Hello people! Hope you guys like this chapter. Thanks to ruler of dragons, tru-viet, MYDOGRULES, Tsukinoyo, Skyheart, MistFairie93, Lyris88, Eterna1, Valinor's Twilight, Uchiha Sasha, and Lady Moonayafor reviewing. Please review, the sooner you review the sooner I update and the more reviews I receive the more I write. Now, on with the story!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything, but the lovely Rei.

Chapter Thirty

Rei woke up and found herself lying on the ground. She groaned as she felt her neck throbbing with pain. Actually, her whole body hurt. She sat up and saw that her hands and feet were tied up. She frowned when she remembered what had happened.

"Good to see you're up, Rei-chan."

Rei turned around and scowled at the person that had spoken.

"I wish I hadn't woken up." She growled.

Orochimaru chuckled.

"That's too bad. I thought you would be happy to know that I will continue to train you."

"I would rather die."

"If you weren't so useful I would have killed you a long time ago."

Rei glared at him and he smirked wickedly. He turned to two other men whom she assumed were supposed to be his teammates during the exam.

"I have something to take care of. Take her away and make sure she doesn't run away or alerts someone that we're here."

The two men nodded and one of them picked her up. Rei scowled at Orochimaru as she was carried off. As soon as she couldn't see him she smirked. She was glad he had been stupid enough to leave her with the other two. She knew she wouldn't escape while he was watching her, but she could if he wasn't there. She knew that Orochimaru wanted her alive and so running away would be easier. She waited until they were far from Orochimaru and put her plan to action.

She reached into her pouch for a kunai as her hands were tied behind her back. She cut the rope without the men noticing and smirked knowing that if they hadn't noticed escaping from them would be easy. She quickly killed the man that was carrying her by slitting his throat and jumped away. As she was in the air she cut the ropes on her feet. She jumped on a tree branch and ran as fast as she could. The other man was caught off guard and didn't react in time. By the time he realized what had happened Rei was out of his sight. He only managed to throw a kunai, which somehow hit her on her side. He growled and ran after her.

Rei could sense the other man approaching her and knew she wouldn't be able to outrun him while she was injured. She frowned as she knew she would have to kill him as well. She really didn't like killing people, but she had accepted it as part of being a shinobi. She guessed she had to thank Orochimaru for that. He was the one who taught her to kill and her training sometimes consisted of slaughtering weaker shinobi. That was why she had left. She had hated killing, but she knew that if she didn't she would die and so she had continued. She hated herself for that and no matter what she did she would always carry that with her.

She stopped and set up some explosive tags on some trees. She hid and waited for the man to arrive. Soon the man appeared. He noticed the tags and stopped before crossing the trees. She smirked. She had expected him to do that. In fact, she had set up the tags so that he would see them. She threw some shuriken with string attached to them. The shuriken circled around the man and tangled themselves in the trees. She emerged from her hiding spot and looked at the man who glared at her.

"What does Orochimaru want? Why is he here?"

"I don't know." He struggled to say.

She pulled on the string and it tightened painfully around the man.

"I…don't…know…"

She sighed. He was telling the truth. She knew because she could tell he was scared. He didn't want to die.

"Tell me, how do you want to die?"

The man looked at her in horror.

"I won't let you take me back to Orochimaru and you know what will happen when he finds out you failed your mission. If you tell me something of value I will grant you a quick death."

The man seemed to think about it and finally answered.

"I don't know…anything…about…his plans…"

Rei sighed. He knew something, but he wouldn't talk. She guessed he was one of Orochimaru's most loyal men. She wondered what the damn snake had offered him in exchange for his services. It didn't matter anymore. He would die. She sent some chakra into the string to make it sharper and pulled on it. She looked away as the blood splattered on the trees. Some of it got on her and she just wiped it off. She looked down at her enemy.

"I'm sorry."

She turned around and ran off as fast as she could. She hated killing, but she knew she had to if she wanted to survive. She found some comfort in knowing that she had provided a better death than the one Orochimaru would have granted him. Still, it felt strange. She hadn't killed in a long time and she found that her hands were shaking. She sighed and ignored it. She had to find Sasuke and the others. If Sasuke and Naruto were injured that only left Sakura to protect them and she doubted that she would be able to take care of the guys and herself. She ignored the pain on her side and kept running.

Sakura watched as Sasuke tortured the Otonin who had attacked them. She wanted him to defeat them, but he was being so cruel…She couldn't believe what was happening and she wished that there was something she could do. She watched in horror as Sasuke approached the enemies to finish them off.
Rei kept running and after a while she sensed a strange chakra. She concentrated on it and gasped when she realized who it belonged to. She ran as fast as she could, hoping that she wasn't too late. After a few minutes she saw Neji standing on a tree. She ran up to where he was and froze at what she saw. Neji's team wasn't the only one there. Ino's team was there and she saw Sakura, who was badly beaten sitting on the ground. Then she saw Sasuke. She couldn't believe it was him. He looked different. She knew what it was because she had trained with Orochimaru. While she was with him she had always hoped that he would never give her the cursed mark. Now, she remembered why. She could see that Sasuke had hurt their opponents badly. She knew she had to stop him, but she wasn't sure she would be able to. Still, she had to try.

"Sasuke, stop!!!"

She saw Sasuke stop and watched as the marks that had appeared on his body retreated back into the mark on his neck. She felt relief wash over her and didn't care that the enemies had runaway. She jumped down to where Sasuke was and looked at him. He opened his eyes slowly and she smiled.

"Rei…?"

"Yeah, it's me."

Sasuke sat up and looked at her with surprise.

"I though Orochimaru had taken you?"

"I managed to run away form his henchmen while he was gone."

"How?"

She looked away.

"It doesn't matter."

Sasuke frowned and noticed the blood that had gotten on her when she had killed the man who had been chasing her. Then he saw the blood coming from her wound.

"You're injured."

"It's nothing. How do you feel?"

"I'm fine, let me look at your wound."

"It's nothing, I'll take care of it. Rest for now. I'll go check on the others."

She stood up before he could object. She didn't want Sasuke to worry about her and so she decided to deal with her own injuries later. She saw that Naruto was awake. That was good, he was being as annoying as ever. She looked at Sakura and saw that she was badly beaten.

"Are you alright?"

Sakura looked up at Rei and was about to say something about how she wasn't there to help when she saw that she was injured. She could see some blood coming out of her cut and she noticed that she had blood stains on her clothes, arm, and face.

"Yeah, how did you get here?"

Rei frowned. She knew she would have to tell them how she had escaped, but that would have to wait.

"We can talk about that later, for now you should take care of your injuries."

Ino walked up to them and said she would help Sakura. Rei nodded and walked off. She stopped, but didn't turn around.

"Sakura, thanks for taking care of Sasuke."

Sakura looked at her and then looked down.

"I didn't do anything. It was because of you that Sasuke-kun stopped."

Rei frowned and looked down.

"Rei-chan, you're hurt!"

She turned and saw Naruto. She smiled.

"I'm fine Naruto. I'll take care of it later."

"No, I'll take care of it now."

Rei turned around and saw Sasuke.

"If I don't help you I know you'll just wait until it's too late. We have to get that cut taken care of before it can get infected."

She sighed, knowing he was right.

"Fine."

They walked away from the others and Sasuke looked at the cut and frowned.

"It's not too deep, but you should have bandaged it earlier to stop the blood."

"I'm sorry."

"Never mind, just try not to be so careless."

"No, I'm sorry I wasn't here."

Sasuke stopped as he was wrapping up her wound and looked at her. He was startled when he saw that she was crying. He sighed.

"What matters is that you got here. I'm glad you managed to get away from Orochimaru."

She wiped her tears and smiled.

"Yeah, you're right."

Sasuke frowned as he knew something was wrong. He finished bandaging her wound and helped her up.

"Rei?"

"Yeah?"

"How did you get away from Orochimaru's henchmen?"

She stopped and looked down.

"I…killed them…"

Sasuke looked at her and couldn't believe what she had said. He had noticed the blood stains that he knew didn't belong to her, but he hadn't expected her to have killed them. He noticed that her hands were shaking.

"Rei, it's alright, you didn't mean to, you had no choice."

"Don't say that. I had a choice, but I chose to kill them. I guess I really am like Orochimaru after all."

Sasuke couldn't believe what was happening. He couldn't believe how much she had changed. He wondered what had happened for her to change so much.

"You're not like him."

She turned to look at him and he was reminded of the day she had left them to go with Hametsu.

"He's my sensei. As much as I hate to admit it if it wasn't for him, I would be dead by now. I learned everything from him, he even taught me to kill. I'm sorry for not telling you, but I knew that if I told you, you would hate me. I'm nothing more than a murderer, Sasuke, and I don't deserve to have you or the others. I'm sorry for putting you in danger."

She walked off and left a stunned Sasuke there. He looked down and frowned. He clenched his fists and cursed Orochimaru. He swore he would kill him for making Rei suffer. He looked at Rei as she thanked the others for their help. The other teams left and Rei rested against a tree while Naruto and Sakura fought like always. Sasuke walked up to Rei and sat next to her.

"I'm sorry."

She looked at him.

"Sorry for what?"

"When Orochimaru attacked us, I didn't do anything. I should have been there to protect you."

Rei smiled at him and smacked him lightly on the head.

"You jerk, I don't care if you didn't protect me. If I got caught it was my own fault for being weak."

Sasuke rubbed his head and smirked.

"I guess we'll have to train more often when we get out of here."

"Yeah."

Rei looked out before her and sighed.

"Sasuke, about Orochimaru-"

"You can tell me later."

She turned to him and smiled.

"Thanks."

"Hn."

"Hey, I thought I told you to stop with that."

"Hn."

Rei sighed and Sasuke smirked. He turned to her and kissed her.

"I'm glad you're back." He said.

"Yeah."

They sat there thinking of what they would do and what challenges laid ahead. Their only hopes were that they would be able to stay together.

End Chapter Thirty

Hope you guys liked it and please review. The sooner you review the sooner I update and the more reviews I receive the more I write. Sayonara!