A Darker World

Alteegry- thanks for your review! It’s nice to know people are still reading and I’m glad I made you laugh.

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Tazuna was really the worst type of person to be a bodyguard for, Jiraiya thought as he glanced up at the menacing sky. It wasn't really the man's fault, but purely situational. Tazuna was an average guy who lived in an average house and went about an average day and that was the problem. A set of extraordinary circumstances had made him a target worthy of going to the cost of hiring a ninja. Now all those things that made him ordinary made him an easy target.

Tazuna was not used to thinking about his own personal security or at least not in the way nobles and other people in positions of power were used to thinking about it. Then there was his house which was completely ordinary. About the only security feature it could boast was that it was suspended over the water, which was not really an obstacle to a ninja. Of course, it was his ordinary life that was proving to be the biggest obstacle.

Every day he would get up and go to the same place and then went back home. It was monotonous and predictable. Even changing the exact route didn't do much for security since they had to depart from the same location. About the only good news was Tazuna was a workaholic. He left just early enough to avoid crowds or as much of a crowd as this economically depressed country could produce. At least Jiraiya didn't have to worry about someone in a crowd with a knife.

The storm, which had been threatening to break all day, finally did. It started with one big drop that hit him right on the head. A few seconds later he was drenched as the remaining workers finished securing the worksite and started to run home. Tazuna was the last man off the bridge and he seemed to ignore the rain like the inconvenience it was.

“All right, let's head home,” The man snapped as he walked by, doubtlessly irritated that his dreams of completing the bridge today had been defeated by the disagreeable weather.

“Yeah, I don't relish being the tallest object in this thunderstorm.” Jiraiya said as they started walking. On the outside he attempted to seem nonchalant, but the bodyguard in him was worried. The bingo book said and his brief battle with Raiga seemed to confirm that he was adept at using lightning. Considering the man's reputation, he should assume that he would take advantage of this storm to enhance the power of his jutsu.

Not that he felt the need to inform Tazuna of that. However, even without warning, Jiraiya was pretty sure that Tazuna knew there would be another attempt on his life soon. The bridge was near completion and there were no signs that the individual or group that had replaced Gato had changed their opinion of the bridge itself. Actually, Jiraiya had started to wonder if perhaps they would wait for the bridge to be completed and then attack and destroy it, which would be a far more psychologically devastating blow than just leaving the bridge uncompleted.

However Raiga intended to finish his job, he would have to stop him and Jiraiya still hoped to recruit the man. The day after the first attack on the bridge, he had surreptitiously summoned half a dozen small toads to keep an eye on the construction site in case he attempted the exploding tag trick again. He still hadn’t quite figured out how the man had managed to time the explosives so accurately and that annoyed him. He had formed a similar network of toads around Tazuna’s house, only instead of watching for sabotage their job was to sense an intruder’s approach.

That was why; when he heard the distinctive sound of air suddenly being displaced over the noise of the rain, he wasn’t surprised. As he looked down and to his right he saw a dinner size plate toad staring back up at him.

“He’s coming from the Southwest, approximately one thousand yard and approaching at a walking pace.”

Jiraiya nodded and the toad disappeared with its purpose fulfilled. Tazuna had walked ahead several steps before realizing that he was no longer at his side. His expression was neutral and the ninja could only wonder what it morphed into when he darted forward, picking him up and swinging the bridge builder over his shoulder before jumped to the nearest rooftop.

The shortest distance between any two spots was a straight line and he managed to cut the usual ten minute walk down to three, hearing accusations of his questionable parentage the entire way. Landing in front of the walkway, he wasn’t surprised to see Monkiibijinesu already waiting by the door. Jiraiya wasn’t sure why these particular summons were so loyal to the Sarutobi clan, but right now he was just glad for it. “You stay with the boys,” he said to the monkey as he passed him by. The monkey’s response was some sort of sound which he interpreted as, “What else would I do.”

He burst into the kitchen, startling Tsunami and with Tazuna close behind him said, “He is coming.” For a second she paled, but his respect for her immediately increased as she nodded. Jiraiya had assumed several possibilities, one of which was the house being attacked itself and he had given her instructions in what to do in each situation. They were more to keep her from panicking, but that could be important enough. Then, he called upstairs.

He left a moment later trying not to think of how terrified everyone had looked. It had been a long time since he had been a bodyguard and he had forgotten how hard it was sometimes seeing the faith people put in you. Unconsciously, he clenched his jaw. This was it. He would either have to convince Raiga to join him or he would have to kill him.

The rain started to fall in sheets, cutting visibility down to fifty yards or so. Entering the woods didn’t help much. Briefly, he entertained the idea of going into Sage Mode, but senjutsu was his move of last resort. He would just have to intercept Raiga before he got too close to the house. Sparing a glance behind him; he was satisfied to see that the house looked unusually bright although it was only a vague glow through the rain. With any luck, if Raiga saw that it might give him pause, even for a second.

When the glow from the house could barely be seen he stopped and crouched. He quickly went through a series of hand signs that ended with him placing a hand on the ground. For a moment, he saw the world in a new way. It was one of sound waves and he could sense the drops of rain hitting the ground as they made their way through the branches. He could feel the way the trees bent with the gust of wind, wanting to topple but their root system holding them firm. He filtered all of that out and found what he was looking for, the steady steps of a man who was not in a hurry.

Raiga was about five hundred feet away and if Jiraiya stayed where he was, the man would pass within thirty feet of him, which would be close enough. Positioning himself so that a tree would hide him from the man’s approach, he waited patiently following the footsteps.

The major disadvantage to the technique he was using was that it encouraged overconfidence. The technique was meant to facilitate ambushes, but an ambush could easily be turned around and when Jiraiya felt the hairs on his arms start to stand up he darted out from behind the tree just before it exploded in a brilliant flash.

The Sannin felt several splinters hit him and a few definitely pierced his skin, but he hardly noticed. Raiga was still close enough for him to spring his own trap. Earth Release: Swamp of the Underworld was a technique that responded directly to the amount of chakra an individual put into it. This time Jiraiya only wanted it to be waist deep.

The ground turned into a soft mud, and with their roots no longer firmly planted several trees toppled with the sound of cracking branches and protesting wood. The collateral damage was extensive and was made worse by the fact that Raiga had jumped from the ground a second before the mud could take him.

Raiga landed on one of the newly fallen trees, which meant he was still close enough for Jiraiya to instigate his initial plan. He jumped into the air as lightning shot across the ground in little white-hot arcs. He was able to complete his series of hand signs as the lightning passed under him and slammed his hands down onto the branch.

The world changed around them as Jiraiya summoned the Toad Mouth Bind, only this time he was inside along with Raiga. The wall started to contract and in the pitch darkness he could hear Raiga starting to attack the walls. He grimaced to himself knowing how fruitless that would be. The walls continued to contract, and as they closed in the other man’s attempts to break free became more and more frantic. Jutsu were performed that were blinding in their intensity, but finally the walls were able to restrain him.

Jiraiya could still hear the other man struggling as he spat out a small quantity of Toad Oil and then ignited it a second later with a fire Jutsu. The small puddle of oil burned, casting an eerie light that only barely illuminated both of them. As poor as the light was, it provided him with his best look at his opponent so far.

Raiga wore a heavy cloak with the hood currently pulled back that revealed a surprisingly smooth face which was currently twisted with a look that if could kill would turn him to ash. His body was slightly turned with one of his hands in the toad’s esophagus as was one of his feet, which he had probably attempted to use to lever himself free. Both of his swords were stuck firmly into the wall, but what struck Jiraiya was the portion of his chest. His torso seemed bulky, far too bulky for what he could see of his arms and legs, almost as if he was carrying a pack under his cloak.

“Raiga Kurosuki, we finally meet.”

“I’m going to kill you.”

The words were delivered calmly, almost as if they were a statement of fact rather than a threat. Jiraiya decided to try to sound amused. “You’re in the esophagus of a fire-breathing toad. One contraction and you’ll know the unique sensation of being digested. Killing me right now would only seal your fate.”

He saw the man understood and he continued. “You and I are somewhat alike. Were both rogue ninja and I’m sure both of our villages would like to see us dead.”

The man snorted either in derision or agreement.

“The difference between you and I is I am not alone. I fully intend to take back my village from the despot who took it over.”

“A counter coup?”

Jiraiya nodded and realized that when said like that, it sounded petty. “Yeah, our preparations are almost complete, but we could use you.”

Perhaps his words weren’t as elegant as he had wished, because Raiga’s reaction was to laugh. “You want me to join you? Now why would I do that?”

For a moment, Jiraiya was tempted to say because otherwise you’re going to be digested, but instead he just waited for the man’s laughter to die down. “Because you’re from the Mist village and you know they’ll continue to hunt you down for the rest of your life. I’m offering you the rank of Jonin in Konohagakure once we take it back. They won’t be able to reach you in the village. It’s the only safe place you’ll ever find.”

What happened next truly astonished the Sannin as a third voice joined the conversation. It was high and childlike, but the voices words were definitely not anything a child should say.

“Raiga, I don’t mind dying with you, but who will hold our funeral then?”

The former Mist ninja tilted his head to the side and said, “You think we should take the deal then?”

Again, the voice spoke, but this time Jiraiya was able to place that it was actually coming from the man, which was the only place that actually made sense considering where they were.

“We could always leave, if you don’t like it. I don’t want you to stop showing me things.”

“I will,” Raiga said quietly before turning and saying, “I will help you in your countercoup.”

Jiraiya nodded, acknowledging his answer before glancing at the remaining puddle of oil to see how much time they had left. “All right, but the voice you were talking to, it sounds like a child’s. Who is it?” As he spoke, he ordered the esophagus to relax, freeing the man. The man stared at him and for a second Jiraiya wondered if he had made a mistake releasing him so soon.

“Ranmaru, he is my eyes.”

A small voice in Jiraiya’s head told him to leave the subject be, at least for now. “All right, now, since the man you’re hired to assassinate is allowing me to use his house as a safe house, I think we’ll have to go pay a visit to your employer and persuade him to lay off.”

Raiga’s swords fell free, and as he bent over to pick him up he started to chuckle. “Kanaye is not a man that can be persuaded.”

The Sannin nodded, not really surprised by the answer. Despite his wishes, he had been drawn into the situation in Wave on a personal level. Tazuna was a good man and didn’t deserve to be killed by some thug. “Then we may have to do something more permanent.”

Jiraiya played the fool because he found it fun, but a fool who was a ninja would not have lived as long as he had. Although, he had a tentative agreement with Raiga, that didn’t mean he fully trusted him just yet. Having the man turn on his employer served two purposes in that. It would protect Tazuna and burn Raiga’s bridges. Still, he gave the man a wide berth, allowing him to take the lead.

They entered the village, but at such an angle that Tazuna’s house was never in view which was reassuring. The rain had let up considerably, but it was still coming down steadily as they made their way to the wharf. A handful of ships were in port and all were dark, clearly waiting out the storm. Identical warehouses were on the other side and Raiga paused at one that seemed no more remarkable than any other.

“He’s here,” Raiga said.

Jiraiya eyed the building. From the front there were two entrances, a small door for people and a much larger door that was used to move cargo in and out. In short, it was very typical of any warehouse located on any dock in the world. Even without peering through a window, he had a pretty good idea of what the insides look like. There may or may not be crates inside, but there might be a walkway suspended above the floor and maybe even be a small office up there, too.

“It’s an ambush.”

The words were barely audible over the rain and had come from the still unseen Ranmaru. He turned and frowned, not knowing how to address his question and just decided to say it, “How can you tell?”

“Ranmaru is my eyes,” Raiga said to him before addressing Ranmaru, “How?”

He found himself leaning in closer to hear the muffled explanation. “Kanaye is sitting at the bottom of the stairs. There are four men hiding among the crates with crossbows.”

Jiraiya wondered what exactly Ranmaru was. If he could see through walls like that, it suggested he had the Hyuga bloodline which would be a disturbing thought. Clans were usually protective of their blood inheritances, but the occasional bastard child always did happen and it was all too easy to envision a young Kunoichi seducing some hapless male and obtaining the necessary genetic material. That was immediately followed by a more disturbing thought, for the Mist village had been known to experiment with genetics to some success, and for a moment he pictured a mass of inhuman flesh and eyes that had been named Ranmaru.

He was pulled out of his thoughts as Raiga started to make a series of hand signs “Stop!”

“What?”

“You were going to use some big lightning attack.” Raiga looked as if he was crazy, and knowing how Mist ninjas tended to deal with situations, he was. “Let’s try to keep collateral damage to a minimum.”

To the other man’s credit, he did listen to his reasoning and his plan. A moment later, Jiraiya created a shadow clone and transformed it to look like Raiga and sent it in to the building via the smaller door which was left deliberately ajar.

The rain stopped and he could hear Ranmaru telling Raiga what was happening inside. His mind had reached the point of overload and now was just accepting the changing events, but he knew on some level he would have to learn more about these two, especially since they would be working together in the future. Then, he received the memories from the clone which consisted of a man presumably Kanaye asking if he had killed the man and once the clone had said yes, the trap was sprung.

At least two arrows had hit the clone before it had been destroyed and that was the signal for them to burst into the warehouse. The warehouse had been semi-empty and the four crossbow men had been hiding behind a row of low crates. With some relief, he noticed that all four hostiles had fired their weapons. Each of the men were stunned as their target had suddenly disappeared.

Jiraiya was on the first man before he could recover, jumping over the crates a kunai in his right hand. It slipped easily into the man’s right eye socket, sending him into shock a second before it killed him. Drawing another kunai with his left hand, he threw it at the next man in line catching him in the throat. The first man’s body dropped to the ground and the kunai came free in his hand. Stepping forward, he spun throwing a weapon, catching the third man in line in the chest. Before that body hit the ground, he had covered half the distance to the fourth man who was trying to reload his crossbow. With a flick of the wrist the man was pelted with shuriken.

He spared a second to confirm each of the men was dead, knowing he would feel guilty later. Under different circumstances he would’ve captured these men easily enough and handed them over to local authorities, but that was impossible here for so many reasons. Turning his attention to Raiga, he saw him chasing Kanaye up the stairs. Just as the sword was about to cut Kanaye down, the man spun around and Raiga jolted to a stop before doubling over against the railing.

Jiraiya acted without thought and with a chakra assisted leap, he almost landed right behind the man on the stairs. Kanaye tried to spin around, his arm leading the way, but was blocked by Jiraiya who heard the distinctive sound of a wire losing tension as something flew out from underneath the man’s loose sleeves. Everything clicked at that moment and he realized the man must be wearing some sort of small wrist crossbow. With that realization, he brought his free hand up into the man’s nose, breaking it and forcing pieces of cartilage into his brain. The man tumbled over the railing, dead before he hit the ground.

Turning his attention to Raiga, he knelt down only to see a small bolt sticking out of his stomach. Blood was dripping from it, almost black in color and although he didn’t know much about medicine, he had seen injuries like this before. The projectile had hit his liver and without immediate medical attention he would bleed out in about forty minutes or so.

“Come on, you have to lay down.”

He reached out to grab the other man’s arm, but it was swatted away with a shout of “No!” The man looked up at him his smooth facial features now coated in a sheen of sweat. “Ranmaru.”

For a second he didn’t understand, but then it clicked. Ranmaru was on his back. The cloak obscured that fact, but he had heard the voice come from there before so either a person or something that might have once been a person was there. Raiga wouldn’t be able to sit down, let alone lay down without putting pressure on Ranmaru.

“Raiga, you can’t die,” Ranmaru said his voice muffled.

“I’m fine. I won’t leave you.” Raiga said in a raspy voice, barely above a whisper.

For a second Jiraiya hesitated, unsure how to proceed. The man needed medical attention that was beyond his knowledge, but one thing he was sure of was that moving him now would just aggravate the injury. He was slightly annoyed that the man had allowed himself to be injured, but a surprising number of ninjas met their end like this.

“Listen, you need to have your injury treated. You need to sit. I’ll make sure Ranmaru is safe.”

The man hesitated for a second, blood still dripping from the wound. He nodded slowly and Jiraiya helped him down the stairs. At the bottom Raiga shrugged out of his cloak, and to the Sannin's infinite relief, he saw the man was wearing something like a backpack. He had half convinced himself that this Ranmaru would be some weird symbiotic creature permanently attached to Raiga. Removing the backpack that presumably had Ranmaru in it was something he did with extra caution, more for Raiga’s peace of mind than anything else.

Jiraiya realized that the bag was oddly light as he gently laid it on the floor before allowing Raiga himself to slide down the wall. He took another glance at the small arrow lodged in the man’s stomach. Briefly, he wished he had learned more than the advanced basics, but he never received more than the standard lessons all Jonin received before taking on a Genin team.

He was so concentrated on Raiga and his wound that when he heard the sound of a zipper it threw him for a second before he looked down at the bag. His imagination had pictured Ranmaru as something malformed, but what emerged was anything but that.

Ranmaru had the gentle features of a child. His hair was lavender and long, but he wasn’t sure if this child was male or female, having that androgynous appearance that some children had. The only other feature he noticed was that his eyes were brown which came as a surprise simply because he had been half expecting some form of the Byakugan.

His movements were a little stiff as he climbed his way out of the bag. Absentmindedly, Jiraiya noticed that he didn’t use his legs to kick his way free like most kids would, but rather used his hands to scoot his way free. Briefly, he wondered if the kid was paralyzed.

Shaking his head, he pulled his attention away from the boy and back to Raiga. The two were staring at each other and it seemed that the boy’s presence was having a calming effect on the other man.

“All right, I’m going to get someone who can treat your wound. You two stay here and I’ll be back in a few minutes. Whatever you do don’t remove the arrow.” He received a wheeze from Raiga and a slight nod from Ranmaru. When he stood to leave, Jiraiya had a twinge of guilt for leaving the young boy here, but if he had been traveling with Raiga this probably wouldn’t have been the worst thing he had seen.

Turning, he ran out of the building before taking to the roofs. On the off chance that he might have needed it, he had learned where the local hospital was or at least what passed as the hospital. Even using the handful of landmarks he picked out on his first day here it took him longer to triangulate then he would’ve preferred to find the squat building. Wave’s hospital was less than a quarter the size of Konoha’s and had apparently been hit with the economic woes that had struck the rest of the country.

The reception area was dimly lit and completely devoid of any staff. Instead there was a buzzer on the receptionist desk that had a makeshift quality to it. The sign next to it had two words that said ring in emergency, which he did, hearing a faint buzzing sound.

A light turned on from an adjacent room moments before a man emerged looking as if he had been sleeping in his clothes. “Yeah yeah, what’s your problem?”

Jiraiya stared at the man skeptically for a minute before deciding beggars shouldn’t be choosers. “There was an accident at one of the warehouses. A man has a piece of metal stuck in his stomach and we weren’t sure if we should move him or not.”

The man nodded. “All right, you did the right thing.” Turning around, he called back into the room, “Shin, get your ass up. We have an emergency.”

Jiraiya always forgot how slow civilians could be even when they were supposedly in a rush. He was pretty sure that Naruto and Konohamaru would’ve been faster than these two. His concern for Raiga was growing by the minute. It wasn’t so much that he liked the man or even the fact that he needed him, but simply the sense that they were comrades. No matter how small the mission was, no matter how brief, he always had that feeling once he fought alongside someone.

Arriving at the warehouse, they found an unsettling scene. The small arrow had been pulled out of Raiga, but he wasn’t bleeding. Ranmaru was crumpled next to him and for a second Jiraiya thought the boy might be dead, but the men checked both of them and announced they were healthy, but unconscious. It was only then that the men realize there were a lot more bodies in the warehouse.

“What the hell’s going on!” Shin demanded.

Jiraiya didn’t answer as his mind worked through the problem. His knowledge of Jutsu was vast and even though he could think of one that might explain the situation, his mind rejected the possibility, but there didn’t seem to be another answer. Creation Rebirth, a technique developed by his old teammate, Tsunade. It required a massive amount of chakra to be transferred from one person to another to encourage rapid healing. How the hell had it been performed here though? Putting that question aside, he answered Shin. “Trust me, the less you know about this situation the better.”