Connecting the Dots: Finalization

Finalization

“Have to say, I’m surprised at you.”  Shikamaru remarked.

The enormous dark man that had been Luthor five seconds ago turned to regard him.  “Why, foolish mortal?”

“Just the way you’re going about this.”  A simple gesture indicated the scene directly below their invisible, floating box.  The floor seethed with sixteen ninjas and some hundred heroes, battling more or less across the room, though various screens showed a number of fights that had crashed out into the streets or other areas of the MetroTower.  Though he couldn’t pretend to know the powers of all the different metas present (though he was fast cataloging them), Shikamaru felt this might have been an uneven match, if Naruto hadn’t spawned about ten thousand clones into existence.  They didn’t do much besides throw around Rasengans, but they were EVERYWHERE, and the heroes were pretty badly disoriented by the whole… Naruto-ness of the room.

Of course, something about those red and yellow streaks shooting through everything seemed to be helping too.  Shikamaru had no idea what they were, but they seemed to be keeping the metas completely off balance.  Hopefully they would keep it up.

The man’s stone grey face was still staring at him for an explanation.  Shikamaru decided to go for it.  “If I was a god, I wouldn’t even be pretending to lead my forces into battle like that,” said he, pointing at a clone of his captor in the thick of the fight, nonchalantly punching clones away.  “Any big brute with more muscles than brains could do that.  SUPERMAN could do that, if it came down to it.”  Shikamaru noted the faint stiffening of his enemy and smiled inwardly.  “Seems awfully stupid.  Last I heard, gods don’t fight their own battles, they get pitiful mortals to fight them out for them.”

“That is just and proper,” nodded the other.

“Don’t know about that, but it’s what gods do.  Well, all gods except you, apparently.”

The man’s glowing eyes regarded Shikamaru for a moment.  “Your duplicity is so unbounded, mortal, that I cannot discern whether you seek to manipulate me into removing my avatar, or, by reverse psychology, into removing my pawns.”

“So much for unbounded wisdom,”  yawned Shikamaru

“The human mind is a mystery even to gods.  Your mind in particular.  However, I think I shall outmatch you this time, mortal.”  A small curve twisted the edge of the creature’s mouth.  “Rather than removing my avatar OR my pawns, I shall retain both.  I have underestimated you and your friends too often for me to make the same mistake again.”

“Promises, promises.  Well, knock yourself out, I guess.”  Shrugging, Shikamaru leaned back in his chair and folded his hands behind his head.  “You wanna play chess?  You might find this battle thing interesting, but its sorta dull to me.”

“A worthy attempt, Mr. Nara, but no.”  Just a trace of Luthor’s amusement filtered into the monster’s deep bass.  “I may have two bodies, but I have only one focus, and I should prefer to spend it on the real battle.”

“Suit yourself.”  Another yawn hid Shikamaru’s growing dismay.  Truthfully, he hadn’t expected to live beyond the prison breakout, and had more or less resigned himself to being an early casualty of Luthor’s rage.  But having lived thus far, his mind was busily working on ways to KEEP living as long as possible, or at least to keep as many of his friends living as could be arranged.

Unfortunately, none of his usual tricks seemed to be working.  Shikamaru was unsure how to handle this bigger, darker Luthor—or Darkseid, if he’d heard that right—and there weren’t many other ways of affecting the battle from this floating box, what with him being magically bound to the chair and all.  It looked as though he’d be doomed to remain a spectator in this battle, helpless to aid or hinder his friends.

Young man, who are you?  Are you alright?

Before Shikamaru quite had time to process the existence of a voice in his head, and the possible implications that raised, another voice chimed in.  And this voice was familiar.
Shikamaru?

-------------

Listen everyone, I found Shikamaru.  I’m updating him now.

Sakura really didn’t care for Ino’s interruptions, however vital.  For one, they made it really, really hard to focus, something kinda important when you were trying to keep a certain Thanagarian’s mace from entering your skull.  For two, Sakura had more than enough voices in her head already, and Ino’s wasn’t making the other’s any happier.

But then, maybe that was making her so doggone POWERFUL right now.

Sakura had never felt such a rush of adrenaline, such an absolute euphoria of rage.  Some corner of her mind distantly noted that she was screaming, roaring in glee as her huge twin axes slashed away at Hawkgirl, whipping back just in time to block the powerful blow from her mace.  The shudder of the strike shot through the blade and vibrated through the handles, but Sakura wasted no time thinking about it, for she moved with the force, yielding under Hawkgirl’s pressure to duck into a roll and go right between the Thanagarian’s legs.  

Huh.  Some kind of teenager with a golden rod was flying at her.  Sakura batted her away with the flat of her axe, then whirled up just in time to catch Hawkgirl’s mace on the upswing.  This was actually kind of fun, in a way, like the sparring bouts she’d had with Hawkgirl.

Except a lot more forceful.  And with a ton of more people running around.  And, of course, everyone was using sharp, pointy objects.  

Sakura caught the crackling mace in the crook of one of her axes, trying to whip it away from Hawkgirl.  It was doomed to fail, but it gave her time to whip out her other axe and give Shayera a healthy slash across the midsection.  Sakura tried to follow that up with a clubbing attack at the head, but Hawkgirl had recovered by then and her mace swung back around to knock the axe aside.  A quick writhe of her body carried Sakura just barely away from the mace’s return strike, but it also threw her off balance, sending her tumbling to the floor.

Sakura’s brain barely had time to process the sight of the mace whizzing at her before an orange blur shot over head and bowled into Hawkgirl full force, knocking her backwards and sending the mace flying.  With a curse, the Thanagarian tore the Naruto clone off her and hurled him at the ceiling, where he exploded into smoke.

Fumbling wildly for her axes, Sakura sprang to her feet, painfully conscious of the poofs and small explosions of smoke behind her.  It was good to be alive and all, but knowing that about thirty  different clones had died to give you enough time to get back up dampened your enthusiasm considerably.  Getting a firmer grip on her axes, she charged at the unarmed Hawkgirl, who growled and flew right at her.  

It was all in a second… axes flashing—a sudden flurry of wings—a great punch to her abdomen—a strong sensation of weightlessness, of violent motion—a desperate flailing of her free arm—again weightlessness—then a collision with the ground (or at least with a Naruto clone) that knocked the wind out of her.

The clones did their best to provide a protective ring as she struggled up, but Sakura was only just hobbling to her feet when a screaming Black Canary broke through and aimed a series of kicks at her.  Sakura deflected the first more or less on luck, the second knocked her back, but on the third she blocked the leg, grabbed it, and threw Canary bodily across the room.

A roaring attracted her attention leftwards.  Hawkgirl was back, and she’d found her mace again.  Sakura threw up her axe to block the blow.

To her horror, Hawkgirl’s mace broke the axe’s blade in half and smashed into her side.  Pain danced through Sakura’s head and darkness swam in her vision, but she managed to bring up her other weapon and smash the Thanagarian across the face with it.

As her winged opponent stumbled backwards, Sakura caught the flash of red and gold out of the corner of her eye.  Something grabbed hold of her…

----------

Sakura’s been replaced.  Don’t worry about her, just keep at it now!  Shikamaru says we need to buy some time!

Chouji didn’t like fighting at the best of times.  It was annoying, it was tiring, and most of the time, it tended to be painful.  He liked Naruto well enough, but he’d never understood his friend’s delight for combat.

But fighting at the worst of times—when all other options had been exhausted and things were really desperate—that was something Chouji could do.  He wouldn’t like it, but he could do it.

And right now, despite the half-dozen bullets in his kneecap, despite the enormous fist Atom Smasher was trying to plant in his face, despite the annoying silver man flying around his head, despite the fact that his head kept bumping against the twenty-foot-tall ceiling, Chouji couldn’t be happier.  Not because the situation was desperate—though it was—but he had voices in his head.

Chouji, Shikamaru needs you to occupy more of the meta force and draw them away!  We’re losing too many of the clones and the Flash team can’t keep this up forever!

“Yes we can!” protested a yellow blur as it raced past Chouji’s ear.

Shikamaru was back!  He was okay, and he was back, and he was giving orders again, and everything was going to be awesome again!  Okay, so apparently the bald guy had some incredibly powerful world-controlling genjutsu thing that was turning all the heroes against them.  (Or something like that… Chouji hadn’t caught all of Hinata’s explanation.)  So what?  Shikamaru was back!

And if Shikamaru wanted him to distract more of the hero-people, heck, that’s what he’d do!

Ducking under Atom Smasher’s fist, Chouji charged forwards, stomping his way through the crowd of heroes.  He shoved a massive elbow deep into Atom Smasher’s side, sending the massive man stumbling backwards.

Chouji, watch your step!  You just about smashed Sai!

Suppressing an unworthy thought about if that would be so bad, Chouji planted his feet and stood still.  His charge had served its purpose, though… more heroes had gotten upset, and now a whole new team of them was attacking.

The silver man whizzed in front of him, raising a giant hammer.  Chouji tried to swat him aside, but the man slipped through his fingers and struck him directly on the temple.  It didn’t exactly daze Chouji, but it did smart.  Almost on reflex, his hand slapped his head, and a badly-mangled Steel tumbled earthward.

Oh dear.  They were probably going to hear it about that.

More bullets, pounding into his kneecap.  Chouji tried to unseat Vigilante through a little foot-shuffle, but the westerner easily avoided his massive foot and continued firing away.  And now there was some black lady in an orange outfit running up his leg, clinging to his pants like a cat, weaving skillfully around his attempts to knock her off.  And there were… ow!  

Turning around, Chouji saw Green Lantern shooting at him, green energy shooting from his power ring to smash against Chouji’s massive frame.  Even as he turned, an enormous fist formed from the energy and dealt him a devastating right hook.

Chouji’s falling!  Chouji’s falling!  Clear the area, clear the area!

Metal and concrete cracked under his weight, leaving a vaguely Chouji-shaped depression in the floor.  Before he could even think of getting up, heroes were swarming over him, cutting away at his armor with lasers, swords, sharp claws, anything they had on hand.  One apparently humorous Leaguer began to stab away at his hind end.

Chouji, however, was more occupied with the green glow zooming toward him.  It was swelling in size, starting to grow into what looked like a giant-sized Luthor.  And out of the corner of his eye, Chouji could see Atom Smasher getting up.

This was bad, Chouji realized.  He didn’t even know if he could handle Green Lantern, much less Lantern, Smasher, and the two dozen heroes swarming over his backside.

But he had to.  Shikamaru and the others were depending on him.  

Slowly, carefully, Chouji struggled to his feet, trying to shake off as many of the little tag-on heroes as possible.  They were all over his back, there were a number on his legs and a select annoying few had reached his head.  But he couldn’t deal with them right now.  Green Lantern was almost here.  Chouji planted his feet, brought up his fists, and…

“YOSH!”

A green and orange blur raced up his back, plowing a swathe through the heroes adorning it.  It shot across Chouji’s neck, through his hair, off his head and straight into the giant green Luthor.

“Dynamic Entry!”

Chouji didn’t exactly have time to wonder what Gai-sensei was doing here, or whether he seriously would be able to take on Green Lantern himself.  All he had time to do was turn around and meet Atom Smasher’s onslaught.

Chouji couldn’t risk stepping backward, or even stumbling, not with so many of his friends around.  And for the same reasons, he couldn’t very well let Atom Smasher go crashing down either.  So he could only let Atom Smasher hit him like a freight train and hold him there, sumo-style, while trying to ignore the heroes carving initials into his skin.
Chouji stood there, muscles heaving, bones creaking, nerves strained to the highest pitch, his fingers firmly clasped about Atom Smasher.  He could feel the hero growing in size and did his best to match it, but it was only a matter of time before he reached his limit.  To top it off, the lady in the orange costume had clawed her way up to his face and was tearing her way up his cheek.  He had an uncomfortable feeling she was headed for his eye.  Slowly, his left foot slid backwards.
Chouji!  Don’t fall, practically our whole team is right behind you there!

Something was pricking the back of his neck—a hero of some kind, probably, stabbing away.  Atom Smasher was still growing.

Listen, Chouji, get out of here!  You can’t fight in these quarters, you need to get those guys off of you!

Heaving mightily, Chouji tried to push Atom Smasher away but the man was simply too big.  He grew to match it, nearly bending over double to fit in the room.  All across his back he felt burning sears and slashes as his armor and cloth began to give way.  Something slashed away at his Achilles tendon and he fell to one knee.
Chouji!

Chouji’s eyes snapped open.  With a growl, he pushed himself up, shaking loose two or three unwary hitchhikers.  He shrank, leaving Atom Smasher’s fingers grasping nothing but air, then grew again at an astonishing rate, barreling in size upwards straight into Smasher.  And as he continued to grow, smashing up into the ceiling and through the next floor, brilliant blue wings burst from his back.

-------------

I… I… okay.  Okay.  Chouji just took out… uh… half of the metas, I think.  Took out, I mean, they’re outside, not dead, but…  Anyway, you don’t have to worry about it.  Just keep at it.

Sai wondered why Ino thought he WOULD worry.  Chouji was a fine comrade, but hardly a close friend.  Granted, Sai didn’t have many comrades either, but in this situation… it was a battle, and sacrifices had to occasionally be made.  If Chouji died taking out half of the meta force, or even a quarter, it would be a better death than many another ninja could have achieved.

But of course, as Sai hastily reminded himself, that was morbid and slightly inhuman way of viewing the situation.  You weren’t supposed to consign your comrades to death, and he wasn’t doing that to Chouji.  Chouji was a big boy, after all.  He could take care of himself.

Although, Sai reflected as he unleashed a new set of ink hawks, these weren’t exactly your average set of opponents.  They ate up most of his lesser monsters, and he really didn’t have enough of the bigger ones to meet them all.  He could draw more, of course, but he didn’t really think he wanted to risk that at this rate of…

Sai backflipped out of the way of Question’s left hook and finished his drawing in mid-air, sending three snakes gliding in the conspiracy theorist’s direction.  Hearing a slight whirring out of the corner of his ear, he landed in a crouch and let a stray T-sphere go whizzing over his head.  He turned to face Terrific, but even as he did, the scientist was engulfed in a globe of insects.

Sai had just barely time to feel relief at that before he found himself whipping away from a rather psychotic woman with a katana.  Sai brought out his own sword to block it, but he couldn’t pretend to be anywhere near the lady’s skill level with her sword.  Still, no major problem.  Sai inhaled and blew a cloud of ink right into the woman’s face, then gave her a sharp rap on the head.

Something heavy landed behind him.  Sai rolled away on instinct and came up facing his opponent.  An burly, quite ordinary-looking man covered in tattoos.  What sort of…

Sai’s unspoken question was answered as three snakes writhed off the man’s arm and shot at him.  Quicker than sight, Sai’s pen formed three hawks, which grabbed the snakes and proceeded to tear them apart.  The tiger tattoo adorning the man’s chest came to life and leapt at him, roaring.  Sai rolled away, scribbling a few finishing touches on a lion that erupted off the page and charged at the tiger.  As they fought, Sai sent his remaining ink hawks at the man’s head and used the distraction to get in close and deliver a few quick blows at decisive points.

Sai watched as the man slumped to the floor.  An interesting opponent, he mused.  I wonder if…

Sai!  Look out!

Almost automatically, Sai ducked, letting three bullets whizz over his head, bullets he was sure wouldn’t have missed him if it hadn’t been for that whoosh of yellow energy out of the corner of his eye.  Already he was up and racing toward the source of the bullets, dodging his way through the battle.  Sure, there were TONS of enemies to choose from here, but right now he needed to deal with the one that was specifically interested in him.

He found him about halfway up the wall, hanging there with one powerful arm and throwing off Naruto clones with the other.  His single red optic caught sight of Sai and instantly he unleashed a swarm of bullets, but this time Sai was ready and performed a quick substitution.

KGBeast?  Isn’t he a villain?  His subconscious answered, So is Luthor.

Nodding absentmindedly in agreement, Sai shot up the wall, already sketching on his scroll.  A new patch of snakes popped out, snaring the man’s arms and legs for all of five seconds before they burst apart under the strain of holding him.  Those five seconds gave Sai the chance to close the gap to him, but the man simply let go of the wall and plummeted to the floor, firing away at him all the way down.  Despite Sai’s efforts, several of the bullets grazed his side and he winced.

Need to close the distance, he reminded himself as he dashed down the wall and into the crowd.  Too dangerous at long range.  Quickly his fingers flew in a seal, and a new Sai condensed out of ink beside him.  He shot out of the crowd, ahead of Sai, straight at KGBeast, and nearly covered half the distance before exploding into a bullet-ridden cloud of ink.

But in the meantime, Sai had slipped around behind the man.  Quick as sight, his paper flipped out, and an enormous gorilla leapt off the page and onto KGBeast.

That should occupy him for a moment or so, thought Sai, flipping to a new page in his sketchpad.  And now that I have a breather… let us see how Susanoo would affect this battle.

--------------

Okay, everybody, we’ve got a momentary advantage!  Sai’s Susanoo should keep a large section of the metas occupied for a while, so press the fight!  We need to get through to Darkseid!

Shino filed away the knowledge and continued fighting.  A beautiful system, this… much like a hive mind.  The experience was granting him new insight into the viewpoints and techniques of his allies, insight that could doubtless be incorporated into more effective jutsus at a later date.

‘Later’ being the operative term, of course.  Attempting to devise new jutsus in the midst of combat would simply not be optimum.  Naruto might excel at that sort of improvisation, but Shino did not.  Aburame had to work with their insects, and you couldn’t train insects to perform totally new attacks in the course of a few seconds.

Regrettable, because his current opponent seemed to be able to adapt his floating robotic sphere to any new format he chose.  Even more regrettably, his opponent appeared to be an extremely creative man.

Shino dodged the first ball shooting at his foot and made a stab at the one circling his head.  His allies were occupied with the third… thank goodness this man only seemed to have three of these things on hand.  But they didn’t seem to be making much progress ripping it apart, and their effect on its speed was negligible.  Some new tactic was required, clearly.

A buzzing of the insects on his shoulder warned Shino of the first globe’s return.  He’d placed a tracker bug on all three of the globes, and males got agitated whenever they approached.   It wasn’t much of a warning, but, in a time like this, it was enough of an edge for him to pivot on his left foot, ducking as he did so, and avoid the speeding T-sphere.  

Each of the T-spheres (Shino had noted) needed a little space in order to build up anything like damaging momentum, and his sudden movement caught the orbiting sphere off-guard.  It fumbled for a little before re-orienting itself, but by the time it found him, Shino had hurled an exploding note.

BOOOM!

Curious, observed Shino as he picked himself up off the ground.  The explosion was disproportionate to the actual size of the sphere.  Clearly, those T-sphere’s contained a great deal of energy.  He was a lightning type, could he--? But no.  They moved too fast, too elusively, and anyway Shino had never attained a full mastery over his element.

Shino had only an instant of respite, but he used it to the full.  He recorded data about the surrounding battle, about his position in it, about the probable impact on the increasingly-loud explosions that denoted where Naruto and Sasuke were.  He noted his opponent, easily cutting through rank after rank of Naruto clones, and for the first time realized that he was not Terrific’s only opponent.  Even while fighting Shino, Terrific was constantly battling off several clones with his additional spheres—apparently he did indeed have more than three.  

The observation increased Shino’s respect of his opponent, and also exacerbated his regret at their battle, but it could not be helped.  Ino had made the stakes of this situation very clear.  If Shino had to kill the man to get through, he would.

With this in mind, Shino leapt back into action.  A single outstretched arm sent out the command, sending his insects boiling outwards toward the man.  Their ranks were too thin, their range too broad for any T-sphere to block.

Or so Shino thought.  Terrific, somehow sensing the assault, instantly whirled about, sending two spheres at the swarm of bugs.  Energy crackled between them as they whirled round and round each other, spinning faster and faster in a widening whirlwind.  Shino’s swarm was blown apart by the force, his many allies dispersed to the wind, left to wander their way back to his coat and re-organize.  A few made it through, but they found themselves thwarted by the superhero’s skin-tight spandex costume.    (Shino reflected momentarily as to whether there might be a hidden insight to Lee’s  obsession with such clothing, but discarded the notion nearly instantly.)  Defeated, they too swarmed back to their master.

Shino had not been idle.  It had taken every second of his speed and instinct to dive out of the way of Terrific’s makeshift hurricane, but once he had, he had wasted no time on the opening.  Terrific’s other spheres were still occupied with the Naruto clones, the only two he could spare on Shino were still whirring away behind him and would take a few moments to change velocity.  This left Terrific (momentarily) without his allies.  Shino shot forward, a kunai raised in his hand.

Now Shino was generally considered a genius, even among the Aburame.  That did not, though, mean that he was an exceptionally gifted taijutsu artist.  His talents were more than acceptable for a ninja, but they did not reach the levels of, for example, Sai. (Lee and Neji did not even bear thinking about.)  

So when he closed with Terrific and found the other to be an expert in several different forms of martial arts, two of which were completely novel to him, Shino was understandably discomfited.  The advantage was still Shino’s—ninja training was more generally comprehensive than most earth forms, and Shino had been training since he could walk—but this needed to be done quickly, more quickly than a full-out fight would allow.  And his allies were not yet sufficiently reinforced for a cocooning attack.

Shino made his decision.  Blocking a downward chop from the scientist, he threw a handful of insects in the man’s face, commanding them to swarm his eyes.  Terrific still kept his ground remarkably well, apparently now relying on sound, or perhaps feedback from his returning spheres, but the distraction was more than enough for Shino to whip past the man’s defenses and touch several key points on his neck.

Terrific slumped to the floor, unconscious.  All about the battlefield, his spheres flickered and died.

Turning with a sigh of relief, Shino was just about to run on to a new target when a dark-gloved hand came out of nowhere and dealt him a sharp chop to the neck.

-------

Shino’s down, guys, but I’ve sent Sai over to take care of him.  He took down Terrific, that frees up a lot of the Naruto clones, and those spheres you were all complaining about should be gone now too.  Better hurry, though, Sai’s Susanoo can’t last much longer.

Neji did not bother to even think ‘Roger.’  He simply let go of the string and let the arrow fly, then nocked another without even waiting to see if it would hit.  Already his Byakugan eyes were seeking out a new target, on the far side of the room.

Generally Neji, as a close-combat specialist, moved constantly about the battlefield, debilitating ninjas as he went.  And at the start, that had been his role here, also.  He’d dashed through the hero ranks, taking opponents out one by one.  But it’d been going far too slowly.  All of these metas seemed to have substantial training of some kind or another, and his Jyuuken style was not nearly as effective without a chakra network to aim at.  True, Neji had been fighting villains without networks for months now, but heroes seemed to be much more talented.  And MUCH more durable, unless that was Luthor’s Equation at work.  Their vastly superior numbers didn’t help either, Neji couldn’t really focus with all that was going on.

Things had changed after he’d found Speedy, though.  He remembered the shrimpy teenager from his training sessions with Green Arrow.  He’d been Green Arrow’s partner (or his sidekick, Neji still wasn’t sure which), and a Titan’s leader at one point.  Now, of course, he was another Luthor-brainwashed crazy, but that hadn’t changed the fact that he was Neji’s inferior, at least in close-range taijutsu.  While the fight hadn’t been easy, it’d been one of the quicker ones, and it ended with Neji holding Speedy’s bow.

That had added significantly to his options.  Neji was nowhere near as good at the bow as he was at jabbing people, but apparently most heroes were nowhere near as good at dodging arrows as they were at dodging bullets.  Neji didn’t understand it, but he still could use it.

He’d eventually fallen onto a mixture of both techniques, a mixture that more or less involved picking them off at long range before closing in to completely disable them at close range.  And, when time allowed, running to a vantage spot on the wall and shooting off a few arrows until someone noticed him.

Like now.  Apparently that last shot had been just a bit too much, someone was starting to break off from the main group of heroes, heading more or less in his direction.  Worse, they were flying.  Flying on a small metal disc crackling with Raiton energy…

Static.

Neji leapt off the wall seconds before the bolt of lightning struck it.  Already he had the bow out, shooting off arrows at Static, but none of them hit.  The teen simply deflected any that came too close.  Still, at least that kept him from shooting any further charges after Neji as the ninja fell earthward.

Neji landed easily, whipping the bow onto his back and raising his hands in the Jyuuken style as Static raced toward him.  As the electrical onslaught began again, Neji whirled about in an elaborate Kaiten, deflecting the attacks outward into surrounding Leaguers.  Faster and faster he spun, as Static flew closer and closer, hurling bolt after bolt, until suddenly, as Static’s disc neared impact, he leapt up, up and over the flying teenager, before plummeting down, hands glowing.

CRAAASSH!

Neji didn’t need the dust to clear, he could already see he’d failed.  With nearly unbelievable reflexes, Static had flipped over in mid-air, upturning his flying disc to meet Neji’s attack.  The disc itself was severely cracked in places, and the Byakugan revealed a few broken bones in Static’s right wrist, but the teenager himself was unharmed.

And, Neji realized belatedly, fully capable of unleashing another attack.

Pain crystalized on Neji’s palm, lancing its way up his arm and through his body before he could even think.  His muscles seized up, his vision darkened, his mind grew fuzzy.  Static’s attack had nowhere near the ferocity of Livewire’s, but it had been delivered at much closer range, and Neji could barely even feel most of his body over the overwhelming, pounding pain.  Through the mist on the edges of his vision, he saw Static rearing up his disc, and realized something.

These heroes would kill.

The red-and-yellow blur flashed across Neji’s immediate area, and suddenly Static was flying backwards, repelled by an unseen force.  He’d no sooner hit the ground than three Naruto clones piled on him, and though he soon dispelled them with a shockwave, by the time he was up Neji had recovered and was once again waiting for him.

This time Neji went directly for the offensive, spinning into a Kaiten immediately and bearing down on Static with breathtaking speed.  The other teen no longer had his flying disc, but the metal floor beneath him ripped away from its bolts and immediately he was on a flying surfboard of steel, shooting far out of the reach of Neji’s whirlwind of death.

Neji did not even pause, but continued spinning all the way to the wall, smashing aside Leaguers (and the occasional Naruto clone) in his path.  Only when he reached the wall did he stop his twirl, smoothly drawing the bow from his back as his feet dashed up its surface, notching arrow to the string as he rose above the rest of the tumult.

Static had been flying pretty high, apparently hoping to gain some time that way, but as soon as he saw Neji run up the wall, he flew out toward the middle of the room, hurling bolt after bolt.  Neji whipped back and forth across the wall, firing arrows all the way.  None of them hit, but they DID make Static do some fairly impressive acrobatics.

Neji’s arm flew to his quiver and groped for a moment before finding an arrow… his LAST arrow.

The distraction that came from this realization gave Static a free moment.  His hands thrust outward, and with a sudden jolt of shock Neji realized his feet were lifting from the wall—or rather the metal beneath them was.  Static had ripped his path off the wall, and he was swiftly heading into thin air.

There was barely time to think.  Feeding chakra directly to his leg muscles, Neji leapt, out into the air, straight at Static, hands glowing in attack.   If he could just reach him…

Static’s surfboard darted aside easily, and Neji continued his headlong descent.  Yet even as he fell he notched a last arrow to the string and shot, straight up, at Static.  The surfboard dodged that too…

…but failed to take into account the explosive note attached to it.

BOOOM!

Neji watched with a quiet satisfaction as the surfboard and its airborne rider tumbled earthward.  And as he heard the flutter of ink-laden wings beneath him, the thought occurred to him.

I flew…

-------------
CONTINUED IN PART II!  LINK IN DESCRIPTION!