At a time

Chapter 17

The other girl looked surprised but nodded along. "W-what do y-you need Kazemi?"

"Promise me that you'll keep yourself safe." The Uzumaki stresses as she clasps Hinata's hands in her own. "I don't want you getting hurt. You're one of my friends ya know? I hate seeing you hurt." She murmurs sincerely.

Blood rushed to Hinata's face as she blushed violently. "O-o-of course K-Kazemi."

"Then I'm glad we had this talk." She says before ruffling the other girls hair. "I'm gonna go visit TenTen now, do you know where she'd be?"

"A-ah! She w-was d-discharged t-two weeks ago." Hinata informs her as Kazemi frowns. Two weeks and she hadn't known? Damn, Kazemi may be a bad friend.

Smoothing out her frown Kazemi gives Hinata a grateful smile. "Thanks Hinata, you really are the best."

Somehow, the girl blushed harder.

...

"TenTen!" She called as she wrapped her arms around her. "Sage where have been?! Do you even know how worried I was?!"

The older girl returned the hug while patting her head. "Sorry Kazemi, I got kinda sidetracked training."

She could tell, the training ground looked as though Lady Tsunade had returned and smashed a hole into the poor training ground.

Kazemi hesitates before speaking up. "Is this because of the Sand Kunoichi?"

TenTen clenched her fists. "She beat me so easily. I know it was a bad match but that was just so damn pathetic."

"I understand." Kazemi moves to pat her shoulder but the girl moves away. "TenTen..." There was a tone of hurt in her voice that she desperately wanted gone.

"I know you mean well Kazemi but..." She bites her lip, clearly not wanting to say it before sighing. "You know what I mean right? It's hard. My grandmother was the only Kunoichi in the family and even then she was just a chunin. You're just so fucking smart and powerful and I'm not that talented and I'm from a merchant family and I'm no where near where I'm meant to be and--" She buries her head into her hands. "And I suppose that I'm just having a hard time and I'm taking it out on you. I'm sorry."

"You don't have to apologies." Kazemi states while desperately ignoring the heat in her eyes as she stares up into the sky. "I see what you mean. It must be frustrating having someone around who had a bad start by birth get so far ahead and you're not even close." Except she didn't really have the worst start, now did she? Jinchuriki, Uzumaki and a Hokage's daughter.

TenTen smiles weakly. "I really don't want to envy you Kazemi. You're still one of my bestest friends." She says while pulling her into a hug. "And I should apologise, I shouldn't have dumped that on you."

"I'm sorry to. I hadn't noticed that I effected you like this." Kazemi buries her head into her shoulder. "Gosh, we really should've just talked sooner. I hate not being upfront."

"We did talk. At least it happened sooner than most and no cracks were really formed in our friendship." She soothes as the Uzumaki pulls out of the hug.

"I suppose you are right." They both smile. And then Kazemi frowns. "I have something to tell you TenTen. It's really important."

"Yes Kazemi?" TenTen looked concerned now. "You can tell me anything."

"It's..." She falters. "It's about the Kyuubi."

...

There was a bout of silence as Kazemi looked at anywhere but TenTen. And wow, isn't that tree looking just beautiful today?