Yamanaka Ino; 7 Years Later

Age 19

-I Hurt Him-

I admit, our escape hadn't been the most graceful or efficient escape we had ever done, but as we ran away from the building we had previously been held in, I couldn't help but smile. A certain satisfaction came over me.

In front of me, I could see Sasuke approaching a wall and next to me, Neji slowed down. Sasuke stopped in front of the wall with his hands cupped and without even changing my speed at all, I leapt on his hands and sprung myself over the wall. I was now officially in the clear.

I stood next to the wall and waited for the other two to jump over. They were taking longer than they should be considering we were escaping and all they should be doing is jumping over the wall.

Just as I was beginning to get worried and think they had been recaptured, I saw Neji perched on top of the wall. He jumped down and landed gracefully next to me.

Sasuke easily leapt up and landed on the wall. I saw him sit there for a minute. Maybe he was scoping stuff out or thinking of a plan.

Then, without warning he let himself fall from the wall, landing with a bit less grace than Neji.

"We should probably give ourselves a little bit of distance from this place as much as possible before we rest for the night." Sasuke said. He had been appointed the leader of our mission a little while back so he got to call the shots. I knew this made Neji angry because I could see him glare whenever Sasuke gave him an order.

But then again, Neji's ALWAYS glaring.

"I say we just travel all night until we get back to Konoha." Neji said. "They are no doubt going to come looking for us."

"Exactly." Said Sasuke with a bit of a glare. "That's why we should give ourselves a little distance."

"I'd rather not run all night either." I said. Neji glared at me too.

"It's settled then." Sasuke said, looking at Neji. The three of us starting running a bit more. I was already a bit tired from having run so much already tonight. Not only that but none of us had really gotten much sleep while we were captured but I wanted to keep that as far from my memory as possible. The only part I choose to remember is the comforting sight of Sasuke's face when he came to rescue me.

The mission had been a success despite the three of our captures. We basically just had to retrieve some information for our village, which we were able to do. We had another teammate with us at the time and because he left early to deliver the information, he wasn't captured.

Every time I got to work with Sasuke, I was happy. We made an excellent team and were mostly successful on most of our missions. However, for some reason, the Hokage found it necessary to stick Neji in on this mission. He really didn't belong here though. This was definitely a jounin mission and Neji, while very skilled, is only a chuunin. It could have been a dangerous decision but it ended up working out in the end.

After a little bit of running, Sasuke slowed down and eventually stopped.

"This is a good spot." He said, gesturing to the clearing we were in. I nodded and agreed. We both simultaneously looked at Neji. I could tell he wanted to disagree but it really wasn't his place.

I ran over to Sasuke and jumped into his arms, giving him a big hug.

"I thought we weren't going to get out of there!" I told him as he caught me. I settled down into a much calmer hug and lowered my head onto his shoulder. "Thank you for rescuing me."

"I wasn't going to leave you behind…" he said, wrapping his arms around me and gently putting one of his hands on the back of my neck. We had only been captured for a couple of weeks but I had missed everything about him. His face, his voice, his touch and his kiss.

I went in to give him our first kiss in a long but then I was interrupted by something.

Neji stood off to the side clearing his throat loudly.

"I hate to ruin the…moment…" he said with an edge to his voice. "But we should set up camp together."

Sasuke dropped his arms and then grabbed my shoulders, pushing me away slightly.

"We'll do it quickly." Said Sasuke as he planted a small kiss on my lips and then turned to walk over to Neji.

That wasn't enough. Thanks for completely ruining the mood, Neji.

Setting up camp wasn't something that was necessarily HARD but it was annoying. It consisted of bending small trees over and tying them down. Then, putting some coverings on top.

According to Sasuke, it was my job to collect the leaves while the men did all the heavy duty things. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Sasuke struggling with a tree that was maybe a little too thick for him to bend. I dropped my leaves in a pile and walked over to him.

"Need a little help?" I asked, my hands on my hips.

"I…can handle it…" Sasuke said, out of breath, as he pulled the tree down.

"Doesn't look like you can." I said, stepping in front of him and putting my hands over his and pulling the tree down. With one, it was impossible but with two, it proved to be a fairly easy task.

I twisted my neck around and kissed him just as the tree was pulled down. Usually, at this point, someone came over and tied it down. However, Neji was off trying to pull an even bigger tree down by himself and no doubt wanted to tie it down by himself too.

"Who's going to tie it down?" I asked him, noticing our predicament.

"See, I was gong to have YOU do it." Sasuke told me.

I laughed a little at him.

"I don't even have a rope with me right now." I told him. We were going to have to let go of the tree anyway to tie it down. "Well, no use holding it anymore, right Sasuke?"

I let go of the hold I had on it and the tree snapped back slightly. That's when I realized I might have let it go a bit too early. Sasuke had been holding onto it and go kind of a whiplash effect before he let go as well.

He grabbed his shoulder, letting out a small yell and recoiled in pain, kneeling to the ground.

"Sasuke!" I yelled, falling down beside him. "I'm SO sorry!"

"No…" he said, tears of pain in his eyes. "It's fine. It doesn't hurt that much."

Neji came over.

"You must not have tied it tight enough." He said as if he knew what happened.

"We didn't tie it at all." I told him as I pulled Sasuke in close to me. I felt so horrible for harming him. Neji glared down at Sasuke.

"Do you think the bone might have snapped?" he asked him, not even bending down.

I broke Sasuke's arm! Now I'll never be able to live with myself anymore!

"It's broken!" I asked. "No it's not!"

"Yeah…" he said weakly, the color fading from his face. "It's fine…"

"Sit down Sasuke!" I told him, pulling gently on his shirt, not wanting to injure him more.

"Listen to your girlfriend, Sasuke." Said Neji, turning away. "I'm not a medic but even I can tell by looking at you that you broke your collarbone."

Oh no! And it's his right hand too! Sasuke's right-handed! What will he do!

"I probably just pulled a muscle." Sasuke said, breaking free of my weak grasp and standing up. He walked over to a tree and leaned up against it, wincing as he moved.

I followed after him. We didn't have any first-aid supplies or medics so we'd have to make due. We couldn't just leave Sasuke's arm alone this whole time.

"I think we should get your shirt off your arm." I told him, helping him gently to remove his shirt.

Removing it from his left arm was easy, he pretty much did it by himself though I could tell that the pain made him weaker. I slipped it over his head and then proceeded to, as carefully as I could, take it off his other arm.

I didn't see his face grimace at all while I did it so I must have done a good job.

Should he be wearing a cast?

"Should we…" I started, not sure how to word it. "Wrap your shirt around your arm? Give you a sling?"

He took his shirt from me with his uninjured arm and put it by his side. He was obviously trying to be a man or something.

"Sasuke, stop being a baby." I told him, giving him a light hit on the side.

Of course, fate has it that I hit the wrong side of him. Watching his pained expression made me cringe.

"I'm sorry!" I apologized. His face was now completely pale. I looked around as if something in my immediate surroundings would help. I saw Neji over there standing there staring at us. Not helping at all.

Why was he even here?

Oh yeah…because he was captured with the rest of us.

"You could help you know." I told him. I felt kind of helpless and the fact that it was MY fault he was like this didn't help.

Neji looked at me for a minute, not moving. Then he stood up abruptly and made his way over to the two of us.

"Sasuke needs to be put out of his pain." He said, sounding unenthused.

"I'm fine, just give me a minute to shake it off." Sasuke insisted.

Neji then gave Sasuke a quick chop on the back of his neck with his hand, knocking him out like a light.

I must have been slightly flustered because I found myself at a loss for words.

"There." Neji said. "We can carry him better this way."

"…Carry him?" I asked.

"Yes." Neji said, looking around. "We'll have to carry him back to Konoha tonight. He needs medical attention."

I groaned slightly to myself. Now, not only would I not get to rest, but I had to travel all through the night carrying Sasuke. All the while, my only company being Neji.

It's a good thing I love Sasuke as much as I do. Otherwise, I would have considered leaving him here.