Chapter Twenty-One: Gone.
Chikakon limped over to Kisame and struggled to clamber up onto the seat beside him. Kisame didn't raise his head from his hands so Chikakon dropped the bowl of rice he had been carrying on his lap carefully. Kisame spared him a weary glance and leant back against the wall. Chikakon pushed his nose into the man's hand and whined. Kisame rubbed his head between the ears.
"No-one's said anything yet." He told the fox. Somehow it made him feel better, just a bit, to talk to someone else. He sighed and scratched at one of the bandages around his arms. The wounds they had sustained from their battle with Orochimaru's experiments last week had been cleaned and tended to by Konan.

The doors opened with a quiet creak and Kakuzu shuffled out, shoulders slumped and rubbing his eyes. Exhaling measuredly, he looked to Kisame and Chikakon. Chikakon tore from the bench; forgetting his injuries he stood on his hind legs and looked up at Kakuzu expectantly. Kisame stood. He could feel his hands shaking, the tremors running up his arms. His throat stuck and he found he couldn't make the words he wanted to ask come out. Was she okay, alive? What was happening? Can I see her? Kakuzu seemed to hear these silent questions. He sighed heavily and ran a hand down his face,
"For having only been gone a day, her wounds are severe." Kisame felt his stomach plummet and a cold flush run through him.
"However," Kakuzu said, watching as the man before him visibly straightened, "We managed to fix her up for now. She still has a number of poisons and experimental drugs in her system; Sasori is still breaking them down and making antidotes but it will take some time. For now, we're just going to have to deal with each problem as it arises. She may not-" Kisame shook his head,
"I want to see her." His vocal chords had finally shifted and he swallowed. Kakuzu shrugged noncommittally, turning it into a roll of his shoulders upon realising his stiffness. The expectation built as he considered the demand.
"Just don't touch anything." He relented, quickly taking his leave.

They didn't loiter; both Kisame and Chikakon rushed through the doors to Natsuki's side. Chikakon jumped up and down on the spot, trying to get at good look at the young woman. Tearing his eyes away from her, Kisame picked the little fox up so that he could see, though he wouldn't let him lick her face. Kisame looked around the infirmary, only seeing Sasori sat at the lab on the other side of the room. He reached out, his arm still trembling, and laid a hand over hers. The veins traversing her pallid skin were still there in that awful purple colour, but they were not as pronounced which Kisame took as a good thing. He looked up at her face, the skin drawn, dark shadows beneath her eyes. Sweat dribbled over her face; if it weren't for that Kisame would have thought her dead. He gripped her hand.

Sasori stood abruptly. Marching over to them, he gave Kisame a look and told him to sit Natsuki up.
"Why?" Kisame warily asked, sitting the woman up despite her feverish groans. "What are you doing?" Sasori didn't look up when he answered.
"This," He pushed a needle into her shoulder, "Is the antidote." If Kisame had been paying more attention to Sasori, he would have heard the tinge of pride in his voice and seen the almost-smile on his face, but as it was, he only cared that Natsuki was going to get better. She was going to live. The plunger of the needle was pushed down and the translucent blue liquid disappeared into Natsuki's body. Sasori took it out and brought out another two, injecting them into her side and leg. Binning the empty needles, Sasori motioned for Kisame to lay her back down again before going through a routine check. He measured her pulse, took her temperature and pressed his finger into her abdomen to see if there were any abnormal swellings or lumps. Satisfied, he gave Natsuki one last glance before leaving the infirmary. Kisame watched the doors swing shut with a gentle thud and turned back to Natsuki. A smile broke across his face. She wasn't going to die.

And he swore his heart soared.

It was all good until the excruciating pain made itself rudely known by clamping its damn sharp teeth into her leg. Both of them. Natsuki groaned and tried to get away from it by turning her head, but that only made her realise that every muscle in her body felt like it had been torn apart like the threads in a piece of string and then clumsily put back together by a toddler with sticky fingers. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut and tried to steady her breathing. It didn't make the pain go away, but it made her feel better about it. Taking another deep breath, she opened her eyes.

Bright light invaded her vision and she shied away from it, closing her eyes again. Barking alerted her to Chikakon's presence, but the high-pitched noise made her cringe. A deep voice shushed the fox and Natsuki forced herself to squint through one eye to see who else was there. She cracked a smile at the blue hand pushing Chikakon's head down as the fox tried to jump onto her. Keeping the smile there was hard work and she had to let it go. With a soft exhalation, she turned her head back to the ceiling and relaxed her eyes. She felt Kisame's hand on her shoulder and sighed as he murmured words she was too tired to comprehend. Chikakon's wet nose pushed into her palm. Darkness drew over her inner eye as sleep took over her.

But even in her dreams, she was tormented. Angry voices hounded her through deserted, war-torn streets. Wails and moans of hysteria rose all about her as the ground was soaked in the nightmarish colour of blood. She couldn't escape. Everywhere she looked, bodies. Corpses of the dead and dying. Those still alive stumbled after her like the possessed or sat under the broken eaves of houses now fallen. They cried there, mourned the loss of their loved ones. Friends, family. The worst part was that even in her dreams- no, her nightmares, she could still feel the pain of watching her own friends and family being slaughtered. And yet she had brought this terrible suffering on other people. Knowingly, she had become their very own nightmare. The wailings grew louder, higher, reaching a crescendo. Her assailants lurched faster, clawing at her as she started to run. They yelled at her, screamed, but her ears heard none of it. Nothing except for one word sailing above the rest:
"Monster."

Natsuki gasped. Her eyes flew wide open and she fought for her breath. Kisame sat up beside her, grabbing her hand. Chikakon stood on the white cloth of her infirmary bed, whining because he didn't know how to help. Her breath came back to her and she worked on steadying her heartbeat. Once it was somewhat under control, she turned her attention to her surroundings. Anything to stop her from thinking about the horrors in her nightmare.

She was still in the infirmary and deduced that the whiteness of her surroundings had been her attacker the last time she had opened her eyes. Twitching her muscles, she tested everywhere to see if she was fit enough to sit up. Whilst still sore, she wasn't in immense pain so she began to push herself up. Chikakon whined at her and laid his ears back worriedly. She smiled at him. A strong arm suddenly helped her into a sitting position and she looked to her side to see Kisame. His eyes were expectant, as if they were asking a million questions all with one look. They were worried, they were happy, there was... something else. She couldn't quite place it, it was almost urging her on and that in itself made her smile at him.
"Hey fish man." Everything in his eyes then turned to elation and his wide, cocky grin broke out across his face, making her grin too. Suddenly, she was in his arms. His head buried itself into her neck and he pulled her close to him. He gripped her like he'd never let go.
"Don't ever, ever scare me like that again." His muffled voice reached her and she snorted, pushing him away. The loss of warmth was strangely... discomforting. She looked away, afraid that he'd be able to see what she was thinking from her eyes. She didn't know why that idea set her on edge. Her eyes caught on the splint and thick layer of bandages around her ankle and cringed when she remembered how that had happened. Then she frowned.
I can't believe that little silver-haired rat was so powerful- No. She stopped herself there, realising with disgust the truth. I was just too weak. She would have continued to from if it weren't for-

The infirmary door flew off its hinges with a splintering crack and a triple-bladed scythe was aimed into the room.
"Bitch where the fuck is that rat?!" He yelled, clambering over the bits of door. Chikakon squeaked and leapt into Natsuki's arms. She glared at Hidan.
"Again, he's a fox. Not a rat." The Jashinist ignored her and continued spouting his usual nonsense.
"I need to fucking sacrifice something dammit! Now hand over the little shit!" Natsuki reeled at the insult to her companion,
"Now that's just pathetic on your part!" She scoffed, "Mistaking him for a rat isn't so bad because at least they're both mammals, but a piece of dung? Really Hidan, did your mother not teach you that what you crap out isn't alive?" She shook her head in a pitying manner. Hidan growled and threw his scythe to the ground where the three blades stuck in.
"Quit your damn yapping and let me sacrifice it already!"
"You are not getting anywhere near Chikakon!" Natsuki grabbed Kisame by the cloak and pushed him forwards, "Get 'im Sharky!" Kisame stumbled and turned back to look at her.
"What? I'm obviously ill, look at me," She gestured to herself, "I need a slave to beat up the brainless idiot over there." She waved a hand in Hidan's direction, grinning when he grabbed his scythe again. Kisame rolled his eyes, trying not to smirk.
"You can't be that ill if you have the energy to argue with Hidan-" Natsuki gasped and threw her arm over her eyes,
"Oh no! I'm- I'm feeling faint-" She collapsed backwards dramatically. Chikakon jumped out of her arms and whined, pushing his nose into her face. Her head lolled to the side and she hung her tongue out. Kisame poked her and she cracked an eye open,
"Don't poke the dead lady." Hidan snorted,
"Lady? As if." Natsuki flew upright,
"Hell yes! Look, I've got boobs and everything!" She started to unfold her top. Hidan cursed and covered his eyes,
"Bitch, no! Stop it- Fuck!" He grabbed his scythe and fled the infirmary. Natsuki smirked triumphantly, tying her white kimono up tightly. She hadn't even had to show anything to send him running. Kisame frowned at her and she looked at him innocently.
"What? I can just put it down to my poor, delirious, sickly mind forcing me to do things I never would." Kisame just sighed and hit her over the head. Lightly of course. Natsuki glared at him,
"Whatever fish-man."

Over the next couple of days, Natsuki was visited by both Kakuzu and Sasori for check-ups. Her severed achilles tendon would take a long time to heel apparently, but her system was responding well to the antidote Sasori had given her. Itachi also visited, but not as much as Kisame and Chikakon. Hidan stayed away for a while, but then made his reappearance. With a blindfold. His 'genius idea' didn't get him very far because he ended up pointing his scythe at the lab desk and demanding it to give it sacrifice-able things. Kakuzu, being there at the time, had lopped his head off and bowled it down the corridor. His body was promptly tossed into a bin. After two weeks in the infirmary, she was finally allowed to return to her room.

"I'm fine, seriously." Natsuki batted the hands away that were trying to help her up. She took hold of her makeshift crutches again and pulled herself into them. She lurched forwards, having to hop about to avoid falling over. Kakuzu grabbed her shoulder and she sent him a miffed frown,
"I had it under control." She said. Kisame looked at her, noticing something was off. When she had gotten up and fell off balance, there had been a look on her like... He didn't quite know. It couldn't be good though. Natsuki shrugged off Kakuzu's hand and tested out the new crutches. Whilst she was used to a walking stick, two of them were a little hard to handle. She wobbled and hopped about some more on her sometimes-alright leg. With a sigh, she realised that the next few months were going to be a real pain.

Kisame and Chikakon walked beside her as she made her way back to her room. Kisame cast her a concerned glance every now and then and not always when she wobbled about on her crutches. In return, she looked at him like he was a weirdo. She finally turned to face him,
"What are you looking at me like that for?" Kisame stopped, not knowing what to say exactly. They stood looking at each other in silence for what seemed like hours to Natsuki, though she was never one to be particularly patient.
"You're... you were acting strange in the infirmary." He eventually decided to say. Natsuki huffed and pursed her lips. She checked the hall for people before yanking him into her room. Chikakon darted through the door before it slammed shut.
"There's a problem." She said. "Orochimaru - Kabuto- One of them..." Kisame's brows pulled together and he struggled to hold in a snarl. They had done something more terrible than experimentation to her, he could hear it in her voice. Natsuki pulled in a shaky breath,
"My tail's gone."

Finally some non-seriousness! But then it turned serious again DX

No-one won last chapter because no-one entered, oh well :)

This chapter wasn't as good as I wanted to be. Very OOC Kisame. Ah, I'm tired. Blarg, updates will be slow from now on, I can feel my inspiration being shoved out by writer's block already -_-