It wasn't that the girl has squealed when she had arrived. It wasn't even that she looked for excuses to try to hug him. It was how she would watch him from the corner of her eyes constantly that annoyed him the most.

Sasuke sent the girl yet another glare when he felt her gaze linger too long on him. The girl's red eyes widened when she knew she had been caught and a blush dusted her cheeks as she pretended to be looking at something else near him. He closed his eyes and had to try very hard to keep his annoyed sigh to himself; he thought he had been done with girls like her when he had left Konoha.

Konoha… how was his old village doing? Just the thought of those happy, oblivious fools made his blood boil. How could they live like that when his clan had been brutally slaughtered in front of his eyes? The scowl on his face grew as he thought of the injustices done to him, but no. He didn't hate the village, no matter how insensitive the residents were; he hated his brother, the one who had committed the horrible act.

"So, Karin-chan," Orochimaru started in a measured voice, steeling himself for more disappointment, "Can you track the chakra signature, or was bringing you out here a waste of time?"

Sasuke had to scoff at this. Of course bringing her out to this Gods forsaken mountain was a waste of time. So was bringing him for that matter; he had better things to do than watch the Sanin kill incompetent underlings in anger.

"Of course Orochimaru-sama!" the red head answered without a second thought.

"Well?" Orochimaru pressed after a long moment, "Where is the shinobi?"

"Ah!" Karin fumbled, pushing her glasses up a bit. "Of course," she said, closing her eyes and concentrating.

"It's getting closer," she said with a frown.

Before she could say anything else a strong breeze blew through the clearing. Sasuke had to shield his eyes from the debris picked up by this wind, blinking rapidly as dirt got into his eyes. He thought he had seen someone for a split second, but no; it must have been his imagination.

"What?" Karin gasped in disbelief. "How?"

"What is it Karin-chan?" Orochimaru demanded.

"The… whoever it was…" she started haltingly, "just passed through here!"

Sasuke glanced quickly over at her and saw the look on her face, pure and utter shock, and he knew that she wasn't lying. The wind had died down now and he looked off into the direction that it had been blowing. So he really had seen someone for that instant, but it didn't make sense… the person he had seen should be back in Konoha, not out in the mountains.

Jiyuudo sat on the ground panting for a moment staring with wide eyes at her feet. What were those people doing here? Better yet, what was he doing here? Wasn't he supposed to be off killing his only family or something like that? Why had he stared at her like that? Sure, she had been in the Makaze so the eternity she had stood and stared at him for was not even a full second to normal people, but still. Why?

Why did she care?

She remembered the hurtful words she had thrown at him the last time they had spoken. Had he taken them to heart? A part of her wished that he hadn't, though she couldn't explain why. She just wrote it off as regret for words spoken in anger, ruining another friendship.

She shook her head violently to clear her head of useless thoughts and slowly got to her feet, wincing as her muscles groaned in protest. Oh how she hated the side effects of her technique. She had pushed the limit of her endurance, probably because she stopped and stared like an idiot. It would appear that 15 seconds was as long as she could go for now.

"I take it that you've met the trespassers," a low voice rumbled from a cave mouth.

"Yeah," she grunted as she arched her back, relishing in how her joints popped and muscles stretched.

"You know what to do."

Jiyuudo cast a sidelong glance at the gaping opening in the mountain side as she reached above her head. The sunlight caught on what she knew to be black shiny scales, and that light in turn reflected off of yellow eyes. For a moment she debated whether or not she should tell him to deal with his own problems and give her some answers, but decided against it.

"Yeah," she said as she turned away and began to retrace her steps. "I want answers when I get back," she said just before she re-entered the forest.

Sasuke sat on a rock near the edge of the clearing doing his best to ignore Karin. His mind was too preoccupied with who he had seen to really care about anything she had to say at this point. What was she doing all the way out here? Was she on a mission?

Orochimaru was conferencing with Kabuto about what their next move should be. He knew what it would end up being; find this mystery shinobi and bring him back to the nearest base for some tests. But the question was how they would find him, and capture him after that.

When Karin tried to get too close to him Sasuke stood up quickly. He couldn't just wait around for her to come back, especially when his teacher was plotting to capture her before he could get his answers from her. He began to stride purposefully in the direction that her chakra had gone, right into the dense forest.

"Sasuke-kun?" Karin called after him, "Where are you going?"

Jiyuudo hadn't been expecting to run into him, and especially not here. She stood completely still, hoping that maybe he hadn't seen her; but she knew that wasn't the case. They stood in silence for a long moment staring at each other, trying to see how the other had grown in the past year.

"Hi," she said dumbly, breaking the quiet that had settled around them.

When he didn't say anything she began to shift nervously from foot to foot. She found herself caring how she looked for the first time… ever. She probably looked like a bona fide mess to him. The dark blue capris that the hospital had provided her with were almost the right size, but still managed to hang loosely to her thin frame and end a few centimeters before they were supposed to, just like the black shirt they had given her. She curled her toes unknowingly, and she realized that she wasn't wearing shoes when her toes dug into the dirt. She flushed a bit at this, and her thoughts went to her dark skin; was it darker than the last time he had seen her? Spending a year in the sun had probably turned her skin a shade or two above mud brown; and she was suddenly very self-conscious as her eyes traveled over his porcelain skin. She ran a hand through her purple streaked hair and realized for the first time how long it had gotten. It had gone from half-way down her neck to half-way down her back, and now she wished that she had cut it when she had the chance.

She had to turn her gaze away from him after a while because it was becoming almost painful for her. He looked exactly how she remembered him, how she would sometimes see him in her dreams though she didn't know why. Looking at him was making her nostalgic, something she couldn't afford to be right now.

"Jizouko," he said finally and her gaze snapped back to him.

She only shook her head at him as she sensed another chakra signature drawing close to them. She didn't pause to give him an explanation as she jumped into the trees and took off in a random direction. Right now it didn't matter to her where she went, so long as she got away to somewhere she could sort through her jumbled emotions.