Chapter 79

"Where's Temari?" Shikamaru bursts into the kitchen with his question. He has just came from the bedroom, expecting his wife to be where he left her just over an hour ago, sitting on the chair, resting.

"Out," is Yoshino's clipped answer, her rhythm undisturbed as she continues with her chore; the metallic clank coming from the knife she's holding against the sharpening stone echoing across the room.

"How can you allow her to go?" Shikamaru mutters, glancing at the other blades arranged in increasing size lying on the table, all due to be sharpened, aware that they are to be used on the herds of deer that the Nara clan has in its care.

Yoshino retorts, "She says she's fine."

"She's not," Shikamaru grumbles. "She was violently sick just this morning."

"And whose fault is that?" Yoshino snaps, pausing, then suddenly banging the knife she's sharpening on the table. "You're the husband but you didn't even know she's sensitive to strong scents. Like an idiot you bought her lavender flowers."

"Tch so I didn't know…" But he should have. Now he realizes why Temari couldn't go inside Ino's flower shop yesterday. Now he understands why the potted plant still wrapped in plastic was left outside on the porch when they arrived from their date. He thought it was strategically placed there for Yoshino to see. He's wrong. He didn't even suspect that with Temari pregnant, the strong perfume emitted by the purple flowers will negatively affect her.

So Temari threw away the flowers he gave her. Tch at least she has a perfectly good reason why.

It irks him though that the first gift he has ever given Temari, he has to give away since Yoshino ordered him to. The old nagging woman could have ordered him to plant it somewhere—anywhere on the spacious Nara state. Doing that would have been a drag but after he leaves Konoha, the plant would have grown and he in a way would have left a visible mark.

"You didn't know either," Shikamaru bristles, jamming both his hands into his robes' pockets. With the humid temperature in Konoha, he would have preferred wearing a lighter coloured shirt but he has run out of a clean one. For today, he wears his Suna garments, with its long sleeves and its hem reaching past his knees and black pants. His brother, Gaara, wears a similar reddish one but his is dark green that it's almost black and uncomfortable. Blaming the heat and him perspiring in his outfit for his bad mood, he brashly quips at the older woman, "You were the one who barges in at breakfast with the flowers."

Lifting the knife from the table, Yoshino gazes sharply at the boy, her eyes speaking of her indignation. With the flick of her wrist, the knife blade faces Kamaru for a slow-moving moment before she turns it around and proceeds in sharpening the cutting tool and pointedly ignoring him.

Releasing his breath slowly now that the threat is withdrawn, Shikamaru mumbles to himself, "Troublesome woman."

The grating of metal against the sharpening stone in the kitchen continues; increasing to a crescendo as a wide bladed knife gets its turn.

Shikamaru has to speak louder over the din of knives getting aggressively sharpened. "Do you know where she went?"

"No," the older woman snarls.

"You didn't ask?" Shikamaru questions, his tone accusing. The working woman just glowers back at him, her expression getting more baleful than before... and dangerous. "Nevermind. I'll go look for her," he utters.

—o0o—

At the Konoha training ground, facing Neji who is a fellow jounin and is a member of the affluent Hyuga clan, Temari states at him, "You can train with me." She utters the words as she makes a sweeping gesture at their surroundings. On the wide, spacious clearing everyone is preoccupied. The two people closest to them—Tenten is resting under a far-off tree, still panting, heaving deep breaths after just finishing a bout of sparring with Neji while Lee, who is quite a distance from them also is energetically walking with the use of his hands instead of his feet, training around the periphery.

Neji, with his white eyes, silently scrutinizes Temari. "You're pregnant."

"Why did you think I ask you?" scowls the blonde kunoichi. "Hinata already refused but you won't. With your byakugan, you can trust in your abilities that you know where to strike without hurting my baby."

The byakugan, Neji's eyes, once it's activated his pupils dilate and the veins around his temples swell. It gives him the ability to see not just chakra channels of his opponent but everything. However, Neji has decided. "I still don't think it's a good idea."

"Do I look that frail?" Temari, without warning, abruptly attacks Neji, throwing a punch that the other shinobi easily eludes then another then another.

Neji jumps backward, avoiding Temari's onslaught, retreating and not bothering to deflect her jabs.

"Damn it, Neji!" Temari continues to charge with her fist, her giant fan remains folded and slung over her back. "My arms and legs are not pregnant!"

They are already almost out of the training ground's boundary. With just taijutsu, Temari has pushed Neji nearly out of the training ground's clearing and towards the rows of trees that act as an enclosure.

The shinobi, with his long dark hair swinging in flight, realizes that Temari will just keep on provoking him and endangering herself not unless he gives her what she wants.

Neji finally raises his hands and activates his byakugan, intent not to just fend off Temarii's attack but to fight. Not merely blocking, the shinobi with the side of his hand hits the Kunoichi's arm then her shoulder. She staggers sideways from the unexpected impact.

With a smirk, Temari recovers and immediately jumps backwards, unhooking her giant metallic fan suspended from her back.

Neji lunges forward, throwing his open fist towards Temari who repels most of it with her closed fan that gives her the advantage of farther reach.

The ones Temari is not able to deflect, she is able to evade by retreating backwards until they are back again on the centre of the clearing.

Perspiration drips from Temari's forehead, her breath coming in short spurts. She's good in taijutsu but she's too conscious of her person. She keeps thinking that she can't get hurt.

Being a coward and depending on someone else to protect them is out of the question. She has to trust in herself that she can defend herself and her baby at crunch time. But first she must train to gauge how far she can go. And for that she needs Neji's help. Afterall, he can see no matter how faint the baby's chakra—its sign of life—is and warn her if it starts reacting negatively to the exercise.

Fortified with her resolve, snarling a battle cry, Temari raises her fan, swinging the butt of her weapon towards her opponent.

Neji moves his arms, the palm of his hands swaying gracefully into position, evidently getting ready to reciprocate.

"What's going on?" an unfamiliar voice suddenly hollers.

With the byakugan, , Neji sees, appearing in black and white, the unfamiliar nin behind him—apparently a foreign one, judging by the Suna head protector he wore around his wrist concealed by the long sleeves of his flowing robe.

Even his clothes suggest that the stranger is not from around here. And the irritation clearly written on his unfamiliar face is not a least bit friendly.

Neji turns around to face and coldly address the unknown nin, about to ask what he thinks he's doing in Konoha but then Temari takes that opportunity to attack her opponent's blind spot at the back of his neck.

Neji pivots on his feet in time to fend off several thrown kunais heading his way courtesy of Temari when simultaneously he sees a line swiftly stretching on the ground and suddenly he can't move.

While pebbles and pulverize rocks are rising towards the sky, Neji perceives Temari running towards him or rather towards the foreign nin, finally opening her fan swinging it in an attack when she is immobilized as well by the same jutsu that caught him.

With the byakugan, Neji is able to detect the jutsu otherwise it would have been invisible. It appears as very fine—several times thinner than a thread— black line radiating from the unidentified shinobi and stretching taut to him and then to Temari, holding them both hostages. Squirming within its confines as what the blonde kunoichi is doing is useless.

Then Neji notices that the foreign shinobi moves his foot, about to kick the ground around him once more sending dirt and small pebbles up into the air as the ones before starts falling. Neji detects that at that instant the very fine line of jutsu holding him grows finer. Knowing that he only has a split second to act on his chance before the jutsu is strengthened, Neji needs to do it fast. With a burst of chakra, the jounin wills his hands to move, pushing them forward, going against and finally snapping the thread of jutsu hindering his movements.

Getting free, Neji swivels around quickly and runs zigzags towards the foreign shinobi. His untied, long dark hair flying backwards with the wind as he evades being caught by the black line continuously coming towards him.

Halting to a stop directly in front of the foreign nin, Neji raises his hands in close combat. His pale eyes show his intent while the engorged blood vessels around his sense of sight, their shape protruding beneath the skin, render his face more menacing.

Neji will make sure that the unidentified shinobi will die a painful death.

The enemy has deliberately come here in Konoha and just attacks a pregnant woman… to the Hyuga prodigy's sense of family code that is totally unforgivable.

TBC

—o0o—

~12 10 12; 9 3 13 AF P 9 11 13~

A/N: Hmm, review? …I do appreciate all your comments, guys. It may not seem like it. But really I am.