The Way Into Mist Village (Naruto)

41: Hanabi Joins

[OP: "In Memoriam"]

The next morning, everyone who wasn't used to long walks woke up stiff again.

"I forgot how uncomfortable sleeping on the ground is," Camie groaned, rubbing her neck.

"You'll get used to it." Temari motioned at them. "Let's get moving."

She pointed ahead, where they could see the start of hills that would turn into mountains soon.

"We have to climb?" Camie whined.

"We talked about this yesterday," Momo reminded her.

"I wasn't listening," Camie said.

"It's the Land of Stone," Temari said flatly. "Mountains...and unfortunately that's one terrain that's hard for us to run over, even using chakra. Loose stones and earth aren't any good if you stick to them, so we'll have to be careful, and you'll probably have a worse time. We need to get as far as we can while it's still level."

"There really is no huge rush," Gaara said.

"We took a long time in Mist," Temari said. "He might be offended if we're late."

"How safe are the mountains?" Wally asked. "There's no avalanche or rock slides are there?"

A pause while Temari gave him a strange look.

"There are," Shikamaru supplied. "But as long as it doesn't rain, it won't be that bad...probably. We can try to cut through the highest ones, but there's always a risk of rock slides."

"It's nothing we're not used to," Shine reminded the heroes. "You literally have that at the USJ."

"But that's much smaller," Shoto said. "I've never been in a real rock slide."

"Not many people have," Shine said humorously.

"Hey, where's Sasuke?" Sakura asked, putting on her headband and looking around.

Everyone noticed he was nowhere in sight.

Wally and Shine exchanged a look.

"So he dipped after all," Dabi said.

"What do you mean?" Shoto asked, kind of crossly since it was early and he was not a morning person.

"He was thinking about it," Dabi explained. "But I thought he'd end up sticking around after all."

"I didn't know you knew," Shine said. "But that explains where you went last night."

"So you noticed," Dabi said.

"I sleep light. I usually notice if someone's not here," Shine said.

"I noticed," Karin yawned, rubbing her head. "But he's not that far away--are you sure he's leaving?"

"He's not here..." Momo glanced around. 

"I bet since he's got the arm fixed up, and Neji's already gone, he's just ditched us," Suigetsu said. "It's just like him, but who needs him anyway?"

"Shut up!" Sakura snapped at him.

"Is he moving farther away?" Wally asked Karin.

"I...I mean, a little maybe..." Karin shrugged. "It's hard to tell sometimes. There's so many people here."

Shine looked grave, but she shrugged. "Better get moving. Eat fast."

"That's it?" Sakura said.

"What do you expect me to do?" Sihne asked her. "It was always his choice."