went at Tayuya at great speed.

The sound ninja threw herself to the right as it just past her and slammed into a tree. There was a crack heard as she looked to see the bark of the tree that it hit had slightly shattered. If that he hit her, Tayuya knew that it would have hurt, a lot.

Tayuya scowled at the pink haired girl she wasn't going to show her up. She was going to bring out her flute and see how the girl liked a little genjustu work. Unlike most genjustu that used the eyes or physical touch hers could be used by sound, something a lot harder to defend against.

His was when a pause took place in the battle as everyone took a moment to see how everyone else was doing both ally and enemy. Sasuke was already planning on several more tactics before he felt a new presence in the area. He hadn't sensed anyone showing up it was just there like whoever had showed up just wanted to be noticed.

He looked around and froze as he felt like someone had just jabbed his chest with their fist and gripped his insides. There standing there in a black cloak with red clouds was someone he hadn't seen in years but despite the new look he hadn't changed much since all those years ago.

"I'm a little disappointed to see that you haven't killed your enemy yet," Itachi told Sasuke as speaking got the attention of the other three in the battle as they looked up at him. "I would have thought you would have come alone a lot more than this."

"Who the hell are you!?" Tayuya shouted at him not liking how someone new showed up. "Are you with these wimps you prissy looking bastard?"

Itachi didn't even spare her a glance as he never took his view off Sasuke. "Well little brother what have you to say for yourself?"

Sakura's eyes widened as she suddenly realized who it was she was looking at, this was Sasuke's older brother the one that killed his clan in a single night and put Kakashi-sensei into the hospital. Suddenly she felt the pit of her stomach just drop out of her. If Kakashi couldn't beat him then what hope did they have?

"Itachi, I'm going to kill you!" Sasuke could only see red where his brother was concerned.

"Hardly, you can't even handle these two, while showing skill for ones this young, they aren't that powerful." He said in his usual calm tone.

"The hell did you just say about us?" Jirobo shouted out at him if there was one thing he couldn't stand it was to be looked down on. They were the elite Sound Four and they were the personal guard of Orochimaru, handpicked by him and given his personal seal. Well maybe it was time to show this person what they were made of.

Jirobo released his cursed mark as black shapes started to cover his body as he felt the power flowing through him.

"Let's see you deal with me now!" Jirobo with incredible speed rushed at him, the large boy jumped off of several trees as he launched himself into an aerial attack at the man. His fist had just impacted with Itachi when he suddenly became a murder of crows, each one flying away suddenly.

"What?" He couldn't understand at first how it had just happened but then he felt the cold metal of a kunai against his throat. Itachi was suddenly behind him with the small weapon pressing against the skin.

"You should have known better than just attack up front like that," Itachi said coldly before slitting the teen's throat with a simple flick of his wrist.

Jirobo on reflex his hands went to his throat trying in vain to stop the flow of blood, the markings on his body started to fade as he fell from his spot on the tree. The last thing he saw was the ground coming at him as he crashed into the ground. Itachi turned his gaze to Tayuya who looked at him with fear. Her mind couldn't just grasp it yet, although she couldn't stand Jirobo, to have him suddenly die like that was socking.

It took her a moment to realize that he was looking at her as her body tensed up and she tried to put up a guard pose although she wasn't sure what good it would do.

Itachi just stood there looking down at her looking like he was judging her and found her wanting. "If you're not going to run then you better come at me with all you have."

"Tch, fine then you bastard," Tayuya called on her curse seal as black marking started to cover her body but she didn't stop there once that was done she took Itachi's advice and went all out with the second level. Her skin darkened as horns grew out of her head as she took on a slightly more demonic look. Tayuya pulled out her flute as she was going to use her strongest attack against him.

With a few notes of her flute three figures came into existence they were even more demonic looking than her as her three Doki came into existence. They were giants standing several feet taller than Tayuya as each was slightly different. There was one with long hair that hid his face, another was bandaged all over their body, the last one had his eyes covered with a white cloth. All three had their mouths sown shut.

"Interesting technique," Itachi hadn't seen a technique like this before so he was getting curious as how this would play out.

-Temari and Kankuro-

The two siblings fought nearly back to back against their foes, they were used to fighting together so they didn't need to speak out, to plan but the problem was the two they were fighting were also used as fighting as a team. The battle had been like a dance between the four of them, Kidomaru kept trying to use his webbing to trap Temari but she kept using her wind techniques to cut them to shreds with her giant fan. For Sakon he had managed to get close to Kankuro early on and the two were fighting it out in a hand to hand battle.

Kankuro although trained in hand to hand, never really liked it, he preferred to attack from a distance with his puppets but this guy hadn't even given him the change to unleash one of the wrapped up forms he was carrying on his back. All he could do was fight on and hope that he could get some ground when an opening presented itself.

Just went the boy did a spinning kick Kankuro saw an opening and attacked when his opponent's spin was making him face away. He sent out a fist but the white haired boy suddenly dodged it.

"The hell, you got eyes in the back of your head or something?" Kankuro jumped back hoping to get enough distant to pull out one of the puppets on his back.

"Actually you're not far off, he is brother?" Sakon smiled as he looked back at Kankuro. "Come on, time to wake up now. He's such a pain to get up as he likes to sleep in a lot."

"I'm up already," Ukon the brother spoke up as the strange lump on the back of his head started to move.

Kankuro was shocked to see that there was a second head, he hadn't known what the hell he had been looking at but the fact that he was fighting a guy with two heads while his sister was fighting a guy with several extra arms and threw out webbing, he figured these two were the biggest freaks he had ever encountered. And his little brother had a demon living inside of him so to him that was saying something.

"Time to go to work brother," Sakon spoke up with a smile.

"Oh I agree brother," Ukon replied as the twins lashed out as Kankuro.

Kankuro let out a small curse as he was attacked yet again, he kept trying to get the distance but the conjoined twins weren't letting him have his way. Every time he tried to get some space they would close it and it kept ending up in a hand to hand battle. Although Kankuro did train in hand to hand combat, his opponent seemed to be a lot more skilled in that area than him. Slowly he felt his defenses being cut away. He knew it was only a matter of time before he make a mistake so he decided to make a mistake.

He dropped his guard just enough to make it look like he had a hole in his defense but trying not to make it obvious. Just like he had hoped they went for it, they batted away his defense as one of them went for a grab with one of their hands.

As the twin brothers managed to get a hold of Kankuro as Ukon was about to use their special technique, the twins were special in that Ukon could sent himself into the body of their enemy. This allowed him to take control of their nervous system while his brother Sakon could finish them off if needed, although sometimes Ukon liked to use their victims own hands to choke the life out of themselves before going back to his brother.

"Got you now," Sakon smirked as his hand reached out and gripped the puppet user. "Go for it brother."

There was a pause as Ukon felt something was off, when he merged with another person he used his chakra that was mixed with his brother's to link with the chakra in their victim. But there was no chakra that he could sense it was like the man wasn't even there.

"Sakon something's wrong!" He tried to warn him but in that moment one of the two wrapped up bundles on his back burst open as Kankuro jumped out of it. There were blue lines on his fingers going into the fake version of himself. Those were chakra strings that he used to command his puppets, this was a new technique he had been working on lately.

He had found a way to make one of his puppets look exactly like himself as he hide behind it controlling it. For a puppet user the puppeteer was the major weakness in this style, if you could bypass the puppet and take out the one controlling it you won the fight. The puppeteer's was nearly defenceless while controlling a puppet, so Kankuro had figured out a way to keep himself safe and make a target at the same time.

The fake Kankuro suddenly shed a 'skin' as a wooden puppet was shown, it quickly burst open its chest extending as it basically gobbled up the twins. It had all happened so fast that they hadn't even had time to react before they were swallowed by darkness.

"Damn it break us out of this thing!" Ukon yelled at his brother.

"I'm trying!" Sakon yelled back but the wood was a lot tougher than it looked plus he didn't have much in the way of movement in such a cramp space. He would have to see if releasing his curse mark would help in given them the power to break free. Things never got that far though for the pair, Kankuro was already using the finishing blow. As his hands waved around the arms and legs disconnected from the main body, each segment seemed to hover in the air as blades jutted out from one end.

"Time to end this," Kankuro drew his hands together as the blades pierced the puppet like a giant wooden iron maiden. There was a pair of screams coming from inside the puppet but soon it was all quiet again.

"Damn you!" Kidomaru yelled at him, he couldn't believe that the twins had been taken out like that. He fired his webbing at Kankuro as he used his puppets to take the shot. Soon he found his puppets suck and unable to move for the moment.

"Crap," Kankuro figured he might be able to cut them free but he had to use both of his puppets and that was all he had on him. With both of them stuck like this he didn't have a backup on him as the freak with the multiple arms was coming at him. Well on second thought he may not have had another puppet but he did have something just as good, an older sister.

"You shouldn't turn your back to an enemy," Temari smirked as she swung her fan with all her strength sending a large amount of wind slamming into the sound ninja. With that much force she had actually managed to send him flying off into the trees, she also took down several of the trees as well. The trees broke apart with huge cracking sounds like the bones of giants snapping and soon the thundering sound of the large severed trees hitting each other and the ground.

Temari stood there panting she had put all the chakra she could into that attack, the force would have been enough to shatter bones if their enemy survived it was doubtful he would live for long with the kinds of injuries he most likely got. Still she paused scanning the damaged area of the forest for any kind of sound of movement. There wasn't a single sound other than the gentle wind making the branches sway.

"Think you got him with that," Kankuro told her as he pulled out a kunai trying to cut the webbing without getting the weapon stuck. Whatever this stuff was it was just as nasty as actual cobwebs he was afraid if he messed up he would get his weapon stuck or worse his whole hand if he slipped up.

"Most likely but keep your guard up," Temari and Kankuro heard the large scale battle going on ahead of them where Jiraiya and Kakashi had gone. Temari wasn't worried about that, if they went quiet then she could start to worry, no it was how silent the others seemed to be. She thought she had heard explosions during the battle from where Naruto and Gaara's position generally were but it suddenly went silent.

"We need to hurry," She told him.

"Well help me out here I have to cut them free as I don't know how long this stuff lasts."

Temari blew out a frustrated sigh she could try to use her fan but if she cut up his 'dolls' he would be difficult to deal with until he made new ones plus without them he wasn't as strong. They would need all that they had because she felt that the others would be facing tough fights as well.

Next Up: Bad Blood