Their progress over the next few days was decidedly slow, but Tenten was barely aware of any of it. She slipped in and out of consciousness, the landscapes blending into a blur of green and brown as they passed. Her brow burned with fever; occasionally, a cool hand passed over it, only to be quickly removed and followed by a concerned murmur that sounded vaguely familiar.
In the hazy dreams of her half-sleep, her worst memories played out like a macabre film reel: losing the match at the Chuunin exams; listening to Gai describe Tsunade's grim prognosis of Lee's condition; the day that Neji was brought back from the mission to rescue Sasuke; the crushing pressure of being completely surrounded by a sphere of water, and choking into blackness again. Those terrors were alternated with brief dreams of light and warmth, of gentle voices whispering placations in a voice that she couldn't really understand.
At some point, she regained enough consciousness to be somewhat cognizant of her surroundings. They had apparently stopped to rest, and she woke to find the bandages being carefully removed from her leg. Neji handed the discarded wrappings off to Lee, who took them with noticeable aversion and carried them away –where, Tenten didn't know, nor was she overly concerned with finding out. What little rational thought had been spared by the break in the fever told her to examine the leg, but she instantly regretted it. The bruises, though fading slightly, were still prominent enough to thoroughly discolor the leg; any areas not consumed by the unsightly wounds looked cadaverous.
Tenten's tongue suddenly felt very heavy, and she had to swallow several times to remind her stomach that its contents should be going down, not up.
Neji barely touched the leg, but it was enough to make Tenten start. Neji, who had apparently been so fixated on the injury that he hadn't noticed that she was awake, looked markedly surprised.
"You're… awake." He attempted to blink back his shock and failed.
"How…" The word came out as a raspy choke, something more akin to the screech of a crow than any comprehensible form of human speech. She tried again. "How long has it been?"
The second attempt didn't turn out much better than the first, but Neji at least seemed to understand it.
"Since you were last conscious?" He grimaced, and she could see there was something that he was keeping from her, but her head was swimming, and it would have taken too much effort to try to extract the information from him. "Approximately a day and a half."
"We are traveling as fast as possible." He murmured, seemingly as an afterthought, and a flicker of something unrecognizable flashed across his face for just a moment. Tenten was seized by a pang of guilt, one that was quickly overrun by a dizzy spell.
She didn't feel her head hit the ground, but she was aware of the sudden rush of air as both of her teammates suddenly appeared, hovering above her. Their faces blurred around the edges, fading like ghosts, and she giggled absurdly as their features bulged and shrank in her gyrating field of vision.
The last thing she saw was a narrowing pair of pearly lavender eyes, and then the void swallowed her again.
The Fifth Hokage was slumped over her desk in a quasi-drunken stupor when someone barged in, causing papers to fly across the room and making such a racket that Tsunade had no choice but to remove her aching head from its resting place. Without regard to her mentor's current state, Shizune threw open the curtains, casting the entire room in relentless morning sunlight.
Tsunade groaned.
"There had better be a damned good reason for this."
Shizune slammed a mission file down on the Hokage's desk. Even amidst the torrent of paperwork that passed across her desk every day, Tsunade instantly recognized the folder. She sat up straighter in her chair.
Shizune glanced at the file meaningfully, gesturing to the door.
"They're back."
Tsunade jumped to her feet without another word of protest. She was almost out the door when Shizune caught her shoulder.
"And…"
Tsunade paused, turning to glare at her apprentice expectantly.
"Well?"
Shizune grimaced, her pale face contorted with worry lines.
"You're not going to be happy about this."
Tsunade stormed into the hospital, scattering medics and attendants as she went. She caught sight of Sakura Haruno talking to one of the newer nurses, but she had no time to stop. Upon seeing her mentor, the pink-haired girl excused herself quickly and ran after the raging tornado that was the Fifth Hokage.
"Tsunade-sama!" Sakura called after her breathlessly, finally managing to fall in step beside her. "Have you heard—?"
"Why do you think I'm here?" Tsunade snapped, cutting her off. She didn't miss the look of irritation that crossed Sakura's face.
"They should be arriving any minute from what I've heard. We've already prepared rooms for all three, because we don't know the extent of their conditions. The reports, however, suggest that at least one of them is…" Sakura hesitated. "… incapacitated."
Tsunade frowned. If that was the case, then Shizune had been right on at least one count. She was not going to be happy about this.
This should have been a routine mission, the kind of mission that the village got handed at least once a month. It was one that, in all honesty, should have been given to lower-level Chuunin rather than two Chuunin and a Jounin, but Tsunade had been short-handed at the time and, feeling oddly benevolent, had decided to hand it over to Team Gai, thinking it would be a break for the three young shinobi, who had been practically run ragged lately.
When they were a day late on their arrival, she didn't think too much of it.
When a week passed without word, she had begun to worry.
And now, ten days past the expected end date of their mission, the team had somehow stumbled back to Konoha.
As it stood at the moment, Tsunade hoped they had a very good explanation.
"And the other two?"
"Seem to be able to walk, at least, but one can assume they're all severely exhausted." Sakura continued in her clear, clinical voice to discuss the possibilities of what they might be dealing with, but Tsunade's thoughts were somewhere else, picturing another mission that had ended unexpectedly. The brief memory of pale hair and warm blood flowing between her fingers made her shudder.
No, she had to concentrate.
They turned a corner and Tsunade barely had time to stop in order to keep herself from running straight into three bedraggled figures.
Or, rather, she realized on closer inspection, two bedraggled figures, and one limp, ashen body that was suspended between the two.
The normally immaculate Neji Hyuuga was disheveled, and noticeably thinner. His visage was smeared with blood and dirt; patches of his once-white uniform were now a shade of rusty copper. His eyes had a dull sheen to them, and the veins along his forehead were far too prominent. They pulsed unnaturally, as though he'd been using the Byakugan constantly.
Rock Lee looked no better. The shinobi, who typically had boundless reserves of energy, was haggard, and he appeared to be having trouble standing. He limped as the group progressed down the hall, and Tsunade noted with concern that it was the leg she had once operated on. Aggravating the injury again could have dangerous results.
But by far, the worst-looking of the group was the girl hanging like a ragdoll from the shoulders of her teammates. Her left leg, wrapped in several layers of bandages and secured in a makeshift splint, dangled at an unnatural angle from her body. Her skin was ghostly pale, occasionally broken by patches of red that flamed from her cheeks and forehead. A thin coating of sweat covered every visible part of her body. If Tsunade hadn't detected the faintest movement of air through her lungs, she would have sworn the two boys were carrying a corpse.
"Do not think," she began, "that this excuses you from the extensive explanation that you will be giving me about this." She gestured to the ghastly sight in front of her. "But it seems we have more pressing matters.
"Sakura, take care of Lee and Neji. I…" Tsunade gave the unconscious weapons mistress an appraising look. This would not be simple. "…will take care of Tenten."
She watched as the assisting medics carried Tenten away, saw the feeble protests of her teammates, who were too fatigued to even put up a substantial fight.
Yes. A very good explanation was in order.
A/N: This chapter is proof that writer's block can, in fact, be conquered, given the right selection of music.
- Senka