I understand the improbability of certain events in this fanfiction. Tough cookies. I am the author, I can control whatever I want.

By the way, the only reason I'm posting chapters is because I'm getting comments on deviantART. If you're interested in this story, comment and it'll be up sooner.

Haruka, Masuyo (c) me, Zopponde. I'm pretty sure all other characters appearing in this chapter belong to Masashi Kishimoto.




Contemplation
Chapter 3

Haruka sneezed. I hope that clone catches a lot of fish, she thought. I’m going to need a lot of food to recover from this damn cold!

She paused to pluck a helpful herb from the ground and moved on.

A few minutes passed similarly, and she began to consider heading back to the shack when she thought she heard something and stopped.

She heard it again and confirmed it: it was the sound of someone walking through the forest.

An almost familiar female voice nearby muttered something and she heard a considerably more recognizeable voice call out, “Haru-chan! There you are!”

Haruka cringed, a pause that gave her energetic pursuer enough time to jump out of a tree and directly in front of her in an orange-and-blue blur, blocking her escape.

“Haru-chan, we’ve been looking all over for you!” Haruka knew the colorful ninja, named Naruto. She was still grateful for his previous actions, but she knew that he’d drag her back if it was the last thing he did.

She held herself stiffly in a vaguely offensive manner, but then remembered that, though it hadn’t exactly been the most quiet death, Masuyo had hardly screamed or anything, so they might still be trying to figure out who killed her at this point.

“Why did you run away?” Naruto asked innocently as three other familiar ninjas dropped from nearby trees in a circling pattern, one considerably more so than others.

Haruka cringed again. Damn it, of all the people who could have followed me, it had to be Shino’s team and Naruto! My clone had better be having better luck than I am!

“Naruto, you were supposed to wait for the signal,” Shino’s male teammate, whose name Haruka never could remember, scolded. His ever-present dog yapped once in agreement from his owner’s feet.

Haruka sighed. “Okay, why do I have a full team of ninjas after me?”

Naruto looked at her as if confused. “Because you should be at home, why else?”

Haruka twitched angrily. “How many times have I said it today, Leaf Village is not my home!!”

“I don’t think that’s all,” Shino’s dog-loving teammate added. “I think I heard some talk of suspected of attempted murder.”

Haruka felt a pang of panic. Attempted?! she thought. Did she actually survive?

Shino’s head snapped to face his teammate. “Do you actually believe any of that? Do you really believe that Haru-chan could do such a thing?”

Shino’s other teammate, Himaka or something, piped up. “Um, Shino, p-please calm down…”

Haruka sighed. “Yeah, really, please do calm down. I can defend myself perfectly well, thank you very much.”

“So,” Naruto chipped in, “are you coming home?”

Haruka sighed again and looked up at the trees, contemplating. I have a clone back with Itachi-sama and Kisame-san, she thought, and I really should settle this whole “attempted” bit…

She smiled as innocently as she could. “Yeah, I guess so. These woods are getting boring, I’d like to head back to civilization now.”