Don't be afraid to give your best to what seemingly are small jobs. Every time you conquer one it makes you that much stronger. If you do the little jobs well, the big ones will tend to take care of themselves. ~Dale Carnegie
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The crash of silence after the fighting stopped was in some ways worse than the fighting itself. Everything was poised with stillness; a brief moment stretched out longer and longer as no one moved.
I could hear the beat of my pulse, loud in my ears but fast and thready; could hear the dry catch of my throat as I swallowed. I could still see afterimages, flickers of light imprinted on my eyes by the flaring of the chidori, making everything left seem somehow darker.
"Gaara," Naruto said tersely, "what are you doing here?" It was probably only the Kyuubi chakra that made his voice edge into a threatening snarl, but then again, the last time we had seen the Sand trio we had been enemies. He had landed on the sand, but was crouched and wary, ready to get free if it proved to be a trap.
"Your Hokage sent us," Temari answered quickly, eyeing him almost uneasily. She was probably remembering how much destruction an angry or out of control Jinchuriki could cause. "She thought you could use some backup. We were bringing a message to Leaf from the Council of Elders when we were asked to take this mission to assist you."
"Oh," Naruto said, releasing his hold on the Kyuubi's chakra. The red chakra cloak faded away, and the physical changes went away with it.
Then he tipped over and faceplanted in the sand.
I spasmed reflexively, sitting up, wanting to check up on him, to help him but not being close enough to actually do anything.
Sasuke touched down gently beside him, his own enhancements fading away, and rolled him over. "Chakra exhaustion, I think," he said, frowning. Gingerly, he touched the front of Naruto's jacket, where it was ripped and bloody.
"Moron. Giving everyone a heart attack like that," Kiba groused beside me. He shifted about, trying to find a position that hurt the least. Akamaru whimpered as he was jostled, curling himself into a tiny ball.
I glanced at Kiba, taking note of how pale and clammy his skin was. "Yeah, well, you know Naruto," I said lightly to hide my worry. The fight might have been over, but that didn't mean things were totally okay.
The sand platforms drifted gently towards the tree line, taking us towards Lee and Hinata. Naruto's toad summon seemed to have vanished, either because he was unconscious or having run out of chakra.
"Kiba needs to get back to Konoha ASAP," I said bluntly, as soon as we were in comfortable speaking distance.
"Don't give me that," Kiba scoffed. "You're injured too. I saw your arm."
"It's not so bad," I said. Kiba really, really needed medical attention. "I'll last till we get back."
"How about you let me be the judge of that?" Kankurou asked, crouching down and taking my wrist with a grip that was surprisingly gentle but firm enough to stop the reflexive jerk away I made as he prodded my hand. The bandages on my forearm were wet but not completely soaked through. He frowned as he moved a hand up to my neck to take my pulse but nodded reluctantly. "Alright, I'll give you this one. We'll move faster with just one anyway."
I recognized the concession for what it was; a delicate balancing act of probabilities, trying to get the best possible outcome for the greatest number of people. He could take both of us; but that would mean travelling slower and reducing the chances of reaching medical attention in time for Kiba. Two of them could go, but that would leave only one with the main group which would put them in danger if there were any further attacks.
"You take Inuzuka back," Temari suggested. "Gaara and I will stay with the rest of them."
Kankurou's gaze flickered to Gaara, but he didn't object or make any other suggestions. "Sounds like a plan," he agreed, hopping down onto the bone free ground. He hauled one of Kiba's arms over his shoulder and pulled him up, taking most of the Inuzuka's weight. "Come on, you'll be home free in no time."
He leapt away in a blur of speed, heading on a direct path back to Konoha.
"We are most fortunate you arrived when you did," Lee said carefully. I could practically feel the awkward tension in the air but at least he didn't appear to be upset or aggressive. Considering Gaara had nearly ended his ninja career, Lee had a huge capacity for forgiveness.
"It was our mission," Temari said, shrugging awkwardly and closing her fan. "Speaking of which, what do you want done with her?" she gestured at the red haired girl wrapped up in Gaara's sand. Even if she woke, she wasn't getting far.
Tayuya. I'd nearly forgotten about her. It was lucky she hadn't ended up impaled on the spikes.
Lee glanced at me and I blinked, realizing that with Kiba gone and Naruto out of it, only Sasuke and I were part of the original mission, and he'd just undergone an unknown and possibly mind-altering procedure. Right. Up to me, then.
"We have to take her back with us," I said. "Capturing them was the whole point of the mission." I hesitated, then decided to push my luck. "Can you seal bodies away?"
They weren't part of our mission, and I couldn't really make them do it. It depended on how helpful they wanted to be.
"Yes," Gaara said flatly, the first time he'd spoken.
Temari looked a little surprised at his intercession, but nodded. "You want to take him as well?" she asked, nodding at Kimimaro.
I nodded. "There should be a second corpse close by as well. And… remnants of a wooden barrel, if any survived. They have seals on them which might be important."
Temari nodded dubiously, glancing at the field. "We'll try," was all she said, stepping out onto the sand cloud that had formed once again beside Gaara.
I nodded in acceptance, and turned back to the others. "Hinata."
"Naruto is fine," she said softly, deactivating her Byakugan that she'd been using to stare intensely at him. "I mean, as far as I can tell."
"That's good," I said, a little bit more worry being chased away. "Are you injured?"
She shook her head mutely.
"Unless one of the others managed to find her, Ino is still out there alone," I explained. "She was knocked out and I had to leave her behind." I gave as accurate directions as I could to where she had been left. Now that the adrenaline focused clarity of battle was fading, things were becoming muddled. Had we gone north or north east? How far? How much had I doubled back?
"I will find her," Hinata said reassuringly, looking quietly determined. She was a good choice for this, with her Byakugan and tracking skills, she'd be able to locate Ino even without completely accurate directions.
"Watch out for the traps," I cautioned as she jumped away. Then I sighed wearily, feeling all the aches and pains accumulated over the mission all at once. Exhaustion settled heavily on my limbs, making my hands fumble as I pulled a pill out of one of the inside pockets of my jacket. However tempting it would have been to take a soldier pill, they reacted badly with injuries, aggravating them horribly, which limited their practical usage quite a lot. This was a Blood Replenishing Pill - containing erythropoietin to stimulate red blood cell formation, large proteins and starches to help regulate blood pressure and artificial oxygen carrying compounds, they were a 'quick fix' pill for shinobi who were injured on missions. However, they didn't solve all the problems, and were more of a stopgap measure than a cure. Then I wiggled my canteen free and dumped a sachet of re-hydrating powder in it, with glucose and sodium for quick uptake and energy, it made a decent fluid replacement.
We'll be alright, I thought, taking a second to let it sink in. We'll be alright now.
The mission had gone from bad to worse to insane, knocking us around at every opportunity, but… we'd made it through.
"Lee?" I asked softly. "When you got Tayuya… Shikamaru and Chouji…"
He seemed to understand what I was asking. "Your brother was uninjured. Chouji required medical attention, however, and Shikamaru was having trouble carrying both people. Rather than leave the prisoner unguarded, I volunteered to take her and assist you."
I slumped a little with relief. It wasn't good that Chouji was hurt, but it could have been so much worse. I had been half-dreading the truth ever since Lee had shown up with her.
They're both alive. Mobile enough to return to Konoha. Anything else… well, we had to get back to Konoha too. Anything else would be dealt with then.
My attention was dragged back into the present as Temari dropped back down onto the ground, Gaara hovering silently and stoically behind her.
"We got what we could," she said, tucking a scroll away with brisk efficiency. She didn't look at all bothered by what had to have been an unpleasant job. Kidomaru hadn't been in one piece after Kiba hit him, let alone adding in the damage that Kimimaro's spikes would have done. "There wasn't much that could be retrieved, though."
"Anything is good," I said. "If they're really bothered they can send someone out to scrape the rest off the ground." Hopefully not us, though. I'd had enough of this place.
Temari smirked. "Right. Let's go, then."
I staggered to my feet, fighting to keep my face neutral as my everything protested the movement. I doubted it escaped anyone's attention, but considering that Lee and Sasuke were equally battered and bedraggled, they had no room to comment on it.
We set a slow limping pace as we headed back, mostly silent. I knew I should have tried to talk to them, or at least to Gaara, and that I might not get another chance for a while, but I could hardly start talking about Akatsuki with so many ears around and the longer I left it, the deeper the silence feel and the harder it was to try and break it. Eventually, everything settled into a tired daze of moving, and it was long gone dark by the time we reached the village gates, probably early rather than late.
I felt completely and utterly exhausted, bone deep and achingly weary. I was out of chakra, having used all my reserves and started drawing on that last vital supply of stamina somewhere along the line, and it made me feel strangely hollow and empty. My muscles trembled with fatigue and pain and too much adrenaline, and for one desperate moment, I just wanted to cry.
I fought against the feeling of having been pushed too far, against the stinging eyes and tightness of my throat, reminding myself that everyone here had gone through the same. If they could keep on being strong, so could I.
The gate guards took one look at us and then we were suddenly being whisked away to the hospital. I lost track of the others pretty much immediately, being shuffled around until I ended up in a diagnostics room, sitting on the bed while a nurse cut my jacket and glove away, and another placed a breathing mask over my face.
"Count backwards from ten," she suggested, as it hissed. I could feel the air circulating, and thought I could taste it, faintly sweet and chemical.
"Ten," I began obediently, eyes sliding closed, "nine, eight… seven…"
Six…
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Sound washed over me like the babbling of a river, like a tide coming in and out, present but formless, meaningless. Sleep was a warm weight holding me down and I stirred slowly, groggy with both exhaustion and chemicals.
Sound became voices and voices became words, familiar but just beyond the reach of understanding.
I blinked.
"Hey," Shikamaru said, leaning his elbows on the bed. He had a smudge of mud across his forehead, and what looked like the remnants of shredded leaves in his ponytail. He was still 'fresh off a mission' regardless of how long I'd been out.
"Hey," I echoed back.
"How are you feeling?"
I sorted through the returning stimuli; dull aches and pains, bruises, the barest trickle of chakra, too small to grasp. "Tired," I answered. Most of all, tired.
He nodded and I looked past him, to see who he had been talking too. "Temari," I said, surprised. "What are you doing here?"
She shrugged lightly, leaning back in her chair and crossing her ankles, all casual elegance. "Gaara wants to talk to Uzumaki when he wakes up," she explained. "And no one's kicked us out yet."
I nodded, vaguely pleased that they hadn't left yet. I didn't exactly have a plan but having an opportunity was better than none. More importantly, though, Temari mentioning Naruto reminded me that I didn't know what had happened to everyone.
I levered myself up, leaning against the headboard even as several muscles protested the change in position. "How's Chouji?"
"He's fine," he said, tangling his fingers with those of my good hand. "He took two of the pills."
I nodded. I'd hoped otherwise but given the level of opponent it wasn't exactly surprising.
Shikamaru let out a breath that was halfway between a snort and a sigh. "He was this close to taking the third," he said, voice low, and I half wished that Temari wasn't here to see this. "It was such a mess. I was bringing him home and he just kept losing weight…"
I squeezed his fingers. I could imagine it, a desperate race back, pushing past the limits of exhaustion, the building horror of too light, too light, I might not be in time…
"But he's okay now?" I asked, gently reminding him.
"Yeah. Tsunade-sama was here. I gave her unrestricted access to the Nara Medical Encyclopaedia. Dad's not going to be very happy when he gets back." He shrugged, not in the least bit sorry.
It took me a second to put the disjointed sentences together. Of the Akimichi Three Coloured Pills, only the third was absolutely fatal, but the first two still supercharged the metabolism and could have extremely adverse effects – they could be fatal, they just weren't always. And even if they weren't, there was still the chance for permanent, crippling injury. The clan Medical Encyclopaedia was exactly what it said it was, and had a lot of information on the Pills, including what they were made of and how they worked. That right there was a highly guarded secret, let alone what else was in the book. Shikamaru was the heir, and with Dad away, technically he did have the right to give access to it… but that didn't mean it was done.
"I think he'll understand," I said. If it saved Chouji's life… he'd understand.
"Yeah, so. Kiba got out of surgery about the same time you went in," Shikamaru continued, almost changing the subject. "Naruto is just down with chakra exhaustion and they took Sasuke to the secure wing, but I don't think he was hurt. Lee got told off for leaving, but he's fine. Neji wasn't hurt, but he and Tenten stopped by for a while. Same with Hinata."
Which left one glaring exception. "And Ino?"
His eyes dropped. "She hasn't woken up."
My heart sank. I remembered the half whispered mantra, the empty gaze. I'd just left her there. If she'd gone catatonic… if it was my fault…
"I see," I managed.
"The doctors are hoping you can give them more information about what she was hit with."
I nodded mutely, the statement hitting like a blow. Not only had they been unable to help her, they didn't even know what was wrong.
"She'll be alright though, right?" Shikamaru asked, raising his eyes to mine.
"Yeah," I said huskily, trying to swallow the lump in my throat. "It's Ino. She won't let something like this keep her down." Because even if Shikamaru would be the first person to call Ino troublesome, they were teammates and close friends besides; I couldn't look him in the eye and say 'I don't know'.
And I didn't know. I trusted the medics here, trusted Tsunade, but I didn't know. I had no fall back, no safety net of information telling me that this would be okay. I'd always known, intellectually, that things were changing, that I needed to work with information gathered in the present, but it had still been there, narrowing the outcomes, helping me anticipate things. I'd expected the sand siblings to come – doubted it, in the face of danger, but expected all the same – but not Hinata. I hadn't expected Ino to get hurt.
I didn't know if she'd get better.
It scared me.
Be okay, Ino. Please be okay.
I had considered that using Mind-Body Switch on him was a bad idea. I had. Why hadn'tI-?
"It's not your fault," Shikamaru said, cutting through my thoughts.
"You don't even know what happened," I quipped back, tiredly.
"Yeah. But I know you. And I know Ino." His eyes were steady, exhausted but steady.
Temari snorted, shifting in her chair and drawing attention back to herself. "Didn't any of you receive emotional training? Or is that too brutal for Hidden Leaf?"
I wanted to sink back, to let Shikamaru handle it. I didn't want to argue with her. But there was an evaluating look in her eye that tugged at me and I mustered the energy to play this game.
"Sure, we did," I replied, mostly calmly. "People get hurt on missions, that much is true… we just prefer it when those people aren't us." Words within words; don't mistake caring for weakness, we can fight when we need to. It wasn't exactly a hostile exchange, more… testing; probing and deflecting, like the first feints of battle to see where we each stood.
My smile might have been a tad sharp at the edges, an unspoken reminder that she'd been on the opposite side of the fight from us once, and hadn't come off the better for it. That probably had a lot to do with it, actually.
"And when it is?" she asked coolly.
I gestured at myself wordlessly. See for yourself.
She gave a low 'hmph' of acknowledgement before standing. "I'm going to go get something to eat," she said. "Maybe make sure Kankurou hasn't gotten into trouble."
I gave her a commiserating smile. "Brothers. They take so much looking after."
"I'm not the one in a hospital bed, sister," Shikamaru said dryly.
I laughed, listening to the fading footsteps as she walked down the hall. "Speaking of. Have you slept?"
"What do you think?" he asked, drolly. Yeah, I could see his point. Both team mates and a sister in hospital – surgery for two of us – and it wouldn't have been on my list of priorities either. Still, light was pouring into the room, which meant early to mid-morning, and we'd only managed a few hours sleep between planning the mission and moving out.
"I think you probably should," I said pragmatically.
"Trying to get rid of me already?" Shikamaru asked a little archly. "You only just woke up."
"Hardly," I said. "I'm glad you're here." And I was; visual confirmation that he was okay. "You just look tired, that's all."
"I can't. Just… not yet." He rubbed his face tiredly. "Not till everyone…"
Not till everyone wakes up.
That could be a long time, but for now it wasn't worth pushing. "Sorry," I said. "Talk to me?"
He shrugged half-heartedly and looked away and I thought he wasn't going to answer, but after a minute he spoke. "We weren't ready. Not for fighting like that." It was a bland statement, but there was a hint of bitterness hiding behind it.
I felt a pang of guilt, because I had been so confident. Thought that because it had happened, we would be fine. Arguably it had gone well; we'd succeeded, no one was dead… but that was cold comfort. I didn't like to take risks, and it occurred to me that this was a massive one.
"If they hadn't had the second state… it would have been fine," I said. "The ambush went… almost perfectly."
"Yeah. That's why I can't be too angry at them," Shikamaru agreed. "I still think Genin shouldn't have been sent on a mission like this… but it wasn't intentional." He snorted suddenly. "That's what all your missions have been like, haven't they?"
"Kinda, yeah. It never starts out as 'go fight these Jounin-level ninja' or anything… but this one seemed a lot worse." Maybe because we got injured, maybe simply because it was the most recent.
"Joy," he said sarcastically. "And if I tell you I feel guilty that Chouji got hurt, what are you going to say?"
"I don't know, what did you say ten minutes ago about me and Ino?" I asked dryly.
"That's what I thought," he said.
"What a pair we are," I sighed.
We were silent for a bit, not really eager to go digging through the mess that had resulted from this mission. I still didn't know what exactly had happened, but everyone was okay and there would be a debriefing later. Later was fine.
I'd nearly fallen back asleep, eyelids too heavy to keep open, when someone rapped, brisk and efficient, on the door before stepping inside.
"Oh, good," Tsunade said. "You are awake." She lifted the clipboard from the end of the bed and checked several things off, then set a hand on my arm. I shivered a little at her chakra sinking below the skin. "Reconstruction of blood vessels appears to be holding; no weakening of the walls or leakages. Muscle lacerations are healing nicely, too." She nodded a little in approval. "The hand is much trickier. There are a lot of small moving parts that need to be taken care of. We'll be watching closely for infections and you'll be in physiotherapy for that for the next week or two for the very least."
"Yes, Tsunade-sama," I said obediently.
She scribbled several more comments onto the patient record, then slipped it back into its holder. Looking at her, you couldn't tell that she'd probably been awake and conducting surgery all night; she looked as settled and composed as normal. "Now, what can you tell me about the attack that Ino Yamanaka was hit with?"
I cleared my throat nervously. "It wasn't an attack," I rasped. "Ino used her Mind-Body Switch on Kidomaru when he was in the second state of the curse seal. It didn't… it didn't work." I looked down. Shikamaru's hand tightened on mine. "We thought that the … psychological aspects of the seal might make it dangerous, but it was still the best option we had."
I chanced a glance upwards at her face, and something in me relaxed, just a little. There was a little surprise, but no judgement.
"I pinned him down, and she definitely hit her target," I continued. "It stunned him for maybe a second or two, but she never established any control over him, and he didn't appear significantly impaired. After, I don't know, a few minutes, maybe," the words tumbled out of my mouth artlessly. It had seemed so fast and so long at the same time. I couldn't tell how long it had really taken. "her chakra returned to her body and she spoke but she seemed neither conscious nor aware of her surroundings."
"I see," Tsunade said thoughtfully. "Well that changes things, doesn't it." And it did, because if you were testing for physical reasons and there were none…
I hoped desperately that Tsunade might be able to fix her.