Okay, well, first off, I'd like to apologize for this supperrrr late update. I've been pretty busy, but hopefully I'll be back on track after this chapter. Also, since I'm now officially a year older, I decided to celebrate by updating all my fics, which is why this chapter is out now!

Second, thanks to ohud63 for the review. And, most especially, to Katara Tojiro for all the other reviews! Like, woahh thats a lot? As for your comments/questions:

1. I'll be revealing Itachi's involvement with the Akatsuki, and the Akatsuki's goals later on in the story, and as you point out, the reasons for Itachi joining the Akatsuki are different from the actual, and you'll just have to wait a bit to find out why.

2. Your idea of factoring in the Uchihas' kekkei genkai is actually a pretty good idea. I'll see what I'll do with it.

3. Yes, I definitely hinted a Valentine's Day event heh. But it won't happen til wayyy later (like after all the stuff mentioned in 1 is revealed).

4. Yeah, I'm pretty curious about Shikamaru as a waiter, too. Though, honestly, he'd probably make a pretty terrible waiter (Waiter, why hasn't my food arrived yet?). It'll be revealed in the next chapter what he actually does end up doing, though.

All characters belong to Kishimoto-san.

Chapter 26: Temari Is Annoyed (And No One Knows Why)

"Woah, hold up," Temari said, stopping Shikamaru and Shiho in their tracks. Shiho merely looked confused, while Shikamaru looked irritated, though Temari ignored it, since she associated that with his default expression.

"How can you be sure this is accurate?" Temari asked, raising an eyebrow at the duo.

Shikamaru shrugged, looking offended. "I'm always correct."

Temari rolled her eyes. "I know you're smart and all, but I fail to see how a bunch of random clues like this is supposed to help us."

"She's right," The Boy said. Part of Temari wished he hadn't spoken up at all. She had been perfectly fine pretending he didn't exist. "Why would Asuma-sensei even go through all this trouble?"

Shikamaru sighed, as if he was trying to explain how to add numbers. "I know Asuma-sensei. I've known him for a long time, and this is the type of thing he does every single year for his clubs. He likes to mix it up so we don't know what's what."

"And how do you know he's not messing with you now?" Temari demanded. "It's like you say; you've known him for a long time, but he's also known you for just as long, and so, wouldn't he purposely set up something like this just to get at you?"

Shikamaru opened his mouth to protest, and then closed it abruptly. Temari could almost see the gears in his head turning as he thought about her proposition.

"Some genius you are," Temari muttered sarcastically.

"Well, I think you're pretty smart, too, Temari-san."

Temari faked a smile at The Boy behind her, and Shikamaru rolled his eyes.

"Fine," Shikamaru said, after another moment's pause. "I'll refrain from signing up today, but not because you said so."

"I never said that," Temari interrupted.

"You were implying I shouldn't sign up today," Shikamaru pointed out. "But, anyways, you do make a good point. Also, I need to know what Chouji and Ino sign up for, so I can make sure to end up in the same group as them."

"You really do take the easy way out of everything, don't you?" Temari asked.

Shikamaru shrugged, waving his hand lazily about. "Since we're not signing up, we might as well go outside to play."

Temari wasn't sure who exactly he was inviting to go out with him, but all three of them followed him as he went outside with Asuma's shogi board.

He set down the board and prepared the pieces for a new game. Once he finished, Shikamaru sat down on the grass, and then looked up at them.

"You know, only two can play a game at a time," Shikamaru said. He looked at Shiho. "And I already agreed to play with Shiho today."

Temari frowned, taken aback. Shikamaru always played with her. Since when did he play with Shiho…?

"You…did?"

"Yes." Shikamaru's reply was curt and his focus was on the board in front of him.

"And you didn't think to ask me how I would feel about that?" Temari demanded, unsure as to why she was so angry.

Shikamaru didn't seem to know either as he looked at her, frowning. "I wasn't aware I was supposed to ask you."

Temari rolled her eyes. "We always play together, and then, suddenly, you decide to kick me out and play with someone else."

"We don't always play together," Shikamaru corrected. "It's true we played together for the majority of last week, but that was just last week. There's nothing wrong with me switching a partner for a day. I don't recall us signing a contract to be partners for the entire year."

"Fine," Temari grumbled, crossing her arms. Shikamaru sighed, muttering something about troublesome women under his breath. He gestured to the board in front of him.

"Let's get started, Shiho."

Shiho nodded, taking a seat opposite of him. Temari debated what to do. She clearly wasn't invited at the moment, and she hadn't thought to bring a game out (not that she was in any mood to play with The Boy).

"You're more than welcome to watch us play, Temari-san," Shiho interrupted Temari's thoughts politely, though by the hostile look she gave Temari, she didn't really mean her words. Temari decided to play along.

"I'd love to," Temari said, putting on a forced smile as she purposely sat down next to Shikamaru, who didn't appear to notice the tension between the two girls.

The Boy stared between the two of them, before making up his mind. He cleared his throat, shifting awkwardly in his spot.

"I think I'll, uh, head back inside," he said. "I just remembered I was supposed to play with someone today."

No one stopped him as he hurried back inside.

.

"Uh… why are you glaring…?" Kankuro asked.

He had stayed after school today to work on his puppet in the art club. After reaching a satisfying checkpoint, he had decided to end work on the puppet, and had went to look for Temari, who had notified him she would wait for him after school by the shogi club. When he had arrived, his sister had been sitting a little ways apart from a pair of students, one of them Kankuro had recognized as Nara Shikamaru. Temari had immediately gotten up and said a hasty farewell to the two, before following Kankuro.

"I'm not glaring," Temari growled. The two of them were now well out of the shogi club members' hearing ranges.

Kankuro took a step back. "I mean, I'm just saying, you look like you were glaring in their direction the entire time."

"I was not."

"I'm not saying you were," Kankuro said. "I just said, it looked like you were."

Temari sighed, and Kankuro swallowed, unsure what his sister was about to.

"Let's just get back already," Temari said stiffly. "It's late."

"It's only been an hour since school ended," Kankuro said. "So, no, it's not really late."

"Well, it's not like you have any other plans," Temari snapped. "And don't forget, Baki-sensei wants us to continue our lessons."

Kankuro groaned. "I hate lessons. They're torture."

"That's only because Gaara always kicks our asses."

"Yeah, true, but still."

The two siblings fell into comfortable silence, and Kankuro could tell his sister wasn't agitated anymore (though, of course, she would have denied she had been angry in the first place if Kankuro had voiced his thoughts).

"So, got any plans this weekend?" Kankuro asked, saying the first thing that came to his mind. His sister gave him a look.

"Are you really asking me that?"

"No," Kankuro admitted. "I just wanted to talk about something."

"Maybe we should talk about your project," said Temari, and Kankuro took the hint.

"Right." They had reached the hotel, and Kankuro sprinted for the elevator. Temari rolled her eyes and ran after him, causing dirty looks to fly their way, but she ignored them, getting into the elevator just as the door was about to close.

Kankuro was jamming the button with his finger, trying to get the door closed before his sister could arrive, and he didn't seem to notice as Temari raised an eyebrow at him, already in the elevator.

"You're going to break it."

"Ah! Temari!" Kankuro jumped, startled. "Fancy seeing you here!"

"Kankuro. Did you really think you could get away?" Temari asked, unamused by his antics.

Kankuro laughed nervously. "Maybe."

Temari rolled her eyes. "You're ridiculous, you know that?"

"Yeah, you only tell me every few seconds," Kankuro said.

Temari rolled her eyes again. "Hey, but seriously, you should work on your project soon."

"I know." Kankuro sighed. "I don't want to, though."

"You need to do well on it. You know how Father will get if your grade drops even a little."

"I know," Kankuro said again. "It really sucks being his kids sometimes."

Temari nodded in agreement, and the two Sunagakure citizens were silent again. Kankuro was staring at the floor dejectedly, and Temari decided it was time to change the subject.

"Did your club decide anything for the upcoming festival yet?"

Kankuro looked up. "Festival? What festival?"

"Konohagakure has a festival for Halloween every year," a new voice spoke up. The two siblings turned towards the direction of the voice. The elevator door was open, and Gaara was standing in front of them, his arms crossed, but his expression wasn't menacing.

"Welcome back," Gaara added, almost like an afterthought.

Temari and Kankuro nodded uncertainly as they got out of the elevator.

"Were you waiting for us?" Temari asked, noting how still Gaara was.

"Yes. Baki-sensei wants you to start training as soon as you're free."

Temari shrugged. "Fine by me. Homework can wait."

She looked to Kankuro expectantly.

"Yeah, yeah, I'll join you," the middle child said, setting his backpack down.

"There's a training room set up on the twelfth floor," Gaara informed them. "Baki-sensei and I will be waiting there."

The other two nodded, heading into their respective rooms to change.

.

Ten minutes later, the three siblings were stationed in front of Baki, each holding some type of ranged weapon. Gaara held a knife, while Temari and Kankuro had a shuriken and kunai, respectively. They were all dressed in comfortable clothes that clung to their bodies, but not so tight that their movements would be restricted. Kankuro had learned the hard way to never wear loose articles of clothing. He winced, remembering the memory of Gaara pulling on the collar of his shirt and nearly choking him.

"Go ahead, whenever you're ready," Baki said, nodding his head in the direction of the moving targets that had been set up in front of them.

Kankuro was the first to move, expertly throwing his kunai across the room. It landed neatly on a target's face.

Temari rolled her eyes, but she refused to be outdone by her brother. Taking another shuriken from the stack behind her—Kankuro briefly wondered where Baki had gotten the weapons—she flung one after the other, watching smugly as both landed on the same target, one at the heart, and the other on the neck.

"Really? The neck?" Kankuro said incredulously. "Why would you aim for there?"

Temari shrugged, grabbing more shuriken. "If I recall correctly, humans can die from a neck wound just as well as if they were stabbed in the heart."

Kankuro shuddered. "Remind me not to get on your wrong side. Ever."

"It might be too late for that," Gaara remarked quietly as he tested the weight of the knife in his hand.

Kankuro couldn't tell if Gaara was being ironic or not, so he opted not to comment. Instead, he returned to his throwing practice, watching from the corner of his eye as Gaara threw two, three, four knives at a target. The knives clashed against each other, each fighting to dig into the target as they hit the same spot.

"Kankuro, focus!" Baki's voice cut through Kankuro's thoughts, and the boy hurriedly picked up another kunai.

"I am focused!" Kankuro said, releasing his kunai. "See? Very focused."

Baki raised an eyebrow at him, noting where the kunai had landed—right in between the target's legs.

"How mature of you," Temari said sarcastically, also observing where the kunai had landed.

"Think about how painful that is for the other person," Kankuro argued. "Isn't this way more effective than hitting their neck? They won't even die like this. I think."

"And you call me cruel," said Temari, grimacing.

Kankuro shrugged, grinning a little. "Hey, just because we have to train, doesn't mean we can't have a little fun while doing so!"

Temari didn't seem to agree, but Kankuro didn't mind. His sister rarely agreed with him.

"You know, since we're throwing knives and stuff," Kankuro began, "Don't you think it would be fun to invite Naruto and his friends over and test them?"

"What part about that is fun?" Temari asked. She could already feel a headache coming on as she imagined the loud-mouthed freshman running around, throwing dangerous weapons about with no care. All his friends were loud, and Temari wasn't sure she wanted to deal with that. Well, except for Shikamaru. And maybe Chouji and that one kid who always has his hood on and his weird obsession with bugs.

"But, come on, Temari," Kankuro whined, throwing another kunai as Baki shot him a glare. "It'll be so fun to wipe the arrogant look off Uchiha Sasuke's face!"

"I doubt he'll miss," Gaara said suddenly. His voice surprised Kankuro so much that Kankuro accidently threw his kunai towards Baki. Baki neatly deflected it with his knife, giving Kankuro another warning glare.

"You really need to be careful," Temari said. She set down her shuriken. "Let's switch."

Kankuro, who was tired of throwing kunai already, was more than happy to do so.

"But, anyways, as I was saying, it'll be fun!" Kankuro said. "We can see just how talented these Konoha wimps are."

"Isn't that a bit contradictory?" Temari said. "Talented wimps?"

"Wimps can be talented," Kankuro defended. "I mean, think about Nara. He's such a wimp, but he's talented, isn't he? I mean, hello, we just had volleyball with him today."

Kankuro noticed how his sister cringed a little at the reminder of the events from P.E. today. His and Nara Shikamaru's team winning against hers had probably hurt her pride more than she cared to admit.

"Cheer up, sis," Kankuro said, feeling a little bad. "Just invite Nara over, and you can kick his ass then."

Temari smiled thinly at him, and Kankuro figured he should probably shut up. He wasn't sure why Temari was so annoyed by the idea, though. Normally, she liked such a challenge. Maybe she considered Nara Shikamaru to be way beneath her? Perhaps he should just stick with inviting Naruto only. Kankuro was sure that at least Gaara wouldn't mind it.

Humming a little to himself, Kankuro proceeded with the rest of his practice.