The Uzumaki Family (Naruto X Justice League)

Chapter 9: A Jewel Buried Beneath Thorns

The sky cracked open like glass under a hammer. Not metaphorically. Not poetically. It split—black against red, bleeding light and shrieking stars. Demonic rifts tore through the heavens like wounds that would never close, vomiting down monstrosities with too many limbs and not enough mercy. The city—once arrogant in its towers and neon sprawl—screamed.

And in that scream stood her.

Cassandra. Valkyrie. Steel-winged and resolute, she was a statue carved from war. Where others ran, she walked. Where others fell, she flew. Her armor shimmered like an oil-slick flame—equal parts divine and wrathful. The ground shook under the weight of a demon the size of a cathedral, a horned titan with obsidian claws scraping sparks from pavement. Its laugh—deep, wet, wrong—echoed against the high glass of corporate cathedrals.

She didn't flinch.

Her voice hissed into the comms, calm as the dead. "White Rabbit, how's the situation?"

Riana—White Rabbit—was a whisper of death on the skyline, crouched among antennas and broken dreams. Her mask filtered her voice into something cleaner than human. "Worse. They're birthing themselves across the city. I see at least eight rifts open. No clear origin. We may need Phoenix."

Silence on the line for a half-second too long. Then: "She's not answering. I'll hold the line until Titans arrive. Prioritize containment."

No complaint. No fear. That was the strength of the Titans—they didn't need courage. Just purpose.

Riana vanished across rooftops, her form liquid in motion. Below, the demons gorged on chaos—glass shattered, alarms wailed, smoke curled like incense in a temple to annihilation. She moved between the screams like a rumor, her ninjato blades twin streaks of silver death. With each slash, a demon fell. With each kill, her unease grew.

These things weren't invading. They were summoned. Every strike she made was a page torn from a larger story—one they hadn't read yet.

Down below, Valkyrie soared.

The demon roared as she leapt into its airspace, its claws wide enough to cleave buildings. She didn't slow. She accelerated, wings gleaming with heat. Her sword, forged in forgotten science, burned at the molecular edge of matter. It didn't cut—it erased.

With one swing, the blade carved through flesh and nightmare, the creature's torso atomizing in a burst of sulfurous light. Its death shook the buildings, a shockwave of ash and psychic residue spreading like a second sunset.

She landed hard, knees bent, sword humming.

"Rabbit," she said, her voice stone and steel, "I want correlation. Check for anchoring rituals, magic circles, leyline fractures—anything. They're not random."

"Already looking," came the reply. Riana's breath betrayed her exhaustion, but not her will.

The city burned. Not in the way fire consumes, but in the way hope decays. People scattered like insects under overturned stone, the skyline bleeding. And in the midst of it, Cassandra—Valkyrie—stood defiant. 

Then came the roar.

Not the scream of demons. Something deeper. Older. Not a call of hunger, but ownership.

She turned toward the sound. The horizon split—something massive approaching. Not just in size. In presence. The rifts were symptoms. This thing was the disease.

"We've got company," she murmured, her knuckles whitening around her sword.

On a nearby rooftop, Riana froze. The pressure in the air had changed. Heavier. Angrier. A wrongness that made her blood forget how to flow.

She dropped down, blades drawn, eyes scanning. "Something else is coming. Bigger than the others."

"Good," Valkyrie muttered, fire bleeding into her voice like alcohol on a wound. "Let's show them what we are made of."

Their silhouettes were framed by ruin. Ash drifted like snow. The night was thick with the weight of worlds colliding.

But they stood tall.

Because even if the heavens cracked and monsters wore the sky like a mask, there were still some who would answer with steel.

And until they fell—

The city would not.

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Raven:

She hovered above the ruins, Raven—daughter of darkness, wielder of the unclean birthright—her cloak a blade of shadow cut against the broken skyline. The winds whipped cruel fingers through her hair as the world below screamed for salvation. And like a curse long sown, her blood answered the call.

The city bled. Its bones cracked beneath demon talons, summoned from Azathoth's womb by madmen who dared toy with the veil. Portals yawned open like festering mouths in the sky, vomiting Trigon's kin into alleys and bedrooms and sanctuaries alike. What was once sacred had long been defiled.

Raven didn't scream. Screams were for those who had hope left to waste.

She descended, pulled by a familiar tug—a shift in the ether like her own heartbeat misplaced. There it was: a bruise in the tapestry of reality, a trembling scar where her father's realm kissed the mortal one. She dove, cloak slicing the wind, and landed atop a rotting husk of a hotel. Time had peeled its facade into ribbons. Evil didn't build new—evil hollowed out the old and wore it like skin.

She entered. The room waited, dressed in sacrilege. Symbols scrawled in blood, walls heavy with despair's scent, and in the middle of it all: the altar.

A child, no older than ten, lay bound across the stone. His eyes, wide and wet, stared past her. Behind him, at the heart of the rot, sat the priest of ruin.

Her father.

Trigon.

He smiled, and the world lost a heartbeat.

"Welcome, daughter." The words spilled like wine left to spoil—rich, sweet, and utterly wrong.

She said nothing at first. Her silence was the shroud of control, the iron chain wrapped tight around her screaming insides. "Father." The word tasted like ash scraped from old wounds.

"Come now. That's no way to greet family." He stood, robes flowing like oil over fire. "I have missed you. Missed the scent of your conflict, the flavor of your resistance. You've grown strong. Strong enough to end this farce of separation."

She summoned power to her hand—pure shadow bleeding light, crackling and cold. The child whimpered behind him. Trigon did not move.

"You can end this," he said. "Join me. End the suffering. No more petty crime, no more helpless humans crushed beneath their own madness. Only order. Only peace. You and I... immortals among insects."

The air thickened. His words were not just lies—they were truths twisted until even a saint would bleed trying to unravel them.

Her hand trembled.

No more pain.

The words echoed in the ruined cathedral of her mind, whispering to every crack and corner where loneliness had ever made a home. It would be so easy. One step forward. One breath surrendered. And all the weight of the world would pass into his arms.

But she remembered.

The screams.

The lost.

The fire in her mother's eyes the day she fled.

"No," she said, voice iron wrapped in frost. "You are not my father. You are the cancer in his skin."

She raised her hand to strike.

And he smiled.

"I'd stop, if I were you," Trigon murmured, his voice now a needle threading into her soul. "This mortal dies the moment the spell breaks. One flick of your wrist, and his blood's on your hands, not mine."

The child whimpered again, this time louder.

Raven froze.

The energy trembled in her palm, hissing like a caged viper.

A choice. Always a choice.

One that cut deeper each time.

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Trigon died like a lie exposed—loud in the beginning, pathetic in the end.

His monstrous form, fire-wrought and pride-fed, shimmered with defiance until the moment the energy blade cracked through his chest like the final syllable of a curse. His roar staggered the air, but his body crumbled, ash by ash, rage by rage, until he was nothing but dust carried on the tremble of a breath.

"Remember this moment with regret, mortal," he spat, like even the void owed him fear. Then silence. The kind that doesn't end, but waits.

Raven didn't move. Her cloak curled around her like a dying shadow. She had watched immortals fall before—but not her father. Not this. Not like this.

Then came her.

The scent of ozone preceded her. Wasp stood in the doorway like the executioner's verdict, armor humming with death still fresh and unrepentant. The energy hadn't faded from her gauntlets; it hung on her like the smell of burning flesh.

"You hesitated," Wasp said, voice cutting as cold steel. "Out there, people are dying. In here, you wept for a corpse who bathed in their blood."

Raven turned slowly, eyes hollowed by too many dilemmas, too many ghosts. "He was my—" She didn't finish. That word didn't belong to Trigon anymore.

Wasp walked forward, each step a lecture carved in thunder. "He was a cultist," she snapped. "He bartered lives for power and danced in their blood. You think morality's a shield? It's a leash. And you're choking on it."

Raven's fists trembled. The line between what she was and what she could become had never been thinner.

"I don't know if I can kill them," she whispered.

Wasp scoffed. "Because you still cling to Robin's philosophy like a child clutches her mother's robe. No-kill codes. Empty prisons. Laughing maniacs walking free to murder again. You think you're kind. You're just naive."

Raven flinched. The words dug under her skin like old scars ripped open again.

"It's better to kill one," Wasp said, her voice now something colder than doctrine—conviction forged in battlefield truth, "than let a thousand bleed because you blinked."

"Who made you immortal?" Raven asked. Her voice cracked. Not from weakness, but from standing at the edge of the pit inside her and seeing it smile back.

"I don't need to be immortal," Wasp replied, folding her arms. "My armor tells me what I need. Who's beyond redemption. Who's lying. Who deserves to die. If someone I loved turned evil, he'd accept death. I wouldn't make excuses. Could you say the same?"

Raven's breath caught. She couldn't. Not yet. Maybe not ever.

But doubt—doubt is a clever poison—and it had already begun its work.

Wasp turned, her wings stretching wide like divine retribution poised for flight. "Decide quickly. Demons don't wait for your moral epiphanies. Every second you stall, someone screams their last breath."

And then she was gone.

Raven stood alone in the silence. Not the clean, meditative kind. No. This silence choked. It buried itself beneath her ribs and made a home beside the voice whispering you knew he was beyond saving. You knew.

Her eyes dropped to the crumpled body of the cultist. A shell without a soul. A vessel emptied by the same father she once begged for love.

She stepped closer.

She knelt.

She closed his eyes.

Not out of mercy. Out of ritual. She would mourn him—not for who he was, but for what he could never be.

Then she rose.

The hallway stretched before her like the spine of a dying beast, shadows writhing like the thoughts inside her. Somewhere beyond these walls, demons were tearing the city's skin from its bones.

And for the first time, Raven understood.

This war wasn't just steel and fire. It was made of choices. And choices have teeth.

She walked out of the hotel, her cape dragging over ash and blood. The air reeked of sulfur and prophecy. But there was no fear in her now.

Only decision.

The girl who walked in here wasn't the one who walked out.

Raven no longer carried mercy like a shield.

She carried it like a blade—and knew when to use it.

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Hima:

The city burned below, not with fire, but with warmth—laughter, flickering neon, the too-perfect stillness of a park set too carefully in place. But high above, where glass met the stars and the wind licked at steel, envy watched with teeth bared behind sweet lips.

Hima stood on the edge of the rooftop like a judgment unspoken. Her eyes were locked on the pair beneath—a man and a woman, walking hand in hand, as if love was theirs to claim without consequence.

Naruto.

And her.

The woman with the crimson hair and poison-slick smile. The woman who touched him like he was hers, like her fingers belonged against his skin. Pam. Ivy. Interloper.

Thief.

Hima's fists curled, nails carving crescents into flesh. The heat of her fury made the air taste metallic. Chakra buzzed at her spine, eager and hungry, a serpent winding up her bones.

How dare she? How dare he?

She had been his daughter—his world—the only one who had never left, never betrayed, never strayed. And now this woman clung to him like she had a claim, like she knew him. As if the countless days Hima had spent in his shadow, soaking in his quiet strength, had meant nothing.

Her throat ached, full of unscreamed rage and unspoken sorrow. She had thought herself prepared—for war, for duty, for loss. But not for this.

Beside her, Kara bit into her ice cream with the thoughtless serenity of someone untouched by heartbreak. Blonde hair drifting in the breeze, blue eyes scanning the horizon. The Kryptonian didn't know it yet, but she was sitting beside a volcano, dressed like a sundae.

"What are you looking at?" Kara asked, her tone feather-light, unknowing.

Hima didn't respond. Couldn't. Words weren't stable things right now. They shifted and snarled inside her, like wolves locked in a cage.

So Kara looked. She followed Hima's gaze—and her lips froze mid-lick. "Wait..." she squinted, leaned forward. "Is that… Poison Ivy?"

The name said aloud snapped something in Hima. The final insult. As if Pam wasn't just a woman, but a known criminal. A villain. A seductress whose very breath was toxic.

"What is she doing with that guy?" Kara asked, more curious than angry.

Hima didn't answer. Her silence was a battlefield drenched in blood not yet spilled.

Kara frowned and kept watching. "Is that… him? The one you—?"

She stopped. Some truths didn't need to be spoken. The tension in Hima's body said enough.

Kara tried again. "I mean… he's hot, sure. But this feels bigger. You're not usually the jealous type. Is he your—?"

Hima turned her head slowly, and for one horrifying moment, Kara felt as if she were staring into the sun from inside its furnace. The rawness in Hima's eyes wasn't just emotion—it was possession. Worship and war, blended into something terrifying and absolute.

"No," Hima said at last. A single word, soft and dangerous. "Just remembered something… annoying."

Kara didn't buy it, but she wasn't stupid enough to press. You don't poke a dragon when her claws are wet.

So instead, she offered what little she could. "Well… if you ever need to talk, I'm here."

Hima's shoulders slackened—slightly. A breath that almost became a sigh. "Thanks. I'll do so when I need it."

And then, like a ghost remembering it had died, she turned. She hugged Kara—brief, but heavy—and vanished into a flicker of light and chakra.

Gone.

Kara blinked at the empty space.

Teleportation, she thought. Jealousy came with a hell of an exit strategy.

She looked back down at the park. The couple still walked together, oblivious. A perfect scene painted in borrowed light.

But Kara didn't feel warmth now. Only cold curiosity.

Who was this man?

What was he to Hima?

And what would happen if that woman's fingers stayed wrapped around him for too long?

She didn't have answers.

So she did the only thing she could.

She took another bite of ice cream and stared at the city, wondering how many hearts would break before the night ended.

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Naruto:

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Naruto sat as still as a corpse before the hearth of a dying world. The mug in his hand steamed like a cooling battlefield, the bitter scent of coffee curling into the air like ghosts too stubborn to move on. His eyes didn't blink, didn't waver, locked on the flickering news broadcast painting blood-colored truths across the screen. The world spun on chaos's fingertip, but his heart didn't beat faster for it.

Raven: Heroine. Murderer. Martyr.

Her confession, aired in silence, cracked the nations like dry porcelain.

She knelt. She bled. She asked for chains.

He watched the world choke on her honesty.

"Your friend is really something, Mia," Naruto muttered, the amusement in his voice sharp enough to slice.

The flickering screen painted shadows across his face, turning the whiskered lines into something beastlier—like a man remembering violence and finding it beautiful.

Mea sat curled nearby, small in her silence, her knees drawn up like a fortress against what she could not admit aloud. Raven—fierce, flawed Raven—had thrown herself to the wolves without a whisper to those who called her kin. Mea had called her sister once. Now she called her a fool.

The firelight flickered as if her guilt fed it.

"She was alone because I walked away."

Her hands trembled, clenched too tight, fingernails cutting crescent moons into her palms.

"Is she even thinking at the moment?" The thought came with venom and sorrow knotted together, a noose of emotion strangling logic.

Her voice broke into the silence. "Father… what should we do?"

Naruto turned. Slowly. Like a immortal tired of pretending to be mortal. His smile was soft, but behind it lived storms.

"What do you want to do?"

The question fell like a guillotine—quiet, final, impossible to ignore. He didn't offer orders. He offered mirrors.

Mea stared. Then she ran—into his arms, into the comfort that had raised empires and forgiven monsters.

"Love you, Father."

And then she vanished. A flicker of light. A whisper of will. Gone.

Naruto exhaled, slow and long, like an old soldier watching the sun rise red again.

Another child walking into fire to find someone worth burning for.

"She won't handle this alone," Kurama rumbled inside his mind, ancient and unrested, like thunder warming up its voice.

"I know."

The words came like a priest at a funeral—soft and certain, too late to save anything.

"But this is her fight now. Her chain to drag, her sword to raise. I can't blunt every blade for her."

Kurama's chuckle was teeth and smoke. "So you'll send Riana? Let someone else clean up the mess while you play ghost?"

Naruto smiled with no joy in it. "She's better suited for this mess. And subtlety is a cloak I wear better than most. Besides, if I move in the open, we'll have a war before we have the truth."

Kurama growled, impatience curled around his tail. "Fine. But at least let me breathe. Let me stretch my claws a bit. I'm bored, Naruto."

Naruto nodded once, and with a whisper of will, his presence sank into the bones of the world. The wind stilled. The trees paused. Something old and caged blinked.

"Let's have some fun," Naruto murmured. "But gently. No bodies unless we need them. No cities unless they throw the first stone."

Kurama laughed, wild and eager. "Just enough to rattle the cage, then? I can do that."

And the coffee sat cold, forgotten, while immortals moved in shadow.

The day had begun with news.

It would end in fire.

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Naruto walked the corridors of his home with steps too heavy for a man of his power. The light of the sun carved golden lines through the windowpanes, but even its hot glow could not illuminate the tangle of thoughts dragging behind him like chains. His mind—once the forge of iron resolve—now bent under the weight of whispers, not from enemies nor allies, but from the silence between him and his daughter.

He had fought immortals. He had stared down death. But nothing hollowed him out like the thought of Hima hurt.

The door creaked open with a slow groan, not unlike a wounded thing. Her room—still and breathless—felt colder than the rest of the house. As if the warmth of her joy had been bled out through the cracks in the walls.

There she lay, eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling as if it might answer her. Sleep had abandoned her. Or perhaps she had turned it away, a punishment self-imposed.

Naruto stepped in, each movement quieter than the next, like he feared startling a bird already halfway broken. He sat beside her, the bed sighing under the weight of a father's regret.

"Hima," he said softly, voice cracked by guilt. "My precious jewel. Why are you doing this?"

The words reached her, but didn't stir her. She blinked. Once. Twice. Then turned her face just enough to let her eyes meet his. There was no anger in them. No tears either. Just that cold, heavy thing children carry when they realize the world doesn't revolve around them anymore.

"Daddy," she asked, and her voice was a blade wrapped in velvet, "do you not need me anymore?"

He flinched.

Like she'd driven her little hand through his ribs and curled her fingers around his heart, not to crush it, but to remind him how fragile it had always been.

"Why would you say that?" he asked. Not because he didn't know—but because he needed her to say it aloud.

"You spent the whole day with that woman. You didn't tell me. Didn't even say goodbye before leaving. Does Daddy want to replace Hima with another woman?"

The words weren't laced with accusation. That would've been easier. He could've defended himself then, explained, apologized. But this? This was something worse. A child trying to make sense of absence. Trying to assign meaning to silence.

Naruto reached for her, pulling her into an embrace that was more desperate than he wanted to admit. "Never. You are not someone I could replace, Hima. You are my top priority. Always."

And still, something ached. Not from her words. Not even from her pain. But from within. Something buried deeper. A thorn, old and unnamed.

She clung to him then, her grip too tight for comfort, too soft for force. It was a hold of fear. Fear that he'd let go. That he'd fade like dreams do when the morning sun is too bright.

"Daddy," she whispered, her voice small again, like when she was five and monsters still lived under beds, "you can… you can find another wife. But please tell me first next time. Okay?"

She smiled. The way people do when they're losing.

Naruto nodded, his smile gentler than it should've been. "Of course, my little princess."

He kissed her cheek and stood. The room remained cold even as he left it. There was something broken in that space now, a crack in the foundation no jutsu could mend.

At the door, her voice caught him again. "Can we go out today? Just the two of us. Like old times."

Naruto chuckled, forcing lightness into his voice. "Get ready. We'll make a day of it."

He walked away with that same ache clawing at his chest. Not pain, no. Pain he understood. This was something else.

Wrong, he thought.

Something was wrong inside him. Something deeper than doubt. Deeper than guilt. A shadow stitched into the lining of his soul.

The mission with Raven waited. The world's gears kept turning, grinding against fate like teeth. But even as power swirled at his fingertips and threats rose like tides—Naruto knew:

It was the heart that killed men. Not swords.

And tonight, his was bleeding.