Venatori

Summary: Kankuro was a few minutes too late, and Kiba died. Now, Shino and Hinata work to ensure that no more traitors get away alive. Divergence from chapter 212.

The Laughing Phoenix does not own Naruto and makes no profit from this work, other than her sense of accomplishment.

WARNING: Massive spoilers in future chapters. Character death. Blood, gore, and questionable use of medical knowledge and techniques. Some OOC-ness.


Of Assessments and Politics

Kurenai met her students at the main gate to the village, pack slung over her back. Shino arrived a few minutes after she did, but Hinata was a good ten minutes late. The older woman noted the slight crease between Hinata's brows that usually meant her family had been making trouble, but said nothing. If all went well, it wouldn't be much longer until the girl didn't have to report to her relatives every time she had a mission.

They checked out at the gates and set a brisk pace – it would take them about a day and a half to get to the rendezvous point. When they stopped for a brief lunch, Kurenai gave her two students finer details.

"Reports from the villages that have been hit say there are somewhere between twelve and fifteen of the bandits, but only a few wear scratched hitai-ate. It's possible that some of the bandits may simply not like to advertise their missing-nin status and it's also possible that the hitai-ate are stolen, there's no good way to tell. Our job is to hunt them down and eliminate them. The Kazekage would like one alive, preferably one of the ringleaders, but that's the Suna team's responsibility. We're to meet the team at the border, somewhere near these bandits's range. They'll have more information for us."

Both Hinata and Shino nodded. It seemed straightforward enough. Once the meal had been finished, they continued on to the border.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

Kankuro was muttering to himself as he paced. Temari, watching from her seat on a fallen tree, resisted the urge to smack her brother upside the head. "We're early," she reminded him. "We can't expect them for another couple of hours."

"I know!" Kankuro snapped back. Seeing Temari frown and drop her hand to her fan, he ducked his head. "Sorry," he muttered, "But last time I was on a mission that involved Konoha-nin, it didn't go so well. And Gaara needs this mission to work, so…" He trailed off, but Temari understood.

"Just relax, would you? You're making me antsy."

The two of them were occupying half of a meadow in what was generally known as the scrublands. There were trees, but they were smaller and less densely spaced than the great forests at the heart of Hi no Kuni and surrounding Konoha. Meadows full of tall, hardy grasses and shrubs dominated the landscape. The dirt was sandier and the air dryer, as the forests transitioned to the unforgiving deserts of Kaze no Kuni. Their de-facto teammate, a jounin by the name of Isago, was sitting several feet away.

When Tsunade had told him she would be sending two chuunin and a jounin, Gaara had chosen the same complement. Temari and Kankuro were both going, that was non-negotiable. Choosing the jounin, however, proved to be more difficult. Both Gaara's older siblings had insisted Baki stay in the village to help their little brother keep an eye on things and watch his back. In the end, Baki had recommended Isago as one of the few jounin available who bore no grudge against Konoha. There were few enough of them in Suna, as the ranks of Suna's jounin and chuunin had been decimated in the disastrous attempt to invade Konoha a little under a year before.

Kankuro kept pacing, but had at least stopped muttering. Deciding that a little improvement was better than nothing, Temari let this pass. Leaning back, she was about to start cloud gazing (if the lazy bum found it interesting, perhaps she should see what it had to offer) when she caught a slight movement out of the corner of her eye.

A boy in a green coat and black goggles had dropped silently from the trees at the other side of the meadow. "Kankuro," Temari hissed, catching sight of the Konoha leaf on the newcomer's forehead. Turning sharply to follow his sister's line of sight, Kankuro bit off a curse.

By this time, all three of the Suna-nin were watching the figure across the meadow. A moment later, the figure disintegrated, and three more figures appeared from the growth. A black-haired woman in a white and black stylized battle dress with one red sleeve, a girl with indigo-blue hair and white eyes, and the boy whose clone had apparently been watching them.

This time Kankuro really did curse under his breath, and Temari couldn't blame him. The last time they'd seen these three particular Konoha-nin had been several months prior, in the Konoha morgue.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

The little team had approached the rendezvous site carefully, on the lookout for anything that suggested a trap or other foul play. They agreed that it probably wasn't, because Suna was not likely to do anything so stupid given the state of the alliance between the two villages, but blindly marching in would have been, in Hinata and Shino's opinion, similarly foolish. They'd been watching the Suna team a good ten minutes before Shino used his Mushi bunshin to get their attention.

"This is going to be interesting," Shino muttered softly to his teammate as they left the shelter of the trees. The trio stopped about halfway across the meadow, Kurenai's two students flanking her.

"I take it you're the Suna-nin we're working with?" Kurenai asked.

The jounin pushed himself to his feet. "Most likely. My name is Isago."

"Yuuhi Kurenai, jounin. My students are Hyuuga Hinata and Aburame Shino, both chuunin."

"I'm jounin as well. My teammates are Temari and Kankuro, also both chuunin."

"We've met," Shino said softly.

There was an awkward silence, broken by Kurenai. "Where do you want to begin, Isago-san?"

"Ah, right." the Suna-nin looked relieved at the change of subject. "A village was attacked two weeks ago – it's only about a day's travel from here." He pulled a map from his pouch. "We've been mapping out the attacks we can directly attribute to this group, trying to figure out where they've been holing up."

As the two teams approached each other, Hinata poked her teammate behind their sensei's back. "Be nice, Shino-kun." The quiet boy glanced sideways at her before bowing his head a fraction of an angle, a gesture Hinata understood to mean Alright, I'll behave.

The map was examined and generally deemed to give inconclusive results. It was quickly agreed, though, that whoever was planning the raids was being very careful not to lead pursuers back to their base. They eventually decided to try the village that had just been attacked.

That night, the odd group made camp near a stream. There was an awkward moment where it looked like they might have separate fires, but in the end the six of them gathered around one large blaze, though it would have been easily possible to draw a line through the fire separating the two teams.

Once dinner had been finished and a basic watch rotation decided upon, Shino got the attention of the whole group for a general question. "I wish to ask permission to place a single kikai on each of you," he told the Suna-nin. "This way, should we become separated, I will be able to find you with relative ease."

"Your bugs drain chakra," Kankuro pointed out, watching the younger boy carefully.

Shino shrugged, lifting a hand to display his hive. "It is only damaging when there are a large number of them. A single female does not drain enough chakra to be noticeable, even for a civilian who has almost no chakra to draw on."

"And what about when the mission's over?" the Suna jounin asked, watching the insects that swarmed over the boy's upraised fingers.

"I will remove the insects. At any rate, females have been documented to live only three to four weeks away from the hive."

There was a moment of silence before Kankuro shrugged. "I've not got a problem with it." He frowned at Temari's sideways glance. "Yeah, I've fought the guy before, so I know he's not lying when he says he'd need a lot of bugs to really drain us. And besides, I'd bet he'll bug us anyway if we say no."

Shino made no comment at this, quietly releasing a kikai to perch inside Kankuro's hood.

Temari snorted. "Well, when you put it that way," she turned to Shino and held out a hand. The Aburame quietly placed a kikai on the tips of her fingers, and she held her hand up in front of her eyes. "Behave yourself, or I'll squash you flat," she informed the insect, before letting it crawl onto her shoulder.

Isago hesitated. He'd seen the remains of shinobi who'd gone up against an Aburame, and it had not been pretty. On the other hand, he didn't want to make the situation any more awkward than it already was, and he was pragmatic enough that the last thing he wanted to do was give up an advantage. He carefully took the kikai Shino offered him, placing it on his shoulder.

The rest of the night went quietly and the team packed up and moved out as quickly as they could the next morning. Nobody spoke much. Shino and Hinata were quiet people by nature and Kurenai, still a little leery of the Suna jounin, was more than happy to take her cue from them. Like Kurenai, Isago was more than willing to operate with caution around the jounin he had only just met. Unlike the genjutsu mistress, though, Isago knew a little bit about his opposite number. Some of Kurenai's more vicious techniques had brutalized the Suna-nin who got a little too close to the throng of civilians she was guarding at the time, and he'd heard a few mutters about a red-eyed jounin who could 'bring nightmares to life' from the survivors.

Temari and Kankuro, meanwhile, were perfectly content to keep quiet until they had a better read on the Konoha team. The mission was already fairly sensitive, which was why the Kazekage's siblings had been sent, and neither wanted to make it more difficult by angering the Konoha-nin. The whole deal was further complicated by the fact that Kankuro had fought one of them and then been too late to keep their teammate alive a mere seven weeks later.

By unspoken agreement the team dropped to a civilian's walking pace when they reached the outskirts of their target village shortly before noon. The shinobi were greeted with wary caution by the villagers, but they answered most of the questions Isago posed them. Kurenai managed to get a few details out of some of the villagers, but in general she let the Suna jounin handle the talking. The chuunin watched quietly, observing both the villagers and the damage – a burned barn and broken property. Most of the damage had been repaired or cleared away two weeks after the raid, but the marks were visible to their keen eyes.

Once Isago and Kurenai were satisfied with their questioning, the little group gathered to confer.

"The information is consistent with what we've gotten so far." Isago said. "The group descends en masse early in the morning before the villagers are really up for the day, then set one or two things on fire and break a few things to get attention. They then force the villagers to give up valuables, take some food, and take off. No real molestation of the women or children, nothing to suggest that they're planning to come back."

"So where do we go from here?" Temari wanted to know. "The trail's two weeks old, it'll be difficult to follow."

Kurenai smirked a little at that, surprising the Suna-nin. "There is a reason the Hokage sent us," she said dryly.

Isago and Temari looked a little confused. Kankuro groaned and smacked his forehead. "You're all trackers, aren't you. I mean, I know you are," he pointed at Shino, who nodded, "But you're a tracking team."

Kurenai shrugged. "Tracking is not my primary skill, but in essence you are correct."

"The bandits left the village heading north-east," Hinata told the group softly, the veins around her eyes bulging with the activation of her Byakugan. "It looks like they laid a false trail about a kilometer out, although it's a little hard to tell from here. The track I think is the false trail leads east from there, following the river. The real trail seems to lead south-east, but it's muddled." She made a noise of frustration. "They've doubled back at least twice, and…" she trailed off, suddenly realizing that everyone was looking at her, the Suna-nin practically gaping. With a little squeak, she turned bright red and looked down at her toes.

Shino reached out and rested a hand on her shoulder. "It should be clearer once we have it in front of us," he said.

Hinata nodded, still bright red. Temari chuckled a little, adjusting her fan's weight across her shoulders. "I think I'm impressed," she said. "Lead on, oh experts."

Still flushing, Hinata led the group out of the village, Shino at her shoulder, checking for the signs of the bandit's passage. They moved at a slow lope, stopping occasionally as the two Konoha chuunin conferred over the traces of the bandit's passage. They managed to cover a good fifteen kilometers before Shino and Hinata began to have trouble following the trail in the fading light. Kurenai suggested a halt, and put her students to finding a good place to camp. Once they had, the group settled down for the night, feeling more relaxed in each other's company than they had the night before.

They set out again early the next morning. Shino and Hinata began having real trouble following the trail, and twice they had to backtrack, having been fooled by false trails. They'd only covered eight kilometers when the group stopped for a quick lunch. Hinata was biting her lip and Shino was visibly frowning. Shino ate quickly and walked away from the group, finding a nest of bees. That done, he sank into light meditation at the hive entrance. Social insects had better memories than solitary insects, and while the bees might not have been as advanced as his own hive, he could roughly communicate ideas.

"What's he doing?" Kankuro asked.

Hinata bit her lip. "S-sometimes insects r-remember things. Shino-kun i-is checking to see if they s-saw anybody." She bowed her head. "I-I am sorry about h-how slow we're going."

Kankuro frowned. "Hey, it's not a big deal, alright? That trail's two weeks old and it rained some since then, I don't know that I'd have gotten us this far."

Hinata flushed a little, but didn't look up. "Th-that is very kind of you, Kankuro-san."

"It's truth. And please stop calling me Kankuro-san, it's way too formal."

Shino returned about a half hour after he'd left, frowning. "The bees were only marginally helpful," he told the group. "They had some memory of a large group of people moving through the area two weeks ago, largely because a prime patch of flowers was destroyed at the same time. What is strange is that the destruction seems to have been arbitrary – the patch is several hundred yards from the trail we've been following."

Isago pushed himself to his feet. "Show us?" he asked. "Maybe we can figure out why this patch was out of the way."

Shino led the group to an open clearing, largely bare dirt with some scraggly grass and fallen leaves covering it. Had they not been told that plants had been flowering there two weeks previously, Temari and Kankuro weren't sure they'd have believed it. Isago knelt, and examined the surrounding ground.

"Someone used a doton jutsu here," he said softly. "It was a subtle one, but if you look, you can see the edges."

"Why would they be using a doton jutsu here, when the trail passes by?" Temari mused, hands on her hips.

Straightening up, Isago frowned. "Let's keep moving."

They managed to cover another ten kilometers that afternoon, but Shino and Hinata kept having more and more trouble following the signs. It was frustrating to the two, especially since the trail had been so clear at the beginning. When Isago called a halt, they were happy to take a break.

Later that evening, after they'd eaten, the group held a little war council around the fire.

"It's weird," Temari muttered, glaring at her fan as she worked it over. "This is supposed to be a big group, right? So why aren't they doing more damage?"

Kurenai nodded. "Usually bandits are very destructive, and it's not uncommon for an established group to regularly return to a set of villages for food. Sexual assault is also fairly common, but they seem to have left the villagers alone, and it didn't sound like they took a whole lot of food."

"And they're not hitting any one village more than once, according to the information we've received." Isago mused.

"Ah, th-there was something strange a-about the trail," Hinata began, deliberately not looking at anybody. "A-at first, it seemed like a r-regular trail. But then, a-as we followed it…i-it almost s-seemed like they got better at hiding it."

Shino frowned. "I noticed that as well, but thought I might have been mistaken. But with the doton jutsu in the clearing, I have to wonder if someone was waiting for them there, someone with more experience hiding a trail."

"Isago-san, when did the reports of bandit attacks first start to come in?" Kurenai asked.

"Four, maybe four and a half months ago. They've hit ten villages since then, anywhere between five and eighteen days apart."

"And they're supposed to be a group of fifteen or so, but I don't think they're taking enough food to feed themselves." Kankuro frowned, eyes focused on a joint in Karasu. "Call me paranoid, but something doesn't feel right here."

"I do not disagree, Kankuro-san," Shino said softly.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

The team continued following the bandits for the next three days. For the next two days the trail became a little more difficult to follow, before suddenly becoming easier. This was worrisome, as it most likely meant that the bandits felt comfortable enough to stop hiding their trail. Midafternoon on the third day, they stumbled upon an abandoned camp. The team spread out, going over the site in exacting detail. Traces suggested that the camp had been abandoned only a few days previously, and they found the poorly-buried midden and latrine fairly quickly.

Meeting up by the badly-disguised firepit, the team compared notes. "It looks like there were about fifteen people here," Isago began. "I found at least fourteen different places where people had been sleeping."

Shino nodded. "Judging by the insects at the midden and latrine sites, I would agree with that assessment. It looks like they've only been gone four or five days."

"They left the site travelling north," Hinata told the group. "As far as I can tell, they continued moving almost due north for at least a few kilometers."

"At any rate, these aren't your run of the mill bandits. I found the remains of some shinobi-class traps out on the west side of the camp. One was still intact." Kurenai held out a hand, showing the group a high-quality shuriken. "I left that one alone so everyone could have a look at it, but I found this nearby."

"I found a spot where a trap had been taken down in a hurry. This was there." Kankuro held out an odd-looking kunai. It was the same length as Konoha's standard-issue kunai, but it was wider and heavier, looking almost like dagger. "It looks familiar, but it's not Suna-made, and I don't think it's Konohan either."

"Wait a minute, let me see that." Temari pulled the blade out of her brother's hands and held it up in front of her face. "Baki showed me a blade that looked just like this a little while ago. Said it was taken from an Ame-nin. See how it's wider and heavier? That gives it a little more stability in the rain."

"When'd this happen?" Kankuro demanded. "How'd I miss this?"

"About three weeks ago. He said he wanted me to have a better understanding of weaponry and how it's adapted to environment. I think he just wanted me to know what I can't blow away with a wind. Gaara was doing paperwork at the time, and I think you were playing with scorpions."

"Oh, yeah!" Kankuro grinned. "Got some really interesting venoms from them too."

Hinata perked up at this, interest noticeably piqued. Kurenai smiled slightly, before changing the subject. "How do we want to proceed next?"

The team decided to follow the trail leaving the camp for a kilometer or two before stopping for the night, and after examining the intact trap and making one last sweep to make sure they'd gotten all the information they could from the site they headed out. After dinner, the group sat around the campsite trading ideas. In the end, the only thing they had enough information to be definite about was that there was at least one missing-nin of chuunin or higher skill level in the group and at least one had gotten their gear from Ame, either directly or from an Ame-nin. They also changed up the watch rotation, putting two of the group on watch at any one time.

Shino and Isago took first watch, followed by Kurenai and Kankuro. Temari and Hinata took last watch, taking advantage of Hinata's hyperdeveloped eyesight to deal with the grey of the morning twilight. By the last half-hour, Temari was feeling relaxed enough to strike up a conversation with the younger girl.

"So, I saw you got interested when Kankuro mentioned venoms. You like poisons too, I take it?"

"Eh?" Hinata was a little confused by the non sequitur, but her natural good manners made her answer the question. "I-I have been learning how to make poisons and antidotes. Senpai says I am getting pretty good at it."

"Senpai?"

"A-A friend of sensei's. Anko-senpai was kind enough to teach us the basics."

"Anko…you mean that woman who proctored the second part of that Chuunin Exam?" Temari didn't detail which exam she meant, but Hinata understood.

"H-Hai."

"Better you than me. I thought she was a little strange. No offense meant, but she was a bit…out there."

Hinata had to fight the urge to giggle. "Anko-senpai is a little…enthusiastic, but she is a good teacher when she chooses to be."

"I'll take your word for it. Still, poisons? I didn't think many Hyuuga used those."

Hinata made a mental note to see how much information Suna had on the Hyuuga. She couldn't tell if Temari actually knew the statistics or was just fishing for information. She figured it was fairly harmless information – Clan Hyuuga was best known for dominating hand to hand combat, a style that rarely used poisons. A moment of deliberation later, Hinata decided to take a gamble. "What my father does not know will not hurt him."

Temari raised an eyebrow. That was interesting. She held a position of high enough status in Suna that she was at least passing familiar with the notables of the other hidden villages, especially their allies. Konoha was at the top of the list, and Clan Hyuuga was tagged as 'people to watch' on the list Baki had insisted his students look over before the attempted invasion. She knew Hinata was the daughter of the clan head, and her initial assessment of the girl had not been flattering. Now, however, she had a better idea of the true clan dynamics.

Later that day, Shino requested an early halt for lunch. He ate quickly and walked to the edge of the clearing, where he'd seen signs of a particularly large hive of bumblebees. When he reached the entrance, he leaned forward to examine the hive before shouting suddenly and throwing himself back.

Hinata was on her feet immediately, Byakugan activated and scanning. She couldn't see anything to indicate a trap, so she approached her teammate. "Shino-kun? What is it?"

Shino was glaring at the hive. "Insecticide," he snarled. "Lots of it. The entire hive is dead."

"What?" Kurenai came up behind her students. "Why would they kill a hive of bees?"

"Maybe they didn't want a beehive so close to camp?" Kankuro offered. The withering glance he got from his sister shut him up.

"We're at least six kilometers from their campsite, unless there's another one just ahead the bees wouldn't have been an issue." Kurenai said, shaking her head.

"Shino-san," Isago said slowly, "Your clansmen can communicate with insects other than your own, correct? You used that hive of bees earlier to confirm that the bandits had passed by them."

"That is correct." Shino said, voice clipped.

"And this is the first time you have seen an insecticide in use on this mission."

Shino nodded once, sharply.

"They might be trying to slow us down." Isago said grimly. "If they know an insect user is after them, they're going to want to remove any advantage."

"But how would they know there's an insect user in the group?" Temari asked, leaning forward.

"Could they be watching us?" Kurenai asked, turning to Hinata.

The girl was frowning. "I-I don't see how. Unless they can h-hide from the Byakugan, I-I should have seen them."

"What about a long-ranged spying technique?" Isago asked. "I know there are some that can get a few kilometer's distance."

Hinata flushed. "I-I have an eight kilometer range. U-Unless they are using s-something that has a l-longer range, then I sh-should have seen them."

Kankuro whistled, impressed. "Guess we don't have to worry about people sneaking up on us, then."

"But if they're not watching us, then how did they get that information?" Temari asked, bringing the conversation back on track.

"Sensei, I didn't use my insects anywhere near the village, and you didn't give them my last name." Shino had calmed down some, but his fists were still clenched at his sides. "The only way they'd know I was an insect-user would be if they recognized me as Aburame."

Nodding, Kurenai considered that. As much as she disliked the implications, there was another possibility, one she liked even less. "Unless they got the information from the missions scrolls." She turned to the Suna-nin. "Do you know if Hokage-sama sent the Kazekage our names?"

Isago shook his head. "We didn't know who we were meeting, just a team of one jounin and two chuunin."

"Gaara might have gotten that information," Temari said, thoughtfully. "I wouldn't put it past him to say nothing, if he thought our having that information might bias the mission before we even met up."

Kankuro snorted. "Probably did. That sounds just like him."

"It's probably best to assume that our names are on the mission scroll somewhere in Suna. So the information could have come from someone in either Konoha or Suna," Kurenai said, thinking out loud. "This is an A-ranked mission, so the list of people who could access the details is short, but it's not impossible to assume that at least one person on the list sold us out."

"But why?" Kankuro wanted to know. "This is supposed to be bandit cleanup with a handful of missing-nin, the only reason it's not a B is because of all the politics."

"U-unless they're not just bandits or missing-nin," Hinata whispered. The group turned to look at the girl, but she was staring off into the distance, eyes unseeing. "This could be a subsidized group, o-or even," she hesitated, but plowed on, "even a s-scouting t-team. S-someone could be l-looking to take a-advantage of Suna and Konoha's v-vulnerabilities."

Isago leaned forward, offended by the implied slight to his village. "What makes you think that?"

Shino gave him a withering look. "Isago-san, Suna has just undergone a transfer of power. There is a new Kage on the throne and he is particularly young for his position, of course people are going to push to see what they can get away with." His gaze turned back to his teammate. "Who, Hinata? Who has an interest?"

Hinata bit her lip, still gazing into the distance. "I d-don't think either of the daimyo would want to jeopardize the alliance. I-I'm pretty sure the generals feel the same, and I can't think of any powerful merchants with interests in this area. I a-also don't see any towns or villages c-contracting with a group of missing-nin, there's no motive."

Shino frowned. "That leaves the shinobi. And while I think we can probably discount Kiri and Kumo, if only because of geography, that still leaves a number of smaller villages and Iwa, not to mention independent groups and interests, including some within Konoha and Suna."

Temari frowned. "While I agree with your reasoning, do you really think this is that big? Are we sure this isn't some petty bandit boss who's hired a bunch of missing-nin and is looking to build a power base?"

Kurenai shrugged. "It is possible, of course." She hesitated a moment, then decided to lay some of her cards on the table. "Hokage-sama told us to make sure this mission was a success. She wants the alliance with Suna to hold."

"Trust me, Gaara's the same way," Kankuro said wryly.

"If this mission fails, it could damage relations between Konoha and Suna." Isago was standing now, pacing as he talked. "If it goes really badly, then it might be enough to sever them."

"Then we'll just have to make sure it doesn't." Temari retorted, hefting her fan onto her back.

"If they have information on Shino, then it's safe to assume they have information on the Konoha team, if not all of us." Kurenai said. "This is going to get messy."

"But now we have some advance warning," Isago pointed out. There was general nodding at this. Packing up swiftly, the group moved out.

They spent the next two days following the trail, finding more signs that pointed to their target's having some knowledge of the team. Two more hives of bees, a nest of paper wasps, and a large anthill were all found dead, and with each discovery Shino got more and more tense. Hinata very nearly walked into a trap that her Byakugan had missed, and was caught at the last minute by Kankuro, who had noticed something off about the ground in front of her and was fast with his chakra strings. They also found a couple more abandoned pieces of weaponry that Isago and Temari tentatively identified as being from Ame.

Midmorning on the third day after they found the first dead hive, Hinata suddenly called the team to a halt, eyes focused on something in the distance. "Chakra signatures up ahead," she said softly. "About eight kilometers out." She swallowed. "I c-count seventeen, and at least six are definitely shinobi."

"Can you guess at ranks?" Kurenai asked, staring in the same direction as her student.

Hinata shook her head. "Not at this distance."

"Right." Isago moved up to flank them. "We'll need to get closer while staying as hidden as possible. If we move fast, we can get there around noon, get some time to watch them."

The group moved out, more carefully now they had their prey in sight. As they advanced, they did their best to hide their chakra signatures. Hinata and Temari had the most trouble – Temari because she had the worst chakra control of the group, Hinata because she was keeping her Byakugan activated at the same time. At around 13.00, Shino called them to a halt again, this time a mere kilometer from the group. Hinata quietly identified eighteen chakra signatures, and using a combination of size and subtle signs indicating refinement of their chakra systems, tentatively ranked them.

What she found was troubling. She positively identified one jounin, three people who could be special jounin or high chuunin, two who were definitely chuunin-level, and three more who could be high genin or low chuunin. The other nine had varying levels of chakra, and she placed them at genin or pre-genin level, although she admitted that some could be non-shinobi who simply had more chakra than most civilians.

Swearing softly and creatively, Isago wrote everything Hinata reported down on a spare slip of paper with the date and their location, then rolled it up into a tight scroll and summoned a small desert lizard. He tied the scroll to the animal's back, instructing it to report to Baki with the information. That done, he ordered Temari and Kankuro to stay behind and watch out for any reinforcements while he joined the Konoha team in scouting up close.

Fanning out, they managed to get within fifty meters of the 'bandits' and settled in to watch. They counted nine wearing hitai-ate, obviously shinobi by the way they dressed and acted. The other nine looked to be soldiers. Almost all of them wore the same symbol somewhere on their clothing: the four vertical lines of Ame with a single horizontal slash through them. After observing the group for about an hour and a half, they worked their way back to the siblings.

The camp's layout and the enemy numbers were discussed in exacting detail, maps drawn in the dirt as the scouts tried to pass on everything about the site. The question then became what to do next. The original mission had called for elimination of the bandits, but that was before anybody realized just how many shinobi there were in the group.

On the one hand, they were outnumbered three to one. On the other, this was probably the best chance they were going to get to take out this group. They could try to send for backup, but the odds were good that reinforcements wouldn't make it in time. In the end, as the sun was starting to dip to the horizon, they decided to attack.

In the wee hours of the morning Shino's hive began to slip into the interloper's campsite, quietly draining the chakra of the sleepers. Shino, standing a dozen meters from the camp, winced as he sensed the liberal amounts of insecticide they'd used around their camp. He was going to lose a lot of insects to this mission – he'd just have to hope the insecticide-resistant ones he'd been encouraging to breed would be enough. As the grey of dawn began to lighten the sky, one of Kurenai's genjutu forced the sleepers into unconsciousness and Kankuro and Isago took out the sentries. That done, Hinata stood watch, Byakugan activated, while the rest of the team moved through the sleepers, killing.

The team met up at the firepit, communicating numbers in hand signals. Shino had killed two, Kankuro three. Temari had gotten two, while Kurenai and Isago had each downed four. That was fifteen deaths, including the two sentries. Shino frowned, then whirled at the sounds of a scuffle behind him. Three of the shinobi with the slashed Ame hitai-ate stood behind them, the one Hinata had identified as jounin-class with an arm pinning Temari's arms to her sides and a kunai at her throat. At his side, one of the special jounin had grabbed Hinata and was menacing her eyes with a set of claws. One of the chuunin, bleeding from an injury to the shoulder, stood behind them. Shino glanced down to see that three of the bodies had been moved, revealing holes. They'd been hiding under the bodies of the rest of the squadron.

The Ame rogues backed away, keeping a tight grip on their hostages. "Stay right there," the leader said, "And we won't gut these two pretty ladies right in front of you."

Kankuro growled under his breath and Shino's hive began to rumble, more of his insects pouring from under his sleeves and swirling around his body.

"This one's Hyuuga," the special jounin informed his superior, using the claws to force Hinata's head back on pain of losing her eyes. "Main house too, it looks like."

"She'd be worth a lot on the black market," the chuunin put in. "Her weight in silver easily, if not gold."

"And the Kazekage's sister's got a pretty price on her head too," the leader mused, forcing Temari to keep pace with him as he backed up. "So this mission wasn't a total–"

Three things happened in very quick succession. Kankuro pulled Kuroari out from its hiding place in the trees, scooping up the chuunin. Half Shino's hive boiled up around the leader, pounding into him like hail and sinking jaws into whatever exposed skin they could find. Kurenai's hands snapped into the last of the string of seals she'd been slowly forming, careful to keep Shino between her hands and the three rogues as she did so, snaring the special jounin holding her student hostage in a genjutsu.

The jounin flinched and winced at the insect's attacks, giving Temari all the opportunity she needed to break his grasp. Twisting under his arm she wrenched his wrist enough to make him release the kunai and, catching it, sunk it into his throat.

Hinata was not quite as lucky. The genjutsu bought her time to force her enemy's hand away from her face and wrench away, but the special jounin broke through the genjutsu quickly enough to reach out after her, tearing through her coat and leaving three deep slashes across her arm. Wincing, Hinata pulled away, spun under his hand, and slammed a palm into his chest, pumping more chakra into the strike than she'd have liked. Bloody spittle frothed from his mouth and he collapsed, heart shredded.

Shino was at his injured teammate's side in moments, gently pulling the remains of her sleeve away from the cuts. Kankuro shoved the special jounin onto his side, extricating the claws and examining them. "Poisoned," he informed the team at large.

"Do you know it?" Temari demanded.

Kankuro shook his head. "I know enough to know it's not an animal poison, but plant-derived toxins aren't my strong point."

Shino drew a kunai and cut the sleeve off of Hinata's coat, fashioning a tourniquet from strips of the material. That done, he pulled a vial from his pouch and pressed it into Hinata's hand, then stood and took off into the trees.

"Where does he think he's going?" Isago demanded from where he'd been securing the prisoner inside Kuroari, stripping the man of weapons and making sure he wasn't carrying a suicide pill.

The question went largely ignored. Kurenai and Temari were busy checking the bodies to make sure they were dead and Kankuro was bent over the slash on Hinata's arm. "No strange colors at the wound, the smell of the toxin's being largely covered by the blood…" he muttered, examining it carefully.

Hinata gently pushed him back. "W-watch out, Kankuro-san." Opening the vial with her teeth, she carefully poured the liquid over the injuries, hissing slightly in pain as it made contact. "It's a general disinfectant with a mild anti-toxin," she explained. "It should give me a little extra time and hold off infection."

Kankuro whistled, impressed. "Nice. That should help." He turned Hinata's arm, considering. "These don't look too deep, either. As long as we bandage them carefully I don't think you'll need stitches." Pulling some of the extra bandaging from Karasu loose, he folded it into a pad and gently pressed it to the wound.

Ten minutes later Shino returned, carrying both his pack and Hinata's. Kneeling by his teammate and Kankuro, he opened his pack, pulling out his medical kit. Between the two of them, Kankuro and Shino bound up Hinata's wound to their satisfaction, Shino ignoring Hinata's insistence that she would be fine without the two of them fussing over her, Kankuro following his example.

Once they'd finished, the trio returned to the group at large. Kurenai and Temari had begun searching the dead and the assorted packs while Isago, apparently having secured the captive to his satisfaction, had used a doton technique to open a trench near the firepit and was starting to haul the bodies to it. The boys joined him while Hinata was firmly relegated to sorting through the packs thanks to her injuries.

By the time the bodies were all disposed of in the trench and it closed back up again, it was approaching midday. Hinata and Temari had sorted out the packs, and the group gathered to go over the contents. Most of the weapons were sealed into two scrolls, and Kurenai and Isago each took one. Ame-gear or not, it was largely good metal that could be melted down and reforged. The clothes were discarded, as were most of the rations, going into another hole Isago created. The papers were examined carefully, but information was frustratingly scant. There was a map of the border regions between Konoha and Suna's respective territories, the villages that had already been attacked scratched off. There were a couple of requisition orders, a few personal letters, and a number of smaller scraps. The only thing that looked even remotely like a formal order was a note three lines long and signed with the slashed Ame symbol.

Your orders are threefold: to observe and monitor shinobi and military activity, to cause trouble for Suna and Konoha's alliance, and to train the men under your command. You are to report in at the end of five months – progress reports are to be sent in every two weeks in the usual manner. Do not advertise your shinobi status.

Besides the obvious orders, it meant nothing to any of the group. The papers were shuffled together and placed in Isago's pack, the remnants of the bandit's packs thrown in on top of their clothes and food and buried. As the prisoner was captured on the Kazekage's orders and Suna was closer, the team set off for the desert village right after eating a quick lunch. They were somewhat burdened by the prisoner, who was still being kept inside Kuroari, but as they could move more or less in a direct line their pace was faster than it had been for several days.

The first indication that something was seriously wrong came the next morning. The rest of the team was up and getting ready to move out before Hinata, which was a little bit strange as the girl was usually up earlier than most. When Shino went to wake her, she was groggy and sluggish. She didn't want to eat anything either, and looked positively green when Kurenai offered her some food.

"Hinata, are you all right?" Kurenai asked.

"I-I'm fine, sensei." Hinata said softly.

Temari shot the other girl a slight smirk. "Feeling a little under the weather after that injury?" she asked. "Can't say I blame you, it looked pretty nasty."

Hinata nodded, and Temari turned to sling on her pack and fan. Picking up her own pack, Hinata stumbled a little. Shino frowned, watching her carefully, but said nothing.

About an hour after they'd left their campsite, it was blatantly obvious something was wrong. Hinata was paler than usual and having trouble keeping up with the pace the rest of the team had set. Shino dropped back to pace her silently.

His caution was validated when Hinata abruptly stumbled into a tree trunk and slid to her knees, shaking so much she was incapable of supporting her own weight.

"Hinata!" That caught everybody's attention. Nobody had ever heard Shino raise his voice.

Within moments the rest of the team had landed around them, Kankuro crouching on Hinata's other side. "Seizure," the puppeteer snarled, hands going to steady Hinata as she nearly fell over.

Shino had his fingers on Hinata's wrist. "Her heart rate's too high."

Kurenai hissed. That was not good, especially given Hinata's history of heart injuries. "How far are we from Suna?"

Temari bit her lip. "At least a day's fast march."

"Hinata's got some antidotes on her, she knows them better than I do but there might be something…" Shino sounded frustrated.

"I've got some things too." Kankuro added. "It's not going to be pretty, but we can probably keep her stable."

"Temari, once we reach the outer patrols I want you to go on ahead." Isago took charge of the situation. "Move fast and report directly to Kazekage-sama. Make sure he knows what's happened and make sure there's a medic-nin on standby for when we get in."

Shino slipped Hinata's pack off her shoulders and onto his own while the Suna jounin picked up the girl. Her seizure had stopped by this point and she laid limply while he arranged her across his back. The group moved out at speed, stopping briefly around noon for the shinobi to choke down some food. Shino and Kurenai tried to get Hinata to eat, but couldn't do more than make her drink some water.

"Nausea, fatigue, seizure, and an elevated heart rate," Shino recited, carefully watching his teammate to make sure she drank. "Kankuro-san is sure that the poison is plant-based, can you think of anything…"

Hinata shook her head wearily. "There's something, something about a bean, but I can't remember. My mind feels foggy."

Kankuro, meanwhile, had been sorting through his own stores of antidotes. When he failed to find what he wanted, he turned to the girl. "Hinata, do you have anything that'll slow your heart rate some? I've got some things but they're mainly toxic and I'd rather not use them and risk a reaction."

Hinata nodded slowly and Shino passed her her pack. Digging in it she found a small bottle. "This might work."

Kankuro looked the bottle over, sniffing the contents, then passed it back. "Take a little bit. Not much, just a tiny bit. Beans," he muttered to himself. "What about beans…"

The group moved out again shortly after Hinata had choked down her dose, the little Hyuuga being carried again by the Suna jounin. About an hour later she had another seizure, this one worse. Shino stayed as close to her as he could, hands clenched in his pockets in frustrated rage. Kankuro kept muttering under his breath, listing as many plant poisons as he knew and trying to figure out which ones fit Hinata's symptoms. As he worked his way through the lists he'd suggest names to Hinata, hoping she'd recognize one as the poison working its way through her body.

"What about the Nightshades?"

"P-possible, b-but my eyes are fine."

"Foxglove, Wolfsbane?"

"It w-would fit the h-heart rate and n-nausea, but n-not the seizures." Hinata closed her eyes, leaning her head against Isago's shoulder. "I-I'm so sure I know w-what this is," she said softly. "I-It's just out of r-reach, but I know this."

"Is there anything you can remember, anything at all?"

Hinata shook her head. "J-Just that it's a bean, and s-something about oil."

Late that afternoon, as the sun was beginning to approach the horizon, Temari shot ahead of the group. She'd recognized the outer limits of the village patrols and, using her chakra to boost her speed, tore into the village. Stopping only briefly to identify herself to the guards, she hurried to the Kazekage's offices. Gaara was in the middle of sorting through piles of paperwork when she got there.

"Temari, you're back." A slight, nearly invisible smile crossed the young Kage's face. "Where is the rest of your team?"

"I came on ahead," Temari told him, trying to keep her breathing as steady as possible. "Mission success, even if it was an absolute fiasco. We even got a prisoner for you. Hyuuga Hinata was poisoned during the attack on the so-called bandits. She was relatively okay when I left, but Isago requests a medic-nin on standby at the gates."

"Baki," Gaara's voice was clipped. "Have somebody sent to the hospital to retrieve a medic who specializes in poisons. Take two men with you and collect the prisoner when the team arrives. Temari, what do you mean by 'fiasco'? We got the report Isago sent in, but it was rather vague."

"The mission was to deal with a group of bandits, Gaara, not an eighteen-man battalion." That got everyone's attention. Baki stopped at the door, listening. "We were expecting ex-soldiers with the odd chuunin-level missing-nin. We found nine shinobi wearing slashed Ame hitai-ate and nine – I'm not sure what they were. They looked like ex-soldiers, but Hinata said their chakra systems were more developed than a civilian's."

"Baki." Gaara's usually calm voice had gone cold. "Get the medics to the gates and make sure there aren't any more injuries. I want the prisoner in interrogation as soon as possible." The jounin nodded and was gone. "Temari, I'll wait for a full debriefing until the rest of your team is here. In the meantime, you should go to the hospital and get checked out."

"Gaara, I'm fine, I wasn't injured."

"The dried blood on your neck tells me otherwise. Please, Temari, go."

Temari went.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

Hinata's memories of the rest of the day would always be a little fuzzy. She remembered being carried, trying to answer as many of Kankuro's questions as she could until she couldn't remember the answers. She hadn't even noticed when Temari sped off ahead of the group. Sometime after the sun went down she had vague impressions of a jumble of voices, and then she was being moved, picked up off Isago's back and laid down on something. Then she was moving again, whatever she'd been placed on swaying back and forth a little.

Hinata closed her eyes, and let everything go black.


A/N:

I'm back! Exams are over, I'm done for the semester, and I'm officially on summer break. In practical terms, this means I have a little down time before I go back to school at the start of June for a research internship. I should be able to get most of the next chapter done before I go back, so hopefully I can pull myself back to my update-every-fortnight schedule.

Isago is canon. He's listed as one of Baki's assistants, and leads one of the rescue teams when Gaara is kidnapped in Shippuden. Similarly, the poison the Ame-nin used on Hinata is a legitimate poison I can easily see being found in the Naruto-verse. Hinata's right, it is from a bean, and there is oil involved. Brownie points to whoever is able to identify it.

This is regrettably unbetaed. Pyrozia has finals coming up and didn't have time to look it over. Therefore all errors are mine.

Next Chapter: Hospitality of the Desert