Okay, I know that the battle scene was gory, and was quite short, I personally pin the blame on my morbid personality and my awful skills at fighting fight scenes.

Can you guess what's coming up next? ...wel anyways enjoy!

-mayu

Innocence

Chapter 16

"WHAT?!" the birds scatter from their perches on the Hokage tower banisters. Iruka's yell was rather loud and urgent; scaring many babies causing them to cry, and making lots of parents curse the heavens.

Inside the mission room, team seven stood; well, they tried to stand. Sasuke and Narue were leaning on Shikamaru, while Kakashi had a hand on the boy's head, seemingly putting a lot of weight upon it as Shikamaru was panting and shaking with the effort of holding all three of them up. Kakashi had just told Iruka and Sandaime about their mission, adding the little detail that it was an a-ranked as an offhand comment.

Kakashi laughed lightly, "Oh it was nothing! We got out of it okay, only a ruptured spleen and 5 broken ribs for Sasuke, a concussion and ripped leg muscle for me, mental stress and overall exhaustion for Narue, and Shikamaru…well he's perfectly healthy!" Several listening sweat-dropped at the easy way he rolled their injuries off his tongue.

"Momochi Zabuza you say? Well, that's interesting. Anyways here's your payment, congratulations on completing a high level mission!" Sarutobi tossed out four wads of cash. (I'm using dollars if anyone of you asks…I'm not very good with foreign money.) They each let go of shikamaru to catch the money, allowing him to breathe once again.

As they were leaving the door, Kakashi stopped and waved his team through, staying behind to talk with the Hokage.

"Sandaime-sama, the seal has cracked." The serious look in Kakashi's eye drew Iruka's and Sarutobi's full attention.

"You're sure?" Kakashi nodded.

"At the bridge, she went into kyuubi state, and could not control her actions. She brutally murdered a boy, slowly and in pain. It took shikamaru to get her out of it, she says it hurts or her to think about it, I believe that the fox is interfering with her mind." The information silenced the men in the room, at least until Sarutobi let loose a very tired sounding sigh, his years catching up to him.

"We'll have to watch her, make sure she's okay, I can't risk the kyuubi breaking free, no matter how much I love that little girl."

Narue sat on her bed, neither of her family was home and she was thankful, she needed to think. She remembered clearly the feelings that came with the immense power that she had on the bridge. The huge hate and anger that drove her muscles, without her brain telling them to do it. Was it the kyuubi? Was he taking control?

She had felt the separate feelings and thoughts of another, another full of malice. The other one had taken joy and satisfaction in the way the boy screamed. The other one wanted to kill her teammates, not her. Not her. She wouldn't do those things...would she?

Narue curled up in a tiny ball, biting her lip to keep from whimpering. She couldn't do anything against such a powerful beast, there was no way. She was just a very tiny person with mental issues and the most powerful demon residing in her stomach.

One thing was certain; she didn't know who kyuubi was and who Narue was within her own body anymore.

"Sasuke, have you seen Narue around? I lost her after we left the mission room." Shikamaru ducked into the small ramen stand, finding Sasuke already there.

"Nope, she's gone; I thought she would be here." The pale boy answered, Shikamaru sighed heavily and sat on the stool beside his teammate.

"By the way, what happened on the bridge? I was….knocked out before anything happened." Sasuke admitted that he was beaten rather grudgingly, but was still curious as well. Shikamaru ran a hand down the length of his face, wondering where to start.

"Well, after you hit the deck, Narue as stabbed in numerous places by poisoned senbon, she hit the floor too; we all thought she was dead. After a few seconds she was up again, but…it…wasn't her… it was a different person all together. One who enjoyed torturing people, and that's..." Shikamaru squeezed his eyes shut, pausing. Sasuke said nothing, waiting for the other boy to continue.

"The other person in Narue's body...hurt…the boy she had been fighting...badly. She then came after me, but she stopped, she said 'he is hurting me, help me shika...help me.' She collapsed after. Gatou then came, and Zabuza died killing him. We were in no condition to fight, but Narue pushed away from me and punched the unfinished end of the bridge. It collapsed and took Gatou's army he had brought with him down to the lake."

There was silence between the two boys, both digesting the tale.

"So you're saying that Narue went berserk?" Sasuke tried to imagine the small girl killing so many people, but found he couldn't. Not with his imagination anyways.

"More than berserk my friend…and I'm going to find out what happened." The resolve in Shikamaru's eyes grew in Sasuke's as well, and they set out to find either Kakashi or Narue, either one could explain this, they were sure.

"Kakashi-sensei, quit avoiding the subject." The jounin sighed; he was cornered…in more ways than one. The man's back was pressed against two walls; the boys had ambushed him just as he left the tower.

"Alright, fine. I only hope that Narue won't kill me or anything else after I tell you. Narue is the container of the kyuubi no yokoi, the very same that attacked Konoha 13 years ago. The Yondaime sealed the monster within Narue, he meant for her to be a hero, but she turned out to be the village's scapegoat. Do you understand now?"

This new information immediately silenced the boys' questions. His explains quite a bit about their teammate.

"So you're saying…that Narue is the demon, The Kyuubi?" Sasuke's question earned him two death-filled glares from Shikamaru and Kakashi each.

"No! Narue is not a demon! I thought you'd know that by now Sasuke!" the harsh words from Shikamaru came out of Kakashi's mouth as well. The dark-haired boy shrunk back at the amount of venom put behind those words.

"I apologize I meant no disrespect." He hadn't menat to though; he was confused and spoke his mind.

Kakashi straightened and said, "Well, you should go find Narue, make sure she's okay. She knows about the kyuubi, but I'm afraid for her mental sate." He poofed away before either of his students could ask him further. They sighed and decided to do as he said; Shikamaru eyed Sasuke though, wondering if he understood what would happen if he ever hurt Narue.

The knocking on her door surprised her; she had not been expecting visitors. Blue eyes were curious as she made her way around the clutter in the living room to the door, peering into the peep-hole. Narue gasped, it was Shikamaru and Sasuke! What were they going to think, she had been so different on the bridge, do they hate her now?

After a few minutes of silent debate she settled for opening her door a crack and talking to them. As the light filtered in, she tried at speaking, "Y-yes shika-kun? Sasu-kun?" they looked at her sadly, the girl was obviously not having the greatest day. Her eyes were darkened, and her face was red and splotchy, as if she had been crying.

"Narue, can we come in?" shikamaru asked softly, watching her hesitate before opening the door wider. Stepping in, shikamaru and Sasuke sat themselves on narue's couch. There were no sounds in the apartment so it was safe to say that neither of her parents was home. They both waited patiently for Narue to sit opposite them, and when she did started to talk.

"We talked to Kakashi…"

This chapter has been cluttering up my com for a while and I just want to get it off my back! Ok so review, and tell me if theres anything wrong with it so I can fix it in the next chapter.

-mayu