Forgotten

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from Naruto (Shippuden). This is a story inspired by the original made up for entertainment purposes only. - Krystal

Chapter 33: Just travelling

The next few days were rather uneventful. Before she knew it, she reached the Land of Wind. In a sense, she reached allied territory as this is where Sunagakure was located. Since the Orochimaru incident, Konoha and Suna have been close allies. Whenever there was a need for help, they would cooperate and come to each others aid. Danzo, however, couldn't trust them. He often reminded them that, in time of peace, they should still remain on guard, because it was also the perfect time to start a war. Yuki was not as pessimistic. She wasn't optimistic either. She could understand that logic, but she also wanted to believe in others. It was what the Third have always reminded her. Doubts lead people to fight while trust lead people to cooperate.

The Land of Wind environment was very different from the Land of River or of Fire. It was much drier. It was suffocating. Although it wasn't her first time in the Land of Wind, it's geography was constantly changing because of the blowing wind and movable sand dunes. Her white hair stood out even more now in the dull desert colors. Slowly, the wind grew stronger and Yuki was, then, forced to take refuge in a small nearby town. It was almost like a ghost town. She walked into one of the motels there and asked for a room.

"Are you sure you want to stay here, little girl?" Asked the old owner. He had to be at least 75 years of age. His eyes were constantly tearing from the dryness and had lost the sparkle a young human would have.

"It's really windy out there. I don't have much of a choice." Yuki replied. "It's not good for businesses to turn away guests, you know?"

"It's not safe here." He said as he grabbed the keys for her room. "Especially for a young girl like you."

"I'll take the risk for not getting blown away."

Her room was not big, but was clean. That's really all she could ask for. Her windows were closed to prevent the flying sand from pouring into the room. She sat down at the desk and started writing her report to Danzo about Hidan and Kakuzu. She decided to omit Itachi's appearance. She also wrote another letter to Tsunade which contained more details and asked her for updates about the village. Although she couldn't speak of Danzo, she still had the ability to remind the Hokage of the dangers in the other Lands. In this case, it was related to a group of highly skilled shinobis who showed hostility towards Naruto, a shinobi from Konohagakure. She summoned two little rabbits who were both only asked for whenever she needed messages to be delivered. Carefully instructing them, she then sent them off on their way.

Night time in the Land of Wind was very chilly. The suffocating hot weather drastically changed as the sun set. The wind was cold, the land was cold. The living conditions were not easy in this land. Yuki headed to bed early that night and wrapped herself in the blankets to keep her warm. As she closed her eyes, she heard footsteps outside her room. Suddenly, her door was knocked down and the shook the whole room.

"Please! I beg you to stop..." she heard the old owner pleading whoever had just broken into her room.

"Raid this room!" she heard a thick voice order.

Yuki rolled her eyes in her bed, before rolling out of bed, yawning.

"With whose permission?" she asked still rubbing her eyes.

As she finally managed to open her eyes, ten men were standing in front of her. One of them, most likely the leader and the one who ordered her room to be raided, was grabbing the owner by his collar. She pointed at him:

"You really should respect your elder."

He laughed and said to her:

"I could spare your life if you give us all your belongings, kiddo."

"I could spare your life if you let him go."

He shoved the old man to the side and glared at her:

"Is that a challenge?"

"Is it accepted?" Yuki asked back, now annoyed that she was disturbed from her sleep by a bunch of hooligans.

He gave sign for his men to charge ahead at Yuki. All slow and rather clumsy, it took no time for Yuki to send them all flying out either the door or the window. Their leader spat on the floor and rolled up his sleeves all the way to his shoulders. She then noticed that he had a tattoo on his right shoulder. If she wasn't mistaken, it was the emblem for the ANBU from Sunagakure.

"What's an ANBU doing raiding poor people's places instead of protecting them?" she then asked him.

He glanced at his tattoo, then grinned evilly:

"Protecting them? Sunagakure doesn't give a s*it about them. Why should I? I don't want to become one of those poor people."

He then ran towards her with great speed and strength, making her back up and exiting the motel through a hole that was made by one of his men as she had kicked him out. They were now in the streets. Yuki landed gracefully and lightly onto the ground, while he landed heavily, making a lot of noise and waking up the few people who were in the village.

"So you deserted Suna?" Yuki asked brushing off the dust on her clothes gently, still not finding him a worth opponent.

A funny thing about her was that she found no pleasure in fighting people who didn't deserve her respect. People who used brute force to take advantage of others were the worst scums to her. It wasn't that she was pretentious. She just felt like people needed to be deserving of her time to be worth the fight. The outcome was never something that she was interested in. It was the fight itself. To her, the man in front of her was nothing but a brute, a criminal and worthless piece of human.

"You are probably not from around here. Let me tell you, a lot of people have left Suna. That place has no future. They rely on another village for their survival. They rely on a monster to survive. They actually protect that filthy monster. I'm not doing that job. Do you know how many peers I've lost? That monster..."

Before he could finish, he pushed away by a gush of wind. He slammed into an electricity pole and passed out. The wind came from behind Yuki. It was precisely aimed, avoided her and yet caused plenty of damage. Yuki looked around and saw the kunoichi that fought against Shikamaru in the last round of the Chunnin exam, Temari. Her fan was spread out and, from behind it, her two brothers walked out. She closed her fan. All three were now walking towards Yuki.

"I remember you." said the one named Kankuro. "Konohagakure, right?"

"Her name is Yuki." said Gaara.

"You actually remember." said Yuki with a smile. "I'm guessing you are here to take that guy back."

"He is only one of the many." Temari said as Kankuro went to grab the man and lock him up in one of his puppets. "Since that incident, a lot of our ANBUs have been on the loose, creating chaos in small towns like these. We've actually asked Konoha to lend us a hand. When I saw you, I assumed that's what you were here fore. Judging from your tone, you weren't made aware of it."

"I'm actually on a break right now." Yuki lied. "Just travelling the world. I needed that since the Third passed away. I didn't think I would run into such trouble."

"Travelling?" asked Gaara, obviously doubting that it was the truth. "I'm surprised they allowed an ANBU to simply travel when the village is short on shinobis."

Kankuro then brought a kunai close to her throat:

"What are you really here for?"

Yuki didn't flinch at the cold blade resting on neck. Her expression remained the same. She looked into Gaara's eyes as she repeated:

"I'm just travelling the world."

"Gaara, what should we do with her?"

He didn't speak for a bit. Gaara's eyes were much gentler now than what she remembered. He didn't have a murderous aura around him like he used to. He seemed to have made peace with himself and the One-Tail that lived within him. His siblings also spoke to him without fear. She heard that they had assisted the Genins during the Sasuke's recovery mission. At first she didn't believe it, but now that she met them once again, it wasn't a hard to thing to imagine.

"Let her go."

"She's a spy. You know it!" Kankuro said. "I don't care if she's an ally, the fact that she's not telling us why she's truly here for..."

Yuki smiled at Gaara. She then flashed herself away from Kankuro's grip and into her motel room where she grabbed her belongings. She sat on the balcony and looked down at Kankuro who was still in shock at what had just happened.

"I'll come with you willingly wherever. How does that sound? You guys could be my tour guides!" She said cheerfully as she swung her bag around onto her shoulders.

She jumped down from there at Kankuro and Temari's unhappy expressions. Gaara didn't seem to bothered by that statement. He always found her intriguing. It was in manner, in her fearlessness, in her kindness that Gaara was interested. He still remembered their brief conversation on the rooftop. She said that they had things in common. She was the first one to address him with we. She made him feel like he was part of something. Although he didn't recognize it then, he definitely could now. As for Yuki, Gaara was also a very interesting character to her. He was simply misunderstood what she could see. Part of the mission or not, she wanted to know more about him. She wanted to know him for more than the One-Tail and the reports about him. Without further delay, she made her way with them to the doorsteps of Sunagakure. She wasn't exactly welcomed, but they tolerated her presence. She promised herself, as she walked in, to not stay here longer than needed. She didn't need to feel attached to another place. However, she could already tell, as she made that promise to herself, that something or someone would make Sunagakure feel like a second home.

End of Chapter 33

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xox

Krystal