Working at her family's flower shop while off mission had afforded Ino a significant amount of information about Choji's fiancee. What she couldn't gather from there, she was able to glean from the Hokage's office while Tsunade was sleeping one off. It also paid to have her friend Sakura be Tsunade's special student, though most of her requests for info were denied with a "If I get caught, I will be ACTUALLY killed. Get it?! Killed. Actually. By Tsunade. Because she's scary." Ino thought Sakura was a wimp and terrible at gathering information., but that's why she was being trained for the intellegence agency, and Sakura wasn't. Occasionally her attempts at information acquisition lead to some supspision on her friend's behalf.
"Why are you always asking about that no count Diamyo's granddaughter?" Sakura had asked one day.
"Well..she has...beauty secrets that were handed down for ages and I need to know about her so I can get them from her...without actually being her friend.?" Ino was not as good at lying as her training would have her be.
"Do you really expect me to believe that? This is about Choji, isn't it?"
"Nooo. no. Choji. What? Why would I care about anything about Choji. Why would you even bring Choji into this conversation?" Ino looked around while adamantly defending herself.
Sakura just shrugged her shoulders. "You're a terrible liar, Ino. Stay out of Choji's business, it's his and has nothing to do with you."
This made Ino mad, "Look who's talking, forehead! You are always eaves dropping... Never mind. Forget I asked."
Ino walked away, hoping her friend would forget the conversation. She decided to take her shopping soon and distract her memory with a recent picture of Sasuke that she snagged from Central Intelligence. How Sakura could still be hung up on the snake was beyond Ino. She overlooked the fact that she was the one that had taken the picture in the first place.
Ino had tried to fool Shikamaru into giving out information once. It didn't work.
She had snuck up on him in his secret rooftop, wondering if he didn't notice her presence, or if he just didn't care. As her head passed the last of the stairs, she realized it was because he didn't care. All she saw was four feet, four arms, four spiked ponytails, and one pineapple head, rather busy with one another. She backed down the steps slowly, thinking that Shikamaru had realized she was going to be questioning him today, and he had chose the best way to avoid talking with her. Either that, or he was a guy who was involved with a girl, and that kind of thing just happens. It grossed Ino out. Why anyone would want to kiss him was beyond her.
Ino knew Choji's fiancee's type. Rich girl. Bad attitude. Has to marry for politcal reasons, but no suitor liked her enough and she ruined every opportunity for a great match. Her name was Gaki, and everyone referred to her as Gakihime. She was one of the diamyo's granddaughters, and as such, required, at the very least, a good match.
It wasn't till a year ago that Ino had found out that Choji had allowed his parents to begin the matchmaking process and arrange a suitable marriage for him. She had been bothered when she found out, and, because she had kept Choji's proposal to her a secret, had no one to talk to about it.
She had gone to the club that night, very short skirt, very thirsty, and very angry. After a number of free drinks sent to her, Ino was well on her way to forgetting why she was mad. Out on the dance floor she had found Kiba grinding away on every available female and decided to save all the rest of the girls and 'take one for the team'. She found herself shortly thereafter making out with Kiba in a dark corner, against one of the walls, and feeling not quite right about it.
"Kiba, hmnng. Ki-ba. glbnm. Kiba! Stop!" Ino was pressing her hands against his chest.
"What Ino. I'm doing some of my best work here. What's the problem?"
"I don't know, I just don't feel right about this." Ino hugged her arms around herself.
"This is about Choji being entered in the marriage pool, isn't it?" Kiba let his arms drop to his sides as he leaned against the wall.
"Why is everyone bringing up Choji?! Why does everybody think I care about that?!" Ino pointed her finger in Kiba's face.
"Woah! Hold on babe. " Kiba pushed Ino's finger down. "I was just offering a suggestion. Now, it was nice, but I've got a few more trees to sniff up tonight." With that, Kiba bounded his way back into the club crowd.
"Gross, Kiba." Was all Ino could utter before she turned and walked out of the club.
The night air sobered her up a little, and it was during her walk home that she had decided to gather all the info she could about Choji's marriage contract proceedings.
Over the next year, she had been very successful in stopping most of the marriage negoiations, mostly using psychology and staying away from using her jutsus.
But then, Gakihime came along. Her family was desperate, Choji must have been too, to agree to marry her, and he was available. There was no stopping this match. Every subtle trick Ino threw their way blew up in her face and sped the marriage negotiations up considerably.
She tried, and failed, and now Choji was marrying the wrong girl.
It wouldn't do. Ino spent an hour doing her makeup and hair, not to look gorgeous, but to resemble a plain, hard to pick out from the crowd, wedding guest. She didn't know if they were going to use chaka sensing on the wedding guest, so she didn't want her disguise to be chakra based. She would supres her chakra long enough to at least get into the wedding hall, and perhaps to get to the bride. She wouldn't know her exact plan until she got there. Her clothes weren't revealing, her chest she bound tight so there wasn't anything to draw the men's attention. She darkened her skin a little, put in brown contacts, a short brown wig, and glasses. Ino chuckled as she looked in the mirror. She kind of looked like that intellegence weirdo, Shiho, who so obviously has a crush on Shikamaru. 'Too bad, Shiho. I don't think he's into plain and boring, so much as wild and witchy.' Ino thought to herself. She finished her look with a plain kimono made of fine cloth, but otherwise indistinct. One last check in the hall mirror, and Ino was out the door, headed to the wedding.