The sealed kunai

Chapter 57: Eyes Straight Ahead

It took another day after leaving the camp on the Konoha side of the Tenchi Bridge for Naruto to reach the other side, well within the country he planned on assisting the northwestern troops with getting through, Maki tagging along to make sure he didn't die namelessly somewhere along the line. The company was definitely nice though, and Maki kept up with him throughout the trip despite the murderous pace he was cutting to reach the fortress guarding the Kusa side of the bridge before the stalemate could be any further set.

"Naruto-senpai." Maki eventually said as they were traversing through the wild territory a few miles past the enemy side of the ever widening and deepening river that separated Konoha's line from the side held by Kusa and the other smaller villages of the region, "I was wondering if we could take a rest for a short bit?" She sounded quite a bit out of breath, but it was the afternoon and they had been running since she had revealed herself to him the previous night.

Naruto drew them to a stop in a decent little spot within the vast bamboo forest and allowed Maki to take a knee to catch her breath, "Yeah it's okay." He said, taking that moment to double-check his supplies as he heard her let out a sigh, "We should make it there before sunset anyway and we'll scope it out until dawn tomorrow."

That sounded right to her. The travel times that had been established to most places were set with a normal person's travelling pace in mind, not the pace of a jinchuuriki physically conditioned to never tire without even tapping into their demon's chakra. If Maki was visibly breathing hard that was the equivalent of a normal person huffing and puffing on ones hands and knees since she was never supposed to show a thing.

Sitting down next to her, Naruto put a hand on his formulative training partner's back in a soothing manner letting her know that he was aware of just how rough the entire trip from the three-way border had been on her. Turning her grey eyes towards him she saw Naruto give her a small smile that she couldn't help but return, 'Naruto-senpai would be a good leader.' He was able to convey thanks towards a subordinate's efforts without even saying a word. It was those eyes of his.

Naruto's eyes were the most expressive part of him. When he was ready to get down to business of the gravest of natures you could see it. It was like you were drowning in that stare, head held full-on under the water with no relief. When he was excited or happy... even if he was amused, if it didn't show on his face which he would still do often, those eyes still lit up. They always did, even back in the dimly lit training facilities that had populated their youth.

Ugh, why was she fangirling? She was past that years ago.

Then again that was when he wasn't around.

'Damn you Danzo-sama...' Maki thought to herself, quelling a blush back, 'You knew what you were doing this entire time.' It had to be inappropriate for her to feel that way about her captain, but it was hard to help. A children's crush she never quite grew out of, and also factoring into Danzo's plans was the fact that Naruto didn't seem to perceive it. Thank goodness for that. She would have died of embarrassment if it had come to that. Root kunoichi don't crush on anyone... even when they're supposed to.

At that moment, Naruto sneezed as if his body was aware that she was thinking intensely of him, but his mind didn't catch up to the instinct as he instead brought up the mission at hand, "Alright Maki-chan. Whenever you feel up to moving again we're going to go ahead and do this. We'll be attacking by tomorrow at sundown."

"You mean after sundown don't you?" Maki asked curiously, running a tired hand through her dark hair, "Yes, a full day to get down the nighttime guard rotational patterns. That sounds right."

Naruto looked befuddled at her question at first, "No. We're not attacking at night. We're doing this at sundown if even that late."

That sounded insane. Maki had never done any wetwork during the light hours. It was too risky for a Root operative to do so since discretion was the most important thing. Konoha couldn't be linked to the things that they were busy doing.