And another one is complete, albeit a little short. The next one will be longer, I think. Anyways.

And thanks to Uchihas-don't-whine for another great review! Thanks for noticing all the little details I put in; it makes me feel great that someone pays enough attention to get the subtle things! Thanks so much for reading my story!

An open mouthed Neji gaped back and forth between the ghosts and Sasuke. "There's four of them? Four pure phantoms, all in one place?"

"Actually, there's five. The last one's the one I just performed spinal cord surgery on."

Unable to stand any longer, Neji sank into the nearest chair. "Holy shit."

Sasuke smiled; he really liked it when he was right. "Why do you think I called you here?"

"I don't know, maybe a bad feeling about some misidentified coherent specter and some ramblings about Akatsuki. But five pure phantoms…!" He shook his head in amazement. "I'd give anything to examine them."

"Ask them yourself," Sasuke said with a trace of humor. "They'd probably say yes."

"Jesus." Neji passed a hand over his eyes. "I'm sorry; I've just never seen a phantom before, so it's hitting me kind of hard."

Sitting by Hinata's head, Sakura turned to Neji suspiciously. "How did you know they were phantoms right away? Sasuke said that he had to do research to confirm it before he knew they were phantoms and not draugrs."

"You did?" Neji asked, shooting Sasuke a look.

"It's because of the differences between our gifts." Sasuke tapped the side of his forehead. "My family specializes in innovation and invention to do with dealing with ghosts, making objects like those bracelets and learning how to fight dangerous ghosts, but the Hyuugas' power lies in their vast powers of perception, far greater than the Uchiha gift. Each family has a second level of power as well, but those are kept secret and hidden, even from each other."

"Hm." Neji seemed impressed by this. "Even I didn't know that about your family, that you're inventors and fighters. Because of our powers of perception, we never have to confront dangerous ghosts because we can see their powers and aggression levels as a colored aura. I guess you'd say that we're the passive branch of the family, and you're the aggressive side."

"Family?" Sasuke frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Didn't you know? The Uchihas and the Hyuugas were one family a long time ago that split in two, forming the two families we know today. That's why our powers are so similar. In some way, Uchiha, I'm almost like your cousin."

"Huh." Now it was Sasuke's turn to impressed. "I didn't know that. But what about your actual cousin, Hyuuga? Did you forget about her?"

"My…?" Neji's eyes went wide as he realized. "Oh, shit! Hinata!" He jumped up and shooed Sakura and their others away from his cousin, taking her place at her head.

"Does she do that normally?" Sakura asked, a little tentatively.

"Yes, every so often. She's been sheltered most of her life, so she hasn't seen many powerful spirits before. Your blondie over there's the most powerful ghost she's ever seen, so it must have given her system a shock. As I said, we tend to avoid dangerous ghosts, so that means avoiding one with high power levels." He gently began waving above Hinata's face, causing a soft current of air.

"Hear that?" Naruto gleefully elbowed Sasuke in the side. "I'm the most powerful ghost she's ever seen."

"That's not much," Shikamaru scoffed. "She fainted before seeing the rest of us, remember?"

"Ha! You're just jealous!" Sticking out his tongue, Naruto blew a loud raspberry to the other ghosts, who all prepared to jump him except for Shikamaru, who shook his head and leaned against the wall with a smirk belaying his air of annoyance.

Stepping in at the last second before feathers flew, Sasuke diffused the tension by asking, "Shouldn't you be a little more worried about how she's doing? You did knock the poor girl out, after all."

"Oh, yeah." Naruto darted over to the couch to watch the unconscious form of Hinata as she slowly started to wake. Shaking his head, Sasuke followed him, marveling at the social ineptitude possessed by the giddy phantom.

As Hinata's eyes slowly cracked open, Neji picked up her head and cradled it in his lap. "Hey, Hinata. You okay now?"

The girl blinked her pale eyes a few times, then reached up to touch her cousin's face. "Yeah, I'm fine."

"That's good!" Naruto plopped down next to her on the couch, and grabbed her hand, vigorously shaking it. "Hi! I'm Naruto! Sorry about earlier, by the way. I mean, I just walked in and you were like, poof! Out like a light! Hey, do you do that often? Cause I-"

He cut off as Hinata fainted again.

Everyone stared at her, a little shocked, then Neji rounded on Naruto. "You made her faint again!"

Jumping up and raising his hands in a gesture of innocence, Naruto protested, "I didn't mean to! It wasn't on purpose! She just…" He trailed off, making a flopping gesture with his hands.

Standing up, Neji ripped off his suit jacket and loosened his tie. "That's it. You can mess with me all you want, but you never - EVER - mess with my cousin. She's like a sister to me. Put 'em up, Blondie!"

"Woah, woah!" Naruto put his hands up, trying to back away. "I'm sorry, okay? Is that better?"

"Not even close!" With a snarl, Neji launched himself at Naruto.

But he never connected. Sasuke pulled Naruto out of the way, holding the phantom close against around the waist, and surprisingly, Shikamaru launched himself from his place by the wall to grab Neji and hold him back.

"Easy, stallion," he murmured in Neji's ear before releasing him and floating languidly back to his spot on the wall, leaving Neji to stare confusedly after him and Sasuke to wonder if Shikamaru had copped a feel while holding Neji back from attacking Naruto.

"N-Neji," a timid voice whispered from the couch. Every head in the room turned towards Hinata, who was sitting up on the couch. "P-please don't hurt him."

"Why not?" Neji asked, fuming silently, wondering himself if he had just been molested by a ghost.

"Be- be- because I- I…" Hinata blushed furiously and hid her face in her hands. "Ifinkhisrillcudd!"

"What?" Neji reached down and took Hinata's hands away from her mouth. "Speak up, Hinata!"

"I don't want you to hurt him," she said, gulping, "Because I think he's really cute!" Everyone froze in silence as she continued, blushing even harder. "I like him, so you can't hurt him!"

"This is an interesting development," Shikamaru remarked from the back of the room as Neji sat down hard on the floor, brain appearing to have short circuited from shock.

Naruto, for his part, seemed to think it was a hilarious development. He walked up to Hinata and doffed an imaginary cap for her, bowing low. "And has m'lady fainted from my insurmountable cuteness, or my indomitable power?"

"B- both," Hinata admitted in a trembling whisper.

"Both?! You hear that?" Naruto turned back to the other ghosts, triumph in his eyes. "I'm powerful and cute! You all could probably take lessons from me!" He turned back to Hinata and took her hand in both of his, falling to one knee. "And would like to learn my name, or would it best suit you to simply call me 'pumpkin'?"

"Alright, 'pumpkin'," Sasuke said, feeling a surge of jealousy in his chest. "Stop flirting with the guests. They're here for a purpose, you know."

Jumping up, Naruto also bowed low for Sasuke. "Don't worry, m'lord! I know my place and purpose." He straightened up and whispered in Sasuke's ear, letting a hand slide over his own neck, "And don't worry. I remember who gave me this."

"That a promise?" Sasuke murmured, low enough for only Naruto to hear.

"We'll just have to wait and see, now won't we?"

"I have a feeling I missed a lot of what just happened," Sakura commented, looking confusedly as the mass of empty space in front of her that she knew contained bodies that she couldn't see.

"Don't worry. You're not missing anything important," Kakashi observed dryly. Even with his eye covered, he could still hear them, Sasuke realized. "If I didn't know better, I'd think it was just an exercise in introducing the characterization of two new people and building a foundation for their interactions with other people, and we were just sitting silently off to the side because we weren't needed for a while."

"Well, isn't it a good thing that this is real and we aren't in a story, Kakashi," Sasuke said sarcastically. "Otherwise literary devices would rule our lives, and then what would happen?"

Kakashi's single eye misted over and his voice took on a glazed tone. "I don't know, but I bet it would involve lots of drama in the forms of relationship problems set in the middle of our adventure, which would just be stupid. I mean, who has the time to worry about a boyfriend when you're fighting evil?"

"Naw, we just do that in between battles." Everyone looked at Sakura when she said this, so she hunched her shoulders slightly, a little afraid of all the stares. "What? Wasn't anyone else thinking the same thing?"

"Anyway," Sasuke said firmly, "we are moving forward, on and away from - whatever that was. Hyuuga, I asked you here to - Neji, are you even listening to me?"

Neji was still sitting, unresponsive, on the floor, so Hinata giggled prettily and poked her cousin. "N- Neji?" She said sweetly. "I think you should wake up now."

With a jolt, Neji came out of his stupor and shook his head. Showing remarkable clarity for one who was just practically in a coma, he straightened his tie, put his jacket back on, and faced Sasuke. "I'm sorry. What were you saying?"

Sasuke sighed; having the Hyuuga on board was going to be a struggle the whole way, he could already tell. "I brought you here because I want you to confirm the Akatsuki sightings. If there really is Akatsuki here, we need to investigate what they're doing, and why they picked Konoha to do it in. Your eyes are greater at perception than mine, so I'm going to need your help for this. Are you in?"

Neji internalized all this, then asked simply, "When do we leave?"

Sasuke felt a happy jump in his heart. Perhaps working with Neji wasn't going to be as bad and he had envisioned. "As soon as possible."

"Excellent." Neji looked at his cousin, still on the couch, then at the twin suitcases still sitting next to the door. "Hinata and I need somewhere to stay while we're in Konoha. I had assumed you had made arrangements, Uchiha, since you asked us here, but since I did come early I will give you the benefit of the doubt if they are not yet ready, though you should have guessed that we would make an early appearance and made arrangements for it."

Shit, Sasuke had completely forgotten about that. He cast a panicked glance at Kakashi, but the owner of the Hokage was already shaking his head. He opened his mouth, prepared to bullshit his way out of this one, but stopped as he remembered the empty rooms in his suite, the ones his father and mother had planned to occupy before they had canceled their portion of the trip. Neji and Hinata would fit nicely in those rooms.

"I have two empty rooms in my suite. They were intended for my parents, but since they didn't come with me to Konoha, they're empty. I believe they will suit you quite well."

Sasuke did not miss the wink of gratitude Kakashi sent his way. Seriously, was that man at all worried about his town, or just the money? But Neji was nodding in approval, so Sasuke let it go.

"Yes, I think that will do quite nicely," he said thoughtfully. "If you will show us the way, we will secure our belongings, than you and I can go about our business. There is, after all, no time like the present. Am I correct?"

"Yeah, sure. Let's go with that." Picking up his own suitcase, which he had placed down on the floor at the edge of the room at the start of the conversation, Sasuke started up the stairs. "It's this way. Come on."

Neji and Hinata grabbed their suitcases and started to follow Sasuke, but Kakashi's call stopped all of them. "Sasuke!"

Turning back around to the faces of four anxious people below him, Sasuke asked, "What is it?"

"How's Lee?"

This gave Sasuke pause. He had forgotten that he hadn't told the rest of them how the operation had went, and was touched that they thought enough of the little ghost to ask about him. "He's going to be fine," he said, and all their faces alighted into smiles, putting warmth into Sasuke's heart. "We weren't sure for a bit there, but he's going to pull through."

"Shino and Kiba went to check on him about five minutes ago," Shikamaru said in a lazy drawl, and Sasuke winced, not even having noticed them leave. "We'll let you know when he wakes up, Sasuke."

"That's good." Turning back to the Hyuugas, he gestured up the stairs again. "It's suite 2B, top of the stairs. Come with me."

In the suite, Hinata quickly skipped off to the larger of the two rooms, shutting the door behind her to unload her clothes out from under the watchful eyes of boys, but not before uttering a stuttering thanks to Sasuke.

Neji, on the other hand, pulled Sasuke bodily into his room and left the suitcase packed on the bed rather than taking his clothes out. Crossing his arms over his chest, he fixed Sasuke with a look. "I have something I want to talk to you about, Uchiha."

Sasuke held up a hand. "Please, Neji, call me Sasuke. I think we've moved beyond that. And I know, Hinata isn't going to see any combat. I'll have Sakura come up and keep her company while we work."

"That's not what I was going to say… Sasuke." Well, at least he said it, albeit grudgingly. "I wanted to make absolutely certain that my cousin is off limits. Do you hear me?"

Sasuke couldn't help it; he giggled - a wretchedly unmanly sound - a little. Neji, however, did not look amused.

"What's so funny?"

"Oh, just that I'm the last person you need to be telling that to." Sasuke shrugged his shoulders, surprised and elated at how easily the admission came now, and silently thanking Sakura for what she had done. "I bat for the other team, Neji."

"Oh." The only reaction from Neji was his eyebrows drawing closer together. "Then I have something else I'm worried about. Those ghosts are all so free minded; do you think they'll try to sneak into Hinata's room at night?"

Sasuke shook his head. "I don't think you have anything to worry about. Lee's injured, Shino and Kiba are two full of each other, and Shikamaru's to lazy to do anything."

"What about the other phantom, the one she liked; Naruto, I think you called him? Would he be an issue?"

Stuck by jealousy, Sasuke pointed his nose in the air and snapped, "Naruto sleeps with me." Then his face flushed as he realized what he had said; he had practically admitted that the phantom was his lover! Even if they hadn't gotten that far yet. But still, he didn't take it back, and while Neji's eyes did widen in surprise at first, he soon nodded with more confidence than before, clearly put at ease that his cousin was completely safe from ghosts coming into her room in the night.

"You should probably change," Sasuke suggested. "It's not going to be comfortable wearing a suit in a town like this; people tend to give you funny looks."

Neji considered this, then nodded. "I shall change my shirt, then the two of us shall be off. How does that sound?"

"Perhaps more than just the shirt," Sasuke suggested dryly. "Don't you have any casual attire with you?"

Neji's eyes drew together. "I guess so. Dressing informally is not something I usually do, but I may be able to find something."

"You'll need it," Sasuke warned. "It gets humid in these seaside Maine towns, as I've learned, so a layered suit is both impossible and impractical."

"In that case, I shall endeavor to find something more suitable, and then we shall be off." Neji turned towards his suitcase in a clear dismissal.

The move grated on Sasuke a little; it was, after all, in a room that he was in charge of that Neji was staying in. Determined to get the last word, he ducked out the door, then stuck his head back in. "You had best endeavor to find some shorts, else there be sweat stains 'neath your royal pits 'ere the day comes to its most brilliant close."

Then he jumped away from the door with a laugh before Neji could respond. Taking a quick detour into his own room, Sasuke took stock of what was left of his supplies. Today, during the fight, two of the knives had been lost, but he had another spare, so he packed that inside his satchel, as well as the silver cross. The vial that had held holy water before the fight was long gone, lost during the second scuffle with Gaara, and the backup mason jar he had was now fully empty. Sasuke growled at the sight, knowing that he would have to replenish his stock sooner or later, sooner preferably, and he just didn't know how to do it here.

Making a mental note to ask Kakashi where he could get some more holy water the next time he saw the masked man, Sasuke started out to go back downstairs, passing the open door to the room Neji was staying in as he did so. He didn't try to look, but as he passed to entrance, the voice of Shikamaru drifted out, as lazy sounding as ever.

"You seem like you'd be a good chess player."

"As a matter of fact, I am," Neji responded coldly. "I've won several competitions in the region where I live."

The response was unhurried. "I like chess."

A beat of silence followed where Neji was clearly expecting more, then he demanded, "And?"

"Do you wanna play some time?"

Shaking his head, Sasuke continued on his way. It appeared that Neji was being given the same treatment he himself had gotten from Shikamaru when he first had appeared in Konoha. The ghost may put up a facade of being lazy, but when it came to the safety of his friends, he would go to any length to protect them. That spoke volumes about the ghost's character.

Sighing, Sasuke sat down in a comfortable armchair in the main lobby of the Hokage. Everyone else had vanished, presumably to go do the jobs Kakashi actually paid them to do, and he leaned his head back and closed his eyes, enjoying the few stolen moments of quiet, without anyone who needed saving or an explanation or to rely on him. Sometimes, it was nice to be alone.

A gentle weight settled against Sasuke's head, and a smile tugged at the corners of his lips. And sometimes, it was to have some company, too.

"Crazy morning," Naruto commented, trailing his hand across Sasuke's shoulder and resting his cheek against his hair.

"Definitely," Sasuke agreed, not opening his eyes.

Naruto swooped down to press a delicate kiss, soft as the caress of a butterfly's wings, across his cheek. "Tired?"

"That goes without saying. I need a nap from all that excitement." As Naruto slipped his arms around Sasuke's neck, brushing the top of his blond head of hair under his jaw, Sasuke leaned against the warm phantom. "But this is just as good."

"You think?" Naruto started to slowly rock back forth, lulling Sasuke a little.

"Mm- hm." The warmth and contact was almost putting Sasuke to sleep. "You're so warm, like my own little personal sun. I like it when you're near me."

A chuckle vibrated against the skin of Sasuke's collar. "You're only saying that because you're so out of it right now. You'd never admit that to my face if you were lucid."

"But does it make you happy?"

"Oh, yes." Naruto's voice deepened. "Very happy."

"Then try asking me sometime when I'm fully awake. Maybe I'd be able to say it straighter."

Another kiss was pressed to Sasuke's cheek, this one lasting longer. "You said it perfectly fine the first time, Sasuke. I know what you mean."

"Good." Sasuke let his head loll back on his shoulders, leaning back against the warmth that was his personal dawn. "Then be quiet so I can get some sleep. Neji's going to be back soon, and then I'll have to take him to watch the Akatsuki."

"You want me to take you guys to the shack with the dark auras?" Naruto murmured. "That's where they'll probably be, if there is Akatsuki here."

"I'd be honored," Sasuke said with as much dignity as his sleepy voice could muster. "Now just stay there and let me sleep on you."

The last thing Sasuke heard before the darkness of sleep claimed him - even if only for a short time - was Naruto's chuckle, getting in the last word. "As you wish, my lord."