Evanescent Trail

V

Changing paths



Two weeks after the said tailing and Kiba already forgot about it, Sasuke however, as hard as he could was still trying and it was showing on how his personality would change from time to time. Naruto was the first to notice this change on Sasuke’s character, every time they would get into the occasional fight, he would sometimes catch Sasuke in a daze.



“Oi!” Sasuke drew his head back a little as he blinked on the fingers before him, the snapping sound earlier had him reverting back to reality and looking straight on Naruto’s worried face. He was sitting on a bench inside the Konoha coliseum locker room, as he remembered he was in the middle of preparing for the scheduled match against a man of the mantis clan from the neighboring village southwest of Konoha. And the blonde who was currently crouched before him volunteered to be his manager since his mentor Kakashi was out on a business trip with Iruka and the half of the faculty teachers.



“If you don’t snap out of it, even a low class demon could kill you this instant, you hear me?” Sasuke nodded at this absentmindedly and just continued to tug on his black gloves before a little straining of the hands and razor sharp nails quickly cut through the leather material.



“Oh come on, what’s wrong with you Sasuke?”



“Nothing.”



“Obviously I’m just here to hand you towels and mineral water but… just a bit of information. You don’t have to worry about his hands, because his blades are on his back, four of them, umm… about two meters in length. He tends to jump a lot, and his blades are poisonous. It never fails to know a little bit, since this is the first time you’re going to fight someone like that.”



“How’d you know that? It wasn’t even in the video.” Sasuke asked, confusion and suspicion arising.



Naruto only grinned. “Heh. He showed them to me of course. What a show off.” At that Sasuke suddenly gained new understanding of the current situation, and he gained a new kind of motivation to humiliate that kamakiri in front of the many students watching them, of course, he’d make sure that Naruto would watch every scene of it.



“Hit on you?” Sasuke put up a pained smirk, but if it was pained or not, Naruto didn’t know since he’d already stood up and headed for the door.



“Nothing new. Focus Sasuke. It’s the only thing you need right now.” Naruto said quietly before he closed the door behind him and proceeded to walk the hallway leading to the open coliseum. He couldn’t describe the frustration he was feeling, if not for the damn power instability then he’d have signed up for the competition too, but for now all he can do was train under that toad Jiraiya and gain control of his constantly increasing powers. Engaging in fights were strictly prohibited since in his state now if he got too excited one punch could equal to five horse kicks, usually that’s something to be impressed about, but he’s not fighting in a death match and a strength like that if not controlled properly can lead to unexpected casualties, and he didn’t want people suddenly staring at him with that ‘look’ again.



The coliseum was in an uproar by the time Naruto finally got to his coach seat located closest to the border separating the audience to the fighting rim, Kamakiri emerged first from the northern entrance to the blonde’s left in all his green glory, he had small spikes where his eyebrows were supposed to be, the underside of his forearm were filled with spikes too, forget about his nails, his whole fingers had turned into green blades and his thighs resembled that of a mantis’ hind legs. It was now Sasuke’s turn and he arrived with the usual cool air around him making the entirety of the girls squeal and cheer for his name, some waving banners, some shouting ‘prince’ and some booing because of their jealousy for the handsome young cat.



There were rules and one of them strictly reinforced was the prohibition of fully morphing into their animal forms since it’s when their abilities can be truly grasped.



The fight didn’t start quickly as opposed to what the audience thought since Kamakiri had been known to be a hot head, they spend half of the time analyzing each other and when a long blade suddenly tore from inside the insect’s back towards Sasuke’s direction in lightning speed the crowd went into an uproar, the tip of that blade had only pierced the hard concrete and dark purple poison dropped from it dampening the floor, so strong that even the concrete melted from it because Sasuke who had crouched to the floor ready for any attack jumped forward and landed behind the Kamakiri with equal speed during the first attack.



It was making Naruto’s breath hitch from excitement, anticipation and worry.



He didn’t even notice Kiba sitting beside him, he was too absorbed in the somewhat short but long fight with his hands wrenching the towel close to his chest that had it been wet it’d have dried off with how tight he was twisting it. His five tails too couldn’t help but swing from right to left from behind him, his ears and eyes were all focused and heightened as they tried to adjust and see the speed of the two competitors so fast that he’s having trouble seeing them.



“Enjoying the scene?” Naruto’s breath hitched again as he quickly turned his head to Kiba’s direction, surprised none the less.



“Ki-Ki-Ki-Kiba! What are you doing here!?” Kiba’s fight had just finished and it was before Sasuke’s, his forehead was bandaged and his right ear was sewn because it nearly got torn earlier by one of Temari’s attack, she uses the wind with such strong impact that it could cut through skin, that even if Kiba got through it with a win and only a couple of scratches and his damaged ear his whole body numbed with the pressure.



“I’m fine, no need to go looking like some worry wart mother of mine Naruto, I already got scolded by the original.” Kiba smirked, he wouldn’t be able to move his right ear for a while and his whole body was still feeling little skitters of painful electricity when it had just recently gotten back to feeling everything from being numbed earlier. “Man, that woman’s a Bitch, with a capital B.” The both of them chuckled before they resumed to watching the fight, he missed some of the action but judging from how Kamakiri’s nose was bleeding all the way down to his chest from Sasuke’s jab earlier and Sasuke’s chest with a shallow cut from Kamakiri’s hands he’d say they’re on even ends.



“I’m sorry.” Naruto said solemnly, he felt bad for not being with Kiba during the treatment, sure he’d come by frequently but his time was torn in giving Sasuke moral support and talking to his sponsors and Kiba. The infirmary was at the south wing and Sasuke’s locker room was at the opposite side, he’d been running back and forth since earlier.



“I understand, idiot, ‘sides, Hina’s there with me. Not like I’m saying I didn’t care that you weren’t there, but it’s important for a coach to be with him.”



“How’s Kurenai by the way?”



“Oh, she’s still unconscious. To think she’d be worse off than the one who’s actually fighting. Even Hina didn’t act that weak when she saw my blood.”



“She cried though.” Naruto grinned with a teasing voice, making Kiba blush.



“Actually-” Naruto and Kiba quickly whipped their heads back to the fighting arena at the sounds of girls screaming with terror, and Naruto felt his chest suffocating as he looked at Sasuke’s squirming body in midair, he was suspended by two scythe looking blades from Kamakiri’s back in the air, both his shoulders were pierced through and no doubt from how his eyes were turning dull, the poison was already getting to him.



“Stop the fight!” From the horrifying image the audience including the judges took their attention to Naruto who had shouted in a worried voice. He really didn’t know how thick and deadly the poison could do to Sasuke’s body, but the strong nauseating scent of an aromatic flower from it told him it was no extraction from a simple poison Ivy. “His blades are poisoned! If he’s not treated quickly it could kill him! Look!”



“Poison!? This…” Using poison wasn’t one of the prohibitions in the rules, tranquilizers, paralyzing drugs, sleeping dusts could be used. One of the judges talked to the other three in the midst of the audience shouting for the competition to continue while the others shouted for Naruto’s side, Kamakiri had never actually used the scythe like blades on his back, only with his hand to hand combat fighting style did he use to win and reach that level, but Sasuke’s far from the average fighter, and Kamakiri felt that cornered for him to use such a forbidden tactic just to win.



In the middle of the fighting arena despite how Kamakiri looked as if he was on the winning side, his whole body was covered in deep cuts, his ears were bleeding from the huge roar Sasuke used earlier to dishevel his five senses and gain the upper hand, and his back was bleeding heavily from when Sasuke cut one of the four blades on his back.



“What!? How could you think of the technicalities this time!? Go and make the referee count already!”



“We must confirm first if it’s not just a paralyzing agent. We must respect the Uchiha’s decision to continue fighting.”



“Surely, you could understand that if we just ended the competition by default, the Uchiha might regret it.” Naruto had already walked to the three judges on their table at the uppermost part of the coliseum and he succeeded in at least convincing them to do the counting already despite the referees protest about technicalities, but in truth was just afraid to get hit of the swaying third blade on Kamakiri’s back, it was true that until Sasuke loses consciousness, declares defeat or not able to fight back until the given time limit ends they’re not to be disturbed, but, but, to Naruto it just wasn’t fair. If it were him in there, if it were him and not Sasuke, he could have—suddenly Tsunade, one of the judges words hit the nail, and he was left with no choice, but to keep quiet and watch it play out till the end.



“Oh no, I won’t let you off that easy asshole…” Kamakiri’s manic grin sent shivers down the referee’s spine who had started counting from ten and up at the farthest corner of the arena.



“Yeah. Right. Bastard.” Sasuke managed to choke through the blood on his mouth, his pitch black eyes suddenly swirled into blood red, the audience of course didn’t know what Kamakiri was seeing when his eyes suddenly widened and he backed off. He harshly pulled his scythes from Sasuke’s shoulders, dropping him roughly on the floor spraying blood everywhere and started waving his blades around him like a mad man.



“Sasuke!!!” Naruto called out, no, this one fight might actually end up with him losing a dear friend.



Sasuke coughed blood as he slowly got up from the concrete, the referee abruptly stopped counting seeing Sasuke still conscious enough to fight. The raven haired cat just watched patiently Kamakiri suddenly go still, his eyes were wide open as he screamed and begged for help in the middle of the arena, until he clutched his hair tight and with another hoarse scream tearing from his throat he quietly dropped hard on the floor unconscious.



“You’re a hundred years early to be my rival. Useless bug.”



From afar Kiba watched the whole scene, he didn’t know if Naruto really didn’t know about Sasuke’s blood ability to create near reality illusions through eye contact or that he just forgot about it altogether because of worry, damn, he’d have to prepare himself for that if he was going to win in the competition.



The crowd was again in an uproar, hooraying so loud that even the referee’s voice finishing the countdown and afterwards announcing Sasuke’s win was drowned by it. Immediately soon after, Sasuke too lost consciousness and had to be carried straight to Konoha’s General hospital by ambulance when it was confirmed by one of the medics that Kamakiri really had used a deadly poison. It was needless to say that Kamakiri was banned from entering the competition permanently.



“What do you mean you don’t know!?” Naruto hollered towards the male cat doctor in the hospital hallway in close proximity while shaking the poor cat back and forth.



“Oi ‘ruto calm down…” Kiba tried to pry the fox’s hands from the collar of the doctor but he just won’t budge.



“You’re a fuckin’ doctor! How can you not know!?”



“We’ve already extracted most of the poisons to his body, however that poison is made to destroy each nerve in the cells preventing it to heal itself, we’ve talked to the other boy’s parents and they’re willing to give the recipe for the antidote, but it takes merely a week at most to gather the recipes and make them. We cannot undo the damage with our lack of facilities as of now, usually the panther family generates tissue quickly by themselves as well as cells. They heal quickly, but it is somehow preventing them of that. It’s most likely that it’s made so that the healing of his wounds would be delayed. What’s more his body won’t accept the blood we give to him since he doesn’t have any living panther relative anymore. If this goes on--”



“Shit!” Naruto slowly loosened his hold on the doctor as he sunk to the floor, covering his head with both hands as if trying to deny that everything was not real. He was fucking worried! Why did that asshole have to be such a killer mania freak that he’d have to use that on Sasuke!? “Shit…”



“Naruto…”