“Get them! They’ve got enough Earth scrolls to get all of us through!”

3 squads, all from the Mist, had surrounded Itachi’s team. Before, his squad, with a pair of scrolls as well as a few extra Earth Scrolls, had been trying to determine how they were used to enter the tower. Now Chika shrivelled up into a defensive ball, and Okuri was at the end of his metaphorical chain. Itachi would usually prepare a plan of attack, but he was heavily outnumbered, only had one explosive kunai, and the gains weren’t worth the risks of fighting.

Mist squads were flexible; they joined up and divided like drops of water when it was required. The males wore no shirts, showing the hideous battle scars on their torsos and faces. The superior of all 3 squads, a tall, blue haired girl with a short sword, stepped forward, confident in her stride. Okuri’s body language told a different story: Tensed and ready for attack, he was merely waiting for the slightest provocation. The Mist leader merely laughed at his aggression and spoke to Itachi. “Cough’em up, Uchiha boy, or they’ll never find your corpse.”

“Don’t listen to her! They’d kill us as soon as we gave them the scrolls! We might as well make them pay for it in blood!”

But Itachi ignored Okuri and calmly handed the Mist leader 3 Earth scrolls. The girl looked them over one by one, making sure they were genuine, before tossing them to her comrades. Then she casually put her hands behind her back and began to speak again. “Pleasure doing business.”

Itachi heard the deft movements of fingers behind the Mist’s back, and jumped back, anticipating her jutsu. However, had Itachi noticed the quiet river behind him, he would’ve known to dodge sideways. Twin water drills hit him in the back, slamming him to the ground. Simultaneously, 6 of the Mist worked to restrain Okuri, grabbing his limbs, head and torso, and the other 2 female Mist, green haired twins, threw a chain around Chika’s neck and began to pull.

Okuri thrashed wildly like a trapped animal. Chika clutched the chain at her neck. But Itachi did nothing. As a side effect of the jutsu, his body was temporarily paralyzed. Not that he wanted to move, or even open his eyelids. He didn’t wish to see the end.

The Mist leader forced his eyes open, an evil grin on her face. “Time to die.” She stood over Itachi, sword in hand, poised to strike. “Shame you didn’t listen to your feral friend. Might’ve gotten you somewhere. Or not.”

Then, out of the corner of Itachi’s eye, something unexpected happened. In order to slit Okuri’s throat, one Mist holding his head had to take his hands off him and draw his large kunai. That was all the opportunity Okuri needed to throw off his subjugators. His head no longer restrained, he thrashed to his right and bit off the fingers of the Mist holding his arm. The boy yelped in agony as he pulled back his fingerless hands. Freed, his right fist immediately planted itself in the face of the Mist holding his left arm, who recoiled with a hand covering his caved in face. The Mist holding his torso thrust his arm to Okuri’s head, but he merely grabbed his forearm and snapped it like a twig. The Mist jumped away, causing Okuri’s upper half to abruptly drop to the ground. The 2 Mist left holding onto Okuri grasped him with all their might, but his legs slipped out of their grip. He kicked back hard enough to break their jaws. Okuri jumped up and whirled around…..just in time to intercept the last Mist’s giant kunai. He grabbed his opponent’s wrist and thrust the oversized weapon through his bicep. The giant blade pierced flesh and bone. The Mist screamed and collapsed, unable to withstand the pain.

The head Mist stared on in horror as her team mates were reduced to broken dolls. The Mist choking Chika slackened the chain, and then took it off, perhaps hoping that by going softer on Chika they could spare themselves the agony of being brutally ruined by this Leaf. Okuri merely turned to face them, looking forward to more savage combat. The sister prepared to use the chain against him, but the head Mist stopped them with a simple hand motion, and Okuri’s face turned to confusion. “Come on, you maggots.” She shouted to her fellow Mist. “We’ve got what we came for. We don’t need to stick around this cesspool.” She turned to Okuri, seeing the wrath behind his eyes. In other nin of this village, she had seen a burning anger when she had invoked their anger. Intense, deep, passionate, fanatical. A hot, fiery rage. In Okuri’s eyes, she saw the furious, harsh winds of the North. Ruthless, merciless, unrelenting, unforgiving. A cold, icy rage. Something that couldn’t be extinguished. It scared her. “Don’t want to feed ourselves to the dog now, do we?”

The Mist picked themselves up and headed towards the river. Okuri stared, wide-eyed as the injured shinobi limped past him, as if he wasn’t there, to regroup with their leader. Then he began to realize what was happening. They were going to the river to retreat. To escape. To run away. His face twisted sinisterly. He couldn’t let that happen.

He started towards the group, fingers re-arranging themselves into a variety of positions, all good for clawing an opponent’s organs out. Itachi, with the paralysis having worn off, intervened, stepping in his way. “Come on now, Okuri. Time to go. Fight’s over.”

“It’s not over.” Okuri panted. He roughly pushed Itachi aside and continued on his slow, deathly walk towards the Mist, who now stood staring back at him.

Itachi, undignified and in the dirt again, shouted to him “There’s no point in pursuing them…”

“IT’S NOT OVER!”

Chika tried to open her mouth to dissuade Okuri, but he cut her off.

“IT’S NEVER GOING TO BE OVER! WHY DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND!?! WE’RE GOING TO GROW UP INTO KILLING MACHINES! IT’S NEVER GOING TO END UNTIL WE ALL DIE!”