Chapter 33

Ino frowned; Sasuke was here—Naruto had said he confronted Sakura this morning and she had turned him away. If Naruto knew, and Sakura had not denied the claims, but merely sent him from the vicinity, then the facts were most likely true—therefore the receptionist was lying.

"Well, then perhaps I could see Haruno Sakura?" she asked, just as politely, but an icy undertone escaped her.

"I'm sorry," the receptionist smiled brightly, but an annoyed edge was laced in the reply, "Haruno Sakura is very busy at the moment and I don't know when she will be available next."

Ino growled mentally to herself—she was going to see Sasuke by tomorrow at the very latest. There had to be a way in which she could find out what room he was in. Shikamaru was smart and quick on his feet—think like Shikamaru, think of an underhanded and devious plot. An idea came to her and she quickly made some hand gestures behind the other side of the desk, where the receptionist couldn't see her. She hadn't marched all the way up here only have her trip turn out fruitless.

"Oh, that's too bad—" she told the receptionist in a saddened tone, finishing up the last few hand signals behind the desk, completing the jutsu. There was a minor rushing sensation as her soul was torn from her body and flung into that of the young receptionist.

She entered the receptionist's mind instantly, just in time to watch her own body fall to the side, landing on the floor with a flump. Ino stood up in the receptionist's body hastily, trying to act as natural as she could. She needed a distraction so that her body would not look suspicious. After all, having an unconscious body going unnoticed at the foot of one's desk was very out of place indeed, especially if the person behind said desk wasn't doing a thing about it.

"Oh my goodness!" she exclaimed at her soulless body, "Are you alright?"

A couple of medics were standing nearby and they turned towards the sound of Ino's (the receptionist's) voice. She quickly waved them over, hoping that nobody would recognize the jutsu that she had cast on the receptionist and figure out what she was up to. The two medics rushed over and bent over her body, calling at her, checking for responses.

Ino smirked from behind the receptionist's face and quickly sat down, scanning the monitor of the computer while the medics concerned themselves with her body. Making use of the distraction, she flicked through the different windows, hoping that she would at least find something before she knew that she had to release the jutsu. Luckily for her, there was a file open on Sasuke—'Rm: 221' was printed boldly at the top of it. Having gotten the information she had needed, she quickly released her hold on the young woman she had been inhabiting, the familiar grabbing sensation hurling her back into her own body. A confused noise came from the receptionist as she regained control, having no idea what was going on.

Ino blinked her eyes open slowly, pretending to be confused over what happened. Staring up at the two medic ninja she squinted slightly, forcing her eyes to bring them in and out of focus.

"Are you alright?" one of the medics asked her as she slowly sat up, holding her head like she had a headache, a groan escaping her.

"Yeah…" she murmured tiredly, as the other medic helped her to her feet.

"What happened?" the receptionist asked sounding confused.

"She fainted," one of the two medics replied, mistaking the receptionist's literal question and interpreting as she was asking what happened to Ino.

"Perhaps you had better go lie down," one of the medics spoke kindly to Ino, who nodded dumbly.

She smirked inwardly as the medic led her into the main part of the hospital, a supportive arm wrapped around her. Now that she knew what room Sasuke was in, it wouldn't be difficult to sneak away and go pay him a visit after the medics had left her to rest. She kept up the façade about being tired and confused, acting like she had no idea why she had fainted. This was going to work out nicely…

"Well, then" Sasuke heard Sakura announce as she opened the door to his room, "How did the questioning go?"

He slowly sat up as she asked the question and shrugged in response. Other than not being able to answer about a third of them, it hadn't been too bad. He supposed worse people than Kakashi could have come and demanded answers out of him—he was actually quite surprised that the Hokage hadn't sent ANBU in for the job, but that would probably come eventually. When the Hokage had talked to him the other day, she sounded skeptical when he told her of his erased memories—there would probably be some ANBU who would double and triple check the validity of his claims.

"Sorry it took so long, but you know how Kakashi-sensei is," there were the familiar soft footsteps that indicated she was drawing near to him, "I bet you're feeling pretty hungry at this point."

"A little," he said with indifference, even though he was ravenous. His stomach decided to contradict his words at that moment by grumbling loudly—he felt the back of his neck get warm.

A quiet giggle could be heard from Sakura and it sounded somewhat stifled, Sasuke decided to ignore her and pulled back the covers of his bed, swinging his legs over the edge.

"Well, your body seems to think otherwise," she said with a gentle laugh, "Come on, let's go down to the cafeteria."

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