Troublesome Fate
By: Lone Ronin
Author's Notes: I know I took a long time to update this, but I'm not sorry about it at all. There is a bit of lime in this chapter, with lemon to follow soon, I hope. Go to Y!Gallery.
Moving on to things of importance, there's several storylines going on here that I'm trying to cover as they all eventually come together. Shikamaru's getting a run for his money as a chuunin, Sakura's training, Neji's got family problems, and now Leaf is forming an Alliance with Sand. I first thought it would be just 10 chapters, but now this story is looking at about 20 chapters.
Part 9: Leaves, Sand, Wind and Water
"I came for my private lesson." The voice behind him said as a hand went up Shikamaru's shirt.
Having no idea what he was talking about, Shikamaru bit down on the hand over his mouth while he choked his attacker as hard as he could with his shadow, then whirled around and kicked him square in the chest with all his might, taking whoever it was completely by surprise.
Roka came running down to the ground floor of the academy at the sound of a struggle to find a stunned Shikamaru with his kicking leg still in the air, as Kakashi peeled off the far wall and crumpled to the classroom floor.
"What happened here?" he asked in total shock.
"He grabbed me from behind and groped me." Shikamaru answered as Roka helped a very apologetic Kakashi up.
Kakashi seemed pretty embarrassed about the whole thing.
"Sorry about that, it was just a joke, I thought you were…someone else." The jounin explained, winded but not seriously hurt.
Shikamaru soon realized the real reason why Kakashi had snuck up on him.
'I really did think he was Iruka from behind, how embarrassing. Maybe I should see a medic about my eyesight, although he is rather cute. I'd do him if he was a bit older.'
Kakashi was checking him out! Shikamaru felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up. But he did his best to keep a neutral expression as they continued to chat.
"Iruka-sensei wasn't feeling well today, so we had to substitute for him." Roka explained.
"That's too bad, but I guess I can find out about any new prospective genin students he's noticed another day." Kakashi answered.
The jounin's explanation for being at the Academy was almost believable, if Shikamaru hadn't been able to hear what he was thinking. Hearing sexual thoughts from one of the last people in the world he wanted to have sexual thoughts about, Shikamaru almost lost his will to live. Normally he didn't hear thoughts that intimate, but it seemed like Kakashi was even more perverted then he let on. Thankfully, Shikamaru's shinobi training allowed him to hold back his impulse to run down the village street screaming like a maniac.
'I was hoping to play "Ninja and Prisoner", or maybe "Teacher and Student", but maybe I can get in a game of "Doctor and Patient" with him instead.' Was the last thing on Kakashi's mind before they were (conveniently) interrupted by one of Roka's crows who squawked a message to his master.
"What? No way in hell!" Roka pouted as the crow flew off.
"Well, from Roka's enthusiasm, seems your team has a recon mission." Kakashi mused.
"How do you know?" Shikamaru asked.
"Let's just say that Yumi's put in charge of those sort of missions since an incident involving Roka trying to make friends by offering flowers to a village elder's daughter. Besides, your captain is on a solo mission right now."
Although he was no longer recognized as an ANBU and his physical abilities were far below that of one due to his age, the call of the past, for the adrenaline-pumping missions considered too dangerous or distasteful for other shinobi to do was simply too much. Disguised as an old peasant driven from his farm, Subatsu wandered Field Country on the last few days of his solo mission. Thankfully, the mission had not required any distasteful behavior on his part (yet), but it was quite dangerous for anyone who didn't know Field Country as well as Subatsu did. Everywhere he went, it was the same story about how Field Country had gone to hell, rumors were that the feudal lord had gone mad.
Only a few years ago, Field Country had at least been peaceful, if not prosperous. The lord of Field Country had simply been content to waste the people's taxes on gambling and women, while minding his corrupt and idle court as the serfs on his land scratched out a miserable, though at least stable existence. But suddenly, seemingly overnight, the lord of Field Country passed one decree after another, news riders rode through the tiny surrounding villages and cried out one new plan or new tax after another introduced every day. But without planning and organization, each new plan to increase crops or develop weapons, prospect for metals or dig more wells for water, simply fell through.
Farmers were pulled from their lands and food production fell, everyone was starving. The fact that a drought had swept the area didn't help much either. As the country rapidly destabilized, people turned to the only sure way to get food, through thievery. Whole families and even villages had formed bands of wandering gangs, looting and maiming anyone unlucky enough to cross them, fighting other gangs for turf. Not willing to be sitting ducks as they plowed their fields, the honest farmers who remained had abandoned their lands and in a rapid downward spiral less were left to grow food, making the famine worse.
Despite this, the feudal lord had refused to admit the drop in food production and demanded the same taxes as always. Now he had disappeared and none of the magistrates would say where he was, only that he had some great plan in mind.
Subatsu heard the same thing over and over again as he traveled through the area, unnoticed in the surrounding chaos. He arrived at the last town of his mission, finding the one thing he had hoped not to find. A news reader was informing the largely illiterate crowd of an offer for free food and employment, in return for arming themselves to try and overthrow Konoha.
"What's going on here?" he asked some of the crowd.
"They're recruiting soldiers and supply carriers for a march on Konoha." A peasant informed the undercover shinobi.
"The reason you're all starving is because the Leaf have taken everything from the Sound, so now they can no longer protect you. If you help us to loot and destroy the village in exchange for training and equipment, you will all be well rewarded."
The peasants, not knowing any better, could only accept the news rider's version of events, but the idea of joining the Sound produced a lot of muttering among them.
"I heard that ninja of Konoha get their powers from the forest spirits themselves, what if we're killed?" asked one farmer.
"It's starve here or die there, but at least it will be with some food in our stomachs if we go and maybe some money for our families." Said another man.
Seeing the nodding agreements of the other desperate citizens around him, Subatsu had quickly slipped out of the crowd to get back to Konoha with the urgent news.
From what he had gathered not only from this but also missions and intelligence gathered from more dangerous ANBU missions, it was pretty obvious they were simply rounding up some expendable fighters for a distraction while they launched the true attack elsewhere. It seemed that there was some political infighting taking place in Otogakure, between Kabuto and a rival medic who was trying to get on Orochimaru's good side.
After rounding up some peasants to make a suicide rush at Konoha's front gate, Taro, a former Sand medic who now worked for the Sound, found himself having a hard time putting the rest of his plan into motion. Most of it was from dealing with the few Sound shinobi who had taken his side. With the exception of Katsuobushi, the relationship wasn't one of trust, they had all been driven to work together. All of Taro's coalition was a collection of outsiders who wanted to usurp power and move up in the ranks but were renegades who weren't trusted because they didn't use sonic based jutsu. With so many different people in difficult and uncertain circumstances, it was inevitable that friction would arise.
But this really didn't matter to Taro, all he had cared about was his research. Orochimaru had promised him the best equipment and instruments to do his work with, plus there were no restrictions on annoying things such as ethics and pain medication. It was even better then how things had been under the old Kazekage, his successor, Sabaku no Gaara had practically done him a favor by kicking him out. He reserved most of his hatred for Kabuto, who had recently sabotaged his experiments, releasing almost all of his carefully grown naga-monsters in his quest for the data to make an unlimited supply of containers for Orochimaru.
'At least I've still got the queen, he'll never find her.' He thought as he angrily calculated how long it was going to take before he could grow new ones.
For the time being, he had vowed revenge on Orochimaru's right hand man. And he was going to do it by getting on his superior's good side, enlisting the shinobi on his side to take out Orochimaru's worst enemy, the Hokage of Konoha.
He put aside his current frustration as he sized up the young peasant who Kabuto had been working on. As far as he knew, Kabuto was trying to modify Orochimaru's original cursed seal, hoping to be able to completely control those with the mark. The former peasant who he only knew as Han, was now asking him to reverse whatever experiment it was that the Orochimaru's favorite medic had performed on him. He really had no idea how to remove that cursed seal, but being a medic allowed Taro to get away with promising things which couldn't be challenged.
Lately the kid had been nothing but a pain, asking too many questions about what the medics were doing to him with their research. Now he was making it clear that he just wanted to get his seal removed and go back home and no one was going to convince him otherwise.
"I don't really want to do this mission, it doesn't sound very safe." He complained.
"Well, Masako seems to think you can handle it. Just do this one last mission with her and Ryuku, and I'll fix you up, deal?"
"Fine, what do you want me to do?" Han sighed.
"Not much, leave the actual assassination of the Hokage to Ryuku, just make it a little easier for them to do their part. If you find the mission isn't going that well, unfurl this scroll exactly like I showed you, it will trigger all your cursed seals." the young man with slightly bucked teeth nodded as the medic finished giving him instructions for his mission.
Taro smiled as he dismissed the Sound genin. The one good thing about being stuck in this backwards country was it was much easier to do his research when he could manipulate others without having to explain too much to them.
"Taro!" Another young man called out angrily as the first one left.
"Yes, Ryuku?" The rogue medic kept his cool regard as the blue-skinned shinobi with sharp teeth and a slash through his Mist hitate-ate slammed his fist on the table, rattling the instruments on it.
"I thought you said this was an important mission!" the renegade bellowed out.
"What makes you think otherwise?"
"We're supposed to be attacking Konoha, one of the strongest hidden villages and you stuck me with a bunch of stupid farm kids who haven't even finished their training! If I had known you were going to do this to me, I would have stayed at the Mist."
It was pretty clear that he felt this mission, not to mention the shinobi he had to work with, was beneath him, and Ryuku of the Mist hated doing anything he considered to be below his talents.
"Ryuku, you know it hurts me when you talk like that, considering I used to live on a farm." A girl with brown eyes and her long braided hair pulled back in a cloth pouted and put her arm around his.
"I didn't mean you, you're a great kunochi and I have faith in your abilities Masako, just not that of the others." Ryuku softened.
"Don't worry about it, the two of us could do this mission just fine and afterwards Orochimaru's going to promote us for sure after we kill the Hokage." Masako said as she fluttered her eyes.
"Why can't you give me Katsuobushi?" Ryuku turned back to Taro as he pointed at a seemingly empty spot.
"I can join you after I retrieve the documents Taro left behind, we were only able to take a portion of his work when we fled Suna." Katsuobushi cut into the conversation with his hoarse, barely audible voice.
"Where are you, Katsuo? You know I hate it when you hide." Masako complained.
She peered into the darkness behind Taro, not seeing anything until a figure with in a yukata with light plate mail and a mask on the lower half of his face formed from a pile of biting sand insects. She jumped back a bit in revulsion; she had always hated bugs in the fields of her family farm, she still hated them now.
"Katsuobushi , I know you can move quickly with your swarm, but I need you hurry up and give me what you found in Kabuto's office before you go to Suna to get my things." Taro requested.
Taro's spy quickly handed him the documents he had found and gave a brief explanation of what it meant.
"Kabuto has a particular interest in the bloodlines of Konoha, he seems to be hoping to capture them all alive so he can duplicate their abilities in a single, invincible body. And if he had their genetic information stored as data, he could just make a new one for Orochimaru when the old one runs out. It would take years for him to have enough data though, so in the mean time, he's hoping to use Hyuuga Neji's body as a backup should anything go wrong with Sasuke." Katsuobushi explained as he flipped though photos of Ino, Chouji, Shikamaru, Shino, Neji and Hinata.
"We'll see about that. Here, Ryuku, along with the Hokage, I want you to kill all these people." Taro said as he took the files from Katsuobushi and handed them over to Ryuku.
"You should have told me about this earlier. We saw him while we were following Kabuto, we could have killed Neji back when his team was in the quarry." Ryuku complained, although he was now content that he could do a bit of killing for sport.
As Ryuku left with Masako and Katsuobushi's form melted away into his swarm, leaving to get his friend's old research, the medic sighed to himself. Masako and Han had run away from their farming village in the unstable north before becoming Sound shinobi. She was still an insecure and inexperienced shinobi, but at least she seemed to be able to get Ryuku to do what she wanted.
Taro turned back to his work, he still had so much to do. Data to analyze, reactants to purchase, toxic byproducts to dispose of, a medic's work was never done.
He never noticed Kabuto watching him from the rafters, holding Taro's original scroll that had been meant for Han, which the white-haired medic had managed to switch when his rivals hadn't been watching.
The next day in Konoha, Neji woke early and performed his exercises in the center courtyard the way he usually did before preparing to see Shikamaru. He hardly noticed any of the things which usually annoyed him, such as the arguing and complaining of his relatives as the Main and Branch houses quarreled over every little thing. He hopped out over the rooftops, the same way most shinobi went to work or training, noticing Hanabi going off to class and Hinata leaving the house and going in the direction of the hospital.
He left the district and made his way to where he and Shikamaru had agreed to meet, at Konoha's highest point.
"So you have a mission later today? Any idea what it entails?" Kouichi asked Shikamaru as lay on his back in the grassy fields on top of Hokage Mountain, waiting for Neji.
The bats seemed to suit Shikamaru quite well as a summon, they were pretty easy-going and did what he told them without questions. He could summon groups of them without a problem by now, but he hadn't been able to summon Noren, the only one he was big enough to ride on.
Although he was technically now awake in the day and asleep at night, Kouichi the bat had now become the most constant sleeper in the Nara house, but at least he didn't make trouble.
"I'd imagine that it has something to do with those Sand-nin we rescued from those monsters." Shikamaru answered.
"What makes you think that?"
"I have to travel again, out west to Sunagakure this time, I'll get the details during the briefing this afternoon. You don't want to come with me?" Shikamaru asked.
"You can summon me if you need me, why bother with extra provisions when you don't need to?" the bat asked.
"I think you just want an excuse to stay around the house because mom peels fruit for you." Shikamaru commented, his mom was slowly becoming accustomed to their unusual house guest.
Kouichi didn't answer this, but simply flew away as he saw Neji approaching.
Although he knew his date was coming, Shikamaru closed his eyes and pretended to be asleep, curious to see what Neji would do.
Neji reacted by kneeling down and trying to pick him up by the shoulders.
"Hey!" The lazy ninja cried out.
"No one ignores me." Neji smirked as they started to play wrestle, managing to pin Shikamaru.
Shikamaru responded by catching Neji's wrist and flipping him over, so their positions were reversed.
"But I'm a chuunin and you're considered a genin, so I outrank you and I can do whatever I want." He countered.
Neji pinned him again.
"I'm older then you and I've performed missions at the chuunin level." He answered.
Shikamaru pushed Neji off, but instead of trying to pin him simply nudged him so they lay side-by-side, facing each other.
"There, now neither one of us is on top." He said as they finally settled the play fight.
Although neither one had really realized it, it turned out to be their ideal date. They didn't have to say or do anything, each seemed to understand what the other wanted.
Neji pulled him close as they kissed deeply. Shikamaru gasped, surprised at how soft Neji's hands were as he slid them under the younger ninja's chuunin jacket and net shirt.
Neji continued to push his hands further, gently rubbing Shikamaru's chest and nipples.
Shikamaru sucked on Neji's neck, before pulling the collar of his shirt down and gently biting Neji's shoulder. He then moved back up and opened his mouth, allowing Neji's tongue to explore the inside of his mouth for a bit.
They continued to make out for some time, before both of them stopped and looked straight up.
"What are you looking at?" Shikamaru said to the fat black crow in the tree above them with a message for each of them in its beak.
The crow responded by dropping the folded papers, containing instructions for Neji to return home and Shikamaru to get to his briefing before it flew off, letting out a loud and insulting 'CAW,CAWcawcaw…' which was about as close to laughing as a crow could come.
The crow flew off to continue its message delivery work at Konoha Hospital, where Sakura was studying during her break from a long shift, when a nurse told her that a girl had come in and wouldn't say what was wrong, but was asking for treatment.
"Could you get someone else to handle it? I haven't eaten anything all day." said Sakura.
"She specifically asked for you, and she seems rather upset." The nurse replied.
Sakura hadn't spoken to Hinata in a while and was surprised to see her at the hospital, but she quickly finished her snack, then calmly grabbed the proper forms and a pen and led Hinata into an appointment room.
"Now, Hinata, since I'm a medic giving you treatment, anything you tell me is completely confidential, you can tell me anything and it won't leave this room, okay?" Sakura started with basic procedures.
Hinata nodded shyly in understanding.
"So, tell me what's wrong."
"I-I think I might be dying." Hinata whispered.
Sakura hadn't expected that answer. Hinata didn't really appear to be dying, in fact, she didn't seem to have anything wrong with her at all.
"Why do you think you're dying?" Sakura gently urged her on.
"Well, when I was watching the chuunin exams and I started coughing up blood from the fight with Neji, this ANBU with medic training healed it, but I think he did something wrong, or he just delayed it, because now I'm bleeding from, um, well…I'mbleedingdownthere." She stuttered near the end and mumbled the rest out.
Sakura realized right away what she was talking about, it had already happened to her.
"You're not dying, Hinata, you're having your period." Sakura answered.
"What's that? Is it supposed to happen?" she honestly didn't have a clue.
"It's perfectly natural, it means you can have children now. Didn't anyone tell you about it?"
"We really don't talk about those things in my family." Hinata said shyly.
After running a few tests to confirm that Hinata was really having her period and there was nothing wrong with her body, Sakura quickly got her what she needed and proceeded to explain everything. With Hinata relieved that she wasn't dying after all, Sakura decided to ask her about when she had coughed up blood as they walked down the hall to the hospital exit.
"Have you coughed up blood since?" Sakura asked
"No, I haven't, he did a good job, but…"
"What's wrong, Hinata?" Sakura asked as Hinata stopped and took a closer look at a staff photo up on the wall with her Byukugan.
"That's him up there." She said in surprise as she pointed to the one face on the photo of medic researchers that had been completely scratched over in black ink.
"When the ANBU healed me, I decided to look past his mask so I could thank him later. But when I realized that he was the guy who called himself Kabuto during the exams, I figured he was planted in the exams to watch us. Why is his face scratched out?" Hinata explained as she looked at the picture in confusion.
The hair on the back of Sakura's neck stood up at Hinata's observation. Like the ninja of Konoha, the medical field was very close knit, for them to do that he must have done something awful. And it wasn't related to him leaving Konoha, she had remembered seeing the black mark on the picture when she had visited Rock Lee, before Kabuto's spying was revealed.
"I'm sure there's a good reason, I could ask around for you later, but right now I've got a lot of work to get done." She answered as calmly as she could.
"I guess I'll go home then, I'm so sorry for wasting your time, Sakura, I really did think something was wrong." Hinata apologized.
"There's no need to apologize, better to be safe then sorry, right? I'll see you around, let me know if you ever need help again." Sakura reassured her.
After Hinata left, Sakura quickly asked one of the nurses about the picture with Kabuto's scratched out face, but she refused to say anything, answering that she didn't know him that well. She got the same reaction from other nurses, medics and doctors. Some even denied that Kabuto ever had medic training.
'Why won't anyone in the hospital talk about Kabuto? I wonder what he did.' Sakura wondered before another nurse informed her that Tsunade had a mission for her.
She went to Tsunade's office and recognized Yumi as the other medic in the room, one of the few others besides her and Shizune who had both shinobi and medic training.
"Have you two looked at the test results on those monsters that were brought back?" Tsunade asked Sakura and Yumi as she held a copy of the autopsy report.
"Yes, but they looked so strange, their DNA was nothing like the nagas of Wind country, so I had the tests run again." Yumi answered.
"It's no mistake, these monsters are nothing like the quiet creatures seen wandering the deserts of Wind Country. They don't look or act like them, in fact, they appear to have the DNA structures of a number of eusocial insects, which have the structure of a hive that has workers and a single egg laying queen." Tsunade explained what the test results meant.
"Which brings me to your mission." The hokage continued.
"In a sense, you're both shinobi, but the fact that you both have advanced medic training means that the medics of Sand will see you as an ally and give you the information I need. The Sand-nins who were recently rescued had an important message for me. They have told us that an individual medic by the name of Taro, an expert in genetics and the only one who has the expertise to do this has recently abandoned their village. The timing appears to be perfect, so I suspect this is his handiwork. However, he did leave behind much of his research. It is presumed that he took his knowledge to Orochimaru. He also left with the help of one of their best chuunin captains, an insect user named Katsuobushi because he was angry they didn't promote him to jounin. Be sure that you get every single piece of information that you can on the two of them for the bingo book, as well as any current genetic research and anything they know about these naga monsters." The Hokage instructed.
"Are you sure they'll just give us all that information?" Yumi asked.
"Tell them you're doing it on my behalf and you shouldn't have a problem." Tsunade said with a smile, knowing she was well respected by the medics of many ninja villages.
"And one more thing, the two of you are not to discuss this portion of your mission with anyone, including your other two teammates." She added.
"Yes, Tsunade-sama." Yumi and Sakura both replied respectfully before Roka and Shikamaru arrived at the time they had been instructed to come for the official mission.
Seeing Yumi and Sakura had arrived earlier made them suspect something was up, but they knew better then to say anything.
"Are we late?" Roka asked in confusion.
"You're just in time." Tsunade replied.
If the first mission had been a fun rush, then the second mission, by comparison, was a horrible, scorching bore. They were hot and their bodies ached as they rode in single file on camels during the uncomfortable trudge through the desert west to Sunagukare, draped in robes to keep the sun and sand out of their faces and weighed down with provisions. And the fact that not all of the people they were escorting were not the most friendly didn't help matters either.
"Were any of you aware of what was agreed upon in the treaty between Suna and Konoha years ago? How they both agreed to only accept missions within certain areas? It wasn't exactly followed to the letter, you know." The leader of the Sand-nin team, a jounin named Shuyo, asked them as he flicked the cloth covering his face back and tossed sand into Sakura's hair.
"I never really paid much attention in my history class." Roka muttered as he prodded his camel along, annoyed that Shuyo had kept on bothering them to talk about politics.
Yumi stayed quiet, focused on keeping their bearings, since she was appointed leader. Shyuo, Roka and Shikamaru followed directly behind her, with the genin and Sakura at the rear.
Tsunade had explained the official mission after Shikamaru and Roka entered. Although it was technically a 'cover', it was still quite important that this mission be done well. She needed a well-traveled, mature and responsible team, but they couldn't be too mature. Many jounin and even some senior chuunin still had an axe to grind with Sand, the current treaty was still quite delicate and old grudges from past conflicts died hard.
"This is an important diplomatic mission and the reason I picked the four of you for it is because you all have the best balance of personal skills and ninjutsu. The Sand-nin that were rescued have completely recovered and informed me that not only do they now have a new Kazekage, but he wishes to form an alliance with us against the Sound. You are to escort both the Sand-nins and my reply to their message to Sunagukare as quickly as possible and on the way back, you must bring the Kazekage, and his attendants back to Konoha so we can publicly announce the treaty together." They had recalled her saying.
The stubborn Shuyo wasn't making their work much easier. Sakura and Shikamaru had tried to be friendly with the Sand-Genin trio, but his team had kept silent, probably worried about saying the wrong thing in front of their leader. But Shuyo wouldn't shut up and it was getting on Roka's nerves.
Yumi was too busy navigating the trail to referee the situation, so Shikamaru decided to steer the conversation in another direction before Roka did something stupid.
"Shuyo-sensei, what do you know about these nagas that live in Wind Country?" he asked the jounin.
"They're very shy and mostly nocturnal and they don't bother people, they run away if you try to approach them. They're colored green because they prefer to stay around desert oasis and other areas with some vegetation. We never had trouble with them, then this strange new species showed up, attacking anyone and anything in their path. We've tried to exterminate them, but the difficulty is that we don't' know anything about them." Shyuo explained.
"Look, the oasis, we're almost home." One of the genin said to his teammates.
Sure enough, they were at the source that supplied Suna's drinking water, but they couldn't make a pit stop. The landmark was the nastier end of the oasis, full of bugs and toxic plants at the banks.
Shuyo hesitated while his team held back a bit.
"Is everything all right?" Yumi asked.
"This was where we first saw the signs of those aggressive nagas, they like to frequent this area and hunt the normal ones." One of the sand genin, a dark haired guy, replied.
Suddenly, the camels they were riding began to buck and cry out.
"What's wrong with them?" Roka wondered.
"It could have something to do with that really ripe, dead naga over there." Shikamaru pointed out the body by the water.
The partially eaten remains were rather well hidden in the grasses. The tracks and trampled plants made it pretty clear what had killed it. Yumi looked at Sakura and she nodded before they got off their mounts. Using their naginata and kunai respectively, Yumi and Sakura gently turned over the body, sending insects scurrying.
"I don't think I like what I see." Yumi said.
"This is a fresh kill." Sakura mumbled half to herself.
"Yumi, Sakura, I think we need to start running." Roka called out to the medics as he observed several buzzards circling overhead.
"What are they saying?" Yumi called back.
"They're arguing about who's going to get to eat our eyes and ears should the pack of monsters nearby manage to kill us."
Sure enough, a pack the more aggressive purple creatures off in the distance were visible on the horizon.
It was a wild chase through the desert as everyone kicked their camel's ribs to make them go faster.
"Faster, faster, how much further are we from Suna?" Yumi pleaded with her camel asked the sand jounin.
"Judging by the sun's position, I'd say ten minutes." Shyuo replied.
It was a long ten minutes as they went over the dunes with the monsters on their trail. One of the nagas managed to grab a hold of a camel, sending its rider, one of the genin, flying. Shyuo managed to catch his student, before a slicing set of wind drove off the monsters from their prey.
They had made it to Sunagukare, short of a camel.
Shikamaru and the team dismounted their camels as Kankuro and Temari sized them up, clearly not impressed.
'Our message said we needed their best and they sent these guys?' Kankuro's dismissal of them didn't improve the mood.
"Well, I see you brought our shinobi back. Let's go, the Kazekage is waiting for all of you."
'Humph, you may have a new team, but I still think you're weak.' Shikamaru heard Temari's mental assessment of him as they were led past the bleached bones of unlucky animals who had succumbed to the desert heat and into Sunagukare.
Suna was quite different from Konoha. Rather then being surrounded by high walls, Sunagukare stayed hidden through camouflage, it's sandy domed buildings so similar to the windy sand dunes of the desert, that it was possible to walk by and never notice that there was an entire village beside you. Children still played in the streets, but there were no fences or vegetation, just covered wells and buildings designed to keep the sand out.
They arrived at the largest building in the center of the village, where Temari knocked on the large doors under the arched entranceway and they opened to reveal Baki.
"The Kazekage will receive your message now." Baki said as Yumi bowed in respect and handed him Tsunade's message.
Back in Konoha, Neji sat at the table set aside for the Branch House, bored out his mind at the so-called party. Hinata had gone to the hospital and when someone had noticed her carrying back something that she had hidden in her room, it was decided right away that they needed to mark her 'attainment', whatever that was.
This of course had caused Yuroshi, the family's financial agent, to complain about the money that would have to be spent. It was finally settled that there would be a party, but to save money, the best food and seats were saved for the Main House and their guests. Branch family members could not invite anyone, and were given the least amount of food that could be given to them.
Neji stared at the stuff that passed for food in front of him. The fried rice was kind of burnt, he'd gotten the part from the bottom of the dish, and the noodles in his soup had been boiled for too long by accident and were soggy, it was gross.
Looking for an excuse to not go, he had asked Gai if he could take a mission during the party, but his teacher had insisted he participate in the dramas of his family. Gai's concept of family was one where everyone was treated equally and that they were actually people you wanted to be around. But right now Neji just wanted to be around Shikamaru, someone who understood him and with whom he could do things that were mentally stimulating, such as play shogi or go, or talk about their past missions, rather then the trivial gossip and stiff formalities he was tolerating right now.
"Neji-sama, a package just arrived for you in the mail." Noyuuren, who working in the kitchen and the tables to keep the party going, interrupted his thoughts.
Neji slipped away from the party in the middle court, took the parcel to his room and quietly shut the sliding door. Items such as adult books could be ordered and delivered to your house in Konoha, wrapped in nondescript plain brown paper, but so were confidential messages. Noyuuren had just assumed it was the latter and took it to Neji without question, since those who did not have shinobi training were not allowed to read materials related to it unless they had special permission, such as a medic.
But he had been waiting for this order from and bookstore and knew exactly what it was. Shikamaru's discovery of those fluffy pink romance books had led him to look for some more hardcore material at the bookstore.
Okay, lime part here, if you wanna read it, just go to my account at Y!Gallery.
He finally finished his climax, panting heavily as he wiped himself off with tissue. He'd been embarrassed about the whole idea of jerking off, but it was actually a lot of fun. Still, fantasy just didn't compare to reality, and he wondered if they were both ready for it.
"I want him." He said the words out loud before he could stop himself.
As he lay there thinking about what he could do next to occupy his time, the sound of screeching birds filled the air.
"Neji, are you in there? Hurry up!" Hiashi suddenly called from down the hall.
"Yes, uncle Hiashi." Neji got the magazine under his mattress and his robe tied up just in time as Hiashi flung the door open.
Neji couldn't get his regular clothes and ninja equipment to get out the door fast enough.
He ran past frightened relatives who were quickly grabbing their things and went outside to find the largest messenger birds were circling the sky and making a racket, the emergency signal that told every able shinobi to get ready to defend the village from an open and large threat while designated chuunin evacuated civilians to safety.
Neji quickly joined his team and they were given their orders to go to the main gate, where he waited with what was left of the Rookie Nine, along with other ninja whom Neji didn't know that well. The air was tense as they assessed the army that was literally at their gate.
Hinata and Shino were calmly scanning the area while Kiba scratched behind the ears of Akamaru, who had now grown as big as a wolf. Tenten sharpened a kunai on a nearby stone while Lee stretched in anticipation.
"They don't seem all that strong, it looks like a trap." Chouji complained as he ate his chips, unaware that Neji could read his lips from a distance.
Suddenly a kunai came flying over the wall. Izumo and Kotetsu read the attached message demanding an immediate surrender, before they responded with a few explosive notes.
"What are they saying?" Yumi prodded Shikamaru again as the stood in the main hall of the Kazekage's Office.
"I don't know anyone in there, so I can't really hear what they're thinking that well. But they seem to be willing to agree with the treaty, so relax." He reassured the nervous medic.
They had quickly been ushered into the main hall, where the genin they had escorted were allowed into the meeting room, while they had been instructed to wait. After a tense hour of discussion behind closed doors, Yumi, Sakura, Shikamaru and Roka were allowed in to see the Kazekage of Suna and his council for the first time.
"I see we're meeting under better circumstances." Sakura went stone-silent and Shikamaru felt his hair stand on end as Gaara acknowledged them.
'When did he become the Kazekage?' Shikamaru heard Sakrura, slightly disturbed but outwardly calm.
Although he had helped in the mission to get Sasuke back, it wasn't exactly all warm and fuzzy feelings. However, the Gaara they were dealing with now was quite different from before, though still pretty intimidating in his new crimson robes and white sash, with the village crest on his painted hat. Sitting at the head of a large table, surrounded by his council, he motioned for them to sit.
"After some discussion, our Kazekage has chosen to accept your Hokage's treaty, and her invitation to return with you to Konoha." A council member stated as Gaara looked at them in silence.
"Um, Kazekage-sama, as a show of good will for the treaty, Tsunade also requested some papers, that we think would be of help in dealing with those monsters." Yumi began to add.
"We were also informed of this, our medics have agreed to share their information as a gesture of goodwill." The council member answered.
Yumi did her best to hide it, but Shikamaru could tell how relieved she was that their mission was successful. Eager to impress the legendary medic-nin Tsunade, a small group of sand medics had disappeared into the lower levels of the main building, to get the papers. They all went down into the basement for the papers without a problem, but then a sudden free-for all broke out as the defenseless medics began were screaming and falling over each other to get up the stairs. The reason they were trying to run soon became obvious as a swarm of desert insects came out of the doors.
"I know those bugs." Temari snarled as she unfurled her fan.
She blew the bugs down the hallway with a gust of her weapon before charging into the room in fury. The others followed her and came face-to-face with a strange ninja in light plate-mail, putting stacks of papers on the floor.
"How dare you show your face here, Katsuobushi?" she seethed at the sight of the traitor.
"Don't challenge me Temari, I'm not what I used to be." The Sand traitor replied, as winged insects appeared from under his sleeves and quickly began flying into the air vents with the papers.
"I'm going to kill you!" Temari charged him while dispersing the insects with a package of poison powder, but the insects beat their wings and simply fanned it away as Katsuobushi continued to steal the papers.
"We need to get those papers and scrolls!" Sakura said as she ripped a huge chunk out of a nearby wall and hurled it at Katsuobushi.
It quickly became clear that melee attacks weren't going to help as Katsuobushi's insects simply dispersed everywhere and hid his physical form. Yumi had some better luck driving the insects away with her fire, but she didn't use it very much to avoid burning the documents.
The cloud of insects pushed everyone retreated, smacking the bugs as inflicted painful bites, until Roka and Shikamaru's birds and bats were called out. The fight quickly went to their favor as their summons ate the stinging, swarming insects and Katsuobushi decided that he'd had enough.
"My poor insects." Katsuobushi muttered to himself as he retreated.
Gaara attempted to crush Katsuobushi with his sand, but the fine insects simply slipped through the sand grains and the insect-user melted away and disappeared.
"Don't dismiss me when you're finished!" Kouichi squeaked as the bats and birds finished off as many remaining insects as they could.
"Who was that guy?" Roka asked.
"Katsuobushi abandoned our village because Gaara had refused to make him a jounin. He was never able to summon that many insects and in that variety before. If he had been half as powerful as he was today, maybe we might have considered it." Temari said angrily as she wiped the blood from insect bites on her face and neck.
"At least he didn't steal a lot of papers, and the things he managed to take weren't that important." Sakura said as she assessed the damage.
As the medics did their best to stop the burning pain of the bites and stings the insects had left, Kouichi quickly filled everyone in on what was happening.
"I'm glad your mission was successful, Shikamaru-kun, but you all must return to Leaf. Shortly after you all left, the Sound surrounded Konoha. It wasn't an all out battle when I left, but the village is under siege, Tsunade says we need reinforcements, fast." The poor bat panted out.
Upon hearing this Gaara apparently decided that the packing wasn't going quickly enough and the sand around them quickly began shuffling and placing everything onto the animals for transport. The team became a bit startled as Suna began to suddenly fade into the horizon until they realized that Gaara was moving everyone with his sand at more then twice the speed they would have gone had they walked.
"Hold still and let the sand carry you. We will reach Konoha in a few hours. Suna has a score to settle with the Sound." Gaara stated coldly.
The air was tense as the Konoha shinobi held their positions. The Sound were almost at Konoha's door, but a direct assault at the gates seemed too obvious. Civilians were still being evacuated as jounin and chuunin coordinated their defense strategy. The air was tense as several chuunin and jounin returned to the village from their missions and were updated on the situation.
"They have the most expendable at the gates to try and knock it down, I wonder if they realize they're going to their deaths." Kakashi stated as they prepared to attack.
"They were starving in Field Country, so they figured they had nothing to lose, the genin can deal with them without a problem." Anko added.
It appeared their tactic was to try and create a distraction at the front to divert attention. But the puzzling question was where they were going to try and surprise attack the village from, being protected by the main gates on the South side of the village and the Hokage mountain on Northwestern portion. That only left the Eastern forests, which would normally be full of traps, but those were still under the floodwaters.
Anko quietly began to rub her shoulder in apparent tension as Kakashi and Subatsu continued to talk.
"Have they determined where they're attempting the true ambush yet?" Subatsu asked.
"No, all those with animals are watching though." The jounin replied.
"Where's my team?" Subatsu asked Kakashi as he looked around, having just returned from reporting to the Hokage and needing an update on the situation.
"They're with the Sand getting reinforcements. Are you all right?" Kakashi turned to Anko as she started rubbing her shoulder even harder.
"My seal is reacting." Anko replied.
Author's notes: What's going to happen? Here's a hint: don't get too attached to Taro.
I just had a revelation, that the first nine chapters of this story has more plot development then the first one hundred episodes of Dragonball Z, strange, huh?
I know this moves a bit fast, but that's my style, and I'm not a pro writer.
Coming up, the siege of Konoha!