Normal POV

Tess awoke early in the morning, her eyes snapping open eagerly as the dim light from the sun illuminated her surroundings. Seeing as they were staked out in a forest an abundance of trees and grass littered the world around her.

Stretching her arms above her head Tess pushed herself off the trunk against her back and stood, eyes scanning the area below. She could easily identify Shikamaru's pineapple shaped ponytail bobbing around the ground, and hopped down, walking up to him.

The genius sensed her and glanced over his shoulder, smirking slightly.

"Ohayo," he greeted, and Tess lazily smiled in return.

"What'cha workin' on?"

"Oh," Shikamaru turned back to the map in front of him. "I've just been looking over our enterance point and tactics."

Tess knelt down beside him and ran a hand through her hair. "Did Zetsu contact us yet?"

The Nara shook his head, eyebrows furrowing. "He hasn't. My guess is that he's relaying information in the order of team numbers."

"So we'll be fourth," Tess said, finishing the thought. She allowed herself to fall back onto the soft grass and glanced up at the sky.

While the mission had officially begun yesterday, today would be the first day they'd truly begin to search for Taylor and Lauren. All of the groups had already positioned themselves where told around the outskirts of the Sound village. This would be where they'd camp out at the end of each day of searching until the two were found.

Tess narrowed her eyes at the clouds overhead. The weather didn't look too favorable but hopefully the overcast skies didn't hold rain. Rain would just make things that much harder for them. Kiba and Akamaru wouldn't be able to use their keen sense of smell and neither Deidara nor Sai would be able to get an aerial view. If it rained two of their key methods would be sent down the drain.

Tucking her knees to her chest Tess brought a fist to her lips and glared at the ground.

"Damn…"

"What?"

Tess glanced up and was surprised to find Kakuzu standing there in front of her, Deidara at his side. Both had a bundle of firewood tucked under their arms.

At seeing her wide eyes Kakuzu shook his head, patting her hair before walking towards a nearby tree to set his wood down.

"If you're surprised to see us than you haven't been properly keeping tags on your surroundings – pay more attention."

Tess glared at the misers back and clicked her teeth angrily, mentally cursing him out. Deidara only shook his head at the two and knelt down in front of the red head.

"Don't mind him, yeah," the blonde said catching her attention and he smiled. Tess could tell that the gesture was clearly forced and that he wasn't even remotely trying to emit the feeling meant from the smile. But she knew not to expect more from him at the moment.

"Why'd you say "damn", yeah?"

Tess shook her head and quirked an eyebrow at him playfully. "No reason. Just over thinking the possibility of things that could go wrong, you know?"

Deidara laughed sourly and glanced to the side, straightening himself out as he stood. "Yeah…I know."

Tess suddenly felt her heart pang. Even though there wasn't a legitimate reason for her to feel like an asshole she sure felt like one after saying something like that. Especially to the guy whose girlfriend was currently MIA.

"Deidara-," Tess hurriedly stood and jogged after him. The blonde paused after setting his firewood on top of Kakuzu's and turned back to her. Deidara understood why she had rushed after him at getting sight of her apologetic face but hushed her before she could say anything.

"I've been thinking about it too, yeah" he said honestly, brushing his bangs to the side of his face. "-All the shit that could possibly go wrong on the mission. But one thing I can count on is the fact that Lauren won't give up."

Tess stared at him with both her eyebrows hidden behind her bangs, but soon laughed slightly, her lips turning upward in a smile.

It was almost cheesy how the Akatsuki had changed since they'd encountered them. Sure, it was rough at first – Lauren getting stabbed in the hand, Taylor nearly getting killed by Tobi, and herself punching Hidan into a wall – but at some point the criminals had started to concern themselves with their wellbeing. At some point – for some weird reason – the Akatsuki had accepted them into their ranks and into their lives. It was surreal that any of this was even happening – that Lauren was dating the blonde in front of her, that Taylor was involved with infamous Itachi Uchiha and that she was crazy enough to love a psycho religious murderer. But when Tess really thought about it, she couldn't even begin to imagine her life any other way. These guys had really influenced them too.

"Hey Deidara," Tess smirked, nudging his shoulder as she scooted next to him. The bomber quizzically raised an eyebrow at her surprising change in attitude.

"Do you think that when this is all done with you'll ask Lauren to—"

"Oi!"

The group of ninja all jumped at the sudden voice but quickly relaxed when the black half of Zetsu morphed out of the ground a couple feet away.

"What the hell?" Naruto exclaimed as he hopped down from a nearby tree, looking Zetsu over with astonishment. "Didn't you used to be half white?"

Tess rolled her eyes at his comment which easily could've been considered racist if said to anyone else – and walked up beside the Uzumaki, crossing her arms.

"Zetsu has the ability to split in half," she explained simply and Naruto slowly nodded in understanding as Kakuzu, Shikamaru and Deidara joined them. "Now," she looked back to Zetsu, eyes serious, "what's up?"

"There's a shit ton of bases littered all over the country," he responded, sounding peeved. "At the moment we have no way of locating which one the blonde and brunette might be in."

"Dammit," Tess cursed, fist tightening as the rest of the group displayed the same distraught faces.

"What about splitting up?" Kakuzu suggested, eyes narrowed as he looked up from the spot he'd been glaring at.

Black Zetsu remained the same. "We can create a limited amount of white clones with our chakra alone, but there's currently four still searching as we speak. That doesn't mean we'll have anymore results though. Some of those fuckers' bases are a meter deep and a meter wide. Not to mention that with the amount of bases we have to scour while still maintaining utter secrecy this whole thing may take fucking weeks."

"Then we'll have to charge in and start searching ourselves," Naruto said determinedly, fist clenching at what he was hearing.

Shikamaru shook his head, eyebrows creasing.

"For all of us to charge in and start searching…that would just create more of a problem."

Tess nodded in agreement even though she didn't like what she was hearing. "It'd be best just to leave it to Zetsu, Kiba, and Deidara and Sai. They all have the skills for this type of thing. If we all just start looking I have no doubt the Sound will start to pick up on us."

Naruto clicked his tongue, crossing his arms angrily.

"The white clones are still looking," Zetsu put in, his one attempt at trying to calm the group down as he started to morph back into the forest floor.

"Thanks," Tess said as his body continued to disappear, and with a slight nod of his head the black clone vanished.

"Well," Shikamaru stretched his hands over his head with one final yawn and then brought them together in front of him, his appearance changing with a cloud of smoke. "Looks like it's time to start."

"Deidara," the blonde nodded and reached into his cloak, pulling out a readied ball of clay. "You keep watch from the skies," Shikamaru commanded. He then looked over to Kakuzu. "You come with me."

Nodding, Kakuzu made a handsign and changed his own appearance to that of a Sound ninja.

"Naruto," Shikamaru turned to the blonde and red head beside him. "You and Tess stay here and watch out for anything."

"Hai," the two chorused and with that Deidara hopped on his bird, soaring up into the sky while Kakuzu and Shikamaru silently headed through the trees towards the sound village.

Tess watched their backs until she could no longer see them. Soon after Naruto nudged her side and nodded his head back towards a large tree behind them.

"I'll go up high, you stay on the ground?"

"Yeah," Tess nodded, and Naruto sent her a smile before hopping up into the branches.

With a small sigh Tess shook off the last of her wandering thoughts before spinning and heading back to the tree Naruto was in, leaning her back onto it.

Day 1 of searching for Lauren and Taylor: begin.

One of the worst things about being held captive was the fact that there was no way of telling what time it was or how many days it had been. This feeling came into factor much more for Lauren and Taylor who were also battling the clock of the poison's circulating through their system.

From what they were told they had up to 15 days to live. How many days had it been already? How many days did they still have left?

For Taylor it felt like nearly a week had already passed. Of course, she knew that it hadn't been a week – it just felt like it. She was cold and hungry, her head was pounding – it was terrible, put simply.

For Lauren on the other hand, time felt like it was only going a tad slower than normal. Her mind was racing with so many thoughts and plans to get out of here that she barely kept tabs on how long she was awake or asleep. Sure, she understood that most of the plans stacked up in her head were impossible thanks to the chakra restrainer on her wrist, but she had nothing else to think about – that was their main priority after all – to get the fuck out of there.

However, another reason that time felt incredibly slow for Taylor was because she was beginning to worry. Her arm was numb – and not in the "holy shit it's cold down here I can't feel my body" kind of way.

Taylor literally could not feel her arm. She couldn't feel the cold on her skin – it didn't even feel as if it was attached to her body. The only thing that assured her it was still there was the fact that she could visually see it.

The blonde clenched her jaw and glanced back over to the pale limb dangling at her side. The muscle in her shoulder contracted as she tried her best to move the unfeeling arm, but the best she managed was to twitch her fingers and bend her wrist.

"Goddammit," she hissed, chest tightening as her hand limply fell back to the stone floor. Taylor wanted to assure herself that this was happening because of the lack of food, water, and proper living conditions they'd been given but every moment it became harder to convince herself so.

Losing control of her arm didn't happen because she wasn't eating or drinking – it happened because there was poison slowly circulating through her system and inching her towards death.

Taylor was about to curse again when she stopped herself, sighing instead. She was already fed up enough with the situation they were in – there was no point on getting herself riled up further.

"Hey, Lauren," Taylor called out, cringing at the sound of her frail voice. "Are you up?"

On the other side of the wall between them Lauren rolled her head forward tiredly, sleep trying to take over. She wearily glanced in the direct from which Taylor's voice was coming and responded, "Yeah – is something wrong?"

The blonde bit her lip, looking down at her arm. "Ah, um… I was just, uh, wondering how you're feeling."

Lauren exhaled a breath, tucking her unchained legs to her chest as she curled forward, wrapping her arms around her knees.

"To be honest?" she said, mouth frowning. "I feel kind of nauseous…"

Taylor blinked in surprise. Every time she had asked before Lauren had replied that she was fine.

"Seriously?" Taylor replied; worry beginning to engulf her once again. "Are you gonna throw up?"

Lauren would've rolled her eyes at the question but she truly didn't know.

"I hope not."

Taylor narrowed her eyes and stared at the ground. "You think the poison has something to do with it?"

The brunette sighed, rubbing her forehead on her knees. "I don't know – I could just be feeling this way because of the lack of substance in my gut."

"But I haven't eaten anything either and I'm fine," Taylor hurriedly responded.

Lauren rolled her eyes. "I'm not as skinny as you, idiot. I actually have to eat."

"Lauren…"

The Uchiha sighed, resting her head on her lap.

"Sorry," she apologized, glancing at the ground. "I guess my jokes aren't really funny at the moment…" Lauren sighed. "Let's just not think over it too much at the moment – I don't really know why I'm feeling like this."

"Alright," Taylor relinquished, resting her head on the rock wall behind her. Lauren was right, it'd be best not to assume anything at the moment. After all—

"What about you?"

Taylor blinked, looking back over to the wall beside her. "What?"

Lauren lifted her head up and glanced to the side. "What about you? How are you feeling?"

Taylor laughed sourly, looking back to her motionless arm. "Oh, you know…"

Lauren narrowed her eyes at the wall between them. "Taylor," she scolded. "What the hell is up?"

The blonde sighed and ran her other, perfectly fine, hand through her disheveled hair.

"I can't feel my arm."

Lauren blinked, both eyebrows raising. "What does tha—"

"It means I can't feel my arm," Taylor interrupted, shoulder muscles twitching as she tried to move the limb yet again. "When I try to move it nothing happens. It doesn't feel the cold and when I touch it all I get is this tingly feeling. The best I've been able to do so far is move my fingers and wrist…"

Lauren listened intently, clicking her tongue angrily once she had finished.

"…is it the arm that the poison got injected into?"

Taylor blinked, her wide eyes wandering back to the paralyzed arm as the realization suddenly hit her.

"Yeah…it is."

"Goddammit," Lauren cursed. This wasn't good. "Just…keep an eye out alright? Let me know if anything happens…"

"Yeah," Taylor nodded, head rocking to the side as she suddenly started to feel depressed. Her jaw clenched as her eyes slid closed, a stinging trapped behind the lids. "I'll let you know…"

All the shinobi on the rescue mission were glad to be a part of it – they all wanted to find Lauren and Taylor. But at the end of the day when they had no further clues or leads on where to find them…that just made things more stressful.

On the third day of the rescue mission Itachi was once again wide-awake to watch the sun rise over the trees.

Since the day Taylor had been captured by Orochimaru he hadn't been getting much sleep. The only time he slept was when he could no longer force himself to be awake.

The Uchiha glanced over at Sasori who was sitting crossed-legged on the grass nearby, adjusting one of his puppets.

While the red head had been dealing with constant insomnia after being reverted into a human it was clear that the bags under his eyes were much darker and heavier than usual. All of the Akatsuki were worried about Lauren and Taylor – and not just the Akatsuki, the Konoha nin too.

Itachi leaned forward, thumb and forefinger pinching the bridge of his nose. The first time Orochimaru had captured the girls he'd been worried, of course. It was his sister and her friends, three girls he had spent his childhood with, that the snake had taken. However, even with Tess safe, Itachi was gravely worried for Lauren and Taylor.

Over the last few months he'd strengthened his relationships with the both of them. Lauren had convinced him of his wrong ways and managed to get him to begin to mend the bond between Sasuke and himself. She'd shown him just how she'd changed for the better over the years, but also that she was willing to do what was needed for the others around her. He couldn't have been prouder of the woman she had become.

Taylor on the other hand had certainly changed since when he had first met her. She had gone from the adorable little blonde girl he'd seen running around his house to a gentle and caring young woman. Slowly Taylor had started to capture his heart and it took him so long to realize it – but he wouldn't trade her for anything. She was the only woman Itachi had only felt so strongly towards.

Itachi clenched his jaw.

He would get her back. He wasn't about to let the love of his life slip away – nor his sister.

"Ano, Itachi-san…"

Surprised, the Uchiha snapped out of his thoughts and looked up at Sakura who was standing in front of him with a small smile.

"Sasori wants us to gather…"

"I see," he said, pushing himself up from where he was sitting. Sakura stepped back, patiently waiting for him to stand, and once he was the two walked over to where Sasori was still sat, Hinata and Yamato already gathered around him.

"Itachi, Sakura," the puppet master stated, his hazel eyes glancing to the pair. "I want you both to go into the village today and see if any information is floating around."

"Hai," they chorused and Sasori continued, eyes turning back down towards his puppet.

"I've contacted Deidara and I'll be watching from the skies with him. Hinata-san, and Yamato-san, you two will stay behind and guard the camp for the day."

"Hai," the two nin responded, and not a moment later did a flapping sound catch their ears.

"Finally," Sasori sighed in annoyance, resealing his puppet back into the scroll as Deidara's bird landed in an open space nearby. The puppet master shoved his hands into his cloak and strode towards his partner.

"I hate to be kept waiting," he said seriously as he jumped up onto the clay creation beside the bomber and without another word the two took off into the sky. They remained silent for a good portion of the day after that – no words needed to be spoken between them. They both had the same thing on their minds.

Hopefully they'd get some clues to Lauren (and Taylor's) whereabouts today… because if not the artists would definitely go mental.

Taylor didn't know how long she had been asleep this time. She was constantly drifting in and out of consciousness, her pounding brain not helping a bit with her exhaustion – the pain continuously waking her up.

In this instance however, her pounding head was not the cause of her sudden awakening.

Taylor's eyes snapped open as she heard Lauren hacking in her cell. No, not coughing or clearing her throat, Lauren was hacking.

Taylor's heart starting beating loudly in her chest as the sounds continued to echo between their cells.

Nearly a minute later the sounds died down but Taylor held her breath, deeply concerned.

"Lauren?" She finally called out hesitantly. "Are you alright?"

Across the wall Lauren, still catching her breath, was staring at her hands. Even in the dimly lit environment she could still see the red color that stained them.

"Taylor…"

"Yeah?"

Lauren rested her head on the cold stone wall behind her, still panting as a pit settled in her stomach.

"Let's just hope we get found soon…"

LOOK HOW QUICK I UPDATED?!

*whispers* i really shouldn't have updated this story because I'm breaking my own rule pertaining to updating one story and then the other but omgguysijustamreallylookingforwardtothelastfewchap tersofthisstory!

And also, I posted my other story (Shinobi High) without a plot in mind really, and since I have the plot for this story planned out I just kind of went ahead and wrote another chapter. Not only that, but besides planning a plot for that story I also really want to get this one done before the school year starts back up in a little over a month.

3 chapters left...hopefully I can get it done in time. (Which might mean putting Shinobi High off a little more - but hopefully not)

Anyway...I was supposed to start reading my summer reading books (because would you look at that the summer is half over) BUT I DON'T WANT TO OH MY GOD.

Did I mention that the 11th grade AP English teacher (who I strongly dislike, mind you) gave us a 447 PAGE PACKET TO GO ALONG WITH IT?

*screams in the distance* fuck that shit~!

But seriously, school has completely ruined reading for me. All I want to do is sit down and read a suspenseful book with romance and mystery and action and NOT have to annotate every page while doing it! Besides that, we don't even read books with made up characters anymore! It's all about life lessons and economy and things that everyone should know! And to be frank, I ALREADY KNOW HALF THAT SHIT BECAUSE OF MY LIFE JESUS.

*cough* Uh, sorry about that. I'm just really not looking forward to reading or the class this upcoming year, alright?

Anyway, I went and bought pizza for dinner during rush hour! And didn't get killed :D Yay!

Oh yeah, I passed my drivers test and now have the ability to drive myself places! Also, I can blast my Japanese music in the car without anyone complaining about it! YES THANK YOU GOD.

I didn't even glance at the picture they took for my license XD I hate being in pictures and hopefully I'll never have a reason to pull it out and show anyone anyway.

Oh, and Deidara and Sasori going "mental"? It seems that the language of a certain Gavin Free is rubbing off on me XD

Well, that's all I have to say.

What will happened to Lauren and Taylor?! Stay tuned for the next chapter to find out!

Please review!