Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

"A stumble may prevent a fall"- English Proverb

Sakura felt herself slowly returning to consciousness, feeling warm and comfortable. It sounded like the rain had stopped, and there was light assaulting her closed eyes. She should wake up, she thought, but she felt so secure lying there. She could smell a wonderful smell. She could smell the forest, and something dark and masculine. It was strange and new, yet it reminded her of home. She smiled and scrunched her fists into whatever soft thing she was touching. In reply, she felt arms tighten around her. She stiffened. She didn't remember falling asleep like this.

She opened her eyes, and it seemed her hands were grabbing the front of Deidara's shirt. She felt a hand move up the outside of her thigh, coming dangerously close to her buttocks.

"Now who's molesting who in their sleep, yeah?" She mocked silently before attempting to subtly wriggle out of his grasp, finding the tight grip around her small waist very awkward to extract herself from.

She wasn't quite sure why she didn't want to wake him up. If Naruto pulled this crap on her she'd have knocked him unconscious by now. Maybe she was just embarrassed about yesterday. She had pretty much emotionally broken on him and had leaned on him heavily- much more than she had even burdened her own team with. She was surprised he had let her, thinking back on it. What did he have to gain from making her feel better? She finally managed to roll away from him, though not entirely unscathed; his hand-mouth had drooled on her thigh.

Unbeknownst to her, Deidara was smiling smugly, fully awake and taking advantage of the situation. He had been enjoying her mild panic at his "unconscious" advances. He felt the heat of her body disappear, and opened his eye a slit. He saw her face, bathed in the morning sunlight, making her pink hair glow. Her eyes were slightly puffy from sleep, and a light blush adorned her cheeks. She was looking towards the entrance of the cave with a thoughtful expression, and he wondered what she was thinking about.

He also wondered if she knew her panties were visible from this angle.

She stood up and walked over to where her clothes were drying. She gave him a quick glance, to which he instantly feigned sleep at, before she quickly removed her vest and began re-tying her chest bindings.

Deidara felt great relief at what he saw.

"So you're not that young, yeah." He grinned at her horror-stricken face, watching the pink blush turn to a full red face. At first she looked confused; a very innocent look on her features. Then her eyebrows contracted in an evil-looking glare, and Deidara wondered if it had been such a good idea to tease her this early in the morning.

"Deidara..." A vein popped in her temple. He gulped. "You're going to turn around right now, or I won't even bother to use that bracelet to kill you. I'll just pound your head against the wall until your brain comes out."

He obediently complied. No, it hadn't been one of his best thought out plans. He did feel a little guilty at how upset she seemed to be, but the teenage-boy part of him was very content, so it evened out in his books.

"Can I turn around now... yeah?" He asked a little timidly after he stopped hearing the shuffling of fabric.

"I suppose." Came a grumpy reply. He turned round, giving her his best cute look through the strands of hair that hung in front of his eyes. Since last night, seeing her decapitate that man with a punch, he respected her. He didn't want to stay on her bad side for long if he could help it. Also, he'd taken his hair down last night to dry, and he wanted her to do it again. It had been a nice change to have it off his neck and out of his face.

She looked at him, her glare softening once she saw his innocent "pleasehelpmyhair" face. She sighed and walked over to him, kneeling behind him. He felt her delicate hands take his hair, tugging gently at the long strands.

"I still want to know what happened to make your chest like that." She said, her fingers brushing the soft skin on his neck slightly. He leaned into the feeling of her hands in his hair, not used to the feeling of someone taking care of him.

"It's a kekkei-genkai, yeah." He wasn't sure why he was telling her. Maybe it was because he wasn't the type of person who liked to keep things bottled up. Then again, it's not like he went around telling everyone his past. No, only Leader knew about his past, though Sasori had known to some extent. Perhaps it was some special girl-jutsu she was using on his hair to make him so relaxed he'd tell her anything.

"All people in your clan have this condition?" She was surprised a clan with such a debilitating jutsu could sustain its numbers. She massaged his scalp slightly as she pulled more hair back.

"No, I had a very rare mutation of it, yeah. I basically had one extra mouth." He sighed in bliss. "The last person to have the kekkei-genkai that strong was my great grandfather. He didn't live very long, and he took a good chunk out of Iwa as he went, yeah."

"When did it manifest?" She was surprised he was telling her any of this. Maybe he underestimated her and thought it didn't matter if he told her. She frowned as she pulled more soft strands into her hands, working out tangles.

"I first started to notice a concentration of chakra in my chest when I was eleven. When I was twelve, a mouth opened up right over it." His voice was a little strained.

"Before that, my strength had been in taijutsu. I was one of the most talented young shinobi in my village, yeah." He gave a bitter laugh. "That all changed within a year. When they noticed I was having trouble breathing during the harder training, the medics examined me. Once they found out what had manifested, they turned on me.

""A reincarnation of his grandfather" They said. They thought I was going to grow up and destroy the village, like him."

She waited for him to continue, after a few minutes of silence she noticed that she had forgotten about his hair. She was just holding it in her hands, staring at the back of his head. Who would have thought this carefree young man had carried such a stigma from such a young age? Well if you thought about it, it made sense, she thought. Itachi hadn't been the happiest of children, and nor had Zabuza. She returned to playing with his hair, hoping it would encourage him to tell her more.

When the silence continued, she wrapped the tie around his hair neatly, leaving a couple of strands around his face. She doubted he would tell her anything else today, and they were a bit too close for comfort. If Tsunade knew she was playing hairdressers with an Akatsuki she would have her examined in the psychiatric ward.

Deidara seemed to come out of a daydream, and he turned around and looked at her with an unreadable gaze. In that moment, she felt very protective of him. He was more like Naruto than she had first realised.

She watched him as he stood up and walked towards the bright entrance, only his silhouette visible to her now, the sunlight reflecting off his golden hair. Although she knew it was extremely far from the truth, he looked angelic.

He pulled a cloak from its drying spot, and threw it towards her, pulling his own on. She was still a bit shocked from what she had learned. His own village had turned on him. He hadn't even done anything wrong. He shouldered the pack she had given him the day before.

"Oi." His voice stopped her musings, and she knew he was smirking, and although she couldn't see his face, she could picture his arrogant but attractive smile. "Aren't we supposed to be escorting me to Konoha?"


The weather was a nice change from the previous day, Sakura thought, as she easily leapt across the dry branches. At least they didn't have to travel on the ground.

She felt a lot more optimistic today, though she couldn't think why. She'd just decapitated someone with her bare hands yesterday, and walked through a slaughtered village. Somehow, even though she was sad, she felt as though today would go well. Maybe it was the sunshine, but the world felt like a better place.

Deidara, on the other hand, was very bored. He didn't like travelling, especially in silence. The monotonous jumping, landing, and jumping had grown old quickly. He may be happy to be able to run around again, but that didn't necessarily mean he wanted to do it all the time.

"So how old are you really, hm?" The question was unexpected, and sounded suspiciously like he was teasing her, though his face didn't betray him.

"Fifteen." She replied. She didn't see any reason why she shouldn't tell him. "How about you? You have to be older than you look if you're in Akatsuki." She was very curious, she realised.

"I'm nineteen, yeah, and there's no age limit in Akatsuki..." Deidara replied. "Besides, I've been a member since I was fourteen. Not quite as young as Itachi was, he was only thirteen, yeah."

Sakura was a little shocked. Since he was fourteen? She'd know how young Itachi had been, but that was different. He was an Uchiha, and normal rules didn't apply to Uchihas. Deidara didn't seem like a cold-hearted genius. He seemed like an interesting, volatile person. She could understand him, even if only a little.

"Will you tell me the rest of how you became a missing nin?" She asked, delicacy in her voice. She had no right to ask, but he interested her. He was something very different from the predictable and law-abiding friends she had in Konoha.

"Maybe another time, yeah." He answered, not meeting her gaze, looking instead at the approaching trees. It was the answer she had expected.

The small breeze in the air didn't do much to keep the heat away as they rushed past hundreds of trees. The sun beat down hard on the leaves, making the air around them hot and humid. Sakura caught snatches of sky through the heavy foliage, and it reminded her of the view from the roof of her apartment. She used to sit up there for hours, staring at the sky, thinking that it was the same sky that was looking down on Sasuke.

Where was Sasuke now? Did he miss them? Did she care? She knew she'd always have some sort of tie to him, but thinking on how much he had hurt Naruto and how easily he changed his loyalties, she didn't think she could ever trust him enough to give him her heart again.

"Can you hear that?" His voice brought her out of her mind-wanderings. They came to a halt, resting on the large branch of a pine. She concentrated on the quietness of the forest, and heard the light rushing sound of a river or stream. Her eyes lit up, and she looked at him excitedly.

"It's about time we had a break anyway." She said, already moving towards the sound, hearing him take her lead.

She was so hot. She wasn't sure how many hours they had been travelling in this heat, but a wash in a clean stream sounded good. She still had blood stains on her body from the night before.

When they reached the stream, Sakura gave a little whoop of joy before dropping her pack and reaching down to take off her boots. She heard Deidara make an amused sound before doing the same. For once she wasn't bothered by him laughing at her.

The water looked fresh and cool, shallow enough to see the flat stones at the bottom, but deep enough to reach at least to her waist. She decided to go in with most of her clothes on. They could do with a wash anyway, and it would be less embarrassing. Looking over to her right, Deidara seemed to have fewer inhibitions than her.

He had taken off his shirt, and was bending to roll his trousers up. She had a perfect view of his back from this angle. She hadn't seen his back before. His skin was slightly tanned, and the muscles under the smooth looking skin flexed as he worked on the cuffs of his trousers. She frowned. He wasn't planning on going all the way in, yet he still took off his shirt?

Sakura blushed and looked away, focusing instead on the cool water that awaited her hot and tired body. The pebbles made crunching noises as she padded across them to the water's edge, dipping her foot in the water. It was a lot colder than she'd thought it would be. Deidara joined her at the edge, using his own foot to test the water. He jumped back and glared at the water.

"It's really cold, yeah." He looked so offended, Sakura couldn't help but laugh at him. She was still laughing as she ran straight into the freezing water, splashing some droplets onto his bare skin. When she was knee deep she turned and looked at him, delighted at the furious expression on his face.

"Chicken?" She asked, like he had taunted her before. She received an even more cross stare. "Aren't you coming in Dei-chan?"

She had barely finished the "chan" when she saw a blur and felt herself dragged underwater. She came up spluttering and vengeful. Had he just... Dunked her?

She summoned chakra to her fist, and punched the water as hard as she could in the direction of his smug smirk. The resulting tidal wave was very impressive, towering at twice the height of a person. Deidara, still grinning, nimbly leapt to the side and came at her once more. So he wanted to spar again?

She stopped the chakra flow to her fists; she wanted it to be a fair fight. She pushed his quick punches to the side with her forearms, but she was being pushed deeper into the water. She was going to lose her footing at this rate.

She wedged her foot against a rock, using it to launch herself past Deidara so she was further up the bank than he was. She used quick, jabbing attacks, trying to get past his blocks, but he seemed to have improved these past few days. He was teasing her; no longer attacking, just keeping her off-balance with his annoying blocks.

She used her leg to sweep his feet, and felt very satisfied when he landed with a splash. She wasn't happy for more than half a second before her own legs had been pulled out from under her, and she was underneath his wet, half naked body with her head barely above water.

For a few seconds, she just lay there too shocked at the situation they were in to retaliate. Once she regained her thoughts, she realised her hands were pinned just like before, only this time, she couldn't threaten him with his hair. She'd tied it up for him that morning, and the ends of his neatly tied hair were dripping water onto her neck.

She looked down at their position, and smiled when she realised that all was not lost. She bent her left leg at an angle impossible for most people, slipped it through the gap between them and used it to push him off her. He had underestimated her flexibility, of which she was very proud.

He landed a few feet away, remarkably still on his feet, with an impressed look on his features.

"You didn't tell me you were that bendy, yeah." His gaze travelled down her soaked body. Why did everything that came out of that man's mouth sound so suggestive? It was pissing her off, although she didn't want to read too much into the reason why.

She lunged at him once more, putting all of her natural strength into being as fast as possible so he couldn't react. The foot of water she was dashing across slowed her a little, but her speed training with Tsunade paid off when she managed to clip his jaw, grab the hand that came up to block, and throw him over her shoulder, pinning him in the exact same way he had just pinned her.

She looked him straight in those beautiful blue eyes of his triumphantly.

"Let's see you get out of it, hmm? Dei-chan." She taunted, bringing her face a little closer to his, certain of her victory. His eyes narrowed at the nickname.

"Now why would I want to get of this Kitten, hmm? But since you ask..." His mouth was suddenly on hers, hot and filled with seduction. His lips moved against hers encouragingly, almost tenderly. The world disappeared when her eyes closed, and all she could feel was him.

Sakura felt herself being sat up slowly, feeling his strong arms around her, a warm contrast to the icy water. A hand stroked her wet-clothed body from her waist upwards, making her gasp in surprise. In addition to the soft, enticing lips holding her own captive, she felt his tongue enter to meet hers. All she could do was pull him closer and respond as best as she knew how, her hands splayed across his bare back. When the added sensation of another mouth at her neck appeared, she lost all rational train of thought.

Only when she felt the sharp little teeth at her jugular did she pull away in realisation. He had tricked her.

Where had his hands gone? She could have sworn she was just pinning them vengefully. They were sitting up in...

In that position.

She was straddling his lap, her hands on his chest from where she had finally pushed him away. One of his hands was open-mouthed on her neck.

Sakura blushed pinker than she had ever blushed before.

"I win, yeah." She heard him say. She didn't even want to look at his stupid face. Her first kiss, stolen by Akatsuki's pretty-boy. She got up, avoiding his gaze, fighting back tears.

She grabbed her pack and began walking upstream to bathe where he couldn't see.

"I'll be back soon." She muttered as she walked past him.

Deidara frowned. He hadn't expected her to react like that. He had expected her to try to slap him, releasing her hold on his hands. He didn't understand her, but he understood from the way she kissed, tentatively and unsure, that he shouldn't have kissed her.

Deidara heard a small splash behind him, and smiled as he saw a flash of scales. He was hungry, and the thought of roast fish made him even hungrier.

He saw a cluster of fish over near the other side of the river, and began to wade out towards them, kunai pulled from his trousers. When he was drawing close, the texture under his feet changed from pebbled to soft and slippery. He almost couldn't believe his luck. He dived down, his hands tugging expertly at the floor, pulling away a large chunk before surfacing. A large grin curled the corners of his mouth upwards. He had found some really, really good clay.


Sakura had taken off her clothes, and was scrubbing them furiously, wondering why she had reacted the way she had. Yes, Deidara was extremely attractive, and interesting, but he was also a smug bastard with hair like Ino's. He was Akatsuki, she couldn't forget that. If she could just put it all down to hormones, then everything would be fine.

She didn't want Sasuke to have her first kiss anymore, anyway. She was coming to realise that even an S-class nin treated her with more respect than he ever did. If Deidara could travel with her, spar with her, and see her at some very low points without calling her "annoying" then she was sure he could have. She inwardly growled as she scrubbed the last of the blood out of her medic's skirt. Maybe it was good Deidara had taken her first kiss. At least it was something she'd remember for the rest of her life.

She was finally feeling clean when she began to smell something very good. The aroma of the cooking fish made her hurry to put her clothes back on, and scramble to the shore.

Deidara had lit a small fire, and had four medium-sized fish cooking above the baby flames. He was sitting on a dry log next to the fire, staring out thoughtfully at the river. She had come to realise that he liked to daydream, especially at this time of day, just as the temperature was cooling.

"Hey." She called. "You caught these?" She gestured towards the fish, and he nodded, turning to face her.

"There were lots around, yeah, and it's been a while since we ate." He moved up to make room for her on the log. "They should be done now." He lifted one of the speared fish, inspected it, then passed it to her. Surprised, she took it, muttering thanks before biting into the moist meat, seeing him reach for another before she closed her eyes in bliss. The fish was delicious, and perfectly cooked.

For a few minutes the only sounds were that of the river, and the soft crackling of the fire as they ate. Sakura felt at ease. Despite the kiss they had shared earlier, she had decided to put it out of her mind and just think about easier, more comfortable things, like home. She wondered how much Tsunade was worrying, and hoped she wasn't drinking too much, or poor Shizune would be having a hard time. She hoped her old cat was alright, she didn't like leaving him for very long. She worried that he got lonely.

"Sakura, yeah..." For once Deidara seemed to be the awkward one.

"What is it?" She replied, still half thinking about Konoha.

"What's Konoha like?" He poked the fire, although it didn't seem like it needed poking. Sakura wondered why it was that all guys seemed unable to leave fires alone, before she thought properly about his question.

"It's filled with good people." To her, that was the most important part, though Deidara looked at her sceptically. "It always feels safe, and I know that my friends are all around me." Sakura pondered her home village, thinking about what was good, and what was bad. "The citizens can be judgemental. When Naruto was growing up, he was treated badly by many of the villagers. Before I got to know him, I didn't treat him very well either." She thought for a moment. "But they come around." She smiled as thoughts of Ichiraku crept in. "We go for ramen a lot now."

"It sounds a lot different from Iwa, yeah." He said. "We didn't have ramen there." He added as an afterthought, looking at her with his grin back in place, which made her smile.

They set off again, having stamped out their fire and buried the fish bones. They didn't want to leave a trail if they could help it. Sakura was still worried about those hunter-nins catching up to them. She knew they'd had to break earlier than expected last night, and if the hunter-nins had managed to catch a trail after the storm then they wouldn't be far behind.

They were back to the rhythmic jumping through the trees, only this time Sakura had a big distraction. Although she had decided not to think about what happened back at the river, she was finding it extremely difficult, as the scene kept on repeating in her head. The sensation of his lips on hers refused to fade. It also didn't help when every time she looked at him, images of his naked torso filled her mind.

She whacked herself on the head, ignoring the funny look Deidara gave her. It was his fault, so she wouldn't even explain it to him. He'd only be all smug about it.

The sky above them was beginning to fade, from the pale blue of the afternoon, to a deeper orange as the sun began to set. It didn't look like they were going to reach as far as she'd hoped today. The break at the river had slowed them down; though she was glad they had, despite having her first kiss stolen. She'd been able to sort out her thoughts, and she'd learned that Deidara was a good cook. That fish had been wonderful, maybe she could persuade him to cook again before they reached Konoha.

Sakura had been so absorbed in her thoughts, that she hadn't been paying attention to the chakra signatures of the area. She gasped and stopped at once when she concentrated on the four signatures she could sense.

"Deidara." He was beside her in a second. "There are four. Really strong, coming from that direction." She pointed towards Konoha. The hunter-nin had somehow gotten around them and figured out where they were headed. They were approaching fast, there was no way they could outrun them. Even if they could escape them, they needed to go that way to get into fire country. They would have to fight.

Sakura was a little frightened as the hunter-nins became visible, landing on the branches twenty feet away. Three of them were men, two in their early thirties, the other a little older. The woman looked to also be in her thirties. One thing they all had in common was the predatory look in their eyes. They were all prepared to kill. Sakura could tell that they all had many, many times the battle experience that she had.

She felt a hand on her shoulder.

"Sakura, you might want to take my bracelet off, yeah."