*****
"I'm here.Mieko." A snake like voice came from a tree above the two fighters. Sasuke looked up, red eyes glared at him from he shadows of the tree. He didn't like this. two against one? The voice was talking to the girl below and the girl responded telepathically, 'Thank you sister.'
"Men." The raspy voice spat with disgust, "I hope this opponent will be more of a challenge than all those pathetic creatures."
"You see, she is my mouth, I am her ears.both of our one weaknesses. our only weaknesses.are the other's strong point." The one, now identified as Mieko, smirked, bringing her hands together.
"Humph. You guys are pathetic. you already need back-up? Fine. I'll just defeat you both on my own." Sasuke sneered. His eyes narrowed, not phased by Mieko's previous warning.
"Such a naive boy." The snake-like shinobi sarcastically shook her head; her fangs still had blood dropping from its points. She walked into clear view so that Sasuke could see the similarities between his curse from Orochimaru, and her's, running up and down her arms, reaching all the way to her neck. She brought her hand up and took a kunai in her opposing hand. She stiffly thrusted the blade into her palm. The curse started to glow red, equal color to the blood that was pouring from her hand. The blood from her hand that almost reached the ground, started to float and retract so that it began to take form and harden, into somewhat of a reed.
"Ahh.the more lives I take and human blood I drink, the stronger the reed's jutsu becomes." The glowing curses rose up past her chin flowing to her mouth, which she put the reed up to. She had an eerie calm to her that was soothing yet frightening all at once.
'Okay. this will be over now. pathetic Uchiha boy.' Mieko's sapphire eyes followed Sasuke's movements with such precision it was as though she was a computer tracing data. He didn't move, he was afraid to and even when he tried to move, his body stayed in the same place. He was frozen, a melodious hum rang through his ears, but he could not feel it moving through the air. He suddenly felt a strong compression against his body. The sound waves came from the reed, blasting strongly against him. The other sister started to dash around Sasuke, flicking out a hair thread while doing so. It flickered as it instantly wrapped itself around Sasuke. He struggled gritting his teeth. Why were these women so strong? Maybe he did need another person to fight with, but that wasn't an option for him. He had to fight for his own destiny. The strand began to tighten; he felt his skin tearing from the seemingly invisible thread.
"Yum." The snake-like one licked her lips softly, she then noticed something odd. Sasuke was grinning. why? Sasuke closed his eyes, and then the strings tightened and his eyes shot open, he gulped and his face turned pale. no it wasn't Sasuke anymore. It was Mieko! She was spitting out blood, and controlling the thread now was another Mieko, who slowly faded and turned into Sasuke.
"It looks like you are the ones that are too naïve." He snickered.

*********

Along the barrier of the fighting zone, sat someone waiting, waiting for answers that would never would be answered. The path that would never be cleared, and she knew she had to take it eventually. Sakura knew where Sasuke was, she had walked past the fight a couple of times, pacing slowly. When she walked out of the administrative building she had bumped into Ino again. She was irritated more so than usual by Ino. She wanted the friendship with Ino, but at this point in time she didn't want anybody. Sakura's last wish was to be spotted exiting Tsunade-sama's office, and being unlucky girl she was, Ino had spotted her. She couldn't remember exactly, but she came up with some dumb excuse to tell Ino what had happened, and made sure not to mention the assassin she had met earlier. She wanted to join the fight, but she couldn't tell which side to join. She liked being part of the leaf clan, having a claimed identity, and she owed it for them protecting her, it was her turn to protect them; but that would mean working with Sasuke, whom she knew was probably superior to her and find her useless. She wanted to fight him so badly, and maybe with their help, being strong female ninja, she could succeed. On the other hand, that would be going against her only family, everything she knew, against the Konohagure village. Sitting and waiting, she knew she would find herself being considered a coward, but she was too confused. She wanted to be strong, but can't you love and be strong? She and Ino, still chasing after Sasuke. why did he control their lives so much? But. he didn't control Ino as much as he did Sakura. Ino had Chouji and Shikamaru. She was somewhat jealous of the bond that team had. Their situations were light and full of friendly debates, even if they did call themselves the weakest team. Although it was true that at times with them everything was happy and friendly arguing occurred on team 7, but being on a team with Sasuke always seemed to bring her such misery. They got into too many troubling situations, she had friends but she still felt like she was outside of everyone else, just looking from a jail cell out into the free world. She was a prisoner. Trapped in the misery of others, and the eternal loneliness of being separated from everyone. Sitting behind a tree trunk, she knew that it was not before long that she'd have to choose.what was she going to do?

********* "Where were you?" Ino grumbled at Shikamaru, practically attacking him. The ground was marred with blood, every building for that matter. She shivered slightly as she almost stepped upon an unclaimed body.
"What?" He yawned irritably, he was unnerved by having to meet Ino in the streets, where all the dead, unclaimed bodies now laid, everyone else was in hiding.
"You may be a Chuuin now, but you'll never change!" Ino's anger built up, as though steam would rise through her ears.
"Relax? What's the big rush?" Shikamaru rolled his eyes, remembering why he hated girls so much.
"And you too, Chouji! Put away the fuckin' food!" Ino seemed touchy, and she seemed to be more of a trash talker than ever. It seemed as though she was angry at the world. She would glare at everyone, even if Sasuke were there. Ino was pacing like a maniac, her steps were jolted.
"So what the hell are you going to tell us?" Shikamaru nagged, leaning up against a wall and stuffing his hands in his pockets, he then twitched as he felt the blood against his arms. It was still fresh.
"Why don't you look around smartass! Can't you see that there was a massacre! We have to find out what's going on! I mean. Sasuke-kun could be in danger!" Ino added.
"Yuh. sho?" Chouji asked, ignoring Ino's request, which was really more of a demand, for him to stop eating.
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN, YEAH SO?!?!? AND GET THAT FOOD AWAY!!!" Ino angrily glowered at them, she knocked the bag away from Chouji.
"Wha dut fiz fect uhs? Who karz bou Shzhuke?" Chouji chewed in large bites.
"Speak properly Chouji!" Ino growled at him. Chouji took one big gulp of food so that it fell through the back of his throat and simply repeated his question,
"Why does this effect us?"
"SASUKE-KUN IS A MUCH MORE IMPORTANT CIVILLIAN TO OUR VILLAGE THAT YOU!!!! ALL YOU EVER DO IS EAT!!! NO WONDER WHY WE WERE THE WEAKEST TEAM!!!"
"I think we should worry more about Tsunade. I haven't seen her anywhere lately." Shikamaru simply stated, chills running up his spine, he wanted to get out of here as fast as possible, but no one would allow a group of gathering shinobi into their houses. Anyway, Ino would probably stop him before he even tried to get away.
"I heard from some people that when Sakura went to Tsunade-sama's office she came back with blood all over her and a strange look on her face." Ino added as a slight gossip tid-bit.
"God. that was it?" Shikamaru grumbled with tired eyes, Shikamaru wasn't going to come out of his house in the first place, anyway. he didn't want to show that he really cared. He enjoyed pissing off Ino, especially when her ego got ahead of her.
"What do you mean by, "that was it" you ASS!" Ino grumbled feeling ashamed that her information served no purpose. Shikamaru looked around and lowered his eyes, "It was probably them... from that time.'" Shikamaru sighed under his breath, trying to get away from the bodies. "Who!?" Ino gasped, with a curiosity and anger swelling up insider of her, "Tell me! Come on!" She groaned, almost pouncing on Shikamaru, "Com'on! It's no fun to hide secrets!!!" She puppy-dog pouted as Shikamaru picked up his pace and then noticed that Chouji had left, probably to get himself into hiding or get a new bag of chips. Shikamaru rolled his eyes, "Ino. You'll just get in the way." He started to run and as Ino tried to desperately follow; instead she came across a shadowy figure, and it was not Shikamaru.

******* Chapter 6 End To be continued..