The Ultimate Weapon (Naruto Fanfic)

44-Revelations

Migota sped toward Aoi, seeing him collapse in the middle of the street. She had expected to see blood soaking the ground or something of the like, but no such wounds were present. The only wound that was visible was a small puncture wound, and that had already stopped bleeding. Looking around, she found the senbon that had pierced Aoi's arm.

The others had joined her by then, and she brought the projectile up to her nose, sniffing it delicately. There was a faintly sweet smell, and Migota crinkled her nose in disgust, stowing the senbon in her own pouch for later. Shin had taken Aoi, holding him close as he felt for a pulse and other signs of life. When he felt the faint fluttering under his fingers as he held Aoi's wrist, he breathed a sigh of relief.

Shino and Shikamaru were a pace off, the latter looking around the scene trying to imagine the fight. Both of Aoi's si were still embedded in the rooftops, and Shikamaru jumped up to grab them. When he returned, Shin had gathered Aoi into his arms, and he looked ready to go.

"We should head to the hospital, the senbon was coated with poison, and I don't have the skills yet to find an antidote or even identify them as quickly as the doctors there." Migota looked over at Aoi, whose face seemed paler than it usually was, and there was a faint, pained expression on his face. "We should hurry."

All four took off, Shin leading the way. He turned his head slightly, gazing at the leaf shinobi. "Are you sure that none of you want to follow after Sasuke? He could become a problem later."

As neither of the other two seemed inclined to answer, Shikamaru sighed ever so slightly as he did. "While it is true that we want to bring Sasuke back to the village, it seems that as of right now none of us has the skills to do so. Aoi was by far the strongest of us, and to be put in this state Sasuke would either have to lucky or skilled." Shin nodded, but it seemed that Shikamaru wasn't done talking yet. "As it is, we only have one tracker with us, that being Shino, but Sasuke already has a rather large lead. I'm sure that in the village, he won't be masking his trail, but once he exits it will become significantly harder to track him. Lastly, there is no guarantee that he was alone. It would be foolish to attempt to pursue him in these circumstances."

Shin looked at the youth wide-eyed as he went on with the explanation. He had only seen them as children, perhaps skilled, but likely to give into a fit of rage. What he hadn't expected was this detailed reasoning, on par with the level of a jonin. "Seems like I underestimated your intelligence."

Shikamaru simply nodded, and they continued in silence.

_+_

Aoi was aware of a floating sensation. There was a blackness that seemed to surround him that somehow seemed familiar. Remembering the time when he had been knocked unconscious during the chunin exams, he immediately opened his eyes. As he had suspected, he was once more in that open field of pillars. He began falling again, but being prepared this time, he turned to land feet first on the ground.

Looking around, Aoi saw that nothing had changed since he was last here. Writing still covered the pillars, and the walls were still that same curtain of a sky. Searching the curtain, Aoi tried to find the hole he had created last time, to no avail. It had either closed up or was out of sight for the moment. He made a move to walk towards the sky again, when something stopped him.

Searching over his shoulder, Aoi caught a flash of movement darting behind a pillar. Walking slowly, Aoi peered behind the pillar to find nothing. He looked around again to be rewarded once more with a flash of color once again darting behind another pillar. Going a little faster in an attempt to catch the figure, he was still too slow to catch them. There was another flash of color off to the left.

With nothing else to do, Aoi kept up the chase. He had a vague feeling that he was being led somewhere, but had no idea where. Suddenly, as if he had a bucket of ice dumped on him, the pillars cut off and there was a small clearing. A gazebo stood in the center, and unlike the surrounding pillars, there were vines crawling up the columns that held the roof. Curious, Aoi walked closer to the structure, wondering why it was there.