A story of pariahs

"How dare he?!"

Tomura felt his grip on the pathetic shinobi tighten.

Oh, how badly Tomura just wanted to let his pinky fall, and turn this absolute waste of air into ashes.

A heavy hand on his shoulder knocked him out of whatever daze he was in.

"Tomura, you can let him go now." It was Kakashi's voice.

Unlike the rest of his teammates, Tomura knew a Substitution no Jutsu when he saw one.

Tomura realized that he had been crushing the shinobi's arm for some time now, apparently, he had been too lost in rage to notice.

He let the chunin level shinobi go.

Before the shinobi could get any ideas, Kakashi swiftly knocked him into dreamland.

Sakura continued to openly guffaw at Tomura from the sideline.

"Did... did I hear that right? Did he really say..."

Sakura felt warmth spread through her heart, the very same one that she felt when Tomura hugged her before.

So lost in her thoughts, Sakura didn't notice Tomura approach her crouching form.

"You okay?"

She just dumbly nodded, still left in shock from the recent events.

Tomura looked doubtful. He gingerly took her hand.

"Whenever Naruto used-to-be scared, me holding his hand always seemed to help." Tomura reasoned in his head.

Not far from the two, Kakashi's one eye narrowed.

"Why didn't ya' show yourself earlier?! I could've been killed!"

Kakashi just glanced at Tazuna, then looked back at the two tied-up shinobi.

"I needed to see who they were targeting." He said it as though i was the most simple thing in the world.

Tazuna thought otherwise.

"Huh?!"

Kakashi didn't seem exasperated, although, he did have Naruto on his team.

"I wanted to see if those two chunin shinobi were targeting us Konoha shinobi..." Tazuna gulped. "Or if they were targeting you."

Kakashi had been watching from the treeline as his team fought. He noticed how, as one of the shinobi distracted Sasuke, the other circled the rest of the genin, and aimed for Tazuna.

A well played tactic, if there wasn't such a thing as a 'Tomura'.

"If you want our help, you're gonna need to cooperate." Kakashi turned around, and started walking the very same path they began on.

Team Seven( and their client) scrambled to keep up with the jonin.

Just as Tomura reached his left, Kakashi put a halting-hand on his shoulder.

"Dispose of them." He whispered to Tomura, just low enough for the others to not hear a thing.

Tomura subtly nodded.

Kakashi lead his team away from the scene.

Once far enough to not be seen, Tomura turned to the tied-up shinobi.

"So..."

He let out to an awful grin.

"... Who's first?"