Chapter 1
The war was over.
They had lost.
It hadn't crept up on them. It hadn't been sudden. Their defeat had not been a great plunge from the heights of uncertainty, where one battle, one event, turned the tide.
No. Theirs was the slow death. Victims to a constrictor. The relentless tide of tireless, once dead, foes pushing against the always dwindling resistance.
More than the Shinobi world, human life itself, faced a slow, steady and implacable extinction.
Konoha...had been the first.
After Pein's attack, with no infrastructure to speak of, the village was weakest of all in terms of logistics.
Tobi had capitalized on that. Using the fact that Konoha had no records, no effective way to organize their forces other than word of mouth down from on high from the Hokage. With the administrative functions so invariably crippled, the leaf village soon collapsed, their ninja scattering to group with the other battle groups.
Iwa was next...after Onoki's death.
The old man was so dead set on keeping his seat until someone was worthy to replace him no one was actually prepared to replace him when the moment came.
With all Jounin and Anbu on the front lines a coordinated effort from Iwagakure's elders couldn't be made to name a replacement. And by the time the new Tsuchikage -Kitsuchi- had received word of his anointment, the man was neck deep in an ambush and promptly killed.
The immovable rock, crumbled beneath the relentless flood.
Suna was next.
Gaara's power over the dune sea had proven absolute, even without the Shukaku. For thirty days the bulk of the enemy forces had descended on Sunagakure, and for thirty days the sand village held strong as the rest of the allies regrouped for one final push at the heart of this cancer.
Then...inevitably, the white messenger hawk had reached them.
They were out of time.
'A' had to move before the full force could regroup.
Only Bee returned from Amegakure. Half dead, carrying news of their defeat.
A was dead.
Now, only Kirigakure, its shores defended by a stretch of sea and its heart protected by dense fog, mountains and now, thanks to the seal masters work, relentless storms that made the oceans come alive with impossible fury like the famed whirlpools of Uzushiogakure.
This alone kept what little of humanity remained, safe.
For a time.
Tobi would not be denied though
Ten thousand of his creatures were cast back out into the sea. And a thousand more pushed forward.
Kiri fell.
And now, here they were, the very last vanguard, the most elite of the elite. Men that had survived endless, unremitting war for the better part of two years were guarding their very last, most desperate hope as the enemy forces pounded away at them.
It defied the very belief of all human limitations.
A marvel of the world.
Every manner of seal was calibrated to perfection.
Impossibly complex, combining, as a foundation, the recovered Uzumaki designs, coupled with sealing arrays from all corners of the Shinobi world for the single most intricate collaboration ever made between the Shinobi countries.
Barrier seals from Iwa, acceleration seals from Kumo, stabilization matrixes from Suna, space time arrays, derived from the summoning animals of Konoha, nature arrays from Kirigakure taken from the vaults of the shodaime, that had helped create the seven blades of the swordsmen and imbue them with their powers.
And lastly, an Uchiha seal array. One based on the displacement of time; derived from the Mangekyo's Tsukiyomi technique.
More delicate than any one thing ever made in this world, it was also the most powerful and their very last prayer for a miracle to deliver them from this nightmare.
"You have to stop! You've looked over it eight times already!"
"It has to be perfect." He answered back.
"I know but we have no time! Even if it you found something we can't change anything now. You have to-"
"It has to be perfect." He repeated, moving towards a different spot, eyes roving over the lines of ink spread out over a room half the size of the Hokage tower. Built three months ago for this exact purpose, the moment this project moved beyond the dreaming stage and became viable due to sheer desperation. "There can't be any mistakes. It has to be-!"
Naruto!" Sakura's hand shot out gripping him by the bicep and whirling him around to look at her. Bloodshot blue eyes staring into sea green. "Naruto listen to me! You have to stop! You need to focus now!"
"But it has to be-"
"I know!" She shouted, interrupting him before her voice softened. "I know...But we're done. There are no more last minute fixes. We have to go with what we have now."
"She's right dobe." Sasuke stepped out from the shadows dark eyes staring at his old teammates. "He's here. Point's five and six are down. Four is under attack and three is setting up its final defenses with Mei now. After that, all we'll have left, is the Hachibi."
"His name is Bee." Naruto snarled, looking over the array at his feet despite their words.
After a tug and a pull he marched off, moving towards his designated place on the seal, Sasuke and Sakura flanking him.
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