Sasori knew when he was beat. He had no idea the Leaf shinobi would launch such a ruthless attack from all sides. It was a miscalculation on Sasori's part and one he would now have to deal with. He twitched his fingers and Konohamaru ran over to him, picking him up. With his other hand, Sasori shot out more chakra strings that attached to Sakura and pulled her out of her hiding spot and into Sasori's grasp. Directing the one hundred foot tall Konohamaru, Sasori punted Sasuke out of the way, the size difference once again canceling any need for finesse or planning, and escaped as fast as he could, the giant toad giving chase. Neji, however, wasn't so lucky. After dealing with the Naruto clones and getting caught in Kakashi's Sharingan there wasn't much left to do except try to escape. Unfortunately, with Konohamaru being left to the toad, every ninja present was focusing on Neji. Within seconds, attacks rained down from both sides, Naruto with his Shadow Clones, Sasuke was fire techniques, Shizune with poison gas, and Kakashi with regular close quarters combat. While Neji was getting pummeled, Jiraiya was drawing out a sealing scroll, ready to catch Sasori's chakra when the healing began. After a few more minutes of ceaseless pounding on Neji, Naruto was able to use Shadow Clones to pin him down while Shizune was lifted onto his chest to perform the healing jutsu. It was difficult, but she drew on Sasuke's chakra to finish the operation, hunting down and pulling out all of Sasori's chakra. Though it was powerful, his chakra did not contain the same poisonous malevolence that Orochimaru's had. Jiraiya caught the chakra in his scroll and sealed it up, stowing it in a bag separate from the one he was using to hold the scrolls of Orochimaru's chakra. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief as Neji shrunk back down to his normal size, unconscious.

Naruto looked around in the aftermath of the battle and said, "Crap! That other guy got away with Sakura and Konohamaru!"

Jiraiya smiled at him and said, "Hey, don't worry about them! I sent a toad after him so he'll be coming back in a little bit."

As though on cue, the toad returned to Jiraiya's side. Jiraiya yelled up to it, "Alright, did you get him?"

The toad croaked and shook his head. Apparently Konohamaru had gotten away. Jiraiya swore loudly. "I underestimated him."

"Well there's nothing we can do about it now." Kakashi said. "Let's take Neji back to the hospital and report to the Hokage."

Naruto was reluctant with this plan. He wanted to chase that guy down now and get his friends back. But he was pretty worn out by his fight with Neji and he wanted to make sure he was going to be okay too. So the group left, ready to track down Sasori again when they were better prepared.

As the Leaf ninja made their way back to the village, Konohamaru had stopped running and set Sasori and Sakura down in a large clearing, far enough away from the village to be safe. Sasori was almost fully recovered and pulled out a scroll. He had been defeated soundly and was now down one servant. Even if Deidara, Hidan, and Kakuzu made more, they wouldn't be enough. The Leaf Village had too many giants on their side. The only way to tilt things back into the Akatsuki's favor would be to make whatever servants he had now, bigger and stronger. It didn't help that his bodyguard was a mere Academy Student with barely any jutsu.

"That won't matter though." Sasori said to himself as he finished drawing the last symbols on the scroll. "After he gets this dose of power, no one will be able to match him in size or strength."

Sakura's heart was pounding as she watched Sasori work. This was starting to look very, very bad. It was bad enough having only Orochimaru to worry about. Now they had to try and keep track of at least three people. And she knew there were more members in Akatsuki. The only question was where exactly were they?