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Koiuta, V.2	By : dragonslover1 Category: Naruto > Het - Male/Female Views: 1338 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: 'Naruto' is owned by Masashi Kishimoto. I am not profiting from this fanfiction.

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Koiuta, Love Song V.2

　

A Fresh Start

　

　

It was around dusk when she was spotted, a blood-splattered, half-dead kunoichi wandering in the desert. It was Suzaki who�d spotted her, a blonde kunoichi of Sunagakure, her team and herself darting through the desert back home after a completed mission. In the fading light, the other female had been nearly invisible, if not for her silhouette against the sky.

She stopped her team and, as one, they investigated. The kunoichi was so lost, so drained, that she didn�t even notice the team stalking closer. One foot in front of the other, she staggered onwards, no goal obvious except to escape whatever chased her. Upon closer inspection, no allegiance was noted, no forehead protector blazing a village�s symbol, but her proximity to the Land of Earth hinted at her origins.

Suzaki was surprised as she neared the girl, for although she was a brunette and Suzaki a blonde, they shared eerily similar facial features. Their cheeks, jawline, noses and eyes had the same shapes. Other than that, they were hardly alike; Suzaki was taller, her body more toned and thicker. She was tan; the other girl was pale. Her eyes were a rich orange; the other�s a bright blue.

And the kunoichi was riddled with wounds. Many still bled, leaving a trail of scarlet behind in the sand. To make matters worse, sand was stuck to her as well. She must have fallen a time or two, Suzaki realized. A wave of sorrow hit her; what had this woman gone through?

Though she wanted to help this woman, instinct and protocol were stronger. She eyed the brunette from top to bottom, noting the mesh visible along her arms and lower legs, her sleeveless haori, the loose pants knotted with ties at the knees. Multiple straps crossed her chest and hips, anchoring three sheaths to her: two kodachi and one katana. Definitely a kunoichi.

Suzaki and her team exchanged glances, and her sensei—
Masumata-sama—
nodded in approval. They jumped into motion, surrounding the newcomer in an instant. She stopped there, her obviously sluggish mind at least able to perceive obstacles before her. As Suzaki watched, she eyed the person in front of her, Masumata, eyes trailing over his forehead protector, before nodding once.

Without a word, she collapsed, whatever will had been driving her suddenly drying up. Airou-san, her male teammate, caught the kunoichi as she fell, sending Masumata a helpless look.

After a few moments, Masumata said, �We�ll take her back to the village with us. Then we�ll find out what happened to her.� He looked between Suzaki and Minami, the two female students of his, and said, �Backtrack. Follow the blood she left behind, but do not cross the border. If you encounter another team, do not engage.�

That decided, they kicked back into motion. She was relocated to Airou�s back and off they went, the group splitting into twos. Masumata sprinted off ahead of Airou to warn the village while Suzaki and Minami followed the girl�s tracks back to the border. It took two hours at full speed for the pair of them to reach it, making Suzaki rather impressed with the female they�d saved. It must have taken a full day for her to walk this distance with those injuries.

They�d encountered a lot of blood along the way, however, and Suzaki felt a minor chill that the girl wouldn�t survive. She shared a worried glance with Minami, waiting at the border as they were, trying to see beyond the rocky terrain on the other side.

A rain of shuriken fell upon the pair a moment later, the two barely recognizing the attack in time to dodge. With their sensei�s directives echoing in their minds, the girls backed off and sprinted away, dread flowing between them. To be attacked at the border, while they were on their own side?

That was a declaration of war.

- - -

By the time Tasha woke, two days had passed. This was surprising for both her and her nurse, but for differing reasons. Tasha was overflowing with energy thanks to her jewel, and sleep had never come easy nor in great quantity to her. Yet with the extent of her injuries, the nurse had expected her to be unconscious for a week, at the least. So as Tasha made to sit up, getting her bearings, the nurse called for a doctor.

�Where am I?� was the first question to pass Tasha�s lips.

While they waited for the doctor to arrive, the nurse (a pretty young woman with a round face and arched brows that made her look constantly worried) answered, �Sunagakure. You were found wandering the desert. What do you remember?� she asked.

Tasha moaned on a reply, her numerous aches acting up. A dozen kunai had slashed her all across her arms, several shuriken had imbedded in her legs and fists had hammered against her. She remembered pain. �My team,� she began, voice rough from her ordeals, �they tried to kill me. . .�

Unease sparked in the nurse�s brown eyes, lifting only when the doctor arrived a moment later. Thus began a difficult, pain-filled give-and-take, the three of them watched over by two male ninja in the room. Tasha learned that she�d had a grand total of seventeen wounds stitched up while she�d been out, ranging from three stitches on one cut to twenty-two on other.

She was in terrible shape. Hell, one of the kunai had nearly sliced her chakra jewel clean out of her face, leaving behind a gash that would undoubtedly scar. Had the attack succeeded, Tasha would be dead by now. The jewel had been attached to her when she was so young that her chakra had become tied to it; to remove it was to die. Her team had known that, she realized, and were trying to end her quickly.

That move had damned them, however. The jewel had reacted, sending out dozens of blades of pure wind energy, slicing her teammates to pieces. Bloody chunks of what had once been people rained around her, nearly coating her from head to foot in their own blood.

As she and the doctor exchanged information, he jotted down notes on a clipboard. She was dizzy, still suffering a headache from the intense blood she�d lost, and curious as to her future. She asked what was to become of her, and in return, the doctor asked her why her team had tried to kill her.

She honestly didn�t know the answer to that, though she�d puzzled over it for well over a day. The only answer that had made any sense was that her father had done something royally stupid, and she was now paying the price. She said as much to her audience, then added. . .hopeful and pleading. . .that she would like to remain here, rather than be forced to go back.

At that, the doctor�s eyes had turned pitying. �We�re negotiating with the Tsuchikage,� he informed her. �As of now, he wants us to surrender you to his ninja.�

Or else, she finished for him. A new kind of pain speared her, one of rejection and betrayal. Her chin trembled as she fought back waves of despair, crushing all hope right out of her. �I�d like to be alone now,� she managed to say through the crowding in her throat.

As soon as the room was empty, she turned on her side and tears began falling. She knew it, then: her Kage didn�t just want to punish her for her father�s transgressions, whatever they were; he wanted her dead. What had she done to draw his ire, she wondered? She�d been a good ninja, damn it, obeying swiftly and without mercy to whichever order he gave.

Though she quietly yearned for a different kind of life, she�d done her damnedest to live the one she�d been given to the best of her ability. She�d tried to honour her clan and country, to uphold the values they�d driven into her since graduating from their academy. So what had gone wrong?

There was a devastating sense of loss flowing through her, one she couldn�t quite explain. And though she�d never really been satisfied with her life before, now it seemed to just be mocking her. She�d always felt empty, to a degree, and now what little she thought she had was taken from her. She didn�t even have the faith of her own Kage. Was there anything else that could possibly be taken from her?

Probably, she admitted, and it was better not to contemplate such a thing. It would merely tempt fate.

- - -

Another message, similar to the first. And second. And third.

Gaara, the Kazekage of Wind Country, glared at the message as he read it, delivered by a crow of Earth Country. You have two days, the message read, to return Tasha of Kurotaishou, or we will take her by force.

Sometimes Gaara truly enjoyed his position as the Kazekage. Sometimes it was fulfilling, giving him pride after a lifetime of seeking it out only to have it denied from his grasp. Watching the ninja teams gave him a sense of satisfaction, their victories a direct result of his wise selections in missions. A bit of that satisfaction was vindictive, he admitted, for giving teams that had once viewed him harshly missions far below their skill level had put them in their place.

And then there were times when he hated his job. Such as right now. The ninja, Tasha, had been recovered nearly dead within their border. As she�d had no allegiance at the time, that made her �property� of Wind Country. It was within his rights to keep her protected here in the heart of the desert. And he was trying to, damn it, but the Tsuchikage was determined to get her back.

Aware as he was of ninja secrets, Gaara was now enacting a plan. He was delaying the demands as best he could while his two best teams were out, scouting for information. He knew his requests for why the Tsuchikage wanted Tasha would be ignored, so it acted as a stall while his teams dug up the information themselves.

It was a dangerous situation. They teetered on the brink of a ninja war right now, with Tasha somehow being the prize. If it came to it. . .Gaara would have to hand her back, he realized with a scowl. He couldn�t risk the lives of his citizens over a single fugitive. Whatever her ultimate importance to the Tsuchikage, he would not let his people die for her.

As he pondered on his next move, praying for diplomacy though he knew it was useless, he was interrupted by a Jounin arriving. Their words were curt, to the point. . .and somewhat pleasing. Tasha had awoken. The Jounin-slash-doctor had interviewed her as well as tended to her wounds, and now he had a report to offer. Gaara listened with increasing confusion and dread, then dismissed the man.

He needed his teams back by tomorrow, then, with whatever information they�d uncovered. What he learned the following day was worse than he could have guessed.

Both teams had returned by noon the following day, along with the doctor, all of which had given reports. The three reports combined spelled out something that had Gaara�s respect for Iwagakure plummeting.

The first bit of information: Tasha�s clan, Kurotaishou, had a new baby in their midst. Whether or not Tasha knew of it was unknown and inconsequential at this point. The babe was a week old now, the reports said, and it was massively important to the clan as a whole.

The second bit: whether by oversight or purposeful withholding of information, Tasha had not mentioned the gem beside her eye. When the doctor returned, he asked her further questions about her clan, her life, her purpose and so on. Eventually he discovered that the gem itself was nothing but pure, solidified chakra, enough of it to essentially make a human into a bomb.

This was initially worrisome, as Gaara feared she might be a suicide ninja here to assassinate him (he�d survived a few attempts already)—
until the third bit of information was relayed. Added to the rest, the story spelled out that Tasha was a host to a chakra-gathering gem, its existence spanning at least two centuries. Its purpose seemed to be to just gather more and more, though it was limited to her own clan.

And the child that was just born? The baby boy had stronger chakra lines than Tasha did, so the clan wanted to remove the gem and implant it within the boy. Something that had to be done as soon as possible, the report said, but no one knew exactly why. Worse, Tasha had explained that to remove the gem was to cut off her chakra entirely, an act that would kill her.

The entire debacle smacked of stupid and irresponsibility to Gaara. They were treating a living being as though she were a mere tool, less than an animal, to be used and discarded as needed. No respect whatsoever was being offered for her. The demands stated that she was to be returned, no offer of reward nor any promise, save that of war if denied.

It burned Gaara up to have it come to this. Tsuchikage was really planning on killing her without any reason to actually do so. All information gathered suggested Tasha had been a fine ninja, well on her way to climbing the ranks, a possibly invaluable kunoichi to her country. And yet they still tried to kill her, still wanted to do so.

He might not be her Kage, he decided, but he would not hand her over to one such as Earth Country�s. She did not need to die.

And so Gaara called for a council with his best Jounin, working out a plan. They couldn�t keep Tasha here either way; she was too close to her home country, too easy to reach should a team break through. He could have her escorted to the west, out of bounds, as it were, but he suspected it would be safer for her to travel east into Fire Country. His Jounin agreed with the idea.

The plan set, he had it enacted immediately. A message was sent via falcon from Suna to Konoha, asking for a team—
preferably Jounin, just in case—
to wait at the border between Fire Country and the Land of Rivers. Information, too sensitive to be sent by bird, would be exchanged there. He knew Konoha would agree. Their countries had an ironclad alliance as of late, something Gaara suspected would only grow stronger should Naruto achieve his dream of one day being Hokage. The two of them had a kind of long-distance bond, one Gaara treasured for the rarity it was.

That done, he sent a second falcon to Iwagakure, agreeing to the Tsuchikage�s terms. Not that there really were any terms to agree to, mind.

From there Gaara chose to visit Tasha himself. He found her sitting at the edge of her bed, staring down at the floor, solemn. Perhaps even depressed. He said to her, �Chin up. Today is the day you live, not die.�

She snapped her head up, and at first glance, he was almost staggered by her resemblance to Suzaki. The two could easily pass off as the other, he noted. But more notable than that was the multitude of bandages wrapped about her. Even in her own clothing they were visible, around her arms and legs and a strip taped to her cheek. A few were stained red, still fresh.

She replied, �Who are you?�

�Kazekage,� he answered, offering no more. Her eyes widened, fear taking up residence there. He didn�t bother with dispelling the dread, instead going straight to business. �You will be leaving tonight. I�ll have a team escort you through the Land of Rivers to the border of Fire Country,� he explained, �where you�ll be handed off to a team of Konoha ninja. You should be safe there until you�re well enough to take care of yourself.�

As he spoke, her expression filled with more and more disbelief, then hope, then gratitude. �You�re letting me go?� she checked, her voice quiet and breathless.

He nodded, opting not to get offended by her lack of faith. �Do you know why the Tsuchikage seeks your death?� he asked.

She grimaced but shook her head. �I assumed my father did something,� she told him.

He tilted his head at that. �Why would it matter if he did?� he queried, honestly curious.

A shrug. �In Iwagakure. . .women are nothing more than possessions,� she explained, her tone growing bitter, �and my father was my. . .owner. So, like a child, if he misbehaved, then his toys would get taken away.� Cold, hard, logical; despicable.

Gaara liked his neighbors even less now. He shook his head. �That is not what happened,� he informed her. Though he didn�t have to tell her anything, he felt it her right to know why she�d been targeted. �Another in your clan had a child, and the child has stronger chakra points than you.�

At first, confusion had settled over her gaze, only to harden into something far darker. Something so beyond anger or spite that he lacked the vocabulary to name it. With venom evident, she retorted, �Oh, but of course.�

So she understood the rest, then. Good. Now that the information was exchanged, he backed up a step. �Be ready to go by dusk,� he told her. As he left the room, he pondered over which team to send with her as escort. His mind quickly latched onto Masumata�s team, since they were the ones who�d found Tasha in the first place. It had a kind of agreeable symmetry.

While Tasha would be getting escorted to Konoha, another team would approach the border with the news that Tasha had escaped to the west. A single ninja would be going ahead in that direction to lay a false trail. If it backfired, so be it; Gaara would not be letting the Tsuchikage have this victory.

He would not allow a young woman to die because a better host for her jewel had been born.
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Koiuta, V.2