Title; Lucky

Disclaimer; Nope I don't own any of the Naruto characters.

Okay so the pairing will be SasuHina in the end, but don't expect me to avoid muddying the waters a bit first. Just trust me, in the end SasuHina.

Chapter 4-

"We need to take Ino some food." The blonde put in awkwardly as we awaited our meal. I'd have preferred to help but there was a rather limited amount to do and Hinata was the only one of us that had figured out how to work the foreign hotplate. That left Hinata at the stove, the kettle boiling on its own and the rest of us twiddling our thumbs.

"I don't need to do anything for Ino." Came Hinata's soft voice after a moment. From what I'd heard and figured the blonde had thrown her to the wolves, she certainly didn't owe her anything.

"She'll starve, you really okay with that?" put in the blonde his sapphire eyes scanning the room imploringly. His guilt tripping didn't reach the Hyuuga though with her back turned.

"She can look after herself, she'd been pretty eager to be on her own after all." Our brunette leader spoke up looking unimpressed at the blondes attempts to sway us his way.

"It's getting dark Naruto. The dead, they'll be far more dangerous in the dark." Sakura spoke up prompting the blonde to descend into a brooding silence. I guessed his adherence to her could be quite useful at times.

"The dead, that's what you call them Pinkie?" asked Tenten throwing a teasing grin at the other woman, they had seemed to have sparked up a strange friendship between them after partnering up. We had all sort of bonded a little with the exception of Naruto, his concern for Ino and insistence on returning to her seemed to put him at ends with the rest of us, though Hinata in particular.

Of course everyone but Naruto had noticed the infected status, the blonde had lost his bag fleeing from the crowd downstairs and none of us were quite sure how to broach the subject.

"They are dead, Teagan. Besides it's better than ghouls." Returned the more respectful Sakura. So far she was the only one who insisted on using Tenten's given name and it seemed to agitate the brunette about as much as Pinkie irritated Sakura.

"They're zombies." Muttered Naruto mostly to himself it seemed. I suppose they were somewhat similar to those old movie monsters. The idea of calling them zombies though just didn't quite sit well with me, it felt like we'd be abandoning ourselves completely to the ridiculousness of this situation.

Any further argument came to a sudden halt though as we all quieted to better hear the busy Hyuuga. At some point while she'd been preparing the food she'd begun to hum lightly to herself, a soft airy tune.

"What is that?" I asked lightly the tune ringing a bell in the back of my mind that went unanswered. It was so familiar and yet I couldn't place it. The Hyuuga woman for her part seemed to become quite nervous at having four pairs of eyes suddenly riveted on her, she blushed awkwardly at having been caught singing.

"I don't know, it just sort of popped into my head." Admitted Hinata. No, there was a lot more to it than that, both Tenten and Sakura had reacted the same as I had. Another connection perhaps.

The kettle came to a boil a moment later and we settled down into a silence that could have almost been companionable, if not for the brooding waves coming from the blonde or the tension the rest of us carried.

"We'll split up to take watches through the night, school boy and I can go first." Announced Tenten, I'd have to talk to her about that little nickname. The plan drew something from Naruto around a mouthful of noodles before he hastily choked them down and repeated that he could take a middle shift alone.

When all was said and down we'd figured that Tenten and I could take four hours together, Naruto three after that and Sakura and Hinata another four after him. Naruto would have an extra hour to rest but it seemed fair given his rest would be more sporadic than ours. It was also a long time to stay put around the things downstairs but there was no telling when we'd be able to rest again and none of us wanted to move outside without full daylight at our backs.

"You alright love?" the white haired pretty boy quipped to me. I threw him a glare tightening the tourniquet on my leg. I might have been less temperamental had I been provided a little more clothing, Garaa had a full double breasted suit, B had his damned costume and Suigetsu the freak had his tracksuit. And what do I get, my damned panties and a v neck. I'd be reporting someone to the authorities once I escaped this place.

"Don't call me love, asshole." I shot back. I wasn't in the mood for this flirty bastard, not after the hell we'd just crawled through. The broken air vent I'd just been in was still hanging precariously above the mob of hungry mouths and I could see the gleam of scarlet on the broken jagged metal that had cut into my leg.

"You're a lucky one though princess. Pretty strong too, I thought you were a goner." He continued on unperturbed. Yeah real strong, I'd just managed to get a hold of that iron bar during my fall, almost bloody wrenched my shoulder out of its socket too but it kept me from falling into that pit of Undead hands and teeth. I didn't bother dignifying the shark tooth bastard with a response.

"Garaa, B! Are you alright?" I called out, the pair were still trapped the other side of the gap. I couldn't see any way for the young business man or the TV personality to get across now.

"We're fine miss Tsunade but we'll have to find another way across." Boomed the elder man's voice full of confidence, the red head didn't seem so confident though but then we'd all seen what happened to others before when they got cocky. Genma had been all but torn to pieces when he'd pushed ahead of us into this building. I could still hear the howls he'd released as the cold fingers had torn though his torso ripping organs free.

That had shaken us.

He'd been the first casualty in here but not the last, there had been three more deceased notices posted on my phones app since we'd been split up. Our little group had been fortunate enough to get onto these walk ways but the others were still down below somewhere.

"How will we deal with them?" I put the question to the brunette as I idly leaned against the railing. Whatever these things were they were nothing if not persistent, the majority of them were still clambering over each other pushing against the stairs crumbled ruins.

"We could make some kind of spear, pick them off. I'd rather kill them now than leave them free." Answered the woman without much conviction. I suppose it could get messy if too many corpses piled up, the remaining ones might get up here using them as stepping stones. I was surprised to feel the tall woman's body press against my back her arms snaking around my waist and her chin resting just on my shoulder.

"It's cold." She answered the unspoken question simply. I couldn't disagree with her and the shared body heat was quite nice.

"I've got a confession to make." She whispered huskily, lips so close to my ear that I had to fight with myself not to shiver. For all the tomboy masculinity she displayed there was something distinctly feminine and seductive in her throaty whisper.

"Oh yeah, what's that?" I asked. There wasn't much of a mood for romance, not with the scent of the corpses below fouling the air or their low chilling groans. Sakura had probably been right about the situation encouraging some kind of desperate liaison but there'd be little romance to it when or if it happened.

"I don't want to tell you. We might have to you know…kill each other, it'll be easier the less we know." She offered instead and yet I felt her grip tightening around me all the same and her head roll slightly her cheek pressing against the side of my neck.

"I disagree, the better we know each other the less likely we'll be to abandon each other. You wouldn't let me become one of those things." I offered, I certainly didn't want to become like that. No, a dignified death would be far better.

"So you say now...We've met before you know." Tenten admitted going on to explain her mother had worked on a play with mine and she'd watched over me during rehearsals, I'd been about five at the time and she'd been fourteen.

"It's not a surprise, Hinata met me as I child too. Do you recognise anyone else?" I returned. It was another connection and more so this one was through my mother too and her work as an actress. I tried thinking back but there were always any number of suits wandering around my family, business partners or associates of my father or an agent hoping to represent my mother.

"Can't say that I do, but someone could know me. Or maybe it's something stupid like blood I donated once went to someone here." Answered the woman struggling a little to get more comfortably wrapped around me.

"Come on, they're making me uncomfortable." Prompted the brunette releasing me. Yes I suppose there was something off putting about all the shuffling corpses below. We stepped back into the office and settled ourselves on the mildly uncomfortable couch the brunette wasting no time in cuddling back up against me with a shiver.

"Have you ever been in love?" asked the brunette strangely after a couple of quiet moments shifting her position to glance up at me. The eye contact made me feel slightly strange, her large doe eyes where so at odds with her tough persona and I was uncomfortably aware of just how close our faces were in this position.

"Strange question. No, I've cared for woman before certainly but never enough that I'd call it love. And you?" I answered earning a hum of approval from the woman, and something about how a young man shouldn't rush to fall in love.

"You wanted us to be better acquainted school boy. Once I thought I was, but I fell more for my idea of him than the man himself." Answered the brunette shifting once more in my lap to straddle my legs. There was no real way to avoid looking at her now and distinctly less as her hands slide up to cup both sides of my face. The moonlight added a silvery glow to her eyes now and a faint gleam to her bare skin.

"Don't make too much of this. I just get a little sentimental sometimes." She spoke in the same low husky whisper she'd used earlier before pressing her face closer her dry chapped lips pressing against my own. It was the gentle sort of kiss that I wouldn't have thought the woman would use. Her left hand slid higher into my hair as her lips pressed more purposefully into mine. Her leather clad thighs slid further up to wrap around my hips and my hands moved instinctively one sliding over a taunt thigh and the other planting itself on a hip as her tongue flickered against my lips before she pulled back eyes heavy and lidded, her breath just slightly pitched and laboured.

"So just what should I make of that?" I asked already half guessing the answer, same as Sakura. Same as me if I was being a bit more honest, hope was slipping away bit by bit and I was thinking of all the things I'd like to do again before death caught up with me. A stiff drink and a decent lay certainly were pretty high on that list.

"Something a little sweet in case it all goes sour." She answered, apparently playing cutesy was among her list of hidden talents. She hadn't moved off me yet though and I began to wonder just how much a little was as she began to lean in just a little closer.

Any thoughts of how bad an idea all this was or what a mistake it might become in this hostile environment died the moment her lips fell on mine again and she pressed her kiss deeper.

Not for the first time I wondered at the questionable choice of two of my travelling companions. The bowl cut lunatic was a force to be reckoned with swinging that bat around as if he'd been born with it in his hands and the other man was the kind of calculating you only saw in professional soldiers, killers and sociopaths.

But they had their problems too. The hooded Shino was too quiet and I was certain he'd seen them coming but hadn't bothered shouting us a warming and Gai was the opposite, it had been his shouting that drew these things to us.

I pulled the teary eyed Kin along looping her arm over my shoulders as she threatened to fall under her own weight. They'd caught her when they'd come through the treeline, one biting into her leg tearing through the leggings to tear a lump of flesh from her, another the opposite arm and the last throwing itself on her back. The last hadn't bitten her but it's sharp claws had cut deep groves into her ribs on the left side and her right shoulder tearing her blouse open with a messy splay of blood.

I wasn't sure how we'd gotten them off her we'd just reacted striking at the three as she rushed forward panic stricken. More had joined those three from the sounds of it as we fled through the canopy the two boys flanking either side of us as I tried to keep the girl in my arms awake and moving.

We weren't moving nearly fast enough though and I threw a glance at either of the guys, Kin needed to be carried and I was running on empty.

"Temari, let go." It was Shino that answered the look stepping close to us. I unhooked the woman's arm from my shoulders and breathed a sigh of relief as Shino's hand reached out. I was too shocked to respond as the hand slammed into Kin sending her tumbling backward as Shino's hand tangled itself in my tank top nearly tearing it off as he dragged me along.

I could hear Kin's screams as the horde descended upon her fallen form.

By the time that I came to my senses enough to do more than run and follow woodenly Gai had led us inside some seemingly abandoned building and both he and Shino were busy barricading the thick iron slab of a door.

I rounded on the silent man hammering a fist into his cheek that jarred my hand painfully. I paid it little heed though grasping his collar with my other hand and whirling him around pressing him to a wall. I raised my still throbbing hand ready to hit him again and would have except for Gai's interference.

"The fuck is wrong with you!" I snarled pulling my arm free of the middle aged man child's grip. The younger man took his time to fix his glasses back into place before he drew his cell from his pocket to aid his answer. He flicked down to Kin's name, now highlighted with a glowing orange 'infected'.

"She was a liability." Was his simple response, and she could be an asset distracting the mob for us. I gave the hooded man a long dark look as I released him and backed away.

"You're a cold son of a bitch aren't you?" I spat out regretting the choice to throw my fate in with this sort of person. Gai was surprisingly stoic in the situation, Kin's death had evaporated his earlier boyish cheer.

First chance I had I'd be parting company with this lunatic.

"Where's that blonde idiot?" came Tenten's first question after she'd awoken, her bed mate seemed far more interested in getting a bite to eat though trying to aid Sakura in preparing breakfast…more instant noodles.

Yup.

"He set out at first light to get some food to that blonde bimbo. Sent the crowd scattering around the building too, once they heard him bumbling around down there." I answered, despite the trouble he was causing I had to give him some points for refusing to abandon his friend.

"Great, does he know she's probably turned into one of those?" continued the brunette looking anything but pleased. I couldn't blame her, we'd be having significantly more trouble getting out of our safe haven now. Sanctuary turned prison, I never was much of a fan of irony.

"We told him but I don't know that he believed us." The kettle clicked to a boil and that seemed to end the topic of Naruto. We'd probably keep a check on the phones of what his condition was but there'd be no chasing after him, too much trouble for no return. Though speaking of the phone.

"There's been a few changes on the other's status." I spoke up prompting the newly risen pair to go for their phones quickly. Surprisingly there hadn't been any infections or deaths but a third status had appeared in pale blue; Injured. Seeing as I hadn't gained it for my sprained wrist and neither Sasuke or Tenten had for their gashes it was a safe bet the message meant a heavier injury, maybe a disabling one. Choji, Kurenai and only moments ago Naruto had all gained the status.

Other than that there had been few changes. Choji became linked with the other small group of Kankuro, Shikamaru and Kurenai, which gave me some cause for worry given his newly injured status and how he'd gained it. Kakashi's status was still blank but a small line connected him to another blanked out face.

"Wish this damn thing would tell us more." Intoned the Uchiha, I had to agree. This thing teased us more than it gave useable information.

"Other people can worry about themselves." Gritted out our brunette leader poking her meal with disinterest. Eating at the moment was more of a conscious choice than an instinctual one.

"There's plenty of noisy stuff up here, we could get them riled up the opposite side of the building, throw down a flare of two to keep them distracted and make our way out this side." Spoke up Sakura, we'd swapped our weapons around a little and she now held the fire axe. My wrist still couldn't support the weight leaving me with the single handed cleaver instead.

"Seems as good a plan as any, how about direction. We saw a path leading west, how about you two?" Tenten spoke throwing the question to both Hinata and I.

"Yeah, we passed a small path I think." I answered glancing toward the Hyuuga for confirmation. It had been narrow through and the canopy close knit. We probably wouldn't have to worry about an ambush from the sides given the thick plant life and those creatures inability to sneak as such but it would make fleeing difficult too.

"I think we should head east. We've no guarantee some of these creatures won't follow us from the building and their groaning always brings more of them. The fence on the east side is still standing so it'll stop them from pursuing us on the path." Sakura put in. I was beginning to enjoy having her clever mind around but pointed out my own worries.

"It's the same westward." She offered with a shrug. I recalled the lazy Shikamaru's opinion on all this, like a video game, level two offered more freedom but both choices would still be more difficult than what had come before us.

"It's decided so. Pinkie can lead with me then and you two can bring up the rear." Spoke Tenten, the last on the matter before we settled down for what I hoped would not be our last meal.

Karin Uzumaki was a powerful woman, a queen to rule the world if there ever was one. So it wasn't much of a surprise that she'd survived through the night on this hellish place, or that the men had fled out of fear of keeping company with a strong woman. It wasn't a surprise one of those pushy men had given her a love bit either.

It did annoy her though how much the bite had affected her, she'd been sweaty and exhausted since the rat faced man had nipped at her forearm. It hadn't been much of a bite, barely a graze but Shizune thought he might have been diseased or something.

It would pass though, she was sure of that, she just needed a little help at the moment that was all.

"I need a rest Karin." The dark toned girl complained lightly setting her down against a wall. Karin couldn't fault her, she looked as exhausted as the Uzumaki felt her tanned skin dripping with sweat. Karin was surprised to realise just how appealing Shizune seemed in the moment, how nice her skin looked.

"K-karin! What are you doing?" The Uzumaki leaned in her face brushing against the other woman's exposed collar bone, she reached her hands out one wrapping around Shizune's slim waist and the other trailing up a strong thigh, and such strong thighs she had…good strong tender muscles. Karin's tongue flickered out instinctively and she tasted a drop of the dark woman's sweat.

"Shush Shizune, shush. Just a little taste." Breathed Karin opening her mouth wide and tightening her grip as Shizune tried to pull away. She didn't hear her friend's cries as sharp teeth bit into her flesh or feel it as a shaky fist hammered into her temple over and over again desperate for release until with a pained spasm it stilled and fell lifeless to the stone floor.

Karin had drifted away and failed to feel anything as her body was usurped.

Chapter 4 ya dig it? Feel a little bad for Shizune but that's the way it is in a zombie tale, being good and helpful will get you killed, being evil and a jerk will get you killed karmatically, being smart will get you killed, (cause it's scary when the genre savvy chick or guy bites the bullet) being dumb will get you killed in a way to amuse the audience. The only thing that will really help is plot armour and that can crack pretty quickly in this genre.

Also a bit of a companion one-shot gone up to this chapter else wheres on my profile.

Anyway questions, opinions, well wishes? Leave a review.

By the way would anyone like a character list posted up, ages, occupations and starting groups of different characters, that kind of thing?

R&R