A (not so short) BACKSTORY

I

"Oi! You call that art, un?"

Nakashima Natsuki pulled herself out of her work and back into the real world. She was at the chuunin exams sketching in her own little corner. She looked up from her drawings to see a boy about the same age as her (maybe a few months older) looking down at her. His long blond hair fell into his face as he tilted his head and his only visible blue eye- the other hidden by his bangs- shone with sarcasm. He was wearing a black Iwagakure headband on his forehead. A smirk grew across his face when he saw her look up at him through intense violet eyes.

"Yes, as a matter of fact I do call it art," she retorted. Her response shocked him. He obviously wasn't expecting her to be so confident after he insulted her.

"Is that a challenge, hm?" the boy asked, his childish grin returning to his face.

"Yea it is," Natsuki replied, her violet gaze flashing with competitiveness as she stood up. She unhooked a scroll from her belt and held it in her hand waiting for ther blond to make the first move. Luckily he did.

The swung his arm through the air. At first glance, Natsuki didn't realize what had happened until it hit her- literally. A large chunk of clay his her directly between the eyes. The boy smirked at his success and made a handsign before Natsuki could protest.

"Hey! No jutsus!" One of the proctors shouted when he saw the handsign. He pulled the boy away, giving Natsuki the time to pull the clay off her face, ruining a beautifully sculpted bird. Natsuki growled at him as the proctor and Hatake Kakashi, Natsuki's caretaker, lead them away from each other.

II

Natsuki had gotten past the first part of the exam, a written test...easy. Now, for the Forest of Death, this is what had her worried.

Natsuki had made her temporary campsite beneath a large oak tree close to the center of the forest, where she would have to report after gaining possession of another team's scroll.

This was her third day into the test, leaving her with two days left to pass the test, and she still only had the heaven scroll, being unsuccessful at tracking another team for their own scroll. Luckily, however, no one had been able to find her yet. She had to admit, this was much harder without a team.

She stood up from where she was resting, deciding to take a look around for another team. Once again, she found her searches fruitless and sat back down where she was.

Suddenly, the leaves in the trees above her rustled. Natsuki hid behind a tree trunk, anticipating an attack from another team. Then, the trees gave way, revealing three ninja. One, who specifically stood out to her (only a little less than a year older than her) had pale grey hair pulled back into a low ponytail. The glare on the lenses of his round glasses semi-blocked his deep black eyes.

Natsuki procured a few shuriken from her bag and prepared for an ambush, this time she was getting a scroll. She peeked out to make sure the ninjas' backs were facing her but when she looked out at the clearing, the team was gone. Natsuki's eyes narrowed in suspicion of their disappearance.

"Looking for us?" Natsuki felt a small vibration against her eardrum. She jerked her head around to see the grey-haired boy's face close to the side of hers, his lips grinning against her ear. His teammates stood at a safe distance away from him. That was when Natsuki felt a sharp point in her back and she noticed the kunai being held against her. Natsuki snickered at his question. With that she closed her eyes and explained with a hint of sarcasm, "No I was looking for the Easter Bunny."

"Hmf...I suggest you take the easy way out of this and simply hand over your heaven scroll so we can get this over with without shedding any blood..." His voice was smooth and calm, almost hypnotizing.

"Hah!" Natsuki surpressed a laugh, "I honestly love how you think I'm acutally going to give in!" In a plume of smoke, the white-haired girl disappeared, leaving the boy dumbfounded. Natsuki reappeared gripping to the tree branch above the group. Without warning the realeased the branch, allowing her foot to land ahrd on the boy's head, befuddling him long enough for her to release a multitude of shuriken in his direction, pinning him to the tree trunk. She did the same for his teammates so that neither of them could get in her way.

The boy struggled for freedom from the restraints but failed in his attempt. Natsuki grinned as she casually walked up to his position on the trunk of the tree and took his scroll from his bag. Flaunting it in his face for a few extra seconds before once again disappearing in a puff of smoke.

Test number 2: Check...

III

Finally, It was time for the final test of the chuunin exams. Natsuki was finally going to fight the boy who insulted her art, whom she later found out to be Deidara of Iwa. She was going to show him the true power of her art and she had the upperhand. She had seen what he can do but he doesn't have a clue about her.

Natsuki pulled her wavy white hair down from it's messy bun, just to put it back up again as she waited for the first match, her match, the fight she was determined to win.

"Are tyou ready for this, Natsu-chan, un?" She heard that speech impediment and that stupid nickname and Natsuki knew exactly who was talking to her.

"Of course I am, DeiDei-kun," she retorted, making sure to put extra emphasis on his own dreaded nickname she had alredy given him as payback, "but the true question is: are you ready?"

Deidara blushed profusely but still angrily grunted as he too, waited for the announcement of their match until, finally, it came.

"Our first match is Deidara of Iwagakure versus Nakashima Natsuki of Konohagakure."

Natsuki snickered before facing Deidara, "What do ya say? Fair fight?" She asked him, holding out a hand for him to shake.

"Sure why not, un?" He took up her offer and shook her hand as if sealing a deal. Suddenly something pinched down hard on the skin of Natsuki's palm, causing her to quickly pull away.

"OW! YOU BIT ME!" she shouted angrily at the blond, who laughed before heading into the open arena. She followed, glaring at him through a hard violet gaze every step of the way.

The fight was definitely interesting. It began when the proctor gave the signal. Natsuki stood still, anticipating her opponent's first move and gripping a scroll tightly in her hand. Deidara, once again, attacked first, throwing hundreds of clay birds into the air. Natsuki carefully doedged each of them, still holding a firm grip on the scroll in her hand. Once the storm of clay had passed, she decided it was her turn.

Natsuki whipped the scroll open to a sketch of none other than, her opponent himself. She bit her thumb, waiting for the salty tang of blood to readh her taste buds. When she finally felt the warm fluid drip into her mouth, she swiped her now wounded finger across the parchment, quickly releasing it afterwards. With a loud pop sound, an almost exact replica (minus a few slight differences) of Deidara appeared beside her.

"Hmf...Baka..." Deidara muttered beneath his breath when he saw the jutsu, 'What exactly is the point of making a clone of your opponent?"

Natsuki chuckled, "You really are dull, aren't you? This clone possesses each of your own abilities. It's really pretty self explanatory." At that, the clone had produced tens of clay sculptures and was preparing for an attack on the real Deidara.

Natsuki glared intensly at her blond opponent, waiting for his next move. When he didn't attack, Natsuki did so for him. Natsuki made a quick hand gesture and her clone attacked, meanwhile she disappeared herself.

Deidara easily dodged the attack and destroyed the clone but realized his own opponent was no where to be found. Natsuki reappeared behind him, pinning him against the ground, face down, in the process. With a grin, Deidara rolled over on his back, backfiring Natsuki's attack. He felt her struggle under the weight he was exerting on her wrists.

After a short amount of time, Deidara felt a warm, wet substance from Natsuki's left arm. Curious, he cautiously lifted his hand to see blood smeared across his palm. He examined her arm to see a the bandages wrapped around her left forearm and her arm warmers had also been stained.

Natsuk took the chance while Deidara was unsuspecting and kneed him in the crotch in an attempt to escape his grasp. Once she escaped, she swung her arm, releasing about a dozen shuriken hurdling in the blond's direction, restraining him against a single wall of the arena. He struggled but was unable to remove himself from the wall, eventually he gave up.

A proctor stopped the fight and Kakashi appeared behind Natsuki, holding her back from attacking again. "The winner of this round is Nakashima Natsuki, due to her opponent being unable to fight."

Natsuki, gripping her injured arm, which had now gone limp, proceeded foreward to her defeated opponent, removing the shurikens from the wall one by one and releasing the blond ninja. Once Deidara had been set free, Natsuki nodded her head in farewell with a grin on her rounded face, "Nice match." Deidara chuckled in reply and nodded as well before walking away.

Somehwere in the arena, the same silver-haired boy from the second test sat watching the match. The sun gleamed off his glasses as he began to understand the white haired girl's battle tactics: fighting fire with fire. Using her opponents' own strength against them. And taking them by surprize. She was defintely using more mental power than muscle power. However he couldn't help but notice she had a few weaknesses of her own. It didn't take much pressure for her arm to beging bleeding so profusely- there was obviously a scar there that had not healed properly. He was sure that she had some other weaknesses as well, but for now that was the main one.

Although the boy knew he had a job to do, he couldn't help but admire her work. She had defeated both the blond and the gray-haired boy himself. A small smirk grew across his face as he remembered his own fight with her and the way she sauntered away almost unharmed. With each memory, the boy's grin stretched wider until it could've been considered a smile. Without a word the boy snuck away from the arena, knowing this wasn't the last time he would see the younger albino girl. What was her name again? Oh yes: Nakashima Natsuki.

IV

It had been a week since the Chuunin exams and Natsuki sat outside watching visitors for the exams lave the village, heading back to their own. Kakashi sat down next to her, reading, like always. Unbeknowest to her 'father', and perhaps to even Natsuki herself, that she was keeping her eyes out for a certain familiar face and certain familiar long blond hair. Finally she spotted him. 'Kakashi wouldn't notice if I snuck away for a few minutes,' she thought as she slowly stood up, 'Besides I'd usually leave around now anyway.'

"Hey Barbie!" Deidara turned to see Natsuki running towards him. At the last minute, she could feel her left knee buckle and she remembered she hadn't bothered wrapping it today. Instead of stopping smoothly in front of the boy, she tumbled in what she was sure seemed extremely clumsy. She shut her eyes and held her arms out in front of her waiting to feel the impact of the ground. When she instead felt two arms around her, she opened her eyes to see Deidara holding her upright (or at least upright enough to keep her from falling flat on her face). She could feel her face redden as she pushed him away awkwardly, managing to regain her balance despite the pain eminating from her knee.

"Shit! I should've figured that would've happened!" She mumbled to herself, ignoring the fact the blond ninja was standing right next to her.

"You okay, hm?" He asked, his voice was barely above a whisper. "Huh? Oh yea! Fine!" Natsuki found herself scratching the back of her neck as she desperately searched for what she wanted to ask him so badly that she was willing to end up falling into his arms.

"I wanted to show you something before you left," she forced the words out of her mouth. Not even waiting for him to answer she grabbed him by the wrist (more aware of the dangers of holding his hand) and briskly led him away from the crowd. Eventually, they ended up at somewhat of a hillside almost completely surrounded by trees.

Once reaching her destination, Natsuki hurried to check the time- 8:11. 'Two minutes,' she thought to herself.

"Do you mind explaining why you dragged me here, un?" Deidara asked her. Natsuki hesitated, still seaching for the right answer. After about ten seconds she broke the silence, "I told you: I want to show you something." She calmly walked over to the top of the hill and sat down, letting her feet dangle over the edge. With slight confusion, Deidara followed suit and they both sat in silence for a few moments.

'8:12,' Natsuki counted down in her head as each minute passed. Without taking her eyes off the slowly darkening sky she told the other ninja to do the same, "Watch the sky." Deidara obeyed as they waited.

'8:13,' As soon as she made the mental note, two shooting stars shot past, one after the other in an everlasting game of 'tag'. Finally Natsuki dared to take her eyes off the sky and turned to look at the blond, who was still staring upwards. She didn't dare speak, afraid to interrupt any thoughts that may be going through his head. That and she was unsure at what to say. Finally he broke the silence for her.

"How'd you know this would happen, hm?" he asked, keeping his gaze towards the sky. "It happens every year," Natsuki explained, "Same place. Same day. Same place. August 13 at 8:13."

Finally, he turned to look at her and she took that as a queue to continue speaking, "I used to always come here with my father. That was when only one star flew past. Ever since he died, there have been two stars. I used to believe that it was my parents, letting me know that they're still here for me."

` "What do you mean by 'used to believe'?" he asked, "Do you not believe anymore."

Natsuki smiled and looked back up, "I never said I stopped believing," she hesitated, "I know you probably don't care to hear my life story. I really just brought you here to see it. In fact, your the first person, besides myself, to have seen it." With that she concluded her story and layed down in the grass.

For a while, Deidara continued to stare up blankly in thought. By the time he looked back down, Natsuki was asleep and snoring. Loudly. He chuckled.