Kairo Chapter 11

Zelos: Welcome you darn good-looking folks!

Sakura: (Winks) Does that include me, Zelos-kun?

Zelos: (Examines teeth in mirror) Depends…

Naruto: Like HELL it does, Sakura-hime!

Lloyd: …Hime? …Professor Sage, what the heck does 'Hime' mean?

Raine: (Sigh) It means princess in Japanese.

Lloyd: Ah. On with the story…

Gaara clutched his head even tighter, feeling the waves of pain coursing through his body. Eyes wide, and chest heaving, he dared looking up with out lurching forward in pain. Seeing his siblings staring at him with bewildered and concerned expressions.

"Nnngghh…" Gaara grunted his usual cold toned voice hoarse and cracked. His body threatened to fall down, on Gaara's stomach. Temari and Kankuro both saw this and rushed over.

Temari wrapped her arms around her little brother, pulling him close. Surprisingly, he buried his head into her neck. Something he didn't do since the sand siblings were very young. Tears came to Temari's eyes as Gaara rubbed his now damp face on her neck. 'He's crying…' Temari thought sadly. The last time Gaara cried was when their dad, the former Kazekage, destroyed all of his toys.

Kankuro wrapped a comforting arm around Temari's shoulder, putting his other hand on top of Gaara's fiery red head. He rubbed Gaara's head, messing up his red locks. (Not that it was neat to begin with.) Gaara let out a small hiccup. Kankuro looked at his older sister with a shocked expression, Gaara was actually crying! The shocked look quickly disappeared from Kankuro's face as he noticed that Temari was sobbing quietly.

Hinata gasped, forgetting about the battle, she ran over to Gaara who was being cradled by Temari. She knelt down beside Temari, who was weeping along with her baby brother. Hinata reached out, her hand and fingers trembling and stroked Gaara's stiff back. Gaara's back muscles tensed up even more at first, but relaxed when he realized it was Hinata.

Getting up from Temari's lap, (He somehow ended up in) Gaara turned to Hinata. His eyes were pink around his irises. Taking her hand in his, he guided it to his chest. Placing Hinata's hand over his heart, he stared into her eyes. Hinata blushed lightly. Sasuke scowled darkly, and everyone else stared in awe. Tenten, Ino, Sakura and Chai sighed dreamily. Temari smiled, wiping a few stray tears away.

Leaning in, Hinata proceeded in planting a chaste kiss to Gaara's left cheek. Just then a hand shot up from the ground, fingers clamping around Hinata's arm. She gasped, eyes shot wide. 'Itachi's back!'

Gaara's pained expression deepened, but he willed the sand to clamp around the arm. The sand shifted into the form of a hand, grabbing the limb sticking up from the ground, pulling it up violently.

It was being pulled up so hard by the sand, that Hinata thought that it would come right off Itachi's body. The sand kept pulling until Itachi's hand let go of Hinata's arm. Hinata was scared to death, she was roughly clutching Gaara's maroon shirt.

Gaara winced as another wave of pain overcame him, his control over the sand weakened and loosened. That was a big mistake, because as soon as the sand was loose enough, Itachi emerged from the dirt.

Brushing off excess sand off of his dirty cloak, he stared at Gaara and his supposed victim. Before he could move, he sensed something sharp slicing through the air behind him. Quickly reaching into his cloak and pulling out a Numei sword, Itachi batted away at the kunai, much like Sammy Sosa would to a baseball.

"OH GOD DAMN YOU!" Naruto hollered, causing Sakura who was standing beside him to clutch her ears. 'We have to do something!' She thought. 'If we can't take care of even ONE Akatsuki member, how are we supposed to clear this mission?' Her jade eyes wandered to where Itachi was standing, Chai and Lee were going crazy. 'Tsunade once told me, that when you're in a situation where you can't do anything, you just have to do what you can!' with a new sense of determination swirling inside of her, Sakura ran into the fray.

"Sakura-chan?" Naruto called after her. Turning around, Sakura gave him an angry look. "Don't just stand their gaping all day! We need to take Itachi down!" she yelled, turning her head back to the fight that was beginning again. 'Yeah!' Naruto ran after her.

"Neji!" Shikamaru shouted while dodging a storm of tiny shuriken. Neji jumped back to Shikamaru who took his distance from the enemy. Panting, he turned to the analysis expert. "What?" Neji moved his head to the side to evade another kunai, still facing Shikamaru.

"I have a plan." Shikamaru replied, looking to the Byakugan master. "If everybody can keep him busy," he paused deflecting a senbon that was supposed to plunge into his stomach. "Maybe me and Kankuro can immobilize him by using my shadow possession technique, and his puppet master technique." Neji gazed at him absently, considering the plan. Shikamaru watched, but widened his eyes suddenly when a dagger flew dangerously close to his head. Luckily it made a by-pass, and plunged into the snow.

Neji looked at him and nodded quickly, his cheeks were pink because of the cold. Shikamaru nodded back and jumped further back. Neji grit his teeth and went deeper into, what seemed like a raging war zone. Kunai, senbon, shuriken flying out in all directions, the clang of metal clashing against metal, sparks flying due to the burning of chakra, and the cries of pain and struggle. A shrill scream echoed through the shell of his ears before he realized what had happened. As if regaining his eye sight, Neji looked to the source of the scream.

Sure enough, their was Tenten. The long sword, thin sword that Itachi had pulled out earlier was slashed across her stomach. The sword was stuck in Tenten's left hip. Her eyes were wide, she was taking deep ragged breaths, but anyone could tell that. Temari, who was actually protecting Gaara, was about to swing her fan but stopped short when she saw what everyone else was staring at. Itachi grinned malevolently, pulling it out sharply, causing Tenten to crumble to the snow covered ground. Blood leaked out of Tenten's wound, the red droplets contrasting with the white snow.

"Tenten!" Anger and Rage swelled in Neji's chest. Sprinting forwards, he scooped Tenten up in his arms. Itachi showed no signs of striking at him. He shifted her around so that he was cradling her in his arms. Her eyes were closed and her buns were messy, her Chinese styled top was ripped from ones side of her waist all the way to the middle of her belly. Her tan stomach was exposed. 'This can not be good, this wasn't destined to happen!' Neji thought miserably. He eyed her ripped clothing. 'She'll freeze.'

"Tenten!" Sakura shrieked, running over to aid her friend. Running up to Neji, she wrapped her arms around Tenten's waist, looking to Neji for permission to carry her. Neji was reluctant, but he positioned Tenten in Sakura's arms. He nodded and watched Sakura give him a small smile, running to a safe spot so she can use a healing technique.

Lee gritted his teeth ferociously, Chai scowled angrily, and they both charged ruthlessly towards Itachi. Chai was knocked back with another swing of Itachi's sword, but Lee managed to cling onto his blood-stained cloak. What a delirious move! Lee has definitely lost his mind!

From near by, Gaara was staring at the scene, panting heavily. Most of the pain had subsided, but Gaara hadn't fully recovered from his 'attack'. One of his best friends, and former victims, was about to die. 'A foolish move that can cost Lee his life… Unless… He has a few tricks up his sleeve.'

In fact, Lee had created quite a commotion with Itachi. While Lee latched onto his arm, he started pounding him with punches to Itachi's chest and stomach. Itachi had hunched over, spitting some blood onto the snow when Lee landed a successful blow. Lee planted his feet on Itachi's hip, and jumped off of him. Itachi slumped over even further. He glared up at Lee, who frowned. They stared each other down, both staying in their positions.

Tenten had been healed; she sat cross legged in the snow, a blanket from Sakura's supplies bag draped around her shoulders. Chai who had been hurt earlier was currently clutching her side, Sakura was bandaging her left hip. Chai eyed the fight. Lee and Itachi were just standing there, staring at each other. No one seemed like they would move anytime soon. Neji had walked over to comfort Tenten. Chai watched as Neji sat down, hauling Tenten up onto his lap with his arms. He whispered sweet things into her ear, making her close her eyes and coo. She smiled, but raised her eyebrows when she heard trudging noises.

Itachi had stood up, still glaring, but he didn't seem to be focusing on just Lee. He leered at every one of them, pausing, and holding his gaze on Hinata, and the stranger in the pink jacket.

"You may have one this round, but that doesn't mean you'll get the best of both worlds next time." He growled evilly, hiding his Numei back into his cloak.

Sasuke lunged forwards, kunai poised and ready to stab. But before he could even touch the material of Itachi's cloak, Itachi glared at him and disappeared in a puff of red smoke. Sasuke halted, breathing in even breaths. 'He was gone for now… But I wonder why he came anyway.' That thought ran through everyone's heads. Stashing the kunai back into it's holster, Sasuke turned to the group.

Tenten looked up at the sky, getting up from Neji's lap. She smiled brightly, forgetting that she was still injured.

"Let's go! It's off to the Ice Country!"

"WAIT A SECOND!" A voice, shriller than Ino's hollered. Everybody froze and looked for the source. Sakura stood their, ruffling her own pink locks and smiling sheepishly, staring at the man with flaming red hair, and pink clothes.

"We didn't catch YOUR name!"

This chapter was all about the action, as you probably know by now, the fight with Itachi was pretty long. But in the end, the team wins, but some of the shinobi are injured. Next chapter, they will finally find out who the mysterious guy in pink is.

Zelos: It's me! Zelos Wilder!

Lloyd: Shut up, Zelos!

Naruto: Yeah! Shut up!

Sasuke: How about you two shut up!

Naruto, Lloyd: NO!!!

Hinata: EVERYBODY QUITE!

Sasuke, Naruto, Lloyd, Zelos: Oo Whoa…

Temari: You tell them, girl!

Suzume-kage: Umm… wow…