7. Ambush And Rescue

Story Start: Training Field Camp Site

It was probably only the fact that this potential future team was composed of future sealers that kept me and Minato alive the night following my discussions with him and Kushina. Minato had taken second watch after Kushina, and was in fact ten minutes from waking me up for my own shift when he felt three chakra signatures cross the outmost seal barrier. Using the message functions of our goggles, he managed to wake us just as the enemy hit the second barrier which unlike its brother was NOT permeable. The enemy was not to be denied though.

Kushina and I came out of our tents just as there was a loud thunderclap and light briefly replaced night sky as they tried to take down the barrier with a Lightning jutsu. Cursing mentally to myself at how Kushina's kidnapping attempt was happening now rather than after we graduated, I fired off my own message with the googles. Daisuke-sensei luckily was quick to answer though he looked like he had just woken up as he asked "Davis, what is it?"

"We're under attack Sensei, someone just tried to take out our barrier with a lightning jutsu." I said before wincing as an even louder thundercrack sounded out in the woods.

Daisuke-sensei snapped into full wakefulness as he said "I'm on my way, will your barrier hold?"

"Not for long. It's coupled to the Chakra Battery Seal that is powered by the turbine but it hasn't had very long to store chakra." I said as a third lightning strike hit home and there was the sound of shattering glass as the barrier failed. Wincing, I said "Strike that, they're through now, hurry."

There was no more time to say anything else, in an instant the three Lightning shinobi were upon us, swords out and streaming with lightning in an attempt to further blind us. Unfortunately, all that did was tell Minato and me where the overconfident enemies were coming from and we blasted their position with a combined Gale Palm jutsu, shorting out their swords and hurling the three nin back to slam against trees. Kushina fired off a star flare to provide us light even as her chains lashed out securing the three nin to their tree trunks. That backfired though as all three of them sent their lightning chakra down the chains shocking her and Kushina yelped as her chains dissipated, the redhead falling to the ground twitching as she tried to combat the foreign charges in her body, made worse by the fact that she was actually primarily a Water type.

'Crap!' I thought, mentally cursing the fact that Kushina had gotten so good with those chains that it was pretty much instinct for her to use them first. Minato and I quickly put ourselves between Kushina and the three Cloud nin as Minato asked "What are they doing here? They could have easily slipped around us undetected but instead they assaulted our position."

I cut loose with a Wind Senbon jutsu that forced the shinobi to duck behind the trees they had been slammed into even as I said "They're after Kushina."

"How do you know that?!" Minato asked even as he sent his own wind jutsu to smash into the weakened trunks forcing them to topple over, three blurs taking to the treetops showing that the three Cloud nin had gotten out of the way in time.

"She's a female Uzumaki, with all that implies, while we're clan-less, do the math." I grunted as I unsealed what looked like a regional version of a simple flare gun from a storage seal on my right palm. When I pulled the string attached to the long tube though what came out wasn't a simple flare, but a flare with three D-class explosive seals attached to it. As planned, by the time it reached the tree where one of the nin had fled, the flare had burned the attached fuses and the tree briefly disappeared in a fire ball, a loud crashing sound following as the top half of the tree fell down, the trunk destroyed.

A rather ugly look came upon Minato's face as he growled out "Over my dead body!"

"That's the plan brat!" One of the Cloud nin said before he used a Shunshin jutsu to appear right in front of Minato, right leg already out in a kick which connected with Minato's chest hurling him back. The man paid for getting close though as I slammed my left palm into the extended leg, a pocket of chakra forming then overloading in a fraction of a second which detonated in a small blue fireball. The shinobi yelled out in pain as chunk of skin and muscle the size of an egg was torn out of his leg then backhanded me away before I could grab Kushina and open the range again.

It was my turn to slam into a tree again and I couldn't help the 'Ooph!' that escaped me as the wind was blown out of my lungs. The cloud nin reached down to grab Kushina only for Minato to replace with her and he slammed a kick into the nin's groin. The man stiffened with a sound that sounded almost like a horse before he sunk to his knees.

But while Minato was dealing with that one, it left a still recovering Kushina undefended from the other two. I saw one of them dropping from the tree Kushina was now under, the girl still twitching. Scowling, I substituted with a near by stick that had fallen from that same tree sometime before the three of us had made camp here and tackled the man away from her. Even as we hit the ground, the man tried to paralyze me by streaming Lightning chakra into my body but I had already began streaming my own Wind chakra around me and the electricity fizzled out. We rolled a couple of times on the ground, the bigger enemy using his strength to get on top of me while I used my exploding chakra pocket to do the same, before the nin slammed a punch into the side of my head that threw me off of him and left me seeing stars. From my position on the ground, I could see the third Shinobi hoisting Kushina on his shoulder before blurring out of our camp site. Before I could even think of going after him though my opponent took two steps forward than slammed his foot down on my face and darkness rapidly overcame me.

Time Skip: A Few Minutes Later

A rather strong smell in my nose had me groaning as I opened my eyes. Kneeling next to me was Daisuke-sensei, a stick of smelling salts in his hand. He had apparently moved Minato over to my side because he was already sitting up and rubbing at his own head, a rather nasty bruise beginning to form on his temple. Quickly sitting up, I said "Kushina, is she?"

Daisuke-sensei shook his head and said "She's not here. Unfortunately, your attackers bugged out just before I got here."

"Why'd they leave us alive? One of them said that they planned to kill us." Minato asked.

"I had been watching the fight thanks to your goggles. When I saw both of you go down I flared my chakra. I was close enough at that time to spook them and they took off." Daisuke-sensei said, tapping his own set of goggles.

"Thanks for that, but we need to go after them." I said as I began to get up to my feet.

"No, I need to go after them. You two just got your backsides whipped. I want you both to head back to the village to report what happened and get medical attention." Daisuke-sensei said firmly. He stood up and began moving to the closest tree, clearly intending to tree hop in order to make up for lost time.

"Sir, with all due respect, I can't do that." Minato said, also getting to his feet and causing Daisuke-sensei to pause before he leapt up. Pushing the polarized goggles up to his forehead so that way we could see the stern stare of his hawk like single eye on his face as he looked over his shoulder at us, Daisuke-sensei said "You want to say that again Academy Student?"

Minato winced at the reminder that he wasn't even a Gennin yet but firmed his stance as he said "Kushina is our friend sir, and Davis and I both aren't the types to just stand back while she's in trouble. Even if you left without us, we'd just follow anyway."

"Is that so?" Daisuke-sensei asked, turning back towards us with crossed arms. Glancing at me, he continued "Davis, do you feel the same?"

I gave a deep sigh and said "My logical mind is saying to follow your orders sensei, but the emotional part is currently pulling it into a back alley to try and beat it to death."

Daisuke-sensei gave a wry chuckle and shook his head as he said "You always did like your metaphors kid." A moment later, he sighed and said "I could, and should have a shadow clone make sure you stay, but even that might not be enough. Alright, you two can come with me, but you will do exactly as I say, am I clear?"

He glared at us at the end and both Minato and I stiffened as we automatically gave hand to forehead salutes and said "Yes sir!"

Daisuke-sensei snorted at that before he created a shadow clone which immediately took off back into the village and said "Alright, let's get going then. Going by Kushina's tracking seal, they're going at a fast run to open the distance as much as possible. Given what you did to one of their legs Daisuke, they are either going to have to stop for a break within the hour to treat it or have one of the others carry him slowing them down but that won't matter if we don't make up for lost time."

"Right." Minato and I said with nods and we quickly followed Daisuke-sensei up into the trees, using the branches to cover more ground for less effort than we would have by running along the ground.

Around forty minutes later we were almost on top of them. Attempts to contact Kushina had failed, her voice muffled and unintelligible, showing that she was gagged and also showing that we needed to add a mental component to the communication seals. That would come later though, since while Kushina couldn't speak, she could still turn her head showing that she was on the shoulder of one of the Cloud ninja bound along with a chakra suppressant seal on her right wrist while another was carrying the wounded nin piggy back, both mobile shinobi running like they had the Shinigami himself on their heels. Of course, with Daisuke-sensei, AKA Death's Hawk coming up behind them, that was a pretty close comparison.

His yellow eye narrowing, Daisuke-sensei said "I'll replace with Kushina and deal with these three punks, you two get her up to the tree tops and free. Do not interfere."

"Hai sensei!" Minato and I said, Minato moving from the back left position of our triangle formation to behind Daisuke-sensei in preparation to catch Kushina and we hit the metaphorical after burners, quickly closing the remaining hundred yards. With their hands full, neither of the runners could do anything as we flew overhead and the carried nin didn't even get a chance to finish his hand signs before Daisuke-sensei replaced with Kushina and slammed his fist into his throat crushing it even as it knocked the nin off his buddy's back and onto the ground. Needless to say, the change in weight threw off the other carrying Cloud nin's balance and he tumbled to the ground, Daisuke-sensei easily rolling away backwards and coming up with his tonfa out and spinning, a savage grin on his face as he said "Nice night for a run isn't it?"

"Oh fuck, it's Death's Hawk!" The Cloud nin who had been carrying his buddy said with panic filled eyes. That shinobi in turn was making grasping motions at his neck in desperation as he choked to death from Daisuke-sensei's blow.

Daisuke-sensei smirked and said "You spark heads really messed up, ambushing my three students like that. I'm afraid I'm going to have to teach you boys a lesson." There was an ominous SHINK sound from his tonfas as the hidden blades popped out and then he was among the two, a whirling dervish of bladed death.

Meanwhile, Minato and I were standing on the highest branch of a nearby tree that could take our weight. I removed Kushina's gag then started on her bindings, Minato easily carrying her as I worked. As I undid the rope around her, I asked "Kushina, are you feeling alright?"

Kushina nodded and said "I don't think they drugged me or anything." Blushing as she glanced from my face to Minato's she said "Thanks for coming after me guys."

Minato smirked down at her and said "We're not letting you get away from us that easily."

"Yeah, I'm afraid you're stuck with us, just like a roach checking into a motel." I said with a smirk.

Kushina slapped my shoulder with her now free hand even as she giggled and said "That's terrible Davis!"

A sudden scream of pain from below us broke up the mood and all three of us winced as we once more paid attention to the video feed provided by Daisuke-sensei's goggles. Looking a little green, Minato said "Geeze, I didn't even know you could do that to a guy with his arm still attached."

"Apparently you can." I said, a little queasy myself.

That turned out to be the cloud nin's right hand shoved about an inch past the wrist up the unfortunate guy's ass, his shinobi pants and underwear apparently nowhere near enough to stop the gruesome sight from happening. The poor bastard was hopping around trying to get the two body parts separated while Daisuke-sensei took on the other nin tonfa to sword. The blades on his tonfa were chakra conductive and glowing white hot with fire chakra absolutely ruining the man's sword from all the times he had to block Daisuke-sensei's punishing swings. Even as we watched Daisuke sliced right through the sword just above the hilt and he Spartan kicked the suddenly wide open shinobi into the trunk of the tree we were in so hard we actually felt the whole tree shudder from the impact, more than a few leaves shaken loose and floating down to the ground.

Immediately locking onto the 'grievously wounded' nin, Daisuke's tonfas popped back into their storage seals as his hands blitzed through hand signs and we heard him shout out "Water Style: Hidden Geyser Jutsu!" There was the sound of a foot stomping the ground and then a blast of water shot up under the Cloud nin's feet and blasted him up into the air so high the three of us actually had to lift our heads as he passed us to keep him in sight. Just as he began to fall back to earth, Daisuke replaced with him, rapidly went through another set of hand signs and called out "Lightning Style: Heaven's Wrath Jutsu!"

A massive bolt of lightning lanced down and the thoroughly soaked nin screamed in agony for a moment before abruptly falling silent. Daisuke dropped down to the ground next to him as easily as hopping down from the last two steps of a set of stairs, leaning down and checking the nin's pulse, nodding at what he found.

"DAMN!" Minato, Kushina, and I all said together, eyes wide at how brutally, and more importantly, rapidly Daisuke-sensei had taken down the three shinobi that had given us so much trouble. All three of us jerked a little as said Jounin said over our coms seals "Alright you three, you can come down now."

Minato and I dropped down to the ground, Minato finally setting Kushina back onto her feet even as he said "I am suddenly very glad that you are a Leaf nin sensei."

"Ditto." Kushina and I said together causing Daisuke-sensei to chuckle.

Pointing past us to the nin who he had slammed into our tree, Daisuke-sensei said "Get that guy into a stasis seal Davis. I think the boys in T&I would like to have a word with him. I'll deal with these other two."

"Right." I said with a nod, turning around and quickly unsealing sealing ink and paper along with a brush to make said seal. When I was finished, I saw Daisuke-sensei putting two scrolls that had black borders on them into his Jounin vest pocket and the veteran clapped his hands as he said "Alright, we're done here, let's get back to the Village."

"Hai sensei." The three of us said and we quickly took back up to the trees, crisis averted. For now, anyway.

END

Author's Notes: Update Schedule and Poll on Profile

Sorry for the wait on this one, I had to scrap the first draft of the ambush scene because I thought three Academy students holding their own against full fledged shinobi for more than a minute if that was rather unbelievable. After that I got held up clearing my Deviant Art Notifications Cache. Work didn't help matters either but now I'm just making excuses.

Anyways, I hope I showed Daisuke-sensei in a good light. It's hard to write a badass mentor figure going to town on what amounts to mooks in a way that is both able to showcase their skills and be a believable fight scene. Still, let me know what you think about him.