Love Through Negotiation «COMPLETED»

Chapter 29

Kurotsuchi shot up awake, eyes wide to the open air and her skin immediately freezing from the intense cold. She took in oxygen like she had just sprinted a marathon and looked all around, trying to take in the world around her. A world unlike the one she had nearly died to. The entire castle that was supposed to be above her head was exploded outward and down, practically pinning her to the ground. The only thing that kept her from being turned into a pancake was a white and blue oversized slug covering her from the waist down. There was an open hole in her combat shirt from where she'd been pierced from her own blade and a tear in the middle showed a wide, ugly scar from her fight with the Uchiha.

"Stay down. You're in no condition to move around," Came the soft, feminine voice of the slug on top of her. She recognized it as Katsuyu, Tsunade's summon. "You're lucky I found you when I did. You were almost dead."

She finally caught her breath and started swiping the thick layer of slime over her skin off her body as quickly as she could. The cold air made it feel like she was covered in ice. "W-What happened?"

"Lay down and rest. You can't go back to the fight."

Her eyes went wide and she looked all around her general area. "Where is it?" She asked frantically.

"What are you looking for?"

"My sword! Where is it? It was… It was…" It was in her. Pierced through the chest, near the heart. And now it wasn't. She looked at Katsuyu more intensely. The hilt of her sword was poking out of its side, probably kept for safekeeping.

Kurotsuchi grabbed the hilt and pulled it out with a wet schlick, then started scrambling to unearth herself from the white and blue slug. It started to protest against her actions, but she paid it no heed. She slapped her hands against he ground and slabs of earth rose up to push the rubble off her body. The girl stood and stretched her muscles and immediately regretted her decision. It was like someone drenched her insides with spirits and threw a giant fireball in the middle for good measure. Her muscles cramped and every foot of viscera in her gut protested.

She still stood, though.

"Where are they?" She asked, surprised by the rasp in her voice. How long had she been out? Hours? Days? Who was still alive?

Oh no.

"Where is he?!" She shouted at the summon, climbing up to the top her rubble tower. Her heart sank at what she saw. A wasteland of rubble and broken architecture pockmarked with pools of bile lava and acid. Swamped with water, lit on fire. A cloudy sky with spires of lightning reaching down to the ground every other second off in the distance. A few miles away she could see a giant horror, one eye, one ear, one mouth, many hands, the size of a mountain. The ten-tails, unknown to her.

"W-Who? Wait, no. Get back down. You're not completely fixed."

"I'm fixed enough," she growled out, grabbing a hold of the cold stone and jumping off. Every step she took was an earthquake of pain in her torso.

She still walked, though.

She still ran.

The sounds of the summon protesting her actions was lost to the whistling wind as she navigated the wasteland spread before her. She had to find him. Make sure he was okay. He needed to know. She couldn't die with him not knowing. He couldn't die not knowing. If there was anything in the world that had a just bone, it would give this to her. It had already taken her mom and her freedom, and then gave her him with its own cruel sense of humor. And it also gave her everyone else.

The world gave and the world took and she was starting to understand that. Right then. With the air chilling her skin to ice and her body shouting to her to stop, lay down, rest. She understood. But it wasn't enough. She would have to be greedy for just a little bit. Just a little bit.