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Here we go with the update! :)

Chapter 14

I do not own Naruto

"Begin" came out of Orochimaru's mouth as I stood down below in the rink. There was seven people here, including me. And I had to be the survivor no matter what.

Right when that single word came from Orochimaru's mouth it began. One of the younger girls went flying at the other younger girl and the two men started taking kunai to the other's throat. I took a breath realizing all I've done is stand here watching everyone else. Think Sakura what do I do now?

This wasn't like a mission or anything, where I was killing the bad guy, this was just plain out killing.

Survival of the fittest.

A twisted version of natural selection.

I didn't want to use a lot of chakra so I drew out my twin swords that were latched onto my back. I charged towards the two men that were fighting each other. I slew them in a quick motion of my swords. I didn't even have to be as close to them so the real sword touched them. The wind chakra took care of the rest and slit them, their bodies falling to the ground blood pouring from the cuts.

They were probably confused as to how I cut them down from so far away.

I turned around to take a look at everyone else and a woman the same age as me kicked me in the right arm and by surprise I dropped my right sword. I gritted my teeth. And went to slay her down with my other sword but she avoided it by jumping up. Smart, it was the only way to dodge my swords. She came straight down charging, sending her chakra to her hands, yellow light came from them and began to pour down on me. I couldn't see anything! I had to get out of there.

I ran forward taking a guess, and ran right into something sharp. I yelled out in pain when the sword collided into my abdomen. I looked, and now I was able to see more clearly, it was someone else now, a man. Remembering back to when I fought Sasori, rescuing Gaara, I put my hands on the wound formed by the sword and began to heal myself. Cringing in pain.

What was I going to do about this guy? That was the real question. Knowing that the only thing I thought of was going to hurt, and it was going to hurt a lot, I did it anyway and took the chance. Sending chakra down to my foot and sent up the foot to his chin sending him up and when he tried to grasp the sword the sword moved up along with him and I groaned in pain.

In one swift motion I pulled the sword out and healed as much as I could. I took a breath and stood up from the ground. The man came back down to the ground and I took the sword, compliments of him, and shoved it right into the same spot he got me. I breathed heavily, still recovering from the stab wound. I healed a bit more.

The woman was coming up fast on me and went to punch me in the spine put with my speed I acquired while here, dodged, and punched her down into the ground with the punching method I learned from Tsunade. I stood triumphantly. I killed four people. One of the girls survived and was fighting a man who looked to be my age.

I was going to have to kill them, it was as simple as that. I moved my hands into signs and slammed my palm to the ground.

Katsuro, the tiger, appeared and stomped on both of them without even trying. His large size needed the entire area otherwise he wouldn't fit. I took a deep breath. I thought I could feel myself going unconscious and my chakra levels weren't so great either and Katsuro disappeared in a poof of white smoke.

I grinned. I made it through. I was one step closer…

I felt the darkness coming over me. And a burning sensation I felt around the wound I had yet to heal completely. I moved my hand over the wound, and immediately frowned. Poison.

My vision became blurry and the ringing in my ears grew louder and louder.

I was falling. Like that sensation when your half way from being awake and sleeping, and your body jolts awake like your falling.

I couldn't even tell what was happening anymore. I felt sick like I was going throw up. I fell to my knees and used my hands to support myself up. Arms slung around my waist, and it felt like I was thrown onto a man's shoulder.

"Bring her along." A voice said.

"Hn."

Sasuke stood up in the gallery with Suigetsu he saw Sakura get stabbed by the sword, he knew it was poison. When he saw her fall to the ground he whipped into action, senses flowing through him, protective instincts, and slung her onto his shoulder.

Kabuto instructed him to follow and he did of course listen, he knew more about this stuff than he did, so he was going to follow Kabuto's instructions, even though he hated taking orders.

Kabuto brought them to a room with a cold metal table in the middle. "Lay her there." Kabuto said and he did so. He stood there looking down at Sakura, she was cringing in pain. And her brow furrowed from the poison that flowed through her body. Wet tears fell from her eyes. "Na…" she mumbled. Kabuto was off getting supplies in one of cabinets and didn't notice her incoherent mumbles.

"What?" Sasuke said to her quiet enough so the creep didn't hear.

"Naa..ru…"

Sasuke squinted his eyes at the half-conscious girl.

"Naru…to…." She mumbled.

Sasuke's face had a frown plastered to it. And he was upset about this more than anything right now. This was why they were different. She wanted people to care for her, to help her along with the struggle. He did not want any of that. At all.

So Sasuke left the room, and let Kabuto go to work.

When I woke up, I was back in my room, in the cold, dark, boring room. I could barely move and I was sore. I could barely see anywhere when I opened my eyes. I vaguely remembered what happened. I was fighting the others and I killed the last one remaining, and then everything was dark. Black. Nothing.

My throat itched and I wanted to get up and move around more than anything but I was tied to the bed. "Good, you're awake." Came a voice from the door. I slowly moved my head over to see Kabuto. "Sorry about the restraints." He said leaning against the door frame. "In order to get the poison out you had to stay still."

I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing came out. I couldn't even nod my head. I was beginning to get a rather large headache at the back of my head as well. This was just getting worse and worse.

"It's fine. You won't be able to talk for a bit. The poison he used weakened you more than I thought it would. And I'll give you some pain killers that'll help you get to sleep." He told me. "Unfortunately though I cannot remove the restraints yet. It'll be a couple more painful days."

This was going to be nothing but hell until this poison wore off. And I was going to fall far behind on the plan.

"Naruto." A woman's voice called from behind him as we walked from the ramen stand and towards his house.

Naruto turned around to see who called him and was surprised to see the short, woman, he knew to be Sakura's mother. Naruto was a little taken back. He didn't think that he would ever be confronted by her mother.

"Naruto, I want you to bring my daughter back to me."

Naruto woke up in a cold sweat and jumped from the slumber he was just in. He breathed heavily, the dream he had just had made his heart-ache. He got out of bed and went to the kitchen and took out a glass. He filled it with tap water from the sink and drank it down faster than he ever had before. "Naruto." Was the dream happening in real life? And she was in his house?!

Naruto turned to the voice, but them he registered that the voice was more manly than Sakura's mother. Sitting at the table was none other than Jiryaya, drinking a cup of tea."WHAT!? WHY ARE YOU HERE IN MY HOUSE!?" Naruto yelled stunned spitting out water in the process.

"I'm going to take you training. Tsunade made it clear to me that you need a break away from everything. And what better else thing to do would be to take you out training!"

"Listen, pervy sage, I'm not in the mood."

"But I can turn that mood around, with a little bit of training. Come on; let's take a quick look into the things I can teach you? You want to save both right? Then you need to tweak yourself a bit more."

I woke this time not in pain, I was able to see, and I was no longer strapped on the bed. I could move around and my throat no longer burned. I could talk, which was probably my favorite of the things that went back to normal.

As of now I was standing in a room with Orochimaru, waiting for another person. He had informed me that he had a mission for me, my first mission, which what I was told was always hard and exhausting.

I really hoped that those rumors were wrong.

About a minute later someone knocked on the door. "Enter." Orochimaru stated from the opposite side of me. The door creaked open and in walked a man I've never seen before. He was about my age, with brown hair, and blue eyes. He had face paint on that reminded me of Kiba and Kankuro.

"Good." Orochimaru stated, "Now that you both are here I can begin."

My heart began to beat faster, I was worried about the mission he was going to throw at me. I took a deep breath mentally preparing myself for the terror to come.

"You two will take a little trip to Kari, a small village outside Amegakure." Orochimaru began. "There you will find a man named, Taro, he owes me a large sum of money. If he doesn't pay up, kill him."

Even though this was Orochimaru we were talking about it seemed kind of harsh.

"How much does he owe?"

"63,000,000 ryo."

My eyes shot open. Was he serious? Where in god's name did Orochimaru even get that amount of money to begin with?

"Of course, with interest, that is the amount. Originally it was 30,000,000. That was a couple of months ago, now I demand 63,000,000."

That's barbaric!

"Yes, Orochimaru-sama."

"You'll leave for Kari tomorrow. I left a small map in your room Sakura, Kabuto should have laid it on the table. Make sure you know the route. Don't be seen either."

I nodded. After the meeting I departed the man who I was going on the mission with tomorrow, whose name I still did not know. I walked all the way back to my room, this whole Itachi thing was driving me crazy!

I would have to think long and hard about this whole mess.

I entered my room and went to the table taking a look at the map. Kari was right there and it looked to be about ten miles north of Amegakure. I sighed. It was going to be raining. I could just see it. Amegakure. Why did that place ring a bell so much?

And then it hit me like a train.

A couple of months ago I was rifling through Tsunade's papers and saw a mission report from Kakashi's team. I could see it clearly. It was a mission report to a mission on the whereabouts of the organization Akatsuki. The organization that just so happened to have a certain Itachi Uchiha involved. I took a breath. Smiling, this was going to probably be my only chance to get a hold of Itachi. I had to take it.

But how. I wasn't going to be in the village, I was going to be outside the village, with another person. I can't just say, "See ya' later, I got to go talk to an old friend who just happens to be in Akatsuki, oh and by the way, I'm a spy, and he's working with me."

I shook my head. What to do!? I was half way there. I could almost touch it. I had no choice to go on the mission, so while on the mission I might as well try at least. And I needed to succeed. Why did this have to be so freaking difficult?!

Not to mention I hadn't even been thinking about killing Orochimaru, or that whole Sasuke mess. I haven't even seen Sasuke yet!

Sighing, I walked to my bed laid down, and drifted to sleep.

The next morning I woke, changed, and freshened up, and the ate a small breakfast. I was ready to go, all I had to do was wait for the guy that I was going with.

I waited outside for about ten minutes until he decided to come out. "Sorry, I got lost." He said nonchalantly.

"You get used to it." I responded. So was this guy like really, really new?

"Doubt it. I've been here for three years." He said with a small laugh.

I was shocked. Three years and he still didn't know his way around here? I've been here three weeks and I know this place like the back of my hand!

"Anyway, I'm Kachi." He said holding out his hand for me to shake. And I did so.

"Sakura." I said with a smile.

"Nice to meet you, let's go then?"

I nodded and then we began out run towards the village.

It was a five-hour trip from the hideout to the village, and we stopped once to take a long, cool, drink of water. We arrived at the village just in time for dinner. We walked around the village looking for a bar. Bars were always the easiest place to get information. The bar tender was always sober, and he usually knew everything about everyone.

We walked into the bar to receive stares of from the civilians sitting and having a drink. All men. Not one woman in sight. I took a deep breath and went towards two empty bar stools. Perfect.

"Goo' evenin'" the bar tender said when we both sat down. "Wha' can I get you two?"

"Just a hot cup of tea." I told him looking around the room, catching glances from others.

"An' you?" the bar tender said asked looking towards my partner.

"The same." He said with a smile.

The bar tender left and then went to get the cups of tea as we received even more glances from the people around. It wasn't my fault. I didn't drink.

The man came back with the cups of tea and set them in front of me. "Anythin' else?"

It was now or never, "Listen, we're looking for someone." I said immediately, "Do you think you'd be able to point us in their direction?"

The bar tender laughed a bit, "Well, sure…. Who ya' be lookin' fur?"

"A man, Taro, is the name." Kachi told him.

The bar tender smiled. "Everyone's lookin' fur him. He owes a lota' very dangerous people, a lot of money."

"That would be why we're looking for him. So could you give us a little nudge?" Kachi said.

"Well sure, that be him, o'er there in the corner. Comes in every now and 'gain he somehow always has the money to drink."

I turned around nonchalantly to see the direction he was pointing in. A fat man, with brown hair, bags under his eyes, and it looked like he hasn't slept in months.

"He used to be the top dog on the drug scene. Now he's just a poor man, who owes money to everyone. Who ya' be working for that they sent ya' here?"

I laughed at how ridiculous the question was. "Like we'd tell t only you." I shot back.

"Alrigh', alrigh', because I haven't seen such a fine lookin' lady here in a while." He said giving me a wink.

Ugh. I need a shower.

I looked over to Kachi and he looked at me, in sync we both nodded and went over to the man. I was actually starting to like Kachi and I think he would probably be my only friend here. It was nice having someone like that, I could rely on. I had Suigetsu as a friend, but he disappeared to god knows where.

We were coming up close, to Taro, his eyes were locked right on us, Kachi looked over to me giving me a nudge. "Let me handle this." He mouthed, "Believe it or not I can be very convincing." he said giving me a wink.

Two winks in less than a minute. Was I looking exceptionally well this morning?

"Ah, Mr. Taro!" Kachi exclaimed loud enough for the entire bar to hear. "Let's take this in the back shall we? Away from all the onlookers, hm?" he said glaring at Taro.

"No thank you, young man, now shoo!" Taro waved him away and continued drinking his tall glass of beer.

Kachi's eye twitched.

In a flash, Kachi's foot hit the bottom of the table flipping it over and leaving the mug empty on the ground, the beer spilled all over the hardwood floor. "Let me rephrase. You are coming in the back with me and my partner here. Okay?" Kachi said putting an evil grin on his face.

If Taro wasn't scared shitless. I defiantly was.

Taro looked down at his spilled beer, and back up at Kachi, and grinned. "I don't think so." He chuckled deeply. "Now, you've spilled my drink. And I am not very happy about that."

Kachi grinned right back at him. "I think you owe my boss a, from what I hear, a very, very large amount of money. And I for one, will be either taking back the money you owe, or no one, and I mean no one will find your body. And no one I bet will miss you. I mean, the others who you owe money to will surely be upset."

"If you do that, that's calling all of them after you for the money."

"Oh? Then I'll just have to kill them as well."

"Don't be cocky, boy." Taro growled. "Just who is your boss anyway?"

Kachi laughed cruelly. "Orochimaru."

Taro's face went pale, blank, and he started to sweat. He began to get very nervous and even looked as if he was going puke up right in front of everyone.

"Now," Kachi said with the grin back on his face, "Let's try this again? Shall we?"

"I still can't believe that you scared him like that, he ran out of there faster than I think he ever ran." I said with a laugh.

"I'm surprised as well, I didn't think we'd be getting the money. I thought I was going to have to kill him." He said.

"Do you always do these kinds of missions?" I asked, "You're so good at intimidating them."

"These are the only mission I ever do."

"Really?"

"Yeah, I take care of all of Orochimaru's money. Mostly though I put the people who never gave him back the money in their place though."

"Well you certainly have a talent for it."

"I like to think so."

We were sitting at a ramen stand. Kachi was unbelievable hungry. And so was I but, I couldn't eat ramen, it reminded me too much of home and Naruto.

We were going to be heading back soon. But then the subject of Itachi bounced into my head. What do I do? Knock him unconscious and make a break for it?

Thinking about the information I reviewed over spying and espionage over the years, nothing that came to mind was slightly possible to do in this situation. But then it clicked. Kabuto was the key word in this whole entire situation.

When he acted as a spy for the Akatsuki or something like that and met the fake Sasori we made way back when.

I thought about it more. And figured it was going to be the only chance I had.

"Kachi?" I mumbled.

"Hm? What is it?" he said slurping up a noodle.

"I need to make a detour, to Amegakure."

"Amegakure?" he said putting the chop sticks into the ramen, pulling more out and putting it in his mouth, not even swallowing before he spoke again. "Why?"

"I have a spy there. Informing me occasionally on the Akatsuki. They contacted me saying I need to get there."

"Hm… Well. Okay."

I expected more of a fight not just a, "Okay." That was so far the one easy thing that has happened the whole time here.

"You're not even going to ask who my contact is?"

"Nope. You probably wouldn't tell me anyway, so what's the point? I trust you, you're a good person. So I'll meet you here. Hurry back. I want to get home." He said shooing me away while taking a drink of his glass of water.

He was letting me go? This was the opportunity I couldn't pass up, so I got up slowly from my seat and left.

Now I was just hoping I wasn't going to get killed by any member of the Akatsuki. That would be embarrassing.

New Story Alert.

Life. Deleted.

There was a beeping. That's all I heard. Beeping. Why was there beeping? I didn't understand….Wait…. Who am I? Where am I?

New Chapters every Monday

I got this done on time this week :) (pat on the back for me)

I hope that the chapter didn't have a lot of mistakes. I think I got them all but near the end I got bored and tired, and just went AH FUCK IT, and updated.

I was actually even busier this week than last, so I'd really not sure how I got through. I guess it was a fun chapter to write.

Next chapter should be better! Itachi finally makes his appearance, another complication, and we can finally get a move on with the whole Sasuke situation.

Next Sunday will be the update day again.

And another thank you to all that reviewed. It really brought a smile to my face.

Please Review.