Unsung Story of the Inconspicuous

A/N: Ahaha, now things get interesting! Well, will shortly. Thank you to Shana, who got through this with great speed as usual.

Don't own, won't profit.


'Blood type?' Raiku's poor doctor repeated for the nth time.

'O negative,' Raiku answered promptly, if a little wearily. Most Gairano were. Being universal donors was not only a convenient coincidence in general, but it also meant that they were the driving force behind the Konoha blood drive.

It fit. Recessive genes just… spoke to them.

She scratched a hand through her hair, slowly enough that it didn't generate audible sparks. She felt flat and tired, which was a disappointment after how much better she'd felt yesterday. But apparently her medic had been right to want her to get checked out.

Daisukenojo watched from her side with rapt attention at the exchange between Raiku and her put-upon doctor, who had been questioning her almost continuously since her blood tests had come back from the previous day. After they had immediately realized that she'd snuck out and basically barricaded her inside her room for the night, they had escaped with vials of her blood, like… pathology bandits.

Even though it meant he became privy to certain intimate details of Raiku's physical state and she disliked that on principle, she had to admit that Daisukenojo's curiosity was justified from a scientific standpoint. Raiku's condition made it exceptionally hard to treat deep wounds, even with the use of chakra healing. Which she had only just become aware of, but that she should have seen coming. Konoha medics were known for their proficiency in the extremely difficult art of chakra healing and also often specialized in treating shinobi with difficult bloodline limits, due to Tsunade's influence, but the same was not true of were extremely competent, of course, and Raiku would never, ever tell a nurse or medic that they weren't doing a good job, since her family had a high concentration of both and she was deeply frightened of their ability to make her death look like an accident. But she'd been told that while things weren't going badly, they also weren't going that well, even without any beginning signs of infection. It had apparently gotten to the point that it was decided that her treatment needed to be stepped up which was risky for Raiku at the best of times, since IVs alone were always touch-and-go.

Raiku was out of danger, Daisukenojo had explained after a long talk with the more accommodating nurses who weren't ignoring him for abducting her. But she would soon slide back into it if they couldn't feed and water her as rapidly as her body was demanding. In turn, her wound wasn't going to heal properly without the nutrients and care she needed, which her condition was making impossible.

It also created awkward questions.

'And remind me why you can't drop your technique,' the doctor gritted out.

'Because… I can't,' she hedged.

'But you know how to get around it already - you gave her a transfusion and everything when she arrived, didn't you? What else do you even need to do, here?' Daisukenojo frowned, absently keeping a bag of tiny chocolate taiyaki away from Raiku's questing fingers.

The doctor shook his head and flipped the page up on the clipboard to look at the chart. 'No. Because of her technique, we were forced to use plasma pills to make her body generate more on its own. We've been using work-arounds.'

Raiku shrugged. 'So why can't I just take more?'

'Because!' the doctor snapped, making her flinch back and cower slightly. He visibly calmed himself, but his eye still twitched slightly. 'Because,' he continued in tones of forced evenness. 'The human body can't just - look, plasma pills contain things like erythropoietin, which can cause strokes in large doses. They're only designed to keep someone from dropping dead from blood loss! We could risk it, but you're still dehydrated and malnourished, despite our best efforts, which I'd like to point out would have happened over a longer period than this,' he added, giving her a sharp look. This made her cower even more, which didn't seem to deter him as much the second time around.

It wasn't her choice or her fault, or even her father's - it was almost impossible to keep up with her body's demands now that she'd started hitting puberty, though the only sign so far had been that she'd grown even more, and only vertically rather than horizontally. Like a stretched piece of bubblegum. Suddenly, she had to eat twice as much, to both sustain her body's growth and to keep her ability stable. They hadn't worked out a proper system yet; it was a work in progress!

And after the explosion, she had just been so...

She was so wrapped up in her thoughts that she almost missed the next part.

'-the last thing we want is for you to contract an infection in your immune-compromised state and if we give you any more fluids without giving a transfusion, you're going to bleed pink.' And then die, his gaze promised. Because I will kill you.

Raiku found herself being glared at and shrugged helplessly, throwing her hands up and shooting him her best pleading eyes.

The doctor's jaw clenched worryingly.

So that hadn't worked. Raiku found the effort of keeping her arms raised exhausting and dropped them to her lap, where she twisted her fingers together. She really didn't feel well, and she knew he was right. She did need help. But she'd been seriously injured in the past - how hadn't this been addressed before now?

She stared at her hands, worrying. They'd never had trouble bringing her physically up to scratch before. The medic had said she would be fine. Getting nutrients intravenously was the most effective delivery system imaginable, so what was going on? And she'd had transfusions before. Hell, she had an IV in now, so that couldn't be it! So why…?

Why was she recovering so slowly? The medic had said it was to be expected, but suddenly it wasn't?

How could she get worse, when she had already reached safety?

'She has a fluids and nutrients IV in,' Daisukenojo pointed out with a frown. 'Plus medication. Why isn't that enough?'

The doctor's hands tightened on her chart. 'The problem isn't the IV or the meds, it's all the other-,' he broke off to take a deep breath and rubbed the bridge of his nose. 'Okay. You've had serious treatment before,' he began again, starting from square one for the millionth time that day.

'Yes.'

'And it went normally?'

'Yes?' Raiku offered uncertainly.

He tensed, then took another deep breath to make himself relax. 'Are you asking me, or telling me?'

'She was unconscious,' Daisukenojo interjected, starting to tense in response to the much older man, his protective big brother instincts starting to kick in now that Raiku was being interrogated by a stranger. Interrogated by a stranger after being thought dead and after a surprisingly touching bonding session, she amended, since she'd been interrogated plenty of times before without him batting an eyelid.

'Yeah,' Raiku added lamely, hand stretching out to the side. 'I was.'

'You still haven't said what the problem even is,' Daisukenojo grumbled, moving his food out of her reach yet again. But, a suspicion was starting to gnaw at the back of Raiku's mind. Maybe something had been different? Didn't Ryuu say, the first time, that the medics had to treat her differently?

But he was the one who pointed it out, they hadn't said anything - there was no reason to think that she couldn't recover under normal medical care! Was there?!

But if things continued this way, they said that she would start getting worse again. And what if she got into a bad state, like before? The last thing she needed was to blow up a hospital in Sand. Then Gaara would have to murder his way through to the front of the line to even get a chance to kill her.

Not that she thought he wouldn't do it - he did have first dibs. Well, after Ryuu and Daisukenojo. Possibly Yamada. Oh, she added, also Neji. Hinata. Iruka. Those Sound nin, if they'd lived. Ryuu's biological family. Her dad. Mura. Right, also Mayuko - okay it may have been time to re-examine some life choices.

'Well, what the hell do you plan on doing?' Daisukenojo was starting to get upset, though she'd proudly noted that he'd restrained it well until now. He'd been stressed, before, but hidden it with far more composure than he usually did. Raiku wasn't like a sister so much as she was like a pet insect that he'd had for a while and gotten ill-advisedly attached to, or maybe a hermit crab that bumped into the glass too often and whose idiocy made it endearing, but damnit, he was invested.

"He's gonna release her into our custody so that we can take her home for specialist care," a deep, gravelly voice interrupted from the doorway.

She knew those quotation marks.

Raiku creased her eyes happily at the enormous figure of Yamada who had stooped to get his head in through the doorway, even as her doctor swelled in anger. 'Are you insane, she can't be dragged across international borders -,'

"Hey, Speedy," Yamada greeted, getting himself in awkwardly through an entrance too narrow for his frame. "Get up, Shorty, I get the chair."

Daisukenojo grumbled his way out of the wicker chair and onto the edge of her bed, pushing her legs a little to get her to shuffle them enough to make room. Yamada moved past the doctor, who was now realizing the full physical extent of the man he was arguing with, and sat on the uncomfortable chair by her bedside. It groaned alarmingly. It had not been built for this kind of pressure. Almost nothing was.

Raiku eyed it for a moment with concern, before Yamada forced her attention back on him by speaking. "Look," he said to the doctor, dark, flinty eyes stern under his non-existent eyebrows. "You can't fix her while she's got her killer jutsu up. She can't remove her jutsu without being able to focus. She can't focus when she's doped up on meds to the eyes or when she's in so much pain that she can't see straight. We don't have the technique with us to learn, so we gotta go back and get her family to take it off, get me? So we've gotta go now, while she's still doing well enough to travel."

'A member should come here,' the doctor growled. She had to admire him. He really was determined to get her back to full health, and not many people would stick up to Yamada for the sake of a foreign Genin. He was wrong, but that was incidental. 'If she contracts an infection in the field, or god forbid, gets attacked-,'

'Hey! We can protect her!' Daisukenojo argued.

The doctor gave him the king of derisive looks. It was so perfectly crafted that Raiku, who examined facial expressions compulsively, actually got shivers. It spoke of years of practice dealing with shinobi. 'Oh, really? Then how did she get into this situation?'

Okay. He had them there.

Which, judging by the sudden waves of aggression exuding from her teammate and leader, was definitely not appreciated. Yamada's stony gaze would have physically broken a weaker man under its weight. "We leave tomorrow morning and you'll have her ready," he said in a low voice, not an ounce of compromise in him. "Get me?"

Raiku looked between them nervously. She actually was not entirely on board with this plan. It seemed to involve dragging her increasingly sickly body across large distances, which. Uh. Which was something she didn't like. But she couldn't argue with Yamada in front of his opposition in such a precarious situation, especially when the opposition was a foreign doctor. It would undermine his authority as a Konoha Jounin and a leader.

But Ryuu had said that the… man, his relative, had vanished. Which meant he was still alive. What if he took the opportunity to come back? And take Ryuu by force? She remembered the inky blackness of Plot crawling up Ryuu's side and shuddered. Or worse.

She cast an eye around for hers and it took a moment, but she caught sight of its mostly transparent mass puddled around the foot of the bed. It was getting harder to see. Which meant it was taking. The thought was nauseating, much like doing anything else, so she tried not to dwell on it.

The doctor left radiating displeasure and very nearly slammed the door shut, which gave Raiku the chance to voice her concerns.

'Yamada, I don't-,'

"I don't want to hear it, Speedy."

Or not.

She knotted her fingers together and shot Daisukenojo a pleading look. But he appeared to agree with this course of action, the freckle-faced defector.

Yamada took pity on her after a moment. "Speedy. You're not gonna get better here," he told her firmly, but not unkindly. "We gotta go back to where they know how to take care of you."

'But I haven't… before, it was… I'm sure it'll be fine if I…'

"Raiku." Yamada gave her a patronizing look. "Think very hard about your stay in hospital the last few times."

He'd used her real name. He must have been serious.

Unsure what he was referring to, Raiku scanned her memory. She didn't get it. It had seemed normal, except for her family smuggling in masks. She'd gotten antibiotics that she actually didn't need and lots of painkillers, been sedated, etcetera et-

She paused, a voice that sounded suspiciously like her own rising in the back of her head.

Previously, it pointed out in sly tones she was certain she'd never used in real life, she had always been hospitalized in Konoha.

Of course.

And in Konoha, it continued, key emergency staff members were also Gairano clan members.

She groaned aloud and earned a look of pride from Yamada as the realization struggled through the mire of her dehydrated, weakening mind to stand proudly at the forefront.

Of course.

'You have got to be kidding me!'

'What? What the hell is going on?' Daisukenojo demanded. He was ignored. Yamada patted her shoulder and levered himself up with a grunt.

"Good work. We leave in the morning, get me? Come on, Shorty. We've gotta get extra supplies."

'What!? That doesn't make any sense either, we have more than enough-'

"No," Yamada said, giving Raiku a meaningful look. "We don't."

She grimaced. This was going to end badly. She waved at them as they left and tugged at her IV line a little. She was going to miss it so much. Still, she knew she had to get some rest if she was going to be ready for tomorrow, so she pulled her blankets up towards her and flicked the blinds shut.

In her peripheral vision, her Plot vanished a little more.


Shortly after dawn broke, casting Sand in warm orange light, a medic double-checked Raiku's strappings in the reception of the hospital with a displeased expression. Possibly because it was early in the morning, but more likely because she was leaving without it being approved by anyone.

'Are you ready?' Daisukenojo yawned, not awake enough to even bother covering his mouth. It earned him an irritated look from Ryuu, whose bedhead was a thing of beauty, but everyone knew that Ryuu was long-established as terrible. And also not a morning person, besides.

'No,' the medic growled, shooting him a hostile look.

'I think so?' Raiku offered, brow creased uncertainly. Only, not really, no. She was woozy and disoriented and felt oddly floaty because of the double-dose she'd been given. Daisukenojo had been given the rest of her supply, with strict instructions that he'd been told, then had written down for him, been forced to repeat and then told again. The staff had been very, very unhappy with the situation.

Yamada hadn't cared and didn't care now. He stretched his arms over his head, fingertips almost brushing the high ceiling, and made a satisfied sound. "Alright then! Time for us to go!"

The four of them made for the exit. Yamada had initially wanted to leave at night, so that it would be cooler. But after what had happened… he had apparently decided they needed visibility more than they needed to stay out of the heat.

Her doctor had disagreed most strenuously, she remembered with a grimace, already eyeing with resentment the nearing sliding doors that led outside. Oh god. She could almost feel the heat coming towards her. She didn't want to. Every step felt like it was taking her towards her doom.

She braced herself as Yamada led the way out into the -

'Gairano?' someone called. She almost fainted with relief and spun so fast that she almost threw up.

'Yes?' she asked brightly.

Only to yelp as the medic slapped a bandaid onto her face.

'There we go.'

She frowned at him, rubbing her forehead, and moved to leave again. Damn.

More slowly, begrudgingly, she turned back towards the doors. Everyone was out now. She had no excuse. She had to do it. This was getting too self-indulgent. The Plot was making her act emotional and whiny and it was going to stop. Raiku gave herself a mental slap around the face and squared her shoulders. Okay. She could do this. She took another step and exited the hospital, exhaling heavily. Her sandals crunched a little on the rough road.

Right, that hadn't been so hard. Raiku smiled under her new but not particularly improved mask. She could be optimistic about this! She was going to be happy if it actually killed her. Which was almost a statistical certainty, but that was a risk she was willing to take.

'Hurry up!' Ryuu called from the end of the street, still mostly deserted at this time of day. Made of sand, too, which she wasn't going to miss! Things were looking up already. She nodded quickly and started forward.

'Gairano.'

She turned again with an exasperated look. 'Are you going to hit me again-'

Raiku paled and trailed off at Gaara's perpetually hostile stare.

Not the medic.

Raiku felt every muscle in her body try and tense up for fleeing, but knew she was more likely to run into a wall than to safety. 'Oh hey… there. Hi!' she said awkwardly, eyes darting to the left. They were still walking away, getting ever smaller. Why couldn't she have been placed onto a better team!?

The shorter shinobi stared at her, with his arms folded and green eyes almost as angry as his hair color. Which was pretty bad.

They stood for what felt like forever in a silence one part awkward, one part homicidal and a few thousand parts terrified.

'So. I… have to go,' she said hesitantly, jerking a thumb towards her team's retreating backs. 'But this has, um, been fun, though-,'

'I came to the hospital,' Gaara interrupted in a dark tone, eyes boring into her like an accusation.

Raiku restrained a flinch with what felt like herculean effort and hastily fashioned a reply. 'Yes, you absolutely did.' Tragically, it was not a good one.

Another silence.

Raiku was starting to sweat under his scrutiny. What was this for?! He'd tried to kill her in a hospital before, was this just a repeat? She was so not prepared for this, he'd just appeared out of nowhere! He didn't sleep; he could have come while she would have been unconscious! That would have been the most considerate thing to do, outside of not murdering her at all, which she accepted was probably not his first choice.

Gaara seemed to tense a little as the silence went on, which was actually a little unusual, since he was usually utterly relaxed. Physically, anyway. Probably because he had the comfort of being able to kill anybody ever.

'You… came to the hospital,' she repeated, at a loss for what else to do.

She blinked.

No.

'You came ... to the hospital,' she said in a slightly different voice, a giddy disbelief rising amidst her usual waves of horror. No. There was no way. It was impossible.

'Oh my god!' Ryuu shouted, startling her into jumping. When she looked, he'd come halfway back down the street and had his hands cupped around his mouth. 'Put it in a letter, idiot! We've gotta go!'

Raiku looked back at Gaara quickly to see if he was offended, but he was… glaring at her again. Oh good. 'I. I will do that,' she said, desperate to find a way out of the situation but not entirely sure she understood what he'd meant enough to end the conversation correctly. 'I will. Um. Send a letter. To you,' she added, as though it wasn't obvious. 'Also Iwao, but I will write two. One will be to you but not to Kankuro, because he scares me.' Stop, Raiku, stop, she told herself firmly, knowing she looked like a babbling idiot but that it was particularly bad in this case.

Gaara said nothing, so she pressed on uncertainly, deciding to go for it.

'Because you… came to visit me?'

She hadn't meant to end on a rising intonation. That had been an accident that could cost her her life. She braced for some scathing response from the highly aggressive redhead, tempted to close her eyes. But nothing happened.

Gaara blinked slowly. 'Fine.'

Raiku almost fainted for the second time that day, blood rushing rapidly to her head from the shock. 'Oh good! Then I'm going to go this has been a good talk well-'

'RIGHT. NOW.'

'I'm coming! I'm going,' she added to Gaara, taking a step back and laughing nervously. 'Bye! Goodbye right now!'

She ran off in a crooked line, feet definitely not cooperating with her brain but still doing their best with the Escaping-From-Gaara agenda. She counted it a success when the sand beneath her feet didn't rise up to strangle her, drawing level with Ryuu's irritated expression in a few seconds. He snorted at her obvious lack of coordination, equally caused by drugs and her relief.

'Seriously, couldn't you have done that yesterday?'

She shrugged helplessly. Honestly, he knew it had been beyond her control.

Speaking of which…

Raiku could suddenly feel again through the adrenaline and became aware of a pressing matter.

'I'm hungry,' she told him with a pleading look.

She'd gone from one homicidal madman to another. He gave her a narrow stare.

'That's really unfortunate for you.'

'Ryuu!' she protested, taking a few quick, awkward steps to catch up when he turned on his heel and strode off towards the two others waiting for them. 'I have to keep my strength up! The doctor said so!'

'I'm not hearing this. You ate ten minutes ago!' he said, shaking his head and walking faster.

'Ryuu! Ryuu, you can't get rid of me that easily!'

But he definitely could. She was starting to fall behind a little, her wavering path not as fast as his direct one.

'Ryuu!'


A/N: Oh, Raiku. Your accidental non-friendship is taking so many years off your life.

Reviews:

Skwiziks: Excellent! Yes, Daisukenojo hasn't had much screentime, mostly because he is Raiku's ideal: extremely normal. Iwao will probably pop back up a few times, just because I enjoy that sort of character, but I'm glad you like him. And your fears are almost certainly justified, as Raiku's Plot is amping up. Hehehe.

Fluehatraya: Oh god the armada. The pale-haired guy is Hijino, and as the prettiest Jounin there, he's the most likely to have reappearances. That is the law of the Naruto universe. I think a friend of mine has put those cards somewhere up on an art site, but I'll have to double-check that. Thank you for reviewing!

fleeting . white . feathers: Oh, Raiku. Raiku, you never stood a chance, you poor bastard. Noted on the pairing front! I also see them more as bros, at this stage, but they are all basically children pre-timeskip anyway. And I have no idea what that idea would entail, really!

Aotrs Commander: Ha, thank you! I liked them. And thanks so much for saying that!

Mittelan: Ah, yes. Ryuu and Raiku, that seems strangely popular. Thank you for reviewing!