A seven year old Uzumaki Naruto was walking around the outskirts of Konoha. The blonde boy, who was wearing a white shirt with an orange spiral on it, along with a pair of dark blue shorts, as well as three strange whisker-like marks on his cheeks, had just pulled his greatest prank to date, releasing a bunch of harmless garter snakes into the girl’s bathrooms at school. Of course Iruka-sensei had caught him and he was punished, but he didn’t care. At least he was getting some acknowledgement, although he didn’t like the idea of being known solely for his pranks.

Out of the corner of his eye, Naruto saw a dark clad figure lying on the ground in the warm weather and light breeze that made the leaves of the trees rustle in a kind of exasperated way. His mouth twisted into a grin at the fun he could have with the sleeping figure. Naruto crept silently towards the slumbering figure; pen in hand, ready to draw all over the unsuspecting victim. However, when he reached the side of the soon to be victim of his prank, he noticed that the man was staring at him with a blank look in his eyes.

Naruto froze when he saw this and started to mumble an apology to the man.

“Ah, sorry, I was just…yeah, um sorry? No hard feelings right?” The boy asked the man, not making eye contact.

When he heard no response, he looked at the man, expecting to see the cold furry that people always have on their faces after his jokes. Instead, the man was lying on the ground in exactly the same position he had been, when Naruto first saw him.

‘What is he, sleeping with his eyes open?’ Naruto thought, a sweat drop forming on the back of his head.

Still searching for a prank to pull, Naruto settled for the ‘kick someone in the ribs and run away’ gag. An oldie but a goody. Naruto drew his leg back and delivered the hardest kick, a seven year old could manage. He expected the man to get up and chase him, but instead he simply lay there. Once again walking over to the prone figure, Naruto looked at the man’s face, only to notice that it was turning slightly blue. In a moment of clarity, Naruto realized that the figure wasn’t sleeping. He was dead.

Shocked at his new found discovery, Naruto turned around to run away, only to find his path blocked by another figure, this one in an ANBU uniform. Naruto was frightened right then, he normally got blamed for things he didn’t do, and this was something he didn’t do. Hell, he didn’t even know what happened, other than he found the guy dead.

“I-it isn’t what it looks like.” He exclaimed quickly, “I just found him…”

“I know exactly what it looks like.” The ANBU said, walking over to the body. Naruto could see that the shinobi had dark black hair, much like the dead man had. “Uchiha Shisui appears to have been suffocated or drowned. Killed by Uchiha Itachi.” The masked ninja replied.

“That’s awesome, how you can tell that just by looking at a dead body!” Naruto exclaimed, glad that he wasn’t being blamed for the death of the man. “How do you do that?”

There was a pause for a moment, as the ANBU turned and looked at Naruto, his eyes turning from black to red, with three odd marks circling his pupils.

“Because I am Itachi.” He stated calmly. “Now that you have seen this, I cannot let you live.” He said as he drew his sword.

Naruto turned to run, but was stopped when the cold metal of an ANBU sword cut through his stomach. The sword was quickly removed, before it was once again slid through his body. Naruto let out a scream, only to find it muffled by the hand of the ANBU. As Naruto slid to the ground he was rolled over. Before he lost consciousness, he saw the ninja take out a kunai. Then everything went black.

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The next thing that Naruto knew, he was lying in a bed in a hospital. However, having never been hospitalized before, he didn’t know where he was. He tried to open his eyes, but found that he was stopped by something covering them. Reaching up to touch his eyes, he felt the course but soft texture of gauze. Suddenly he was racked with a fit of pain as the adrenaline of his awakening wore off. He groaned and winced in pain, it wasn’t until someone spoke up that he realized someone was in the room.

“Naruto-kun, it is good to see you are awake.” Said Sarutobi, the Sandaime Hokage.

“Uhh, oji-san, what happened?” Naruto managed to groan out while he winced.

“It would seem that you were attacked by Uchiha Itachi and thrown in the river, left for dead.” Sandaime said. “You were found floating in the river along with the body of Uchiha Shisui, by an old student of mine, and she brought you both back.”

“Hey, old man, what’s with my eyes?” Naruto interrupted the venerable Hokage.

Although he couldn’t see it, the Hokage cringed before he answered.

“I was about to explain that. It seems that for whatever reason, Itachi damaged your eyes beyond our healing abilities.”

This elicited a gasp of shock from Naruto.

“Does this mean I’m blind?” He asked, through gasps of breath. He began to cry at the prospect of never being able to see again.

“Actually, far from it.” The old man said. “My former student is a very good medic-nin and she was able to transplant Shisui’s eyes into you. It is very rare indeed, but it was vital to your survival that every place that blood could leak out from was plugged. That included your eyes.”

“Eww, I have some dead guy’s eyes in my head!” Naruto yelled.

“Yes Naruto-kun I suppose you do.” The old man chuckled. “Naruto, those eyes are very special, they hold the bloodline limit of the Uchiha clan.”

“What’s a bloodline limit?” Asked Naruto.

“It’s a special ability that is passed down through someone’s family.” Explained they gray man. “Now, since you are not an Uchiha, I do not think that the limit will awaken in your eyes, but that doesn’t mean that they aren’t valuable. If someone were to take them, Konoha would be in very big trouble.”

Naruto just lay in bed digesting all of the new information he had just learned.

“Old man, how long was I out for? Did anything important happen?” He asked.

“To answer your first question, you were unconscious for about two weeks. Now, Naruto, the second thing is pretty bad. Itachi, the man that attacked you, he murdered his entire family except for his little brother, Sasuke.” Sarutobi said in a sad voice. “This means that there are only four people left in the world with the same kinds of eyes you have.”

Naruto just sat there in silence. He didn’t know what to do, he was only seven for crying out loud, and he just found out that he had some dead guy’s eyes in his head, and the dead guy’s family was dead, except for one kid. This day just couldn’t get any weirder. Oh how wrong he was.

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After checking up on Naruto, Sarutobi made his way back to his office, he had a meeting to conduct with someone, and it wasn’t going to be good. As he entered his office, he saw his old student, Tsunade waiting for him. She was holding a standard medical file, with all of the information they could gain from Naruto while he was unconscious.

“Everything seems to be fine, Sarutobi-sensei.” The blonde women said. “There is one interesting thing. You said he was an orphan, right?”

The Sandaime just nodded.

“Well, I ran a DNA test with some extra blood samples we had, and well…you should look at them yourself.” She handed the old man the folder. When he opened it he stared at a complete genetic profile of the blonde. However, what grabbed his attention was the report that Tsunade had written up.

“Who else has seen this?” He demanded.

“Only Shizune and I have seen the report.” She stated, calmly.

Sarutobi began to massage his temples as he felt a migraine coming on.

“Do you know how this could have happened?” She asked.

“I have an idea, although I shudder to think of how she’ll take this.” Sarutobi said.

He pressed a button on his intercom and waited for his secretary to respond.

“I need you to have Mitarashi Anko meet me as soon as possible.” He ordered.

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The aforementioned jounin was currently training out at field thirty-eight. Mitarashi Anko was a kunoichi known for her short temper, more than slightly sadistic nature, lack of proper clothing and her prowess with kunai knives. She was a little annoyed that the hokage was pulling her away from her training, but she needed a short break anyways. He brown trench coat didn’t move at all as she made her way up the winding stairs. When she entered his office, she was greeted by the sight of the old man, as well as Tsunade, the legendary medic sannin.

“You wanted to see me Hokage-sama?” She asked, a look of slight confusion passing through her brown eyes.

“Yes, as you know, Uchiha Itachi attacked and killed his best friend as well as a small boy a couple weeks ago. Tsunade ran a blood test, to look for any possible relatives.”

Anko didn’t like where this was going. There were only two reasons why he would call her in to discuss this kind of situation.

“Anko,” The sandaime said, breaking her train of thought. “We have good reason to believe that it’s him.”

Anko’s eyes grew wide at those words, and she collapsed into a chair, grasping her breath and shaking her purple-tinted hair in such a manner, as if to knock loose a certain memory.

Tsunade thought this was strange, even for Anko, who was known for her loud entrances and more than slightly sadistic nature.

“What do you mean him?” she questioned. “What in the hell is going on?”

Sarutobi sighed at the question of his student.

“During the Kyuubi attack, there were many S-class secrets made, one of which was Anko’s pregnancy.” He stated.

“What do you mean, pregnant, she’s only twenty four, that would make her seventeen, at the time, I know that’s rather young, but that’s not exactly worthy of such secrecy.” Tsunade said, angry that she was left out of the loop.

“You know who Anko’s jounin sensei was, don’t you?” Sarutobi asked, rubbing his head. “You know what he did?”

Of course Tsunade knew this, Anko’s jounin sensei was Orochimaru, her former teammate turned missing Nin. He was wanted for experimenting on humans, but she didn’t see what that had to do with…

“Oh, my god.” Tsunade gasped, looking at the slouched figure resting in a chair, her hands grabbing her stomach.

“Yes, due to one of Orochimaru’s experiments, Anko hasn’t aged in over seven years.” Sarutobi said, trying to comfort the sobbing women in his office. “And due to another of his experiments, she found she was pregnant.” We think it was part of an experiment to create a new bloodline limit.”

“So, you’re saying, that my baby is alive?” Anko asked, through ragged breaths. “Why? Why did you lie to me than?” She demanded.

“Anko, I had no intention of lying to you about this, when I found your son, there was no evidence that he was related to you in any way, and due to the damage of the Kyuubi, we just assumed, that your son was dead. I’m very sorry about this.”

“I want to see him, right now!” Anko demanded. “There’s no way, that I’m leaving him now, who knows what he’s going through because of me?”

“Of course Anko, but before that, I have a few other things I want to discuss with you first.” The hokage instructed.

“All right, but can you at least tell me his name.” She said.

“His name is Uzumaki Naruto.” The third replied, watching her reaction.

Anko’s face was a mixture of emotions. Happy and sad were interchanged with anger and fury. She was grateful for the chance to be a part of her son’s life, sad that he had been hospitalized in critical condition for the past two weeks, and angry at the villagers, who were too ignorant to see that the boy, her son, wasn’t the demon that was sealed into him.

“Anko, in the DNA results, Tsunade found some very interesting information. It seems that Naruto has a large number of genetic markers, in common with the Yondaime.”

This elicited a loud gasp from Tsunade and a blank look from Anko.

“Are you saying that the father of my son is…is the Yondaime?” She questioned.

“No, I’m not. You see, during his assault, Itachi damaged his eyes so badly, that they had to be removed. When Tsunade found him, she had to transplant the eyes of Uchiha Shisui to stem the large amount of blood loss he was experiencing.”

“I don’t see why that is important; Kakashi has a sharingan implanted in his head too.” Anko growled.

“Yes, but Kakashi hasn’t suddenly developed Uchiha genes.” The third replied.

“What do you mean Uchiha genes?” Anko questioned.

“Hear me out, when your son was born, he had darker hair right?” The third questioned.

“Yes, dark hair and my eyes.” Anko said.

“After the Kyuubi was sealed, the boy I found had blonde hair and blue eyes. Just like the Yondaime. In fact, he looks exactly like the Yondaime did at his age. Now, with the Uchiha genes, his hair is still blonde but with black streak in it, and his eyes are going to be black. His DNA shares markers identical to Shisui, as well as the Yondaime. What I think happened, was that Orochimaru succeeded in creating a bloodline, that would absorb anything foreign that the body was subjected to, into the DNA. That way, any descendants of the child would bear the traits as well.” Sandaime concluded. “I think that before my successor died, he may have transferred, either by accident or intentionally, some of his DNA into Naruto, giving him his former appearance.”

“Wait, what about the Kyuubi, does that mean that he is part demon or something?” Tsunade asked, shocked at her sensei’s analytical analysis of Naruto’s abilities.

“My son isn’t a demon!” Anko said, loudly, glaring at the sannin.

“Calm down you two.” The sandaime said. “If I am correct, Naruto must be subjected to someone’s DNA to change. Since the Kyuubi is sealed inside of him, than there is no fear of him becoming a demon, besides, we have a full DNA write up. He’s 100 per-cent human.”

“But, what’s to stop someone, from putting their blood into him. He’ll keep on changing, and that won’t be good.” Anko worried that her son may end up with some kind of disorder before she got to know him.

“Well, for one, since the Kyuubi is healing him, it is safe to assume, that the demon has some ability to regulate what is absorbed and what isn’t. If he didn’t have the Kyuubi, than I shudder to think what would happen.” Sarutobi said. “I believe that the ability is either fading, or slowing down completely, because he adopted the genes of the fourth within a matter of minutes, but this time it took almost the entire two weeks he was unconscious for the changes to occur. Do you have those reports, Tsunade?”

“Hai, his DNA had been slowly changing over the period of the past two weeks, and the changes were mostly minimal. I would need to run more tests, but I think that this ability is either being over written in his own DNA, or it is being stopped as to prevent further damage to the boy.” The medic Nin deduced.

“Now,” said the third Hokage, “What do you say, about meeting your son?”


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(A/N: I figured I’d outline Naruto’s bloodline limit.

Senshin (absorption) - Naruto’s bloodline limit allows him to absorb any foreign DNA introduced into his body. This allows him to pass on the traits to his children, as well as use any features like the mangekyou sharingan. (That’s not a hint. It’s just an example) He has genes of Anko, the Yondaime, and now Shisui. No one knows who his father is.)

Tsunade, Anko and the Hokage made their way back to Naruto’s hospital room. Anko was more than a bit nervous about meeting her son that she didn’t know survived the Kyuubi attack, for the first time. She was surprised that the Hokage had allowed her to regain custody of Naruto, since she was a former apprentice of Orochimaru, plus her son was the Kyuubi vessel. She had no doubt, that life would be rough for the two, at least for a while.

As the trio entered the room, they found the blonde asleep in the overly large bed, making his already malnourished frame seem even smaller. Anko let out a sob, seeing her son in his present condition. She quickly rushed to his side and held his sleeping form in her arms. Seeing mother and son reunited in such a fashion made both the Hokage and Tsunade smile. Tsunade went to check on his charts, to see how he was progressing. After reading the clip-board attached to the end of the bed, her face fell into a frown, and she motioned for Sarutobi to follow her into the hallway.

“Sensei, no one has checked up on the boy, since I finished with him, except for me and Shizune. Isn’t there one doctor here who doesn’t see him as the demon?” She asked her anger showing.

The Sandaime let out a sigh and frowned.

“I was unaware that the staff harbored such a grudge against Naruto, of course this is his first time in the hospital, so I really had no previous knowledge of the staff’s reaction.” He said.

Tsunade’s scowl deepened as she heard two idiot nurses complaining about the demon brat.

“Tsunade, I have a request for you.” Sarutobi said. “I know that you have lost a lot of faith in this village, but I want you to come back. I would like you to be able to check on Naruto, since you are the only medic Nin, not biased against him. If you don’t want to take on the role of a ninja again, would you at least consider running the hospital?”

Tsunade stared at him with a glint of anger in her eyes.

“I’m sorry sensei, but that’s not happening anytime soon. I’ll stay until Naruto is well enough to leave with his mom, but after that I’m leaving again.” She said. Suddenly a look of compassion washed over her young looking face. “But, I will stop by a couple times a year to check on him and to make sure that his bloodline isn’t acting up.”

Sarutobi just nodded, and headed towards the room of Uchiha Sasuke. Sasuke was lying in his bed, depressed after witnessing the brutal murder of his parents at the hands of his older brother, who had then used the genjutsu Tsukiyomi (Moon Reader), which forced the eight year old to relive the murder of his entire clan for three days. Right now the black haired, black eyed boy was laying on his side, staring out the window.

“How are you today, Sasuke-kun?” Asked the old man.

The boy simply looked over at him, but didn’t say any thing; he simply rolled back over and resumed moping.

Sarutobi was greatly saddened by this turn of events, as the last remaining Uchiha that was loyal to Konoha, he was important to the survival of the sharingan bloodline. Although, now that Naruto had incorporated it into his own DNA, there were now two people who could pass it on to their children.

“Sasuke,” The Hokage started “There is someone I want you to meet.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto awoke to find himself in a dark, damp, creepy hallway, with pipes and a faint glow at the end of the hallway. Feeling an irresistible urge to follow, Naruto headed towards the light. When he arrived, he found himself facing a large gate, with a simple piece of paper stuck to the front of it that said ‘Seal’. Suddenly a large pair of blood red eyes, with black slit pupils leered at the small boy.

The first thing that ran through Naruto’s mind was, ‘What the hell’ followed closely by an audible “What the hell, I can see again!”

“Brat, that’s because you aren’t in the conscious world yet. You’re in your mind.” A deep voice echoed through the cavernous hallway.

“Who are you?” Asked Naruto; staring into the red eyes without blinking.

“I am the great Kyuubi!” The voice rang out.

“Eh, but your dead, how can you be in my head? I must be dreaming.” Naruto yelled and then muttered. “Ok, I’ll cut back from five bowls of ramen before bed to four.”

“I am most certainly not dead!” The Kyuubi retorted. “I was sealed inside of you by the one you call Yondaime. I am doomed to stay trapped in here until you die, thus taking me with you to the afterlife.”

“Wait, you’re sealed inside of me?!” Naruto’s voice was full of shock and surprise. If this was the great demon that attacked Konoha, than that would explain why people always said mean things to him. “You! You’re the reason that everyone hates me? Aren’t you? You’re the reason that no one will help me, and no one will let their kids play with me! You’re the reason that I don’t have any family!” The boy screamed, tears beginning to flow from his eyes.

Upon seeing the boy, who had stood up to more hardships in his short seven years of life, than most people did in a life time, begin to cry the Kyuubi’s eyes couldn’t help but soften a bit.

“Yeah, kid, I’m the reason that everyone hates you. I’m the reason that they keep their offspring away from you. But I think you’ll find that you are mistaken, I had nothing to do with your lack of family.” The deep bass voice of the legendary fox rang out.

“What do you mean, I don’t have a family, no one loves me enough to give me one!” Naruto yelled. But suddenly, the cage began to dissolve around him, along with the back ground, and Naruto slowly felt himself wake up.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Sarutobi and Sasuke entered a room to see a woman who had dark hair that almost looked purple, holding a boy with blonde hair and bandages over his eyes. Both were sleeping, the women holding the blonde to her chin.

“That is Uzumaki Naruto; the bandages are from where your brother attacked him and hacked at his eyes.”

At this, Sasuke looked shocked, he knew that his brother was deranged, but hacking out the eyes of a child was wrong, even for a homicidal maniac.

“To save his life, a student of mine transplanted the eyes of one of your clansmen into Naruto. He’ll have the sharingan, and due to his bloodline limit, he will be able to pass it on to his children.” The third explained.

“Hokage-sama, why are you doing this?” Sasuke asked.

The third smiled at the young Uchiha. “Naruto is, or rather, was an orphan. The woman you see with him is his biological mother, since Naruto was born during the Kyuubi attack, records were messed up and they were separated. I thought that since the two of you share the same bloodline, that we should keep you two together, that is, if you would like to.” The third explained.

“Do you mean; live with them?” Sasuke asked, with a hint of joy in his voice.

“If you want to, than yes, Anko is a jounin, so she has many difficult missions that may last a long time. If you were to join them, she wouldn’t have to worry about Naruto while she was away.” The third explained.

“I would like that a lot, if they would have me.” Sasuke said, after only a few seconds of thought.

The Sandaime just smiled and walked the boy back to his room. He would talk with Anko and Naruto about this later. If she refused, he could always make it a mission.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto could feel someone’s arm’s around his shoulders in an embrace he was unfamiliar with. This wasn’t some villager trying to kill him; there wasn’t any pressure on his neck. This felt, almost good. But no one loved him, maybe it was the Hokage. Naruto shifted a bit, letting out a quiet groan from his stiff back muscles. He felt the person who was holding him recoil and gasp.

‘I knew it, another person who hates me.’ Naruto thought.

Suddenly the arms appeared again, this time in a full fledged hug. Naruto heard the mystery person, sobbing on his shoulder, as they hugged him. Naruto normally would have pushed this person away, but something about the hug caught him off guard. He was too stunned to ask a question, although he quickly recuperated and was about to ask one, when he heard the door open, followed by a number of footsteps, and the protective arms of the mystery person retracted.

“Making up for lost time, eh, Anko?” The voice of the Hokage asked.

“Huh? Old man, who is this?” Naruto asked jabbing his thumb to his right, in what he hoped was the direction of the mysterious Anko.

Naruto felt a hand encircle his as the mysterious person spoke.

“Naruto, I…I’m…” Anko choked on her words, and couldn’t finish them.

“Naruto, this is your mother, Mitarashi Anko.” The Hokage said.

“Wh-what? I don’t have a mom, you said so yourself!” Naruto cried.

“I know, Naruto, but I was wrong. There are a few things I want to talk about, the first being your history.” Said Sarutobi.

“Wait, is this about the Kyuubi?” Naruto asked. This completely shocked the two occupants in the room.

“How do you know about the Kyuubi?” Asked the Hokage.

“I was just talking with the great big fuzz ball. He told me about how the Yondaime sealed him inside of me, and how he was the reason the villagers hate me.” Naruto replied.

“It is true that the Yondaime sealed the Kyuubi in you to save the village, but that’s not the only thing I wanted to talk with you about.” Said the Sandaime. “Naruto, while you were unconscious, we ran some blood tests, to try and find your parents, and it turns out that Anko is your mother. We also found out that you have a very unique bloodline limit, it allows you to absorb people’s DNA into your own, you see when you were born, you had much darker hair and brown eyes, but some how, some of the Yondaime’s DNA got into you, which is why you look almost exactly like him.” The Hokage said.

Naruto just looked shocked, but since his eyes were still held shut, he couldn’t stare in the correct direction. The Sandiame continued:

“Tsunade thinks that your bandages can come off in a day, so we will keep you here for the night. Now, I think that you should get to know your mother better.”

Without warning, Sarutobi left the two in the room alone, one just happy to know her child was alive, the other digesting the insane amount of information that was just leveled at him. While the two sat in awkward silence, Anko’s hand snaked onto Naruto’s head and began to stroke his hair.

“O-okaa-san?” Gasped Naruto at the unfamiliar contact.

“Hai, Naruto-kun, I’m your kaa-san.” Anko said trying to hold back tears.

“I missed you, okaa-san.” Yawned Naruto, snuggling into the unfamiliar warmth of his mother and fell asleep.

Anko didn’t say anything. She just hugged her son tighter, her tears falling freely again.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

As the sun crept ever lower in the western sky, Anko moved Naruto into a more comfortable position in his bed and made her way into the hallway. She was hungry and headed towards the vending machine at the end of the hallway. She suddenly felt a presence spying on her from her right and looked over her shoulder at the offending person. She saw the Uchiha survivor looking at her from his room, saying good-bye to the Hokage. As she turned her attention back to her previous task, she felt the old Hokage come up behind her.

“Hokage-sama, I-I want to thank you for allowing me to get my son back, most of the village would like nothing more than for him to be dead, but I can’t… I won’t let that happen now.” Anko said, in an unusually demure voice.

“Think nothing of it, Anko. I wouldn’t have it any other way. If anyone deserves a family it is that boy above all others.” Sarutobi said. “Actually, I have a question to ask of you. I know that mother hood will be a new experience for you, but I would like to keep the sharingan bloodline together as much as possible, Naruto will hopefully brighten Sasuke’s disposition, and Sasuke may be able to calm your son down a bit.”

“You’re asking me to adopt the Uchiha?” Asked Anko, she was shocked that she was being asked to guard possibly the most important bloodline in the entire village.

“Yes, Sasuke has already expressed his wish to live with the two of you, should you wish to take him in. I’m afraid for him, you see, not only did Itachi murder his parents in front of his eyes, he’s done caused the boy some serious mental trauma. I’m afraid of what would happen to him if he was left alone. All he seems to do is brood, but when I mentioned the possibility of a new family, his eyes picked up immediately.” Sarutobi explained.

“I…I’m honored, Hokage-sama, but I’d have to talk with Naruto first.” Anko said.

“Of course.” Said the Sandaime. “Would you at least like to meet him?” He asked.

Anko removed her purchase from the machine and nodded her head.

“Well then, I’ll bring him by tomorrow when Naruto gets his bandages off.” Sarutobi said and left the hallway.

Anko simply returned to her son’s room to dream about life with a new family.

The morning sun rose, and with it, Anko’s eyelids. As she rubbed the sleep from her eyes, she looked at the sleeping form of her son. His blonde hair was streaked with lines of Uchiha black, and the new genes had even given his normally unruly hair a bit of a lean, causing the hairs on the top of his head to lean towards his arms, although it was slight. The whisker marks which adorned his cheeks seemed to fade with the incorporation of his new genes, but that might be a good thing. The less people recognized him, the better it would be.

The sleeping boy was awoken around nine o’clock by the entrance of the Sandaime Hokage, as well as the remaining Uchiha survivor.

“Once Tsunade gets here, we will be able to remove the bandages.” The old man explained.

While the group was waiting, Naruto had tried to start up a conversation with Sasuke. He knew the boy from the academy, but that was as far as his knowledge went.

Though it wasn’t known to Naruto, Sasuke was doing the same thing. He wanted to find out all he could about his new ‘brother’. What he knew from the academy was limited, and it failed to do the blonde justice. Sasuke knew that Naruto had a reputation as being the dumbest boy in the class, who like to play jokes and was very loud. But after talking with him, he realized that Naruto, for all his apparent short comings, was actually quit smart. Thinking over his short experience with the boy, he realized that most of the questions Naruto received, and subsequently failed, were much too hard for most gennin to answer. Actually, Sasuke didn’t even know the answer to the questions the ‘dobe’ received. Sasuke came to the conclusion that Naruto’s lack of skill was due to his lack of a family. He hadn’t had anyone to teach him any techniques, or how to control his chakra. He had grown up alone, without the benefits or joys that family brings. The black haired boy’s next thought caught him off guard. If Naruto had never been trained, than how good would he be with supervision? While Naruto was the dead last at the academy, it wasn’t by much. He might even be a worthy challenge for Sasuke, maybe even better than the Uchiha. The thought of this made the Uchiha smile.

The boy’s conversation was interrupted by the arrival of Tsunade and her apprentice, Shizune, who would be departing the hidden village immediately following Naruto’s dismissal from the hospital. She muttered something about a hang over, and proceeded to unwrap the bandages surrounding Naruto’s head. After the last bit of gauze was removed, Naruto slowly opened his eyes. At first the unusual sensation of bright light hitting eyes stung for a while, but slowly they grew accustomed.

The crowd in the room was looking at the boy expectantly, waiting to hear his reaction. Sasuke immediately saw the Uchiha eyes and noted with happiness, that the boy looked almost like an Uchiha, with his darkly streaked hair, and deep black eyes. He was happy that even if the person staring back at him wasn’t a true Uchiha, that he had at least found some one who was like him.

Naruto was just happy to have his sight back; he blinked a few times before taking note of the people in the room. He recognized the Hokage and Sasuke. But there were three new people in his room that he had never seen before…including his mother. Naruto looked over his shoulder at the purple haired jounin and stared into her brown eyes. Although he looked nothing like her, he knew instinctively that she was his mother.

“Kaa-san!” The boy cried and quickly enveloped Anko in a fierce hug.

“How do the eyes feel?” She asked, returning the hug.

“They feel fine.” The boy replied. “Can I see what they look like?”

Tsunade pointed her thumb over towards a small mirror over the sink in a corner. Naruto leaped out of bed and quickly made his way over to the sink to check out his new appearance.

The black eyes of Uchiha Shisui gazed back at the former blonde. The look seemed…almost…natural. The only sign that the eyes were transplanted were small scars around the corners of his eyes, where the originals had been removed. The left eye had a cross running downward towards the bridge of his nose, and the right eye, had two scars forming a cross at the far corner. All in all, Naruto liked his new look, the eyes weren’t his usual happy blue, but he liked them none the less. His hair was now streaked and more limp than before made him look a bit more mysterious, seeing as it actually hid some of his face. However, the thing he was most happy about was the fact that those ugly whisker marks had faded. Where there were once three lines, only two remained, making him look less like the fox that was trapped inside him.

“This is so cool!” Naruto said, responding to his new look.

“I’m glad to hear that you like your new look, Naruto.” The Sandaime said. “I have a question for you, I want to know, how you would feel, having Sasuke as your brother.”

“You mean, since he’s an orphan too, you want to him to live with kaa-san and me?” The seven year old asked.

The Sandaime chuckled to himself, seeing how intelligent Naruto could be.

“Yes, I would like for your mother and you to adopt Sasuke, so that all of you can have a family, even after such tragic events.”

“That would be so cool! What do you think kaa-san?” The loudmouth asked, heading back to be closer to his mother.

“I don’t mind as long as you don’t.” Anko responded, smiling at her sons, ruffling their hair.

“Now, I believe, there is the matter of getting used to your new eyes.” The Hokage said. “Naruto, you’ll need help to use your eyes correctly and there isn’t any real point in separating you two since it would be nice if you both activated the sharingan. I’ll have some specialized training set up for the two of you starting next week. Until then, I suggest you get to know each other better.” The old man smiled and exited the door leaving the three person family alone for the first time since its conception.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

One week later, the two boys found themselves waiting to meet their new sensei. He was currently running a good hour and a half late, and both boys were beginning to wonder if he’d ever show up.

“Yo, sorry I’m late, you see there was this kitten, and it was caught in a tree…” A voice said, approaching the two young ninjas-in-training.

The two looked at the new comer with identical stares of both disbelief and anger. He was a tall man with grey hair, although he wasn’t old, and it stuck up in many different angles, not unlike Naruto’s old hair. He was wearing dark pants and a dark shirt under the standard issue jounin vest, as well as black fingerless gloves that had a metal plate on the back of the hand to block swords. The most peculiar aspect of the man was his Konoha head protector was pulled over his left eye, completely obscuring it, and he wore a mask that effectively covered his face and nose.

“You two are Sasuke and Naruto, I assume?” The silver haired man asked the bewildered boys.

They just nodded their heads looking at their sensei, he seemed…well they didn’t know how he seemed, there was something about him, he seemed dangerous, even if he was an hour and a half late.

“Why don’t we introduce ourselves, you can tell us your likes, dislikes, hobbies, dreams for the future, those kinds of things. I’ll start off, my name is Hatake Kakashi, I don’t feel like telling you my likes, or dislikes, my dreams for the future…I have a lot of hobbies.” He finished, giving absolutely no detail in his cryptic answer.

‘Great, all we learned was his name.’ The boys thought to themselves.

“Well, my name is Uchiha Sasuke, I like my family and training, I have a few things that I don’t like, my hobbies…hm, I guess I don’t really have any, as for my dreams…I want to start my own family…and I want to help my family accomplish their goals.” The raven haired boy said.

‘Hm, he didn’t mention Itachi; I guess that’s a good thing.’ Kakashi thought.

“My name is Mitarashi Naruto; I like my family and ramen. I dislike the three minute wait for the ramen to cook; my hobbies are training with my brother and mom and trying all the different types of ramen that I can find. My dream is to become the Hokage and help my family with their dreams.” He finished.

‘Hm, ramen obsessed boy, but he’s got a hard dream.’ Kakashi thought. He stared at the boys before him, Sasuke in his usual blue t-shirt and shorts with the red and white Uchiha fan on the back, and Naruto, who had taken to wearing black shorts with a bunch of pockets on them, with a white shirt. The interesting thing about the shirt was the clan symbol on the back. It seemed to be a mixture of the orange swirl he had donned under the name of Uzumaki Naruto and the Uchiha fan. It was an orange and red swirl, divided just as the Uchiha fan was.

“Well, my job for the time being is to help you two learn to harness the power of the sharingan. Sasuke, since you haven’t awoken yours yet, we’ll be doing drills and exercises to help you and Naruto, since you have fully developed sharingan already, you just need to learn to use the correct amount of chakra to activate them. You’ll be doing mostly chakra control exercises. Both of you will do drills with me until you get the hang of the sharingan.” Kakashi explained.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

After their first day of practice, Kakashi pulled Sasuke aside, since Naruto was being stubborn and still practicing his chakra control.

“Sasuke, I don’t wish to bring up a potentially sore subject, but when I agreed to take on this assignment, I was given a psychological evaluation, and it said that, when you were admitted to the hospital, you were set on killing your brother, but today you didn’t mention him. I hope you don’t mind me asking, but what happened, was the report wrong?”

Sasuke glared at his instructor before sighing.

“No, when I moved in with Naruto and Anko, I was pretty set on killing … him.

Flashback

Sasuke was unpacking his belongings into his new room, which he shared with Naruto. Anko’s apartment wasn’t that big, and they were looking for a larger place to live, but for now it was her apartment or nothing. Naruto was moving his stuff into the room as well and Sasuke was shocked to find that everything of value that Naruto had could easily fit into a backpack.

“Naruto.” Sasuke said, breaking the silence of the room. “I understand that my brother attacked you, but Itachi is mine to kill. If you get in the way, than I may be forced to kill you. Don’t get in my way.” The brooding boy warned.

Naruto looked at his new brother like he had some kind of marine animal stuck to his face.

“I don’t care; you can kill him if you want.” He shrugged.

Now it was Sasuke’s turn to be perplexed.

“How can you not want revenge for what he did to you?” He asked.

“Oh, it’s not that I don’t want revenge, but it comes second. I don’t know about you, but revenge isn’t going to control what I do, so you don’t have to worry about me ‘getting in the way’.” Naruto explained.

“You obviously don’t get it, I have to kill him. I am an Uchiha, and I must avenge my family. It’s all my fault that they died, I couldn’t do anything.” At this Sasuke began to break down a bit and tears came to his eyes.

“Sasuke, it’s not your fault. You’re in the academy, learning to be a ninja, and he’s ANBU. There’s nothing that you could have done. If you had been there to ‘help’ them, you would have died too.” Naruto said.

Sasuke crossed the room in a second and pinned Naruto against the wall.

“You don’t get it, do you?” He hissed “I’m an Uchiha, I MUST avenge my clan.”

“No, I do get it; you think that because you’re from this clan, that you must avenge their deaths. You forget that your brother is also an Uchiha.”

This simply confused Sasuke even more.

“What the hell are you talking about?” He asked the boy, trying to calm himself down.

“Look, you know how to cross multiply numbers, right?” Naruto asked him. Sasuke merely nodded his head, not understanding where this was going.

“So you know that when you cross multiply like terms will cancel each other out. Think about it. You’re an Uchiha in the academy; he’s an Uchiha in ANBU. If you could cross multiply the two, than you’re stuck with an academy student against an ANBU. You never would have stood a chance.” Naruto articulated.

This struck Sasuke deep. He hadn’t thought of his life in such a scientific way before. It made so much sense.

“Look, Sasuke, I’m not telling you to abandon your goal, but you shouldn’t worry about it until you can match him. I’m sure one day, you’ll see him again, and be able to kill him, but that won’t be until you’re at least a chunnin, more than likely, not until you’re a jounin. Don’t worry about it for now and focus on other things.” Naruto simply left the room to find his mom and give Sasuke some room to thing.

End Flashback

Sasuke retold the story of Naruto’s logic to Kakashi, who was very impressed by the ‘dead last’s’ ability to change Sasuke so easily.

“It’s not a good thing to be an avenger. Avengers lead a life of pain and suffering. They live for one reason, and if they ever accomplish their goal, they are left with a feeling of emptiness and despair. They become so caught up in their own world that they become social outcasts and loners. It is not a life that I wish upon any one.” With that Kakashi dismissed the boys for the day.

The boys walked back to their apartment at a quick pace, hoping to make it back in time to shower before dinner. The looks that they received were surprising to Sasuke, especially the first time he noticed them. He was used to people recognizing him, because he was from the Uchiha clan, but the looks people gave Anko and Naruto…they made him shiver every once and a while. At first it was simply at Anko, she brushed it off, scowling at the people foolish enough to make a remark behind her back. He wasn’t able to hear what they were talking about, except for the word snake.

After a while, the looks began to move towards Naruto. Even after the changes he went through, people recognized who he was. Sasuke was taken by surprise the sneers and glares he received. It surprised him just as much, when Naruto brushed them away by smiling at them.

Flashback

It was the day after Sasuke’s minor blow up at Naruto, and the boys were sitting around their new apartment, waiting for Anko to return from shopping.

“Hey, Naruto, why didn’t you go with your mom?” Sasuke asked. He himself hadn’t gone because he was still digesting the conversation he had had yesterday.

“Well, I didn’t want mom to have any more problems.” He said, rather cryptically.

“What do you mean? How could you cause problems for her?” The full blooded Uchiha asked his brother.

Naruto looked at his feet, swinging them in front of his body.

“You saw the way people look at me, right?” He asked. Keeping his eyes rooted on the floor.

“Yeah.”

“They look at me like that, because I have the Kyuubi sealed inside of me.” He said, quietly. Suddenly, his voice took a much more serious tone.

“Look, I don’t care if you hate me, but if you use that to hurt kaa-san, than I’ll kill you.”

Sasuke was shocked. The reason that Naruto had grown up without any kind of care was that he had a demon sealed inside of him? That didn’t make any sense. But that would explain the looks the younger boy received, as well as Anko. As the mother of the Kyuubi vessel, she was probably seen as an anathema. Not to mention the hisses he heard yesterday, first calling his adopted mother a snake, and then openly hating his adopted brother.

“Naruto…I don’t hate you. It’s just a lot to take in.” Sasuke stammered.

The rest of the day was spent in silence, waiting for Anko to return with dinner. She seemed to notice the look on her son’s face, as well as the look of heavy contemplation that graced Sasuke’s face. When she asked what was wrong, Naruto denied that anything was amiss, and Sasuke simply shook his head. That night, when the boys were lying in their room, sleep had decided to fail them.

“Hey, Naruto…” Sasuke started to speak but paused for a second. “I don’t hate you, for the Kyuubi. I think your actually pretty brave, to put up with all the stuff you do.”

Naruto turned over to the boy and, although Sasuke couldn’t see him, stared at the boy. Then Naruto returned to his previous position and tried to go back to sleep. Before he managed to find refuge though, he said:

“Thanks, Sasuke. You’re the first person I’ve told besides the Hokage and kaa-san, so this means a lot to me.”

The boys remained silent for the remainder of the night, before finally falling asleep.

End Flashback

After that day, the three people living under the roof of Anko’s apartment could actually feel like a family. Sasuke and Naruto acting as each other’s brother and Anko as a mother to Naruto and a surrogate mother to Sasuke. That night Sasuke had made a decision, that he would protect his new family. He didn’t know that Naruto had done the same thing.

The next few months passed quickly for the two boys, between the academy and their training with Kakashi, they had little time for other activities. They would attend the academy until three in the afternoon, and then train with Kakashi until five or six and then return for dinner. Anko proved to be a very capable mother, caring for her two sons and keeping up with her duties as a jounin. She would often be seen sparing with Naruto and Sasuke or simply chasing them if they were running late for any reason.

As remarkable as Anko’s transformation was, the most noticeable changes were in Naruto and Sasuke. Sasuke had, for the moment, given up on avenging his family and embraced his foster mother and brother. Without feeling the need to measure up to his murderous brother, he became almost…social. He still abhorred the attention he received from his fan girls, but he would make attempts to meet the other people in his class. It had taken him a while, but almost five weeks of constant training and different combat scenarios with Kakashi and Naruto had awoken his sharingan. It wasn’t complete, but he wasn’t expecting it to be, and was actually quite happy when he noticed that his right eye had two of the strange coma-like marks in them instead of one.

Naruto had changed the most. With the love of his mother, and the attention of his brother, he quickly gave up his prankster ways and devoted himself to both his school work and training. It had taken him almost as long as Sasuke to re-awaken the sharingan, but he finally did, if only one day before his brother. He was leading a happy life now, and a large part of that was due, in part, to Sasuke. Before the majority of the village had harbored grudges or hatred against the boy, but now about half of the village was reconsidering their previous opinions. One half of the village was convinced that Naruto had conned the remaining Uchiha into being his brother, while the other half were convinced that Sasuke could do no wrong and thus accepted Naruto as part of society.

After the training with Kakashi ended, the boys continued to train together and further their skills. Sasuke remained entrenched at the top of the class, but Naruto was quickly climbing the ladder and was closing in on the middle of the class. Naruto was constantly trying to find out if he had absorbed any more bloodline limits, so far unsuccessfully, and learning how to integrate the sharingan and some of his new katon techniques into his fighting style. Naruto had never learned any type of rigid taijutsu style, and he liked that. It gave him an unpredictability that he found helpful.

Sasuke had continued to train in the basic academy taijutsu, but he did thrown in some moves he learned from Anko and Naruto to give his arsenal more variety. He had also picked up Anko’s love of kunai and other throwing weapons. He didn’t have the experience that his adoptive mother did in close range combat, his throwing accuracy wasn’t bad and he consistently hit his mark with little or no effort.

It was during one of Sasuke’s throwing exercises that Naruto finally discovered another bloodline. Once again, Sasuke was trying to throw ten kunai and have them deflect of each other to hit ten separate targets. He had gotten to the point where he could hit eight or nine, but the tenth continuously eluded him. Jumping into the air, he took a breath to calm himself down and focus on his task before he released the throwing knives. Sweeping his arms out Sasuke released the metallic objects from between his fingers and began to right himself for his descent towards the ground.

CLINK! CLINK! CLINK! CLINK! CLINK!

The knives bounced off of each other and Sasuke ventured a look at their trajectory. With nine simultaneous thuds, nine of the kunai embedded themselves into the intended targets.

‘Damn, still only nine. Now where is that other one?’ He thought.

He heard the yelp of his brother and figured that his kunai might have gone off course more than he had thought. What he saw confused the Uchiha to no end. Naruto was sitting in the shade of a large tree and there, not a foot in front of the younger boy’s face, was the kunai. Floating in mid air.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

“Old man!” Naruto yelled as he burst into the office of the Hokage. “Something happened and we don’t know what it was…but it was cool! We figured you would know so we came here.”

Upon hearing the ‘we’ in the statement Sasuke walked into the room.

“Why don’t you tell me what happened and I’ll see if I can help you boys.” The venerable Hokage said smiling at the close kinship the two shared.

“I was taking a break from climbing trees when one of Sasuke’s kunai came flying at me. I panicked because I didn’t have time to block it, so I put my arm out like this” he raised his right hand in a warding motion, while he used his left arm to cover his head “and when I didn’t get hit, I looked and it was just floating in the air.”

This confused the Hokage. He had never heard of something like this.

“Is it a kind of chakra shield?” He asked.

“No, we figure out that it could only repel metal objects, I tried throwing different things at Naruto, and the pebbles, dirt clods, and my sandal all got through, but he can stop kunai and shuriken in mid air.” Sasuke explained. “That’s why we came here, either it has something to do with metal, magnets, or this field only stops deadly things.”

The Hokage thought about this for a minute. “Hmm, I have an idea how we can find out.”

He took out one of his many paper weights and laid it in front of Naruto.

“Try to change the shape of this, if you can, Naruto.” He said.

Naruto concentrated on the paper weight, which was shaped like a leaf and willed it to become a simple block. Nothing happened. He tried for five minutes, concentrating on the leaf and willing it to change, but it never did.

“Well, I think we can say that your ability isn’t to control metal.” The Sandaime explained. “I also think that your own tests show that it isn’t some kind of force field, so I believe, Naruto, that you have a very rare bloodline that was originally from Sunagakure. Their Sandaime had the ability to control magnetic forces and used it to control small pieces of metal for his jutsu.”

Naruto and Sasuke stood there with their mouths agape and stared wide eyed at the grey haired man.

“That is so cool!” Naruto yelled in triumph. “I have a bloodline of a Kazekage!”

“Yes, I suggest that you practice both repelling and attracting different things, it could come in handy someday.” The Sandaime suggested. “In the mean time, I believe that your mother should be arriving shortly to turn in her report, so why don’t you two just wait here for a while.”

True to his word, Anko walked into the office not three minutes later to deliver her report. It was a straight forward mission, guarding the Fire Countries daimyo from a missing Nin. It wasn’t very hard, and she finished early. When Naruto explained about his new bloodline, Anko smirked and ruffled his hair.

“All right, from now on I expect to have to try during our kunai duels.”

This earned a groan from Naruto, who hadn’t inherited his mother’s love of kunai, much to her disappointment.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto’s birthday, October 10th, rolled around rather quickly. He still hadn’t perfected using his magnetic abilities, but he was getting better. Dawn came early and the boys were awoken by Anko’s usual greeting, a bucketful of cold water. After a quick warm up (read: five hours of being chased by your mother, who is throwing kunai at you) the trio headed home for brunch.

As the day wore on, both Sasuke and Anko noticed that Naruto was more and more reluctant to leave the apartment. They figured it had to do with the Kyuubi and when they asked him, he explained that the villagers always hated him more today and had grown accustomed to staying inside to minimize contact with drunk and or irate villagers.

Anko decided to stay and comfort her son more that night and so Sasuke was the only one to go out to enjoy the festival, although it was rather subdued now that he knew of Naruto’s burden. He watched as the smaller children ran around, enjoying the games and food of the festival. In reality, Sasuke was appalled by the villager’s treatment of Naruto. He had only come out to honor the Uchiha who had died in the attack and then he planned on returning back to the apartment. After a nice speech by the Hokage, Sasuke walked back towards the apartment, passing different restaurants along the way. He heard different people talking in various states of inebriation about different worries, from raising their kids to the state of the village.

Once he returned home he joined his adoptive mother and brother for dessert before he headed to bed. As he was taking his dishes over to the sink, he looked out the window at the sky, noting the new moon. But what interested him the most was the group of flickering orange lights that were making their way towards the apartment building. He didn’t immediately recognize the glow of torches, simply passing them off as part of the festivities, but he did seem to recognize the silver haired chunnin leading a group of twenty or thirty people.

‘What is Mizuki-sensei doing?’ He thought. It wasn’t until he heard the shouts of “KILL THE DEMON!” Then it hit him.

“Shit! Anko-kaa-san, there’s a mob outside!” Sasuke yelled in warning.

“WHAT!” The purple haired jounin yelled as the door to the apartment was kicked in.

The first person in the doorway was greeted by a kunai to the shoulder, courtesy of an enraged mother. The second person met a similar fate, this time from Sasuke.

Mizuki forced his way towards the door, loosing shuriken as he entered and multiplying them with Kage Shuriken no Jutsu (Shadow Shuriken technique) He was absolutely dumbfounded when the multitude of metal seemed to slow and hover in mid air.

“YOU WILL NOT HURT KAA-SAN!” Naruto screamed and repelled the shuriken back towards the mass of now shocked villagers. Mizuki was able to use a Kawarimi no Jutsu (Replacement technique) to avoid the multitude of steel throwing stars. Shuriken are not as lethal as kunai, unless they embed themselves in the throat or head, so damage to the mob was minimal. However, the only person standing was Mizuki who took the moment of shock to organize another attack on the ‘demon’.

He new he couldn’t hope to beat a jounin like Anko, so he decided to try and burn out the three ninja.

“Katon: Goukakyuu no Jutsu!” (Fire type: Grand Fireball technique.) Mizuki then unleashed a very large ball of fire towards the apartment, only for his fire ball to be doused by two cries of “Suiton Suijinheki!” (Water type: Water Barrier) from Naruto and Sasuke.

“H-how do you know that?” Mizuki stammered as he froze upon seeing the boys perform the jutsu. Then he noticed that both boys had red eyes with comma marks circling the iris.

“S-sh-sharingan! T-that’s n-not possible!”

He watched as Naruto raised his right arm and leveled it at him, while Sasuke simply smirked at his brothers antics. Suddenly Mizuki felt his arms begin to fall asleep. Then his legs and the last thing he remembered before he passed out was wondering what the hell was going on.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Very quickly, ANBU swarmed Anko’s apartment and before too long the Hokage appeared a look of grim anger on his face as he watched the ANBU round up the members of the incapacitated mob. He walked over to Anko who was checking on her sons, making sure they were ok.

“Would you three be able to tell me what happened?” The old man asked.

“Hokage-sama,” Sasuke began, stifling a yawn due to exhaustion “these people, were trying to, YAWN, kill Naruto.” His eyes drooped into sleep as he was talking.

The Hokage noticed that Naruto was also drifting off to sleep, so he suggested that Anko move them to bed, and that she give the report after that was done. After moving the two into their beds, a very angry Anko moved back towards the living room and addressed the Hokage.

“Hokage-sama, those people broke down the door and were calling for my son’s head, so Sasuke and I defended our home. Then that chuunin used Kage Shuriken no Jutsu and Naruto stopped them with his new bloodline before throwing them back at the crowd. That put most of them out of commission but Mizuki managed to get out of the way and tried to burn down the apartment. Naruto and Sasuke were able to stop him using Suijinheki, and then I’m not sure exactly what happened, but I think Naruto used his magnetic bloodline again to do something to Mizuki and made him pass out.” Anko spat, incensed that people would be prejudiced against her son in such a manner.

The fact that the two boys were able to use a jutsu like the water barrier was astounding to the Hokage.

“Anko, where did they get the water for the jutsu from?” He asked perplexed.

“I guess from the sink, Sasuke left it on because they broke through the door.” She replied, picking up some things that had been scattered by the intrusion.

“To be able to keep a technique like that up at their age…I believe that we can expect them to grow up to be very strong.” The Hokage remarked.

The day following the mob attack on Naruto dawned with grey skies, threatening to pour rain, and an unusual humidity for the fall weather. Both boys were sleeping soundly when Anko decided to wake them up around eight in the morning. After their display last night they deserved to rest up. Quickly shaking Naruto and Sasuke awake, she hurried them out of bed and told them that breakfast was ready and that they had matters to discuss.

The boys entered the small kitchen/dinning room after a few minutes and rubbing the sleep from their eyes muttered a ‘thanks’ as they accepted their breakfast of cereal and toast.

“First off,” Anko started, her face holding no emotion, “I want to congratulate the two of you on your performance last night. The way you boys were able to use the water barrier at your age shows great potential and chakra control. Secondly, I want to know what you did to Mizuki.” She spat out the silver haired man’s name like she was cursing.

The boys exchanged sheepish glances, which were quickly covered by mischievous grins.

“Well, ever since I discovered the magnetic bloodline, I was looking for a way to attack people directly with it. I’ve been trying to pull the iron from the ground and tried to do the same thing to humans. But since I can’t go and try it on people, I haven’t gotten very far. Last night…I think I used the fox’s power, and that was how I was able to beat Mizuki-sen…Mizuki.” Naruto explained. If nothing else, Naruto had adopted his mother’s ideals about hating people. If they crossed him wrong like last night, they were forever an anathema, and he would treat them as such.

“I just wish he would have used some cool jutsu, so I could have copied them.” Sasuke complained.

This elicited a laugh from everyone and the mood switched to lighter conversation before the boys had to leave for school.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Life settled down and fell into routine for the three. Two years passed without incident and the boys were starting their, hopefully, final year in the academy. The two had grown up and closer together than anyone could have hoped for. Sasuke had grown close to five feet three inches, and showed no signs of slowing down, while Naruto was smaller, at four feet eleven inches, but was a bit quicker than his brother, who was physically stronger.

That day at the academy, the class was reviewing the different techniques that they might have to demonstrate at their graduation exam. The selected skill today was the Henge no jutsu or transformation. As Iruka-sensei called each member of the class up to change into a copy of him, he couldn’t be more proud of his students. They were easily one of the best overall groups he had ever taught.

“Haruno Sakura!” The brown haired chunnin called out.

The pink haired Sasuke fan girl quickly moved to the front of the class and formed the correct hand seals before calling out “Henge!” A puff of smoke appeared and after it disappeared, a perfect copy of Iruka smiled back at the teacher.

“Very good, Sakura.” He admonished the girl. “Next up is Uzumaki Naruto.”

Naruto made his way down the rows of desks and stood in the front of the class. It had been decided after much arguing and yelling, that Naruto should keep the name Uzumaki, since Orochimaru would come back for the boy if he found out he was alive. The only people who knew him as Mitarashi Naruto were Sasuke, Anko, Iruka, Kakashi and the Hokage. Iruka had originally been skeptical of allowing the Kyuubi container into the academy, however after seeing how hard the boy worked and how he interacted with the other students; he grew to like the energetic boy.

Naruto adopted the classic Sasuke pose and slouched a bit, before performing the technique perfectly.

“Good job Naruto. Next up Uchiha Sasuke.”

Sasuke sauntered to the front in his typical lazy/I don’t care type of manner, before lazily forming the seals. No one noticed the unusual twinkle in the raven-haired boys’ eyes before it was too late.

“Henge.” The boy said, in a very lazy manner. It was so lazy that it made Shikamaru seem energetic and playful.

As the smoke cleared, the sight of a naked woman with black hair greeted Iruka. As his nose erupted in a fountain of blood, he could only think one sentence.

‘The hell? I figured Naruto or Kiba would try something like that, but Sasuke?’

The class erupted in laughter from the male population and indignation from the females of the class. They couldn’t bring themselves to believe that their beloved ‘Sasuke-kun’ would do something so...so…perverted. In another cloud of smoke Sasuke returned to normal and broodingly walked back to his seat. Or rather, he walked back to Naruto’s seat. As Iruka got back up from the floor with wads of tissue stuck up his nose to prevent further blood loss, he noticed the two Sasuke’s and groaned. He had been pranked. He watched as the second Sasuke disappeared in a cloud of smoke and was replaced by Naruto, who promptly doubled over in laughter at his teacher’s expense.

“Kami, Iruka-sensei, you should have seen the look on your face when I did that!” The blonde and black haired youth cried out in laughter, rolling in the aisle.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

That night was…interesting, to say the least. Anko was torn between outrage and maternal pride at her son’s antics. She was very proud of the fact that he could keep up two illusions, which admittedly were his worst skill, and that he had pulled such an elaborate and hilarious ruse. On the other hand he had done something perverted, and like all women, Anko despised perverts.

She settled on increasing the ferocity in her training. Neither Sasuke nor Naruto showed up to class without sporting new cuts from their mother’s kunai.

“Ok, today we’re going to be reviewing the Bunshin no jutsu.” (Clone technique) Iruka explained. Naruto groaned; Bunshin was his worst skill. It wasn’t that he didn’t know how, he had copied the seals with his sharingan and practiced the technique for hours, but he simply couldn’t do it correctly and for the life of him, he couldn’t figure out why. Sasuke didn’t know what was wrong and his mother wasn’t much more help. She figured that it had to do with his abnormally large amount of chakra and, in comparison, his poor chakra control. Truthfully Naruto had been practicing his control since he started training with Kakashi, but with all his extra chakra, he always seemed to be behind the others. Suddenly inspiration struck him like a…like a…well it struck him. He’d ask the old man! He’ll know what to do.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

After class, Naruto told Sasuke to go on home without him and that he had something to talk with the Hokage about. Sasuke was about to follow his brother anyway, but was side tracked when a group of fan girls began to chase after him.

Naruto headed towards the Hokage’s office and asked to see the old man. The secretary told him to wait, because the Hokage was in a meeting and couldn’t be disturbed. As the meeting ended, representatives from the surrounding villages exited the office and Naruto walked past them all into the Sandaime’s office.

“Hey, I’ve got a problem.” Naruto said, when he saw that he had the Hokage’s attention. “I can’t do a Bunshin and I can’t figure out why. Mom thinks it’s ‘cuz I’ve got such high amounts of chakra, but she’s not sure.”

“Can you perform the technique for me?” Asked the grey haired leader.

Naruto performed the technique and was rewarded with three dead and deformed clones.

“Hmm. Yes, I would agree with your mother, you do have too much chakra.” The Sandaime said. “Now, Naruto, there are other forms of the Bunshin, that are actually more useful. There’s the Mizu Bunshin that creates a solid clone out of water, and the Tsuchi Bunshin is made of earth. These require more chakra than normal, so you should be able to do those without problem. The only problem is that we don’t have any way to teach you those particular techniques. If you ever encounter them, do me a favor and copy them, that way we can write them down.” The old man chuckled at the joke. “The only other variation we have of the Bunshin is the Kage Bunshin (Shadow Clone) which takes up a large amount of chakra, but it creates solid clones. Unfortunately, since it uses such a large amount of chakra, it would be a bad idea to try and copy it, so you will have to learn it the old fashioned way. Now it is a Kinjutsu, so I can’t just give you a copy of the jutsu, but if you’ll stop by my office, oh say, this weekend, I will teach you how to perform the jutsu.”

Naruto sat in a chair and stared at the old man. He was going to learn a Kinjutsu! Plus, he would be able to pass the graduation exam this way!

“Okay, I’ll stop by over the weekend to learn this jutsu! See ya later, Old Man!” Naruto exclaimed as he exited the office.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

That weekend Naruto returned to the office of the Hokage to learn the forbidden technique Kage Bunshin. It turned out to be easier than he expected, but the old man didn’t lie when he said it used a lot of chakra. The principle behind the skill was simple enough, take a normal Bunshin and put about ten times more chakra than necessary to create one clone, and then another three or four times as much chakra to sustain it for any reasonable length of time. In the end it was very easy to see why it was forbidden. He had agreed to show Sasuke, but both boys realized that the full-blooded Uchiha didn’t have the chakra reserves necessary to perform the technique. However, the two did find another form of solid Bunshin they could both use. They were watching some of the different shinobi of the village train, and found Kakashi was dueling with a green- spandex clad man with thick eyebrows and a bowl cut, except that ‘Kakashi’ was a Mizu Bunshin. The two boys then conned the lazy jounin into showing them the technique, which they learned and used in their training routines.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Time moved quickly after that weekend. The two boys continued to train, although they also found time to do other activities. Both Naruto and Sasuke had become friends quickly with Shikamaru and Chouji, although it was mostly Naruto who hung out with the lazy boy and the potato chip addicted pre-teen. Sasuke had struck up a rivalry with Hyuuga Neji, the previous years number one rookie, and seemed to be competing against each other in just about everything.

After nearly three straight years of being rejected by Sasuke, many of his fan girls decided on another tactic, they tried to become friends with Naruto, Shikamaru, and Chouji. Naruto hasn’t been able to walk through town without being hounded for the last four months, while the other two boys have only recently become targets. Luckily for them, or terribly unlucky for Naruto, Shikamaru’s laziness and Chouji’s constant eating seemed to be turn-offs in their own right, while Naruto couldn’t claim any of the previous self defense mechanisms and was sorely tempted to try his mother’s tactics and begin to throw kunai indiscriminately.

The graduation exams rolled around and as expected Sasuke was slated to become rookie of the year, while the position of top kunoichi was in a heated argument between Yamanaka Ino and Haruno Sakura, both of whom were GIGANTIC Sasuke fan girls. Naruto was moving between the top half and top quarter of the class, largely due to his poor effort on written assignments, as he often responded when asked about his poor grades

“Who cares what the middle name of the Nidaime’s brother’s third youngest sister was? And who cares if Tsunade of the legendary Sannin is the granddaughter of the Shodaime, I mean honestly, when will that ever save my life.”

Of course, what people fail to notice while he is ranting on like this, is the fact that he knew that Tsunade was a) part of the legendary Sannin and b) was the granddaughter of the first Hokage. It was during one of these rants that he actually got to know Shikamaru, after the lazy genius noticed that Naruto knew those facts. While Naruto may have given up physical pranking for the most part, he still loved to mess with people’s heads.

As Naruto entered the exam room he felt confident that he would pass. Before he would have been worried sick over his inability to perform a Bunshin, but now he was able to two different kinds of Bunshin, he felt very sure in himself.

“Okay Naruto, you have to perform a Bunshin to pass.” Iruka said

Deciding to play it (relatively) safe, Naruto created three Mizu Bunshin from the glass of water on Iruka’s desk.

“Congratulations, you pass!” Iruka said, after he found his voice again and handed him a Konoha forehead protector. After that there was time for celebration.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The next day, Naruto and Sasuke showed up for their genin team assignments.

“I’d like to congratulate all of you for passing the exam. You are all true shinobi of Konohagakure and should always wear the symbol of the leaf with pride.” Iruka explained as he began assigning teams. It wasn’t until he reached team 7 that Naruto paid any attention.

“Team 7, Uchiha Sasuke, Uzumaki Naruto,” At this, the two brothers exchanged high fives and head nods in silent approval. “And Haruno Sakura.” Iruka finished.

“Team 8 will be…” But before Iruka could continue, he was cut off by Sakura’s voice

“Iruka-sensei, why am I on a team with Naruto? Won’t that make the teams unbalanced?” She asked in a way that made it sound less insulting than it really was.

“Normally you’d be right, Sakura, but Sasuke was the number one rookie, Naruto ended up around the middle of the class, and although you are the second ranked kunoichi, all of the teachers thought you could learn the most from being with Sasuke and Naruto.” Iruka explained.

“Now, Team 8 will be Aburame Shino, Hyuuga Hinata, and Inuzuka Kiba. Team 9…” and with that Naruto quit paying attention again. However he was rudely interrupted from his lazing when team 10 was announced.

“Team 10, Nara Shikamaru, Akimichi Chouji, and Yamanaka Ino.” This got a groan of displeasure from Shikamaru and Ino.

“Your jounin sensei’s will be here shortly to collect your teams.” Iruka explained before leaving the room as various jounin came into the room and picked up teams. Eventually the only team left was team 7. Sakura was trying to talk with Sasuke who had created a Mizu Bunshin and then used a basic camouflage jutsu to hide while he sat with Naruto, who was somewhere in between sleeping and daydreaming.

Two and a half hours later, a very late Kakashi entered the room, only to be hit on the head with an eraser. He was then forced to dodge two kunai, thrown by Sasuke and Naruto, while Sakura simply tried to stammer an apology for her ‘rude and childish teammate’, completely ignoring the fact that Sasuke had also thrown a kunai at the jounin, and if anything was aiming to do more damage than Naruto, since he was aiming for Kakashi’s ‘family jewels’.

“Well, my first impression of you guys is…I really don’t like you.” The pepper haired jounin replied. “Meet me on the roof.” With that he disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

When the three genin arrived at the roof, they found Kakashi sitting on a ledge, reading one of his perverted books. He noticed that Naruto and Sasuke arrived first, followed by a very wet, and very angry Sakura.

“What happened?” The jounin asked.

“She tried to hug a Mizu Bunshin.” Came Naruto’s reply, his face creeping into a large grin, which was mirrored by Sasuke.

“Anyway, why don’t you all introduce yourselves, you know, likes, dislikes, hobbies, dreams for the future, those kinds of things.” Kakashi ordered.

“Why don’t you go first?” Asked a drenched Sakura.

“My name is Hatake Kakashi, I don’t feel like telling you my likes, my dislikes are personal, as for dreams for the future…I suppose I have a couple of hobbies. Ok, you’re up Pinky.”

“My name is Haruno Sakura, my likes are” She glanced at Sasuke. “My dream for the future…” glanced at Sasuke again. “My hobbies…” stared at Sasuke. “I hate Naruto and Ino pig!”

‘Oh great, a love struck fan girl. How come all the kunoichi these days only care about boys? Why couldn’t I have gotten one like that girl Gai has? She’s very talented and useful.’ Kakashi sweat dropped, for the first time in his life, he actually envied Maito Gai. The world was ending, he was sure of it.

“Ok, one of you two, I don’t really care which one.” He said and motioned towards Naruto and Sasuke.

“My name is Uchiha Sasuke, I like my family, I dislike, no I HATE, my fan girls, I don’t have any hobbies, my dream is to start my own family and to help kaa-san.”

Of course this is what Sakura heard:

“I like my family…and Sakura. I want to marry Sakura and love her for all of eternity.”

This caused her to try and hug the Uchiha again, only to find herself hugging Kakashi, who Sasuke had used as a replacement. This, it was safe to say, caused Naruto to fall to the ground laughing harder than ever, clutching his sides.

“HA HA! My name is Uzumaki Naruto, HA HA HA! I like ramen and my family; I dislike any one who would hurt my family. My hobbies are trying out new ramen flavors, and training, and I want to become Hokage and HA HA help my family achieve their dreams!” He stated, his words turning into fits of laughter every once in a while.

“Well, that’s it for introductions; meet me tomorrow at seven o’clock at training ground 32 for survival training.” Kakashi exclaimed as he went to leave. But then he noticed that both boys had their sharingan active, hoping to copy the technique he used to teleport away earlier. He decided to simply take the stairs. As he walked away he heard the angered cries from the two:

“Damn you, we will figure out how you do that cool technique!”

Sakura was very VERY angry. It was nine o’clock in the morning, and neither her teammates nor sensei was at the training grounds. Sure Kakashi had shown up late yesterday, but surely he wouldn’t do the same thing twice, right? WRONG! Not only was he late, he was even later than yesterday. Not to mention the fact that Naruto and Sasuke weren’t there yet either. Just as she was about to storm out of the area and find her tardy teammates, the two boys in question appeared on the edge of the area, chatting and walking at a relaxed pace. Seeing the two walk in so casually made Sakura’s already boiling blood bubble over.

“WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TWO DOING?” She screamed at the boys when they came in range of her voice. “YOU’RE TWO HOURS LATE! Oh, Sasuke-kun, did that baka slow you down, I know you wouldn’t be late if he didn’t.” She gushed at her crush.

The pair was saved from answering her by the arrival of their grey-haired sensei.

“Yo!” Kakashi greeted the team with his standard introduction.

“YOU’RE LATE!” Sakura bellowed at the jounin.

“Well, you see, there was this dog attacking a mime, and he couldn’t call for help, so I had to spend the next hour trying to decipher his gestures. He wasn’t very good. Then when I took him to the hospital, he still refused to talk, even to give his name and other information, so that took a while.” Kakashi explained.

“You’re lying!” Sakura accused bitterly.

“Any way, your test is to get these from me, before this timer goes off.” Kakashi explained, showing the three two silver bells. “If you don’t, I’ll send you back to the academy.” He drawled lazily.

“But sensei, there are only two bells.” Sakura dumbly stated.

“Yes, well, this exam does have a high rate of failure.” Their sensei explained. “Well, the timer is set for noon, so you’ve got about three hours to get a bell. BEGIN!”

With that, the three gennin-hopefuls disappeared into the surrounding forest.

‘Well, Naruto and Sasuke are well hidden; they might actually be able to pass this time…if they can get Sakura to work with them.’ Kakashi thought, while taking note of the surroundings. All three gennin were hidden well, although he could still see them, but then again, he wasn’t a jounin for nothing.

Meanwhile, Sakura was watching Kakashi impatiently. She was sure that Naruto would jump the gun and attack their sensei first, but it seemed like he had more sense than she gave him credit for.

‘I must try and find Sasuke-kun, and then we can come up with a plan to get those bells.’ She thought as she searched the area for her crush; however she couldn’t find him or Naruto. She quietly moved around the shrubs and bushes trying to find the Uchiha heir but she failed. As time began to tick away, she became more and more worried. If she didn’t get a bell soon, she would never be on the same team as her beloved Sasuke-kun.

As she was searching, Kakashi found himself occupied with a two sided attack from the boys. Naruto attacked from the left and Sasuke the right. The boys targeted his feet, which the jounin easily dodged by jumping in the air, only to meet a pair of kunai thrown from the boys on his way up. He was taken by their thoroughness, the kunai didn’t leave him room to dodge them, and so he quickly blocked them.

Before he could be too proud of himself, he was knocked back towards earth by the boys, this time from above.

‘One set must be clones of some sort.’ Kakashi concluded. ‘But damn, that stung.’

He was met once again by two fists, courtesy of Naruto and Sasuke, his own weight increasing the force of the blow. However, his body was quickly replaced by a section of log.

‘Shit, Kawarimi!’ (Replacement technique) The boys thought, before scattering back into the woods to hide.

Meanwhile, Kakashi was nursing an aching back and thanking his lucky stars that the boys were slower coming up than going down. If the attack had been coordinated and struck at the same time, they might have very well gotten the bells.

Sakura saw the display of taijutsu from the tag team with mouth agape and eyes wide. Who knew that Naruto and Sasuke could fight so well together? This time she was able to keep her eyes trained on the boys and she quickly made her way towards the two before she was interrupted.

“Yo.” Kakashi’s voice traveled to her ears from behind and slightly above her and she quickly whirled around, kunai in her hand in a defensive stance. But when her eyes caught up to her body, she didn’t find her teacher. In fact, she didn’t find anything. What she did find, was a big black emptiness that engulfed her. Suddenly out of the darkness a weak voice emerged, calling for her assistance.

“S-sakura. Y-you need to…Kakashi h-he…” Sasuke’s broken voice was quickly followed up by his equally broken body, kunai puncturing his arms like a pin cushion and he was showing signs of obvious blood loss.

Upon seeing her crush’s deformed features, Sakura proceeded to promptly faint at the genjutsu she had been ensnared in. Kakashi was watching the kunoichi and sweat-dropped at her inability to recognize the obvious mental attack.

‘Ok, maybe Magen: Narakumi no Jutsu (Demonic Illusion: Hell Viewing Technique) was a little much.’ Kakashi thought, ‘Nah, it isn’t a high level genjutsu or anything, she should have been able to detect it, the report said she’d make a great genjutsu specialist, like Kurenai, now there’s a thought, how come she wasn’t put with her?’
Kakashi was unable to think too long, he still had two gennin to humiliate…or test, how ever he felt like seeing it.
Much to his dismay, however, the two siblings were very difficult to find, causing the jounin to consider using his dogs once or twice. But such tricks shouldn’t be wasted on gennin, and he decided to follow the sparse clues they left about for him. Twice he thought he had corned the duo, only to find them to be shadow clones using henge, or mizu bunshin.
‘These two would be very interesting to teach.’ The grey haired man mused.
Eventually, he was able to find them, his excellent tracking abilities and above average speed helped him locate the boys. They were in a clearing, taking stock of their kunai and other gear. They had shown great skill at trap setting and recognition. They had picked through the double layered traps he had laid with ease and it was unlikely that they would encounter more than two layers of traps.
Before he could even greet them, he was forced to dodge a set of kunai courtesy of Naruto and a swift taijutsu attack from Sasuke. Kakashi was able to block the right jab from the Uchiha, and the ensuing left round house kick. He even managed to grab the boy’s left hand as it flew towards his face, but it was during this period of fighting that Naruto snuck up from behind to grab the bells. With both of his hands occupied grappling with Sasuke, Kakashi couldn’t use any techniques to stop the younger boy. But he was an elite ninja after all, and he had the perfect solution to this problem. He tripped the attacking boy. Yep, Mr. ‘I’ll be the next Hokage’ was tripped and thus missed his chance to grab the silver bells that were so critical to their success.
Quickly, Kakashi threw Sasuke into his brother, giving him the space to perform a quick counter attack. As the boys picked themselves up from the ground they noticed the glaring absence of their sensei. However, they remembered a pearl of wisdom their mother had implanted with them.
‘If you can’t see your enemy, go to a place where you have a good defensive and observational position.’
The two scattered into the tree branches, just as Kakashi exploded from the ground. The two quickly flashed through the hand seals for Katon: Housenka no Jutsu (Fire type: Mythical Phoenix Flower) and peppered the surrounding area with the miniature fire balls. Kakashi was forced to dodge them and in doing so, moved him back towards a thick grove of trees.
‘These two will be interesting. Now if they could just figure out the true purpose of this test.’ The jounin mused to himself, dodging the joint attack from the boys once more.
Sasuke quickly flashed through the seals for Housenka no Jutsu once more, forcing the jounin to dodge to his right and confront Naruto who flashed through the seals for Katon: Goukakyuu no Jutsu (Fire type: Grand Fire ball) and inhaled deeply before launching a large ball of flame from his mouth. As the fire settled down, the duo was able to make out the form of a tree section, once more the victim of a Kawarimi no jutsu, courtesy of the masked jounin.
Said Jounin was currently cursing the two for actually making him work so hard to put them down. Their tandem style of attacking was very good, and both boys were better fighters than either of their profiles had indicated. Sasuke had much more chakra than his profile stated and a greater level of control as well. Naruto was simply faster and stronger than indicated. Together the two made an excellent team and in the coming years would prove to be invaluable to the leaf. As he was mulling this over in his mind, he heard the ring of the timer, indicating that the three had run out of time.
“Well, I guess that it’s Sakura I’ll be tying to the tree this time.” Kakashi stated more to himself than to the boys who were stewing over their inability to retrieve the bells.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Sakura opened her eyes and found herself staring at her sensei. Well actually she was staring at his legs and when she tried to stand up, she found herself tied to a large wooden stump. To her right were the boys who still seemed angry that they hadn’t retrieved the bells.

“Well, that was…informative.” The voice of her tardy sensei drifted towards her ears.

“Sakura…your profile stated that you were excellent at recognizing genjutsu, but you fell for a fairly simple one. If you can’t focus under pressure, then you will not survive your first battle between ninja. Sasuke and Naruto…your planning was excellent…your execution was nearly flawless…and you both showed great potential, but you lost track of time, which is one of the more important things a shinobi must keep track of, especially in the field. Although you all failed, Naruto and Sasuke showed that the records of this village are a bit out dated, so I will give you another chance. But it will be much harder than before.” He tossed two bentos towards the boys. “You two can eat…but don’t give any to Sakura. Be ready to come at me with the intent to kill me after lunch.”

With that he, poofed away in a cloud of white smoke leaving the threesome alone. The boys began to eat their lunches, but stopped about half way through. Sakura was inwardly fuming over the fact that it was her own uselessness that nearly cost them their opportunity to become gennin. Her stomach was growling, already having digested her light breakfast, and wishing that she could eat the food the boys had left over. It came as a great surprise to her when the two boys offered their remaining food to the pink haired girl.

“Here, eat up.” Sasuke directed.

“But…but…Kakashi-sensei told you guys not to give me any food.” She dumbly stated.

“Yeah, but he isn’t here right now, and besides, we’re pretty sure the idea of the test is to exhibit team work. I mean, why else would teams be made of three people, he can’t send one of us back to the academy, it’s either all or nothing.” Naruto explained, filling her in on the conversation he and Sasuke had earlier as Sasuke cut through the ropes tying her to the stump. Sakura quickly rubbed the feeling back into her wrists and was about to take the first bite of food, when Kakashi reappeared in another cloud of smoke.

“YOU…YOU…pass.” His voice changing from unbridled fury to a complementary tone in mere seconds.

He was greeted by two smirks and a look of surprise from his students.

“Naruto and Sasuke were right, you are a in a three man team for a reason. I can’t fail just one or two of you, its all or nothing. Sasuke and Naruto showed that they could work together very well, but to be a team, the three of you must be willing to cooperate and work as a team. Do you see that monument over there? That is the monument for fallen heroes. They have all died in the name of this village. Some of them should be here right now, walking around…but they aren’t because they either couldn’t…or didn’t work as a team. Remember, the three of you are a team, but you are more than just three names on a piece of paper in some filing cabinet. To become a complete team, you must trust each other to do what you alone cannot. From this point forth, you are team 7, but you must become comrades and friends if you truly wish to become a team. Remember, in this world of shinobi, those who break the rules are considered trash… none of the other ‘teams’ I have ‘instructed’ shared their food with the other member, they were foolish enough to listen to my instructions, but those who would abandon their friends…they are worse than trash.”

The three gennin sat, listening to Kakashi’s explanation; they were all thinking the same thing. ‘It seems like he knows this from personal experience. Come to think of it…he probably does.’

“Well, anyway, meet me at the Hokage tower tomorrow for your first mission.” With that, Kakashi poofed away in a cloud of smoke to the chorus of curses coming from the two boys.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

That night there was a celebration in the Mitarashi household. Anko took the boys out to dinner for their accomplishments. She told the boys that no one had ever passed Kakashi’s test before, so she was really proud of them. She bought each of her sons a new set of kunai as well as an imitation of her own trademark trench coat. Sasuke’s was a dark dark blue that almost seemed black and had the Uchiha crest on the back. It had many hidden pockets for carrying weapons as well as other supplies. Naruto’s was a dark grey and the only markings on it, was the hybrid Uchiha fan and Uzumaki swirl design he had created. It was proudly worn on the collar of his coat. It was a great surprise when the Sandaime also gave them some gifts. Sasuke received a very old manual from the Hokage, that was supposedly from his ancestors. It was all about how to manipulate fire for different techniques and is thought to have lead to the creation of many of the newer fire jutsu. Naruto received different books and scrolls that taught the basics of sealing. The Sandaime explained that while the Yondaime didn’t have a bloodline limit in the traditional sense, he did create many different seals that could only be used by people of his blood.

Sarutobi had learned, in his many dealings with Naruto, that if any information was written down, the boy would pick it up very quickly. It was when information was simply shown to him, or during oral examinations that the boys struggled. In truth, Sarutobi knew the two types of clone he had mentioned to the boy, but he couldn’t teach them to Naruto. He knew that sooner or later, the boys would probably copy the Mizu bunshin from Kakashi, or an opponent, as for the tsuchi bunshin…Sarutobi him self had learned the technique as a gift when he first became Hokage, with the understanding that he never write it down or teach it to anyone. He wasn’t going to break the trust of the elderly Tsuchikage over a matter as trivial as a technique. As he watched the family finish dinner and joke around, he couldn’t help but be proud. The will of fire was clearly evident in this young generation, and it shone on a bright future for Konoha.

Anko was exceptionally proud of her sons; however, she also was a bit weary for them. Naruto had never been outside of the village, both for his own safety; there was talk of an organization which was interested in the demon vessels, and because of what he might possibly represent to the village. A weapon of great power. She shuddered every time she thought of her son that way. She had heard rumors of another vessel, from the Wind country, who had a taste for blood and was about her son’s age. She only hoped that they didn’t come to the next chunin exam, or there might be a fight of catastrophic size. Sasuke hadn’t been outside the village since the massacre. Since he represented the last of a bloodline, his survival was key to the village, letting him go away would be a golden opportunity for assassins from other villages. When they left the village on a mission…she didn’t know how they would react. Naruto would probably like it, a chance to see something new, learn new techniques, or just meet new people. Sasuke…she didn’t know how he would take it. In the almost three years since he had been living with her, he had changed remarkably. He was lively and energetic, he was obsessive with his training, but Naruto was able to reach him, and she was glad. If he had turned into an avenger, she didn’t know what she would have done. ‘Probably beat him into a pulp.’ She mused to herself. It was then that she decided to be a part of her son’s first mission outside of the village. That way, they would have a familiar face if something were to go wrong. ‘What am I thinking?’ she mentally berated herself, ‘They have to do a bunch of crappy D-rank missions first. I wonder who will take it the worst? Naruto? Or Sasuke?’ She couldn’t help but smile and snicker at the mental images of her sons faces when they found out that their first twenty or so missions would probably involve weeding some lazy civilian’s garden.

Two weeks have passed since Team 7 passed their test, and the members were well entrenched into the shinobi life by now. They were used to getting up early, only to remember that Kakashi was always two hours late, they were used to training, which consisted mainly of physical exercises and light sparring. But, they weren’t used to the crappy D-rank missions they were receiving. While Sasuke kept up an emotionless facade, he was inwardly steaming, swearing on the graves of his deceased parents, that if he had to weed one more garden, he was going to find a way to resurrect the dead members of the clan and then kill them himself. Naruto was angry as well, he was pissed that he was doing grunt work when he could be off chasing bandits or doing something productive, like training…or eating ramen, anything to stop the monotony. Sakura was getting bored doing the same tedious jobs over and over, but she was also glad that these short missions gave the team ample time to train, something she realized she needed to do much more of.

She was currently waiting for her three other teammates at their regular meeting place, a small bridge that spanned a small river and was roughly half ways between the three genin’s houses. She was adamant about punctuality and continued to show up before her teammates, although now it was only about ten minutes before the others now. She was currently researching different ways to increase her power. Given that she had excellent chakra control, albeit a small amount, she found two different fields that were perfect for her, medicine and genjutsu. She was trying to figure out which area to concentrate on, but was having a hard time deciding.

The two weeks had shown a marked increase in the trio’s teamwork. She learned a lot about her teammates and was rethinking her previous notions about them, especially Naruto. Before, she would have written the multicolored haired boy off as a general idiot and fool that had only just squeaked by the academy, but now…he had proven himself to be intelligent, physically strong, and cheerful, despite these strange looks he often received. Sakura had heard rumors about her teammate, but she didn’t know what to think of them. From what she had pieced together (she would never just go up and ask him) he had been separated from his mother after the Kyuubi attack and not rejoined with her until he was seven. His mother was a jounin and was the former apprentice of the traitor Sannin, Orochimaru. Due to her connections with the powerful ninja, she was often disrespected and sometimes hated. For whatever reason, Sasuke had moved in with the two and had been living with them since his family died.

‘But, just because the people don’t like his mom, do they really hate him?’ she thought.
When she told her sensei that the things she disliked were Ino and Naruto, she was basing those on what she had seen. Many of the civilians of the village often shot glares at the boy and muttered curses behind his back. When she asked her parents why, the answer she was looking for was skirted and if her parents were in a good mood, they would simply tell her she wouldn’t understand and that she should probably keep her distance from him.

Yet all of the new data she had told her that Naruto was trustworthy and protective of his teammates and would never hurt anyone that didn’t deserve it. He was a mystery, and she would figure him out sooner or later.

As Sakura was contemplating Naruto’s life, the rest of her team was making their way towards the bridge for their next mission. She absentmindedly greeted the boys as they arrived only minutes before Kakashi showed up and they made their way towards the Hokage Tower for their assignment.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

‘Damn them! Damn them to hell!’ Sakura was fuming as she waited for her tardy sensei. Some how, the boys had managed to talk the Hokage into giving them a C-rank mission instead of the boring and safe D-rank ones they normally got. She was beside herself, she didn’t want to look weak in front of Sasuke, but she doubted her ability to perform up to par on the harder mission. Hence the cursing of her teammates…them and that annoyingly late sensei! ‘I mean, would it kill him to be on time once?’ Apparently it would, because he was running an astounding two and a half hours late. If he didn’t have the client with them, than the three would have left a long time ago, with or without Kakashi. The threat potential on C-level missions was mostly bandits and those were rare.

“Yo, sorry we’re late, there was this drowning fish and it needed to be given CPR and someone glued my mask to my face, so I had to instruct Tazuna-san, here how to do it.” Kakashi greeted the trio with a smile (or at least what they had come to interpret as a smile) and a wave of his head. Tazuna was simply staring at the man in disbelief.
‘He was buying supplies and he tells them I was giving CPR to a fish?’ Tazuna thought as Sakura yelled “LIAR!” at the jounin.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The group was walking along the road between Konoha and the Wave Country and it was very boring. The only interesting thing was a quick lesson about the different Shinobi nations and their leaders. Besides the Hokage (When this was mentioned Naruto supplied that he would be the greatest Hokage of all time one day), there was the Raikage, Kazekage, Mizukage, and Tsuchikage, who were the leaders of the Cloud village, Sand village, Mist village and Stone village, respectfully.

When he was done talking the team and their charge drifted back into a lull of inactivity. Naruto, who was in the front was searching for signs of bandit attacks or ambushes, Sasuke who was behind him was mostly sightseeing and enjoying his time out of the village, Tazuna was worried that he was sending these three kids to their death if they were to encounter the true reason he needed escorting and Sakura returned to pondering over her teammates. They became so entrenched in their various activities that when an inconspicuous puddle came into view, no one immediately realized that something was wrong. Kakashi was the first to notice that a rather large puddle had formed in the road when there hadn’t been any rain for days. Naruto probably would have overlooked it, if he hadn’t been bored and activated his sharingan. It was a habit he had developed, although he wasn’t sure why, but if he got bored, he would activate the sharingan and try to copy new jutsu or just the way people acted and walked. On this occasion he saw the chakra flowing from the deposit of water and silently signaled Sasuke that there were enemies about. Sasuke, in turn, turned towards Kakashi, catching the attention of Sakura, but the jounin didn’t seem to be paying attention, but Sasuke noticed his eyes were harder than normal.

‘He must have noticed them.’ He reasoned and turned his attention to the front, where Naruto was deciding what to do.

‘This is a C-rank; there shouldn’t be any chance of shinobi encounters.’ Naruto reasoned to himself. ‘But if I attack them and they aren’t after Tazuna-san, then I could start something I can’t get out of.’ He gulped at the thought of possibly attacking another jounin. He settled for a simple strategy, he passed through the puddle and watching the reaction of the liquid, trodding in it purposely. Sasuke followed suit, but Sakura and Tazuna walked around it, while Kakashi just ignored it.

As he passed, the puddle quickly changed shape into two men, whose faces were covered with horned masks bearing the symbol of the Hidden Mist village. They had metal gauntlets on their arms, connected by a serrated metal chain, which was covered with a deadly poison. The masked duo quickly ran forward and wrapped their chain around Kakashi and before anyone could do much more than look surprised, they pulled the sharp chain through the jounin, separating his body into many different sections.

“One down!” Their voices were given a deeper timbre by the masks they wore, and they were good tag team fighters.

They quickly moved towards Tazuna and Sakura. Sakura was frozen, seeing her sensei ripped apart by the two masked ninja in front of her, and it wasn’t until the forms of Naruto and Sasuke leapt in front of her and their client that she realized how close the two attackers were.

Naruto completed the seals for Katon: Housenka no Jutsu, forcing the pair to either jump up, due to the area covered by the small fire balls, or disengage the chain and dodge separately. The pair jumped up into the air, just as Naruto intended for them, only to be greeted by a much larger fire ball, courtesy of Sasuke. The ball of intense flame connected with the pair, although they were able to lessen much of the damage by disconnecting the chain and twisting to the side. It was during the masked men’s dodge that Naruto leapt into the air and threw a pair of kunai attached with wire at the pair, successfully capturing one ninja, the kunai acting as weights like a bola and then embedding themselves into a tree, with just the slightest help from the boy’s bloodline.

Meanwhile, Sasuke was engaged with the other ninja in a taijutsu match. He was easily dodging the slowed blows, thanks to a combination of sharingan and the fact that the armor of his foe was slowing him down. The masked ninja launched a clawed palm at the Uchiha’s face, only for the boy to duck under the blow and land a straight jab into the attacking shinobi’s stomach, doubling him over. Before the mist ninja could even blink, Sasuke’s knee connected with his face, sending his head reeling backwards once more exposing his stomach. His clawed hands flew to his face to staunch the blood flowing from his nose. Only then did the Mist ninja remember the poison on his over-sized clawed gloves. Upon impact with his face, the poison on his claws mixed with the blood that was trickling into his mouth through the crack in his mask caused by the boy he was fighting. At first he staggered backwards, probably from the force of Sasuke’s knee, but he quickly dropped to his knees before falling on his stomach, dead. Seeing his brother’s death, the second ninja tried to cut himself with his own gauntlet, only for it to be forcibly held to his side by an unseen force.

“Now, now, we need someone to question.” Naruto grinned at the captured foe.

“Excellent work, you two.” Kakashi’s lazy voice greeted the ninjas and their charge.

“Sensei…but how…you…chain…died?” Sakura’s gaping mouth was able to form that disconnected sentence after the initial shock of her sensei’s return wore off. She glanced at the pieces of his body, a twig was sticking out of his mid section…wait! A twig? He had used Kawarimi before the deadly duo had cut him with the chain and substituted himself with a section of tree.

Kakashi turned to face the captured man and asked who their target was. The masked ninja didn’t reply. He reached up and lifted his forehead protector, but from the position of the genin, they couldn’t see what he was doing. After a moment the incapacitated ninja’s eyes widened in horror and he began to scream and yell

“The bridge maker!” Over and over until he passed out.

Lowering his headband, Kakashi turned and leveled his gaze at Tazuna.

“It would seem,” He started, “that Tazuna-san needs to explain a few things before we
continue.”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

‘Damn it, damn it, damn it!’ Sakura was more than angry with her luck today. First of all, she was sent on a mission she probably wasn’t ready for, and now she was on a mission she definitely wasn’t ready for. ‘Damn that drunken man!’ As she cussed out Tazuna she wondered who she was more pissed off at. Tazuna, the man who had lied about the mission specs or Gato, the man who was harassing the people of the Wave village. The other thought floating around in her mind, was her sensei. What was hidden under his protector that it would cause an assassin to cry out in horror? ‘Maybe he lost his eye and he showed him the empty socket.’ She thought, shuddering at the thought.

After Tazuna explained that he was trying to bring relief to the oppressed village by means of the new bridge he was building, much of the mystery surrounding the attack of the Nuke-nin was resolved. The Wave country/village was a once thriving place, until Gato, a ruthless businessman had set his sights on it. He had entered and wrecked the economy of the town through blockades and violence. If the bridge was completed it would be a gateway for new supplies and goods to enter the town. After some discussion, and more than a little ‘crying’ from Tazuna, the team decided it would continue the mission. If the bridge was completed than not only would the economy of the village return, but trade between the Konoha and the hopefully reinvigorated sea town would blossom. They would request assistance when they reached the relative safety of the town. Kakashi explained that the mission was at least B-rank now, and if they encountered a jounin ninja it would escalate again to A-rank.

The group was making good time after the ambush and had an uneventful trip across the water surrounding the Wave country. After they made landfall, they headed towards Tazuna’s house so they could send for help. About midway between the house and their landing spot, Naruto, who was leading the group still, suddenly threw a kunai at a bush to his left. Sasuke quickly followed suit, adding a Goukakyuu no Jutsu to scorch the area in case Naruto hit anything. As the foliage began to burn down a bit, they discovered a rather terrified snowshoe hare, hugging against the farthest tree for his life. Kakashi quickly doused the fire with a small suiton jutsu. However he pondered about the appearance of the hare.

‘Hmm, that’s a snow hare, but it hasn’t molted yet, it’s the middle of summer, it should have turned brown by now. Unless…it was raised to be used in a replacement. It seems that tougher competition has arrived.’ He was sure to keep his visible eye open for any signs of their enemy. It was a good thing too, because not five minutes after his genins almost barbecued an innocent hare, a giant sword came flying at the team from behind.

“EVERYONE, GET DOWN NOW!” He ordered, throwing himself at the ground as Sasuke and Sakura managed to bring down their ward and Naruto flattened himself out as well.

The sword embedded itself into the trunk of a large tree, and when the group raised their heads to look at the weapon, they found a fairly tall man with spiky brown hair, his forehead protector was askew to his left and his mouth was covered in bandages. He wore no shirt, but his forearms were covered in camouflaged warmers and he stood on his sword with an air of confidence.

“Ah, the copy-ninja, Hatake Kakashi, no wonder the Demon brothers failed to kill the bridge builder.” His voice was deep and ominous, sending chills down the backs of Tazuna and Sakura. Naruto and Sasuke were affected a bit, but it was less intense, due to their mothers training.

“Momochi Zabuza, Nuke-nin of Kirigakure. As you can see, I too read the bingo book.” Kakashi replied, his voice didn’t carry any of his usual laziness. He once more reached up and lifted the barrier obscuring his left eye.

“Oh, the sharingan, I get to see it already. How interesting.” Zabuza leapt off his large head cleaver and onto the surface of the water, taking the large sword with him in one movement. He raised his right hand up to his face and raised the index and middle fingers, while his left arm stood straight up, the fingers mimicking those of his other hand. A thick fog suddenly rolled through the area, obscuring the woods and its occupants.

The chakra being released by the two jounins was something to be in awe of. Sakura, who was much more aware of chakra signatures than the boys, was having a hard time refraining from screaming in terror, the killing intent of the enemy jounin was focused at the genin and their instructor.

“Don’t worry Sakura; I won’t let any of my teammates die.” Kakashi turned towards the team, his eyes closed and a smile played on his lips. Running vertical along the center of his left eye was a long since healed scar. This lead to another train of thought for the pink haired girl.

‘I thought the sharingan was the bloodline of the Uchiha clan, but then how does Kakashi-sensei have it? Is he related to Sasuke-kun maybe?’

Suddenly, Zabuza appeared in the center of the defensive perimeter the team had set up around Tazuna, sword stretched across his back, ready to slay the three genin. But almost as soon as he appeared, Kakashi was there, planting a kunai into the side of the enemy, only for the body to turn to water and fall to the ground in a pool of liquid.

‘Mizu bunshin!’ he thought as he quickly searched for the missing Nin. However, Zabuza got the upper hand and appeared behind the leaf jounin; his sword swung at Kakashi’s waist and ripped him apart, only for the grey haired man to turn into water as well. Zabuza’s eyes opened in astonishment. ‘He copied my technique in this fog? The sharingan truly is a weapon to be feared.’

As he finished thinking, Zabuza felt the unmistakable edge of a kunai pressed against his neck.

“It’s over.” Kakashi said, coldly.

“Are you sure about that?”

Suddenly ‘Zabuza’ dissolved into water once more, the product of a mizu bunshin. This time it was Kakashi’s eyes that widened. He suddenly found himself flying towards the river a few meters away from the group. He didn’t notice the impact of Zabuza’s leg, but it was strong enough to send him into the water.

Zabuza rushed towards the river, before stopping suddenly.

“Makibishi. Good try, but not good enough, Kakashi.”

He quickly back flipped onto the rivers surface once more. Kakashi’s head broke the surface of the lake, trying to find his adversary, only to realize that it was far too late. Zabuza stood at his side, forming hand seals very quickly.

“Suirou no Jutsu!” (Water type: Water prison technique) He spoke the jutsu with practiced ease and the surrounding water quickly engulfed Kakashi into a swirling sphere of water. Zabuza’s right arm was sticking into the sphere, holding it together and increasing the density of the water to trap the illustrious copy ninja.

“Run! He can’t follow you while he keeps this jutsu up!” Kakashi pleaded with his team.

Naruto let out a short laugh. “Nope, not gonna happen sensei, ‘those that would abandon their comrades are worse than trash’ right?” He gave his brother a quick look and the two rushed the mist jounin, only to stop at the waters edge when Zabuza created a mizu bunshin without using hand seals. The two boys attacked the clone, but were thrown back by the flat of the giant sword their attacker wielded.

Searching the surrounding area for anything that could be used to fight off the clone, something on the ground caught Sasuke’s eye.

“Hey, Naruto…” He gestured towards the ground off to the side of the clone that was steadily making its way towards the boys.

Naruto looked towards his teammate was indicating and got the meaning of the unspoken sentence.

“Well, shit, I didn’t want to do it, but you got a point.” The blondish boy spoke, before raising his arm and pointing it to the left of the clone, his eyes closed in concentration.
Meanwhile, Sasuke was throwing shuriken and kunai at the clone, only for them to be blocked by the giant sword. Thinking quickly he created a mizu bunshin from the river and used it to catch the clone in a pincer move, but the jounin’s clone was much too strong and destroyed the clone before once more kicking the Uchiha away.

“Hm, those students of yours are weak.” Zabuza commented, off handedly to Kakashi.

The Konoha jounin didn’t respond, but watched his students fight against a superior opponent. He watched as Sasuke was once more repelled and fell to the ground. But as he rose, both of the jounin noticed that his face wasn’t contorted in pain or frustration, but plastered with a smirk of superiority.

“Naruto, NOW!” Sasuke yelled.

Naruto simply smirked, eerily reminiscent of his brother, and waved his arm. In a fraction of a second, the mizu bunshin disintegrated and Zabuza was hit with an unseen force and the shock of the attack forced him to release the water prison.

‘What was that?’ Sakura wondered in awe.

Zabuza’s right arm began to drip blood as he brought it to his face to inspect the damage. He found the small makibishi lodged in his arm and stomach. The spiked pieces of metal, normally used to impede enemy’s movements, had become a rather effective ranged weapon.

‘How the hell did that brat do that?’ He cursed mentally, drawing his sword and advancing towards the duo, until he was stopped by Kakashi’s figure rising from the river in front of him.

“Your fight is with me.” He calmly stated, locking eyes with Zabuza.

‘Damn it, this guy is pissing me off.’ Zabuza commented to himself as he began the hand seals for the Suiton Suiryuudan no Jutsu (Water type: Water Dragon Technique). As he flashed through the seals he noticed something peculiar in the behavior of his opponent. He was doing the exact same seals…at the exact same time.

“Suiton Suiryuudan!” Both jounin’s cried out at the same time. Two dragons composed of water rose from the raging river and spiraled at their intended target, only to crash into each other.

“Damn it, it’s like he knows…” Zabuza started

“What I’m going to do next.” Kakashi finished.

Zabuza’s eyes widened in shock as the copy Nin read his thoughts.

“Damn you…” Zabuza cursed

“Insignificant monkey!” Kakashi once more supplied the demon of the mist with the end of his sentence. This time Zabuza didn’t respond and just ran through the seals for Suiton Daibakufu no Jutsu. (Water type: Great Waterfall technique) Kakashi once more imitated his opponent, and when Zabuza locked eyes with his opponent once more, he was startled to find not only Kakashi, but the ghostly figure of himself, standing behind him. Zabuza slowed his seals just a fraction of a second, but it was enough for Kakashi to finish. The water on which the two were standing began to churn around the two and rise up, creating a tidal wave that crashed against the rooted body of Momochi Zabuza.

Zabuza felt his body slam into the trunk of a tree, before he was pinned to the trunk with kunai.

“How is it…that you can see the future?” He asked groggily.

“Your future…is death.” Kakashi began to move forward, kunai in hand, but was stopped as two metallic needles slammed into the incapacitated jounin’s neck, killing him instantly. Everyone in the small clearing created by the battle followed the path of the needles to a masked figure standing on the tree.

“Thanks, I’ve been looking to kill Zabuza for quit some time. You were right, his future was death.” The person spoke in a voice that sounded like he was the age of the genin, maybe a year or two older, but there was no appreciable difference.

“Ah, a mist hunter-nin.” Kakashi said and lowered his headband, covering the sharingan once more.

The hunter Nin disappeared in a swirl of leaves, before reappearing next to the body of Zabuza. After a quick series of hand seals, the two disappeared, leaving only Team 7 and Tazuna.

“Well this sucks.” Kakashi said, before crumpling to the ground and passing out.
“Kakashi-sensei!” Sakura cried out and ran to the side of her teacher to check on him. He appeared to be fine, but he seemed tired some how.

“Come on, lets take him to my house, it’s just a ways to town from here.” Tazuna offered, still in awe at how the team handled themselves.

Kakashi slowly regained consciousness, and with it, all of the aches and pains that come with chakra exhaustion.

“I wonder how long I was out for this time?” The lazy jounin asked to no one. He opened his one visible eye and found himself laying on a futon in a room he didn’t recognize. Shortly afterwards the door opened to reveal his team in varying states of exhaustion.

“Only a day and a half, actually.” Came the reply to his seemingly rhetorical question, from the last remaining Uchiha.

“Were you training?” He asked the genin.

“Just a little bit sensei.” Naruto replied. “Mostly just some taijutsu.”

Kakashi nodded in approval and attempted to sit up a bit, succeeding after two tries.

“It is imperative that we send for help.” He said, his voice in a dead serious tone. “Zabuza is alive; the standard procedure for hunter-nin is to dispose of the body on sight, not to take it somewhere else. I think that the ‘hunter’ was working with Zabuza and simply put him in a death-like state. He is still alive and has at least one person working with him. If his partner is skilled enough in the medical arts, which I think they must be because the knowledge needed to put someone in a death like state is well above average, than we have about two weeks or so until Zabuza is well enough to attack again.”

This brought a gasp from the genin who thought the ex-mist ninja was out of the picture.

“Sasuke or Naruto, do either of you have a summoning scroll for a messenger bird?” Kakashi asked.

Both boys nodded their heads in the affirmative and produced two identical scrolls.

“Good, I need one of you to send a message to the Hokage, requesting back up. Right now, the three of you aren’t strong enough to fight either of the two foes we have identified right now. But I plan on changing that.” His last sentence was accompanied by a slight smirk, barely evident through the fabric of his mask.

While the boys saw this as a good thing, Sakura didn’t like the look her sensei had. Not one bit.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The next day dawned early and with not a single cloud in the sky, although the genin didn’t have the time to admire the surrounding wilderness. Kakashi had taken the team to a location in the forest surrounding Tazuna’s house. There were trees every direction one could look and a stream about four feet deep ran through the forest, bisecting the trees into two distinctive areas.

“Now, I’m going to teach the three of you to control your chakra. This will help you conserve chakra when it comes to battles you may fight later on. Theoretically, if you master even basic chakra control, you can perform any technique. Of course that is theoretically and based also on the size of your chakra reserves, but don’t worry too much about it. Now, Naruto, and I assume Sasuke have already completed the exercise I’m going to give you, Sakura, so they’ll have to do something else. All right, Sakura, you will be climbing trees.”

The pink haired girl’s face contorted into a look of confusion, before she asked how that was going to help her chakra control.

“Well, you see…you won’t be using your hands.” Kakashi replied, and proceeded to walk straight up the closest tree, crutches and all, without his hands. “It is said that the soles of the feet are the hardest part of the body to gather chakra to, so this will help with proper molding, but also, if you use too much or too little chakra, you won’t stick to the three, so it will also help with your precise control over the amount you use.”

Sakura pondered over her strategy to conquer this stage obstacle, before she pulled her hands into the ram seal and gathered chakra to her feet.

“If you feel uneasy about this, you might consider running at the tree.” Her sensei suggested.

Sakura ran at the tree at top speed and was able to run more than three quarters of the way up, before she fell back to earth and landing on her feet after a graceful back flip.

“Very impressive Sakura, you didn’t make the top because of poor control, but because your reserves are so small.” Kakashi explained to the three genin. “I want you to continue to run up and down the trees when ever you can, this way, your reserves will increase significantly.”

Sakura nodded and continued with her exercise. Meanwhile Kakashi turned his attention to his two remaining students.

“The exercise you two will be doing is called water walking, and it sounds exactly like what it is.” He walked out on top of the water and stood on the surface. Suddenly he wobbled a bit and quickly returned to shore. “As you could probably tell, this requires much more chakra to perform. During the tree climbing exercise, the goal was to release a constant amount of chakra to stick to the tree. With this exercise, the goal is to release the correct amount of chakra, and then keep control of it away from your body. You see, the chakra you release in this exercise, isn’t going to be trapped by the tree, so you have to create ‘stilts’ with your chakra and push them to the bottom of the water. The stream of chakra must be constant and controlled. If we were in Konoha, we would practice over a hot spring, but since were here, this river will have to do.”

When the copy ninja had finished the directions, the two boys began to test out the new skill. It was slow going, especially for Naruto, since he had so much excess chakra. Sasuke was able to steady himself on the surface by noon, but Naruto was struggling. His feet were battling the water, surfacing and then submerging once more. They took a break at noon and reunited with Sakura, who was very tired by now and could use the rest.

After lunch they returned to their assigned tasks and continued to struggle. Sakura had made it to the top of a thirty foot tall tree a few times, but when she tried other trees, she seemed to top out at around thirty five feet or so. She assumed it had to do with her small chakra reserves. The boys were a different story all together. After his initial success with water walking, Sasuke was having a small amount of difficulty. He was able to stand on top of the water fine, but if he tried moving more than small baby steps, he would loose control and wet his feet with cold river water. Since he wasn’t the chakra monster his brother was, he took a break around two in the afternoon and continued reading the information the Hokage had passed onto him. The actual manuscript was too valuable to bring with him, but he had taken many notes on the information contained within, and brought those. The steps outlined to control fire weren’t exceedingly complex, but required a good amount of control to do.

Naruto was still having troubles with the exercise, but he was now able to stand on the water, but any attempt at movement would throw off his control. But he kept at it, and while Sasuke was practicing some fire control skills, Naruto was finally able to move a bit…albeit, unconventionally. Having troubles keeping his chakra at a consistent level away from his body, he simply used his chakra to skate along the surface of the water. It was effective, but it wasn’t the point of the exercise.

When Kakashi returned later, he noticed the improvement his students had made. Sakura had improved her reserves somewhat, it wouldn’t be an instantaneous process, but he was quite happy with her improvement. The boys…well Sasuke had been able to stand on the surface easily, and then take a few steps, but after two or three his control or reserves faltered and he would fall in. ‘Nothing another day or two of practice wouldn’t fix.’ Kakashi thought to himself. Naruto, on the other hand, was making slight progress, he could stand on the water, but taking any steps, larger than an inch or two was impossible. He did show of his new ‘skating’ ability, and while it impressed Kakashi and Sakura, (reluctantly) Kakashi was quick to point out that it wasn’t the goal of the exercise to skate, but to walk.

The team began to head back to Tazuna’s house for dinner in a comfortable silence, the genin were either too tired or annoyed to speak much.

“Oh, yeah, before I forget, the back up I requested will be here tomorrow, so I’d make use of the day training, since you might not get too much more time.” Kakashi said, still reading that perverted orange book of his.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The next day was typical of the Wave country, sunny with morning dew rising off the grass and a light fog rolling in off the surrounding water. The genin spent the first half of their day continuing with their chakra control exercises from yesterday. After lunch, Sakura had tentatively tried the water walking exercise and decided that she needed to expand her reserves much more before trying it. Sasuke had almost gotten the trick of the exercise and was almost able to walk from one shore to the other, although his feet would slip under the surface of the river once and again. Naruto was making progress as well, especially after some tips from his brother, who watched how Naruto was molding his chakra. They were almost even in terms of control, but Naruto was slightly behind Sasuke, if only because of his abnormal amount of chakra.

As the group headed towards their ‘home’, the boys felt a chakra signature approaching quickly, and took up defensive positions around Sakura, who was confused at the sudden behavior of her teammates. Almost as soon as Sakura figured out someone was coming, her teammates were uneasily shifting their weight from one foot to the other and searching their surroundings for any disturbances. Suddenly realization dawned on the boys and they quickly turned tail and ran towards the house.

“Wait, what’s going on?” Sakura yelled at her teammate’s backs.

“Um, nothing…nothing…just um, DON’T TELL HER ANYTHING!” Naruto yelled and added a burst of speed to distance himself from his teammate.

This left one pink haired kunoichi very confused as she suddenly felt a figure drop from the trees behind her. She whirled around and drew a kunai, only to find her ‘attacker’ was wearing a Konoha head band along with a trench coat and was staring in the direction that Sasuke and Naruto had run off.

“Um, can I help you?” Sakura asked.

“They ran off that way, didn’t they?” The figure asked in a rhetorical way.

“Y-yes.” Sakura stammered, she felt the killer intent rolling off this new figure and was very frightened by it.

“Thanks.” The mysterious figure said with a smile, before disappearing once more, her trench coat flowing behind her.

Sakura shrugged her shoulders and continued back towards the house.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

When she returned to Tazuna’s house, she was greeted by her sensei and Tazuna’s daughter Tsunami.

“Hey, sensei, I saw this really strange lady, and she had a Konoha head band, is she our back up?” Sakura asked as she accepted a glass of water from Tsunami.

“Yes, that would be Mitarashi Anko, who I believe right now…is yelling at Sasuke and Naruto.” Kakashi answered without looking up from his book. He was correct, because if Sakura listened very carefully, she could make out sounds coming from up stairs that sounded like either yelling…or murder, it really could have been either one.

Suddenly, Naruto and Sasuke ran through the kitchen and out the door, followed by a set of kunai, which embedded themselves in the table.

“Get back here! I’m not done with you two yet!” Anko yelled from the top of a flight of stairs that lead to the bed rooms.

“Um...Kaa-san… I don’t mean to be rude or anything…but… no!” Naruto yelled back over his shoulder, still running for his life, Sasuke ahead of him. He hadn’t stuck around to ‘talk’ with Anko.

‘So that’s Naruto and Sasuke’s mom.’ Sakura thought as she watched the woman at the top of the stairs glare at the retreating backs of her sons. ‘She’s scary…and deadly…and she’s a jounin so she’s strong…I bet Sasuke would love someone who was as strong as his mom…damn, I need to train more.’

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

A week had passed since Anko had arrived, and things eventually settled down. After Anko had trained the boys into the ground (both figuratively and physically) for attacking a jounin and disregarding orders, she became calmer and helped guard Tazuna or train the genin.

Sakura watched as the boys grew stronger under the tutelage of two jounins. She was quite disappointed in the fact that she didn’t have enough chakra to perform almost all of the jutsu that the boys were learning. She was diligently climbing trees like it was going out of fashion, but her chakra reserves were growing at what seemed like a snails pace. She was currently lying at the base of a tree resting after another continuous hour of running up and down a forty-seven foot tree.

In almost a week and a half, she hadn’t managed to find out how Naruto was able to propel makibishi at a jounin, or how Sasuke came to live with Anko and Naruto. It wasn’t for lack of trying either, they just wouldn’t talk. The best she got out of them was “It’s called a secret for a reason.” In one short week, Sakura had learned to hate that word like nothing else. Not even Ino-pig could compare to her hatred of the word ‘secret’.

‘If I hear that once more, I think I’ll go insane!’ She mused to herself and started to get back on her feet.

“Hey! Pinky!”

Sakura turned around to see Anko meandering over towards her, leaving Naruto and Sasuke lying on the ground, dazed.

“You’ve been doing that forever, aren’t you bored yet?” The jounin asked.

“Well…yeah, I mean I keep running up and down, but I just can’t seem to increase my reserves enough.”

“Well that’s generally the problem that plagues most kunoichi. We have pretty damn good control, but not large enough reserves.” Anko said, this wasn’t anything new to Sakura, she had known this before. She looked at Anko and noticed the glint in her eyes that seemed to promise pain. “But…there are other ways of forcing your reserves to increase. Keep in mind that most of them are illegal and you would be killed, either by the attempt or by Konoha if you did, but there is one perfectly good way that might work for you, but we’ll need Kakashi’s help…”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

A few more days passed, with the boys engrossing themselves in the literature that they received from the Hokage, and Sakura working with Anko and Kakashi on…well no one knew quite what they were doing. The day wore on and the two jounin began to return home with a badly winded Sakura, but the boys continued to practice. They returned for dinner, which was a subdued affair, both due to the economic state of the country and the loss of another five workers from the bridge, pushing its completion back even further. Then there was the enigma known as Inari. Tsunami’s son was silent and would often throw dirty looks at the ninja. That night, things came to a head. Inari was watching the genin eating dinner, when he suddenly threw his fist at the table.

“Why? Why do you even try? You’ll never be strong enough to beat Gato! No one is! You’ll just end up dead!”

“Don’t flatter your self kid; I don’t plan on dying any time soon.” Naruto replied, barely acknowledging the boy.

“Idiot! Gato’s too strong…he just kill you like you were a fly.” Inari almost screamed as tears from long since repressed memories welled to the surface.

“Yeah, whatever, do you have any more rice? It’s really good.” Naruto asked Tsunami.

“You don’t get it, do you?” Now Inari was screaming, his tears flowing freely down his face. “Gato’s taken everything from me…you have no idea what it’s like!”

A very tense silence followed as everyone watched Naruto for a reaction.

“So you’re telling me, you’ve been playing the protagonist in your own tragedy? That’s a stupid way to live, even worse than revenge. Kid I don’t know what happened, but I doubt that it was worse than what I lived through for almost eight years. I doubt that very much! In this entire world, there are probably only eight people that have the same kind of pain that I had for so long. If you think that your life is so tough, than do something about it! Don’t just sit there and cry!” Naruto quickly stomped off into the surrounding forests for some well deserved alone time.

Inari was shocked speechless, while Anko and Sasuke were staring daggers at the boy, radiating killer intent at the boy, who luckily was unawares. It wasn’t until Sakura broke the silence that this trend stopped.

“Umm, shouldn’t we try and find Naruto? Zabuza should be healed by tomorrow, and we’ll need all of our strength to fight him.”

“No, he needs some time to himself. I think this little argument drug up some rather unpleasant memories for him.” Anko replied.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Later that night, Kakashi found Inari sitting on a small pier that was by the house. Surprisingly, he also found Sakura there. He figured she would be too tired to be up, what with the training she had been doing. He sat next to Inari, while Sakura was lying on her back looking at the sky.

“You know, Naruto doesn’t want to be mean or anything, but he just doesn’t respond well to wallowing and brooding.” The lazy jounin said. “But he does know what he was talking about. I heard about your father, and I am truly sad to hear that such a great man was killed by a thug like Gato, but you still have a mother. Naruto grew up on his own for almost eight years with no parents. He was hated for something he had no control over, even after he found Anko.”

This was a news flash to the pink haired genin. She didn’t realize that people hated him just for who his mother was. This called for more contemplation. A lot more contemplation.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto stormed into the forest, in the exact same manner he stormed out of Tazuna’s house. He was feeling emotional, not quite crying, but not too far from it. It was something he hadn’t done since he moved in with his mom, and he didn’t plan on starting now. So he did the best thing he knew to take his mind of certain disrespectful child. He trained…and trained…and trained some more. He didn’t stop until it was easily midnight, and he still had energy to burn.

‘Yes, but tomorrow is the day Zabuza is supposed to finally be healed, so I need to conserve my energy.’ He thought. ‘Might as well go to sleep.’ With that he lay down in the soft grass and fell into a quiet sleep.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Morning dawned early, and Haku was making good use of it. The fake hunter-nin was gathering herbs that would be needed after the fight with the copy ninja Hatake Kakashi and his team of genin. Of course the two boys were the only ones worth preparing for. From what was gleamed during the previous encounter, it was obvious that the two were above average tandem fighters…and then there was the strange blond and black haired boy. ‘He was able to project makibishi into Zabuza-sama…I wish I could figure that trick out.’ Haku entered a clearing and noticed the aforementioned boy lying in the grass. Walking towards the prone boy silently, Haku stopped and stared at the sleeping boys face. Along with the distinctive dual whisker marks, Haku noted the small scars covering the boy’s eye lids. ‘Someone tried to remove his eyes?’ This thought crossed through Haku’s mind without being fully thought through. ‘Damn you kid, do you have any idea how hard those pieces of metal were to remove?’ Haku barely noticed the pain of the spines of the thistles cutting skin. As the blood slowly slid down Haku’s right hand, it fell into Naruto’s snoring mouth; the fake hunter turned and left the sleeping boy. ‘When we fight…I’ll make sure you can’t endanger my precious person!’

Not even thirty seconds after Haku left the clearing, Naruto shifted in his sleep, the motion of which, caused the dark blond to bite the inside of his cheek drawing blood and waking the boy with a yelp. Haku’s blood quickly rushed towards the new entrance and Naruto began the tedious process of absorbing the new DNA. The only thing Naruto felt was a slight rumble in his stomach, from a lack of food. He quickly headed back towards the house for some well deserved food.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

When Naruto arrived at the house, he found that his team had already left for the bridge; they too were making use of an early sunrise. With any luck, the as of yet unnamed bridge would be finished by the end of next week, and this mission would end. As he was about to leave and rejoin his team, two samurai decided to cut through the front door, in an attempt to abduct Tsunami. Before they could even make a snide opening remark, their stomachs were crushed by a pair of fists, courtesy of a certain genin. The pair slunk into unconsciousness rather quickly and Naruto simply cussed. His stomach was twisting and turning, and now he didn’t have time for breakfast!

“If they attacked here, than they must also be at the bridge. I want the two of you to go somewhere safe.” He addressed Tsunami and Inari who was standing at the corner. “Gather as many towns people as you can, and prepare your self. Gato might choose this time to ‘make an example’.”

He quickly ran towards the bridge and arrived just in time to see Sasuke kick the masked hunter-nin away. He quickly rushed over and joined the others; thankfully, Zabuza and Haku were on the opposite end of the unfinished bridge.

“I see that the blond boy has decided to come.” Zabuza commented off handily. “Haku, don’t take any chances with those two, something doesn’t sit right with me about them.”

“Hai, Zabuza-sama.” Came a high pitched voice from behind the porcelain mask. Naruto couldn’t tell weather it was a guy’s voice or a girl’s.

Suddenly the mist ninja split into two. Then four. The masked person kept on dividing so fast it was making Naruto’s head spin and his stomach twist. A sudden twinge of pain ripped through the right side of his head and he instinctively reached up and grasped his temple, completely missing the senbon that Haku threw at him. His eyes rolled up into the back of his head and he began to pitch forward, right as the needle pierced his stomach.

Naruto hit the ground with a thud and didn’t move…

Last Time:
Suddenly the mist ninja split into two. Then four. The masked person kept on dividing so fast it was making Naruto’s head spin and his stomach twist. A sudden twinge of pain ripped through the right side of his head and he instinctively reached up and grasped his temple, completely missing the senbon that Haku threw at him. His eyes rolled up into the back of his head and he began to pitch forward, right as the needle pierced his stomach.

Naruto hit the ground with a thud and didn’t move…

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

In less than a second, Anko was at her son’s side, checking him over and calling his name. Sasuke was able to refrain from attacking only because he was frozen with dread. He was unable to help his family again.

“Sasuke, he’ll be fine, he’s still breathing and his heart rate is a bit high, but it’s still strong. I’m more worried about the acid in his stomach, damaging his muscles and other organs right now.” Anko said through clenched teeth. “But since I’m worthless when it comes to being a medic-nin, I think I’ll take out my frustrations on a certain mask-wearing kid!”

With that declaration of pain, Anko and Sasuke engaged the mist ninja. Kakashi placed himself between Zabuza and Tazuna along with Sakura. Suddenly, a thick mist began to roll through the area. As if it were some unseen signal, both Zabuza and Kakashi disappeared into the fog.

“Sakura, you need to protect Tazuna and Naruto. I’d suggest you use your new skills now, but keep some chakra left, incase it is needed.” Kakashi’s disembodied voice rang out through the fog, before the sounds of battle replaced it.

Sakura only nodded and gave a silent ‘good luck’ to all of the Konoha shinobi, before she moved over to Naruto’s body and dragged him back towards Tazuna. Once she was done with that, she bit her thumb, and drew blood. Quickly performing seals, she quietly muttered “Kuchiyose no Jutsu!” (Summoning technique) With an audible ‘poof’, two dogs appeared and stood guard over Tazuna and Naruto. One was an adult Golden Retriever; he was about three feet long and 2 feet tall. He weighed almost sixty pounds and had a small Konoha leaf embroidered onto a handkerchief around his neck. The second dog was an adult Bearded Collie. She wasn’t as tall as the golden retriever, but weighed almost as much. She was only two feet long and a foot high, but was much more energetic. In the week that she had been practicing the technique, her chakra reserves had grown rapidly. Since the summoning took a lot of chakra to do, it drained her quickly, and she was then forced to practice controlling what little chakra she still had. The two dogs in question didn’t take much chakra to summon; it was about the equivalent of making four bunshins…five times…each. So for Sakura, that was a lot of chakra.

“Koumyaku (Streak) Onchou (Grace), I need you to guard Tazuna-san, while I check on Naruto.” Sakura ordered. The two dogs quickly padded over to the old man and tensed as they monitored the battle around them. Well, Koumyaku did, the golden retriever was more battle hardened than his compatriot, Onchou simply stood there and wagged her tail in anticipation. Sakura quickly worked to diagnose her fallen teammate. His breathing was indeed very labored, his heartbeat was becoming weaker and weaker, and he was beginning to sweat, despite the coolness of the fog, indicating a fever. His body was trying to burn out some invader.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

While Naruto was unconscious, the Kyuubi was working overtime. Something in the DNA of that hunter nin was not agreeing with Naruto’s DNA. The demon knew that he could stop the process of absorption any time he wanted, the seal did allow him to heal his vessel, but he chose to wait. ‘Just a little more time kid, just wait a little more.’
In just a few minutes, his vessel’s bloodline would finish copying over the important code for the new bloodline, Mastery of Water and Ice, and he could stop the process. If only the brat could hold on for another minute or two…

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Sakura was becoming worried. Naruto’s symptoms had become more severe as new ones continued to appear. His breathing was becoming very shallow and slow. She felt the once steady beat of his heart slow down under her hands and it didn’t show any signs of strengthening. The weird part of this was that his chakra was becoming more and more focused, like it had some purpose. A sudden burst of chakra from the area of Sasuke drew her attention, but just as soon as she looked up, she felt Naruto’s heart beat once, and then stop…

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The fight between the faux hunter nin and an enraged mother and adopted son was…interesting. This hunter nin, Haku, was pretty good, at least mid to high chuunin level. Of course Anko was a Tokubetsu Jounin so it wasn’t too difficult to find the winner of the match. Or so you would have thought. After a few minutes of Haku getting beaten into the ground, the mist ninja performed a series of one-handed seals, catching the two Konoha shinobi off guard.

“Hijutsu: Sensatsu Suishou!” (Secret Technique: Flying Water Needles). Water that was strewn about the field of battle suddenly rose into the air and formed into large icicles that resembled Senbon needles. The deadly popsicles suddenly flew towards the duo and they were forced to jump into the air at the last minute by adding chakra to their legs to gain more height.

As the pair landed they noticed the small flair of chakra that gave away the annoyance in the mist ninja.

“Hijutsu: Makyou Hyoushou.” (Secret Technique: Demonic Ice Mirrors) Once more, water rose up from the bridge and solidified, this time into thick sheets of ice that created a cage of glistening mirrors. Haku slowly walked into the mirrors and suddenly the missing ninja appeared in every one of the mirrors. Moving faster than normal eyes could follow; senbon flew from every direction and hit precise points on Anko’s arms, immobilizing them. Sasuke quickly activated his sharingan and rushed to his mother’s side. He quickly removed three of the five needles that were holding her arms hostage, but was forced to move out of the way by another volley of the thin metal needles.

“Damn, this is going to get difficult…” He thought before launching into another attack.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Sakura was panicking. Her teammate was technically dead at her knees and she didn’t know what to do. The first aide covered in the academy was very basic and didn’t involve reviving a dead person. She just froze as time slipped by. The sounds of battle didn’t distract her and she continued to stare at Naruto. His face was pale and his lips were becoming blue. As she knelt next to his body, tears began to form in her eyes and she cried. She cried at her own inadequacies, she cried at her teammate’s unfinished goals, and she cried that a brother and mother would have to deal with this reality. She closed her eyes and wept.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

While Anko and Sasuke were engaged in their own battle and Sakura was dealing with her dead comrade, Kakashi was fighting Zabuza. The mist ninja was proving to be a worthy challenge and with the addition of the unnatural mist floating through the area, his sharingan was next to worthless. The first two strikes went to the nuke nin from Kiri, but they weren’t as bad as they looked. A slight cut to the side was more or a hindrance in terms of mobility than a hindrance to his life, and a bruise was forming on his other side from a vicious kick, but all in all things couldn’t be going better. His plan was going well, Anko and Sasuke were mopping the floor with Zabuza’s accomplice, and Sakura was guarding Tazuna and Naruto. He could finish this fight in one move. Or he could have…until he heard Sakura start bawling. It was that slight noise that caught the ears of Zabuza, who was a master of silent killing. He knew that the blonde was lying motionless if not dead and his pink haired teammate was crying over him, leaving the bridge builder defender less. It was the perfect time to strike.

Moving silently, Zabuza made his way towards Tazuna and once he spotted his target through the mist he charged the man. Kakashi was too far away, and that wound to his side was limiting his speed enough so that the copy ninja couldn’t protect the old man. Zabuza swung his large sword at the bridge builder’s head, only for the old man to be tackled by a large golden dog. The mist ninja was even more surprised when a second dog, this one white and black, attacked him. Onchou had spotted the new man and quickly attacked the man. The nin-dog rose up on her hind legs and brought her clawed paws down…onto Zabuza’s crotch. The mist ninja cried out in pain and doubled over, only to be tackled by the battle hardened Koumyaku. He hit the unfinished bridge on his back, and felt the breath being knocked out of him. In a flash Onchou was back in the fight…licking his face, while Koumyaku was biting his right arm. With a wave of his left arm, Zabuza was able to dismiss the two summons, but was still in pain. He was able to regain his footing, but before he could do anything about his own pain, a large surge of chakra seemed to explode over the bridge. Sakura actually fainted from the sheer amount of killing intent being released. What she didn’t realize before passing out; was that the chakra wasn’t coming from the jounins. It was coming from her seemingly dead teammate.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

When Naruto’s heart had stopped beating, the Kyuubi was worried. The human body can only survive for a short amount of time without air, and if the DNA absorption didn’t finish soon, both he and the kid would die. Almost a minute after Naruto had taken his last breath of air; the process was complete enough for Kyuubi to halt the process. Scanning over the remaining code, the monster fox was able to isolate the problem that Naruto was having.

‘Ah, yes that would cause his reaction. Won’t the baka be surprised to find this out?’

He mused as he sat back and watched as normal functions returned to his container.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto felt the chakra of the Kyuubi flowing through his system, where as before he felt…nothing. It was like this was the first thing he had ever felt. It felt…right. Like it belonged. He heard the muffled sound of Sakura fainting behind him and he shakily stood up to inspect the fighting going on around him. What he saw threw him into a rage, the likes of which had never been seen before. On the ground, lay his adopted brother, senbon piercing his body like a pincushion. His mother had a fair number of needles in her as well, although she was able to dodge most of the thin projectiles. They were trapped in a crumbling cage of mirrors that seemed to glisten in the weak sunlight. He quickly activated the sharingan and saw the residual chakra in the mirrors. It wasn’t an extraordinary amount, so why was his brother and mother injured so? With a pulse, the chakra of the demon fox, flooded through him and the reasons ceased to be important. Someone had harmed his precious people, and that someone would die.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The demonic ice mirrors had turned the tide of the fight. Or actually, the needles that were preventing Anko from using her arms were. If she could move her arms, she could summon a snake or use a fire jutsu, but no, there were needles in her arms that prevented her from doing anything other than dodge. Luckily the three needles that Sasuke had removed were helping restore some movement, and soon she would be able to move her arms enough to remove the final two. She just hoped that Sasuke could hang on for a while longer.

Sasuke was holding his own, his sharingan was able to anticipate the movements of his opponent, but dodging the needles that were thrown at him was more difficult. If he could destroy the mirrors, than maybe he could buy enough time for Anko to escape or remove the needles. He was beginning to feel the strain on his chakra reserves, but he could hold on for a while longer. While the Mist ninja was preoccupied with a scorch mark on the pants of his or her battle kimono, Sasuke quickly ran through some hand seals, before inhaling a deep breath.

“Katon: Goukakyuu no Jutsu” (Fire type: Grand fireball)

A large ball of flame shot from Sasuke’s mouth and impacted the three closest ice mirrors. A large cloud of steam issued forth, and when it cleared, the Uchiha was astounded to find that his attack had little effect.

“My mirrors cannot be broken by your attack.” The mysterious shinobi said, returning his or her attention to Sasuke.

The Uchiha glared back at his opponent and tried the Grand Fireball, this time with a twist. Using the new knowledge from his ancestors, Sasuke narrowed the stream of fire coming from his mouth, so that it was only a few inches in diameter. It had the same amount of fire as the normal attack, but this one was focused. It impacted a sole mirror, which held its shape for a second, before subliming into steam.

Although he didn’t realize it, Sasuke had just taken the first step towards learning Katon: Karyu Endan (Fire type: Fire Dragon Flame Bullet) a very advanced Katon technique.

‘Now to get rid of more of those damn mirrors!’ He thought and once more flew through the familiar hand seals. After destroying more than half of the almost twenty ice mirrors, Sasuke ran out of chakra to perform the modified technique. The amount of chakra it used was high, and the Mist ninja was still throwing senbon at him.

Anko had finally gotten enough feeling in her arms to shed the final two needles. The steel needles hit the concrete bridge and in the blink of an eye, she was back in the fight.

“Katon: Ryuuka no Jutsu!” (Fire type: Dragon Fire technique)

A large burst of flame finished off many of the remaining mirrors, but before the last one was destroyed, Haku threw three final senbon at the jounin. But instead of hitting the intended target, Sasuke threw himself in front of his mother and took the needles to the chest. Anko was able to catch him as he fell to the ground, but noticed to her horror that all of the needles had pierced through his right lung. That was what Naruto saw as he awoken. His brother in his mother’s arms.

‘This is bad; I only have enough chakra for Makyou Hyoushou once more.’ Haku thought as the boy who was releasing an insane amount of chakra approached. Running through the hand seals once more, the hunter nin was shocked when Naruto entered the mirrors as well.

“There is nowhere you can hide from my wrath. For harming my family, my precious people, you will die!” The boy’s voice was colder than the mirrors that formed the battleground.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Both Zabuza and Kakashi felt the exponential increase in chakra. Both were shocked by the output that was coming from a scrawny kid.

‘What is this kid?’ Zabuza thought, taking his eyes off Kakashi for a crucial instant.

‘Has the Kyuubi broken free? No, the seal is still intact. I must finish this now!’

Kakashi then reached into his flak jacket and removed a small scroll. He unrolled it and using some blood from a previous wound, smeared a thin line across the black ink of the scroll. He refurled the paper using some acrobatic tosses and slammed it into the ground.

“Kuchiyose: Doton: Tsuiga no Jutsu!” (Summoning: Earth type: Tracking Fang Technique)

A crack in the bridge formed and ran from the scroll towards Zabuza. Suddenly, several large dogs burst from the ground and used Zabuza as a chew toy.

“Give up now?” Kakashi calmly stated. “If you don’t, your future is death.”

“Damn you!” Zabuza growled at the silver haired man, but it was a show of false bravado. He couldn’t move his arms even an inch.

Kakashi began to make hand seals and then proceeded to grab his wrist. Chakra gathered in the palm of his hand and began to crackle like lightning. The sound this attack made was unbelievable. It sounded like a flock of birds were chirping…no, laughing, at the prone form before the copy ninja.

“I’ll give you one more chance. If you don’t surrender, you will die.”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Haku was worried. Almost drained of chakra, there was little chance that the blonde could be defeated, especially since Makyou Hyoushou was worthless. The blonde and black haired ninja was attacking ruthlessly and with no opening for counter attacks. It would only be a matter of time before he landed the decisive hit, for with Haku nearly drained of chakra; there was no way to retaliate. Firing more senbon, and a stray kunai at the enraged boy, Haku was surprised by the tactic that was subsequently employed.

“Suiton Suijinheki.” (Water type: Water Barrier) The projectiles were swallowed by a wall of water at least four feet thick. Suddenly, the water barrier began to spin like a top, and the missiles changed course. As water flew off of the barrier from the high velocity spin, it froze into elongated shards of ice. “Mateki Sandansha!” (Shards of winter) The new spin on the Sensatsu Suishou took Haku by surprise. The ice shards hit home and threw the Mist ninja to the ground, as well as dislodging the mask. Haku was rendered unconscious by the force of the fall and didn’t see the enraged boy approaching.

Naruto stopped to stare at his opponent. He was expecting either a girl or a very effeminate man, but this was…different. Even without the mask on he still couldn’t tell what the gender was. It was rather infuriating, actually, and it was at this time that the Kyuubi’s chakra quit flowing through him and the events of the past few minutes caught back up. He felt tired, more so than he had on the rare occasion that he suffered from chakra exhaustion. There was also a dull pain that throbbed through his body, and an itch was slowly spreading from his right arm towards his chest. He suddenly fainted next to a defeated Haku due to exhaustion.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Kakashi was cursing his luck. He had charged Zabuza with the intent to finish the man off, but suddenly his summons were dismissed and Zabuza was free to flee back into the mist. Looking at the scroll, Kakashi noticed some senbon and ice fragments stuck into the scroll, destroying it. Without the Tracking fang, Kakashi was forced to resort to a different tactic. He had been able to immobilize both of the sword user’s arms and was once more charging chakra for his sole original jutsu, the Raikiri. (Lightning Edge) Once his arms were useless, the mist Zabuza had created disappeared and Kakashi was able to see the damage the various fights had done. Naruto, Sasuke, Sakura, and the Mist ninja, Haku, were unconscious, and Anko was helping the wounded. She was working on reviving a fainted Sakura when she sensed a foreign presence on the bridge.

The thump of a cane echoed across the bridge. Looking behind Zabuza everyone who was conscious noticed a short man with grayish brown hair and a moustache.

“Hm, some ‘demon’ you turned out to be, you can’t even kill a bunch of kids. Luckily, for me at least, I’ve determined to terminate your contract early.” It wasn’t until the figure made his threat that those present noticed the mob of people behind the diminutive figure.

“Gato!” Zabuza growled. “Kakashi, it seems that I no longer have a reason to fight you. I do have one last request though; would you lend me a kunai?” Using his teeth, Zabuza unraveled the bandages that his mouth from view and caught the kunai that was lazily tossed to him by the copy ninja. Dashing forward, the demon of the mist madly hacked his way through the throng of bodies surrounding his former employer, taking many slashes and stab wounds from various weapons in the process. Finally reaching his target, Zabuza cut Gato’s thought cleanly and watched as the life slowly ebbed from the fat man. He then collapsed from the wounds he had received earlier. None of the thugs dared to approach the man, for fear of their lives. They did, however, find the courage to threaten the Konoha shinobi.

“You just killed our meal ticket!” One yelled.

“We’ll kill you to make some dough!” Another supplied.

‘Damn it, I’m running low on chakra. I might be able to bluff them away.’ Kakashi thought. Making a cross shaped seal he imitated the seals for Kage bunshin, but he really created twenty bunshins. The thugs were weary, but began to charge at them anyway, until a large water dragon washed them away.

“Suiton Suiryuudan no Jutsu.” (Water type: Water Dragon technique) The weak voice of Sasuke came from behind the copy ninja.

Anko returned to her injured son’s side and helped him over towards where Sakura and Naruto were laying. Haku lay a bit away from the group. Covering his sharingan, Kakashi made his way towards the only other body on the bridge, Zabuza. The mist ninja was still alive, but was fading due to a lack of blood.

“K-Kakashi-i…I-I have one more favor t-to ask you.” Zabuza’s voice was weak and nearly inaudible. “I want you to b-burry me here. It’s kinda nice.” Those were the last words spoken by Momochi Zabuza, the Demon of the Bloody Mist.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Once all of the surviving shinobi, including Haku were transported back to Tazuna’s house, Anko used a messenger scroll to contact Tsunade for Naruto and Sasuke. Sakura was awake again and helping to nurse the various patients.

Luck was on their side, since Tsunade happened to be only two days away from the Wave Country, and was going to be there in less time than that. Haku was being kept under a genjutsu that kept him or her asleep. Although there was little fear of the kid killing anyone, the risk they ran if he or she attacked anyone was higher. Naruto was still asleep and Sasuke was simply suffering from chakra depletion, but those holes in his lungs could be a problem. All the Konoha shinobi could do was wait.

The next day, Tsunade arrived around dinnertime and set to work immediately. Her assistant Shizune was currently checking on Haku, and her report was due shortly. Sasuke was patched up with little problem, the senbon attack to his lung looked worse than it was, but it would have escalated had he not received proper treatment. Naruto was a bit of a mystery. Tsunade had a list of his symptoms, but couldn’t come up with an explanation for his illness. All of his ailments were common to allergies, but thanks to the Kyuubi, Naruto had never been sick a day in his life, or had allergies. Even the fainting was consistent, if an allergic reaction is left untreated, it may escalate to anaphylaxis, which if untreated could turn fatal. Tsunade was once again using a basic diagnostic technique on the Kyuubi container, when Shizune entered the room and whispered in her ear. Tsunade’s brow wrinkled, before a look of comprehension dawned. She nodded to Anko, and the jounin motioned for Sakura to leave the room. She did so with a look of frustration on her face. Her team didn’t trust her to be in their conversation.

“It would appear,” The blonde sannin began “That Naruto absorbed another bloodline. I noticed the change in his blood, but without the equipment necessary to perform extensive test, I didn’t know what occurred. You said that he showed the same abilities as Haku, right? Due to his bloodline…and his ‘guest’, Naruto has never had any problems with absorbing anything, but this time he did. All of his prior symptoms are consistent with an allergy, but I didn’t know the source until now. It would appear that Haku transferred some of her DNA into Naruto. All of the DNA up until this point was male, but I believe that the female DNA caused an allergic reaction. I think we just have to wait for the Kyuubi to eliminate the excess DNA in his system and he will be as good as new.”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

True to her word, Naruto was up and about in a days time, after the explanation of what happened he was more than happy to train with his new blood line. He would disappear into the woods for hours at time. Sasuke was less fortunate; Sakura continued to hang onto him wherever he would go. The only place he was able to get some peace was around Haku. For whatever reason, Sakura was afraid of the mist kunoichi, probably because Haku would kill Sakura in no time. It was while Naruto was off training and Sasuke was able to avoid Sakura enough for Haku to ask the Uchiha a question.

“Uchiah-san, your mother…she told me that your past and mine were similar. Do you know what she means?” The brunette asked.

Sasuke thought about it. He didn’t know that much about Haku. “No I don’t.” He answered. “But maybe we should talk and find out what Anko-kaa-san meant.”

“I’ll go first.” Haku said. “I was born in Kirigakure, well actually it was a small outlying town, but that’s like splitting hairs. My mother was the one with the bloodline, the Mastery of Water and Ice, but she hid it. In Kiri, bloodlines like mine were feared and those with them were hunted down and killed. When my father found out that my mother had one…he killed her, and then he tried to kill me. I don’t remember what happened, but somehow, somehow I was able to kill my father and all of the members of the mob he had gathered. Then I ran. I ran as far and as fast as I could. I lived on my own for a few years before I met Zabuza-sama. He trained me to be a shinobi and took the place of my father. Eventually Zabuza lead a failed coup and we had to flee form the Mist village. We took jobs as nuke nin for various individuals until we were contacted for this assignment. What about you?”

Sasuke was amazed by the similarities in their lives. Granted he hadn’t killed his father, but they were both the last of their bloodline, not including Naruto, and had adopted new families.

“I was born into the Uchiha clan; we were famous for our sharingan and made up the entirety of the police force. But then my brother killed off the entire clan. He used a genjutsu on me and made me relive the slaughter of my family for three straight days. When I awoke I was in the hospital and depressed. It wasn’t until Hokage-sama took me to see Naruto and Kaa-san that my life changed. Anko has become my mom and Naruto is the only one I will ever call brother again.”

This time it was Haku who was in awe of the similarities of the two. They continued to compare their lives for a long time. It wasn’t until dinner that the two returned, earning a death glare from Sakura and two mischievous looks from Anko and Naruto. In fact after dinner, Haku approached Kakashi and Anko about returning to Konoha with them, to live life as a civilian. She said it was what Zabuza would have wanted, but deep down Sasuke knew it was because of the same history the two shared, and for once, he didn’t mind a girl following him.

Sarutobi, the Sandaime Hokage rolled the message he had been reading up and sighed. Team 7 was returning from their C turned B turned A rank mission late but intact. Actually they were plus one member, a Mist kunoichi named Haku, who wished to become part of the village as a civilian. The report included her history and truthfully Sarutobi was impressed. It wasn’t everyday that the apprentice to the ‘Demon of the Bloody mist’ wished to join your village, let alone as a civilian. Well, he’d be dead before he let an opportunity like this slip away. He called some selected individuals into his office.

Moments after his summons left his possession, the four people he had called arrived. Yuuhi Kurenai, Umino Iruka, Shiranui Genma, and Morino Ibiki all entered the office of the Hokage with various degrees of clueless ness, although Ibiki hid his best.

“You called us, Hokage-sama?” Iruka asked the old man.

“Hai, Team 7 will be returning with an extra ‘member’. A former Mist kunoichi by the name of Haku. She was apprenticed to Momochi Zabuza, until his death a couple days ago. She wishes to become a Konoha citizen, however, due to her skills; I would like her to be a shinobi. The only problem is that she would need someone to adopt her and sponsor her. She has lived through the Mist’s ‘cleansing’ and hasn’t had a true family for years. You four are the only ones with the ability to defend her, should Hunter nin come for her, as well as provide the correct atmosphere for someone her age.” He handed the four the letter he had received from Kakashi and Anko. In turn the quartet passed it around and read its contents.

“Hokage-sama,” Iruka spoke “I would like to adopt Haku, seeing as how she has already bonded with Sasuke and Naruto, but as a chuunin, I don’t have the income to support anyone besides my self, and that’s if I don’t treat Naruto to ramen.”

“I’m afraid that I wouldn’t provide the correct atmosphere in a home that you are looking for.” Ibiki stated.

Genma was about to make some excuse when Kurenai spoke up.

“I’ll take the girl.” She stated calmly. “I have been lonely as of late, and a companion would do me wonders, and as skilled as she is, perhaps she could inspire Hinata.”

The Hokage merely nodded his head and dismissed the others.

“I will have the paperwork for you later today, and they should be returning in three or four days. There was a slight incident involving Naruto, but it has been taken care of.”

Kurenai nodded her head and left the office.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Three weeks had passed since that meeting in the Hokage’s office. Team Seven had returned safe and sound, although Sakura was still glaring/hiding at/from Haku. Speaking of the ex mist ninja, Yuuhi Haku was adapting very well to her life as a Konoha shinobi. Technically, she was on the mandatory ninety-day probation period, but that didn’t stop her from training with Kurenai, Team Eight, or Team Seven. Originally the plan was to have her trained as a medic ninja, but it quickly turned out to be a bad idea. While she was well versed in anatomy and pharmacy, Haku had a problem with being a medic nin. She had a large fear of blood. Not Tsunade large, but somewhere in between freak out/panic/faint. So the decision was made that Kurenai would train her to become a genjutsu specialist. It turned out that Haku had chakra control to rival Sakura, but larger chakra reserves, something the pink haired girl found to be a grave injustice, although no one was quite sure how she came to that conclusion.

It turned out to be the correct move. Haku seemed to be a natural at deception and manipulation, so genjutsu came naturally to her. She didn’t have a large number of techniques, but when she used them in conjunction with her bloodline limit, they became very difficult to combat.

Speaking of blood limits, our protagonist was currently practicing his new bloodline in the forest. Needles of ice were scattered around the area and even a few had hit their target, Anko. She was pleased with her son’s progress with his newest addition. He was faster than Haku when he used the demonic ice mirrors, and when he didn’t, but he was quickly growing bored of the same two techniques. So he’d create his own.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Whenever Team 7 wasn’t training, the different members had their own routines to follow. Naruto would go and train with his various bloodlines and the sealing techniques that the Sandaime gave him, Sasuke would practice his fire manipulation, and Sakura spent an equal amount of time fawning over Sasuke, and immersing herself in the world of medical ninjutsu. It turned out she had a knack for the stuff, and after only three weeks of practice, was able to heal minor cuts and lacerations. She had grown more accustomed to having Haku around during training, but still saw the girl as a rival for Sasuke’s love.

Naruto was walking back from the forest having just finished creating a new technique. Ok, technically, he hadn’t created it, he had heard about the Satetsu (Iron Sand) that the Sandaime Kazekage was famous for and had been trying to replicate the technique for ages. He had finally succeeded today and was feeling proud of himself. So, in celebration, he would treat himself to Ichiraku ramen!

Over the years of living with Sasuke, Naruto had developed a kind of sixth sense when it came to his brother. For instance, he could tell when fan girls were chasing him, or when he was…ok, so mainly he could tell when Sasuke was being chased by fan girls, but hey! It was a darn good skill to have at times. He got that feeling right as he turned the corner towards the main street of Konoha. Right on cue, Sasuke rounded the corner followed by hordes of screaming kunoichi.

He also noticed that Konohamaru, the grandson of the Hokage, was forced to flee for his life, and in the process, bumped into a shinobi dressed in a black body suit with cat ears on the hood. He was wearing purple face paint, and had a large bundle, wrapped in cloth on his back. He also noticed the Sunagakure insignia emblazoned on his forehead protector.

“Little brat! I’ll teach you a lesson for running into me.” The black clad kid threatened and lifted Konohamaru off the ground.

“Hey! You’d better put him down.” Naruto demanded.

“Oh? What’s a little punk like you gonna do about it?” The mysterious kid asked, still holding Konohamaru.

Naruto was between a rock and a hard place. ‘I don’t want to show satetsu before I have to, although it would probably scare these guys witless. I know!’

Naruto drew a kunai from his holder. Through his study of seals, Naruto had pieced together, at least what he though, was the principle behind the Yondaime Hokage’s Hiraishin no jutsu. (Flying Thunder god) Although he wasn’t capable of recreating the technique, he did create a good bluff.

The kunai he had just drawn had a couple seals carved into it. One contained enough chakra to create a kage bunshin when it impacted the ground; another contained a low-level fuuton technique to quickly dissipate the smoke created by the kage bunshin. He would simply use a henge to transform into something inconspicuous and hope his opponent didn’t see through it.

The plan worked like a charm. Naruto threw the kunai at the Suna genin’s feet and quickly transformed into a pebble on the ground.

Kankurou wasn’t able laugh at the Konoha genin’s attempt at throwing a kunai, when a fist connected with his face. He flew behind a blonde girl Naruto didn’t notice, although she seemed to be the black clad boy’s teammate. While both of their attention was away from the clone, Naruto dismissed the clone and canceled his henge.

‘What the hell was that? I couldn’t see him move!’ The boy quickly stood up and watched Naruto help Konohamaru to move out of the way. He quickly un-shouldered whatever was strapped to his back, causing his teammate to question his decision.

“You’re really going to use the crow?” She asked in a surprised voice.

As he was about to unwrap ‘the crow’ a pebble ricocheted off his hand.

“Ow!” The boy growled and turned his attention towards the stone thrower.

Sasuke sat in a nearby tree, tossing three more stones in his hands.

“You know, that’s the Hokage’s grandson you were threatening.” He stated coldly.

The Suna boy stared at Naruto.

“No, not me you idiot, Konohamaru!” Naruto growled in outrage.

“Kankurou…stop it.” A voice drifted towards the small group. It was coming from Sasuke’s position, but no one had felt him arrive.

“G-Gaara!” Kankurou stuttered, “T-that brat started it!”

“ENOUGH!” The red haired Gaara said forcefully. He was hanging upside down from the tree branch adjacent to Sasuke. “You are an embarrassment to our village, Kankurou; if you don’t stop I’ll kill you.” Turning towards his female teammate he spoke equally as coldly. “Temari, why didn’t you stop him? You two were not to make any kind of trouble.”

“S-sorry, Gaara, I lost him for a moment and d-didn’t find him until just a moment ago.” The blonde kunoichi replied, shaking.

Gaara turned towards the Konoha shinobi. He glanced at Sasuke first. ‘The black haired boy was able to hold off Kankurou with some rocks, but he was holding back. He is strong, but the blonde…’ He glanced turned towards Naruto and Konohamaru, who was hiding behind the blonde and black haired boy. ‘I have no idea how he did that move with the kunai…a replacement perhaps? No, it was too fast for that, not even Baki could do a kawarimi that fast. He is just as strong as the black haired boy, if not stronger. Something tells me I should be weary of those two.’ He suddenly disappeared in a swirl of sand before reappearing in front of his teammates. He was wearing a black short-sleeved shirt and dark brown pants and had a large gourd strapped to his back. He also had dark black rings around his green eyes…or light blue eyes…err a light bluish greenish color…anyways, it was some one of those colors that fights would start about.

“I’m sorry for my teammate’s behavior.” He said and began to walk off.

“Wait!” Naruto yelled after the red head. “What’s your name?”

The shortest Suna genin turned and stared at Naruto. He didn’t flinch as Sasuke jumped down from his tree perch and landed next to his brother.

“Gaara. Sabaku no Gaara. I am interested in your names as well.” He calmly stated.

“Uchiha Sasuke.” Sasuke said, still feigning his coldness.

“Uzumaki Naruto.”

“I look forward to seeing you in the upcoming chuunin exams, Uchiha Sasuke, Uzumaki Naruto.” Gaara once more turned away before disappearing in another swirl of sand.

The boys just turned away after making sure Konohamaru was ok, and began to chat idly.

“So,” Sasuke started “chuunin exams, eh?”

“Think Kakashi sensei will nominate us?” Naruto asked.

“I bet if we hid the registration forms in one of those ‘books’ he reads he would.” Sasuke joked.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Indeed, Kakashi did nominate Team Seven for the chunnin exams, which were being held…tomorrow. This was a point of annoyance for all members of the genin team, since they would have little time to prepare for the exams.

“Just fill out those registration forms and turn them in to room 301 by 3:00 pm tomorrow.” With that, the lazy/perverted jounin disappeared in a poof of smoke, leaving the three genin in an anxious mood.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Dinner that night was short and subdued. Both boys were muttering about late sensei’s not giving them enough time to get ready for stuff.

“Ok, what’s this about Kakashi?” Anko asked.

“Oh, that baka of a sensei didn’t tell us about the chuunin exams until today, and then he says if we want to participate we have to fill out these forms and have them for tomorrow!” Sasuke complained, as he packed extra clothes into a backpack.

“Yeah, and if it wasn’t for Gaara we wouldn’t even had known about the exams until today!” Naruto added.

“Who is Gaara?” The name seemed familiar to Anko, but she couldn’t place it.

“Oh, his name is Sabaku no Gaara, we met him the other day, Konohamaru had trouble with some Suna shinobi and Gaara scared the guy who was bothering us.” Naruto explained.

Then it struck Anko. Sabaku no Gaara! The Kazekage’s youngest son. The vessel for Suna no Shukaku. He was the demon vessel known among the ranks of foreign shinobi as being bloodthirsty and insane. If he met Naruto and Sasuke…he was here for the chuunin exams! That wouldn’t be good if he fought with Naruto. Eventually the boy’s demons would express themselves…and who knew if the village would survive the fight?

“Kaa-san, is something wrong?” Sasuke asked, seeing the panicked expression on his mom’s face.

“Boys, Sabaku no Gaara…he’s like Naruto…he had a demon sealed inside him at birth also, but something is wrong with him…he’s done higher rank missions than most chuunin, without a scratch on him.”

Sasuke and Naruto were frozen in understanding. So there was someone else like Naruto. That struck Naruto very hard. Someone had lived through what he had gone through…and if it was half as bad as what happened to him, than that was unacceptable.

“I’m going for a walk.” Naruto said, his voice sounded dead as he exited through the door.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Gaara was sitting on the roof of a random building staring at the moon. It was only a quarter full, but already he was dreading the full moon. The voice always got unbearable on those nights. He suddenly felt a presence behind him and without turning his head, ordered the sand he controlled to crush the intruder.

“Suiton: Suijinheki.” A voice spoke softly, and Gaara could feel the sand halt upon contact with the water barrier. He applied more force to the attack, but still his sand couldn’t contract around the barrier. He turned his head and to his utter amazement, found a solid ball of ice surrounded by his sand.

“Who are you?” He demanded of the shadowy figure in the ice sphere.

The ice melted and a small hole appeared around a familiar face.

“I didn’t mean to intrude; I come here to look at the sky sometimes.” Naruto responded.

Gaara didn’t say anything. Despite the voice calling for the blood of the boy, Gaara didn’t attack. He had orders to wait until the chuunin exams. He simply withdrew his sand and returned his gaze to the moon. He felt Uzumaki sit next to him, a few meters away and stare into the sky.

After a few minutes, Naruto broke the silence.

“You stare at the moon a lot. Could you tell me why?”

Gaara didn’t say anything. The boy with odd hair was quickly wearing out his welcome. ‘Kill him later.’ He though. He stood to leave and turned his back to the boy when he heard the boy again.

“It’s because it seems so alone…isn’t it?”

Gaara froze.

“I thought so. You know…I used to feel the same thing. Until I was almost eight, I lived on my own. I assume that you’ve heard of the Kyuubi attack, so that in itself is nothing unusual, but while many orphans of the attack were adopted, or lived in orphanages, I was different. When I was five, the orphanage I was living in kicked me out. Told me that I wasn’t wanted by anyone and that if I knew what was good, I’d go and kill myself and save the village the trouble. Since I couldn’t enter the academy until I was seven, I lived off an allowance that the Hokage gave me. But the looks that followed me…I got those for as long as I can remember. The looks of disgust, the looks of hatred, I got so many of them, that I would hide in my shabby apartment for weeks at a time, not leaving until I had to buy food. Its hell isn’t it? Not being loved. Not being acknowledged. That’s a pain no one should live through.”

Gaara’s eyes widened, as a boy he had never known described his life to a T.

“Then I met Kaa-san, and Sasuke, and Kakashi-sensei. They saved me from that pain. They made my life worth living. I don’t know how bad you had it in Suna, but from your appearance…and reputation, I can guess it’s been worse than mine.”

Gaara turned to look at the boy, who was still staring at the cloudy sky.

“I’m a monster, you wouldn’t understand. I can survive on my own. I live to prove my existence.”

“What makes you so sure?” Naruto asked, still staring at the sky.

Gaara simply continued to glare at Naruto.

Naruto sighed. “Look, I know the history of Shukaku. The Ichibi (One tailed) was imprisoned inside a teakettle and then inside of two others…and then you. You don’t believe that I can know the pain you’ve lived through. So I’ll ask you this…how strong a tea kettle would you need for Kyuubi?”

Gaara was in shock. Beside him sat the vessel for the Kyuubi no Yoko. The strongest demon to roam the earth was imprisoned inside a boy his age.

“I may have the strongest demon in existence sealed inside of me, but even I can’t live by my own. Not like I was. I don’t know what the sky looks like in Suna, but I’ve heard of sand storms that block out the sun, so I’ll assume you don’t get a good look. Look at the sky some time, not even the moon is ever alone.”

Gaara stared up as the clouds, which were obscuring the heavens, parted. There was the moon, as big and bright as ever, but in the background, were thousands…millions…perhaps billions of twinkling stars, shining compassion and friendship to the lonely moon.

“There is no need for you to be alone Gaara. If you want, I’ll be more than happy to be there for you when you need me.”

With that, Naruto leapt from the roof, and headed home again. Gaara simply stood exactly where he was for a while, before sitting down and thinking about the boy who knew his pain so well.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The next day, Team seven headed towards the academy, room 301. They entered a hallway and saw a bunch of teams mulling about, since two genin were blocking the door to room 301.

“You aren’t fit to become chuunin.” One said.

“Yeah, we’ve seen people quite as ninjas because of the chuunin exam. Go home while you can, people die in this exam!” The other ordered.

A boy in an atrocious green spandex suit with black hair in a bowl cut was pleading with the two genin. A kunoichi with her chestnut brown hair up in two buns was pleading with the green clad boy. Team seven assumed they were on the same team. Then where was their third member?

Sasuke then spotted his rival, Hyuuga Neji leaning against a wall, arms crossed and eyes closed. Team seven walked past, but Neji opened his eyes and spoke before they got too far.

“Uchiha.”

Sasuke replied in kind. “Hyuuga.”

“Uchiha.”

“Hyuuga.”

“Uchih-“

“OK ALLREADY! You know each other’s last names! God that was annoying!” The girl yelled at the competing ‘genius’ ninja. Neji and Sasuke simply turned their backs to each other and folded their arms against their chest.

“Hn!” They both grunted in unison, creating another staring contest. Yep, it was a testerone fest fit for a high school locker room.

“You might as well take down the crappy genjutsu you have up.” The rookie geniuses were once more speaking in unison, trying to constantly out do each other. More glares ensued.

“So, you figured it out, well seeing isn’t enough.” One of the genin said, before charging the two teams, only to be stopped by the green boy.

“Lee,” The kunoichi said, belittling her teammate, “I thought it was your idea not to show off our strength?”

The boy sheepishly bowed. “Gomen, Tenten, I forgot.”

The two teams walked towards room 301, the two ‘captains’ were still glaring at each other, while Tenten and Naruto were cracking up at the two geniuses acting like small kids.

As they approached the room, they found Kakashi…and a future version of Lee waiting for them.

“Ah-ha! I told you my youthful team wouldn’t show up after your team, my eternal rival!” The future Lee bellowed at Kakashi.

“I’m sorry Gai, did you say something?”

Gai began to cry. ‘Darn you and your hip attitude!’

“Well, it’s a good thing your all here, the test is optional, but can only be taken in teams of three, so if someone hadn’t come then their entire team would be unable to participate.” Kakashi explained. The two teams entered the door to uncertainty.

Team seven entered the waiting room for the Chuunin exams, where they were greeted by a loud shout from Inuzuka Kiba.

“Finally! About time you guys showed up!” The brash boy yelled.

Sasuke was still locked in a staring contest with Neji, so it fell to Naruto to answer the call.

“Yeah, whatever, dog-boy we had a little run in with a couple of egos.”

Upon seeing the questioning look of the Inuzuka, Naruto pointed over his shoulder at Sasuke and Neji, who were still locked in an ocular war.

“Tch. So troublesome, I figured at least one of our teams wouldn’t be nominated.” The forever-lazy voice of Shikamaru drifted towards Naruto.

“Hey, Shikamaru!” Naruto replied to his friend, noticing Chouji was following the lazy boy. “How you been? I haven’t seen you guys much since we started missions.”

“Mah, D rank missions are too troublesome.” Was the only reply given.

Around this point the remaining members of Teams Eight and Ten met up with the members of Team Seven, Team Gai, and Team Over-Inflated-Ego…I mean Sasuke and Neji. Yamanaka Ino immediately tired to latch herself to Sasuke but the Uchiha was able to dodge the tackle, miraculously without blinking.

“Ino-pig, you leave Sasuke-kun alone!” Sakura growled and went over to her rival.

“Hey, you guys shouldn’t draw attention to yourselves.” A new voice said quietly.

Everyone turned and took stock of the new comer. He was dressed in dark purple except for a swatch of white around his abdomen. He had grey hair to rival Kakashi’s and wore glasses. He wore his kunai holster on his right leg, and wore purple arm wormers that doubled as gloves and had metal plates attached to the back of the hand.

“Do you see that team over there? Those are the Rain ninja; they have a certain…reputation for being aggressive. Especially if they knew you were rookie genin.”

“How did you-?” Ino was about to ask, before the new boy cut her off.

“This is my seventh time taking this exam, since I didn’t recognize you I kinda figured it out.” He sheepishly rubbed his head “My name’s Yakushi Kabuto, by the way.”

“Wow, so if this is your seventh time, than you must really suck!” Kiba commented.

“Well that’s one way to look at it…” Kabuto said sheepishly. “Luckily there are a few good things that come when you take the test enough. For instance, I have collected information of all of the participating genin from previous exams.” It was at this point that the grey haired boy removed a deck of cards from his utility pouch and placed one face up on the ground where everyone could see it.

“These are the number of ninja taking part in the exam; Konoha has the most since we’re hosting the exam, followed by Rain, Mist, Cloud and Waterfall. Suna and the newly formed Sound nation only sent one team, but that means they are probably the best in their villages.

“Yeah, well we’ll just beat them all, won’t we Akamaru?” Kiba declared earning stares form many of the surrounding teams.

“I wouldn’t say that too loudly.” Kabuto admonished. “The team from Suna is composed of the Kazekage’s children, so you can count on them having the best training possible, plus the youngest, Gaara…well I’ll show you.” He pulled out another card and everyone noticed it was blank.

“Hey, why is it blank?” Ino asked.

“Well, the card will only respond to my chakra, so that way no one besides me can read them.” He focused a bit of chakra into the card. A picture of Gaara came up, along with a chart for mission history, a space for notes, and a pentagon that was used for charting abilities.

“Sabaku no Gaara, has completed 8 C-rank missions and wow! A B-rank mission. It says he didn’t do any D-rank, but that’s probably because he’s the son of the Kazekage. The note worthy thing about Gaara is that he has returned from all of his missions, without a scratch on him.”

At this, most of the genin were shocked. Sasuke and Neji were still staring at each other, although it was their second staring contest, with both deciding that the first was flawed when some other genin walked between them. Naruto wasn’t paying attention to Kabuto, he wasn’t too worried about the competition, besides Gaara and Sasuke who could bother him?...Perhaps Neji…come to think of it, Shino was always mysterious, so who know what kind of skill he had…and then there was Shikamaru, Naruto knew he was really smart, he constantly kicked his butt at strategy games.

“Maybe I should pay more attention.” He thought, but was interrupted by the emotionless voice of Gaara.

“Uzumaki Naruto” I have something to discuss with you.”

Naruto’s eyes met up with Gaara’s and he simply nodded his head, before heading off to a corner.

“Those things you said last night…about the moon…I’m not sure I can believe that.”
Naruto frowned a bit.

“But,” Gaara continued, “I wish to try. Would you be my friend?”

Naruto’s smile nearly reached his ears. “Of course, I said so last night, and I meant it.”

Gaara simply nodded his head, his lips barely curling into a smile. “There are things about this exam…they don’t bode well for this village. Make it through this exam, eventually there will be fights…make it that far, and we shall fight…to prove which way of life is correct.”

“I’ll look forward to a fight between us.” Naruto said, still smiling. “But there is a stipulation I would like to throw in there. Promise you won’t unnecessarily harm any Konoha shinobi. To thank you for the warning, I’ll give you one of my own. Don’t underestimate Sasuke, should you run into him before I do. He is a seriously good fighter.”

After Gaara had agreed to the stipulation, the two demon vessels parted ways, just in time to see Kabuto get attacked by a member of the Sound team, who was wrapped in bandages, and appeared to be wearing a hay stack on his back. At first it seemed like Kabuto had dodged the attack, but soon afterwards, his glasses fractured and he bent over before retching on the floor.

‘What the…he dodged it! So how did he still get hit? Chakra extension…no that takes extremely good control to do, most genin couldn’t do that, so how? Well, they are from Sound, maybe it has to do with some kind of sonic attack. That would explain the loss of balance.’ Naruto analyzed the situation quickly, as did Sasuke, but they were the only ones besides Shikamaru to determine the probable means of attack.

“ENOUGH!” A voice rang out through the crowded waiting room. “There is to be no fighting, unless an instructor gives explicit permission, and even then there is to be no killing.

A large man, with scars crossing his face and wearing all black, from his shirt to his boots and back to the coat he was wearing was addressing the assembled genin. His head was covered in a bandana, which was also used as his forehead protector.

“My name is Morino Ibiki; I am the first examiner of the Chuunin selection exam. You will all come up here and draw a lot.” Everyone in the room drew the slip of paper and opened them up to find a letter and a number. “Ok, you have one minute to find your seats for the first exam! Anyone who doesn’t make it to their assigned seats will be eliminated from this exam, along with their team! Oh, did I mention, the clock started when I started to talk?” He said with a sadistic grin that would have made Anko proud.

Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura quickly found their seats and steeled themselves for whatever lay ahead. Sakura was a bit scared of the examiner and the exam. She didn’t know what was coming. Sasuke was a bit more prepared, since Ibiki held the same rank as his mom; they would hang out sometimes, along with some of the other jounin. He knew that Morino Ibiki was the torture and interrogation expert in Konoha, therefore this exam would be very cerebral. He groaned at the thought of this. If anyone enjoyed mind games as much as Ibiki, it was Naruto.

As Ibiki was explaining the rules of the exam, Sasuke took the time to check his surroundings. Sakura was seated behind him and was surrounded by foreign ninja. He didn’t worry too much about her; she was smart…if nothing else. Naruto was sitting on the left half of the room, and was in the fourth row from the front. He too was surrounded by foreign shinobi, but only to his front and back. To his left was a Konoha shinobi that he had never seen before, and to his right was Hyuuga Hinata. Sasuke knew of her crush on Naruto, I mean, who didn’t? So even if Naruto were in danger of failing the test, Hinata would try and help him out…assuming she could muster the courage.

The first exam was a written test, points would be deducted for missing a question, and if you got caught cheating. To some of the smarter ninja in the room, it became clear that the questions were too difficult for most genin to answer. Thus, the only option left was to cheat without being caught...

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The twenty teams that passed the first portion of the exam now stood in front of Konoha’s famous Training Area 44 lovingly referred to by many as the ‘Forrest of Death’. The instructor for the exam, Yamashiro Aoba, was explaining the second stage of the exam.

“…death. Each team will fill out these waivers, and once you’ve turned them in, each team will receive one of two scrolls. Either the Heaven or Earth scrolls. You must use all of the skills from the first exam as well as combat skills to find and retrieve the scroll you are missing. Once that is done, report to the tower in the center of the area. The time limit for this task is five days. Should any member of your team die, the entire team will be eliminated. If you leave the confines of the area, your team will be eliminated. Oh, don’t open your scrolls. The consequences could turn out…bad.”

Naruto and Sasuke snickered at the jounin’s attempt to sound sadistic; the tone just didn’t fit the friendly jounin at all. Of course, the boys did have large expectations when it came to sadistic nature. The only reason that Anko wasn’t proctoring the second exam, was due to her ‘conflicting interests’ since her son’s were participating.

Team Seven turned in the required paper work and received their Heaven scroll before heading to gate 22. After few anxious minutes of waiting, they were allowed inside the area and quickly dispersed; Naruto made a large amount of shadow clones and used henge to transform them into the different team members. With any luck the clones would be able to dupe anyone following them long enough for the real team to disappear. Unfortunately a pair of eyes narrowed at the attempt, before quickly distinguishing the real team from the fake and following them.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Team Seven stopped about an hour and a half into the forest for a short break. Naruto went into the nearby woods to ‘relieve himself’ while Sasuke and Sakura kept an eye out for any enemy teams. Suddenly, a large brown snake crashed through the undergrowth and both genin were forced to side step.

“As expected from an Uchiha.” A high-pitched voice rang out through the clearing and seemed to be coming from the snake. A grass ninja with long black hair rose from the back of the snake and stared at the two genin who had drawn kunai already. With a burst of chakra, the two suddenly fell to their knees as kunai passed directly through the center of their heads.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

While Naruto was off ‘relieving himself’, a trio of rain ninja tried to ambush him, but were spotted long before their ‘sneak’ attack. Instead they managed to skewer one shadow clone with three kunai, before their legs were frozen to the ground in ice. Try as they might they couldn’t escape, and when they tried to replace themselves with something, they found that their arms were punctured with ice needles before they could move. A few more ice needles formed from thin air and impaled the genin in the neck, not killing them, but putting them in a state of false death for a while. Naruto smirked at his handiwork.

‘All those lessons on anatomy with Haku have started to pay off.’ He thought and liberated the scroll from the genin. Unfortunately it wasn’t an Earth scroll, so now the team had two Heaven scrolls. Shrugging, Naruto quickly sealed the scroll into another scroll so they could hide it from an enemy. He placed another seal on top of it; this one was a hybrid blood and chakra seal. It was the most advanced type of seal he had learned, it would only open if his blood were to be smeared on the seal, and a specific amount of chakra was pushed into it. The chakra level was variable and was also tuned to his unique chakra. In short, no one and I mean NO ONE, besides Naruto could open this scroll. His moment of pride was dashed short when a large snake tried to swallow him. He even succeeded too, but it found out very quickly that that was a bad idea when its thought was cut open by a sword of ice.

“Koori no Yaiba” (Blade of Ice) Naruto thought as the ice sword that had enveloped his hand receded. ‘I like it. A bit bloody, but effective.’ He suddenly picked up the sound of a fight and raced back to his team.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

‘What is this?’ Sasuke thought as he was felt the kunai puncture his head, blood spurting forth. Only he didn’t drop dead. ‘It’s like when kaa-san uses kanashibari (temporary paralysis technique), but so much bigger!’

Shakily Sasuke retrieved a kunai from his holster and quickly nicked his leg with the sharp knife, freeing himself from the illusion of his own death moments before the strange grass ninja’s fist impacted the ground were he was not a second earlier. The crater left by the fist was large and Sasuke was glad that he grabbed Sakura before escaping.

“Impressive, Sasuke-kun, very impressive!” The ninja responded, straightening his, or her, back. Suddenly, a large amount of ice needles flew towards their opponents, who dodged them, but only barely.

“Why is it that all of our opponents are way too androgynous?” Naruto joked before launching into another attack. “Sensatsu Shuishou.” (Flying Water Needles) Naruto once more made the deadly projectiles, but this time the man/women simply formed some hand seals and blew all of the needles away with a fuuton technique.

“Naruto! Be careful, this one…he’s on a different level than most. His kanashibari no jutsu is stronger than Kaa-san’s!”

“Than he obviously has no business being here.” Naruto replied as he moved towards his teammates, finally settling next to Sasuke and the still stunned Sakura. They simply watched the ninja as he…or she laughed at the two.

“Very good Naruto-kun, I expected my snake to be more of a challenge for you, I obviously underestimated you.” The brown eyes of their opponent narrowed into slits. “I promise it won’t happen again.”

The attack was swift, but both boys were able to dodge it, although they realized that an unconscious Sakura was a bad item to have to carry around. One unspoken command later, Sasuke was engaged with the foreign shinobi and Naruto was waking up Sakura. A quick prick to the back of the hand was enough to wake the comatose girl and Naruto quickly told her to hide as he joined his brother in attacking the ninja.

Sasuke had activated his sharingan to help in the fight, but he was still having trouble. It seemed that whenever their enemy attacked, Sasuke would bring up his guard, but would still get hit.

‘The sharingan…it still isn’t fully matured yet.’ Their opponent noticed, although the site of the crimson eyes did make his or her mouth water slightly. After punching Sasuke away, and dodging a volley of small fireballs from Naruto, the figure smiled.

“You have very good eyes, Sasuke-kun, too bad they are worthless in a taijutsu fight…unlike your brother’s.” The androgynous being tried to aggravate Sasuke, but to no avail.

The battle continued on, with both boys attacking with various taijutsu styles and ninjustu thrown in for longer-range support. Naruto reformed the Koori no yaiba and continued his fight with the snake like adversary, managing to keep the…person at bay. Their opponent shivered, but not due to the cold of the sword.

‘A water manipulation bloodline? Not even the Nidaime had that much ability when it came to water. That would be a great thing to add to my ‘collection’!”

In the moment that their enemy had been pondering whatever it was, the boys took this time to attack. Sasuke launched a number of kunai and shuriken at the man and Naruto charged in with the ice sword once more, this time cutting their opponent in two cleanly.

The boys stood panting a bit, the fight was much longer and intense than any they had faced before and if it hadn’t been for their ‘conditioning’ with Anko, than they would have been out of the fight a while ago. They turned to find Sakura, but froze when the cackling laugh of the grass ninja reverberated behind them. Standing on a tree branch was the effeminate shinobi.

“Very good, of course I expected nothing less from a team lead by Kakashi-kun.”

Before he could continue with the sentence, Sasuke had launched a barrage of shuriken connected with wire at the opponent. The throwing stars spun around the trunk of the tree, binding the ninja to the trunk securely.

‘Sofushasan no Tachi!’ (Manipulating Windmill Triple Blades) ‘How impressive, someone so young can perform this maneuver!”

Sasuke completed the seals for his newest Katon justu.

“Katon: Ryuuka no jutsu!” (Fire type: Dragon Fire technique)

A bolt of fire quickly made its way down the wires from Sasuke’s mouth and towards the incapacitated ninja. Their opponent tried to move, only to find his feet and hands frozen to the tree branch in very thick ice. ‘Their teamwork is nearly impeccable! This couldn’t have been done in a couple of months!’ The grass ninja lamented as the incredibly hot fire of the jutsu impacted the tree trunk, punching a large hole through it. Their adversary screamed in pain and surprise.

The boys waited for the fire to die down before turning their backs on the grass shinobi this time. As the fire slowly turned into embers, they were very surprised to find the foreign ninja still standing. The only visible sign of damage was that his face seemed to be…melting. Using a burst of chakra, the ninja was free from the wires, snapping them all easily. Then he began to giggle…then chuckle…and finally it turned into a full-blown psychotic laugh.

“Truly,” the now identifiable man said through a bout of cackling, “truly, you are worthy of being my new vessel!” With that, his neck launched forward, mouth agape right for Sasuke’s neck. Naruto wasn’t fast enough to intercept the blow on his own, so he did the next best thing.

‘Good thing I had everyone keep some of my satetsu (Iron Sand) on them for something like this.’ He thought.

Activating his other long range blood line, Naruto shot spikes of iron filings at the incoming ninja from the back of Sasuke’s coat, coming up right as the ninja’s head was aiming for the crook of Sasuke’s neck, resulting in some nasty cuts especially one to the roof of the ninja’s mouth.

The long necked grass ninja quickly withdrew and gapped at Naruto.

‘The Iron Sand! Sasori wiped out that bloodline! Even I couldn’t recreate it, the child died during the Kyuubi attack. But then why the hell can this kid use that?’

“It would seem that I have underestimated you once more Naruto-kun, but I’m afraid that I must mark your teammate now. The sharingan it too important to me.” This time, the enemy used Kanashibari once more, freezing Naruto to the spot and once more launching his neck at Sasuke.

The last remark by their snake like opponent registered a cord with Naruto.

‘Orochimaru! Kaa-san’s jounin sensei! No wonder we couldn’t beat him! There is really only one thing to do right now…’ Naruto realized what he had to do.

He was able to break out of the kanashibari by slicing his finger on a shuriken and was able to say only one word before Orochimaru’s neck reached Sasuke.

“SHARINGAN!” He cried, hoping the snake sannin would stop his assault on his brother. To both his great relief and fear, the sannin did just that. Naruto took this time to launch more satetsu spikes at the attacking ninja before he was able to jump in front of Sasuke and locking eyes with Orochimaru.

Seeing the fully matured sharingan of Naruto, Orochimaru couldn’t help but be confused. Sakura was simply beside herself, first they were attacked by a grass ninja who was able to survive a direct hit form a jounin level fire jutsu, and then his neck stretched out impossibly long, only to be driven back by spikes of some sort, plus there were the ice needles, which only Haku could do. When the mysterious ninja tried again, Naruto had activated his…sharingan. But that would me he was an Uchiha, wouldn’t it? She didn’t know what was going on anymore and simply stared at her teammates. What else were they hiding from her?

“Naruto! What are you doing?” Sasuke asked his brother who was standing in front of him.

Orochimaru began to laugh. “I see, Naruto-kun, you’ve figured me out. Yes, that is it. You plan on sacrificing yourself to save Sasuke-kun. It’s only natural. The only way that prey can save its young from a predator is to offer something better.”

Sasuke was about to yell at his brother for being stupid, but was stopped when Naruto simply put a hand in his face.

“Sasuke, run and get help. The test doesn’t matter anymore, you were right; he’s way out of our league.”

“So you’re going to fight him on your own?” Sasuke yelled at his brother. “No way in hell will I let you risk your life for m-“ He was cut short when Naruto’s hand slammed into his neck, knocking the Uchiha out cold.

“Sakura, take Sasuke and run. Find somewhere to hide and get help any way you can!” Naruto ordered before he launched himself at Orochimaru before leading the missing nin away from his teammates. The snake sannin quickly obliged, chasing after his new target. As Naruto was leading him off in the opposite direction, Orochimaru made a quick hand seal and a kage bunshin poofed into existence. The clone’s neck elongated once more and made its way to Sasuke. Sakura leapt in front of the attack, but was knocked to the side. She could only watch as a pair of fangs bit into her beloved’s neck and a strange tattoo appeared, resembling the tomoe of the sharingan. The clone smirked and disappeared. Sakura held back her tears at her own uselessness as she hid Sasuke in the hollow of a tree before heading out after Naruto.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

As expected, Naruto’s fight against one of the legendary Sannin wasn’t going very good. He had been able to cut Orochimaru with the satetsu some more, but the wounds were very minor and didn’t hinder the more experienced man at all.

Orochimaru was simply toying with the boy. He wasn’t even thinking about the fight, but instead how Naruto had acquired the sharingan, satetsu, and a water manipulation bloodline. There was only one logical explanation, and frankly it made his mouth water in excitement.

“The senshin! It didn’t fail as I thought; Sarutobi-sensei must have hidden it from everyone. I must have him!”

By this point in time, Naruto was running low on chakra, even with his way beyond average chakra control, the hyoton (Ice techniques) and satetsu took up a lot of chakra, not to mention the constant depletion caused by the sharingan. That’s when Kyuubi felt he needed to make his presence known. The red chakra of the Kyuubi began to lead into Naruto, empowering him beyond belief. His already red eyes became slightly darker, and a slit appeared as his pupil, the three tomoe still swirling in his eyes.

Naruto nearly flew at Orochimaru and was able to connect with a punch, but to his annoyance, Orochimaru turned into a pile of mud. Naruto jumped out of the way as he felt another attack from behind. Dropping onto all fours, he once more charged Orochimaru, only for the snake’s tongue to wrap around his neck.

“So, my work wasn’t for naught. Plus you’re the vessel for the Kyuubi, interesting.” Lifting up Naruto’s shirt, he saw the seal was visible. Gathering chakra to his finger tips, a purple flame appeared on each one, before Orochimaru drove his hand into Naruto’s stomach.

“Gogyo Fuin.” (Five Elements Seal) Five new symbols were seemingly etched on top of the original seal. Naruto felt the Kyuubi’s chakra begin to recede and he began to feel tired. The tongue released him, and Naruto crumpled unceremoniously to the ground.

Through heavy eyelids, Naruto watched as Orochimaru’s neck once more stretched out and bit him on the left side of his neck. A pain like no other flooded his system, and the last thing he heard before blacking out was Orochimaru’s voice.

“I will return for you, Naruto-kun, along with Sasuke-kun, you two will grant me my dreams.”

He promptly passed out from the pain and lay on the ground until Sakura found him, the black tattoo on his neck a reminder of her own uselessness.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Anko was racing through the forest of death as quickly as she could, looking for her former sensei. She had kept up a suicidal pace, loosing the ANBU that were coming with her after the first forty minutes. She had recently found the body or a large snake, a sure sign of her ex-teacher. Suddenly, her cursed seal throbbed painfully and she was forced to stop. Looking ahead, she felt as if her birthday had come early. There standing on a branch was Orochimaru. He was sporting some nasty cuts, but was still able to dodge Anko’s initial strike. Jumping backwards towards the trunk, he smiled wickedly.

“Why Anko, it’s been so long, why the long face?” He teased. In a flash, Anko was grappling with her former mentor, backing him into the tree trunk. She quickly drew a kunai and stabbed it through her left hand and his right, impaling them to the tree.

“You’ll have to pardon my rudeness, but I need a hand.” She hissed as she used his left hand to form seals for her technique.

“Now, now, Anko, there is no reason to kill yourself, is there?” The voice of Orochimaru emanated from behind her, and she twisted her neck to look at the sannin. She felt the body pinned to the tree dissolve into mud and she knew she had blown her chance.

“Besides,” Orochimaru said manically, “doesn’t Naruto-kun need you?”

He disappeared as ANBU started to close in on their position, leaving Anko weeping to herself, left hand still pinned to the tree.

Sakura had been keeping watch over her unconscious teammates for nearly a full day now, without sleep or food, just some water that she had packed away for emergencies. She needed sleep badly, which her body constantly told her, but she pushed through the fatigue and weariness. Sasuke was tossing a bit and running a slight fever, his entire body was covered in sweat and looking at his face, contorted in pain, made Sakura’s stomach turn.

Naruto wasn’t doing as well. When she found him, he was laying on the ground rather awkwardly, like he had been dropped to the forest floor. He had the same hickey/tattoo on his neck, but was reacting differently to it than Sasuke. He had the same fever, but she felt almost no chakra coming from his body, unlike her crush. It was almost like he was in a death like state, like what Haku had done to Zabuza.

She had done all that she could, with her limited knowledge of medical techniques and all she could do was defend her teammates, like they had done for her since they had become a team.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto found himself in the dark, dank hallway that lead to the cage that held the Kyuubi prisoner. He hadn’t been here since the incident with Itachi. Walking along the corridor, he slowly came to the cage of the Kyuubi; however there was something off about it. He didn’t remember everything about the room from the first time he was there, but he was pretty sure that there wasn’t a large brick wall where the cage was supposed to be. The only opening was a hole, about five feet high and twelve feet long, smack dab in the middle of the wall.

“Hey stupid fox, what the hell is that?” Naruto asked.

The red eyes of the Kyuubi appeared in the hole and leered at the boy.

“This is the result of the seal that the Orochimaru placed overtop of the original seal. I should be cut off completely, but I was able to move a portion of the Goguoufuuin (Five elemental seal) to affect some other function, but that was all. Effectively you are cut off from my chakra until the seal can be removed.”

“What function did you move the affect to?” Naruto asked a hint of worry in his voice.

“The seal is now binding your ability to use your ice bloodline.”

“Aw, crap, I liked that one too. Wait, why did he bite my neck then?” Naruto inquired.

The great demon simply stared at the boy, seemingly in contemplation before answering.

“The bite was simply a way of delivering a cursed seal. The seal is an attempt to lure the recipient to who ever placed the seal on them. In this case, he is attempting to influence you and Sasuke to his side. Also it is preventing me from interfering with the senshin. Without me, your DNA would be a mess of various people’s and extremely weak. If you have weak DNA, than all the cells your body produces would be weak. Basically, without me, your body would probably begin to reject itself. Be careful with any bodily fluids you might come in contact with until you can remove the Goguoufuuin.”

“Well he’s out of luck; I’ll never join him, although that problem with my DNA, that wouldn’t be good to experience.” Naruto determinately stated. “But why Sasuke? He didn’t mark him, he was following me. Right?”

“Kid, I doubt that one of the legendary sannin from Konoha, would let a target escape, I can’t be completely sure, but he’s probably been marked.”

“I will help Sasuke through anything he needs.” Naruto declared once more. It seemed as if the conversation was done and Naruto quickly grew bored. After an indeterminable amount of time Naruto grew restless and asked a question to the fox.

“Hey, fuzz for brains, why did you attack Konoha anyway? All of the books and accounts I could get my hands on only mention the destruction, nothing about the reasons for you being an idiot.”

The demon fox was silent once more.

“Kid, there are a few things you aren’t ready to hear yet, most of them pertain to that topic, but what I can tell you…will be limited by your knowledge of history. What do you know of the Biju?”

“Well, I know that there are nine of you, and you were the strongest…”

“Am the strongest, I am the strongest, not that stupid past tense you idiot!”

“Yeah, whatever, One tail, is Shukaku, sealed inside of Gaara, Two tail is a cat, I don’t know anything else about it, Three tail…not sure, isn’t it supposed to be a turtle or something? Um…four tails, four…um I don’t really know about the four through eight, gomen.” He apologized for his lack of knowledge.

“Not too shabby for a human. In all honesty, you shouldn’t know more than that. I’m surprised that you knew of the Sanbi. As for the Yonbi, Gobi, Rokubi, Shichibi and Hachibi…the six, seven and eight tailed demons are the reason for my attack.”

“What does that mean? Are you saying that they tricked you?”

The eyes of the nine tailed fox narrowed in anger.

“They DID trick you! Oh that is too funny, the greatest demon in the history of the world, tricked into getting his butt handed to him!” He began to laugh with great mirth.

“Shut up brat! It isn’t that simple!”

“I don’t see how, I mean what did they do, say ‘Hey Kyuubi, I got an idea, lets destroy Konoha, we got your back’ and then run away or something? ‘Cuz that would be hilarious!”

“No…this is more than I planned on telling you, but I suppose it is necessary. I have lived for more than 1000 years, I have seen many things, and I have hated just as many things. With 1000 years of knowledge, I suppose I have developed a sort of complex. I really, REALLY hate people. Every being in this world, be it animal or human has a certain potential, humans have a higher potential than most beings with the exceptions of biju. You are not ready to be told the full story, so I’ll make this a riddle for you. I am immortal and I grow tired of people who fail to live up to their potential. You can figure the rest out on your own.”

With those parting words, the cage and surrounding area dissolved to black as Naruto was torn back into the world of semi consciousness.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

‘Sasuke-kun…Naruto…I’ve failed you again…I’m sorry.’ Sakura was in between a rock and a hard place. Or technically she was between the ground and one of the Oto Nin’s foot. Rock Lee lay in a state of semi-consciousness on the ground in front of her unconscious teammates, having been the victim of several sonic attacks, courtesy of Kinuta Dosu, a.k.a. ‘the mummy’. Team Ten, the Ino-Shika-Cho trio were weary and eyed the captive member of team Seven, their previous attempt at helping their fellow Konoha shinobi having failed on a gamble. Tsuchi Kin, the Oto kunoichi was unconscious following her encounter with Ino’s Shintenshin no Jutsu (Mind Body Switch technique) and Abumi Zaku was holding Sakura to the ground. It was at that moment that a large spike of dark chakra erupted from behind Lee.

All of the combatant shinobi shifted their gaze to the eruption of black chakra swirling around Uchiha Sasuke. A veritable typhoon of chakra swirled and roared around the boy, making his features seem darker and more sinister. Strange black marks began to spread from the left side of his body towards his right. They were the shape of flames and seemed to multiply quickly as they spread over his skin. The boy opened his hands and looked at his empty palms, before closing them again, as if he was testing them. He took a long, deep breath before his face lit up in an evil smirk.

“Sakura…who did this to Lee?” He asked, more or less ignoring the fact that his only conscious teammate was trapped beneath the sandal of another ninja.

“Sasuke-kun…” She whispered in shock at her now transformed beloved.

“I did it!” Zaku boasted to the Uchiha. “And now I think I’ll finish you off as well!”

The dark haired sound ninja raised his arms at Sasuke, palms facing the boy before he yelled out his attack.

“Zankuuha!” (Air Cutter)

A large wave of compressed air erupted from small vents in Zaku’s palms and raced towards Sasuke who simply looked at it, as if it weren’t worth his time to dodge it. The massive attack impacted and dust and dirt were kicked up, seemingly from an explosion.

“Ha! I blew away every last bit of him!” Zaku

A sudden flurry of movement from Zaku’s right caught him completely off guard and the hard shot to his jaw wasn’t even expected.

“You’re pathetic! There is no way you could have possibly beaten Lee. He is apart of Hyuuga’s team after all.” Sasuke retorted venomously.

That said he shifted his gaze onto Dosu.

“So, that means it must have been you!” He quickly charged the bandaged Sound Nin, only to be fired upon by Zaku once more.

“Hey! Were not done yet!” The cocky boy challenged. He once more took aim with the palm of his hands.

“Saidai Zankuuha!” (Maximum Air Cutter)

An even larger blast of compressed air and chakra streaked from the vents in Zaku’s arms towards the demonic looking Sasuke. Again the surrounding ground was decimated and blown away, but unlike the previous time, Zaku found that Sasuke’s counter attack didn’t wait. Sasuke held both of Zaku’s arms behind his back and was pulling on them, using his foot as a brace to level more force onto the appendages. As Zaku felt his shoulders begin to ache he gritted his teeth, ignoring the pain, but quickly he failed to silence his own voice. Zaku cried out in pain and began to plead with the cursed Uchiha to let him go. But Sasuke paid no heed to his captive. Zaku’s cries reached a crescendo as he felt both of his shoulders and elbows dislocate under the force of the Uchiha. From that point on it turned into a whimper as he fell to the ground from his knees.

“Such a pity too, you were so proud of those arms of yours.” Sasuke sneered at the broken shinobi.

Sakura and team ten were in shock. There was Uchiha Sasuke, one of the brightest genin in the village, and he had just broken both arms of a combatant and not batted an eyelash. Shikamaru and Chouji knew that this wasn’t a sane Sasuke, but they couldn’t do much about it. Ino on the other hand…she was broken, but in a different way. The mask that she had placed over Sasuke had shattered into a million pieces. It was torn apart and replaced by a demonic, evil Sasuke that looked as if he had been drug up from hell itself.

While Sasuke was gloating over his achievement, Dosu was retrieving his teammates.

“Here, we’ll give you our scroll. Just let us go.” While Zaku was definitely the mouth of their team, Dosu was the brains and muscle. He recognized a curse seal when he saw it and knew that he alone couldn’t beat it.

“But we haven’t fought yet.” Sasuke taunted the remaining ninja.

“I will fight you in the third round fights, just let us go.” Dosu was pleading now.

“Hn. If you’re chickening out now, than I suppose that I’ll have to fight you later.” Sasuke sneered.

Dosu placed his teams Earth Scroll on the ground and quickly leaped into the forest.

Sakura was rising to her knees, still afraid of what she had just witnessed. Team Ten was frozen in their places as well. Sasuke was the only one to move a muscle in the next minute. He simply clenched and unclenched his hands again, before breaking out in maniacal laughter once more.

“Finally! With this…with this power, I can kill that man and avenge the deaths of my family. Yes, I see what I must become. I must once more take up the path of the avenger, even if it means giving my body to the devil himself!” No one present knew how true that sentence would become in the coming months and years.

His power rant was interrupted by another explosion of chakra, this time from Naruto. At first it was small, but very quickly it equaled the chakra of Sasuke, before surpassing that level by leaps and bounds. Naruto slowly rose to his feet, his own sharingan activated, and as the flame marks spread over his body.

Sasuke, upon seeing his brother rise, seemingly from the dead, became a mixture of fear and anger. Fear as the chakra level usurped his own, and then anger that a brother of his was once again more powerful than himself. He tried to release more chakra from the seal, but couldn’t keep up with Naruto. He felt the adrenaline of his battle fade and the cursed seal began to retract and exhaustion claimed him again.

The reaction of Sakura and team ten was pure terror and astonishment, not necessarily in that order. The loud obnoxious boy they once knew seemed to disappear into the fiery swirl of chakra that leapt and danced around the boy. Where as the chakra coming from Sasuke had been black, Naruto was releasing an orangey red chakra that burned the grass that he had been laying in. No one noticed Sasuke pass out, they were rooted to their spots by fear. Naruto copied Sasuke exactly, opening and closing his hands, seemingly testing them, just as his brother before him, but instead of laughing or looking pleased, he seemed frightened. Where Sasuke had begun to laugh, Naruto began to cough. Not once, or twice, he fell into a coughing fit that seemed to go on for ever, the flame marks never once receding, but not spreading. He continued coughing until his gag reflex kicked in and he vomited on the ground. Once he had emptied his stomach, the coughing didn’t stop and he dry heaved three times, before he coughed out blood. When that happened, his eyes grew wide and he looked at his vomit caked hands, which now had blood on them. Suddenly the marks of Orochimaru’s cursed seal withdrew and Naruto had to fight for consciousness. He wobbled on his knees, forcing his eyes to try and focus. Reaching into his supply pouch, all those in attendance thought he was going for a weapon, so when he removed a scroll from his pack, they were shocked.

“S-sakura…take th-this.” He coughed again and channeled what little chakra he had into the scroll, unsealing it and releasing his previously captured heaven scroll. He then promptly passed out.

Sakura cautiously approached her fallen teammates. They seemed much more…peaceful than they had since that snake man had bitten them. She collected the two scrolls that now belonged to her, before remembering team ten. She tensed up and drew a kunai. She wouldn’t let her teammates down by loosing their scrolls.

“Chill out, Forehead girl, we already got ours.” Ino told her, finally released from the grip of fear.

“Yeah, besides, we wouldn’t take scrolls from fellow rookie genin.” Chouji replied, smiling.

“That would be too troublesome.” Shikamaru agreed.

She smiled at the friendly team ten, before putting both scrolls in her supply pouch and turned to her fallen teammates. Moving them was going to be hard, especially with the distance they had to travel to the tower.

As she was contemplating the logistics of making a medical sled to transport them on, Shikamaru and Ino had picked up Naruto, while Chouji had moved over to Sasuke and tried to lift him by himself. Sakura quickly moved to help out the big boned boy and the two teams made their way towards the middle of the Forrest of Death.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto and Sasuke hadn’t awoken by the time the two teams reached the tower. Team Ten left Sakura and the boys in one of the antechambers of the tower where they were supposed to wait. After twenty minutes of nothing but silence Sakura grew tired of waiting and began wondering what the hell was taking so long. The faded painting that served as the only decoration in the room caught her eye. The only bits she could make out were Heaven and Earth. Suddenly the scrolls popped into her mind.

“Maybe I should open them. Even if we do get disqualified, at least Sasuke and Naruto will get medical attention.” She said out loud.

Removing the scrolls from her pack and opening them, she saw a complicated seal, drawn onto the paper of the scroll. She quickly dropped the two scrolls when it began to smoke. They landed on top of each other, forming an X. Suddenly, a large puff of smoke appeared and out of that smoke appeared the Hokage and Anko.

The Sandaime quickly checked Sasuke while Anko was busy assessing Naruto. She looked at the Hokage with worry clearly displayed in her eyes. He solemnly nodded and Anko lost it. Her eyes began to water, tears began to stream down her face, and she let out all the frustration she had accumulated in the day and a half since her encounter with her former sensei. She punched the hard stone next to Naruto’s unconscious body until her knuckles bled and she couldn’t support her own weight any more. She felt like she had failed. She had failed to protect her sons, she had failed to kill her sworn enemy, and she had failed the Sandaime, who had given everything she could ever want in life. She barely registered as the Hokage took Naruto and Sasuke to a side chamber to perform the Fuuja Houin (Evil sealing method) on their cursed seals. For the first time since Orochimaru had left her, she cried, I mean really cried. She didn’t even notice when Sakura joined her in tears.

Sasuke woke up with a splitting headache and a funny taste in his mouth. He looked around and quickly deduced that he was in some hospital wing, although he couldn’t identify which. Pushing the covers off of his chest he sat up and shut his eyes against the harsh light emanating from the windows. Hearing the easily identifiable sounds of his brother snoring, he looked to his left and saw Naruto laying face up on the adjacent bed. As the sunlight crept onto Naruto’s face, the boy turned over, exposing the back of his neck. The inverse tomoe of the cursed seal glared at the Uchiha survivor and suddenly the memories from the forest of death came pouring back into his head.

He remembered the adrenaline rush that the seal gave him, the extreme feeling of invulnerability and most of all the power. Oh the power, it was like a drug, he remembered the power he held over Zaku and remembered that he had dislocated every joint in the boy’s arms. He quickly ran to the trashcan in the corner of the room and nearly vomited. It wasn’t from the fact that he had broken a person completely, or that he had ignored his teammate, but his tone of voice when he spoke those words.

“Such a pity too, you were so proud of those arms of yours.”

‘I…I sounded so much like…him. But I’m – I’m nothing like Itachi. Am I?’ He asked himself, expecting no response. ‘Ah, but are you? Are you truly different, you were always looking up to him; it is him who you are constantly judging yourself against. You wish to emulate him, which is why you will come around…in time.’ A sinister voice not his own replied

Caught unawares by the new voice, Sasuke surveyed the room for intruders. He found no one.

‘That won’t do at all boy, I’m afraid that you won’t be able to rid yourself of me with a silly kunai.’ The same voice goaded him.

“Who are you?” The now paranoid boy demanded.

‘Me? I’m no one really. I’m simply you.’ With that the voice went silent and didn’t answer any more questions.

“Sasuke?”

This time when surveyed the room he noticed that Anko was looking at him having just woken up from a fitful sleep by the side of her biological son.

“Kaa-san…I…he…Orochimaru…Naruto sacrificed himself…I broke Zaku’s arms…” The broken sentence from her adopted son confirmed every one of her worries as she watched the usually calm face that Sasuke kept up fall.

“Why? Why is he like this, I was ok…but he I don’t know…so much chakra…” He tried to ask.

“Naruto…the seal forcibly draws out chakra from within the victim…Orochimaru…he put a seal over the Kyuubi seal and blocked off Naruto…mostly. Some how, the seal didn’t completely seal off the chakra…and the cursed seal…it forcibly withdrew demonic chakra at such a great amount that some civilians on the other end of Konoha fainted.”

“I-it drew out the fox’s chakra?” Sasuke stammered.

“Hai.” She replied running a hand threw his hair. “We’ve sent for Tsunade but she won’t be here for a few days, and well…you two are supposed to be in the preliminary fights in two hours.”

The amount of time that seemed to disappear from Sasuke suddenly caught up with him.

“What happened? That last thing I remember is Naruto’s seal activating and surpassing mine, but since that was Kyuubi’s chakra I’m not surprised.”

“Sakura and Team Ten managed to carry you two to the tower and Sakura summoned myself and the Hokage through the scrolls. He then sealed up the cursed seal with the Fuuja Houin. (Evil sealing method.) Now I want you to understand something. The seal will stop the Heaven seal from spreading, but the force that is preventing it from doing so, is your own will power. Or it would be normally. Hokage-sama has developed a newer version of the seal and got to try it out on the two of you. No longer is it your own will power that holds the seal at bay, it is Naruto’s. You’re will power holds his seal in check. This means that if you succumb to the seal, his containment seal will break.” Anko recapped all of the important events from the previous three days for her son.

“But why? If I am weak than Naruto will suffer because of me?” Sasuke argued.

“That is one of the reasons that the seal was done this way. Hokage-sama recognizes that Naruto’s will power is exceptionally hard to break. He also realizes that despite the possible threat that this procedure poses, he trusts you to protect your brother. I know that Naruto would agree, you are not weak in any way, shape or form.”

It was at that moment that Naruto began to stir in his bed.

“Uh, Kaa-chan, what happened? Is everyone all right?” He asked with his eyes still closed due to their sensitivity.

Anko smiled at her son and began to recount the happenings of the previous three days to him.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

While Anko and her son’s were getting reacquainted, Kabuto’s team was meeting with their true jounin instructor.

“I’m sorry Orochimaru-sama, but Sasuke was able to get out of the forest before I could gather more information on him.” The spy reported.

“I am disappointed Kabuto…however there is now another player in my plans and you would be advised to gather information on him as well. I believe you are aware of him…Uzumaki Naruto. Or should I say, Mitarashi Naruto.” The snake sannin grinned evilly at his spy.

“M-Mitarashi!” Kabuto was taken aback by the new information. “Then that would mean that…that the senshin…is alive and well!”

“Indeed it is Kabuto, but that is not the only good thing to come of this excursion into familiar territory. It would seem that Naruto and Sasuke are closer than we thought. If we are able to lure one to our side…”

“Than the other would surely follow.” Kabuto finished. Amazed at the luck of the situation.

“Not only one, but possibly two. You forget, Anko-chan was the only one to survive giving birth to one of my ‘children’ and she could still prove useful to us. I want you to amend the contingency plan for an extra two ‘passengers’.”

“Hai, Orochimaru-sama, I will do it immediately.”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto was in a bad mood. First of all he is told that he has about two hours to prepare for the preliminary rounds of the third exam, and that he is forbidden from taking any medical aide until after his fights, unless he has it on him. That wouldn’t be a problem normally, that is a distinct advantage of having a nine tailed demon sealed inside of you, but fate was feeling especially vindictive today, and had seen fit to give him a severe case of chakra exhaustion. He didn’t have enough chakra to perform Kage Bunshin, or Mizu Bunshin and although the Goguoufuuin (Five elemental seal) had been removed, courtesy of the Sandaime, he still couldn’t use the Mastery of Water and Ice. He barely had enough to sustain the sharingan for a minute or two at the most, and he could maybe - maybe produce a magnetic pulse once.

‘If I ever needed another reason to hate the snake freak, I think I might have just found it.’ He thought.

He wanted to get to the arena where the fights were to be held, but was forced to wait. Sakura was patrolling the hallway in front of his room and she wanted answers. He didn’t want to give them, and so the very boring game of cat and mouse began.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Seven teams were assembled in a large indoor stadium, located in the central tower of Training Area Forty-four. Rookie Genin team’s Seven, Eight, and Ten from Konoha had made it through the second round of the Chuunin selection exam. Also first time entrants Team Gai had gotten through as well as the eight time entrants Team…Kabuto, no one knew what team they were because they had failed so many time previous. There was also the team from Suna and Oto. The Oto team looked the worse for the ware and Zaku’s arms were still in slings.

“Congratulations on passing the second phase of the examination. From here on out there will be a series of one on one matches. Since so many of you passed there is a need to do preliminary fights to determine the final ten contestants for the third phase.” Aoba’s voice cut through the silence. “This means that one of you will have to fight twice, unless one or more of you withdraws yourself from consideration. From here your individual performance will not negatively impact your teammates.”

At first no one seemed to be volunteering, until Kabuto raised his hand and asked to be excused. He claimed that he was still feeling the effects of the sound attack back at the beginning of the first exam.

Most of the remaining participants wrote him off as a genin who didn’t take being a ninja seriously and ignored his departure. Shikamaru wasn’t one of them.

‘Lee took two of those attacks and he seems fine. Besides he can’t use chakra to heal himself, so why is Kabuto still injured?’

The Hokage was giving a speech about the true meaning of the chuunin selection exam, how it was a substitute for war and that each of the ninja here were a testament to their own village. Suddenly a sickly looking jounin asked to finish.

“My name is Gekkou Hayate. I will be the proctor for these preliminary matches. The matches will be to the death unless I decide that there is a clear winner. Anything goes, but if you continue your attack after I have called off the fight, you will be stopped, by force if necessary.” He coughed a number of times in the midst of his speech and the bags under his eyes seemed to grow in intensity as he went on.

“Anyway, the thing that will decide your opponents…” he motioned to a wall were there were two statues of shinobi with their arms outstretched. A panel slid away to reveal a large monitor with the names of the remaining genin cycling quickly through it. The names began to go slower and slower until it stopped with the first fight of prelims.

Sabaku no Gaara vs. Inuzuka Kiba

“Alright Akamaru!” The brash boy yelled as the other contestants went back up the stairs.

“First match of the Chuunin selection exam preliminary matches…hajime!” Hayate wheezed.

Very quickly Kiba charged the stoic sand ninja and cocked his arm for a hard punch. It never connected. Gaara’s sand simply stopped the punch before flinging Kiba into the wall, knocking him blissfully unconscious.

“Um, ok, winner Sabaku no Gaara.” Hayate coughed.

Hyuuga Neji vs. Abumi Zaku

The Hyuuga boy stared at his opponent, his pale eyes betraying no emotion. Likewise the Oto shinobi stared back with a smirk on his face.

“I don’t see what’s so funny.” Neji scolded his opponent. “You are fated to loose this match to me anyways. There is nothing you can do to stop fate.”

“We’ll just see about that.” Zaku retorted.

“Second match, begin!” Hayate wheezed at the combatants.

Neither boy made a move.

“By the look in your eyes I can tell that your mind isn’t in our fight.” Neji read the boy’s expressions like an open book. “There is fear there…yes, fear that you won’t be able to defeat me. You know as well as I do that I alone am fated to win this match. Quit now or you will be broken.” Neji’s byakugan flared to life and Zaku took an involuntary step backwards.

“Hm, your arms aren’t even dislocated let alone broken, you should drop this charade.” Neji goaded the boy once more before rushing forward to attack his opponent.

“Zankuuha!” The started Zaku cried as he unleashed his attack on Neji. The only real problem was that he was so frightened by Neji’s byakugan that he forgot to remove his arms from the sling they were in. His attack went off to the side as Neji landed a number of sharp strikes to Zaku’s rib cage and arms. The strikes cut off all chakra flow to Zaku’s arms and made a large portion of his right side numb.

“Examiner, he won’t be getting up.” Neji coldly said as he turned away. He was right too, because after a ten second count from Hayate, Neji was declared the winner and the board once more sprung into action.

Mitarashi Naruto vs. Tenten

Most participants noticed the name change; the Konoha shinobi were used to referring to Naruto as ‘Uzumaki’ and so the new name was a glaring change. The foreign shinobi recognized the name as one of the most dangerous kunoichi in their bingo books, Mitarashi Anko, the former apprentice to the traitor sannin Orochimaru.

Tenten recognized the name for a completely different reason. Mitarashi Anko was the biggest customer in her father’s weapon shop. The amount of kunai she went through annually easily fed her family for three months a year, and with the addition of Naruto and Sasuke a while ago, that figure had grown exponentially.

The pair made their way to the arena and Tenten was able to take a look at her opponent. Naruto appeared to have seen better days as he seemed very tired and sluggish. Naruto was too busy trying to plan for this fight that he didn’t notice. The fake hiraishin kunai he had created would work, but he only had a couple of them. Most of the other seals he had learned and used weren’t meant for combat like those were.

‘Besides, with a weapon specialist like Tenten, kage bunshin would be mostly useless.’ He thought and moved on to his next option.

“Begin.” This time the announcement was shortened to simply one word in anticipation of the fight.

Naruto quickly drew two kunai and held them in a defensive position as Tenten withdrew a small scroll from one of her two supply pouches and swiped some blood over it, summoning a staff for her use.

‘Yeah, just my luck, the only genin with any kind of sealing skills besides me, and it has to be her.’ Naruto grumbled.

Tenten didn’t seem it, but she was fast. Not like Lee, but when your sensei is Maito Gai, ‘the fastest green streak in the world’ you tend to pick up some points in the speed department. As it was, she was able to push Naruto back, since his reach was less with the kunai. Naruto jumped back and threw one of the fake hiraishin kunai at the brown haired girl. He once more transformed into a stone on the ground, and once more the trick worked like a charm. The clone poofed into existence behind Tenten and quickly grabbed her in a choke hold with a kunai to her throat.

“I’d withdraw if I were you.” The clone threatened.

Tenten merely smirked.

“Fat chance!” She quickly whipped the staff around and the clone had to loose its hold to grab the wooden pole. If that had been the whole of the kunoichi’s attack, everything would have been fine, but alas, she followed up the staff swipe with a wrist flick, loosing a kunai at the clone’s stomach, which promptly vanished.

This caught everyone in the audience by surprise.

‘Just like you to weave tricks into serious attacks.’ Sasuke admonished to himself.

“Where is he?” Sakura asked loudly, her question was echoed by all of the remaining contestants.

‘Naruto-kun keeps impressing me beyond my wildest dreams!’ Orochimaru was nearly salivating, disguised as the jounin for the Sound Village team.

Due to his lack of chakra, Naruto was forced to release the henge and reappeared in a poof of smoke. However, he didn’t waste any time in attacking the started girl, and succeeded in disarming her before he forced to towards a wall.

Thinking quickly she threw a handful of shuriken at Naruto, who was forced to jump backwards due to their trajectory. Both fighters were looking exhausted, their fight had been going on for about ten minutes now, and with Naruto’s handicap, he didn’t have much strength left. As he was evading another wave of metal, he slipped on a pebble that was strewn about the arena and went down.

Tenten took this opportunity to launch her most advanced attack. She quickly placed a pair of scrolls that were eerily similar to the scroll she had retrieved the staff from earlier, on the ground and quickly performed a series of hand seals before a large plume of smoke surrounded the area.

“Soushouryu!” (Twin Rising Dragons) Tenten yelled as she leapt into the air, the scrolls unfurling themselves and the smoke taking the appearance of two dragons. She bit her thumb, drawing blood, and swiped it over the twisting scrolls, summoning an endless amount of weapons, before hurling them at the prone form on the arena floor.

Naruto was in a bind. He didn’t have time to scramble away, and he was never very good at Kawarimi. His options were limited if he didn’t want to die. He readied himself and concentrated on drawing out as much chakra as he could safely. As the first of the projectiles was about to strike him, he emitted a magnetic pulse that successfully halted the progress of the weapons. Due to the twirling nature of her attack, Tenten didn’t notice and continued throwing. As more and more metal came towards him, it became harder and harder for Naruto to stop them all. He was almost out of chakra and he decided to use most of it in a last ditch effort to finish this match. He repelled some of his floating armada of steel back at his opponent, in an attempt to either stop her attack, or pin her to the wall with sharp pointed objects. Most of his weapons were blocked by new incoming ones, but since he caught her at the tail end of her attack, the last ones flew by her, missing her body by inches.

To say that Tenten was surprised was an understatement. No one had ever defeated her Soushouryu without moving an inch. Not only that, but he still had some of her projectiles floating around him which he quickly loosed back at her. She was forced to dodge a shuriken aimed for her right arm, and a number of senbon needles which were heading for her neck. She barely managed to avoid the sickle that whirled past her head, and she was unable to avoid the kunai that successfully pinned her left leg to the mortar of the far wall.

In a moment of worry, Tenten looked away from her opponent and at her leg. In that instant, Naruto was able to pin her remaining leg and arms to the same wall. Try as she might she couldn’t break free.

“I guess I have no choice but to surrender.” She said glumly.

Hayate simply nodded before announcing Naruto as the victor. Naruto walked over to her and removed the kunai that impaled her clothes to the wall.

“Good match.” He offered, holding out his hand for her to shake.

“Yeah, good match.” Tenten replied. ‘Wow, he’s gentlemanly…no one here is probably as kind as he is. He’s got really nice eyes too…’

As that final thought drifted through Tenten’s mind, she blushed red and averted her eyes away from those black depths. She quickly retreated up the stairs to her teammates.

The board once more began its programmed duty of selecting the combatants.

Sabaku no Kankuro vs. Yamanaka Ino

Ino and Kankuro began their descent to the arena floor, Gaara spoke up.

“Kankuro…if you harm her more than necessary to win the match…I will make you physically unable to use those ‘toys’ of yours ever again.”

Kankuro simply gulped, not wanting to cross his brother

“Alright, next match…begin!” Hayate ordered.

Ino quickly placed her hands into a weird seal before she called out her attack.

“Shintenshin no jutsu!” (Mind Body switch technique) Her body slumped to the floor, and everyone who was familiar with the technique shifted their gaze to Kankuro. But nothing happened. He simply stood there, mouth open, staring at the slumped over body of his opponent. He didn’t want to get too close to her, knowing that it could easily be a trick, but he didn’t know what to do. He continued to stare for about five minutes, not moving incase it was a trap.

Ino slowly began to stir, clutching her head.

“Ow. What was that?” She questioned. She suddenly slumped over onto the floor and into unconsciousness.

The crowd was shocked into silence. Until the medical team rushed onto the floor and placed Ino on a stretcher. Kankuro smugly walked back up to the balcony, ready to gloat, only to come face to face with the enraged eyes of his younger brother. Sand began to snake its way up Kankuro’s legs, until the make up clad boy couldn’t move.

“What did you do?” Gaara asked, his voice betraying no emotion.

“Hon-honestly, G-Gaara, I didn’t do an-anything.” He stammered.

Gaara’s eyes narrowed and his sand contracted around his brothers legs. Crushing them into sawdust. The real Kankuro slowly stood up from the bundle that was slung on the back of the now immobile puppet.

“Wait, you are a puppeteer?” Shikamaru asked.

“Yes, I am, and I’ll have you weak Konoha shinobi know, that I am the greatest puppet master since Sasori!” Kankuro boasted.

“It’s too troublesome to argue, I just wanted to check my concerns about Ino.” The lazy Nara drawled. “The Shintenshin no jutsu would normally replace a person’s mind with Ino’s, but if she misses, she has to wait for five minutes before she can re-enter her own body. Also, she would experience chakra fatigue and migraines. I suppose that trying to switch minds with a puppet will have the same effects as missing completely.”

The next set of names scrolled through the board before stopping on two names that would prove for an interesting fight.

Uchiha Sasuke vs. Dosu Kinuta…

Uchiha Sasuke vs. Dosu Kinuta

The two names fell into place quickly on the board, but in the arena, the two combatants took their time before meeting on the floor of the arena.

“Next match…hajime!” Hayate motioned towards the ground before leaping away. ‘This match should be good.’ He thought. ‘The best of the Sound ninja versus one of the most promising ninja we have.’

Both competitors didn’t waste any time in attacking, Sasuke threw a number of kunai and shuriken at Dosu, while the bandaged boy simply held up his right arm, and the metal projectiles simply clanged off the melody arm. He flicked the metal of the arm, and launched his attack against Sasuke. The Uchiha simply smirked (having inserted ear plugs before the match started) and quickly activated his sharingan. Seeing no chakra in the attack, Sasuke could only conclude one thing.

‘He really has no control over the direction of the sound waves.’

Thinking quickly, Sasuke charged Dosu, who was a bit surprised that his technique didn’t have any effect on the sharingan wielder. The two traded blows, Sasuke used his superior speed to his advantage, and Dosu relied on his brute strength. Sasuke used his mobility to slip under Dosu’s guard and land a punch to his stomach, doubling the boy over. Sasuke had recovered more of his chakra than Naruto, and had enough to use his sharingan for a while, but he still considered himself woefully low on chakra at the time. He’d have to stick to taijutsu until it came time for the finish. As he slipped behind his opponent, Sasuke attached an exploding note to Dosu’s…haystack. Leaping away, he channeled some chakra into the note and was rewarded with an explosion that sent Dosu’s body into the ground.

Sasuke merely smirked and turned around to face the smoldering form of his opponent.

“I’m not going to fall for a worthless tactic like that; I’d get back up if I were you.” He ordered.

Dosu slowly got up from the floor, the haystack on his back, discarded. It clattered to the floor, where it flipped upside down, revealing that it was a thick metal hemisphere, covered in hay. He hadn’t taken any damage from the explosion.

They didn’t exchange anymore words, merely tore into each other once more, Dosu gained some speed, with out that metal shell attached to his back he felt much lighter. Sasuke was beginning to become frustrated. Who knew that Dosu would be such a good taijutsu fighter?

‘Of course if he could beat Lee, than I should have expected it.’ He thought to himself. He had to be careful of Dosu’s right arm, if he got hit, than the sonic waves from the melody arm would travel through his body, bypassing the earplugs.

Sasuke dodged another right hand as Dosu’s punch smacked against the ground instead of Sasuke as intended. Sasuke took the opportunity to attack Dosu’s face with his knee. The attack landed, but Dosu barely noticed it. Sasuke was shocked that his attack had little to no discernable effect. He was just as surprised when the Sound ninja’s left fist thundered into his stomach.

“Oof!” Sasuke grunted as the wind was released from his lungs. He barely had enough presence of mind to avoid the follow through attack from the melody arm, and he jumped away to safety.

“Is that all you’ve got?” Dosu inquired, sounding bored.

Sasuke sneered at the boy and took a deep breath of air, before launching another attack. This was on a new level than the previous assaults; Dosu barely had time to react to the swift movements of Sasuke’s arms and hands, this time complete with Kunai. Dosu stumbled back from the ferocity of the attack, giving Sasuke all the time that he required to make his move.

Leaping forward, Sasuke’s kunai flashed forward towards Dosu’s head. The heavily bandaged boy tried to fend off the attack, but was too slow. The Kunai sliced through the bandages surrounding Dosu’s face. As the gauze began to unfurl, the face of Kinuta Dosu became visible for the first time. His face was riddled with scars, some old and some newer, but the main feature noticeable were the thick headphones covering his right ear. Sasuke made an attempt to steal the ear piece, but was halted by Dosu.

“That wouldn’t have worked when I was only using one eye, why do you believe it would work when I have all my faculties intact?” He asked, the scared mouth moving very little. Sasuke launched himself at Dosu once more.

The battle raged on for a time. Ten minutes, fifteen minutes, twenty minutes, both teens were becoming exhausted, Sasuke refusing to use chakra, and Dosu mimicking him. Both were sporting various injuries, Sasuke had taken a number of left hand to his torso and a few knees to the face, he also had the sneaking suspicion that he had broken some bones in his fingers, while Dosu had numerous cuts and large welts where the ring of Sasuke’s kunai had impacted his head, creating fractures. Neither would yield, and there was no end in sight. As the combatants once more engaged each other, Dosu caught Sasuke completely off guard by kicking him in the side with his left foot. It was the first time that Dosu had used his legs as a weapon and the force knocked Sasuke towards Dosu’s incoming right arm. The melody arm vibrated at a specific frequency and went to work. Sasuke immediately felt ill and would have vomited due to the foreign vibrations had he any solid food in his stomach. Instead he lost his orientation and was wobbling back and forth.

“Finally, this fight will end.” Dosu said, breathing heavily.

Sasuke fell to his knees and barely noticed Dosu approaching him. He tried to move, but his body didn’t want to follow his wishes and he stayed rooted to the spot. The boy from Oto continued to draw closer, drawing a kunai as he walked.

‘Come on…come on, damn it!’ Sasuke willed his body to move, to no avail. The only part of his body he felt like he had control over was his hands. His hands! Of course, he hadn’t performed any ninjutsu in a while, and he had nearly forgotten that he could. He flashed threw the few hand seals for his most destructive jutsu, wishing to end this fight one way or another.

“Katon: Ryuuka no Jutsu (Fire type: Dragon fire technique)

Since no one had been able to put up a resistance after one of sonic assaults, Dosu was taken by surprise as fire engulfed his body. He let out a great cry of pain, before he fell backwards, still burning. The medical crew immediately ran to his side, but it was too late. Sasuke had killed his first person.

“Um, winner Uchiha Sasuke.” Hayate declared the match over. Sasuke shakily made his way up to the balcony where he was greeted by an anxious Sakura and a pensive Naruto.

“Sasuke-kun, you were so cool!” The pink haired wonder declared, launching herself at him. He didn’t have the energy to dodge, and was nearly crushed to death by Sakura.

“Um, Sakura, I think he may need to rest after that fight.” Naruto practically demanded, prying her off his brother. Sasuke shot him a look that said ‘thank you’ quite plainly.

“The next match will now be decided.” Hayate wheezed.

Rock Lee vs. Akado Yoroi

“Yosh! It is time for my youthfulness to shine my way to victory!” He cried as he practically jumped to the arena floor. Oh who am I kidding, he did jump to the floor and then quickly ran to the middle to wait for his opponent.

One of Kabuto’s teammates made his way to the arena floor where he sized up the overly enthusiastic taijutsu specialist.

Hayate started the match and Yoroi charged Lee who had taken up a sideways pose, his right foot facing forward and his right arm extended with his wrist hanging downwards. His left arm was held behind his back, hand clenched in a fist. As Yoroi charged, Lee didn’t make a move until the older boy was already attacking him. Many in the audience thought that Lee would be on the receiving blow of the encounter, but were sadly mistaken, when Lee’s outstretched hand merely slapped Yoroi’s away. The duo quickly entangled themselves in a taijutsu match, with Lee winning, but not showing more skill than was necessary. The older genin was becoming annoyed at his opponent, and decided to play his trump card. His right hand became enveloped in a blue glow. Lee noticed the change, but didn’t change is approach to the match. Yoroi began to swipe his right hand at the boy, who simply dodged and wove around the one sided attack. He became so absorbed with the right hand of his opponent that he failed to notice when the left hand snuck around his guard and grabbed at his arm. The fact that someone had snuck under his guard was more of a shock than anything to the enthusiastic taijutsu specialist. Yoroi took the lapse of concentration to sneak his right hand in and grabbed Lee’s neck in a choke hold.

“Now you can feel it, my ability. I am siphoning off your chakra; soon you will be as weak as a new born baby.” The veiled boy goaded.

“I am sorry to disappoint you, but I have so little chakra in my body that I use very little of it for physical modification.” Lee smiled at his opponent, before using his right elbow to knock his attacker away. Lee quickly regained his footing, and launched into his favorite combo. Lee ran at his opponent and dropped under his guard before connecting a sharp right foot to Yoroi’s chin that launched the older boy into the air. Lee quickly followed him up and seemed to attach himself to his opponent.

“I may not be allowed to use ‘that’ move unless the situation calls for it, but I can improvise.” He proclaimed as he landed numerous punches to Yoroi’s back and kidneys. As the two began to fall, Lee twisted over in mid air and launched a sharp snap kick into the boys gut, sending him into the ground. Yoroi simply coughed, before passing out.

“Winner, Rock Lee.” Hayate said, before quickly covering his ears in anticipation of the speech that was to come from the boy’s sensei.

“Lee! Your fires of youth burn so brightly that you took it upon yourself to further your repertoire of moves for your own style of taijutsu! I am very proud of you!” Gai bellowed at his student, who immediately broke down into tears at the praise from his role model.

Most of the remaining genin were talking about the previous matches, and staring at Sasuke and Lee in awe at their fights. Sasuke had the toughest fight so far, and Lee had the fastest most bone breaking fight so far.

Aburame Shino vs. Akimichi Chouji

Chouji descended the stairs to the arena floor nervously. Shino was so mysterious that he didn’t know much about his opponent. Shino didn’t say a word as he entered the combat arena, he simply stared at Chouji.

As soon as Hayate started the fight, a wave of black seemed to form behind Chouji and sweep towards him, cutting off a route of escape for the big boned boy.

“These are my Kikai bugs.” Shino stated, his voice emotionless, but not cold, like Zabuza or Kakashi during their fight. “They feed on chakra, if you attack me, I will have them latch on to you and slowly deplete you of your chakra. If you attack my bugs, I will attack you. You cannot win. Chouji thought over his options carefully. He hung out with Shikamaru, so he did pick up some practice in thinking through his options. Unfortunately, he didn’t have any techniques that took out a large space, just his Bubun Baika no Jutsu (Partial Multi-size technique), but that what he needed was a large range distance attack. He simply didn’t have one.

“You’re right, I don’t have a way to defeat you, Shino, I guess you win.” The boy admitted defeat gracefully, but not without a bit of remorse in his voice.

“Winner, Aburame Shino.” Hayate confirmed.

Sabaku no Temari vs. Nara Shikamaru

“How troublesome, I have to fight a girl.” Shikamaru whined.

A vein on Temari’s head throbbed noticeably.

“What did he say?” She gritted her teeth together, promising pain to the lazy boy who was slowly making his way to the arena floor.

“Next fight, begin!”

Temari was about to unleash a large amount of pain onto the pony tailed boy before her, but found that she could move.

“What the…” She asked. Involuntarily her head pointed to the ground, where she noticed that a dark band connected her to Shikamaru.

“I know I’m not supposed to hit a girl, but conversely, I shouldn’t loose to one either. I guess the only option that I have left is to make you concede.” He drawled.

“Well tough luck with that, I’ll never give up.” Temari sounded brave, but mostly it was fear of what Gaara would do to her if she simply gave up.

Shikamaru let out a sigh and he pantomimed shifting the fan Temari still had strapped to her back. Once it was straight, he bowed foreword, Temari copying him completely. With a sudden jerk of his head, he forced Temari to smack her head into the metal casing of her own fan, incapacitating her, or at the least concussing her. She slumped to the ground dazed, but not unconscious.

“Do you give up now?” He asked her.

Still dazed, Temari didn’t hear him, but her head nodded up and down, signaling her forfeit.

The medical staff came onto the floor to check her over, and took her away to be treated for a concussion, as the next fight flashed up on the board.

Tsuchi Kin vs. Haruno Sakura

“So, Naruto, who do you think will win this one?” Chouji asked his friend.

“Sakura will win this.” Naruto said no doubt in his voice at all. “She’s worked really hard since we graduated, and she’s good enough to win this fight.”

Down in the arena, Kin had thrown a pair of senbon with bells attached to the ends at Sakura, who had dodged them by simply moving out of the way. Not wasting an opportunity, she charged the sound kunoichi, only to suddenly become ill half way there. She fell to her knees and gripped her sides, breathing deeply.

“You are at my mercy, pinky, time I finished this and brought a bit of dignity to the sound village.” She drew a kunai and approached the unmoving girl.

“Naruto! I thought you said that Sakura would win?” Chouji questioned.

“She will, just watch.”

As Kin drew even with her opponent, she made to stab Sakura’s head with the knife, only for it to become lodged in a stump. She then felt the cold steel of the pink haired kunoichi’s kunai at her neck.

“Your genjutsu was too easy to get out of, if I were you, I’d quit now.” She warned the brunette.

Kin made to turn around and stab Sakura, but she quickly found herself in a genjutsu.

“Magen: Narakumi no Jutsu (Demonic Illusion: Hell Viewing Technique)” Sakura trapped Kin in her own worst nightmare, causing the same reaction that she had experienced during the bell test with Kakashi.

“Winner, Haruno Sakura!” Hayate declared before he signaled for the final two opponents to come to the floor of the arena.

Hyuuga Hinata vs. Tsurugi Misumi

The final member of Kabuto’s team, as well as the final member of Team Eight faced each other in center of the arena waiting for the match to officially to begin. Hinata looked like she’d rather be somewhere else; while Misumi looked as if…well you couldn’t tell since he covered his entire face with cloth.

“Hajime!”

Hinata dropped into a basic jyuken stance, left leg slid in front of the right leg, the palm of her left hand open and facing her thigh. Her right arm was slightly extended, palm once more open, facing her opponent. Misumi charged at the dark haired girl, right arm cocked for a sharp punch. Hinata didn’t move, waiting for him to make the first move. He did…five feet from her. His arm stretched out and rocketed forward, aiming for her face. She quickly dodged it, and went to counter attack, as had been engrained into her training since a very young age, but was halted by his other hand stretching out and attempting to strike her again.

Hinata blocked this attack and slid under his outstretched arm, aiming for his abdomen. Suddenly, his right fist turned around in mid air and began to return to him, aiming to go through Hinata as it did. Of course, Hinata’s byakugan picked it up immediately and she was able to adjust herself to avoid the fist from behind.

This trend continued for a number of minutes, Misumi would attempt to keep the fight long distance and Hinata would try and close that gap. On his next exchange, Misumi threw a number of shuriken at the Hyuuga heiress, and then shot both his arms behind the projectiles, created a layered attack. Not having too many options, Hinata deflected the shuriken back at the attacking arms, but the metal plating woven onto her opponent’s gloves stopped them from doing any major damage. His arms crossed over each other in mid air so that his right was over top of his left and Hinata was forced to attack his hands.

This is exactly what he wanted, Hinata’s open palm attacks acted more like a glove than anything else, and she ended up catching Misumi’s fists, which he then stuck to hers with chakra. He quickly closed the gap between them, now that she couldn’t close his tenketsu, and quickly moved his arms apart, violently breaking Hinata’s guard. He was able to land a head but, and since he wore his protector, the damage was magnified. While she was still dazed, he stretched his body around her and began to constrict against her body, squeezing the air from her lungs. Suddenly, he felt a sharp pain in his abdomen. But that was impossible; his abdomen was currently behind the girl, how could she injure it? He felt another sharp pain in the same place, magnifying the damage of the first attack. Hinata continued to push chakra out of her finger tips in an extremely thin line. The normal jyuken strike emits chakra from the palm of the hand where it is easiest. This spike is about one to two inches in diameter and is cylindrical in shape. The chakra that Hinata was using was much, much thinner. It was comparable to a hypodermic needle and originated from the very tip of her middle finger, thus allowing her to extend the range of her strikes to a few inches away from her hand. Since Misumi hadn’t been able to bind her wrists with his technique, Hinata was quickly able to relieve the pressure, the effects of her jyuken equated to the damage of over fifty punches in only ten strikes. Misumi crumpled to the floor clutching his stomach, the chakra attacks of the Hyuuga clan had created an ulcer and the pain of his stomach acid spilling into his stomach was excruciating.

The medical staff quickly carted him off the floor, declaring Hinata the winner of the final bout of the preliminary matches. Once more the Hokage spoke up.

“Congratulations to all of you who have won your fights. As you are aware, these were preliminary fights to weed down the competitors for the third task of the exams. That task will be in exactly one month, as I am sure you will all need to rest up and train, now that everyone has seen your techniques. You will draw lots to determine your next opponent.”

One by one the victorious ninja withdrew a slip of paper from a box and opened them to reveal their fates.

“When I call your number, show your lot to the coordinator and wait around for a few minutes more. I have one more announcement to make.” Sarutobi ordered.

One by one the fighter’s numbers were called, until the bracket was complete.

Nara Shikamaru vs. Hyuuga Hinata

Uchiha Sasuke vs. Sabaku no Gaara

Aburame Shino vs. Rock Lee

Mitarashi Naruto vs. Sabaku no Kankuro

Hyuuga Neji vs. Haruno Sakura

“These will be the fighters you must face in one month’s time. Due to the odd number of people in the draw, the winner of matches three and four will fight before he must face the winner of match five. As for my announcement…it is necessary that you know how the decision for rank advancement will be made. Just because you win your fight, it doesn’t mean that you will be promoted. To gain the rank of chuunin, you must show the qualities of one. Even if you loose you could still earn the rank, but the advantage of winning is that you will have more opportunities to show your skills. I’m sure you will all do your villages proud.”

With that the participants were dismissed to rest and focus on their training. Team Seven was holding an impromptu meeting along with Anko. They were outlining their plans for training. Kakashi’s original plan was to train both Naruto and Sasuke since he wouldn’t have to focus on them solely and Anko would help Sakura. But as they say, ‘the best laid plans of mice and men…’ With Sasuke facing Gaara, and Sakura drawing Neji, they would both need more concentration and individual attention than Kakashi could give if he took both of the boys to train. He didn’t want to, but it looked as if Naruto would have to find a temporary sensei for a month.

“Naruto, I know we had planned for me to take you and Sasuke for the month but since Sasuke drew Gaara…” Kakashi started to explain his reasoning.

“I’m not going with you.” Naruto plainly stated. Everyone looked at him shocked. Naruto wasn’t the type to miss out on a training exercise. “Gaara is a very strong opponent and it will take Sasuke all month to have a legitimate shot at defeating him. I don’t want to put my brother’s life in danger simply because I needed some training for an opponent I can already beat.”

Everyone was silent once again, before Kakashi’s face split into a grin.

“Well, Naruto, if you keep doing things as grown up as that, you might make Chuunin this time!”

With that, Kakashi left with a tired Sasuke stumbling behind him.

“Naruto, are you sure you’ll be all right?” Anko asked her son, making sure that he wasn’t put out about the training

“I’m fine Kaa-chan; I just don’t know who I should ask to train with.” The one time blond replied.

“I’m sure you’ll find someone.” She replied, ruffling his hair. “I won’t be gone all month but it’ll be a few days before I’ll see you again, so don’t slack off while I’m gone.” Slipping back into sadistic mode, the rest of the threat left unsaid, but Naruto got the message.

As his mother and teammate were leaving the arena, Naruto thought of something.

“Kaa-chan! I want you to let Sakura know about my limit, she saw most of my abilities in the forest so she deserves to know.” He called out.

Anko simply nodded before dragging her slave out of the building. “Don’t forget, Tsunade will be here in about five days so make sure you get her Ok before doing something stupid.” Anko replied, finally exiting the doors.

Naruto smiled as he watched his mom leave the arena. With Orochimaru on the loose he was worried about her, she didn’t know it, but when he first moved in with her, her nightmares of her times with her former sensei woke him, and he vowed to extract revenge on the person who harmed his mother. Clasping the seal that was burned black into his neck, he reaffirmed that vow and promised that one day, Orochimaru wouldn’t walk this earth.

Naruto was fiddling. It was taking too long, and Naruto yearned to be able to train until he dropped. Tsunade had arrived in the village on time and performed all the necessary tests, but she was double checking a test and it was taking forever! Finally after what seemed like ages (about five minutes) Tsunade gave him the ok to resume training.

“Ok Naruto, you’ll be fine, I’ve checked the containment seal as well as the Kyuubi seal, they are working fine, so you shouldn’t have anything to worry about.” The slug medic announced

“All right! I’ve been waiting forever! Thanks Tsunade-oba-chan!”

Tsunade sighed; it had taken nearly a year to get him to call her aunt instead of granny or ‘old hag’

“Hey, are you and Shizune-nee-chan staying for the final rounds?” He asked, foot already out the door.

Tsunade’s immediate reaction was to say no and leave as soon as possible, but then she remembered that many different daimyos and people from all across the shinobi continent would be here for the finals, and that meant one thing. Betting! Seeing as she was more or less the private physician of the Mitarashi household, she knew Naruto and Sasuke’s strengths rather well. She cackled evilly, oh the money she could make!

“Yep, we’ll be here, I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Naruto grinned, of course he didn’t realize that by ‘it’ Tsunade meant betting, but who would ruin a child’s joy?

“All right, I’ll see you then.”

With that, Naruto was out the door of the hospital, faster than Sasuke when he’s being chased by fan girls. But he was still stumped about who he should ask to train him. Tsunade and Shizune would do it, but their techniques took too much control for him to do.

‘Oh, well, can’t waste another day sitting around, I could practice my chakra control. Maybe then I could ask Tsunade or Shizune to train me. Didn’t Kakashi-sensei say something about doing the water walking exercise over a hot spring?’ He thought to himself.

Thus, Naruto found himself practicing Water walking, over a hot spring…with a white haired pervert peeking at the Women’s bath house. Normally, Naruto would have pounded the pervert into the ground, or yelled at him for being so open about his…pervert ness, but something about this man caught the boy off guard. He wasn’t a ninja, one look at the aging debauchee was more than enough to tell that, but something was off. It was like what Naruto was seeing, wasn’t there, faint trails of chakra seemed to leach off the old man, mixing with the air around him.

‘He has way too much chakra to be a civilian, but he doesn’t have any village symbol on him.’ Naruto pondered, once more slipping slightly into the water, scalding his feet. Cursing he turned his attention away from the pervert, and back to the task at hand.

Of all the facts that are known about Jiraiya, the Frog-hermit of the legendary Sannin, one fact escapes many people’s minds, and yet it is the most important of them all. Jiraiya is, for lack a of a better term, a perfectionist. Yep, the perverted author of arguably the most perverted book ever, has such a complex, that he has never needed an editor for any of his works, not because he is cocky that his latest tome doesn’t need it, but because he is so meticulous in his own editing, that not a mistake has ever crossed his eyes, and lived to tell the tale.

It is for this same reason that he is on level footing with Orochimaru and Tsunade, despite the lack of any kind of blood line limit, special ability or other such nonsense. You see, Jiraiya’s need for perfection, extends into his ninja life as well. When he is given a new technique to learn, he will not stop until he has it mastered, quite unlike Orochimaru, who simply wants to know all the techniques in the world. By mastering the techniques he is given, Jiraiya not only is able to minimize the amount of chakra needed, but he also understands what the technique is for. While Katon: Goukakyou no Jutsu, is a powerful technique, the intent while using it, should not be to cause damage to your opponent, but rather, to make them move to a position that is favorable to you. One of the reasons, he hypothesized, that the Uchiha clan had adapted fire techniques to their library, was for that reason. By moving an enemy into a certain position, their sharingan would be able to anticipate the enemy’s moves and defenses, giving the Uchiha the maximum amount of leverage over them. Good idea, in theory, but he didn’t have the evidence to prove it.

Jiraiya was currently trying to ‘research’ some new inspiration for his latest book, when some brat decided to practice his chakra control, a mere twenty feet behind him. What was worse than the fact that the kid didn’t give him any respect was that his technique…was all wrong! Oh so terribly wrong. That part of Jiraiya’s mind that craved perfection began to pick at the rest of him, while the perverted old man tried to throw it off.

‘Ignore him, ignore him, just ignore him and get back to the ladies.’ Jiraiya chanted to himself over and over. Unfortunately for Jiraiya, less than five minutes later, he snapped.

“Argh! You’re doing it all wrong brat, either do it right, or leave me alone!” He yelled, momentarily forgetting the bathing women on the other side of the fence, who all disappeared in the blink of an eye, much to Jiraiya’s disappointment.

“Whatever, you old pervert, you aren’t even a ninja, how do you know weather I’m doing it right or not?” Naruto fairly yelled at the white haired pervert.

Jiraiya had, up to this point, been yelling at his opponent, with his back turned. After Naruto had once more been disrespectful, Jiraiya couldn’t stand it, and whirled around to pound the disrespectful brat, only to stop in his tracks. Blond hair with black streaks in it, black eyes with tiny transplant scars around the edges…that trench coat… this was Mitarashi Naruto, the container for the Kyuubi. That explained the need for chakra control, but that didn’t stop the fact that he was still doing it wrong!

“Kid, do you even know who I am?” Jiraiya asked, rhetorically. Obviously this kid had never even heard of –

“’Course I do, you’re Jiraiya of the legendary Sannin, but you gave up being a Ninja to become a full time pervert!” Naruto accused.

“Than you should know that I know when you’re doing something wrong!” Jiraiya countered.

“Than you must be going crazy, ‘cuz this is exactly how Kakashi-sensei told us to do it.” Naruto retorted.

“Kakashi, eh? Figures, that lazy ass attitude of his has affected his teaching. That…that…exercise, if you can call it that, is the easy way to do it. It doesn’t help your control as much as the correct way.” Jiraiya lectured.

“What?” Naruto yelled.

This is the way you’re supposed to do it.” Jiraiya walked out onto the water, but instead of his chakra forming stilts, they dissipated onto the water. “You must always expel the correct amount of chakra into the water in order to float. It must be exactly the correct amount to match the amount needed to float on the water. Instead of making ‘stilts’ you are dissipating your chakra so that the surface tension of the water holds you up, like a water strider.” Jiraiya explained.

Naruto tried to emulate the pervert, but found that this form of control was much harder. He fell into the hot water again, but instead of simply sinking a few inches, he fell completely into the water. Naruto leapt out of the spring as the hot water burned his skin slightly. This was going to be a long day, he just knew it.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Sasuke’s training could be described as going eerily similar to Naruto’s. Hot water and burns were abundant, but not because of the water walking exercise. Sasuke was practicing his fire manipulation across a small lake, while Kakashi watched. The hot steam created from the practice was constantly flowing back into Sasuke’s face, making oxygen harder to come by.

“Ok, Sasuke, that’s enough for now.” Kakashi ordered. Sasuke backed away and breathed deeply, the cool air feeling good against his hot face. Kakashi handed him a towel and motioned for him to sit down.

“To get past Gaara’s sand, you’ll need more than fire.” Kakashi admonished.

Sasuke sighed. “I know, but what else should I do? The only other idea I can come up with, is extreme speed to get around his sand, but that’s just a theory.”

“Well, that’s a start.” Kakashi smiled. Something about it unnerved Sasuke. “Speed is the one weakness of the sharingan. Even if you can see your opponent’s move, if your body is too slow to react to it, you will loose.”

Sasuke nodded, that was exactly what had happened in the fight with Orochimaru.

“If you need some incentive…” Kakashi began to dangle his bait in front of Sasuke “I may have a technique to teach you.”

Kakashi’s visible eye curled upwards as if he were smiling. But Sasuke was sure that it was a smile that would fit his mother better.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

For what was the one-thousandth, five-hundredth and forty-second time since she became a genin, Sakura cursed her sensei. Even when the sensei happened to be her teammate’s mother. The cause was once more due to Anko’s love for sadistic training methods.

It had been three days since Sakura had started her training under the sadistic jounin, but despite the complaints of her sore muscles, Sakura knew that she was getting stronger because of it. Anko had her doing chakra exercises to increase her reserves, which were still pathetically weak, even for a kunoichi. Since she had been so busy, it had almost slipped her mind that Naruto had more or less ordered his mom to come clean about this ‘limit’ he had. Of course, when one of your pastimes is memorizing everything that a certain Uchiha does, your memory grows quickly. Sakura had asked the first night, but Anko had thrown a kunai at her head and told her that she would explain everything when the time was right.

It was tough for Anko to talk about her time with Orochimaru. Partially because of the memories that it drug up and partially because of the memories it didn’t. She could remember every mission she had ever gone on with him, every ninja she had killed because he told her too. She could remember helping him as he conducted his experiments, but then suddenly a block hit. She couldn’t remember anything between the time he gave her the cursed seal, and the time she found herself back in Konoha. But when her memory returned, she found herself under suspicion of treason and carrying a baby.

Sighing, she decided it was time to bite the bullet.

“You wanted to know about Naruto’s bloodline limit, right?”

Sakura simply nodded.

Anko stared into the fire that they had built before beginning. “When I was in the academy, I was so much like Naruto, loud, brash…annoying…but I was the top kunoichi in my class, hell I was the top student in my class. I was the first kunoichi to hold that title, the best scores in the history of the academy for a female since Tsunade-hime. I came from a family of civilians with one noticeable exception. My grandfather’s brother in law was Jiraiya of the Sannin. Unfortunately my great-aunt died before they could have any children, but Jiraiya remained close. He was set to be my jounin sensei as a favor to my grandfather. That’s why it was such a surprise when Orochimaru took me as not only as his student, but as his apprentice. It was the first in a chain of events that created the rift between the legendary sannin. Under Orochimaru I flourished as a ninja, next to Tsunade-hime I had the best record, in terms of missions completed as a genin. Since Orochimaru was so famous, I received a lot of respect, something that no one in my family had gotten before. But after I passed the chuunin exam things began to go down hill.

He convinced me to help him with some ‘experiments’. People that he swore up and down had betrayed the village… people that ended up dying under his hands. But I didn’t care, my sensei, one of the legendary sannin, was acknowledging me. When he was discovered experimenting by Hokage-sama he…we fled to an island, I can’t remember where, but to an island. It was there that I found some of the ‘traitors’ I had captured. He had done so many experiments on them that I barely recognized them. I was going to go back …fess up to my mistakes, but I never got a chance to. As I was packing to leave, he caught me, and gave me the cursed seal that I still have today, the same exact seal that Naruto and Sasuke have. No doubt he found some sick satisfaction in giving all three of us the same seal. I don’t know what happened after that, there’s just this large black spot, but when I can begin to remember again, I was back in Konoha, apparently some ANBU had been sent after us and found me. Sandaime-sama had sealed over the cursed seal and told me that I was pregnant. He asked if I knew who the father was, I said no, but I had a decent idea. Unfortunately when I was due to give birth, the Kyuubi attacked. When Naruto was born, I was fully prepared to see my sensei’s eyes, or skin, but he simply had dark brown hair, and my eyes. He was…perfect, in my eyes and I was the happiest I had been since I was a genin. But in the confusion of the attack, Naruto was thought to be dead and I fell into a bout of depression. It was during the few years between when I gave birth and when I found him again, that I realized that Orochimaru hadn’t simply experimented on my son, but on me as well. It would seem that I haven’t aged at all since the experiment, but in reality, I simply age extremely slowly. One day I was training when the Hokage called me into his office and told me that my son had been found.

“Part of the reason that Naruto wasn’t identified as my son is because of his limit. It is called the ‘senshin’ and allows him to incorporate foreign DNA into his own blood, in essence ‘absorbing’ it. In the confusion of the battle with the Kyuubi, someone’s DNA got into Naruto and changed his appearance. When I was brought to him, it was because he had been nearly killed by Uchiha Itachi. Tsunade-hime found him and transplanted the eyes of an Uchiha into him and he ‘became’ part Uchiha. After a bit of experimenting he discovered another limit. The Sandaime Kazekage’s ability to control magnetic fields with his chakra was probably given to Naruto by Orochimaru before he was even born. Well, after that…you were there in wave country. Some of Haku’s DNA got into his system and now he can control water and ice.”

Sakura was flabbergasted by the news. Her teammate was an experiment by one of the village’s most infamous criminals. It seemed like a fairly tale, but she knew in her mind it must be true. She also realized how difficult how hard it must be for Anko to talk about her experience with her former sensei. She didn’t feel it prudent to ask about it any more for the duration of her training.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

On the bright side Naruto had finally mastered the ‘true’ water walking exercise. On the other, Jiraiya still wouldn’t teach him anything helpful. Of course part of was because he had just finished the exercise and was looking for the pervert, but the details weren’t important.

Jiraiya was actually talking with the Sandaime about Naruto.

“…so that’s where I found the inspiration for chapter six.” The legendary pervert explained. The Hokage merely nodded.

“Any way, I was researching for my next book, when someone interesting started to train behind me.”

“Really?” Asked the Hokage, “Who would that be?”

“No one important, someone named Mitarashi Naruto!” Jiraiya replied, seemingly nonchalantly.

The Sandaime tensed, before resigning himself to the fate he had brought upon himself.

“Jiraiya-“

“Sensei, how couldn’t you at least let me know she had found him? I understand why she hasn’t written to me, I did over react when Orochimaru selected her, but I expected that you would at least tell me that he was alive. You know that Anko is like a granddaughter to me, even if we aren’t related by more than marriage.”

“Jiraiya if I told you that Anko had found her son, you would have ran back here and put not only yourself, but her into an awkward situation that she just isn’t ready to deal with yet. I don’t think she’s told him of your connection yet, but if she has it is up to Naruto and Anko as to weather or not to rebuild burned bridges.”

As much as Jiraiya wanted to argue with the Hokage he knew he couldn’t. It had been years since he had cut off communication with Anko after she had been selected by Orochimaru and she didn’t protest. Sighing he exited the office of his sensei and went to find his latest student, vowing to make up for his previous error in judgment.

After about twenty minutes, he found his charge, eating ramen at a small stand he wasn’t familiar with.

“Hey brat, you finished that exercise?” The perverted hermit asked.

“Yeah, ero-sennin, I finished it. Took me a while, but it’s done.” The boy responded.

“Than come on, I’m gonna teach you some stuff for the finals.” Jiraiya motioned for Naruto to follow him. Naruto paid for his ramen and followed after the old man.

Naruto was surprised when they went to a legitimate training ground, instead of some land near a hot spring.

‘Wow, I guess Ero-sennin can think straight once in a while’.

The only problem with the selected area was that it was already occupied. Haku and Hyuuga Hinata were training on the field, Haku was creating water clones and Hinata was attacking them with her jyuken style of taijutsu. Looking at the intruders into their territory, Haku quickly greeted Naruto.

“Hey Naruto, who is the old guy?” The brunette asked. At the word ‘Naruto’ Hinata had quickly hidden herself behind one of the water clones in an attempt to hide herself from her crush.

Knowing that her friend would never gain any confidence if she continued to hide from her fears, Haku quickly dismissed the water clone

“Hey Haku-chan, Hinata-san, this is Jiraiya, he’s an old pervert so I’d be careful around him.”

Both nodded, but were respectful of Jiraiya, even if he was a damnable old pervert, he was still one of the legendary sannin, and so he should get some respect. Suddenly an idea struck Haku.

“Jiraiya-sama, Hinata and I have been training for her fight against Nara Shikamaru and we came up with an idea to defeat the Kagemane no jutsu (Shadow Copy technique) but we need your help.”

Jiraiya, ecstatic about receiving respect from someone of the younger generation, especially when it was someone as beautiful as Haku, listened as she whispered her plan into his ear.

“Well, she is a Hyuuga, so it might work, if not, it would be a hell of a shock anyway. ‘Course it all depends on what kind of nature chakra she has. You wouldn’t know, would you?”

The shy Hyuuga heiress shook her head negatively, eyes still pointed at the ground trying to look any where but Naruto. Jiraiya pulled out some paper and instructed Hinata and Naruto to channel some chakra into the paper. Naruto refused, claiming he didn’t care, but really it was because he didn’t want to show that he had multiple natures to his chakra. Hinata carefully took the paper and apprehensively channeled some chakra into the paper. It split in half and she began to worry that she had done something wrong, began to mutter an apology before Jiraiya interrupted her and explained what happened.

“Don’t worry, you didn’t do anything wrong, when the paper splits in half like that, it means that your chakra nature is wind. Wind nature chakra can cut through anything, if you can learn to use it correctly. It’s kind of weird though, I’ve never known a Hyuuga to have wind nature chakra. Most of them don’t test, but those that do always seem to have water or earth type. Anyway, here’s what you want, and if you need any help with the later stage of your plan, feel free to ask me for help.”

Haku nodded and took the offered scroll and Hinata away from Naruto and Jiraiya to help her friend with her training. Jiraiya on the other hand took the opportunity to chide Naruto about the apparent crush that Hinata harbored for him.

“So, Naruto, don’t you think that Hinata looks cute when she’s practicing her jyuken like that?” Jiraiya lead.

“What?!” Naruto sputtered; surprised that he would ask something like that. “I…I mean, yeah…she’s kinda…but she’d never be allowed to…I mean she’s a Hyuuga and I’m…’sides, not likes she likes me or anything.” He finished lamely.

Jiraiya simply stared at his student before shaking his head.

“Whatever, I’ve got something cool to teach you, this should take up most of the time before the finals, so don’t expect much free time.”

Naruto nodded vigorously, eager to get on with his training.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

One month passed, and Naruto was taking his time heading to the arena. He was walking toward the arena when he saw Hinata sitting by a tree in the middle of a training ground.

“Hey, Hinata-san, how come you aren’t at the arena yet?” He asked the girl, startling her, and in true Hinata fashion, she quickly ducked behind a post in the ground.

“N-Naruto-kun, I didn’t hear y-you.” She stammered, blushing. He was so close to her.

“It’s fine, but you still didn’t answer my question.” He pointed out jokingly.

“I was just th-thinking.” She answered.

“Oh, well the finals start in a little bit and I thought everyone would be there, but then I saw you and I figured it wouldn’t hurt to ask how come you weren’t already there.” He explained.

“Oh.”

“Do you want to walk together?” He asked.

‘Did Naruto-kun just ask me to walk with him?’ Hinata thought to herself, blushing.

“S-sure, Naruto-kun.”

The two walked towards the arena and the final round of the Chuunin selection exams.

Naruto and Hinata were in awe at the number of people who had come to see the final matches. The stadium was packed to the gills with people. Everyone, from various feudal lords to the lowliest peasant were in attendance to see who among the genin, if any, would achieve the rank of chuunin. Naruto noticed Tsunade and Jiraiya standing by the Sandaime along with his usual honor guard. There was another seat, and rumor had it that the Kazekage would be in attendance.

“Put on a good show, right now, you guys are the stars.” Naruto looked at the speaker and noticed that it was Shiranui Genma, a tokubetsu jounin.

“What h-happened to Hayate-san?” Hinata asked

“He’s around; you didn’t expect him to referee the prelims and the finals did you?” Genma responded. “Anyway, before we start, here are the ground rules. They’re the same as the prelims. Anything goes, but if I think there’s a winner I will stop the matches and my decisions are final.”

As the gravity of the situation started to ware off, Naruto realized for the first time that Sasuke and Kakashi hadn’t shown up. His inquisitive eyes met Genma who simply shrugged his shoulders in understanding before instructing Hinata and Shikamaru to remain behind.

The Hokage greeted the Kazekage, who didn’t say anything, merely nodded his head in acknowledgment. Sarutobi motioned to Genma to start the matches.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, shinobi of all ages, I am proud to begin the final round of the Chuunin exam. Our first fight will be between Hyuuga Hinata and Nara Shikamaru.” Genma announced.

The two opponents faced each other without saying a word and waited for the match to begin. Genma dropped his arm signaling the fight to begin and in a flurry of activity…nothing happened.

Shikamaru was mentally sorting through the reasons that it was too troublesome for him to fight Hinata, while Hinata was going over the strategy she had devised and waited for Shikamaru to make the first move.

“Um, if neither of you move, I’ll disqualify you both.” Genma sweat dropped at the lack of motion from the two competitors.

With that, Hinata launched a kunai from her right hand and a pair of senbon needles from her left. Haku had shown her the value of the small metal needles when used in conjunction with her byakugan.

Shikamaru lazily moved to his right, avoiding all of the projectiles and quickly formed the seal for his Kagemane no jutsu. (Shadow imitation technique) His shadow raced toward the Hyuuga. Shikamaru would have smirked, but something felt off. He knew Hinata was smart and she had already seen his technique once, it shouldn’t work twice, but it looked like it would…until Hinata did something that hadn’t been done before. She halted the movement of his shadow.

To say that Shikamaru was surprised was an understatement, sure he had heard of people being able to overpower the Kagemane, but that was once it was attached to them, not a foot and a half before it even touched them!

Without wasting a breath, Hinata charged at Shikamaru in a basic jyuken stance. Shikamaru was taken back by the seer amount of determination that shone in the girl’s eyes. Shikamaru made to dodge her attack, but only partially succeeded, earning him a few closed tenketsu on his arm and shoulder for his troubles. Hinata simply kept up her assault, eventually cornering Shikamaru and closing more tenketsu, before the lazy boy escaped using a flash bomb.

‘Damn, what is she doing to stop the kagemane?’ Shikamaru thought. He wasn’t given the time to find a suitable answer, as Hinata’s byakugan was able to find him almost instantly. She wrapped an exploding note to the handle of a kunai, and threw it above Shikamaru’s head. The note detonated and blew off a section of tree branch, forcing Shikamaru to abandon his position on a low branch. When he landed, he immediately tried kagemane once more, only to find that Hinata cast no shadow for his to attach to.

‘Bunshin!’ He realized, before a pair of hands grabbed his ankles and pulled him into the ground up to his head.

“That’s Doton: Shinjuu Zanshu no Jutsu, (Earth type: Inner Decapitation technique) Shikamaru-san, I’d suggest that you give up.” Hinata quietly stated, leveling a kunai at the lazy genius’s throat.

Shikamaru closed his eyes, and although he couldn’t move his hands to form his ‘thinking pose’ he quickly began calculating any chances he had to escape.

“Tell me” he asked, eyes still shut tight, “how were you able to halt the kagemane? I’ve never heard of anyone doing that before.”

Hinata blushed at the compliment before she whispered into his ear, for fear of exposing the secret of his clan’s technique.

“I assumed that your technique operated on the same principles as the jyuken, you contort your shadow with chakra, and use that chakra to enter your opponent’s body, making them mimic you. To stop the effect, I modified the jyuken, and used an incomplete kaiten as a shield to protect me. I changed the nature of my clan’s taijutsu from offensive to defensive.”

Shikamaru was impressed that Hinata had worked out the kagemane to such a degree that she had been able to counter it effectively. He opened his eyes and was about to admit defeat, when he noticed that Hinata had deactivated her byakugan.

‘I have one shot at this, but it will be worth it.’

Hinata was waiting for Shikamaru to admit defeat, when suddenly she got the feeling that something was wrong. She felt a spike in Shikamaru’s chakra, and activated her byakugan quickly, but before she could do anything, she felt control of her body slipping away.

Her eyes showed her that a trail of chakra led from the hole that she had created for Shinjuu Zanshu and led back up to Shikamaru.

“Finally, Kagemane no jutsu, success.” He drawled

Hinata faulted a bit, her big victory, and now she was about to loose.

“I give up.”

Hinata looked at him, eyes wide in shock.

“I have no way of forcing you to do anything, I am trapped in the earth and can’t move an inch, and while I might have been able to catch you in the kagemane, I have no further moves to make.”

“Winner, Hyuuga Hinata!” Genma announced to the crowd, who cheered at the completion of a great match.

The kagemane receded and Hinata held out her hand to help Shikamaru out of his grave. The two returned to the platform where the other finalists were standing and the Konoha genin congratulated Hinata on her victory, with one noticeable exception. Hyuuga Neji found his cousin’s performance to be poor and underachieving. She had to resort to outside techniques to defeat the laziest person in the village. He hadn’t even moved at the beginning of the match!

“Great job, Hinata-chan!” Sakura congratulated the shy girl with a friendly pat on the back.

“Why do you try and clean up trash?” Neji scowled at his pink haired opponent.

“What!?” Sakura yelled at the other Hyuuga, while Hinata’s eyes dropped to the ground, avoiding all contact with her older sibling.

“For the heiress of the strongest clan in Konoha to have to resort to outside help, is despicable, and shames everyone who bares the name of Hyuuga.” Neji lashed out.

Sakura glared at Neji so hard the other combatants, including the two remaining sand siblings, thought she was going to bore a hole in Neji’s head.

“Why are you trying to put Hinata-chan down so much?” Naruto asked, just a hint of rage flying off his tongue.

Hinata could barely believe her ears. Not only had Naruto defended her performance, he had called her ‘Hinata-chan’! She felt a familiar heat rise to her cheeks, and decided that if she died now, she would do it with a smile on her face. Only the voice of the announcer brought her out of her fantasy land.

“Since Uchiha Sasuke is not here, his match will be postponed until the end of the first round matches, at the request of the Kazekage. So our second match will be Rock Lee vs. Aburame Shino.”

The two walked to the ring and waited for the signal, but before the fight began, Lee addressed his opponent.

“Yosh, it will be an honor to fight you, Shino-san, it is said that the Aburame taijutsu is the strongest in the village, on par with the jyuken even!”

Shino raised an eyebrow at the boy. It was an unknown fact that the only people who had a chance at defeating an Aburame in an all taijutsu fight dedicated their lives to the art. Shino’s father was more than a match, even for a master like Maito Gai.

“Begin!”

Lee raced at Shino at an unbelievable speed, only for the stoic boy to easily block the kick that Lee had aimed for his head by catching Lee’s left foot. Lee quickly broke Shino’s hold and attacked again, aiming a hard right foot for Shino’s side. Shino once more easily blocked the blow, this time with his forearm. Lee flew into a back handspring to distance himself.

In the contestant’s box, everyone was surprised to see Shino hold his own against the taijutsu specialist. Shikamaru was sure that Shino would forfeit because his kikaichu (destruction bugs) wouldn’t work against the chakra-less Lee.

“Is that true, that the Aburame taijutsu rivals the jyuken?” Sakura asked Hinata, who quietly nodded her head.

“I’ve spared against Shino-kun many times, but I haven’t beaten him once.” She confirmed.

“Hn, that’s just because you are a weakling.” Neji scoffed.

“What is so special about this style of taijutsu?” Kankuro asked “It doesn’t look like much to me.”

“The Aburame clan has risen to prominence because they offer a check against the two strongest clans in Konoha, the Uchiha and to a lesser extent the Hyuuga.” Naruto supplied, history was one of his strongest subjects in the academy. “The Aburame clan is well known and feared because of the kikaichu they harbor within their own bodies since their birth. Kikaichu feast on chakra, any type of chakra they can get, including that of their host. As such, the Aburame clan is completely incapable of using outside techniques, just clan techniques and taijutsu. The Uchiha clan was notorious for harboring a grudge against the Aburame, because of the bug clan’s success against Uchiha in the Chuunin and Jounin exams. Since the Kikaichu eat their host’s chakra, the sharingan cannot sense the chakra signature of an Aburame. The Kikaichu would quickly deplete the chakra of their opponent and since the Uchiha were almost completely reliant on their katon jutsu, they would quickly fall. One theory on why the Uchiha became so proficient in fire techniques is because of the Aburame. The fire will scare away or kill the bugs.

With the Hyuuga, the jyuken is rendered nearly useless because, once again, the Aburame have no chakra system. Yes, the jyuken can still attack other organs and body systems, but the kikaichu have a symbiotic relationship with their hosts and make the organs highly resistant to physical damage.”

Shikamaru and Sakura were in awe of Naruto’s speech, not to mention the sand shinobi. Hinata smiled at Naruto, knowing that he was well versed when it came to the history of the village.

Back in the arena, Lee had charged Shino a number of times, only to meet with the same result. The whispers about the Aburame taijutsu weren’t over exaggerated. Lee withdrew a pair of kunai and charged once more, receiving a raised eye brow from his opponent. Shino dodged the first couple strikes easily enough, but Lee didn’t let up and soon Shino’s jacket was slashed to ribbons. Although he didn’t discard the tattered coat, it did little to hide his body, and what a body it was. Shino was, for lack of a better term, ripped. There were a number of females in the stadium who straight away fainted from seeing the physique of the boy for the first time. Under the cream colored jacket, Shino wore a black tank-top that, according to a number of women in attendance “clung to his body like Sakura clings to Sasuke.” In other words, it hugged his muscles very tightly.

Now Shino was as close to angry as an Aburame can get, this was his favorite jacket out of the thirty four he owned. Lee was in for it. The resulting battle was fierce and for the most part, invisible to the general public. Lee and Shino redefined the word fast as they traded blows with each other. The contest was even and heated, until Lee was able to land a sharp kick to Shino’s gut, and kept kicking away, launching the boy into the air. Or he would have, if Shino hadn’t suddenly dissolved into a swarming mass of kikai bugs.

Lee felt a number of pinching sensations as the bugs swarmed over him, but he ignored the sensation and performed a very vast spinning kick, successfully separating himself from the insects like a centrifuge.

“You have been bitten by some of my newest tenants. They have a moderately venomous bite, that won’t kill you, but it will result in unconsciousness. You had best concede the fight, you will need medical attention.”

Lee could feel something was wrong with him, and figured that it must be the venom.

‘I have a short time to finish this fight…I’m sorry Gai-sensei, but I'm afraid I might have to give up. I cannot beat him without breaking my promise.' Lee apologized to his mentor.

Over the boisterous crowd, a voice rang out.

“Lee, it is alright, I give you permission to take them off!” The voice of the Green-Beast of Konoha rang out.

Lee didn't need to look at who the voice belonged to. He crouched low to the ground and lowered the orange leg warmers he wore to reveal a set of black weights. He unsnapped the weights and dropped them to the ground where they made a deep crater. Shino's eyes rose once more, but he couldn't do anything as Lee made his attack. Lee disappeared in a blur of green that many trained shinobi couldn't follow with their eyes. This time, when Lee's foot impacted Shino's chin, the Aburame couldn't do anything but fly into the air. Lee appeared underneath Shino and whispered 'Sorry' to the boy, before launching into a series of punches that targeted his kidneys and side, before redirecting the now injured boy towards the ground with a hard chop to the stomach. But Lee was not finished. He followed Shino downwards and grabbed his ankles with his hands and wrapped his feet around Shino's neck, shifted his center of gravity and readjusted their trajectory into a Peregrine Falcon drop. Shino's head hit the ground with a smack before his body collapsed face down. Lee rolled off his opponent panting heavily.

Genma walked over to the two and checked them for injuries. Shino was unconscious and unmoving; his sunglasses had shattered upon impact with the ground. Lee too was unconscious, but Genma figured that it was due to the poison and strain that his body went through.

“This match is a double knock-out!” Genma announced to the crowd who had gone silent. They erupted into cheers as the two boys were stretchered off the field.

In the observation deck, the Konoha ninja were in awe of the fight before them. Even the stoic Neji had admitted that it would be interesting to fight the two taijutsu enthusiasts. The Suna shinobi were engrossed in a different topic.

“Kankuro, I sense that something is off with the Kazekage.” Gaara stated as if it were something that should have been obvious. The youngest of the Kazekage's sons hadn't called the Wind leader 'father' since an incident involving an assassin years ago.

“W-what do you mean?” Kankuro asked, obviously he hadn't gotten the same vibe from his father.

Gaara stared at the blue robed kage intently for a minute before he answered.

“I do not trust the Kazekage, and I will not participate in the attack against Konoha. If you or Temari injure one Konoha citizen...I will kill you both. Something seems off about him...he is too strong.”

“Are you saying that someone killed and is impersonating our father?”

“Yes.”

Kankuro was in shock. Never had he seen his father loose in battle, but here his youngest brother was suggesting that exact scenario.

“Mitarashi Naruto vs. Sabaku no Kankuro” Genma called for the next pair of fighters, but Kankuro didn't want to move ...until Gaara whispered something in his ear.

“If you don't wish to die very slowly, you must keep up the appearance that nothing is wrong. So fight this match. I am interested in how strong Naruto could be.”

Partly out of fear for his life, and partly because Gaara had never shown an interest in anything other than killing people, Kankuro complied with the request. Sadly, the fight was much less interesting than the talk between the brothers.

As soon as the fight began, Naruto let some of his satetsu flow from the confines of his sleeves and formed them into an amorphous cloud. Kankuro just stared at the sight; there was the Sandaime's greatest weapon, the iron sand, being controlled by some genin that his brother was interested in. But Kankuro decided that even against the iron sand, he would continue this fight, just to appease his homicidal younger brother.

'As long as he can't tell which body is Karasu and which one is me, than I'll be fine.' Strategy and stealth were essential for a puppeteer, and Kankuro prided himself on the later, which was a mistake. He manipulated the chakra strings that lead to his puppet and made to position Karasu in a defensive position. But the puppet didn't move.

“I've flooded the joints of your puppet with satetsu.” Naruto voice came from in front of the real Kankuro, who had hidden himself as a bundle on the back of his puppet. Naruto leveled a kunai at the bandages and slit them off, revealing his true opponent.

“You've used that trick already; you should try a new one.” He said coldly, the kunai pressing against the shocked genin's neck. “You should give up.”

Kankuro just nodded his head and Genma declared Naruto the victor.

Naruto returned to the observation deck, while a visibly uneasy Kankuro slowly ascended the stairs, afraid of the wrath his brother was going to bestow on him. But when he made it up to the deck, Gaara was just staring at the two combatants. Kankuro tried to slide behind Naruto, but Gaara noticed him and gave him a stare that drew the puppet master in.

“Good job, if you had put up a fight, someone might have noticed my conversation with Temari. As it happened, everyone was watching Naruto defeat you, so no one noticed.” Kankuro was stunned. He had failed Gaara, but instead of death, he received praise for it. It must have been a first for the world, Gaara praising someone.

“Hyuuga Neji vs. Haruno Sakura...begin!” Genma's voice rang out over the crowd and brought everyone's attention back to the arena.

Sakura started off by throwing a kunai at her opponent and then created a trio of bunshin and rushed the Hyuuga prodigy. Neji just stood their, byakugan on, and stared down Sakura the entire time she attacked. Just as she was about to reach her target, Sakura smirked as she saw the explosive note that she had wrapped around the handle of her kunai begin to burn down. Her training with Anko over the past month was nothing like she had imagined. While Sakura was best suited for a medical career or as a genjutsu specialist, Anko had taken the month to train her in the art of demolition. An entire month on expanding her chakra capacity and work on creating her own explosive notes and various other incendiary devices. The kunai had embedded itself in the ground behind Neji and was about twenty feet from the boy. Her joy was short lived, however as Neji simply slid into a sweep kick and took Sakura's legs out form underneath her, sending her towards her own explosive.

Sakura quickly concentrated on the chakra she had embedded in the note and stopped it. She had been partially successful during her training in creating an explosive note that the user could start or stop at will. The note stopped, and she was able to pluck it from the ground and throw it at Neji's unprotected back, restarting the detonation in the process.

In the stands, Hyuuga Hanabi and Hyuuga Hiashi, Hinata's sister and father, were watching the match with no interest.

“Hanabi, watch closely. He is the one, in which the Hyuuga blood flows thickest, though it is wasted against such an inferior opponent.”

Neji began to emit chakra from the tenketsu all over his body and began to spin. A dome of chakra formed around him and the spin reflected the kunai back towards Sakura, who quickly performs a kawarimi and switches place with a stone.

“Kaiten!” (Heavenly Spin) Hanabi gasps.

“That is the Hakkeshou Kaiten (Eight Trigrams Palms Heavenly Spin), the absolute defense of the main branch of the Hyuuga clan. For someone to have learned that attack that is not a part of the Main family...he is truly the prodigy of our clan.” Hiashi intoned.

This time it was Neji who took the offensive and rushed at Sakura before she could get set. Sakura was forced to create a Chakra Enjintou (Chakra scalpel) to block Neji's palm strike that was aimed for her heart. Luckily for Neji the Enjintou takes a lot of control to perform, and Sakura just didn't have enough. Instead of a sharp scalpel, what Neji felt was more like a steak knife, and while it hurt, the damage to his palm was minimal. However, instead of leaping away like Sakura had intended, Neji just slid to his right and made to close the tenketsu on her arm, but Sakura had a surprise in store for the genius. She replaced herself with a flash note and while Neji was blind, threw a pair of kunai at him, which he was able to block by doing a blind Kaiten. As the move was slowing down, Sakura rushed Neji with a kunai in each hand, another skill she had picked up from Anko. He dodged the kunai she held in her right hand, albeit sloppily, and made to close some tenketsu on her left arm. But, to add insult to injury, Sakura was able to place a kunai strike to Neji's arm, which knocked the wind out of his sails, causing the genius to gasp in surprise. The cut was shallow but traveled the length of his arm, spilling a good amount of blood onto the ground.

“Neji, I may dislike you for what you said to Hinata, but if you don't get that checked out soon, you may die.” Sakura stated. The crowd was in awe, a shinobi without a clan had seemingly defeated the greatest prodigy to come from the Hyuuga clan in the past century. But Neji wasn't done yet. Neji emitted a pulse of chakra which acted like a puff of compressed air from a can, and knocked Sakura off balance. He then quickly took his stance before beginning his attack.

“You are in my field of divination!” He called, before his hands began to move at a speed that couldn't be seen by many.

“Two strikes, four strikes, eight strikes, sixteen strikes, thirty-two strikes, sixty-four strikes!” He chanted. “Hakkeshou: Rokujuu Yonshou!” (Eight Trigrams Sixty-Four Palms) Sakura fell to the ground, nearly unconscious and drained of her chakra. She tried to get up, but her body didn't want to let her.

“Do you give up?” He asked, with an evil smirk on his lips. “I didn't hear anything, must be my weak cousin rubbing off on you, I'll say it once, trash attracts more trash.” His right arm recoiled and was about to land a devastating blow to Sakura's internal organs, but Genma's arm stopped him.

“This match is over, if you wish to retain your ninja status, as well as your head, you had better quit now.”

Neji just walked away, but was stopped in his tracks by Naruto. The two locked eyes but didn't say a word as Sakura slowly regained her breath and walked off to receive medical attention.

“Genma-san, since Sasuke isn't here yet, why don't you let me and Neji fight now? I owe him for what he has done to my teammate.” Naruto's voice was cold as he challenged the previous rookie of the year.

Genma looked up to the Hokage who sighed. He should have seen this coming from Naruto. He would stall so that his brother could arrive and not be disqualified. Looking over at the Kazekage he asked for the man's opinion.

“I think it would be an excellent fight, while we wait for my son to fight the Uchiha.” The Kazekage replied.

Sarutobi sighed again and nodded to Genma. The fight would go on.

“There will be a fifteen minute intermission, before the next fight, which will be Mitarashi Naruto vs. Hyuuga Neji.” Genma announced and the crowd began to mutter amongst themselves. 'Why hasn't Sasuke fought yet?' one member would ask the other. No one seemed to know, but that didn't mean they weren't looking forward to the next round of matches. Some because it was bound to be an interesting match up, what with a Hyuuga against someone who could use one of the most famous bloodline abilities to grace the shinobi nations, and others because they wanted to see Neji demolish 'the demon brat'. Alas some things never change. When the break was over, the two boys hadn't moved a muscle, despite Neji receiving treatment for his wound, and were staring each other down, in a way that was reminiscent of Sasuke and Neji before this entire exam began.

“Begin!” Genma's arm dropped and the action was on.

Almost instantly Naruto and Neji went on the offensive. Naruto created a number of Kage Bunshins and they circled around Neji, who was finding it impossible to distinguish between the real Naruto and the clones.

'Damn, these clones...they have their own chakra circulatory system, so it is impossible for me to pick out the real one.'

Rushing forward, Neji started to strike as many clones as he could, but for every clone that seemed to be destroyed, two more would poof into existence.

'What is this, I've never heard of a self sustaining cloning technique.' Neji was becoming annoyed, if he didn't figure out some way to defeat the blond nuisance, than he would have to reveal his final trump card. His byakugan didn't show anything different with the landscape or with Naruto's chakra flow, so how was he making so many clones? It wasn't until Neji felt himself be tripped up by the staggering number of clones that he noticed something was wrong. The chakra flow in his own body was the problem. He had been caught in a genjutsu and didn't even realize it. He took a number of deep breaths and regulated the flow of chakra within his own body.

Now there weren't any clones in the area, but that hadn't meant that Naruto had been idle while Neji was fighting a log. He had strategically placed a number of explosive notes and flash tags around the boy and set them off in a large explosion of light and heat.

But Neji had replaced himself with a rock and was glaring angrily at Naruto.

“What happened to 'those who rely on outside help are weak?” Naruto taunted.

“Shut up! It is my destiny to defeat you anyway!” Neji growled and charged at Naruto, who simply ducked under the incoming palm and landed a solid uppercut to Neji's stomach before the Hyuuga branch member could do anything about it.

“You and that fate kick again, I don't get it, what makes you so special that fate would grant you victory?” Naruto was playing twenty questions with him, in the middle of a fight! Neji became very angry. Launching another attack, Neji was unsuccessful in his attempt at closing any tenketsu on his opponent. Naruto performed the seals for Katon: Housenka no Jutsu (Fire type: Mythical Phoenix Flower) forcing Neji to leap out of the way. For a second nothing happened, but then Neji decided to go off on one of his rants.

“You obviously don't know about the Hyuuga's destiny of hatred. You couldn't possibly know what it feels like, to know that someone could end your life on a whim. You cannot possibly know what it feels like to be branded as inferior, with a seal that could destroy your mind. You know nothing.”

“Wow, sounds like someone is carrying around a lot of emotional baggage.” Naruto quipped. “You should really see a shrink or someone about those feelings you are having.”

Neji growled like an animal and proceeded to charge Naruto once more, only to find that the blond had ended up behind him.

“They Hyuuga clan will do anything in order to protect the main family, those who were born privileged, including offering up branch members as sacrificial lambs.”

“I don't really care too much, all I know is that you have problems with the main house and you choose to centralize those issue onto Hinata-chan and all the other people around you. I may not have a seal that can kill me, but I've got more stigma attached to me than you could gather in a life time. But I press through any problems I have, fate doesn't decide the outcomes of minor struggles like ours, but fate helps those who help themselves, which is why I'm going to kick your ass, for all the people who have adversity and work their way through it. I think your teammate Lee calls it, 'the geniuses of hard work'. Hinata-chan has all the pressures of being the heiress of the 'most prestigious clan in Konoha’, Sakura worked her butt of this past month to get where she is, and I've got a good portion of the citizens of this village rooting against me, just because Anko is my Kaa-chan. For these reasons I will defeat you!”

The two combatants, finally tired of each other talking instead of fighting, charged at each other, Neji in his Hakkeshou: Rokujuu Yonshou stance, and Naruto with a Koori no Yaiba (Blade of Ice) formed around his right arm, while his sharingan spun wildly in his eyes, momentarily shocking the stoic Hyuuga. This time, it was Neji who came off the better of the two, managing to shut off sixty-four of Naruto's tenketsu, while Naruto was only able to put a slash across Neji's chest that traveled from his right hip up to his chest, before Neji was able to lean his head back enough to dodge a near fatal strike. But Naruto had managed to cut the cloth of Neji's headband, showing the entire stadium the branch family seal that marred his forehead.

“I have sealed off your chakra, you have no way to defeat me. You should have known that fate would decide against you, the dead last of your class, you had no chance to defeat me.” Neji gloated.

'He's right, I feel as strong as a new born...I suppose I have no choice. Jiraiya-jiisan, thanks for the help with this one.' As Neji was gloating, Naruto placed his hands into the ram seal, most commonly used to focus and gather chakra. He concentrated on doing something that he didn't want to do again in his life time, but the feeling of belonging occurred once more, as he called upon the chakra of the Kyuubi.

It was Jiraiya's idea to learn to call upon the Kyuubi's chakra when needed. Especially with a Hyuuga in his section of the draw and a fellow demon container in the other half, the need was great. The process itself had turned out much easier than Naruto had thought it would be. Although chakra is both physical and spiritual, a demon's chakra is nearly all spiritual, and thus, when the Kyuubi was sealed inside of him, almost all of its power was added to his own. However, the Kyuubi had little control over his chakra now that he was sealed. In truth, it was Naruto's chakra to call upon and use when he felt fit, the bonus of the current arrangement was that if his normal chakra pathway was shut down, the Kyuubi chakra could open it back up as if it were a different source of energy.

Which was why Neji was surprised to see an orange/red chakra begin to seep into Naruto's system, only moments after he had shut it down. The chakra was so intense that it blinded Neji when he tried to look directly at it. As a demonstration of his new power, Naruto used his satetsu to hold onto Neji's hands and feet, while a layer of ice crept over his entire body. Naruto had spent a good amount of time learning how to draw water out of the air and funnel it into his hyoton techniques.

Neji was in shock, 'Am I actually going to loose to the dobe? No, I can't, fate...'fate helps those who help themselves'. Naruto's words floated through Neji's mind, as his frozen/petrified body was pulled into the ground.

“Neji,” Naruto's voice was a whisper so low that the Hyuuga doubted that someone could hear it if they were standing next to them. “You think that you've lead a hard life, at least you've had love. Growing up, I was not shown love until after I was shown death...even afterwards, my nightmares were rife with thoughts that it might just be a hoax, that at any moment, someone would come along and say 'Gotcha'. You think that I don't know what it feels like to have my life controlled by a seal...your wrong...my life has been controlled by three.”

With that the 'loudmouth dobe' walked off to the deck to receive congratulations from all, including a blushing Hinata, who had nearly fainted when her crush said he would win for her. Neji just stood in the ground, while Genma sauntered over to him.

“You know, a bird, even one that was raised in captivity will instinctually try and open the latch of its cage.” The laid back man reprimanded the youth as he lifted him out of his hole.

“Winner, Mitarashi Naruto!”

Just as Neji was making his way off the arena floor, one chronically tardy jounin appeared in a swirl of leaves, with one annoyed genin.

“Sorry, we're late, you see there was this old lady doing her shopping, when a bunch of Sasuke's fan club, who were chasing us, crashed into her and broker he hip. Sasuke felt so bad for her that he finished her shopping for her.” Kakashi apologized, once again lying out his mouth.

“Yes, well, you should talk with the Hokage about getting something done about those fan girls.” Genma retorted, not being able to hide his smile. “The next match will be Uchiha Sasuke vs. Sabaku no Gaara.”

Gaara descended the stairs to the stadium and faced Sasuke. Genma quickly began the most anticipated fight in the history of the chunnin exams. But Gaara didn't move to fight Sasuke. Instead he turned to Genma and plainly spoke.

“Suna has allied with Oto to invade Konoha during this match. I refuse to fight, because that,” he turned to the seats where the Kage's were sitting, “isn't the Kazekage.”

Almost as soon as the words were out of his mouth, an explosion rang out from the area of the front gates of the village. A giant brown three headed snake crashed through the walls. The fight for Konoha was on!

When the shinobi in the stadium heard the crashing of the wall, they all turned and made to leave to help their comrades. However, a giant snake crashing through the thick outer walls of Konoha was just the first part of the plan. Soft white flowers began to descend from the sky and the people in the arena began to drift to sleep. Even some of the less experienced shinobi fell victim to Nehan Shoja no Jutsu. (Temple of Nirvana technique) The jounin in the crowd, however, did not. Neither did Sasuke, Gaara, Haku, Hinata, and Naruto. When they heard the explosion, Naruto and Sasuke activated their sharingan and Hinata, her byakugan. Haku, being the genjutsu specialist-in-training that she is, easily recognized the effects of a genjutsu and dispelled it before it could affect her.

Gaara had immediately tried to get to the Kazekage in the box by disappearing in a swirl of sand. He was stopped by a small contingent of Sand shinobi who felt it would be beneficial to ‘take care of the demon’. In another two minutes, Gaara was racing up the side of a building only to meet a large purple shield and four Konoha ANBU kneeled in front of it.

“I wouldn’t try and get past.” Their captain said, distinguished by his tan robes that covered all of his body. “It will burn you alive.”

Gaara nodded, not liking the fact that he was useless. “Who is inside?”

“The Sandaime, Orochimaru, who was impersonating the Kazekage, and Jiraiya-sama.” The captain replied.

So he had been right, the Kazekage was dead. Gaara disappeared in another cloud of sand. He had some sound ninja to hunt.

Back in the arena there was much more action going on than with the sannin and their former teacher. Kakashi, Gai, Kurenai, and Asuma were taking apart the many sound shinobi that were occupying their time and taking up their concentration. To save their chakra the jounin were using kunai to their fullest, or in Gai’s case, pure taijutsu.

“Yosh! My eternal rival, that makes fourteen enemies that I have defeated!” The overly loud, overly green clad man yelled at Kakashi, who had exposed his sharingan to help interpret the moves of his opponents, as well as to catch any techniques the enemies might use.

“I’m sorry Gai.” Kakashi said, as his kunai crashed into the skull of a random ninja. “Did you say something?”

Tears began to well in the eyes of the ‘Prideful Green Beast of Konoha’. ‘Oh, it is that hip attitude of yours that makes you my eternal rival!’ He mentally declared, before delivering youthful justice to his fifteenth victim of the day.

Meanwhile, the rookies who had weren’t in the care of medic ninja were making their way to their injured comrades so that they could defend them if necessary. Shino and Lee would be very helpful in a situation like this, but with the injuries that both sustained during their fight, they would be very easy prey for even the weakest of sound ninja. The Konoha genin arrived at the medical tent in time to watch as nondescript sound shinobi drove a kunai into the bodies of Lee and Shino.

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Haku was quickly becoming annoyed. Her first instinct was to join the group of rookies and move with them to the medical shelter, but she was stopped by five sand shinobi. These were obviously the larger threat when compared to the sound, but they were just chuunin, so she had a respectable chance at defeating them. Doing some one handed seals, Haku created a multitude of ice needles and launched them, along with some real senbon at her attackers. Two of the shinobi fell quickly to her needles, but three managed to get out of the way. While two of the sand shinobi were making seals, the third attacked her with taijutsu. Using her superior speed, Haku was able to block his incoming attack easily enough, but his strength began to push her back. Forming another one handed seal, Haku locked eyes with her opponent, who immediately fell into her trap. He though that she was performing another sensatsu shishou, but really she was creating her Makyou Hyoushou (Demonic Ice Mirrors).

Stepping into the closest mirror, and creating a Koori no yaiba, she made quick work of the remaining shinobi. But for all her effort, the group of genin she was going to follow had already disappeared. So she decided to do the next best thing. She made her way around the stadium and woke up as many shinobi as she could find. Taking stock of the situation and the size of the stadium, Haku gave out an annoyed huff. This would take a while.

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The Konoha shinobi were mortified as two of their own were murdered in front of them, kunai plunging into their hearts. Yet when the black steel implements were removed from the bodies, no blood came from the wound. In fact, nothing came from their wounds, but their flesh seemed to chip and crack away. The two corpses grabbed their attackers and the click of spring loaded traps could be heard before both enemy shinobi screamed as their blood flowed to the ground.

“Weaklings.” Kankuro’s voice materialized form inside the cabinet that was placed between the two beds. “Don’t worry; my sister got your friends out of here earlier. They’re fine.”

The assembled Konoha ninja breathed a sigh of relief, before heading back out to the battle. They quickly noticed that the Suna and Oto shinobi were much weaker compared to the Konoha ninja. While Konoha had taken some losses, no one recognized any of the ninja they saw.

Suddenly they came across Gaara battling with someone that the Konoha ninja didn’t recognize, the remnants of a wooden box lay shattered on the ground, as if they had fallen from the roof where the large purple barrier rose above the skyline of the village.

Kankuro gasped as he recognized the figure fighting with his youngest brother: their father, the Yondaime Kazekage.

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Things were not looking great for Orochimaru. First of all, his sensei was still pretty sharp for such an old man, and Jiraiya’s assistance wasn’t any help either. The two of his former acquaintances were foiling everything he had done. His Sound Four had performed perfectly, erecting the Shishienjin (Four Violet Flames Battle Encampment) barrier to trap the Hokage and both of his former pupils. However, the snake sannin’s opponents were able to act together to avoid and counter all of his attacks. So, like any genius, he moved to his already prepared back up plan. Kuchiyose: Edo Tensei (Summoning: Impure World Resurrection) was a technique that required a sacrifice of life in order to bring the souls of the dead back to life as obedient slaves to the summoner. Since he was fighting Konoha shinobi he would resurrect the three deceased Hokages to fight for him. How ironic, the Professor defeated by the two men who trained him and Jiraiya humiliated by his own prized pupil. Jiraiya…between him and the Sandaime they were easily two kage level opponents…he would need more fire power. As the technique began to take effect, the coffin of the Shodaime began to rise up from the rooftop, followed quickly by the coffin of the Nidaime, designated by the kanji for First and second carved into the wood of their caskets.

‘No! The fourth’s coffin must not rise!’ Student and teacher came to the same conclusion and immediately began to counter the technique. A coffin with the kanji for Fouth began to rise from the rooftops, but stopped about half way up before receding back to whence it came. The two ninja breathed a sigh of relief, before they saw another casket rise from the ground. It too had the kanji for Fourth emblazoned on it, but this one was much newer.

All at once the lids of the caskets opened up and fell down. Out stepped the Shodaime and Nidaime of Konoha, as well as the Yondaime Kazekage.

The Shodaime and Nidaime had reproachful looks in their eyes as they realized that they would be fighting their protégée.

“Sarutobi…we are sorry.” The Shodaime spoke for his brother as Orochimaru inserted the tagged kunai into their bodies. This would be a very tough battle. Once ‘that snake bastard’ as Jiraiya referred to him, had implanted his kunai, all three shinobi attacked their targets. But about half way between the two groups, something happened that would help Konoha immensely. Spikes made of sand rocketed up through the roof, impaling all three Kage’s through the heart. All eyes that were attached to a living body looked to the outside of the barrier, where a certain red head was staring at the form of his father with hate rolling off of him. The sand receded and to the horror of the Konoha shinobi, the bodies of the Kages began to reform.

Once again they were impaled by Gaara, and once more when the sand was removed they reformed. This cycle repeated itself a number of times before Orochimaru changed his tactic.

“Enough! Take care of that brat!” He ordered the Kazekage. Had any Suna shinobi been present, they would have noticed that a sick smile crept across Gaara’s face. The Yondaime approached the barrier and simply walked through. His body caught fire, but once it smoldered out, the form started to reform.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

When the giant snake Kyodaija was summoned and began to wreak havoc on Konoha, Tsunade moved to handle it, since Jiraiya and Sarutobi would be busy with Orochimaru. With one demonstration of her monstrous strength, the snake fell into a deep crack before it was beset by a number of various fire techniques, effectively destroying it. She quickly ducked behind the lines to help the wounded before they could gather more injuries. A medic was supposed to heal wounds, not risk their lives inflicting them. She momentarily worried about the family that she had become a part of, Orochimaru would stop at nothing to have them, and if this plan didn’t work he would simply come up with another. Her thoughts were interrupted by the next case of an injured shinobi that came to her. Suddenly three figures caught her attention. Aburame Shino and Rock Lee were being supported by a blonde kunoichi she didn’t recognize, but the Suna emblem gave it away.

“Where can I put ‘em?” Temari asked bluntly.

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Gaara, despite his ambition to destroy the Kazekage, was not having a great time. Despite being a terrible father, for various and numerous reasons, he was a skilled shinobi, and while he might not have been as strong as the Sandaime Kazekage, it was still enough to hold his own against his son.

It was a stalemate physically, but with all the experience he possessed, the Kazekage was winning the battle. Gaara was forced to seal himself inside of a cocoon of sand that would attempt to spear the man with spears of sand, only to have no effect when he hit. The normal, calculating Gaara was gone, replaced by the homicidal manic that so many people knew the young boy as. Deep inside, Gaara was beginning to think that he might not be able to defeat his father, but under the influence of Shukaku, he thought himself invincible.

Neither combatant noticed the contingent of ninja that were watching the fight. The contingent, however, was far from clueless. Shikamaru was planning all the possible plans of attack to help the red head. Hinata was worried that she would get in the way; Kankuro was just watching the fight, mouth agape. Sasuke and Naruto were also plotting, but since they didn’t have IQ’s over 200, they were slightly behind Shikamaru.

“Does anyone have any idea what technique he’s using to be able to regenerate like that?” The lazy Nara asked.

The silence sounded like a negative answer to everyone present.

“Can I assume that it’s not a blood limit?” He probed again.

This time Kankuro nodded. If this were a blood limit, than Suna wouldn’t be in the shape it is financially or socially.

“Kaa-chan would tell stories…about a technique that Orochimaru was working on…it animated the dead. She said it needed a special tag to work.” Naruto supplied after a moment of silence and another regrouping of a limb on the part of the Kazekage.

“Hinata, can you find that tag?” Shikamaru asked quickly. Gaara was being pushed back against the side of a building and was threatening to collapse it if he wasn’t able to move away from the failing structure. Activating her bloodline limit, Hinata looked at the chakra pathways to look for a tag that would animate the dead. She couldn’t find anything at first.

‘Naruto-kun’s friend needs me…that’s like Naruto-kun needing me!’ She thought as she carefully added more chakra to her eyes, trying to see more, trying to see smaller.

“Th-there! It’s in his neck at the base!” She exclaimed quickly, almost going too fast to hear. Sasuke quickly leapt into action, charging the Kazekage with kunai. The older man felt the attack coming and dodged. Sasuke overshot, but was able to catch himself and turn around to see Naruto leap into the fray. Naruto also attacked with a kunai, and once again the Kazekage dodged the first strike, but Naruto didn’t overshoot like his brother. He was able to launch a second attack, but the second was off balance and the blade wouldn’t reach the talisman. However, in a flash of light, the head of the Kazekage fell of as ice spread over the surface of the knife, extending its range considerably. The ice, however, wasn’t the usual cloudy mess that ice cubes always turn out to be, but it was perfectly clear.

As the Kazekage was trying to reform his head, Gaara took the opportunity to crush the rest of his body with his sand. A dark liquid rushed from the mass of sand that compressed the body of the Kazekage into a very tiny ball.

However, Gaara wasn’t finished, despite killing the man that had made his life a living hell. The maniacal glint in his eye only grew bigger and Kankuro involuntarily stepped back a number of steps, while the other shinobi were caught off guard at the killer intent that the genin was producing. The only two who recognized what was happening was Kankuro and Naruto, and the former was making sure he wouldn’t have to do anything about it.

Naruto on the other hand saw what would happen if Gaara was to use too much of Shukaku’s chakra inside the village.

“Gaara!” He yelled at the red head. “You said we’d fight in the third round, let’s do it now, but we need to change venues.”

Gaara’s blood lust filled eyes looked at the demon carrier like Akamaru looks at a steak, but nodded and the two boys disappeared to do battle in a less occupied location.

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The battle inside the barrier was going better, considering that it was two kage level ninja versus two former kages. Sarutobi was working on the Shodiame and Jiraiya the Nidaime. After seeing the regenerative powers of their opponents, the two knew that the best way to finish the fights was to seal the souls away into something. The problem was that Sarutobi only knew one soul sealing technique, the Shiki Fūjin. (Dead Demon consuming seal) It required the life and soul of the user, but to the Sandaime he would do it to save his village. Luckily for his friends and family, Jiraiya had an alternative way.

Creating a kage bunshin, the toad hermit bit his thumb and pulled out a scroll. As his clone succeeded in capturing the Shodaime, he swiped his blood over a seal and summoned a very ornate katana. He unsheathed the blade and quickly stabbed it through the body of the Shodaime before turning his attention to the second Hokage. Meanwhile, Sarutobi was distracting Orochimaru so that Jiraiya could do whatever it was he had planned. Seeing Jiraiya stab the First Hokage, Orochimaru smirked. That would never work; the puppets of the Edo Tensei were practically invincible. To his shock, the body of the first, instead of reforming, crumbled into sand and the body of his sacrifice, Kin he believed her name was, tumbled to the ground.

Jiraiya’s sword made short work of the Nidaime, without his Raijin sword, the second Hokage didn’t have a good way to counter the toad hermit. Jiraiya couldn’t have been happier. Noting quickly that the seals that were so delicately etched into the steel of his sword were holding, he plunged the tip of his sword into the tile of the roof and began to seal the souls that his sword had stolen.

“Kihaku hitoya…fuuin!” (Soul Prison…seal!) This was a technique that Jiraiya had theorized after Naruto had shown him the transcripts he had on sealing. The Fourth was a true seal master, one that made all others seem pale by comparison. This technique used two different set of seals, one performed by the shinobi and another carved into a weapon of their choosing. The hand seals allowed the shinobi to forcefully remove the soul of their target. The seals on the weapon attracted the souls and kept it or them bonded to the weapon that split soul and body, for a short time. From there a number of possible moves arise. First would be to seal the soul or souls into something else. This would then allow for the vessel to be destroyed, returning the souls from whence they came. The second option would be to seal the souls into the weapon, if the weapon had the sufficient seals etched into the surface. This would grant the weapon certain abilities of the souls trapped within. Guess which option Jiraiya took?

With the sword implanted in the rooftop, all he had to do was channel a bit of chakra through it and…presto, instant forest.

“Mokuton Hijutsu: Jukai Kōtan (Wood secret technique: Birth of Dense Woodland). A forest of trees rose up from the roof and forced Orochimaru to leap up and fight on tree branches. The trees kept growing and forcing the snake higher and higher, until he was in trouble of being burned by his own barrier technique. Seeing this, the Sound four dropped the roof of the technique, which allowed the trees to grow out, but kept the ANBU in. Orochimaru dropped back towards the ground and his henchmen reactivated the barrier. Sarutobi and Jiraiya met him half way down. Orochimaru summoned his Kusanagi (Grass Cutter sword) to parry Jiraiya, while Sarutobi had summoned the monkey king Enma and had him transform into the Kongou Nyoi. (Adamantine Staff) With Jiraiya mostly drained of chakra after using the sealing technique, it would be up to the Sandaime to win this fight.

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Naruto and Gaara were having a fight of their own to remember. Gaara was using more of Shukaku’s chakra than anyone had ever seen him use, and Naruto was forced to tap into the Kyuubi’s chakra to help even things out.

Things had started out simply enough, Gaara’s sand made many attempts to capture Naruto, who used shunshin (body flicker) to move around until he was positioned to strike the boy. He couldn’t bring himself to kill the boy, after all the reason he was acting like he was wasn’t his fault. Naruto was forced to resort to pressure points, in order to finish this fight without damaging Gaara too much. Using a burst of red chakra, Naruto shot himself forward toward the red head in an attempt to lodge a pair of senbon in the boy’s neck. However, instead of the sand defending Gaara like normal, the sand engulfed him inside of a sphere, like when he was fighting the Kazekage.

‘I need something that can pierce that wall!’ Naruto thought. ‘Sand won’t dissolve, so I can’t easily wash it away, but maybe I can still remove it!’ He flashed through the few hand seals necessary for an elementary water technique, mizu kaishuu no jutsu (Water collection technique) By pouring chakra out into the surrounding area, Naruto is able to condense the water molecules in the air as well as bring water from near by streams or from underground, up to the surface. This is thanks to Haku’s bloodline, allowing him to control water in any form. Water began to surround the cocoon, the eye that adorns the top took everything in with detail, relaying it to Gaara, who wondered what was happening, but didn’t worry too much, soon the blonde’s blood would be his.

The water that Naruto had gathered created a large cylinder to hold the sand cocoon hostage. He then proceeded to form the cylinder into a suirou no jutsu (Water prison). Then, he began to swirl chakra through the arm he had embedded inside of the prison. Jiraiya had begun to teach his great grandson the rasengan, but due to the training that was required to help him against his opponents in the exams, he had only worked on the technique of the Yondaime for a few days. As the chakra swirled in his hand, so did the water. In short order, the water began to spin violently, until it grew so fast, that the sand of the cocoon began to spin off into the water, leaving Gaara exposed. Naruto froze the water around the outside, trapping the sand, before he melded himself into the ice and made his way towards Gaara. Gaara was dizzy from the spin cycle he had gone through, which was why he didn’t resist when Naruto was able to prick a point on his body that sent him to sleep. In his worry over his friend, Naruto forgot that Shukaku would emerge if Gaara were to fall asleep. Naruto froze when he felt the large amount of killer intent that Gaara began to give off.

Cursing to himself for forgetting such an important detail, Naruto tried to wake the boy up. He created a small ball of water and threw it at Gaara, but the boy wouldn’t wake up, and the sand was beginning to break through the ice. Naruto ran to his side and tried to shake Gaara awake, but this once again failed. Realizing the trouble he would be in if he couldn’t figure out what to do next. The demonic chakra was beginning to break through to the sand which was already overpowering his ice cube. Not to mention, the curse seal on his neck throbbed as he was thinking, throwing him off his rhythm.

‘Damn you Orochimaru, I was thinking!’ He yelled in his mind as panic began to set in. If worst came to worst, he could always call on more of the Kyuubi’s chakra, but he didn’t want to after the way he acted under its influences on the bridge in Wave country. That’s when an epiphany came to him. Orochimaru’s Gogyō Fūin! (Five Element seal) When the snake freak had used it on him to stop the Kyuubi’s chakra, Naruto’s sharingan had been active and was able to copy the way the chakra was molded, despite the lack of hand seals. One of the first things that Naruto and Sasuke had done once they activated their sharingan, was memorize the way each different hand seal affected the way that chakra was molded inside the body. By deciphering the movements of the chakra inside Orochimaru when he did the seal, Naruto could, in theory, copy the seal!

Naruto had a good memory, but it wasn’t photographic. One small mistake could end up killing Gaara, not to mention that the Gogyo Fuin is only good to place over even numbered seals. Now, where was Gaara’s seal? Ripping off the Suna nins shirt, Naruto quickly found that the seal, a dark thick band of loops and twists that circled Gaara’s chest and back. The focus of the seal was directly over Gaara’s heart, and if this didn’t work, he would almost certainly die. He was in luck, it was a two point seal, barely capable of sealing a lesser demon, it definitely wasn’t meant to hold back the awesome power of a biju. Naruto took a deep breath and poured what little excess chakra he could spare to hold his ice prison together just a bit longer. He closed his eyes and began to perform hand seals. He had to get this correct; if he didn’t…he would kill his friend. Naruto felt the chakra flow to his finger tips, and stabilize. He heard his ice creak and moan as it began to break under the assault of the sand inside.

‘Here goes nothing.’ Naruto couldn’t do anything else but hope for the best as he drove his right hand into Gaara’s chest, right over his heart.

The sudden decrease of demonic chakra was a welcome sign that everything went well. The last thought that Naruto had went along this line.

‘I hope someone finds us.’ He then blacked out due to physical and chakra exhaustion.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Blood dripped from wounds and began to pool on the tiles that made the floor of the arena for the battle between sensei and student. However, the blood didn’t belong to the oldest of the combatants. Orochimaru held back a howl of pain as he clutched his shoulder where his left arm once was. The aforementioned appendage was held in the clutches of Enma, king of the Ape summons. No longer able to perform techniques with the speed required to ensure survival in this fight, the snake sannin had no other option but to retreat, his Sound four keeping any ANBU from following. The battle for Konoha had ended with the defeat of the invading forces, which retreated in utter humiliation.

Thanks to Tsunade and Shizune, the number of wounded and dead Konoha shinobi were minimized. Konoha had survived, in large part to the efforts of every shinobi, from gennin to jounin. Anko had left the arena and immediately reported to the wall to help protect it. She was of course worried about her sons, but she knew that they could protect themselves. The Konoha genin that had found Gaara fighting the Kazekage helped the ANBU clear out any hiding enemy ninja from the streets, often chasing the ninja into the ANBU forces.

About two hours after the retreat of Orochimaru, Naruto and Gaara were found by a small contingent of Genin, lead by Hinata and Neji. Both were admitted to the hospital and were treated for various physical injuries. The two would be unconscious for almost three days, a record for both, and as a result, missed the massive rebuilding effort that the village was going through. The village would be back to normal in about three months, and Konoha had solidified their reputation as being amongst the elites in the Shinobi world.

A mere two week’s travel from Konoha, two figures dressed in black cloaks with red clouds on them headed for the village. These two would be the harbingers of a new dawn, and Konoha wouldn’t like the day that their sun rose, and the village of Konoha fell into perpetual night fall.

Naruto had been confined to his hospital bed for too long. Despite the reassurances of his mother that it was necessary to prevent against further damage from chakra exhaustion. The amount he had used to defeat Gaara and defend his home had been monumental, using up all of his unnaturally large chakra supplies, as well as forcing a good amount of the Kyuubi’s chakra into use. Safe to say that he wasn’t expected to awaken for a good week and a half. Granted he was anything but normal, so it wasn’t too much of a surprise that he petitioned to be released minutes after waking up.

Thankfully, Tsunade denied his request and forced him to spend at least the next day in the room, under her strict surveillance. After that, he should be able to return home, given that he doesn’t exert himself too much…but since he had a tendency to overdo everything he does, more like no working out what so ever.

He hadn’t taken his forced vacation well, especially when he could have been able to help out the village, which needed a lot of help rebuilding. That was where the rest of his family was, while he was stuck helping Tsunade sort papers. One of the lessons from this encounter was the unfortunate truth that Sarutobi was growing on in his life, and a suitable replacement must be found before long. Fearing what would happen if he offered the post to Jiraiya; the old and wizened man offered the office of Godaime Hokage to Tsunade. He had always hoped to be able to pass on his position to one of his students, now that his true successor was gone.

He had gone to see his only female student to offer her the job and was expecting a long argument from the blonde, but was shocked when she accepted his offer after only a few days of thought. He was almost sure that she would refuse because of her brother, Nawaki, and her one time boyfriend, Dan. It was both of their dreams to become Hokage, and she had taken their deaths rather harshly. Whenever the grey haired man thought of this a sad smile would take over his face. It was against the very nature of a Kage to not feel sorrow for one as close as Sarutobi was to his students, especially when that sorrow was caused by death.

Where does the smile come from? Well, the first thing that Tsunade did when she began her journey was to ‘visit’ the Stone ninja in their home. Once again, the Iwa Shinobi suffered sleepless nights and extreme fear of a blonde haired Konoha ninja.

Returning to his original train of thought, Sarutobi couldn’t help but feel a sense of relief pass over him. This arrangement would be best for Konoha, which would in essence have two Kages to guide them through the times ahead, one in battle and the other in her wisdom and with the utmost respect of the village. The future of the village was in good order.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

“Finally! I can get out from behind that stupid desk!” Naruto was ecstatic about his release from paperwork. If that was what the Hokage did all day, he might just reconsider his job options in the future. He had suffered behind that desk for an entire week before he was cleared to help out with the manual labor with the rest of his friends. To celebrate his freedom, the young man quickly made his way to Ichiraku for some ramen.

Tsunade had more important matters to attend to, most of them dealing with sorting out the results from the chuunin exam. From what she had seen, the genins, while impressive, didn’t have the maturity to be chuunin at this stage. But after the attack from Orochimaru, the village did need more Chuunin…

As night set around the village, the two figures in black cloaks reached the gates of the village. They wore straw hats that shaded their face from view and their cloaks covered their entire body except for about six inches of their legs.

“We’ll stay the night out here, and search for our target tomorrow.” The shortest of the pair said, his voice was emotionless and dead. The only visible part of his skin was his hands which had a ring on his right ring finger.

“What, seeing your old village make you nostalgic or somethin’?” The larger one asked, his hands were in his pockets and not a bit of skin was showing.

The shorter of the pair didn’t answer and just walked over to a tree before climbing it using chakra and lay across a branch for the night, adjusting his hat so that no one would be able to see his face.

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The next morning Naruto reported along with his team to the Godaime to receive their assignment for the day.

“Team Seven…you’re needed in the…” Tsunade wasn’t the best at assigning missions, normally this was something that Shizune did, but she was off helping at the hospital, so the task fell to the female Hokage. She had been determining where placement of teams by need, but with all the focus on the rebuilding, the heaviest hit spots were already near completion, and thus most of the teams were reassigned to lesser areas of need. To pick the new areas, Tsunade had been throwing darts at a map of Konoha and presto! New location!

As her latest dart thudded into the map, she looked at the location and grinned.

“Team Seven, you are hereby assigned to help the rebuilding in Konoha’s hotel district. If you weren’t aware, the district sustained minimal damage, but if we are able to get the structures back in form, we can begin to make revenue from them again. You have your orders, dismissed!”

The quartet headed towards the building where they would start their day, passing through the center of the village on the way. None of the genin noticed the oddly dressed duo that were sitting at the counter of a small shop, eating breakfast. However, Kakashi did notice, although he didn’t appear to. Upon sensing the legendary Copy ninja, both of the foreign shinobi tensed, but relaxed once the team had passed. No one noticed this action. As the three young ninjas began their work, Kakashi made some lame excuse about needing to check to see if he left his refrigerator running. They never noticed the hawk that began to circle in the sky, calling the attention of the higher ranking ninja.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The two mystery figures finished their food and made as if to follow team seven, but midway towards their destination they were accosted by three figures. Sarutobi Asuma and Yuhi Kurenai had spotted the bird that Konoha routinely employed as both a messaging and alert system. At the time Kurenai had been training her daughter/protégée Haku in the harder aspects of genjutsu and the brunette had followed her mentor to assess the threat of these ninja.

For a moment the five shinobi just stood there and gauged each other. After a moment, the smallest of the cloak clad ninja spoke.

“It’s been a while…Kurenai-chan. The voice was distinctly male, but not exceedingly deep like one would associate with men in their twenties and thirties.

“Uchiha…Itachi!” The genjutsu mistress stammered. Itachi was labeled an S-Class missing ninja after his ‘departure’ a number of years ago.

In response to hearing his name, Itachi raised his head, revealing fully matured sharingan to all present.

Haku was in shock, Uchiha Itachi was a name known to most missing ninja. She remembered a time, not long after she and Zabuza had departed Mist, that her father figure had a run in with an old ‘friend’ from the Seven swordsman. She hadn’t been privy to the conversation except for what little she could discern from the next room over. Hoshigake Kisame had been extremely strong, even for a member of the seven swordsmen, and had garnered a reputation for assassinating daimyos, but that had recently changed. He had joined an organization of missing ninja and had come calling to recruit. He had mentioned that the genius prodigy of Konoha had recently gained entry to the same organization, by massacring his entire family. Haku had recoiled at the thought, memories of her father and the small group he led leapt to her mind.

“Haku!” Her head snapped around and looked at her mentor. “You must go alert Sandaime-sama that Uchiha Itachi is back in town, and headed towards the hotel district.”

She began forming hand seals for one of her strongest illusions.

“Magen: Jubaku Satsu.” (Demonic Illusion: Tree Bind Death) She whispered her technique and quickly two large trees sprung from the ground and wound their branches around the two ninja. However, as she began to reappear, seemingly out of the trunk, to decapitate the rouge Uchiha, she found herself at the mercy of her own illusion.

“I’m sorry Kurenai-chan, but I can’t allow you to get any help. Kisame, deal with the girl.” Itachi ordered.

Kisame quickly made his way towards Haku, who turned to run, but upon hearing Asuma clash with the blue skinned man, she stopped to watch. Kisame was rather tall, and carried a large sword that was wrapped on his back. He was naturally blue skinned, despite the taunts that his mother ate too many blueberries when she was pregnant with him. He had gills and closely resembled a shark.

Asuma had donned his trusty trench knives, through which, he was able to channel chakra and extend the blade of his knife. Kisame took a shallow cut to his cheek from the initial assault, but grew wise to Asuma’s ability and proceeded to draw his sword, Samehada, from his back and blocked the subsequent attacks.

The shark faced man took a swing at Asuma and connected with the chain smoking jounin’s gut, cutting him badly.

“Hah! My Samehada can eat right through that pitiful chakra knife you have, but the best part is, it doesn’t cut, it shaves!” He boasted before turning once more to Haku.

He disappeared from her view, and she instinctively leapt into the air, preparing a number of senbon needles as she did so. Kisame reappeared directly in front of her, even though she was in the air. Doing the only thing she could, she created an ice mirror and disappeared through it, looking for the old Hokage.

Kisame was taken aback, that bloodline had been wiped out years ago, he had been part of the team that made sure of it. How had the girl survived? Even if she survived the initial purge, she should have been found out in the subsequent sweeps of Kiri.

‘She must have gotten out of the village…but how and to where, she didn’t have the symbol of the leaf on her, so she must be new.’ His pondering was cut short by his partner’s curt voice.

“Kisame, ignore her, we need to move quickly if we are to acquire our target before the Sandaime can intercept us.” His orders came as he landed a hard chop to Kurenai’s neck, immobilizing her before the duo continued on their path.

It didn’t take long to find team seven, seeing as there was only one genin team assigned to the area. Sakura was off helping clean some of the rooms on the lower floor, while the boys were working from the top down. The two were about to make their presence known when they were interrupted by a pair of kunai thrown in their direction.

“We know you’re there, come out brother!” Sasuke spat the last word as if he had swallowed soap.

“That runt’s your brother?” Kisame asked, jovially.

“It has been a while hasn’t it Sasuke…and you as well Naruto-kun, what has it been, four years or five?” The normally stoic teenager couldn’t help but dig at the pair.

“NOT LONG ENOUGH!” The two yelled and charged their black haired tormentor together. Itachi was slightly impressed when a chidori erupted in his younger brother’s hand, but more so when a crystal clear blade of ice formed around Naruto’s arm. The duo’s timing was spot on and any normally shinobi would have bit the dust. However, Itachi isn’t exactly what could be considered normal by any stretch of the imagination. He simply grabbed Sasuke’s wrist behind the chidori and ducked under the horizontal slash that came from Naruto, before he proceeded to throw Sasuke into Naruto.

Not losing hope, the brothers attacked again, this time with slightly different results, but the outcome was the same. This time it was Kisame that simply stopped the pair with Samehada to block the ice and a swift kick to Sasuke’s side.

“I’m here too you know.” He joked, hoping to rile the two up more. It worked and they split apart to attack each opponent separately. Kisame stepped in front of Sasuke, forcing Naruto to fight Itachi. Years of training with Kakashi and their own sharingan had ingrained in the boys not to look at Itachi’s eyes, or they would be as good as dead. By concentrating on his midsection and legs, one could easily determine the moves that someone was making. Naruto unleashed his satetsu and used his new attack.

“Satetsu Kaihō!” (Iron Sand: World Order) Naruto declared as the black cloud formed an ever increasing branching ring of spikes that was designed to wound or trap his opponent.

Sasuke, on the other hand, had tried to engage the fourth member of the blue man group in an taijutsu battle, but was shocked at how smoothly Kisame was in a fight, especially with that awkwardly shaped sword. Forming a few hand seals, and inhaling a deep breath of air, Sasuke blew a large fireball towards his opponent, who simply smirked and hid behind his sword. The fire burnt the bandages that Samehada was wrapped in, but the dark blue sword, which was textured with many different scales, exactly like shark skin, just absorbed the attack. Sasuke scowled, this would be much harder than he thought.

Naruto wasn’t having any better luck; Itachi had simply let the attack graze over his body, taking shallow wounds, but nothing major. Naruto had attempted to follow up with a flurry of punches; the distance was closed with a shunshin, only to be blocked off at every turn. He wasn’t used to fighting again, after his draining encounter with Gaara, and could feel his muscles weakening as the one sided fight wore on.

Like wise, Sasuke was receiving a thorough beating, but unlike his brother, he was having a hard time keeping cool under the pressure. He was shocked at the power gap between his foe and himself. Even more disgusting to the young Uchiha was that he knew that Itachi was stronger. Struggling to stand up after a particularly vicious encounter with Samehada, which he had taken across his forearms; Sasuke began to go for broke, and formed his second and final chidori for the day. Charging forward at Kisame, Sasuke readied the crackling ball of energy and drove it towards his opponents head. Kisame hadn’t anticipated that Sasuke would aim so high, and the only thing he had available to block with, was the handle of his sword. The blue electricity of the chidori met with the hard metallic handle of the shark named sword. Sasuke finally broke through, his hand continuing towards the blue man’s head, only to be rocked when Kisame kicked his broken sword at the boy, winding him.

Rising to his feet again, Sasuke tried to feel for his chakra, but found precious little. He could feel a throbbing coming form Orochimaru’s cursed seal, and decided to give into the call to power. But instead of feeling the rush of chakra to his body, he heard Naruto wince and clap his hand to his neck. In that second, Itachi had locked eyes with Naruto, and activated his mangekyou sharingan, trapping the boy in the world of Tsukuyomi.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Anko had made her way to the hotel district at impossible speeds upon hearing that Itachi was back in town. Haku had been unable to find Sarutobi, but had reported to Tsunade who had been receiving a report from the kunai addicted kunoichi. She had pointed Haku in the direction of the public bath houses, more specifically the female side, for if Sarutobi couldn’t be found, than Jiraiya and Tsunade would have to do. She made it to the building that Team Seven had occupied first and upon feeling the chakra from above her, headed up stairs as quick as she could. She arrived just in time to witness her son being pulled into the hellish nightmare that was the world of tsukuyomi.

Yet, after a second, to everyone’s surprise, Naruto was unaffected by the technique! Itachi took a step backwards, eyes wide open. He couldn’t figure out how it was possible, until he looked at Naruto’s eyes. They weren’t black as they had been before, or even the mature sharingan that he had witnessed during their fight. Instead, there was a black iris, with a red blade, the exact opposite of Itachi’s mangekyou sharingan.

‘He received Shisui’s eyes; my mangekyou will be worthless against him. It was then that he noticed Anko’s presence. The situation had broken down and he knew it. The only move left to make was a tactical retreat and he told Kisame as such.

“Why, it’s only one worthless ninja?” He asked and made to charge Anko, who merely smirked and disappeared in a blur of motion, reappearing behind Kisame and having grabbed Naruto, handed him off to Sasuke. She was crouched to the ground and upon seeing the look of rage that he had been blown off, she smirked at the man.

“I don’t see what’s so funny?” He asked in a huff.

Anko calmly stood up, and straightened out her coat before pulling Kisame’s left arm from behind her back, the appendage having been completely removed via kunai.

“Your nervous system leaves much to be desired.” She chided before turning her attention to Itachi. The youngest ANBU captain ever in the history of Konoha felt the chakra signatures of Tsunade and Jiraiya approaching and grabbed Kisame’s sword an ordered the older ninja to retreat, blowing a whole out of the wall before leaping out of the building and fleeing into the surrounding forest.

After a sufficient distance, Itachi took the opportunity to dress Kisame’s wound, the blue man had been in a state of shock that he had been humiliated by a Konoha kunoichi and had his arm removed. Once he had regained sufficient sense, he asked the question that had been bothering him since the encounter.

“Why did we leave, you could have taken her!” He asked boisterously.

Itachi’s eyes narrowed in response.

“No, she is a special jounin for a reason, not just because she is good at torture, but because she was singled out by Orochimaru as his apprentice before he defected. He has been after the sharingan for such a long time that he studied it’s weaknesses and created his entire style of fighting around it, a style which he passed on to Anko. She has been raised as a tool to fight Uchiha, a tool that could easily fight me equally unless she was to make a mistake. Not to mention that Jiraiya and Tsunade of the legendary three were moments away from arriving, there is no chance for us to escape with our target against them. The news of the jinchuuriki’s eyes must be reported to the rest of the organization. We may need to amend the plan a bit.” He speculated as he continued to push ahead, back towards the base of his organization, Akatsuki.

Back in Konoha, all parties involved in the little skirmish were licking their wounds and pondering the day’s events. Asuma wasn’t as injured as he seemed, mostly the damage was superficial, but there was the worry of damage to his intestines and some other internal organs. Kurenai would have nothing more than a headache when she wakes up, although her pride will undoubtedly take a large hit. Naruto, besides having some major bruising, and muscle fatigue due to his activities, was being evaluated by Tsunade, who wasn’t nearly as interested in his new sharingan, as Sasuke was. With the healing that she gave him, not to mention the Kyuubi’s own healing powers, he shouldn’t have been in such a condition. His muscles should have been back to perfect condition, not weakened like he had just awoken from a coma. She suspected some form of poison or other liquid and sure enough, during a scan of her ‘nephew’ she found a large quantity of a foreign substance that she was unfamiliar with. After testing, she discovered that it was a laboratory created virus that targeted the immune and chakra systems and upon destroying it’s host cell, would not only release new copies of the virus, but a good bit of potassium chloride as well, a very potent muscle inhibitor. The good news was that he had only recently been infected and with treatment, he would be cured of this problem quickly, the only issue left was, ‘how did he get this virus anyway?’

Sasuke hadn’t taken much damage, other than to his pride and mind. First of, he realized how large the gap between Itachi and himself was. Secondly, he was angry that he couldn’t land a blow to Kisame, but most of all, he felt sick to his stomach that he tried to reach to Orochimaru’s cursed seal for power, and in the process, almost caused Naruto to fall victim to the tsukuyomi. He had forgotten that his seal was contained by Naruto’s will and vice versa. He cursed at himself for forgetting something like that. It was because of him that Naruto had nearly been subjected to torture by his worst fears.

‘I won’t let it happen again!’ He resolved to himself.

‘Ah, but of course you will let it happen again because you are too weak and powerless to stop your true brother!’ There it was again, that voice that had mocked him before the chuunin exam prelims.

‘Who are you?’ Sasuke demanded.

‘Fool! We’ve been over this already, I am you, I know all about you, Uchiha Sasuke, I know how angry you feel when you see Naruto like this, how all you can see is your mistakes! You cannot save your precious brother, because you are too weak, which means that sooner or later, I will come out and play. Perhaps with that girl you like so much, Haku was it? Yes, she will have to be taken care of, so that Itachi cannot use her to get to you…’ And with that, the sinister voice left Sasuke’s head once again, leaving the boy in a cold sweat that this split personality would harm Haku simply for self preservation! Sasuke felt like the room was closing in on him, so he took his leave to go sit on the roof and ponder this new predicament he found himself in.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

In Oto, Orochimaru was ignorant of the altercation between the members of his former organization and his intended targets, but he didn’t care. He had just finalized his plans to capture two vessels that contained the sharingan, not to mention his own creation, the senshin. He would accompany a team to Konoha that comprised of Kabuto, his bone user, Kimimaru, and the sound four. Although with only one arm, he would be useless in a battle against his former teacher or teammates, he did have enough of an advantage to capture his third target and former pupil, Mitarashi Anko. Yes, as the group set out towards the village of his birth, he couldn’t help but grin…things were finally looking up for the snake sannin, and he wouldn’t have anything getting in his way!

Naruto was sick of that feeling. It had been hanging around him since that incident with Itachi and his blue sidekick, and that had been a while ago. He was sick of the feeling that something terrible was going to happen, and soon. He didn’t listen to these kinds of feelings, never had a reason to honestly, but this was different. Jiraiya had explained that the two missing ninja were part of an organization called Akatsuki, made up of only the strongest ninja, who were hunting and capturing the tailed demons, or their containers. He supposed that this might be contributing to the current funk he was in, but it didn’t explain it.

He exhaled sharply, rereading the letter in front of him for the second time, looking for anything he might have left out or forgotten. Spotting no problems, he rolled the scroll shut and began to walk to the Hokage’s office from the comfort of the tree he had been sitting in for the past hour. He made quick time to the administrative building but decided to take the approach to Tsunade’s office slowly. It was late, around ten-thirty if he had to venture a guess, and he didn’t need to be caught sneaking around the office of the most powerful ninja in the village. Quietly, he was able to open the door to the office and slip inside, noting that for once Tsunade was not sleeping at her desk, and had more than likely slipped out for some sake.

He found the exact place he was searching for and slipped the scroll inside of a small compartment that he had seen the Sandaime use often. It was a small cubby built into the inside of the desk, near the right knee of whoever was sitting at it. Placing his scroll along with the other one already there, he stood up and made to leave hoping to make it home before too long, his mom had become worried about his safety and had imposed strict curfews on him. The boy shuddered. The last thing he needed to do was make his mom worry.

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Likewise, Sasuke was out and about at this late hour of the night, except his was for a different purpose. It was the anniversary of his clan’s massacre and he had gone to pay his respect. It was a difficult time, especially with the reappearance of Itachi, which seemed to mar today even more than usual. He sat on the pier where he first learned to perform his first fire technique and watched the moonlight and stars reflect of the still surface. The voice in his head hadn’t returned since the incident, but what it had said kept echoing around and it scared him. There was no way that voice could have been him, he wasn’t cruel or evil sounding, he wasn’t overly violent, and he certainly didn’t want anyone dead, especially if that person was Haku.

Haku. The name drug up a thought that he didn’t want to admit or acknowledge. Did he really care for her? She had experienced the same feeling of loneliness he had, even if his was substantially shorter, both having witnessed their family killed before their eyes. She was strong, something he would definitely look for when he decided it was time to date, and the fact that she was level headed, where he was a bit more rash was a nice contrast. He would watch as his brother would spar with the brunette and couldn’t help but be amazed by how quickly she thought up a strategy and how effective they were. She was no Shikamaru, who Sasuke knew to have an IQ larger than most people’s bill when they took Naruto out for ramen, but she was extremely bright in her own right. Then there was the way that her smile would seem to sparkle, and not in the obnoxious way that Lee or Gai’s would, but it could brighten his mood no matter how bad his day was. Come to think of it, if he could see her smile now…

Ok, it was official; he was at least slightly attracted to her, which made what the voice said, even more painful to hear.

“You cannot save your precious brother, because you are too weak, which means that sooner or later, I will come out and play. Perhaps with that girl you like so much, Haku was it? Yes, she will have to be taken care of, so that Itachi cannot use her to get to you…’”

The voice had to be his own, he hadn’t told anyone, not even Naruto that he liked her, not a single soul.

He stood up and walked towards the gates of his former complex and as he walked out of the gate he never noticed that he was being looked for by two different groups of shinobi.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

“Orochimaru-sama, you do not need to exert yourself in your current state, allow me to take care of this, you know as well as I that I can handle a simple abduction.” If anyone other than Kabuto had said that, they would have been disemboweled faster than they could blink.

“It would be wise of you not to overestimate yourself.” The snake sannin hissed at his subordinate. Sending yourself is too much of a risk, and I cannot risk Kimimaru’s health to make sure you succeed in your task. You will accompany me, which is the simplest way of completing our task.” The sannin declared.

Kabuto nodded, not wanting to test his luck against his master. He still thought it was overkill, after all Konoha shinobi were too weak to demand the presence of himself and his master. The duo slipped into the shadows and suppressed their chakra to a level that was nearly undetectable and made their way to the apartment of Mitarashi Anko.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Anko was waiting rather impatiently for her sons to return home, when the cursed seal, long since repressed, began to burn. This wasn’t unusual, but tonight it burned with a new fury that she had never experienced before. It fought with its containment seal so hard that she was sure it would break free this time. Sensing the sudden appearance of two people who were not her sons, she instinctively lashed out with a kunai, cutting off the arm of her opponent thanks to a bit of wind nature chakra, just like she had done to Kisame. The pain receded for a moment, enough time for her to get a look at her attacker, and was shocked to see it was Yakushi Kabuto, now minus a left arm. The boy seemed shocked that she could fight through the pain and injure him in such a way.

“Why don’t you run back to the bastard, together you two make such a cute pair, you even got matching arms removed.” She joked. What she saw next made her eyes widen and mouth hang agape in shock. She felt the cursed seal flare up once again, but she never felt the blow to her head, courtesy of her former sensei.

“Do you still think you should have come alone?” The sannin asked his assistant.

“I will admit she was more of a danger than I thought, but I could have done the job anyway.”

“Yes, I suppose you could have, but what we need right now is secrecy, and you, my subordinate, lack something in the tact and grace department when you become too riled up.”

“Hai, but we both know that’s not why you keep me around.” Kabuto finished stretching out his new left arm and picked up Anko. So far the plan was going off without a hitch.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

“Uchiha Sasuke.” The voice cut through the night and into Sasuke’s ears. The boy turned around and faced the speaker, not completely surprised by who he saw.

“We are the Sound Four; we have come to offer you the chance to join us under our leader, Orochimaru-sama. If you do not wish to join us of your own accord, we are to take you by force.” The largest one spoke. Sasuke figured the whale of a man was the leader of the quartet, but he felt the most chakra coming from a pale skinned man, who seemed to have a large, irregular bump on the back of his head. The accompanying ninja were a tan man with dark hair that strongly resembled a spider. Perhaps it was the fact that he had four arms, but he definitely looked like a spider. The final member of the four, was a red headed women, who looked pissed off to be here and from the tick on her head, she was about to let her feelings known.

“You thought I’d actually join you? You must be dumber than the standard sound trash that we dealt with during your little invasion.” Sasuke retorted.

“Then we have recourse but to take you with us.” The pale skinned man spoke, before he and his compatriots launched themselves at Sasuke.

With the sharingan active, it was simple for Sasuke to see their movements and adjust himself accordingly; however after a few minutes of dominating the fight, the four ninja upped the ante a bit when they activated their cursed seals. The marks that spread across their skin were unlike the marks he remembered from his only encounter with his own seal, but Sasuke was a bit shocked at the number of different seals Orochimaru possessed.

Shortly after this new development, Sasuke began to succumb to the teamwork and power of the four sound shinobi. His only option seemed to be the cursed seal, but he remembered that Naruto controlled his seal, and Naruto would never falter in his brother’s defense.

‘But if I were to break his seal, than maybe he would release mine.’ Sasuke thought, it was his only chance to defeat these guys.

As he was about to succumb to the temptation to snap his brothers seal, he suddenly found the area surrounded by sheets of ice.

“Sasuke! Are you all right?” Haku’s voice came from behind him and it never sounded so good.

“I’ll live, but it’s a good thing you showed up, I don’t know how much longer I could have lasted, one on four.”

Looking over at the four ninja who where having a little trouble standing on the ice sheet, Haku became angry that they would try and attack a Konoha shinboi like this. She formed the familiar ice mirrors and stepped into one of them before she began to move slice the sound four apart with kunai and senbon. She felt rage enough to kill and if the four hadn’t been highly competent ninja, they would have been dead within seconds of their imprisonment. This bitch showing up wasn’t part of their plan, and threw a monkey wrench into the works. If they were forced to go level two cursed seal, the risk that they would be found rose exponentially, but they didn’t have a choice. Uchiha Sasuke must be captured for their master.

From Sasuke’s point of view, Haku’s mirrors were suddenly destroyed by a giant gate erupting from the surface of the earth. He covered his face to shield it against the sharp ice fragments that rocketed at him. When he looked next, he saw the pale man holding Haku’s unconscious body between him and …another him? It seemed as if the man had cloned himself and was now holding a very important bargaining chip.

“If you don’t want her to die, you will place this seal on yourself.” The fat guy spoke as his cursed seal receded back into its mark and held up a paper talisman that had a seal drawn onto it. Not being the seal-master-in-training that his brother was, Sasuke didn’t recognize the markings as one that would place him into a state of complete paralysis.

Things had gone south so fast that Sasuke’s head was still spinning as he did the only thing he could do to protect the one girl he cared an ounce about. He barely registered accepting the talisman from the fat man, but he would clearly remember for the rest of his life what he did afterward. Noticing that Haku’s eyes were beginning to flutter open, he quietly whispered to the captive girl.

“I’m sorry.”

He quickly slapped the seal on his chest and immediately felt the effects of the seal take away all movement from his body. It was terribly unfortunate that the seal didn’t arrest his ability to see, as he was forced to watch the four shinobi beat Haku until she resembled little more than a mass of blood, skin and clothing. As they whisked his unresponsive body away, he could only hope that he died after what he had put Haku through; it was the only thing that he deserved.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto felt something through the cursed seal on his neck, but like his mother he had learned to tune it out. He walking along the deserted streets and was half way through an alley when he was accosted by two people with a third slung over the shoulder of the shorter one.

“Why Naruto-kun, it’s very dangerous to be walking alone at this time of night.” Orochimaru spoke with a grin on his face which made Naruto freeze, and look up at the figures that were standing on the rooftop overhead. His gaze immediately went to the prone form of his mother who was draped unceremoniously over the right shoulder of Kabuto.

The realization that Kabuto was a traitor didn’t seem to faze him as much as the form of his mother. The Kyuubi’s chakra began to well up inside him and his hair began to stand on end at the sight. His eyes morphed from the black that many were accustomed to seeing, to the blood red sharingan. As he was about to lash out at the sannin and his man servant, Orochimaru’s eyes shifted direction and he smiled even broader at the sight that was quickly becoming visible in the dark.

“You have recovered Sasuke-kun, good work my sound four.”

Naruto’s knees nearly buckled, they had Sasuke and his mother.

“Let them go!” He sneered, his eyes never leaving the Sannin.

“Or what? You’ll attack me? You’ve already tried that, and it didn’t turn out so good did it, Naruto-kun?” The former sannin was pushing Naruto’s buttons in exactly the right order to get the desired outcome.

The memory of his previous beat down rose in Naruto’s memory causing his spirit to fall. Not once breaking eye contact, he offered himself to the devil.

“You let them go, and I’ll go with you. You want the senshin for your immortality technique, right, so take me and leave them alone!”

“My, my, how noble of you, sacrificing yourself to me once more, but I’m afraid that you’ll have to try better than last time, with Sasuke I could create a whole new Uchiha clan and I your mother is the perfect surrogate mother.” He goaded the boy. His plan was nearly complete, just one more push and he would have everything he ever wanted.

“Then what do you want, I’ll do anything, just let them go!” Naruto was pleading now; tears were welling up in his eyes as he tried to negotiate his mother’s release.

“Well, there is one thing. You will come with me but before you do, you will complete the senshin by absorbing the DNA of Kimimaru there.” Orochimaru lay the terms of Naruto’s surrender on the table as Kimimaru suddenly appeared behind Naruto and held a sword made entirely of bone to the boy’s neck.

“You can always decline, but then I take your family away, and you die, so what will it be?”

Naruto wasn’t sure what the snake meant by completing the senshin but he didn’t have a choice and nodded his head. Kimimaru, a sickly pale man who was part of the Kaguya clan, famous in the Mist for their ability to fight using their bones as weapons sliced his wrist with a knife and then slit Naruto’s wrist before crashing the two bleeding appendages together, seeping his own blood into the boys body.

Naruto didn’t feel anything as the blood flowed from one body to another, but didn’t care as long as his family was saved. After a minute of the impromptu blood transfusion, Kimimaru leapt onto the roof with Naruto still in his grasp and handed the boy over to Kabuto so he could heal the boy’s wrist. Looking at the man he had followed and fought to the death for, Kimimaru spoke the lasts words of his life.

“It is done, Orochimaru-sama, may your goals finally be accomplished.” He spoke quietly as his strength deserted him from his long fought illness.

Naruto suddenly doubled over in pain, still in the clutches of Kabuto, who simply stopped the boy from falling off the roof. Naruto stifled as scream as every cell in his body seemed to ignite, as if on fire.

“Finally, it begins! I will finally have my perfect vessel! Behold the birth of the true form of the senshin!” The snake boasted as he watched Naruto roll around, fighting to remain conscious from the tremendous pain in his body. After a minute of the extreme pain, he passed out into unconsciousness while the Kyuubi merely watched in shock as every function of his host’s body changed to something he had never seen in a human.

“Kabuto, prepare for Sasuke-kun’s transportation.” Orochimaru looked at the paralyzed body of his second choice body before smiling. He opened a glass bottle and removed a black pill. “This will break that puny containment seal and release the second level of your cursed seal, Sasuke-kun. It will be extremely painful, but it will be worth it.” He forced the pill into Sasuke’s throat and then forced it down by massaging the boy’s throat. Almost immediately, Sasuke felt the containment seal break as he was plunged into unconsciousness.

Orochimaru quickly repeated the process with Anko, while the Sound Four were busy sealing Sasuke with the Shikokumujin (Four Black Fog Formation Seal). This prevented the drug that he had been forced to ingest, from killing him. After sealing Anko in a similar fashion, the six remaining ninja sped out of Konoha with their three ‘prizes’.

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How Haku had survived her injuries was a mystery to Kurenai who found the girl she had come to think of as a daughter, in the middle of the street, but all she cared about right now was getting her to the hospital. Upon getting into the hospital, the night staff quickly jumped into action, pumping healing chakra into the girl like it was going out of style. Her body slowly began to heal and she would make it through this, but she lost a lot of blood, so there was not telling how long she would be unconscious. She slept through the night and was still unresponsive when the Godaime received the report of her hospitalization.

No matter what she did, Tsunade couldn’t figure out why someone would attack Haku. She had no enemies and Kurenai was well liked by her peers, so it was unlikely that it was retaliation for something she did. Tsunade slammed her hand into the wood of her desk and cursed when she felt something fall onto her knee. She looked down and discovered a pair of scrolls lying on the floor. Picking them up, she noticed that they were both addressed to her specifically, not Sarutobi, but her.

Opening the first one up, she saw a lengthy letter that as written by Naruto.

Tsunade-bachan,
If you’re reading this, than you obviously got angry and hit your desk, you should stop that, it’s not healthy for the desk! I have been having a bad feeling ever since that run in with Itachi. Something bad is going to happen, and I can only assume that it is going to happen to me. If for some reason I am missing from the village, it only means that I was right. Ever since I was made aware of my lineage, I have tried to piece together the events that happened that have lead to Itachi’s return to Konoha. According to Sasuke, shortly after Itachi attacked me, he went on to slaughter his entire clan, except for Sasuke, who he left alive to test his strength against. This begs the question, ‘why Sasuke’? The answer comes from the history of the Uchiha clan. Village records report that the Uchiha are an offshoot of the Hyuuga clan by means of genetic mutation. However, there is no mention of any intermediate states between byakugan and sharingan existing. This would indicate that the Uchiha clan suddenly sprung from no where. Using the information that Sasuke received from the Sandaime, we were able to find out that the head family of the Uchiha clan was created when a Hyuuga sold his soul to a demon for more power, power enough to crush his enemies, around 150 years ago. The result was a hanyou child, Uchiha Madara. The demon blood came from the nine tailed demon that preceded the Kyuubi no Kitsune. While the damn fox has been alive for over 1000 years, he only became the Kyuubi, which is more of a title than a name, around eighty years ago, after defeating and killing the demon who gave rise to the Uchiha clan. The problem was that in killing this demon, the fox began an ancient demonic ritual, in which the offspring of the deceased demon would be given the means in which to avenge their ancestors defeat.

This was a ritual that hadn’t been activated in years and only affects direct descendants of Uchiha Madara. If you weren’t aware, Uchiha Mikoto was the last direct descendant and inherited the power to suppress the fox’s power, as did her sons. However, to be able to use these powers, the Uchiha would have to accept their demonic heritage, something which hadn’t happened, until Itachi.

By gaining the mangekyou sharingan he broke all ties with his humanity and awoken his demonic blood, allowing him to suppress the chakra of the Kyuubi, this is probably the reason that he was sent after me, instead of someone else.

Ever since Sasuke received the cursed seal, he has seemingly been warring with himself, a sign that the seal has begun to forcibly awaken his demonic blood. He has already shown some ability to slow the Kyuubi’s chakra when we spar, so it is my wish that he be sent after me if I should go missing.

The second scroll that you hopefully have found is an earlier scroll that I began to write when I tried to comprehend how the senshin works. You may gain more knowledge than I out of it, but then I am not a medic and my knowledge of biology is limited.

Sincerely,

Mitarashi Naruto

Tsunade was quite shocked by this revelation. The Uchiha clans were descendant from demons and had the ability to subdue the chakra of the Kyuubi. That was something she thought only her Grandfather could do! Well, it wasn’t actually the same thing; her grandfather’s ability worked on all of the biju, and didn’t suppress the chakra, but purified it, making it useless to the demon. She signaled for her assistants, Kotetsu and Izumo, to go fetch Naruto and Sasuke so they could explain this new information better.

The two chuunin returned ten minutes later reporting that no one was in the apartment and it didn’t appear that anyone had been inside for a while. The feeling of dread began to creep up the godaime’s back as she remembered Naruto’s note. As she was wondering what to do next, she received a report from the gate guards that a team of ninja that were returning from a mission had just returned with news that Orochimaru and a couple of subordinates had been spotted with some odd barrels and what seemed to be Mitarashi Naruto. The team had wisely decided to hightail it back to Konoha and report on the situation. This report was almost immediately followed by the report of a body that was found on top a roof that appeared to be from a Kaguya. That sealed the deal; so to speak, she called for Jiraiya and Sarutobi so they could plan how to approach this situation.

The former Hokage was angered to hear the news, he didn’t like the idea that his former student would abduct an entire family from his own town and no one would know about it until the next day.

“It’s obvious that we need to rescue them, and we will need to assemble a team quickly, or else they will reach the boarder and we will loose them. I will lead the team, since I am the only one capable of fighting Orochimaru with a level head.” The old man suggested.

“Wait a minute! I can fight him well enough, I will go!” Jiraiya fired back at his sensei.

“I said ‘with a level head’, you’ve just learned that the women you see as your own granddaughter, not to mention Naruto, who you see as a grandson, were abducted, you cannot tell me that your head is clear.”

“Well, we’ll have to send you both, because our options for the team are very young. All of our available chuunin and jounin are either out on missions or just returned. We have a force of genin to track and follow a sannin and for all we know a group of jounin. Crap, I need more sake.” Tsunade grumbled as she looked at the list of available ninja.

“What about the chuunin exam, didn’t anyone get promoted?” Jiraiya asked, surprised at the lack of ninja.

“The closest we got to agreeing on anything was Nara Shikamaru, from what he showed during the invasion; the ANBU praised his mind in luring the enemy into different traps. Asuma reported that he had an IQ of over 200, but that hasn’t been substantiated yet.” Tsunade replied, still searching for some left over sake.

“Fine, we’ll take Shikamaru, Hyuuga Neji, Rock Lee, and Aburame Shino. Jiraiya stated in a hurry to rescue his family.

“No can do, Shino is out on a mission with his father, and Lee is off with Gai on a training mission. You can have anyone else from team seven, eight, or ten, Gai’s other teammate, and Tenten is out with her father selling weaponry to Wave.” Tsunade was ticking off the remaining genin on her hand.

“We’ll take Inuzuka Kiba and Akimichi Chouji, they are the strongest, physically, and we will need their stamina to catch up quickly.” This time it was the Sandaime that spoke up, cutting Jiraiya off.

“Meanwhile, I’ll send word to Suna that we need some help. They’ve been itching to get at Orochimaru for double crossing them, so they should help.” Tsunade replied as another assistant with an armload of papers entered her office. “Haku just woke up, I’ll be going down there to check on her in a while, so assemble your team and you can leave whenever you are ready.” She ordered the two out of her office and gulped down a quick mouthful of tea, before she headed towards the hospital, but not before taking the other scroll Naruto left with her.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Shikamaru was woken by the sound of his troublesome mother calling for him. He slowly drug himself downstairs, only to find the Sandaime waiting in the kitchen, seemingly waiting on him!

“Shikamaru, we’ve got a bit of a situation and you are needed for an emergency rescue mission, you’ll need to get your supplies and follow me, we have to get the rest of the team.” Sarutobi briefed the lazy boy, who was shaken from his morning stupor. Nodding he quickly ran back to his room and gathered everything he needed and returned before Sarutobi could finish the tea that he had been offered.

Their next stop was Chouji’s house, because it was the closest. Jiraiya was off gathering Kiba and Neji, but managed to catch up to Sarutobi and the other two boys just as Chouji was stepping out of his house. The six ninja began to sprint through the town to make up for time and didn’t slow down when they hit the forest just outside of the village. They didn’t dare ask Jiraiya what was going on, the sannin had a look that promised castration for anyone who so much as looked at him the wrong way. After about thirty minutes of sprinting through the foliage, Sarutobi began to explain their mission.

“Sometime last night, Orochimaru infiltrated the village and abducted Naruto, Sasuke and Anko, we don’t know how far ahead of us they are, but as long as Neji can keep using his eyes to scout far ahead, we will know sooner or later. Kiba is making sure we are following the correct train, and Shikamaru and Chouji are going to be our brains and muscles. It is imperative that Orochimaru not reach the boarder and escape, if he does, the village will assuredly be crushed.” Needless to say, the genin were surprised that they were being brought on a mission of such importance. They steeled themselves for the impending conflict, unaware that a three man team from Suna was being briefed about a rescue mission.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Tsunade was meeting with Haku, who had recovered from her injuries remarkably well, but was still hospitalized due to blood loss. She was actually fighting with the nurse, just like Naruto would have, to be let out. She quieted up when Tsunade walked into the room.

“Tsunade-sama, you need to let me go, Sasuke-“ She was cut off by a wave of the legendary medic’s hand.

“You will stay here, we’ve got a team out tracking Sasuke, Naruto and Anko right now, they will bring them back, what you should do is rest, you lost a lot of blood, it a small miracle you didn’t bleed to death. What happened to you?”

Haku shrunk back into the bed she was lying in as she was scolded by the Hokage.

“Last night, around 10:30, I was walking back to the house, when I heard a disturbance and when I checked, Sasuke was being attacked by four sound ninjas. There were three guys and a girl and they all had these strange lines running across their skin, like a tattoo, but they actually grew and shrunk in size. I turned the ground into an ice rink and trapped them in my ice mirrors, but after a few seconds, the markings on their body changed and the marks became a solid color. Then this giant gate crashed through my ice and mirrors and the girl trapped me in a genjutsu. Then they made Sasuke put some seal tag on his chest that paralyzed him. Then they beat on me for a while and I lost consciousness. I don’t know what happened after that. I- I am so-sorry.” The breakdown in her voice at the end of her statement was due more to Sasuke’s final words than to her own injuries.

Tsunade tried to calm Haku down, but was only moderately successful, Haku fell asleep sniffling to herself as Tsunade sat next to her. Quietly leaving the room, Tsunade returned to her office to begin reading over Naruto second scroll. When she made it back, she shakily took her seat, the weight of the day finally beginning to catch up to her. The only thing she had to do was read the scroll.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The rescue team was making good time, considering that four of their members were genin. They had to stop for a rest, but they hadn’t caught up enough for Neji to get them in visual range, which would put them about eighty meters away from their target, but according to Kiba, they were about two or three hours off, a distance they hoped to make up when the sun went down, if they could afford to wait that long, the boarder was quickly approaching. During the break, Shikamaru asked the question on all of the genin’s minds.

“Hokage-sama, why would Orochimaru want Naruto, it doesn’t make sense to me?”

The Sandaime just got a sad look on his face, before releasing a puff of smoke from his pipe. (Which he just had to bring with him, much to Jiraiya’s disapproval.)

“Both Sasuke and Naruto have important bloodline limits that Orochimaru covets; I assume he took Anko to use as a threat against the boys. I cannot tell you more, that is up to Naruto.”

This sated the boy’s inquiries for the time, but Shikamru was not one to leave a mystery, especially when it involved one of his friends. Neji was trying to piece the puzzle together as well. He had more experience against Naruto than any of the other genin. He had seen the sharingan, something that not too many others could claim, as well as the ice, and the sand. Was he some kind of bloodline sponge? A subordinate like that would definitely attract attention.

Shikamaru had come to the same conclusion, but without knowledge of the sharingan, he wasn’t sure why Orochimaru had such a deep interest in Naruto. Surely a copied Sharingan wouldn’t be as powerful as a true one. Before he could get too deep into his thoughts, the group was once again moving, making slow progress on their prey.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Tsunade had to agree with Naruto’s overall hypothesis. She had just finished reading over his theory about the senshin, how it works and what it could be used for. Naruto’s theory was sound, but it posed many problems when thought about in terms of biology.

Somehow, the senshin absorbed and incorporated the DNA of anyone who placed their DNA in contact with Naruto’s own. The problem was that normal DNA production wouldn’t allow for incorporation, DNA was the same in someone at the age of 2 and 92. Somehow foreign DNA was being used to create new cells with in Naruto, a feat that should have been impossible.

Naruto figured that if the Viruses cut out the genetic sequence for the bloodline and was then injected into his own cells, than new copies of his cells would contain the bloodline limit. This was a pretty good conjecture, but was impractical due to the fact that there were trillions of cells in the human body and to fully incorporate a bloodline, the DNA would have to be pasted into every cell in Naruto’s body.

The only way around this would be to specify one cell, or a handful of cells that all new cells would be copied from. This would allow a virus to incorporate the DNA into cell, and have the cell replicate the new DNA. It defied all laws of biology, but was the only thing that made sense. She just had to get a hold of Orochimaru’s notes, or else she would never know.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The rescue team had been running at full speed for most of the day and had finally pulled into visible range of Neji’s byakugan. About 250 feet away from the group was the sound four with the unconscious form of Naruto and two barrels that no one recognized. They were very close to the boarder, but with enough distance to spread the fight out, so that there was no chance of friendly fire.

Shikamaru had come up with a clever plan to scatter their enemies by landing a large cluster of explosive notes in the middle of the group and then having the Konoha ninja drop down in the center. When all of the shinobi were in place, Jiraiya threw the cluster of notes into the exact center of the group, as planned. Shikamaru’s plan went off perfectly and the Oto ninja found themselves staring into the faces of some very determined Konoha ninja, who were dead set on getting their comrades back.

Neji stared down Kidomaru, the boy who resembled a spider, with four arms and had his dark hair pulled into a ponytail, much like Shikamaru. Neji had claimed the boy, because he had noticed during the invasion of Konoha that the spider silk that had been generated to keep the ANBU from following was composed entirely of chakra.

“Things that are made of chakra can be destroyed by chakra.” He had explained to Shikamaru when they had been picking opponents.

Chouji was matched against Jirobo, the fat one of the Sound four, because he was most likely to fight like Chouji, with sheer strength and power as opposed to the speed and finesse of the jyuken.

Kiba eyed Sakon, the pale kid with that seemed to clone himself, since Akamaru could act on his own, it would be best if Kiba fought the boy, if it was a clone, than Akamaru could pick out the correct one, and if it were something else than it would pay to have two on two, instead of one on two.

Shikamaru was forced to fight Tayuya, the red headed girl with the anger management problems, because he hadn’t spoken up in time. He didn’t want to fight women, but then he also didn’t want to die.

Jiraiya was matched against Kabuto, simply for the fact that he would be easiest to pummel into the ground and dissipate some of his rage. Then he could move onto Orochimaru.

Sarutobi had removed Naruto from the grasp of the sound ninja and placed him far enough away to ensure his safety in the upcoming fight. He was paired against Orochimaru because a clear head would be needed to retrieve all the hostages without incident.

No one noticed when the barrels began to smoke until the tops exploded off and the forms of Sasuke and Anko rose from the smoke.

The first figure visible through the thick haze was Anko, although few would recognize her. She stood up from her cramped position to the shock of the Konoha shinobi and the sound four alike. Orochimaru was pleased with the new appearance of his former subordinate and was anxiously waiting to see Sasuke’s new form. The most noticeable difference in Anko’s appearance was her skin, which had gone from soft and fleshy, to a grayish purple color that resembled her hair color and seemed to be made of scales. She had bright yellow cones under her eyes, like Kiba, except that these ran down the length of her face, as well as her arms, in the form of stripes. From the outsides of her forearms, grew two scales which seemed more like a square turned on its corner. These were about a foot from her body at their longest point and were the entire length of her forearm. Judging from the gashes in her coat, they were extremely sharp and probably capable of causing major damage. Her nose had pushed up slightly in the front, as if someone had punched it, and her canines had elongated into fangs, which became visible for the first time as she liked her lips of a bead of sweat, which had accumulated due to the heat. Her eye lids opened, much too quickly for someone who had been entrapped in a claustrophobic container, revealing golden yellow eyes, whose pupils had transformed into slits, just like a snake. Ridges, where her eyebrows once were, shaded her sensitive eyes from the harsh light and she took a shuddering breath, still acclimatizing herself to her new body.

A mighty gust of wind swept through the area, evacuating the dust and smoke that still lingered about, revealing what was once hidden. There stood Sasuke, transformed by the power of his seal and his demonic heritage, into a new form that oozed power and chakra. Two enormous black feathered wings folded back down on themselves, after clearing the air around the body they were attached to. His skin was lined with thick lines that all stemmed from the center of his chest, which had grown so much muscle mass that it had ripped the shirt he had been wearing, to pieces which hung from his shoulders. His hands had grown boney, resembling claws, complete with sharp talons on their tips. Two horns which resembled a bull’s grew from the sides of his forehead, before turning and pointing straight foreword. This made his hair fall over his eyes, obscuring the red of the sharingan behind pitch black locks. The final addition to the new ensemble was the migration of the cursed seal of heaven from his neck to his left bicep. Instead of the three tomoe, the marks now resembled a stylized ‘S’ with another‘s’ imposed behind it.

Upon seeing the transformation of his seal, Orochimaru’s eyes widened in shock, this was not supposed to happen! Somehow, he had broken the connection which had been formed when the former sannin had marked the boy. The Sasuke that stood before him was no longer a pawn of his.

Sasuke felt his internal devil take control of his body, immediately after he had emerged from the blackness of his unconscious mind.

“Finally! I am free, free to avenge the injustices I have suffered!” Devil spoke shakily, testing out Sasuke’s voice for the first time. Looking over at Naruto’s prone body he began to walk towards it, only to be stopped by the transformed Anko. The lids around the Sharingan narrowed.

“You have your own revenge, allow me to have mine!” Devil’s personality had made Sasuke’s voice deeper and more menacing than should be allowed on a twelve year old. When Anko didn’t move Sasuke tried to walk around her, but Anko stood tall, protecting her son, even if she wasn’t doing it consciously.

“What iss the point of fighting an unconciouss opponent?” Her voice had picked up a hiss in this form, making her sound more like her sensei. “Can you not feel it? He will awaken sssoon, wait until then.” Making eye contact with her adopted son, Anko saw the resignation in his eyes as his posture shifted to a neutral stance. Seeing this, she too blurred out of existence, showing off the speed she had gained in this form, and reappeared behind Orochimaru, who had been fast enough to dodge the initial slice from her Spiegel blade like appendages, but still took a deep slice to his cheek.

Sasuke eyed the two closest figures to himself and his true opponent. Chouji was a bit worried about the new form of his comrade, who was leaking chakra enough to surely be felt back in Konoha. Jirobo was looking on in shock; this brat’s power was many times his own. Thankfully the second level of the cursed seal had a built in predetermination to follow orders from Orochimaru, so Sasuke would more or less be brainwashed. What Jirobo didn’t know would cost him.

In a flash of black Sasuke reappeared in front of the fat sound nin, grabbing his face in his clawed hands and actually lifting him off the ground with one hand. Flames spread over the body of the captured ninja so fast that no one had a chance to react before Jirobo had been reduced to a smoldering pile of bones and ignited human oils.

“Tell the fox that I will be waiting for him at the waterfall on the boarder. If he doesn’t show up in ten minutes, I will return and kill everyone I see.” The demonic Sasuke ordered Chouji to relate that message, although the Akimichi was a bit confused as to what he meant by fox, but would risk his life over it. He nodded, but had to hold down a shudder as his eyes connected with the Uchiha. Sasuke turned his back to the entire situation and walked a few paces away from Chouji, before his dark wings spread open to their full seven feet span, before making a mighty sweep downwards, propelling the boy into the sky and towards the valley of the end.

Once that happened, all hell broke loose. Orochimaru and Kabuto attempted to follow after the boy, but were stopped by Anko and Jiraiya. Neji made a pass at his opponent, Kidomaru and was able to connect with a Rokujuu Yonshou. He was about to finish off his opponent, but was shocked to find that Kidomaru had been secreting a substance over his entire skin made of chakra that blocked his attack. He followed as the boy lead him towards the edge of the surrounding forest to continue his assault. The Oto ninja, who had initially written off his opponent, was now a bit worried. He hadn’t suspected that the white eyed brat could pierce his body armor.

‘That brat is too dangerous to let in close; I’ll have to finish him off sniper style.’ He formulated his plan while making sure that the kid was still following him.

Neji was hoping to catch up quickly, he didn’t know how long it took to reform that silk armor, but if he wanted to connect with tenketsu, and not silk, he should act quickly. Making up ground quickly, Neji pulled even with the spider boy and proceeded to attack him once more, his speed flowed into the sixty-four hands easily. He landed hit after hit, but something was off. Kidomaru was trying to catch his hands. He was off, but every time Neji struck, his hands kept coming closer to catching Neji’s. On the fifty-seventh of sixty-four strikes, Kidomaru caught up. Seemingly from no where, an extra pair of hands burst from the boy’s shirt and caught Neji’s arms at the elbows. Taking the opportunity, Kidomaru spat his chakra fabricated web and was able to encase Neji in the sticky substance, though it took almost all of the chakra he could reach to do so.

“Bastard cut me off from my most of my chakra. He’s no threat now though; I can kill him at my leisure.” The tan spider man was about to leave, when he heard the sound of silk being sheared. He spun around and was shocked to see Neji stand up from the remnants of his impromptu sleeping bag.

“If sixty-four hands weren’t enough, how about this?” Neji asked as he attacked his opponent, who was still rooted to the ground, with his newest technique.

“Hakke Hyaku Nijūhachi Shō!” (Eight Trigrams One Hundred Twenty-Eight Palms)

After the first few blows, Kidomaru had basically taken a Rokujuu Yonshou, but still Neji pressed on. He didn’t stop until 128 tenketsu had been closed, on top of the previous fifty-six, leaving him with even less chakra than Lee.

From his prone position on the ground, Kidomaru had no choice but to activate his cursed seal, in an attempt to force some chakra through his coils. It was successful, but all it did was open his tenketsu, it barely added any chakra to his reserves.

‘Damn kid is going to make me go level two? I’ll kill him for this!’ Kidomaru felt the rush of chakra as he ascended into his second stage, his skin became much darker, and his arms grew in muscle mass. He grew horns on his head and some horn like appendages on his elbows. His hair grew out and turned white, to match his white fangs. Neji was shocked at this transformation, never having seen the transition to level two, just the result. This was the only opportunity that Kidomaru needed to summon a large spider and escape into the trees. Neji paid the arachnid no heed; he just hurled an explosive kunai at the summoned creature and made to chase after his prey, but was stopped by three more spiders. If they hadn’t looked exactly like the one he had just squashed he might never have taken a second to think about it, but these miniature spiders were clones of the larger one which now had a large hole in it’s abdomen. Peering at the arachnid through his byakugan, he noticed that from the hole, hundreds, if not thousands of these miniature spiders were pouring out.

They were easy enough to destroy, as they couldn’t really stand up to a jyuken strike, but their never ending numbers forced Neji to use the 128 palms attack multiple times and he lost track of his six armed opponent for a critical second.

Kidomaru had stationed himself on a tree branch about twenty yards away from the Hyuuga boy who had pushed him this far. Secreting more of the chakra thread from his body, he made a bow, made of the same type of thread as his body armor, and proceeded to fabricate an arrow from the same material. He was able to sight his target easily and drew his string back, in preparation for the shot. As Neji’s body was twisting around the smaller arachnids, Kidomaru let loose his bolt with accuracy that would make Tenten jealous. Neji spotted the shot through his byakugan and seamlessly switched from offense to defense. His kaiten blew away the spiders that were trying to latch onto him and deflected the arrow with ease.

Kidomaru cursed the boy’s defense. He prepped another arrow and waited for Neji to slow down. As soon as the kaiten began to die down, he loosed the gold arrow from his bow, aimed directly for Neji’s neck.

Neji just managed to see the lethal dart out of the corner of his enhanced sight, but could do little to prevent it from piercing his body. However, where it pierced, he could change. By purposefully stumbling to his left, the arrow sliced through his right shoulder, tearing muscle and tendon easily. Neji knew he could no longer perform the advance jyuken techniques that labeled him as a genius and saw only one way to end this fight. It would require the use of his left arm, since his right hung at his side, useless. Neji’s sight retracted from the binocular mode that he used so often and turned into his own body. Upon finding the first of his specified targets, he applied the jyuken to his own body, specifically his head. The apparent suicidal move caught Kidomaru off guard and he let the tension on his latest arrow, a spiral tipped head that would pierce anything, kaiten included, slack. Neji then proceeded to disappear in a blur of motion that caught the arachnid off guard. Neji’s path towards his opponent was far from straight, but he appeared for an instant in the vision of Kidomaru, which gave the sound ninja just enough information to guess at the Hyuuga’s next position. Sure enough, Neji appeared directly in front of the startled boy and delivered a palm thrust to Kidomaru’s chest, which liquefied his heart and passed through his body and destroyed the tree he had been resting on. However, as the final strike had been delivered, Kidomaru had unleashed his attack, which passed cleanly through Neji’s stomach, a serious wound that may prove fatal if he couldn’t receive attention soon.

Neji fell to the ground from twenty feet in the air and landed on his front, cracking some of his ribs.

“Ugh, I never thought that f-forcing open a gate would be so hard on my b-body.” He breathed out before the pain of his injuries forced him into blackness.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Not long after Neji had left the group, Naruto had awoken, as promised by his mother. His eyes flickered open and began searching his surroundings. He didn’t recognize the area as being foreign, so he must still be in Fire country, but he was no where near Konoha. He stretched his arms out, to shake off the slight bit of rust he felt from not using them in a while and proceeded to stand up. His attention was snapped when he noticed the transformation his mother had gone through. The snake had lied to him! Naruto began to move towards Orochimaru, in an attempt to help his mother and punish the snake, but was stopped by the voice of Chouji.

“Naruto, um Sasuke-“

Upon hearing his brother’s name, Naruto spun and looked at the young Akimichi.

“What about Sasuke?” He ordered.

“Sasuke, well he transformed into some kind of dark angel thing, and he tried to attack you, but your Mom got him to wait until you woke up, and then he said he’d be waiting for ‘the fox’ at the waterfall at the valley of the end, and if you didn’t appear in about eight minutes from now, he’d return and kill everyone.” Chouji spoke very fast, he wanted to go help Kiba who had disappeared with the pale boy, Sakon a minute ago.

Naruto nodded and sped away from the battle field towards his brother, not sure of what to expect.

Upon noticing his perfect vessel escaping, Orochimaru once more tried to make an attempt to follow the boy, but was stopped by Anko, who took the head off the lump of mud he had to use to escape. Without his arm, Orochimaru was useless against his former subordinate, who thanks to his seal, was fighting on sannin level easily, and his old sensei. Having no other choice, he tried to escape by disappearing into the ground, but was stopped by Anko, who had pushed her own arms into the ground and drug him back out.

“The only esscape you’ll have today isss death!” She hissed before once again attacking her former sensei, only for him to turn into mud and try to counter attack with the Kusangi, which wasn’t very effective against Anko’s new scales. Her skin was more like carbon steel than flesh, and made her very difficult to injure. He needed a distraction to escape, and he needed one fast. When he saw the only member of his elite guard that was still in the area, Tayuya, he had found his distraction.

He raced over to her, a move which forced the Konoha shinobi to protect Shikamaru, and bit his hand, drawing blood, as if he were going to summon something. But instead of Manda or another of his snake summons, his blood covered the cursed seal and he had his distraction. By undoing the seal, Orochimaru had turned his subordinate into a bomb that would be equivalent to releasing all eight of the celestial gates at once. The resulting release of chakra created a crater that was quite deep and what must have been at least fifteen feet wide. This provided enough of a distraction for the snake traitor to escape into the ground, as well as knocking Shikamaru into a tree, bruising a number of ribs, as well as scattering the Sandaime some thirty feet towards Neji. Not being able to massacre her target had snapped Anko’s mind somehow and a need for blood took over. The problem was that her eyes landed on Jiraiya as the target of this bloodlust.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Chouji had indeed managed to find Kiba and Sakon…as well as his twin brother Ukon, who happened to live inside his brother’s body. Even though Kiba and Akamaru had used the Jūjin Bunshin, (Beast Human clone) turning Akamaru into a second Kiba, they were having a difficult time dealing with the twins, who had grown opposing horns, as well as armor over different sides of their bodies. Kiba had succeeded in separating the two from each other, but was having trouble landing a decisive hit on them. Chouji quickly moved to help his fellow genin, and used Bubun Baika no Jutsu (partial multi size technique) to enlarge his palms and managed to slam Ukon into the ground. Unfortunately, the strange boy got up from the crater; more annoyed than damaged and turned his attention to Chouji. Moving so fast that he only appeared as a blur, Ukon landed a series of punches to the young Akimichi’s stomach, an attack that Chouji was able to neutralize by transforming his entire body with the baika no jutsu. (Multi size technique) Moving into his next attack smoothly, Chouji curled into a ball and steam rolled at his opponent. Ukon was forced to jump out of the way and had turned around to gloat, only to see the giant bowling ball come back at him. Having no time to leap away, he was forced to dive to the side in an attempt not to be crushed completely.

Showing a bit of maneuvering that didn’t look like it belonged on the big boned, Chouji immediately spun around and succeeded in rolling over Ukon, stopping to add pressure for good measure. However, Ukon was more resilient than he looked, and used a technique similar to the inner decapitation to escape. He had taken damage, nothing life threatening, but annoying none the less. He had to recuperate inside his brother’s body, probably for no more than ten minutes, but it was too long for his tastes.

Kiba wasn’t faring any better than Ukon, and was in a large bind. He just couldn’t land a hit on the slippery Sakon; even with the Gatsūga (Double piercing fang) he hadn’t been able to do any damage.

“Akamaru, I know we haven’t perfected that technique yet, but I think it’s our only hope right now.” Kiba asked for the input of his canine companion. The transformed dog just yipped in approval, and the two performed a quick series of hand seals before being enveloped in a large cloud.

“Like I’m going to give you the chance to perform any moves!” Sakon sneered and charged blindly into the cloud, only to receive the full brunt of a massive paw swipe. He caught himself against the tree before he could be damaged even more and eyed his opponent now. Where there were once two pathetic genin, there was now a two headed wolf that had to be two stories tall. Its slobber was running from one of its maws onto the ground, making the ground slicker than ice.

“Here we go! Garōga!” (Double wolf fang) This time, the spin of claws and teeth was so large that even in his cursed state, Sakon had immense trouble avoiding becoming a chew toy. He was surprised when he felt cuts on his armored skin begin to open after avoiding a close strike.

‘The vortex from that attack is actually able to cut through my armor! I couldn’t survive a direct hit if I wanted to!’ He realized. He was forced to dodge another tornado of dog, sustaining more injuries, negligible though they were. This time, his movement didn’t go so smoothly and the branch he had landed on broke off, sending him crashing onto the slobber drenched ground, making it impossible for him to regain his footing in time to dodge Kiba’s next pass.

“Kuchiyose: Rashōmon!” (Summoning: Rashomon) The voice of Ukon summoning the strongest defense available was relief to Sakon, even though the gate wouldn’t be as strong as if it were summoned by both of them.

The monstrous tornado struck the demonic gate and pushed against it, testing to see which would stop first. The gate cracked right down the middle and Kiba continued towards Sakon, only to hit nothing. The boy had been able to regain his footing and scamper away to his twin brother. The two joined back together, still in their cursed forms, but weary and sore. Summoning the Rashomon gate had taken nearly all of Ukon’s chakra and Sakon was banged up from his encounter with the Garouga. Neither one was physically injured greatly, but they were pushed into a corner, with no way out except escape. However, escape was not to be.

“Kamaitachi.” (Cutting whirlwinds) Temari’s attack impacted the conjoined twins, cutting into them, but not killing them. Gaara would take care of that.

“Sabaku Kyū… Sabaku Sōsō.” (Desert Coffin…Desert funeral)

The two never really knew what hit them as the sand crushed the life from their bodies. Kiba and Akamaru had separated into their original forms due to lack of chakra and Chouji had followed Ukon towards the battlefield arrived just as Gaara was finishing the twins off. Both were glad to see reinforcements, especially Gaara and his brothers. Temari hadn’t changed, except for her clothing, which had gone from lavender colored battle kimono, to a black one with red trimmings. Gaara had changed the most of the two. During his stay in Konoha after his fight with Naruto, the Sandaime and Jiraiya had managed to add more layers to his seal, changing it from a two point seal to a much more stable double-reinforced three point seal. The rings around his eyes weren’t as visible, what had once been an inch thick ring of black was now more of an outline, nearly indistinguishable from eye liner. He had gone from the loose fitting clothing he had worn to much sturdier clothing; including full black pants a brown shirt which had the thin outline of white running across his chest diagonally, and a small piece of leather across his stomach. He had changed in innumerable ways since his fight with the boy he considered his first true friend.

“Where is Naruto?” He asked in the same voice he had always had.

“He’s fighting Sasuke, Orochimaru abducted both of them, plus their mother, and something happened to Sasuke, he looks like some kind of evil angel now. He threatened to kill everyone if Naruto didn’t fight him at the valley of the end.” Chouji supplied as he handed Kiba a soldier pill, to replenish his strength. “By the way, where is your brother?”

“He’s off looking for the main group, with those puppets of his, he’d be better off helping to move the injured, since it looks like we got here a bit late.” Temari answered, seeing as Gaara had already headed towards the direction that two fighting chakra signatures could be felt.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Jiraiya was not having an easy time fighting Anko. First of all, she was family, and not even the most perverted author of the most perverted book series, would fight family. Secondly, she was really, really strong in this cursed state. He had forgotten completely about Kabuto after Anko had attacked him; the small fry wasn’t going to be much of a threat during this fight. Anko moved fluidly and swiftly, her speed had surpassed the speed that ninja were able to move at by many times, and initially, had Jiraiya remembering his old student, the fourth. She might not be as fast as the Hiraishin, but damn if she wasn’t in second place. If he hadn’t helped the fourth create the Hiraishin, he would be in a world of hurt, but as it was, he was able to keep up by using his chakra to boost his speed, not unlike unlocking the first gate, but without the negative side effects.

As demonstrated previously, the scale blades on Anko’s forearms were just as sharp as a kunai, and she wielded them much more naturally. The force behind her blows was greater than Jiraiya had seen in any kunoichi besides Tsunade, and he got the scary feeling that she hadn’t shown nearly all of her trump cards. She had proven capable of taking one of his punches, not a mean feat at all, and not feeling a thing, as well as countering almost every earth technique he used. He was reluctant to use fire techniques for obvious reasons, but was running out of ideas that would end this confrontation without hurting his granddaughter.

A gut opened over his eye for his mental wonderings, courtesy of Anko’s new blades, and he was instantly pulled back into the fight. He had exhausted all of his jounin level techniques and only had Kage level moves left in his arsenal. The problem with this was that they would almost assuredly kill the women, something he would not do, even if it did cost him his life. Molding the correct amount of chakra, he threw his hands to the ground and performed one of his largest scale attacks.

“Doton: Yomi Numa.” (Earth type: Swamp of the Underworld) Purposefully, the sannin limited the depth of his swamp, making it just deep enough to entrap Anko up to her waist. However, this didn’t keep the serpent mistress for long. She took to the mud and water very easily and rose to the top, despite the weight of her wet clothing and the mud on her skin, she moved just as effortlessly as before, but before she could make the edge of the swamp, Jiraiya took advantage of the flammable gas that had been bubbling from the depths of the muck. Using a simple fire technique, he entrapped the charging women in a ring of fire that held her long enough for Jiraiya to complete his next technique. It was a variation on the Doton Kekkai: Dorōdōmu (Earth Release Barrier: Dungeon Chamber of Nothingness), in that it created a dome of earth that would leach the chakra of anyone or anything trapped inside, but it was much faster acting at the cost of the ability to regenerate. It could drain a genin in a matter of five seconds, and a normal jounin in less than forty five seconds. To make sure he could keep the dome up long enough to drain Anko’s chakra down to a safe level, he intensified the fire before erecting the dome. To keep Anko’s tainted chakra from his own; Jiraiya moved the leached life force to a nearby tree, which grew before his eyes. He kept the barrier up for two minutes, longer than anyone had ever been subjected to the draining power for. He noticed the tree had stopped growing, and took that as a sign that Anko was nearly out of chakra. When the mud fell into the swamp, he was relieved to find a severely weakened Anko back to her normal self, panting on the surface of the swamp.

Cautiously he approached the worn figure. Finding nothing wrong, he moved her off the swamp, so she could conserve her energy. After a few seconds, Anko looked at the old ninja with an appreciative look.

“Thank you, for stopping me, I guess the new seal level was too much for me to handle so soon. Please, leave me here and go check on my sons, Naruto doesn’t have the second level to his seal, Sasuke will be too strong for him to defeat, you must stop them.” She pleaded. Jiraiya was about to protest, when Sarutobi showed up with Kankuro who was supporting an unconscious, but no longer bleeding Neji with one of his puppets.

“Go, Jiraiya, you are stronger than I, and you can feel the difference in their chakra levels. You must go stop this before Sasuke can kill his brother.” Sarutobi ordered his former student. Not wasting a moment, Jiraiya sped off towards the Valley of the End.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto had made good time on his way to the valley, he still had three minutes, and he could just begin to make out the form of his brother, sitting, cross legged, by the river at the end of the waterfall. Stepping onto the bank, opposite Sasuke, he looked on as the tattooed form opened its eyes and looked at Naruto.

“So you came. I was expecting to have to go back and drag you here.” The demonic boy chided.

“Cut the crap!” Naruto yelled. “I know you want revenge against the Kyuubi, so why do you target me, I am not the fox!”

“Because you harbor the murderer, your life sustains it, and if I kill you, I will do what not even the Fourth could do!” Devil bragged before standing up and adopting a fighting stance. Naruto looked dejected but took his own stance none the less.

The devil inside Sasuke struck first, disappearing in a blur of darkness and landing a crushing straight punch to Naruto’s sternum, driving the wind from the boy. Shakily Naruto rose to his feet and attempted to pinpoint his brother. Even with his sharingan activated, it was nearly impossible to read the movements of the demon he was battling, and Naruto suffered three more punches and a snap kick to the side of his ribs for his efforts.

“Get up, I realize that I am holding back the fox’s chakra to make my job easier, but you are not trying at all.” Devil was openly mocking him now, but Naruto didn’t know what to do. Stepping onto the surface of the water, Naruto drew some up to his face to wash some of the dirt off, without realizing that he had done it instinctually. He looked back at the visage of his brother, and decided he couldn’t sit back. He focused on the water beneath his sandals, he felt the way it rocked back and forth, as well as the way it pushed him away from the fall. Once more the water rose to do his bidding without his immediate recognition. When the gravity of his actions finally sunk in, Naruto was shocked, never before had he shown this much affinity with water.

‘This must be part of the ‘complete’ senshin.’ He thought before once again returning to the fight.

This time when Devil charged him, Naruto drew the water around him and used it to intercept the demon. Sasuke’s primary chakra nature was fire, just like every other Uchiha, thanks to their demonic heritage, so water was more effective than any other type of attack.

Thinking back to Kakashi’s fight with Zabuza, Naruto remembered a technique he had wanted to try out, but hadn’t had the time to learn. Using his new found command over the liquid of life, Naruto formed the water in front of him into a raging wall of water and crashed it towards Devil.

“Suiton: Daibakufu no Jutsu.” (Water release: Great Waterfall technique) He whispered, awed by the fact that he had perfectly performed a jounin level technique without hand seals on his first try. The water washed over his opponent, who simply used his black wings to block the brunt of the attack and was only pushed backwards a little.

Naruto decided to experiment with the other half of his ice bloodline, the wind nature component. Inhaling a large breath of air, he infused chakra, and spat a ball of air at his brother, once more without hand seals.

This time, Devil was ready, and since fire is will beat wind, like rock crushes scissors, he simply created a flame in his hand and batted the attack away, creating a sizeable explosion. Naruto returned with another wave of water, but this time he followed it up and charged the winged figure.

Devil leapt into the air and spread his wings to shake off the accumulate water. He then dove at Naruto, pushing the boy under the surface of the water with force enough to create a large void on the surface. While underneath the water, Naruto had the upper hand and managed to grab the legs of his adversary, keeping both figures underneath for a longer time. Devil managed to kick his way free after a few seconds, but was gasping for air by the time his head resurfaced. Naruto surfaced not long afterwards, looking the better for the moment. While the battle was waged on the water, he was in control. Sasuke realized this and used his superior speed to reappear at Naruto’s side before he landed a devastating roundhouse kick, sending Naruto crashing into the sides of the valley. He followed that up by grabbing Naruto’s face and driving him farther into the rock wall until the small gouge that Naruto’s body created collapsed, burying the boy.

Stepping back, Devil admired his handiwork, before spreading his wings and taking to the sky once more, just in time to see Naruto’s hand appear from under the ground. The two boys eyed each other down again, with Devil blocking Naruto’s path to the water, and thus his only advantage. Thinking of his satetsu, Naruto tried to create a javelin or something long to throw at the flying figure, but was surprised when a bolt of lightning instead struck the ground from his hand instead. Seeing that his power over water and wind was good with lightning also, Naruto began to summon lightning bolts from his hands and shot them at the flying figure. As fast as he was, not even Devil was fast enough to escape the bolts, and fell to the ground, dazed. Moving quickly, Naruto disappeared into the ground, once more without the aid of hand seals, and pulled the shocked boy into the ground.

Thinking the fight over, Naruto took deep breaths, before being smashed into the ground from behind. Devil stood over the boy, hair sticking up and a furious look on his face, but not critically damaged. He had replaced his body as it hit the ground at the last second. Foolish boy, did you think that a few tricks like those would defeat me?

Naruto was tired; he hadn’t started the fight at a hundred percent, and had taken a lot of damage, though no broken bones.

‘Must be that white guys limit.’ He thought as he watched Devil inhale deeply. Reaching deep into his reserves, Naruto threw his hands to the ground and managed to pull up a large slab of earth to intercept the concentrated blast of intense fire that had been sent his way. Devil, upon seeing his attack slam against the barrier, began to gather chakra into his hand to form a chidori, easily capable of piercing whatever earth technique Naruto had used.

Rushing foreword, his thrust easily penetrated the wall, forcing a weary Naruto to move out of the way quickly, or risk being impaled on his brother’s arm.

“It will be such a thrill to end the life of the beast that has wronged me.” Devil chided, seeing the fatigue begin to set in on Naruto.

“Sasuke-kun, you cannot kill the boy! Orochimaru-sama needs him!” Kabuto’s voice broke through the haze of the battlefield; he had snuck up to about thirty feet away, earning the grey haired boy a glare from the Uchiha.

“You have no right to order me about. You need to learn your place!” Devil sneered, before disappearing and reappearing before Kabuto’s eyes. He shoved his fist through the older teen’s chest, ripping his heart from his body, before crushing it and returning his attention to the fox container. Taking a step towards Naruto, Devil was amazed when he was stopped by a hand on his leg.

From the ground, Kabuto rose to his knees, the hole in his chest closing at miraculous speeds, and a new heart forming where the old one was. This shocked Devil so much that he allowed Kabuto to fully rise, before trying to attack again.

Devil was easily at jounin level, but Kabuto was fighting at a higher level yet. Not yet a sannin by Devil’s calculations, but stronger than ninety five percent of the jounin he knew.

“Naruto-kun is important to Orochimaru-sama; I cannot allow you to kill him.” Kabuto repeated, taking deep breaths from the strain of the forced regeneration.

“Tell me, how is it that I crush your heart, and yet you live?” Devil asked, perplexed, noticing for the first time that Kabuto’s eyes were now red, as opposed to white.

“It is because I am closely related to Naruto-kun.” He cryptically replied. “I am an experiment, done by Orochimaru-sama that focused on DNA infusion into a complex organism. By creating a number of cells that would produce ‘master copies’ of a beings genetic material, Orochimaru-sama was able to add DNA to an organism with trillions of cells. In a way, I am a predecessor of Naruto-kun’s limit, but where his is specified to copy bloodline limits, mine was limited to that of a Starfish. This makes it very easy for me to regenerate cells, limbs or even organs, as long as my core isn’t damaged or destroyed, and I can move that around as easily as I move my feet. You would have to destroy every cell in my body to completely wipe me out, something that even the great snake sannin would have problems doing.”

Deciding to test the boy’s claim, Devil ripped off Kabuto’s ear, only for a new one to grow back.

“It seems that you weren’t lying when you said you could regenerate your cells easily enough, but I wonder…”

This time, Devil’s fist was engulfed with flames as it ripped through Kabuto’s head as if it were paper.

“Fool, never give away your weakness to anyone, you assumed me an ally and you paid with your life.” Devil spat at the body and turned around to finish Naruto off, only to see Kabuto’s headless body rise in a reflection from the stream.

Considering how complex a head and brain are, Kabuto’s head re-grew very fast.

“I told you, every cell in my body must be destroyed to kill me.” He said, riling Devil up even more. Punch after punch, kick upon kick, all manner of hacks and stabs and even a chidori penetrated Kabuto’s body, but no matter what Devil did, he just couldn’t kill the teenager. By now the pair had moved next to where Naruto was kneeling on the ground, still winded from his earlier battle. Just as Kabuto was re-growing his third arm in as many minutes, Naruto struck.

“Hakkeshou: Rokujuu Yonshou!” (Eight trigrams: Sixty-four palms) He had copied the movements from Neji during their fight at the Chuunin exams, so the movements came easily enough, but actually spiking his chakra at the same time was much more difficult than he had thought.

“Nice try Naruto-kun, but without the byakugan, the chances that you closed off any of my tenketsu are remote.” Kabuto drawled.

“I know that, that wasn’t the point. You don’t have to see tenketsu to do damage.” Naruto fired back, waiting for his attack to take effect.

“Haven’t you been listening, every single cell in my bod- body, would h-ha-have t-t-t-to be de-destr-destroyed.” Kabuto’s teeth were chattering as he finished his sentence.

“I may not know a lot about biology, but I do know that ice crystals puncture cell membranes really easily. That wasn’t any attack I hit you with, I pushed ice nature chakra into your entire body; every cell in your body is being ripped open by ice crystals.” Naruto informed Kabuto of his fate, just as ice began to erupt from his skin. Kabuto began to list forward and was dead before he hit the ground.

Turning back to Devil, Naruto noticed that both of the original combatants were nearing the limits of their bodies, Naruto from his transition and Sasuke from his transformation. They charged each other one final time; neither had enough chakra to form any meaningful attacks, for Devil that would have been a chidori, and for Naruto, anything he could have done would have cost him his consciousness. Both landed solid punches, Naruto a right hook, and Devil, a straight jab to Naruto’s face. Both landed on the ground on their faces, neither one moving. That was how Jiraiya found them when he arrived a minute later. Checking the two Konoha ninja, he was relieved to find them simply unconscious, and Sasuke returned to his normal state. Taking a second to check on the body of Kabuto, he verified that the boy was indeed dead, and the only regret Jiraiya would have, was that he didn’t get a chance to punch the traitor in the face.

“Are you going to stand there, or are you going to lend me a hand?” He asked to the red head standing at the edge of the valley. Gaara looked at the two boys who he was supposed to rescue, and was disappointed in his opportunity to rescue Naruto, like the energetic boy had done for him. Floating down into the valley on a cloud of sand, he created stretchers for Naruto and Sasuke and left Jiraiya to take care of the corpse.

Jiraiya once more summoned the swamp of the underworld and watched as Kabuto’s frozen corpse was sunk into the muck, never to be found or recovered. He left the area and headed to catch up with the other Konoha shinobi.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Days later, Naruto and Sasuke woke up in the Konoha hospital, with Anko sitting between them, holding onto Naruto as if he would disappear if she took her eye off him. After the customary questions about what happened, both were glad to hear that no one was killed and that Neji would make a full recovery from his injuries, thanks to the quick work of the Sandaime.

Sasuke was appalled to learn of his demonic side taking control and nearly killing Naruto on multiple occasions. This sent him into a deep funk that he just wouldn’t come out of, even after he was released the following day.

Naruto had explained about his new found ability and wanted to know what had happened.

“If you ask me,” Jiraiya spoke his two cents. “Orochimaru was always too smart to create an incomplete limit like the senshin. It was obvious that there was a limit to the number of bloodlines it could absorb, and he knew that. I guess what he planned was that when the carrier absorbed five limits with a different main chakra nature, than they would become some kind of master over those natures. You mentioned you could easily control water and wind, which are the elements of the Hyoton techniques, the satetsu is made by combining lightning and earth, the sharingan imparts fire nature to your blood, your original nature was wind, was it not, and then the Kaguya clan was earth and water nature. I’d say that you will, with a bit of work, be able to completely control every single element, something that would allow you to learn any new blood limit techniques that would express themselves in the future, as well as possibly create new abilities. That was Orochimaru’s true goal, to create a vessel that could harness the power over every chakra nature, and thus be able to learn any technique.”

This idea was met with general acceptance by Naruto and Tsunade, which was good enough for the Sandaime and Kakashi, who had arrived to visit his pupils as soon as he returned from his mission. Everyone but Anko made to leave, and on the way out, Jiraiya pulled Tsunade off to the side and began talking in hushed whispers.

The day Sasuke and Naruto would be let out was sunny, which was exactly the opposite of how Sasuke was feeling. He had taken the opportunity to walk around the village instead of eat lunch with his family.

“Once more, I almost kill my family! Am I cursed? Will I ever be rid of this…this…plague?” He asked himself out loud.

“What plague?” Haku’s voice snapped him out of his self-pitying thoughts quickly and he wheeled around, coming face to thigh with the girl. Taking a seat next to the dark haired boy, Haku wondered what was on his mind that would be creating such a funk.

“It’s none of your concern!” He snapped, not realizing how sharp his voice was until the words were out of his mouth. “Sorry! I didn’t mean to snap like that, it’s just that after we were abducted by that bastard, Naruto and I fought, and I wanted to kill him! I nearly became the one thing I swore I never would, and that is my brother!” For the first time since his family was massacred, Uchiha Sasuke broke down and cried. Haku didn’t know what to do except comfort the boy until he was done.

After a few minutes, Sasuke’s tears began to abate, and his breathing shallowed out to normal.

“Feel better?” The kunoichi asked.

“I don’t know. I’m not cured, but I think maybe I can cope now.” He replied, realizing just how close he was to the girl.

“I’d say that’s about as good as could be expected right now.” She replied, giving him that smile that he loved.

He stood up and offered her his hand. After pulling her up, he decided to take a risk.

“Would you like to go get some lunch with me?” He asked, with his heart in his throat.

“I’d love to!” She replied smiling that wonderful smile.

That night, every member of the Mitarashi household slept soundly for the first time in nearly a month. They didn’t know why, but that would become clearer tomorrow.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Anko was awoken the next morning by a knocking on the door. She stumbled from bed and answered the door, mumbling about idiot chuunin who didn’t know how to let people get their sleep.

After receiving the message from the rather frightened ninja, Anko woke her sons up with the news that they were to meet the Hokage in thirty minutes.

Half an hour later, found the trio stepping into the Godaime’s office, not knowing what to expect. As expected, Tsunade was buried behind mountains of paperwork, without Naruto there to help organize; Shizune had been having a difficult time getting the Hokage to finish her work.

“Ah, good you’re here.” The blonde Hokage barely looked up from her paperwork. “I don’t know how he did it, but Jiraiya has convinced the council and Sarutobi-sensei that the three of you need to leave the village to train yourselves so that we don’t repeat the past week. You three will be leaving with Jiraiya for two and a half to three years for your own protection. We can’t have Akatsuki getting Naruto, and we can’t have Orochimaru getting any of you. There is a great possibility that both groups would use one of you to get to the others. From what the pervert has told me, he’s got training planned for each of you, and by the end of it, we won’t recognize you.”

Anko was about to object, saying she didn’t need the training, but the Hokage cut her off.

“I know you’re a perfectly capable fighter, Anko, and frankly Konoha needs you to do missions, but there is no doubt that all three of you are targets, and I will not be satisfied until you can defend yourselves from Orochimaru and Akatsuki.

Bowing their heads, the three ninja accepted their assignment and returned to their home to gather and pack their supplies. Sasuke finished earlier than his family and excused himself to go say goodbye to some people. The only people he really had the intention of visiting were Haku and Neji. He decided to visit his rival first, not wanting to break the news to his new girlfriend.

He was able to find Neji’s hospital room easily enough; Neji would require a good deal of physical therapy to return muscle memory in his shoulder and to make sure that his stomach wound was fully healed. Sasuke stepped into the room not expecting to find Hinata and her younger sister Hanabi there. Realizing that whatever brought Sasuke to this room was personal, Hinata lead Hanabi from the room before turning to Neji and informing him that they would be back in fifteen minutes.

For a while, the two rivals just started at each other, and then Sasuke broke the silence.

“I wanted to thank you for coming after us, not for me, but for Naruto and Kaa-san.”

“Hn, it was no problem, the only downside was that I didn’t get to fight you.” Neji kidded, relieving the pressure Sasuke had been feeling since he entered the room.

The conversation was light from then on out, until Sasuke brought up the training mission. For a minute Neji was silent and simply stared at Sasuke, trying to read his mind. Finally he released a breath of air and resigned himself to this fate.

“Well, I suppose that I’ll just have to keep up with you…might be a challenge since you’ll have a sannin as a sensei. Of course, I’m so far ahead of you right now, that you could train for ten years and I’d still win.”

Sasuke laughed at the barb. He’d show Neji, two and a half years would be plenty of time to kick his pale butt.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

As Sasuke knocked on the door to the house where Haku lived with Kurenai, his palms began to sweat at the thought that she might dump him because of this arraignment. She answered the door and was pleased to see him; she hadn’t expected him, assuming he had a mission since he had met with the Hokage. For some reason, the news of that meeting had become village news, and there were all kinds of speculations as to the nature of the get together. They left the house, and walked along the road talking about just ordinary things, until they reached the topic of the meeting. Haku had inquired as to its nature and Sasuke knew it was time to come clean.

“Hokage-sama is sending the tree of us, Naruto, Kaa-chan and I on a long term training assignment with Jiraiya. We’re to be out of the village for up to three years.”

“Oh.”

“Um, I’ll understand if you want to break up with me, -“

“What gave you that impression?” She asked, a bit of fire in her voice.

“I, um, just thought that, maybe you wouldn’t want to do a long distance relationship?” He answered meekly.

“Uchiha Sasuke, the thought never crossed my mind. I was worried about how I would handle not seeing you for three years!” She replied sternly, but in a way that made him sure she was joking. “Seriously though, if you want to stay together, I’m fine with that, just promise me you’ll write at least, three years with no visits and not letters? I think I’d take a page from your mom and cut off some limbs.”

“Of course I’ll write, I wouldn’t dream of leaving you in the dark like that!” He responded with a gulp, afraid that Anko had somehow rubbed off on the brunette.

They spent the rest of their time together walking around the village and talking, with the odd break for food or drink thrown in.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Sasuke returned just in time to catch Jiraiya meeting up with his family at their home. Grabbing his backpack, he stood by as Naruto tried to cram more instant ramen into his pack. Finally giving up, the quartet walked towards the gate. Taking one last look at the village, they walked off into the sunset. They never noticed the pair of eyes watching their departure.

“Good luck…Naruto-kun.”

It was not a particularly nice day in Konoha. The sun had been hidden behind clouds for the past half a day and the rain had yet to show signs of slowing down. There was a real chance of flooding if the rain didn’t slow down. Tsunade stared out the window at the pouring rain and occasional bolt of lightning. Two and a half years had passed to the day since Naruto and his family had left, and the Hokage could say without hesitation, that things were just a bit too quiet. She hadn’t heard from Jiraiya, Anko, Sasuke or Naruto in almost a year, around ten months to be exact, and she was beginning to regret letting them leave. The last she had heard, Sasuke had thrown himself into training to control his demonic blood, Naruto had taken to sealing like a duck to water, and Anko had been improving so rapidly Jiraiya was talking about making her the official snake sannin.

From the sound of things, all three of them were due for a promotion, but they would have to come back to receive it. She turned back to her paperwork. Ever since Sarutobi had cut her loose, so to speak, the paperwork had been a constant pain in the neck. Cursing her former sensei, who was undoubtedly drinking tea right now, Tsunade signed another form and placed it in another pile.

Taking another stapled packet of forms, she started to read through them, noting anything that she didn’t like or didn’t agree with.

“Jiraiya, if you going to come in do it or get the hell off the ledge.” She ordered upon sensing her teammate.

“Jeez, is that how you greet an old friend after two and a half years?” He joked as he stepped in and took of a soaked black cloak.

“That depends, if by friend you mean someone who absconds with the people I consider family and don’t write back for almost a year, than yeah, that’s how I’ll greet ‘ya.”

Jiraiya smiled, still the same old Tsunade. Not even her clothing had changed in the two years since he had seen her last. “Well, we’re back for good now, figured there wasn’t a better time to come back, see if I couldn’t get the boys in the next chuunin exam. The one in Suna is in a week right?”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

While Jiraiya was schmoozing with Tsunade, Anko and her kin had made it to their home, wet, but happy to be back. Sitting their packs down on their beds, both boys realized that…they would need longer beds. They added it to their list of things to do and buy before tonight. In celebration of their return, they had decided to go out for lunch, and beds would come later.

They made their way towards their restaurant of choice with complete anonymity thanks to the changes that occur when people don’t see you for nearly three years. They had a nice dinner and lazily made their way through the rest of their list. The sun was nearly set when they began their trek home; they would be forced to sleep on the floor for one night, since their beds wouldn’t arrive until the next day, after unpacking the groceries and their other supplies, the three split up to go reacquaint themselves with the village.

Sasuke immediately went to meet up with Haku. He had kept in touch with the kunoichi, and their fledgling romance had managed to grow while the two were separated, something that both Anko and Naruto were trying to figure out how they managed to do.

Sasuke knocked on the door to his girlfriend’s house, which was answered almost immediately by Kurenai. The older women eyed Sasuke, sizing him up for her ‘daughter’.

“I assume you’re here for Haku?” She asked after dressing the boy down.

“Yes mam.” Sasuke replied, hoping to make a good impression on the genjutsu mistress.

Nodding her head as an indication to enter the house, Kurenai yelled for Haku. Said teenager walked around the corner and nearly fainted in shock.

There was Sasuke, the only boyfriend she had ever had, except that he didn’t look like the Sasuke of old. He had grown at least six inches, perhaps more! His hair style had changed in a small way, it still came to a point that stuck up in the back, but in the front, his bangs, which used to fall to either side of his face, almost like Hinata’s old hair style, now fell all over his forehead, partially obscuring his protector.

His hair wasn’t the only thing that changed; he had branched off from his family and ditched the trench coat, opting for black and white pants that had the golden outline of a flame running up the legs. At his waist, a black karate belt held the lose pants on his hips. He wore a white hooded sweat shirt, to help insulate him against the approaching fall weather, it was rather nondescript, other than the Uchiha fan which was shrunk to the size of a butterfly and placed on the back, hidden beneath the hood when not in use. All in all, she thought he looked hot, and felt her cheeks heating up at that thought.

Haku wasn’t the only one who was shocked at the changes that two years could make. Sasuke had to exert a lot of self control not to gape at the girl. Her hair was shorter than he remember, where it once fell to around her lower back, if not held in a bun, it now fell to just below her shoulder blades and was pulled into a small pony tail. She was wearing a white skirt that fell to around her knees, and a black long sleeve t-shirt. Around her neck was a thin silver chain that Sasuke recognized immediately. For a birthday gift, he had sent her the necklace, a silver braided chain that had a large oval shaped turquoise on it, attached to a leather back. The blue stone had reminded him of the water that she could control with ease and grace.

“Wow, you look good.” They spoke at the same time, blushing at the words spoken as well as the timing.

“Would you like to go for a walk?” Sasuke inquired.

“Sure!” Haku answered brightly and the couple quickly left the house and slowly made their way towards the center of town while catching up on the happenings of the past few years.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto had gone to Ichiraku, despite just having eaten dinner; he needed to support his favorite ramen stand in the world!

In between his fifth and six bowls of the delicious noodles, another figure joined him at the stand, although he sat a few seats away. Looking over at the new comer, Naruto was happy to see the friendly face and round body of Chouji. He tried to hail the boy but when your mouth is full of noodles, it is rather hard.

“Naruto?” Chouji was shocked by the changed his friend had gone through.

Naruto’s hair had grown shaggy and long since he had last been seen in Konoha, it resembled the Yondaime almost exactly, except for the streaks of black that ran through it. He had grown as well, though not quite as tall as Sasuke he was five foot six, but wasn’t as muscular. That was the main difference between the two; Naruto had focused on speed while Sasuke had focused his training on strength and power. Naruto’s new wardrobe had been based around this, and he had scaled back the full length trench coat to only a jacket, and had changed from simple shorts and pants to cargos, giving him more than enough room to keep scrolls, shuriken and kunai, plus whatever he needed for any other situation. Underneath the dark grey jacket, he wore a simple white t-shirt, nothing fancy or flashy. His techniques would do his talking for him, not his clothes.

“Chouji! Hey man, how are you?” The hyper boy asked, happy to see his old friend.

“I’m fine, but how about you? I mean you’ve been gone for two years and we haven’t heard from you? What have you been up to?”

“Well, besides fending for my life not too much, just training day in and day out.” Naruto responded while motioning for another bowl.

The two chatted for the duration of the meal, before Naruto had to head back home.

Halfway back, Naruto stopped.

“Hey Lee, do you want to stop following me like some fan girl?”

“Ah Naruto-kun, it is so good to see you!” The equally hyper boy replied, dropping to the street from his position on a rooftop.

“It’s good to see you too, but why were you following me?” Naruto asked, wanting nothing more than to get home and get some sleep.

“I know that you requested some advice from Gai-sensei about taijutsu training while you were gone, I wanted to challenge you to a spar to test out your skills.”

“As good an idea as that sounds, right now, I’m too tired to fight tonight, but how about tomorrow?”

“Yosh! How about Ten o’clock, I will meet you at the arena where the chuunin exam finals were held, is that acceptable?”

“Sure, see you later, Lee.” Naruto yawned as he waved the exuberant boy off and finally made it back home. His mom was asleep in her room, but Sasuke hadn’t come back yet.

‘Probably out romancing Haku.’ Naruto snickered to himself. He just wasn’t interested in finding a girlfriend just yet, despite knowing how short a shinobi’s life span could be.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

“So Jiraiya, you gonna tell me how they all progressed or am I going to have to guess?” Tsunade asked her teammate as they shared another glass of sake.

“I guess I do owe you an official report, and as fun as it would be to just let their performances tomorrow let them speak for themselves, I do owe you for all those missed reports.”

“Damn right you do!”

“Well, I there isn’t too much to say. They’ve all grown so much that you’d be hard pressed to find anyone within ten years of them who could put up a decent fight. I’d say that Anko could easily be at our level, since she’s received training by two sannin, it isn’t that hard to believe. Her speed is simply unbelievable; she might be the fastest shinobi since the Fourth, if Naruto doesn’t use his techniques. She’s still favoring hand to hand combat, but she changed from kunai to sai, but she put a thin edge on the main tsuba.”

“Why would she do that?”

“Well, it turns out that the sai gives her a better defense than the kunai, plus it penetrates deeper through tissue than a kunai, so she can immobilize much easier than kill. She’s pretty damn accurate with them too, she can hit a moving target from thirty feet and if their close enough to a wall, stick ‘em up too. She’s a real danger to get too close to; I’d say she’d wipe the floor with Kakashi, unless he’s got a new trick up his sleeve.

Sasuke…I guess I should say that he was a mess when we started, he was blaming himself for the fight with Naruto. He worked alone for a long time, just training and not really getting any where, but then we met up with this woman, Jun, never caught her last name, who was actually a taijutsu specialist, and he seemed to snap out of it. I never really got to talk with her, she took him under her wing for a good portion of the time and whatever she did it works! He bulked up really quickly, not to mention he picked up a good bit in the speed department. She must have also taught him her style, because his changed dramatically. About the time I stopped sending you reports, he had an episode with his demonic blood coming out, but this time he didn’t go after anyone. It was like he had been able to bring it out on his own. Long story short, Sasuke is able to transform into his ‘devil mode’ at will now, and it gives him a strength and speed bust, but according to him there is more that he can learn. Not sure there’s anything more to say…hasn’t picked up any weapons or anything like that, he spent most of his time on taijutsu…I figure that he’s high chuunin level, maybe low jounin when he isn’t transformed, and when he is, he’s closer to Kakashi’s level.

Now Naruto has probably picked up the most of the three. He’s mastered nearly every aspect of chakra manipulation, mostly thanks to the Kage bunshin; otherwise it would have taken much longer for him to do it. He no longer requires the metal shavings to use the satetsu, he can make his own particles from the ground, he managed to learn some of the Kaguya’s techniques, he can turn his spine into a whip, his arms into swords and drills, and he experimented with that bloodline heavily early on. He has also been able to use the mokuton techniques, though without more training, he can’t master them. Hyoton techniques, he’s expanded on, plus he’s created some new chakra combinations. He’s got one that combines earth and fire to get magma, let me tell you, he lets that go, pretty much any opponent is going to have to be able to fly or they will loose their feet! Earth and wind allowed him to partially emulate some of the techniques that kid Gaara used, mostly just the offensive ones, he hasn’t been able to do any kind of armor with it yet.

That’s only touching on his progress. Since he was using those clones, he had a few read over the information he had on sealing, he’s well on his way to becoming the next seal master of the village, I’d give it another four or five years, but he is well on his way.

“That’s amazing! Sarutobi-sensei had been bragging about how quickly Naruto had learned the basics, but I never would have thought that he could have progressed so far so quickly. Doesn’t it normally take ten or fifteen years to learn enough to be considered a master? Now, you mentioned that he might be faster than Anko? How is that, I know he had a good control over the body flicker, but that isn’t that fast. What has he done?”

“Tsunade…he’s nearly learned Hiraishin. Not only did that, but he created a new tier of speed techniques too.”

“What do you mean new tier? They can’t be faster than the hiraishin, right?”

“No, it isn’t as fast as the hiraishin, but it is far more versatile. You know that hiraishin is extremely consumptive in terms of chakra, right? That was the entire reason for the kunai, by stringing the seals for the summoning and flash of light with a set amount of chakra to the kunai, it allowed for a one use instantaneous summon. If Arashi had to use the technique without the kunai it was much more draining. Naruto devised a way to remove the excessive chakra drain as well as the reliance on a marker at the cost of only about fifteen percent. He calls it Shunpo.” (Flash Step)

“How does it work?”

“Honestly, he hasn’t told me, all I know is that there are two ways of doing it, the first is the easiest in terms of chakra usage, but it will grow weaker with every use, not to mention damage the legs. I haven’t even seen the second way, but he assures me that there is one and that it is more like the hiraishin.”

“Well it better be good, I hope you realize that Lee has only gotten faster, I hear he’s picked up a technique to increase his speed as well, if you aren’t careful, Naruto might loose before he can use this new technique of his. Who did you pick to fight Sasuke and Anko?”

“Well I know Sasuke wanted a shot at Neji, but I’d rather see him fight Izumo, since Sasuke is a fire specialist. As for Anko…I don’t know, I was thinking either Kakashi, Genma or maybe a mystery fighter, I’ve got a meeting tomorrow morning with my third candidate, if I can get him it’ll be him, but if not than I’ll probably go with Kakashi.”

“Mind telling me who this mystery man is?” Tsunade asked in curiosity.

Jiraiya shrugged his shoulders before telling her his plan.

“Are you nuts? Those two would cause too much damage to the arena; we need it for the jounin exams in three months!”

“Don’t you see; it would be the perfect test to see if she’s improved as much as I think she has.”

“Fine, but it’ll be weapons and taijutsu only; we don’t need to build a new stadium!”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Sasuke had always found it easier to talk about personal matters with complete strangers, that way you wouldn’t have to hear what they thought about you. Haku wasn’t a stranger, but seeing as they hadn’t seen each other for nearly three years, it felt like it.

They had walked around town for hours taking about their friends and what Sasuke had been up to, normal things that people talk about when they haven’t seen each other.

“So you’re telling me, that Shikamaru, the laziest and most sedentary person in the village, actually passed Lee in a sprint, just to escape from Ino?” Sasuke asked; trying to make a mental picture of a scene he knew had to be false.

Haku giggled and just nodded her head in the affirmative.

“I heard that Lee even tried to catch up without removing his weights, but couldn’t, although I have no witnesses.”

They continued on in comfortable silence, hand in hand until Haku asked the question she had been worrying over for a while.

“Sasuke, did you ever come to terms with the whole ‘attacking Naruto’ thing?”

The aforementioned boy didn’t respond right away, he collected his thoughts for a few seconds before he answered.

“Yeah, but it took a good bit of time. I have my other sensei to thank for that, it took her a long time to get it through my skull. Eventually I had to talk with him about it, but he assured me that he didn’t hold anything against me.”

“I thought you would have worked with Jiraiya-sama, who was this other sensei? You did say it was a she, right?” Haku was perplexed; she hadn’t realized that Sasuke was receiving instruction from someone other than the toad sannin.

“Her name is-was Jun, she wasn’t a ninja, but she was a taijutsu specialist, and she had a power similar to the Shodai Hokage. She was able to control my devil side, but only to a degree. She came from a foreign nation and actually had experience with the same type of curse that I have. The father of her son also has the ‘devil gene’, as she called it, and passed it on to her son. She was the only one who could neutralize this power, although she could completely neutralize and reverse his power, but with mine, she was only able to halt it. She helped me in more ways than just fighting. She was the one who counseled me through my own fears about Naruto and everything else.”

“Did she die? You talk about her like she’s gone.”

“I honestly don’t know; all I know is that one day I woke up and she was gone, with no trace or anything.”

“What about this son of hers?”

“I never met him; she said I looked like an identical twin to her son.”

“Oh, I see.” After this, the conversation once more turned to lighter things and before too long, it was time for the two to return home. Sasuke bid her good night before departing for his still packed sleeping bag.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto woke up around nine; he had been getting up earlier than this for the duration of his training, so the extra three hours felt like an eternity of sleep. Fixing himself some eggs for breakfast, he started to go over some strategies for fighting against Lee. He was soon joined by Sasuke who sleepily accepted the plate of fluffy yellow eggs and began to chow down.

“It’s not like Kaa-chan to be this late; I wonder what’s keeping her?” Naruto asked between bites of some toast.

“Late am I? You’re the ones who’ve been asleep for the past few hours.” Anko’s voice was laced with mirth as she saw both boys jump in their seats. “Come on, we’ve got to get to that arena or we’ll be late.

The boys grabbed their supplies and were out the door before the sentence registered in Naruto’s head.

“Wait, how did you know about my match with Lee?”

Sasuke groaned. “Jiraiya told us we would have to fight someone when we got back; you aren’t even supposed to know who you’re fighting. You just got lucky that Lee is the only one chivalrous enough to introduce himself.”

Naruto had the decency to blush before his thoughts returned to planning his fight out. When the group entered the arena, they were shocked by how large it was. When it was filled with thousands of cheering people it seemed much smaller. The now empty stands stretched up to the sky, an effect that was only made greater by the small contingent of people sitting in the front row.

The rookie teams from Naruto and Sasuke’s graduating class were there, plus Gai’s team, along with their senseis. Tsunade and Jiraiya were present with Sarutobi and his grandson, Konohamaru. The most surprising additions were Haku and the sand siblings, all three of them. Everyone had changed so much that Naruto had to do a double take to make sure he recognized everyone.

The first person he recognized was Chouji who was seated with his team and their sensei, Sarutobi Asuma, the son of the Sandaime. Chouji hadn’t changed too much; he had changed from his jacket and scarf to some armor that most members of his clan wore. He had grown both in height and weight, though it was to be expected of an Akimichi.

Shikamaru had traded in his grey jacket for a full sleeved black shirt, over which he wore his chuunin vest. He hadn’t changed much, probably deeming it too troublesome.

Ino had definitely grown. What had once been a purple two piece dress with bandages covering her stomach was now a purple two piece dress with no bandages covering her stomach, although the dress seemed to be the same one she had worn before he left. She wore some net arm and knee guards, but that was about all the differences Naruto could spot.

Next up was team the third member of team seven. Sakura had done a complete one-eighty in terms of personality from meek and nearly useless, to a medic ninja who was training under Tsuande. She now only wore a pink sleeveless top, as opposed to the full dress she used to wear. She had a pale pink skirt that covered a pair of black shorts. Her hair was now short, and only came down to the end of her neck. The change that showed just how much she had grown wasn’t a physical one. No, it was the way that her eyes didn’t linger on Sasuke. To be honest, it seemed that she didn’t even look at him in more than a glancing way.

‘Seems she’s gotten over her ‘Sasuke phase.’ Or she’s just trying hard to get…either way, she doesn’t seem too interested.’ Naruto was glad that his other teammate had grown up, he smiled at her, which she returned by waving her hand at him, before moving on to the next person in the stands.

Aburame Shino of team eight, had traded in his old full body trench coat, for a new half trench coat in black, over this he wore a dark grey coat, complete with a hood for those times where his hair just couldn’t be let out for any reason. His trademark sunglasses had been replaced by a new model, ones which wrapped around his head and disappeared into the recesses of his hood.

Of all the acquaintances that Naruto had made, Inuzuka Kiba had shown the most growth and change. He used to wear a bulky grey jacket and pants, which had had discarded in favor of a black leather coat that was more form fitting, along with a mesh undershirt. His pants hadn’t changed in years, but Akamaru sure had! The puppy once small enough to sit on it’s partners head and read answers, was now too large to sit anywhere on Kiba without crushing him! He seemed big enough for Kiba to ride if he wanted, more like a fury bike than an animal.

Surprisingly, the person sitting next to Kiba wasn’t Hyuuga Hinata, like Naruto would have thought. In fact, he didn’t see her in the stadium at all, come to think about it, he hadn’t seen that girl from the chuunin exams he fought either, what was her name…ah, Tenten, that was it!

‘Maybe their off on a mission or something?’ He thought.

It turned out that the person sitting next to Kiba was none other than Rock Lee, Naruto’s opponent for this little fight they were going to have. He still wore the green spandex, and still had eyebrows thicker than many people’s fingers, and he still had his hair in that ugly bowl cut, but he did have something that Naruto wanted very badly. A chuunin vest. It was proudly displayed over his spandex and frankly it made Naruto a little bit jealous.

The ‘youthful green beast of Konoha’ was currently meditating, while his other teammate, Hyuuga Neji was sitting eyeing Naruto and Sasuke with great interest. He had donned a shirt and pants that made it look like he was wearing a kimono, and his hair had grown to be several times longer than Naruto remembered. He had a black skirt over his cream colored pants, and Naruto wondered if he had raided Hinata’s closet for the day, because he really looked like a girl.

Temari hadn’t changed since he had seen her last; just a few days before they left for their mission, she still wore the black battle kimono that ended at her knees, with the red sash thrown in for color.

Kankuro, likewise, hadn’t changed at all, except maybe for the design of his face paint. He still looked like a cat that stood up on two legs, but Naruto couldn’t tell if it was on purpose or as a joke.

Gaara was the second shocker of the day. He wore the blue and white robes of the Kazekage, though opted to leave off the hat. He looked to have grown more than a foot since their last meeting, and seemed very lanky. Naruto could feel the chakra rolling off of him; it was much greater than any he had felt from the red head before. Currently he was discussing something with Tsunade, who was being ogled by Jiraiya. Yes, it was the small consistencies in life that made the everyday hustle and bustle that much more fun.

Sarutobi hadn’t changed at all; in fact it didn’t even look like he had aged! If not for the fact that Konohamaru was almost up to his grandfather’s chin, Naruto could have sworn that the entire Sarutobi family hadn’t aged one bit.

Not having seen Haku since he had left, Naruto looked upon the girl he figured would turn out to be his sister in law. She was dressed in uniform, consisting of a full length, light blue shirt with white horizontal stripes going down the sleeves. Her pants were nondescript, standard dark blue shinobi wear, with a holster for her senbon tied to her right leg. She had cut her hair since he had seen it last, but the biggest difference between the Haku of old and the women that was in the stands was the jounin vest that she wore over her shirt. Every once in a while when she would move her head, Naruto though he caught the hilt of a sword sticking over her shoulder, but couldn’t prove it.

“Hey, Sasuke, did you know your girlfriend was a jounin?” He asked mostly just to tease his brother.

As much as Sasuke hated referring to his relationship with Haku as boyfriend and girlfriend, he just smirked and responded with a similar tactic.

“Yeah, she told me last night, she passed about a year ago, and Neji just passed at the last exam.”

“Nani! Neji’s a jounin?” This sent the kyuubi container into a deep funk that lasted until Tsunade cleared her throat to start the matches.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The assembled shinobi in the crowd were anxious to get a look at their friends for the first time in a long time, they wanted to see how much they had changed, and how strong they had gotten.

Nearly everyone except for Chouji was surprised to see how much more mature Naruto seemed. His hair was even shaggier than most remembered, though it was still the two tones that were unique to him. He looked anxious to fight, but not in a nervous way, he was genuinely interested in fighting Lee.

A Ino and Sakura were interested in seeing Sasuke after so long, despite both having moved on from their crush. He had the same flame embroidered pants that he had worn yesterday, even if no one besides Haku knew that. But instead of the heavy sweat shirt, he wore a plain white t-shirt with a black dragon swirling towards his right shoulder. He wore red arm warmers, not unlike those he had seen many in his old clan wear, those these had metal rods sewn into the material that he could use to block weapon strikes, not unlike the metal plated gloves that many jounin wore. The other noticeable difference was that instead of shinobi sandals, Sasuke wore some shoes with a very thick sole. The thick sole served two purposes, first was to add weight and power to any kicks he delivered, and the second was to hide the quarter inch metal plate that added even more weight, plus had the added bonus of making makibishi and caltrops obsolete.

However, it was Anko’s new appearance that had everyone most surprised. She had traded in her leather skirt and tank top for a more standard shinobi uniform. She wore the standard black pants, much like Kakashi’s except she didn’t tape up the legs, she just folded the legs up a bit. She had lost the shin guards in exchange, but the pants had some thin metal mesh in them, so she didn’t loose the protection entirely. Her shirt was sleeveless and was made of the same material. Over her shirt she wore a thick jacket the same color of her old coat. There were pockets sown into the outside, though they were full of padding, or weights. It wasn’t too heavy, only about forty pounds, but it gave her enough of an advantage when she took it off. She had changed her hairstyle, from the duck-butt she had before this time skip, it was still rather messy, and her bangs stuck up and to the side, but it was pulled into a short, loose ponytail that actually hid a kunai that she could control via chakra. It was a variation on the hari jizo that she had created on her own. Yet of all of these, changes, not one was more surprising than the smile she had on her face. It wasn’t a smile of death; it was a smile of pure happiness and joy. During her training, she had finally come to grips with her past, with Orochimaru. She would still have her revenge, but her priority was now, and had been for some time now, her family. She had pushed herself for them, and they for her. They had become so much closer than ever, and each member had never felt better.

“I still don’t think this was a good idea, Jiraiya.” Tsunade eyed Anko suspiciously. I really don’t need a destroyed stadium.

“Nah! They’ll be fine! I fully expect Anko to win, but this way you don’t loose a front line ninja for a while.”

Tsunade just glared at the super pervert before looking back at the crowd. Two new figures were just arriving.

“Hey Hinata! Tenten, you almost missed the action!” Ino greeted the two missing members of the former rookie genin. The two girls sat down next to Chouji, who made room for Ino to squeeze in next to her friends.

Hinata had grown considerably since her days as the shyest girl in Konoha. She had become a much stronger fighter since her first Chuunin exam, she was nearly on even footing with Neji, and that was saying something. She had graduated to chuunin on her second attempt, along with Shino, Neji and Lee. She had grown her hair out a bit, not long enough to need tying up, but long enough to not be thought a boy if someone saw her from behind. She traded in her baggy tan overcoat for a smaller black one, and by smaller I mean, more like a wind breaker than the thick winter coat.

Tenten had gone a more dramatic overhaul, she had traded in her pink Chinese shirt and pants for an outfit that resembled a miko or shrine maiden, with baggy white pants that had a red stripe going down the side. Her shirt was also loose and had a similar red stripe that matched up with the pants. She had kept her hair in the familiar dual buns that everyone had come to recognize her for, but had opted for some heeled shinobi sandals, rather than the flat ones that most people wore. She had black gloves that were slightly longer than Kakashi’s, but were only passed her wrists by about two inches. Strapped to her back were two short wakizashi, held parallel to the ground and facing in opposite directions.

“Well, now that everyone is here, let’s start this thing.” Tsunade mumbled to herself, before nodding to an anxious Lee, who quickly leapt into the ring, while Anko and Sasuke leapt into the stands to watch.

“Naruto-kun, let us fight without any restrictions, I have received permission to remove my weights from Gai-sensei, so be forewarned.”

“No holds barred, eh? I can do that, but I should warn you, I don’t plan to go easy either.” Both boys were smirking at each other before Tsunade yelled for the match to begin.

Lee adopted his basic stance, left hand behind his back, with the right outstretched.

Naruto’s stance was similar, in that he also turned to his side, but instead of having his legs together and hands opposite, his legs were spread out and his left hand was held loosely out in front of him, while the right was curled into a fist and placed by his chest. For only a second, neither one moved, and then they both disappeared. For a second, both reappeared, Naruto with his right fist being held by Lee’s left, and Lee’s leg being blocked by Naruto’s knee. The two separated in a blur of green and grey, before showing up every once in a while, locked in combat. After a minute of such high speed fighting, the boys ended up on opposite ends of the stadium from where they started.

“Naruto-kun, your form is most excellent! You truly must have been reveling in the spring time of your youth to have improved so much in such a short time!” Lee’s banter broke the serious mood of the stadium.

“You’ve improved too Lee. You must have been working four times harder than normal!”

“A good guess, but I have not yet begun to show off what I have learned yet!” Lee responded before dropping to the ground and removing his weights from around his ankles. Before he even stood up, Lee had disappeared in a green blur that made nearly everyone in the arena gasp at the sheer speed of it.

No one was more surprised than Naruto when he felt the strongest backhand he had ever felt; connect with his stomach, sending him flying towards the walls. He was able to catch himself on the wall, and fall back to the floor, before disappearing once more.

To the spectators, they were watching the fastest battle of their lives. Even the jounins were having a bit of trouble keeping up with the two speed demons. Kakashi was tempted to expose his sharingan, just to see what was going on, but decided that the next chapter of the newest Icha Icha book would be more interesting.

Back on the ground, Naruto was having difficulty keeping up with Lee. The raw speed that he had was awesome, and was not something he wanted to have to fight again. He might have to resort to shunpo if he couldn’t handle the speed for much longer.

Of the two combatants, it was possibly Lee who was the most surprised. Naruto had recovered from a heavy punch to the chest and got back up and continued to fight. At the very least, Lee had expected Naruto to be winded or wince or…something, but the blond and black haired kid just kept on fighting. One of the disadvantages of using weights to train and increase your speed, is that once you remove them, you only have one gear, as opposed to using other more traditional methods to increase speed. Naruto, who didn’t have any visible weights, wasn’t as fast, but he was managing to keep up! If he couldn’t finish the fight, than Lee might have to resort to his new technique.

Outside of the odd punch or kick, most of the blows that were exchanged were neutralized by the opponent. The match would carry on if neither teenager could land a decisive blow. Once more the boys separated, for only the third time in the match, but both knew that at their current level they were too evenly matched. While Naruto’s form and style weren’t as crisp and polished as Lee’s, he made up for it with the shikotsumyaku, which kept him from breaking bones, and by using earth nature chakra, he was able to strengthen his skin enough to protect him, hence the shrugging off of Lee’s earlier attack. Lee was worried that Naruto was becoming used to their current speed, as well as his opponents resistance to injury. If Lee couldn’t come up with something, he might not be able to win without causing a comrade serious injury.

“No offense, Lee, but this slow escalation thing isn’t really workin’ for me. What do you say we go all out right now?” Naruto’s voice was happy; he had really been enjoying himself.

“I see you must be feeling especially youthful today. I too see the pointlessness of our current situation, and I agree. Let us end this fight.”

The two didn’t appear to change, but in their minds they were sizing up the other.

‘Fuzzy-brows is really fast, and if he’s got another speed technique I might loose, even with shunpo. I wonder if he’s got more weights on his body?’ The beginnings of a plan began to form under the mess of hair on his head, but it involved dodging the first strike, something he wasn’t one hundred percent sure he could do.

‘Naruto-kun has gotten much stronger than when I last saw him, and he beat Neji! I must hope that I can finish him with this next attack. If not, I will have to resort to the gates…if I get the chance.’

Naruto watched as Lee removed a second set of weights, but this time from his arms. He had building up muscles on his arms as well as his legs, hoping it would help in his quest to defeat his eternal rival, Neji. He was even more surprised when Lee began to bounce on the balls of his feet, as if he were warming up to go on a run.

“I must warn you that no one besides Gai-sensei has been able to keep up with me when I use this technique, and even then, he had to remove his weights. I hope you can get much faster Naruto-kun, because if you cannot, I will win this fight in the next attack.” Lee warned, still bouncing like a kid with a jump rope.

“Don’t worry about me, Lee; I just hope you can keep up with me when I begin.” Both teens were smiling at each other, signaling that no hard feelings would exist after this bought.

In the audience, everyone was in awe that Lee had a technique that even Gai was hard pressed to match.

“Gai, what is this technique?” Kakashi asked. He knew of no technique that someone who could not use chakra would benefit from.

“Just watch, my eternal rival, my youthful student’s speed is something that not even I would be able to match if he used this move to its full potential. He has been looking for a foe to test out his full speed on for a while, and he has chosen the very youthful Naruto-kun.”

Below, the two teens were locking eyes for what had become nearly half a minute, neither one wanting to make the first move, lest the other was faster.

It was to the audiences shock when Lee disappeared before their eyes, not a single person who couldn’t be a Kage was able to keep up with the awesome speed the boy showed. All that was left where the boy had been was a cloud of dust and a crater from where his weights had fallen to the ground. A deep trough was forming on the ground, seemingly by an invisible force, but everyone knew it had to bee Lee. He was moving faster than what the human eye, even with the sharingan could see.

When Lee disappeared, Naruto’s eyes, still black, widened in shock, Lee was at least as fast as the shunpo! Having no further course of action, Naruto’s eyes bled into the familiar red and he too disappeared in a flash before the stunned crowd.

“Damn, Jiraiya, what did you do to him?” Tsunade asked, not believing that she could only barely keep up with the two.

“Nothing, my dear Tsunade, that is the shunpo. I just hope its fast enough; Lee’s using an old form of footwork called the shukuchi. (Reduced Earth) It uses the acceleration from the first movement to propel the user so fast that it seems as if the distance has been closed in an instant. This just might be the true test of Naruto’s shunpo.”

Down in the arena, both teens were still moving at their extreme pace, Lee couldn’t land a hit on Naruto, and Naruto was having trouble keeping the shunpo at a high speed. The strain of using his chakra in short burst, and releasing it from his legs made it a very tiring technique, it made his leg muscles feel like jelly for a nearly a day afterwards the last time he had tested it. He recognized the shukuchi; it had been the inspiration for the shunpo, using pure footwork to surpass the speed at which the eye could follow. From his study before creating the shunpo, Naruto had found the one flaw in the shukuchi, a flaw that he could, at least temporarily, correct with his technique. The shukuchi was comprised of thirteen steps, on the final step was the point at which the user had the most speed, one that didn’t allow muscles to catch up to. At the end of that step the user was always close enough to their target, that if they missed, the shukuchi needed to be started all over again. The shunpo gave the user the speed of someone on the thirteenth step in an instant, but after repeated use, unlike its mother move, the shunpo would deteriorate and begin to slow.

Lee was floored that Naruto could keep up to him at such a speed. Every time the taijutsu specialist would close in on his opponent, the half blond would disappear in a flash, avoiding the critical strike and forcing Lee to restart his legs. It wasn’t something that was hard; he had practiced with the shukuchi for nearly two years before testing it out with his sensei, so the transition from one to the other was seamless. Each time he would miss, Lee noticed that his next strike would come just a fraction closer, signaling that Naruto’s technique was becoming too taxing to use. Finally, on the next pass at each other, Lee came close enough to assure that his next attack would hit.

The same realization had dawned on Naruto, all of the flash steps he had been forced to use were rather draining for the boy, and he could feel his legs protesting with every move he made. He watched as Lee began his shukuchi and knew that he would have only a fraction of a second to complete his plan. Kneeling to the ground and placing his hands on the earth, he watched as small craters from Lee’s feet drew closer. Just as Lee was on his thirteenth and final step, Naruto sprung his trap.

“Doton: Rasengan!” He began to swirl the earth underneath Lee until the boy became trapped in the earthen whirlpool and began to sink, but not before he landed a blow to Naruto, which had originally been aimed for his chest, but thanks to the spin, landed on Nartuo’s left shoulder.

By the time that the dust from the continuous shukuchi had settled, Lee was buried up to his chest in earth, and Naruto was clutching his left shoulder, obviously in pain.

The stadium burst into cheers for the two boys for their fight. Tsunade appeared on the arena floor and quickly dug out Lee and checked Naruto’s shoulder.

“Winner, Mitarashi Naruto!” She announced as she began to heal Naruto.

Her announcement was greeted by the crowd, Naruto had won the match. The reality was that the match was much closer than it looked. Lee had done something that Tsunade didn’t think possible. He had shattered the joint that connected Naruto’s arm to his body, despite his Kaguya bloodline making his bones stronger than steel. This would take a very delicate and involved procedure to make sure that no bone fragments were left after the bone had healed. Kyuubi might be able to heal cuts and stop bleeding, but rebuilding a bone took time for anyone, even if they did have a bloodline that was based around them.

She finished doing what she could for Naruto, before placing his arm in a sling that she made from the boys shirt and telling him not to move it. She allowed him to stay for the rest of the fights, but was adamant that she be allowed to x-ray the bone when they were done.

Taking a seat with the other rookies, he was congratulated by everyone, including a blushing Hinata and an awestruck Tenten. The weapon’s mistress was so surprised that someone could best her teammate in a contest of speed that she barely recalled the event, and didn’t snap out of her daze until Sasuke’s match was announced.

Sasuke stood loosely as he watched his opponent, Kamizuki Izumo, enter the ring. The chuunin had his brown bangs over his right eye and his hitai ate covered his entire scalp in blue cloth. Tsunade quickly started the match, hoping that neither fighter would become too injured.

Knowing that it would be unwise to use ninjutsu in front of an Uchiha, Izumo grabbed a scroll from his pouch and opened it up. He proceeded to summon a tetsubo. Sasuke eyed the heavily spiked iron club in surprise, surely the speed at which the chuunin could use that weapon wouldn’t be fast enough to pose a serious threat, so there must be some other reason. Not feeling threatened, Sasuke just stood there, and waited for Izumo to begin the fight properly. He didn’t have to wait too long, as the assistant to the Godaime rushed forward to close the distance between the two, his tetsubo held low and behind the advancing man. Expecting to have to jump over a horizontal sweep, Sasuke was surprised when Izumo leapt into the air and curled into a ball. He then began to rotate around, his tetsubo pointing at either the ground or the sky. Sasuke easily dodged the attack, but was surprised when a sizeable dent was left in the ground from the impact of the weapon. He had never expected his opponent to be able to apply that much force o his club.

Sasuke could feel that something was not right with the way Izumo moved, but he couldn’t place a finger on it. He activated his sharingan to check for genjutsu, but didn’t find any. Izumo once more made a pass at the Uchiha, again going vertical, but Sasuke was able to easily dodge the impact of the weapon but was still convinced that there was a problem with the attack pattern of his opponent. After his second miss, Izumo picked up his speed drastically, making his charges at twice the speed he was going before. Sasuke easily dodged each attack, not realizing that Izumo was leading him through a dangerous ballet.

On the chuunin’s next pass, he created a shadow clone behind Sasuke, who had the same spiked club as the original. As Sasuke dodged the originals blow, he felt the presence of another opponent behind him. He whirled around, but only had the time to raise a defense before the club came whistling down on his crossed arms.

Anko and Naruto winced, even with the metal guards in his warmers, Sasuke couldn’t block a club strike, they were meant for dealing with bladed weapons, not impact makers.

It was for this reason that they were a bit shocked when, instead of Sasuke being driven into the ground, the tetsubo stopped on the guards.

“I see,” Sasuke said, finally smiling, “This isn’t a tetsubo, it’s a naginata.”

Izumo was shocked that someone had seen through the illusion his weapon created.

“How did you figure it out, not even your sharingan can see through the illusion my naginata creates.”

“True, I cannot see through the illusion yours creates, but the illusion isn’t nearly as strong on your clone. I can see the real weapon hidden under the illusion of your clone as easy as I can see past a transformation. Now that I know what type of weapon you posses, you pose no serious threat to me.” With that being said, Sasuke easily destroyed the clone and once again turned his eyes to the real Izumo.

Izumo made a charge once again, this time dispelling the illusion around his weapon. It was a fine piece of craftsman ship that Tenten recognized as her father’s work. The shaft of the naginata was a mixture of red and blue, representative of Izumo’s role as a shinobi of the fire nation and his own affinity with water. The blade was nearly a two feet long and had a nasty curve at the end that ended with a barb. On the opposite end from the blade was a heavy metal sphere that acted as a hammer, it measured nine inches in diameter and was clearly responsible for the craters that were formed earlier. Though they were very difficult to see, there were a series of seals engraved onto the shaft that constantly maintained the illusion of a tetsubo and did so using such little chakra, that the sharingan and even Kurenai couldn’t see past it.

Sasuke just stood there as his opponent approached, and just as Izumo was about to deliver his strike, he fell to the ground asleep. Izumo had made the fatal mistake of locking eyes with an Uchiha, and Sasuke made him pay. Hypnotizing the chuunin into falling asleep was something that was routine for Sasuke now, why waste energy fighting an opponent, when you can simply send them to bed? Tsunade once again appeared down in the arena and checked over each combatant before declaring Sasuke the winner. Izumo was woken up and congratulated Sasuke on his victory before both moved back to the seats to watch the final match, Anko versus this mystery fighter of Jiraiya’s.

Anko waited on the arena floor for her opponent, and was quickly becoming impatient when he didn’t show up.

“Hey, Jiraiya! Where the hell is this guy?” Anko yelled up at her teacher.

Just then a swirl of leaves appeared, signaling the arrival of the opponent.

“Sorry about that, but this years class is almost as bad as Naruto and Konohamaru.” The voice of the ‘mystery fighter’ was calm and warm, but not a mystery to anyone there. Umino Iruka stood before everyone looking as if not a day had changed, ready to fight a special jounin/possible sannin. Everyone in the stands looked at Jiraiya asking for an explanation. Jiraiya didn’t say anything, just motioned for the fight to begin, which caused everyone to quickly turn back around. In the brief second that they hadn’t been looking, Anko had drawn two sai and had locked them against a pair of kunai that Iruka used to defend himself.

It shocked the crowd to see their former teacher locking blades evenly with Anko. They turned their heads to Sasuke and Naruto, who didn’t seemed as phased as the rest of the group.

“What?” They asked, not taking their eyes off the fight. (Anko had just leapt over Iruka in an attempt to get him off balance; he just rolled away before springing back to his feet.)

“It doesn’t bother you that Iruka is fighting your mom? And holding his own? He’s only a chuunin, shouldn’t he be getting flattened?” The questions seemed to come from everyone at once.

“Not really, makes perfect sense to us, after all, he does teach.” Naruto replied as he watched his former sensei stab his mother’s stomach, only for her to turn into a block of wood.

“Look at it this way,” Sasuke spoke up as he continued to watch the fight. “The children of this village will one day become the next generation of ninja, they will become the next Hokages, jounins and chuunins, they are the most precious resource available to the village. Without them, Konoha could be broken for years without new ninja to fill the ranks.”

“Ok, but what does that have to do with a chuunin being able to fight evenly with your mom?” Ino asked as Anko managed to land the first actual hit, a shallow slice to Iruka’s cheek.

“He’s not a chuunin.” This time the answer came from Asuma. “They are right; the future generations of this village are the most important. They are like the king in shougi, if they were to fall, then so would the village. Do you really think we would protect the most precious resource with only chuunin? To become an academy teacher, you must first pass a very rigorous test, one that puts you on par with many jounin and special jounin. Iruka might hold the rank of chuunin, but he probably has the power of an ANBU captain, if not more.”

This shocked the crowd. All of their teachers at the academy had been much stronger than they had originally thought. Even the jounin of the group weren’t sure if they could beat the gentle teacher.

The fight was in full swing now, in retaliation for the scratch on his face, Iruka had managed to damage Anko’s left arm, a small cut, but it would restrict her movements. The two were very evenly matched, and without the use of ninjutsu to settle the fight, it looked like it would go on forever. Anko took another cut to her jaw line, and in retaliation managed to pierce Iruka’s defense and give him a matching cut on the other side of his face. The fight had been going on for a long time and with only those few wounds, it didn’t look like either was going to win without stepping up and showing one of their more devastating moves.

Surprisingly it was Iruka who made the first break through, managing to grab Anko from behind and hold a kunai to her throat, only to end up holding a log. Anko retaliated and grappled with the teacher’s hands, before maneuvering her hidden kunai to his throat. Iruka just disappeared into a puddle of water, before reappearing behind Anko with a kunai to her back, only to find that she had turned around and held her sai to his temple.

“This match is a draw by forfeit!” Tsunade’s voice shocked the crowd out from their stupor; they had become so engrossed in the match that they had completely failed to notice that both fighters used ninjutsu, a big no-no.

Both fighters smiled at each other, congratulating the other on a good fight before heading to the stands.

Everyone gathered around the six people who had fought, and congratulated them on an amazing display. Tsunade was conferring with Jiraiya and Sarutobi to decide if anyone should be promoted. Finally they reached their decision and addressed the crowd.

“Hey!” Tsunade’s voice was loud enough to quiet down the masses immediately. “First we’d like to say that everyone who fought today was awesome and truly shows the will of fire that we are proud to posses. We have decided that due to the proceedings, we will announce our plans for you guys, at least for the next couple of months. Izumo, you will keep your job and will be assigned to a squad for a new group we are creating to deal with the Akatsuki and Orochimaru. Iruka, you will also become a part of this group, but you’re main focus until we activate your squad is to continue at the academy. Anko, same thing, except you’re going to be given missions to do until you are activated. Lee, I am proud to announce that we want you to begin training to take the exams to become a teacher at the academy, as well as a jounin, we think you’ve shown great improvements and want you to be able to tutor the next generation in taijutsu. Naruto and Sasuke, we don’t want to promote you two to chuunin just yet, though you both have the skill to easily pass the exam. Next week the chuunin exam will be held in Suna, and I want you to officially pass the test there. Your third teammate will be Tenten. We’ve been purposefully holding her back so that she can provide skill in the genin ranks as well has help improve her hand to hand capabilities. Once you pass the exams, you will also be sorted into a squad, along with everyone else above the rank of genin. But I think that’s enough of my warbling, everyone deserves to celebrate after today, so lets go back to our lives and take the day off!”

Everyone slowly made their way out of the arena, the younger teenagers made plans to all meet up for a party after dinner as everyone split up and headed home to rest, or in the case of the fighters, get cleaned up. Of all the people in the crowd, Tenten was the most shocked and pleased.

“I get to be on a team with Naruto-kun! I hope Hinata doesn’t kill me!”

The makeshift team had only a few days in which to get used to each others strengths and weaknesses, as the trip to Suna would take at least three days, perhaps more. They had sparred and hung out for those days, learning about each other and what had gone on in the two years since Sasuke and Naruto had seen the village. They had also been forced to complete some tedious D-rank missions, far less challenging that what the new trio were used to.

It was the last day before they would have to leave for the exam, and the new team was meeting with the Hokage to finalize the details for the trip.

“As I’m sure you’re aware, you three will not be the only ones going to Suna. You will be accompanied by a small support staff, plus a jounin to act as your sensei. I will be joining you for the final round of matches; I trust that all three of you will make it. Your team leader is going to be Shizune, that way you will have a trained medic there, not that I don’t trust Sand’s medics, but I would rather have Shizune there than leave you three high and dry. Sakura will be accompanying you as well, this is going to be a chance for her to advance her learning, there are many rare medicinal plants, as well as older techniques, that might be outdated, but they are effective, for her to learn. For the first few days that will be all, but later, Hinata and Neji will be joining you; apparently the Hyuuga clan is vacationing to Suna.” All of this wasn’t too surprising to the ‘genin’, but the following news was.

“According to Jiraiya, Akatsuki may be starting to mobilize, and he believes that they will go after the Kazekage first. We do not anticipate an attack, especially when there is such a large gathering of shinobi, even if they are S-class ninja, they aren’t foolish enough to attack a village when there are even more jounin there than normal. None the less, be on alert, and if something happens, Jiraiya is supposed to be hanging around the village to gather information, and for once he doesn’t mean peep on the women’s bath houses. He can handle that threat. However, for you at least, the most immanent threat is from Iwa shinobi, plus the cloud has sent a team this year. Iwa, I hope I don’t need to explain, but that means that Naruto, you’ll need to keep some of your…flashier moves to a minimum. Sasuke, ever since they failed to get their hands on the Byakugan, Kumo has begun to show signs that it wants any other bloodline it can get its hands on, so be careful! I don’t need to tell you that, hopefully, but I’ve known you two for too long. You’ll somehow end up going overboard doing something rather stupid and it’ll come back and bit you in the ass if you don’t watch it. Tenten, as for you, I’m hoping you can keep these two focused and down to earth during the exam. I know that you’ve gotten better since your first exam, so I’m not horribly worried, but still, watch yourself.” With that, the three left the Hokage’s office, and went home to pack for the trip ahead.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The three day trip had been uneventful, nearly everyone agreed that it was one of the more boring things that they had done in a long time. Upon arrival to the village, they checked into their hotel and took care of the last minute paperwork that needed to be filled out. They had all been forced to don far lighter clothes than usual, all three participating members opting for more loose fitting clothing. For Naruto and Sasuke, that meant t-shirts and shorts and Tenten just wore an outfit resembling her old apparel. Since Shizune and Sakura would be inside most of the time, they didn’t have to change much, just opting for lighter colors instead of the darker ones that they usually wore.

The next day was routine for the team. They would meet up around nine and then head out to do whatever they were supposed to. Today it just happened to be the exam. Upon entering the waiting room, they noticed that the number of ninja participating was far fewer than in Konoha, even though there were more nations represented. Iwa had sent two teams, which wasn’t a surprise; they were the closest major shinobi village. Rain had sent a few, Grass had a pair of teams, and even the Waterfall village had sent a team. The biggest shock was Kumo, which had also sent a single team, but they were the farthest village from Suna, making their presence a question mark for the Konoha team. For obvious reasons, Sound was absent from the proceedings and Mist had declined to enter a team, probably because water techniques would be extremely difficult to use in the desert.

The rock ninja sneered at the three as they waited for the exam to begin, but didn’t move. Sasuke and Naruto scanned the other teams, noting only four sand teams. The thing that stuck out most was the Kumo ninja. They seemed to exhibit classic ‘Gaara symptoms’, standing at a distance from their third member. This time, the person that the other two members were shying away from, happened to be a blonde girl who had her hair pulled into a ponytail. She had dark eyes, with some marks around the far edges that seemed to elongate them. Her hitai-ate was tied around her forehead. She seemed to be slightly older than all of the other entrants, possibly around Haku’s age. This set off warning bells to both of the boys, and even Tenten felt that something was off, but couldn’t place it. The other two members of her team were far less interesting, one was tall and fit with brown hair and the other was shorter and had red hair. Both had swords strapped to their backs, but they weren’t any of the usual blades that you would have expected to see. One seemed to be a nodachi, a very large sword that at least resembled a katana, but the other one, the red head, carried two butterfly swords.

“So…we’re avoiding them, right?” Tenten asked, eyeing the blonde wearily.

“Sure, I think we match up pretty well, but let’s avoid them, no need to risk serious injury.” Naruto summed up what he had been reading off the opposing team, and Sasuke backed him up. Naruto was a good judge when it came to reading the strengths and weaknesses of his opponents.

A door opened, revealing the large form of a Suna jounin, who ordered the assembled ninja into the next room. But instead of a written exam like they had before, there were only chairs, and another door.

“This will be the first exam of this chuunin exam. We will call your teams into the next room, where we will administer the test. Weather you pass or fail, you will exit through another door, where you will wait until we are finished testing. Communicating with other teams during any portion of this test is forbidden. We will begin with the first team from Rain.”

The jounin exited, followed quickly by the designated team. The room was soundproofed so that no one could hear, and because the door didn’t have a window, no one could see what was happening either. After five minutes, the jounin returned and called back the next team, this time it was a Sand team. This cycle repeated itself many times over, until the Konoha team finally got called. They were the tenth out of fourteen teams to be called, with only the Cloud team, a team from Iwa, and two sand teams left.

When they entered the room, they were surprised to see a single table with a piece of paper on it. Around the room there were many other Suna shinobi, they would be watching the exam as well as the proctor. The team walked up to the table and looked at the paper. The paper was divided into small squares, ten squares to a side. Some of the squares had things written in them, like two points and three points; another square was marked as the starting point and another, the ending point. These two boxes were in opposite corners of the paper, with a small pebble on the starting square.

“This is your exam. It is seemingly straight forward, like many missions you will participate in, yet there are a number of hidden perils. Only one person may move your token at a time and only one space at a time. For each square you land on, you will be awarded one point, except for the marked spaces. They are bonuses that will be added to the one point you already would get. You may or may not decide to land on these spaces, much like secondary and tertiary objectives. There are also some hidden squares that have negative or positive consequences on them and you will not be notified should you land on one, until we have tallied your score. Weather or not you pass this exam will be decided on a rubric, a part of your score is determined by how many points you earn, but another fraction is based on criteria that only we know.. You have two minutes to look over the board before you must make your first move.”

The three Konoha ninja just looked at the paper with blank faces. Internally, however, Naruto and Sasuke were cursing. They weren’t very good at strategy like this. Luckily, Tenten was good at more than just throwing weapons around.

“Ok, well it’s obvious that we want a high score here, to help our chances when they grade us, but that still doesn’t help us when it comes to figuring this out. What if one of the criteria is quickness? By landing on too many bonus spaces, we will be drawing out the ‘mission’, but if we take the shortest route, we gain the fewest points. So we have to do this in a way that is short, but fruitful.” She analyzed the situation perfectly, pointing out the flaw in the obvious course of action. The boys just nodded, knowing by now, that the weapon mistress was good at these kinds of things.

Tenten looked over the paper once more. The bonus squares were arranged so as to create a lane between the start and the ending. It was straight, short, and devoid of any bonuses. The three point bonuses were farther towards the corners than the two point squares, so to get them would take more time out of their mission. The second obvious solution was to move towards the two point bonuses and then follow along the edge of the lane to the end. It would be longer than the lane, but give more points. However, in her years as a ninja, Tenten knew that those were the areas that were most likely to have traps hidden in them. The outer route was probably the safest, but would take up the most time. She needed to find a balance!

“Ok, were just going to have to find a balance between speed and points. Traps would most likely be laid just outside this lane here, so I would avoid that route. Do you guys have any ideas?” She wanted their input before moving the piece.

“What if we did a zigzag pattern?” Naruto suggested, indicating his proposed route, between one edge of the lane and the other.

“No, that just increases our chances of hitting a trap.”

“What if we zigzagged between the edge and the two point squares?” Sasuke piped up.

“Maybe, but that does increase our time greatly.”

The boys continued to ponder the map, while Tenten kept staring at the paper, daring it to give up its hidden answer.

“Here’s what we’re going to do.” The beginnings of a plan seemed to jump into her head. “Let’s say that the start and stop points are hidden shinobi villages. That would mean that the area, lets say within two squares in any direction, should be safe from other ninja and traps. Outside that it’s a crap shoot, so we don’t want to take any risks. What if we move to the bonuses that are the closest to the ‘villages’, but then stick exclusively to the lane, zigzagging to increase our score?” Her team had no better ideas, and their time was up, so Tenten made the first move, sliding the pebble up one square. Sliding it up once more, she landed on a two point bonus that was just outside of the lane. Noting that none of the jounin seemed too pleased with slow movements, she moved back into the lane by sliding one space right. She slid over two more spaces, before she reached the edge of the path, and then moved up one space. Something felt off though, like there was some fundamental thing she wasn’t doing. It actually began to eat her up inside as she move up another space, once again contacting the boarder of the cleared lane. Not wanting to leave out her teammates, she handed off pebble moving duties to Sasuke, who followed their plan and moved over two more spaces. He moved two spaces up, plus another one to the right, before handing off to Naruto. Seeing the end in sight, Naruto moved another space over, to the edge once again, but then moved off the beaten path onto a two point bonus. Being only four spaces away from the end no matter what he did, Naruto just moved right, to the edge of the grid and then up two more spaces, before he too handed off, back to Tenten, so she could finish what she started. One last move up, and the team was finished with the first part of the exam.

They stepped back and let the proctor do his job, adding up their scores and conferring with the others.

“You accumulated 22 points for your movements. This was out of twenty-five points, any more and you would have failed, for taking too much time. To that, you are awarded a further fifty points out of fifty for teamwork and another forty-five out of fifty for leadership. That gives you 117 out of 125 points, so far. You did correctly assume that we were judging you on speed. You get four points, out of a possible five, for your speed. That gives you 121 points, out of a possible 125. You have qualified for the second exam.”

They smiled, happy to have passed this rather interesting test. They exited the testing room to find another waiting room, filled with all of the teams that had gone before them. They were all sitting silently, remembering the warning about communication and not willing to take chances. Naruto just moved to an unoccupied corner of the room and waited for the first exam to end. The final four teams came through, one by one, followed shortly after by the instructor.

“For those of you who failed, you do not have the correct mindset for a chuunin. For those that passed, you still have more challenges before you. Those of you who passed, wait around, we will begin the second exam in a short time.”

The teams that failed filed out of the room, heads held down, many still not sure why they failed. There were a surprising number of teams that had failed, and as hard as their first chuunin exam had been, Tenten, Sasuke, and Naruto all felt that this exam had been harder. In all, only six teams were left, including the Konoha trio, the Kumo team, had passed, along with both Rock teams. Only one of the Sand teams had passed, along with one of the Rain teams. When all of the failing teams had left the room, one of the jounin that everyone recognized from the observers, stepped forward and cleared his throat.

“Ok, since there were so few of you to begin with, the normal second test would just be a waste of time. Your test is going to be in the same spirit, but with a good twist. You will be lead to a remote location that we have prepared. Somewhere in this location is a structure and inside that is a file folder. Inside that folder is some information, which you need to some how return to us to pass. This will not be as easy as you think. To aid you in this task, we will give everyone here the same information; the only difference will be the structure of the building you must infiltrate.” The older ninja handed out a manila envelope with the briefing in it to each of the teams. You may not open those until you reach your area, and only then will your exam begin.”

Each of the six teams was lead out of the building and along the streets of Sunagakure to a pretty barren part of the surrounding desert. They had been split up upon entering the arena of sand and wind, so the other teams were far from their minds as they opened up the folder to read their mission briefing.

Objective: To obtain the information of folder 7699 from outpost 5.

Intelligence: Outpost 5 is an off site laboratory for the Sunagakure weapon smiths. The file is kept in the filling cabinet in the main office. The office is staffed at any time by one jounin level ninja, as well as three to four chuunin. The file itself is nondescript, so as not to draw attention, but it has a seal placed on it to prevent duplication by means of chakra. This file is checked upon by the jounin at the beginning and ending of every shift. The noted disappearance of the file will force the station to become locked down by means of some seals as well as some traps placed by the Kazekages themselves.

Time limit: One day…….Your time began when you started to read this message.

NOTE: This is to be treated as a real mission that you would have received from your own village.

Once more, Tenten began to strategize while the boys found the map of the area and facility.

“Ok, first off, we can’t kill any of the people in the building; it’s a Suna outpost, so killing them would draw too much attention. The most obvious time to attempt to steal the information would be at a shift change, but since the folder is checked at the beginning and ending of each shift, which would give us very little time to copy the document manually. Does it say how long the shifts are?” Tenten was looking at the written information, as opposed to the maps.

“Let’s see…you’d think so, that’s pretty standard information for an extraction….ah, here it is. Shifts change…EVERY HOUR! What the heck kind of time frame is that?” Naruto began to grumble about the shifts, while Sasuke continued to look over the information.

“It seems that they have five ninja there every hour between nine pm, and nine am. From there on out, it’s only four ninja. That doesn’t help us though, first off, it’s right in the middle of the day, and secondly the sun would be rising in our faces if we stole the information that early in the morning. Obviously that blinds us, but it also casts our shadows back towards the building. That’s too easy to follow; we’ll have to go later in the day, or at night.” Sasuke’s black eyes darted over the various papers strewn about on the ground as he listed off his points of contention.

“You’re forgetting that right now, it’s barely noon, and it’s at least a five hour run to the outpost. That means we’ll have to have the folder by, let’s say, 6am, so that way we have time if one of us gets injured. It’ll have to be a nighttime extraction, but if we made good time, we might make it in time to hit the seven o’clock guard change. That way, even if they notice the document has gone missing, we’ll only have four ninja after us initially, as opposed to five. Now, once we get there, we’ll need to stake the area out, and hopefully find an entry and exit point.” Once more showing that her brain was more than just used for hurling weapons, Tenten outlined her plan, making sure that they would know what to do in the interim until they reached the building. The three left quickly, hoping to make good time on their way.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Indeed the team did make good time, sighting their target right around five pm. Wanting a bit more cover, the team decided to wait until nightfall to make their move. They used their time to scout around and try and spy on the guards. Eventually a plan began to form, and all that was left to do was wait.

Time seemed to creep by at a snails pace, but eventually it grew dark enough that the team felt secure in moving in. Each member of the team transformed into a member of the passing Sand team, hoping that the guards wouldn’t know which team would be coming for them. Walking in the front door was the next order of business, and it too went off without a hitch. The first test came when they saw the desk where a pair of chuunin sat. When the pair looked up to inspect the newcomers, they say the swirling tomoe of Sasuke and Naruto’s sharingan. Under their hypnotic influence the guards fell asleep, hopefully for a while. There were still two more ninja, a chuunin and a jounin, that needed to be taken care of, but the team was prepared.

This time, Tenten and Naruto transformed into the two incapacitated guards, while Sasuke kept his form of a Suna genin. Naruto picked Sasuke up, as if the Uchiha were knocked out, and they proceeded on their way down the hallway. There was only one more desk, and as they rounded the corner at the end of the hall, they could make out the form of the jounin sitting there, doing her paperwork.

Sensing the presence of the team, the jounin looked up, and saw the form of the ‘injured’ genin. She didn’t even take the time to verify the identity of the two chuunin, until they passed by her desk. She immediately felt the difference in their chakra, and tried to stand to stop the pair, but was brought down by another sharingan induced hypnosis. Not wanting to take any chances, Naruto hit some points on her neck that would make sure she stayed down for a while.

Having nothing else to do besides copy the file and watch for the other chuunin, Tenten and Naruto moved into the side room where the file was located. They quickly located the target, and swiftly pulled it from the cabinet. Naruto let out a whistle, upon seeing the seals placed over the file.

“They weren’t kidding when they said you couldn’t copy it by means of chakra. You can’t even take the thing out of the building without breaking two seals, plus another two on the door, probably above the frame. Whatever is in here, they must want to keep badly.”

“But then how are we going to get it back?” Tenten asked. “The point is to test our reliability, and we shouldn’t go looking through a file that they want that badly, so how do we finish this?”

“First off, they never said we shouldn’t look through it, unlike the test back in Konoha, so we’re just going to have to copy it by hand, but we’ll have to break another seal on the folder, which would normally take a bit of time, but since I’m here…” Naruto had the tendency to praise himself too much when it came to seals, but then he had the right too, he was far more advanced than 99. 6 percent of the world when it came to sealing.

Quickly severing the seal that held the folder shut, he pulled out a blank scroll of his own, as well as a pencil he kept on himself for occasions such as this. Looking over the file’s contents, he was surprised when it turned out to be a profile of his team. He showed it to Tenten who just shrugged, so he continued to copy the file down, at least until he reached the information on himself.

Mitarashi Naruto- Age 15 rank?

Mitarashi Naruto is the only biological son of Mitarashi Anko, special jounin of Konoha. He is the human container of the Kyuubi no Kitsune, as it was sealed into him by the Yondaime Hokage. Not much is known of him until he became a genin. At his first genin exam he defeated Jounin Sabaku no Kankuro, a Hyuuga and the current Kazekage, Gaara-sama, showcasing an impressive display of thee different bloodline abilities. Sharingan (believed to be implanted, based on scarring around the eyes), Hyoton (Unknown), as well as the Sandaime Kazekage’s signature ability, satetsu. (See note below) He has also shown an impressive ability with seals, having performed a five point seal in order to disrupt the chakra of Shukaku, during the invasion of Konoha.

NOTE: Naruto’s ability to control the satetsu is believed to be directly inherited from the Sandaime Kazekage by way of Orochimaru and Akasuna no Sasori. Sasori is believed to have killed the Sandaime and taken his body, while Orochimaru is believed to have used the DNA in various experiments in hopes of recreating the satetsu.

NOTE 2: The theory that Naruto is a descendant of the Sandaime has been confirmed via blood sample, obtained by Sabaku no Kankuro. Genetic relation: Son.

The pencil dropped from Naruto’s hands. Sure he had suspected that his father was the Sandaime, but to see it, confirmed by DNA, was another thing altogether. Unlike the rest of his family, Naruto had never had someone he wanted to get revenge against. Sure he had sworn to harm whoever had caused his mother the mental anguish she had suffered, but spending those two years with her, had shown the boy a side of his mom that was strong enough to fight her own battles. Now he had someone he needed to extract vengeance against. Akasuna no Sasori. The man that had killed his biological father, and even if he had never known him, Naruto felt some kind of connection. It was strange, really. He had never known his father, his mother hadn’t even known him, and yet here he was, standing in the middle of a building during the middle of the chuunin exams, and he felt the sudden urge to find this scorpion and kill him for what he had done.

“You ok?” Tenten asked as she looked back from Sasuke who was keeping a look out for the other chuunin.

“Yeah…I mean, I’ll be fine, just give me a minute.”

Tenten looked at the boy who had once defeated her. What she saw was something she hadn’t come to associate with Naruto. Sadness and anger were splayed across his face, and by the whiteness of his knuckles, it had spread across his body.

“You sure? Is there something I can do?” She was more worried about her teammate, no her friend (and maybe more than that, if she could have he way) than the exam right now.

“I’ll be fine, I’m sorry to make you worry, it’s just something that I need to process for a while. I’ll finish this up and let’s get out of here.”

Sure enough, one minute later he was finished copying the folder’s contents, and the team was on their way, making sure that the conked out guards would awaken before the next shift started, so as not to attract attention. The sprint back to their starting point was long and tiring, but they were surprised to find that they were the first team back. They were dismissed for the day, and told to return at noon the next day for the third exam.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto just couldn’t get to sleep, no matter what he tried to do that night. Finally around 2:30 am, he just got up and decided to walk around the village. He walked through the town, wondering what it was like when his father was alive, what kind of a Kazekage he was, and how he compared to the Hokage that he had grown up idolizing.

“I should have known, my chakra nature is wind, and that’s really rare to find in Konoha, even if you are a genetic experiment.” He mumbled to himself as he kicked a small pile of sand, scattering the particles into the night air.

Somehow in all his wanderings, both mental and geographical, he had come to stand in front of the Kazekage’s office, which still had a number of lights shining brightly from the top.

‘I wonder if Gaara’s still up?’ He thought and decided to climb up to find out.

Walking up the stairs, he was disappointed in how many doors there were and how…plain it seemed. He could rationalize the doors, with so much sand blowing about, they must be needed to keep it out, but the lack of windows was another thing all together. Finally he came to a door that had the title, Kazekage, engraved on a small brass nameplate tacked to it. He was about to knock, when the door just opened up, granting him access.

Gaara was seated at his desk, buried behind piles of paperwork, but not as much as Tsunade was, or even the Sandaime.

“Naruto-san.” Gaara’s voice was deeper than he had remembered, despite just having met with him a week ago.

“Kazekage-sama.” Naruto replied out of instinct, not quite having adjusted to the shock of the last mission yet.

“Please, there is no need for such formalities between friends.”

“You sure? I thought that one of the perks of being a Kage was that everyone had to call you –sama all the time.” Naruto joked, trying to force his mind to ‘normal’.

For a while, Gaara was silent, just working on his work and Naruto just stood there, looking around the office, trying to imagine what his father would have looked like in it. It was harder than it looked, considering that he didn’t even know what his father looked like.

“So, can you tell me why you are staying up so late? It’s not like you have to remain awake anymore, so why not get some sleep?” Naruto posed.

“It’s just a habit. I used to spend the night by myself, and although it hurt at first, I eventually grew to enjoy the time I spent at night. Everything is much quieter and cooler at night. But that doesn’t matter anymore, since Jiraiya-sama fixed my seal. The real question is why aren’t you sleeping?”

Naruto sighed and closed his eyes, deep in thought.

“We just completed the second part of your exam, and I must say, pretty ingenious of you to pose information on our own team as classified information.”

“I suppose it is, but you still haven’t answered my question, if you passed, then you will need all of your strength to pass tomorrow.” Gaara still hadn’t raised his head away from his paper work.

“No, I suppose it doesn’t. I’m just shocked. I had always wondered who my father was, if Kaa-san knew him, or if he was still alive. When I got older, I began to suspect that it was the Sandaime Kazekage, but to see it written down like that…it just became so…concrete, like there was no longer this possibility that he was still alive out there somewhere, there was no more mystery left in my search. It’s just a lot to process at once, and I’ve never been good at handling large stuff like this.”

“I’m sorry for you to have to find out this way, when we were gathering the data; we assumed that you knew about the Sandaime.”

“There’s no need to apologize, Gaara. I said that I suspected it; it’s just the finality of it, is all. Every time I close my eyes, I keep trying to picture what he looked like, what I am supposed to look like. Kaa-san always described me has having her eyes and brown hair, but that doesn’t help me much. I can’t even imagine what he looked like, and yet I have this want, this urge to go avenge his death.”

Gaara stopped writing and looked at his friend, his first and probably best friend.

“If you want, I can show you a painting of the Sandaime, I’m sorry, but his things have long since been lost or destroyed. All that remains of him are his painting and statue.”

“Yeah, I’d like that.”

The two exited the office and headed to the room where the council of Suna would meet. Along the wall were statues of all the previous Kazekage’s, from the Shodai Kazekage, who had a mask over his face, just like Kakashi-sensei wore. To the balding Nidaime, who only had hair falling down his back. Then he came to it. The statue of his father, the Sandaime. He had spiky hair that fanned out in front and fell down in back. He had a strong face and flat jaw line, something that Naruto actually thought he shared. The statues were all the same height, so there was no way to tell if he was tall or short, but he seemed like a man who was confident in what he did, and could do it well.

Gaara directed Naruto to a door at the far end of the room.

“This is the closest thing to peace than the Kazekage can get, it’s also where we hand the paintings of those that have come before us.”

When he stepped in, Naruto could feel a sense of calm that persisted throughout the room, it was quiet, but had numerous windows that gave a view to the busy streets below. Hanging on the wall were four pictures, each of a man wearing the same blue and white robes. His gaze was drawn to the third portrait. Indeed, the man had a dark brown hair that defied gravity in front, and bowed to it as it receded down his head. His skin tone was darker than Naruto’s, but it was obviously a tan. Though he couldn’t see too many similarities, Naruto still found a connection between them.

“I don’t know how much more you care to learn tonight, but there are a couple of things I wish to discuss with you before your examination.” Gaara broke the moment, but it was needed. Naruto knew that he easily would’ve sat in that room all night, just staring at his father’s face.

Once back in Gaara’s office, Naruto sat down and took the water he was offered.

“Seeing as you are his son, you are automatically considered a citizen of Sunagakure. Any time you wish to enter, you can, no questions asked. Secondly, you are entitled to all the information we have on your father’s death. It shall be provided at the end of the exam. Unfortunately, all of the Sandaime’s possessions have been lost or destroyed, so I cannot pass them on to you, but you and your mother are entitled some money for the widows and children of deceased ninja, should you so desire. That is all of the official business, though I do have one more thing to ask of you.” Gaara went down his mental list calmly, but when he came to the final item, became a bit hesitant.

“Oh, and what would that be?”

“As the Kazekage, I would like to make you an honorary shinobi of Suna, not because of your heritage, but because of what you have given me and my family. You wouldn’t be forced to take missions or any other responsibilities of a normal shinobi, but you would be allowed more freedom if you returned here.”

Naruto was a bit struck. He had never thought that he might be given the opportunity to become a shinobi of two different nations, even if one was honorary.

“So I would be able to come and go as I please? I’m assuming that I wouldn’t need to pass a chuunin exam again, right?” Receiving a snort and a nod from Gaara, Naruto continued to contemplate the decision. “Yeah, I’d like that. Even if I am a Konoha shinobi, it’s nice to think that I’m somehow living up to him, even if it is only this.”

He took the Suna hitai ate that Gaara offered him, and looked at the shiny metal.

“It’s been a long night, Naruto, you need to get your sleep, or else you might not make it through the third exam.” Gaara was trying to get back to his work, something he found hard to do around the half blond.

Realizing that his friend was right, Naruto pocketed his new headband, and thanked Gaara for showing him the painting of his father before leaving. By the time he got back to his room, the clock read 4:00 am, he had spent an hour and a half just walking and talking with Gaara. This time sleep came easily to him, not some fleeting object that dangled out of reach like before. Tomorrow was the final test of these chuunin exams, and if he didn’t get a month to prepare, it wouldn’t surprise him. But no matter, he would be ready for whatever, or whoever came his way.

The day after Naruto’s meeting with Gaara was as pleasant as could be expected for Suna, hot and windy, but at least it wasn’t humid. Sasuke woke before Naruto, still unaware of his brother’s discovery. Naruto hadn’t told anyone about it, and it was obvious that something was bothering him, but Sasuke knew that Naruto would deal with it, better than he could. He looked at Naruto, who was still sleeping, before getting up and checking his gear for the day. Naruto woke up half an hour later, just enough time to check his own belongings, before they went to meet up with Tenten.

They met up with the brunette outside of the room she shared with Shizune and Sakura, both of whom would be otherwise engaged today. Their teammate was waiting, her two wakizashi, which were hidden away in a scroll yesterday, were once again attached to her back, and looked ready for action. The three headed for the meeting point, eager to get the third portion of the exam underway.

They got there early enough, and weren’t surprised to see the Cloud team already there. They seemed none the worse for wear and eyed the leaf shinobi wearily. Soon they were joined by another team, the lone team remaining from Suna, who seemed to be a bit tired, but uninjured. If he had to venture a guess, Sasuke would have assumed they got back in around two or three in the morning. There was only a little bit of time left before noon, and only three teams had passed. This got almost every team wondering about how hard the last part had been, as well as the skill level of their competition. As the final seconds were counting down to noon, what would surely be the final team arrived, they were from Iwa, and Naruto recognized them as the group that had been sneering at them before the first exam started.

“Now that you are all here, we will go over the set up for this portion of the exam. The final portion will consist of three team fights. The fights will be chosen by the drawing of lots, and will take place in two weeks exactly. As usual, they will be held in front of the various daimyos and other regional leaders, as well as the Kazekage and Hokage. The only way to win is to disable or kill all three members of the opposing team. Even if there is only one member of your team left, they will be declared the winners.”

One by one, each team was called forward and withdrew a slip of paper with a number on it, which would place the remaining twelve genin. The first match would be between the team from the Sand, and the Cloud team. This meant that Naruto and company would face the Rock team, something of a grudge match. The real pain of the situation was they only had two weeks to get ready.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The team had spent the first four days doing nothing but practicing their teamwork, an area that was still a bit weak, especially compared to what they were used to on their old teams. Slowly but steadily they progressed, to the point where they became highly skilled at anticipating each others moves and keeping out of the way. Their workout today had been productive, and they had agreed that after this session, they should work on techniques that they may need. Sasuke had left to send a letter to Haku, something he hadn’t gotten out of the habit of, no matter how short a time it had been since he had last seen her. This left Tenten alone with Naruto, something she was looking forward to greatly.

“Hey, Naruto, you wanna go get some lunch? We’ve been working really hard, aren’t you hungry at all?” She asked innocently enough.

“Sure, it is really hot out. What are you in the mood for?”

“I don’t care really, how about somewhere out of the sun? Oh, I know! I saw this little seafood place around the block.”

“Ok, sounds good to me.” Naruto agreed. As hot and windy as Suna was, they actually weren’t that far from a small body of water, even though they were in the capitol, they managed a constant supply of fish and other marine food stuffs. The restaurant was surprisingly empty when they got there, though neither could figure out why. They ordered some food, which arrived quickly enough and then got to discussing different things.

“Well, you’ve seen how Sasuke acts around Haku, it’s not that I don’t want a girlfriend, but I’m just not sure who would be interested in me.” Somehow the topic of conversation had gotten to Naruto’s lack of a girlfriend.

“Well, why don’t you tell me what kind of girl you would look for, and I’ll tell you if I know of anyone who fits that description.”

“I dunno, I guess I would be attracted to someone who doesn’t make assumptions…probably someone who’s pretty strong, not just physically, but mentally, oh, I’d rather date someone who’s smart, not like those fan girls back in the academy.”

Internally, Tenten was grinning like a Cheshire cat! ‘I’m open minded! I’m smart, heck, I’m better at strategy than he is, and I am most definitely NOT a fan girl!’

While the weapons mistress had been gloating, Naruto had returned to his fish, and was eating happily, when a new presence entered the building.

“Ah, Tenten, I wondered if I would see you.” The voice came from the entryway, and was easily recognized.

“Neji! What are you doing here? I didn’t think you’d be here this quick.”

“We weren’t, but the clan council decided to join us on our vacation, so we had to leave earlier, so we could make arrangements for them.” He moved out of the incoming light, and stepped towards their table. Naruto noticed that Hinata was with him, probably so he could act as her body guard.

“Hello, Naruto-kun, Tenten.” Her voice was soft, but held a hidden edge, that was directed at Tenten by the way she locked eyes with the other girl.

“Neji! Hinata-chan, nice to see you! How is your vacation going?” Naruto asked, moving over so that the Hyuugas could sit down.

“It’s been about half a day, Naruto; we can’t really make a decision on that.” Neji corrected.

“Well, there’s got to be something you can make a decision on, isn’t there?”

“Well, it isn’t as peaceful as we would have hoped, what with the council following us now.” Hinata spoke up, alternating between watching Naruto, and shooting death glares at Tenten, who seemed to have discovered the wonders of the boy as well, and was trying to make a move.

“If the council is here, and your family is here, than who’s back in Konoha?” Tenten asked, keeping her eyes on Hinata.

“Well, it’s not the entire council, only the more senior members. I guess they just wanted the time off.” Neji filled in the blank.

From there on out, the conversation turned to the exams, what Naruto and Tenten thought about the competition and their chances. They also discussed the variations in the exams, for example, Neji and Hinata’s second chuunin exam, had been in Mist, and was almost entirely fighting, both as a team and individually. When Tenten brought up the second exam, Naruto stiffened ever so slightly, something that both Hyuuga’s caught immediately.

“Was it really difficult?” Hinata asked, more to Naruto than Tenten, first off because she wanted to talk with her crush, and secondly because she was worried about him. That stiffening a moment ago, was a sign of something he didn’t want to talk about, and, being the loving girl she is, Hinata wanted him to talk about it.

“It wasn’t that hard, we had to run for a while, and then take out some chuunin and a jounin, but it was fine. We had to copy the information that Suna had gathered on ourselves, as part of a mission. They said that I was a probably one of the most skilled weapons users in the past twenty years, but noted that I did have a weakness when it came to people with wind nature chakra. Luckily, Naruto-kun here, fixed that for me. What did it say about you, Naruto?” Tenten was once again trying to rub the fact that she was spending time with the boy, in Hinata’s face.

Naruto just shrugged. “Not much, it was pretty out dated, nothing since I went with Jiraiya.” Obviously this was a lie, but he just didn’t want to spill the beans on his heritage just yet.

Eventually Naruto convinced Neji that they should go looking for Sasuke, who was ‘probably still writing his love note to Haku, despite having an hour and a half head start’. Never one to miss a chance to mess with his rival, Neji agreed, and after receiving assurances from Hinata that she would be fine by herself, the boys left the restaurant.

“So…you’re here for ‘vacation’ are you?” Tenten asked sarcastically.

“Yes, we are. The trips been booked for weeks, if you’re implying that I’m only here to see Naruto-kun, than you need to get a grip on reality. Besides, if you don’t watch out, you may end up costing him a chance at chuunin.”

“I’d never do that to Naruto-kun!”

“Tough words, coming from someone who has problems with a bit of wind!” Hinata was firing on all cylinders now.

“Well at least I’ve got the guts to ask him out; you just stand behind trees and stalk him!”

The two just glared at each other, neither retreating nor giving an inch. This was a war, and would be fought until one was dead…or at the very least, so ugly that no one would want to date her. The tension was nearly palpable, when both just turned on their heels and walked away.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The remaining time before the exam was spent training on individual techniques and some strategy. When they were done, either Tenten and/or Hinata would try and hang around with Naruto as much as possible, always trying to out do each other in their own twisted attempt to gain affection. Finally the day of the fight came around and all three members felt prepared.

There was a large crowd, just like before, with Daimyos and other important people were in attendance, along with the Hokage and Kazekage. The Hyuuga main family was in attendance as well, though they were trying to be discreet about their presence.

“Welcome to the chuunin exam. We have four teams that best exemplify the qualities of a chuunin. They will fight in three team matches. The only means of victory are to incapacitate or kill all three members of the opposing team. The first match-up is between Sunagakure and Kumogakure.” Gaara’s voice had the entire crowd silent, as he began the fights.

The six ninja just stared each other down in anticipation of the fight that was about to begin. The jounin who would be refereeing the matches gave the order to begin the fight and the action…was barely on. Actually, all of the six ninja just stood there, the Sand shinobi were waiting for the first move to be made, while the Cloud ninja just stood there looking bored, their arms crossed over their chests. Suddenly, the blonde kunoichi just turned around and walked to the edge of the arena and sat down.

“This isn’t worth my time, you two finish the fight.” Her voice was harsh, but full of confidence as she just leaned back and closed her eyes.

The boys on her team just turned to the sand team and drew their respective swords. However, the brown haired boy with the nodachi just pointed the blade at the other team, before a surge of lightning struck the Sand ninja he was pointing at, not killing him, but knocking him out, painfully. The other boy, who had two butterfly swords drawn, charged at the two remaining ninja, who were shocked at the speed of the first attack and was able to slash the side of one of the two remaining ninja, before the other even knew what happened. Though none of the sand ninja had been killed, the severity of the attacks were growing in intensity and the lone kunoichi knew she stood little chance if she were to fight these two on her own. She had no choice but to surrender the fight and tend to her teammates.

The proctor called the match and signaled for the medics to take the two injured boys away.

The two remaining teams headed for the arena floor. They faced each other, the Rock ninja constantly glaring at the leaf shinobi, but for their part, Naruto, Sasuke and Tenten kept their cool. Immediately after the start of the match, the Rock ninja decided it would be a good idea to try and mock the leaf ninja. The main problem with this was that all three Konoha shinobi had performed a short series of hand seals and disappeared.

Instantly the Iwa ninja were on guard, but weren’t fast enough to avoid being pulled underneath the earth to their necks.

“Here we thought you would’ve seen that coming.” Naruto mocked, crouching down to pat the kunoichi on her head.

“You idiots! Did you really think that this is going to hold us? We’re freakin’ Rock ninja, we thrive on earth jutsu!” With that, all three rock ninja disappeared into the ground, leaving the leaf ninja at the disadvantage.

At this, Naruto and Sasuke broke into identical smirks as the half blonde began to run through some hand seals. Unfortunately he was cut short, when a pair of hands grabbed the legs of the Konoha shinobi. They were quickly jerked downwards, until the ‘bodies’ all fell into a puddle of water, soaking their opponents.

“And there I would’ve though you’d see that coming.” Sasuke taunted from the team’s position on the arena wall.

The Iwa ninja were now rather angry, and were speaking in cuss words and vile gestures. Naruto took it upon himself to finish the fight now, so they could get on with their day. Waving his hand, three bolts of lightning discharged from his fingers and struck the wet rock ninja, who had the idea to raise a defense, but since lightning chakra is strong when compared to earth, they were all struck, causing a massive case of static build up, as well as unconsciousness.

“The team from Konoha wins.” The jounin once more motioned for the medics to take the losers away. “The next match will begin immediately.” The final two teams faced down each other without wavering.

Tenten was a bit worried, she knew something was off with this team, but she couldn’t figure out what. The two boys seemed strong enough, judging by their last performances, and yet they shied away from the blonde girl. There was obviously something about the girl that obviously scared her teammates, and if they were scared, then shouldn’t she be?

“Tenten, don’t worry too much, I already told you, I think we match up pretty well with these guys. Just stick with your man and don’t worry, you’re more than ready for this.” Naruto reassured the girl, who blushed heavily at being read so accurately, before she smiled back and steeled herself.

The Cloud team was eyeing their opponents just as hard as the Konoha team, and the males were feeling a bit nervous, seeing how the Rock ninja had been beaten at their own game. Meanwhile, the kunoichi was still feeling bored with the fight. Sure their opponents were strong, but she was the vessel for the Nibi no Nekomata, the two tailed cat demon. She was almost certain that they would win and honestly felt like she would just sit this one out again. Then, once her opponents were either defeated or dead, she would have to retrieve that Uchiha’s sharingan. It wouldn’t be easy, as the Hokage was in attendance, but Yugito was sure she could do it.

When the match was started, she gave orders to her teammates.

“Katsu, Hikaru, this is on you again, these nobodies bore me.” As she began to walk away, she was stopped by the sudden appearance of Naruto’s fist connecting with her face, throwing her back far beyond the line created by Sasuke and Tenten.

“Like hell you’ll sit this one out! I’m fighting you, and if you just sit there and take it, then where’s the fun?” The ever loud ninja shouted before giving chase.

Katsu and Hikaru were in shock, no one had dared fight Yugito by themselves, and no one they knew had ever moved that fast before. Before they could move to help out their teammate, they were forced to dodge a two sided assault from Sasuke and Tenten. They split the Kumo team apart even farther than before. So far their plan was working perfectly, now it was on each individual to perform to their abilities.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Tenten faced off against the red head with the two swords. The butterfly swords were an interesting design, with a single edge and a simple knuckle guard to protect the hands. There was also a small edge along the flat side of the blade for trapping other swords. Having not seen much from her opponent in the first fight, Tenten wasn’t sure what to expect, but she felt prepared.

“So which one are you? Katsu or Hikaru?” She asked, trying to get some kind of read on the boy.

“My name is Katsu, which is all you need to know for the purposes of this test. However, before we begin, I too would like to know your name.” Katsu had his blades held in a rudimentary defensive stance that Tenten instantly recognized and began to plan ways around.

“I’m Tenten.” Was her terse reply as she drew her wakizashis and prepared to fight.

The initial clash was short and surprisingly even. Katsu’s swords were only about a foot and a quarter long, while Tenten’s wakizashis were a foot and a half long. Usually this would be edge to Tenten, but it seemed that Katsu used his swords for defending, trying to pinch his opponents blades between his. The shorter blades made his defense much harder to penetrate, even with a wakizashi. Tenten used her blades more defensively than offensively too, and found a point where her blades gave her the perfect balance between offense and defense.

Once more the two clashed and once more the two came to an impasse. On the third pass, it was Katsu who ended up with a slice running from his waist to his shoulder. It wasn’t very deep, as he had been able to half heartedly block the slice, but it still stung and bleed heavily. Despite his wound, when Tenten made another pass at the injured boy, he was able to run his blade down hers, and land a deep cut to her left hand, rendering one of her swords useless.

Tenten jumped back and hissed in pain. She had only two choices either use just one sword, against an opponent who had an advantage defensively and still had two working arms, or go to long range. The choice wasn’t hard. She pulled a small scroll from her pouch and swiped some blood from her injured hand over the seals within. As each seal symbol was covered, a kunai popped into existence, ready for her to throw, which she did. Tenten’s first kunai flew at Katsu, who was forced to dodge the first projectile, before sensing another one flying at him. This one he blocked with his blades, along with the next one and the next one until he became fed up with this game.

Forming some hand seals, Katsu felt his chakra leach out into the air and begin to crackle.

“You should know not to use so much metal against a ninja with the power of lightning!” He nearly screamed something that was very un-chuunin like.

“Raikou dageki arashi!” (Lightning strike storm)

Just like the name suggested, a storm of lightning bolts seemed to fly from Katsu towards the mass of metal that Tenten had around her. She threw herself to the ground in an attempt to escape the onslaught, but wasn’t very successful. The bolt hit right behind her but the second bolt succeeded in connecting with her wakizashi on her back. She received very little of the shock, but it was enough to double her over so that the third bold struck dead on. Tenten could feel the heat generated from the bolt, along with the electricity and thought she would die from the intense pain. She fell to the ground once more, landing at the feet of her opponent, who stopped his attack and stepped forward to finish the fight. Tenten knew she only had one slip chance for an escape, since she could no longer form hand seals. She desperately reached for her other wakizashi and managed to grab the handle in enough time to deflect the incoming blow from above. The blade bit into the ground to the left of her head, after sliding down the length of her own weapon. Taking the opportunity to escape, she rolled on her side, away from Katsu and got just enough room to try and rise to her knee. What she had planned wouldn’t be useful if she were still on the ground.

“I’m impressed that you survived that attack, but no matter, you won’t last through another round.” Katsu was now boasting as he restarted his attack. Once again a hail of lightning bolts sped at Tenten, but this time she was prepared and held her once discarded wakizashi above her head.

Bolt after bolt crashed into the blade, yet Tenten never faltered or fell down. Over thirty lightning bolts impacted the sword, yet she held it as still as if she were in a calm breeze. Katsu was speechless; this girl had just used a sword to defeat an attack using electricity! He couldn’t figure out how this could be.

“It’s simple really, Naruto-kun is practically a seal master, so he put a seal on this blade that would neutralize any chakra that it came in contact with, even if it is in the form of lightning. Now, I think it’s time I ended this.” Taking one final kunai from her holster, Tenten threw the knife into the wall directly behind Katsu. She then held her hands out in front of her and suddenly a net of electricity sprang from the rings of her kunai, which had been strategically embedded in the ground to create a half circle going from the wall around Katsu and then intersecting the wall again. The final kunai acted as an anchoring point to tie all the lines above the boys head, cutting off all forms of escape.

“Interesting thing about chakra strings.” Tenten made a fist with her hands and pulled downward, crashing her lines into Katsu and shock him into a black out. “They can be formed into nature chakra strings very easily.” Having won her fight, Tenten slumped down along the wall next to Katsu’s prone body and tried desperately to stay conscious. In the end she failed and slipped into a deep sleep, but she trusted her teammates to win their fights.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

As soon as Sasuke had become separated from Tenten, his opponent drew his nodachi and once more tried to fire that lightning bolt from it. Sasuke was prepared and threw a kunai into the ground a few feet in front of his body, making the bolt miss.

Sasuke closed the distance between the two rapidly, removing the ability to summon lightning. Sasuke ducked under a horizontal swing from the long sword and landed a kick to the boy’s sternum. However, instead of sliding sideways like he had intended, the boy took the energy of the attack and leapt backwards as well. This left him once again in a position to use his sword as a means of physical attack. Again Sasuke charged and was able to avoid the arc of the blade, but when he connected with his opponent, the boy again jumped backwards.

“No matter if you avoid one strike; I have been trained in the art of this sword since before I could hold one. I will always be in position to strike again, almost instantly” This time the boy held his sword to the sky, in what Sasuke could only assume was a new attack. Sure enough, lightning struck the blade, but instead of dissipating, it clung to the steel, essentially creating a knock off of the Nidaime Hokage’s raijin sword. Sasuke eyed the boy, wondering what he would do. His opponent removed a small block of some kind of metal with his left hand, still holding his electrically imbued blade with his right.

“Now you will see why they call me Hikaru!” He threw the block at Sasuke, who was surprised at how slowly the projectile was coming at him, but moved to avoid it none the less. However, as the block passed by his position, Sasuke noticed the exploding note on the block, and it had just burned out! The explosion wasn’t large, in fact it was more like a fire, but since it was attached to the block, it immediately reacted with the metal, producing an extremely intense white light that threatened to blind Sasuke if he didn’t shelter his eyes. Feeling the wind from an incoming attack, Sasuke rolled to his side, eyes still closed, as the light was so intense that it penetrated through his eyelids. He instantly began to try and think of a strategy to save himself, but was having difficult time thinking and dodging. Having mastered his own nature manipulation, Sasuke released large balls of fire from his hands, hoping to force Hikaru to stop his wild attacks.

His tactic worked, and the brown haired brat was forced to leap backwards, allowing Sasuke to maneuver himself into the position he wanted. Hikaru noticed that, even though blinded, Sasuke’s moves weren’t random. In fact, the Uchiha’s moves were perfectly thought out, and placed in directly in front of the flare, sheltering his own eyes, but forcing Hikaru to look at the intense light. Having seen his opponent’s moves, Sasuke felt as if he knew what would happen, and he didn’t even need his sharingan. Deciding he would try and end this now, Sasuke pulled out a small scroll from his pouch and swiped a small amount of blood over the symbols, as was standard for summoning something. However, what he summoned was not an animal nor was in any kind of weapon that Hikaru had ever seen before. Sasuke held a very large sword, but it wasn’t a sword in the style of a katana or any other traditional sword design.

Sasuke’s sword was actually a claymore, a heavy blade that was nearly as tall as Sasuke. With the point firmly stuck in the soft ground, the gigantic weapon’s pommel stopped at shoulder level, which made the blade nearly three and a half feet long. The hilt was a simple cross that forked upwards, creating a V at the end of the fine blade. The entire thing was jet black, just like Sasuke's hair, though there were three points of color on the weapon. The pommel was a hollow ring, in which sat a blood red stone, nothing of value like a ruby or other precious gem, but a red stone, similar in color to the sharingan. At the ends of the hilts there were steel stars, forged exactly like a shuriken, but most interesting were the silver characters that seemed to be written into the blade at its base.

For such an awkwardly large weapon, Sasuke handled it with ease, hefting it so it was aimed directly at Hikaru.

“You use that sword because you aren’t very fast. You can conduct lightning through it and increase the speed of your attack, but as long as I can see your blade, I don’t have to worry about being hit.”

Hikaru smirked back. “That might be, but you can’t attack me with that oversized knife, the electricity will flow right through to you.”

“Actually, it won’t.” Sasuke disappeared in a blur, similar to a shunpo, but instead of a flash, when he reappeared, there was a sound like a building collapsing, and in that instant, his sword was locked with Hikaru’s nodachi, both of which were encased in crackling electricity. The Cloud ninja was thrown back from the compressed sound waves and Sasuke pressed his attack. Every slice of the great sword bit into the blade of the nodachi, despite the protective covering of lightning.

Hikaru found himself reeling from such a strong assault, but recovered enough, to drop a smoke bomb, obscuring his body for just a second, before the compression from Sasuke’s latest movements blew it away. In that time, Hikaru had leveled his nodachi at Sasuke and shot a bolt of lightning at the Uchiha. Not having time to dodge the attack, Sasuke channeled come chakra into his claymore, stopping the electricity, but causing another change altogether.

The fist of the silver characters dulled to black, and a gust of wind stopped the bolt of lightning before it even reached Sasuke. Trying again, Hikaru continued his blitzkrieg, only for all of his attacks to be halted by Sasuke, who would stop the bolts with his sword.

“It’s no use, no matter what technique you use on me, Kame Kawa (turtle shell) will stop it.”

“Impossible! You’re sword cannot be doing that, I must be in a genjutsu, there is no way you could have control over lightning, fire and wind!” Hikaru screamed, launching into his attack once more. Still, the great claymore’s created wind halted the lightning as if it were nothing.

“It is useless. It would take someone of far greater skill than yourself to get past my swords defense, and even if you did, it still has more tricks to unveil.”

“You lie! There is no way that is your sword doing that! KAI! KAI!” But no matter how many times he tried, Hikaru couldn’t dispel the illusion he was convinced he was trapped in. When he couldn’t break the Uchiha’s spell, Hikaru gathered all of his remaining chakra for one last attempt at victory. Running through a string of seals, Hikaru took a deep breath, before launching his attack.

“Katon: Mikon kasai!” (Fire type: Wild fire) The attack was immense and easily would be comparable to any fire technique that Sasuke knew before he had left with Jiraiya. But is was of little concern, as the massive wave of fire drew closer, Sasuke just lifted his sword again and slashed at the fire. To the audience’s astonishment, a giant burst of steam covered the battle area, before it was blown away by a gust of wind. Sasuke stood easily, Kame Kawa resting by his side, and a very winded Hikaru was on his knees, gasping for breath.

“Impossible! You can’t use water techniques in a climate like this!” He accused between breaths of air, all thoughts of victory gone from his mind.

“That may be, but my sword can.”

“How?” The simple question was not an easily answered one, but Sasuke thought he would try and answer.

“My family has created a new form of weapons, based on the legendary zanpakuto of the shinigami. The zanpakuto were legendary weapons of destruction that were said to be living beings with souls of their own. While the only ‘true’ zanpakuto belongs to Jiraiya-sensei, my brother, my mother and I each have our own zanpakutos with their own special features. Like the legend, each has two stages that can be released, though we have yet to find an occasion to use them, and I will not release Kame Kawa’s true form for anyone besides Itachi.”

“So what is your weapons ‘feature’?” The dead tired boy asked.

“I thought that would have been obvious by now. Kame Kawa’s shikai (initial release) will automatically release an attack that is of a stronger chakra nature than what I am facing. It does it faster than a ninja can with hand seals, and it used less chakra.”

“That’s nice…” Hikaru was so tired from chakra exhaustion that he seemed delusional and by the time he was done, he had passed out onto his stomach. Sasuke just sealed his sword and headed off to find Tenten.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

When Naruto had picked a fight with Yugito, he knew she was different, and it was possible that she was a jinchuriki as well, though he wasn’t sure. Her reflexes were superb and she was very quick to top it off.

“You are signing your own death certificate by fighting me; I am in the top ten percent of the shinobi in Kumo.”

“Honestly, I don’t care. I don’t even want to fight unless I have to; I just wished to talk with you. I noticed that your teammates don’t like being around you. Any reason why?”

“What’s it to you if my teammates are weak?”

“Not much, it’s just that when the Kazekage was in my last chuunin exam, his teammates were acting the same way, so I was thinking you might be in the same boat.”

Yugito’s eyes narrowed at the accusation. If there was one thing she didn’t like, it was being compared to people who were weaker than herself. She charged the boy who had dare fight her. Her movements were fast and furious, but it seemed that no matter what she did, Naruto would always evade her flailing limbs.

“You’re fast, I’ll give you that, but there’s no way you can keep up with me once I get serious.” She boasted, before pumping some chakra to her limbs and dashing forward. Her use of chakra had also formed some claws on her hands, and she managed to put a couple of slices in Naruto’s shirt, but was still unable to land a true hit. Growing steadily angrier, she kept charging the annoying brat, wasting more chakra than was necessary, but still not landing a hit.

‘No matter what I do, I can’t touch him! What is his secret?’ Thoughts along those lines kept running through her head, until it became too much, and she seemed to snap.

“Stay still so I can cut you!”

“Hmm…I don’t know…getting cut could hurt…so I think I’ll keep moving.” He replied, taunting the girl.

That comment did it for Yugito. She began to call upon the chakra of her demon, and she felt the changes begin to occur. Recognizing the problems this might raise, Naruto pulled out a scroll and summoned his own weapon, a scythe. The handle was a dark brown and had a bright blade at the top. There were silver characters; similar to the ones on Sasuke’s sword at the juncture of the blade and the staff and upon his command, the first of these characters went dark. Instantly, there appeared a multitude of white symbols over the shaft of the scythe. He bit his thumb and whipped a bit of blood on the flat of the blade, before he began to twirl the weapon over his head.

“Kokuangyō no Jutsu.” (Bringer of Darkness technique) With that done, Naruto held his weapon in a defensive stance as a thick impervious darkness enclosed both fighters, hiding the two from view.

The sudden darkness was a surprise for Yugito, and even with her demonically heightened senses, she was pressed to see anything. She had finished her transformation, a dark red fire now covered her body, and she took the appearance of a cat. Her claws were ready to rip into the annoying boy, but she couldn’t see him now. She could easily hear him, and smell him, but instead of only one brat, there were ten and each was more identical than the last.

“So I was right, you are like Gaara as well as myself for what it’s worth.” The voice came from all ten boys, making it impossible to pick out the real one.

Yugito recognized the importance of the boy’s words, it was fairly common knowledge amongst the shinobi villages, that the Kazekage was a jinchuriki, but if this boy was one as well, than he undoubtedly held a stronger demon than her own. She may have been brash and easily angered, but Yugito was not stupid by any means. The demonic chakra stopped flowing and she reverted back to herself.

“So you too hold a demon, huh?”

“Yep, my names Mitarashi Naruto, the vessel for the Kyuubi no Kitsune, nice to meet you.”

“There is no way I can beat you, Naruto-san, I only have two tails, and I you have nine. The only thing for me to do is forfeit.”

“I suppose I’ll have to accept that, but before I let this go, I want to meet with you sometime before you leave for Kumo. I don’t know if you were aware, but there’s an organization that’s after people like us.”

Yugito nodded. She had heard of Akatsuki and knew that they were strong fighters. She might be strong but she wasn’t sure if she was strong enough to deal with S-class missing ninja.

“Can we meet tonight? We will be leaving late tomorrow, and I do not wish to look suspicious to my comrades.”

Naruto just nodded and dropped his genjutsu. When the two fighters came back into focus, Yugito made her forfeit official and walked over to collect her fallen teammates.

“Winner of the Chuunin exam final tournament, Mitarashi Naruto, Uchiha Sasuke, and Tenten!” The jounin announced to the crowd, to thunderous applause.

Yugito walked through the dark streets of Suna, en route to her meeting with Naruto. The boy was weird, she would admit, but a capable fighter and certainly crafty enough to be a ninja. Throw in the fact that he was a jinchuriki as well, and Yugito was intrigued by the boy. She climbed up a wall and leapt onto an open ledge where the leaf ninja was supposed to be. He was there, but he wasn’t alone. The Kazekage stood with him, talking like they were old friends.

“I figured it wouldn’t hurt if all three of us were here. Besides, we all have the same kind of problems or at least we will if things don’t change soon.” Naruto read the look off her face before she could even before she could voice her complaint.

“It is nice to meet you, outside of the exams.” Gaara extended his hand in greeting and was a bit shocked when the girl reciprocated and shook his hand. The Kazekage knew that the kunoichi was strong minded and detested people she considered weaker than herself.

“Well I don’t know about you guys, but I figure we should get this done with.” Naruto was watching for anyone walking about this time of night.

“This is about the Akatsuki, right?”

“Yeah, I don’t know how much info you and your villages have, but as I think we should share. We might not have anything other than the demons in common, but that’s still enough of a reason for me.” This was directed more at Yugito, as Naruto felt that he and Gaara held a strong bond already.

“I agree. I may have been trained by many different shinobi since I was young, but even I don’t wish to have to fight two S-rank criminals at once.” Yugito was a surprising ally, but hopefully one that could be trusted in the future.

“Very well, why don’t we take this inside, that way we can speak uninterrupted.” Gaara motioned towards his office. Already spread out on his desk were the appropriate files. Yugito looked around the room a bit in awe. The Raikage’s office wasn’t nearly as nice as this; it was much darker and seemed more cramped. Gaara just moved behind his desk and waited until the two sat down before he pushed the first file forward.

“Our information on the organization as a whole, it’s a bit below what I would have liked to see, but we just haven’t had the resources to put on a spy mission of this caliber.” The two visiting ninja looked over the information; it was a vague and speculative but solid and was confirmed by everything that Naruto knew. The only new information was a possible location of their base, mostly based off of a number of disappearances in the region between the Fire and Sand nation. Gaara pushed another folder forward.

“Despite our status as a great power, we have produced few ninja worthy of S class status, at least in the past twenty years or so. Therefore, if there were a member of Akatsuki from Suna, this is my bet.

“Akasuna no Sasori.” Naruto’s voice wasn’t any different than usual, but even Yugito could tell that he was a bit uncomfortable. “At least it’s convenient.”

Yugito shot him a look of bewilderment, but he just shrugged it off and then pulled a book from his pouch.

“This is what I’ve been able to assemble, mostly though Jiraiya, but he’s the closest thing to an expert on the organization that you could get without being a member. “As far as Konoha goes, we only have one confirmed member, Sasuke’s older brother Itachi, but there are still four members we haven’t confirmed with a hundred percent accuracy. We had another one, but then Orochimaru left the organization, around the same time as Itachi left Konoha. What we know for sure is that they seem to go through members on a pretty frequent basis, that’s one of the reasons that we don’t know the exact members for sure. Besides Itachi, there’s Hoshigaki Kisame, a former member of the seven swordsmen of the Mist. There’s Sasori and his partner, Deidara a Rock ninja who specializes in explosives. There this guy named Zetsu, but we don’t know anything about him, even where he’s from he doesn’t work with anyone, at least, as far as we know. The final pair, which is the one we aren’t a hundred percent on, is a guy from Takigakure named Kakuzu. Once again, we don’t know much, but our best estimate is that he’s right in the middle in term of strength, more than likely fifth. His partner is from some unknown village or country and goes by the name Hidan. Once again, we don’t know anything about him, so it’s all guess work. As for the last two, we have absolutely nothing, they haven’t been seen or heard from, and if it weren’t for the fact that someone has to be leading the ninja, we wouldn’t even know they existed.

As for motive behind them, we don’t have much. Since they’re capturing the demons and their hosts, it’s easy to see that they need the power for whatever they’re doing. If they need that much power, than it’s probably some kind of take over the world thing.”

“What’s the point of capturing jinchuriki if all they need are their powers? Wouldn’t it be easier if they just convinced us to join their side?” Yugito asked; this new information was an eye opener.

“Well, all we have is a story that one of Jiraiya’s old students told him. Apparently at a time before the biju were being sealed up, there was a ‘hidoi yajuu’ or great beast that was even more powerful than the demons we have. It was rumored to have untold power and be impossible to defeat or kill in any way. Suddenly, some time around three hundred and fifty to four hundred years ago, it just vanished and the first records of biju appeared in human history. Now, this story goes that the beast was suppressed, not killed, by a number of its weaker minions who had grown tired of being subservient to this beast. I think that those servants somehow became the biju, and I think I may even know how. If the biju sealed parts of the beast within themselves, then to revive the beast, the Akatsuki would need the biju and not their hosts.”

Yugito and Gaara were captivated by the boy’s tale which, if true, would spell immeasurable trouble for the shinobi world.

“How many demons do they have?” Gaara was the first to find a question to ask.

“Only three right now, but we know for a fact that they are increasing their pace. Jiraiya’s informants have alluded to increased sightings of the members and we can only assume that they will be coming after you two soon.” Naruto was shocked when both took the information in stride and didn’t even bat an eyelash.

“Well, that’s to be expected, so any guesses on who they’ll send after us?” This time Yugito seemed to be more interested.

“No, and I’d rather not speculate too much. That way if I’m wrong you haven’t prepared for the wrong people, you should be ready for anyone and anything”

The conversation continued on for a while, well into the early morning/late night hours. Eventually the two visiting ninja went back to their rooms and prepared for their departures later the next day.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

“…and your informant is sure that the Nibi and Kyuubi jinchuriki are leaving tomorrow?”

“Yes, the Konoha team is leaving with the Hokage and the Cloud team is by themselves. There is the small matter of the Hyuuga’s remaining, but they should be of little importance.”

“Even so, we need not get into a fight where one or more of the legendary sannin are near. Undoubtedly Jiraiya has been floating around Suna as well. Konoha is very protective of that boy. If the four of you were to leave today, you should arrive in two days. I want the Shukaku and Nibi now; that will make our plans go much smoother later on.”

The four shadowy figures just nodded their heads and blurred out of existence.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The entire contingent of Konoha shinobi, minus the Hyuuga delegation were back on the road to Konoha and in were actually accompanied, albeit loosely, by the Kumo shinobi, who were taking their losses rather well. The arrangement was actually something of a surprise, as the jounin that had accompanied them had been called back to Kumo earlier yesterday, leaving his team to make it back on their own, or in this case, with the Konoha shinobi. There was talking about Cloud’s new Raikage, the previous one having died a few years ago, so new was a relative term. A day had passed since they had left the small enclave in the desert and nearly half of this day was gone when the convoy stopped in light of the sun and heat.

Part way through the small lunch they troupe was having, Naruto’s head suddenly picked up and his eyes immediately snapped back towards Suna. Sasuke and Jiraiya recognized the sign of a marked kunai being thrown, though they didn’t know how Suna seemed to get their hands on one. In reality, Naruto had given both Gaara and Yugito a hiraishin kunai that they were to throw if they were ever in need of help or if they ran into Akatsuki. Obviously Gaara was being visited by the organization and either needed help or had pressing information.

“Akatsuki’s after Gaara – I’m taking Sakura – watch out for another attack.” His words were very tense and spoken very rapidly and before anyone had realized it, the all but promoted chuunin had grabbed the young medic by her arm and began to sprint off into the desert back towards Suna. What the assembled group couldn’t see, was the concentration that spread over Naruto’s face as black sand began to seemingly appear from nowhere and form a tunnel of coils before obscuring the two retreating figures from view in a shell of iron and then shooting off towards the village at a steep trajectory.

By creating a magnetic field in the coils, Naruto was able to pull a projectile made of the iron sand to the center of a coil and then switch it off, before pulling the projectile to the next coil. He had created a coil gun, which was very useful for throwing weapons, but here he had used it to create a much faster way of travel for the two ninja, one of which was still in shock from the experience.

“Sakura, there are S-ranked criminals attempting to abduct Gaara, and I need you to help out when we get injured.”

Sakura instantly knew how serious the situation was, never before had Naruto alluded to the fact that he would assuredly sustain injury from a fight, the boy always left some room in his wording, lest he become injured.

“But…but…S-rank? We can’t handle S-rank criminals! They’re nearly Kage level!” Sakura tried arguing with her abductor/teammate, but was overruled considering that they were already hurtling back to Sunagakure.

“Probably not, but then again, we don’t have a choice. These guys are after Gaara and Yugito and sooner or later they’ll be after me, so we decided we’d band together and help each other.”

The medic just nodded not entirely sure of the connection between the three, but she realized that it must be serious if three ninja as strong as Naruto and Gaara were being hunted. She watched as a small hole appeared in their sphere of metal and the ground began to quickly approach. Her eye’s widened as their carrier plummeted towards the sand below but was amazed as the speed began to slowly drop, until she felt their downward speed stop completely, just before they were pulled through another series of coils.

“How much longer do you think this’ll take?” Sakura turned and asked her teammate, hoping for a short reply as her stomach couldn’t take much more acceleration. But as her head turned, it wasn’t her teammate that she saw, at least as she knew him. The boy standing with her in the steel cocoon was far more determined than she had ever seen him and had a glint in his dark eyes that was foreign to her. The most puzzling change was that he had just finished tying his new Suna head band to his forehead, removing his worn Leaf symbol and placing it in his pocket. The cloth was a dark red as opposed to the usual black or blue and although it didn’t stand out much, to the citizens of Suna, it marked him as an honorary ninja, one who had the friendship and support of the Kazekage.

“It’ll still be a little bit, at least another couple hours.” He saw her eyes sweep upward to his new accessory and answered the question before she asked it. “Gaara asked me to become an honorary Suna shinobi…turns out that my father was one, so I’m automatically a citizen.”

Now, Sakura was never dumb by any standard, so it was only natural that she figured out Naruto’s secret.

“Sandaime Kazekage is your father…isn’t he? I remember, during the first chuunin exams, your mom told me that she thought the satetsu was part of you, even before you were born…I guess I just never put that together until now.” The only confirmation she got was a nod before she felt the bottom of her stomach fall with her descent again.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

As quickly as Naruto had disappeared, everyone’s eyes focused on Sasuke, asking for an answer, which for once, he didn’t have.

“What? Don’t look at me like that! I don’t know what the hell that was about, but he felt the pulse from a hiraishin kunai, probably from Suna. Why they would have a kunai or who has one I don’t have a clue so don’t ask me.” Sasuke’s revelation started an explosion of questions that began to fly around until Yugito was able to raise her voice loud enough to be heard.

“I KNOW WHAT HAPPENED!” Almost instantly everyone shut up and looked at the blonde. Seeing that she had their attention the kunoichi continued. “Naruto gave the Kazekage and I one of those kunai and told us that if we ever had problems involving Akatsuki, we should throw them and he’d be there as fast as he could. Gaara must have thrown his.”

“So that’s what he meant when he said ‘watch out’.” Jiraiya muttered before looking to Tsunade for confirmation. The Hokage gave her silent agreement and began to herd the other ninja towards Konoha while Jiraiya began to head towards Suna to assist in any way possible. Shizune helped to push everyone towards the village while Tenten and the boys of the cloud team were trying to figure out what was happening.

“Not to sound dumb or anything, but why are we running and who is the Akatsuki?” The weapons mistress asked as she pulled up to Sasuke, but it wouldn’t be the Uchiha who answered.

“The Akatsuki are a group of S-class missing ninja who have committed grievous injustices against their home villages. What they are planning is a mystery and we only have information on about 78 percent of the organization. We do know that they are after a select group of ninja who all had similar upbringings…” Tsunade gave just enough information to answer the question, but keep Yugito and Naruto’s past secret. The information had its intended results as Tenten became quiet and picked her pace up

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto and Sakura were still hurtling through air when finally the village came into view as a jutting wall of rock on the horizon. Using one more acceleration coil, the two found themselves at the entrance to Suna and the entrance to the fight as well. Gaara was battling a ninja with blond hair that was falling over the ninja’s left eye and then was pulled into a pony tail in the back. Judging by the explosions rocking the air around the fight, that was Deidara and so Sasori would be around somewhere. Sure enough, there was the scorpion fighting against an old woman that caused Sakura to inhale sharply.

“That’s Chiyo-sama! She’s one of the most respected people in Suna, what’s she doing fighting?” The old women seemed to be holding her own, but her age was obviously hindering her and she was visibly wearing down. Naruto was descending as fast as was safe to and could do nothing but watch as Sasori was able to push the elder women into the stone surrounding the village. The pair was still a good ways up in the air and a good ways away from the action, so no one had noticed the large black sphere shooting towards the fight yet, but not for long. Sasori’s tail shot towards the white haired lady and there was nothing Naruto or Sakura could do to stop the stinger except reveal themselves and hope that the shock was enough to buy some time. Using the material of the shell, Naruto’s satetsu began to plummet towards the ground in an attempt to immobilize Sasori’s puppet, though he couldn’t see where the criminal was hiding, so the best he could do was stop the puppet.

Thankfully the tactic worked and the rain of metal was enough to stop the tail in its tracks and allowed just enough time for the landing of the pair. Sakura instantly ran to Chiyo’s side and began to help the venerable women, checking her over for injuries and making sure she hadn’t been poisoned as was common with puppeteers. While she was checking her ‘patient’, Naruto had set to work demolishing the immobile chunk of wood with a fast rasengan to the body. Not surprising to the boy, a similarly cloaked figure leapt from the wreckage and stood up to eye his opponent, though it was a figure of speech, seeing as there was a dark cover over Sasori’s upper body.

“Konoha’s other jinchuriki…this day became more interesting.” Sasori’s comments reached the ears of the women, though only Chiyo realized their implications, Sakura was wondering what the puppeteer meant. Naruto picked up on the word other, but didn’t pry he just watched in fascination as Sasori removed the cover over his face.

For someone who had been alive for a good long while, Sasori didn’t look a day over seventeen or eighteen. His hair was a violent red, something reminiscent of a flame, and his eyes were a golden brown color. While he was probably a heart-throb on the level of Sasuke when he was in Suna, he now had a look on his face that was pure, unwavering hatred.

“You destroyed my favorite puppet and though I cannot forgive you, I am interested, how did you know that I was inside?”

“There were no chakra strings coming from anywhere I could see, which would mean that they were hidden inside the body of your hunk of wood.” Naruto replied, still eying his opponent. While he didn’t look any worse for the wear, the trip and his constant use of electromagnetic forces took a toll on the teen.

‘Crap, I probably don’t have anymore chakra than Sakura does right now! This isn’t going to be good, not that it was going to be easy before.’ He began to think about a plan, though he was throwing out nearly as many as he was coming up with.

Thankfully Sasori was taking the battle more cautiously than normal. After seeing the damage that the rasengan could cause, along with the fact that the kid seemed to have control over the satetsu, Sasori knew this was a horrid match up for him. His grandmother might not be a large threat, but this jinchuriki…he would be problematic.

“Sakura, you need to help Gaara when you are done, I can take things from here.” Naruto’s words were forceful, he didn’t need her and Gaara could use the help if the raining sand particles were an indication.

“But-“ Sakura was cut off by her teammate.

“No, I have almost every advantage and Gaara will probably need some help, if not medical attention. Besides, since Chiyo-sama is Sasori’s grandmother, she knows him better and what he’s likely to do.” Sakura hadn’t known of Chiyo’s relation and in light of that bit of information, decided to listen to Naruto.

Not for the first time today, Sasori was impressed at the knowledge the jinchuriki had. It wasn’t common knowledge that the highly respected Chiyo had raised him when his parents had died, heck, he doubted if most of the council knew that, making Naruto’s acknowledgement even more interesting. That was when he noticed it, Naruto’s head band. The red cloth wasn’t distinguishing, after all that pink haired girl’s cloth was red too, but if you coupled red cloth with the Suna emblem, well then there was only one possible explanation.

‘So, he’s the recognized son of a Kazekage…but Sandaime never had any kids and he’s the last person to use the iron sand…must be Orochimaru’s work.’ Sasori’s thoughts only made him more intent on getting the boy’s body for a puppet if he could, although being a vessel, the extraction of the fox would leave only a miniscule opening to make a puppet.

Naruto had enough waiting and upon seeing Sakura head towards Gaara decided to begin the fight in earnest.

“Satetsu Shigure! (Iron Sand Drizzle) The adrenaline increase had caused Naruto to shout out his attack, something he hadn’t done in a long time, as it wasn’t good for a ninja to make loud noises. The metal filings clumped together and formed hundreds of pellets before being flung at the puppet master, who had to move quickly to avoid the high speed bullets, lest they hit and lodge themselves in his joints.

Naruto didn’t realize that Sasori had turned himself into a human puppet, so when the red head dodged his attack, Naruto flash stepped into his path and delivered a very quick snap kick to Sasori’s stomach. He instantly knew that something was wrong when the resistance to his attack was greater than anything he had ever felt before. Sasori fell into a pile of sand and Naruto had to leap back and try to locate the man.

From his left he noticed movement and ducked under the bladed arm of a puppet that tried and take a swipe at him. Fire sprung to life on his fist as Naruto drove it into the body of the marionette, forcing Sasori to relinquish his control over the puppet. Naruto realized that Sasori was much better at stealth than he was at detection, so he spread his satetsu out over a large range and had it rain down once more.

“You won’t be able to force him out like that twice.” For the first time, Naruto heard Chiyo speak and turned to watch the old lady pull a couple scrolls from her person and summoned two puppets, one a women with dark black hair that fell down to her shoulder blades, and the other a man with red hair to match Sasori.

Naruto had seemingly ignored her advice and created a mass of shadow clones, probably around thirty or so, and was currently blowing sand around with some chakra, trying to find the hidden scorpion. Chiyo just glared at the teen, who was he to disobey her? The two puppets opened their mouths and two black balls around the size of an apple shot forward until they collided, resulting in a large explosion that kicked up a wicked sand storm.

Hidden in the sand, Sasori wondered what his senile grandmother was trying, those attacks hadn’t even been close to his position and he knew she could find him eventually, so why waste a trap?

“Doton: Rasengan.” In the confusion of the explosion Sasori had lost track of Naruto who had taken the opportunity to spread out into a circle, where all of the clones plus the original began to make a trap door for the scorpion. The individual rasengan didn’t cover more than a five or six foot radius, but with thirty clones, each performing the technique, Naruto was able to increase his coverage by a large amount, and not just by increasing the numbers, if two of the swirling pits would collide, then the area would expand farther than twenty feet! Naruto had created a gigantic pit of quicksand and Sasori had nowhere to go but up.

Erupting from the sand cocoon he had created, Sasori leapt into the air, a summoning scroll already in his hands and unfurled. He needed cover, something he could only get now with puppets he had. As the scroll was unfurling in the breeze of his ascent, Naruto suddenly appeared above him, arm positioned to send him rudely back to the ground. This was such a surprise to the master puppeteer that Sasori’s only option was to try and push himself backwards or forwards while in mid air. Twin sets of blades sprung from beneath Sasori’s cloak and began to rotate at impressively high speeds, even for a shinobi. The displacement of air was enough to push the puppet man back, just enough to make Naruto miss his body.

Naruto’s fist scraped down the length of the scroll without doing any damage to Sasori and the boy had to stop the swirling sand so he could land. The speed of the rasengan had grown so great, that had he landed, he would have instantly been sucked down into the sand, and not even shunpo could have gotten him out of the pit. The sand was still spinning, but at a much slower speed when he landed and he was able to walk across it as if it were water.

Sasori looked down at his scroll and cursed. The brat had smudged just a small portion of the seal, but it was enough to make the entire thing explode if he tried to summon anything from it now. Knowing that a puppeteer’s weakness is in close range combat, Naruto took the opportunity to close in while Chiyo moved her puppets closer as well, two blades appearing where their hands had been. Naruto’s first strike was a haymaker to Sasori’s stomach with his right hand. Once more the blond felt more resistance than usual to his assault except this time his opponent didn’t turn to sand…he splintered. The sudden pain wasn’t anything that Naruto would have taken seriously except that he had never fought a man made of wood before and took a step backwards in surprise.
Chiyo recognized the significance of that exchange and continued Naruto’s attack.

“Please, I created those puppets, I know their secrets, do you actually expect to defeat me with them?” Sasori chided as he dodged the sword swipes from the puppets he had made from his parents bodies. Any reply that Sasori’s grandmother would have spoken was cut short as Naruto re-entered the action but this time he had flames dancing on his fists and licking at his wrists. His punches were fast and hard and Sasori had little chance to dodge and sustained a number of hits which began to spread over his wooden frame, threatening to engulf him completely if he didn’t do something.

Sasori pulled a scroll from his back and summoned something in a puff of smoke before Naruto or Chiyo could do anything. Naruto leapt into the smoke attempting to press his advantage but was stopped before he could go too far by Chiyo’s hand.

“There is no need to rush in, I can find him and rushing into a situation like this is unwise.”

Naruto agreed but blew the smoke away regardless. There was Sasori or what was left of his smoldering body, but much more ominous, was the newly summoned form of the Sandaime Kazekage and yet both knew that it wasn’t the Sandaime anymore. Satetsu began to spill from the body of their opponent and formed into spikes of metal that shone with the dull reflection granted by the poison imbued with the filings. Naruto didn’t fear the sand, as he could block it with his own or possibly even highjack the control if he could inject his own chakra to the sand, though the multiple projectiles would make that much harder to accomplish.

The sand rained down and swiftly Naruto’s satetsu formed a covering to protect his ally and himself from the poisoned shafts while Chiyo removed a large round object from her cloak and sent her already summoned puppets to distract her grandson while she prepared to finish him off. The puppets hand clasped together and wires entwined with fingers and pulled taught, creating a deadly set of garrote wires. The two puppets sped forward while Naruto remained content to screen the advances of his partner with his satetsu.

Sasori, in control of the Sandaime’s body wasn’t fooled by the puppets wire trick, even though it wasn’t one of his additions, but with the screen by the jinchuriki, dodging the pair he once knew so well became difficult. He became so engrossed in his task that he failed to notice the sphere his grandmother hurled at him. In mid flight the ball began to spread out like a net, eventually forming a gaping tooth rimmed mouth that was able to pin Sasori to the sand before expelling a seal that completely suppressed his chakra.

“It is over, you cannot use chakra now.” Chiyo’s puppets sprung forward once more and began to stab the body of the Sandaime multiple times, making sure that the last human remains of her grandson were destroyed. “I hope you weren’t too intent on killing him, I’ve been taking responsibility for his actions for too long and it needed to be ended by my hand.”

Naruto just nodded, recognizing that Chiyo deserved her revenge over his own. He was interrupted from his thinking by Gaara who spoke in a rather concerned voice.

“Chiyo-baasama, you’re experience is needed immediately, I was able to kill my opponent thanks to Sakura-san’s intervention, but in the process she lost her arm to Deidara’s explosive. You must help her; I can only stop the bleeding for now.”

This was a major surprise to Naruto as guilt quickly leapt into his body; Sakura was his charge for this mission, if he hadn’t brought her then she would still have two arms and not be in danger of bleeding to death. Gaara had brought Sakura, who was unconscious from the concussive blast was lying on a bed of sand that Chiyo quickly went to and began to look over her patient.

“My specialty is in poisons, not medicine, so there is only so much I can do, and it would mean the end of her career as a ninja and as a medic.” This was brought another wave of nausea to Naruto as he heard that his teammate would never be a ninja again.

“Would it be possible to re-attach an arm and get it work properly?” Gaara asked, snapping Naruto from his self pitying.

“I suppose it could be done, but her arm was destroyed in the explosion, was it not?”

“Yes, however I was thought that perhaps you could implant one of Deidara’s arms.”

“I suppose it might work, but if she isn’t a match to the blood type than she’ll reject the arm and could be in even worse shape than she is now. The only person who has done something remotely like this is the Hokage and she is at least two days travel from here. I’ll do the transplant, but there is little I can promise after that. You must get the Godaime Hokage here to help as soon as possible.” Chiyo left no room for argument and Naruto indicated that he would go try and grab Tsunade; before he began to flash step away, hoping to make it in time.

Naruto had been running at extremely high speeds for the past hour and was feeling the burn in his legs from over use. His cheeks and eyes showed the influence of the demon he was holding, something he didn’t use unless it was an emergency. His training had increased his chakra reserves past his previous levels by three times easily but he was still vulnerable. Naruto would have been past the point of exhaustion a good while back, if not for the fox and since it was the only thing keeping him going at this point, Naruto didn’t want to complain.

“Hey gaki, where’s the fire?” Jiraiya’s voice snapped the jinchuriki from his musings; something that was surprising considering the toad hermit was on Gamabunta. Naruto was about two feet from running smack into the toad bosses front right foot.

“I need Tsunade-bachan! Sakura-chan’s been injured and if we don’t get bachan than she’ll loose her arm!” Naruto was about to run around Gamabunta when he was wrapped up by the oversized tongue of the amphibian and hauled onto his head.

“Thanks boss.” Naruto took the opportunity to grab his breath back and was glad when the giant summon turned around and headed back.

“You need to think your plans through more, Naruto. Sprinting from Suna trying to get back to Konoha is still going to take a lot of time and if your friend is in serious trouble, it will kill them.”

Naruto nodded, realizing that he could have cost Sakura her arm if Jiraiya hadn’t shown up. For the first time since the exams, he realized that it might be too soon to look forward to the title of chuunin. Naruto closed his eyes to guard against the fierce wind that was slamming against his face from the toad bosses great leaps.

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“Sasori and Deidara are dead.”

The only reply was silence until the leader spoke.

“I know.”

“Shall I…?”

“…No. They may not have been the most powerful, but if they are dead that means that Jiraiya is most likely behind it. Recall the others, if he is still in Suna, then their group hasn’t left yet, and not even the immortals can take on two sannin.”

A pair of green eyes narrowed.

“You know that I’m not one to second guess you when it comes to these things, but we need those jinchuriki, you said so yourself. If we don’t get at least one now, then they may come up with a better system of protection.”

“Of course I am aware of that, but since we are two members short, any further loss of life would make us unable to seal the demons. At our current strength we can only seal one demon.” The brown eyes of the leader closed in a moment of reflection before the seated figure rose and dusted itself off.

“I will get our target and leave you to recall the immortals back. If Hidan gives you any crap have Kakuzu bring him back.” With that the leader of Akatsuki stepped out of their base and into the light for the first time in a while before beginning his trek towards Suna.

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The ride to retrieve Tsunade had grown quiet, as Naruto was contemplating his previous fight and Jiraiya was just standing there, eyes closed.

‘Why didn’t I think of summoning?’ Naruto was kicking himself for his oversight. ‘It’s far simpler than travel by satetsu and uses far, far less chakra. While I did get there faster with my sand, it used far too much and riding on Gamabunta wouldn’t be too much slower.’

It was amazing how much distance the toad boss could cover when he wanted to, and while it had taken Naruto almost an hour and a half to meet up with Jiraiya, Gamabunta hadn’t been moving at full speed, and in fact he wasn’t moving anywhere near full speed. In the time he had been riding, Naruto was back in the outskirts of the Fire country, a feat that was a day and a half by foot or even four hours by shunpo. It was a good thing that Jiraiya came along when he did; Naruto truly would have been the death of Sakura for not thinking though his travel plans.

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“Kakuzu, Hidan, you are to return to base.”

“WHAT? We haven’t captured the jinchuriki yet, why do we need to return now?”

“Idiot, you do not question orders! It doesn’t matter why, but I would hazard to say that Sasori and Deidara failed.”

“Correct, they were beaten by Jiraiya.”

“Hmph, that idiot always was too overconfident.”

With that, the two missing ninja began their return but not before Kakuzu’s eyes swept over the party that was their target. Besides the jinchuriki, there was the only other Uchiha besides Itachi and the Hokage, a sannin herself, but more importantly, the granddaughter of the only person besides the leader to outright humiliate him in a fight.

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The sun was sitting low on the horizon when the Konoha party felt they could rest safely. They had been followed by two members of Akatsuki for most of the day after Naruto and Sakura had left but for some reason they had left a short time ago. Tsunade was no slouch and knew that they were watching her, but kept her party unawares except for Shizune who would be needed if they attacked, but luckily that came to pass. They had taken a short break, only two or three hours from the village and would be relieved to be able to sleep in their own beds tonight. So when she felt the tremors that preceded the arrival of Jiraiya, she grew rather annoyed. There was only one reason he would ride into camp and that was if her skills were needed. Her annoyance grew to even higher levels when it turned out that Jiraiya wasn’t even on Gamabunta, it was Naruto who had fallen asleep on the ride in.

“Naruto, what are you doing back here? Where’s Jiraiya? Or Sakura for that matter?”

“Hmm…not now, bachan, I need to get that free bowl of ramen, only four more bowls to go…”

“NARUTO WAKE THE HELL UP!” The Hokage yelled in frustration.

“Gaki fell asleep on the way here, he’s exhausted Tsunade, he deserves it after fighting the Akatsuki.” It was Gamabunta that spoke up on the sleeping boys behalf. “Sakura sustained an injury that requires your assistance or she might lose her arm and Jiraiya leapt off a while ago and headed back to Suna, seemed in a big hurry.”

The group as a whole was shocked, Naruto and Sakura had fought off Akatsuki and Sakura was in serious trouble.

“Shizune I need you to get everyone back to the village, you three are more than welcome to stay for the time being, you can send a message if you need to, Sasuke go with them, tell Anko and if you two want to you have my permission to come back to Suna. If I know Naruto at all, he’s feeling responsible for Sakura and won’t want to be sent to Konoha while she’s in Suna, so he’s coming with me.”

Those that had been addressed nodded and Tsunade leapt up to Gamabunta’s head and surprisingly the toad boss didn’t object. In short order he had turned around and leapt off towards whence he came leaving the remaining ninja in his wake. Realizing that if the Akatsuki members realized that Tsunade had left the small group of ninja wouldn’t stand a chance, Shizune hurried them towards Konoha at a dead sprint.

As soon as she had adjusted to this method of travel, Tsunade took the chance to look over Naruto. He wasn’t injured in anyway other than exhaustion and some very minor fatigue to his muscles, so he must’ve had help with the Akatsuki other than Sakura. Having nothing to do until they reached the desert capitol, Tsunade sat down and waited to catch up with her teammate, wherever he was.

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The trip was much faster than by foot or by any other means that she knew of, and that is why Tsunade found herself staring at the walls of the village she had just left much sooner than she had anticipated. Not having anywhere he could go; Gamabunta disappeared in a large cloud of smoke from which Tsunade walked out of with Naruto who had awoken with the loss of his ‘bed’. Both were allowed into the village without any questions being asked, as per Gaara’s orders and made their way to the hospital where the slug sannin quickly went to work appraising the condition of her pupil and the trauma that she had sustained. Sakura’s right arm had been blown off halfway between her elbow and shoulder which would make any transplantation tricky as part of the arm or stump would need to be removed to make it even with her other arm.

“Hokage-sama, there is another problem that I hadn’t accounted for.” Gaara had been waiting for Tsunade with Sakura while she was unconscious and being tended to by Chiyo and the staff of the hospital. “When I suggested trying to reattach an arm, I believed the Akatsuki member to be female, but it turns out he is not.”

“Can you show me the body anyway, if they are not too dissimilar than it may still be possible, it may just take some corrective surgery.” Tsunade was pleasantly surprised with the steps taken by the Sand doctors to try and preserve Sakura’s arm, and thus her ability to remain a shinobi, but in the end it may still be futile. Re-attaching an arm was not easy and would require that nerves, muscles, blood veins and bone were connected properly and then they would need to make sure that Sakura’s body didn’t reject the new limb. For her to be able to continue as a ninja she would need to connect the chakra pathways as well, or Sakura would never be able to use her explosive strength from her dominant hand again.

Gaara led his counterpart to an unused room in the hospital, not too far from where Sakura lay, to view the bodies of Sasori and Deidara. Quickly taking some measurements and doing some preliminary checks, Tsunade declared the limb suitable for an attempted transplant, though it would need some very delicate and precise work to make it function properly as well as fit at all. The shoulder joint needed to be cut down to fit Sakura’s socket, the stump of her right arm would need removing and all of this took time that was very valuable both to Tsunade and Sakura. All this work would be best served by a Hyuuga, and she only knew of one that had half the skill necessary for the job.

“I need someone to get me Hyuuga Hinata immediately.”

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When Hinata was hurriedly summoned by the Hokage, she was surprised, as the entire group had left two days ago, almost three, so they should’ve been back in Konoha. Not being one to ask too many questions, Hinata followed the ninja who had tracked her down and headed to meet up with the legendary medic. Hinata had a certain fascination for the medical arts, ever since her mother had died when she was young and it was a subject she had studied on her own often to the dismay of her father when she was younger. Truth be told, there were few medical ninja in Konoha who could out fight the Hyuuga heiress and probably sixty five or seventy percent had less medical knowledge than her as well. But there was no one outside of the Hokage who knew more about infections and diseases than Hinata, mostly because of her mother.

Of course, very few people knew this, considering how shy she was, but the Hokage was one of them and was going to put both her knowledge of medical arts and her knowledge of the chakra system to work.

“Hinata, it’s good that you could come as quickly as you have, Sakura has had her right arm blow off and we’re going to try and replace it with a transplanted one. I’m going to need you to prep the arm and then you’ll need to help with connecting her chakra pathways back together.” She handed Hinata a list of things that needed to be done to very precise specifications and left to briefly check on Sakura. Tsunade knew that she would need to look over Hinata to make sure that everything was done correctly or else this new arm would be worthless. As she checked up on the pink haired teen, the Hokage felt a large spike of chakra that she identified as Naurto’s coming from an area well outside of the village along with signatures from Jiraiya, the Kazekage and the final one she had never felt before.

Hurrying back to Hinata the Hokage was surprised that in the short amount of time she had been gone Hinata had already shaped the socket and was busy removing some of the excess muscle mass making sure to leave the chakra pathways intact. Tsuande felt another large burst of Naruto’s chakra; this time mixed with the Kyuubi’s and knew by the flinch of her assistant, that Hinata had felt it too. However the young girl continued with her work, undaunted by the flashes and explosions of chakra that sporadically pop up.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Gaara and Naruto had felt the approaching battle not by chakra but by sheer instinct. They had left without telling anyone and headed towards the disturbance. The battle was a good ways out from the village; it would take even the speediest of jounin more than ten minutes to reach on foot. When they arrived to the battle field, Jiraiya was standing opposite of a tall ninja with brown hair. The newcomer was years younger than the toad hermit but despite his lack of experience it was Jiraiya who was seemingly the worse off.

The steel grey eyes of the Akatsuki member, for that is what he was if the cloak was a good indicator, shifted ever so slightly and both teenagers knew they were being appraised. He had no weapon and no revealing markings or tattoos, he was rather plain looking.

“It was a bad idea for you two to come.” Jiraiya’s words were not comforting and the two boys wanted to know why.

“Quit your complaining and let us help.” Naruto was a bit too happy to get in this fight and though he didn’t know it, he didn’t have a ghost of a chance to win this fight.

“Naruto, this isn’t some random member, he’s the leader, the strongest member of the organization and-“

“And he’s kicking your ass. I understand that he won’t be a push over but if we work together than he’s no problem.” Naruto reached into his utility pouch and retrieved the scroll he kept his zanpakuto sealed inside. Summoning the black scythe, Naruto released the first stage and the first of the silvery markings went black. Again, pure darkness enveloped the immediate area and Naruto took immediate advantage, rushing towards the leader with the scythe bouncing on the sudden currents of air that were being created. Naruto swung the weapon around but was surprised when his target simply leapt over the half blonde and performed a few quick hand seals before expelling a great ball of flame from his mouth. Having no course of action but to dodge, Naruto rolled to his side as Gaara’s sand attempted to stab the leader only for the man to turn into a pile of sand upon impact.

Reappearing from the edges of the inky blackness, the man didn’t dispel the illusion; he out right destroyed it by sending a shockwave of his own chakra out to disrupt the technique.

“Naruto, illusions won’t work against him, at least not ones that you could cast, even with your scythe. He didn’t need to break the illusion he just did it to show you how powerful he is.” While he was a bit intrigued at how the ninja before him could see through the Bringer of Darkness technique, he felt as though he could still win, he just needed a new strategy. Gaara was trying to perform a rather fatal version of acupuncture but was missing and the leader seemed unfazed.

“Then I’ll step it up a little.” Before Jiraiya could stop him, Naruto had started to go into his bankai. (Final release) While the initial release of the zanpakuto are a product of their creation, meaning that they are conceived before hand, the bankai is a product of the wielder’s inner spirit and strength. It is because of this that a word or phrase is usually used to activate this final stage.

“Watashi osore kotonashi nozoite…OSORE!” (I fear nothing except…FEAR)

The entire shaft of the weapon became pitch black as all the symbols became a formless mass and began to migrate upwards until they became a blade opposite the original one with one key difference. While the first blade had stayed the same as always, the new blade was formed upside down, allowing Naruto to cut in any direction he swung osore.

During the researching of these weapons, Naruto had feared that his bankai would somehow involve the Kyuubi or cursed seal, but instead it reflected nothing more than his own view of himself. He was always feared by others in Konoha, feared for the demon and then just when that fear was beginning to subside, fear for those he loved and how they would react to him came to dominate his mind. This time he would close the distance much faster and make sure that he would cut the leader. He flash stepped to the leader, who was still preoccupied with Gaara, and pushed osore forward, only for the leader to disappear in a blur of movement that was just as fast if not faster than shunpo.

Once more, the kyuubi jinchuriki found himself amazed that his opponent seemed to read his movements as if he had a sharingan but had the presence of mind to swing osore around and try to bite into his opponent’s side. Instead of cutting anything, the leader simply grabbed onto the shaft and incinerated it with a little chakra. Naruto dropped the burning wood and tried to land a sweeping roundhouse to his opponent, only to be blocked and punched in the stomach with enough force to push him back yards.

Gaara was beginning to see how this man could control nine S-class missing ninja and continued his own assault, fruitless though it was, hoping to buy Naruto enough time to come up with a plan. He watched as Naruto’s weapon burned into ash and became worried now that his friends best means of attack was reduced to nothing. Which is what made the blonde’s next actions so surprising. Naruto flew into a short string of hand seals before a short tree rose up and grew from the earth, the exact size and shape of osore’s shaft. After plucking the wood, the blades came instantly afterward, the bankai was restored as if nothing happened.

“I see, so the wood and metal were intentional, you can reform you weapon as often as necessary so long as you have chakra.” This was the first time the leader had spoken, his voice held a harsh tone that came from years of giving orders. “I am lucky to have the opportunity to capture both of you though I am afraid I will only be taking one, Itachi-kun would be so disappointed if he didn’t get another chance at you.”

Naruto had heard enough and flash stepped into the fray again but found that once again the leader was faster and shunpo began to lose speed the longer he used it meaning that sooner or later, he wouldn’t even be close to landing a hit. Having no other choice, Naruto disengaged from the battle and withdrew a number of kunai that had three tiny blades instead of one major blade. While the leader was busy blocking Gaara’s sand with a wall of earth, Naruto threw the kunai around the area before hurling the final knife at the leader himself.

“Naruto NO!” Once again, Jiraiya’s words of warning were lost as the teen disappeared in a bright flash of yellow. The leader was forced to dodge the initial strike with a kunai and this time Naruto leapt away before he could burn the scythe again. Once again he disappeared in a flash but instead of finding himself in the arid desert he was trapped in a large cavern of earth in complete blackness. Naruto formed a rasengan and tried to drill through the wall but the chakra was absorbed. Trying once more the results were the same as they were the time after that. Not realizing that the technique he was caught in was not Doton Kekkai: Dorōdōmu which used the chakra to reform itself, but a new technique altogether, Naruto kept pushing more and more chakra into the wall. Since the leader hadn’t uttered a word when he formed the technique, no one knew what it was or what it did.

Jiraiya had watched as his student was trapped and unfortunately he could do nothing about it, he had sustained a hit to a point on his arms that completely paralyzed them for at least another few minutes. If Gaara could hold out then there was a chance that neither boy would be taken. Just as he felt his arms become mobile once more, both Jiraiya and the leader felt the chakra in the area of Naruto reach a critical point and both were forced to dive underground to avoid the blast. Gaara had felt the event too, but too late to retreat to safety. The dome blew apart in an explosion of chakra that spread out not unlike the sun in the early mornings and late evenings. Gaara’s sand moved to block the wave of chakra, but only held momentarily until the wave of pure energy broke through and collided with the young Kazekage, knocking the wind and consciousness from his body. Naruto, having been at the epicenter of such a cataclysmic event was also unconscious and had it not been for his rapid healing, would have died. The two original fighters reemerged from the ground but Jiraiya was too far away from Gaara to prevent the leader from grabbing the red head and pulling him underground leaving only some parting words.

“It was nice to see you again, Jiraiya-sensei.”

The Toad hermit just gathered Naruto up and began the return sprint back to Suna.

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Tsunade was impressed at the Hyuuga; she had completed everything to specifications and far ahead of any time schedule that the Hokage could have wanted. She was just beginning to attach the arm to her apprentice when she felt Naruto’s chakra explode and then recede into near nothingness. Knowing that would probably mean she would be needed again, Tsunade hurried the procedure along as much as possible and by the time that Jiraiya appeared with a badly burned and exhausted Naruto, Sakura was roughly twenty percent finished with attaching the new arm, the really time consuming process was the reattachment of the chakra system, something that Hinata would have to oversee.

Naruto was laid in a bed and treated for the burn but he remained unconscious for the remainder of the day. Anko and Sasuke arrived by midnight, having ridden one of Anko’s larger snakes and were led to Naruto’s room. Sakura’s operation had finished only a small while ago and all that were involved were worn out, especially Hinata who had to use her wind natured chakra to clean the edges on both sides of the arm and make sure they would fit together. It was devastating when used in combination with jyuken, allowing her to sever the chakra system, rendering the recipient in a state exactly like Lee. She had stumbled into the first room she could find, the fact that it happened to be Naruto’s room was a complete coincidence and she fell asleep as soon as she sat down in the corner chair. Anko and Sasuke noticed the heiress when they entered but didn’t remark on it. Naruto was sleeping and had few signs of injury other than some small bruises on his arms.

“That was Hideaki’s doing. He’s the leader of Akatsuki, which means that Chiyoko is the second in command.” Tsunade had come in behind the family and felt it necessary to fill them in.

Sasuke looked confused and Anko only had the faintest look of recognition on her face.

“The Yondaime’s teammates, Jiraiya’s other students are the one and two of Akatsuki?” Anko was surprised and couldn’t figure out how it happened.

“It gets worse, he took Gaara, so we have at best four days considering that two members were killed. If we can’t stop the extraction by then, Gaara will die.”

“So, this is it, right?” Naruto’s voice held an edge that showed his anxiousness to get this job finished.

“Yes Naruto, this is where we tracked the two members who were following Tsunade earlier.”

Naruto, Sasuke, Anko, Jiraiya, Neji, and Sakura were standing before a large boulder that was blocking the entrance to what should be the Akatsuki’s lair. Though they couldn’t track Hideaki, Tsunade had mentioned the pair that she had felt following her group earlier and their trail was easily picked up and followed. On the way they had met up with Kakashi, Gai, and Haku, who had been sent by Shizune, after Tsunade had contacted her and ordered back up.

It had been two days and thirteen hours since Gaara had been abducted by the criminal organization, and Naruto had nearly been vaporized by his own chakra in the explosion that lead to Gaara’s capture. When he woke up, Naruto was devastated to hear of his friend’s fate, and blamed himself as was his custom.

From that instant on, he had bugged and nagged the Godaime to allow a rescue mission, which she eventually agreed to, but not before making sure that Sakura and Naruto were fit enough to go. Sakura’s new arm was working perfectly, and she experienced no ill effects when she tried out any of her medical techniques.

“That’s a five seal barrier, it will take five of us to remove the seals at exactly the same time or else the entrance will lock itself and we’ll have no chance of getting in.” Kakashi noted the large paper seal that was stuck to the boulder.

“I’ve found the other five seals; they are a ways from here, so it might take us some time to return after we remove them.” Neji’s calm voice was awkward amongst the tense group, but after equipping wireless radios, and receiving instructions to the area of the seals, Neji, Sakura, Haku, and Gai headed out to the seals. After a few moments, confirmation came in that all four had found their targets and the intrusion into enemy territory could go on. On the count of three, all four ninja, plus Kakashi pulled off the tags and Naruto blew through the boulder with a rasengan. As the remaining members of the rescue party rushed inside, they were greeted by a completely unwelcome sight.

Gaara’s body, which for a moment was suspended in the air, fell to the ground, limp, as the giant statue that represented all that was evil disappeared into the ground.

“GAARA!!!” Naruto’s cry echoed around the vast cavern. Four figures dropped down from the hands of the giant. Naruto didn’t notice, as he had turned to Jiraiya and began to yell at his teacher.

“You said we had four days! What the hell happened, they finished faster than you had calculated before we killed off two members!” His eyes had tears in them, knowing that his friend, the one that was the most like him, was dead.

“That would be thanks to our latest…recruiting drive.” The women, Chiyoko spoke.

All eyebrows on the Konoha side of the room rose, to varying degrees, until a lone figure, still standing on the hands of the statue spoke up.

“Ku ku ku, it’s good to see you again, Jiraiya, Sasuke-kun and Naruto-kun.” Orochimaru’s projection flickered before it disappeared, though everyone noticed that he had both arms on his body once more.

“So, one of you works for that bastard, eh?” Jiraiya asked, though he knew which one it was.

“Name’s Suigetsu.” The boy, who had had white hair down to his neck stepped forward, his hand moving to the hilt of the gigantic sword on his back. “Never thought they’d let Orochimaru back in, but when you show up with help and a couple of demons to seal, they get happy pretty quickly.”

“You…BASTARDS I’LL KILL YOU! Naruto was leaking large amounts of the Kyuubi’s chakra, as well as activating his sakashima sharingan. During his training, he had experimented with this form of the sharingan and found a couple interesting things, things he was going to implement in battle very soon.

“I’m going to take the jinchuriki, I haven’t fought one yet, and Jashin demands blood today.” Hidan, a man with grey hair and a large three bladed crimson scythe spoke up and eyed Naruto with a smirk on his face.

“Whatever, that woman isn’t here, so I can’t have any fun.” Kakuzu drawled, obviously unhappy that Tsunade hadn’t shown up.

“You were interested in Tsunade-sama, no? Then you’ll have to settle for me then.” Anko marked her opponent with her words, cracking her knuckles as she waited for the fighting to begin.

“Kakashi is mine, for him to have killed Zabuza-sensei…it is something that I cannot forgive.” Suigetsu drew the sword he had been palming since the confrontation began, which was instantly recognizable as the sword wielded by the former demon of the Mist.

“Actually, you will be fighting me.” Sasuke stepped forward and drew his own large sword. “Kakashi-sensei has a better things to do than be bothered by an amateur and I happen to know someone who would be awfully pissed if she knew what you have done.”

There was a tense moment as every one of the fighters waited for the battle to begin.

“Kakashi…we might have a small problem.” Gai’s distorted voice over the radio was apparently the start signal, because immediately there were clashes of steel upon steel and the dull sounds of fists being thrown.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

As soon as Gai had removed the seal tag from the side of a cliff where he had found it, he felt something strange happen. A sudden influx of chakra directed his attention to an amorphous blob that had begin to spring from the cliff face. Shortly after its emergence, the blob began to take a recognizable form. It turned into an exact replica of Gai himself.

“Neji…is this happening to you as well?” The taijutsu master’s voice held no emotion or any hint of fear.

“You mean the duplicate of me? Yeah, I’ve got one.”

“Me too.” Haku’s voice was accompanied by the clang of metal as she parried her clone’s sword.

Gai released a breath of air as he adopted a defensive taijutsu stance, one that was mimicked by his clone.

“Kakashi…we might have a small problem.”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

When the clone began forming in front of her eyes, Sakura was wondering how something of this complexity could be happening. Was this based on previous information, or were these clones forming on some other set of information? The answer came soon enough when the clone exhibited the same scarred right arm as herself.

The clone adopted a basic stance of taijutsu and formed chakra scalpels which Sakura mimicked; she had long since gotten to the point where she could form them correctly, not like against Neji back when she was a genin. They traded some blows, with neither landing anything decisive. On the next pass, both girls used their explosive strength and this time both suffered damage from the exchange.

The real Sakura suddenly felt the fine hairs on the back of her neck stick up, and knew that some attack was on the way, but was still very surprised when one of the clay birds she had seen in her short fight against the member of Akatsuki come flying at her from her clone.

‘I can do that?!’ she thought as she leapt backwards in an attempt to dodge the explosive animal. When she found she couldn’t get far enough away from the explosive clay, Sakura slammed her fist to the ground to kick up a small wall of earth, just enough to block the bird and cause it to explode. She still felt the small pebbles hit her skin as the force from the blast demolished her makeshift wall.

Her eyes began to dart around, looking for the follow up attack that was sure to be coming. The clone had attempted to charge through the debris of the explosion, but was thwarted by the genuine article’s kunai.

‘Why didn’t she use those explosives again?’ Surely that would have been the best follow up to the explosion. ‘Possibly, she can’t do anymore, I mean, I/we don’t have those pouches of clay, so I guess there is just whatever is left in that mouth.’ As soon as Sakura thought of the mouth on the palm of her right hand, she felt it respond and felt that there was just enough clay left in the mouth from its previous owner for one attack. Hoping that the things responded to her thoughts, Sakura pictured what shape she wanted the charge to be shaped as, and felt the internal workings respond to her command. The clone was watching her with interest; it seemed that it was supposed to respond to her attacks, as opposed to instigating the action.

She withdrew a kunai and wrapping an exploding note around it, threw it at the clone, who threw her own knife and deflected the projectile easily. The clone watched as Sakura made a single hand sign and was momentarily mesmerized as the leaves began to fly and swirl around, before it recognized the very basic genjutsu, but didn’t care why a ninja such as Sakura would use such a low level technique, until she noticed that Sakura was smiling and waiting as the clone brushed a leave from her body.

Wait, what? There were no leaves, that was the technique unless…

“Katsu!”

The clone fell to the ground before dissolving into the amorphous blob, as the explosion had taken off its head in one blow.

“This is Sakura; I’m heading back to the entrance.”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Haku was having similar problems with her clone, as it was responding to her attacks and seemed to know every attack she had. Even techniques that she hadn’t shown anyone else, this…imposter knew them as well as she did, if not better.

“Yuki Hakuhen shuriken.” (Snow Flake shuriken) Large snowflakes formed in Haku’s hands, each point and edge as sharp as a real shuriken, before she threw them at herself. Unfortunately, her technique was copied and blocked by an identical set of shuriken. The two clashed shortly in taijutsu, every time their hands would contact the other, deep wounds would open up from the blades of ice that each girl had equipped. They separated and each picked up their previously discarded swords and attacked again. Once more the outcome was stalemate.

As they separated, for the first time, the clone took the initiative and began to run through a series of signs that Haku recognized as a genjutsu, one of relatively high power, but nothing that she couldn’t break out of, after all, she was the adopted daughter of the most powerful genjutsu mistress in Konoha.

Deciding to retaliate with an illusion of her own, Haku spun what was one of her most powerful techniques, a combination of illusion and hyoton.

“Unten Yuki.” (Driving Snow) The weather suddenly became cold and bleak, as a heavy blizzard rolled into the area and the real Haku disappeared. The fake, knowing the technique, dispelled the illusion, but was confused as the snow remained after the illusion was broken. Granted, it was now much less, but there was still enough to qualify as a flurry. Just as the clone realized what was going on, the soft flakes of ice began to swirl around her and begin to cut her to pieces. Releasing a pulse of chakra, the clone was able to stop the flakes, but not the sword that cut her cleanly in half at the waist.

Haku fell to the ground panting. It might have looked like the two were evenly matched, but during their second exchange with swords, the clone had landed a serious hit to Haku’s midsection.

“Hey, Sakura.” The ice mistress called over the radio. “You think you could stop over here and heal a cut real fast?”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Neji was…unhappy. For a perfect clone of himself, the battle was…lacking. Perhaps it was because he had been training with Hinata-sama so much, and her style was nearly the same as his own in every way. That wasn’t to say that he had an easy time dealing with the clone, he hadn’t been able to land finishing blows, but the doppelganger was unable to even land a glancing blow to the genius of the Hyuuga clan.

As he blocked another palm thrust, Neji rethought his stance of the clone. Actually, at times, Hinata was much more of a challenge than this…thing. Hearing the girls’ radio in their own victories, Neji decided that it would be prudent to finish his own spar.

Using Hake Kusho (Eight Trigrams Empty Palm) for less than a second, so fast that the clone didn’t know what happened, Neji was able to rush in underneath the guard of himself and land the winning blow to the ‘heart’ of the clone. Having not sustained any damage in the battle, Neji decided to meet up with the girls and left his area without disturbing a leaf.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Gai too had just finished up his fight, it was rather anti-climactic as well, he had spent so much of his time figuring out ways to combat the sharingan, that he knew how to react to an opponent that copied all of his moves. Knowing that he was needed elsewhere, he didn’t waste time and began to perform some hand signs. As expected, the clone didn’t copy the signs he was making, but made signs for the technique that would cancel out the originals. Unfortunately for the clone, the skill he was trying was a suicidal one, while Gai’s wasn’t. By the end, there was only the original left, the clone having returned to whatever it was. Gai left the cliff face and began to sprint back to the entrance.

The trip hadn’t taken more than ten minutes, and counting the five it took to fight the clone (his was the farthest away, the others were all much closer) it had only been fifteen minutes since the battle in the cavern had started and yet when he arrived at the entrance, he saw the rest of the seal breakers arrive and then almost instantaneously he saw Naruto blur out of the cave with Jiraiya, Kakashi and Anko in tow, before he grabbed the others and huddled them together.

“Naruto,” Sakura was cut off by her teammate.

“Not now, everyone stay together, things are about to get really freaking hot.”

No sooner had he finished his sentence than a wave of heat washed over them, vaporizing any stray threads on their clothing, before Naruto was able to summon a giant wall of water, which began to hiss and steam while Jiraiya flashed through his own set of seals. The last thing that the group saw was the rock of the cave melting into magma, before the fleshy walls of a toad’s stomach sheltered them.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto stared down Hidan, the follower of Jashin, the god who demands nothing less than a kill in battle.

“I fight for the pleasure of Jashin, and because you are a jinchuriki, I may not be able to kill you…but perhaps you shall be the one to kill me, who knows?” Hidan’s voice was uptight, and spoke in pure confidence.

“Kill? I don’t know about kill, but I’m gonna do somethin’ to ya.” Naruto’s eyes were black and red and showed the sakashima sharingan. Hidan was no fool and didn’t stare into his eyes, knowing what Itachi could do with them. He noticed that Naruto drew forth a scroll and summoned his own scythe.

“You wield the weapon of death as well; perhaps you will be the one to kill me after all. I warn you, I may be the slowest attacking member of this organization, but I only need one cut to end your life.” Hidan’s warning was greeted by laughter.

“Ah, yes, that archaic reference of death, the scourge of every child’s nightmares. Since you have been so…sporting… and given me a hint, I suppose I should return the favor. If I cut you twice…it might not kill you, but I can guarantee…you won’t be doing anything for ‘Jashin’...ever again.”

“You dare to insult Jashin!” Hidan’s rage was palpable and he charged forward at the jinchuriki whose enhanced sight read his every move. Naruto ducked the swing of Hidan’s three blades and swung Osore in retaliation.

Hidan stumbled back, the deep wound to his side more of an annoyance to the immortal, but the shock of someone so young doing the damage was awkward to him. He looked at the boy, who stood still, eyes boring into Hidan’s being. Suddenly, the immortal found himself in the world of the Tsukuyomi.

It was different than the previous time he had experienced it, as he didn’t notice the boy, not even Itachi could hide his presence in this world. Nearly as soon as it had begun, Hidan was forced from the world.

“Ah, so that’s it. Not surprising, really, I’ve never done this to someone before, so I can’t wait to see what happens.” Naruto’s voiced incensed the believer even more and despite his injury, the immortal rushed in again only peripherally recognizing that Naruto scythe had changed, and the second blade of Osore had appeared.

Again the two clashed, and this time both were successful in drawing blood, Naruto landed a small scratch to Hidan’s arm, while he had sustained an even tinier scratch to his cheek.

“Ha, I now control your fate, jinchuriki; your life is now forfeit.” Hidan’s maniacal laughter was heard by everyone fighting, but only Naruto noticed as he drew a triangle inscribed inside a circle on the ground and began to transform. His skin became black and white lines began to trace the path of his bones.

“Now you die, Jinchuriki!”

A moment later, one of the two bodies fell to the ground, never to rise again.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Kakuzu was surprised to find that Anko was more than a match for him and he was quickly forced to show off his masks. He wasn’t shocked when the women reached for a weapon. The shock came soon enough, as she blurred out of sight and used her sai to destroy one of the masks, it was the oldest and weakest mask, as any normal weapon shouldn’t have been able to pierce the masks. He no longer had his water mask, but it was of no consequence. He activated his kurogane karada (iron body) while simultaneously using his fire and wind masks in conjunction to cause an explosion that Deidara would’ve been envious of.

When the smoke and debris cleared, there was no sign of Anko and of the many things that Kakuzu was, greedy and bloodthirsty chief among them, a fool he wasn’t. So when his opponent sprung from the ground he leaned back and avoided the swipe of her blades, before counter attacking with his lightning mask.

“Raiton: Gian.” (Lightning release: False Darkness)

Anko twisted out of the way of one of the lightning bolts that came from the ox shaped mask, but the second one was still on its way. Before it could do any damage, the attack was stopped by a gust of wind that Anko had created by spinning her sai around her finger. Her grin caused a tick to appear over Kakuzu’s green eyes as he waited for her to make the next move. It came soon enough as she disappeared and sliced at one of the threads connecting Kakuzu to one of his masks. The Akatsuki member was caught flat footed and the ox mask clattered to the ground before Anko put her foot through it, shattering it to pieces and ending another of Kakuzu’s ‘lives’.

His green eyes narrowed in anger. It was unusual that someone was able to take two of his lives without receiving a scratch in return. He was reduced to fire and wind which was good, since they were powerful on their own and could be combined to create explosions, plus his original heart.

“So, it seems that your masks are important to you, I don’t care why, but I suppose I’ll have to ‘cut your attachments’ with them.” The years hadn’t dulled that maniacal edge in Anko’s voice.

Before he could move, Anko had burst forth, not a technique, but just on pure speed and shoved a sai through the face of the fire mask, she would have had time to kill the other one, but without water nature chakra, it took all of her physical strength to punch through the mask, even though she was concentrating all of her power through the main tsuba.

This time the pain of loosing another heart caused Kakuzu to stumble backwards and Anko was able to use Ryuka no jutsu to incinerate the last external heart of the immortal.

To buy time, Kakuzu tried to trap Anko with his threads but she frayed the attacking strands and leapt back, just as Naruto and Hidan drew each other’s blood.

“It doesn’t matter if you kill me, woman; your son is as good as dead, his blood is on Hidan’s blades and no one escapes once that happens.”

Anko just turned her head and looked at her son facing off against his opponent.

“Actually, it’s your partner that’s finished. Once his blood covers Osore’s blades, he’s done.

Sure enough, Hidan fell to the ground and didn’t move as three people watched.

“Hidan, you lazy piece of shit, get up and kill that brat!” Kakuzu yelled, only for his words to fall on deaf ears.

“He’s gone, there’s no way he can help you now.” Anko’s voice was calm as Kakuzu was shocked that his partner had been killed.

“Bull shit, he’s immortal, there’s no way he could be killed!” He argued.

“Oh, I never said he was dead, but he won’t be getting up…ever. Naruto’s scythe is the most aptly named of all our family’s weapons, Osore, fear. When an opponent’s blood is sacrificed to Osore, they are first made to live through their worst nightmare thought the world of Tsukuyomi and then that nightmare become reality. No matter what it is, it will come to fruition. Most of the time it is death that comes, but for your partner, it seems to be something else.” Anko’s narrative spooked the remaining immortal into shock and he couldn’t move as he watched Naruto walk right past him to Gaara’s still form.

“Hey, what did you do to him?” Anko called to her son’s back.

“His soul…it was destroyed.”

“That’s impossible, you can’t destroy a soul, the soul is immortal!” Kakuzu yelled, only for Anko to interrupt him.

“It doesn’t matter if the soul is immortal or weather it exists at all, all that matters is that he believed it. I don’t claim to be an expert but most religions believe that you need a soul to go to heaven or hell. Naruto has just cursed that lump of flesh to a life with no possibility to move on. He’s as good as dead.” Anko’s brown eyes met with Kakuzu’s green ones. “Now, I think it’s time to finish this off.”

“You can try, you’ll never be able to pierce my defense; you don’t have any techniques strong enough.”

Anko didn’t react more than shrugging her shoulders before Kakuzu noticed the changes her sais were going through. The blades of one became jagged and resembled lightning bolts, while the other became clear and amorphous, like water.

“Every member of our family has arrived at a way to control every element of chakra possible; this is my zanpakuto, Raigeki and Tsunami, one with the power of lightning and the other water. I imagine that if I stabbed you now, it would be like taking a Raikiri.”

Kakuzu never noticed that she threw the weapon until it had passed cleanly through his body, delivering the fatal strike instantly.

“And actually, I imagine that if I threw it, it would be like throwing a raikiri.” Not that he could hear the remark.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

“So, Kaka-chan, it’s been a long time hasn’t it?” Chiyoko asked trying to draw out some emotion. The battling with Jiraiya and Kakashi working together, was far more difficult that she though it would be, but she was managing to hold her own though she knew that she was just stalling until she could find a way out of this fight.

Jiraiya had drawn his katana and had activated the second stage of it, turning it into an exact replica of the Nidaime Hokage’s raijin ken, thanks to his soul’s influence in the sword. The sudden interference of Naruto, grabbing his teachers and removing them from the cave gave her the chance she needed to escape, just as a scorching wave of heat rolled over the area, melting everything in its path.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Sasuke and Suigetsu were locked in a battle of blades, and neither one had the advantage, despite Sasuke’s sharingan and strength advantage and Suigetsu’s knowledge of kenjutsu. In one confrontation, both swords were knocked from their owners grasps and embedded themselves in the wall. Sasuke quickly turned around and landed a series of strong punches to Suigetsu who exploded into water. Sasuke watched as his opponent reformed clothing and all.

“So, you’re some kind of water being, huh?” The Uchiha drawled, though internally he was cursing his lack of earth techniques.

“Not that it matters, but I can reform any part of my body as long as I have water to draw from and I can resist any fire technique that Orochimaru knows.” His continence suddenly changed. “He certainly tested that enough.”

“I see, you are supposed to be able to fight me, and me specifically. No matter, I will defeat you.” Sasuke began circling Suigetsu, constantly blocking his opponent from being able to get to his sword. For the next few minutes, Sasuke was dominating the fight, his taijutsu was far and away superior to Suigetsu, and if the newest member of Akatsuki hadn’t been able to reform himself, Sasuke would have won this fight long ago.

True to his claim, the sound nin was immune to all fire techniques that Sasuke tried and even to fire manipulation. None of his lightning techniques were strong enough either, which was forcing Sasuke to reconsider a promise he had made to his brother. Having just broken his opponent’s body for the fifteenth time this battle, Sasuke quickly un-summoned his sword and grabbed the sword that Zabuza had used so effectively, before throwing it to Naruto, who caught it by the handle, just as he teleported out of the cave with Gaara’s body, an unseen sentence passing between them.

As soon as he had disappeared, Naruto returned and began to grab the other Konoha ninja and evacuate them from the cave, just as Sasuke finished transforming into his demonic state.

“I made a promise never to use this technique, but a message needs to be sent to the snake and this organization, no matter what they do, no matter what twisted experiments they come up with, we will defeat you and kill you.” As Suigetsu finished reforming, he saw the ball of fire twisting and swirling in Sasuke’s hand.

“I told you, no fire technique can defeat me!” He boasted, before he felt the initial wave of heat hit him. His skin was beginning to steam away, even before Sasuke was any where near him. He tried to draw out the moisture from the air, only to find that this technique had rendered the moisture in the air unobtainable to him. He watched as the ball of flame grew in intensity and shrunk in size until the heat became too much for the earth around him and the rock began to melt into magma. The last thing that Suigetsu saw was the demonic Sasuke charging him, though he noticed that the technique was damaging the Uchiha despite his resistance to heat. With a cry, Sasuke slammed the miniature sun into Suigetsu, who instantly vaporized before the ball became too unstable and exploded.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Outside, the remaining ninja were protected as best as they could be inside the stomach of a great fire toad, though Naruto kept up the wall of water anyway.

“What the hell was that?” Haku yelled, realizing that Sasuke wasn’t with them

“Katon: Rasengan.” Naruto’s voice was laced with worry and Anko looked nervous as well.

“What’s the big deal, Sasuke’s element is fire, he should be able to handle it…right?” Sakura asked, not reassuring anyone.

“It’s not the fire that the problem, Sakura, it’s the technique itself. The final stage of the rasengan requires that you put enough pressure on the chakra to compress it into a tiny ball, he basically created a hand held sun, and even if it is his own chakra, the heat is more than enough to injure him if he didn’t protect himself.” Naruto voiced his concern to the group.

“Naruto, what happened to Gaara?” Haku asked, before instantly regretting it when she noticed the look that crossed his face.

“We were…to late…I was able to save his body, it’s in a location far away, so it’s fine, but…” His voice died away as Jiraiya dismissed his summons and the water contacted the still hot magma, hissing violently in protest.

Everyone’s eyes began to search for a sign of their comrade, brother, son and rival, but none was to be found on the ground. There was no warning other than a shadow before Sasuke, still under the influence of his demonic blood, landed in the middle of the group panting and sporting serious burns. He was immediately set upon by Sakura who began to treat the most serious burns. Having recovered his brother, Naruto flashed away and recovered Gaara’s body and the sword that was stolen from Zabuza’s grave. He had to seal the sword into a scroll before he could return to the group, and then returned to the group, before they headed back to Suna.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Their return was met by the entire shinobi population of Sunagakure as well as Tsunade and the Hyuuga that were still in the village. All of the ninja were ushered to the Hospital where they were given a thorough exam by the Godaime. It was during this time that Chiyo, the ancient advisor to the Kazekage snuck into the room where Gaara’s body lay. Using a forbidden technique of her own design, she gave her own life energy so that the youngest Kazekage ever could live.

Things in Sunagakure had gone from tense, to frightening, to worried, to relieved and then back to Tense in three days. Gaara had been attacked twice, abducted, murdered, his body returned in the hands of his friend Naruto, and then revived. The Godaime Hokage had looked him over for any signs of damage, and besides the fact that he was dead less than a day ago, he seemed in fine health. Sasuke was resting and recuperating from his use of Katon: Rasengan, with Haku keeping an eye on her boyfriend. Naruto had taken his Mother to see Gaara so they could go over everything that Naruto learned during the Chuunin exams. While neither really had a connection to the Sandaime Kazekage, they were grateful for the support of the Sand nation and all that they were willing to do for the family of their strongest leader. Anko had just left to check on Sasuke, mostly to see if she could catch her son and Haku in a compromising position and Naruto had plans to go through what little was left from the Sandaime, when Gaara pushed a rather thick stack of papers in front of him. Naruto cocked an eyebrow in question before he began to peruse the document.

“As you can see this was done behind my back and I know what they intend to do, but I thought you should be aware as well.”

“What’s this part at the end about? It seems really weird; it’s just a swap, isn’t it?”

“Apparently Jiraiya-sama found out about the negotiations and alerted Hokage-sama. That part is her doing I was told.” Gaara responded, eyes going back to what work he still had to do. Naruto kept reading over the document amazed at its contents.

“How fast was this done? It had to be finished in the past couple days, right? I still don’t get this; it’s really bad on your end, why did they agree to it?” Naruto had finished reading and had committed the contents to memory. Gaara just smirked; he wanted to see the look on his friends face when he learned the truth.

“They agreed because they knew how I would react to this. I concur with you, this was drawn up far too hastily on your end of the stick and instead of gaining anything, you will actually get nothing. Unlike the Konoha council witch has a well documented history of trying to steal power from the Hokage; our village council is more of an extension of my authority. They have learned to predict how I will handle things like this, and they have more to gain if things go as they are now.”

Naruto’s barking laugh cut the short silence. “You got that right, you know, I still don’t know how this worked, but I have to admit that it’s pretty bad for us.”

Gaara just snorted at the comment and returned to his work, while Naruto headed off to find any of his father’s things.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

“Look, it’s real simple; you go in and ask if Sasuke-kun knows where Naruto is. If they ask just say that Tsunade-sama needs him. It’s fool-proof!” Haku chirped as she tried to convince Hinata to go looking for her long time crush. Eventually the Hyuuga heiress broke down and agreed, although her face might remain the same shade of red for the rest of her natural life. Sasuke was lying in bed, though he didn’t want to, and was very surprised when the shy girl walked into his room. Ok, technically, shoved would have been a better description, but he wasn’t going to split hairs.

“Um, Sasuke-san, would you know…that is…um…could you…is there any way…”

Sasuke sighed at how flustered the kunoichi was and tried to repress a laugh. He had seen very little of her, what with the exams and then the retrieval mission going on, but he knew that she was much stronger than in their younger years, and here she was, reduced to a blithering mass.

“Haku put you up to looking for Naruto, didn’t she?” His question was met with a silent, but nodding Hinata.

“He went with Kaasan to see Gaara, if he still there or not, I don’t know.”

Hinata stood there in a state of shock. That hadn’t been so bad after all. She was about to mutter thanks and back out of the room before she overstayed her welcome when Sasuke interrupted her.

“Can I offer you some advice?”

“A-a-advice?” She stuttered for the first time in a while

“About my brother.” What little red had left her cheeks returned faster than the Yondaime Hokage. She quickly began stammering before Sasuke held up his hand.

“Look, I don’t profess to know everything that goes on in that tiny head of his, or even what he’s doing, and I certainly don’t claim to be some kind of match maker, but it’s clear that you’re worried what would happen if you did something forward and he turned you down.” She was nearing a fainting spell if he kept reading her so accurately, Hinata thought she would die.

“But, he could have Tenten over me, why would he even pick me?” It came out as a fast, and pretty loud exclamation, after which, the heiress immediately slapped her hands over her mouth in embarrassment.

Sasuke actually smiled at her admission. “True, Tenten does seem to be showing a newfound interest in him, but she has done as much as you have in actually doing anything about it. You’ve both just kind of…danced around him, not really doing anything, and if either of you want to stop this cold war, you’ll need to act before long, or…I dunno…Ino will end up with him.”

Hinata began to blabber random fragments again, mostly having to do with Tenten or Ino or her own fear and Sasuke was forced to listen to her for the duration of her little tirade before he deemed it necessary to interrupt her.

“Hinata, relax! It’s not as impossible as it sounds; just go by the Kazekage tower and…”

“BUT WHAT IF I MESS UP? WHAT IF HE DOESN’T LIKE ME…OR WHAT IF HE SAYS NO? Oh god! I don’t know if I could live with that…” Perhaps she had finally admitted her own fears to herself, but Sasuke could see the corner she had just turned.

“Hinata it – Hinata…HINATA!” He seemed to catch her attention as she quit babbling and once again clasped hands over mouth. “Don’t worry about that. That’s on everyone’s mind when they do something. You can’t worry about what might happen and how much it might hurt if you get rejected. You can fall in love without falling, now can you? Hmm…I think I heard a song like that once… ‘You’ll never fall in love, if you don’t fall at all.’ Pretty wise, don’tcha think?”

It wasn’t until Hinata was out of the Hospital and halfway to the Kazekage’s office, that she realized what Sasuke had said…and how much he had been right.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

“That was pretty evil of you, to force her to do that you know.” Sasuke addressed Haku who had hidden herself behind a genjutsu when Hinata walked into his room.

“Yeah, but we both know that if she puts it off anymore she’ll miss out and Tenten will get your brother.” The brunette shimmered into view and sat down next to Sasuke who had closed his eyes in thought.

“Is that really so bad? I have nothing against Hinata but…does it really matter who ‘gets’ him? Either way he’ll end up with a strong girlfriend.”

“I guess not…” Haku seemed to have a pout on her face. “But I really wanted Hinata to get to him first!”

Sasuke laughed at the expression on his companions face. “Riiiiight and it has nothing to do with the fact that she’s your best friend or the bet going on between my mom and Kurenai.”

Haku adopted a shocked façade. “Why….I’m shocked that you would suggest such a bias!”

“Whatever you say…whatever you say.” Sasuke rolled his eyes in fake annoyance.

The ice mistress let out a giggle before beginning to baby Sasuke and look over him in retaliation for that remark.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA


“The remaining jinchuriki are well protected, perhaps too well right now for us to capture right now.”

“There are only two of them remaining and there are seven of us, what’s not to like about those odds?”

“Karin, be patient…the remaining vessels have made a kind of peace between themselves, something we didn’t plan on. It would be unwise to storm Konoha when they have two sannin, two jinchuriki and some very special ninja.” Orochimaru soothed his subordinate, now the medical specialist for the organization.

“For now, it doesn’t matter.” Hideaki’s voice commanded respect and all conversation and debate ceased instantly. “After sealing so many demons, we do not have the power to go after the remaining two, let alone seal them if they are subdued. For now we will sit and return to our usual roles. Orochimaru, you will return to your village and continue your preparations. Karin, you will accompany Zetsu to gather information about the defenses of Konoha. Now that the final two prizes reside within their walls, they will be even more obstinate than usual.” The two stood and left the Akatsuki’s base along with Orochimaru.

“Itachi, Kisame, I have separate tasks for you two. Kisame, now that Jiraiya knows who we are, there is no need to keep his spy network intact, they will go underground. Find as many as you can and eliminate them. We no longer care about his movements so we can sever that connection.” The former Mist ninja smirked at the future blood he was going to shed and exited quickly. “Itachi…your brother has become powerful.” Though it was not a question the leader took a pause, as if waiting for a response. “I have the utmost confidence that you are still the strongest of the Uchiha clan, but I think it is time that we made sure of that…by making you the last member of the Uchiha clan.”

Itachi’s face showed no emotion, just as it had when he murdered the majority of his clan. Soon that word, majority, would be replaced with entirety.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Hinata never made it to Naruto after she spoke with Sasuke, and now they were leaving Sunagakure to return home. The entirety of the group that went after Gaara had recovered and was escorting the Hyuugas back to the village. She had been on her way to find Naruto, but was sidetracked when she saw Neji making out with…the thought of these two particular individuals together was a strange thought, but Hinata decided, if you thought about it, they really did make a good pair. Now there were too many people around to even consider talking with Naruto, let alone ask him to go out with her.

The group had made good time, considering how big they were, and it had only taken an extra day to get back to the outskirts of the village and Naruto and Sasuke were a bit anxious to get home for the first time in over a month and a half. The walls of the city had come into view and so had the guards who were stationed there. As they walked into the village streets, Tsunade was held up by one of the guards. Whatever he was whispering to her was obviously making her mad, if the way her fists clenched was any indication. She headed to her office with a scowl etched onto her face. Anko quickly grabbed her sons and followed after the Hokage, both wanting to know what had happened, and making sure that Tsunade didn’t do anything stupid.

When the Hokage stormed into her office, it was surprisingly full of bodies. These were the more important members of the Village Council. There was Danzo, the old man who had once been considered for Sandaime Hokage, Utatane Koharu and Mitokado Homura, the former teammates of her Sensei. There was also a rather large contingent from the civilian population, even though they had very little impact on shinobi related matters.

“WHO’S BRIGHT IDEA WAS IT TO KICK OUT THE NINJA I OFFERED AMNESTY TO AND THEN JAIL SHIZUNE WHEN SHE TRIED TO STOP YOU IDIOTS!” Yep, she was definitely pissed off and although they couldn’t see her, Anko and company could easily make out what had set off the Hokage. They skidded to a halt behind the enraged blonde in time to hear the response from one of the civilian council members.

“As a council, we decided that it was unwise to have Kumogakure shinobi in our village, after all, they could easily make an attempt at the Byakugan again, without the Hyuuga’s most powerful warriors in the area, it would have been all too easy, besides, we have enough problems with one demon vessel in our city, why should we present an even bigger target and house two of them?” The member had a smirk on his face as Tsuande’s anger abated; obviously she had seen the power of the council.

“Naruto, take Sasuke, go find your friend, Anko, go get Shizune. If she’s in any kind of unrest, take her to see Sakura and then get back to me. I won’t stand to see this kind of abuse.”

“Hokage-sama! We have made ourselves perfectly clear on this matter! That jinchuriki shall not set foot in Konoha; it is what’s best for the city!” The council pleaded, only the three former ninja had withheld their opinions.

“You forget Tsunade-sama, that the council has the ability to overrule you on matters of Village security with a simple majority vote.” Danzo was the first to speak up of the three established advisors to the Hokage. “I’m sure you’ve noticed that the number of council members in this room is exactly fifty-one percent. We don’t need a full session of the legislature to pass acts in the absence of the Hokage. However, since we respect you so much, we decided to wait on the final vote until you returned, you see, we have a number of proposals while you were away.”

Any color in Tsunade’s face faded to nothing at this news.

“First off, Konoha is from this day forward neutral in all matters regarding the criminal organization Akatsuki, in so far as they commit no trespasses against us. All those in favor?” Every member of the council raised their hand and affirmed their resolve. “Very well, next order…” Danzo continued to list off laws that were supposed to ‘protect Konoha.’ “…a curfew of nine o’clock shall be enforced for all civilians and any ninja under the rank of chuunin, not assigned to duty or returning from a mission.” Again, a chorus of affirmative responses went up amongst the crowd. “Item number three, no ninja under the rank of jounin shall knowingly be given a mission that would conflict with the curfew enacted by the previous act.” Hands were raised in acceptance, and a lone one went up in dissention. So far Tsunade was getting politically man handled. “Finally, Konoha will have no relationship that includes protection, housing or caring for anyone of demonic relation or any known collaborators with those people.” As the last round of hands went up, Tsunade snapped.

“Well it seems that we have overruled you today, Hokage-sama, we expect these new laws to be enforced post haste.” As some of the figures tried to leave, Tsunade began to laugh in an evil tone.

“Make me.”

The exodus stopped. “I’m sorry Hokage-sama, I thought you just said ‘make me’, obviously I was mistaken because you have no recourse left to you in the matter of a council override.

“You heard me correctly. I refuse to enforce these ‘laws’. In fact, I think I’ll do my best to break every single one of them, starting with the last one. Nii Yugito, Mitarashi Naruto, Uchiha Sasuke, and Mitarashi Anko as well as anyone they wish, are more than welcome to stay within this village for any amount of time they wish. Of course, feeding, housing and clothing are pretty expensive these days, so that might be a problem…I’ve got it! I’ll take the money out of the operating expenses that the Council would have gotten.” The look on Tsunade’s face was one of pure triumph, one she rarely ever had. Some of the council members tried to make a come back, but they were out shouted by Koharu and Homura.

“That’s insane! How will the council operate? We are too important a body to be without funds!”

“It’s quite simple really; I don’t expect you to operate…at all. I’m disbanding the council immediately.”

Danzo chuckled rather loudly. “You are as terrible in politics as you are at gambling. You have no power to disband the council, not even in war time. Your threat is empty.”

“I suppose your right, I can’t disband the council.” This gave the members a reason to smile. “But, I do enforce all the laws in this village, and I will not allocate a single second of manpower or any money to enforce any measure passed by this council. You have made your ‘laws’, now enforce them yourselves!”

Tsunade walked from her office, a smile gracing her features, finally after so long, the council was in their place. She had noticed Anko at the back of the crowd with a healthy looking Shizune. Looking her assistant over, Tsunade was happy to note that she hadn’t been injured in any way.

“I’m fine, Tsunade-sama, I was only in prison for a couple hours. I’m more worried about the Kumogakure ninja; they were run from the village on threat of death if they didn’t leave. If Akatsuki knew this than-“

“They do.” Tsunade let out a sigh. “Or at least, I’m pretty sure they do. The council knew about Yugito being a jinchuriki, and I know you didn’t tell anyone, so unless one of her teammates ratted her out, than one of the council members is probably a spy for the Akatsuki. Not even Jiraiya could get any solid information on her.

It was going to be a long first day back for the Hokage and the revelation of a spy amongst their numbers was just another black mark that she had to take care of.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Yugito and her team had been run from Konoha and although they had been promised protection from the Akatsuki, there was nothing the Hokage could do about an internal revolt while she was away. They had been far away from the main village and were nearing, what was hopefully, the center of a deep forest. It was with a sudden movement that her teammates turned on her and tried to ambush her. She easily saw it coming and avoided the attack by simply ducking out of the way. Her two teammates, though strong for genin, were absolute morons and didn’t anticipate the speed at which they swung their swords. Without her body to slow them down, the swords continued on a deadly path and the two boys ended up killing themselves. Had it not been for the appearance of Zetsu and Karin, Yugito would’ve laughed at the comedy of the situation.

The black and white plant man had risen up from the earth before the demon vessel, while Karin had snuck behind her on a stream that was running away from the village. Before either party could attack, Iruka appeared behind the blonde girl, covering her back.

‘I couldn’t even sense his chakra coming in!’ Karin thought as she looked over the kindly school teacher, thinking him familiar. Suddenly the truth brought her mind to a halt.

“YOU! I’LL FUCKIN’ KILL YOU FOR WHAT YOU DID!”

Yugito was confused. What could this chuunin have possibly done to a member of the Akatsuki?

“I remember you…from that day…there was so much screaming…so much pain! No one could stop them from dying…you wiped out the entire village every single one of them, dead! That’s why, until I was the only one left alive, they would only refer to you as the ‘Dolphin that kills’. Do you know how long I had to hear that name? Three hours…it took three hours for the last one to die…three hours of screaming. Never has such a short time left such an impression. Even Itachi took the equivalent of three days when he tried to break his brother…I guess your just better than him at ruining a childhood.

When Karin announced that Iruka had been the one to murder her entire village, Yugito was interested. When the red head announced his rather absurd nickname, she couldn’t help but laugh. It had to be one of the top ten stupidest names she had ever heard of. Even the other member of the Akatsuki, well at least the white part of him, laughed as well. The black half seemed ready to strangle itself, just to quiet the other part down.

“Well…that’s a new one…I guess.” Iruka had sweat dropped when the new nickname came out. “Most people just knew me by ‘the Magician’.

When the kindly chuunin revealed that name, everyone stopped laughing. ‘The Magician’ was known to every shinobi nation as a ninja who was a master of deception and misdirection. He was the first Konoha shinobi since the Yondaime Hokage to cripple a nation single handedly. It was reported that one day the Magician walked into Kirigakure, had lunch, went to a bath house and left. Five hours later, over a quarter of the population had died of an unknown and untreatable poison. Even as they lay dead, red marks would appear on their bodies; as if a branding iron had been pressed to their skin.

He didn’t stop at just Kirigakure. All over the elemental countries, people would die with those same markings on their body. No one even realized that the Magician was a Konoha shinobi, until it was discovered that no one from that area had died with those symptoms. To this day, no one had isolated the poison that was responsible, as every tox screen and blood sample had been contaminated by so many kinds of venom that it was impossible to point a finger at one of them.

There had never been a successful identification of the Magician, as some claimed he was tall and lean, others squat and fat. Others claimed he was a red head others blonde. In a world that relied on information, he had effectively dropped off the map.

Suddenly, every question that Yugito had about the scarred ‘chuunin’ became compounded. Was his name really Iruka? Was that really his hair color? Was he even a man? Could he be come woman pretending? Misdirection was a powerful thing in the shinobi world, and there was no better master than this man if he was telling the truth.

Iruka stepped onto the water to square with the red headed woman.

“You’re from Tokushima, aren’t you?” He asked, not because he was unsure, but so he could perhaps buy enough time to leave this without having to kill the girl.

“No. I am from Otogakure; Orochimaru-sama saved me from that miserable place and gave me the opportunity to exact my revenge on you. I was from Tokushima, but there is no Tokushima anymore…you made sure of that.” Karin responded.

Iruka sighed, realizing that conflict was inevitable now. With unsurpassable ease and insane speed, he completed his string of seals before Karin knew what had happened.
Small whirlpools popped up, surrounding the red head, before they turned into conical spikes of swirling water. Karin responded by forming a thin whip from the surrounding water and slicing through the drills on their way towards her. Iruka frowned, something was off.

“You’ve noticed it, haven’t you?” She asked, smirking. “All my life I’ve been preparing for you, knowing nothing about you or your style of fighting has been a blessing in one sense. Nothing you do can surprise me. My Mizu no Muchi (Whip of Water) is not normal. It allows me to not only slice through any water based attack, but hijack and neutralize any chakra that you put into the attack. In one sense, I am a living embodiment of Kisame’s sword.” She began her own set of hand seals before the water rose up and briefly surrounded her before rushing towards Iruka. “Suishouha! (Water Collision Destruction) Iruka was forced on the defensive as the wave was too large to avoid. “Doton: Doryuu Heki.” (Earth type: Earth Style Wall) He spat a river of mud from his mouth that quickly grew to stop the incoming water, but he soon realized his error.

“Raikyuu!” (Lightning Ball) Karin roared as she shoved the tiny ball of crackling lightning into and through the earth wall that Iruka had raised to defend himself. He tried to run through some seals, but Karin got there before he could finish.

“I’m not letting you finish those!” She tried to catch his shoulder with her left hand which was glowing blue. Iruka dropped to the surface of the water on his hands and just avoided the chakra scalpel that was aiming for his artery. Lashing out his back legs, he managed to catch Karin in her back and launch her forward and away from him. Iruka tried to capitalize on her momentary disorientation. “Suigadan.” (Water Fang Bullet) Once again the drills tried to skewer his opponent, but in his rush to form the attack, the water was coming from his current position, and not near Karin, giving the kunoichi plenty of time to block them with her whip once more. She spun around; whip protruding and forming a circular barrier between her and the drills that tried to pierce her. As she slowed down, one more drill tried to catch her off guard, and her eyes widened at her miscalculation. The water was heading directly between her eyes. She had no choice but to show her trump card. Holding up her hand, the water stopped before it began to fall harmlessly at her feet. Reaching forward, Karin grabbed at something that was nearly invisible in the water before pulling it back and letting the remaining water fall at her feet.

“So this is it? This is all the skill that the Magician has? I’m rather disappointed, having to use a jellyfish to do your dirty work for you?” In her hand she held a jellyfish by the bell, letting the poisonous stinging tentacles hand down harmlessly. “He is impressive; a box jellyfish certainly has enough venom to kill me, BUT NOT YOUR FINEST! You will tell me how you have killed thousands!”

Iruka stood back up and drew some senbons from his uniform before throwing them at Karin. They forced her to drop the jellyfish so that she could avoid the projectiles. She twisted to her left, making the left side of her body lead towards Iruka. It was a good plan, and he tried to capitalize once more, as he rushed her weak side, but she had the last laugh as she tripped him up with a small tendril of water that rose to do her bidding. He stumbled forward, dropping his senbon, but one flew in such a manner that it scratched her left foot. Not caring about the superficial wound, Karin rushed forward, chakra scalpels active and cut the muscles and tendons in his arms. She tried to cut the tendons on his legs, but Iruka turned into a pile of water. She had never seen Iruka make hand seals, so she began to spin around trying to find him. Iruka was no where to be found. He had disappeared.

“There is no way I was fighting a water clone the entire time!” Karin fumed. There wasn’t any movement around her. Odd...shouldn’t Zetsu captured the jinchuriki already? Where was he? She looked over to the spot where he had cut off the route of the Nibi’s container. He wasn’t anywhere to be seen and neither was the jinchuriki. Karin focused and tried to sense Zetsu’s chakra. It was no where to be felt. She pushed farther; there were no chakra signatures in a three mile radius. The only things that were left were the smoldering bodies of Yugito’s teammates, standard procedure for a fallen ninja…wait that wasn’t right! The first thing that Zetsu would’ve done once he captured the demon vessel was eat those two subordinates! Holy shit, this was a genjutsu! She quickly summoned chakra and dispelled the genjutsu.

The number of differences between the genjutsu and the real world were so real that Karin almost didn’t realize that it had been dispelled. Instead of the burning bodies of Yugito’s ex-teammates, Karin found the decapitated body of Zetsu smoldering; the only recognizable part of his body was the flytrap head gear he had. She tried to stand up, but she found herself paralyzed and unable to move. There was no way that this was possible! It was like…like…

“Magic?”

Iruka’s voice cut through her thoughts.

“You! You really are the magician aren’t you?” She was amazed at the power this man had, and yet, she couldn’t help but laugh. “To think, I was defeated that easily by a genjutsu of all things. You know, being a medical specialist, I’ve spent my time building up immunities to every kind of poison known to man, so for you to be able to do this is quit a feat.”

The brown haired chuunin was sitting next to her without a care in the world. He took the news and didn’t react.

“Come on! Do something! I need some validation!” She yelled at him.

“How would you have me react? I knew you were a medical specialist just from the way you walked. If you really were out to hunt me that the first thing you would’ve done is build up immunity to any poison you could get your hand on. I am not surprised by anything that happened here.”

“Then at least tell me how you did it!” She was getting hysterical now.

“I thought you’d already figured that out? It was a genjutsu from the first moment you saw me.”

“Not this! Tokushima! Tell me how you did Tokushima! How did you kill all those people?”

For the first time, Iruka seemed to be in deep thought. He furrowed his brow for a moment before relaxing.

“Nah. A good magician never reveals his secrets and besides, I didn’t kill those people.” With that he walked over to the stream and walked onto the surface. Running through his hand seals he motioned for Yugito to pick up Karin and come with him before he finished his technique.

“Kuchiyose no jutsu.”

A spasm of pain racked Karin and she tried to repress a scream and was only partially successful. It was like her entire body was on fire and her legs and arms began to cramp painfully. She could feel her lower back burn and ache at the same time, as if she had been stabbed in the kidneys. She suddenly felt extremely nauseous and rolled onto her side to empty her stomach. When she did, she noticed what creature Iruka had summoned and in her last moments of life, things began to fall into place. It was a jellyfish. The Dolphin could summon jellyfish! She began to heat up as a fever started to try and burn out the poison in her body. Thinking back to the ‘fight’ she had with him, that box jellyfish she caught, it wasn’t just there, it was a summon! When she thought that he hadn’t completed his technique, he really had. He really was a magician, deceiving at every turn, first with a genjutsu and then by his actions.

“Yo-you…don’t use senbons…do you?” She asked, as she began to feel the pain intensify.

“No I don’t.” His voice was without feeling as he continued to head back to Konoha.

Jellyfish made sense, they were extremely toxic and there were so many that he could summon thousands at a time and all the different toxins would mask the true killer from detection. He was one sneaky bastard. She tried to curl into a ball to lessen the pain she was feeling in her back and legs, but the effort was almost too much. She lowered her head and stared at her feet. There, on her left foot was the scratch from that senbon he had dropped in his illusion…but that shouldn’t be there! As she stared at it more, the red wound began to curl and expand, becoming a violent red.

“An-another jelly-je-j-jellyfish?” The pain was coming in even more intense and frequent waves.

“They are called Irukandji, possibly the most venomous jellyfish known to man and one of the tiniest.”

Yugito watched the captive as she spasm and wiggled around in pain.

“It seems to be a very painful way to die, doesn’t it?” She said offhandedly.

“Irukandji venom is not nearly as dangerous as the bigger jellyfish summons I have, in most cases they are non fatal if just given time to wash out of the body.”

Iruka’s words were the key that unlocked the box for Karin.

“I didn’t kill those people.”

“The Magician is a master of misdirection, if he goes to his left or to his right, attack the middle…he’s just as likely to be there as anywhere else.” Those quotes floated though Karin’s sweating head as things snapped together. Jellyfish venom is highly toxic to fish and prey, but to humans it is rather slow acting. Irukandji venom is delivered in far too little a quantity to be fatal, but if the victim doesn’t notice the small fish, but do notice the larger ones, then they get treated for the wrong kind of venom…which is potentially deadly. It was ingenious, if only her kinsman hadn’t tried to treat their wounds, they might have lived. Another round of pain went off and she could no better stifle her cry of pain as she could hold water in a sieve. But this time, she smiled as it passed.

“I’m not going to die, am I?”

Yugito was shocked. For all the pain the kunoichi was going through, how could she even think such a thing?

“Correct, you are worth more to Konoha alive. Weather or not that is a good thing…I won’t say.

Karin passed out soon afterward and the remainder of the trip back was uneventful.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto and Sasuke met up with Iruka and Yugito as they got back to the Konoha gates. After leaving Iruka to drop Karin off with Ibiki before he would head off to report to Tsunade.

The three younger ninja immediately headed for the Hokage’s office. By the time they got there, Tsunade was just beginning to start on her paperwork as well as the new orders for the ninja of Konoha. When they entered, she blinked in surprise.

“That was fast.”

“Iruka-sensei found her; he’s taking this other girl to T&I.”

Tsunade put two and two together.

“She’s Akatsuki, isn’t she?”

“Yes, Hokage-sama, she was partnered with a man named Zetsu. Iruka-san killed him before securing the girl.” Yugito gave her own little report just as the aforementioned chuunin walked into the office.

“That’s enough for now, Iruka can fill me in on the rest later, but I would like to apologize for the actions of my council, you have permission to be here for as long as you like.”

“That’s very generous Hokage-sama; I will take you up on your offer. It is standard procedure in Kumo to never leave an area alone. Since my teammates attempted to kill me earlier, I will have to wait for a Kumo team to escort me.”

Tsunade just nodded and dismissed the team.

“Do you have somewhere to stay?” Naruto asked, knowing that no hotel would house her after what the council did. “I’m sure we could find something.”

“That’s ok, I was offered a place to stay with your teammate Tenten before, and I will just have to see if she can still house me.”

As it turned out, Tenten was more than happy to house the Kumogakure kunoichi, as Tenten wanted to find out what made them similar. When Tsunade had mentioned that the Akatsuki was after Naruto for the same reasons as Yugito, she began to plot a type of…informal interrogation. She was going to find out as much as she could about Naruto…by squeezing it from this blond until she was as dry as sponge.

It took two weeks for a team from Kumogakure to come and pick up Yugito. Since Kumo shinobi were still not allowed into Fire Country, Yugito had to be escorted to the border, a task that fell to Team seven, since the majority of the shinobi were still untrusting of the Cloud nation. In the time that the blonde kunoichi had been staying with Tenten, she had formed a bond and was performing the same advisory role for Tenten that Haku was doing for Hinata. Yugito had no real hatred for the Hyuuga heiress, but she saw Tenten as more worthy of Naruto’s affection. Since Tenten had lightning natured chakra, the two had trained together, and Yugito had to admit, her protégé had taken to the techniques and teachings she had given like she had been training that way all her life.

It had taken Team seven a week to return home and in that time almost the entire ninja population had thrown their support behind their Hokage, while the civilian population was split, not unusual considering their numbers. Despite the schism that was threatening the village, everyone was surprisingly cooperative and some of the council members, who had not expected the shinobi population to back the Hokage as they did, resigned their posts or in one extreme case, took his life in shame of their actions. There were still a large number of trouble making members left, but they had gone from just over half the council to somewhere between a quarter and thirty percent. Things were far from resolved, but things were going smoothly in this interregnum period and if things continued to go this way, the council might find itself obsolete. The one area where things hadn’t gone the Hokage’s way was the interrogation of Karin. It wasn’t a blemish on Ibiki’s record, he hadn’t even gotten a chance to interrogate her, she was still suffering from the effects of the Irukandji poison, two weeks after the sting. It wasn’t unheard of, and even Tsunade’s skill wasn’t able to remove such a tiny amount of poison from the red heads system. She was under ANBU supervision though it was unnecessary as the unbelievable amount of pain she was experiencing had kept her immobile except for spasms and rolling around on her bed, trying to lessen the pain. According to Iruka, this would be a relative short interrogation, she was not overly loyal to Orochimaru or the Akatsuki, and with her sole reason to live having been removed with Iruka’s admission, he felt she would not only break quickly, but might even be convinced to join Konoha’s side in this fight. How much she would help was still in question however.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
In the Akatsuki base, Hideaki was plotting. He couldn’t feel the connection he had to Zetsu and the connection with Karin was weak and would splinter any day. It didn’t matter, they were just pawns. As long as there were three members left than he had enough man power to seal the remaining demons. Speaking of the jinchuriki, he would need to separate them. By now Kumogakure should have removed the Nibi container from Konoha but that did not make her an easy mark to capture. He allowed himself a rare smile. Things had gone exactly how he had anticipated, with Tsunade out of the village for so long, the council would have made their power grab by now and if the Godaime was half the Hokage that she was said to be, than they would’ve been squashed by now as well. If that break was allowed to widen, than Konoha would find itself immersed in a civil war. That alone would invite other nations to attack, with Otogakure leading the way. Even though Orochimaru was leading their forces he wouldn’t have the skill to defeat the entire Fire nation and Konoha would retaliate. Sound would be pushed back, though not before Konoha suffered some losses, but this is where phase two would commence. Hideaki was never given the recognition that his teammate, Namikaze Minato received, but living in the shadow of the Yondaime did have it’s advantages and silently Hideaki had grown in power to where he was today and while he might not be able to recreate the Hiraishin, he did have a substitute that would be more than enough to fool Iwagakure. From there it was a small task to frame the Kyuubi jinchuriki; after all, he was the only one who could replicate the technique that brought the once powerful nation to its knees. Once Iwa was out for the boy’s head, the council would see it as their chance to usurp power from the Hokage by avoiding war. This would divide the village even more, making abducting the jinchuriki all too easy. Normally this would have taken years to accomplish, but with a number of people inside Konoha in high places, and with Orochimaru back in the organization; things would reach a head in far less time. He stepped into the fresh fall air. It was cool and getting colder. Yes, by the end of the year, the world would be his.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

While Konoha was waiting and Hideaki was plotting, Kisame was tracking down Jiraiya’s informants with relatively poor results. The first person he had found easily enough and dispatched of with his usual ease and destructive strength. Kisame knew that to convince someone to spy for him, Jiraiya must have offered him some kind of protection. If he could prove, even to just a few people, that Jiraiya couldn’t save them than his informant net would crumble or collapse on it’s own with no help necessary. Unfortunately, after that initial kill, the snitches had gone underground faster than he had imagined they would and of the many names he still had, he had only found and crossed off another three.

The next person on his list was a former kunoichi who was originally from a small village in Iwagakure, but had since relocated to a remote section of the land of Waves. He had tracked the aging hag to her home and had broken through the door expecting to find a shocked washed up ninja. He was justifiably shocked when instead of his mark; he had to block a scatter shot of senbon from Zabuza’s former accomplice, now a Konoha ninja.

Haku stood in the doorway facing the shark man, she wore what was her usual outfit nowadays, the dark blue pants of a Konoha uniform were rolled up to keep them off the ground and keep her sandals from stepping on the leg. She wore a long-sleeved black turtleneck which bled into face mask, exactly like Kakashi’s, except that it could be rolled up or down, depending on the wearer’s wants and needs. Her jounin vest covered up a sword sheath sandwiched between the vest and her shirt at an angle. The vest had the usual pockets and spaces to hide/hold scrolls and other weapons.

“I remember you; you’re that brat that Zabuza kept around. I’m surprised that you managed to escape my platoon’s sweep back during the civil war. I’m afraid you won’t be escaping this time, I almost feel bad, you see, the Mizukage paid me pretty handsomely for killing your pathetic clan, and I hate to accept money for an incomplete job!” Kisame attacked with his covered Samehada but only succeeded in destroying a water clone.

“Mizubunshin, typical Zabuza, I should’ve known.” Kisame sneered, he couldn’t sense Haku anywhere and began to wonder if Zabuza had taught her his little mist trick when he felt something come flying at him from behind. He blocked with Samehada and was not physically injured at all, but the cloth wrap that was covering his sword fell to pieces, cut by a score of kunai. Without that covering Samehada went into overdrive and began to eat all the chakra it could, eventually causing the ‘house’ to disappear completely, leaving Kisame standing in the middle of a grown over path.

“So, this entire thing was a genjutsu from the beginning, not bad brat.” This revelation startled the shark man more than he let on. If the entire house had been an illusion, than there was no telling how long she had him in her clutches. As if to emphasize his worry, the path too began to break down until he found himself standing on the surface of a delta, one he recognized as being right by the ocean around Wave country.

Haku stepped before him, her sword, somewhere between the length of a wakizashi and a full length Katana drawn and held parallel to the ground at her waist.

“Pretty dumb move kid, it’ll take even more chakra to freeze sea water, you’ll never last against me and Samehada.” He smirked, his pointy teeth fully bared.

“That has nothing to do with why I chose this location. If I die here, I wanted to be by Zabuza-sama’s side.” She gestured towards the cliff to her left; a wooden cross was barely visible at the top. “In keeping with the customs of the Seven Swordsman of the Mist, I challenge you for your rank and sword as the apprentice of Momochi Zabuza.”

If it was possible, Kisame’s grin grew even wider. “I accept; you know that Zabuza never advanced higher than fourth in our group, while I was always the strongest.” He dropped his Akatsuki cloak and charged at Haku, Samehada raised above his head and behind his body with his right hand, while his left was forming a hand seal.

“Suiton: Mizuame Nabara." (Syrup Capture field!)

Kisame spat a sticky stream of water at Haku’s feet, hoping to immobilize her, knowing that taking too much time for pleasure would be frowned upon. The brunette just stood there and allowed the technique to pool around and over her feet. When Kisame came within sword range of her, she seemed to blur away in a burst of speed he didn’t think possible in the situation.

She was behind him and closing quickly, ready to stab into her opponent, when he spun around in at a speed that didn’t suit such a large man and made to parry her thrust, but instead of continuing with her attack, she disappeared again and tried to attack again, but each time Kisame would put himself in good position to deflect any attack she made and she would blur away. The entire thing was very confusing to Kisame and the only positive thing he could tell she was doing was keeping him on the defensive. It was like she didn’t have a plan or any sense of tactics whenever she moved towards him.

Having had enough of this odd tactic, Kisame momentarily let go of Samehada and flew some hand seals and a whirlpool began to spin, forcing Haku to dodge. Kisame took this advantage and trapped the girl in a Suirou no Jutsu. (Water Prison) Though she seemed to be worried about this turn of events, Kisame frowned and swung Samehada through the prison, destroying a kage bunshin. He felt the attack come from behind him and allowed the momentum of Samehada’s swing to continue, which forced Haku to block his sword with hers.

Kisame smirked as he turned around and began to overpower the girl. She might have been fast, but she was still weaker than he was, and once they got in this locked position, he could dictate the style of fighting.

“Now I got you, right where I…want you?” Kisame’s voice broke up as the genjutsu surrounding Haku’s blade was eaten away, showing Kubikiri Houcho. He was amazed that a girl that small and lithe could wield such a large blade so effortlessly. His lapse in concentration allowed her to step forward and shift the swords towards the water, twisting them to reveal that a section of the famous blade had been cut out, making the gigantic sword much easier to wield. What she did with that section didn’t cross his mind until she took her left hand off Kubikiri houcho and with lightning fast speed, drew the wakizashi that she had concealed with a simple henge, slicing cleanly through Kisame who turned to water before splashing into the sea and when he didn’t immediately reappear, Haku tried to bait him out.

“I can’t believe that you still believe yourself to be stronger than Zabuza-sama. Even if he was only listed as an A-rank missing ninja, he was stronger than you immediately after we left Mist.”

“Zabuza? Stronger than me? You must be reliving your hero worshiping days if you think that. Your life must be flashing before your eyes.” Kisame’s deep voice seemed to come from everywhere at once. “Besides, he got himself killed by Hatake Kakashi, even with your help.”

Haku didn’t move except to sheathe her wakizashi, so that the only weapon she had access to was Kubikiri Houcho. She closed her eyes, heightening the abilities of her ears.

“Zabuza was nothing and will never be anything, even in death! All he had was his little mist trick, which never worked on me, nor will it ever work!” Kisame, along with three water clones rose silently from the water. Each Kisame rushed the motionless girl with out a moments hesitation only for her to effortlessly destroy the three clones and focus on the real target, all without opening her eyes, The two great swords locked together again and Kisame tried to use his strength advantage once more, only to be countered by Haku almost effortlessly. Despite this new skill she was showing, it was still a bit sloppy, and a veteran swordsman like Kisame knew to exploit a weakness when presented with one, with Kubikiri Houcho locking up Samehada and with the flat of the metallic blade facing upward, Kisame placed his hand on the flat and used it to lift himself up and land a roundhouse to Haku’s temple, throwing the much smaller girl away.

“I don’t care how much you try and counter me, I know every trick that Zabuza knew, and there is nothing you could have learned from him that will help you.”

Haku just stood up, Kubikiri Houcho was still grasped tightly in her right hand. That kick had disoriented her and she felt like she might have a concussion, but she had achieved what she wanted to.

“Zabuza-sama taught me the true abilities of Kubikiri Houcho, which is all I need to be able to kill you. You don’t even know what this sword is capable of, do you? I wouldn’t expect you to, Zabuza-sama kept the secrets of his sword very close to his chest. The name comes from the fact that just like those knives you see on late night television, it will never need to be sharpened, it is kept constantly honed by the wielder’s chakra, making it always sharp enough to separate someone’s head from their body.”

Kisame might not have known that, but Samehada sure did, though they were tiny and hidden in-between its teeth, the sharkskin sword had been cut every time it had come in contact with its opponent.

“The true strength of this sword is what made Zabuza-sama so great as an assassin, once it comes in contact with a person’s skin; it immediately imprints the electrical pulses that the target’s nervous system gives off. In that way, Zabuza and I can find your position, even if you are hidden or blinded by a thick fog of mist. But I’ve taken this one step farther. I’ve gotten to a level where I can tell what your actions will be from the where the electrical pulses in your body originate and where they end up.”

This had Kisame worried, it was almost like fighting a sharingan if what she said was true…there was the operative word, she could be telling the truth, or, more than likely, she was lying.

Deciding to test out the validity of that statement, Kisame decided to use a high level water attack, before he had even started, Haku was moving towards him.

“You don’t have time for ninjutsu!” She cried as she rushed forward, Kubikiri houcho held behind her, ready to swing in a deadly arc, right at waist level. Kisame made to block his left side with Samehada, but suddenly Haku spun on her heels and began to run backwards, now her sword would swing to his right side, where he had just moved Samehada from. He tried to make a water clone, but Kubikiri Houcho got there first and the only thing he could do was try and move. It wasn’t enough, and Haku’s blade neatly severed Kisame’s right hand. He howled in pain but didn’t drop Samehada or his guard. I wouldn’t affect his ability to perform nijutsu, he had gotten to the point where he could use all of his techniques one handed, and the large majority of them could be done without hand seals all together, but having to fight someone who knew what he was going to do before his muscles even got the message, without his dominant hand was more than he wanted to deal with. He tried to create a diversion with a water technique, but once more Haku responded before the thought had even left his mind and punched him square in the face with impressive strength for her stature. He was forced backward, though not very far and just stood there, trying to think of a way to counter her.

‘She reacts to my nerve impulses which means she knows what I’m going to do as I do it, damn! Every time I go to use a jutsu, she attacks my hands and if I use taijutsu, she can read and counter it easily.’ That’s when a thought struck the older man. ‘All she’s been using is taijutsu and kenjutsu, the most effective way to prevent ninjutsu use is with another ninjutsu, so why isn’t she?’ His mouth splint into an insane grin and he actually began to laugh.

“I’ve got you figured out now girl, you might be able to tell what part of my body I’m going to use, but you can’t tell what I’m going to do with it, so you automatically get closer so that you can stop me from doing anything!”

Haku would’ve frowned, it was true, she could only tell what part of his body he was going to use, arm, hand, knee, leg, but she couldn’t tell what action they would be performing. Now the odds were good that if his body went to move his hand, it was ninjutsu, and if he moved his leg it would be taijutsu, but there wasn’t any assurance of that. She would have to be careful from here on out, before if she made a mistake he would probably be too surprised to capitalize on it, but now he wouldn’t waste an opportunity so it would all depend on her ability to read his movements. She couldn’t afford to make a mistake and that meant that she would have to delay her reactions to him.

Right off the bat he exploited her cautiousness and leapt backwards to get more space between the two of them, Haku didn’t move. Another step backwards and again, the kunoichi didn’t move. Kisame was now far enough away to finish the seals for some of the shorter techniques he knew, another step backwards and now he was in intermediate range. On the next step backwards, Haku took a step forward, not allowing him to increase the gap between them. The next move Kisame made was offensive, running forward in an attempt to catch his opponent off guard.

He was partially successful, Haku was slow to react out of caution and was caught flat footed, but between her speed and the fact that Kisame was using his left hand, she was able to escape with little more than a scratch. Of course when that scratch comes from a sword like Samehada, it’s not exactly something to laugh at. Kubikiri Houcho was a large and heavy blade, despite having grown up around it; Haku had been forced to use some chakra to wield it at her current level. When it rains, it pours and she had the extreme displeasure of having one of the scales from Kisame’s sword break off and embed itself just under her skin where it began to eat it’s fill of her chakra. Kisame might only have one hand, but he had just gotten the advantage in the fight again.

Sensing that the momentum had just swung his way, Kisame pressed his attack with a crushing overhead swing of Samehada which Haku was forced to block, her ability to read his movements momentarily forgotten. The force of Samehada crashing into her own blade actually pushed Haku’s feet under the surface of the water, despite her chakra supporting her weight. She felt his legs pulse and correctly identified a kick which she avoided by twisting out of the way, but that left her vulnerable to Kisame’s follow up attack, a clothesline with his handless right arm. Thinking quickly, Haku sank beneath the surface of the water to try and buy a little bit of time. She felt the water surrounding her become denser and easily recognized the signs of the Suirou no Jutsu. She was hauled to the surface and brought face to face with Kisame’s grinning mouth.

“No clones this time.” He smirked and swung his sword. Haku pushed as much chakra as she could out into the water around her, hoping to freeze the water and give her some level of protection, but the salt water took too long to solidify and Samehada was only slowed down a little bit. She felt her arm shatter at the force of the blow and the teeth took a fair bit of skin and muscle with it as it swung away. The only good thing that came from this was that it knocked her free from Kisame’s technique where she rolled across the water until she was able to slow her momentum down and rise to a knee some ten feet from Kisame. She formed a single hand seal and seemed to dissolve into the wind.

“You don’t expect that technique to work on me again, do you?” Kisame asked, recognizing the beginning of the Jubaku Satsu (Tree Binding Death) that Kurenai had used against him when he had been in Konoha last. Not surprisingly there wasn’t a reply, but instead of a tree quickly rising from the ground and arresting his movement, it was a creeping sheet of ice. He released a burst of chakra to disrupt the illusion, but it didn’t stop the cold from creeping past his waist

“Kai! Kai!” He tried frantically to break the illusion but the ice didn’t recede, the only change that he could feel, besides loosing all feeling in his lower extremities, was the familiar weight of Samehada disappearing from his hand. At some point, probably recently, that wench had taken his sword. The ice had just immobilized his right arm and was threatening the left one. Within a minute it too was lost to him, he was well and truly defeated.

Haku chose that the moment when the ice reached over his mouth to reappear, Kubikiri Houcho strapped to her back once more and Samehada had been just sealed into a carrying scroll. She pulled her wakizashi, made from Kubikiri Houcho and having the same properties and quickly decapitated Kisame’s still form before she teleported next to Zabuza’s grave to nurse her wounds. She was in worse condition than she had wanted to be when she went into the fight. That scale was still embedded in her mangled and broken arm continued to bleed and burn. She was regretting doing this mission alone now, normally she would have at least a couple chuunin with her, but now her only choice was to make it into the nearest village, which was still ten miles away. And try and get some first aide. She grunted in pain as she removed some bandages from her utility pouch and painfully wrapped her broken arm up and put it in a make shift sling. She was already looking forward to getting back to Konoha so that she could get Shizune or Sakura to heal her arm.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Sasuke had been walking around Konoha, not really doing anything in particular. With Haku out of town and his training was done for the day, he was low on ideas to kill the time. He was meandering on an impromptu tour of the training grounds of Konoha, when he felt it. It was the same feeling of being watched that he had felt the night Itachi had murdered the entire clan. He stopped and looked around and realized that in his wanderings he had gotten close to the Uchiha estates, through no intention of his own. Sasuke walked through the gate he hadn’t entered since he had collected his things and moved in with Anko and Naruto. He stopped at the exact spot Itachi had first forced him into the world of Tsukiyomi and without turning around, waited for Itachi to come out of the shadows.

“I’m disappointed Sasuke, your hatred is as weak as ever.” The elder of the two brothers materialized from the shadows of the abandoned buildings and despite the fact that it was near noon, very little light seemed to be shining on this land.

“And for good reason, hate is a useless and pitiful emotion when compared to love and compassion.” Sasuke turned around, his black eyes meeting the sharingan of his brother’s and locking in contention. For the moment not one talked and a cool gust of air swirled around, fluttering Itachi’s cloak and Sasuke’s loose pants, making the embroidered flames at the bottom flicker, as if they were alive. Instantly, the level of chakra in the air rose as the two brothers raced towards each other.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto had taken his day off to sleep in and was just waking up around this time. He stepped into the shower and began the long and somewhat complicated process known as ‘waking up’ while, across the village, a small foot race was being held.

Today was the day, Tenten had told herself, after a parting pep talk from Yugito and then with Naruto’s late arrival the night before, this was the first chance she was going to get to ask him out and she would be damned if she passed it up. She would go over to his house and wait all day and all night if she had to, but today, she would talk to him and get him to see that it was she, not that…stalker of a Hyuuga , that deserved his undivided and unwavering attention. She knew that he preferred kunoichi that cared more about their skills than their appearance, but decided that it wouldn’t hurt if she dressed up a little. Of course, as long as it is a woman’s prerogative to changer her mind, the word little will always be flexible…

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Hinata smiled at how perfect the day was turning out to be. There wasn’t a rain cloud in sight, the temperature wasn’t too hot or cold and the fall winds that blew through every once in a while didn’t hold the bite that they would in just a week or two. The sun was shining brightly, and Naruto-kun would soon be hers. Yup, perfect day indeed! Before Haku had left earlier that week, she had imposed upon Hinata the urgency that she must ask Naruto out before she returned, or Tenten would probably get him, and Hinata would be damned if some…fan girl, would get what was rightfully hers without a fight. She was heading over to his house right now, convinced that there was nothing that could ruin the day.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

By whatever force of nature you wish to attribute it to, the two women found themselves at the exact same point on converging trails at exactly the same time. Basically, both Hinata and Tenten walked up to Naruto’s front door at the exact same time and promptly began to fight about who got their first, and none too quietly either.

“You can not be thinking about asking Naruto-kun out, it’s obvious that he’d choose me, we are on the same team after all.” Tenten yelled; the two girls foreheads were pressed against each other and arms were flying around in wild gestures.

“You were on his team, w.e.r.e, were! If I remember correctly, Sakura-san is the kunoichi assigned to his team, not you!” Hinata fired back.

“Yeah, but he customized my swords for me, he obviously cares more about me than you.” Tenten retaliated.

“He only did that because he didn’t want you to die in the final round!” Ooh, Hinata was in fine form today.

“So what? Even if that’s true, it just means that he values my life more than yours!”

Sitting on the roof, Anko was trying to hold back her laughter and refrain from sneaking inside and getting some paper to make scorecards.

“He cares more for you? I’m sorry, who was the one that he beat and humiliated in the chuunin exams?”

“You want to bring up humiliation? You only won your match because Deer-boy ran out of chakra!” That was it, the gloves had come off, you can insult a kunoichi’s fashion sense, you can insult their cooking, you can even insult their family, but the two things you didn’t insult, their crushes and their fighting abilities. Hinata reeled her head back and delivered a hard head but to Tenten who didn’t see the sneak attack coming. The weapon’s mistress returned fire by punching the heiress straight in her stomach. It would have been powerful enough to knock the wind from Hinata, but she had been training against jyuken strikes, so it just really hurt, Tenten had used a bit of lightning chakra in her punch. Hinata tried to knee Tenten in the face while she was still low to the ground, but missed. Tenten managed to wrap her arms around Hinata’s midsection and tried to bear hug the life out of her rival. It was at this point in the scuffle that Naruto, still partially half asleep walked out of the front door. There was Tenten, in her usual loose clothing, but with a large bruise forming on her forehead, bear hugging Hinata, who was delivering strong blows to the brunette’s back, coincidently knocking Tenten’s head perilously close to the Heiress’ chest. The first thing that crossed Naruto’s mind was:

‘I’m not sure what’s going on…but let’m continue!’

The second thing, and luckily for him, the thought that actually got spoken was:

“Um…what are you doing?”

Instantly the two girls turned to their dream boy and realized the position they were in and jumped away from each other.

“Naruto-kun, would you like to go out for some ramen?” Both asked simultaneously.

“I was just heading over there, but that didn’t answer my question. Why are you two fighting? Were you fighting over me?” Despite the fact that Sasuke knew that Hinata like him, and despite the fact that Anko knew Tenten had a crush on him, Naruto was still oblivious.

Neither woman answered vocally, but both nodded their heads embarrassed at being found out finally, after years of underground crushing.

They were staring at him. They had this look in their eye like they expected him to declare one the victor. Naruto’s mind began to race, while it hadn’t gotten past the idea of two women loving him, especially these two, he knew that he had to do something and fast…but how to do it without crushing one of them?

“Let me guess, you expect me to pick one of you two, right?” Another set of nods. “Okay, here’s what I’m going to do. I’ll take the two of you out on a date, and at the end, I’ll make my decision, okay?”

“I get to go first!” The two had tried to stake their claim and were about to get into another round of fighting over who would actually get to go first, when Naruto raised his hand in a pacifying gesture.

“I said ‘a’ date, not dates, you’ll both go on the same date with me. Saturday night, I’ll meet you two outside the Hokage tower since its mid way between all of our houses. He was about to say that they should be ready for anything when he felt it. The unmistakable feel of Kame Kawa’s shikai being released and it was coming from the Uchiha clan estates. He broke for it, Anko in tow with two feuding kunoichi bringing up the rear.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

While not expecting this to be easy by any means, Sasuke was struck by just how powerful Itachi was. True, he hadn’t used any high level techniques, and he hadn’t transformed, but despite all of his taijutsu training, he was hard pressed to land any solid blows. Here had been a sweep and a knee to the stomach that had been partially blocked, a couple punches that had landed on Itachi’s biceps and were bruising as they fought, but they were few and very far between.

Likewise, Itachi was pleased with how strong Sasuke had gotten, even if he had forgone the hatred that he truly needed to defeat him, as long as Sasuke didn’t hate and draw on that hatred, Itachi would always have the upper hand. But despite that, the taijutsu style that Sasuke was using was very impressive. While not being as heave and powerful as Maito Gai’s style, it was faster and the combo’s could be chained together at lightning fast speeds. He had to stop his musing and drop to evade a high spinning kick, only for Sasuke to bleed his momentum and spin into a sweeping kick that knocked Itachi’s feet out from under him. In that moment that he was airborne, Sasuke’s right elbow slammed into Itachi’s sternum, knocking the elder brother into the side of the nearest building, only to turn into a section of log. Itachi responded by trying to pull Sasuke underground, but upon emerging from the ground, had to evade a Katon: Goukakyuu no Jutsu (Grand Fireball). It had been such a long time since he had so much fun in a fight, that a smile actually graced Itachi’s lips. Stepping up his attack, he made a sword of fire, just from elemental manipulation. He was prepared when Sasuke drew Kame Kawa and released its initial form. Bankai would be coming, but it would have to wait until the right moment. He could feel Naruto and Anko heading for them, as well as two others trailing behind, that if he was correct, was Tenten and Hinata. They would be here soon enough, but he couldn’t afford to think about them right now, Itachi’s flaming blade had come too close and too powerful for comfort, and all of his concentration would need to be used to make sure he didn’t get barbequed.

He blocked and deflected strike after strike, steam rising off every encounter the two blades made, but the extra reach advantage prevented Sasuke from using taijutsu, his great advantage over his brother.

“Sasuke!” Naruto’s voice reached the fighting and Sasuke knew it was time.

“Protéjalos Kame Kawa!” (Protect them from my fury)

The second silver rune glowed and then bled into nothingness. Itachi wasn’t sure what was happening, but things quickly became clear. Sasuke tossed his sword into the air, flipping it end over end, and as it spun, the black metal of the blade created a black circle in the air, just over the brother’s heads. It suddenly expanded and upon contact with the brothers, sucked them into the hole.

“Damn it!” Naruto cussed, he knew that Sasuke would use his bankai; he had told them that he would only use it on Itachi, but he had wanted to help out his brother.

“What happened? Where is Sasuke?” Tenten and Hinata had shown up after the Uchiha brothers had disappeared.

“Sasuke used his bankai; he’s out of our reach.” Anko had dropped any masks she had; the only emotion on her face was the worry that any mother had for her son.

“What does it do? Why isn’t he here?” Hinata was keeping her eyes on Naruto, trying to gauge his reaction.

“It cuts a pocket in space and will hold any two people or two things there indefinitely unless he wills them released. There is no way to get in or out, hence the name Kame Kawa. It is his ultimate defense, even if he can’t kill Itachi; there is no chance that he can get out.”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

At first, Itachi was confused at where he was. It was just…black. Not like it is at night, but there were no buildings no people, he couldn’t even tell if there was a floor or a sky, if he was motionless or falling. Sasuke was standing before him, or at least an outline of him, his little brother’s sharingan seemed to be in greater detail.

“Every since you murdered them, something about you has seemed off to me. You’re explanation that day…tell me why you really killed them.”

The fiery sword he had formed disappeared as Itachi eyed his brother some more.

“When I achieved the mangekyou sharingan I became a demon, I murdered those weak relations of ours simply to test my strength.” As if to emphasize his point he shifted to his own demonically influenced form. His skin turned a paler than he was and the same black lines appeared as with Sasuke. A pair of horns grew from his forehead, though one was much shorter than the other and twisted, as if it had been ripped off. Sasuke quickly transformed as well, the only differences between the two were size it seemed. Sasuke spread his wings in an intimidation move and grinned manically.

“You’re lying. You haven’t lost a bit of your humanity.” Sasuke was challenging his brother.

“What do you mean? Of course I’ve forsaken that weak part of me, and you have too, how else could we have achieved this transformation?”

“This form, this accursed form does not make us demons! You justified your actions on that night, and you justified them today, a true demon needs no reason to kill, no matter how much you might want to forget your humanity, it is still a part of you and you can no easier separate yourself from it, than you can break from this dimension.”

Itachi’s face showed anger for the first time in many years, it was impossible for Sasuke to be correct, he had shed his frailty…he had transcended all that an Uchiha could be, all that a human could be.
“Enough, this is an admirable sacrifice you have made, thinking you can trap me here to save your 'brother', but once I’ve killed you, than I will break free and fulfill my objective.”

The two fallen angels clashed in a powerful flurry of punches and kicks but neither landing a hit, as each arm and leg that was thrust forward was blocked or dodged. All form of weapons had been forgotten, the damage they could cause could was forsaken, in favor of the satisfaction that landing a solid strike with ones own hands would bring.

Inside this realm, the two brothers fought, neither with a distinct advantage, Itachi, who had more experience in this form was counteracting the prowess his little brother had in taijutsu with sheer strength and tactics. Sasuke wouldn’t use anything other than his own strength until Itachi used his mangekyou sharingan. The whole point of separating them from the real world was so that the stronger of the two brothers, champions of two separate ideals, would be free to fight using whatever tactics and knowledge they had without interference.

Just like in the world of Tsukiyomi, time moved at whatever pace Sasuke wished, they had been fighting for what seemed liked over an hour, yet Naruto and Anko had only just finished explaining the purpose of Sasuke’s bankai. Another flurry of activity as Itachi and Sasuke clashed again before separating to size up the other.

“I’m afraid that I don’t have the time to waste on our little reunion, so pardon me for killing you so quickly. I think you’ll find that the mangekyou sharingan has quite an interesting effect in this form.” Itachi rasped out in his demonically deepened voice before the three tomoe in his eyes bled into the triple windmill pattern of the accursed mangekyou sharingan. That was far from the only change though. The black lines on his skin widened and bled together before turning a dark purple color and covering every inch of his skin. His muscle mass seemed to diminish, though Sasuke seriously doubted that his strength had gone down at all, and a surge of chakra, so strong that it shredded his cloak, rushed from his body.
“Hideaki-sama tells me that in this form, I am the faster than the Yondaime when he wasn’t using the Hiraishin.” True to his word Itachi disappeared in such a burst of speed that he actually overshot Sasuke and missed with his attack. The youngest Uchiha was in awe of the speed he had been shown. For his brother to move that fast was almost impossible, he was faster than the sharingan could predict and faster than the nervous system could react. If he hadn’t been practicing against Naruto and Anko, he might really be screwed, but having arguably the two fastest people in the world as sparing partners means you pick up a few things.

“Doton: Yomi Numa.” He used the technique in an attempt to slow down his brother, but Sasuke doubted if it would have any real effect. Despite the change of terrain, Itachi was not slowed down and Sasuke had to dive to his side to avoid the counter attack Itachi made.

‘Time for plan B.’ He grumbled to himself as he ran through the hand seals for the syrup capture field, which Itachi merely floated to the top of, despite having his feet covered in the sticky liquid initially. Undaunted, Sasuke began a new technique and Itachi had had enough. He charged forward at his insane speed and had Sasuke set up perfectly for the initial stages of the Omote Renge (Front Lotus), when he suddenly lost control as the once sticky liquid he had been running on turned into a super slick surface of ice. He fell flat on his face and slid past Sasuke, but before the youngest Uchiha had a chance to capitalize on the comedic opportunity, Itachi used shunshin to right himself but didn’t counter attack, noting the makibishi that Sasuke had littered the area with. He decided to try and wash the spikes away with a suiton technique, but the impediments stood firm. Having no other choice, Itachi spread his now purplish wings and took flight. Sasuke grinned, he had successfully negated the speed advantage that Itachi had and now the fight was on even ground…or air again. With one powerful sweep of his black feathered wings, Sasuke took flight and leveled off with his opponent and once again the fight picked up.

For the next twenty minutes, at least to the combatants, fireballs flew from one area of the sky towards the other, ranging in size from pumpkin sized, to larger than some middle class summons. The conflagrations never hit their mark, or if they did, the target turned out to be a clone of some sort and the fight would continue. The longer this went on, the more Itachi started to become irate and the more he was tempted to use Tsukiyomi, despite the threat to his eyesight. Suddenly Sasuke’s attacks increased in ferocity. He threw a long chain of straight punches at Itachi’s face, which the older brother blocked easily enough, but when he tried to force some distance with a kick, Sasuke quickly tried to connect with a knee or change up his punches and try something that was more looping. In one swift moment, Sasuke succeeded in breaking Itachi’s defense and landed a looping right hook to his brother’s temple which opened up a whole series of targets for the younger brother. In short succession Itachi’s body was riddled with a hard left hook, a right and left jab and then a rising knee to the chin.

As Itachi flew backwards, he locked eyes with Sasuke and drew him into the feared genjutsu of the mangekyou sharingan.

“For the next seventy-two hours you will be shown what will happen to your ‘family’ once Hideaki-sama gets through with them.” He meant for Sasuke to see Naruto’s lifeless body once the Kyuubi had been extracted, Anko’s headless corpse and Haku, beaten, raped and finally decapitated, yet Sasuke seemed unfazed.

“Did you really think that I wouldn’t come up with a counter for this eventually?” He posed before gathering his chakra for a Katon: Rasengan and charging forward, hoping to make Itachi either shop a trump card. He got his wish, as Itachi recognized the potential in his little brother’s attack and couldn’t dodge in mid air. The black fires of the Amaterasu burned towards Sasuke’s charging form, forcing him to try and block with his miniature sun. The two attacks ground against each other for a moment, but in the end Sasuke was forced to leap away, his chakra wasted against the black flames. Instead of dissipating or burning out, the black fire actually pulled back to Itachi, completely under his control.

“I can use the flames of the Amaterasu as both an offensive weapon and an impenetrable defense. You have no way to penetrate it, it is simply a matter of time before it catches you and I am the last of the Uchiha clan.” Itachi boasted before lashing out with his dark weapon. Sasuke dodged the strike, but in cooroberation with Itachi’s words, the flames pursued him relentlessly and soon he found himself missing them by less and less. Sasuke was forced to try and get Itachi in-between himself and the black flames that threatened his life. By gaining altitude and then going into a ninety degree dive and playing a little game of chicken with his older brother, Sasuke was successful, though it didn’t have the destructive side effect he was hoping for. The flames just danced around his body, not doing any damage or burning their summoner in any way.

“Foolish little brother, these fires are loyal completely to me, they will not hurt me, no matter what you do.” Sasuke wasn’t upset, Itachi noticed, instead he was smirking.

“Is that so? Because I happen to know for a fact that if two flames of the sun god are summoned and neither is stronger than the other, than they will turn on their summoners and destroy them for being so weak.” As he spoke, Sasuke cut his hand on his razor sharp horns and flew through the short series of hand seals for a summoning.

“Kuchioyse: Amaterasu.” As blood dripped from his wound, it became consumed by identical black flames and spread. Itachi cursed himself for his oversight, Sasuke had proven to be full of surprises, so of course he would have some how found a way to counter every advantage that the Mangekyou sharingan gave him, including replicating the Amaterasu. Finding it prudent to strike while Sasuke’s attack was weakest, Itachi’s flames flew forward, trying to overpower his brother’s. It was too late, and Sasuke’s Amaterasu was on even par with Itachi’s. For the next five minutes the two pushed against each other, neither gaining any ground nor giving any up, it was a dead heat.

That’s when it happened, there was an ominous change to the atmosphere and suddenly the two fires twisted upwards and spun together before breaking apart and heading back to their summoner. Itachi noted with a sense of glee that Sasuke’s face showed a great deal of fear, he had been gambling on that technique, and now it would kill him. Itachi was in no danger, as he dismissed his own conflagration with a simple wave of his hand, and had enough time to watch Sasuke struck down by the black flames. But instead of the screaming and pain that should have been coming from Sasuke, there was no noise or complaining, in fact the fire seemed to be disappearing into his body. As the volume of flames diminished, so did Sasuke’s demonic features. His body shrunk back to its normal proportions and his horns shrunk back into his head. The only change from Sasuke before he activated his devil mode and now, was that his skin was darker now, like he had instantly gotten a deep, deep tan and his eyes were completely black, no sharingan was present.

“I have taken this technique farther than you or anyone in the history of our world ever has, and in doing so have forced myself past the level of even our greatest ancestor. The combination of the holy flames of the sun god and my demonic body has produced the closest thing to a god that can be found on this earth.”

The war between their otherworldly flames had melted all the ice on the ground and both fighters had landed. Knowing that he had the advantage in speed, no matter what Sasuke said, Itachi pushed his attack, speeding to his brother, who didn’t seem to be interested or even acknowledge that he was being attacked. Itachi formed his fiery sword and was thrusting it at Sasuke’s eyeball while his prey was still staring at his previous location. But as the blade came in contact with Sasuke, it began to dissipate and dissolve until all that was left was the ‘handle’ in Itachi’s hand. The older brother made to back away but Sasuke grabbed his outstretched arm with never before seen speed and strength, squeezing on Itachi’s wrist until it snapped. He let go and Itachi leapt backwards, holding his right arm gingerly. Before he could speak or counter attack, Sasuke blurred from view and appeared behind his brother before landing a devastating snap kick to the back of Itachi’s skull, staggering the older brother forward. Again, Sasuke appeared before his brother and began to clinically land punches to his brother. Everywhere he touched; black flame would erupt and slowly begin to spread, licking away at clothing and skin with no discrimination. The pain of a broken wrist and a fire hotter than the sun eating away at his flesh made Itachi cry out in pain. With one final strike Sasuke stopped fighting and stopped the spread of his fire momentarily.

“For what you have done, not just to me and the clan, but for what you have done to my true brother, I can never forgive you, but you won’t die. I will keep you imprisoned here in this desolate wasteland of a dimension, surrounded by my flames until the day I die. From now on, your life, however worthless it may be, is linked to mine.” He yawned as if he hadn’t slept in days. Taking one last look at his trapped brother, Sasuke stepped backwards and did a single hand sign, before a small hole opened up, showing the path back to reality. Itachi tried to do anything, but any movement resulted in his body coming in contact with the intense fire that formed his prison. He watched as Sasuke walked through the portal and closed up the only window back to reality without looking back.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
The first thing that everyone present noticed when Sasuke emerged from the dimensional pocket he had created, was that he appeared completely unharmed. That notion was thrown out the window when he basically collapsed on top of Naruto, throwing both boys to the ground. With a little help, they got him to the hospital where Tsunade was waiting to check him over. Absorbing the Amaterasu had been a desperation move; he hadn’t perfected the technique and actually suffered some pretty serious burns internally and externally. He was out of chakra and just over all fatigued. Tsunade didn’t expect him to even wake up for over a week, considering what he went through in a short amount of time. At the end of the day Anko and Naruto went home with the knowledge that Sasuke should make a full recovery, though Tsunade wasn’t sure what kind of side effects would come from swallowing such a dangerous technique. Only time would tell.

Ever since Sasuke’s battle with his brother, Naruto hadn’t been sleeping well. True Sasuke hadn’t woken up, even after a couple days of rest, and sure there was the double date with Hinata and Tenten that was less than twenty four hours away, but somehow Naruto knew that his unease had nothing to do with those things. His dreams were plagued by nightmares, ones he had never had before, and that frankly, confused him as to why he woke up frightened and sweating at their conclusion.

It always started the same, an inky black…space…that’s all it was, just black. No figures, no noises no buildings no anything. Then, suddenly, something appeared. It wasn’t anything definite, just a white blob that twisted and turned until it split into three smaller pieces. Eventually those three split and divided and some bled into one another until all that blackness was covered over in white. Eventually, some of the white figures seemed to grow color. Some of them were brown, some green, every color of the rainbow was represented and some remained white. But despite the flurry of activity and movement, Naruto never lost sight of the original blob. It hadn’t moved since it split, it hadn’t shrunk in size or changed its color.

Time passed and some of the shapes and colors grew, some shrunk, a few even disappeared, only to show up again in a minute’s time. Suddenly, and for no reason, the main blob suddenly pulsed and grew, wiping every thing else off the ‘map’ though it had no detail. It was back to inky blackness, but soon color and shape returned to the barren wasteland. The first shape began to quake and grow again, but suddenly it stopped and actually began to shrink. As this was happening, some of the smaller shapes of various colors began to grow in size until all that was left of the original mass was a circular outline. Time passed and the color began to return to the mass, but it was a painfully slow process. Just as it was about to refill, the dream would end and Naruto would wake in a cold sweat, his heart racing as if he had just run a thousand laps around Konoha.

Tonight was no exception and right on cue he leapt up in shock, he sheets soaked in sweat and thrown all over the room. He got up to get a drink of water and try to calm down, but sleep was escaping him. Usually if he couldn’t sleep he’d go outside and train, but it was raining outside and he didn’t fell it would be a good idea to catch pneumonia before his big date. The dream didn’t make any sense to him and thinking about it was only driving him crazy with frustration. He sat down and tried to meditate a little, or at least try and still his heartbeat. He had no intention of winding up in front of the Kyuubi’s cage, but that’s precisely what happened.

“SO, YOU’VE FINALLY COME BACK, HAVE YOU?” The mighty demon asked, red eyes showing no emotion or interest at Naruto’s sudden appearance.

“Believe, me, you’re the last thing I wanted to see right now, I don’t need more stress on my mind as it is.” Naruto grumbled before slouching against the wall farthest from the bars.

“ACTUALLY, I BELIEVE I’M EXACTLY THE THING YOU NEED TO SEE. I’VE BEEN SENDING YOU THAT DREAM FOR THE PAST COUPLE OF DAYS AND YOU ARE JUST NOW COMING TO SEE ME ABOUT IT.”

“You mean that fucked up dream I’ve been having is your fault!” Naruto yelled. “It was all just to get me to come here? What the hell, you could’ve just asked me to come instead of making my dreams look like some kind of kaleidoscope!”

“I AM THE KYUUBI, I DO NOT GO TO PEOPLE, THEY COME TO ME, WHICH IS HOW IT WORKS, AND THAT IS HOW IT WILL WORK!” The demon roared in reply, successfully shutting his jailor up for the moment. “LOOK KID, THERE ISN’T MUCH MORE TIME BEFORE THE AKATSUKI COMES TO COLLECT US AND IF YOU WANT TO HAVE A SHOT AT BEATING THE GUY WHO TROUNCED YOUR ASS LAST TIME, YOU HAVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU’RE GOING UP AGAINST. THAT IS WHAT THE DREAM HAS BEEN TRYING TO EXPLAIN TO YOU, THE HISTORY OF YOUR REAL OPPOENENT.”

“Real opponent? Hideaki is the leader of the group…do you mean that beast he’s trying to awaken?”

Though the gigantic demon’s muzzle and face were cloaked in darkness, the motion of his eyes was enough to clue Naruto that he was nodding.

“THE ‘BEAST’ AS YOU SAY HAS A NAME…IT IS YOUMEI.” (Order)

“Order? That’s a dumb name, what is so bad about order? What’s he gonna do, arrange my sock drawer for me?” Naruto joked, but the Kyuubi found nothing funny in his vessel’s behavior.

“THIS COMING FROM THE BOY WHOSE ENTIRE NAME IS BASED ON FOOD.” This shut up the boy for the moment. “TELL ME, IN THE DREAM, WHAT DO YOU THINK HAPPENED, WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?”

For a minute, Naruto was quiet. He thought about it but couldn’t find an answer he was sure about. “That I shouldn’t ever let you have a set of blocks to play with?” He offered weakly.

The Kyuubi didn’t respond with words, but sighed at how dumb his guest was sometimes.

“LET ME TRY TO EXPLAIN IT USING SMALL WORDS AND VISUAL AIDES SO THAT YOU’RE PUNY MIND CAN GET THIS. HOW TO PUT THIS…YOU HAVE HEARD THE STORIES OF HOW THE WORLD WAS CREATED, CORRECT? OK, TAKE WHICHEVER ONE YOU WANT; MANY OF THEM HAVE THIS IN COMMON. IN THE BEGINNING THERE WAS NOTHING. JUST LIKE YOUR DREAM, THERE IS NOTHING, NO LIFE, NO WORLD, NO ANYTHING. SOME PEOPLE REFER TO THIS ‘NOTHINGNESS’ AS CHAOS. SUDDENLY, SOMETHING COMES INTO EXHISTANCE; SOME PEOPLE SAY THE WORLD WAS CREATED BY A GOD, SOME SAY BY GODS. OTHERS SAY THAT FROM NOTHINGNESS, THE GOD OR GODS THEMSELVES WERE BORN AND THEN THEY WENT ON TO CREATE THE WORLD. EITHER WAY, SOMEING FROM NOTHING, GOT IT?” Naruto nodded his head, this was kind of making sense. “THIS GENESIS OF LIFE WAS CALLED BY SOME PEOPLE, ORDER. EVERYTHING THAT EVER WAS, EVERYTHING THAT EVER IS AND EVERYTHING THAT EVER WILL BE, ALL OF THAT FALLS UNDER THE HEADING OF ORDER.”

“Now hold up! Let me get this straight. Order is everything in the world? I thought we were talking about the Akatsuki’s plans to resurrect this thing, not theology.”

“ORDER, AS IT PERTAINS TO THE AKATSUKI, IS SIMPLY A DEMON, MILLENIA OLDER AND MANY, MANY TIMES STRONGER THAN I OR ANY OF THE OTHER TAILED DEMONS, EVEN COMBINED. THE ONLY THING THAT IT HAS IN COMMON WITH THE STORY, IS THAT IT IS THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF NOTHINGNESS.”

“So how does that make it insanely strong? If it’s so old than why weren’t you able to kill it, the thing must have been way old and decrepit.”

“IF I THROW TWO IDENTICAL ROCKS TOGETHER, DOES EITHER ONE GET DESTROYED? IF TWO LIGHTNING BOLTS HIT EACH OTHER, IS EITHER ONE HALTED? SINCE ORDER IS EVERYTHING, IT CAN BE HURT BY NOTHING, DO YOU GET IT?”

Naruto was confused, but because he had nothing better to do, he tried to work it out. “What’s the point of fighting then? Order can’t be hurt by anything, you just said so.”

His speech was stopped by the toothy grin of the Kyuubi. “THAT’S NOT WHAT I SAID. YOU SAY ORDER CANNOT BE HURT BY ANYTHING. I SAID THAT IT CAN BE HURT BY NOTHING. IF YOU WISH TO HAVE A CHANCE AGAINST ORDER OR EVEN HIDEAKI, YOU MUST LEARN TO WEILD THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF ORDER…THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF EVERYTHING…”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Sunrise found Naruto out on a training ground near his house, attempting to do what had never been done before. Not even the Kyuubi had been able to use chaos or even come close to figuring out how to. That was, until Naruto ended up as his vessel and gained control over all five of the chakra elements. For the first time since the fox had learned of the plan to release its former master, there was a speck of hope at the end of the tunnel. At first Naruto had been reluctant to accept training from the demon that had nearly destroyed the village, but eventually was persuaded. The task he must learn was monumental in cost and almost mind shattering in terms of control needed to even hope to get a result. Naruto had thousands of Cage bun shin working on trying to learn this trick, but each one would dispel themselves after just one attempt, so he had to continuously reform them as well as trying it himself every once in a while, hoping for any semblance of improvement.

‘And you’re sure this is the only way to do it?’ He asked the demon in his head.

“OH, AND WHAT DID YOU HAVE IN MIND?” The Kyuubi retorted.

“This.” Naruto began to form a Fuuton: Rasengan in his hand. Then a Suiton: Rasengan, then a Doton: Rasengan. With each addition, the spiraling ball of chakra grew more powerful and began to turn a pale yellow color. Then Raiton: Rasengan was added and the pressure required to keep the technique together became far more intense and the color lightened to nearly nothing. Finally, he tried to add the final element, Katon: Rasengan to the mix, but when he tried, the entire thing blew up in his face, burning his arm terribly and almost removing the entire thing. Quickly the Kyuubi’s chakra went about, healing the damage and before too long, his right arm was as good as new.

“I don’t get it!” He yelled at himself as well as his prisoner. “That should’ve worked. Every element, combined like that, the weaknesses and strengths of each one should have balanced out one another!”

“GOOD MOVE IDIOT! I TOLD YOU, THE ONLY WAY THAT YOU CAN EVEN HOPE TO GET TO A STATE OF CHAOS IS BY USING THEM ALL AT THE EXACT SAME TIME! IF YOU ADD THEM ONE AT A TIME LIKE THAT, YOU ONLY GO AROUND THE CIRCLE OF ELEMENTS. YOU NEED TO USE THEM ALL SIMALTANEOUSLY TO GET A TRULY NEUTRAL MIX.”

“Why?” Naruto demanded as another score of clones destroyed themselves and were replaced.

“IT’S PRESCHOOL MATH FOR HEAVEN’S SAKES!” THE KYUUBI WAS GETTING VERY ANNOYED WITH NARUTO’S LACK OF PATIENCE. “LET’S SAY YOU START WITH WIND ELEMENT LIKE LAST TIME, THAT’S ONE ELEMENT. THEN YOU ADDED WATER, IT DOESN’T CANCEL OUT THE WIND, SO THAT’S ANOTHER ONE, SO YOU’RE UP TO TWO ELEMENTS TOTAL, GOT IT? THEN DOTON, WHICH IS STRONGER THAN WATER, SO THAT GETS NEUTRALIZED, BUT YOU STILL HAVE A TOTAL OF TWO. LIGHTNING IS STRONGER THAN EARTH, SO DOTON IS GONE, THEN LIGHTNING IS NEGATED BY THE WIND, AND FIRE COMBINES WITH WIND TO BLOW YOU UP!”

“Oh.” Naruto finally got it and went back to trying to do it as he was instructed.

‘IF HE ACTUALLY MANAGES TO GET THIS DOWN…’ The Kyuubi mused as Naruto failed once again and nearly blew himself up. ‘IT’LL BE A MIRACLE.’

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

While Naruto tried to kill himself, Tenten and Hinata were just waking up. Each one considered this the most important day of their lives, and neither could wait for the evening to come. While each one was confident in their own abilities, there was the edge of nervousness that a first date always brought to keep their heads grounded. By the end of the night, one of them would have their heart broken and although neither one wanted to admit it, they were both unwilling to admit that they didn’t want to see the other girl loose. Tenten knew that this was Hinata’s one chance at a relationship that she chose. If Naruto didn’t choose her, than she would most likely be forced into an arranged marriage with some foreign dignitary or some other clan heir, maybe from Konoha, maybe not.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Hinata was combing her hair thinking her own thoughts along the same lines as Tenten. Naruto had proven what the shy girl had known all along. He would be something special with enough time and some support. Obviously she wanted him for herself, and despite the fact that Tenten was showing more traits of a fan girl than a serious girlfriend, she was a good friend, and Hinata hated to see a friend in pain. Tenten might not belong to a clan, or a family with enough clout to warrant an arranged marriage, her parents had been exerting pressure on the brunette to find a man who was strong enough for their tastes, or they would find one for her. This wasn’t anything formal, and all they could really do is threaten her, but Hinata knew something that Tenten didn’t. The only one that fit in the category that was still available…was Lee. Kiba was happily dating the daughter of one of Team 8’s former clients, a wealthy businessman from the closest village east of Konoha, and Shino had a pretty heavy relationship with Ayame from Ichiraku ramen stand of all people. Apparently, her father was once a ninja and was highly regarded by the Yondaime…who knew?

Chouji, as far as Hinata knew, wasn’t dating anyone, but then again, the Akimichi clan had always prioritized oddly compared with the other clans, so he might not have begun looking yet…or maybe he was already engaged, you couldn’t tell with him. Shikamaru and Ino were often seen hanging around a lot and though it didn’t mean that they were dating, people tended to treat them like they were already engaged.

Sasuke was dating Haku and that seemed like a stable relationship, Sakura hadn’t had time for any kind of romantic interest from the time that she became Tsunade-sama’s apprentice, until recently. Apparently while in Suna, she had started seeing someone, at least that was the rumor. No one was quite sure who it was, or even if it was true, but everyone from Kankuro, the older brother of the Kazekage, to one of the council member’s thirteen year old son was being named with no regard for the truth.

That just left Lee and Neji in Tenten’s age group. Lee was still trying to chase after Sakura and Neji was…

Hinata blushed at the memory. She had been looking for Naruto-kun after he had returned from rescuing Gaara and had accidentally walked in on Neji making out with-

“Hinata-sama.” Neji’s voice made the girl jump in surprise. “Your father wishes to see you as soon as you are ready.”

“Just a moment.” She replied, checking her appearance over to make sure she was presentable for her father before exiting her room. As she had expected, Neji was still waiting for her. “You didn’t have to wait for me, Neji-niisan.”

“Your father actually wanted to see both of us, so I figured I might as well wait for you.” He told her as they began the walk to Hiashi’s office. It was far from a short walk and so the two talked on their way. Hinata wondered if Neji knew why they were being summoned, but he had no more of an idea than she did. They reached their destination and knocked on the woodwork before being granted entrance. The first thing that both realized was that Hanabi was already there and the second thing was that Hiashi was angry. Perhaps that was an understatement. Hiashi was royally pissed off and it seemed like these three were going to be taking the brunt of his anger.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Evening came around and it was time for Naruto to meet up with the girls at the Hokage tower. As he had expected both girls had shown up early and were eyeing each other wearily. Tenten had let her hair down a bit and instead of being held up tightly, it fell loosely to her shoulder blades before it was bunched together into a ponytail that was quite long and continued to the small of her back. She wore a red dress with silver accents that somewhat reminded Naruto of the outfit that Sakura used to wear all the time. Short skirt ending and full shoulder coverage. It was much more form conscious than Sakura’s ever was, but for a male with no sense of fashion, there were enough similarities to compare the two.

Hinata had apparently gone all out for this date. She wore a light blue dress that came down to her knees and had straps that held the entire thing on her shoulders. It came over her bust and the straps made a square most of the way over her chest, but it covered enough skin to still be considered conservative. Naruto thought that she looked very beautiful, what with the way that the dress contrasted against the darker, royal blue of her hair and her paler skin. Not that Tenten was bad in comparison; both girls would’ve had any guy with a pulse falling at their feet if they dressed like this all the time.

When the girls had arrived at the meeting point, they were disappointed that Naruto wasn’t there yet, but he still had about ten minutes, so they didn’t hold that against him. Hinata kept looking at Tenten with surprise in her face. She couldn’t remember a time when she had seen Tenten with her hair down. Nor could she remember ever seeing her rival in a dress or without any obvious weaponry on her body. She wore very little make up, just some lipstick that made her lips stand out a bit more from her bronze skin.

Likewise, Tenten was amazed to see what shy; timid Hinata had worn to the date. Especially considering that it was approaching December and the weather was only going to turn colder as the night progressed. The dress was simply beautiful, both in design and fabrication and how it made Hinata look when she wore it. Hinata hadn’t worn any lip stick and the only hint of make up was just a light shading of eye shadow. The most peculiar thing that Tenten noticed about her opponent in love was that Hinata seemed distracted and didn’t seem to be happy to be finally going out with the boy she had been pining after for so long.

“That’s a very nice dress you’re wearing.” Hinata complimented without lifting her eyes from the road.

“Thanks, I could say the same thing about your’s. Mind telling me where you got it? I could use some nice ones like that when I’m dating Naruto-kun.” Tenten hadn’t really meant that last barb; she was just trying to get Hinata to…care about tonight. There was no fun in winning the race if the field all quite half way through.

“I don’t know, it belongs to Haku, she’s lending it to me for tonight. I could ask her for you if you wanted.” She offered, lifting her head just a little bit.

That’s when both girls noticed Naruto walking up; both their jaws dropped and their eyes widened. His streaked hair was as shaggy as ever and hung around his head like a porcupine. He wore a pair of black pants and a sweater. That wasn’t because of the temperature, but because he didn’t want the girls to see his arms, which were quite bruised after today’s training. He looked like a model out of a magazine that other girls looked through and giggled over like school children.

“Wow Naruto-kun, you look nice!” Tenten beamed at the boy who got confirmation on his wardrobe by Hinata.

“Thanks, but you two look so nice that I look pretty plain in comparison.” They both blushed at the compliment, even though it was true. “So, you two hungry for anything in particular?” He asked, trying to get the night started. When neither of them spoke up, he offered his own suggestion.

“I know this place, over by the Academy, its got seafood and almost everything else you can think of.” When both girls nodded in approval, they trio headed out.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Dinner was quite good for Naruto, and simply amazing for the girls. Of course, Naruto was judging the food and the girls were swayed by the ambience. After they finished, they walked around for a little while, killing time until the movie they were going to started when Naruto tensed slightly before relaxing.

“Something wrong?” Tenten asked. She was doing most of the talking between the two girls, and Hinata just looked at Naruto’s face in worry. Naruto didn’t respond immediately, but after a second just shook his head, as if shaking off water.

“I thought I felt something, but it must’ve been my imagination. C’mon, we should go get our seats if we want good ones.” He smiled and both his dates felt their hearts lighten at the sight.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Naruto had felt something. Yugito was in way over her head. The Akatsuki had come calling, and he was much stronger than she had thought a ninja could be. She threw the Hiraishin marker than Naruto had given her, but the man that had come for her disappeared from sight and then reappeared with the kunai in his hand.

“I’m afraid that help won’t be coming for you.” He calmly said as she watched the marker on the weapon was sliced into tiny, illegible pieces. Before she knew what to do he had started hand seals that she didn’t recognize.

He puffed out his chest before spitting…something at her. She didn’t recognize it; it had seemed to have the consistency of molasses but was brighter than any light source she had ever seen. Not knowing what this was, or how to react to it, she put up a powerful defense of electricity, kind of a static field and hoped for the best. Sadly, she got the worst. When Hideaki’s attack contacted her barrier, it seemed to slow for a moment, but suddenly her shelter just cracked and whatever he had used got through. Before she even realized what had happened she saw a spark and she was engulfed in a gigantic explosion that sucked all the air out of what remained of her defensive shield and she fell to the ground and lay on her stomach.

Almost immediately she felt the Nibi’s chakra trying to get out, but it didn’t feel like when it tried to heal her. She couldn’t place it, but before she could figure out the puzzle, her attacker appeared over her and placed a paper talisman on her forehead before she fell unconscious.

“I’m sorry, but you won’t escape your fate by abandoning your vessel and killing yourself, Nibi.” His eyes were hard when he spoke that, but suddenly turned a tiny bit softer. “Poor stupid jinchuriki. You didn’t realize that more than two elements could be used in conjunction to form different attacks.” He slung the girls prone form over his shoulder before touching the ring on his hand. A hole seemed to cut itself out of thin air and he walked through and without another word the ‘doorway’ back to his lair shut itself without a trace.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The movie had ended and the trio was heading back to the Hokage tower so that Naruto could render his final decision. Tenten was feeling confident in her chances, since Hinata really hadn’t said or done anything all night, which even for someone as shy as her, was awfully weird. More than once she had contemplated asking if she was ok, but Naruto had actually asked the question for her and Hinata had answered in the negative and the night went on.

When they got to the tower, they heard what seemed like yelling coming from the still lit office of the Hokage. Naruto immediately headed towards the entrance to the office and Tenten and Hinata just followed. As they got closer, and the voices became clearer, Hinata recognized the voice arguing with the Hokage as her father’s. What he was doing here at such a late hour, she had no clue, but the conversation quickly revealed the truth.

“…never in the history of the Hyuuga clan has such a thing been done! Arranging a marriage between the Heir or Heiress has never, NEVER been done and I’ll be damned if they’ll do it to my daughters!”

Tenten heard that part and looked at Hinata who had gone paler than usual and froze in the middle of the hallway. When Naruto turned to look at her, she snapped out of her little episode and tried to run away from the two of them now that they knew the truth. There had been an arrangement made while the entire clan was vacationing in Suna. She was to be married to either the Kazekage or his brother. That wasn’t the least of it either! There was another provision, much less detailed than her arrangement that forced either Hanabi or Neji to wed a Sand citizen as well.

She had only taken a couple of steps before Naruto grabbed her arm and swung her around into a hug and tried to get her to stay. Hinata continued to struggle and remove herself from Naruto’s embrace, but he proved too strong and she eventually just broke down and began crying. Tenten on the other hand, was confused. Sure she had won Naruto, but by apparent default AND one of her best friends was going to have to marry someone she had no feelings for. It was a victory overshadowed by grief for sure.

“Hinata…Hinata…come on, I’m sure it’ll be ok, let’s go inside and find out what they’re talking about, your dad seems pretty pissed, maybe he’s getting the whole thing annulled.” That brightened Hinata up a bit. If anyone in the village could save her from this fate, it was her father, and he had promised all three of them that morning that he would fight tooth and nail so that they would have the choice to do what they wish with their lives.

She nodded her head, tears pooling in her eyes, but not falling.

“Come on in you three, you might as well hear this.” Tsunade’s voice came from the opened doors of her office where Hiashi and Neji were sitting already. When all three were seated, the Hokage began again.

“If you haven’t figured it out already, the Hyuuga council went over Hiashi’s head and arranged the marriage of his Hinata and either Neji or Hanabi to Sand ninja, in Hinata’s case it is to either Gaara or Kankuro.” Tenten gasped in shock and bit back some tears. This was definitely not how she wanted the night to end.

“The other marriage is between, and I quote, “A member of the main branch of the Hyuuga clan or close relative thereof, and a citizen of Sunagakure of the San Council’s choosing, so long as that person is from an established clan or family.”

‘So that’s why Neji’s involved in this.’ Tenten thought, watching her teammate’s face for any reaction. He didn’t have one, which either meant he didn’t care, or he had heard this before.

“How can they just go over your head like that?” Tenten found herself asking the Head of the most prominent clan in Konoha. “You’re the leader of the clan, can’t you do anything?”

“Unfortunately the Hyuuga clan politics differs from those of Konoha greatly. Unlike the Hokage, who is without a doubt the strongest ninja in Konoha with the possible exception of Jiraiya-sama, I am not guaranteed to be the strongest Hyuuga. In fact, I am fairly certain that I am not, so I cannot forcibly override the wishes of the council like Hokage-sama did some time ago. As for a diplomatic means of resolution, my hands are tied. Suffice it to say that my Great-great grandfather had a reputation for abusing his power, and so upon his death, the council used the tiny period between his death any my great-grandfather’s appointment to increase their power exponentially.”

“So there’s nothing you can do about this?” Naruto asked. Hiashi just nodded.

“That’s why he came to me.” Tsunade answered for the man. “He needed to know if I could overrule him on this, but alas, even with my new political powers, this is a purely internal affair of the Hyuuga clan, thus the only thing I could do, would be to declare war on Suna, and void the contract that way, something I am obviously not going to do.”

For a while, no one spoke up. They just sat their in silence until Tenten spoke up.

“What is the wording on Hinata’s part of the contract? I mean the exact wording, that second part was so vague, maybe we can find a loophole or something.”

Hinata lifted her head from her hands to look over at the girl she had been competing against all night. Was she just giving up her winnings?

“Let’s see here… ‘The following arrangements are made for the future of both the villages of Konohagakure and Sunagakure. There shall be two marriages to be arranged between the Hyuuga clan, acting on their own volition as representatives of Konohagakure, and Sunagakure. The first shall be a marriage between the Heiress of the Hyuuga clan, Hyuuga Hinata and any of the Houses that have held the title of Kazekage.’ Then there’s a list of the houses and the current members there. The Shodai Kazekage has a Great, great niece, but no male descendants. The Nidaime had no offspring and the Sandaime’s house was dissolved following his death. I don’t know why that was done, but it usually means that he had no descendants. That just leaves the Yondaime and his sons, Gaara and Kankuro.” Tsunade read off the contract for all to hear and by the end of it, Hinata was crying again and even Tenten was chocking back sobs. That was pretty tight, not a lot of wiggle room at all. The only other choice even was two other girls, Temari and this descendant of the First Kazekage. So unless Hinata secretly had a thing for girls, she was kind of stuck.

“There’s another provision, it wasn’t specific as to which marriage it went to, but if Hinata were to marry Kankuro, since she wouldn’t have to become a Suna citizen, the second marriage would have to become one. It’s basically a swap, one person to another.” Tsunade hated to be the Bearer of bad news, but when it rains it pours, and if Tenten was set upon helping Hinata out of this predicament, she needed to know all of the facts.

“What if I told you I can fix this entire thing?” Naruto spoke up, holding in a laugh so as not to anger anyone. “Hinata can marry me.”

“WHAT!” Everyone in the room yelled at Naruto except for Neji, who just stared at him.

“Sunagakure has officially recognized me as the biological son of the Sandaime Kazekage. That is where I got the ability to use the Satetsu; it is actually my bloodline, more than anything else is. The house was folded upon his death because he didn’t have any children alive at that time. Orochimaru didn’t steal his DNA from Akasuna no Sasori for another couple years and I wasn’t born until much later. But the council has recognized that I am his son, so if you were to put my name on that contract it would be as valid as if you wrote Gaara’s or make-up boy’s name there.” He turned his Konoha headband around one hundred and eighty degrees to show that he had tied it together with the red fabric of the one that Gaara had given him. I am a citizen of Sunagakure by order of the Kazekage and have the right to come and go from the village and the Land of Wind as I please.”

Needless to say everyone was shocked at that revelation. Tsunade was the first one to get her mind back on track.

“It’ll take some checking, but that could work I suppose, but what about the second marriage, you’re not a member of the Hyuuga clan too are you?”

Suddenly, Hinata let out a loud squeal of glee and accomplishment.

“I know how to fix that one!” She smiled, despite the tears still in her red eyes. “Neji-niisan is dating Temari-san! If he were to propose marriage to her, that should fulfill that part of the contract! Since Naruto-kun’s a citizen of Suna, and Temari is the ambassador to Konoha, they both have dual citizenship! Even that last clause if taken care of!” She was over the moon with joy. She could still marry Naruto-kun and Neji would even get to be with the person he had chosen! She had forgotten about one person however, and Tenten was far from pleased with this situation.

She wasn’t paying attention when Hiashi and Neji approved of this plan, and didn’t even register when they stood up to leave. It wasn’t until Hinata was called to accompany them back to the compound that the weapons mistress stood up.

“Am I that bad that you’d choose an arranged marriage over free choice?” She asked Naruto crying where she stood.

“Tenten-chan, that’s not it! Since this would still be arranged, I would still be free to marry someone that I choose too.” He tried to sooth her, but apparently he said the wrong thing.

“Tenten ran crying from the office. She would not, could not be with a man that chose her second to an arranged marriage. Oddly, the thought that she’d be sharing Naruto with Hinata was not as big of a turn off as it sounded to the other ninja that were in the room…except to Hinata.

“Am I nothing more than arranged marriage to you?” Hinata yelled, tears again flowing freely. “I’m so bad that you need another wife, one that you can choose of your own will?” Quickly she followed Tenten’s example and fled from the room. Naruto was about to go after them, but was stopped by Tsunade’s hand on his shoulder and the cold looks from the elder Hyuuga’s.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Hinata followed Tenten to an empty training ground where she pulled a small scroll from a hidden pocket in the hem of her dress and summoned a bunch of throwing weapons and began to take out her frustrations on a defenseless tree.

“Want to join me?” The weapons mistress asked the heiress without turning her back, her voice still wavering with emotional pain. Hinata didn’t respond but walked over and picked up a kunai and hurled it with surprising force for someone her size. They continued to pincushion the tree in silence for the next twenty minutes until they ran out of weapons to throw. Hinata was panting a bit; she wasn’t used to throwing projectiles so hard.

“He’s a great guy, you two’ll be great together.” Tenten quietly intoned. She tried to keep the sadness from her voice, but was only marginally successful.

“He’s only doing this to save me. You’re the one he chose of his own will. You deserve him more than I. I can always just marry Gaara…kun…it might not be so bad.” She too tried to keep any hints of pain and disappointment from her voice.

“He chose you first though. He cares for you…more than he does for me.” There was no hiding it now. Tenten was choking back tears. No one could compare with Naruto, no one showed as much kindness or compassion.

“It seems to me that he cares for the both of you.” Anko’s voice brought the two from their pity party. The two younger girls gave her a questioning look, inquiring about her presence.

“I was on my way to pick Naruto up from the Hokage’s office. Apparently when the two of you ran out your Dad and cousin did a number on him for hurting you two so badly. The thing is; he didn’t mean to hurt you.” She had been leaping from tree to tree and dropped to the ground to talk with the two girls who had loved…no…they still loved her son.

“Hinata, you’ve been watching him from afar for a long time, always thinking that he didn’t notice you, or that you weren’t good enough for him. But you never noticed that all his bluster, all his security would go out the window around you. I remember, the first time I ever talked with him about school, right after he and Sasuke moved in with me. The first thing he said was that Iruka was the only person who seemed to give him a fair shake and the second thing he told me was that there was this really cute girl who kept getting picked on by the others because she had “pearly eyes”. That’s a quote by the way, so if you see him, feel free to tease him to no end about it.” She paused to see if Hinata was feeling any better and was pleased to see that at least some part of her speech had gotten through. She turned to Tenten.

“And Tenten, you should have seen him when he was working on your swords. He had this look in his eyes that showed just how determined he was to make sure that you couldn’t be beaten as long as you had them with you. Sasuke made fun of him for weeks because of it. I know you were here when we rescued the Kazekage, but here’s a recap. When Sasuke and I got there, he had been knocked around by the leader of Akatsuki and was still unconscious. When he woke up, Sasuke and I were in the room, along with Tsunade-sama and Hinata, you were there too, do you remember what he said?”

Hinata thought about it for a second, going over all the memories she had of that trip to Suna before she admitted that she didn’t know what had occurred. So Anko filled in the blank.

“The first thing he did when he woke up was look for Sasuke and me. When he saw that we were ok, he noticed that Hinata was in the room, you had just helped fix Sakura’s arm, so you were still asleep and he asked if everyone had made it back to Konoha alright “did Tenten make it back ok?” Do you see? He cares for both of you deeply, and although it might look like he picked Hinata because of some marriage contract or that he picked you, Tenten of his own will, think of what he could have done. Hinata, you could be engaged to a man who dresses like a cat, wears more make up than you do and plays with dolls, or a man who used to kill for pleasure, is the youngest Cage in the history of the world as we know it, and still enjoys staying up all night doing paperwork. As for you, Tenten, he could have said, well I’m sorry, I do care for you, but I have to save Hinata from marrying a cat-guy, or the man I consider my best friend.”

While Anko had successfully drained almost all of the hostility from the situation, what little was left reared up.

“But do we mean so little to him that he needs two of us to make his life worth while?” Tenten asked. “I asked him what he was thinking and he gave me something about marrying both of us. What’s up with that?”

“Look, as for the marriage thing, it’s an assumption that an arranged marriage is one where neither party is in love with the other. Some time, not all that long ago, maybe twenty seven years or so ago, the council passed a law that said than any person entering into an arranged marriage between shinobi nations as a form of peace keeping, would be allowed to marry one person of their own choosing as well. It was the assumption that not only was the marriage one without love, but love would never develop between the two people, hence the law. As for his reaction…what can I say, this is the first time he’s ever been in a situation like this. Sure, put him in a hopelessly inescapable situation and he’ll get out every time, but put if before you two…look, just understand that everything outside of ninja arts are new to him.” She walked away, fairly certain that her son would get another chance with the two girls…women he had fallen for.