I don't own Naruto or Dungeon & Dragons.

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Naruto

"I wonder who would want to live out here?" Sakura wonders as they stare up at the buildings that litter the courtyard of the floating bit of land. He does note that those beings have blinded the huge orangish monster using their spears.

"We could stretch our legs..." He muses, he rather not be around when those beings decide to investigate them. Before he could stop it, he yawns and out of the corner of his eye, he finds Sasuke giving him a questioning look.

"You don't seem to be up for any long treks, dobe." The rogue of their team remarks and he glances away from Sasuke. He did have to agree, but he also doesn't want to be alone with those beings hanging around.

"I rather not be alone when those guys come to investigate our ship." He finally says and the other two glance off towards the spot where the upper body of the monster is resting. He's not glancing in that direction as he feels fairly confident that he could imagine what's going on by the dim cheers that hang about in the air.

"I think they're going to be busy for a while. Why don't you just head back in and get some sleep? You really look like you can use it, Naruto." Sakura says firmly and he hears Den echo the weretiger's statement.

Glancing at the two and then finally towards the otter, he grudgingly begins to walk towards the cabin to go to his room to recover his reserves. "Fine, but you guys better wait until I'm wake before investigating that keep!" He says, bending down to pick up a slightly nervous Den from the floor.

Den moves to climb up onto his shoulders, the otter's head resting on his right shoulder while the rear legs and tail hang about his left. Too bad I can't create shadow clones... I could have a few going through what books we have in hopes of getting an idea about what that monster is, what those beings are, and an idea of why this keep is here. He thinks to himself as he scratches Den's sleek neck while Den's whiskers tickles his ear.

)-o-(

Hinata

"Shino! Your bug zapped me again!" Kiba shouts from the other room as Shino slowly reads through their collective scroll collection they have looted over the two years they have been adventuring.

"Kiba... You shouldn't poke Shino's so-to-be familiar. I don't see Shino poking Akamaru." She says to Kiba as she sorts through the junk items they have collected; some of which she plans to sell to some merchant before they leave.

"But it keeps ramming the cage, causing sparks to fly out onto the table!" Kiba says as the paladin comes to stand by the door. She glances towards the door to find that Kiba is hold the cage containing the beetle and sure enough, sparks were coming off of the beetle's wings as the beetle flutters them while ramming the bars.

"It's not like those sparks will cause the table to catch fire." Shino remarks calmly and Kiba growls like the canine he appears to be for a few seconds before stomping off back to the other room that they're renting.

Shaking her head, she returns to her self assigned task of sorting through what they should keep. Some of the stuff could be used for spell components that Shino needs for future spells or old ones. Next I'll go through our rations to see what's fresh and what isn't.

)-o-(

Shikamaru

"We should have just left it where we found it." He says to Ino but his female team-mate just gives him a scratching look while Choji continues to pull the wagon that Ino had loaded up with the bandit's loot after packing it up into chests, crates, and packs. This is so troublesome.

"The least we could have done was hitch up some of those horse instead of having Choji all by himself. It's not much of a reward considering he did save us." He couldn't help but remark, gently reminding Ino that they could still run into trouble and they might need Choji in good shape for fighting these future enemies they have yet to encounter.

"So does that mean you were willing to lure those animals back for that purpose? I thought you said it was too troublesome." Ino states and he scowls, silently acknowledging he hadn't given her request any real thought when the Githzerai had asked him to use his bard magic to call the animals back.

I highly doubt that after picking a team she would have let the others go... He thinks to himself. She has gotten pretty good at finding ways to make money, so I wouldn't put it pass her to want to resell the animals, all of them.

"It's almost evening. I don't think we'll make it to this town before nightfall." Choji says after silence hangs between Ino and himself.

"Sounds fine." He manages to say before Ino could try and convince them to keep going. "Just stop when you find a good enough spot." He adds and he watches as Choji nods his head.

Ino's eyes flash but in the end, instead of rounding on him verbally, the only non-hoof member of their team just crosses her arms and looks pointedly away. He feels a bit satisfied at her reaction since it saves him from getting an earful.

)-o-(

Gaara

The wind moves through his fur as he continues to flap his transformed arms. His body bobs up and down with each up and down stroke of his wings. The same wind whistles in his ears as he flies through the night while the others make camp a few feet northeast of his current location.

He suddenly lunges downwards and with a swift bite, he snaps the rodent's neck. Without a care, he begins to rip into the rodent, going for the organs before abandoning the rest to scavengers. A fox hangs back, clearly wary of him but as he flies away, the fox charges forth to get it before something else comes to take it.

It's fairly nice not having to listen to the rantings of an insane demon. He muses. Kankuro and Temari have been treating me differently as well. They're not as afraid as they once were nor are they as annoying as I use to recall.

He pushes those thoughts aside as he finds another rodent so he can eat said organs. He is force to veer away as a feral black feline lunges forward and kills said rodent. He flies higher into the night air.

He flies around the rocky field and witness different battles occurring below. He did blink in surprise when a pale coated stoat stalks that feral cat. He jerks as the stoat's eyes suddenly glow red and the stoat's mouth opens to reveal longer then average canines just seconds before the stoat lunges forward.

The cat is a second too slow to stop the stoat from sinking its fangs into its body but after a full minute of getting clawed upon by the much larger predator, the vampire stoat slinks away while the cat bolts from the site, leaving the rat it killed behind. He follows the stoat for a few minutes, pondering if he should leave the creature be or engage it.

After giving it some thought, he dive bombs the vampire stoat and fights to knock it out while still in his bat form. Once it was out, he shifts into his hybrid form and picks the little bugger up, putting the blood sucker into his pouch so he can give it to Kankuro as a gift, he's pretty sure his brother would enjoy having something like it as a pet.

-)Be Continued . . .(-