After having watched the latest episode SEVEN TIMES where Hinata confessed to Naruto how she loved him, I just couldn't help but add a NaruHina part, which I wasn't really planning until later. But I just couldn't resist! XD We all need a lot of NaruHina lovin'.

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto Shippuuden.

Naruto's head shot up from the now happily burning bonfire when he felt another one of his clones vanish at the raging rapids of the river. He had sent a total of fifty clones to search for Sai and Sakura before returning to their tent with the boy in his arms, but all of them seemed to have failed. As he watched the boy, now sleeping soundly in his sleeping bag, he was tempted to go out there in the squall to look for them himself when he heard loud rustling outside his tent.

Raising a kunai to his chest, ready for whoever it could be that was within their camp, he nearly toppled over when a flash of fur, fangs and claws darted into the tent, mauling him over.

"Akamaru?" He exclaimed between loving slobbers from the huge, white dog that was pressing him down with both front paws.

"We finally found you," came a voice from outside the flap, and Kiba Inuzuka's very drenched face popped inside. His wild eyes searched the tent curiously. "This rain was a bother to Akamaru's nose, but thanks to Hinata's byakugan, we located you when we got within range."

Naruto, though feeling unbelievably happy for the unexpected visit, asked, "What on earth are you doing here?"

Kiba frowned as he stepped inside the tent, pushed the hood of his jacket, shook his head like a dog to get water out of his ears and made way for two other familiar people into the shelter; as always tall and brooding, wearing a white coat with the hood low over his forehead, eyes unseen from under those dark-tinted glasses, was Shino Aburame.

"Shino!" Naruto greeted happily, finally succeeding in shoving Akamaru off him, and without thinking bolted to Shino as if to tackle him.

The light shifted in Shino's glasses, and he dodged smoothly to the side. "Don't hug me..."

It was just then that Hinata Hyuuga lithely decided to enter the tent, twiddling her thumbs as usual, her lithe figure clad in a brown cloak.

Crap!

Naruto tried to stop, too late. He ended up tackling the unaware Hinata down to the ground. They landed with a quiet squish! on the water puddle just outside the flap, Hinata giving a loud squeal.

This was the last thing Naruto had wanted to do to Hinata, simply because the girl would lose all sense of being when he came so much as a few inches from her. He could not fathom why, but the girl was confusing him. It was like she would come so close, only to run away as fast as she could from him as if he smelled bad.

He didn't smell bad, did he?

And just as he thought this, Hinata had already lost consciousness. "Na-Naruto… " she mumbled incoherently, her face red all over from under her rain slicker.

"My bad, my bad, Hinata! Are you all right?" He loomed his face closer to Hinata's and held up his hand in a fist. "How many fingers am I holding up?" he asked humorously.

Kiba popped up beside him and kicked him off his teammate. "You're not helping, idiot." He picked up Hinata by one arm and dragged her inside the tent where Shino was already drying himself by the fire, staring at the sleeping boy by his side. Naruto crawled in after them, rubbing his butt where Kiba had kicked him.

"What are you guys doing here?" Naruto asked his earlier question again as he sat at the only space he could settle on.

Hinata, who seemed to have come back to her senses, was sitting by Akamaru who was licking his fur contentedly. She started to twiddle her thumbs again. "The Lady Tsunade sent us about three hours after you left the village. As… back up..." She blushed when she saw Naruto looking at her, making her stop talking altogether.

"Not that I'm not glad you're here. But why?"

Shino looked over his shoulder. "She was worried. Why? Because she was informed by certain sources that the water level had already started to rise and wanted the mission over as fast as possible and your team back in the village before things get ugly here." He looked back at the child again, falling into silence again.

"Speaking of your team, where are Sakura and Sai?" Kiba asked as he wrinkled his nose at something. "And what the heck is that smell?" He must be referring to Naruto's smell again. Naruto hated it when he did that.

Naruto, reminded that his teammates were still missing in action, was on his feet again. "We have to find them!" And in a rush told them what had happened, about the successful annihilation of fifteen passages, about Sakura saving the boy sleeping in front of them, about Sai trying to save Sakura and was knocked out by a tree that was swept away in the river, and about not being able to get a visual of them since then.

Kiba sniffed, a low growl bubbled from his chest. "Although finding them is important, the Hokage wants the mission over as soon as possible..."

"We should split up into two groups." Shino adjusted his glasses. "Why? Because it's more efficient that way."

Naruto made a face at Shino for a moment, slightly irking at the way he talked, but nonetheless agreed. "With you guys here, locating them would be a snap!" He grinned at Akamaru, who looked at him wearily.

Kiba bared his fangs at him. "How many times do I have to tell you that this rain makes our noses useless?"

Naruto stared back at him stubbornly. "Can't you use your… uh… dynamic marking something to locate them? Once you mark something, the rain wouldn't matter, right?"

Kiba nearly mauled him over. "Your targets have to be HERE to be marked! And what makes you think Sakura, if she were here, would let me live if Akamaru peed on her?"

Akamaru whined pitifully.

Naruto grumbled silently to himself, crossing his arms over his chest. And as if an idea suddenly struck his fairly slow brain, he brightened. "Hinata! Be my eyes!" And without further delay, he grabbed a very startled, very red Hinata by the wrist and the two of them disappeared into the rain. Hinata did not even have a chance to protest. Or faint for that matter.

Back inside the tent, Kiba could only shake his head. "He went off without even finalizing the team to go complete the mission!" he said in disbelief, then looked at Shino. "That must mean it's me and Akamaru."

Shino did not move. "And you are forgetting my existence?"

Kiba put on his hood. "That boy needs some company. He's still a mystery to us, and we wouldn't want him running away again. I think it would be better if you stay here."

"… Fine." He began to sulk silently, hoping against hope Naruto wouldn't overwhelm Hinata too much.

The moth-like thing was hard to miss, especially since it splattered itself on Hinata's front, making the girl gasp.

"What is it?" Naruto asked worriedly, turning to face her.

"Something collided with me and it's – Ohhh! What is this?" She cried as she tried to wipe at her chest.

Naruto narrowed his eyes at the black stains on Hinata's jacket, and then laughed. "It's Sai! He must have sent a message! Here let me see!" He tried to read the blurry writing, but Hinata covered herself with her arms.

"Don't look too much!" she begged, face an agonizing scarlet.

"Hinata, we don't have time! Just let me have a good look of your – "

"No!"

"Not a good time to play games!" Naruto grunted as he caught Hinata's hands, wrestled for a few times before managing to corner her with her back against a tree, pinning her arms to her side, then hovered his face inches from her chest.

There, black against white, was Sai's handwriting. Some of it were already getting washed off because of the rain.

…ith Sak…ra.

Both well and...

In un...rground cave.

Nee… help ..ast.

"They're all right!" Naruto announced as he happily faced Hinata who looked ready to pass out. "They're in some underground cave somewhere. Hinata! Your byakugan! Hinata? Hinata! Oh, sh – !"

Sakura heard distant rumbling and was up on her toes. Sai was instantly on guard as well. When the rumbling stopped, he grabbed his shirt and slicker and hurriedly put them on, then strapped his pouch to his hip, the flat dagger in his left hand.

"What was that?" Sakura asked, cautiously crouching down to gather her stuff to her and, like Sai, put on her skirt and top, then her cloak.

"Who knows. Let's just hope it's not going to start a cave-in." Sai stuffed his dagger into the sheath on his right shoulder, handed Sakura her pouch and the teddy bear, then was on his knees when another tremor shook the cave violently.

And that was when they heard voices.

"Just a little more!"

Sakura gasped. "Could it be…?"

"Naruto!" Sai exclaimed.

"No, Naruto. Not there! If you hit that surface, they could get flooded in! Over there! That's it! A little more to the left where it won't break through the water channel."

It was a female voice.

Sakura blinked. "Hinata…?"

"All right. Got it. Stand back, Hinata! Oops, sorry. Didn't mean to bump into you… No, no! Don't faint again! Oh, crap!" There was a moment of silence, then suddenly…

"Rasengan!"

Sakura threw her arms over her head to shield herself from a shower of rocks and pebbles, and when she lowered them, there standing in front of her, were three Narutos and an unconscious Hinata being held around the waist by the Naruto in the middle, who had his right hand clawed and extended forward.

Sai, hair and slicker covered in fragments of the explosion of the cave wall, smiled a small smile. "You found us."

Two of the Narutos on either side of the original vanished in a poof of smoke. "Thanks to your jutsu, we were able to narrow down the places we needed to look. That moth of yours – "

" – It was a bird…" Sai corrected patiently.

"Sorry… anyway, it was pure genius, splattering over Hinata's front like that. Look," Naruto said proudly as he hooked his arms under the still unconscious Hinata's knees and cradled her to him, showing them the ink-stained jacket.

Sakura could only shake her head ruefully. No wonder Hinata was unconscious. Naruto must have stared at her good to read the message on her jacket. "Is she all right?"

With this question, Naruto frowned. "She always does this to me… Tell me, do I really smell that bad that she has to faint all the time?"

The depth of his unawareness was beyond belief. Sakura tightened the straps of her boots and made her way up the hole. "Yes, Naruto. You smell bad. Like week-old ramen." She looked over her shoulder to see Sai gaze at Naruto, Hinata in his arms. She knew what the dark-haired boy was thinking, but talking in this certain time and place was inappropriate, and so she said, "Why on earth is Hinata here?"

Naruto, who was looking down at the Hyuuga's face oddly, looked up and smiled. "Team Eight was sent for backup. What perfect timing, don't you think?"

"Where are Kiba and Shino?"

"Ah, I left them in the tent," he said, off-handedly. "Said something about getting the mission over with as soon as possible coz it's dangerous and stuff like that, so they were sent by Grandma Tsunade to hasten things up."

Sai nodded, but he was still observing Naruto and Hinata like a hawk. "Then we'd better rally back to camp. How is the boy?"

"What boy? Oh! That boy. He's out cold in my sleeping bag." He grinned. "How have things been with you two?"

Sakura felt her face heat up at the remembrance of the time when she was alone with Sai. "Just dandy. Let's go," she said shortly, and made their way up the hole Naruto made for them.

Outside, it was still raining cats and dogs. Sakura helped Naruto undo his coat, slung Hinata over his shoulders piggy-back style, and covered her with it. Sai watched them the whole time. Sakura knew he was bursting to say something, but he seemed to be saving it for a better time. When they set off into the trees towards their camp, rain beating down on them mercilessly, that was when Sai took his opportunity to talk.

"Hinata… seems to like you a lot…" The statement was so straightforward that Sakura almost missed a step.

Naruto looked over his shoulder at him, eyes narrowed into slits. "Whaddya talking about?"

It took Sai a moment before he could muster up one of his fake smiles. "She seems to like being around you, and cook you food, and help you out…"

Naruto frowned at him and turned his eyes back on the trail. "She runs away when she sees me, and she faints when I get too close. I don't think we really ever had a decent conversation where she doesn't stutter and shuffle about as if she can't wait to get away from me. She's always struck me as negative, hesitant and just plain weird…" And with this, Naruto's frown deepened. "But I kind of like those kind of people… "

Sai tilted his head slightly, and that was when it happened.

Hinata opened her eyes slightly.

And whispered loud enough for Sakura to hear.

"I like you, too, Naruto…"

And that was when she lost it. Sakura really missed a step this time, her foot slipping on a branch. Arms flailing wildly at her side, she landed in a bush on her butt.

Sai and Naruto did a double-take, and they landed in front of her, Sai kneeling by her side.

"What happened? Does your knee still hurt?" Sai asked her emotionlessly.

Sakura tried to get up, pulled at a branch running up her leg, and stared at Naruto who was looking at her with equally startled eyes. "Naruto… you…!" This was a breakthrough... She knew it!

"What?" Naruto asked stupidly.

"Just a second ago…"

Naruto's eyes once again narrowed into slits, the way they always did when he needed to use his brain extra hard to understand something. "What is it already?"

Sakura pointed at him dumbly. "You just said you like Hinata… and she… just said she liked you…"

Naruto squinted harder. "Yeah, so?"

"That makes you…"

"Just say it already!"

"That makes Hinata your girlfriend…"

Sai's usually flat eyes widened, and he took a step back as if shocked.

It took a while before it sank into Naruto, though. When it did, Naruto's blue eyes popped open like balloons. His head stiffly turned to the girl, whose own pearly eyes were round as saucers. Her face was not red, but was a hideous shade of purple.

"So," Sai uttered feebly. "If a girl and a guy say they like each other, they're… committed… or is that the wrong word…? They enter a relationship…? I'm confused…"

Sakura, whose finger was still frozen as she pointed at Naruto, nodded her head stiffly. "Yes."

And the most unbelievable thing happened. Naruto blushed. He blushed.

"I… you… we…" were the only words that came out of the blonde's mouth. Hinata, who was still staring into nothingness, looked like she had been petrified, unsure of what just happened.

Sai was watching them like lab specimens.

And for all that was worth, Sakura's hardening face broke into a smile. "Congratulations, Naruto. You've made another bond."

Naruto blinked, and he could not keep his eyes off Hinata, who looked like she died on his back. "My… girlfriend…?" It looked like something had dawned within the blonde, and his face cracked a somewhat small smile that could have – could have –gotten wider.

Until Hinata took a deep breath and threw up on Naruto's shoulder.

Sai winced. "Lovely…"

One thing I need to clear before anything else: I am a huge NaruHina fan.

Though this fic is mostly centered on Sakura and Sai, there will be other pairings that would make their entrance in the next chapters, like Shikamaru and Temari, which I've already introduced in the first chapter, and Neji and Tenten because I think they are cute, and I think Tenten is being deprived of screen time and that her character should have been developed more in the series. Why didn't they, anyway? Hmph!

Anyway, please read and review. Review? (wink, wink!) I'll give you Hinata plushies if you do! Yes? Okay? XD