Team 13 by suzieuchiha


“I’m telling you Neji, you’re really going to like these girls,” Naruto needed someone good to get these girls working as a team, god knows they needed it. “They are showing real promise, really!”

Neji sighed, there wasn’t much he could really do, after all Naruto was Hokage. “Fine! Tell me about them.”

Naruto grinned, they were Neji’s problem now. Naruto shuffled the files he’d got out. “Right, firstly Rosa, you’ll need to be careful there, she has a bit of a temper. *cough* She was one of Orochimaru’s failed experiments…”

Neji raised an eyebrow. “You’re giving me Orochimaru’s leftovers?”

“Hey! She’s quite strong actually…” Neji felt the subject had been left unfinished but studied the photo Naruto handed him in silence, it showed a dark haired tanned skinned girl scowling at the camera. The next photo handed to him was of a grinning red-headed girl holding her fingers up in a ‘v’ shape. “This is Abi Yamanaka she’s… a little hyperactive but a lovely girl! You‘ll know her older cousin, Ino.” Neji remembered the loud girl who always pushed Shikamaru around, he wasn’t liking the sound of his new team so far.

“And the third? Dare I ask.”

“Okay you should like this one, a medical ninja from the Inka clan! Tsuzi Inka.” Neji took the photo offered and frowned at the ferret wrapped around the brown haired girls neck. She had thick black rimmed glasses and a lip piercing. ‘She seems familiar.’

*

Tsuzi sat with her ferret, Fuyu, on her head. She didn’t need to look up to guess who it was that approached, the raised voices were enough of an indicator. She rolled her eyes at what her team mate, Abi, was saying.

“You killed my first love!”

“Stop being so melodramatic!” Rosa replied heatedly.

“Melodramatic?! I’m not being melodramatic.”

Tsuzi frowned, she was pretty sure Abi didn’t know what melodramatic meant. It wasn’t the first time Tsuzi had heard this argument. She sighed and wrapped Fuyu around her neck before climbing to her feet. Rosa and Abi didn’t spare her a glance as they continued in the direction of the Hokage’s office, now followed by Tsuzi.

“You killed him and now you are acting as selfish as you were before… like nothing happened.”

“Lay off me, you know how I get when I’m wound up…you don’t want to be in that position, do you? Anyway lets focus on today, new Sensei new start!”

“Ha! I’ll shut up for now but don’t think I’ve forgotten!”

“Like you’ll let me!” Muttered Rosa before turning to Tsuzi. “Morning Tsuzi!”

Abi folded her arms tightly and sighed deeply, she turned to Tsuzi and grinned, “Hello!”

*

Neji turned as he heard at knock at the door, “Come in!” Called Naruto.

Neji watched as his new team walked into the Hokage’s office. The one named Rosa was leading as Naruto said she would. Abi followed avoiding looking at Neji flashing Naruto a quick grin. The medic ninja Tsuzi also avoided Neji’s gaze instead she stared at the floor with a faint blush creeping across her cheeks.

Naruto considered the three and smiled to himself, if anyone could deal with these girls it was Neji!

Naruto gave a warm smile and greeted the kunoichi, his gaze locked onto Rosa’s as he spoke.

“Well Neji, this is Team 13, girls this is your new sensei Neji Hyuuga.”

“So this is the guy with the fancy eyes?!” Rosa commented rudely. Neji considered her and then turned his attention back to Naruto.

“I see what you mean about that one.” he then faced the silent red-head as she muttered under her breath.

“I loved him.” She seemed to realise a second too late that she spoke out loud.

“Neji…Sensei.” she acknowledged him mournfully.

He turned to face the final of the three and raised an eyebrow, she was staring at the floor trying to hide behind her albino ferret.

Neji smiled to himself remembering where he had seen her before, he straightened and smirked at her before turning back to Naruto.

Rosa turned to Abi and both glanced at Tsuzi trying to conceal their sniggers.

Naruto regarded the four of them with a slight nod of his head, he had made the right decision; he was the greatest Hokage yet!

“Okay you guys I’m sorry I can only give you a week to get to know each other, but there’s a mission coming up that I need you to take care of. But with Neji as your sensei I’m sure that will be enough!”

“Hmm.” Neji didn’t seemed very pleased but again Naruto was the Hokage and he wasn’t one to disrespect his, *sigh*, superiors.

When Neji arrived at the 3rd training ground just after sunrise next morning, he found Rosa, Tsuzi and the ferret.

“Where is Abi?” he enquired.

“She’ll be here any second sensei,” answered Tsuzi, eyes wide and convincing.

“Ha, not likely,” said Rosa with a harsh laugh.

“She’s probably just helping her parents with something,” Tsuzi said firmly with a glare at Rosa.

Rosa ignored the glare and continued, “She always does this, you see she’s really indecisive and can never decide how to do her hair.”

At that second Neji turned towards the trees and Fuyu the ferret squeaked a warning.

Tsuzi muttered a quick, ‘Told you so,” as Abi dropped out of a nearby tree.

“Sorry I’m late sensei!” gasped Abi.

“Is there any particular reason why you failed to arrive at sunrise?” asked Neji politely.

Abi fidgeted under his pale eyed gaze and ran her fingers through her hair before shaking her head.

“Then I will ask you to be punctual in the future.”

“Er… yeah, sure.”

“Hey, Abi?” whispered Rosa. “Why’s your hair like that?”

Abi looked horrified and ran her hands over her hair, “What’s wrong with it?”

Rosa just laughed as Abi continued to fuss whilst Tsuzi rolled her eyes and Neji got more and more pissed off.

“Right, listen up brats! Seeing as I don’t have much time to get to know you we’re going to start with each of you fighting me one-on-one. Okay?” the three kunoichi nodded obediently. “So who wants to go first?”

Tsuzi's hand shot straight into the air, then she hesitated lowering it slightly trying to make it less obvious that she was dying to go first. Neji smirked a little.

"Okay, Tsuzi you're up first and you two are to stay right where you are, that means no trouble!" said Neji sternly, he knew he was going to have to take a very firm hand with these girls.

As he led Tsuzi away to the other end of the training ground she looked back at her team mates Abi gave her an encouraging smile whilst Rosa made kissing faces. The 3rd training ground was slightly more sheltered than the other grounds situated around Konoha and it curved so that the end at which they had met and the end where he planned to do this one-on-one skill assessment were completely cut off from each other.

Standing opposite his new pupil Neji took a fighting stance and indicated that she should do the same. He noted immediately that Tsuzi's stance was weak; that would need correcting.

"I want you to attack me with all have, okay? Do not hold back for it will do you no favours." he told her coldly.

Neji felt only slightly guilty as she gulped and nodded looking absolutely petrified. A second later he was sprinting towards her and she was struggling to guard his blows. He held back from using his juuken as he didn't want to cause his new pupil anymore damage than was necessary, but he was still a talented taijutsu user who had pitched his skills against that of Rock Lee many times. Tsuzi did her best to block his blows, her reactions were fast but he could tell she was tiring much too fast. A stronger blow sent her flying across the grass to land in a crumpled heap.He walked over to her slowly and stood before her.

"Is that really all you've got?"

As he waited for a reply he listened closely to her breathing, it was much too strained that was for sure. He could see her back shaking as she struggled to draw air.

"You will not survive real missions if this is the best you can manage."

He didn't expect an answer but this time he got one.

"I know." Tsuzi muttered from her position at his feet.

Her glasses made it difficult to see her eyes at that moment so Neji knelt beside her to look at her properly. Heavily lined eyes told him she knew exactly how much work she had to do but they also showed emptiness and self hatred. He looked away and his eyes fell on the ferret which stood in front of her and appeared to glare at Neji. He wondered what point the ferret served and whether it actually deserved a place on the team.

"Do you always just give up?"

She looked up at him in surprise then back at the floor. "I think I would, except... Abi and Rosa make me fight."

"So you fight for them?"

"I guess so..."

"Are you always this useless?" Neji asked harshly.

He knew it wasn't a nice thing to hear but he wasn't here to be nice. The question had half the desired effect; he didn't get the passionate glare he'd hoped for but he saw her stiffen.

"Sit up and look at me," he ordered. She immediately did as he said though her gaze was once again unsure. "Tell me your talents, I think we can ascertain that taijutsu is not your strong point." Tsuzi shook her head dejectedly. "So what are you good at? I heard you were the groups medical nin, am I correct?" He knew he was correct but thought it best to drop this pointer.

"Er... yeah I am. The Inka clan have always specialised in medical studies but you probably already know that..." she trailed off.

"Yes I do, but what about your own personal strengths?" Neji pressed her for answers.

"Well, I'm quite good with antidotes and... poisons." The way she said 'poisons' made Neji shiver internally.

"Right, now we're getting there. Now tell me a bit about what part you play on this team, when you all attack what is your role?"

Tsuzi thought carefully before she spoke, "My job is to stay concealed as Rosa and Abi engage the enemy. Then I have to sneak around them and search for any possible way to help those two out. I usually use basic genjutsu to give Rosa and Abi the advantage; if the enemy doesn't suspect I'm nearby then they concentrate on the battle at hand and give me openings. I also carry an assortment of useful substances with me many of which can be shot at an enemy via darts in a blowgun." She looked away again as soon as she'd finished speaking as though she felt she had said too much.

Neji was silent for a minute or two as he mulled over what she had told him. He was starting to get an idea of how Team 13 functioned now.

"You each have very set functions, don't you?" he asked.

"I suppose so..." she replied, uncertain as to where he was taking this.

"So you are the medic nin who specialises in poisonous substances, stealth and genjutsu." she nodded slowly. "Then I'd like you to give me an overview like that for your team members, start with Rosa."

Tsuzi took a moment to collect her thoughts before she began. "Rosa is fast and good at taijutsu but she has a real affinity with weapons. She always says she can't understand why I like such flimsy weapons as blow darts and senbon needles, she prefers swords and hefty projectiles the kind of things that cause a lot of damage and a great deal of mess.

"Abi is our tracker and traps expert, she likes to use exploding tags in her traps to blow up half the forest and often uses wires when fighting. Even though she's from the Yamanaka clan she's always a had bit of trouble mastering their mind techniques but she insists she doesn't need them anyway." Tsuzi fell silent, hoping her information had satisfied Neji sensei.

Again Neji took a moment to store this new information away. As expected, talking to a member of the team was much more effective than reading their files. He nodded to himself, "And which of you is the team leader?"

Tsuzi hesitated again, "Technically it's Rosa, but it doesn't always work like that."

"Why not?"

"Because Abi always argues with her decisions and Rosa refuses to listen to us even when she's wrong."

Neji nodded and they sat in silence for a minute whilst he stored all this information away and half-formed a dozen or so plans to get the girls working as a team.

"Right then," Neji said, jumping easily to his feet. "Enough talking, maybe we are a bad match when it comes to sparring partners but you can show me your other skills." Tsuzi jumped to her feet too and waited for instructions. "I want to see your most convincing genjutsu. Show me something that would significantly distract me during a fight."

Tsuzi stood back a little and clapped her hands together. Neji watched through byakugan eyes as a black ferret scurried across the clearing, and then another and then another until torrents of squeaking ferrets were running around him clawing up his legs. Neji stood still though he imagined that had he not been able to see past the illusion with his byakugan, he would have recoiled. His bloodline eyes studied her technique on a level few could achieve. The genjutsu itself was weak and therefore easy to break but he could imagine that something like this would work very well indeed on an unsuspecting and preoccupied enemy.

"Satisfactory, but how about something that would distract me personally."

She nodded and the ferrets disappeared. Neji waited expecting something huge and obnoxious but was surprised when Hinata stumbled into the clearing. Of course he could see it was not the real Hinata but it was her face in a genjutsu that surprised him. She was bleeding from several wounds and her clothes were torn. He watched as the illusion of his cousin backed away from the person who advanced. With a shock he recognised Kiba, but it was not Kiba as Neji knew him, then young man had an animalistic expression on his face as he approached Hinata raising a hand to strike her.

"Stop." said Neji abruptly.

The genjutsu faltered and then faded leaving the training ground in an eerie silence.

"What was that?! How do you know those people?" he asked turning on his student who looked terrified at his expression.

"I-I met them at last years summer f-festival," choked out Tsuzi taking another step away from her sensei. "When I was filling in for Abi on one of the stands. I saw you there as well, she's you're cousin isn't she? Hyuuga Hinata, Head of the Hyuuga Clan and that man, well I don't know him but you didn't seem to like him. So I thought I'd use a shocking image to distract you... I'm sorry!" she spoke quickly, the pleading look never leaving her eyes.

Neji sighed, of course; he had seen her at the stand where Hinata had had her fortune told. Tsuzi's unconvincing expression at that time when she told Hinata to watch out for falling animals had had Kiba in hysterics.

"Hn, I suppose I should be congratulating you... you did as I instructed I suppose. I think we should leave it there for now, I still have those two to assess today."

Neji mentally groaned at the thought of training the other two kunoichi as well, this was going to be a long day.

Tsuzi came back from the sparring match slightly depressed, well more so than she usually was. She was muttering quietly to her ferret that seemed to respond by snuggling in to her the crook of her neck and purring.

Neji appeared right behind her, looking slightly disgruntled, no that wasn’t the right word, Rosa thought, he looked more disturbed.

“She used her genjutsu on you didn’t she?” Rosa said curtly. Neji just looked up and glared. “Wow, hold on mate don’t look so depressed, whenever she’s used that on people, they have come away with a lot worse, I can tell you that.” Rosa then seemed slightly distracted as she remembered the first time Tsuzi used her genjutsu on her. Not a pretty memory, that one. It was just after Rosa’s ‘Incident’ last year. She had to get her to calm down before Rosa did anymore damage. Rosa shuddered at the memory. She had Orochimaru’s snakes all over her and were then taunting her that she wasn’t wanted and that she would always be alone, that ended up reducing her down to tears of self-pity, then tears of shame as she realised to what she had done.

Rosa seemed to immediately perk up, once she realised that she was with her team.

“Who’s next?” Rosa asked cheerfully, she never did like brooding on things; it was just easier if she was happy around everyone.

“Well, seeing as you have so much energy, you can be.” Neji replied almost instantly.

As Rosa walked past Tsuzi, she whispered, “Don’t worry I’m sure you did fine.” And then gave her ferret a glare and in return the albino ferret showed vicious teeth.

While Neji and herself were walking to the clearing, Rosa was recalling the information she had on Hyúga Neji, which wasn’t a lot, all she knew was that he used the Byakugan and used a gentle fist style of fighting whilst pushing chakra out at the same time. She wasn’t worried about the gentle fist because she had studied all forms of martial arts and combat. But she was anxious to know what he thought of her fellow team-mate, Tsuzi who obviously was crushing on him.

They reached the clearing and Neji turned to face the opposition. Rosa had a blank face showing no emotion, this is how she fought, and as long as she didn’t get emotional there was no danger to her sensei.

“I’ve read your background.” The Hyúga stated.

“There are parts missing that only my team and Naruto know about.” Her face stayed impassive.

Neji didn’t miss the way she used Naruto’s name with no authority, as if he was her equal, it amused him. “I was referring to Orochimaru.”

Rosa just looked straight through Neji, trying not to get angry; she couldn’t let it happen a second time. Her face was still black as a white washed wall. “Don’t bring that up.” Her voice was mono-toned but was commanding and forceful.

“Well, lets see what you got then, come at me when you want.” Neji took a fighting stance; crouched knees that were shoulder length apart, arms loosely hung and Byakugan on.

Rosa then took her fighting stance; feet together, legs straight and arms by her side. She waited.

Neji waited.

She continued to wait unemotionally.

“Are you coming?” Neji enquired

“Why do I have to come to you, why don’t you start the fight?”

Neji complied. He ran at her and used gentle fist. He jabbed where her shoulder would have been but there was nothing but air. He immediately jumped expecting an attack as he momentarily had an opening and jumping was the only way to block it. He landed a little way behind were he started. Neji was shocked. Rosa was just standing there in her weird fighting stance looking impassive.

“What was that?” he asked

“I’m assuming Tsuzi told you I was fast.” Rosa said in a business like fashion.

“Yes.”

“Well then why are you holding back on your speed?” It was a rhetorical question and Rosa didn’t expect an answer. Instead she stepped forward and in an instant hands were jabbing and blocking. They jumped away from each other. Rosa cool and collected not even breaking a sweat. Neji exactly the same. “Your still holding back I can feel it, what good is it if you don’t come at me with all you got or you wont know what I can do. Let’s start again.” Rosa said this as if she was the sensei and Neji was getting thoroughly annoyed with her tone.

She launched forward but instead of attacking she went straight past him, she had done nothing to him. She did the same again gathering speed each time. On the sixth time running at him she poked the back of his neck, paralysing him then his shoulder dislocating it, but as she dislocated it the paralysis broke as she knew it would and she bounced off his shoulder into a clear space.

Neji pulled his arm in, popped it back in, and smirked. He then launched forward and dodged to the side of her and kicked her side, which she just barely blocked. He then back-flipped to face her again. Rosa’s feet were together so she should have no balance; he swiped at her feet to knock her over. It was done so quickly that Rosa, even though she was fast she couldn’t stop from toppling over, but as she did so her left foot came up and crashed into Neji’s ribcage. Whilst her foot was airborne she pulled out a scroll and jumped high. The scroll uncurling, and with some speedy reading she found the weapon she wanted: a small throwing star. She landed with the grace of a ballet dancer.

Neji looked at her small choice of weapon. “I was told you liked big clumpy weapons that did a lot of damage.”

“I do.” Rosa’s face was still irritatingly impassive, just like a blank sheet of paper. “And I was told you were better than this. I’ll only use this weapon on you. One star.” Rosa thought this was a good plan to get him to do something other than prance about.

Neji was trying to conserve chakra; this was why he didn’t used some of his more complex techniques, he was also thinking that Rosa was a complete nut case and needed some serious therapy if she thought she could defeat him with one star, he would simply side step it.

Rosa stood there. She extended her hand and flicked the throwing star towards Neji. One star was all she would used against someone who wouldn’t even show their true colours to her. She moved her hands extremely quickly and in a split second the star had multiplied into fifty. They were all going to hit home if Neji didn’t do something exceedingly quickly. He had no choice so he did the only thing that could protect him. He used his Heavenly Spin; blue chakra engulfed him and deflected all the stars. He stopped only to see Rosa grinning, the only emotion she had shown in the last ten minutes of them fighting.

“That was so cool, I’ve always wanted to see that first hand.” Then she quickly sobered up and looked impassive again. “ AT least your serious now.”

“Was that all you wanted to achieve?” As the sensei spoke all the throwing stars poofed back in to one and then that one disappeared, obviously back into the scroll were it was kept.

“Yes, you got a problem with that. All you wanted to do was conserve energy but I wanted to see that, so I had to do something.”

“What are you like when you’re fighting with anger?” He’d herd a bad rumour about her including a death and wanted to know if it was possible.

“You can’t get me angry.”

“Want to bet on it?”

“Would you bet on your life?” He thought she must be joking, but she looked deadly serious.

“Lets see shall we?” This wasn’t their full potential and both of them knew it, he had to get her angry. “Why did Orochimaru abandon you?” he shouted this so it emphasised that he wanted to know what she was capable of, he could see her mouth twitch and her trying to keep under control.

“I told you I don’t want to talk about it.” She could feel anger welling up inside her.

“I know you don’t but I do. Was it because you were a failure?” He got a reaction; it took form of her eyes changing. From their usual intense green they changed to the pattern of a snake. “Or was it because you were of no interest to him after you completed the experiment that you were made for?” this time the reaction was quick and almost deadly. Her neck extended and she almost bit him. That was strange why bite someone? Neji was slightly confused. But he still felt she was holding back. Her anger wasn’t complete he had to say something else.

………………………………………..

Abi was the first to here it. The question no one should ask her team-mate. It was shouted so was obviously intended. She immediately looked over to Tsuzi; with a nod they both got up and made their way to the clearing, Tsuzi in the lead.

………………………………………..

“Did you ever think you could stay with him, didn’t you know that he would always reject the fact you lived if he did need you anymore.”

That was it Rosa’s anger had reached it’s peek, she couldn’t hold it back anymore, she lost control of the last hope of not repeating the incident that happened only a year ago.

Neji saw the change immediately. Her usual stance changed to one that was low on the ground so that she was completely flexible and able to react quickly: a complete contrast to her normal one. Her neck again extended, it missed but turned to coil around Neji’s torso. He lashed at her neck with a kunai, and she retracted instantly. Snake like, she moved around him one meter away, in a hypnotising fashion.

………………………………………..

Would they make it in time? This was the only thought the two Shinobi were thinking. Tsuzi was especially worried. Neji. Why would Neji have to be her next victim? They broke through the clearing and saw Rosa was past it. No words could hold her back.

“What was Neji thinking?” Abi hissed. She silently reacted to the scene. She would use her wires to trap the enraged snake; which was her friend she had to remind herself, around a tree. She would then let Tsuzi inject Rosa with a calming serum. It was their only hope or Neji would be snake food.

………………………………………..

Neji was aware that the two other Shinobi had entered the clearing but Rosa hadn’t noticed.

“Get away you two she’s looking as if she’ll kill.” Neji was seriously worried. The last two snaps Rosa had given him had been narrowly missed; he gravely thought that the two team-mates could never handle her like this, even together.

“You’re the one who should get away.” Tsuzi snapped. He had no idea what they were capable of when they working together.

The red-head reached to grab her wires. With a quick nod from Tsuzi they started: ‘mission: calm the snake.’

Abi leapt as high as she could and landed softly behind the raging Rosa. Her wires did a quick dance and secured themselves around snake’s body. She leapt again to a tree and dragged the snake back and secured her tightly. Following Abi, Tsuzi had arrived at the tree a moment before and stuck the dart deeply into Rosa’s extended neck. Rosa continued to flail and then not even 5 seconds after the injecting took place, her eyes returned to green and her neck returned to normal length and the leader of the team was sleeping peacefully whilst still tied to a tree.

After making sure Rosa would be comfortable when she woke up both the medic-nin and the red-head turned to face a stunned sensei.

Tsuzi was the first to speak. Well she didn’t speak she glared daggers at her mentor before she spoke, but the glare was enough to turn Neji to ice. “What were you doing?” Tsuzi spoke calmly but her voice was coated with a lair of ice. At this point Abi couldn’t hold her rage any longer.

“What the bloody hell were you thinking, getting her all angry like that?” Abi shouted going red as she did so. Shouting didn’t matter to the sleeping shinobi, as she would be out of it for at least half an hour. “She could have killed you.” Abi knew all to well that Rosa would have no trouble with a jonin; their last sensei was proof of that. She then forced herself to calm down and not get tearful. She turned to walk to Rosa. “You talk to him.” She looked at Tsuzi and then walked off to comfort Rosa in her slumber, as she was no doubt going to have trouble in her dreams.

Tsuzi turned to Neji. She fixed him with a cold stare with eventually melted and she just looked sad. “I thought the Hokage would have told you about Rosa.”

“He told me that to get her angry would be a mistake on my part…”

Tsuzi cut in, “And you still thought to get her angry, not just angry but raging?” Tsuzi snapped coldly.

“Why does that happen to her?”

“You started to chide her with comments about Orochimaru. I thought you could have guessed that.”

“No I know that, but why does she turn snake like, and why doesn’t she use those abilities in combat when she’s not angry?” Neji was full of questions it seemed.

“She was an experiment.” One short simple sentence like that had enormous impact. Neji gawped. “If you want to know more ask her not me. But you’d be lucky to have her talk to you any time soon.” Tsuzi had lost her shyness in the event of what had happened but it came back in a blast. She started to get fidgety and then began to blush. “Um … sorry I shouldn’t have spoke so harshly to you.” She then turned her back on him and jogged to see if Rosa was alright.

The sleeping ninja seemed to be having nightmares again and Tsuzi started to hum a gentle song that would have Rosa sleeping soundly in moments, it was ‘X amount of words’ by Blue October. The song worked wonders to calm the sedated shinobi, and Tsuzi continued. Neji walked over and hovered just outside the ring of friends.

He cleared his throat. Tsuzi just kept on humming. But Abi snapped up to look at him.

“Shall we continue?” Abi was just think what a cold bastard, not even bothering to ask if Rosa was ok, but then Rosa was never one to want sympathy.

“Fine.” was all she bothered to answer with.

Abi trailed behind Neji, glaring daggers in his back. They arrived at the clearing and immediately she was searching for spots to set her deadliest traps.

He abruptly turned around and faced the angry ninja. “Right come at me with all you got.”

She disappeared in a puff of smoke, flickering into the forest. She hid her chakra, but knew he would find her with those eyes. So quickly she set up some easy traps that he would never fall for. She packed them close together so that her sensei would have to go around them. After she set those up, Abi also positioned some of her more impressive traps around them. She did this all within a few minutes of disappearing from the other shinobi. Afterwards the flame haired ninja walked causally back into the clearing. No sign of Neji.

Silently she thought to herself how brilliant this situation was; ‘he’s playing to my strengths.’ She then had a brain wave ‘Tsuzi would have told him our roles in the group, she likes doing that, hmm, well anyway let’s start the hunt.’

She dashed round the clearing and darted off in the direction Neji had gone off to. He left a trail like he was rampaging rhino, immediately she saw the senbon needles ready to fire from a trap only 10 yards away. She darted sideways and let loose the trap letting them fly. She continued on his trail like a lioness on a hunt, following every little thing that gave his trail away, on the way she was also dismembering every one of his traps. ‘He’s going straight to my area. How cool, he makes it too easy!’

Neji, having just seen Abi flicker away, thought he may as well go and set some traps of his own. He had finished laying the traps down around the same time as Abi had and so thought to pursue the younger shinobi.

He therefore turned on his Byakugan and began the search. She was following his trail like he had given her directions. ‘Ok’ he thought ‘she’s ok at tracking, lets see if she can follow this’ he went in to stealth mode and made his way through the tree’s concealing his trail as he went.

He stopped and looked, with his Byakugan, at where he came from and sure enough the fiery teen was following, as if she was being led by a trail of breadcrumbs. He dashed off again increasing his speed; he set himself high in the trees and waited to see if the hunter found it’s pray.

Abi was following, chasing the older ninja. ‘No’ she corrected herself ‘I’m hunting him’ she was still irritated and fuming about how he had managed to provoke Rosa into that form. She had tried so hard over the past year to control that side of her only, for what, for their new sensei only to unleash it again, not even realising what she was capable of in that state.

She realised she’d been thinking off on a tangent and got back in gear. ‘Oh he’s good. But I’m still better! Ahaha’ she gave a little high-pitched chuckle, which was her signature, and carried on following. She saw that his trail led up into the high tops of the trees, but instead she carried on to where her traps lay waiting.

She had already figured that Neji was the type of guy to slyly follow her if she led the way, so she did. Within a moment or two she could feels his presence behind her, although he made his own path not completely following hers. ‘Ahaha’ she giggled ‘he thinks he’s so clever’ she was leading him through her most obvious traps that lay hidden.

He dodged the evident swinging log. (when had she found the time to set that one up?!? O.o)

He heard her giggle again. Abi was enjoying having a great ninja such as the Hyuga at her heals. He again skimmed past the flying shuriken, having seen those only moments before. Her traps were getting harder to notice – surely a good sign for her.

Abi then stopped dead, in the middle of one of her more elaborate traps, waiting for the pray to walk in. She had got the idea of this trap from one of her biggest most hated fears - Spiders. If any ninja were to look from a bird’s eye view of this part of the forest they would see a web type formation of multiple things. However, Neji being an extremely capable ninja still didn’t have this luxury, so even before he could see the hyperactive teen he was already in the trap.

A very weak, thin wire was broken as Neji brushed up against it with his foot. As it broke needles flew at him from both sides, he simply jumped high and landed on the branch above. Having landed neatly, the branch abruptly broke from beneath him. He fell to the floor, and darted to the right to avoid any other traps the teen had set out for him.

Abi watched as Neji had jumped, fell and sprinted. She was giggling as every part of her plan was going accordingly and occasionally clapped her hands.

As Neji was moving to the right he looked at the giggling teen. She was happy, but he was going to get to her and force hand-to-hand combat. He caught a glimpse of wire then just ahead and to the left of were he was running. This wire was thicker and so had to have something attached to it. ‘Exploding tags’ was Neji’s immediate thought; he looked around and saw none. ‘Concealed? Hmm where are they?’ just as he finished that thought the earth below him exploded.

It was only one tag but it still made a huge indent on the forest floor, he automatically leapt upwards to land on another branch but from previous experience he instead clung on to the tree with chakra. However, this plan also backfired; the tree fell towards the floor with Neji’s added weight. Before he could be squished he jumped high to get a good look as to where he was going to land. He spotted a place were there looked as if there wasn’t any wire or entrapment. He landed perfectly. He looked around him. He saw the gaping hole in the ground, needles stuck in the trees and the single tree that had fallen. He also noticed he hadn’t gotten any closer to the giggling shinobi.

Abi sobered and looked straight at Neji. “Do you like them?” she queried sardonically.

“If you mean the triggers and the traps, then I suppose I do. They are well laid out and evenly set.”

“Actually they aren’t even.” She stared at him. “You set off some before you could even see me, which let me know you were approaching. Then when you entered within thirty feet of me that’s when the needles got sprung. Yay!! I love my traps!” she said delightfully, she then sobered up again. “You’ll regret ever making Rosa so pissed.” She was back to glaring daggers again.

“I will get close enough to get to you.” not a question, a statement.

“I know.” She stated right back.

All the time they were having this conversation Neji was looking everywhere to find the traps and where he could go without setting off a trap. He noticed all the main branches in the trees had been almost snapped, any weight would snap them right away, also he saw some exploding tags and extra needles dotted about that were ready to fly.

He continued to circle Abi, whilst dodging various attacks from a couple of bombs, and more needles. He started to wonder where all the weapons were coming from, that would be a question for later. Again he avoided rope that was trying to curl its way around his body. He hadn’t got one step closer to Abi.

He had circled her now, thinking that, that must have been the last of the traps that were that close to her. He leapt forward through the crossing wire that he hadn’t been able to see before. Therefore the flying shuriken hadn’t been set off.

Abi’s brow furrowed. “Humph” she was sulking.

He had seen through the flying missiles but hadn’t noticed he was standing on a net; at once it sprung as if to catch him in its grasp. He sliced the net to slithers and landed in a crouch. ‘How the hell had she had time to set all this up?’ the shinobi wondered.

Rapidly shuriken and smoke bombs were let loose, the net had been a diversion; it was only a trigger and not meant to entrap him. This girl was crafty and obviously saw where people thought they might be safe, and used it to her advantage, to create ways that they may only look safe but they could in fact cost them their lives.

As the Hyuga couldn’t see because of the smoke bombs he had to use his Heavenly Spin, for the second time that day. He was impressed; he honestly thought that this group wouldn’t be able to make him use his high chakra techniques, given their track record. As the smoke cleared Abi had the same look on her face as Rosa had.

“Oh My God! That was so bloody awesome!” She squealed.

He was now within twenty feet of her and was determined to search out the rest of her traps before he got any closer.

“I wouldn’t stand there for too long.” She warned a smirk playing at her lips.

He mechanically looked down then jumped away before another exploding tag could go off.

‘Right he’s in position now’ she thought. The flame haired ninja tugged on a wire that was attached to her right thumb. Needles and shuriken flew in from behind forcing Neji to flicker in front of the nearest tree. They flew by and embedded themselves in the ground a further 50 feet away. Another tug and the tree he was hiding in front of came falling downwards. In reaction he swerved around and jumped on the top of the trunk, and faced the teen.

He darted forward quickly to Abi to engage her in combat, however a tag decided to explode in his face causing him to fall back to regain his balance; he had to admit by this point he was mildly impressed by these girls, if he had been trying he could have easily gotten to her. But seen as he was playing with her, letting her think she was - in her terms - ‘awesome’ - he would eventually take her down.

“See what happens when you get too close.” Abi grinned at him and poked her tongue out.

With a raised eye brow at the teens cockiness, he tried again and this time got slightly closer, before four sets of weighted wires dashed at him. The wires quickly wrapped around him causing him to fall. He reached for his kunai, and cut himself free before hitting the ground.

“I’m done.” Abi clapped her hands together and sat down immediately cross-legged.

“Well, I have to say that was ok.”

“Is that it? I get you in a sweat and wrapped up in wire. And all you have to say is that it was ok?” Abi was furious.

“Yes it is.” Neji retorted.

“Humph.”

Neji then also seated himself. Abi then got up untied the wires from her fingers, and started to dart around. Neji realised when she came back with all the weapons that had been unleashed that she also had some others that he hadn’t seen. In amongst them was a screwdriver (he didn’t even want to know what that would’ve been used for!).

She then got out a mat of leather that had little pouches in it, and started to place the needles in according to size. Some were thinner, some were longer and some were bent into various curves; Each for its own purpose. She then picked up the many small shuriken and placed then in her pouch on her thigh. The teen then coiled up all the wire she had used and placed it in a pocket hidden in the leather mat. After she was done with putting all her weapons away she sat back down.

“Well I could give you criticism now or when you’re all together.”

“Later.” Abi simply put.

“Ok but can I ask you some questions?”

“Yes”

“The predicament with Rosa…”

“The subject is off limits. If you want those answered you’ll have to ask her.” The teen retorted heatedly.

“Ok then. How do you set up traps so quickly?”

“The same way Rock Lee is so quick with his tai jutsu. I train.”

“And what about those tracking skills?”

“What about them?” Questions had always annoyed her because they all leaded to why she never used her clans mind techniques.

“Well first off where did you learn them, to that extent I mean?”

“Playing hide and seek with my cousins since I was three.” Abi had decided to be short and curt with the Hyuga because he had brought out the worst of Rosa and no one got away with that lightly.

“Did anyone teach you?” Neji thought no-one that could track as well as she could did so without somebody to guid them.

“Akamaru.” She had named Kiba’s dog.

“Explain.”

“Kiba helped, he’s friends with my cousin Ino, so naturally the dog followed. Turned out the dog was better than the master, at teaching.” She giggled at the thought of Kiba trying to out smart the giant dog.

“Hmm, so is that all you do for the group, make traps and track people?”

“I’d say that was a big part of being a shinobi.” She snapped.

“Of course. It was only a question” Neji said. “Only one question left.”

“I’m not answering it.”

“You don’t even know what it’s going to be.”

“You wanna bet on that?”

“Why do most people in your group want to bet on things?” he queried.

Silence from the spunky teen.

“Why don’t you…” He started.

“Don’t bother asking a question that won’t be answered.” Her mother had always said that to her when she was little, and now she finally got to use it on someone else.

“Very well, let’s go and see how the others are doing.”

They both got up and sprinted to where they left the rest of the team. Tsuzi was still beside Rosa and they were talking in soft murmurs. When they felt the others approach they both stopped talking, and Rosa just glared at Neji. Silence fell upon the four shinobi.

Neji realised he had just made a lethal mistake in making Rosa reveal herself in the form she had been only and hour ago.

Tsuzi had brought her up to date with what had gone on. As part of the snake shinobi’s transformation, the brain sends an electric wave throughout the muscle and causes memory loss. Although minimal, it was enough to forget everything that would have happened when she was in her adapted state. Abi joined her two team mates sitting on the floor and got herself comfy.

Neji was about to criticize them all about their one-on-one fights; she figured it would take a while, him being so great and all. ‘Ahaha’ she chuckled again at her own hidden thought.