"C'mon, c'mon! Surface already! Please," Hinata begged to no one, "come back up! Don't be dead!"

"What happened?" Gaara came over to her in a hurry after hearing her scream bloody murder. He quickly began pulling her away from the edge of the waterfall they were camping near.

"Daisy! And Shikamaru!" Hinata exclaimed in short burst, "They fell over the edge! During the quake!" It wasn't often that Gaara was alarmed, but he was certainly freaked out now.

"We have to contact Tsunade. You do that. In the meantime, I'll look for them." She nodded and bolted in the direction of the nearest town for help.

Gaara paced for a moment, worried. The Shikamaru-guy was new to him, but Daisy… He'd known her since they were kids. Even back then she'd been a little badass. Sweet and adorable, sure; but in a fight, a total badass. He'd personally seen her take worse than a fall. So why was he so worried?

Far down below, a boy's head exploded out of the fast moving water, gasping for air. He quickly pulled a beautiful girl above the water's surface as they were washed further and further downstream. He knew the girl's arm was injured, so he pulled her close, put her good arm around his neck and swam for shore. By the time they made it, the tall waterfall they had fallen from was long out of sight.

Shikamaru trudged out of the river, Daisy in his arms. Both of them were extremely tired from their little trip. Still, neither was willing to give in to the lure of sleep just yet.

Shikamaru walked all the way to the shade at the edge of the forest and carefully set Daisy down in the soft grass. As her trembling hand slid from around his neck, he took it and used his other hand to help her lean against a tree. Then he switched hands and fell against the tree next to her.

Once they'd caught their breath, he glanced over at her and gently moved a wet lock of long hair aside. She turned her head with his motion, pressing his palm to her cheek and opened her weary, deep blue eyes. An instinct told Shikamaru that Daisy wasn't shaking just because she was cold. He gave her a half-hearted, but reassuring smile. She weakly returned the smile, sharing his thought: after all that, at least they were still alive.

Daisy then scooted closer to Shikamaru and leaned into his chest. He wrapped his arms around her, adjusting so not to bother her limp and injured left arm.

Without a word, they quickly succumbed to the numbing exhaustion clouding their minds.

Daisy awoke a few hours later to pressure being applied to her thigh. She forced her eyes to slowly open and dropped a hand on her left leg. To her surprise, the source of the pressure was Shikamaru using his jacket to stop her wound from bleeding out farther.

Shikamaru looked up in surprise at her touch.

"You're awake…" he murmured.

Daisy noted that he'd somehow gotten wet again when she saw the water glittering on his exposed skin. Her heartbeat quickened when she found herself admiring the way he looked in the amber light. Alarmed, she tried to back up, rammed her injured arm into the tree behind her and the leg Shikamaru held throbbed painfully.

"Hey, careful!" Shikamaru protested, moving closer and brushing hair out of her face. "You're too hurt to be fussing like that." Daisy didn't argue.

"You were bleeding pretty bad when I woke up," he continued, "so I tried to stop it and clean you off. I, uh, accidentally fell into the river in the process." He gave her an awkward smile, half wondering why he'd let that slip. Daisy just nodded sharply while gritting her teeth, waiting for the dull but powerful pain in her leg to ease.

He frowned, trying to mentally guess just how much pain she was in. Suddenly, he remembered that she was a medical ninja in addition to her skills as a warrior ninja and asked if she had her medical kit with her. She nodded and mouthed, "In the front pocket of my backpack. The light-blue suitcase shaped thing."

"Okay… Okay, I got it."

"Alright. Inside there should be two small bottles." she went on, "Help me up, then get those out."

Shikamaru did as he was told…and then almost dropped the tiny glass bottles when he turned around. His heart dramatically skipped a beat and jumped to a faster gear when he saw her. Daisy had managed to get her torn and blood-stained black shorts off and was sitting on a rock now, her good hand pressing his jacket to her wound.

She looked up as if feeling his eyes on her and beckoned him closer with a jerk of her head.

If Shikamaru had thought Daisy was beautiful in day-time, night-time and artificial lightings, then she was drop-dead gorgeous now. The golden sunshine made her tanned skin glow warmly and the sun itself formed a halo of light around her head. She reminded him of a goddess from ancient myth come to life.

He finally joined her and asked what she wanted him to do now.

"Take the emptier bottle and pour it over my leg until its completely empty."

He nodded and she put the jacket down so she could push the hem of her skirt just out of his way. Shikamaru hesitated, but began pouring slowly, using his jacket to catch the run-off.

'Why does it bother me so much that Daisy's legs are showing?' he pondered, glad for that she wasn't paying attention to him on account of the light brushing of a blush that had settled on his face. 'Her legs are always showing from the knee down. And on her, that's a lot.' All the same, when they were close enough to touch, he felt something stir inside him…a feeling he couldn't quite place…

Daisy clenched her teeth tightly, her face pinched in a controlled grimace of pain. Just when she thought she couldn't take the stinging any longer, the contents of the bottle was finally emptied. She hadn't even realized she'd been holding her breath until she sighed softly in relief.

"Now…" she mouthed, swallowing the last traces of her grimace, "get the white roll of cloth there. Here, I'll take the other bottle. Just a second…there." She showed him the second bottle's contents and smiled a bit. "Healing cream from the Hyuuga clan. Hinata gives it to me. Stuff works wonders." She handed him the container to put away and slowly stood again. "You'll have to help me put on the gauze, since I'm short a hand."

Shikamaru nodded and set to work. With a bit of difficulty, they managed to get Daisy's leg wrapped and a make-shift sling for her damaged arm.

"Good thing you're right-handed, huh?" he half-smirked. She nodded sagely and winced as she tried to walk. Though her injured leg demanded a limping step, her medical knowledge told her to do otherwise; so she gritted her teeth and walked as normally as possible.

"So I suppose we should try and make it back to camp some how." Shikamaru commented. "Any ideas?"

"As a matter of fact," Daisy replied, turning to face him, "I do have something in mind. We'll want to get back to the fall and try to find a way back up that doesn't require climbing."

"And from there," he continued her train of thought, "we can retrace our steps to the fall and catch up with Hinata and Gaara." He broke into a grin. "Smart. Good plan."

"Thank you." she smiled back kindly, "I thought it was pretty good. The only problem is time." She looked at the gorgeous sunset and frowned.

"Then we'd better get started. 'Time waits for no ninja', right?" he quoted, handing Daisy her backpack. She quickly slipped it on and nodded.

With Daisy's leaving her struggling to keep up and Shikamaru refusing to go ahead without her, their progress was much slower than either was satisfied with. After only making up a small portion of the distance before dark, they knew it was too dangerous for them to continue and decided to camp for the night.

Fairly soon after getting everything set up, Shikamaru left to find more firewood so they could cook something to eat. As soon as he was out of immediate earshot, Daisy heard the rustling of the branches above her – even though there was no wind. Suspicious, she slowly rose, watching the trees as she pulled out a kunai. Without warning, she whirled around with an intimidating expression and thrust the kunai against the throat of the person whom had set off her delicate sense of danger.

The tall boy chuckled calmly and said, "Peek-a-boo."

Daisy gasped with eyes wide and took a step back.

"K-Kabuto?" she whispered sharply. Her surprise quickly wore off, replaced with well-practiced despise.

"What do you want, spy?"

"Can't I stop by to check in on my sweet little sister and her dear friend?" Kabuto asked innocently. Daisy's deep blue eyes narrowed and flashed brightly.

"I'm all too aware that you have other motives, brother." she growled softly, "I'll ask again: what do you want?"

The silver-haired medical-nin sighed. "Never one to beat around the bush, were you? Very well. He asked for me to inquire about your decision."

"I haven't chosen yet. I still have time. I need to think about it more…"

Silence reigned. Then, with a true note of kindness in his voice, he spoke softly: "You know, there is a way out. You don't have to choose."

That got her attention with a start. Gently, she urged him to tell her about this possible escape route. When he tried though, intense pain shot through his throat and he cried out, reminded of the seal upon his tongue that bound his words.

"Kabuto!" Daisy let all traces of her hatred slip away as her concern took over. "What is it? What's wrong?"

"I'm…I'm sealed." he choked out, "I can't tell you anything. I'm… Daisy, I'm sorry. I wish there was some way…"

"That wretched, horrible, awful man! That…that vile snake-like son of a bitch!" she ranted in a fit of passion, "That-that-that…oooohh!"

Kabuto smiled wearily. "Same old Daisy, passionate about every little thing that touches your heart."

Daisy's anger wouldn't be quelled so easily, but Kabuto's words helped calm her a bit. But her aggression died as soon as she heard a new noise some ways off.

"Kabuto, you need to go." she worried, "I hear him coming back. But…tell Him… Tell Him I've made my choice."

"Are you sure little sister?"

"More sure than I've ever been big brother. Enough is enough. I can't allow anyone else to suffer because of me. Now go!" she called softly after him as he disappeared into the night.

Daisy paused at the edge of where the small, dwindling campfire's light reached, murmuring a prayer: "O Mater Luna, Regina noctis, audivo me nunca… Be careful Kabuto."

"Daisy!" Shikamaru called, bursting into the clearing, "Are you alright? I thought I heard someone yelling."

"I'm fine." she turned back to him and attempted a phony smile, "Probably just some animal somewhere else in the forest."

He nodded slowly. "Wouldn't surprise me. Anyway, as long as you're not hurt more than you already are…" He didn't sound totally assured.

When they both went to bed later, Daisy found she couldn't sleep. She was too anxious about the hasty decision she had made.

Earlier in the month, Orochimaru and Kabuto had approached her while on a mission and made a proposition: either stay in the Hidden Leaf Village and watch everyone around her suffer from their attack, or return to the Village Hidden in Sound of her own free will and the village would be spared.

Now Daisy had made her choice. She would go to them and finally – hopefully, anyway – end peoples' suffering because of her. But a new problem had presented itself: what if her friends tried to stop her, or worse, save her? She didn't know what exactly would happen, but she knew the consequences would be dire.

Thinking of this, a single tear slid down her face.

'Naruto…Hinata…Gaara… What have I done?'