After an hour and a half, the jet finally entered Land of Wind, nearing Suna. As Shiori was bringing it to a halt, she felt someone watching her.
Even Kakashi and the rest of Team 7 felt the oppressive stare.
As they looked out of the window, there were three Akatsuki members on the ground, chasing after the slow jet.
One was Itachi. The other was Kisame.
"Damn it! What the hell is that!? How did they reach here so fast!?"
Kisame grumbled as the other two members of Akatsuki kept their mouth shut.
The third, mysterious Akatsuki member did some handsigns, and suddenly, Itachi could see through her eyes, the weird flying thing very high up in the air, several kilometers away.
'Amaterasu.'
Suddenly, the jet made of Shiori's symbiote caught black fire.
Without a word, tentacles shot out of Shiori's back, wrapped around Team 7, and she jumped out of the burning symbiote jet, abandoning a huge mass of her symbiote to burn down to nothing.
Good thing that Amaterasu is very slow, and no one dies from it.
As Team 7 was falling from an incredible height, Shiori's symbiote formed a glider, slowly descending to the ground while heading to Suna's direction.
Simple physics. Afterall, the horizontal part of motion wasn't killed.
"We got attacked by Itachi, Kisame, and... I don't have any information on the mysterious third member."
Kakashi was sweating bullets.
Didn't this mean that there are 5 Akatsuki members nearby? He might be able to take on one, he might be able to take on 2 if it meant getting hospitalized for months.
But 5!?
That's an overkill!
"And a bad news. After flying here, I am nearly out of chakra."
Shiori said, increasing everyone's tension.
"I just have enough to teleport us back to Konoha. I am proceeding-"
"No! We have to save Gaara!"
Naruto shouted.
"Saving him brings no benefit to Konoha. With these many Akatsuki, it seems they know about your friendship with Kazekage, and came prepared to capture you.
My main mission is to be your bodyguard."
Shiori said in a cold tone, sending shivers down Naruto's spine.
But, he wasn't going to abandon Gaara. Unlike him, who got friends, Gaara has suffered a lot worse.
And even then, he managed to become Kazekage. Naruto wasn't going to abandon him!
An orange chakra started bubbling around Naruto, burning Shiori's symbiote's cells.
The tentacle holding Naruto broke, and Naruto started falling to the ground.
"NARUTO!"
Sakura screamed, and Shiori's eyebrows twitched. It seems that her symbiote can't handle Kyuubi's angry chakra even now.
Just as Naruto was about to crash to the ground, Shiori teleported to him along with the rest of the team and preventing him from getting damaged.
"Then let me borrow your chakra."
Several tentacles shot from Shiori, and connected to his chakra nodes, especially along his seal. The tentacles gained properties of wood, and started suppressing Kyuubi's chakra.
Suddenly, Shiori found herself in Naruto's mental space, in front of Kyuubi.
A big, red eye with slit opened, intimidating her.
It was the first time she was seeing Kyuubi in person.
"If you don't want to be captured by Akatsuki, give me chakra without being angry."
"Hmph!"
He ignored her, and went back to sleep.
He didn't say anything like, 'I will tear you apart!' or 'I will eat you!'. He was actually scared of her. But he didn't give her any chakra, not willing to swallow his pride.
Shiori raised her hand towards it, and the symbiote from her hand started flowing into Kyuubi's prison. Unlike earlier, Kyuubi's chakra didn't burn them. Instead, Kyuubi could only thrash around as the tentacles started binding him, and his chakra flowed through the tentacles into Shiori.
"Don't whine that I treated you like a tool in the future. I asked nicely at first."
"WHO THE HELL ARE YOU!? IT'S WOOD RELEASE!"
She only took a little of Kurama's chakra, but it was enough to fill her reserves, and even significantly boost them.
Her symbiote tentacles stopped binding Kyuubi and returned to her completely. She came back to the real world.
"What did you do?"
Kakashi asked her cautiously, as he clearly saw Kyuubi's chakra getting absorbed in her with his Sharingan.
"Just borrowed some chakra from Kyuubi."
Her fingers glowed purple with chakra, and she reinforced Naruto's seal, and the Kurama's chakra receeded.
"I am not very good with genjutsu.
Kakashi-sensei, you take care of Itachi.
Naruto, try to convince Samehada to betray Kisame and come for your enormous chakra, I will deal with the mysterious member, and Sakura, you..."
Shiori struggled to come up with anything.
"Don't be a distraction."
Her fingers turned into claws, and she took out her symbiote sword, glowing with intense purple lightning chakra.
The three Akatsuki members arrived in front of them.
Itachi.
Kisame.
And the third member took off her mask.
"Huh!? What are you doing with these guys!?
Hinata!"