Chapter 118
"Who said we want the bijuu," the puppet says, waiving the crying child up in the air.
'Give me back my child!' Temari bites her tongue to stop those words from being uttered. She knows that demanding they give back her baby will just be futile. She will just sound too desperate. Deidara is right, she has no weapon left and her left hand is severely injured. She has to be less emotional about this. She has to think, keep her wits about her. It's the only weapon she can depend on now. "You want the bijuu, don't deny it—"
"Deidara," the puppet turns around, still holding the wailing baby wrapped in its metal tail.
"Hai," replies Deidara, following suit.
"Stop!" Temari calls out. Her enemies are walking away with her kid, leaving Gaara and her behind. "I see now, your plan! Gaara—"
—oOo—
"Let go of me!" demands Sasuke as six Naruto clones and Naruto try to hold him immobile.
"Calm down, Sasuke," pleads Sakura, trying to shield the Suna nin while the nin still tries to attack her.
"He could have killed you. My child would have grown up without her mother."
"Sarada will still have you if that happens," placates Naruto, grabbing hold of Sasuke's torso with all his might while two clones hold each of Sasuke's arm, and one each leg.
"Dobe!" Sasuke is able to shake two clones that are holding his right hand. "What good am I as a father then?!"
The two Naruto clones just grab again Sasuke's right arm, hanging on tightly, while Naruto retorts, "Just be there for her, teme!"
"What's going on here?" asks Shikamaru, approaching from behind the Suna medic, from the direction where Gaara's body remains on the ground, unmoving.
Sakura sighs in relief, addressing Kamaru. "Good. You're here."
At the same time, the Suna medic nin shouts, "Kamaru-san! These foreign shinobis are trying to take the Kazekage's body!"
Sasuke grits his teeth in annoyance.
"Eh?" Naruto's clones disappear as the real Naruto's jaw drops in consternation. Naruto shakes his head adamantly at Kamaru. "No, no, no, we're here to help."
Sasuke utters with derision, "So you believe what your fellow Suna shinobi just said."
Shikamaru passes the Suna medic to face the three Konoha nins. "How did you get here this fast?"
"And because of that, you think we are the main culprit who harmed your brother?" Sasuke asks, coldly.
"Tch," Shikamaru utters before he swivels around to approach his youngest brother who remains still, lying on the desert sand. He squats down as he gaze travels over his brother's inert body. "Sakura, Temari said you are training under lady Tsunade. Could you—"
"Yes," Sakura nods her head before she immediately moves, passing the Suna medic on her way to reach Gaara. She then gets down on her knees on the other side of Gaara's body, taking out a small flashlight to check Gaara's eyes.
The Suna medic pivots on his foot, only to witness the pink haired nin poking at the kazekage's body and the kazekage's oldest brother and adviser just lets her. "Kamaru-san?"
"It's alright. These are my friends," Shikamaru answers, "from my wife's village."
Sakura raises her eyes momentarily to glance at Kamaru, a small fleeting smile playing on her lips before she leans her ear down to check for Gaara's breathing.
Meanwhile, Naruto laughs awkwardly. "I told you we were close," he tells the Suna medic.
Sasuke just shows his teeth in a growl towards the Suna medic as he shakes off Naruto's remaining lax hold on his torso. "Let go! The bastard gets to live today."
"How did you get here so fast?" Shikamaru repeats his question.
Naruto, this time, answers, "Sasuke returned to Konoha as soon as he discovered some plot to kidnap a kage's nephew. But you and Temari with your baby already left. Tsunade-bachan then send us."
Shikamaru glances at Sasuke, his gaze conveying a mix of gratitude and...pain. So there was to be a warning but it came much, much too late. Shikamaru grabs Gaara's wrist, his fingers enclosed it in a tight grip. Shikamaru is a Suna shinobi. He doesn't cry.
"Come to think of it...you don't seem that surprised," Sasuke says in a matter of fact tone, "that we are here inthis—this particular area even ahead of you."
Shikamaru answers, without raising his head from gazing at his brother, "When you visited Temari at the hospital when she gave birth, you asked her to look out for Sakura since you are going away again. Your reason then was that there was an intel about explosions that needs to be investigated. It was about this, wasn't it?"
Sasuke nods his head.
Sakura asks, "Kamaru, how did your father die?"
"The medic said his heart stopped beating," replies Shikamaru as he watches Gaara's chest. It doesn't move at all. He stares at it, willing it to move. But of course, it doesn't.
Shikamaru stands up again. He needs to stay calm even when his thoughts are so chaotic. He needs to find something, anything to take off his mind from Gaara...and Temari and Shikadai. And that's when he sees it, it's small and almost faded.
Shikamaru walks towards it. It is a couple of meters away from Gaara. "Who drew this symbol?" He asks as he points to the ground.
The Suna medic and the nin who guide him to this place and even his two team members who accompanied him, all shake their heads sideways.
The two Suna shinobis who are among the first at the scene reply that they didn't notice it before but whoever drew the symbol, it wasn't them. It wasn't any of them.
The symbol is a triangle and inside it is an X. It was drawn on the sand, easily erased. It was too small, easily missed.
Sakura whose head is turned sideways atop Gaara's chest, listening in, raises her head to look at the symbol.
"What does it mean?" Naruto asks.
"Someone wrote it on the sand. It must be important," says Shikamaru. "After a while though, it would have been erased by the shifting wind. Whoever put it there...know we are coming. Or atleast hoped we come in time."
"Do you think it was Temari who left this symbol for us to find?" Naruto asks eagerly, only to answer it on his own, "Yes. She must have."
"Let's not disregard the possibility that it could be from someone else," replies Sasuke. "It could mean nothing. Just a diversion."
Shikamaru stares at the drawing. "The shinobi who took my wife and child uses explosions in his attacks—Sakura, what can a triangle mean in a chemical reaction?"
Sakura's eyes meet Kamaru's for a split second before finally she gets his drift. She then shouts, excitedly. "Who can make ice?"
The Suna nins around her look at each other, shaking their heads.
"We need ice but we are in the middle of the desert with nothing but sun and sand."
Sasuke suddenly snorts. Shaking his head at his wife as he mumbles, "Can't believe you don't know."
Sakura slaps her hand on her forehead before making a face at Sasuke. "Make some ice fast. I don't know how long we have before the poison kills Gaara for real."
"You don't think he's really dead?" Naruto asks. "Me, neither!"
"Tch." Shikamaru utters, "Gaara doesn't look worn out in a battle. So it must be poison. If it's poison, it takes time to really take effect."
"Yes," agrees Sakura before she starts issuing orders to the Suna nins to prepare the supplies from their medic bags. They move efficiently as they prepare a makeshift bed for Gaara and prepare IV lines with bottles and hang the bottles from the foldable rods they brought with them. As they prepare, Sakura asks Kamaru, "How do you know so much about poison?"
"My brother Kankuro. His puppets are laced with poison," Shikamaru answers.
Naruto then asks, "How did you know that Gaara needs ice just by looking at the symbol?"
"Just like Kamaru said chemical reaction," Sakura answers.
Naruto nods his head in agreement only to asks again, "And that means exactly—what?"
"There were no tracks from Gaara's. He must have flown." Sakura looks at Kamaru to confirm this and upon seeing him nod his head, Sakura continues, "His enemy, Deidara, didn't leave any tracts either so he must have flown too—"
"That bastard has Temari and Shikadai," interrupts Shikamaru, "tied on his damn bird."
"Oh." Sakura frowns. "They flew...the poison is just up high in the air. It must be since your medic nin is still alive when we arrived. The air down here is safe. Temari and Shikadai—they must be wearing the same protective covering as Deidara."
"Tch, maybe," replies Shikamaru before transferring his attention to Naruto. "They all flew here. The chemicals used must have evaporated to where Gaara was. For it to evaporate, the poison needs heat. Deidara could detonate his bombs at will. It would have been easy for him control where to vaporize the poison, mixing it with the air above, undetected. So clearly, the triangle means that the reaction mixture was heated. And that the X means the opposite, no heat. Therefore—" Shikamaru gestures at the pink haired nin to continue.
"Ice," Sakura obligingly adds as she watches Sasuke.
Sasuke is busy creating the seals, manipulating the molecules of his water release to change it from its liquid form to its solid form—ice.
"We have to be careful. We can't see nor smell the poison vapor and it's very potent. Wear a mask. Those who doesn't have one, please move back," Sakura orders.
"We have to save some of the poison. The ice may just remove most of the poison but not all. I will need some of the poison to find the antidote to actually heal Gaara," continues Sakura as she holds an ice block over Gaara's chest. With chakra flowing from her hands, she pushes the ice towards Gaara's chest. The ice sizzles, immediately melting. As the water runs to the ground, the liquid form of the poison mixes with it. Sakura hurries to entrap the poison to prevent it from evaporating and becoming a danger to them all.
"I want to know more about this poison. It works just like...know why we wait for several hours before someone who died is opened up to be cleaned for burial? They can actually come back after being pronounced dead. I heard it happened once already."
"That poison is too dangerous then. It needs to be destroyed," Shikamaru utters.
—oOo—
Kankuro arrives with his own team, guided by one of the tracker just like Kamaru's team. The guide also told him, his brother is dead.
Kankuro stands aloft, assessing the situation. He has expected the worst but instead he arrives to find a pink haired medic working fast to save Gaara. While Kamaru, and two other unfamiliar Konoha nins are out of her way as she and the Suna medics do their job. He dons his mask as he approaches Gaara's body, sitting on his heels on Gaara's other side, his relief palpable. "Let me help," he asks the pink haired medic.
Sakura nods her head, deducing that the shinobi with make up tattoos on his face is Kankuro, the brother Kamaru has spoken about that is knowledgeable about poison.
Sakura then proceeds to show to the kazekage's other brother how to catch the poison. They work silently. Sakura pushes the poison out of Gaara's body, perspiration running down her brow even when her hands are cold as Kankuro makes sure that the liquid poison removed from Gaara's body doesn't heat up and turn into vapors and render them all unconscious.
Every now and then the Suna medic who had pronounced Gaara dead check for pulse...and each time he shakes his head sideways.
Shikamaru looks on, waiting patiently. Naruto just stands beside him, letting him know of his presence. Meanwhile, Sasuke has moved away from them, choosing to watch on his own as his wife works. He is glad to see her in this way.
Finally, after the nth tries feeling for a pulse, the Suna medic announces, "There. A pulse. Weak but it's there."
—oOo—
~9 27 20, 10 23 20 P10 23 20 Re-P11 4 20 (3paragraphs ed)~