Disclaimer: Naruto doesn't belong to me.

A/N: 3rd chapter..and loves to all of you who reviewed. I hope the chapter meets all of your expectations and more, and for any that might have thought that Tenten had become sappy; a very loud NO can be heard from this authoress. :P because Tenten is STILL self-sufficient, or would at least like to be considered that way.

...more edits. same as the other chapters. -02.5.06

It was a terrible night for Tenten, with her trying in vain to have some sort of peaceful sleep. The few precious moments she had gotten had been fitful, not very relaxing at all. She had vaguely remembered checking her bedside clock multiple times after what seemed like eternities to see what time it was now, only to her dismay to find that only a couple of minutes had passed since her last check up. It was increasingly tiring to have to keep craning her head out of bed to see the small portable clock on her bedside table, and had eventually given up and just took it and left it right next to the pillow, where she could stare at it in peace.

In the end, it was the early hours of the morning when Tenten finally fell asleep from pure exhaustion. The next morning was definitely not going to be a pleasant one, she thought to herself before she finally dozed off.

She stood in a field, the sun high above in clear pale blue skies, and the deep pale green grass swaying in the wind by her feet. It was near flat, save for one scraggly looking tree that looked to have gone through years of abuse by humans. And she looked around, clearly perplexed. Her mind did not grasp the fact that this was a dream, and puzzled over the fact of why she had come to this empty little field.

The sounds of clanging metal and tearing flesh met her ears, and she winced in pain for whoever had just died as she heard a loud thud that seemed to resound for miles. The air and space shifted, and suddenly, Tenten could see two warriors who had just fought what had sounded like a fearsome duel.

Her earlier instincts had been correct, and one man was already down, lying in a pool of his own blood. The other warrior stood calmly, watching his fallen opponent in disdain. Tenten stood shocked, and watched as the still standing warrior give no mercy to the dying man on the ground, who was holding on to his last breath with the last of his strength. She felt compassion for that fallen man, wondering how that first one could be so cruel as she witnessed him plunge his katana into the fallen man's throat.

Blood spurted out, covering the remaining warrior, and the air shifted yet again.

The warrior took on different features, though it was clear that they were still undeniably masculine. His hair now hung free, swaying in the light breeze, features transforming into a remarkably familiar face.

It was Neji.

Tenten gulped, stepping closer to see who the dead man had now become. She dreaded what she would see. Her breath caught in her throat.

Her own empty eyes stared blankly up at the pale, pale sky.

She gasped as she snapped up straight, sweat glistening in the morning light. She checked her clock- 8:30a.m. Breathing heavily as she recounted her dream, she groaned. Now she was even dreaming about the man. She breathed a sigh of relief that she had no missions for the day, or else Tsunade-sama would have killed her; Ninjas on duty were supposed to report in at 7:00. But today had been a special case. With the Leaf at tentative war with the sound, regular civilians and villagers had laid off of asking for missions. Tentative because the war could launch full-scale any day now and several fights had broken out already, but there was no official declaration. And so the Leaf sat in wait for Orochimaru's next strike. The few missions they did get were menial, stay-in-the-city jobs, perfect for beginner genin still learning teamwork. News had spread, and foreigners went to the Mist or the Stone instead to fulfill their jobs, not wanting to get caught up in the mess that was the traitorous Sannin.

Tenten got out of bed slowly, stretching her muscles tiredly from the cramps that she had accumulated during the night. She made her way to her bathroom, and gazed at her reflection while she brushed her teeth. She was a terrible mess, hair mangled, redness covering her cheeks and black circles adorning her eyes.

God, she needed some coffee.

She made her way into the kitchen in her pajamas, sleepily rubbing her eyes while brewing a fresh pot. Fifteen minutes and three mugs of coffee later, she felt as though she could at least attempt to start the day. She was back in her room and pulling on her Chinese collared shirt when the doorbell rang.

"Just a minute!" Tenten said to whoever was outside her door, trying to pull on her pants in a hurry.

The doorbell rang again. Once, twice, three times. "JUST A MINUTE!" yelled Tenten, hoping the daft person on the other side would get the hint and shut up.

The doorbell rang again.

"WHAT THE HELL?" Tenten screamed. She hurried to her door, finally finished, hastily undoing the locks and yanking her door open. "WHAT?" she spat.

The genin took one look at her furious state and gulped. " S-s-o-rrry… but Tsunade-sama asked me to come get…" He hesitated for a moment, trying to recall the name he'd been given. "Tenten? She said it was urgent."

Tenten took a deep breath, schooling her features once more. " Yeah, that would be me, tell her I'll be there in five minutes."

"Ok." The genin sped off, eager to get away from the angry jounin and be done with the mission. First it was Hyuga-san; then it was Tenten-san. God, those jounins were strong and helpful and all in their helping the village outside the borders, but they sure were SCARY.

--------

Hyuga Neji was unnerved, to say in the least. He had just witnessed a love confession made by his best sparring partner and fellow team member. Neji hadn't even tried to sleep, knowing he wouldn't have gotten very far anyways. Above all, Hyuga Neji was a man of sense. He knew that a year ago, he would have scoffed at the display he had witnessed, even if it were Tenten. Except now, he wasn't so sure. Something had changed in the past year, and he found himself watching Tenten with more than just a friend's eye.

And it made him nervous.

Which was why Hyuga Neji was out in a forest far from the Hyuga Compund at 8:45 in the morning meditating. He had actually been there since 6:00, and one could only wonder how a normal, sane person could stand not moving an inch for over two hours. But Neji is not a normal person, and one can suppose that if anybody can, it's Neji. His little brooding session would be over soon anyways; he needed to report in for a mission in five minutes. A genin had come to fetch him earlier on, and Neji had no doubt that he had scared the messenger thoroughly.

He still wasn't exactly sure what to make of this confession, and thought it best just to leave it for now. It would be so much easier just to pretend that it never happened. But it was unexplainable. A part of him didn't want to just let it go.

And that confused him more than he cared to admit.

-------

Four people stood assembled in front of the Godaime's desk, waiting in anticipation for what their mission was to be. Among them were Inzuka Kiba, Tenten, Haruno Sakura, and last but not least, Hyuga Neji. It seemed as though Konoha's heat spell was letting up at last, and the cool East breeze was blowing pleasantly throughout Konoha. The little gusts, which wafted in through the open window, were cool and refreshing.

"Your mission," Tsunade-sama began, " Is infiltration. We don't need any bloodshed if we can help it; it's only a mere information-gathering trip. Use force if the situation arises. And before you ask me why you're going on a mission on such short notice," she replied, effectively cutting off Tenten, who was just about to ask that same question. "It's because I only got word of this earlier today. I need somebody to do this before it becomes anything bigger. And besides-" Tsunade looked pointedly at Tenten. " You shouldn't be questioning orders in the first place." Tenten gulped.

"Which village are we going to?" asked Sakura.

"This won't be in a village. There's a group of stone-nin hiding out Sixteen miles away from Konoha. We don't know they're purpose, but word from our spies in the Stone have reported that there's been a meeting of council elders almost every night so far. They're cooking up something big, and I don't like it. But we don't know if this effects Konoha at all, so we need to send someone to check this out." Tsunade's eyes hardened. "They could be a major threat. The stone-nin assembled seems to be incredibly strong, and we don't know if there's any more that we haven't discovered hanging about. You'll most likely see fight on this mission."

Hyuga Neji hned. "Yes, hokage-sama"

"You'll be captain on this mission, Neji. With your byakugan, you're the natural choice."

"Thank you, hokage-sama

Tsunade merely nodded, a silent gesture for them to begin. "Good luck."

The four ninja walked out and agreed to meet at the front gate in an hour so they could pack. Tenten quickly agreed, not meeting Neji's eyes all the while before dashing off. Kiba only watched silently as he also observed Neji's eyes unusually blank, even more so than usually. They were… cold. Empty. And Void. It sent shivers down his spine. 'Those two probably got some issues they need to work out.' He thought. 'Hope it doesn't interfere with the mission. And hope that they get over whatever it is they're angsting over.' He added on as an afterthought, shaking his head.

-----

The four-man team as well as a dog had left Konoha gates a while ago, heading off down the dirt path road, before slipping quietly into the forest at Neji's lead. Tsunade had offered a map with the approximate location of the stone-nins, where they had been when the hokage's sources had found them. With any luck, they would still be there.

The whole journey had been tense. Tenten, to the untrained eye was perfectly calm, though to Neji it was perfectly clear that she was troubled. She continued on determinedly though, eyes focused straight, entirely different from the usual habits of darting her eyes here and there, observing her surroundings. Neji gave no hint that anything was wrong, and continued on as he would normally, though upon extremely close observation, one would find that he was rather rigid, without the incredible fluidness and gracefulness that was nearly always present. Not that it mattered much of course. Kiba, in the end, gave up caring about his two teammates, and instead thought that he might as well be the only team member to have his whole mind fully focused on the mission. It was all he could do. Sakura remained unaware, content in following Tsunade-sama's orders. She was rather oblivious, one would say. If Neji had noticed, he would have scoffed. But he didn't, which said something for the state of his mind.

Tenten was trying her hardest to look at anything other than Neji. She knew that a good shinobi kept a lookout for her surroundings, though she found that when she did look around, she ended up gazing at Neji instead. The man in question, had yet to notice her stares, the small glimpses they were. In the end, she had just given up, instead keeping her gaze pin straight into the masses of trees rising in front of them. She cursed herself for her weakness. Tenten was not weak. And she could go on just as perfectly as she did before. She refused to think of him, and continue on with her vow of last week. Get over Hyuga Neji. It was folly, what she had done yesterday, and now she had to redeem herself. She'd be all right. She hoped that is.

They were about a mile away when they were ambushed. The stone-nin had changed positions since they had been seen last, and had hidden in the bushes, waiting for their arrival. The stone-nin were good, Tenten had to admit, if they were able to hide their chakra so well. It was Neji in the end that sensed them moments before the first kunai wizzed by Sakura's head, signaling to his teammates to prepare for battle. It was too late, and the stone-nins already knew they were there. 'Somebody must have leaked the information that they would come' Tenten thought as she readied her weapons and began to dodge the onslaught of attacks that had started to rain down upon her. 'Or maybe we've been set up' She quickly glanced around, and saw that her teammates had found their own opponents to deal with.

She quickly grabbed her scrolls, undoing them and throwing them up in the air, fluidly leaping up into the center of it.

"Soushouryu!"

Weapons rained own, injuring many an opponent.

-----

Kiba was holding his own, and smirked as he saw Tenten's barrage of weapons hit almost all their targets.

" Lets go Akamaru!"

the dog yipped, and sank down into position, fangs bearing.

"Gatsuuga!" Man and beast immediately became one, beast taking on the features of his master. They spun and rushed towards the opponent, effectively killing two stone-nins.

" Two down, about a hundred left to go." He wasn't really sure how many nin were out there, but however many there were, he would be ready.

----

Neji had long since disposed of his opponents, and was now working on a third, a fourth, and so on. Right now, he was guarding Sakura, who was the medic-nin of the group, and though she wasn't without abilities, her skills were better geared towards medical jutsus. You never know when you would need a medic, and it was better to keep her safe.

His hands were rather full right now; the enemy seemingly had pinpointed him as the strongest of the group, and had decided he would be first priority. He was sweating now, beads running down the side of his face in a thin river. He dodged and punched, the enemy's blood spattering all over his shirt. He grimaced when he sensed a barrage of weapons heading his way, jumping; he twisted in the air to avoid being hit.

He was holding well, every dodge, punch and kick perfectly executed to meet Hyuga Neji's high expectations, though to a trained eye, one could see that he was starting to falter. He had tried earlier to reason with the stone-nin, making it painfully clear that they didn't want to fight them while in the process dodging multiple attacks. It was easy to say, the stone-nin had paid no heed.

A kunai shot from a bush and streaked towards Neji's head. Neji eyes widened. He couldn't stop it; it was too close. He prepared himself for impact before a figure shot in front of him, catching the kunai before hurling it back into the bushes. Blood spurted from the plant, and the stone-nin hiding within it fell out, dead; the kunai lodged in his eye.

"You should be more careful, loser." Tenten flipped and spun, kicking another enemy in the stomach before turning to look at Neji. She hadn't been able to resist with that remark at the end, though she secretly wondered if maybe that was just a ploy to show that absolutely nothing was wrong. It worked surprisingly well.

Neji smirked, and in the blink of an eye reappeared behind Tenten to catch a shuriken that had been aimed for her. " You should be more careful yourself." He whispered in her ear from behind. He flung the weapon back at the holder, and though it did not succeed in killing the stone-nin, Neji rushing up with a kunai several seconds later sure did.

Tenten reddened slightly, embarrassed to be caught off guard. "Stupid." She muttered to herself before turning her attention back to the battle. But not before noticing the tingling sensation that was affecting her ear where Neji's hot breath had come in contact with her skin.

Another five minutes of battle passed, ninjas on both sides now clearly looking worse for the wear. There were only about ten of the enemy left, though it was clear that about four of them were still mere chuunins, while Neji, Kiba, Sakura and Tenten were all either jounin or ANBU members.

Another block, another hit, and another kick, and the fight continued. Luck though, clearly wasn't on Tenten's side, as was evident when a chunnin's kunai streaked towards her heart, while the weapon's master remained oblivious to its existence. It was shameful for a shinobi of her calibre to be so neglectful, but she was a little tied up at the moment with a stone jounin.

Sakura had noticed though, having just finished off another two chuunin. " TENTEN!"

Neji, hearing the cry, quickly finished off his opponent and turned around to catch of sight of the deadly kunai making its way ever closer towards Tenten's body.

And he could do nothing but watch.

End. Cliff?

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