Battle Against Deidara

When Naruto rushed out of the hideout, two red tails trailed behind him.

The Nine-Tails' chakra cloak covered his entire body. His pupils had become slits, and his teeth had sharpened slightly, but his consciousness was still his own. Jiraiya's training over the past two years had not been in vain—below four tails, he could keep it under control. Two tails were within the safe range: enough power, with his mind still clear.

Up in the sky ahead, Deidara rode a massive clay bird. His left hand gripped the reins, while the mouth in his right palm held a clay grasshopper between its teeth. He glanced back at the golden figure chasing him, the corners of his mouth lifting slightly.

"The Nine-Tails brat can really chase."

He tossed the clay grasshopper behind him. It rapidly expanded in midair, turning into a mechanical grasshopper half the height of a man. Its wings vibrated at high speed as it dove toward Naruto.

Naruto twisted aside. The grasshopper swept past him and crashed into the rock behind him—

"Crack."

Explosion.

The grasshopper's body split open, launching more than a dozen smaller grasshoppers from the cracks. They scattered densely through the air around Naruto like a swarm of startled insects.

The little grasshoppers turned at the same time and flew at Naruto. Not in straight lines—they zigzagged through the air, darting left and right as they tracked his scent like living creatures.

Naruto forcibly twisted his body in midair, crushing the foremost one with a kick and using the force to spring away from three more behind it. But there were too many grasshoppers. They surged in from every direction, sealing off every route of escape.

"Tch—"

"Fire Style: Great Fireball Technique!"

A massive ball of fire rose from the ground and swallowed all the little grasshoppers around Naruto. The blast wave sent him tumbling twice in the air before he landed atop the crown of a large tree.

Kakashi Hatake stood on the ground, his forehead protector pushed up and his left Sharingan already open. His right hand was still held in a hand sign as smoke drifted from his fingertips.

"Calm down, Naruto." Kakashi's voice was quiet but steady. "He's deliberately provoking you."

Riding high above on his clay bird, Deidara looked down at the two of them. His gaze swept over Kakashi before returning to Naruto, and the smile on his lips deepened.

"The Nine-Tails, huh? One bird isn't enough to carry it."

He pulled out a large handful of clay from his ninja tool pouch, stuffed it into the mouth in his right palm, chewed for several seconds, then spat out an even larger grasshopper. It landed on the ground and instantly swelled to the size of a cow before charging at Kakashi.

Kakashi dodged sideways, sending a kunai flying into the grasshopper's head. Its head exploded, and more than a dozen small grasshoppers spilled out, scattering around Kakashi. His Sharingan caught every one of their movements—but it was useless. There were too many, and every one of them moved erratically.

"Kamui..."

Kakashi focused his left eye on one grasshopper, and space began to distort. But the grasshopper self-destructed before it could be sucked in, and the smoke from the explosion blocked his vision. The remaining grasshoppers surged in through the smoke, cutting off Kakashi's movements.

Deidara did not look at Kakashi. Naruto was his target.

The bird dove down. Deidara leaned out from its back and stretched his right hand toward Naruto. Four small clay spiders were tucked between his fingers, their legs clawing through the air as they wrapped toward Naruto's limbs.

Naruto leaped from the treetop, his two tails whipping behind him. He was far faster than Deidara had expected. One punch slammed into the bird's head, tilting it sharply in midair and nearly throwing Deidara off.

Deidara steadied himself and frowned at the two red tails on Naruto's body.

"Two tails? Didn't they say the Nine-Tails' jinchuriki was prone to losing control? How is he still so lucid?"

Deidara held Gaara up in the air and pointed with his other hand toward the hideout behind them.

"Your friend, the Sand Village brat, is already dead."

Naruto froze.

"When the One-Tail is extracted, the jinchuriki dies." Deidara's tone was casual, as though he were commenting on the weather. "When I arrived, he had already stopped breathing. What's the point of chasing me? He won't come back to life."

Standing on the branch, Naruto stared at the pale figure in Deidara's hand as a loud buzzing filled his ears. He could not hear what Deidara said after that. All he could see was the man's mouth opening and closing, that smile on his face as though he were enjoying himself.

The Nine-Tails' chakra began to churn.

The outline of a third tail appeared behind him. It was not solid, merely a red phantom. Naruto's pupils flickered violently between blue and red. His fingers clawed into the trunk, his nails sinking into the bark.

Don't lose control. Jiraiya said three tails can still be pulled back. Four is dangerous.

But he could not control it.

"Naruto!"

Kakashi burst from the smoke and pressed a hand onto Naruto's shoulder, holding him down. Naruto struggled once, but Kakashi did not let go.

"Calm down, Naruto."

Naruto turned to look at Kakashi. The red had not yet faded from his eyes, but blue was beginning to return.

Kakashi's left Sharingan turned slowly, the three-bladed pinwheel pattern in his pupil sharpening and blurring as his focus shifted. His gaze locked onto Deidara's head.

"Kamui."

Space distorted around Deidara's head.

Deidara's instincts saved his life. The instant the distortion began, his body instinctively leaned slightly to the right—not a dodge, but a natural reaction. The tilt was only a few degrees, but it was enough to shift Kamui's focal point from his head to his right arm.

Deidara watched his right arm bend from the shoulder down. It was not that the bone had broken. Space itself was twisting. An invisible hand seemed to seize his arm, wrenching it from the shoulder joint as skin, muscle, and bone were torn apart all at once.

Blood sprayed out. His entire right arm was twisted off at the shoulder. The wound was not a clean cut, but a ragged gash torn apart by space itself. The severed arm remained in the air for less than half a second before it was sucked into the distorted space and vanished.

Deidara's eyes widened. He stared at the wound in his right shoulder, still spurting blood. He did not scream or cry out. For an instant, he even stopped breathing. Not because it did not hurt—it hurt too much for his brain to react.

He looked down and saw his severed arm, still attached to a small piece of shoulder muscle, falling toward the ground.

"The Sharingan... a space-time ninjutsu..." Deidara's voice trembled, his words coming so fast they seemed forced from his throat. "What the hell is that thing...?"

Blood ran from Kakashi's left eye. Kamui had consumed far more than he had expected. Simply twisting away Deidara's arm had already used nearly half his chakra, and the vision in his left eye was beginning to blur. He could not use it consecutively. At the very least, he needed time to rest before opening it again.

Deidara did not give Kakashi the chance.

Using his left hand, he grabbed a handful of clay from his ninja tool pouch and stuffed it into the mouth in his left palm—he no longer had his right hand, but his left palm had a mouth as well. The clay chewed for several seconds and spat out a gigantic flying bird. Deidara flipped onto its back, and the bird plunged down into the dense forest below.

Kakashi's Sharingan tracked the bird's path, but Deidara flew close to the treetops, constantly changing direction under their cover. Kakashi could not lock onto his position. Kamui required a clear visual focus; he could not use it now.

Naruto shot out from Kakashi's side, several tails leaving red afterimages behind him. He was faster than the bird, leaping through the treetops as he gave chase.

"Naruto! Don't chase too deep!"

Naruto did not answer.

Deidara weaved through the dense forest, his left hand gripping the reins. Blood still seeped from the stump of his arm. His face had turned as pale as paper, but he did not stop. He had to shake off the Nine-Tails, find somewhere safe to treat his wound, and reorganize his fight.

He turned behind a large tree. The bird skimmed close to the ground and passed through a thicket. There were no footsteps behind him, no wind, no chakra fluctuations. Had he lost him?

No.

Something moved overhead.

Deidara looked up—dozens of Narutos leaped down from the treetops, rushing in from every direction. Shadow clones. Every clone held a shuriken, sealing off every possible path of escape.

"Multi-Shadow Clone Technique!"

The shadow clones threw their shuriken at once. Deidara's bird rolled through the air, barely avoiding most of them, but three pierced its wings. The bird began to tilt, losing altitude.

Deidara jumped off its back, and the instant he landed on the ground—

"Over here!"

The voice came from directly above.

Deidara looked up and saw a golden blur. Not a shadow clone—the original. Naruto fell straight down from the treetops, a huge Rasengan forming in his right palm—three times larger than an ordinary Rasengan, its spinning chakra producing a low roar in the air.

Big Ball Rasengan.

Deidara had no time to dodge. The Big Ball Rasengan smashed into the bird's back, tearing its body apart with its rotational force and scattering shattered clay in every direction. The shockwave hurled Deidara away.

Naruto did not chase him. He stood where the bird had shattered, holding someone in his arms.

Gaara.

Gaara's body had already gone cold. His chest did not rise or fall, his skin was gray, his lips purple. His eyes were closed, and his expression was peaceful—as though he were asleep. But a sleeping person's chest moved. His did not.

Naruto held Gaara and dropped to his knees. Gaara's body was light, lighter than Naruto had imagined. The Sand Village Kazekage robe was covered in dust and blood, his hair hanging loose and swaying gently in the air.

The Nine-Tails' chakra surged out from Naruto's body. It was not a rampage, but a rage that had been suppressed for too long, seeping out from his bones. The three tails had already solidified, and the outline of a fourth began to appear.

But this time, even at three tails, his consciousness remained. Jiraiya's training had worked—he could feel the Nine-Tails' power rushing through his body, but he could still think. He could still tell enemy from ally.

Kakashi ran out of the forest and saw Naruto kneeling on the ground with Gaara in his arms. Three tails lashed in the wind behind him, while the phantom of a fourth flickered in and out of sight.

He crouched and pulled a sealing talisman from his clothes.

Something Jiraiya had left behind. It was not a seal meant to suppress the Nine-Tails, but an "anchor" to pull Naruto back when he was about to lose control. Kakashi pressed the talisman to the back of Naruto's neck. The symbols on it flashed, and the phantom of the fourth tail vanished. The three tails also receded to two.

Naruto's breathing was still heavy, but some of the red faded from his eyes. Holding Gaara, he buried his head against Gaara's shoulder. His shoulders trembled slightly, but he made no sound.

Kakashi did not look at him. He stood up, reopened his Sharingan, and scanned the surrounding forest. Deidara was gone.

Among the clay fragments on the ground was one piece with an unusual shape. It was not part of the shattered bird, but an intact human-shaped mass of clay. Its features were blurred, but its pose was clear—it crouched on the ground, its left hand clutching the wound of its severed arm, panic on its face. Suddenly, the human-shaped clay cracked, as if it were about to explode.

Kakashi's Sharingan locked onto the human-shaped clay. Kamui.

Space twisted. The human-shaped clay was sucked into another dimension and exploded. It was not a dud. It truly exploded, but the blast wave from an explosion in another dimension could not reach reality.

"Tch."

In the distance, Deidara stumbled out of the forest, his left hand pressed against the wound on his right shoulder. Blood had soaked through his black cloak patterned with red clouds. The missing arm still hurt, so badly that cold sweat covered his forehead and neck.

"That Sharingan... what kind of monster is that...?"

A giant clay grasshopper waited in the clearing ahead, an escape tool Deidara had prepared before retreating. He climbed onto it, and its legs pushed off the ground, launching it into the air.

"Back... I need to get back first..."

Deidara escaped.

Naruto held Gaara and stood in place as the tails on his body slowly withdrew back inside him.

Kakashi walked over and patted his shoulder. He said nothing.

Naruto took the blanket and gently covered Gaara with it.

He turned and walked toward the hideout.

Let's meet up with Sakura and the others first.