Chapter 4: The Confrontation

The city was full of activity, it was 1:30 p.m. and the citizens of the leaf were preparing for this weekends fox celebration, this was a special time of the year where the entire city came together in a massive parade, to celebrate the ancient fox and its past contribution to the current prosperity of the city. Many would come dressed as different variations of the beloved animal. A wide variety of food stands and entertainment would line the streets of the city, it was one of the most anticipated times of the year. For some, however, this was the perfect time to commit crimes.

A young man thought so too, as he raced down an alleyway carrying several bags with white bottles in them.

"Get back here you filthy thief."

The boy ran as fast as he could , as the store owner gave chase. His face was covered with a white mask resembling a bird. He only had one thought in his mind, and it was to secure the medicine he had stolen from a local pharmaceutical shop. He traversed over garbage cans, and ran at top speed. The store owner was surprisingly fast for his age but the boy was even faster, and this was not his first time running away after committing a crime.

"Dam brat if I was younger..." The store owner stopped and began coughing.

The thief had outpaced his pursuer. He looked back as sweat poured down his face, he was in the clear. The urge to slow down and catch his breathe overwhelmed him but the urgency of this mission was too important for him to stop. As he zipped through the alley way, cans of soda made way as the sound of aluminum hit his feet. It did not take him long to reach the exit, as he could see the sunlight shine over the heads of nearby pedestrians. All the while the bottle in his bag clinked together for every stride he took. The moment he reached the exit he collided suddenly with the nearest person, knocking their bicycle down alongside them.

The boy smashed directly into the person, the bags of medicine were sent flying everywhere as both the thief and his unsuspecting victim were sent tumbling across the pavement. It was the perfect accidental ambush. Where two worlds collided under the watchful eye of the sun.

He quickly tried to gather himself after being disoriented by the fall. The entire scene was a mess, bottles lay scattered on the pavement, and his bag was intertwined with the handles of the bicycle. The thief looked around and surveyed the expression of his victim. The person on the bicycle was of average height, his hair was bright yellow and his wardrobe consisted of a black and red jacket. The rest of his out fit was unremarkable, but what caught the thief's attention was the person's face. He had recognized this person before.

"Kenji...?...Kenji Uzamaki?"

"ouch, you really did a number on me, wait ... do I know you?, your face doesn't ring any bells."

The thief quickly touched his face, and realized that his mask fell off during the collision. He scanned his surroundings for his mask and without thinking he picked it up and swiftly placed it over his face. Kenji's eyes widened, the thief had made a fatal error.

"I knew you sounded familiar."

The boy took a defensive stance. But Kenji was already on top of him. Kenji's flung his hand at his face and knocked off his mask, he then curled his fist around the boy's collar and would not let go.

"You, your the reason why I had to sit in a interrogation room for hours answering a million questions, I'm not letting you go this time" Kenji gripped even harder.

"Please let me go , I need to get this medicine to my friend, he is sick and without this medicine he wont make it to the end of the month."

"How do I know that's true? I have no reason to trust you."

"let me prove it to you, I can take you with me, as long as you promise not to do anything crazy when we meet my family."

Kenji released his grip. "Fine , but if you try anything on our way there I wont hesitate to put you down."

They quickly picked up the remaining medicine and placed them in their bags. When they finished, the shuffling sound of garbage could be heard near them. Suddenly a man with a notably large belly and a face full of hair exited the alleyway, still breathing like he had just run a mile.

"You two, have you seen a thief wearing a mask" he moved his hands around his face as he spoke, "It looked like a white bird?"

Kenji spoke up first.

"Yea he actually ran that way" he pointed in a random direction.

The Man stared at the other kid, who appeared to be carrying two large bags in his hands full of festival mask.

"Ok thanks kids, happy fox day."

"No problem" they both replied.

The man took off running in the direction Kenji pointed.

"You have a lot of surprises up your sleeve, transforming the medicine bags was quick thinking."

Kenji smiled "That's one benefit of not using a ninja tool, it doesn't leave behind a trace that ninjutsu had been used and its much quicker to perform simpler Jutsu such as the [Transformation jutsu]."

"I still think its odd, especially for an Uzumaki to not be using a ninja tool , who taught you anyways?"

"My parents" replied Kenji.

"Well we should get going, my friend is waiting, oh ... and by the way my name is Dresden" He outstretched his arm, and shook Kenji's hand.

"Dresden Uchiha." he continued.

After the brief introduction they both made their way, with Dresden leading. They navigated through the city, running from roof top to rooftop. With each movement they got closer to the poorer districts of the city. Until they finally arrived at an area that was known as the Uchiha haven. This district was known for its high density of Uchiha citizens and its connection with crime. Dresden jumped off a roof and landed in front of a small building, that looked run down and abandoned.

"You live here?" Kenji jumped down landing right beside him.

"Yea this is where we live, got a problem with it?"

Kenji raised both hands and shook his head.

They entered the building. The interior of the house was actually well kept despite the outside appearance. The floors were clean and the furniture seemed fairly new, a lot of the furniture in fact appeared to be in pristine condition. Dresden took pride in many things, one was keeping the house clean and presentable. The lavish furniture were of multiple brands, if he could steal a whole set he would. But hitting the same place twice for a matching living room, was not something worth going to jail over. He continued to lead Kenji as they traversed a flight of stairs, when they reached the second floor he approached the door nearest to the stairs and entered.

Dresden opened the door and inside were five individuals, one rested in the bed, while the other four surrounded him as if though they were doctors operating on a patient. They wore deep looks of concern on their face. Dresden looked at his crew as Kenji stared at the group.

"Tatsuke?"

All four of them turned and looked at Kenji.

"What the hell Dresden!" a young girl shouted "You led the enemy straight to our doorsteps?"

The other two were boys, they seemed just as upset as the girl, and echoed her sentiment. Tatsuke looked surprised , but remained silent. Instead his focus was shifted back to the bedridden youngster.

"Your not upset Tatsuke?" said the girl while clenching both of her fist.

"Calm down Claire."

"Calm down?, he's seen our faces and knows your name." she grabbed her hair with both hands as she spoke "Now he knows mine!"

"Relax, he actually figured out who I was yesterday. We go to the same school now, besides we have more important concerns."

She crossed both of her arms, plopped down and took a seat. The other two in the room couldn't help but to agree and redirected their attention to their sick friend.

"Well, now is a great time for introductions" one of the other two boys spoke. Pointing around the room he introduced everyone to Kenji starting with himself.

"My name is Silas Uchiha" he held up a wolf mask to his face and smiled. His long black hair parted ways around his arm as he lifted the mask. He continued.

"That beautiful girl over there is Claire my biological twin, don't worry she's harmless" he picked up a sheep's mask and tossed it to Claire. "That belongs to her."

Claire puffed her cheeks out in frustration as she caught the mask, her black hair was cut short and it brought out the roundness in her cheeks. Her green eyes glimmered as she caught the mask.

"That one over there is our good friend with a short fuse, Sid; Sid the monkey" he tossed a monkey mask to Sid, who knocked it away with his hand.

"Sid Uchiha" he replied with an annoyed tone. His hair was also pitch black, but his eyes unlike Claire's were sharp and his face was rough around the edges.

Silas continued.

"You know our leader already" he pointed to Tatsuke. "And the one sleeping on this bed is Shisu."

Kenji greeted everyone in the room, noting the fox mask sitting next to Shisu's pillow.

"A gang full of Uchiha?" said Kenji.

"Were not a gang, were a family" said Tatsuke, " Dresden hand me the medicine, I think introductions have gone on long enough."

"Here" he handed them over.

Everyone in the room drew closer to Shisu, with Claire now holding one of the medicine bottles she got from Tatsuke.

"Prep the medicine Claire and give it to him."

"Yes" Claire opened the medicine bottle. She poured the medicine inside of another bottle while diluting it with water, afterwards she leaned forward and poured some inside of Shisu's mouth.

Tatsuke brought attention to himself. "Let her do her thing, we will go downstairs and wait for her word" he walked towards the middle of the room and everyone followed him.

They all sat down in the living room area. "So what's wrong with him" said Kenji , while secretly hoping it had nothing to do with their fight two days ago.

"We don't know, we have tried everything , what we do know is that it's some type of respiratory infection, as he's having trouble breathing and his temperature is always rising" Silas folded his hands in contemplation. "At least that's what Claire says, and she's our resident medical ninja."

***

Kenji looked down and remembered the first time he got sick. The doctors were not sure where the infection had come from, but his chakra flow had been deeply disturbed, this caused a massive amount of sweating, and left him bedridden for weeks, it wasn't until three weeks ago he started to get better and eventually recovered. His father told him that a mysterious voice appeared in his head over night and told him to feed Kenji a blue flower that could cure any ailment by re-stabilizing one's chakra, this expunged any impurities in the body. This flower however was discovered to be very rare and hard to find, his father only woke up that very night, to find the flower freshly picked and sitting on his window sill.

Two hours passed as the boys made themselves more comfortable. The quiet of the room was suddenly broken by Claire's footsteps as she walked down the stairs.

She turned to face the boys with a sad look on her face. "He's not getting any better."

"Back to the drawing board I guess" said Dresden.

"I have an idea" Kenji interrupted.

He explained to the group what happened when he was sick, and the nature of the flower, as it was not easy to find. The group leaned forward in full attention as he spoke. He could sense their commitment to finding a solution for their sibling. It reminded him of his time in the Uzumaki Enclave, sitting around other young Uzumaki as tall tales of past wars were told over a large campfire.

"A blue flower?" Tatsuke looked at Kenji.

"Yes."

"And your sure it exist?"

"I'm standing here alive today , am I not?" Kenji placed both hands on his body to ensure the group, he was indeed alive.

"This flower is our best shot at curing him" said Sid.

Claire took a seat next to Kenji and hugged him.

"Thank you."

He blushed. The girl he had been fighting to the death a few days ago was now clinging to him.

"Lets not celebrate to early, we still need to find it."

"You're right" Tatsuke threw a balled up paper at Claire, it hit her head and detached her from Kenji.

"Ouch..." Claire rubbed her head. He continued.

"I know a guy who can find anything, but the world he lives in is dangerous and full of low life scum. We will go there, but we need to make sure our identities are hidden."

Tatsuke pulled out his red mask and placed it on his face. "We have little time to waste, lets go."

The group retrieved their mask and covered their faces. Claire walked up to Kenji and handed him the mask of the fox that Shisu once wore.

"Here" she said gleefully. "Welcome to the gang."

"I'm not joining your group of misfits, but I will help you guys."

Claire folded her arms "You'll come around."

He placed the fox mask on his face and the group headed towards their next destination.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________

Rekka stood on top of the tallest building overlooking the city, as the wind pushed against her back, and the sun pressed against her red hair. She looked down, today was going to be a busy day, not just for herself, but for the citizens as well. The day of the fox was hours from kicking off, and the massive amount of activity that was going to take place, was a perfect cover for her mission. She woke up early so that she could get a head start on crushing Jasper, before he could even think about making an escape.

She took a seat and leaned over the edge of the building and stared at the entrance to the Blue Bird. Her ability to see from long distances was one of her special traits. Rekka leaned further forward and launched herself off of the building and made her way down to the rooftop of the Blue Bird. Here she would wait.

Hours passed.

It was now 3:30 pm and Rekka took up position on the roof, it was now time, as Jasper made no attempt to escape. The city began its celebration, as hundreds filled the streets, music played and the general atmosphere was very loud. As the celebration commenced she made her way inside of the building.

Jasper took refuge on his self proclaimed throne, in this room was twenty of the finest shinobi body guard money could buy, each with state of the art ninja tools. Rekka knew once jasper caught wind of the tracking ninja's demise, that he would fortify his position if he chose not to run. She observed guards placed on all sides of the room, they looked like a small mercenary platoon of shinobi. Contractors from a local agency perhaps?

If it was one thing Jasper had going for him, was the uncanny ability to falsely threat asses any situation. If he didn't want this to be easy for her, he should have at least sealed the room. It was a cost effective scroll, that made prying eyes blind to the contents of any room. Instead she was able to perfectly scout the entire area, reading everyone's chakra signatures.

Jasper twirled his cane as he messaged his chin with his other hand. When suddenly Rekka appeared inside of the room, she stood directly at the entrance.

"I knew you would get in here easily, but I didn't expect this subtly."

"Jasper you expect me to be some type of brute?" you could hear the disappointment in her voice.

The guards took a step back, prepped their ninja tools and prepared to fight, each staring her down as she slowly approached.

"Oh you hired yourselves some lackeys" Rekka placed both hands behind her back as she continued in their direction.

"How about this" she reached into her back pocket, pulled out a headband and wrapped it around her right arm, revealing the Uzumaki house symbol. "I Rekka Uzumaki will allow all of you to live if you just get out of my way, as fellow leaf shinobi just doing your jobs, there is no reason for you to die here for this piece of shit."

One of the guards spoke up, and directed his anger towards Jasper. But his focus remained on Rekka.

"You didn't tell me the person we would be fighting was an Uzumaki, are you out of your mind Jasper?"

"You fool Senzen, I payed you to protect me, you going to run away, because you're afraid?"

"A job, is a job, I never said I would let her pass."

One of his men voiced their concern.

"Boss you sure you want to do this, what about the rumors surrounding the Uzumaki's, they suppose to be unstoppable."

"Relax men those are only rumors. So what, she killed a bunch of spineless tracking ninja, I could do that in my sleep."

Rekka continued to slowly walk forward .

"Rumor or not she said she would let us go, why not take her up on the off -"

"Shut up you fool! and take a look at her eyes" Rekka's eyes burned bright red, and her single pupil resembled that of a feline staring at it's prey. "She made her decision to kill us the moment she stepped in this room."

The room fell silent as sweat poured down the men's face, each prepared to lay down their lives for the other. The slight sounds of a piano could be heard from the room next door, as one of the residents must have remained inside, and was now practicing.

"Lets go men, today is not the day we die!" yelled Senzen.

The men immediately launched themselves towards Rekka and each one unleashed a different Jutsu from their ninja tool. Several sounds of light mechanical screeching permeated the air.

[Fire style: Fire Whip Jutsu]

[Earth style: Sand Storm Jutsu]

[Water style: Water Prison Jutsu]

[Wind style: Wind Scar Jutsu]

A myriad of Jutsu flew towards Rekka , but she was not impressed. She turned to her side and with one hand activated her ninja tool.

[Fire Style: Dragon Flame Jutsu]

A massive dragon made of fire, engulfed her right arm and sprung forth towards the men. The shock wave from activating this jutsu, blew everything away that was directly behind Rekka. Her hair danced with the wind as it pushed around violently, the jutsu was so bright it lit up the entire space around her, you could see her face and the color of her ember eye clearly. The dragon immediately consumed all of the men's jutsu and killed over half of them outright.

"Ahh" Their screams echoed in the air, their corpses rolled around engulfed in flames , while the remaining nine men prepared for a counter attack.

"Hit her now while her jutsu is down."

Rekka smiled, and opted to fight the remaining men in close combat. However the group tried to launch another synchronized jutsu attack on Rekka, they must have assumed she was primarily a fire style user, as any ninja tool user with that much power on display, had to focus on using scrolls of one type for a longer period of time. So they all decided to use water style jutsu and overwhelm her.

It was too late, Rekka closed the distance immediately, the first two men she approached, she broke their defenses an killed instantly, breaking one of the men's neck in a single kick, the other, she threw a kunai directly at his throat.

"Dam monster" yelled Senzen. "Fight me you bitch."

As they fought Jasper began to shake uncontrollably as he started putting on his ninja tool.

Rekka completely dictated the pacing of the fight, she continued with her slaughter, killing another three men by piercing their stomachs with javelins made of fire, with each punch she threw, her ninja tool would activate, and she would follow up with one of these javelin. Her ability to use the ninja tool mid action was phenomenal and on another level, summoning those flame javelin mid punch was like breathing for her. It was no easy task for a shinobi to accomplish.

"Ahhhh" The body of four more men fell, unable to keep up with her advances.

Senzen attempted to save them by firing water bullets at her each time she would engage with one of his men, but she dodged them easily. The only thing he managed to hit was his comrades who's corpses were impaled upright, by the flame javelins that protruded out of the ground.

"I said fight me you bitch" he was desperate and could only save his remaining comrade by taunting her.

"No I shall save you for last" she responded.

She quickly rushed to finish off the last of his men, but then Senzen jumped in her way, directly clashing with her. Both exchanged punches, trying to keep the other on the defensive. Until suddenly Senzen heard a scream, he turned to face his remaining man, and realized Rekka stood behind him with her hand through his chest, and his heart in her hand.

"Nooo!" he screamed as his remaining comrade perished.

Rekka began to laugh menacingly as a clone of herself, was locked in combat with the man , each with their kunai pressing against the other.

"Your not gonna kill me that easily, I wont fall for the same thing twice, and I've seen what you can do now."

"What I can do?" Rekka tossed the still beating heart across the room and it landed on Jasper's lap. He jumped, screamed and knocked the heart away.

"My dear man, I have been but toying with you, allow me to say farewell" she took a bow then released her shadow clone.

[Fire Style: Fire Clone, Fire Prison sealing Jutsu]

Senzen turned to face the clone with his guard ready as it vanished into flame embers. The embers quickly wrapped around him and formed a coffin made of fire, that resembled Rekka's image. He immediately began to scream, as the coffin of fire laid horizontal to the ground, he burned inside of it, like a turkey left in an oven for too long, his skin began to darken, as pieces and bits of him hardened.

This was a very potent sealing jutsu , that required the target to first make contact with the clone, if the target did not engage with the clone in the first ten seconds the sealing portion would not begin to activate and the clone would immediately vanish.

"Ah smells like barbecue in here" said Rekka as she placed both hands on her hips and looked around, taking pride in her handiwork.

"You think this is it?" Jasper stood up, now with the ninja tool on his arm. "I wont go down that easily, those guys were utterly useless, and you saved me the hassle of firing them."

Jasper took off his shirt and reveled his skinny but muscular frame, suddenly a pair of wings made of dense chakra sprung from his back.

"oh" curious, Rekka took a step back and held up both fist.

"Now its time to show you what an Akimichi is made of."

Jasper activated his ninja tool and summoned a small ball of flame, the fire that sat in his hand made Rekka chuckle with embarrassment.

"Someone so rich, yet you cant afford a decent scroll, pathetic."

Jasper smiled, and the spot he once stood, left nothing but and afterimage. He was but inches away from striking her face, the fireball would have slammed directly into head. However, she quickly tilted her head back just in the nick of time, leaving only the tips of her bangs burned.

She jumped back. "Your fast creep, much faster than those losers."

"Is the monster, Rekka Uzumaki complimenting me?"

"Don't flatter yourself jasper, your still going to kiss the ground after I'm done with you."

Jasper activated his insane speed once again, his wings lit up like a Christmas tree each time he moved. Rekka noticed this and dodged each of his initial attacks. He threw a myriad of punches at her, but each and every time she dodged them. The calm expression on her face, was polar opposite to jaspers, as he attempted to land just a single blow. But no matter how hard he tried he could not hit her.

"Do you know what your problem is?" asked Rekka.

Jasper took a step back after having failed another assault on her.

"No enlighten me" he said while breathing heavily.

"Im not moving faster than you, you're just slowing down" she stretched both her arms in front of her as if though she were a mother looking for a child's embrace.

"You lost this fight the moment you let me put you under my Genjutsu, as soon as you witnessed my Fire Dragon Jutsu, you and everyone in this room was placed under it's illusion."

Rekka was fond of using this jutsu, it was ideal for confined spaces and placed it's victim under a shared illusion. One could not discern fiction from reality once it was activated.

"That's impossible" said jasper. "Genjutsu is forbidden, there is no way you would have access to -."

" You should already know jasper, the Uzumaki are not confined to those rules."

Rekka snapped her fingers and the jutsu released itself. Jasper looked around the room and all of his bodyguards were still alive, what he previously witnessed was not their deaths, she only knocked them unconscious.

Stuck in a state of shock, Jasper turned around to look at Rekka, but before he could do anything she punched him so hard his head bounced off the ground and he was immediately knocked out. His wings of chakra slowly vanished and his once skinny and muscular body, was now bovine, hefty as his pot belly draped over his torso. His face rounder, and pudgy. He looked like a swine impersonating the man that once was Jasper Akamichi.

"Huh, who would have known, the conspiracies around the Akamichi were true" she said.

Several minutes passed, and Jasper woke up with Rekka sitting on his throne with a camera in her hand, having snapped several pictures of his flabby body. The bodyguards were still unconscious.

"Oh god no" Jasper looked at his current self.

"So are all Akamichis that fat or is it just you" she laughed uncontrollably.

"Listen, you cant show anyone those photos, my family would kill me, I would be caste aside and my career would be over."

"Its fine, I wont show anyone" Rekka stood up and walked towards him.

He fell to both knees as she approached.

"Don't worry I'm not gonna kill you, I cant, even if I wanted to" she casually glanced towards the direction of the darkest part of the room. "But what I do need from you is what my recently deceased companion asked of you earlier."

"Go on ask away" He looked at the ground and refused to make eye contact as his body shook.

"I am looking for something and I need a way to find it, without getting other stupid people involved, like your tracking ninja that betrayed me. So I'm gonna need you to think real hard for me, what connections do you have that can be useful?"

He exhaled deeply.

"I know a guy, he is the best in the entire city at finding things, and the best part is, with him and his strange methods you will only be dealing with one person, he's in the Black Market district, I will send you the details."

"Excellent, was that so hard, you could have told me this since the beginning , and I wouldn't have had to kill those fools in the forest earlier."

Rekka tossed the camera to him, which he did not hesitate to catch, he smiled and held the camera close to his chest.

"Before you go may I ask one thing" said Jasper.

"Sure go ahead."

"Why didn't you kill these bodyguards, but didn't hesitate to kill those tracking ninja and your own comrade?"

Rekka turned around and smiled.

"It's simple, they were not leaf shinobi, I held no obligation to their lives" she smiled then walked out of the room and pushed past the giant double doors.

Jasper sat on the ground defeated, when he suddenly heard a voice.

"Your lucky we got involved with this mess when we discovered the dead foreign shinobi in the forest."

A man wearing an Anbu mask stepped out from the shadow that Rekka previously looked at.

Jasper jumped, still in fight or flight mode.

"If I wasn't here she probably would have killed you, but then again she does have her own code, but just to be sure, I intercepted her before she got here, and I tagged along."

Jasper turned and faced the man.

"Thank you."

"Stay out of trouble Jasper."

"Wait why do you sound so young?" Jasper leaned forward.

"Anbu hiring kids now" he joked.

"Watch yourself fatty, Rekka wasn't the only one holding a camera." The Anbu soldier stepped back into the shadows as he spoke, and vanished as his last words echoed through the room.