Konohas Traitors (Book Two Of The YASAD Series)

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The walk to Konoha took them nearly a day, and Kruno had been dozing in and out of sleep the entire time, Shikamaru and Kiba taking turns on who was carrying her back to the village. When the sun rose in the morning, Kiba began to laugh slightly, causing everyone to give him an odd look.

"What are you laughing about?" Ino asked, but Kiba only laughed a little bit more before he answered.

"It's our sixteenth birthday today." He said, laughing once again. "We got her back just in time for this."

"It is?" Shikamaru asked, before he nodded his head slightly. "Today is the 7th." He said, and he smiled over at Kruno.

"Happy birthday princess." He said to her sleeping figure who was curled up in her brothers arm, light snores escaping her lips as she held onto Kiba tightly. Her nose was pressed up slightly against Kiba's chest, and a small line of drool trailed down her lower lip. That was something that Shikamaru loved to see when he woke up in the morning, because not much had changed about the way that Kruno slept in those three years he missed out on.

"Do we go to the Hokage first, or do we take her to her mother?" Sakura asked, and Asuma glanced at Kakashi, then at Kruno, then at Shikamaru before sighing softly.

"We should probably take her to the Hokage first, so that lady Tsunade knows she's here and that we found her." Asuma said, and everyone nodded as Kruno shifted around in her brothers arms slightly, her eyes fluttering open to meet her brothers eyes.

For the first time in a while, Kruno smiled up at her brother and whispered quietly. "Happy birthday, Kiba." Kiba laughed softly, and leaned down, gently kissing her forehead.

"Happy birthday, Kruno." He said, and she stretched her arms and legs out. She leaped out of Kiba's arms, causing everyone to jump slightly at her sudden movements, but Kruno just shrugged and made her way over to Shikamaru.

He glanced down at the short girl who was walking beside him now, and he gave her a small smile. "Hey, birthday girl." He said, and she gave him a weak smile.

"Hey." She whispered quietly, her eyes never meeting his, more or less never leaving the ground. Shikamaru placed his hand on her shoulder and gently rubbed it, a pained feeling coursing through his body as she tensed up under his touch, but she soon relaxed to a state that Shikamaru couldn't tell that she was slightly still uncomfortable. It had been three years since the real last time they had a super long physical contact, so she was slightly awkward and uncomfortable with the idea of being touched by him for a long period of time.

Kruno glanced down at her Akatsuki robe, and she slowly took it off. She stopped walking, and just stared at the cloak for a minute. Everyone else didn't notice that she had stopped walking except for Shikamaru and Kiba who both walked back to her, and stared at her with a worried expression on their face.

"Are you okay, Kruno?" Kiba asked, and she shook her head from side to side in a 'no.' fashion.

"I'm scared." She said honestly, her voice quiet and timid. And she was. She was scared of the fact that she was going back into normal civilization. She was scared that she would not be able to conform back to the ways being normal, and not killing people for a living. She was scared that she would not be accepted by the people of Konoha when she arrived back there. But most of all, she was scared that she would not be able to pick up all her broken pieces and return to the fully intact Kruno that Shikamaru and Kiba loved. She wanted to try her hardest to be her again, but there is only so much she could do to fix all the pieces of her heart and soul that had been shattered.

"You don't need to be, sis." Kiba said, and Shikamaru nodded his head slightly.

"He's right. We're gonna be hard the entire time, and we won't let anything happen to you, okay?" Shikamaru said, and she nodded slowly before they started walking again, but not before Kruno placed her Akatsuki robe somewhere that only she would be able to find. Just incase.