It was a dark dawn, the sun had not yet risen, and everything in Konoha was covered in shadows.
In the hospital, a special patient was recovering from death. As the sun came up, his eyes twitched
and opened.
"He's up! He's up" the ninja watching him cried through the building, and the other medical ninjas
came rushing in.
"Where am I?" he asked, looking around confused.
"The hospital, you survived death, we found you basically in three pieces, the 5th saved your life,"
said the same ninja who had been watching over his bed side.
"The 5th, who the hell is the 5th?" he demanded, as a woman came walking in,
"I am," she said calmly, "I am Tsunade, known in this village as the fifth Hokage."
"Great, so what happened, the exams, what became of the exams?" he asked, sounding
concerned.
"The exams have been over for some time, over two and a half years, possibly more, you've been
struggling with death since, it a miracle you're alive," said another medical ninja.
"It's been so long, now I remember what happened! Gaara, he, I, and then the last thing I
remember was a wall of sand and pain coming my way…" he stammered.
"That's right Dosu, that's exactly right," said a voice, and Dosu rose to see something more
horrible than the devil to him, Gaara. "What, no hello from the one whom I almost killed?" Gaara
said calmly, with a smile that gave Dosu a nervous feeling.
"Why, why are you here?" said Dosu with his eyes wide open and his heart beating fast, "what do
you want with me?"
"I wish to apologize for what I did, I've learned that it was wrong what I did, and I wish to
apologize."
"Why should I accept your apology? Why shouldn't we end it now?" Dosu demanded, angry and
afraid.
"Because you've been out for almost 3 years, while I've been busy training and becoming
stronger, do you think that you can take me?" Gaara said, his voice beginning to deepen.
"N-no, I can't, I'm just afraid, I don't want to die, that pain…..was…terrible," Dosu said, his
eyes watering, "I'm sorry, and I accept your apology."
"Good, so how would you like to come with me to my village?" Gaara said with a smile.
"Sure, I'd lo-Your village?" Dosu said, filled with more confusion,
"Yes, my village, I am the Kazekage of the Sand, so, how about it?" Gaara asked once more.
"What the hell," Dosu answered, "What have I got left to loose?
"Get some rest, we will leave in a few days," Gaara said, and then left the room, soon followed by
the other medical ninja, it became that only Tsunade and Dosu remained in the room.
"You should rest now, your wounds are not 100 healed, by tomorrow we can remove your
bandages, and place your old ones back on, though I doubt those would be good to wear after 3
years of lying around," she said, picking up his old moldy wrappings, "I'll get you some fresh ones,
see you tomorrow," she said as she left the room.
"So, a visit to the Sand, interesting, I wonder ho-" Dosu said, suddenly stopping, "I wonder how
Kin and Zaku are…" he said, slowly dropping his head and letting his eyes water up again. He
hadn't been with them long, but the time they had, he had grown to like them, he just never
showed it, he was on a mission after all, and because of that he wasn't supposed to let his
emotions get in the way. He decided to ask tomorrow, or something, for now, he would rest, he
closed his eyes and fell asleep instantly
"Dosu, Dosu wake up, Dosu," he heard, as he slow opened his eyes, starring into the face of a
blonde haired girl, "Good morning Dosu, I'm Ino, from the Leaf, I was one of your competitors
from the chunin exams, how are you?" She said cheerfully.
"I'm… good," he said as he arose and went to put his things on. "Hey, where's my-" he began, as
he saw Ino hold up his Sound Headband,
"I polished it everyday for you , and even sewed the new cloth for you, hope you like it," she said
as she handed him his headband.
"Thank you, it looks great," he said, as he pulled his new shirt on. He reached for his bandages,
and then recoiled, remembering what they stood for to him. He then looked at his headband, and
placed it on his head, without his infamous bandages on. Ino's eyes began to sparkle with
excitement and glee, looking at Dosu, reborn. Dosu went for his weapon, and saw it was rusty and
crude.
"I'll clean that for you," Ino offered, and he handed it to her. "Here, come on over and we'll make
breakfast for you," she said, then grabbed his hand and yanked him out of the room and onto the
street.
They walked to her flower shop, and then went in. As Dosu entered, the smell of many different
flowers entered his nose, and to him, it smelled amazing. He had never smelled anything more
sweetly than a certain blue flower with green and red on the petals; he stopped to smell it, and was
full of glee as he did.
"You can have it for free," said a woman behind him, she had longer hair than Ino, and was a bit
taller than her too, and she wore a red kimono and had her hair flowing out rather than tied back
like Ino. "Go ahead hun, take it," she said, as she picked the flower and gave it to him.
"Thank you very much mam," he said, as we placed the stem in his pocket. Then, Ino came back
down and grabbed him by the arm,
"Come on, breakfast is up here," she said as she dragged him upstairs. Upstairs he saw something
that he had never seen before, a full table of food. There were pancakes, ramen, everything he had
dreamt about having as a small child in his makeshift room in the Sound village. Already sitting at
the table was. Shikamaru and Choiji, Ino's former teammates, he knew them from the fight during
the second exam.
"Welcome" Shikamaru said, without any sense of happiness, and full of fear. Choiji, staring at the
food, started to twitch,
"Hurry up and sit down, I wanta eat" he said, as Ino sat Dosu down then quickly sat down next to
him. Choiji saw that as the begging of the meal and loaded his plate. Dosu reached for a piece of
meat and took a bite, he instantly then gobbled the rest down, and reached for another piece of
food, soon he was eating as fast as Choiji, with Shikamaru looking at them crazily, and Ino giggling
watching the two of them eat everything on the table.
Finally, after a few more min of eating, one piece of the meat that Dosu first ate was on the table,
with Dosu and Choiji shoving each other for it, when Shikamaru reached out, picked it up, and ate
it. Dosu and Choiji stopped shoving, and stared at Shikamaru, eyes wide, and then they hung their
heads while Shikamaru wiped his mouth.
"Delicious" Shikamaru said with a half-hearted smile, as he excused him self and left. Choiji, still
hungry due to training the day before, excused himself and left as well.
"How was the food?" Ino asked, and Dosu replied with a smile "the best thing I've ever had." Ino
smiled, and then excused herself, leaving Dosu to plan his day.
Just as he finished planning, Ino grabbed his arm again and drug him through the house to the town
entrance.
"Naruto is returning soon, he should be here any minute," Ino said, "you can hang out with him
today while I shine your weapon." Ino said, as she grabbed Dosu's arm so he couldn't escape.
Just as she finished her sentence, two figures appeared at the gate, and pushed it open, catching
Ino and Dosu by surprise.
"We're back!" Naruto yelled, with Jiraiya right behind him, out of breath from Naruto's speed.
Naruto then looked down, and saw Dosu there, smiling and waving, "Hey, who are you?" Naruto
said, and Dosu just looked at him.
"You don't recognize me? From the Chunin exams? I'm Dosu, of the Village Hidden in Sound,"
Dosu said, causing Naruto to go wild. "You! Why I'll-" he began
"Naruto, STOP!" said a voice he recognized. A girl wearing a red suit came up, and apologized to
Dosu, "Forgive my fellow teammate, he didn't know what happened to you, and such, he was too
stupid to actually wake up during our fight, I apologize for his blunt idiocy," she said laughingly,
"Oh, I'm so rude, I haven't introduced myself, I'm Sakura." Naruto then looked at her in awe,
amazed by the two and a half years of development she had gained.
"Your! SAKURA! You're so, so….so…." he said making a curving motion with his hands. Bam,
she nailed him upside the head,
"You haven't grown up one bit, have you Naruto?" She said, while Jiraiya, Dosu and Ino stood
there looking at the two fight again until Dosu finally spoke up,
"So, Naruto, wanta hang out for the rest of the day? I leaving tomorrow for the Sand Village and
hoped we could hang out," he said.
"Well, I was just going to say hi to my old friends, but what the heck, I could wait" Naruto replied
laughingly. Dosu then gave his thanks to Ino and Naruto said goodbye to Jiraija and the two went
to wander the town.
"Where to first?" Dosu asked, "Hmmmm, why not check out Kakashi's? Or better yet, the ramen
shop, I'm starving," Naruto said, and took off for the Ramen shop.
"Hey! Wait up!" Dosu yelled as he began following Naruto. The two arrived there a few min. later
and walked through the cloth, and saw none other than Iruka sitting there.
"Naruto! You're finally home, so how ya been?" Iruka asked while slurping down some ramen.
"I've never been better; you should all the stuff I've learned while I'm away, oh! This is Dosu; he
almost died after the prelims in the chunin exam." Naruto answered.
"So that's Dosu, for someone who was crushed under a heavy sand attack, he looks good," Iruka
said, "Thank you sir," Dosu said thankfully to Iruka.
The two boys sat down and listened to Naruto's stories of the training and everything he had
learned over the past two and a half years. Dosu asked Naruto when he was finished "So what
happened at the finals? I wish to know."
"The finals? I remember that. I faced Neji, that dude with the weird white eyes, and kicked his
butt! You shoulda seen it," Naruto bragged, "After that, that girl, Tamari, fought Shikamaru, that
shadow dude, you remember him, don't you? Shikamaru was able to get her with his shadow, but
surrendered, shoulda kept fighting. Then Gaara…" as soon as that word was said, fear flooded
into Dosu, and he felt sand all over him, crushing his body, "and we waited and finally Saskue…"
Naruto said, and the memory of the second exam came back. He remember everyone watching as
Zaku's arms went farther and father back, Zaku was screaming, then, a loud crack came, and
everything was silent, he was more afraid that before, "and this sand thing, and Saskue was like
shoom, and broke that barrier, then, the Sound and Sand Villages attacked us, and the third died
while fighting Orichamaru."
Orichamaru, the leader of the Sound, he attacked them? How many, why, how, when? Questions
flooded his head, replacing the fear and pain felt by the two combatants that Naruto had just
explained in fight.
"Dosu, you okay?" Naruto asked, as Dosu snapped back into reality. "Oh, sorry, I'm fine, so
where too next?" he said as he moved his empty ramen boll away from him. "Why not check out
the school I used to go to?" Naruto suggested, and Dosu agreed.
On the way, they saw Shikamaru and Temari and Konkoro walking together. "Hey guys! Whats
up!" Naruto yelled to them, with Dosu on his trail. "Long time no see! Hey Shikamaru, you and
Temari, eh, eh?" he said motioning his index fingers together. "No, we just hanging out," said
Shikamaru, his face bright red. "Really," Dosu said, smiling as he became in view to the others,
and they stood there shocked. "You guys remember me, from the exams, don't you? I'm Dosu,"
he said, as the others jaws dropped.
"YOU'RE DOSU?" Shikamaru yelled out, "Yep, I'm different without the bandages, ain't I?"
Dosu asked as the trio nodded in amazement. "Well, we'd better get going, nice to see you all
again!" Naruto said as he took off, leaving Dosu to find his own way.
"We'd better get going too," Shikamaru said. The three took off, as Dosu went on his way. "I'll
be right back," Temari said to Shikamaru as she came running to Dosu,
"Dosu! Wait!" she yelled, as Dosu turned around. "Give me your arm," she said, pulling out a pen.
"O-kay," he said, and gave her his arm. She began to write something down on his arm, "I'll be
there in a few days, stop by when you get the chance," she said, then kissed him on the cheek and
ran back to the other two. Dosu looked at his arm and saw an address for Tamari's house in the
Sand village. He had just scored big time.
He rushed off the way he saw Naruto run and quickly caught up with him. "Hey Naruto, guess
wh-" he began, but was interrupted by Naruto quickly, "They-They-They took Gaara!" Naruto
stammered his face in shock.
"What! What do you mean? Who?" he asked, his face just as scared as Naruto. "Let's report this
to the 5th," Naruto said as the two took off for Tsunade's house.
As Dosu ran with Naruto, he saw people looking at him, some running, children crying, and many
other things, he felt alone, scared, and very afraid. It took them a few minutes to get the home of
Tsunade, the 5th Hokage of the Village Hidden in the Leaves.
"We've got a problem, Gaara's been kidnapped!" Naruto yelled out as he ran through the
threshold.
"I've heard," she said, already standing. "Alright, you and Dosu go to the gate of the village,
Sakura and Kakashi will meet you there, and brief you on who took him. You'll head out to the
Sand Village, it will take you three days to get there, so move quickly. We have been informed
that Konkoro has been poisoned and is being rushed to the Sand village as well, Sakura will help
him out, when you get there, follow every order they give you, don't question, just obey. Also, Gai
and his team will set out tomorrow to assist you, work together, I'll look into this, now go," she
instructed, and the two took off.
They reached the gate to find Sakura waiting for them. "Kakashi is-" Sakura began, "late" Naruto
interrupted. About 5 minutes later Kakashi arrived, and they set off.
It was a long journey, but with out any distractions they were able to get there in two and a half
days, and they journeyed up to the Village Hidden in Sand…