DISCLAIMER: I do not own Naruto

[Search For Tatsumaki arc]

Chapter 26: Kawa no Kuni

The sun was setting as a five-man team of all Jounin consisting of Kakashi, Hinata, Kiba, Shino and Naruto jumped from tree to tree, trying to reach the border of Hi no Kuni and Kawa no Kuni. Naruto had stayed in the back of the team and had stayed quiet through the whole day. Kakashi was surprised but was glad he wasn't becoming a problem. Naruto's friends, however, were worried because it was unlike him to be so quiet.

They wanted to say something to him but they didn't know what to say to get Naruto back to his old self again. They decided to leave it alone and contiuned on their way. Once the sun nearly disappeared over the western horizon, Kakashi signaled the team to stop and decided it was time to set up camp for the night. Kakashi was afraid Naruto was going to protest and want to keep going through the night but no such protest came which finally surprised Kakashi.

Naruto quietly brought out his sleeping bag but no sleep would be coming. He offered to take the first watch over the group which Kakashi gladly allowed. After everyone had eaten their rations they brought, everyone pretty much went to sleep without a word and Naruto was sitting in a tree nearby the camp just looking up at the stars through an opening in the forest canopy.

He stared feeling lost and helpless. He hadn't felt this way in quite some time. He wanted to break down but he was deteremined not to do it while on this mission because he did not want to get forced to go back home and he still held on to hope that Sakura was still alive after all.

"A-are you o-okay, Naruto-kun?" asked a soft female voice.

It brought Naruto out of his wandering thoughts. He looked over to find Hinata taking a seat on the same branch he was sitting on looking over the camp.

"No," Naruto replied.

"Sakura-san is a s-strong woman, I b-believe she's a-alive and well," Hinata said in some way hoping to boost Naruto's spirit.

"That's not what's bothering me," Naruto continued. "What's tearing me apart is we had a fight the night before I left for my mission to the Valley of the End. We never made up and I didn't say goodbye when I left."

Hinata felt a loss for words. She didn't know what to say to that revelation. She along with Kiba and Shino believed Naruto was just scared that Sakura was killed.

"Not to be rude, but why are you up here anyway?" asked Naruto.

"I-I couldn't sleep and s-saw you so deep i-in thought that I-I thought you m-might want to t-talk," Hinata answered.

Naruto nodded and turned away to hide a tear that was escaping his eyes. He didn't want anyone to see him break down and just talking about his situation was destroying him more inside. He felt so guilty for leaving without making up with Sakura first.

"Y-you feel guilty, don't y-you?" Hinata asked.

"I feel like shit," Naruto answered. "Like a total jerk."

"I-I don't know w-what I can s-say to help y-you feel b-better only that i-it will be o-okay," Hinata said.

"I don't know if it will be Hinata," Naruto said.

"G-go get some sleep, I-I'll take over watch f-for you," Hinata said deciding maybe a little sleep will help him.

Naruto nodded and thanked Hinata and jumped from the tree. When he landed on the ground he walked to his sleeping bag and got in. He faced away from the group and shut his eyes as a few tears escaped his eyes once again.

Naruto opened his eyes to see that it was morning. He sat up to notice everyone else was still asleep except for Kakashi who must of been on the last shift of watching over the camp. He looked deep in thought but Naruto just left it alone and walked away from the camp to do his business in the bushes out of sight. After he finished, he heard running water nearby so Naruto walked until he found a clear, flowing stream.

Naruto kneeled on the ground and took his hand and scooped water and drank it. He brought his hands back down to the water and froze when a faint image of Sakura appeared in the ripples of the water. He whipped his head up but realized nobody was there and that it was his mind playing tricks on him.

"Get it together Naruto," he said to himself.

He cupped his hands for more water and drank. After he quenched his thirst, he returned to camp where Hinata, Kiba and Shino had woken up and was packing away their sleeping bags to begin another day of traveling. Naruto knew they should reach the border by the evening.

Naruto turned his attention to rolling up his sleeping bag which he sealed inside a scroll and then placed it inside his back pack. Kakashi signled for the squad to move out and the ninja jumped into the trees with Naruto falling behind to the back.

Evening came around and Naruto didn't say a word the entire day as they traveled throughout the day. Kakashi signaled the group to stop which they did.

"We've reached the border to Kawa no Kuni," Kakashi said. "We have two parts to this mission, finding the other two Genin, Botsuraku Aki and Burakku Shinji."

Kakashi handed out copies of their ninja registration forms with their pictures to Hinata, Kiba, Shino and Naruto.

"The other part of this mission is try to find any leads to finding Sakura," Kakashi finished.

"Should Hinata use her Byakugan or me and Akamarur or even Shino's bugs?" Kiba asked.

"No not yet, there's a small village near the border of Kawa no Kuni and Kaze no Kuni where Sakura had an encounter with the Tatsumaki, we'll start from their," Kakashi answered.

"I think it's best we at least see if we can find those Genin because who knows where they are," said Shino.

"You make a valid point Shino, but if Sakura fought a member of the Tatsumaki in or near that small village, they're might be people that can lead us to the direction Aki and Shinji," Kakashi said.

"If we have to, we'll split up once we get to that village, right Kakashi-sensei?" asked Naruto.

Everyone was surprised since it was the first words Naruto had spoken all day.

"Correct," Kakashi answered. "We'll travel a little more until it gets dark then we'll stop. Tomorrow we'll reach that village and that's when we'll begin our search.

Night fell and the squad stopped for the night. Again Naruto volunteered to take first watch over camp.

'Tomorrow,' Naruto thought.

"How are you holding up?" Kakashi said.

Naruto looked up to his sensei and sighed, "I'm holding."

"Sakura has become a very powerful kunoichi, I don't believe she's dead-"

"Her dying isn't what's got me all tore up inside," Naruto interrupted. "It's what I did when I left for our mission to The Valley of the End."

"What did you do that's so bad?" asked Kakashi.

"We had a fight about the amount of time we've gotten to spend together since we've become Jounin Instructors for Genin and I left without saying goodbye, without giving her a kiss, without telling her I love you even though we were pissed off at each other," Naruto said.

"I can't stand here and pretend I know how you feel Naruto since I've never put myself in a situation like this," Kakashi said. "Kami forbid, Sakura is dead, even in death she's not going to blame you for anything but like I said, I don't believe she is and after watching you two grow up, I know she loves you dearly so instead of wasting your energy on feeling guilty and driving yourself insane, turn it into determination in finding her and making it up to her."

Kakashi left and Naruto sat there and let Kakashi's words soak in. Before he knew it, Hinata was there to take over. Naruto thanked Hinata and jumped out of the tree and walked to his sleeping bag and crawled into it to try to sleep for the night.

Naruto was jumping through trees in the front of the team. They were getting closer to their destination and he was determined to find Sakura. Kakashi and the others were quite surprised since Naruto had been staying in the back of their formation nearly the entire trip and now he had taken the lead.

'Maybe our talk last night lit a fire in him,' Kakashi thought as he looked at his student.

The team found themselves at a river which Kakashi signaled to the team to follow it. Naruto stayed out front as they followed the river. They didn't have to follow it far when they came across a village where two more rivers intersected with the river the Konoha-nin were following.

"We made it, this is the village where Sakura and her team had stopped," Kakashi said.

Naruto was the first one to land on the ground, he closed his eyes to begin to enter in Sage Mode to see if he could sense his Sakura-chan's chakra.

"Hinata, can you please scan the area with your Byakugan? If Sakura is still alive and her Genin team are still here, they maybe inside one of these homes," Kakashi ordered.

"Byakugan!" Hinata called out as the veins around her eyes popped out.

Hinata looked into each building in the small village, she looked for Sakura or the two Genin that were in the pictures that Kakashi had given them as a guide. After scanning through the village, the veins around her eyes disappeared.

"I-I didn't s-see anyone," Hinata said.

"Time for plan B," Kakashi said.

He took off his backpack and rummaged through it, he took out a red shirt from the backpack.

"Where did you get that?" Shino asked as he was watching Kakashi.

"Before we left for this village, I payed a visit to houses of the two missing Genin and asked for some kind of belongings so Akamaru could take a sniff and guide us," Kakashi replied.

Kakashi gave the red shirt to Kiba, "Please have Akamaru sniff this and see if he can find a scent."

"Sure," Kiba said as he bent down to Akamaru, "Get a good sniff of this and see if you can match the scent."

Akamaru sniffed the red shirt to get the scent and then began sniffing around the village. The team followed the dog through the village. Kakashi allowed them to go off on their own as he stayed behind to wait for Naruto to fully enter Sage Mode.

Naruto opened his eyes, which had changed to green with a horizontal pupil and dark green around his eye, he began to consentrate on chakra signatures in the area to see if he could find Sakura's. Kakashi just watched as he waited for good or bad news. After ten minutes, Naruto allowed his Sage Mode to disappear and he looked at Kakashi. Kakashi could see the defeated look on Naruto's face which meant bad news.

"Either Sakura-chan isn't anywhere around here," Naruto started.

"Or she might be dead," Kakashi finished. "Let's hope that she just isn't here,"

"Kakashi-sensei!" called out Kiba. "Akamaru found a scent!"

"Well it looks like we might have found one of the Genin at least," Kakashi said.

"Let's go then," Naruto said.

Naruto and Kakashi caught up to Kiba, Hinata and Shino and they followed Akamaru into the woods. They walked through the woods for about ten minutes as Akamaru led them out to a shack in the middle of no where. Kakashi could see that it looked abandoned but he wasn't going to take an risks.

"Alright, I'll go in first," Kakashi whispered. "Naruto will be my back up if I need it. If Naruto ends up needing help as well, Kiba and Shino you'll back him up. Hinata, if Kiba and Shino are needed, you get out of here so you can get a message out to Tsunade-sama."

Everyone agreed to the plan and Kakashi walked to the rusted metal shack alone. Naruto hid nearby to wait. Kakashi created a Kage Bunshin and sent it first. The Bunshin kicked the door in and it immediately was attacked, it dispersed and the memory of the Bunshin rushed to the real Kakashi and realized it was the girl, Aki.

"Aki, my name is Hatake Kakashi, Sakura's sensei, we were sent to retrieve you!" Kakashi yelled out.

Aki reluctantly walked out of the shack to find the silver-haired Jounin. She looked at his headband and noticed the leaf on it. Naruto walked out of the bushes and Aki recognized him, it was Sakura's boyfriend. The other three that emerged from the bushes nearby she didn't recognize but they all had Leaf headbands.

"Are you hurt?" Kakashi asked.

"No, just scared," Aki replied.

"Aki, do you know if Sakura-chan is okay?" Naruto asked.

"I- I don't know, Sakura-sensei told us to run away because the man she was fighting was too strong so we did," Aki replied. "Do you know if she's okay and where's Ankoku and Shinji?"

"We don't know if Sakura is okay, that's why we are here. To find you, her and Shinji but Ankoku managed to find his way back to the village," Kakashi answered.

"Aki, do you know which way he went?" Kiba asked.

"No, I thought they were both behind me when we started running but after I couldn't run anymore I realized I was alone," Aki replied. "I wondered around until I found this shack and I hid here hoping Sakura-sensei would find me eventually."

"At least you had found Shelter," said Kakashi.

"What do we do with her while we try and find Shinji?" asked Naruto.

"Shino, do you mind taking Aki back to Konoha?" Kakashi asked.

"No I do not," Shino replied.

"Aki, this is Aburame Shino, he'll be taking you back to Konoha, okay?" Kakashi said.

Aki nodded. Shino, feeling that the Genin might be tired offered the carry the Genin for a while to rest up. After Aki climbed onto Shino's back, he jumped into the trees to head back home.

"Do you have something with Shinji's scent so Akamaru can try to track him down as well?" asked Kiba.

Kakashi took off his backpack again and opened it up to begin digging through it. He took out a purple scarf and handed it over to Kiba.

"Alright Akamaru, time to sniff out one more person," Kiba said bending down to Akamaru to allow him to sniff the scarf.

Akamaru sniffed the scarf for a bit and then began sniffing around to see if he could pick up the scent elsewhere. The team began following Kiba and Akamaru as he sniffed around through the forest. Naruto, who was in the back, was really holding onto the hope that Sakura wasn't dead and that she had managed to escape and was heading back to the village right now.

An old man, who looked to be only five foot five, who was bald on the top of his head but had snow-white hair all the way around the side of his head. He sported a beared that had a mixture of white and gray and he had hazel eyes and he was wearing a white lab coat. Underneath the lab coat was mesh armor and he was wearing green shinobi pants and blue open-toe sandals. Following behind him was a younger man, who looked to be at least six foot tall, who had short but spikey light brown hair and brown eyes. He also was wearing a white lab coat and he was also wearing mesh armor underneath the coat. He two was wearing green shinobi pants and blue open-toe sandals. He was carrying something on his back but it was covered with a white blanket.

The old man noticed the large gates of Konohagakure coming into view which he was glad because they had reached their destination finally.

"Alright Kaiba-san, we've finally reached Konohagakure so make sure you don't give them a reason to think we are a threat," the old man said.

"Yes, Kaizan-sama, I'll make sure they know we're only helping," Kaiba said.

Kaiba then turned to the blanket he was carrying and started talking to it, "You're almost home."

Sand. An endless ocean of sand as far as the eye can see. The harsh desert wind that blew kicked up sand into the air as three ninja race across the desert, all three wearing headbands with an hourglass shape on them. They wore Chunin-level flak jackets from their village. Something in front of them caught the attention of one of the Chunin.

"Hey, hold up," said one of the Chunin.

The Chunin that stopped the team and walked over to whatever he had spotted. As he got closer he realized it was a kid with messy black hair.

"Hey, get over here, there's a kid laying in the sand!" the Chunin yelled.

The other two ran over to see the kid. The female Chunin bent down and checked the child's pulse.

"He's got a pulse, but it's weak," she said.

The other male Chunin of the team turned over the child to see his face and was surprised the kid was wearing a Konoha headband.

"This kid must be a Konoha Genin," the male Chunin that turned the kid over.

"He needs medical attention, let's take him back to the village for treatment and inform Kazekage-sama," the female Chunin said.

The male Chunin that had turned the child over to try and identify him, picked the Genin up onto his back and the three Chunin began racing through the desert once more back to their village.

Next Time: Reunited