Book Two (IceQueen) Fox's Tricks and Illusions

Chapter One: The Stage is Set

"Clones," Kyoko whispered to herself walking down the candle lit hallway. Other then whilst on her mission, she never saw light made by anything other then a candle. Orochimaru had told her that it was 'so they didn't give their location away'. "Gotta love them."

"So Kyoko, have you found a cure," Orochimaru asked her, sighing she only pulled her hair into a ponytail, brushing her white dress of any dust. "Well brat! Don't test my patience."

"Orochimaru, you're not going to be leaving your bed," Kyoko told him, going through the carpet she kept in his room. It was easier to keep his medication in his room, since if he needed it, he could take a painkiller. "Stress will cause you get sicker, along with movement. We can't have the cancer moving from it's primary location."

Orochimaru only looked at her with narrow eyes, he wasn't able to train her, but had to give her training to his men. From what he had been told, she picked up anything they threw at her. She only had to be shown something once, then be left alone for an hour or two and by then she'll have damn near mastered it. "Brat, don't test my patience."

"And don't test mine. I'm here to heal you, and to do so, you need to stay in bed." Kyoko didn't know why she bothered fighting with him, he was like a child, one that wasn't allowed to get the toy they wanted. "This should be able to attack the cancer cells, it'll also prevent it from growing on any virtual organs."

-IceQueen-

"Such a drama queen," Kyoko whispered to herself. She had thought Sakura was bad, she knew the girl still liked Sasuke, but was now more worried about her skill set. "Akatsuki, huh, they don't hide themselves well enough. Or Jiraiya is getting worse at his job. Itachi, you owe me more then you'll ever know."

She had to careful, Orochimaru had asked about Sasuke a lot in her first year, but since she had started to give him medication, she added a seal to the pill, one that blocked his memory.

One that required, she'd give him the same pill at least once a month. It wasn't perfect, but it kept her old team mate out of the snakes hands. She was pretty sure he didn't even remember the Uchiha clan.

"Mistress Kyoko?" Runa said as she entered her room, she always chose one as far as she could from the pale skinned male. He didn't have to worry about her not getting to him in time, since she had increased her speed in the last almost three years. "Mistress Tsunade has sent you some information."

"I'll sent her what I've found out about the treatment for cancer," Kyoko told her, while slowly writing what she had found with various medication. It helped that the person she was planning to kill was her guinea-pig. Through she made him take two pills, one to heal his cancer and the other to make sure he didn't notice himself getting any better. "The last one worked, but didn't prevent it from taking over other cells. It got rid of them, just not fast enough."

"Of course Mistress."

"Runa, please call me Kyoko. 'Mistress' makes me sound old."

"Of course Kyoko."

"Better," she told her, while adding the paper to her collection. She had no doubt that Danzo was planning her death, further affirmed by the fact she had already found two of his little spies in Orochimaru's ranks. "Now take this to Tsunade, and make sure no one else sees it. My report has been added."

She only smiled as Runa went back to the summoning world, it was her prized secret. Only two people knew about her contract with the fox clan, Anko and Tsunade. Shaking her head, she looked at the two files Tsunade had given her. Sasori of the Red Sand and Deidara, both of them were S-rank shinobi.

She had started to slowly pick off the Akatsuki, since they always went off in pairs, she made sure she wasn't seen. Even she wasn't able to get down two S-rank shinobi in a face to face fight, but she was a killer, and thus was able to pick them off using various tricks. She was sure most of them didn't know they were killed, until after she had finished with them.

She had to thank Zabuza, since he had taught her a lot of his 'silent killing' techniques, which helped her more then he could ever know. The war in the mist was starting to show it's end, and it wasn't looking good for the Mizukage. Mei, on the other hand, was acting more and more like an excited puppy. Through she didn't blame her, she would too, if she was stuck fighting a war for the last six years.

"But who are they after?" she asked herself, she would have to send clones to check on them, but she had a feeling that she had seen the two. "Gaara! My clones had seen the two around Suna, but why didn't they grab him then?! He spent more then enough time outside those godforsaken stone walls."

Something wasn't adding up, why would they wait to grab their targets? As strong as she and Gaara were, two S-ranked shinobi would have easily defeated them. She knew overestimating the enemy was good, but oneself? That lead one to an early grave, she had seen it time and time again.

"For some reason they're after the tailed beasts." She had known that much, since Tsunade was able to get the information out of Jiraiya. She had made sure her fellow Jinchuuriki knew about the threat. "But I don't know what their doing with them, the 'immortal' pair kept their lips shut tighter then Tsunade's hold on her alcohol. And the rest of them are most likely going to be willing to share that information... there's more changes of Jiraiya never spying on a woman's bath house. So it's not going to happen. God damn it!"