AN: All I have to say is, you all are great! If you are reading this, I have already reached 400 views, because of you fine people! And only in a week and a half! DO YOU KNOW HOW HAPPY THAT MAKES ME FEEL?!?!?!

And to Thomas Drovin, you still make me laugh hysterically. Thanks! Yes, I do know about the Shikamaru/Temari relationship. But remember this is when they are 20/23, respectively. It's been four years since Shippuden is currently situated. I will state what happened with them at the first wedding, which should be around chapter … I want to say twenty, but I'm not entirely sure. It might be a little later, but not a lot. Maybe a chapter earlier, but that is when I'll tell the tale of Shikamaru and Temari. No, I am not going to say who is the couple that gets married… all I can say is that it will be unexpected… that is until chapter seventeen or eighteen. Most likely seventeen, considering I'm already writing chapter sixteen, and I've almost got to the second major plot twist. The first one is in here, so please, enjoy the chapter.

And to princessSiyaka, I honestly have no idea why you are reviewing… you helped write the last chapter. So you already knew what was going to happen. But I'm glad you did anyway!

And to the rest of you who would like to know what is going to happen, REVIEW!!! You'd be surprised at how much I'm willing to reveal, like above in my reply to Drovin.

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or its characters etc. You know the drill.

Chapter Nine: A Sister's Devotion

Gaara successfully found his older brother playing videogames in their living room. "Kankuro, I don't have time to explain, but Cordi and I are making a quick trip to Konoha. I'm placing you as acting Kazekage. Now, I have to go pack. Here is a written order to prove that I have given you this duty," Gaara explained, handing Kankuro a loose-leaf sheet of paper with a note saying 'I'm placing Kankuro Subaku as acting Kazekage. Signed, Gaara Subaku, Hondaime Kazekage.'

He turned to run upstairs, until Kankuro stopped him with, "Uh, why?"

"I just told you I don't have time to explain," Gaara growled impatiently.

"Yeah. But what about if the council asks me?" Kankuro asked. "What should I tell them?"

Just then, Cordi ran in saying as she ran by, "I forgot I need to pack. I'm not leaving until I know she is awake and healthy!"

Kankuro pointed at Cordi and asked, "Eh?"

Gaara grimaced and explained the situation with Roxanne and that he was escorting Cordi to Konoha. "Oh my God, is she ok?" Kankuro asked.

Gaara blinked at his sometimes daft brother. "She's in a coma just after having a seizure. I don't think she's fine," Gaara stated in an obvious tone. "Look, I gotta' pack. But don't change too much of Suna before I get back. We shouldn't be gone too long."

He ran upstairs and quickly grabbed a bag and rammed a couple outfits in it. His sand snatched up his hygienic supplies from the bathroom and dropped them in. After finishing his packing and hastily zipping up his bag, he grabbed his sand gourd sitting in the corner and strapped the gourd to his brown vest. Running out of his room and practically flying down the stairs, he greeted an annoyed Cordi.

"Come on!" Cordi said, practically sprinting out the door, Gaara on her heels.

When they reached the gate, Aleera was glaring at them in annoyance. "You guys are late," she growled. Her red scales glistened in the mid-day sunlight.

"I know, sorry," Cordi replied. Aleera offered them a paw up and waited for them to get situated. "Now, we aren't cruising like last time. I want you to go full speed ahead. Got it?" Aleera nodded and jumped into the heavens in a timely manner, eliciting a small squeal from the unsuspecting Kazekage, who tried to pass it off as a sneeze. "Oh, yeah. Hold on," Cordi laughed. She didn't know why, but she felt better when she rode Aleera. It was as if riding her dragon took away all her worries, and her worry of her sister's health was lessened. Not completely, but just enough for her to enjoy the breeze and be more like herself, not like a squirrel when it sees a human.

"Uh-huh," Gaara replied nervously, which was kind of strange. "Um, where exactly should I hold on."

"You can hold on around my waist," Cordi answered. She didn't quite catch his blushing, but she did notice his nervous arms wrapping around her waist, holding her in an awkward embrace. "Are you really that nervous?" she asked him.

"Well, I'm in the air with only wind underneath my feet, so yeah, a little," he replied, holding a little tighter as Aleera made a slight turn to avoid a cloud. Aleera muttered her apologies and saying something about not wanting to get wet. Cordi and Gaara weren't paying attention.

"Haven't you flown before? I've seen you fly on your sand," Cordi replied with an eyebrow raised.

"Uh, well, on my sand, it's more like hovering, so no," he replied. He turned his head around, now getting the full effect of the wind blowing his hair in his face. Sunagakure, his beloved village, was now almost a dot on the horizon, and shrinking. "She seems, to be going really fast. Do you think we'll get there before the end of tomorrow?" Then he seemed to remember something. "You said you guys were just cruising the other time?"

Aleera and Cordi ignored his last question. Aleera laughed at his first question and replied, "We'll most likely get there in an hour or so if I keep going at this speed."

"Oh," he replied. He never thought going to Konoha could be a day trip. "Well, if this is your full speed, how fast was your cruising speed? It's gotta' be faster than what you told us."

"I felt that it would be poor taste to tell you that we had arrived at the border ten or eleven hours before you did," Cordi replied. Gaara's mouth dropped at that. "But it's considerably slower than she's going now," Cordi added.

"So her cruise speed would take us anywhere from three to six hours?" Gaara asked.

"Yay!" Aleera cheered. "He can do simple math! Now, let's try harder stuff. What's the square root of 113?"

Gaara scowled at her and growled, "It's a prime number."

"Oh, he's a smart one," Aleera replied, her gravelly voice dripping with sarcasm. "You'd better keep him, Cordi." Cordi laughed nervously at her dragon, while Gaara continued to glare at both of them.

It was only ten or twenty minutes later that they flew over their first camp area from a week ago. And sooner than they had expected, Konoha was beneath their feet. Aleera landed and helped Gaara and Cordi down, and suddenly her worries were back. They didn't even greet the normal Konohan gate ninjas, for they were in a rush. Cordi sprinted her way over to the hospital of the Hidden Leaf Village, Gaara running behind her trying to keep pace. His gourd wasn't very helpful with his speed, and when she wanted to run fast, she could run fast. She barely let the automatic doors open before she ran in stopping at the front desk.

"Roxanne Turner," Cordi barely breathed.

The nurse on call quickly looked at her clipboard and replied, "Room 118, down the hall to your left."

"Thank you," Cordi replied in the same tone as before, just before she and Gaara tore off down the hall.

"She hasn't woken up yet," the nurse added. But they didn't hear her. They rounded the corner and found Shikamaru, Fred, Ronni, and Lynne sitting outside of a room. Lynne was twirling a lock of red hair around her index finger, her eyes looking off in the distance. Ronni was biting her nails, her eyes looking similar. Fred had her arms crossed, as if she were trying to comfort herself, and her leg was jumping up and down from her twitching foot. Her eyes looked exactly like her friends. Shikamaru leaned against the hospital wall, his arms also crossed, but in a closed off fashion, and eyes holding determination.

Cordi walked inside the hospital room, while Gaara stood outside with everyone else. Her older sister lay in an almost death-like stillness. They had her hooked up to a respiratory machine. She had a wire linked to her chest, taking count of her heart beats per minute. This wasn't the kind of sleeping conditions Cordi was used to seeing in her sister.

Suddenly, she felt tears start to burn her eyes as a ravenous rage built in her stomach. Trying to quiet both her rage and her tears for a little while, she ultimately lost her will to battle them and stormed out into the hallway, tears flowing on her face like rivers. As soon as her stride brought her to Shikamaru, she had him by the collar, twisting it in her iron grip. Her face was twisted into a rabid snarl, showing white teeth and pink gums.

"What did you do to her?" she asked in a feral growl. Shikamaru just gave her a sympathetic stare for an instant, and then changed into his normal indifferent expression. "WELL!?"

"Would you let me go?" Shikamaru asked as if he were entitled to such an order.

"Only after I get some answers," Cordi growled even more menacingly. "What happened? What did you do to her?"

They didn't notice all three of the other girls were looking at him, along with Gaara, who's face held a curious yet impatient countenance. Shikamaru's face fell to a defeated look. "I had just started her on the next level of chakra training, running up trees. She did it a few times and then asked for a break. I told her to try it again a couple more times, because I hadn't heard her breathing. It wasn't till I saw her rummaging through her pack like crazy did I notice how wheezy she had started to sound. When I asked her what she was looking for, she told me it was her inhaler and that she thought she left it at her apartment. So I helped her get back to her apartment, but by the time we got there, she was in full panic mode and barely breathing. She told me she thought she left it in her bathroom and I ran in to look for it. But when I reached her bedroom, I heard something falling to the floor. I ran back to see what had happened only to find her convulsing on the floor due to lack of air. I rushed her here as quickly as I could, but I think I was a bit too late," he explained. His eyes were full of regret and sorrow.

But Cordi's anger refused to let her see that. She had let him go, but her hands were balled into fists at her sides. "I think 'a bit' is a little too kind on your part," Cordi snarled. "Maybe if you had let her take a break earlier this wouldn't have happened, or even asked her if she had brought her inhaler!"

"How was I supposed to know she had a slight breathing disability?" Shikamaru snarled back. Instantly, he regretted it.

Faster than he could notice, Cordi gave him a powerful back-handed slap, making his head spin to the side. And with his lazy attitude, he decided to keep his head facing that way. "My sister is not disabled! And the smart thing to do would have been to ask. Say I had a food allergy, like to shellfish. You wouldn't see me wearing a sign saying so on my shirt."

"No," Shikamaru agreed, turning his head to face his accuser, "but if you are entering a working field like this, where it's very active, we do need to know about everything that might be a risk to your health with the profession. We may not know or have even heard about a medical malady you have because it's from your world not ours, if you've forgotten! And if I had cause to think she needed an inhaler before, I would have asked about it. Next time, I'll remind her!" Shikamaru stood up, making Cordi back away. He bent over her slightly, since he was around Six' one" and she was five' six", and added, "Now, I have a better place to be than at this blame-storming session." With that, he walked away from the group.

Cordi ran back into the room to her sister's bedside, quickly grabbing a chair and sitting next to her. She grasped Rox's hand and rubbed it soothingly with her thumb. Everyone from the hallway walked in and joined her. Fred sat on Rox's other side with Lynne. Ronni stood behind Cordi, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder. Cordi grasped it with her free hand and burst into sobs. Gaara stood in the corner by the door, watching the spectacle.

"I – I – I just can't help feeling so – ," Cordi suddenly was overwhelmed with sobs, making her breath kind of funny. " – helpless," she finally let out. "The last time my sister was in the hospital was when she was five and I was four. My mom told me Roxanne had almost completely bitten her tongue off and was getting stitches to get it sewed back on. I didn't know what she had meant at the time, but I felt I was helping Rox because Mom and I were supposed to pick her up later in the afternoon, and before we left, I had made sure I had grabbed her Care-Bear security blanket along with mine, so she wasn't so scared when she woke up in a strange building." She sobbed again. "But there's nothing I can do to help her out of this."

The other girls comforted her as she broke down into uncontrollable weeping. After several hours, each girl had to leave. It was nearing midnight when Gaara nudged Cordi and said, "Hey, we should go. We can come back in the morning." Cordi gave a weak nod and got up.

But before she left, she kissed her sister on the forehead and said, "Goodnight, I love you." It was obvious she wished her sister would have woken up at that moment and said, "Goodnight. I love you too!" But she knew better than to get her hopes up. She rubbed her sister's head and discovered a small bump, but it didn't look serious.

Kankuro had reported to the Kazekage office as asked by his younger brother. The council wasn't too pleased with the Kazekage's short noticed trip, but what could they do? The desk he sat at was currently covered with paperwork. He had no idea how Gaara handled it. So much paperwork would drive him nuts. Suddenly, he heard a knocking on the office door and it squeaked open. "Gaara-sama?" he heard a girl ask.

Kankuro looked up to see Matsuri standing in the doorway and said, "No, it's just me." He loved seeing Matsuri. It always brightened his day. She smiled back at him. "Was there something you wanted?" he smirked at her.

"Well, just a question on some basic theory," Matsuri replied, walking over to Kankuro and sitting in his lap. "But now that I think about it, I think I get it." She leaned in close to him, and he smiled.

"Good," he replied, closing the gap between them both, engaging her in a passionate kiss. When he broke the kiss, he told her, "I'm not sure how long I'll be able to keep this secret from Gaara and Temari. I've been bursting to tell them about us for a while."

She gave him a seductive glance and replied, "Well, you're gonna have to." She smiled and pulled him into another passionate kiss and straddled his legs.

AN: DUN DUN DUUUUUUUN!!!!!!! Sorry, I had to put in the traditional dorky music for a plot thickening. Don't flame me for my nerdy-ness! For it is my nerdy-ness that brings you this brilliant Fan Fiction. I'm sorry this chapter is shorter than the others… like a lot shorter than the others, but I had to end it there. You should understand why. WARNING!!! The next chapter is going to be a little graphic. There is going to be sexual content… but I wouldn't consider it a lemon… I wouldn't even consider it a lime… but it is going to be sexually graphic, and you probably won't understand what I mean until you read the next chapter. Sorry!

OH!!! Remember to review! I love hearing from you guys!