I co-wrote this chapter with my friend and fellow kunoichi, Vicki. Or uhhh…. Kiri-kohai. Yurp. That's it. Kiri-kohai. So, enjoy! Oh, and make sure to check out her Shika-OC oneshot on Quizilla . teennick . com. Her screenname is xxrockxleexluverxx

I woke up just as Suna was coming into view. My throat was dry, and my tongue felt swollen from lack of water. My stomach clenched painfully from hunger. My head was pounding, and I felt like I would fall off Akamaru any second now. The only reason I wasn't toppling from the dog was Kiba's arm that pressed me close to his chest. I blinked slowly, and felt Kiba start as my eyelashes brushed against his skin, tickling his neck. I tried to sit up, but couldn't find any strength to. All I ended up doing was falling back into Kiba's arms, where he held me tight since I had almost fallen off Akamaru. His leather jacket was warm against my skin, the zippers burning.

"You awake?"

"Yeah...Can you help me sit up? You're burning me with your zippers."

"Hahaha, sorry. You feelin okay?"

"Nuh-uh. Not even a little."

"What's up? If you're gonna be sick, I'll if ya need me to."

"No…I'm just….not good."

"Oh, kay. We're almost there. Don't worry, Sakura'll fix ya when we get to Suna."

"Mmhmm…." I murmured. My head was pounding with the rhythm of Akamaru's footfalls. Nevertheless, I didn't want to get off. It was soothing in a way. No matter how much my head hurt.

Kiba carried me up the stairs, Kankuro and Sakura stomping up after us. When the door opened, I saw three soft bed-couch-chaise-table things. Kiba set me on the closest one. The cushion ns were cold and rough against my sunburned arms. I looked over to see Natsūme still passed out, and Kōhī talking in her sleep. Kankuro was actually sitting on the floor beside her, holding her hand.

Sakura was kneeling over Natsūme, and I heard the faint buzz of her healing jutsu. Moko-chan (who's barely a year older than us, but waaaaay more mature) was setting up funky little IVs for us. She was also doling out water bottles to everyone.

"Hey…"

"Yeah?" answered Sakura, who was closest to me. I may hate her, but I need to know stuff, don't I?

"Kakashi said Shika-kun was here."

"He's with Gaara. They should be here soon."

"They're actually on their way now. I was with them when you arrived. That's them now." Moko-chan said, handing me a water bottle, which I desperately gulped down. I could actually breathe without it hurting now.

The large door opened, and Shikamaru walked in, followed by Naruto and a pale-skinned red-head who must have been the Kazekage, Gaara.

…I can't restrain myself.

"Hey! Gaara! How's life without eyebrows?"

Gaara looked at me with an exasperated expression, but Naruto busted out laughing.

"He said that to Gaara years ago. He bragged about it for a month," Sakura explained, holding her buzzing hands over my head.

"What're you doing to my head, Pinky?"

"Well, I noticed that Kiba's shoulder was covered in blood. And since he has no wounds, and you were the only person on his shoulder, the blood obviously came from you."

"I have a head wound?"

"And a lot of them. You've cracked your skull against stuff a lot lately. You're even gashed to the bone over here." She explained, centering her buzzing-ness to an area above my right temple.

"I'm not surprised," Kakashi commented from where he was leaning against the back of the couch.

'Shut up, Kakashi." I laughed, then winced as I bumped my head on the arm of the couch. "Owwwww…."

Sakura grasped my chin, and pulled it down so she could see my head batter. "Stop moving, baka."

"Yes, mother." I said sarcastically. I noticed how Kakashi tensed when I said that, but ignored it, instead focusing on Shika and Gaara.

"-troublesome woman." I heard Shika say, gesturing towards me. Gaara nodded, and turned the other way to talk to Moko-chan. I swear, absolutely SWEAR, I saw him smile as she talked to him.

Shika came over, and squatted next to the couch so he was about level than me.

"Heeey…..Shika-kun….."

He just rolled his eyes, sighing, and simply replying, "Troublesome woman… You need to be more careful."

I glared and growled slightly and snapped, "Hey, it's not my fucking fault I got kidnapped by some damn people that I don't even know! They frickin drugged me, for Kami's sake!"

He just smirked and stood up again. "Hey Sakura," he said smugly, "I think she's either fine, or has serious head problems, because she seems to be even more foul-mouth than usual. Maybe you should check her extra carefully, just to be sure." I heard Kiba snickering at Shika's comment. I shot a glare at him, making him shut up instantly. Believe me, if looks could kill, he'd be dead on the spot. I smirked as he slowly backed away from my area, a totally terrified expression on his face. His look was priceless: 0.0' Total hilarity!

I heard Sakura standing and saying, "All done, Ijōna. You really need to try not to hit your head so much."

I sighed over-dramatically, complaining, "I already told you, it's not my frickin fault! They fucking drugged me, so my fucking senses were all jacked up! Plus I had to find some way to escape! It so happened that running into shit was more or less part of my plans."

Shika scoffed and said, "Sure, keep telling yourself that. Troublesome woman…"

"Shut the fuck up, you stupid-ass fuck!" I yelled, chunking the water-bottle at his head. I was truly pissed off. He ducked, and the metal bottle crashed into the wall, sticking out of the wall. It was lodged deep into the sheetrock.

I'm surprised it didn't shatter.

"Hey, calm down!"

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!"

"It's not my fault-"

"Grrrrrrgrrrrrrrgrrrrrrr….." I heard a deep growling sound from behind me, and then saw Kiba move in front of me.

"Oh…hey…uh…Kiba, what exactly are you doing…" I said nervously.

"Shut up, Shikamaru. She obviously doesn't want to listen to your crap. Take your stupid little 200 IQ self out of here before I end up doing something I know I won't regret." He said darkly.

I opened my eyes wide, surprised.

Well then…ummm….what the hell is going on here?

"Um...Kiba….What are you doing?" I asked, still kinda nervous.

"Look, I understand what she's saying, so you just need to calm-"

"I need to calm down? What about you? You're the one who was yelling at Ijōna!"

"She chunked a metal bottle at my fucking head! What do you expect me to do, bow down and give her the royal treatment?"

"Hey! Guys! I'm right the hell here!" I yelled, throwing a pillow at the back of Kiba's head. And none too gently either. And he didn't even budge. In fact, he didn't seem to even notice, because they just kept yelling at each other like nobody else was even there. Which they were. They were staring in disbelief. I'm pretty sure Sakura would have tried to move me out of the danger zone if Akamaru wasn't ready to kill her the second she got within three feet of me.

Which sucked, by the way. My head was throbbing. I could have appreciated her healing sedatives right about now. And I usually despise it when she's within hearing distance of me. Let alone touching distance. This is probably a once-in-a-lifetime moment.

Someone should write this down.

"No, I don't expect that. But I do expect you to at least try and be nice to her! Your lazy ass may not be able to handle women, but you could at least be smart enough to know when a girl is having monthly mood prob-"

He couldn't finish his sentence. He never had the chance. Sakura had kicked Akamaru out of the way, jumped the five feet all the way to Kiba, and completely smashed the dead center of his face. I heard his nose crunch. He doubled over, and was about to fall backwards onto me, when I kicked him hard in the base of the spine, and he flew into Shikamaru. They flew backwards into the wall, a distance of maybe twenty feet. They smashed through it, and into the next room, which just so happened to be Gaara's office, where Moko-chan and Gaara had disappeared a few minutes before this little "altercation."

They were somewhat entangled, leaning against Gaara's desk, Moko-chan flushed and breathless. Shika and Kiba were staring, and Naruto had bent down to stare through the hole with a gaping mouth. I stared blankly. I'm pretty sure we all were.

I tried not to laugh at Gaara's face. From what I've heard, he doesn't make very expressional faces much, besides anger and boredom. This: priceless. He was red-faced, and his eyes were wide. He was biting his lip. It was cute, because he looked so scared and embarrassed. I tried not to laugh, but failed. I let out a giggle, then shoved my fist in my mouth and buried my face in the pillow. I looked back up just as Moko-chan and Gaara quickly pulled away from each other, too embarrassed to even look each other in the eye.

**crickets**

"Well," Sai said, clearing his throat, "This is awkward."

I was trying not to laugh harder, since the irony of Sai pointing the obvious emotional awkwardness out was almost too much to bear. Sakura was still muttering to herself darkly. I swear I could see smoke curling out of her ears.

"Mooooooooooorniiiiiiiiiiiin'" We all turned towards the high, sing-songy voice of Kōhī as she woke up groggily from her oh-so-peaceful slumber, slurring her words as she woke up. "Whass everybody doin?"

That was when someone that actually knew what was going on decided to speak.

"WE JUST SAW GAARA AND MOKOTA MAKING OUT IN-" Naruto had started to speak in his obnoxiously loud voice, before he was interrupted by me beaning him in the head with a pillow.

I scrambled across the room, and hissed in his ear. "We don't say thing like that around her. She is innocent, the only one of us who is. We are keeping it that way. If you ever say things like that around her again, you will wake castrated the next morning!"

"What's castrated mean?" he said, still too loudly. I slapped my hand over his mouth, and almost ripped his head off his shoulders.

"It means you'll wake up unable to have kids. No being 'happy.' Got it?"

"….happy?"

I groaned inwardly.

"You're a fucking idiot. It means that you'll wake up unable to….ssshwassshs" I whispered in his ear, highly embarrassed that I had to say it. Kakashi was trying not to laugh, since as a jonin, he could still hear me. I shot him a dirty look as Naruto slowly backed away from me, like a scared dog with its tail between its legs. Speaking of dogs….

"What the hell is wrong with you, Kiba? Saying shit like that is gonna get you punched. Obviously!" I yelled.

Kiba flinched, unable to reply in any way. I heard Shika groan from underneath Kiba as he pushed him off and sat up.

"What the hell just happened? The last thing I remember was seeing Kiba flying towards me like some sort of rabid squirrel."

"Rabid dog, actually." I said, matter-of-factly, earning a glare from Kiba, which I returned. He flinched and looked at his feet.

Good doggy.

Smirking triumphantly, I turned back to Shika and stated, "You both were fighting… Over ME. Me! Of all people, and I wanna know why. So start talkin' smarty-butt."