A/N: Well, sorry for the cliffhanger there, but what had to be done, was done. *Silence* but anyways, here's the next chapter! Thanks to those who are still following this story! :) Means a great deal to know that people are reading my stories :)
ONWARD!
"Can we be sure those paper bombs really took him out?" Neji asked aloud, making the others gasp. I grinned,
"About time. If the paper bombs didn't take him out, look in different areas for something that looks like an escape route. He could've jumped away just before the explosion but then the Anbu would've seen him escaping, unless he was in the opposite direction of the Anbus." Neji looked at me and nodded, "Neji, keep using your Byakugan, Akamaru and Kiba use your noses, see if you can pick up any odd scents other than charred tree trunks and dirt. Shino, see if your bugs can locate anything out of the ordinary within a two mile radius." They all watched as my serious side had come out and nodded as each one was called, Lee and Tenten stepped forward,
"What do you want us to do, Kasai Sensei?" Tenten asked, I wasn't used to being called Sensei, but I was a Jounin after all. I thought for a moment,
"Move around the trees and other debre to see if there's anything left at all." They nodded and went off to do their work, the others did the same and Neji came over to me,
"So you are actually a Jounin." He confirmed for himself finally, "I didn't think so with the way you would tease everyone." I didn't look at him, but I smiled,
"Neji, the cute little genius. I guess you don't like being teased, huh? Kakashi will tease sometimes, along with Asuma. But Jiriyah and Tsunade did it the most to me while I was growing up. But yes, there are times where I act my rank and not my age. If I planned on sticking around longer than this mission, you'd see that for yourself." I mumbled the last bit, hoping he wouldn't hear it, but the genius son of a bitch did. He seemed slightly surprised that I had slipped this information, and slightly... sad? Was that sadness? We were together for a few days when I was attacked by Naruto, I thought he hated me. He looked away and activated his Byakugan once more and looked around, trying to find any trace of Geno's remains or escape. Surprise overcame his face,
"Tenten, Lee, try over there. Go look under that fallen tree." He pointed to just in front of us at a fallen tree, Tenten and Lee nodded, jumping over to the tree he was pointing at. Lee easily picked the tree trunk up and tossed it away, just as he did so, I noticed a hole dug in the ground,
"Is that...?" I asked, walking over to it and bending down to look inside, "It is!"
"So that's it, Old man Geno had an escape tunnel waiting here for him the entire time." Kiba stated, Shino nodded,
"He disguised it well, we might never have found it if not for Neji's Byakugan.
"Geno designed the tunnel so it would slowly collapse from the weight of the dirt. Following him is out of the question, we have no idea how long the tunnel goes, nor how long it'll stay." I sighed, standing once more as Tenten bent down to observe it next.
"In another day or so, we would've never been able to find it, even with the Byakugan." She turned back to look at us, "There wouldn't have been a trace of it. He went to a lot of trouble to cover his tracks." Kiba and Akamaru stepped forward, Kiba kneeling by the tunnel and Akamaru at the mouth of it,
"Alright boy, see if you can pick up his trail." Akamaru nodded and walked further inside of the tunnel, sniffing. He whined after a minute and looked up at Kiba, "look at that, the wily old man even covered up his scent." Lee looked up into the sky, everyone obviously irritated that they had run into another dead end.
"Where could Geno be now, I wonder." I looked at Iku and wrote a message down,
"To Lady Hokage. Fast." I ordered, putting it in her jaws, the letter was in a wooden container. Iku nodded and dashed away, moving at a blinding speed. I sighed as I looked at the others, "We should probably report back to Shikamaru with this news as well." I rubbed the back of my head and groaned, "This is such a drag~." The others looked at me, and Tenten seemed amused, as well as Kiba and Lee. "Hm? What?"
"You sounded just like Shikamaru. Have you two been hanging around lately?" Tenten inquired, her hidden meaning was supposed to insinuate that we were dating secretely or something. I folded my arms and scoffed,
"Please. Shikamaru is a lazy nuisance. He thinks women are all the same, irritates the living hell outta me." I looked away from them, trying not to puff my cheeks out in irritation and Kiba snickered at me.
"Well, he isn't far off the mark. Ino and Sakura seem to beat anyone up that says something they don't like. Tenten is the only girl around here with any sense, aside from you now." Kiba explained, getting a sigh of irritation out of me. Why can't I hate these ninja? Turning back to them, I stated,
"In any case, we should still go back and report to Shikamaru, that way he has all the information from all the groups." Iku appeared, "Ah, Iku." I kneeled down and took the wooden message carrier out of his mouth and read the message. "Okay, Shikamaru wants Kiba and Neji to go to the Academy, along with Hinata and Sakura to search for anything suspicious." I turned and looked at the others, "Now?" I urged them, they seemed to jolt out of it and nodded as they all left. I sighed putting a hand to my head, "Jeez." I looked at Iku and nodded, "We better go help out the others in evacuating the Academy."
"Right." Iku agreed with a nod of his head, it was a short bark, but I could understand it. We leapt from our places on the soft earth and hopped from branch to branch until we reached the border, to which we just jumped over,
"Hey guys." I smiled as they watched me fall to the otherside, they were kinda amazed that I just hopped over. Iku and I darted from rooftop to rooftop until we reached the Academy. People were walking about more freely and doing their daily routines, does this mean the land hidden in the waterfall was nothing to worry about? Great, now we're vulnerable... When we made it to the academy, Iku and I walked in, and the first thing we heard was Naruto yelling at the kids,
"So, now do you understand? That's why you gatta clear out! Everybody go outside on the double!" I peeked into the classroom to find a bunch of kids sitting there and one with an arrogant expression on his face argued with Naruto,
"But that isn't what our teacher told us. He said we were supposed to study in the classroom all day today."
"That's right! We're not supposed to leave the room no matter what!" Another countered, making Naruto get angry.
"Look, it's just for a little while, your teachers will never know." I shook my head and walked in,
"Not everyone wants to skip out on class like you did, Naruto." I slowly walked in and noticed immediately that the class had quieted down, acknowledging my presence and rank. Naruto looked confused as he looked from me to the kids,
"Huh? What the?"
"Kasai Sensei, welcome back!" One with big brown dreadlocks just above her shoulders yelled, the others mimicked her in welcoming me back. So I was here a few years ago... Huh.. Guess that's a memory I should get back sometime soon. I smiled at the children and stood at the desk, shoving Naruto and Choji outta the way.
"Listen, children." They all straightened in their chairs, "We need to evacuate the building, your teachers will understand. Go home, or go train. But you cannot stay in the building. Understood?" I looked up at them with serious eyes, the ones that commanded them to obey me. They all nodded,
"Yes Kasai Sensei!" They gathered their things, continuing with their conversations and laughter as they exited the room.
"Why was that so hard for you?" I looked at Naruto, who seemed deflated. He grumbled to me as Choji seemed to ignore the whole thing, eating his bag of chips.
"Well, onto the next classroom!" Choji announced, blowing up and popping his bag, then tossing it into the trash as we walked out and I did the same in every room. On the last one, Lee walked in and I sent Naruto and Choji out to talk to him,
"Hello, children." I grinned, greeting them,
"Hello, Kasai Sensei!" They all smiled at me as well,
"I need you to evacuate from the building for now. You can resume your classes tomorrow, since all the teachers for today were sent on a mission, you're dismissed. Understood?" They all nodded and responded like the other classes,
"Yes, Kasai Sensei!" They gathered up their things and ran out as well.
"Well, that was easy." I mummured, walking out and nearly bumping into Naruto, O_O'' "Naruto, why don't you move out of the doorway, huh?" Naruto seemed to realize that someone was behind him and blinked,
"Oh, yeah, sorry. Bushy brows was just mentioning to us how weird it was that the kids from the first class were going to Kunai train over in the practice hall."
"I agree, that does sound strange." I looked at the three of them and we nodded in sync. The four of us headed down to the Practice Hall and stayed on the upper level, the children were teasing each other as they traded off turns to throw Kunai.
"Look at 'em, they're really training," Naruto stated, amazed while he leaned over on the railing. "Remember when we were at the Academy? We used to skip class and hang out here all the time. It was the last place the teachers ever thought of lookin' for us." He said 'we' didn't he? Who else skipped class? -_-'' Jeez... I watched Naruto as he reminisced, he chuckled, "It was great. I used to read manga here or take a nap,"
"A nice quiet place to eat a snack." Does he only think about food? I sweat dropped, listening to these two,
"Well, I'm glad they're training." Lee and I replied in sync, which made us look at each other. "Uh..." We both blinked, then refocused on the other two,
"I would not boast about that. You could learn something from them." I nodded in agreement with what Lee was saying as the other two looked at him confused, morons. "Look at them! Training hard, even when the teacher is not looking."
"Yeah, I didn't graduate way ahead of my years just by skipping class all the time, ya know." I stated, looking at the other two, who seemed to be ashamed of ever admitting that they skipped now.
"The picture of the ideal student!"
"Oh, you're still talking..." Looking at Lee, I saw him clench his fist as he cried out,
"Such triumph in dedication! It is inspiring to watch!" Lee's eyes began to water, I think with tears of joy, "I only wish I could go through training all over again with them!" Naruto seemed to sigh, tired just by listening to Lee, "We must not interrupt them, let us be off."
"Hang on..." The three of them looked at me, I was staring intently at the item that the children were throwing their Kunai at. "I know I've been gone from the village for a while, but when did that get put in here?" Naruto leaned forward as the other two seemed to have their eyes bug out of their head,
"Okay, watch this! I'm gonna nail it!" One of the kids announced, focusing, we each gave an expression of horror and jumped down in front of the target log. Naruto blocking the Kunai with his butt in the process,
"Ah~!" Naruto exclaimed, looking at his butt with pain,
"Uh, what an idiot..." I sighed, looking at the target and putting a hand under my chin in thought. The children seemed to exclaim their dislikes about us interfering with their training,
"Hey, that was right on the target..." One of them complained, not moving out of his throwing stance.
"It looks new, like it was placed here recently..." Lee stated,
"Ya think Geno might've done it?" Choji asked as Naruto shimmied the Kunai out of his butt cheek, I looked at the kids who were yelling at us to get out of the way. Then I looked at Lee,
"Don't let them hit the bulls-eye." I whispered, moving out of the way with them. He seemed confused but then it clicked,
"Right." He stated and we continued to watch them practice, "try loosening up your shoulders before throwing!" Lee gave out advice like candy, I glared at him,
"Who asked you?" The kid that had just thrown was shoved out of the way,
"Stand aside, I'll show ya how to do it!" He held up his Kunai and took his time aiming. "Hiiya!" He threw it and the Kunai contacted just below the bulls-eye,
"Ooo~ so close! Do not forget to focus! Focus on the target boys!" Lee kept yelling and it was getting kind of annoying, I sighed and leaned back against the wall to wait for Naruto to bring Hinata or Neji. Most likely Neji since Hinata would have a heart attack.
"Allright! I'm gonna nail it this time." The kid with the riceball shaped head stated, aiming and breathing slowly as he focused. "Focus, focus... Here we go!" He got into a throwing stance and pulled his arm back, and threw it. It hit the bulls-eye straight on, making a loud ting of metal on metal, but the kunai didn't stick, it fell out of the target. "What the-?" Lee bent down and picked up the kunai,
"There must be a flaw in the blade. Yes, indeed, let that be a lesson: you must take good care of your weapons!" I sighed in relief, if this trap was really set by Geno, then I'm glad that it didn't stick.
"Hey, no fair! That was a bulls-eye!" The kid complained, I rolled my eyes,
"Just take it and let someone else throw." I grumbled, looking at the bulls-eye intently. Another kid came up, talking big,
"...on the money!" I only caught the last of what he said, since I decided to listen to the kids boasting for the hell of it.
"That is the spirit!" Lee cheered, I elbowed him,
"Doesn't 'don't let them hit the target' ring any bells, Lee?" He 'oof-ed' and gave me a shameful smile.
"That one looks good!" He yelled, watching the kids' kunai fly through the air, I gasped,
"Oh, no. If that one sticks who knows what might happen,"
"Bushy brow!"
"Grab it, Lee!" Neji had yelled at him, but I was already moving and had made it there in a blink of an eye when Naruto and the others entered. Catching it just inches away from it's target, the bulls-eye. Naruto and the others ran over,
"Wow, nice catch, Kasai." I smiled,
"Thanks, Naruto." The kids began to get irritated and started yelling at us, Kiba growled and glared at them,
"Quiet ya brats! If you had hit the bulls-eye, then the entire academy would've blown up!" All the kids got terrified expressions and I sighed,
"Way to give it to them lightly, Kiba." I sighed, tossing the kunai back at them. I summoned Iku with a high pitched whistle and told him to find the others and gather them up here. He nodded and dashed off, doing what he was told. We waited for a few minutes before they all appeared. Neji gave Shikamaru and the others a run down.
"A triggering device hidden inside it, huh?" Shikamaru asked, I gave a stifled yawn, I haven't slept since two nights ago, before we reached the Leaf. Thanks to Geno, I haven't slept since. Man. I gave a big yawn and shook my head afterwards, trying to clear the sleep from my eyes. Now that I think about it, I haven't eaten since yesterday either... and that Ramen was all I had... My vision began to get blurry and I saw their mouths move but the sound wasn't reaching my ears, what's...? A hand suddenly landed on my shoulder, I was so out of it that I only turned my head to see who had done it,
"Hm?" Someone had come over, probably noticing how out of it I was, and was concerned.
"Are you alright?" Who's voice is that..?
The last thing I remember was feeling like a rock in a pond as I fell to the ground.
There it is! Kasai did in fact pass out, and as we all know, when a Jinjuuriki gets weak, the creature inside gets stronger and fights to get out.
Hope you liked it! I stretched it as far as I saw fit,
Until next time!
-Kasai!