"I..." Kruno trailed off, glancing around at everyone around her. Her eyes trailed around at everyone she cared about, starting with Ino and Choji.

Would it be wise to go home and be with them again? Try to be normal and be on her old team with two people who proved that they did miss her at least a little bit? Kruno sighed, and then her eyes trailed over to the sand siblings.

She was unaware of why they were there. She had been apart of Gaara's murder, and she knew that they knew that. It made no sense to her that they were here, because she knew if someone had killed Kiba she would be relentless until she murdered the person that took her brother.

Temari was staring daggers into Kruno, and when the two caught eyes, the glass only intensified. Kruno gave a small smirk, and this only enraged Temari more. The girl ran forward towards Kruno, her hand grasping the fan on her back, ignoring the screams of Kankuro to stop. She grabbed the fan off of her back, and shoved Shikamaru out of the way of the blow before she swung a gust of air at Kruno.

Kruno let out a painful whimper but she covered her face with her arms, waiting until the wind died down. She could hear and feel the cloak she had on ripping and falling apart while she had it on. She could feel small cuts opening on her arms as she blocked her powerful wind from harming her face and neck. Just as the wind died down, another large gust flew into her, and that's when she heard Tobi grunt in discomfort. That's when she knew she had to get Tobi out of this mess before he got seriously hurt too.

With all of Kruno strength, she pushed Tobi's side. Tobi went tumbling to the side, barely making it out of range of Temari's fan. After Tobi was out of harms way, Kruno fell back into a position that she could protect her face. A few cries of pain escaped the brunettes lip until the last little bit of the attack finished up.

Kruno's ears were ringing, and she stared up at Temari who was towering over the girl who was on her knees, blood covering random spots of her body, and a small line of blood dribbling down her lip and nose. Despite all of the screams of protest from around them, Temari wasn't going to stop.

She got in Kruno's face, and smirked slightly. "I ought to kill you. You hurt my brother, you killed my brother." She said, and Kruno gave a weak laugh, smiling a very small smile up at Temari.

"I actually didn't." She said, breaking off of her sentence with a cough, covering her mouth with her elbow. "I was keeping watch from above-e. I didn't know it was Gaara until it was too late." She whispered, half way lying. She knew it was Gaara, and she knew it would be Gaara for a long time. But she didn't know that it was going to be him that particular time.

"I don't believe you." Temari said, getting closer to Kruno's face, a deadly look in her eyes. Kruno's eyes held no emotion, and she just stared at her with a blank face. Kruno had become amazing at hiding her emotion, it was something that came fairly natural to her. She had to hide her emotions when she was on missions, or when she was sad about Shikamaru because no one around the base other than Kisame was someone that she could talk about everything. It was easier for her to just push all of emotion down to the bottom of her throat than have to talk about what was bothering her with people who didn't know how to comfort her.

Temari was pulled back by Kankuro and Gaara, and Sakura rushed to Kruno's side. Gaara took his sister in front of her, and stared into her eyes, shaking his head slightly. "If I have forgiven her, you should too. I do not believe that she was there that night, Temari. I believe what she says because she was there for us when we were little and everyone else turned their backs on us. Do you really want to hurt one of our only true friends?"

"I don't care, Gaara." Temari said, pain lacing through her voice. "I thought I had lost you. I thought I was never going to see you again, and that was the scariest thing in the entire world. I promised myself I would kill anyone who could have been apart of that."

"I don't care. You know how you felt when I was killed? That's how Kiba has felt for three years now. He just got his sister back, and you fighting with her is not going to make this situation any better. Now, you are going to apologize to her. Because what you just did was uncalled for." Gaara said, and Temari sighed heavily before she shook her head.

"Maybe when I'm not so mad." She mumbled, and Gaara sighed as they glanced over at Sakura and Kruno, was who now being held up slightly by Shikamaru since she had almost passed out a few moments before. Everyone was waiting for her to pull back from Shikamaru, but at this point, she was just too tired to fight it, and she leaned into him, allowing him to hold up her weight while Sakura healed her.

Shikamaru ran his fingers up and down her spine slightly in an attempt to calm her down while she was being healed. Not that she was fighting them, or even moving at all, but Shikamaru knew that she was freaking out on the inside much like they were on the outside. The Jonin that were there crouched down around Kruno, attempting to keep anybody else who could possible want to harm her the chance to get near her very low.

As Sakura finished healing Kruno, she stood up and looked at Kruno who was still leaning against Shikamaru's familiar chest, not sitting herself up. Her breathing was light and settled, so light that it was barely noticeable. Kiba crouched down in front of his sister, and gently brushed a piece of her bangs out of her face.

"Kruno." He whispered quietly, and she looked up at him from her exhausted eyes.

"Yes, Kiba..?" She said quietly, and her brother gave her a sad look.

"Are you coming home?" He said, and she thought about it for a moment. What would be the best thing for her? Going home with her old friends, or going home to her new friends? Going home to her biological family, or going to home to her adoptive family? She sighed softly, and she nodded slightly.

"I will." She said, and Kiba stared at her with a happy expression on his face, everyone around them doing a slightly happy dance, but Kruno spoke again. "One three conditions."

Everyone stopped and stared at her broken state, still leaning against her ex lover. "What are they?" Kakashi asked, and a few mumbled could be heard from around them, agreeing with Kakashi.

"One," She said, shifting herself slightly. "I can go see the Akatsuki whenever I want without being followed." She spoke, and Naruto shook his head.

"Nope! Can't happen." He said, crossing his arms over his chest. Kruno shrugged slightly.

"Kay, then Tobi, let's go." She said, attempting to push herself up off of Shikamaru, but he wrapped his arms around her tightly and pulled her back down. Sakura looked at Naruto and smacked him the back of the head, hard.

"You Dobe! Shut your mouth!" She shouted, and Naruto rubbed the back of his head slightly, pouring, but he nodded and agreed as Kruno went on.

"Two." She said, Shikamaru's arms slightly untightening from around her. "One day every week, I get to go out of the village and meet up with a friend, who I will not name, and I will not be followed."

Shikamaru got an uneasy look on his face, but he didn't say anything. He was so close to getting his love back in the town that he could see her everyday without worry. He just nodded slightly along with everyone else.

"Three," She said, her eyes falling shut slightly as she spoke. "I-I am not revealed as a member of the Akatsuki and am given time to readjust to everything around me before I am bombarded with questions." She said, and she them glanced around at everyone through her barely opened eyes, and noticed their slowly nodding heads, smiling to herself. "Thank you," She whispered, before she passed out in Shikamaru's arm. Her limp body fell forward into his strong arms, and he lifted her up bridal style slightly as he stood.

They all looked down at her, happiness radiating off of everyone around her. She was coming home, finally. It was finally happening, they were finally getting Kruno back.

"Can Tobi leave now?" He asked, and Asuma nodded slightly.

"Make sure you tell them that she came on her own choice, Tobi." Asuma said, and Tobi nodded his head quickly before he disappeared into the trees. Shikamaru and everyone watched him for a second, before they all gathered into a larger group.

"Thank you sand ninja, for coming along with us to find her and bring her back. It is greatly appreciated, and I honestly don't think she would have come without you guys." Kakashi said, and they all nodded slightly. Kankuro smiled at Kruno before he looked up at Shikamaru.

"Tell her I'll get her the food I owe her next time I see her." He said, before the sand ninja took off back towards Suna. All of the leaf ninja stared at each other, before looking back down at Kruno.

"She doesn't want anyone to know that she was part of the Akatsuki, so we need to make up a story that we can all stick to." Asuma said, and everyone around them nodded.

"Maybe we can say that we found her passed out during a mission and that we know nothing else?" Choji said, and everyone nodded slightly.

"That'll have to work." Kakashi said, and that's when all of them began to walk back home, Shikamaru holding Kruno's sleeping body in his arms, never once letting her slip from her comfortable state, which was currently curled up on her side with her hand placed on the middle of his chest, grasping at the jacket he had on at the moment, and he couldn't help but smile at her.

Finally, after three years, he could work on their relationship, work on fixing everything that had fallen apart. Work on every broken word, every broken piece, every lost light. He finally had the chance to make her see just how much he loved her, and to slowly gain back the love that he hoped she could find her again. He could work on making that light in her eyes come back, and that was all he wanted.

Maybe, just maybe, he could get her back to the way she was before all of this mess, to the girl who was madly in love with him. To the smiling girl who would give up anything for anybody, even the people she didn't know. Kruno shifted slightly in his arms, causing him to look down at her while her eyes fluttered opened and stared up into his.

As they walked, they held eyes. Kruno's emotions were swimming around in her broken eyes, and Shikamaru tried to pick out just one, but he found so many different ones.

Sadness, regret, brokenness, hurt, but there was a small sliver of something he hadn't seen in a while. There was happiness in her eyes, a beautiful shining piece of happiness, no matter how small it was. It gave him hope that he could bring her back.

"Where are we going?" She whispered in a quiet voice, a childlike feature in her voice.

Shikamaru smiled, and he pushed a piece of her hair back slightly out of her face. "Home. We're going home."

//

wow 20 whole chapters this is
amazing I love it so much thank you guys so much for reading this story and following me along in this crazy journey of writing this series.

I LOVE YOU SO MUCH EVERYONE.

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