WHERE ARE U!! WAIT TIL I GET MY HANDS ON YOU (stomps off screen)

(head pops up from behind a bush, hand prints visible on neck) is she gone?

Right okay Takara found out what was going on and she didn't like it… But you will!

THERE U ARE!!!

Takara The Honey Trap

Takara headed towards the bar. She hated doing this sort of thing but it was effective in most cases. Before she stepped into the bar she pulled the clasp from her hair and let it fall around her face and gave it a ruffle, she let her jacket lay open, unbuttoned the top three buttons on her shirt and mentally kicked herself. After making sure her kunai where well hidden but within reach, she kicked herself again and entered the bar. It was as she guessed dark gloomy with a number of people seated around at various tables, conversation quieted as she entered. Without pausing she headed to a table in the corner sitting with her right side facing the wall to hide the scar, it didn't take long for a man to offer to buy her a drink.

"Why not?" she answered with a forced smile, eyebrow twitching.

The man grinned to himself and fetched a few bottles of sake from the bar. For the next hour Takara found it hard to keep forcing the smile while the man got drunker and continued to talk about himself. When he started missing his mouth and using two hands to try guide the cup she took her chance.

"So tell me, what has a strong (kick) handsome (kick) guy like you carrying weapons around the town?" (kick, kick, kick, kick)

"wee 'ree no realllly meaaannt to sss sss spek bout itsss" the man slurred.

"Aw but you can tell me… can't you?" (kick, kick, kick). The man smiled drunkenly.

"Course I cann, but you not allowed to telll no oneee." He put his finger on his lips in a sshing gesture, or at least tried, he only succeed to poke himself in the nose. The man muttered on most of what he said was gibberish mutterings of a drunk man, but he did say a few things of interest. For one thing he confirmed her suspicions of repeated raiding parties coming from the western hills and that the townsfolk where not happy with strangers, the last strangers that had stayed in the town had been murdered and robbed not long after leaving the village. This got Takara thinking that perhaps who ever was in the hills didn't want word of their presence spreading. She'd gotten all she could use from the man, now to get away.

"So, does you have a bed to stay in tonight?" the man asked reaching to grab her hand. Takara cringed,

"Okay, nice time over…" she muttered she drew her hand away angrily and looked around the bar, it was late and the bar was more or less empty, no one was looking their way. The man slumped over and grabbed her, Takara gritted her teeth and flashed her snake like eyes at the man she grabbed the back of his neck and slammed his head on to the table and knocked him cold.

"No touching!" she hissed quietly.

"Drunken fool" someone muttered as Takara picked up her coat and left. Once out side she shuddered,

"I feel so dirty" she whined. "I hate doing that! I need a shower."

Takara headed back to the guest house. Hinata was asleep by the time Takara returned to the room. Quietly Takara got changed into a stealth suit, thought twice about lifting her katana (which for some reason was on the other side of the room from where she left it) setting it back down she donned a darkened ANBU mask she crept out the window and to woods in the west. If it was just bandits then she would clear them out, but if it was ninja, then that was another matter.

With the help of her Serpents Gaze she soon found a worn path in the darkened woods, she followed it from above in the trees. Several times she had to avoid traps.

This isn't just some bandits… she thought to herself looking at the almost invisible wire stretched across the path, it was attached to an explosive note. The third with in a hundred yards, she was getting close. Carefully she jumped down from the trees and continued on her hands and knees, progress was slow as the amount of traps increased and she had to disarm a few. There was a number of heat sources up ahead, a fire and a few humans. Takara crept up closer, it was four men, ninjas, they where standing guard in front of a sunken gate leading inside an underground base. The four men where wearing sound village protectors.

One man was scanning the bushes, went he saw two pinpricks of amber light,

"Huh?" he squinted into the darkness.

"What is it?" asked another, the first ninja didn't respond, "Hey," still no answer he second guy nudged his arm, the first guy shook his head as if coming out of a day dream.

"What is it?" repeated the second guy

"Thought I saw something…" he looked back into the bushes the lights where gone.

Takara running from branch to branch, she had got what she needed a made a hasty exit. With the Delving Daze jutsu she could at least say for certainty that Orochimaru wasn't there, he was some weeks ago while he waited for Sasuke but moved on before the genin appeared. It was just a base of sound ninja that he had abandoned but they still had their loyalty to him, they where a leaderless bunch of thugs that didn't know where their 'master' had gone. But had made Takara leave so quickly was that she uncovered in the ninjas mind, a plan to 'remove' the strangers was underway.

Two sound ninja's where dispatched to 'deal' with the strangers. One was supposed to go to the guest house the other was sent to the bar she herself had been to not half an hour ago, they knew she was there. Takara was nearly at the town when a kunai hit the branch next to her feet. Takara stopped and back flipped into a crouching position in a clump of bushes. Where did that come from? She saw it, a heat source, it was a ninja, and the way his head was moving about he didn't know where she went and he couldn't see in the dark. Takara aimed a kunai at the sweeping head and got ready to throw. Wait! Two ninja where dispatched! She swept the entire area no other heat sources big enough to be human, a couple of squirrels and a few small creatures, foxes maybe, but no other humans. Dammit! She crept along the branch, it was painfully obvious that this guy couldn't see a damn thing after a few minutes she was behind him, the fool didn't even move from where he threw the kunai. Takara grabbed his shoulders and spun him around grabbed his wrists in one hand and pinned it against his chest while pushing him against the tree, his legs where trapped underneath him and with her free hand held a kunai to his neck.

"Where's the other" she hissed, her serpent like eyes flashed in the dark, the man whimpered, she pushed the knife closer. "Where?"

"He went to the guest house to kill the small one!" he cried.

"What!" Takara flicked her eyes towards the lights of the town, the ninja took his chance he pushed out forcing Takara back and slipped a kunai out of his sleeve and swiped for her neck, she jerked her head back at an impossible angle.

"What the…!?" Takara's kunai cut off the rest of the sentence by slicing his throat. Takara was gone before the body hit the ground.

Hinata woke in the night, Takara wasn't in the bed across the room, Hinata yawned and was about to go back to sleep, but paused hovering her head over the pillow, something was wrong the window open, she hadn't opened it. Something caught the moonlight and flashed. The kunai struck the pillow, pinning it to the bed, luckily Hinata had rolled from the bed in time but the knife had grazed her hair, crouched on the ground and using Byakugan she saw one guy crouched on the ceiling of the room wielding another kunai. Hinata grabbed the nearest weapon, Takara's katana, it was heavier than it looked but Hinata was able to pull it from the black sheath and hold it in front of herself, deflecting the second kunai knife. The ninja dropped from the roof and landed lightly on the ground before lunging for her with a third kunai. Adrenaline took over Hinata swung the katana is a deadly upward strike, slicing the ninjas attacking arm, he grunted and dropped the kunai grasping his wrist with his other hand. While he was distracted Hinata slammed her open palm into his chest. The man staggered back, that was a pretty basic attack but for a Gentle Fist user it was a fatal attack, it used a lot of chakra though. The man collapsed and fell face down on the floor, blood pooled from his wrist. Hinata kicked him over, holding the katana in front of her, just in case.

"One of Hiashi's assassins?" was her first thought, but no this man was wearing a sound village symbol. While she was crouching over the body she sensed another presence behind her, turning swiftly she threw a kunai taken from the dead mans pouch. The other person at the window ducked the kunai and rolled into the room.

"Whoa, Wait!" the person while rolling to their feet and waving their hands. Hinata still held the katana and jumped forward, the figure ducked avoiding the horizontal strike. The heavy weapon over balanced Hinata's usual perfect form, the figure grabbed her wrist and prevented her from falling.

"I told you not to play with my katana…" said the figure quietly.

"Takara-sensei?" Hinata was relieved as Takara took off the black mask.

"You okay?" she asked scanned her for any injury and sounding concerned.

"Yeah… I… I'm fine. Who is he?" She asked letting Takara take the katana from her.

"A sound ninja, they have a base up the hill, it seems they have this village under a close watch. They don't like strangers, the whole village is in on this, it's not safe for us here. Get dressed, we gotta get outta here." Takara threw spare clothes into the backpacks while Hinata got dressed.

"What did you find out?" Hinata asked as she pulled a tee-shirt over her head

"That Orochimaru is no longer in Rice Country, hurry" Takara threw Hinata her beni hat, she caught it and pulled it over her bed messed hair. Both of them left through the window and sprinted from the sound controlled village. They continued to travel with out stopping for two days, continuously changing direction and at a number of places dropped mustard bombs. They where like smoke bombs but they coated the area with a layer of mustard powder and fine ground pepper this layer would confuse and disorient the sense of smell of any one trying to track them, sending the pursuer into sneezing fits and removing their sense of smell for a day or so.

"Ok… I think we can slow down now…" puffed Takara coming to a stop on a tree branch, Hinata landed next to her and sank to her knees.

"Finally…" she puffed. "So you're mission is to find Orochimaru and Sasuke?"

"Not entirely, its to gather any useful information and this tends to be useful, we can inform Tsunade that theirs no need to send ANBU search teams into Rice." answered Takara as she sank down onto the branch, beside Hinata.

"Did you learn any thing else?"

"Yeah … you can't use a katana, we'll have to fix that" Hinata pouted

"It's heavy, what did you expect you never let me train with it."

"That's not the point, I don't think you suited to use a katana, there too large for some one with your natural speed, something smaller and lighter would do for you." Takara looked out over the valley which their perch in the tree gave them a good view over the country side and the rising sun added a certain beauty to the scene. Hinata followed her gaze but when she saw nothing assumed Takara was just thinking.

"So… What happens now?" asked Hinata breaking the early morning silence.

"hmmm?" Takara came out of her thoughts "Well tracking Orochimaru is out of the question at this point. He's been gone far too long, and I can't put you in that kind of situation, not just yet, so there's no chance of us finding him. So we're just gonna do a wander."

"A what?" Takara had a large vocabulary of slang and phases and Hinata didn't even try to pretend she knew what her sensei was taking about.

"In other words, we are going to go about keeping our eyes and ears open for any thing of interest and while we're at it lets see what we can do with your skills." Takara swept her eyes around to look at Hinata directly.

"You mean training? Proper training?" asked Hinata.

"Yes, non-stop, Monoki, are you up to it?" Takara asked in all seriousness.

"HAI" Answered Hinata, Takara cracked a small smile

"You'd better be… Starting tomorrow the training will begin. I'll start with one of your weakest skills tai-jutsu, once you get competent with that we can move on to greater and more complicated things." Hinata nodded with a look of pure determination on her face. "As for today consider this you last day off for a while" Takara smirked at the tiny twitch of Hinata's eyebrow at those words. Takara slipped of the branch and landed on the ground below.

"Come on, lets find somewhere to sleep" she called back up to Hinata.

"Right" she called back and jumped down next to Takara, her legs gave out and she fell on her butt. "I guess I'm a little tired…" she tried to joke. Takara raised an eyebrow at Hinata on the ground, she had to remind herself that the kid wasn't up to so much travelling so quickly. Endurance, another quality she would instil into her young student. Takara offered her hand to Hinata and pulled her off the ground and taking her rucksack from her back. It was heavy but still much lighter than her own and they weren't going far. About ten minutes later they had found a good place to rest, Hinata was filling their canteens from a stream while Takara was writing down what she had found out into a small scroll. Hinata returned just as she sealed the scroll, and performed a summoning jutsu and the same little blue dragon appeared.

"Hey Takara!" he piped as the smoke cleared.

"Hey Ryuu, fancy doing a little job for me" Takara said it wasn't a question

"That would depend… what's in it for me?" the dragon said slyly.

"Ryuu, we're in the middle of nowhere and I'm running low on treats so you'll get something on delivery."

"We?" asked the little dragon and looked around to Hinata who was a little wary of the cat sized dragon.

"Oh and who are you?" he asked blinking his amber eyes.

"Royki Monoki…" answered Hinata using her assumed name. "Who are you?" The dragon bared his little fangs in a grin and drew himself up on his hind legs.

"I am the great and powerful Ryuu!!" he declared letting loose a puff of smoke.

"No, you're the kid of Gusomai who can't even breathe fire yet…" said Takara flatly and poked the dragon on the head, and suddenly the dragon was no longer scary.

"Oi! You could at least let me form a good impression on your… wait who is she any way? Your kid?" Takara almost choked, Hinata, who was giggling at the dragon, burst into full blown fits of laughter.

"NO!" Takara glared at the little dragon. "she's my apprentice so be nice! Here just take this to Tsunade before I yank your whiskers."

"Okay okay. Relax!" said the little dragon clutching his long moustache like whiskers, she had carried out that threat before. She handed the small scroll to the dragon and he flew off.

"And you can shut up and all…" She muttered to Hinata. Hinata's laughs subsided, eventually.

"Is he a branded summon too?" she asked.

"No he's a proper summoned creature."

"Like Naurto-kun's toads and Kakashi-sensei's hounds?" Hinata asked

"Exactly…" said Takara slightly surprised that she caught on to this very quickly.

"Could you teach me how to do that?" Hinata chanced

"I really don't think you're up to it now… but I promise that when I fell you're ready I will teach it to you." She added quickly when Hinata dropped her gaze to the ground. Takara knew the kids chakra control was near enough spot on but she didn't have a lot of chakra on the whole. She would have to work on that as well. Hinata smiled at Takara and she smiled back.

"Now get some sleep it all starts tomorrow."

They spent the rest of the day and the following night resting in that spot and the next day they moved out and Hinata's training began in earnest.

There see you got to hurt someone! PUT ME DOWN!! I don't wanna do anything like the bar bit again it made me gag just writing it

(Mutters angrily) FINE!! But ur lucky I got to take out my rage on a sound ninja!

ER… yeah sure, also a Beni hat is just a material cap that covers the crown of the head, forehead and top of the ears, and top of the neck.

Read and review, please and Thank you!!

(on a side note I recently posted a one shot cuz it was an idea I had that didn't fit with the story, take a look and tell me what ya think.)