"What took you guys so long? The Akatsuki should be here at any moment," Kimimaro's voice cut through, his piercing grey eyes lingering on Kabuto no more than a second, before turning to crimson-haired kunoichi by him. "So, you must be Karin Uzumaki."
Karin blinked, caught off guard by the abrupt address.
Kimimaro tilted his head. "I heard Uzumaki are known for mastery of fūinjutsu, massive chakra reserves, extraordinary life-force vitality, and... sensory abilities. The other Uzumaki I met was nothing like I heard. I hope you don't disappoint me." His tone was blunt devoid of any respect.
"What did you say, you pale-faced brat?" Karin's mood, which had been relatively content that she saw Sasuke, turned into pure indignation. Her fists clenched at her sides as blood rushed to her face. "Who in the hell do you think you are talking to?" She took a step forward, ready to unleash a barrage of verbal... and potentially physical... abuse on the sickly-looking subordinate.
Before she could close the distance, a low voice intervened.
"Karin, leave him be," Sasuke said, his tone characteristically detached and cold.
Yet, as the words traveled through and filtered into Karin's utterly biased, deeply infatuated mind, they underwent a magical translation. To her ears, the cool command sounded entirely different: "Karin, my dear, come back to me and leave him be."
The transformation in her demeanor was instantaneous. Her scowl vanished, replaced by a lovesick, starry-eyed expression. "As you say, Sasuke-kun," she swooned, practically melting into a puddle of her self imposed affection. In her haze of adoration, she completely forgot to demand answers about who this mysterious "other Uzumaki" Kimimaro had mentioned was.
Suddenly, a spike of chakra flared through her conscious. Two massive chakra signatures bled into her sensory range from miles away, growing exponentially heavier with every passing second.
Karin's eyes went wide open. "The Akatsuki... they're here."
A few paces away, Orochimaru's tongue slithered across his lips as a slow manic grin split his pale face. "Finally..." he said, an excitement sound bubbling up from his throat. "I finally get to dissect my old partner... or rather, my ex-partner."
~~
Miles away above the desolate hidepost, the atmosphere was vastly different... though no less tense.
"Yo... Sasori-no-danna, are we even going the right way?" Deidara complained, his voice dripping with exaggerated boredom. He was lying completely flat on his back atop a intricately sculpted clay dragon, lazily using his hands to prop up his head as the clay beast glided just a few feet above the ground.
Below them, Sasori... still encased inside his hunchbacked, mechanical Hiruko puppet... left a slow grinding trail mark in his path. "We have been at it forever, un. Are you sure you don't need a ride on my dragon?"
Sasori let out a long grating groan of irritation, the metallic scraping of gears echoing from Hiruko. "Shut your mouth, Deidara. We are about to reach the location. Just be prepared; I am finally going to kill that damn snake, and I don't need your obnoxious commentary slowing me down."
Deidara didn't even bother to react to Sasori's usual abrasive cursing, simply blowing a bubble of explosive clay that popped softly in the dry wind. "You're confident, un. Are you sure your precious spy hasn't been found out yet? What if it's a trap? Orochimaru isn't exactly known for being easy to corner."
"Deidara," Sasori snapped, "are you doubting my memory-sealing cursed technique? And frankly, it doesn't even matter if it is a trap. It is the strong that will stand in the end and I am that one." Sasori felt composed in his absolute control over Kabuto, completely unaware of just how deep the double agent's loyalties actually ran.
Deidara shifted onto his side, propping himself up on one elbow as he stared up at the vast cloudless sky. "I wonder how Kakuzu and Konan are doing. Do you think they actually managed to kill Jiraiya, the legendary Sannin? They had it so lucky, un. Don't you think we should have been the ones assigned to that mission instead of rotting out here?" He sighed dramatically, remembering the disruption of the seven-tails sealing ceremony that had thrown their schedules into chaos a week prior.
"We have reached our destination," Sasori interrupted coldly, ignoring Deidara's musings. "That is the hideout up ahead, and I can already sense my spy. Daydream all you want, Deidara; I am going ahead to tear Orochimaru apart."
"Hey, Sasori-danna, it's not fair for you to take all the glory, un!" Deidara pouted... though a competitive spark flashed in his blue eyes. "Let's make a game of it. We'll see who gets to him first."
Before Sasori could retort, Deidara's voice trailed off as he yanked the clay dragon upward, soaring high into the sky.
"Idiot," Sasori muttered to himself. "Orochimaru, I am coming for you."
With a sudden burst of movement, despite the massive and bulky appearance of the puppet, Sasori flicked forward with terrifying speed, closing the distance toward the cave entrance in a blur of motion.
~~
As he neared the looming architecture of the underground hideout, Sasori decided not to take any chances against a shinobi as cunning and unpredictable as Orochimaru. Without stepping out of his primary defense, he hovered his deadly third Kazekage puppet silently behind him, keeping every mechanical trap and poison weapon primed.
Right at the end of the cavern, a solitary silhouette stepped out from the shadows to block his path... a figure completely covered in a strange, white calcified bone structure that resembled natural armor. [A/N: drip in the comments]
Sasori slowed his advance, his mechanical eyes narrowing. "Are you just another one of Orochimaru's disposable lackeys?"
Kimimaro didn't flinch, nor did he show a shred of insult. He simply stared down the legendary puppet master with an unwavering conviction. "I will be the one to deal with you. Lord Orochimaru is busy... and you simply don't deserve his time."
Without another word, Hiruko mechanically snapped its jaw open. A barrage of rusted, glistening senbon needles shot forward in a dense cloud aimed at the white-haired youth.
Simultaneously, Kimimaro raised his hand. With a crunch of his fist, a dense segment of his own bone erupted from his palm, rapidly morphing and extending outward until it formed a heavy perfectly balanced bo staff.
With preternatural grace, Kimimaro stepped forward, spinning the bone staff in a blinding circle that deflected the rain of poisoned needles harmlessly to the stone floor with a clatter of metallic rings. He didn't even blink as he looked back at the puppet.
"Good thing," Kimimaro murmured, "Lord Orochimaru specifically warned me about your little collection of poisons."
From within Hiruko's shell, Sasori let out a low, appreciative hum. "Interesting... no wonder you seem so confident. But let's see how long that bravado lasts. Doesn't your little bone armor block oxygen circulation? Let's see how long you can survive when your suit itself turns against you."
Hiruko's mouth opened even wider this time, far beyond normal anatomical limits, as a sickly-purple, poisonous gas began to billow out, rapidly filling the confined cave-like underground corridor.
~~
A/N: I wanted to pit him against Deidara, but the fighting style would be similar to Konan. So I changed to Sasori which is dangerous for kimimaro in its own way.
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