Hey everyone! At long last I'm here with a new chapter. Some of you might have already seen on my profile page that I'm more or less in a pseudo hiatus. That means updates might be slow like molasses; I've been writing four term papers simultaneously for the past few weeksD:

But I did manage to get some writing done (un-betaed for the time being though), so here you go.

ATTENTION: I made a poll a few days back about pairings in BaH, just because I'm curious. If you'd have a look at it I'd love you forever:D Or sent me a PM - I'm (almost:DD) always glad to receive mail.
And, as always, for more information about my projects (challenges/fics/snippets/random ideas) please visit my tumblr - the link's on my profile page3

When she comes to there is rubble pressing in on her.

Her leg is pinned – probably broken – and something feels terribly wrong with her elbow. It takes a second before Hisana can gather her withs enough to activate her kekkei-genkai. But the Sharingan reveals nothing. A stone plate has formed a tiny cavity around her upper body, but there's no room to move. She has no idea how long she's been unconscious; all she knows is that the air feels entirely too thin.

A little shaky Hisana takes stock: She's injured, unable to move, and there's a finger poking into her cheek that's not her own. She bites at it, but there's no reaction. Feeling for a chakra signature is futile; whoever is attached to the other side of this finger has no chakra left to give off and the rubble around her is too thick to feel anything. Right now she'd happily trade her kekkei genkai against Kohaku-sensei's Byakugan.

As it is, she's immobile, as good as blind, and alone with a body.

For a while she drifts in and out of consciousness. Her legs are numb, which isn't good, and the inside of her head is slowly but surely turning quiet. Alone the slow, steady lub dub, lub dub of her heart fills the silence; she tries to concentrate on that. The only sign of how much time has passed is the fact that the finger on her cheek is turning colder every time she opens her eyes.

She sleeps.

Another earthquake makes Hisana's eyes snap open. More rubble, she thinks wildly. The stone plate can't handle more rubble. The panic that rises in her chest feels entirely animal and she doesn't have enough energy to wrestle it down. Tears roll down her cheeks; they're hot on her freezing skin.

A hand grips her leg.

She yelps in pain, fighting the urge to kick out and hurt herself more. But she has skin contact now and – a tremor of disbelieving hope runs through her whole body. It's Sora. She'd recognize his chakra signature anywhere. The hand feels around her leg, probing at her injury, before disappearing again. The earth trembles once more, before the rubble crumbles away from her cheek. Her teammate reaches for her, blindly sticking his finger up her nose. She tries to recoil, but the stone won't let her.

"Ew," Sora's voice echoes from below. "Oh ew. You alive in there?"

She opens her mouth but no words come out. Her throat is dry and when she coughs it feels as if she's dispelling an entire tablespoon of dust from her lungs.

"You found me," she croaks in disbelief. "How did you-?"

Sora disrupts her with a derisive snort.

"Oh please. I'm a Doton type – you think I won't find you in a bit of rubble?"

He digs a bit more earth away from her face.

"Give me a few more minutes and I'll get you out of here, no trouble," he says. "Got to dig out your leg first, it's pretty messed up."

"Haru?" she asks belatedly.

"He's ok. He and Aki-chan got out all right. It's just us who got unlucky. Ah, well – and them."

He pokes at the finger still sticking out of the dirt.

"And their kid? The hostage."

"Aki-chan said not to worry. They're not just rock hard, they're apparently some sort of little Doton monsters. Just give me a second, I'll get you out!"

And then she's alone again. Or not entirely. The pressure is suddenly off her legs; more rubble simply falls away from her. Then Sora's hand takes her wrists and pulls.

Moving through earth is disconcerting she thinks dimly. She's not the one leading, so she can close her eyes against it, even though there's probably no need to. There seems to be a thin film of chakra over her, keeping anything from getting up her nose or even scraping at her skin too much.

And then she's breathing fresh air again. Or maybe that's being generous, but the stale air at the mouth of the cavern feels almost incomprehensible – as if her lungs are unfolding completely for the first time ever.

Another hand reaches for her upper arm to pull her up. It's Haru. Her view is getting fuzzy around the edges, so she closes her eyes.

"I don't think I can walk," she admits.

She can feel Haru shrug against her.

"We already expected that. To be honest, we're just glad you're conscious."

They hoist her onto Haru's back, Aki trailing after them with small uncertain steps.

"Nee-san … I can't help, but you're all right, aren't you? I mean, you can always give up."

Hisana gives a snort that quickly turns into a cough.

"I'm fine," she rasps. "We're not giving up as long as anyone can still carry me."

"Then we're good," Haru quips up, trying to shift her weight away from her injured leg. "You're not that heavy."

"Oh I don't know," she mumbles against his shoulder. "I distinctly recall someone telling me to lose some weight."

They take turns carrying her. All she can currently do for her team is being their eyes for two to three hours. She gets tired easily; Hisana thinks she might have a concussion.

They try to avoid other teams. She's a liability at best, and with Haru protecting her there's only Sora to shield Aki. It forces them onto the defensive and that doesn't sit well with any of them. Every once in awhile a scuffle can't be avoided, though. Hisana is predictably of little help, but once an unsuspecting ninja walks right into her visual range and she puts him to sleep before the rest of his team realizes what's going on. It knocks her out for almost six hours. Sora warns her not to do shit like that again. Everyone's mood hits a new low after that.

When they reach sunlight again – three, maybe four days in – she doesn't even realize. There's heat and light and it just doesn't compute. Someone takes her off Sora's back and she can feel the soothing cold of yin chakra on her leg. The next hours are nothing but a blur of heat and cold. She doesn't care anymore; her job is done, they're out. It's endorphins that carry her into unconsciousness.

As it turns out they've been sort of lucky.

The cave in cost them time, but it also took out a whole slew of competitors. Hisana doesn't know if they all died and she actively tries not to think about it too hard. It shouldn't matter; all Konoha participants are alive, if in parts injured and out of the running. When the six days are up there are no more than eleven participants that made it out in time. This in turn means no preliminary matches. Again it feels like a bitter sort of luck. In Hisana's condition a fight would have been completely out of the question; she would have had to forfeit. But now there's an entire month to heal and prepare.

It takes almost two weeks to get back onto her feet again. They're two anxious weeks. The boys visit regularly and she can see how nervous they are, which in turn makes her nervous.

"There's no privacy here," Haru complains. "Wherever you go to train, there's always someone there watching you."

So Kohaku-sensei keeps them moving, even takes them out into the desert to get some peace and quiet. Once she joins them she almost wishes to be back inside the creepy but air-conditioned hospital. It's the middle of summer and without the buildings of Suna to throw shade they can't keep it up for longer than two hours at a time. To make matters worse, Hisana's throat still feels sore and abused. She's been choked twice in a very short time and she's inhaled a lot of dust during the cave in. Her lungs are fine, but her pharynx has been chafed raw.

At this stage of their training they have all learned to ignore a certain level of discomfort, but this is more than Hisana is used to. Still, getting rid of the nervous energy in her limbs makes all of that almost worth it. Moving, fighting is a relief. She's finally back on her feet again – not at the mercy of strange, unfamiliar shinobi. Foreign shinobi. The note of xenophobia coloring her thoughts makes her a little uncomfortable. It sounds nothing like Sarah. Not for the first time she becomes aware of how much she's changed; Hisana knows that in this world foreign more often than not does equal dangerous. Especially with something as delicate as medic-nins involved. No wonder that Kakashi-shishou doesn't like hospitals.

Luckily her leg has healed well enough. The medics acted as if it wasn't a big deal. Honestly, if she'd seen it on anyone else Hisana might not have batted an eye herself. But there's something deeply disconcerting about seeing your own bone, and your flesh hanging in strips. About feeling the wind on your raw, exposed nerves. It's an entirely novel sort of pain.

Training is moving, accordingly, slowly.

Hisana doesn't feel as if she's slowed down much – if there's one thing she has to thank Hyuuga Neji for then it's teaching her how to fight through discomfort – but she does know that a well aimed hit to her stiff parts will make her legs collapse like a house of cards. It's frustrating to know that she'll have to work on this before she can actually prepare for the matches, while her teammates are already miles ahead of her. Presumably.

There's a loud plonk as her scroll topples down the bed and rolls several feet along the floor. She's still holding the other end, glassy, tired eyes not moving up from the text. Team 11 has been split up for now. Kohaku-sensei comes by once a day, assessing her injuries and checking in on her progress. It's all he can do, now that his students may very well have to fight each other; the less contact they have right now, the fairer he can divide his time and his advice between them. And while the boys – fully mobile and ready to beat the crap out of someone – may have an advantage right now, Hisana is furiously working on hers.

Kakashi-shishou may be a useless lump most of the time, but he does take an unholy glee in sticking it to people. And now that Hisana is officially part of 'Team Hatake' – alongside his pack of dogs, how flattering – she enjoys more of the benefits this brings.

The scroll on her bed is a ninjutsu scroll; it describes, in boring and overly complex detail, advanced chakra control techniques for chakra conducting weapons. Hisana's bokken is still very much made of normal wood, but her teacher's annoyingly vague note assured her she'd "find it useful", smiley face. Hisana's current hypothesis, shaky and entirely unsupported by anything resembling facts, is that wood might be a little more forgiving of foreign chakra than forged, compressed metal. After all, it still retains some of the tree's natural chakra pathways. Somewhere. She thinks. If they're even accessible to her.

Infusing things with chakra isn't really all that difficult. The process described in Kakashi's scroll is the same one used for chakra paper – just on a larger scale and more controlled. The paper is, after all, destroyed in the process, which would be counter-productive in this case. Hisana is strongly tempted to ask Kohaku-sensei for help; the Juuken might very well be a simple, if violent, chakra infusion. Then again, if it is, there is no guarantee that her teacher is allowed to share the particulars of if with her. She's an outsider. Worse, she's an Uchiha.

Nevertheless, the thought has given her an idea.

Hisana scoots off her bed and hobbles over to the door. Kohaku-sensei still isn't back, even though it's already pitch black outside. She knows that the room across is just as empty and silent as hers; the boys are still out too. Opening the door gives her a thrill anyway.

The corridor is empty; to her right a flight of stairs descends into darkness, to her left only two more rooms house another Konoha team. And on the end of the corridor … a yucca palm. The edges of its leaves have turned brown and the decorative clay pot is chipped. Hisana has the strong impression it's been hurriedly put there just for them and has since then been forgotten by the innkeeper. Her knee pops uncomfortably, the sound echoing off the walls, as Hisana makes her way towards the plant. It's taller than her, but she lifts the dry, gritty feeling pot off the ground and heaves it back into her room.

Her joints keep making a racket and she thanks all deities that the upcoming matches aren't exactly a stealth exercise. At least her leg has stopped hurting.

She slumps down onto the floor, the plant firmly wedged between her legs. Hisana tugs at the leaves thoughtfully. It's a desert plant – sturdy. This might even work.

Her Sharingan activate. The palm tree's chakra signature is faint and gently pulsating, its intensity caught somewhere between the loud, erratic pump of animal organisms and the steady background hum of inorganic material.

The leaf between her fingers is thick and she can only guess at the number of chakra veins curling through it. Even with her finger pressed to it, Hisana can't feel anything beside the faint overall signature, as if it's exhaling chakra through every stoma; not for the first time she wishes she could exchange her kekkei genkai for the Byakugan. Instead of dwelling on her own short-comings she lets her chakra skirt along the edges of the leaf, before pushing at the foreign energy. There's a sizzling noise and she jerks her hand back.

"Oh for the love of-"

The leaf crumbles away, blackened and burnt. The stress impulse makes yucca's entire chakra signature flare. Interesting.

For a moment Hisana considers brushing the singed parts away and simply pressing her finger into the sap. But the notion strikes her as weirdly cruel somehow. She reaches for the trunk instead; the chakra shivers against her hand as if the palm tree is already anticipating the next blow.

"You're giving me performance anxiety," she informs the yucca. "Stop that."

Kohaku-sensei's appearance takes her by surprise.

He doesn't knock on the door, but simply barges in inelegantly. It's light outside and she blinks up at him blearily. He blinks back.

"You're late," she informs him, immediately feeling like someone's mother.

"And you have popped a blood vessel in your eye," he returns flatly. He eyes the yucca tree somewhat wearily before making his way over to her. He smells dusty and like blood and sweat.

"Turn those off," Kohaku-sensei grumbles and Hisana needs a second to grasp what he means. She deactivates the Sharingan reluctantly, hissing when the room suddenly feels much brighter. "What have you been doing?"

"I'm trying to … infuse things with chakra."

"And you started with a living thing?"

The 'you idiot' goes unsaid but definitely not unheard.

"It already has a - …"

Hisana gestures vaguely towards the plant while her teacher examines her eyes, squishing at the surrounding tissue. She makes a face.

"Yes," he agrees, "an entire system already full of chakra. Why not start with something that cannot push back?"

The light sensitivity eases in one eye and he moves on to the next.

"Why chakra infusion? You don't possess any sort of chakra conducting weapon."

"Yes, well, Kakashi-shishou might be a bit of a sadist, but I'm pretty sure he's not going to send me on a wild goose chase. Why would he give me a reading on chakra infusing weapons if it's useless to me?"

"I did not say that it is useless," Kohaku-sensei huffs. "You need to learn how to listen. If you cannot infuse a weapon, what can you do with it? This should really not be new information to you."

Hisana stares at him for a long moment, and then an embarrassed flush crawls over her cheeks.

"Oh."