Chapter 12

'Huh?' Was what I thought as I came back from dream world. I couldn't feel the ground beneath me and it felt as though I was moving. My eyes shot open and I pushed whoever was carrying me away. I glanced around in my now crowched position and glared at the two in front of me.

"What. The. Hell?!" An amused smirk appeared on Kisame's face, as Itachi's stayed stoic as ever. "Where are we?!" I shouted angrilly. Suddenly, I noticed something. Dante was no where in sight "Where's Dante?!" I shot forward and kneed Kisame in the gut, satisfied as he crumbled to the ground, holding his stomach in pain.

Grabbing Kisame by the collar of his shirt, I pulled him up with great strength so that his face was just before mine. "If you did anything to him.." I trailed off, letting their imaginations try and figure it out.

All of a sudden, I was dragged backwards a bit, letting shark boy go in the process. I sneered at Itachi angrilly "Calm down" He deadpanned. I shook my head "How can I stay calm when you kidnapped me when I was sleeping?!"

Kisame began laughing at my fuming form "What're you laughing at, Fish stick?" He immediatly stopped and glared at me. I rose an eyebrow "Aww, little fishie getting angry?" "That's it!" He grabbed a hold of his Samehada and growled at me.

Just as he was going to rush forward, Itachi lifted up a hand, stopping him from doing so. "You to Kisame, calm down" Itachi turned back to me "Leader wanted to meet you" I shrugged "That's his problem! I'll meet him after the Chunin exams, not now" With that said, I disappeared and reappeared at the small cabin, not even awaiting their reply.

I was about to walk inside, when I was tackled to the ground. "Uwah!" Something heavy was on top of me and I was about to kick it off, when I recognised my attacker as Dante. My face instantly lit up "Dante!" Wrapping my arms around his neck, I pulled him closer, probably squeezing the life out of him.

Once we stopped hugging, Dante sat right in front of me and narrowed his eyes at me "Where were you? I woke up and your were nowhere to be found. Do you know how worried I was?" I scratched the back of my neck and gave a nervous chuckle "They kinda.. kidnapped me" "What!?" In the blink of an eye, he was up and baring his fangs.

"I'll kill 'em!" Rolling my eyes, I placed my hand on his head. He, straight away, calmed down, but that didn't mean the obvious anger in his eyes died out. "It's fine, I'm fine. Besides, we can't hill them.. yet. Remeber? Story line?" Dante sighed, but nodded, however reluctant it may have been.

"So.. what are we going to do during this month?" After a moment of silence, me in my thoughts and him.. in his own, I shrugged "No clue. I have an idea about what we're gonna be doing after the Chunin exams though. Wanna know?"

Dante nodded his head with a wide grin. "Well.. It's a surprise" I stated with a smirk. The large wolf fell to the ground with a sweatdrop, before jumping up at me and nuzzling my sides. I burst out into laughter and tears formed in my eyes.

"Hahaha! Stop it! Hahaha! I'm sorry, I'm sorry! Hahaha!" After another minute of pure torture, Dante climbed off and lay down right beside me. I was breathing heavily and he kept on chuckling every now and then.

With a glare, I punched his arm playfully. "Your such a jerk sometimes, ya know that?" "Yup" He replied, popping the 'p' with a cheery tone. I rolled my eyes and stood up with a sigh. "Alright! First chore of the day - blowing up the cabin" He jumped to his feet and howled in excitment. "So.. how should I do it? blast it away with deva or make some explosives and run for our lives as it destroys a section of the forest?" He seemed to ponder on which one. Obviously, both of them were good choices and would both be fun to watch.

"Lets go with the latter. Seems much more interesting than the first one. We'll get exercise while we're at it" With a nod, I disappeared and reappeared inside the small cabin. I sent a punch to the floorboard, making a large dent. When I finished planting my 'made up on the spot' explosion, I ran out the door.

Dante saw me coming and instantly began running right beside me. On only our eleventh step.. a massive 'BOOM' and heat from the large amounts of fire came from behind us. Dante laughed as we kept on running from the fire that was still chasing our running forms.

As we came to a stop, panting and sweeting from the heat, I noticed the big cloud of smoke moving along above our heads. Dante and I turned to each other with a 'Uh-oh' look. Just then, many ANBU jumped out from the trees, holding kunai in their hands and taking attacking stances.

I held up my hands in a 'I surrender' position and spoke up "Sorry about that. But, we're participating in the chunin exams and we're training. I promise it won't happen again" I bowed low and gave Dante a 'Do it' look. Complying, he bowed his head in apologies.

The ANBU stayed silent for a while before I heared a faint sigh. Standing back up straight from my bow, I rose an eyebrow at the next question "What's your name?" "..Why?" I could practically see the eye roll with that one "We need proof" "Oh.. Well, I'm the one and only Alexis!!" I replied with a peace sign and a wink. The lead ANBU gave a nod and turned to leave, however not before stating "Clean up the mess" I rolled my eyes and saluted mocklingly.

"We're not really going to clean that up.. are we?" I shook my head and replied with a "Nope" - popping the 'p'

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"Yawn"

Dante rose an eyebrow "Your still tired?" "I'm always tired, if you havn't yet noticed" He shook his head and we both burst out into laughter.

Suddenly, from behin, I heard someone shout my name "Lex-chan!" Turning around stiffly, I came face to face with a grinning Naruto "What did I say about calling me anything other than Alexis?" I practically hissed out through gritted teeth.

Naruto shook slightly in fear from my dark glare and stuttered out a "S-sorry". I sighed and with a shake of my head, asked - "What did you want anyway?" "Oh yeh!" He yelled, realising he actually came to me to tell me something.

"I'm meeting up with the pervy-sage, wanna come?" I pondered on the thought of meeting Jiraiya. He's cool and was one of my favourite characters, despite his perverted side. Coming to a conclusion, I answered Naruto with a "Sure, why not"

He grabbed my hand and began dragging me along. Angrilly, I ripped my hand away and followed at a much slower pace, too tired to run. We walked for around 4-5 minutes, until we came up towards a small river, surrounded by many lush green trees.

While I admired the scenery, Naruto walked over to the pervy sage, who was kneeling in front of a bush with his head stuck through it. "Hey Pervy-sage! My friends here to meet you!" Naruto shouted in his ear, making the sage himself jump from fright.

I chuckled inwardly and Dante just let it out without any hesitation. His wolfy laugh caught the attention of Jiraiya, who had just bonked Naruto on the head. Raising an eyebrow in my direction, he asked "And who are you, young lady?" Before I could even answer, I was rudely interrupted by the blonder haired hyper-active idiot himself.

"Her name's Alexis and the large wolf beside her is called Dante" I glared at him angrilly that he'd even bothered to interrupt me, however let it go as I was in the presence of the one the legendary sannin.

I strolled casually up the Jiraiya and bowed "It's a pleasure to meet you Jiraiya. I'm a fan of your work" Ok.. that's kind of a lie because I havn't yet read any of them, but I wanted to make a good impression and this way was the best.

Standing back up straight, I noticed a blush cross over his goofy grinned face. He suddenly took a hole of my hand and shook it inbetween his own two. "Finally, a young woman who appreciates my work" I nodded and took my hand back before turning to Naruto "I'm leaving now" He pouted "Aww.. stay and train with us" With a shake of my head I replied "I have no need to learn from anyone. Let Jiraiya-sensei concentrate on you, since you'll need it for your fight with Neji" Naruto's face dropped when I said Neji's name, although peeked up again as he seemed to notice something.

"You just called Pervy-sage 'Jiraiya-sensei'! You never call anyone sensei, not even your own sensei" I shrugged, not really caring "I respect him. Anyone who knows who Jiraiya is should show him respect" Naruto laughed "He's just a pervy-sage" I sighed and shook my head. Dante, surprisingly, bared his teeth at Naruto "He's amazing, shut up brat"

I rose my eyebrows in shock and knelt down besides the large wolf "What'd wrong Dante? You never get this riled up when someone insult someone else" "Jiraiya's amazing, his books are amazing, his death is amazing. He shouldn't be called 'pervy-sage'" I smiled and kissed his nose, before whispering so that he could only hear "Your really amazing, you know that?" "Of course I do, who do you think I am" He replied with his nose high in the air.

Standing back up, I bowed once again "It really was an honour meeting you finally. I would like it if we could talk some other time Jiraiya-sensei" He grinned and gave a laugh "That'd be great Lexy-chan" Naruto cringed at that name and looked as though he was waiting for me to hit the sage. When he realised I wasn't going to burst with anger, he grew an irk mark.

"What!? Whenever I call you that, you get angry and give me a death glare. But when pervy-sage does it, you do nothing! It's not fair!" He wined. Jiraiya gave me a 'huh?' look and I just shrugged with a smirk.

Without even another word or glance, I began walking off, however not before hearing the two say their 'goodbye's'.

"where are we going now?" Dante questioned, sounding rather bored. I shrugged my shoulders lazily, although I was pretyy bored myself to be honest. "How about we go around and see how all the other rookies are holding up with their training?" He nodded after a moment of what seemed him being in thought.  "And after, we can spend some time alone on that hill?" He pleaded, puppy dog eyes and all. Rolling my eyes, I agreed.

With that said, we began our way down the busy streets of Konoha...

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(Third Person POV)

Meanwhile, elsewhere....

"How'd it go?" The shadowed figure asked from behind the large desk. His voice held authority and you could tell instantly that he was the type that didn't like to be talked back at. His name? - Pein. Or as the other members of Akatsuki would call him.. 'Leader-sama'

Itachi and Kisame stood stack still in front of their leader, as some of the other members leant against the wall, curiosity at their peaks.

Itachi was the first one to speak up "You were right" Everyone rose an eyebrow in confusion, except for Pein, Konan and Tobi. Although, Tobi acted differently. Itachi did not say anything else, to inside his thought to really care.

Kisame decided to take this into his own hands and shouted "She's amazingly strong!" So loud that even someone far outside the base could have probably heared it. Itachi, who was the closest, cringed and moved away slightly, eard pounding now and then; Though, he did not show it.

"Explain what happened" Pein ordered, wanting to know every detail. Itachi thought it'd be better for him to answer, as he isn't so.. loud. "She barely used any strength and was able to defeat Kisame in under 30 seconds. Her speed is much faster than even my own and is her strength is tremendous. In my opinion.. she is strong enough to join" Many were quite surprised that Itachi has spoke so highly of her and that he'd even spoken so much in such a short amount of time.

Pein nodded, excitement boiling though him. "Why did you not bring her though?" Kisame snickered, catching the members attention "We did. We were half way here when she woke up and told us she had to do the chunin exams.Then she disappeared before we could do anything"

Pein nodded his head in thought "You may all leave now" He finally stated.

Each Akatsuki member left the office, their thoughts surrounding the new soon-to-be member.