But Neji's Byakugan could see her chakra-it was still flowing, weak and slow, like the last flicker of a candle about to burn out, wavering, liable to go dark at any moment, but not extinguished yet.
"She's still alive!" Neji turned and shouted to Guy. "But she needs treatment immediately! There's a wound above her left eye, and she's lost a lot of blood-there's another roll of bandages beside her ninja tool pouch, but no one's with her!"
Guy clenched his fists.
His knuckles cracked beneath his skin, not from the force of his grip, but because the strain of the Eight Gates Formation was dislocating his finger joints.
He looked at the dark red main root at the bottom of the pit, then at the tears and blood mingling around Neji's eyes, then toward the western side of the Bamboo Forest, where he could not see Tenten but knew she was bleeding.
"Guy." Chisen's voice came from beside him, calm, as calm as though he were addressing a specimen in a laboratory. "Carry Tenten somewhere safe.
Neji will go with you. He's already out of chakra, so staying beside the pit won't help.
Take her out of the Bamboo Forest and stop the bleeding with whatever bandages Neji has left.
I'll handle the pit."
"Alone?" Guy's voice trembled, not from fear, but because the strain of the Eight Gates Formation made his vocal cords spasm. "You're going to sever the main root alone? The wound on your right leg-"
"I'm a medical ninja." Chisen cut him off, his voice still just as calm, but with something more beneath that calm-not sharp, but deeper, heavier, like a hidden current beneath the ice. "I know my own physical condition better than you do.
The knife wound on my right thigh has