Read Or Die Fan Fiction / Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ So Near, Yet So Far ❯ Sakura vs. Anita ( Chapter 4 )

Summary: After entering a strange alley, ROD the TV's San Shimai (and Nenene) have ended up in the Naruto world, where they encounter Team Seven, featuring Sakura, who has been having a *very* bad day.

And now, without further delay, Sakura vs. Anita, part one.

Chapter 4:

Sakura vs. Anita

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Both girls took a step forward and readied their throwing weapons. Suddenly, Kakashi coughed, and paper and steel flew toward each other in the alley.

Instead of using her paper to attack, as Sakura had clearly been expecting, Anita caused each of the pieces to move in front of a kunai. As a kunai hit a sheet of paper, it became embedded just past the tip, and immediately fell to the ground. When Sakura saw what had happened to the three kunai she had thrown, she pulled out a handful of shuriken and threw them in quick succession at the other girl, using different angles with each throw.

Sakura wasn't worried about hitting any of the women who had come through the alley with Anita-as soon as the fight had begun, the women had edged around the two girls and joined Team Seven at the mouth of the alley. Naruto, still standing almost in the middle of the alley, had backed up a few steps to stand closer to his sensei, who had repositioned himself so he could lean against the corner of a wall with his arms across his chest. Nenene and Maggie stood together near Naruto, but on the other side of the street, almost as if an invisible line had been drawn down the center of the alley, separating the two groups-for the most part. Michelle, with even more persistence than usual for her, had gleefully attempted to position herself next to Sasuke. Sasuke, who had been watching her approach, had been expecting just such a move from long dealings with the likes of Ino, and had unobtrusively edged around to place Naruto directly in the woman's path. Each time Michelle tried to move toward Sasuke, the dark-haired boy would take a step in the opposite direction, all the while appearing to be totally focused on the fight between his teammate and the paper user.

Several shuriken flew at Anita, each far enough away from the others that Anita couldn't possibly block each singly, as she had done with Sakura's previous attack. Sakura watched her opponent carefully, expecting Anita to attempt to dodge the shuriken and give open herself to another attack.

Anita remained unmoving. Sakura frowned, attempting to figure out what the girl's strategy was. Suddenly, she gasped. To the surprise of all the Konoha ninjas, Anita had summoned a solid wall of paper. The shuriken thudded harmlessly into the shield. When all had hit the wall, Anita released the paper onto the ground, leaving it lying at her feet for further use. She looked up, looking for Sakura's next move, only to discover a blank wall instead of her opponent.

When Anita had raised the shield, Sakura had been worried that it would be permanent, or that, when she released it, Anita would do so by turning each individual sheet of paper into a blade aimed at the ninja. Sakura also realized that although her new, pink-haired rival could manipulate paper, she probably couldn't see through it. The kunoichi concentrated her chakra to her feet and ran straight up the wall that her back had been to. As she did so, Sakura could hear the soft gasps from at least one of Anita's companions. She nodded to herself. This proved what she had already suspected; Anita had an odd and apparently powerful gift, the manipulation of paper, but she was not a ninja. These women had not seen a ninja fight before. All the better for Sakura's next attack. Positioned several feet above the other girl's pink head, Sakura readied another kunai in her hand and watched as Anita dropped her paper shield and began looking from side to side for her opponent.

As Anita looked to the end of the alley where their audience was positioned, Sakura brought her kunai forward and propelled herself off the wall and toward the body of the other girl. Just as Sakura pushed herself from the wall, Anita noticed both her sisters and Sakura's teammates looking at a place high up on the alley walls. She quickly jerked her head up to see what the others were watching. Even as her eyes widened in surprise, Anita reacted, dropping into a crouch and splaying her right hand on several of the sheets of paper on the alley floor. She swept her hand up above her head, the paper following it like a tail, protecting her head and back. Anita jerked her other arm out to protect her face, which the paper was not yet covering, just as Sakura reached her.

Sakura's left shoulder hit the paper shield above Anita's head, painfully dislocating it, but she had twisted the right side of her body enough that it was clear of the paper. She brought the kunai to Anita's arm in a vicious stroke, drawing blood in a deep, slashing cut that went lengthwise for almost five inches across her forearm.

As she landed, Sakura realized that Naruto was jumping up and down in the alley, cheering encouragements wildly. Right next to him were Nenene and Michelle, now standing together, shouting just loudly for Anita, with Maggie joining in with a quieter cheer once in a while. Every so often, if Naruto would jump to close, Nenene would glare at him intimidatingly. Sakura almost grinned at the sight. Sasuke, standing between Naruto and Kakashi, was actually smiling a little. Sakura's mouth dropped open. He seemed to approve of how she was fighting. Inner-Sakura gave a triumphant "Hell yeah!" It was about time Sasuke got to see her fight seriously. Reluctantly, she turned her gaze away from her dark-haired teammate to her sensei. He also appeared to be smiling, although he wasn't giving encouragement like Naruto. As she looked at him, he gave her the thumbs up. She smiled back at all of them, and turned her attention back to her opponent, becoming serious once more.

Sakura and Anita had both sprang back immediately after their clash, and were once again at opposite walls of the alley, now breathing a little more heavily, with an injury apiece. Sakura watched Anita closely for another opening, knowing that she would not be able to use the same trick again. Anita reached for more paper from the pack on her leg. It was then that Sakura realized that the other girl had yet to attack.

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A/N: Wow, that didn't take nearly as long as the last chapter to write, and it went much better than I anticipated. Sweet. I was toying with the idea of making the entire fight just one chapter, but this seemed like a good place to end it, even though it is only a couple pages long. So, sorry about the length. But, as promised, there is a good fight starting! Stick around till the end! ^_^ (which will hopefully be fairly coming soon-just a couple more chapters, I think)

And, uh, yeah. I just realized about three hours after I wrote this, and was getting into bed, that there is no dialogue. Oops. Do you think this hinders the chapter? Does it even matter? Please review and give me your opinion.

I had another reviewer! Yay!

Fionn, thank you for your wonderful review! I'm glad you like it. I do have a problem with chapter length, I agree. Unfortunately, this didn't turn out to be much better. However, you should be either happy, or worried, that this is much longer than what I had planned. Also, now that you mention it, I was thinking (rather unconsciously) of the paper manipulation as a bloodline trait. Don't worry, I wasn't going to let Naruto be able to use it (he gets too much neat stuff anyway ~.^), but you know how he is when he sees something cool... Anyway, thank you so very much for taking the time and effort to read, review, and think about my story, and bring some good points to my attention.

Once again, I welcome reviews and helpful criticisms, so if you notice something that you think is odd, really liked or didn't like, feel free to push the review button. I love knowing that people *are* actually reading this, and that it isn't disappearing into a black hole somewhere.

Next chapter: Anita vs. Sakura! (part two of the fight)

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