- Ramin Djawadi: "Love in the Eyes" (Game of Thrones)

21. Stung (More than Once)

'We have lost two scrolls of forbidden techniques. Sources tell us they were taken to the Sand. Retrieve them whole and bring them back to me.

P.S. Minato, watch out for Hanzou. He is still after you.'

Minato shut the scroll and stuffed the rest of his rations in his mouth. Retrieving scrolls of such meaning from the enemies were classified as a 'highly dangerous mission requiring ANBU'. And Minato, it seemed.

Hadn't Minato spent five years at the border and been assigned a team, he would have probably been offered a spot among the ANBU. And even though the mission demanded such ranks and most ANBU probably would have gotten their hands on the scrolls as easily as him, he was without doubt the best equipped to get the hell out of there. He could probably even have done the mission alone, but he needed decoys.

The ANBU had gone ahead as he sat outside Suna, waiting for the bear-masked ANBU to throw one of his kunai to let him know it was his turn to act. The plan went as such: the two ANBU were to find the location of the two scrolls, but seeing as they were likely to have such security that removing them from their spots would alert Suna, they were to drop the kunai nearby, draw the guards away from the location, retreat and let him do the rest.

His only problem with the plan was that waiting for the signal gave him too much time to kill, and he had nothing else to do than to hide and reread the scroll containing mission details over and over again.

And, of course, contemplating how Hanzou was going to get him next. He had so far come up with a few good ideas, but he didn't plan on telling him any time soon.

He had been sitting there for a good forty-five minutes when he felt the kunai's alert, and feeling that it was about damn time, he disappeared from behind the rock he sat by and appeared in a narrow hallway by the doorstep of a small, dark, sand-coloured room. It was dimly lit by openings in the tall roof, shining down upon two large scrolls that lay on a table of sandstone.

He could sense the ANBU retreating nearby, as well as the guards walking away, and deciding to wait until they were a good distance away, he tried instead to analyse the security measures taken to keep the scrolls where they were. He knew even before he sensed it that a barrier had been placed by the doorstep, making him vulnerable as soon as he stepped inside the room; plus, as soon as he lay hands on the scrolls or removed them, he would alert the guards placed around the building he was in, and they would appear within the room not long after the sin of retrieving the lost scrolls were begun.

The only thing he couldn't quite figure out was the countless, small holes in the ground. He was sure something would turn up from them if he neared them; maybe some sort of desert animal?

No matter who he alerted first - Suna, the guards or the animals – he had to be quick.

Deciding to take a big leap instead of running across the ground, and therefore running across the holes, he backed off a few meters in the hallway, and rechecking that the ANBU were well on their way out of the village, he kicked off and ran; breaking the barrier, he jumped from the doorstep and landed with good precision on top of the scrolls, and the last thing he heard after getting a grip around the two scrolls was an alarm being set off.

He was quite pleased with turning up inside the cool shades of one of the Wind's very few forests, far enough away from Suna to get caught.

However, he had not expected the sharp pain he suddenly felt piercing his arm.

Looking down at the scrolls he held, he saw a small scorpion dangling from his right arm. Without hesitating, he grabbed his kunai and stabbed it against the warm earth; it released his arm and stopped moving.

He had not taken into account that there might be holes underneath the scrolls as well. The pain had subsided, but his head was swimming and his eyesight became blurred.

Well, fuck.

So maybe he had mostly gone on missions by himself. Maybe he had come out of situations all right, unhurt and with the message 'mission accomplished'. Maybe he had known he was skilled enough to do so.

This was probably the last time Minato was proud enough to think he was guaranteed to complete one by himself.

He was lying in a hospital bed, feeling something cool against his aching, hot forehead. Someone had placed a cold towel on it. He had to remember to thank this person later for making his night better, but was at the moment too busy not having the energy to open his eyes, spending the remaining on cursing at himself for not thinking of any hidden scorpion holes. Plus, he wasn't in the mood for speaking to anyone, seeing as he was currently in the danger of losing the ability to use his right arm and leg.

They had luckily planned where their meeting place would be after Minato had retrieved the scrolls, and he was lucky the ANBU found him before any shinobi of Suna did. He had then been barely awake but feeling quite ill – more like he was dying, maybe – and they hadn't needed an explanation to know that Minato had been stung by something poisonous. The dead scorpion and the fact that he couldn't move or talk had been enough.

Having hurried back to the Fire country, they were able to stop at the border and have most of the poison removed from his body. And so they began the day-long journey back to Konoha, supporting a Minato who had never felt worse. He had a bad fever, he couldn't use his right arm and could barely walk on his right leg. He needed a proper antidote (his bag containing the scorpion in a jar), and he could only think of one person who was able to make one.

It was therefore quite a disappointment to hear that the only one able to heal him was out on a mission.

The third had sent him to the hospital ten seconds after they had entered the door to his office. Minato's life was no longer in danger, but he could barely stand. Apparently, his only saviour (of course, he was not going to die, but he would prefer to be able to use his arm and leg) was on her way back, so he had to stay the night with a fever, a heavy head and something he imagined couldn't be so far from a dead body at the hospital. It was not hard to fall asleep, but he kept waking up. He vaguely remembered waking up by someone replacing the towel on his forehead with a cold one and hearing someone apologise before he dozed off again, but other than that, he had no idea why he constantly woke up. Maybe it was his body fighting against the remaining poison, not caring about the difference between 'alive' and 'awake'.

The only time he was happy to be woken up, was when he heard the door burst open and saw Tsunade enter the hospital room.

Shikaku lay an Ace on the pile of cards on the edge of Minato's hospital bed.

Grumbling, Minato brought in the deck of cards with his healthy hand. He usually won at these games, but there was no denying it; Shikaku was a level higher in intelligence. Even Kakashi seemed dangerously good at this.

"By the way, I saw Kushina leave the hospital earlier," Shikaku mentioned.

"She did?" Minato said in surprise.

"What, she didn't come by to visit you?"

There was no denying that hearing this news stung worse than the scorpion, either. Minato had been awake for half a day, the poison leaving his body and the fever gone, but he still had problems using the right side of his body. He had expected Kushina to visit – especially after hearing that she was on a break from missions – but maybe the fact that she didn't was his own fault.

"Did something happen between you two?" Rin asked gently as he started up a new round by placing three fours on the sheets.

"I think she's avoiding me," Minato said, and explained that he had confessed his feelings towards Kushina. Somehow, he felt like he could trust his little soldiers in not telling him off; they had after all confronted him about it several times, but never told Kushina a thing.

"What did you say to her?" Shikaku asked.

"I didn't exactly just say it," he began, but found it hard to describe exactly what he had done.

"Are you sure she realised?"

"Anyone with brains would realise," Minato said. Then, more to himself than the others, he said, "Maybe it was a stupid thing to do ..."

"So what did you do?" Shikaku asked as he threw three Kings on the pile.

"I touched her hair."

As the seconds passed, Minato realised just how stupid that sounded.

"You touched her hair."

"In a bit more affectionate way than usual."

"So you often touch her hair?"

"No."

"Then she probably knows."

"Yeah."

A few seconds passed again, in which Minato triumphed with three Aces.

"What did she say?" Shikaku asked eventually.

"Nothing," Minato replied with a sigh. "I told her I liked her, I had to leave, and now she's avoiding me."

"Well, girls are complicated."

"You don't say?"

Even when Minato was finally able to limp around outside the hospital a few days later, Kushina seemed to avoid being alone with him. She had in a most awkward tone asked him how he was doing when he bumped into her and Mikoto as he was walking with his team, but had quickly made an excuse and dragged Mikoto off with her.

"It was definitely a stupid thing to do," Minato sighed, at which all three of his soldiers nodded in agreement.

It seemed that he had indeed made Kushina start taking him seriously, but he didn't feel good about it.

And as the end of December neared, day by day, he made a New Years resolution: no matter how beaten up he would become, he was going to make her talk to him.

I have no idea what game they were playing.