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EE: Whenever I read stories, I review!

DD: Yeah!

Neji: Just review, okay?

DD: Thankies!

Chapter 5…

I opened my eyes to see that I was lying on a mat inside a small tent. I tried to remember how I got there, but had no recollection. I sat up and immediately felt my head swirl and sway. I rubbed my sore neck and saw Rai, squatting in the doorway of the tent.

"Where's Tashi?" I asked immediately with wide eyes. At first I expected him to laugh, but he didn't. He looked serious and almost sad.

"Well, I'm sorry I have to be the one to tell you this, but" he began, "But, he is most likely dead." I felt my eyes widen even more and my jaw dropped. Tashi dead? Never!

"You're lying!" I declared. I bit my lip, wanted to believe with my whole heart, that what I said was true, but couldn't.

"I'm sorry, but do you remember anything from last night?" he asked solemnly. I racked my brain, but no, I couldn't conjure any pictures into my head that would help Rai.

"Only Tashi and I patrolling for a while and then Tashi yelled something I couldn't make out and then black." I said uncertainly. Rai nodded understandingly.

"Well, I know for sure that your black out was caused by a poison dart, luckily we had an antidote. You see, the person who shot it was…" he looked down.

"Your friend, Tashi." He finished and I felt like covering my ears and screaming a random song to drone out his voice.

"Not Tashi!" I yelled, "He would never do anything to hurt me!" Rai sighed.

"Well, I think he had a grudge for some reason." He explained.

"We did have a couple of arguments." I said quietly. But I didn't want to believe it, but something in me said what Rai said was true. He nodded curtly as if to prove his point. But still, Tashi and I had had many arguments before; some more drastic than this, just over whom we could trust on a short mission was nothing. But Rai's serious face said otherwise. I sighed, and began to cry. Tears steamed down my face as I sobbed. Rai looked guilty.

"I-I don't b-blame you f-for what h-happened." I said crying. And he nodded. And got up to leave, but not before saying one last thing.

"Like I said, I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this." And he left, leaving me to bawl my eyes out.

My head was throbbing and felt sore all over. I yawned and opened my eyes and saw the fresh blue sky. I tried to remember how I got here when it all came flooding back to me, the argument, Hina, Rai. Looking around I saw that I was no longer in the pit I fell in last night and two people were looking over me. One was a young woman, about twenty-five or so, she had light brown hair and soft blue eyes, behind her was a boy about seven years younger than her, eighteen-ish. He had sandy blonde hair and honey-colored, amber eyes.

"So he's up!" the woman said grinning and the boy just stared at me. I winced and saw that my shirt was off and I was bandaged around the middle, my wrist was snapped back into place and wrapped in a sling.

"You're actually lucky, that kunai in your stomach missed all vital blood vessels and organs." The woman said again, with my kunai between her two fingers, "I'm Akina and that over there is Shizumaru." Akina pointed her thumb at the boy.

"I'm Nara Tashi, and how did you two find me?" I asked and stroked the bandages on my stomach. They both looked at each other before Shizumaru answered.

"Well, late last night, Shizumaru, Haiku and I were taking a walk and we saw you down in that pit. At first, we thought you had died and we fished your body out of there so we could bury you, but saw that you were still barely alive." He explained. And I nodded.

"But, you guy's just take walks, two days into this forest?" I asked, "And who is Haiku?"

"We live out here." Shizumaru answered, "And Haiku is our other friend, Akina's apprentice that she drags around."

Akina nodded and looked around, "The little brat went to go find some food." Shizumaru nodded at me.

I sat up and felt a horrible pain in my stomach from the kunai wound. I must have shown a look of pain, because Akina looked at me.

"Sit your ass down!" Akina snapped and bonked me over the head. But I shook it off and got to my feet. My whole upper body felt weak and unstable, but waist below, felt normal.

Shizumaru handed me my shirt and I slipped it over my head, getting it on was sort of tricky with one arm in a sling and the other hurt whenever I raised it too high. But eventually I got it on correctly.

Suddenly a girl about twelve or thirteen years old with black hair and chocolate brown eyes emerged from the bushes and stared at me in surprise. "He's alive!" she exclaimed, "Oh yeah! Ten bucks, Shizumaru!" she held her hand out.

Shizumaru sighed and set a ten in her outstretched hand. (I don't care if they don't use dollars in Naruto, they do now!) The girl smirked and slipped the money in her back pocket.

"Can't you two stop betting on people we save?" Akina asked irritably.

"No." Shizumaru said truthfully and laid his head down on the ground, "And I'm going to take a nap."

Then, the girl, who I assumed was the Haiku they we're talking about stomped over to him.

"No you won't!" she shouted as if he were a hundred feet away and kicked him hard in the stomach, so he flew about two meters. I was surprised such a shrimpy kid could pack such a kick.

"Ow, " he moaned and sat up, "Damn it Haiku, that hurt!"

"Good!" she said smirking at him. Akina's eyebrow twitched.

"Both of you shut up and help me make a fire." She snapped at her comrades.

"Why should we listen to you?" Shizumaru sneered and lay back down.

"BECAUSE I CAN KICK BOTH OF YER ASSES, SO SHUT YER YAPS!" Akina screamed at them, but Shizumaru just ignored her and closed his eyes. Haiku walked over to him and stomped on his stomach.

"Ah, shit, Haiku!" he yelled, "One of these days I'll just…"

"Take your anger out on a twelve year old." Akina muttered and started the fire up by herself.

"Whoa," I thought, 'these people argue a lot.' And I would know, living in the same house as my parents, Ino and Shikamaru. They argued 24/7. I remember back when Cho and I were close, we would wonder why they even got married because they hated each other so much as teens and still looked as if they did.

"You're so frigg'n lazy!" Haiku yelled.

"That's not as bad as being a stupid brat!" Shizumaru shouted back and glared at her.

"THAT"S IT!" Akina screamed and grabbed Shizumaru by the ear, "Leave her ALONE!!"

"Fine," he muttered, "But tell her to also."

"Okay, Haiku, stop bothering Shizumaru."

"Okee-dokee, Akina-samma." Haiku sang and sat down away from Shizumaru.

"What's your secret?" Shizumaru asked, only to get a punch in the head.

Then Haiku looked over at me, "Hi! I'm Haiku, I'm twelve and I don't know my last name or who my parents are, I like to sing, hum, and make Shizumaru mad, my goal is to be just like Akina-samma, and I don't like bugs, especially spiders or people who say I talk to much, meaning Shizumaru."

"Yeah, okay." I said confused and creeped out. I wasn't the best kid person, unlike Cho. She could get any kid to do whatever she said and they still adored her. I sighed and laid back down, thinking about the past 24 hours. 'Man, Hina's going to be pissed.' I thought before I drifted off.

About 10 days had passed since the, Hina, Rai, and kunai incident. The more I thought about it, the more I was sure I could have prevented it, I could have been more alert, I could have pushed Hina out of the way, I could have been more careful with my kunai- it all just lead to one thing- I shouldn't have acted so rash to my best friend, and now I lost her. 'I'm so sorry, Hina, I'll get you back I swear.' I thought determined; I had learned to ignore Akina, Shizumaru, and Haiku's endless arguing by now.

Then the thought hit me that nearly twice as much time had gone by since Hina and I were supposed to be returning to Konoha. Had they noticed? Probably, I mean, even reckless Tsunade would notice two chuunin completely missing from a simple C-ranked mission. 'I wonder if mom or dad realized Hina and I were gone for longer than the mission was supposed to take?' I thought.

"Get AWAY from me, Haiku!" Shizumaru shouted at her.

"I don't see what your problem is, there's enough forest here for everyone!" she yelled back.

Shizumaru then muttered something that I couldn't hear and shook his head.

"Don't mumble Shizumaru, if you have something to say, say it!" Akina said irritably.

'Or,' I thought, 'Cho looked at the calendar, and decided to put two and two together!' I bolted upright. Cho, the most daring, rebel, think-she-can, girl in the history of time, backed up with the ramen freak and a human ice-cube. I knew she would instantly grab her freak-pals and rush of to this forest with out telling anyone just for the thrills and to piss our mom off. And that just goes to show that even though I haven't had a full-length conversation with her in years and still know her exact personality. 'Troublesome.' I thought and shook my head.

For the past five days I only left my bedroom to eat and pee. And luckily for me Ino seemed to be just fine with that. What did I do all day? Slept mostly, read a bit too. The amazing thing was, was that I didn't know it was possible to sleep for than fourteen, fifteen hours a day until I started pulling in over eighteen hours a day, easy.

At about a week and a half of sleeping practically all day a knock on my door awoke me.

"What!" I moaned, shoving my head under my pillow.

"Cho!" Ino's voice shouted from the other side of the door, "Why are sleeping at two in the afternoon?"

"Because!" I snapped, "What do you want!"

"I was just wondering if you knew where Tashi was, I just realized he should have been home five days ago."

"Typical, you realize it five days after he's been missing, some mother!" I shouted at her.

"Cho, I really don't need your mouth today so just…" she began but I cut her off.

"Why asked me? Ask his psycho-kunoichi friend!"

"She's missing too, besides I think you should respect his friend more, Hina's a perfectly nice girl." She scolded.

"Whatever. Wait, where was their mission?" I asked suddenly perked as I mulled the whole conversation in my head and walked over to my open window.

"Uh, the forest around Konoha, why?" she answered confused.

That was all I needed, without a second thought I let myself fall out the window.

"BYE INO!!" I yelled happily as I hit the ground running.

I sat cross-legged on my front porch and watched as the light wind made the branches of the trees sway. I probably looked peaceful, but I was just bored out of my mind. It was killing me inside to know that I was the only Hyuuga, with my Aunt Hinata, as exception to ever be a genin this long. I mean I was fifteen; the same age my dad was when he became jounin. I sighed and closed my eyes. Sometimes I wished I wasn't a Hyuuga, just a normal person, no expectation to live up to, no cursed seal, and no frustratingly huge house. I just wanted the nightmare I called my life to just blow away in that wind, as if it was never there… My thoughts were interrupted by a soft thump in the ground before me. I instantly opened my eyes and prepared a fighting stance but saw that it was no threat.

It was Yoru's best friend and old teammate, Nara Cho. She was smiling at me with her short, thick blonde hair blowing in her face.

"Hey, Nai Li, do you know where I would find Yoru?" she asked and walked up to me. Now, Cho is super pretty, her smile, the color of her eyes, everything. I was always amazed how my brother got some girl as pretty as her to like him enough to be his friend, but then again, every girl in Konoha was practically drooling over him. But not Cho, that's probably why their friends.

"What is it Cho? Did your mom release another tsunami at you?" a voice said from behind me.

It was Yoru.

"No, my brother's missing and I need your help." She explained.

"Sorry, too busy." He said and turned around to walk away but I stopped him by grabbing his sleeve.

"Tashi's missing?" I asked alarmed.

Cho nodded.

"Wait, he and Hina went on a mission a while ago!" I almost yelled.

"Yes, the Uchiha girl is with him too." She said irritably.

"But, Hina's not an Uchiha." I said frowning.

"Yes she is, it's obvious. I mean honestly, she looks exactly like Sasuke, who I'm positive is her dad…"

"Uchiha Sasuke is married to the hokage!" I protested, wide eyed.

"Poor guy…" she murmured, "Oh well, are you in Yoru?"

"Fine, but you owe me a favor."

"Yay!" she exclaimed, "I love you, Yoru-kun!"

Only I noticed his face turn a bright shade of crimson.

"I'm in too!" I found myself shouting.

"Why?" Cho asked me.

"Because," I explained, "My two best friends are in trouble and I'm going to help them!"

"Fine, but don't slow us down." Yoru said coldly.

"I won't!" I yelled at him.

"Then what are we waiting for!" Cho chimed and leapt off with Yoru leaving me to follow.

End

EE: Yahoo! One more chapter down, a whole bunch more to go!

Neji: You're optimism creeps me out.

EE: Good!

Neji: There you go again!

DD: Review!

EE: (sings) Move along, move along…

Neji: CREEEEEEEPYYYY!

DD: Yeah, I have to agree.

EE: What? I'm a fabulous singer!

Neji: Not really…

EE: Shut up!

DD: Please Review!