Hi everyone! MagicalTrixs here with a new chapter. Now I know i said i wasn't going to take a nother whole month to post the new chapter but i found it quite difficult to write this whole month, due to some real life things. Also the short Q & A will be at the end, anyways Heres the new chapter. R&R and enjoy. :)

Dont own naruto*

.

.

.

[Konoha's Leaf Resort/ Gaara's temp. home]

It was early in the morning and the sand team was up and ready to continue their mission. This mission was of most importance to the Sand Village, they knew that, and they knew that with the help of the leaf village, they would not be wasting time. The team was ready to exit and go the hokages building.

"You know, this is a do or die situation we're in." Temari started. "The success of this mission is more valuable than our own lives."

"We already know that temari." Kankuro stated.

"Once we start, we have to make progress. One of these coordinates (she held out the paper with the locations of the hideouts) is his hideout." Tamari looked thoroughly at all the locations.

"We don't know how the hokage plans to separate her teams, but if we team up with them our chance will be stronger, since we hold even more information that can be essential to them and us." Kankuro added.

"We have less than two weeks at most. The elders expect us to be finished with this by then." Temari finished. Gaara just nodded.

"We should get going now, the meeting is in thirty minutes." Gaara claimed. Kankuro grabbed his puppets from the sofa, temari set her fan on her back, and gaara adjusted his gourd on his back. They opened the door to exit the room and headed towards the hokages central building.

As they walked through the the streets of Konoha, the sound of silence surrounded the area. To gaara that sound was sanctuary but for the other two, it was beyond annoying; Which raised the question, why were they ninjas if they got inpatient in silence?

"So temari... I bet you are really dying to see shikamaru." Kankuro started.

"WHAT?!" She retorted.

"Yeah... you're defiantly praying to get him on your team, your face is all red just thinking about it."

"HOW DARE YOU!" She shouted.

Gaara mentally rolled his eyes, not this again. It seemed like that was all they have been recently talking about. The noise of his annoying siblings soon silenced as he looked out ahead. Everything seemed some-what different for some reason. He remembered yesterday, how ino affirmed him that she was thinking of him. Well, he has to admit that he is looking forward to seeing her again. She has become a part of his routine for some reason, It's like he feels something for her. I mean, they are are just, what he likes to call, verbally connected. So what is this feeling he has for her when shes around. She is one of the few people who started conversations with him and wasn't afraid to say what was on her mind. She is also a bit hard to read, but then again, he hadn't had much experience with many females to know their mode swings. Some nice things about her? Well she was sweet and polite (with the exception of yesterday) for someone her age. She was also pretty and...

"Gaara? Hell-O? Are you listening?" Kankuro waved a hand in front of him. Darn him, he couldn't even think quietly before being interrupted by them.

He sighed deeply. "What?"

"I said, how do you think the hokage will divide her teams?"

"I have no clue." Gaara answered.

"Hmm... You seem really distracted lately, is everything okay?" Temari asked.

"Aside from you two constantly bickering, everything's fine."

"We are almost there." Temari pointed to a directional sign that read "Hokages Central Building".

Five minutes had passed when they finally arrived. As soon as they stepped into the building, they were greeted by many leaf shinobi and other officials. They were five minutes early and were instructed to wait in a waiting area. Little by little, some of the other teams started arriving. They were able to recognized everyone in the room at first glimpse. As soon as the five minutes passed the messenger came back to the waiting room.

"The hokage is expecting you now." Everyone walked through the beige corridors until they got the hokages office. As they all entered, they were greeted by Shizune and Lady Tsunade. As the hokage looked on she knew there was someone missing because the horizontal line they formed was broken by a gap. The line was coordinated by members on the original teams:

Shino, Hinata, Kiba, Lee, Tenten, Neji, Naruto, Sakura, Sai, Choji, GAP, Shikamaru, Temari, Gaara, Kankuro. She sighed mentally.

"Where is Ino?" She looked at shikamaru, which to his surprise as well, just shrugged his shoulders.

~An hour earlier~

Ino had just got out of her morning shower, she knew the meeting was starting soon and needed to get ready as quickly as possible. She blow-dried her long blond hair in five minutes. She had shorted her hair a little bit yesterday so that it wasn't extremely long, It became waist length. She also shortened and arranged her long fringe, both her eyes were visible now and her new fringe drifted to the left side (in a side swept fringe style), two long bangs fell and laid gently on both of her checks. She knew she was 17 now, and so, needed to get a knew appearance to look fresh and and hopefully more appealing. Now for the best thing she had been waiting for, her new attire.

[Chelsea by Stefy Rae (BGM)] Bgm = is the background music that the characters themselves can't hear

Ino was so glad that her old ninja gear was ruined, there were many flaws in that attire that she never realized. She looked at her clothes that laid gently on her bed, it was so awesome. First of, she put on her light-yellow V-neck shirt, this shirt was amazing because it wasn't big on her and it showed the curves of her torso (her bust, shoulders, waist, and hips). She then Slipped (put on)on a Heliotrope-toned, Pleaded, mini skirt ; this skirt was upper-thigh-length but was neither too short nor too big. Next, she put on some dark-violet-shade knee-high open-toed boots. The best thing about these boots was that they didn't show the outline of her ankles or the rest of her leg, it was 'stuffed' lightly for that special occasion. She also adjusted some black knee pads, yesterdays unexpected mishap still stinged. Looking in the tall mirror, she adjusted everything to her liking. 'Wow I wonder if they will recognize me like this.' She thought, she was right in a way, she had never worn anything that covered 80% of her body and still made her look fabulous. Now what she was about to do was apply very light make-up, of coarse she didn't need it, but still just a little to lighten her up. She applied a very light foundation and maskara, she added a barely noticeable lilac eyeshadow (No really you could hardly notice she had any on). She had also applied some blush. Finally, she applied her dusty-pinky-peach plumper that made her lips a bit more luscious. Once she looked the mirror again, her appearance literally didn't change much (well duh, she didn't really go heavy with make-up, and honestly, never planned to go further than this). She then looked in the mirror and began playing with her thin blond hair, trying to executing a new hairstyle. She really did appreciate her pony tail but she did change the position of it, she settled on putting it on her right side (not much that it would become a side ponytail, but enough to know it wasn't in the middle), she tied her ponytail with a lilac ribbon with a pink heart ornament. She double checked that everything was in place and as far as her fringes go, she liked the way she shortened them. 'Is this really me.' She couldn't even believe how attractive she looked, she became so amazed with the transformation. 'I'm so going to rock this meeting.' She looked at the time and realized she was going to be late. She put on the last pieces of her outfit on. First, she put on a cropped long-sleeved sweater-like top, it reached to about the length of her bust. This top was horizontally stripped with two hues of violet, mauve and heliotrope (same as the mini skirt). Next she wore a cute little black mountain-goat horn-bracelet, it was small and swerved around her wrist perfectly.

Hm... it was sort of interesting how she was treating this like some sort of date, but oh well, she wanted to make the change and it was kind of worth it. She loved this new look and now the only thing that was really exposed was parts of her legs. She grabbed her new shoulder length satchel (crossbody bag) and headed out of her room and to the meeting.

~Back at the meetin

Five minutes had passed since the meeting started and no sign of Ino. The hokage was frustrated, she knew that ino had a tendency of always being the last person to come to a meeting. For now, she needed to start and hope that ino would at least come in to catch some of the information.

"Hrrmm..." She cleared her throat. "Well begin now, as you all know the sand shinobi are here on a very substantial mission. It has come to our attention that they-..." She's cut off as the door opened.

As Ino entered the room, it became silent. Once she was in full visual appearance, all eyes were on her. In her mind this was a good/bad thing. For one she new she looked good because a lot of the boys in the room were flushed and had their jaw dropping. In fact this was probably the only occasion were these boys had noticed her, they always tended to not pay attention to her, like ever. When she looked at shikamaru and choji, they looked bewildered and looked aroused from the looks on their faces. When she turned to look at gaara, well he looked a bit calmed, that was before she winked at him which made him made him a little bit more aware, then smiling back to her. The other thing was that she was late and tsunade would have her head. But for some weird way tsunade also looked a bit dazed on what was happening. This was a good chance for her to apologize.

"I'm so sorry that I made everyone wait. I hurried as fast I could but I can't run here since my knee injury still stings." She bowed to show the remorse of her acts, she looked so innocent, anyone would by it.

"INO!" Tsunade shouted. "You always have this tendency of being the last to arrive, where are your manners, this isn't a village assignment, we are dealing with an ally assistance and should be ready to help at any given moment! Understood?!"

"Yes ma'am" Wow she was a bit surprised that the hokage hadn't killed her at this rate, but oh well she got what she deserved for trying to be perfect. And explain to me why everyone was still staring at her? Okay calm yourselves down, she was sure she wasn't the only good looking girl in the room, right? Although sakura, tenten, and hinata were also staring at her a bit, they all looked the same. Nothing new or exciting on them, boring... but hey, she had the most attention, just like she intended.

"Now, like I was saying before..." Tsunade began. "It has come to our attention that the sand village is in great peril. Two weeks ago a rouge ninja from a neighboring city in the wind nation, sneaked into the sand village and stole a classified vault. This vault contains secrets and blueprint of the sand village. That rouge ninja was chased into the our nation, unfortunately the villainous ninja gave them the slip and is now hiding in our boundaries. Since the sand team arrival, they have discovered a parchment containing different coordinates scatter through-out the fire nation. Since they have little time to find the vault and the fire nation is a big place, we'll be assisting them on retrieving their nations most valuable asset. Now, I know most of you don't know exactly what your looking for, but what you want to do is check thoroughly through every location you receive. Anything that seems strange or out of the ordinary, you report it immediately. You will split up into a two man cell and continues from there."

Lee was wondering one thing. "Excuse me hokage-sama?" She acknowledge him and let him ask. "I was wondering how exactly we will communicate if we are able to find anything."

"You will use these seals." She took out a pile of seals from her desk. "All you need is to attach your progress note on to this seal then stick them to a fast animal, it wont hurt them but they will deliver your progress here."

"I was wondering, what shall we do if we find the dangerous rouge ninja?" Shikamaru asked.

"You shouldn't, under any circumstances, charge in with out any proper knowledge of the situation. If anything, you should wait for gaara, temari, and kankuro to arrive at the scene before doing anything reckless. I know I can trust you all to follow these rules, right?" Everyone turned around to look at naruto, if there was anyone who would mess up this assignment, it would be him.

"What!?" He responded.

"You naruto, in specifically... I want you to be aware of the situation. This is no time for you to act unprofessional, you just made chūnin and I expect you to know the consequences of any misbehavior."

"I know." Even for naruto, he seemed too serious. Maybe he's finally seen the light of growing up, ino thought.

"Now, here on my desk are some scrolls, each containing several locations. I will pick one of you to come up and grab one as well as pick your partner that will accompany you. Please be aware that once you have everything, the task begins." Everyone looked at one another before tsunade continued. "Ino! Since you were the last person in, you'll be the first one to start."

"Fine by me." She stepped out of line and walked towards the hokages desk. She picked up a beige scroll tied with a teal colored ribbon and 5 seals.

"Pick your partner."

"Hmm." she turned around to see the people lined up. She knew who she was going to pick from the start but wanted to build up the hype a little, she stepped closer to the person she was going to ask. "Gaara... want to be my partner?" She gave him a small smile. If you thought that everyone's jaw drop when she had first entered the room, you'd wouldn't believe the look of disbelief everyone had on their face's, especially kankuro who was secretly dying to be her partner.

"Ino!" She turned around when tsunade had called her name. "Gaara has his own te-"

"I'm fine with this arrangement." Gaara interrupted and gave ino a returning smile. Now everyone looked even more bewildered than before, they had no idea what was happening. Gaara stepped out of the line and headed for the door.

Ino turned around to give tsunade the alright-we're-ready- to-go look, but tsunade was still in shock that gaara had accepted ino's request. Gaara opened the the door and let ino pass first, such a good gentlemen, ino thought.

When they were walking out of the building, she wanted to apologize up-front about what had happened. "Gaara...I'm sorry, I didn't mean to put you on the spot...I just thought that-"

"You don't have to apologize."

"I just want you to know I didn't mean to cause you a dilemma or anything."

"Don't worry..." He stopped walking and turned to look at her. Ino felt so powerless when she gazed into his eyes and then when he smiled at her, it made her want him even more. "I don't mind." He started walking again and ino began following behind, so he didn't mind being with her, that's great! Hopefully. Ugh, why did she have to doubt herself so much? He made her act so differently. She was terrified at times when he was around, cause if she said or did the wrong thing, he might see how hard she was trying.

They had made it out of the main gate, and ino gained her composure and began walking adjacent to him. They had walked about a quarter mile before they stopped to look at the scroll. She undid the ribbon and spread the sheet open.

"The first coordinate on here is in the... far north-west... the Sun Flower Village." She handed him the scroll, she just felt a bit more at ease with him holding it. Gaara took one glance at it before sealing the scroll and and putting it away safely in his satchel. When they looked in front of them, two paths laid in place.

"Which path should we take?" Gaara asked. Ino pointed to the path on the right. Gaara nodded and they then began walking to the Sun Flower Village.

The journey seemed like it would go on forever in the first ten minutes because it was so silent. The one thing she dreaded, was silence. It made her nervous. What was he thinking?... was he hating this silence too? The last thing she wanted was to annoy him. Thats why she was surprised when he spoke up.

"You look very divine." He had noticed her since the meeting, but will admit that he was a bit timid to be direct with her.

"I..." She didn't know what to say exactly. She wanted to say that it was all for him, but ended saying the usual. "Thanks." What a coward, she could of at least complemented him back but nooo... she was too reluctant to do so.

"Gaara?" He turned to give her firm look. "I was just wondering... who is this person your chasing?... and what does this person plan to do with the vault?"

At first he wasn't too sure about the whole situation but came to one conclusion. "His name is Komouji Kuren. From the information of our intelligence group in suna, he was able to break into our village and steal the vault with a giftable technique that allows him to phase through solid walls. As far as his plans go, the only conclusion I have is that he wants to cause destruction. That vault contains the entire blueprints of the wind nation, and it'll bring about mayhem, if it used against us."

As they kept on walking ino thought of a couple of things. "You know..." She gathered some thoughts of her past experiences and remembered the similarities. "This happened once at our village. You see, there was this old guy who used to work for the leaf village, without being initially born here. He was a good worker and always did his part, anyone would of thought that old men would be innocent against any hidden crimes. Anyways, one day he disappeared without anyone knowing and on that same day, konohas secret documents went missing. The hokage then ruled one possible suspect and with that he had become the enemy. Fortunately enough, we were able to figure out his hiding location and ruin his 'evil scheme' before it was too late. Well it turned out that he would've went through with his hole plan if he had wanted to, but he was just doing it for entertainment I guess. I don't know... I just think it seems really similar, doesn't it?" Gaara nodded, which to be honest, she wished he would of answered so that they could have kept talking. You know... she really liked gaara as a person, but sometimes it was so frustrating, he ended conversations right when it was his turn to say something. Perhaps that will change in the future, if the odds are in her favor.

They had walked about a good mile without having said anything to each other. In that short amount of time, ino remembered that gaara was a loner, he never really had a friend to associate with. "Remember what you asked me yesterday?" Peaking his curiosity, he turned around to look at her. "What I think of you." She paused for a second looking for the right way to word things. "I think... your a very unique individual, your very serious and mysterious... but at the same time I believe that your kind. I know you don't like to show emotion, but I think you're really suffering by doing so." She smiled sadly. "I suppose that the reason why you don't really know how to let others in... is because... you haven't had a genuine friendship or bond to communicate with." She started getting watery, although she didn't want to. "You don't deserve that (She wiped away her watery yes with her arm). Anyways, I want you to understand that the reason why I've been thinking of you so much is because, Well, I want to ask you if... Um... if you'd like to be my friend?" At this point, both of them had stopped walking and just stared at each other.

Gaara was really astonished by her, yet again. She was offering something he never dreamed of having, someone who wasn't afraid of him, someone who wasn't going to betray him if let in... a friend. No one from the leaf had ever offer such dear affinity to him; even naruto never verbally asked if they could be friends, he just assumed.

"I'm sorry, I must seem so stupid for asking that. I didn't mean to disturb you. Either way... I think I'm trailing further than the mission requires-"

"You're truly humble." He extended his hand in sign of agreement. "I would be more than honored to build & cherish a friendship with you."

At first ino just stared aimlessly at his hand before extending hers, realizing what it meant. They both smiled at each other respectably, knowing that they both had created a new bond.

"Thanks." was all she could say at first.

Gaara immediately shock his head. "No, Thank you." Once they let go of each others hand they began walking to their destination.

Ino was really satisfied that gaara and her were on good terms, even if it wasn't bad to begin with. Anyways, she started wondering what type of place they would have to explore for this mission. It was certainly weird that anyone would go to the Sun Flower village to conduct evil schemes, although, sometimes the most peaceful places were the ones that held the most mysteries.

Half the day had gone by, as they traveled to the sunflower village. The sun began to set and the moon began to rise. Ino was walking with her hands behind her back, just looking at all the plants and animals. She felt a nice cool breeze push against her skin. It was quite nice being in the outdoors as the sun set, the gorgeous illuminating color gave such a vibrant feeling. The journey seemed a bit too exhausting by this time, she wished she could rest, but only reject that urge. Gaara on the other hand, noticed her pace had slowed down. Once it was completely dark out he stopped walking and turned around to look at her.

"We'll stop here for today."

"What? Why?" She questioned.

"You're tired from walking."

"No, its fine... I- I can keep going."

"Its better if we stop here for now, we can continue in the morning."

"You sure? Taveling to the sun flower village is a two day trip."

He nodded. "Besides your knee might get more injured if we continue."

"Oh right. Well were should we set up the cabin?"

"Cabin?"

"Well you see, I have a cabin summoning seal. My family has had them for generation and to be perfectly honest, this is my first time using them, so... lets hope this works." She took out her cabin summing seal, then she bit her thumb slightly enough to get some blood on it, then placed the seal on the ground. At first nothing seemed to happen, but then a giant cloud of smoke engulfed the area. Once the cloud cleared, they saw the small cabin the laid in front of them. "Success!" She jumped in excitement, They entered the cabin and took notice of the surrounding area inside. There were sleeping bags in the middle, a fireplace, and a rectangular room (bathroom). She unfolded her sleeping bag and set it on the floor. She turned around to see what gaara was doing only to discovered he wasn't even there. She sighed mentally and went outside to look for him. She gazed at all near locations but discovered nothing. She worried where he might of gone off to, she only wished he wasn't mad or anything.

She was about to go inside when she saw little grains of sand falling from the roof. As she walked a bit further from the cabin his form came into contact. What was he doing up there? Perhaps he couldn't sleep. She infused some of her chakra to her feet and climbed up to ask personally why he was up there.

"Not sleepy?" She tapped his shoulder, which seemed to break him from his daydream or something.

"I hardly sleep."

"Seriously? How do you get strength then?"

"I do about four hours of sleep."

"That's really unhealthy. Maybe I can help."

"hm?"

"Well I know some great techniques for falling a sleep."

"Its not the falling a sleep part that I have trouble with."

"Then?"

"Jinchuriki."

Ino looked at him worriedly. She didn't know that much about the jinchuriki, and the effects it had on their human holders. "Perhaps you can talk to it. Naruto got his under control when he was younger and I think it worked for him."

"It's not that I don't have control over it. It's just... this monster has haunted my entire life and I don't know how to react with it."

"Don't give up. I'm sure that when the time is right, an incredible miracle will happen, and you'll be able to rest properly." He only smiled at her, that was encouraging to say the least. It wasn't that simple to tell the great amount of chakra holders to stop tormenting you.

"You should get to bed, we'll be starting at dawn." She nodded at him and with that jumped down the roof.

"Good night." She said to him, as she went inside the cabin.

"Good night, Ino." He responded softly.

.

.

.

Questions & Answers #1

1) Q: Your characters are a bit OOC, why?

A: Honestly, I need them to be a bit OOC so that the story runs a bit more smoothly.

2) Q: Is Gaara Kazekage?

A: Not at the momemt.

3) Q: Why do you like Gaara & Ino as a couple?

A: I've liked them both ever since I first saw them on the show. I also love purple,yellow, jade and red hues... Coincidence?

4) Q: Are you a die hard naruto fan?

A: No, I don't really read the manga or watch the anime. I mean I do know what goes on in it, but I'm not a die hard fan.

5) Q: Is the storyline made for what it seems to be?

A: You'll be surprised at how it will turn out, thats all i can say. 8)

Okay so chapter six has been uploaded, I really hope you gus enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed imagining it. The Q&A is up and there will probably be more, its really just made for you to understand things a little better. Anyways, I won't be posting anything soon because I have to go through some moving plans, but dont worrie, I wont forget about the FF. Thanks for reading! Comment/Review if you guys feel like it *