A Few Minutes Later-Yuri's POV

I had stopped tugging Kiba along and we were now strolling the village, hand-in-hand. Not much had changed. Mariah's face on the mountain was now completely complete. A few shops had opened and a few had closed. It was about lunch time when I started to get hungry.

"Kiba, can we stop for lunch?"

"Yeah, sure. Where do you want to go?"

"Where do you think?"

"I'm assuming that means Ichiraku Ramen?"

"Uh huh. Oh! Don't worry, I'll treat."

"Ok. I know, I should be protesting, but I'm glad you're paying."

So we headed over to the ramen shop.

"Why hello, Yuri! Long time no see! Here to eat I hope? My business is has suffered without you. I don't know what I'd do if Naruto and or Mariah left as well." Teuchi said. "How much do you want?"

"I'll take ten." Kiba said.

"What about you, Yuri? Ten? Twenty? Thirty? Forty?"

"Fifty," I said calmly "For starts."

Kiba choked. Teuchi did a double take.

"You sure? That's a lot of ramen."

"I'm sure."

"I'm glad you're back."

He then vanished into the back to make sixty bowls of ramen.

"I'm glad I'm not paying." Kiba said. "Are you sure you can afford this?"

"Yup. I made money while I was gone."

"How?"

"I did some odd jobs and I worked as a mercenary, bounty hunter, assassin, ninja. It actually pays quite well."

"A mercenary, bounty hunter, assassin, ninja? Weird,"

"It was part of my training. I visited other villages and no looked at me like I was a monster. It was great. I could be a normal human being."

"If you liked it that much, then why did you come back?"

"Because, even though the majority of the village hates me, I have friends here. I have you."

He smiled and tugged my hair lightly. Then the ramen came and we dug in. It was awesome beyond awesomeness. Believe it! _ I downed the first 20 bowls in a minute and thirty seconds flat.

"Holy crap! How can you eat that fast?! You never do that with anything else!"

"I don't know. I just can. It's fun."

"You're weird when it comes to ramen."

We finished up, I paid, and then we wandered the village; eventually ending up in our favorite spot, the lake. It hadn't changed at all. We sat down together under our favorite tree. He slipped his arms around me and I rested my head on his shoulder. Then we picked up were we had left off at Mariah's house. We didn't do anything weird. We stayed there the rest of the day making up for lost time. ^_^

The Next Morning-Kiba's POV

There was a knock on the door of my room around six this morning. It was my mom.

"The Sixth Hokage's here to see you. She says it's urgent."

I got dressed and hurried downstairs. Mariah, Itachi, Naoki, Sasuke, Akari were there.

"What's up?"

"Is Yuri here?" Mariah asked

"No, why would she be here? She's staying at your place. I dropped here off there last night, you saw me. Why?"

"Because she's not there now, and her bed wasn't slept in. So we figured she would be here." Mariah said.

"Why would she be here?"

"Because you're here." Naoki said.

"What does my being here have anything to do anything?"

"Well, she might have spent the night with you." Naoki said, matter-of-factly.

I turned scarlet.

"WHAT?!!!" O_O

"Kiba, what are you yelling about this early in the morning? Some people are trying to sleep."

It was Hana. She was rubbing her eyes.

"Oh, Hokage-sama. What brings you here this early in the morning?"

"Yuri is missing in action. We thought she might be here, for obvious reasons. Mariah said calmly.

"OBVIOUS REASONS?!!!" O_o

"Kiba, keep it down. Honestly, it's a logic idea. But she isn't here and they aren't at that stage yet. Which means we still don't know where she is."

"She's probably at the training grounds. I'll go check there." I volunteered

"We'll come too." Mariah said.

"Why?"

"Because we have nothing better to do." Naoki said.

"Whatever."

We headed to the training grounds, but she wasn't there. Hinata, Shino, and Kurenai-sensei were though.

"Hinata, have you seen Yuri this morning?"

"No, why?"

"We can't seem to find her. Shino, Kurenai either of you seen her?"

"No."

"Nope."

I was starting to get worried, as usual.

"Where else could she be?"

"Oh my."

Hinata had turned white.

"Hinata, what's wrong? Are you ill?"

Shino moved over to her.

"No, its just… last night, I heard sounds. I thought that it was just my imagination, but… Oh no!"

She took off running.

"Eh, what do you…? Hey Hinata! Wait for us!"

We all took off after her. We managed to catch up to after a bit.

"Hey Hinata, what are you talking about?"

"Last night I…"

Whump! We had been rounding a corner with Hinata in the lead and she had run into someone. It was Neji. Hinata staggered backwards and Shino caught her.

"I'm sorry, Hinata. I didn't see you. Where are all of you going in such a hurry?"

"Neji, are you ok?"

The rest of Team 9 had arrived.

"Neji-kun, have you seen Yuri this morning?" Hinata asked.

"No, none of us have seen her in two years."

"She's back. She came back two days ago."

"Really?! No, we haven't seen her yet."

"Did you hear strange noises last night at home?"

"Why?"

"Just answer."

He thought about it.

"Now that you mention it, I think I did. At the time I didn't think anything of it. Wait, you don't think Yuri…?"

Hinata nodded. Neji turned to his team.

"Gai-sensei, I'm leaving early."

"Right. It's fine with me. When you find Yuri, bring her by sometime. We haven't seen her in ages. Team, move out!"

'Yes, Gai-sensei! Good luck, Neji."

"Sure." Ten-Ten said reluctantly. I think she wanted to stick with Neji.

"Let's go." Mariah said.

As we ran we talked.

"What's going on? Do we know were Yuri is?"

"I think so."

"Where is she?"

"The Hyuuga Complex."

"What?! Why would she go there?"

"To tell uncle she was back. She must've had a death wish. I don't know why she would do it."

Team 8 looked at me suspiciously.

"What did you say to her?" Shino asked.

"Nothing bad! I…"

"Don't glare at him. Everything's fine between them. They were making out on my porch before I kicked them off of it. I don't know what they did after that." Mariah said.

I blushed.

"We just went for a walk around the village, had copious amounts of ramen, and went to the lake! That's all that happened! It was scary how much ramen she ate."

We finally reached the Hyuuga Complex.

"Neji, Hinata, Shino, Kiba! Get searching!" Mariah ordered.

We nodded. Neji and Hinata activated Byakugan. Shino called on his bugs. I used my nose. I knew her scent like the back of my hand. It had changed a little over the past two years, but still was basically the same. I found her.

"Found her."

"Me too."

"I have as well."

"And I."

"Let's go."

We headed in the correct direction. We entered a large room near her room. It appeared to be empty except for something over in the corner. Akari barked and charged over to it. We hurried after her. About half-way across the room I noticed something shiny a little ways away.

"Hey, it Yuri's headband."

I realized just what the thing in the corner was.

"Yuri!"

She was just lying in there. There was a small pool of by her head. She was covered in bruises. Hinata rolled up Yuri's sleeve, her arm was covered in red dots the size of a pin head.

"It looks like she fought Father."

"In my non-professional opinion, I think Tsunade needs to take a look at her. I do know some medical jutsu, which I will use, but I can't do that much for her." Mariah said.

"Hinata and I can do some medical jutsu as well. Not much though." Kurenai-sensei said.

They got to work. After ten minutes we heard footsteps. A minute later Hiashi entered the room.

"What's going on? Why are you here?"

Neji stood up.

"Why did you do this to Yuri?!"

"Oh, that. I was just greeting her after her journey, more importantly, why are you here? Only two of you, plus the Hokage of course, is allowed here. I don't appreciate trespassers."

"That's not how you greet someone! You could've killed her!"

"You mean I didn't? What a pity. But that still doesn't answer my question, why are you here?"

"We came for Yuri."

"You can't have her. She's staying with me for a while. You have no authority over me in this matter. I am her uncle after all."

"Then why don't you start acting like it! Hand her over at once! That's an order!" Mariah said stepping toward Hiashi.

He wavered. He knew better then to mess with the Hokage.

"Fine, take her and good riddance to the trash."

He stalked out. I gently picked Yuri up and we took her to Lady Tsunade. In the end she wasn't that badly injured. Just a few broken ribs, a bunch of bruising, inside and out, and some internal damage.