Soul Scrolls
Chapter 2
I scrutinised Shikamaru, watching for any tell-tale signs. Signs that the lovelorn male lead in soppy television dramas would display when around their love interest.
But he acted pretty much the same: nonchalant, bored, totally unflappable. He caught me staring and offered a puzzled look. "Is there something on my face?" Embarrassed, I shook my head and quickly looked away.
But surely he... kissed me for a reason... And what else could it be, but that he likes me?
My thoughts were rudely interrupted by the sound of someone crunching on potato chips and stuffing more into his cavernous mouth as he swallowed.
"Hey! Y'all are early today!" A shower of chips soaked in saliva rained upon us. We ignored the source, being used to it.
Our teacher blew out a cloud of grey smoke that threatened to choke us all. But we paid no heed to the health hazard, for we had been passive smoking for the past six years. "Well, Choji, you're a little late today." He glanced at his watch. "Five minutes to be precise. You know the price."
Choji groaned but was sporting enough to offer every one of us five chips each-- one for each minute. I was rather surprised at the lack of his usually vehement protests, but I soon discovered why when I happened to glance at his swollen backpack.
"Ah, yes. I nearly forgot." Asuma-sensei threw his cigarette butt on the ground and crushed it into the dust with the heel of his sandal. "You'll be on a mission with your squads to protect the influential business from our village, Watanabe-sama, from the occasional bandit, and potential Hidden Cloud ninjas. Oh and you'll be headed for Hidden Sand Village."
I gulped. Hidden Cloud ninjas were reputedly one of the most vicious, and they were promoted according to the number of enemy ninjas killed. They were a tough lot, and were often merciless in their tactics.
"Well, I wish you all the best of luck, and please report to headquarters in two hours. Ja!" With that, Asuma-sensei disappeared in a puff of smoke.
Instinctively, we all looked to Shikamaru for a battle plan.
He rolled his eyes and sighed. "How troublesome."
*****
"The Hidden Leaf and Hidden Sand Villages have signed a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with each other. Hidden Cloud Village was also interested in joining the agreement, but several politicians in Hidden Leaf and Hidden Sand had their doubts about Hidden Cloud Village, especially because of its ruthless means of promoting its ninjas.
"Well-known entrepreneur Watanabe Hiroki led a group of businessmen from Hidden Leaf and Hidden Sand Villages in the protest against Hidden Cloud's joining the FTA, and succeeded in their quest.
"There have unconfirmed reports of Hidden Cloud Village's intentions to break off diplomatic ties with Hidden Sand and Hidden Leaf, and Watanabe-san has claimed to have received death threats purportedly from Hidden Cloud ninjas..." Shikamaru's voice trailed off and his hands trembled visibly-- the newspapers were practically shivering in his hands. He looked up grimly at the rest of us crowded around him. "This is bad. Very, very bad."
One of the genins under Choji's charge whispered fearfully, "So what are we going to do?"
He voiced out the very question haunting us, and for a while, nobody, not even the genius Shikamaru, had an answer.
*****
We marched alongside Watanabe-sama's bullock cart, a sad procession of nine ninjas. Our senses were on the alert, in anticipation of an attack from either bandits or ninjas. But what if the Hidden Cloud ninjas disguised themselves as bandits? Would we then underestimate them and...? I shook my head and tried to concentrate on looking for any suspicious happenings around us.
But still I continued to worry, and prayed hard that the Hidden Cloud ninjas wouldn't outnumber us.
Out of the blue, Arisu, one of the genins under me, cried out in pain, and instinctively flung a kunai in the vague direction of the enemy. Immediately, we armed ourselves in anticipation of a further attack. Meanwhile, Arisu bravely plucked the offensive kunai from her thigh, and blood gushed out of her wound.
Wincing in pain, she silently ripped a section of cloth from her shirt and tied it tightly around her wound. Even though I was her team leader, I did not dare to offer aid because that would create a window of opportunity for the enemy to launch an attack.
The sky clouded over and I glanced over at my teammates. We had never fought Hidden Cloud ninjas before, but our training at the Ninja Academy required us to have some knowledge about ninjas from other villages.
But of all the villages, we knew least about Hidden Cloud Village because it was an inward-looking society that was somewhat distanced from the other villages.
And then a shower of shuriken rained upon us, and all we could do was to dodge and hit them away with our kunais. There was no chance for us to even execute a simple Bunshin no Jutsu.
Inevitably, many of us got grazed by the shuriken, but right then, protecting Watanabe-sama was our priority. Thankfully, the bullock cart was made of sturdy teakwood and hence not a single shuriken was able to penetrate and harm our client.
The cart-driver had covered his animal as well as himself with a thick layer of dried grass, which proved useful in its purpose. I smiled sadly, half-wishing I were that fat, stupid buffalo.
In any case, we were stuck at a stalemate, but it would only be a matter of time before we got weary and injury-bound, and that would be when the enemy would come in and finish us off.
Shikamaru turned around and cocked his head to the left, just slightly, informing us that we would have to be ready for the 'Ino-Shika-Cho' combo. Meanwhile, he would try to lure our attackers out.
He then yelled some gibberish-- another signal of sorts-- at one of his underlings, who then moved his hands rapidly in a long series of complicated seals. Seconds after a surge of his chakra around us, the shurikens stopped coming. I marvelled at the young boy's skill and complimented him for it. Before I could ask him what he did, Shikamaru replied, "It's genjutsu. He made us 'disappear'. I'll bet the Hidden Cloud ninjas will be running out here soon, wondering where we went."
Sure enough, five befuddled Hidden Cloud ninjas emerged from the thick bush and immediately, Shikamaru yelled, "Ino-Shika-Cho combo!"
Choji was the first to emerge from the protective cloak of chakra around us, and I snickered at the memory of us at the chuunin exam in the Forest of Death. Oh boy, he sure has matured.
The Hidden Cloud ninjas were completely unprepared for a giant meatball rolling around at breakneck speed and one of them was knocked out from the impact. However, the rest managed to leap away in time, having witnessed the plight of their teammate. These guys aren't ordinary ninjas... They're chuunins, at the very least... which means... I shuddered, not wanting to think about the amount of blood they had spilt.
Seeing a chance, I summoned as much chakra as I could and performed Shintenshin no Jutsu, and captured one unsuspecting Cloud ninja. Using his body, I buried a kunai in his teammate's heart, and who fell over with a grunt. Banking on the fact that the others were too busy dodging Choji to bother about their other teammates, I calmly walked over, intending to kill my 'host's' unconscious teammate.
And then I felt something icy pierce my back. Oh, damnit... As I hurriedly released the jutsu and returned to my body, I could only hope that my wound was not fatal...
A/n: I apologise for taking so long to update _ but I'll take approximately this long to load each new chapter ^^;; Thanks for reading and I hope you'll enjoy the story. (Oh and I'm glad to note that there are many ShikaIno fans out there like me!! XD)
There may be some discrepancies in the story, especially since I changed the storyboard after writing chapter 1. I hope you'll forgive those errors. Oh, and the story will be approximately 7 chapters long.
Ino and gang are probably chuunins or jounins, I can't really decide, and I'm also rather confused by the Naruto story because chuunins are team leaders (or Academy teachers, like Iruka) and jounins are teachers and well, I guess they're a little young to be teachers. Ah whatever. I'm confusing myself ^^;;
Blah³ ^^;; That was an error on my part, and I apologise for the OOC-ness. But (I'm too lazy to change it) people change, and I thought maybe Sasuke would change after what has happened to him.