Chapter 15: Winter Break Part 1

AN: I apologize for the delay in updating. I lost my computer and everything on it when my son spill/dumped Gatorade on it while it was plugged in. I have been having a difficult time rewriting the chapters I already had finished. Please enjoy this update!

Also, thank you to the guest that pointed out the misspelling of Shikamaru's name. I think because I call him Shiki for short I just automatically typed his name that way. I will make a note of it to go back and fix his name in previous chapters.

"Again!" Sweat stung Hinata's eyes as she sparred with her little sister. They were both quite good, but Hinata was better. Although her father had yet to admit it, Hinata had improved vastly in the last few months. She had worked herself ragged practicing every night until early in the morning. She refused to be a disappointment.

She had already decided that she would put her all into training while she was home this break.

Hanabi lunged at her older sister, intending to deliver a crippling blow with her gentle fist. Her timing was perfect. However, Hinata slid to the side, grabbed her wrist, and spun around in one fluid motion. In a movement almost too fast to follow, Hanabi was on her knees with Hinata's pale hand at her throat.

"That will be enough for today." Her father clapped his hands together once loudly to signify the end of the match. "Go wash up for dinner."

Both of the young Hyuuga girls bowed respectfully to Hiashi before turning to leave the sparring room.

"Hinata. You will stay." Her face blanched and her stomach dropped. She slowly turned back to him with her shoulders slumped. Hiashi waited until Hanabi had closed the door behind her before speaking again. "You have…improved."

Hinata almost died from joy at that moment. It wasn't exactly a compliment, but it very well could have been the nicest thing her father had ever said to her. The last time she could remember him openly showing her any sort of affection was when she had been kidnapped as a child. Her father had held her so close when she had been recovered. She thought he would never let her go.

She longed for moments like that again. However, she was content with the small bit of praise he gave her. She would work hard so that he would have no choice but to praise her further.

"I have arranged for several tutors to come in during the mornings and work with you so that your mind will not become dulled during the holidays. You will also work with a speech therapist during the afternoon. Evenings will be for practicing the Gentle Fist technique." He stopped as if waiting for her to reply, but Hinata knew better. After the brief pause he continued talking. "I will be arranging for your things to be brought here from your apartment at the school, Hinata. I do not wish for you to return there."

She knew this was coming. She was hoping to avoid the conversation until later in the break, but there was no helping it. Her father was a willful man. He would have his way. Except, this time Hinata didn't plan to give in.

Hinata squared her shoulders and met her father's gaze directly. "I-I wish to return to Konoha High. I do n-not wish to abandon the rest of my friends after what h-has happened."

At first, Hiashi's face crumpled in anger, but then he seemed to think better of it. "We will see, Hinata." He turned and left his daughter standing in the middle of the sparring room. She knew that his decision would depend on her progression over the break. She was determined to show him that she wasn't just a screw up.

Shikamaru dusted his hands off and moved behind the counter as a customer approached. At first, he could have sworn that the guy didn't have anything to buy but he set a small container of chocolate milk and a candy bar on the counter. Shikamaru sighed at the bother of it all before scanning the items.

The two didn't exchange a single word as the items were paid for and he walked outside. Shikamaru couldn't help but get a weird feeling from the guy. He was normal enough looking with his dark reddish hair and his brown eyes. Shikamaru was sure he had never seen him around here before. Then why…?

As the man started to walk off, Shikamaru caught a flash of a long blond ponytail chasing after him.

"I-Ino! Wait!" He hopped over the counter and rushed outside only to find that both of them were gone. Tears filled his eyes. He knew it wasn't Ino. Ino was gone forever. Sometimes it was just hard to let someone go.

He ripped off his apron and threw it on the ground. He needed to home and think. There had to be something he was missing. Maybe he should call Hinata. She had become really close to Ino. If anyone would know something then it would most likely be her. He walked back to Choji's place with his hands shoved deep in his pockets and his head hung low.

He missed her so much that every day was a struggle to continue living. He didn't know the point of living except to find Ino's killer. He could never love someone else the way he had loved her.

Once back at Choji's he slipped upstairs to the room he shared with his friend. He pulled out his phone and dialed Hinata's number. It rang through to the voicemail, and Shikamaru decided to leave a message for her. Hopefully she would get back to him soon.

"Hinata, its Shikamaru. I wanted to ask you some questions. Call me back when you get the chance." Sighing he hung up the phone. He felt like he wasn't getting anywhere. He need to find some connections.

He sat down on the bed heavily and steepled his fingers in an upside down position. For some reason it helped him to think.

Hinata was the logical place to start. Ino had been with her right before she had been attacked. Shikamaru also knew that it had been a man that had killed her since he had heard his voice over the phone. Why would that particular man have killed Ino? Was it a coincidence that she had just been out walking at the wrong time?

Shikamaru suddenly leapt up from the bed. "Of course!" He cried out while smacking his forehead. Hinata had mentioned that a man had attacked her and Sasuke. There was the connection. It had to be the same man. He had probably followed the girls back to Hinata's apartment. Which meant that Shikamaru had probably caught a glance of the man since he was with them.

He needed to talk to Hinata immediately to get a description of that man. Every detail would help him to hunt the bastard down. He wouldn't let her death go unpunished.

After working hard all day, Hinata was left with absolutely no energy. Hiashi's schedule made sure that not a single moment was wasted during the day. It was only during the few hours before bed that the girls were allowed to do what they wanted to.

Hanabi ran the bath water for her sister and picked out a pair of pajamas while Hinata pulled her phone out from her top drawer. They weren't allowed to have their phones during the day either. Hinata unlocked her phone and opened her messages. He had quite a few texts.

The first was from Ten Ten. She shot a quick reply telling the girl that she missed her too and that her day had been full of the grueling tasks her father had set before her.

She moved to the next message. Sasuke had texted her several times asking where she had gone. She hadn't had time to see him before leaving, and now she was stuck without her phone all day every day. She typed in a reply telling him that she was sorry and she was home for the break. She also told him that she wouldn't really be able to talk until around eight or nine at night and asked him how he was doing.

The last message was from Shikamaru.

Hinata we need to talk. Call me. Now.

She pressed the call button next to his name. She had already decided that she would be there for him through all of this. He had lost his girlfriend of many years. Sometimes people just needed to talk.

The phone rang and was answered on the third ring.

"Hinata?"

"Hello, Shikamaru. How are you?" Even though she had only been working with the speech therapist for a few days, she had improved by leaps and bounds. It helped that she had already been working on it on her own.

"I need to talk to you about Ino." Hinata was surprised at the tone of his voice. He sounded anxious. She figured that he must be having a really hard time. "The man that attacked you; what did he look like?"

Hinata wondered what that had to do with Ino.

"W-well he was tall and had silver hair. It was all slicked back." She stopped to wrap her free arm around herself. She didn't really like remembering the man that had tried to kill her, and had nearly killed Sasuke. "His eyes…his eyes were a strange pink color."

There was silence on the other side of the line for a few moments. "Right, okay. Is there anything else? Can you remember anything he said?"

She wracked her brain, and tried to remember that night. Flashes of the scythe rang through her mind, but she ignored them and focused on the words.

"He said something about getting paid when Sasuke asked him what he wanted with me. He said…Kakuzu stole from him, and he was getting paid to teach me a lesson." She wrinkled her forehead in confusion. She had gone over those words so many times and finally gave up.

Shikamaru was silent again, and Hinata worried that she had said something stupid.

"Hinata. I need you to let me speak to your father."

"Wh-what do you mean, Shikamaru?"

She noticed that since Ino had died, practically everyone had stopped calling each other by anything other than their first names.

"Just trust me, Hinata. Hurry!"

"O-o-okay!" She wondered if the nervousness was causing her stutter to act up. She had been doing so good!

She raced from the room, and caught a glance of Hanabi peeking her head out of the bathroom as she mixed different oils for Hinata's bath. Hinata ran down the hall and to her father's office where he would most likely be. She knocked on the door, then entered before he could respond.

"Hinata. What is the meaning of this?" He stood from his writing desk.

"Father. My friend needs to talk to you right away." She handed the phone to her father, who looked at her like she had lost her mind.

She watched as her father's eyes went wide while on the phone, and he motioned for her to leave the room. She obeyed without question. She found her sister waiting for her in the hallway and reached out to take her hand. They waited there for their father to come out of his office, but after a few hours they decided to call it quits. Hanabi went to bed while Hinata made her way to the garden and sat on a bench.

Hikari was usually out here at this time of night. All the talk about Ino had wrenched the wound in her heart open again. She missed the girl. She had suggested before that Hinata get her tattoo finished, and now she intended to do so.

Sakura sighed as she showered. She could hear her mother and father downstairs fighting. She knew they were arguing about whether to send her back to the same school or not.

She stepped from the shower and wrapped a towel around herself. They would eventually decide to let her go back. She knew they would. They were aware that she would be unable to get another scholarship to a different school on such short notice.

While gently toweling her hair dry, she picked up her phone. She hated it that she didn't get texts from Ino anymore.

Tears filled her eyes as she sat at the edge of her bed. She missed her best friend. She was so stupid to let jealousy take control of her like that. She knew that if she could go back, she would change everything…but she couldn't.

Her cell phone lit up with a message, and Sakura touched it to open it.

Thinking of you

She stared at the message. No one would believe her even if she showed them this message. It was that unreal. Since the night she had fallen into his arms on the bridge, Kakashi had been texting her sweet things like this. Sakura was afraid to believe that he was coming on to her in case she was mistaken.

Thx Ive been thinking about u too

It had been like this for the past four days. Sakura had taken two side jobs at a grocery store and the library to collect the money she would need when the term started again. She hardly touched her phone all day, but every night when she lay down for bed she would read his messages and reply to them.

That's good. How was your day?

Long but good

Good. I am looking forward to your return.

She couldn't believe that her math teacher was this sweet. She had always considered him to be a perverted old man. He wasn't really that old, but his silver hair definitely made him seem older.

Why?

I have a surprise for you when you get back.

U do?

Yes.

What is it?

That would be ruining the surprise. Sleep well.

You too.

Even though the exchanges were innocent enough, Sakura's cheeks always burned afterwards. She tucked her phone under her pillow and closed her eyes to sleep. She had to visit her grandmother tomorrow and try to convince her to give her some money.

She hated the thought of taking advantage of her grandmother like that, but she needed the money to pay off the two men she had hired. She specifically requested that the job be finished by the time the term started back up. If that was to be the case, then they said they wanted the other half of their payment as soon as she returned.

With these thoughts in her mind and her hand wrapped around her phone, Sakura fell asleep.

"Where is he, un?" The blond pestered his partner as they lay in wait for their target.

"Be patient, Deidara. He will come." The stoic red head replied in a toneless voice.

Deidara wasn't good at being patient. At first he sat quietly behind the brick wall Sasori had ordered him to. He started getting bored after a few minutes and started throwing small pebbles to see how far he could get them to go. Sasori had glared at him from his own hiding position, and so Deidara had stopped. He tried playing with his long blond hair, but it just wasn't fun. He had no choice but to get up and question his partner. Soon wasn't soon enough.

"Go back to your hiding spot."

"You're trying to torture me, yeah." Sasori ignored the comment as Deidara made his way back to the brick wall.

It just wasn't fair that he had to sit out here in the middle of the night and wait for some fuck head to come by so he could destroy him. Sure, they were getting paid for it, but this was soooo boring. Deidara sat down heavily and leaned against the wall. He wanted to blow something up.

"I wanna blow something up, yeah!" He shouted at the sky.

The sun was suddenly blotted out by a large figure looming over Deidara from the other side of the wall.

"Well today is your lucky fucking day, princess." The very man Deidara had been longing to blow to smithereens stood above him with his scythe at poor Deidara's neck.

"What the fuck, un?" Deidara's big blue eyes widened as he looked up at Hidan's angry face.

The sound of unwinding metal thread was heard as Sasori came to his rescue. Deidara had never been gladder of his partner's body modifications as that moment. He would prefer a weirdo that was hardly human to being decapitated any day.

Sasori's puppet thread wrapped around Hidan's weapon and allowed Sasori to pull it away from Deidara's exposed throat. Deidara took this opportunity to leap up and back away from the psycho bearing the giant three bladed weapon. He reached into his pocket to pull out some of his special exploding clay.

He was really quite proud of it. It was something he had come up with on his own. Each piece was a masterpiece crafted by his own hands. This particular one was shaped like a little dove. Deidara thought this was hilarious because doves represented peace and Dei just wanted to blow shit up.

Deidara chucked the dove at Hidan's face and watched in glee as it exploded. Sasori was used to Deidara's 'throw shit randomly' tactics and was already clear of the explosion zone.

"That was beautiful! True art, yeah!" Dei shouted as Hidan went flying backwards.

This was the exact reason Deidara had decided to take up this life style. Nothing beat getting paid to do what you loved.

"Did you see that, Danna?" His blue eyes sparkled with glee as he looked to his partner for approval. As always, he was met with his stony faced expression that gave away nothing.

Did you enjoy this chapter? I hope so! Leave me your thoughts!