"..." Normal chat.
ABC. Thought.
Chapter 8
Next morning
"Kakashi-sensei."
Once finish getting ready for the trip, I approach the white haired man who is reading his book by the tree.
"Hmm?"
His attention then changes from the papers to me.
"Thanks... for helping me."
Despite knowing that his assist did not come for free, it'd still better to express my appreciation than staying silent.
Hearing so, Kakashi smiles and gestures his hand to me as if saying *You're welcome*, though I'm sure that it can also be interpreted as *You owed me an explanation*.
"You'd better not get too close to that girl, Naruto. She may not be the person who you think she is."
When Naruto's packing his stuff into the backpack, Sasuke stops by his spot. And he speaks in volume that only enough for both of them to hear.
"Huh? What do you mean?"
Needless to say, Naruto's puzzled by his statement.
"Just a warning."
Yet Sasuke refuses to provide more detail and walks off.
That bastard! What was that all about!?
Annoyed, Naruto glares at him. Then his gaze shifts to Nina who is talking with their teacher not too far away. Both of them seem to be in a good mood that he doubt there's anything serious happened last night.
..
...
"I'm going to look for them."
Naruto declared for the nth times and stood up.
"Alone in the middle of the woods, at night. Are you an idiot?"
But Sakura's quick to stop him from breaking what's left of the team.
By then Naruto and Sakura had gathered at their camping spot after finishing their duties long ago, waiting for their missing teammates and teacher to return.
I wonder what happened to them? Where did they go?
Sakura couldn't hide the anxiousness on her face. After finding out that Sasuke had disappeared without a trace, she dashed back to their old spot to report to Kakashi.
That's when she's informed that Nina had also gone missing. And according to Naruto, she had went off into the woods on her own to gather some dried branches and had yet to come back.
Therefore Kakashi decided to go look for the two Genins by himself. While telling Naruto and Sakura to stay put to keep everyone's belongings.
Which lead to what they were doing then, sitting in the middle of the area watching the fire burning.
"Say, Sakura-chan. Don't you think Sasuke has been acting weird lately?"
Could no longer keeping it to himself, Naruto asked her about his friend's odd actions.
"Weird? Like how?"
Sakura stopped drawing illegible scribbles on the ground the moment her crush was mentioned.
"Yeah, like, bullying people. You know."
She's surprised by his statement. What? Sasuke-kun? A bully?
"Why do you think so? What happened?"
And Sakura started wondering what had caused Naruto to jump into such a strange conclusion. Yet he refused to elaborate and kept asking for her opinion about his theory.
"There's no way Sasuke-kun would such a thing."
Confidently she claimed and Naruto's expression lightened up. Only for a little but it's enough for her to figure out there's something going on between them behind her back.
"Yeah, I wouldn't believe that either."
And he smiled to her softly. As if having assured that his best friend wouldn't have become one of those kind of people that he hated most.
"Jeeze, Naruto. You're not making any sense right now."
He grinned at her sarcastic question and returned to his normal up beat personality.
What was Naruto trying to imply just now?
While she's left drowning within her own confusions. Wondering whether she should ask Sasuke about it when he return.
Even so at the end of the day, Sakura couldn't bring herself to ask him and let her suspicions fall into oblivion.
...
..
"What's wrong, Naruto? Hurry up or we'll leave you behind."
Notice that he's been staring at his package for a while now, I pat Naruto's shoulders to wake him from his long daydreaming.
"Nina-chan. You're not hiding anything from me, are you?"
Then Naruto turns around, looking deep into my eyes.
"Never!"
And I almost choke on my own breath.
Did Naruto somehow notice me acting abnormal? But why? And how?
This isn't the time to question the universe, I have to find a way to deal with him first.
Let's see. A kid Naruto isn't capable of sensing people's emotion. And he's too much of an airhead to figure out anything that is far more complex than Ramen, ideal friendship and Shinobi's trainings.
"You are my close friend, Naruto. How can I do something knowing that it will hurt you or your feelings?"
Therefore striking at his vital spot is my first and easiest solution.
"Are you doubting me, Naruto?"
I act to be hurt by his judgement. By adding a suitable amount of disappointment in my tone to make myself more convincing.
"No! I believe Nina-chan! You know!"
Naruto strongly declares his trust on our pure friendship.
Good, he caught my bait. I've got to thanks the author for making him too easy to read sometimes.
A couple of hours later.
We reach to the Sunshine's village gate and the first thing catches my noses is the faint scent of blood.
Are they slaughtering cattle out here?
Confused, I turn to Kakashi, then to Naruto and the other two for some clarifications. No one finds it strange so I take my guess that this is normal for the rural area.
As we get further inside, the atmosphere is similar to any other normal village. Clean street, crowded market and people working on their jobs like any usual day.
No sign of assault or abnormal activities. And the scent of blood from earlier has also disappeared.
The moment we arrive to what suppose to be the leader house, I take the delivery package out of my backpack to prove to the workers that we're the expected visitors.
Then, they lead us into the guest room and there. A man in his 40s with straight long black hair and green fancy kimono, greets us with open arms.
"Welcome, Shinobi of Konohagakure. I've been waiting!"
Judging by his attire, he should be the owner of this household, Kazuhiro.
"Kazuhiro-san."
Kakashi greets him with a slight bow and the man does the same to him in return.
"This must be the delivery package that I've asked for. Thank you so much!"
The moment seeing the parcel box in my hands, Kazuhiro reaches out to take it.
"Not so fast. We're still not certain that you're the one who wrote this commission."
However Kakashi stops him.
"What ever do you mean?! It's saying right here that Kazuhiro was the one who bought Konoha shinobi's service for that package!"
Kazuhiro shows us a wrinkled brown paper in his hand that filled with words and a signature of the village leader at the bottom.
"Yes, it's true that Kazuhiro has hired us for this job. However, you're not him."
Kakashi explains, his penetrating blank stare is causing the man to feel uncomfortable.
"Do you even realize what you are saying right now!?"
The self-claimed Kazuhiro protests.
After looking at each other, the team 7 takes their turn to show him the result of their investigation this morning.
"There were no sight of children or their activities around this area."
Therefore Sasuke starts first.
"The market's too clean at the busiest time of day. Not even a single cattle around? Just who are you trying to fool."
Next is Sakura.
"Your subordinates were following us on the street, even right now inside this house. They're suck at hiding their killing intent, you know."
Then Naruto.
"The scent of blood at the village's gate."
It seems that my fear was right. The villagers were dead and these bandits were in the middle of to disposing the villager bodies at the river bank nearby. While preparing for our arrival.
"Or based on this."
Kakashi shows us the picture of Kazuhiro which we have never seen or heard of before setting off onto the journey.
And by the look on our teacher's annoying face, we can tell that the reason for his doing is something along the line of - testing our observation skills...
"Impressive! I didn't expect for be exposed by a bunch of kids."
That man's stunned by our performances before bursting into laughter. As if just having watched an entertaining play.
Hold on, if they've been here waiting for a single package. That's mean...
I hold the parcel box closer when seeing more of bandits appearing in the room and surrounding us. Right now, there are at least fifteen of them. Not counting the ones outside.
"Yes, that thing contains a valuable piece of hand crafted jewelry for the dead old man's daughter upcoming wedding."
Ignoring Naruto's never lasting blabbering, the man in fancy Kimono speaks.
"He's such a cheapskate to hire you low rank shinobi and put that inside a parcel box just to fool people."
The menace aura that he and the others are showing, is starting to make me feel uncomfortable.
"Get ready, everyone."
Kakashi orders and we change into their fighting stance for the battle.
While Naruto's excited for the big fight. Sasuke smirks at his new found challenge. Sakura is not fazed by the large amount of enemies. There's me, who has not prepared both physically and mentally, for this.
Oh boy, here goes nothing!
In one second, the bandits jump at us with various type of tools in their hands.
Therefore Kakashi priority the tough ones to eliminate. As Sasuke and Naruto aim for the average looking ones. Sakura and I are in the role of support and keep the package safe.
"I'll protect you!"
Naruto summons multiples of his clones. More than half are used to fight with him and the rest in the back line to keep Sakura safe.
"I can fight too, Shannaro!"
Not going to be left behind by her teammates, Sakura engages into the battle as well. With the help of several Naruto's clones.
Ugh! Why won't this thing get in!?
While I'm still struggling to put the parcel box inside my backpack due to constant dodging bandit's attacks.
In the middle of chaotic moment, some of them have sneaked into our team position to get a hold of Sakura from behind. And her surprise yelp gains all of our attentions.
"Sakura, duck!"
Quickly I throw several Shuriken toward to her attackers. Only waiting for that to happen, one of the bandits dashes to my side and snatches the parcel box out of my hand.
No! I can't let them get away!
In instant, I abandon my team to chase after them. Not leaving Kakashi a chance to stop me.
And it's not until getting deep into the woods that I catch up with them. Only to realize having made a grave mistake by setting my feet into right their territory, which is full of deadly trap and ambush, alone.
"What do we have here? It's the little girl from that shinobi's family earlier."
One of the bandits steps out of the crowd to speak to me.
He's tossing that package up and down in his hand, acting like having won the battle. Despite more than half of his men are having their asses handed to them at the moment we speak.
"I say we capture this girl and sell her to the slavery market."
One of the bandits suggests his brilliant idea and they laugh.
"Let's use that paralyze method, it's the easiest and quickest."
Now several blowguns can be seen in their hands and aiming at me.
Holding tight onto the Kunai in my hand, I retreat a few step back to calculate my safe zone and prepare for combat. Only end up looking more like a joke to them.
Never mind that necklace, I need to get out here alive first.
And I try dodging my way toward to the exit, while hoping not to get hit by any paralysis needles.
"Give it up, kid. This is the end."
Those bastards enjoy their moment playing around with my amateur shinobi skill. The way their eyes look at me feels as if watching a cornered, helpless animal which is about to get killed.
Give up? You must be kidding.
When being surrounded, I take a deep breath to calm myself.
Not until I drag every single one of you down to hell with me.
After tossing the Kunai away, my hands reach for the double daggers hanging around my waist. Changing into a much more suitable battle stance to initiate my final resort.
"Gyahh! Intruder! It's one of them!"
Before able to draw out those blades, I hear multiple yelling and see people get kicked into the air.
"No need to get all so excited for. I wasn't here just to provide aids."
What a big surprise. It's Sasuke who has arrived to save the day.
"For how long are you intending play this detective game again?"
And here I thought that he cared for me as a teammate for once. But I guess that's too much to ask from the Uchiha.
"Until I rip off that fake mask of yours and find out what you're truly hiding."
Pulling his Kunai out of the bandit's body, Sasuke declares to stick with his so almighty duty till the very end.
"Looks like we've got company. Doesn't matter, because you all are going to die here."
Then, one of the bandits gestures his men to gather before us.
"Hmph! We'll see about that."
Gladly accepting their warm welcome, Sasuke steps forward and I notice that his Sharigan has been activated.