Momo had taken advantages of the brief respite from the Gedo's fighting them to write an update to Shine.

She described what they'd done and her belief that Obito was not deterred by it, as the others had told her basically what they'd said to him.

"Still I think you'd be proud of Bakugo and Camie's ability to stall that long," she wrote. "And Shoto did his best to help. But that trap will not hold him long.--"

She broke off suddenly, as shown by a sudden dash in the ink.

And the she picked up in a much more scrambled hand.

"--It just broke free! But it's not coming at us. It just took off. Shikamaru and Ino say it's going away from the coast to the main area of Lightning...at least, I assume so. Or it's heading for the land of Fire or Rice. Something that size won't take long to get that far at the speed it's movements... I think we're entering the next phase of the Statue. Is Madara still with you? If he is, you should run."

"He's not here," Temari said, when Dabi had read this aloud to them. "So where is he? Where is it going?"

"But since we sent him away... It's gotta be near here, right?" Wally suggested.

"I wouldn't think we'd miss something that size," Shine said.

She was right.

Within the next few minutes they saw the statue run pretty near them, but Obito must have known that Madara was not with them, so it ran past them and farther into the mainland.

"Hey, what was that?" Mei asked. She hadn't seen the statue yet.

"That was the Gedo Statue, the future body of the 10 Tails," Gaara said.

"Where is Lord Ay?" Onoki grimaced. "I thought he went after it."

Ay, in fact, had only gone part of the way there, before he saw it running past, and promptly ran into Naruto again. Both of them and Bee had chased after it.

"If that thing gets to Madara," Shine said, "I'm warning you, it will be completely unstoppable, for you anyway."

"Even with what you taught us?" Gaara said.

"That might stop it," Shine hedged. "But you'd need an opening to get so close, unless there's a miracle from Heaven, which has happened before on my missions."

"What is she talking about?" Mei asked.

"We're working on a way to stop it," Gaara said. "We'd better go after it. Lord Tsuchikage, are you able to fight?"

"Don't be so impertinent. I'm always ready to fight," Onoki said.

"Well, I'm recharged," Wally said, picking Shine up. "I guess we're going. What about the kids?"

"There won't be anything left to do on the coast. I'll tell them to join us," Shine said, taking out her pen.

* * *

"She says," Momo said a few seconds later, "she wants us to meet them further inland. That's where the rest of the battle is going to be, for better or worse."

"She's sure about that?" Shikamaru said.

"Yeah, totes," Camie said. 

"They can activate that Tsuki no Me from anywhere," Bakugo pointed out. "As soon as he finds Madara, why not? They've thinned your forces out so that there won't be enough of you to stop that beast once it evolves."

"What?" Shikamaru said shakily. "Are you sayin this entire last day was just killing time so that...but... So we never had a chance?"

"No, you have a chance," Momo said. "Don't give up yet. There's still Naruto..."

"And Sasuke," Camie said. "Though he's an idiot, but at least he's powerful."

"I don't want to rely on Sasuke," Shoto said darkly.

"Me neither," Shikamaru insisted.

"But he's going to be showing up," Camie insisted. "He's got, like, stakes in this too, bro."

"How would Sasuke of all people have an interest in this?" Sai inquired. "He doesn't care about Leaf."

"Exactly," Camie said. "He doesn't care about anyone but himself, right? Don't you think that this fight could end Leaf for good?"

"That b-----d," Shikamaru said. "He wouldn't."

"He would," Shoto said. "Or at least, he'll tilt the deck in their favor, trust me. We know all about how much he's betrayed Leaf. He destroyed the Akatsuki. Are you really doubting he'd do it?"

"Oh..." Ino said, sadly. "How could this happen?"

"So we've gotta go," Choji said.

"The force won't be happy to hear that we're wasting our time here," Shikamaru sighed.

They told the captain that.

But they'd never all get there fast enough to do anything if someone didn't go ahead, so Sai took Team 10 and Tenten also, with the hero kids, to catch up faster.

Along the way, they finally spotted Naruto.

He and Bee and Ay and Tsunade.

"Yo, they're probably looking for Madara right now," Camie called.

"Do you think we should warn Naruto?" Momo asked.

"Knowing Naruto, that wouldn't make a difference," Shoto said. "We'd have better luck warning Ay or Bee."

"Wait...Ay, Bee? Shi? Darui?" Camie said. "Lol, I just realized that that's like the alphabet in English."

"That's weird," Momo said. "They don't have that here."

"Yeah..." Bakugo said. "But who cares?"

[To make matters worse, some of the transliterations for the show literally spell their names as A, B, C, and D.]

They passed Naruto and waved at him.

Naruto looked up and then blinked. "Hey," he said. "Granny Tsunade, it's the...the weird ninja... When did they get here?"

"Huh?" Tsunade looked up. "Oh...yes, they were helping earlier. You didn't know they were here?"

"No," Naruto said. He waved. "Hey, guys! Come on!"

"He's even more annoying in person," Bakugo said.

"You think Naruto is annoying?" Momo said. "I think he's the kindest one of them all."

"He's a moron who only wins fights because people bail him out of his own stupidity," Bakugo said.

"That's not a nice thing to say," Sai spoke up. "Naruto is a good friend."

"No, he's not," Bakugo said. "A good friend would realize that forcing people to do what you want is being a s----y friend, and jamming your ideals down their throat isn't going to convince anyone to do what you say."

"Well, in his defense," Shoto said, "that did work with Pain."

"Pain literally gave up on his ideology when one person died--and then embraced it again. Clearly that guy was not hard to persuade," Bakugo scoffed with contempt.

"Isn't that a little unfair to Naruto though?" Ino said. "He did save the village."

"And you all suddenly liked him after that, but you treated him like s--t before that," Bakugo said. "Don't be fake nice now, Blonde Ponytail."

"That's really the best you could think of?" Shoto said sarcastically.

"I don't know her that well," Bakugo said.

"My name is Ino," Ino said.

"He doesn't care--" Shoto began.

"I don't give a rip," Bakugo said at the same time.

"Bro, both of you shut up," Camie said. "Are we gonna talk to Naruto or not?"

Sai lowered the birds so that they could do so, but the birds kept pace with the running ninja.

"Who are they?" Ay asked.

"They're the students of that rude woman and, I guess, her partner," Tsunade said.

"Eh? They have more?" Ay said warily.

"Lord Ay." Momo tried to bow while on a flying bird, not very successfully. "Lady Tsunade, nice to meet you and see you again."

"Sure." Tsunade didn't buy it.

"Hey, Momo, Shoto," Naruto said, not bothered, it seemed, by the war at all. "What are you doing back here? Where's Dabi and Shine?"

"They're with Gaara right now," Momo said. "We're looking for them. What are you doing?"

"Oh, I'm looking for this Madara guy and the Gedo Statue," Naruto said.

"Bro, so are we," Camie said. "Hi, I'm Camie Utsushimi, and this angry hedgehog here is Bakugo Katsuki, my bf."

"Don't call me that," Bakugo said.

"Bae, you call Kaminari Pikachu all the time," Camie said.

"You brought more people with you?" Naruto said. "Or are they ninja?"

"No, they're with us," Shoto said, "sort of... Camie isn't in our class, but she's part of our core group. Bakugo is our top classmate, actually."

He was hoping that recommendation would make the ninja think he was less of an ass, since so far he didn't seem to be making a great first impression on anyone, as usual.

Tsunade did raise her eyebrow like she doubted he was telling the truth.

"Yo, yo, who are they? I don't know," Bee spoke up in rap. [Sorry for my crappy rhymes, but the show's aren't any better, so I can't really claim it's that cringey by comparison.]

"Naruto, they were helping us fight that statue," Shikamaru told him. "They slowed it down and then it left us to look for Madara...but they say that Madara is not the one controlling the statue right now, that it's someone else, behind the mask."

"Eh?" Naruto said. "But I thought he said he was Madara."

"No, apparently he's not Madara at all," Ino said. "He's someone else... Who did you say it was?"

"This dude named Obito," Camie said. "He's got it in for Kakashi and everyone else."

"Why Kakashi?" Tsunade asked.

"Like, too much to explain, lady." Camie waved dismissively. "It goes way back, that's all. Also he wants to put you all in that Eternal Night dream thing, but I think Madara put him up to it. I can't tell who's controlling who now, honestly."

"Yes, it's growing confusing," Momo said. "But we do know that if they unite the Gedo Statue will morph and be much stronger than before, and if it gets Naruto's Beast, that will be it for the evolution. You can't stop it after that."

"We know that already," Tsunade said. "But Naruto has been helping us fight, so we'll have to risk it."

"You do realize how incredibly stupid that is, right?" Shoto said, never one to be respectful when confronted with incompetence in the adult world. "Naruto is literally all they need to win, and he could be anywhere else in the world right now, but you're allowing him to go toward them."

"We need him," Tsunade said. "I'll bet on him."

"And your bets always end well," Bakugo said, scornfully.

"They do with Naruto," she said. "And I don't like your tone."

"We'll defeat Madara, yo," Bee spoke.

"Y'all are dumb," Camie said. "I so knew they wouldn't let us talk them out of it."

"I'm starting to think that destiny is predetermined more by knowing that people are too stubborn to change their minds, more than the paths being truly unalterable," Momo observed, with some bitterness, because the ninja were getting on her nerves.

"Well, if you read the book, that would be it," Shoto said. "We're wasting our time with them. We should just get to our teammates."

"You're all upstarts," Ay said. "Who are you to tell us what to do?"

"Upstarts?" Shoto said. "Isn't that what everyone calls Shine?"

"Yay, we joined the club," Bakugo said. "Upstarts," he sneered. "It's just your way of saying you won't listen to us 'cause we're younger than you, you freaking prick."

"What?" Ay said, angrily.

"Sai, fly us out of here fast," Ino said, horrified. "Before they say something else."

"We'll meet you there," Shikamaru said to Naruto, as the birds sped up.

"Are you trying to get yourselves killed?" Choji asked the heroes.

"Are you?" Camie asked, with a straight face.

Choji wasn't sure how to answer that question in that tone.

"I think we should inform our fathers about this," Shikamaru said.

Ino nodded and connected to do so.

* * *

Even so, it took both groups a long time to find Obito. The sun slipped lower in the clouds, and the ground fighting to wipe out what was left of the clones continued, but the clones would soon be gone.

Bakugo complained that it shouldn't take that long to find a huge statue, but it had a head start.

They picked up Hinata and Neji on the way, since they flew over that area. They offered to let Sakura join them, and she insisted she'd head for the field on her own when she was done with her medic duties.

Finally, they did find Shine, Wally, and Dabi, who'd gotten ahead of Gaara and Temari at some point and finally found Kankuro.

They'd been catching him up on everything that happened when the others joined them.

"Okay," Kankuro said, when they'd all greeted each other, "why doesn't Shine just beam us all there?"

They all looked at her.

"I can now," Shine said. "Camie, how do you think we're doing for time?"

"I'm terrible at math," Camie said. 

"I thought you weren't allowed to be bad at math in Asia," Wally said.

"For an asian, I'm bad at math," Camie said. "Like, this time thing confuses me. I feel like, by now, they'll be fighting the Tailed Beast, and we're not fighting that, right? Because that's freaking terrifying."

"I like a challenge," Bakugo said. "This has been too tame so far."

"Are you...real?" Shoto said, with a look of disbelief.

"We must be winding down to crunch time," Shine mused. "I hope, anyway. I'm tired. I can't take many more hours of running around like this."

"I think I'm nearly out of chakra..." Sai was sitting down while they were talking.

"You could take us to Sasuke," Wally said. "I know, we don't like him, but he's gonna find the statue soon, right?"

"Not before Naruto does," Momo said. "And, we can't go to Sasuke, right?"

"Correct," Shine said. "I swore to him that we would not follow him, and we have not so far. I wouldn't go back on my word."

"Hold up," Kankuro said. "I remember you saying that, but I thought that was just for then...not now."

"No, that was permanent until he changes his mind about us," Shine said. "Which looks very unlikely."

"She's serious," Shoto said. "Consequences for rejecting us are not light ones."

"Oh yeah," Wally said. "We met one lady like us who that happened to. She never went back to that...people."

"Never?" Hinata said, astounded.

"It's dangerous to shut out the light," Shine said somberly. "Even in the diluted form it is in with us, a little light is enough to see out of a dark room, isn't it? It's like that. What good does it do you if you shut your eyes?"

"That makes sense," Sai said. "And that describes Sasuke perfectly."

"See? He gets it," Camie said, pointing at him.

"We should just go meet up with Gaara again, I think," Momo said. "We should all work together. To me that seems like the only real plan. We can't fight these villains."

"Why do you keep calling them villains?" Ino asked. "What do you mean by that?"

"It's someone who does bad things and breaks the law," Shoto said.

"Oh...you mean a rogue shinobi?" Ino said.

"Villain is a lot easier to say," Wally said.

"I guess." Ino wasn't sure why it mattered.

"I kind of like the sound of rogue shinobi, personally," Dabi said. "Villain is a better word for these guys. It goes beyond rogue."

"Dabi-san!" Neji said severely. "Going rogue is a serious thing."

"Let's bicker about terminology later," Shine said. "I think Momo has a point, unless anyone has a better idea of what to address. My knowledge of this battle is limited. I can only go through so much material. It gets hazy for me after this point."

"I'm fine with just joining them and waiting to see what happens from here," Wally said. "But you guys have to hear how Shine got Madara to stop for a bit."

He told them the story.

Camie cracked up, while the other three and the ninjas were just dumbfounded at how easy it had been.

[The funny thing is, I didn't exaggerate. It was always just as easy on the show to distract Madara. Once Hashirama shows up, he sits out most of the rest of that part of the fight, just waiting for him to be finished.]

"How could he be so stupid?" Shoto asked.

"Shoto, your misconception is that powerful men are always smart," Shine said. "Far more often than not, they're simple people who are in the right place and right time to spread their crazy ideas to people who are desperates enough to latch onto anything, and that is all Madara is. I'd almost like him, really, if he wasn't a sociopath about it. He's kind of hilariously simple minded."

"You are so weird, Likstar-san," Kankuro said. "I thought so from your letters, but now I'm sure of it. All of you are."

"Says the bro who wears a bear costume with face paint every single day of his life," Camie said. "Like, how many hours does that take you to put on, for real?"

"It doesn't take hours, and it's not a bear--it's a cat." Kankuro was offended.

Tenten snickered.

"Sai is tired," Shine said. "I'll just take us there... All of you are ready?"

"Ready," the ninja said.

"I guess," Shoto said.

"Ready." Camie peace signed.✌

Momo just nodded, and Bakugo smirked.

Shine opened the door.

* * *

They thought she was taking them to Gaara, but Shine cut out the middleman and just took them right to the base of the statue.

They were just in time, in fact, to see the clash between Naruto, Kakashi, Bee, and Obito and Madara and the statue.

"Oh, we missed a lot," Camie said. "Like, Naruto already fought Obito, and Obito's totes been revealed."

"You mean it's almost over?" Shine couldn't tell what was going on other than they were fighting and yelling at each other.

No one saw them standing behind the statue.

"Did we miss Guy smacking Madara around?" Bakugo said. "That was one thing I actually wanted to see!"

"No, Baku, that's not till later." Camie peered around the statue. "After Sasuke gets here."

"What do we do?" Kankuro asked.

"Do you think we can do anything?" Shine pointed to the fight. "Short of pray?"

"Well...no, but I didn't think you'd say that," Kankuro said. "You faced Orochimaru and didn't bat an eyelash."

"I'll let you in on something," Shine said. "That was mostly gall. And that works on most villains. You act tough, and they back off. That will not work on Madara; he's the wrong kind of bad guy, and Obito is too devoted to his mad quest for that to work. In fact, it'll egg them on. I've got nothing I can do here except fight, and that thing is far bigger than I am. If we can't David and Goliath it, what can we do?"

"I think we could do something," Wally said.

"The kids are tired and so are we," Shine said. "I think we should wait it out. We know the ninja can handle this thing for now. The time to get involved would be once they're in over their heads."

"It does seem like Naruto and the others are handling it for now," Ino noted. "Maybe we can wait till they need backup, wait for the other force to arrive and all fight together. We can't do anything alone, right?"

"I'd have to agree," Shikamaru admitted. "I hope they can hold them off that long."

"Unless Hashirama shows up," Camie joked. "Then Madara would probably stop right now."

"Let's get out of sight," Shine said.

Thankfully, Madara hadn't noticed them yet--he was focused on Naruto.

They went and hid behind some rocks.

The fight dragged on for quite a while, and then the kages were there. They must have gotten into a fight before now.

In fact, that was true, and Orochimaru had shown up to "bail them out".

Gaara, who had known he was going to come, thanks to the DJs' warning, still couldn't believe the nerve he had to act as if he was doing them some big favor.

Temari thought it was appalling and would have attacked him, but Gaara stopped her.

"Whatever game this is," he said, "let's just play along for now. He must not want Madara to win either. After all, what would he do if the world ended? We'll deal with him after we stop the others."

"I don't trust him or them." Temari eyed Team Taka, who she only knew vaguely as the people who'd helped Sasuke when he joined the Akatsuki, and only because they were dressed as such.

Sasuke was nowhere in sight.

"Hey, where is Sasuke?" Temari asked of the red headed girl.

"Huh?" she said. "Uh...how did you know he was with us?"

"I'm not stupid," Temari said.

And Shine had told them, she added mentally.

"He went ahead," the guy with pointy teeth answered her. "Said he wanted to back up the other ninja."

"Temari and I will go then," Gaara said. "Take care of them."

He gave Orochimaru a stern look. "And if they are not the same as we left them when we come back, you will have to pay the price for it."

"I'm surprised the Kazekage has such resolve," Orochimaru said, not very nicely.

"Why, you--" Temari gripped her fan.

"Peace, Temari." Gaara held her back. "We know how easily he is frightened by the Light. Let's not stoop to his level."

That remark didn't sit well with Orochimaru, and he scowled at them.

"What does he mean Light?" the pointy teeth guy said.

"Shut up!" The redheaded girl was clearly terrified that he'd anger Orochimaru.

The other guy said nothing at all, but he had a dark aura that Temari didn't like.

They left.

By the time they caught up, though, a lot of things had gone down.

The heroes had been watching all this time, and finally they'd gone to join the ninja when the reinforcements showed up and they could blend in.

"If Obito recognizes us," Momo said, "he might go ballistic, after the way you mocked his past."

"Bold strategy, by the way," Shine said. "I might have used it too, but it did run the risk of making him hate you."

"Nothing I'm not used to," Bakugo said.

"I dunno about that, but I had no other plan," Camie shrugged.

"There you are." Shikamaru saw them. "Good... I hope this attack we're using will work."

They were trying to bury the Tailed Beast.

The heroes knew it would not work, but they didn't say anything. They had no better idea.

But when the Beast broke out and started firing, they suddenly realized it was later in the danger than they'd thought.

"Oh!" Camie suddenly said. "This is it!" She grabbed Wally's arm. "Wally, it's gonna be too late! There's whole cities."

"Oh...oh no!" Wally said. "Shine, I gotta go."

"Okay," Shine said quickly. "But be careful, those things will hit fast and hard. You can't be close when they do."

"Hey, I've outrun The Joker's bombs before. I've got this." Wally disappeared from sight.

"Where is he going?" Choji asked.

"To try to mitigate the damage," Momo said, glancing up at the Beast nervously. "How could we not realize it was the time?"

* * *

Wally was able to run ahead of the Beast bomb and he found the city that was about to be obliterated.

He had no hope of saving everyone in it, but he grabbed as many people he could and ran them out. They never even knew what touched them.

Wally could work really fast, but couldn't move people too fast without hurting them, so all in all he got out about 100 people before the bomb hit.

The people who could see the city screamed and cried and then began to ask how they'd been spared and wondered if it was an angel.

Wally saw what was left of the city.

It had to have had thousands of people in it, and he'd only gotten to 100 or so...and even that was way more than would have survived.

He shook his head. "That's...no...just...not right."

He glared. "Those madmen! Do they even know what they're doing to these people?!"

Angrily, he ran away.

Unfortunately, he shouldn't have delayed that long, because he quickly realized that the next bomb was heading right for the ninja main intelligence headquarters.

Wally got to it first, but he knew he had minutes or seconds before the bomb would hit.

To his surprise, the ninja inside, who knew that the bomb was coming (at least two of them did), weren't trying to run.

"Hey!" he cried. "Guys, you need to run. Unplug from that thing. I'll take you out. That bomb is coming right for us."

"What?" Ao, who Wally barely remembered from earlier, stepped out from the desk he was at.

"It doesn't matter," one of the mind jutsu users who was helping Inochi said. "We have to finish our job. We're not going to run."

"What?" Wally said, shocked. "No, come on!"

"Leave us be," they urged.

Wally glanced upward. It would be on them in another second--in fact it might be already. He should just grab who he could and run.

But...what if they needed to communicate that message? What if he messed up too much by trying to save them?

It was a terrible moment for him...realizing that this might just be their choice.

 No one else was moving to run either.

Wally turned to the door.

Mabui, the Cloud ninja who he barely remembered from before, walked around the corner of the room's entrance, carrying paperwork.

"Hey," one of those at the map yelled at her. "Don't come in! Run!"

"What?" Mabui said blankly.

"Go! Get her out of here," the person called. "She doesn't need to be here for this information!"

Wally heard the weird hissing sound of fire blazing through the air and knew the bomb would hit in less than 1 second.

But for him that was more than enough time.

He grabbed Mabui before she could even answer the person who'd yelled at her and dashed out of the building.

He couldn't have tried to grab anyone else, or it would have been too late. He had to grab Mabui and make sure he didn't break her neck while doing it.

They were out of the building and across the clearing and behind a rock when the bomb hit and decimated the entire thing.

He and Mabui both felt heat rush over their heads, but they weren't killed.

Wally then stood up and looked at what was left of the spot in horror.

"I can't believe it..." he said. "I could have saved most of the guys if they let me... Why did they all stay?"

Mabui stood up... She was a very short woman, even for a ninja, and she couldn't see over the rock, but she pushed herself up to peer over it and stared in horror at the miserable pit where the building used to be.

"They're gone..." she said.

"Yeah..." Wally said.

Mabui swallowed. "The enemy must have done that on purpose..."

"I could have saved more of them." Wally was still upset. He put his head in his hands. "They said not to... Crap! Why did I listen?"

Mabui bit her lip and then grabbed his arm. "What was your name again?"

"Wally West," Wally said.

"West-san," Mabui said, firmly, though she looked shaky, "they chose to stay put because it was their duty."

"But even so, some of them didn't need to die."

"They would choose to stay with their leaders. It's a matter of honor," Mabui said. "I...would not have run either. You didn't allow me the chance to make the honorable choice."

"What? Are you crazy?" Wally said. 

Then he remembered that ninja had very different views of death in battle than he did.

"I mean...uh, I get that was a big deal to you, but that one guy said to take you out, and I could just manage to, so I did. I don't think that's on you...and aren't you glad you didn't die? You can still help..."

"I...suppose I can be of use," Mabui said. "But I will bear the shame of this..."

Shame? It wasn't her decision...

Ninja were so weird.

"Who was that guy?" Wally asked.

"He was one of Cloud's other intelligence ninja," Mabui said. "Not my division, but... I don't know why..."

"I guess he decided you didn't have to die. Why were you out of the room?"

"I...well, I..." Mabui faltered. "There was something I had to do in a different room, and I had to get the new reports..."

She leaned on the rock. "They're all dead... We're severely damaged from this... We could lose."

"You won't lose," Wally said. "Hey, we should go. I can take you to the battlefield if you want... Ironically, that's the surest place not to get hit by a bomb... You shouldn't stay here. There's no one else here."

Mabui straightened. "You're right... I might as well. Where Is Lord Ay? Perhaps--"

"Oh, sorry, I think he's out of commission for now..." Wally said. "But he's alive. Maybe he'll show up later."

"This is a disastrous outcome..." Mabui said.

Wally realized that she was a little shell shocked and was trying to suppress it.

He picked her up gently and ran back to the battlefield.

He found that the ninja there had managed to delay the Beast, but it was going to recover soon enough.

"Sunshine," he called.

Shine was surveying the action, but she turned. "Wally? What happened...? I was starting to wonder where you were."

"I...only saved a small amount of people. It...that thing was so fast," Wally said. "Even for me..." He was crestfallen.

Shine pursed her lips. "We can't save everyone, honey... I'm sorry." She looked up and put a hand on his shoulder. "I know you saved as many as you could."

"I didn't though," Wally said. "I would have...saved their dads, but they told me not to... I listened to them. All of them wouldn't budge... I thought if I yanked them out of it I could hurt their minds, but was it worth dying over? I feel like crap..."

"But you have one person." Shine glanced at Mabui.

"Yeah, she's...an exception. Someone asked me to, and she was in the right place at the right time," Wally said. "But I could have taken at least half a dozen of them..."

"They made their choices, Wally," Shine said firmly. "You can't blame yourself for that. They didn't run when they could. They knew it was coming. Sometimes people make sacrifices in war... I'm sorry you had to see it."

"It's not my first time. It's...but..." Wally sighed. "Well, you know."

"I know," Shine said quietly.

"Mabui?" Camie turned to look at them. "Whoa...you got out. That's awesome."

"It's not," Mabui said. "It was an accident, nothing more. Is there something I can do to assist in this fight?"

She was clearly trying to figure out what was going on, but seeing it in person had to be vastly different from hearing about it.

"Most of us aren't doing anything but waiting to help," Momo said. "Naruto is shielding everyone from running out of chakra, but other than that, only the Tailed Beast attacks are doing any damage."

Shikamaru was talking to his teammates, probably about whatever had been said by his father.

"Is he going to be okay?" Momo wondered.

"Right now he has to finish the fight," Shoto said. "Processing it will have to wait."

"I saw Ino crying," Camie said.

"She's dealing with it," Dabi said flatly. "It's not pretty, but it's war. Time to be sorry about it later. If we all survive, that is... Lose your head at a time like this and more people die. Not everyone can be a soldier."

"I don't think I could be," Momo said.

The Tailed Beast started to shoot spikes.

"Uh oh!" Camie cried.

"Duck!" Momo formed a metal shield and threw it up over them.

"What are those things?" Dabi asked, fire blazing over his arm.

He shot fire out, and it consumed some of the spikes as they came at him.

"No one thinks this is a problem?" Wally pulled Shine out of the way. "Weird."

"Wait!" Camie had her hands over her head. "I just realized it! Crap! We have to get to Neij!"

"Neji?" Momo went white. "Oh no! Where is he?"

"By Naruto!" Shoto was peering around the shield. "There's no way we can go over there without cover. I'll make a blockade toward them."

He started to do so... The spikes went through the ice.

"I guess that's not strong enough..." Momo said.

Bakugo blasted some spikes aside angrily.

"Here, get in here." Wally pulled Mabui into the shelter with the kids.

Mabui pursed her lips.

"Can you do anything?" Camie asked her.

"Nothing that would make a large enough difference to help," Mabui said. "Not without more time. My jutsu takes a lot of effort to do on large objects."

"Wait, what's your jutsu again?" Bakugo asked.

"Teleportation," Camie supplied before Mabui could answer. "It's a lot like what Shine does, but, like, it takes more time and it can kill ya."

"Did I tell you that?" Mabui looked at her in confusion.

"Guys, we don't have time!" Momo said. "Think, there has to be a way we can protect ourselves."

"Can you make a full-body armor?" Dabi said.

"Joking is not helping!" Momo sad.

But then suddenly the spikes stopped, and the attack changed again.