Leo: Disclaimer time!
Sasori: Leo doesn't' own Naruto, the manga, anime, merchandise, or characters beside Misaki.
Misaki: Commencing story!
Misaki's POV
"How's it hanging, Baa-chan?" Naruto waltzed into Tsunade's office hands over his head leisurely, seemingly unaware of his disrespectful nature.
"Heh, looks like the brat's finally come back." Tsunade smirked a vein already twitching in her temple. I snickered to myself laughing at how fast Naruto had managed to piss the Fifth off in the short amount of time he'd been in Konoha.
Just then, the doors of the office broke in behind us abruptly startled us, "Tsunade-sama, it's urgent!" A woman I recognized as one of the top decoders in our village yelled out hurriedly.
"What is it then? Out with it." Tsunade responded impatiently.
"The Sand's Kazekage has been taken by an organization called Akatsuki!" the lady rushed out.
"G-Gaara?" Naruto and I exclaimed taking a minute to soak in the news. "But that's impossible…" I murmured to myself.
"How could someone beat Gaara-san…?" Sakura also seemed to be in shock. Tsunade closed her eyes and carelessly tossed down the piece of paperwork she had been holding in her hand.
"Right then, Team Kakashi, I will give you your new mission." Tsunade said, iron resolve in her voice, "You will go out to the Sand, find out the immediate situation and relay it to Konoha. Afterwards, follow the orders of the Sand and back them up."
"Understood." We saluted her.
"We'll be heading out now, Tsunade." I called behind me. I swiftly secured my backpack traps readying myself for the long journey to Suna. I looked back tossing a reassuring smile to Tsunade who in truth looked a bit worried. This might just be one of the hardest missions she's given us so far.
"…Yeah." She nodded in my direction.
"Do your best!" Iruka-sensei called out to us as we made our way out.
"Hai!" Naruto saluted him as we started down the dirt path to Suna.
"Hey Naruto!" I looked up to see Jiraiya heading down the path towards us a cocky smile on his face as usual. "Heading out on a mission so soon?"
"Yes sir!" Naruto readily saluted him.
"Oh Tsunade, the Sand's Kazekage-" Jiraiya started before Tsunade cut him off.
"I know; I got the message already. Team Kakashi is heading off to Suna now." Tsunade briefly explained the situation to him.
"Hmm, alright. Naruto can I have a word with you, real quick?" Jiraiya pulled Naruto aside. I scoffed; we all already knew that he was going to warn him about the Akatsuki and his tailed demon. It was only a minute before Jiraiya and Naruto split up, Jiraiya brushed past Kakashi whispering something to him that I didn't catch.
Naruto shouldered his backpack and started down the road again. "Misaki, Sakura-chan, Kakashi-sensei, let's get a move on already!"
"Wait a minute, Naruto!" Sakura jumped onto a tree branch hurriedly catching up to him.
"Alright, alright, I'm coming. Who made you team leader anyway?" I shook the bad feeling settling over me off and quickly jumped onto a tree branch after my team.
'I really hope Gaara gets back to the Sand quickly. He's a tough character, I'm sure he's doing fine.' I thought. I shook my head clearing the thoughts from my mind, 'I just have to focus on this mission.'
Third Person POV
"It's a new kind of poison. We haven't found any kind of antidote." The brown-haired medic nin assessed the damage done to the Kazekage's brother.
"What even happened to have got Kankuro-san hurt this badly." The blonde medic in the room mumbled after he performed basic medical procedures on the patient.
"He shouldn't have gone after the captors all alone, he was obviously in some sort of physical fight and the opponent must have coated their weapons with poison. He must have been pretty skilled to defeat Kankuro-san so soundly." The medic answered his question.
"Let's hope the assistance from the Leaf Village comes quickly, without Kazekage-sama here there's so much chaos in the city, even the Council can't begin to handle it. The civilians all saw Kazekage-sama get defeated, there's way too much disarray. Konoha's medic nins should help the situation with Kankuro-san too." The medic sighed heavily.
"Let's hope. We have 2-3 days for him to hold out."
"Gaara…and now Kankuro too…" Baki finally spoke up for the first time in hours after sitting to the side in the room brewing over the situation.
"Baki-san…" the brunette medic muttered. He couldn't even begin to understand how Baki must feel seeing two of his former students put in such a dangerous situation all in one day.
"Urgh…ugh…" Kankuro groaned on the bed obviously in a lot of pain from the poison.
"I guess… all we can do is ask his retired sibling." Baki sighed.
"Temari-sama?" the medic looked at each other nervously. This must be serious.
Misaki's POV
"Huh, is that… Temari-san!" I squinted into the distance seeing Temari standing at the border of the Sand and the Leaf where the forest briefly transforms to desert in this small clearing.
"Huh? Is that you Misaki-chan?" Temari turned a curious look on her face as we jumped down from the tree in front of her. "What are you guys doing here?"
"We're here to help retrieve Gaara." I explained curtly.
"What do you mean? Gaara is fine." Temari furrowed her brow and dismissed our excuse impatiently.
"You haven't got the news yet?" Sakura questioned in confusion.
"Gaara was kidnapped by the Akatsuki, Temari." Kakashi explained in more depth than me.
"What?! How is that possible?!" Temari's eyes widened I felt a pang of pity for her as I realized that this was her brother we were talking about, she probably isn't taking this well.
"I had a bad feeling…" She lowered her gaze to the sand swirling around our feet, bewilderment brewing in her eyes.
"It's going to take three days to reach the Sand from here." Naruto ground out, determination in his eyes, "Let's head back there and see what the situation is."
"Ok…" Temari agreed uneasily and with that we took off back to the Sand. We quickly reentered the forest to make quicker time to the village.
I glanced over to Naruto he was gritting his teeth, and I could see the anger brewing in his gaze.
"Na-" Before I could even get a word out, he shot ahead of us.
"Naruto, I said to hurry not to split up the team." Kakashi coolly called out.
"I can't stand it!" Naruto yelled out in frustration, we all quickly fell into silence. "Even I know they're after Gaara and I… you still don't know, right Sakura?"
Sakura made a small noise in surprise.
"Inside me is sealed the demon fox Kyuubi." Naruto said coldly and at that moment I wished he would turn his face so I could see the kind of expression he was making right now. No best friend wishes to see their friend feeling as alone as Naruto must feel right now. I lowered my gaze from him instead staring at the tree branches flying beneath me.
"Gaara and me… just because we have monsters inside of us; that's what they're after! They only see us as the monster inside of us! I can't stand them looking at us like that! Like we're not human too!"
The way Naruto spoke conjured an image of a little Naruto in my mind, surrounded by people in the village all hating him when all he wanted to do was prove to them that he wasn't a monster, that he did deserve to belong.
"He and I… we're exactly the same! He was fighting all this time…and was even lonelier than I was! He was targeted by the Akatsuki just like me! Even so, why is it always him that has to play such a hard role?! IT'S ALWAYS HIM ALONE!" Naruto yelled I could tell his anger at the situation was increasing by the minute. Until now I never really understood what Naruto and Gaara's life was like before I came to Konoha and everything happened at the Chuunin Exams but now I realized how hard it must be for the both of them to always be looked at with such judging eyes. To never really belong.
"That's why this time I don't want to just sit around asking why…this time I'm definitely going to save him!" Naruto said this time not with anger but with determination and steel in his voice. While it might have gone unnoticed by the rest of the team I could hear the slight wobble in Naruto's voice indicating that he was tearing up. I smiled sadly at him; he really does get passionate. He always cares too much.
"Naruto." Sakura finally broke the tense silence in the air. Naruto glanced back at her distractedly. "You've really gone through a lot the past few years haven't you?" The silence Naruto gave her answered her question perfectly.
"Uchiha Itachi. You're his target too." Sakura said, "I wasn't just training these past two years and a half years. I was looking through Tsunade's notes and researching as much as I can." I had a quick flashback back to when Sasuke introduced himself to us when we were just put together as Team Seven and he said that there's a very specific person he plans to kill in the future. Itachi.
"The enemy Sasuke wants to kill is really Uchiha Itachi, isn't it…? A member of the Akatsuki." Sakura revealed. I thought of the time Itachi tried to kidnap Naruto in the hotel before Jiraiya showed up and saved us.
"Because of that Sasuke is now with Orochimaru, to gain power. But all Orochimaru wants is Sasuke's body so we have about half a year left. And Orochimaru was originally a member of the Akatsuki. So what I'm trying to get at here is…"
"The closer we get to getting information on the Akatsuki…" I was slowly starting to see Sakura's point.
"…we get closer to Orochimaru and so we get closer to Sasuke." Sakura finished my sentence. "And our time limit to rescue Sasuke is only half a year."
"This time…this time I definitely won't let him go so easily…I'm stronger this time." I clenched my fist making my decision now.
"I'm with you on that. This time he won't get away!" Naruto agreed.
We finally made it to the gates of Suna feeling sweaty and dirty, I could already feel the sand sticking to my hair and my body making me more hot and uncomfortable than I already was.
"Temari-san was with you? Come on, right this way!" the woman standing guard hurried us into the village.
"The Kazekage was abducted and Kankuro was wounded in the process of trying to get him back." The guard briefed us.
"What? Kankuro was wounded?!" Temari's head snapped up in surprise at the revelation.
"Yes, he got hit with the enemy's poison too, he's in bad condition. We have no way to neutralize it. At best he's only got half a day left." The woman hurriedly explained the gravity of the situation.
"Let's hurry, Temari-san." Sakura stepped up to the older kunoichi, "I'll examine him."
We quickly made it to Kankuro's room in Suna's hospital. I threw the door open quickly making my way to his bed. I side stepped the grandma standing by his bed. "Obaa-s-" Before I could get a word out she had already rushed past me.
"The White Fang of Konoha!" she yelled as she threw a punch at Kakashi who had just entered the room. Luckily, Naruto intercepted for a startled Kakashi quickly throwing the old woman back.
"HEY!" I yelled suddenly infuriated, "What are you going at Kakashi-sensei for you wrinkly old hag?!"
"My son's enemy…I'll get revenge today!" she glared hostilely at Kakashi already falling into a comfortable battle stance.
"No, wait! I'm not the-" Kakashi tried to clear up the situation before he was interrupted.
"There's no use arguing!" she cut him off.
"Sister." The old man standing at Kankuro's bed held out an arm in front of her blocking her off from getting to Kakashi. "Take a close look. There might be a close resemblance but he's not the White Fang."
There was a heavy silence at the old woman studied Kakashi before she suddenly threw her head back in laughter, "Gyahaha! I was only pretending to be stupid, baka!"
I sweat dropped before flaring back up, "Who the hell do you think you're fooling, you heap of-" I was only getting started before Sakura swiftly cut me off.
"Besides that, Kankuro needs medical attention right now." Sakura announced.
"Please!" Temari pleaded. Sakura nodded the familiar green glow appearing around her hands. She gently put her hands on Kankuro's chest, a look of concentration on her face. She slowly lifted her hand up a purple blob of poison being extracted from his chest.
"Nice going Sakura!" I smiled happy to see that Kankuro already looked a bit more comfortable without as much poison circulating through his body. I took the bowl of the poison from her hands. "Now we just need to make an antidote for the leftover poison circulating in his bloodstream. Everyone please gather what I say!" I easily turned to the room asking for cooperation.
"You two remind me of that slug woman…" the old woman piped up.
"Tsunade? That must be because she's my master." Sakura smiled pleasantly.
"Well… she practically raised me so of course I'm going to turn out like her." I muttered to myself. The old woman seemed surprised.
"She raised you?" she asked curiously. I shrugged it off.
"Who knows?" I said before we could talk about it more I changed the subject. "Anyway who's ready to kick the Akatsuki's butt?"
"Yosh!" Naruto pumped for fist in excitement much to my amusement.
"Man, you're always ready to pick a fight aren't you?" I laughed as I made my way out of the room.
"Wow, I can't believe you guys have so many herbs." I said in awe of the size of the greenhouse they had. I was expecting a bit less, them being in a desert and all.
"Pardon us…it's a bit difficult to grow herbs in this climate. We especially have a small amount of Tomoshirisou." (a rare plant that only grows in two areas of Japan)
"Nah, with this I'll be able to make at least three antidotes…excellent." I grinned happily; everything was going to go smoothly.
Third Person's POV
"As soon as Misaki-chan is done with that, let's get going!" Naruto stretched already getting ready for the mission ahead of him.
"Sorry to be a bother but could you guide us to the place where Kankuro was fighting after this?" Kakashi inquired, "I might not seem like it but I'm an expert at pursuit, if there's even a little bit of their scent left at the battleground…"
"That…won't be needed." The room turned to Kankuro who had finally regained consciousness and was sitting up, "There are two enemies. One of them abducted Gaara so you should follow Gaara's scent… Just in case they split up, I caught a piece of one of the other one's clothing on Karasu."
"Hm…making a success out of such a failure…truly a shinobi of the sand."
"Kankuro are you ok?!" Temari fussed over her brother helping him sit up better and making sure he was okay.
"Yeah, I'm feeling better." Kankuro turned to look at Naruto, "Uzumaki Naruto…"
"Uh, hiya." Naruto smiled nervously at his intense gaze.
"Kankuro, are you sure that one of the two people you followed was Sasori?" the old woman spoke up again.
"Chiyo-baasama and Ebizo-jiisama?" Kankuro seemed surprised to see the two elderlies there. He quickly composed himself and answered though, "Yeah, it was Sasori of the Red Sand, he introduced himself to me."
"Sasori of the Red Sand…? May we please hear more about the Akatsuki? Please." Sakura piped up immediately interested.
"Come on Kankuro; make sure you drink it all." I had a hand on Kankuro's back as I pressed the cup to his lips helping him take the antidote. I inspected the cup to make sure all of it was gone before I set it on the table, "You should be fine now. Wait for the paralysis to wear off, until then get some rest."
"…" Kankuro was silent as he stared down at his trembling hand. "Uzumaki Naruto…"
"Hm?" Naruto turned to him surprised to have been called so suddenly.
"…Please save my brother." Kankuro bowed his head, shading his eyes from view not allowing us to see what he was thinking.
Even so, Naruto smirked, "Leave it all to me. I'm gonna become the Hokage one day so I'll secure this favor in advance from the Kazekage!" Naruto turned his back, "Now let's head out."
"Again, who made you team captain?" I leaned against Kankuro's bed.
"Sakura-san, thanks for healing me. And Misaki-san…" I looked down to feel Kankuro's trembling hand on my forearm, "Thanks for the antidote."
"Pervert." Naruto muttered eyeing Kankuro's hand on me over his shoulder.
"What did you say, you brat?!" Kankuro sparked up responding to Naruto's taunts. He quickly balling his hands into trembling fists.
I sighed, "Naruto don't upset the patient. Let's get a move on now." I said shoving him out of the room. We made quick time to the gates of Suna readying ourselves for the real mission.
"Wait, Team Kakashi! I'm going to!" I looked behind us to see Temari looking at us determination in her eyes.
"No Temari." We looked up to see Chiyo standing on top of the watch tower. "Stay here and work the defense on the country border. From the Village Hidden in the Sand, I am more than enough for this mission."
"B-but Chiyo-baasama!" Temari sputtered in protest.
"Don't you think that's a little too much?" Baki tried to talk her out of it.
"DON'T TREAT ME LIKE AN OLD WOMAN!" She shrieked as she jumped down from the tower.
"Ah! She jumped!" Naruto, Sakura and I backed away as she fell from the sky; we were surprised when she made a perfect landing.
"I've been wanting to give my grandson some love for a while…" she explained a hint of sadness in her eyes. One of the Akatsuki must be her grandson.
I pushed the pity of my mind and squared my shoulders. "Don't hold us back then." I warned.
She turned to me, "I wouldn't dare."