An: I AM SORRY (sigh, again) about being so late getting the chapter up so late. I am back now that the technical difficulties are all over (for now at least).I beg for forgiveness! (neji: hmph Me: Can it you) Anywho, on with it. Oh and to talonlee-san who sent me a review, I didn't realize that we don't know the sand siblings last names (never noticed)! And no, I don't think Rock lee's last name is Lee. At least that's not how I interpreted it as his last name. Yeah, true there are several adults we don't have the last names either for but I was complaining just about the kids. Though…ya think they would give us Tsunade's because she was the 1st hokage's grandfather and the 2nd was her uncle…or was it the other way around…..oh no wait I was right the 1st time.

Neji: Some Naruto fan you are, you don't even know that much about Kohona history?

Me: Okay Mr. Hyuga genius No. One rookie, if you so smart tell me about Kohona history.

Neji: (sweatdrop) Uh...Hey TenTen, Shikamaru can you help me out here?

Me: (smirks) knew it. You live in Kohona and you don't even know the history of it. How sad.

Neji: HEY I know important wars and stuff…just not who's related to who that's all!

Me: Okay if you say so.

Neji: Grumbles.

TenTen: Neji did you call for me?

Neji: Its okay never mind.

ME: Where's Shikamaru?

(TenTen points over to the couch were he is listening to my mp3 player asleep)

Me: Hmm, we could be mean and turn the volume up or we could just go do something else. (We all look at each other)

Neji: Let's do it.

TenTen: Yeah

Me: Goodie! Heehee…..

Together We are Unstoppable Believe it!

Chapter Fourteen

The secrets hidden in the Sand: Things get complicated!

Deidara and Tobi looked over the village hidden in the mist.

"Remind me again Deidara-san why we are here?"

Deidara turned to look at his not-too-observant partner and asked with a bored look,

"Do you have any brains at all?"

"We are to wait here, until the leaf ninja get here, then we make our move."

"If you ask me, we should just get them as soon as they get out of sand."

"Yes but the alliance between leaf and sand are too strong not to mention those ninja are personal friends of the Kazakage. Framing them wouldn't work, but killing them near here would easily cause issues…ninja on a simple peaceful mission with an "alleged" ally; an alliance that is still shaky to say the least; killing them would cause quite the conflict…"

"You mean the boss is going to start using the demons that soon after getting the kyuubi?"

"The kyuubi is one of the strongest of the demons. We can easily use it do cause a new ninja war and find the final demons."

"Yeah but without Hiden and Kakuze it's going to take longer to seal the kyuubi."

"So what? We still will have it and it won't take much to use it."

"Good point."

"Just stay out of my way and shut up or I'll blow you up with my clay figures." Growled the blonde as his companion slowly dozed off for the eighth time that morning.

The group of leaf ninja reached Sunakuge right on schedule. (Sakura complained that they would have gotten there early if Kakashi didn't take so long to get ready in the morning.) The ninja slowly entered the village hidden the sand. They wondered who would be their escort when Temari walked up to them smiling.

"Hey guys. I'll be your tour guide for this one." She said in a cocky voice grinning the whole time at Shikamaru.

"Oooh, now I know why granny-sama let you come." Teased Naruto at Shikamaru who groaned.

"Can it Naruto you know it wasn't."

"Yeah, so watch it loud mouth." Said Temari with narrowed eyes.

"Okay, okay, geez you two still can't take a joke!"

"Any way, Gaara would have came himself but-"

Suddenly, they heard a bunch of girls squealing, some of them rivaling even Sakura's and Ino's loud high pitched voices, and then the girls that went with them went running past them, each one with some sort of "I love Gaara-sama" slogan. Everyone stared after the group and Temari sighed.

"Yeah, after the battle with Orochimaru, all of Gaara's fan girls have started to really getting annoying. He's already got 10 wedding proposals this morning alone." She groaned rolling her eyes. Well come on, he really wants to see you all so let's go." The sand siblings said leading the way towards the Kazakage's tower with Yamato and Kakashi not far behind. Ino and Sakura looked thoughtfully after the Gaara fan club and asked,

"Were Ino and I ever that bad?" she said looking at her best friend who eye brows were cocked at the fan club as well. The boys all looked at each other took a step forward and in unison they yelled,

"YES!" before making a break for it. Ino and Sakura watched them run even Sasuke, then looked at each other and started to laugh.

"Don't you just love messing with them?" giggled Sakura.

"Oh yeah, and yeah we were that bad well, you more so than me over Sasuke." Sakura glared at the blonde and said,

"Oh yeah who jumped all over Sasuke every chance she got?"

"Nice try billboard brow, it was you."

"Don't think so Ino pig." Growled the pinked haired girl. So all the way to the tower, the boys sighed as the girls argued on who was the worse fan girl. All the boys secretly knew that they both had been equally bad but none of them we brave enough or as Naruto said stupid enough to point it out.

When they got inside, Temari lead them into a meeting room with a large round table, Gaara already there. Naruto smiled and said,

"Hiding from your fan girls?"

Gaara half glared at him before he said,

"Don't even start."

Naruto laughed and shook hands with him. Once everyone had gotten settled, Gaara started.

"Well, we haven't really gained anymore information about Akatsuki, though they are on the move. We aren't sure but we think they are either after the kyuubi (Gaara nodded towards Naruto) or another demon. Besides that we really don't have much more than Tobi and Deidara have been sighted." Naruto growled.

"The same Deidara who went after you and took your demon?" asked Sakura.

"Yes the same."

"Great the guy we have no clue about and the clay guy just great." Grumble Naruto.

"Deidara is from the village hidden the rocks and Tobi is from where?" sighed Ino.

"Yeah, Deidara specialty is exploding clay figures and Tobi's is as much of a mystery as the leader is we have no idea were he is from or what his techniques are." said Temari leaning back in her chair.

"Sounds like fun." Said Sasuke casually looking at the just mentioned criminal's files.

"They aren't pushovers that's for sure." Sighed Kakashi.

Gaara nodded.

"Deidara was banished from his village for his experiments with his clay figures. He used fellow ninja for target practice."

"Urg." Stated Choji simply.

"So, what are you guys going to do now?" asked Temari looking at Shikamaru.

"Keep on heading towards the mist village and find out what we can about that girl that had the two-tailed cat demon and go from there." He answered lazily.

"Have you thought of any way to deal with the Akatsuki members?"

"Yeah but we have so little information it makes it hard to come up with a plan though thanks to you all's detailed info about Deidara, Kisame, and Itachi we've at least have a half of an idea."

"Can you at least stay the night?" asked Gaara looking over at Kakashi.

"Yeah, that probably would be a good idea."

When everyone else followed Temari out, Naruto and Gaara went out to the balcony to talk. Naruto sighed and leaned on the railings and looked over at Gaara. To lighten the mood, Naruto smirked and said looking over his shoulder,

"Yeah know, I think you have more fan girls than what Sasuke did."

Gaara rolled his eyes.

"Yes, probably and they are getting really annoying."

"Tried threaten them using sand burial yet?"

"Don't think I haven't thought about it."

Naruto laughed and said,

"Eh, you just need to get a girlfriend and they will back off."

Gaara grunted and stood beside him. At that moment, a fan girl that had been climbing the vine that was climbing up the wall, the vine snapped and she fell to the ground. The two looked down to hear the girl say,

"I'm okay! Gaara-sama, will you go out with me?!"

"Yeah, you really need to get a girlfriend." Naruto laughed at his friend.

"Hm, Naruto-san, have you thought about what you going to do once you are hokage?" asked Gaara looking at him.

Naruto stopped laughing and looked up to the clear sky.

"With all that's been going on with Orochimaru and Akatsuki, I really hadn't thought about it."

"Why aren't I surprised?"

"Watch it." Muttered Naruto as Gaara smirked at him.

"And to answer your question truly, I am acutely kind of worried."

Gaara looked wisely at him.

"You know, like can I be as great as the others, am I really ready….is Tsunade going to dump all her back paper work on me…."

Gaara chuckled at him.

"You are a great shinobi; I don't think you'll have any problems…expect maybe all the paper work that Tsunade-san leaves you."

"Let me guess on how much paper work a kage gets."

"You don't want to know trust me."

"Ya know….it's kinda creepy when you try to make jokes." Gaara looked at him.

"Why?"

"Simple, Mr. I'm-going-to-kill-you-Kankuro-if-you-make-just-one-joke."

"Alright point made."

Sasuke, Choji, Sakura and Ino were all hanging out in their guest rooms. (Yamato was sleeping; Kakashi was somewhere reading his book, and as for Shikamaru, the theory was that he left with Temari somewhere and probably wouldn't be back for a while.)

Sakura and Ino were on the floor talking while Choji was munching on some Sand village candy and Sasuke was laying on the bed with his eyes closed hands behind his head. Ino suddenly sighed and said thinking out loud,

"I wonder who would be better for Gaara, some one like Hinata whose quiet or some one who's out going like me?"

"You forgot to mention loud mouthed." Snickered Sakura. Ino glared at her.

"Whatever billboard brow."

"You aren't seriously going to try to hook Gaara up with some one are you?" asked Sasuke not moving from his comfortable bed.

"And why not?! You know what, I'm going to go for a little walk come on Sakura." Said Ino getting up. Sakura looked after her for a moment then shrugged and followed suit.

Choji chuckled and said,

"Poor Gaara-sama he'll never know what hit him."

Sasuke snickered and nodded.

The night was fairly peaceful; they spent some of it eating with the sand siblings. (Temari and Shikamaru where late for dinner and left not long after, earning some jokes from Naruto and Kankuro when they returned; Temari threatened to take both of their heads off with her fan if they didn't can it so they both quickly ran for it.) Besides that, the night was peaceful; (well, Sasuke had trouble sleeping thanks to Naruto's snoring but other than that it was uneventful).

Early the next morning every one was packed up and really to move out. Shikamaru walked a little ways off with Temari.

Temari didn't say anything not like she had to. The two looked at each other then kissed very deeply to say good bye. When the two broke apart, Temari brought him into a crushing hug and said,

"You had better come back to me in one piece." Shikamaru smirked and said,

"I promise I will." And with that he kissed her on the forehead and returned to the group.

"Getting a kiss good-bye?" snickered Naruto when the shadow ninja returned.

"You know what, keep that up and I'll use my shadow sewing jutsu on you."

Finally everyone was ready to go and Gaara was there to see them off. Though Ino was still missing.

"Urgh, where is she?" complained Naruto to Sakura who only shrugged.

"I dunno she mentioned that she had to find some one before we left."

"Sorry Guys I was late!" waved Ino as she ran up to the group. With her was a girl who was very nice looking. She had redish-brown hair that went to her shoulders and warm brown eyes. She was wearing a simple but nice blue sun dress with a sliver locket around her neck. She was being pulling (more like dragged) by Ino.

"Ino-san…." The girl started but Ino interrupted her.

"Gaara-sama, Manami-san, Manami-san, Gaara-sama. Have fun! Gotta go bye!" she rushed, pushing her fellow leaf ninja to get moving, leaving a slightly stunned Kazakage and girl staring at each other not too sure what to say.

Gaara snapped back to his senses and waved to Naruto who waved back to say good-bye.

"Good luck, Naruto-sama." He smiled before turning back to the very pretty girl that Ino had brought to his attention….

"Ino, you are evil you know that?" chuckled Naruto as the group walked.

"Hey my matching making brought you and Hinata together!" pouted Ino.

"Yeah, by pure accident."

"How did you two finally get together anyway?" asked Sasuke looking at the two blondes.

Ino got a huge grin on her face.

"Well-l, you see…"

"She got fed up of Hinata blushing and stuff every time she saw Naruto and just pushed the two together." Sighed Sakura.

"How?" asked Sasuke looking at Naruto.

"She pushed them together literally." Chuckled Choji who had been nearby at the time.

"So it was really dumb luck?" smirked Sasuke.

"Hey, it worked didn't it?" pouted Ino.

"Yeah, after Hinata fainted from embarrassment." Smirked Naruto.

Kakashi was smiling under his mask at the lot of them and said to Yamato quietly,

"It's good to see they can keep their sense of humor even in face of a hard mission."

"Indeed." Smiled Yamato looking at them.

So the ninja left the village hidden the sand, hoping that they were ready to meet whatever came their way. Destination: The village hidden in the mist.

-------------------

That's it for that chapter. Wow, it was short. Don't worry fellow action junkies; the action is coming up in the next chapter. Sorry about the rushed ending but I really wanted to get this up.

(Turn volume all the way up of course awaking and ticking off one Nara)

Shikamaru: (pulls earphones out) Why the heck did you do that for?!

(We all look at each other and shrug)

Me: We were bored.

Shikamaru: (rolls eyes) Why don't you guys just torture Neji some more?!

Me/TenTen: Been there done that.

Me: Yeah see, here are pictures of Neji with beads in his hair!

TenTen: Yeah, I helped!

Neji( eyes bulge): YOU WHAT!?

Me: Yep, when you took a nap

Neji: TenTen how could you?!

TenTen: (shrugs) Rock Lee wasn't around. (Neji sighs sadly)

Me: Come on TenTen, Let's go throw some kunai.

TenTen: Okay (we leave, Neji and Shikamaru sit down and look at each other)
Neji: Now what?

Shikamaru: Dunno

Me(calls out): You know it's pretty sad when two geniuses can't think of anything to do!

Neji/Shikamaru: GEE THANKS!

Me: Your welcome
NejiShikamaru: groans……

Lol, Kiki