Chapter Eighteen: Hydrophobia.
"What?"
"You'll be taking a few lessons with Kisame from now on." Itachi repeated himself. It was becoming quite a common thing for him to do around Natsuki. "What kind of lessons?" She asked suspiciously.
"Swimming." That one word sent chills down her spine. That meant going in the water.
"I don't want to." She immediately said, perhaps too rushed. Itachi's slight frown told her that she wasn't winning this one, like usual.
"Most everybody has noticed your aversion and reaction to water. It's too severe a weakness for us to ignore, I want you to work on it. Kisame won't let anything bad happen to you, so don't fret over it." Natsuki blew through her nose, not looking the Uchiha in the eye. Why couldn't they just leave her alone? "For now though, I want you to tell me where my scroll on the phoenix flower jutsu is." Natsuki laughed nervously, so he noticed?

Natsuki froze when there came a knock at her door. She inched over to it, cracking it open and peeking through. Kisame gave her a weird look, shifting Samehada on his back. "What're you-" She slammed the door in his face.
"I'm not doing it!"
"Doing what- you mean swimming?"
"I said I won't do it!" She shouted through the door, leaning her full body weight against it just in case he tried to force it open.
"You can't just- Natsuki, come on; Itachi did say this was part of your training, didn't he?"
"I don't care about training, I'm not getting in the water!" She heard a heavy sigh from the other side of the door and braced herself to keep it shut. He didn't try and barge in though, much to her surprise. "Then we'll just build it up, start with something easy like standing in the shallows, okay?" Natsuki's brow furrowed, it was hard to argue with somebody when they were being so reasonable. She almost agreed, but then she thought of the water, that huge expanse of it surrounding her and let out an involuntary squeak, squeezing her eyes shut. No, she couldn't do it, she couldn't- Something in her wall shifted. Freezing on the spot, she stared at that point, trembling. It shifted again and something began to morph out of it, greyish-brown like the rock, then slowly turning a dark, swampy green. "Zetsu! What the hell are you doing in here! How did you do that?!"
"Be quiet onna. It was Itachi's request. We wouldn't have to be doing this if you hadn't have asked that favour of him. I thought we could use his- Just be quiet, I want to get this over with. Fine." Natsuki blinked, shirking back when his two golden eyes, predatory like a leopard's, landed on her. "If you do not leave and commit to your training right now, I'll eat you." Natsuki had a feeling that that wasn't an empty threat. As Zetsu stepped closer, her resolve broke and she hurled the door open, making to escape. A strong arm lifted her off the ground and threw her over a shoulder. Again with the shoulder, Kisame... She muttered to herself in her head. "Finally," He chuckled, turning, "What made you leave so fast, see a ghost?" Natsuki stared, just seeing the last of Zetsu's venus flytrap sink into her floor. Something like that...

"Okay," Kisame let out a heavy sigh, letting Natsuki down. She huffed, brushing herself off. Then she realised where they were. At the lake. She swallowed the lump in her throat and instinctively hid behind the nearest tree. She was easily dragged out from behind her hiding place. "Take your tabi off." Kisame instructed, taking his own ninja sandals off. "We'll just stand in up to your ankles, okay?" She shook her head vigorously, too deafened by the fear rising in her chest to process his words properly. "No, not okay." Kisame huffed, walking over and throwing her back over his shoulder. She yelped as he took her tabi and socks off for her. "Do you know how long it takes me to dry my tail?" She asked, panicking as he began to walk closer to the water, "Very long, I'll tell you that now, it's a pain in the butt to dry, so we should just go back now-" Her hands balled into fists in the back of his cloak and she thrashed, hating how she couldn't even escape. Hating how she was so powerless, so helpless. "Stop it, stop walking closer to it!" She screamed, kicking his stomach and ribcage wildly. He stopped. Natsuki hadn't realised how labored her breathing had become. She flopped over his shoulder, shivering and trembling. The water lapped at one of Kisame's feet. Gently, he set her down next to it, gripping onto her shoulder when she tried to step away from it. "Just put one foot in." She shook her head again, his thumb rubbing circles in her shoulder. She looked up warily, but his quick smile was reassuring. As his hand fell from her shoulder, she grabbed onto it, latching on as if it were a lifeline. "If I drown, I will send my ghost to haunt you and Chikakon to bite your nose again." She bit out, trying to be brave and proud. Her chin lifted. A little bit of piddly water, to think it could send her into such a fit! It was stupid, it made her stupid. She wouldn't allow it. But at the same time, that same fear stirred in her heart. She lifted one foot, squeezing Kisame's hand even tighter, hovering over the surface of the lake. If she stepped down, it wouldn't even cover her entire foot. It was just like having a shower. She refused to look at the rest of the lake, deep and blue, shifting with small waves created by the slight breeze. She only concentrated on the bit in front of her. Shallow. So shallow she could see the small pebbles and dirt and sand beneath it. She forced her foot down and the cool water ran over it before settling around, pushing back and forth with the lapping of waves. She could feel Kisame's grin and his grasp around her hand tightened for a second in a rewarding squeeze. She grinned up at him, looking back down at her foot in the water. She slowly placed the other one in and wiggled her toes ecstatically. She had done it! "Good," Kisame grinned, stepping in next to her. "Try coming a little deeper." Natsuki immediately yanked back on his hand, kicking water everywhere. "No!" A tremor fled through her body. 'Deeper'. It made it sound as if she'd be wading in, the water splashing and lapping over her head. The cool, dark depths trapping her in a suffocating, inescapable prison. Then she realised he didn't want her to go in that far and her cheeks burned. Quickly, she tried to cover her mistake and the subsequent embarrassment. "I- I mean, the water's cold, I don't want to freeze." Kisame looked down at her, her face hidden behind her hair, her hand still gripping his. Her toes locking together anxiously. "As soon as you come up to your ankles, we'll go straight back to the base." He compromised. Natsuki shifted her weight from one foot to the other before finally letting her head hang despondently. She inched her left foot out, deeper into the lake. The water lapped around it and she gripped his hand even tighter, squeezing her eyes shut. Sharks and fish with long, sharp teeth and bulging yellow eyes attacked her behind her eyelids and her eyes flew open with a screech as she shot out of the water. "Don't close your eyes." Kisame mumbled. He gently tugged her back into the water. "Just try again."

Itachi sighed, throwing his head back to look up at the thick canopy above him. He had gone to see how Natsuki's swimming lessons were going and so far... he wasn't impressed. Kisame had hold of Natsuki's hand, trying to get her to stand back in the water. It was ridiculous. At this rate, they wouldn't get anywhere. He looked back at the lake just to see her kick his partner in the face, a feat to be marveled at seeing how she was much shorter than him. Kisame picked her up by the shoulders and tried to force her back in the shallows. She thrashed and somehow, in the mess of grabbing hands and limbs trying to gain control of the situation, she managed to claw her way back over Kisame's shoulder and onto dry land. The two quickly got into another arguement, Natsuki jabbing a finger in the blue-skinned man's face, yelling some sort of obscure insult and then storming away. With nobody watching him, Itachi couldn't help but facepalm. That was no way to go about teaching Natsuki how to swim. He rubbed his shoulder thoughtfully as Kisame stalked off in the opposite direction of the base. This was going much worse than he thought it would. He hadn't accounted for his partner loosing his temper with the girl. I had better sort this out before she refuses to take any more lessons...

"Stupid fish, just because he isn't afraid of water..." Natsuki kicked a twig frustratedly, her hands balled into tight fists. "He'd know if he was scared of anything, but nooo, he just has to be mister I'm-so-cool, doesn't he? Well to hell with him!" Her fist, blazing with raw and unrestrained chakra, collided with a nearby tree, splintering it's trunk. "STUPID JERK!"

The wind pushed at Itachi's face, branches and leaves suddenly appearing in his vision. He was going much faster than he usually did. Natsuki's chakra, he could feel its instability, its fluctuating presence. She couldn't be far now. Out here, anyone could get to her and if that happened, then Leader-sama would certainly be displeased with both him and Kisame. Even though the base wasn't too far away, Itachi knew the girl had a nasty habit of damning all the rules when she was mad. Suddenly, he felt the chakra flare and moments later, rocks and debris flew at him, carried by a powerful gust of wind that threw him back. Flipping in mid-air, he managed to kick off another branch and land on the ground safely, covering his eyes from the dirt flying at him. This couldn't be good.

"Who the hell are you?!" Natsuki yelled, temper spiking when she found the pest still alive and smirking. He pushed up his glasses smugly,
"My, my. That's quit a punch you packed there." Her eyes flitted around, seeing the scorched and burnt husks of trees. How had be dodged her fireball jutsu? "Answer me!" She shouted, demanding his name yet again.
"Oh, I'll tell you if you come with me." That same smirk again,
"No way in hell!" Chakra coursed through her legs and she kicked off the ground, flying at him, her hands flashing with signs, "Phoenix flower jutsu!" She didn't even see it, his neat maneuvering to the side, letting the bursts of fire pass him by harmlessly. He chuckled and adjusted his glasses. "Quite fiery, aren't you? But you'll have to better than that!" His fist suddenly pounded into her abdomen and she crashed into a tree. A choked cough threw blood to the earth. Damn it... Her tail thrashed angrily and she got to her feet, stumbling. "Who are you?!"
"You're awfully hung up on that, aren't you?" The man tilted his head, giving her a glimpse of one, almond-shaped eye, heartless and black as the depths of the ocean. A chill ran down Natsuki's spine. "It is of no concern to you though. Who I am will not help you escape defeat." Stinging pain suddenly burst up Natsuki's arm and her leg and she jolted; she could feel blood dribbling from both limbs and then from her neck and shoulder. "Those were warning shots, I'll impale you next time if you don't agree to come peacefully."
"What do you take me for?!" Natsuki went to attack again, throwing herself forwards. She had beaten Hidan in hand-to-hand combat before, no way in hell could this silver-haired runt kill her! He couldn't even hurt her, she wouldn't let him!

~:~

Natsuki winced at another scalpel slicing through her side, but her fist continued towards the runt's face, pounding him to the ground. A poof of smoke clouded her vision as the man disappeared and more cold steel slashed through her skin. She whirled around, throwing a punch to his face again only to be kneed in the stomach and hurled to the ground. She coughed, blood splattering the ground. A scalpel pinned the neck of her kimono to the ground. A sign of his dominance over the situation, over her. She almost tried to spit at him. Her foot was suddenly, brutally, yanked to the side and a terrible cracking sound echoed through the scorched grounds, swallowed up by a bone-chilling, earth-shattering yell as the man plunged another blade through her achilles heel, severing the tendon completely. Then a cold hand pulled her up by the neck and a sharp pain shot through the back of it. Pressure point- She guessed as her world turned to darkness.

Itachi fell into a crouch, using his sharingan to quickly survey the area. The trees here were a scorched, burnt mess and the the ground bare of life. Mutilated footprints in the dirt was the only other evidence Itachi needed to know that Natsuki had fought someone here. He stood from his crouch cautiously, fingers twitching in preparation to grab a kunai or perform handsigns. The tomoe in his sharingan twisted. He could barely feel her chakra anymore and the frustrating, infuriating thing about it all was that he hadn't got there in time. He didn't know if she had depleted her chakra resources, if she was hurt, if she was safe. He didn't know where she was. If he tried to follow the faint trail of her chakra, what would he find? A half-dead body or the fiery girl he had come to see as a close friend? A helpless feeling began to settle in his gut, tugging at his heart. He had lost control of the situation, he didn't want to follow her chakra, he was too scared of what he would find. It would be just like that night... that night where he was forced into murdering his entire clan, his family, his friends... That same helpless feeling had swallowed him up then too. "Hey, un." Itachi's head whipped around to face the blond and the puppet-master. "Looks like you lost you temper Itachi-kun." Deidara teased, a mischievous grin plastered to his face. "What happened?" Sasori's voice through Hiruko was rough and gritty. Itachi took a moment to compose himself. "Natsuki fought somebody here." He didn't want to admit that he wasn't certain of anything else.
"Deidara, let's go." Sasori bit out, emerging from Hiruko.
"What- why?"
"This situation calls for haste; Deidara, fly back to the base and inform Leader-sama that you, me and Itachi are taking on a new mission. Whatever he says, I want you to come back and join us. We'll need your help." The blond frowned, but he still dug into his pouch and through out a small clay bird. With one hand sign, it had enlarged and he was flying away, high up into the sky. "Let's go." Sasori snapped. "I hate waiting."

~:~

"Nnh." The room was dark, pitch black and dank. The air was heavy, hard to breathe in. The panic sat in the air, filling it. Making it heavier. The weight of it on her chest, it was impossible. Then the pain, that excruciating monster burning up her calf and through her ankle, drowning out the dull thrum from her thigh. She didn't even think she could twitch her toes. Where the hell... am I?

This one annoyed me, mainly just the 'swimming lesson' part though. I tried so hard to make it good for you guys though, I hope it's okay.

The competition is still running overall, but no more entires will be taken for CH17 which means... ForASunset'sRise, you win for CH17! Request anything you want rated T or under ^^

Finf, out ^/_\^