The ride back to Konoha had been a long one, for both Bazu and Toushi as well as the intire hidden sand crew, but finally they had reached their final destination. Gaara's breathing had become rushed, and harder during the duration of the flight, it was more than clear that his sickness was spreading and growing stronger in at a rapid pace, getting him to the hospital for Tsunade's treatment was their top priority at the moment. Toushi jumped down from Chiyo's head, then turned her body back up to face Bazu who was helping Gaara down from the bird. It was strange, this man was supposed to be one of the strongest kage's in the history of the sand village, yet he needed a genin's help getting down from a bird. Toushi's distrust in the rumors became more and more as time went by, but soon he would no longer be of her concern. As Gaara touched ground, four medicle ninja appeared at his side, two of which were holding a cott that was positioned directly under him.

"Please rest Kaze-kage-sama, we will transport you to the medicle ward as quickly and safely as possible." One of the nameless ninja spoke.

"As for you two, your mission is complete please return to your teachers as soon as possible for more orders." Apon finishing , the medicle ninja and the remaining sand-nin made their way towards the building without sharing so much as a word of thanks to the two genin. Bazu crossed his arms over his chest and began to walk away, leaving toushi behind. She looked at the back of his head as he turned to walk away and extended an arm to his shoulder, his chakra was awkward, something about it made her feel as though she were in danger. Usually, she wouldn't pay much attention to something as simple as this, mostly because Bazu was known for being extremely short tempered and sometimes overly emotional, but this was different. He felt like an enemy. As her hand touched his shoulder, Bazu smacked it away from him and fixed his eyes against hers. A stern look dancing through his expression and down her spine.

"Whats wrong with you?" She spoke, forcing her words into existence even through the thought of being attacked or lash out on.
"Don't touch me, Toushi. Go to Naruto-kun, and stay there.
"But whats the problem?" She continued.
"I can't explain it, or more so...you wouldn't understand if I did. Just go, i'll catch up to you later"
"What am I supposed to tell Naruto and Sasuke"
"Tell them that you don't know where I went, and leave it at that. I can't have anyone following me right now, do you understand?" Bazu said heavily, apon turning around to face her more. The sweat on his brow had begun to bead up, and his eyes were slightly drawn into themselves as if he were straining to look at something. Her silence was enough to annoy Bazu to the point of hurting her, this wasn't a time where he needed a pointless conversation.
"Do you understand!" He snapped.
"Yes! Yes, I understand...jeez"
"Then go." He commanded. The kunoichi turned around and began to make her way back to the training grounds where she'd find Naruto. His chakra was strong, so searching him out was easier than finding Sasuke's, even though she needed to talk to Sasuke more. Bazu was Sasuke's responsibility more-so than Naruto's. The very moment Bazu had developed his Shinjitsu he had become attached more and more to Sasuke, this was no-doubt because of the Uchiha's bloodline, the sharingan. The two bloodlines had similar qualities, as far as the destruction of the eyes went. Though, the shinjitsu had much more extreme effects, and was quicker to the punch than the sharingan was. The fact was, the shinjitsu was constantly destroying Bazu's eyes, even when it was not in use. It would eventually case him permanent visual damage, almost to the point were he would become almost completely blind to anything except the outline of other peoples chakra. Toushi's mind continued to race, trying to figure out what she could possibly do to help Bazu over-come the effects of his bloodline, but she was of normal blood herself. What could she, a person who knew nothing of the morals of the other clans, do to help him? Was it even her place to try to step in the way of a clans tradition? Blindness was something that many members of the Mirowa clan experienced, and the ones that managed to avoid becoming blind were top ranked criminals in Konoha's bingo-book.

"Damnit Bazu..." She spoke to herself, only moments before reaching her destination. Sure enough her teacher, Naruto-kun, was standing in the middle of the field, he looked beaten up and tired, but this was not something foreign. He was training with Sasuke-san, as usual.
"Naruto-sensei!" she called out, as she ran towards him, waving her arms wildly above her head so that he'd notice she were there. He did notice, but he did not give her the reaction she had hoped. His usual happy-go-lucky call to her was replace today with a look of complete and obsolute seriousness. She stood infront of him, and looked up into his ocean-blue eyes.

"Toushi-chan, I need you to go to the school, and wait for Godaime-sama to give her lecture. I don't know how to explain whats going to happen to you without scaring you, so i'm just going to tell you the best way I know how. Hm...lets see..This village is about to be put under a high-level security alert. Our intelligence gathering ninja have recieved valid information that this village, and the surrounding villages are being targetted by a group called the Akatsuki." Naruto turned away from her to face Sasuke, who had begun to walk towards the both of them, stepping into the conversation to help better explain what was going on with the village.

"What Naruto is trying to say, is that everyone in this village will fight to protect all of our children. You are our Nakama, do you understand what a Nakama is Toushi?"

"No, not really." She said, still completely confused as to what they were talking about.

"A Nakama is someone who is very dear to you, someone you'd go to the ends of this earth to protect, knowing full heartedly that they'd do the exact same thing for you. Naruto, is my Nakama and you are both of our Nakama and as Ninja, it is our duty , and yours, to protect this village. Godaime-sama is going to make an announcement to all the capable genin of Konoha and brief you on what is going on with the villages surrounding us. Then she will make an announcement to the intire village. Make sure you pay complete attention to any order she gives you. Understand?"

"Yes sir!" she said, saluting playfully to the both of them.

"By the way, Toushi. Where is Bazu, and don't lie to me either." Sasuke began, he already knew what the answer was going to be, but he needed to hear it from her mouth, to avoid making rash decisions and going off on a wild goose-chase.

"Bazu was headed towards the north-gate. He didn't tell me anything about where he was going, he just left. He seemed really upset about something, and he looked like he was in alot of pain."

"I see"
"Damnit.." Naruto blurted. They both knew exactly where he was heading, they had also felt the same surge of chakra towards the direction of the north-forest. Naruto rushed off, leaving Sasuke and Toushi behind.

Toushi scratched the back of her head, feeling guilty for snapping under sasuke's pressure so easily. "He's going to kill me for tattling..."

"Worry about that later, right now you need to get to the academy so you won't miss Lady-Tsunade's lecture. Naruto and I will do something about Bazu. Now go!" Sasuke chased after Naruto in one direction, as Toushi rushed quickly towards the school. She had never seen Sasuke and Naruto so uptight and proper. Whatever was happening, it really brought out the sense of duty in her teachers that she had never seen before. It was inspiring, the thought of having Nakama, someone to protect, something to fight for. It was all too nastalgic for one small girl to understand, but she had the gist of it. She was a bright little kunoichi, she had understood what was happening the moment Sasuke brought up the thought of having someone to fight for. Her village was under attack, that much was clear now. But, who could it be? Which of the surrouding villages would attack Konoha? The leaf village was almost the center of the intire fire country, anything that came into the fire country came through Konoha for the most part. What could've happened to disrupt the balance of the villages? Whatever had happened, she was going to be thrown into the mix with this lecture. Her time to prove herself as a ninja was soon to come, she'd have to defend her family from the enemy tides, this was certain. At this moment of realisation, her resolve grew twice it's size.

"I will defend this village with my life!"

"...hufff...huff..." Bazu's breathing was heavy, the sound of fatigue dancing against his every gasp for air. His skin was burnt in places, and blood trickled down from his forehead slowly, crawling down the flesh of his nose and hanging from it's tip momentarily, before dropping off and landing in the grass at his feet. His clothing was torn, and the area around his body was burnt away completely and still burning in some spots. He had been beaten into a bad condition by some force unknown to him until this very day. A man in a long black cloak, that was dressed in red-clouds stood before him, his hands extended and his eyes completely intertwined with Bazu's now completely active Shinjitsu. He needed to find a way to fight against the explosions, or he was sure he'd die. But how was he to fight against someone who's skill was this great? He had mouths that smiled and made grunting noises as they chewed up a white clay-ish material, and spat it out as a ball. His long blonde hair fell down infront of his face,covering up the intire left side of his face. Now! He had found an opening.
Bazu jumped backwards as two small four-winged birds slammed into the ground where he was previously standing. Apon impact, they exploded like motion bombs, the backwards push of the explosions caused Bazu's jump backwards to over-shoot, putting him directly in the path of his other opponents blade. The white-blade was swung horizontally from behind Bazu's body, aiming to cut him through his center. The Mirowa quickly slapped his feet against the dirt under him, and jumped upwards, throwing himself into a series of full backwards summersaults thanks to the use of sudden bursts of chakra through his feet. The blade passed under his body as he went through the next rotation of his final flip, and landed on the ground.

Bazu knew he was in danger, he had severly underestimated these two men and needed to get away if he wanted to leave this fight with his life. Bazu ran to the right, into the tree's surrounding him so that he could cover up his position and maybe get away from them simply by hiding. To further mask his position, as he ran in one direction a clone slipped from his body and ran in the opposite direction. Bazu and the clone jumped and fliped through the trees, as the birds of clay followed them, slamming into tree's along the way, as they dive-bombed for their target. Bazu jumped upwards as two bombs slammed into the ground infront of his body. The explosion would send a massive rush of flames and debris upwards under him, and the force from the explosion would propell him higher into the skies. Bazu's mind-rushed, his speed was being matched by these unknown foes. He was known for being able to keep up with almost any Jounin within Konoha, why were they keeping up with him so easily?

"Damnit, damnit, damnit!" Bazu spoke to himself in the back of his head. He was coming down from the air now, and it had just dawned on him that they had not even paid the clone he had created a sliver of attention, all of their attacks were directed completely at him, and there was nothing he could do at this point, he knew he was finished the moment he fixed his eyes on the ground. His shinjitsu picked up the massive amounts of chakra that had been gathered under ground. It was like an army of small balls of chakra had burrowed themselves under the dirt, land-mines no doubt. Bazu closed his eyes and released his shinjitsu.

"I've lost..." he muttered as his feet touched the ground. The chakra under the dirt released all in unison with one another, the explosions were dull, with only a bit of fire, but the force of the explosions ripped through his intire body and rocketted him upwards into the skies, his body flipping and flailing about, now completely out of his control. The blue-faced ninja jumped upwards from the tip of one of the tree's below him, his bandaged-blade drawn above his head, and his hand gripping the hilt of his weapon deftly. As they reached their peak, the ninja slammed his blade down against Bazu's stomach, stopping his upwards climb instantly. Pain tap-danced against all of Bazu's senses as he plumetted back towards the ground, until eventually slamming into it full-force on his back. His body bounced, and blood flowed from his newly aquired wounds, eventually leading him into an unconcious state.

The shark-like ninja, and the blonde-hair appeared at his side, staring down at him.

"That was a bit much, Kisame. You almost killed the poor kid! HMMMM!" The blonde scolded.

"He was stronger than I expected him to be, I didn't want to underestimate him too much, but those eyes. I haven't seen eyes like those before. They're almost like the leaders, this one definately has a bloodlust about him that not alot of children harbor these days. Deidara, lets let him live. I can sense other ninja approaching anyway, plant the headband, and lets go."

"Right..." Deidara's palm opened, dropping a grass-village headband into the palm of the fallen Konoha genin. As it touched ground, the two Akatsuki faded. The movement, had begun.

[END