Chapter 17
No success.
A whole week had passed and no matter what she did, she couldn’t get the sand siblings nor their teacher to crack.
She’d tried almost everything however if she went about poisoning or torturing that wouldn’t exactly be subtle.
Today was the day of the chunin exam final round and they hadn’t fessed up. Her only consolation was they had probably double-crossed the sannin however unlikely that was.
She sighed as she sat atop Hinata, kunai to the girl’s throat. She hadn’t been paying much attention to the match and had been going mostly on autopilot till she found herself in a somewhat provocative stance.
Shrugging she leaned down and whispered in her ear, “Come now Hina-chaaan… how much longer will you let people see me on top of you? Or maybe you want people to see you writhe under me?” she gave a small nibble on the girls lobe and that decided the match.
She girl gushed a nose bleed and passed out, face red as she laid immobilised on the ground. Getting up she wiped her knees and ran a hand through her hair and looked to Hayate with a raised brow.
“The winner- cough- is Naruto Uzumaki!” he let out another stream of coughs causing her to frown, rummaging through her pockets to find a particular scroll whilst making her way to the kage box. Once she arrived she was pleased to see the sandaime being guarded with Gai and Kakashi sensei.
Temari’s and Shikamaru’s match had been highly amusing and had seemed more to her as if the two were flirting rather than fighting against each other whereas Gaara and Sasuke were completely vicious against each other.
Sasuke had even managed to wound Gaara with his chidori however Shukaku hadn’t taken control. However Sasuke had been undone by his own pride, one of Gaara;s sand whips which he hadn’t noticed pierced his stomach causing him to collapse and the match thereby ended.
Entering the kage box she frowned when she smelt something… familiar yet gross coming from the fully garbed kazekage. Her eyes widened slightly and she went to Kakashi sensei and whispered in his ear, “Pedo-hebi pretending to be the other shadow.” This caused a brow to be raised yet he nodded, whispering it to the hokage.
As to be expected of the sandaime, he showed no outward reaction and instead looked back to Naruto, “Did you have anything else to discuss?”
She nodded, taking out a vial from the scroll she had taken out, “This vial should get rid of Hayate’s coughing. Can I give it to him?”
He reached out his hand to inspect the blue concoction, taking a sniff of it, “And all it does it get rid of his cough? No side effects or… added surprises?”
She gasped and placed a hand on her heart, “You wound me old man. I use non loyal or none Konoha ninjas as my test subjects. Hayate is also a very good kenjutsu sensei.” She nodded earnestly.
The sandaime sighed and handed her the vial back, not even trying to defend his people.
Smiling, she ran back down the stadium to see Temari trying to get a safe distance from Gaara who was attacking with sand whips. Shrugging she went over to Hayate and tapped his shoulder.
Whirling around, he raised a brow and gave a small brow, “My lady?”
She raised the vial for him to take, “Here, have this. I’ll make you some more and do some blood tests on you after the exam but this will stop you from all your coughing. You’re like that because of a poison, right?” He nodded and took the vial of blue potion from her, looking wearly from her and the vial, “Don’t worry. I got it sanctioned from the sandaime to give it to you. It doesn’t do anything other than get rid of your cough.”
He looked up at the Neko operative before reluctantly drinking the vials contents. He began to cough a few times but when he cleared his throat, he seemed to be a little better.
“Feel any different?” she asked, notebook in hand waiting for a response.
Understanding what she was doing he turned to watch the match as he replied, “My mouth and throat feel less constricted but there is a feint warmth there that wasn’t there before. When I drank it, it was hot as if it was burning whatever was in my throat. Right now my stomach is… I can feel it go round because it’s warm and in certain areas it’s as I said earlier, as if it’s burning.”
She nodded writing it all down, “It’s burning away the worst of the poisons inside of you. It’s not gotten rid of all of it, and that’s why I want a blood sample from you so I know what’s in you and try to get rid of it. The poisons inside of you will fester and if not treated… I doubt they’ll kill you but it will damage your insides. Understood?”
He nodded, “I get it, hime. I’ll come looking for you with Yugao a day after the exams.” She smiled and gave him a kiss on the cheek right before he announced Gaara to be the winner, it turns out after a while Temari had given up on fighting against her brother, his ultimate shield getting the best of her.
Naruto was called onto the grounds as the sand siblings went up, “Is this really necessary? I mean, I can’t exactly lose against myself now can I?” she asked.
“True, however you can fight yourself and then you’d still win, but if you were to lose against yourself then you have no right to be here.” Replied Hayate causing several confused looks and chuckles from those who knew about her clones which had seals on them.
Sighing she stayed in the arena as she awaited Gaara’s return. It took some time because he was in the middle of getting patched up but four mintues later, he arrived and they both took their positions.
After Hayate had announced the beginning of the match, neither of them made the first move, “So. Nice weather we’re having today. I looked at the clouds earlier and could have sworn a small drizzle would have started by now.”
She received a grunt for a reply as she heard him swallow. She smiled to herself, her tactic was to either psyche him out or seduction. Sure, she could go with fighting but where was the fun in that?
She shook her head, there was no point to do that, during her time with him he hadn’t succumbed and-
‘Try harder. I want to see him become putty in your hands. Do the same as you did the girl Hyuuga girl.’ Spoke Kurama, leering slightly as he chuckled.
Making a few clones she shunshined behind him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders from behind as the others latched onto his arms.
“I don’t really want to fight… do you want to fight me?” she asked into his ear.
He gulped again, looking straight and not at her chest which was up against both his arms, “We must fight. It is part of the exam.”
She hummed in agreement, “Or we could both bow out. People would understand. Well, besides your father. Oh wait that’s not your father.” She replied, dispelling her clones and wrapping her arms around his neck.
“What do you mean? The kazekage is right up there with your hokage.”
“Hmm. That’s what it looks like. It would seem your kazekage is missing since the person in the wind kage robes is Orochimaru. I would know his smell anywhere.”
He didn’t reply straight away, simply looking at the man in the box. Naruto could hear the people in the arena, telling them to flirt some other time. They were mostly merchants who would shut up if they knew they would get better trade if Suna and Konoha signed new contracts.
“You expect me to believe the kazekage is actually an S rank criminal?” he made no move to attack her nor push her away and she saw it as a good sign.
“You’ve been lying to me since we met and I’ve not questioned your loyalty have I?” his eyes widened slightly yet she continued. “Despite the fact I know you’ve sided with Orochimaru and planned to attack us today, I helped you with Shukaku. I didn’t have to do that. I didn’t have to persuade the hokage not to attack Suna and I didn’t have to go through all the trouble of making sure that no matter what happens, you and siblings wouldn’t get in trouble. Now tell me, which one of us is in the wrong”
He didn’t have a reply, however his mouth remained open as he struggled with a reply. “You knew?” was the only thing he managed to say, his voice more gravelly than it usually was causing her to shift slightly.
“Not from the beginning. That day… that I saw Jiraiya. I… I knew then what was going on. I may not have been truthful exactly but I… it’s an S rank secret that shouldn’t really be telling you…”
She stopped when she noticed something. The audience was very quiet. Looking up she saw feathers falling and the crowd was asleep, minus ANBU, jonin, some chunin and very few genin.
Genjutsu.
The enemy has begun their attack.