Adult-FanFiction.org : Naruto

Grounded	By : djserani Category: Naruto > Het - Male/Female Views: 2818 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, and I do not make any money from these writings.

Chapter List
- 16
- 17
- 18
Sakura was on her in an instant, her hands glowing green, her chakra focused. “Sakura?” Ino’s voice came from somewhere to her right. “What happened?”
Sakura was too busy concentrating on healing Hinata. She’d lost blood. A lot for such a short time. Too much. “I don’t know. I didn’t see. One minute she was sending the Cloud ninja to hell, the next she was covered in blood and passing out. She’s lost a lot. The only thing I can think of is the overuse from her Gentle Fist.” Sakura fell silent and went back to healing.
Ino glanced around. Temari was still fighting the Grass-nin. She was still standing, but it was getting close. He seemed to be giving back as much as he was getting. Shikamaru and Chouji had found Kirisame again and were playing cat and mouse with him. And Kakashi was trying to get a hit on Myou, but spending more time dodging than anything. She couldn’t see much past that except for a lot of dust where Lee, Tenten, and Neji would be. She hoped they were okay.

Temari was getting pissed, now. It would figure she’d go up against another wind user. She was almost out of chakra, she knew she was bleeding in more than one place, and she was exhausted. Glaring at the grass-nin across from her, she bit her thumb, drew it across her fan then swung the fan once more. Kamatari appeared and looked up at her. “This guy is a pain in my ass.”
“Yes, my lady.” Kamatari turned and started for the Grass-nin, disappearing from view. A moment later, as the flurry of leaves settled, the weasel was gone and the rogue-nin lay in the grass, still.
Temari nearly collapsed. She leaned on her fan for a moment, trying to catch her breath. “Shika!” Chouji’s voice drew her attention and she spun, her eyes wide.

I’ve about had enough of this guy. Shikamaru thought as he flew backwards again from another strike by the water whip. He was vaguely aware of Chouji shouting before he hit the trunk of a tree and slid to the ground, his breath knocked out of him. He briefly thought it would figure he’d end up in a situation like this because of a woman.
He shook his head hard to clear it and glared at the Rain shinobi standing just out of reach of his shadows. This was ridiculous. He glanced up at the sun and knew he’d get no help there any time soon. They’d run out of chakra before the shadows could lengthen. He needed to make them instead. Or come up with a different strategy.

Kakashi watched the sword swing again and knew exactly how far it could reach. He was going to run out of chakra soon if he didn’t do something. He had one big trick up his sleeve, but he didn’t want to use it if he could help it. He’d nearly been undone when he saw the cloud nin go for Sakura a while ago, but she’d handled herself well enough as he should have known she would. He’d chastise himself later for the almost hit he took over the lack of concentration. Especially since he’d lectured the rest of them about it before they left.
Nothing damaged the sword that he could see and that, in itself, didn’t surprise him. He’d finally figured out that the blades ability to slice through anything was chakra related. If he could get Myou to use up his chakra, he didn’t have to worry about the damned sword so much. But he was getting dangerously close to using up his own.
He had to be careful. There were too many of his own people here. He dodged another swing and realized he had no choice. Sighing, he opened the Sharingan eye.

Tenten landed hard and slid backwards into the cliff face. She’d had enough. The Sand shinobi had come at them after the fight between Kakashi and Myou had started. Lee was still engaged with the other Rain-nin, Mirasame, and Neji had found himself opposite the Sound-nin. He’d started with the rotation shield, but apparently Misumi, as he’d announced himself to them, was smarter than Meizu and Gozu and wouldn’t get anywhere near Neji.
She wanted to use her Heavenly Chain of Destruction, but Lee and Neji were too close. She glared at the Sand-nin again, pulled her scroll out and tossed it carefully in the sand shinobi’s direction, making sure to keep it away from Neji and Lee. Finally, after the barrage of knives finished falling, he was on the ground.
She turned to Neji who was now fighting directly with Misumi. She couldn’t see his hands move, but that was nothing new for Neji. Just as she was about to help, the sound-nin flew backwards and lay still and Neji fell to his knees, panting hard.
A moment later, Lee flew up into the air, wrapped around Mirasame, turned them over and spun as they headed to the ground. A huge cloud of dust flew, but as the air cleared, Lee was standing—barely, but he was standing—and Mirasame wasn’t.

This had to end and soon. That was all Sakura could think as she watched the fights progress. Kirisame’s water whip kept Chouji and Shikamaru just out of reach. They needed a ranged advantage and didn’t have one. Sakura saw the cloud of dust toward the back where Lee, Tenten, and Neji were, but still couldn’t make out what was going on.
Hinata was laying behind her, resting. The bleeding was stopped and as long as she didn’t try to do anything strenuous for a while, she’d be fine. Sakura sighed and turned to Ino. “Watch her for me. I’m the only one here with chakra left. Stay here.”
She pulled her gloves tighter onto her hands and ran.

Kakashi saw her run out of the corner of his eye. He cursed her silently, but knew he couldn’t pull his attention away from Myou at this point. He dodged one more swing, then, as Myou pulled the sword back for its last arc, he focused his attention on the right point. “Kamui.”
The vortex opened in front of him and the sword moved right into it. Myou let go in surprise and Kakashi released it, closing the vortex. He slumped down, exhausted. He’d almost waited too late to use it. He pulled a new kunai out of his pouch to send to Myou, but he beat Kakashi to the punch, literally. Kakashi flew backwards, landing hard on his back in the dirt, the breath knocked out of him. He saw Myou go flying over him, puzzled over it for a second, then decided he didn’t care. Sakura’s going to kill me, was the last thing he thought before he blacked out.

There were several broken bones, some internal bleeding, more blocked chakra points than Sakura could count and almost everyone was close to chakra exhaustion. She and Ino were that way because of the healing they were now having to do. And Sakura knew she had to do the lion’s share of it or Ino would risk the baby.
When she got the bleeding and chakra points taken care of, she worked on the broken bones. She was ready to pass out herself by the time Chouji’s wrist was taken care of. She sent up a prayer of thanks that he was the last of them.
The rogue-nin were not so lucky. Six of them were dead. Three of the sentries, the cloud ninja, Kirisame, Misumi and Myou were out cold. They’d require healing when Sakura could regenerate some chakra, but none of their injuries were life-threatening. Tenten had summoned wire to bind them and Temari had set Takumi on guard duty. So far, he was so desperate to live that he was willing to do anything. Including, it seemed, kiss her feet. Literally.

Sakura stood up and stretched her back. After checking on Shikamaru’s internal bleeding and Lee’s broken bones one more time, she stopped at Kakashi. As she knelt next to him, he opened his eye and looked up at her. “Don’t kill me.” She barely made out the words.
“Not yet. It’s no fun to kill an almost-dead man. I’ll wait until you’re back to full health first.” She brushed the hair out of his face and pulled his headband down over the sharingan. Then, she leaned over and kissed him over the mask. “Get some rest. We’re safe here for now.”
He reached out and grabbed her hand and she held onto it tightly. She wouldn’t let the tears fall yet, there was too much to do. But they would. She knew it. Just not yet.

Temari sat with Shikamaru’s head in her lap. If someone had pointed out that she was crying, she would have adamantly denied it. She didn’t cry. She was Temari of the Sand, sister to the Kazekage and top-ranked ninja.
She just conveniently ignored the water that was leaking from her eyes and dripping down her face. It must have been raining. Or something.
“Woman, if you’re going to drown me, do you have to do it one drop at a time? Or is this some kind of water torture? Isn’t there a less troublesome way of killing me?” Shikamaru opened his eyes and looked up at her.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m not a water-user.” She managed to keep a straight face for a total of about three more seconds, then she grinned. She leaned down and kissed him gently, patently ignoring the grins on Ino’s and Chouji’s faces. She took a deep breath. “I love you,” she whispered to him.
Shikamaru’s amused smile faded. “I love you.” He pulled her face down to him and kissed her again.

Neji’s face was pale and Tenten worried over just how pale it was. He’d refused to let Sakura look him over, his eyes glued to Hinata. Sakura had tried to tell him she’d be fine, had just lost a bit too much blood, but he still wouldn’t move.
Tenten could certainly understand. The most she ended up with were a few scrapes. Lee was the one with three broken bones, though Sakura had healed them. But he’d opened the second gate and was going to need to rest for a while from it. He was currently curled up around her, asleep.

Kakashi had passed out again. After making sure he was okay, Sakura stood and stretched once more. “Neji.” She shook his shoulder and he looked up at her. “I need your help.” He just looked back at Hinata again and Sakura shook him hard. “Neji. I can’t do this alone. I need your help.”
It finally got through to him. “I’m sorry Sakura-san. What can I do?”
“We’re going to have to camp here tonight. There’s no way we can move everyone. As such, we’ve got to get the dead away from here and clean up a space to sleep.” Sakura put a hand on his shoulder. “She’ll be fine. All she needs now is rest.”
Neji took a deep breath and stood up. With the help of Takumi and Chouji, they took care of the dead nin. The only one in their group capable of the transport seals was Kakashi and he was still out cold.
Sakura got Temari, Ino, and Tenten to help find a clean place to sleep since a good portion of the camp had been the battlefield. There were some spots that were not good to sleep near. It took a while, but they’d finally managed to also gather enough wood and materials to build a decent fire.
Sakura turned at last to the hurt rogue-nin. There were only a couple with anything remotely serious. She took care of them, but had to leave those with minor injuries alone. She couldn’t afford complete chakra exhaustion.
Once watches were set and water collected, Sakura gave in to the need to sleep for a bit. She curled up next to Kakashi, covered them with a blanket and passed out.
- 16
- 17
- 18
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