An Hour Later, Alvarcus's Room
"Let's see." I look over my hastily gathered materials. "I've got the storage scroll premade already. I've got Shirokumo on standby to whisk it away to the Nest if I have to. I have a very flimsy cover story, something like wanting to wander around and see the sights before I have to leave. So I'm all set! Let's get this show on the road!"
It's time to go see just what exactly the Hexagonal Crystal unlocks.
Two soft knocks land on my door.
"Or not." I swear I'm going to find out your secrets eventually. "Who is it and what do you want?"
"It's Ino. I want to talk to you about something." She sounds nervous, very nervous. I wonder what caused her to act like this? "Anko maybe pushed me to do this a little bit so… yeah."
"Well get in here and get it over with." I open the door for her. "You can't always let Anko trample all over you, you know. You've got to stand up for yourself. That being said her getting you to change your usual attire is something I'm totally okay with."
"I want to do this too, she's just… well she's being Anko." Ino hesitantly enters my room. "I give an inch and she takes a mile. But she's right, if I don't do this I'm going to regret it."
"Alright. I'll bite. What does Anko want you to do and why does it involve me?" I'm not sure I'm okay with where this is going. Just what did Anko tell Ino?
"It's a little awkward." Ino confesses as she plays with a loose thread on her coat.
"We're a little bit past the awkward phase." I blandly point out. "You have been inside my head, that's gotta be way more awkward than whatever the hell this is. Not to mention all the other shit I've done."
"Will you be quiet? You're not making this any easier on me!" She huffs out in annoyance that is quickly replaced with nervousness. "It's just…"
"Come on. Spit it out." I coax her to tell me the purpose of this visit. "Any second now. I'm waiting. It's not that hard, just -"
"Fuck it." Ino grabs a fistful of my coat and pulls me to her. Then she crashes our lips together in a searing hot kiss.
She's kissing me.
And I'm kissing her back. My arms naturally wrap around her waist and pull us closer together. Her arms wrap around my neck trying to deepen the kiss even more. It's freaking amazing. The softness of her lips, her subtle fragrance and the feeling of her hands running through my hair. Amazing.
Like all good things it came to an end, but this was an abrupt and sudden end. I gently yet firmly pushed her away once my brain rebooted and got over the sudden influx of sensations.
"Alvarcus?" Ino softly asks. She's scared right now, there's a speck of fear in her eyes. She's afraid of how I'm going to react. "Is everything alright?"
"Ino I'm sorry." I make the mistake of looking into her beautiful green eyes and see them widen in pain. "I can't. We can't."
"W-what do you mean?" She shrinks on herself. She's feeling terribly insecure right now. "But you just were! You were enjoying it! You kissed me back!"
"I know. It was amazing too, but that doesn't change anything." I gently say to her, she's very fragile right now. "Ino look, I may sound like a dick here but we would never work out. Tomorrow morning I'm leaving for Otogakure. You'll be going back to Konoha. I have no idea when we will see each other again. It might even be on a battlefield as enemies. I don't want to put you through that. I don't want to go through that. It would never work, we're too far apart."
"You… don't even want to try?" Her eyes start to water.
"Ino I could never devote enough time to you." I softly continue speaking. "I have too much on my plate right now. I'm trying to take down a village, keep my friend out of harm's way and trying to stop a freaking war. I simply don't have enough time for a relationship with anyone. There are things that I have to put before my own wants and needs, the fate of the world is one of them. Even if none of that was going on, you deserve better than me."
"I don't want better than you. I want you." She reaches out and grasps my hand in hers. "Alvarcus please. Let's just try. That's all I'm asking."
I didn't want to do this. I don't want to say what I'm about to. It will only hurt her more. "Ino what about Sasuke?"
"Sasuke?" She harshly scoffs out in disgust. "You think I still care about him? Alvarcus there was a time when him and I had something, I'm not even sure what that was, but it's gone now. I thought he cared about me, I thought I mattered to him. Then you told me he left. He abandoned not just Konoha but me too. I've stopped caring about Sasuke ever since I found that out."
"But he hasn't stopped caring about you." I gently pull my hand out of hers. "He made sure to check up on you when we were at the Chunin Exams in Kusa. He still cares about you. Ino he's my best friend. Even if you want nothing to do with him anymore he still sees you as his girlfriend, he doesn't know how you feel about him now. I can't, I won't hurt him like this. No matter how much I want to."
"Sasuke." Ino angrily growls out. "Because of him. Because of that arrogant self entitled prick you won't even try."
"Yes. I am sorry Ino but I won't betray him like that. I will not add that to the list of reasons I can't live with myself, it's long enough the way it is."
"Alvarcus Mar you're a bastard." Ino whirls around in fury and storms out of the room. "I hate you."
She slams the door shut with so much force the frame shook. But her anger was faked, it's just masking the real emotion she's feeling. The tears streaming down her face told a very different story.
"Don't worry. I hate myself right now too."
...
Later that Night, Alvarcus's Palace Room
"I really need to go see what this thing does." I hold up the Hexagonal Crystal to the light. It has a deep purple tint to it, one unlike any other gemstone I'm familiar with. "According to Doto this tiny little thing unlocks a super weapon of mind boggling power. That would be fantastic to have on my side during a confrontation with the Akatsuki."
It's rather pretty, especially when the light refracts through it. It sends sparkles dancing around the room in a symphony of lights.
"Yeah you do." Shirokumo's scratchy voice says from the ceiling. He's been wandering around up there for a while now, checking it all out while debating if it's worth it to start a new web. I'm only here for one more night after all. "You've had that all day and you haven't seen what it does yet?"
"I'm more surprised you don't already know." I shrug as I continue to admire the crystal. "This is the first time you don't have info on something."
"Doto was trying for years - a whole decade - to figure out what that unlocks. I've been trying to for about three days now and even then the spider presence here is miniscule. We don't like the cold, I'm working with about a tenth of what I normally have."
"You can call them off the search, I'll just go find out myself." I offer him. "Not like I have anything better to do, I can head out now."
"Yeah you do that. About damn time you got off your ass and did something." Shirokumo laughs to himself.
Someone pounds on my door twice interrupting my admiration of the Hexagonal Crystal.
"Another time then." I quickly pocket the crystal once more.
"Alvarcus you have some explaining to do!" That's Naruto's voice. He sounds pissed.
"You made Ino cry." And Shikamaru, he sounds even more pissed than Naruto. "You better have a damn good reason."
"You two don't understand." Ino sniffles out. "Just leave it alone."
"What are the odds that if I pretend I'm not here they'll go away?" I mutter to myself.
"Alvarcus open the damn door or I break it down!" Naruto threatens as he slams the door once more, rattling it in the frame. "You will apologize for whatever you did if I have to beat it out of you!"
"Yeah that's about what I expected." I mutter to myself. Then I raise my voice up. "Didn't you try the doorknob? It doesn't have a lock."
...
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