Disclaimer: I wish I did own Naruto but sadly this is not the case.


The figure landed softly, noiselessly in one of the lower branches of the tree, one of those big, ancient trees that grew in sight of the gates of Konohagakure no Sato, the village hidden among the leaves. The ninja, for the grace and fluidity of the very posture and movements left no place for a doubt about the subject; looked at the ninja village with azure eyes sparkling in the light of the afternoon sun that filtered through the treetops, a strange mix of genuine happiness, restless trepidation and baleful dread bubbling inside, rising slowly, until a large, calloused hand landed atop the blue-eyes ninja's head, ruffling blonde hair, while the owner, a tall man with a wild, long mane of white hair held in a ponytail, a red sleeveless coat over gray shirt and shinobi pants, red facial markings running down his face from the eyes and a horned hitai-ate with the kanji for "oil" engraved, said in his usual loud, boisterous voice:

- "Don't worry about it, brat. Just be happy you're home again, no need to get cold feet at the last minute, neh?"

Once upon a time, Uzumaki Naruto, genin ranked ninja of the Konoha village would have jumped screaming and kicking at the smallest insinuation of the kind that Jiraiya of the Sannin was making, but after more than two years of learning and growing in the training trip with the toad sage, Naruto just sighed and answered:

- "I suppose you're right, Ero-sennin. Let's just get this over with."

Jiraiya smirked while his pupil jumped down to the road and began to walk with a determined pace towards the large village gates. He looked at the blue sky and the mid-afternoon sun through the foliage, taking a moment to enjoy the calm that blanketed the world around him, and then jumped down after his student. He guessed that Tsunade, the Godaime Hokage of Konoha would want to see him before long, and the last thing in his to-do list right now was to antagonize the Slug Princess in any way, shape or form. He sighed, resigned, thinking that not even peeking on her during her bath would get the only female member of the Sannin more worked up than the bombshell he was about to drop on her and Konoha.


Inuzuka Kiba wanted to scream. Scratching the red fang mark in his cheek, the spiky haired second child of the Inuzuka clan head was bored out of his mind, fighting to stay awake and contemplating the fact that the life of a chünin was not what he had pegged it to be. Where were the dangerous super secret missions to be done? Where the powerful ninja to be defeated? Where, the beautiful daimyo daughters to be rescued? Instead of all that fun and excitement, he had gate guard duty. Gate duty! Life definitively could not be more unfair. Well, it actually could, since the alternative to cover Izumo's spot at the gate had been to cover the older chünin in the Hokage's office, and he was not THAT bored of life to risk it in the always dangerous task of waking his village leader out of one of her alcohol-induced naps. No, he'd rather stick with gate duty, thank you very much. If only fate would take pity on him and send his way one of those beautiful daimyo daughters from his dreams who he could then escort to the Hokage, who then would order him to be her shadow and guide while in the village. Yes, she'd do that, and then some foreign ninja would try to kidnap the girl. Powerful ninjas, mind you, so he could show better his power and manliness by easily beating them, and the girl would be so smitten by his prowess and animal magnetism that she would want to be his girlfriend. And then…

Then, his trusty Inuzuka nose pulled him out of his daydreams to inform him that someone was approaching the reception stand, and Kiba opened his eyes and raised his chin from the wooden counter to look at the arriving person and do his work. His thoughts, still lingering in his latest daydream died a quick but painful death when his eyes took in the vision of loveliness in front of him. He did a double take, and with an open, slightly salivating mouth he began to check the newcomer out from the ground up.

First, cute little feet, perfectly decorated with painted toenails and encased in standard issue, black ninja sandals, with a black metallic shin guards. Long, shapely, altogether sexy legs, encased in black, skin-tight pants to the hip, with an orange fringe in the right leg and the left legging replaced with form-fitting fishnet that showed creamy, soft-looking, lightly tanned skin and sported a blue kunai holster strapped to it. The pants hugged delicious, curvy hips and were decorated with a blue belt that sported a metallic buckle with the Konoha symbol and held a tantö blade horizontally over what promised to be a beautiful, firm and round-shaped butt. While a stray thought about how a beautiful kunoichi was better than a beautiful daimyo daughter tried in vain to get through the fog in Kiba's mind, the Inuzuka's eyes continued to take in the sight in front of him. The hips were followed by a bare abdomen, slim and toned, with more of that wonderfully tanned, creamy skin, and then his lucky eyes reached visual heaven. Kiba was not a stranger to feminine beauty by any means; his female teammate, his jönin sensei and even his village leader were all beautiful, well-endowed women, however, he could swear then and there that he had never seen more perfect breasts in his life. Full and round, firm and lovely, the size placed in that perfect spot between generous and impressive, squeezed together by a black and orange, short sleeved shirt with red spirals in the shoulders and a low, v-cut neckline that showcased a fishnet-covered cleavage that would feature in Kiba's dreams for years to come. A quick sideways glance took account of slender, graceful arms, the left one sporting a blue scroll holder and black gauntlets with metal plating protecting delicate looking hands. The visual tour returned to heaven and then continued upwards, finding a pair of cute, short, bushy pigtails, tied from the base of the neck and thrown over her shoulders, and while the Inuzuka's mind finally decided to work to race over possible pick-up lines to be used, first date scenarios and other, definitely more mature and pleasant situations, the chünin took in the sight of silky, lustrous golden blonde hair held off the face by a Konoha headband. Kiba wondered just how he had missed this angel-on-earth for so long and thanked the Kami for gate duty, finally making eye contact to find beautiful, shining sapphire colored orbs under long, sensual eyelashes that looking at him with a knowing, mischievous look, but held no hint of anger or disgust at his blunt, perverted staring. No, she was not angry, in fact he could see past her cute button of a nose, her pouty, full, scarlet pair of lips smiling coyly at him, making her refined, feminine, whisker-marked face look all the more beautiful and endearing, and……..

…………

………………………

Kiba began to feel an uncomfortable sensation bubbling up in his stomach while his hormone-addled brain finally pick-up certain key facts he had missed previously: a preference for orange in the clothing, golden blonde hair, vibrant blue eyes, three whisker marks per cheek……. And then her coy smile turned into a foxy grin he knew too well, complete with shut eyes and victory hand sign. With Kiba's dawning understanding grew both the horror at the thoughts he'd had just a moment ago and the sickness in his stomach, and then she crossed her arms, doing wonderful things for her already memorable cleavage and causing havoc to his crumbling composure. And finally, the last nail in the coffin: the girl's voice, soft and feminine, yet vaguely familiar, said with too much sweetness and barely contained laughter:

-"See something you like, dogbreath?"-

The nickname cemented her just discovered identity, along with the horror of what he had just thought of doing to her, or rather to him, and Inuzuka Kiba turned a sickly shade of green and jumped over the reception stand's counter, running like a possessed towards the nearest alley, where during the next few minutes he proceeded to get re-acquaintanced with the breakfasts his big sister used to put in his bento box back in his old academy days.

When Kiba turned green, Uzumaki Naruto finally released the laughter that was threatening to burst through her composed façade, and when he ran to the alley, presumably to throw up, she leaned on the counter in full, eye-tearing peals of laughter. Then she got her breathing back under control, and turner her attention to the other occupant of the reception stand, who had remained utterly composed and calm through the whole ordeal, although you could see he was quite amused at his best friend antics, if you knew where to look. The blonde kunoichi smiled at him, and waved, saying:

-"Hello there, Shino-kun. It's good to see you again"-

-"Hello to you too, Naruto-san. Welcome back to the village…"- the composed Aburame heir said, in his trademark monotonous voice, shifted his stance slightly to look at the gate's side of the stand and added:

-"…and welcome back to you too, Jiraiya-sama"-

The legendary Konoha ninja, Jiraiya of the Sannin didn't answered, but acknowledged the greeting with a nod of the head, and kept walking at his leisure, while Naruto crouched to scratch Akamaru's ears. The large white furred ninken whimpered softly with satisfaction at the attention, and Naruto took the time to pull a cloth-covered package from the small traveling bag she carried. It turned out to be a rather big meat piece, the hind leg of a recently hunted piglet, which Akamaru began to eat without a second thought. Naruto then stood again, and sensing the imminent return of a pissed off Kiba, chuckled again, and said to Shino:

-"See you around, Shino-kun. I got to go report to Baa-chan's office, and hit her with my two-and-a-half year's mission report. I bet she'll love the paperwork"-

She grinned, and jumped across the street, following the path Jiraiya had used before to head to the Hokage's tower. Not ten seconds after that, a very angry and very pale Inuzuka Kiba burst off the alley he had went into, screaming bloody murder and looking everywhere for a certain blonde prankster in dire need of a beating. Instead, he found his companion ninken eating what seemed to be a meaty bribe, and his ninja teammate calmly putting down the identities of the arrived ninjas in the logbook.

-"Where is he! I'm gonna beat the crap outta that joking bastard! Akamaru, hurry up and help me track him down!"-

The dog only made a noise with it's throat that could be interpreted as "I'm busy" and kept chewing the piglet bone, the meat long gone by now. Kiba winded down at that reply, and resigned to return to his post. He knew he could not just go off chasing down Naruto without a severe reprimand from the Hokage, gate duty could be boring as all hell but it was important, and a reprimand from the Hokage could very well represent several days in the hospital. But he would get his revenge, oh yes, he would...

Kiba lost himself in another kind of daydreams than before, and Shino sighed loudly for his standards in an uncharacteristic display of emotion. His teammates were like family to the kikaichü bug user, but there were times when even he wondered how he managed to put up with their antics. He briefly wondered why Naruto had went on with his transformation after playing his joke on Kiba, but quickly deduced that there were bound to be more victims of that joke today, and soon his mind was in deep analysis of his last training session with his father.


After Naruto fled the scene leaving an infuriated Inuzuka ninja behind, she catch up with her sensei, and landed next to Jiraiya. Both of them walked to the Hokage tower in silence, since Jiraiya was reviewing in his mind all possible arguments he could wield in his favor to avoid the beating his gut told him he was going to get after this meeting, while Naruto was taking the sights of her hometown after being away for a little more than 30 months. She noticed that little had changed in the way of buildings; that clothing store managed by the old lady was still in the corner of the street that leads to Ichiraku's ramen, the dango stand a little way ahead, the market covering a whole section of the main street. What had changed, in Naruto's opinion, was the fact that people were reacting different to her than they did during her childhood.

Her mood grew somber, remembering the mistreatment she had suffered all her life, and guessed that the lack of hurtful, dirty looks and rude gestures, and the occasional smile and greeting nod were simply originated in the fact that nobody was connecting her female self with the male "demon child" they were used to hate. Word would run quickly and the hate would return soon enough, she guessed, but there was nothing she could do about it. It was not that she could not deal with that, either, it was just that after spending more than two years surrounded with people that sincerely appreciated her and treated her with respect, and even admiration, it was hard to get back in the mind frame required to ignore the offensive behavior of those villagers that knew of her burden and resented her for it.

So deep in her musings she was, she didn't noticed the dashing figure in course of collision with her, and not even well honed ninja instincts prevented the two figures from crashing with one another. Naruto lost the air on her lungs for a moment, and landed on her rear, the running boy in his knees in front of her. The boy, a Konoha ninja by his headband, quickly regained his foot and bowed quickly before offering a hand to Naruto.

-"I'm sorry, ma'am. Really, I'm sorry. I didn't see you there, and I'm in a hurry, and…."-

At this point, Naruto took his offered hand to stand up, and said while dusting herself off:

-"Really, Konohamaru. You need to see where you're going. What if I had dropped a precious bowl of ramen or ten, eh?"-

That cut Konohamaru's apologizing tirade, and he focused in the girl in front of him. Something familiar rang a bell in the back of his mind, and after few seconds he made the connection; between the whiskered cheeks and the blonde hair there were not many options anyway. He opened his eyes with surprise, and a grin of happiness adorned his face; he pointed to the smiling girl in black and orange and exclaimed:

-"Naruto-nii-san! You're back!"-

-"Of course I am. And I see you're already a Konoha ninja like me, eh?"- said Naruto pointing at his headband

-"You bet I am. Udon, Moegi and I graduate from the academy with no trouble at all. We're now in the same genin team under Ebisu sensei"-

-"The closet pervert? At least he does teach some cool jutsu to you guys, doesn't he?"-

-"Not enough, but I've made improvements in the Oiroke no Jutsu you taught me, nii-san. Want to see them?"-

Naruto laughed, and said to Konohamaru: -"Sure, but weren't you in a hurry somewhere in the first place?"-

Konohamaru jumped; suddenly remembering what was that had him running around the streets of Konoha in the first place. -"Aggh! Moegi is going to kill me if I'm late! Let's hang out later, then, and I'll show you my new techniques, ok, nii-san?"-

Naruto nodded, and Konohamaru took off at a dead run again, waving to Naruto as he went away. Naruto chuckled a bit at her little friend antics. No, not little anymore, she thought. He was a full-fledged Konoha ninja now, just like her, even if he was a rookie genin. She trotted a little, catching up to Jiraiya again, and after a couple of blocks of walking, she said to Jiraiya.

-"It is weird. I would have thought that Konohamaru of all people would have commented on my gender"-

Jiraiya answered: -"Maybe they think you're just playing with that jutsu of yours"-

-"Yeah, I suppose they would expect that of me. I guess the joke will be on them tomorrow evening, right, Ero-sennin?"-

Jiraiya blistered a little at the nickname, but didn't comment on that; he had given up on weeding it out of Naruto's vocabulary a long time ago.

-"You're sure you want to go through with that plan, after all?"-

-"I sure do. My friends don't deserve me lying to them, Ero-sennin. Besides, it will tell me just where I'm standing. I'm going to need to know in whom I can count, and you know it"-

Jiraiya sighed again. He did that a lot around Naruto, of late.

-"Ok, brat. Let's go report to Tsunade, and if we survive until tomorrow, you go ahead with that plan of yours. Provided Tsunade-hime authorizes you, of course"-

That said, both Konoha ninja hurried the last few hundred feet until the Hokage tower, the center of operations of the shinobi population in the village, and entered.

Senju Tsunade, Godaime Hokage of Konoha and only female member of the Sannin was arguably the most skilled kunoichi to have lived and the foremost expert medic-nin in the world.
Beautiful as well as powerful, the woman was a force to be reckoned with, one enemy that would make anyone tremble at the thought of facing her indescribable physical strength and battle prowess. It was said that the legendary kunoichi feared no foe, and since she had ridden of her trauma-induced hematophobia several years ago, that was mostly true. There was one enemy, however, that filled her with dread, and had her looking for the nearest escape route. She had no compulsions in admitting her weakness; it was no secret in the village that her equally legendary sensei, the late Sandaime Hokage of Konoha and nicknamed "the god of shinobi" admitted freely his fear of this devilish enemy.

Paperwork. It seemed to be the bane of all Hokage, the most powerful of Konoha ninja, and yet defenseless as kittens when confronted with this horrible enemy. Tsunade mussed about this irony of fate, while she reviewed and signed another document of the batch of paperwork her second apprentice, Haruno Sakura held in her hands. Her first apprentice, Shizune, was out of the office, most likely fishing some more dreadful paperwork from wherever hellish place it spawned from.

Kami, but she would kill to find a bottle of good sake in her desktop instead of the ever-growing pile of documentation. Or maybe two bottles. But what if she got visitors? She'd need more bottles, maybe another two. But then they would begin to chat, and then that quantity of liquid ambrosia would not be enough. No, it would be better if it were ten bottles even. Or maybe a whole barrel? Surely it was not too much sake, right? What a foolish notion, too much sake. Bah, a barrel would only get her started, she mussed, and then a sudden sound spooked her:

-"Tsunade-sama!"-

Tsunade returned from her fantasy world and glared at the just arrived Shizune. The dark-haired woman stood in front of her with tsunade's pet pig, tonton, hugged against her chest, and a stern look in her fair face.

-"Tsunade-sama, do you realize you were scribbling nonsense in that requisition form?"-

Shizune said and pointed at Tsunade's desktop, where a document was filled with small, doodle-like drawings of sake bottles and math operations of how much sake was good enough for a night. Tsunade had the decency to look appalled, and put the form back in the pile of pending work, intending to rework it from scratch. She folded her ink-stained fingers with as much composure as she could manage, and said to her first apprentice and surrogate daughter:

-"Well, what were you telling me?"-

-"I was telling you th-…."-

Shizune was in mid-sentence when the door burst open, a well-placed kick making it shake in it's hinges, and a blonde girl with two pigtails much like Tsunade's own, albeit considerably shorter entered with a hand making the peace sign, and grinning from ear to ear, she said loudly, almost to the point of shouting:

-"Hello there, Baa-chan! Did you miss me?"-

Both the Godaime Hokage and her second apprentice stood there, stunned, while Jiraiya walked calmly after his student into the office and Shizune stood there, with a smug look on her face.

-"I was telling you that Jiraiya-sama and Naruto-kun have just arrived from their training trip, and that if you'd want to see them. A moot question, now…"-

Shizune shrugged, and quietly took her place to the left of her leader, smiling pleasantly to Naruto, who just stood there next to Jiraiya waiting for Tsunade's brain to catch up.

Said kunoichi quickly recovered, her eyes widening slightly as she finally recognized her favorite blonde gaki, and keeping with her image as stern village leader, stood, slammed her hands against her wooden desktop, which cracked in protest, and screamed:

-"Brat! Don't just come into my office screaming like that! Much that I'm glad to see you again, you need to respect me!"-

-"Oi, baa-chan, you're screaming way louder than me"-

Naruto mumbled, using her pinky finger to try and get rid of the ringing in her ear product of the Hokage's potent lungs.

For Haruno Sakura, the first time Shizune announced Uzumaki Naruto's return along with Jiraiya of the Sannin, her world stopped for a second, while her mind cooped with the idea. She had known her teammate was coming back sometime during the month, if everything had gone as scheduled, but the fact of having him already there, in the same building, took a little to register in her mind. She was finally going to see one of her teammates again! She had been training with diligence during these two and a half years, always with the goal of meet with Naruto again so they could go and save their wayward third teammate, Uchiha Sasuke, from the clutches of the vile missing-nin, Orochimaru. She felt herself swell a little with pride, she had trained hard and was sure she was not going to be a hindrance to her team anymore, she was going to save Sasuke this time, and help Naruto fulfill their promise of a lifetime!

An ear-splitting smile spread on her face, and she subconsciously pushed a pink strand of hair behind her ear in a nervous gesture when the door exploded open and the voice of her friend, somewhat different but still recognizable, interrupted Shizune-sempai as she tried to get Tsunade-shishou's attention. And then, all her trepidation at seeing her long missed teammate again, and see just how much he had grown and matured went out by the window, replaced by an irrational rage at his antics, for in front of her was not the now handsome (hopefully) blonde man she was expecting, but a cute, rather petite and well endowed blonde girl, grinning like the Cheshire cat.

Inner Sakura called for blood, and the real Sakura agreed wholeheartedly this time. The gall of the idiot! Not two steps within the village and the blonde fool was already playing stupid, ridiculous pranks with that perverted jutsu of his! It was so much for her expectations of Naruto maturing during his training trip. He was probably the same loudmouthed, obnoxious idiot that used to pester her with date invitations all the time.

Then, after Tsunade's outburst against Naruto, Sakura marched towards Naruto who had just turned to look at her with a smile and a wave of the hand and bonked him in the head, hard enough for Naruto to flip around and land face first on the floor. For good measure, she yelled after the hit:

-"Naruto, you baka! Stop playing with that perverted henge of yours and treat Tsunade-sama with respect! She is the Hokage, you idiot!"-

Naruto stood slowly, still very much a female, and Sakura's next words about how hoping for him to mature were too much to expect stuck on her throat. Naruto's henge had not dispelled! The henge no jutsu, or transformation technique, allowed a ninja to take the shape and appearance of any person or object, real or imaginary that the user's mind could conjure with enough detail, and established a delicate chakra matrix around the user to fool the witnesses' senses. But any kind of sudden contact could disrupt the chakra matrix, not to mention the concentration of the user, since her "contact" had been a rather heavy handed punch, even by her considerably rough standards.

Sakura's anger was forgotten for a moment as curiosity about the super resilient henge replaced it, while Naruto nursed her head, and took a precaution step towards the nearest exit, the door, before saying:

-"You know, Sakura, I don't know what is giving me the headache, if the hit or the yell. I was going to say that I had missed you, but I think I'm going to rethink that."-

It is curious how the human mind sometimes decides to go completely off track and focus in the things one least expects. Instead of getting doubly angry at the uncommon retort to her, in her mind, well deserved aggression, the pink-haired kunoichi's mind froze on the spot after noticing that her teammate and admirer of years had left the affectionate "chan" suffix out of her name. A cold wind brushed her soul as she noticed that she actually missed Naruto calling her "Sakura-chan". She, for the first time since knowing Naruto and rejecting his constant advances, found that having Naruto calling her "Sakura-chan" and trying everything for her attention actually flattered her deep down, and made her feel special. And now, not ten seconds from seeing him again after so long, he had called her just "Sakura" and that little, one-time-so-far break from routine had her dreading she would lose him.

Before Sakura could stop and consider the implications of her last thought, she opened her mouth to try an apology, but Naruto had already moved to the Hokage's desk and slammed a thick stack of papers on it. Everybody but Jiraiya blinked at the sight of the heavy manuscript, until Naruto said:

-"This, Baa-chan, is my report of the training mission. I'll tell you the whole thing myself, if you rather not read this…"-

Tsunade rolled her eyes in a sarcastic manner, telling Naruto that she would forsake gambling forever rather than pick the written option.

-"… but you must know that there are some things in the report that are classified"-

Naruto ended that phrase by patting discretely her navel in a meaningful manner. Tsunade picked the subtle warning and turned to look at her apprentices.

-"Shizune, Sakura, you may take the rest of the afternoon off. This is going to take a while."-

-"Erm, baa-chan. You may want Shizune-nee-chan to stay. You may want a second medical opinion."-

Naruto said with an apologetic look to Shizune, thinking that maybe she wanted her prospective early break from work. Instead, Shizune smiled brightly and said:

-"I'd like to stay, Tsunade-sama"-

The blonde Hokage nodded, and before Sakura could say that she too was interested in hearing about Naruto's travel, or yell at him for not considering her for a second opinion, never mind that Naruto had no reason to be aware of her degree of skill as a medic-nin, Tsunade told her:

-"I'll see you tomorrow as we agreed, Sakura. Go and rest. You'll talk to Naruto then"-

With what amounted to a direct order from her Hokage, the pink haired medic-nin bowed to Tsunade and quietly left the room, closing the rattled door behind her. Her confusion at her strange interaction with a normally predictable Naruto and her own reaction at the lack of "chan" suffix in her name would remain in her mind, and the night of sleep she got that day did nothing to help her make sense of it all.

Haruno Sakura, pink haired jönin level kunoichi of Konohagakure was using the ninja express route, the rooftops of the village buildings to travel towards the poor district of the village, the section where the people with fewer resources lived, where you could still see faint evidence of the last large scale attack the village had suffered, almost three years ago. Naruto lived in this part of town, and she wanted to have a word with her recently returned teammate.

This morning, after a night of restless sleep, she had awoken to find that a written invitation had been delivered to her house, by who her mother called "a cute, polite blonde girl in a sundress and a hat". Naruto using his so-called Oiroke no Jutsu to run around town made no sense, the blonde boy had always been starved for attention, so passing unnoticed as someone else was not something he'd do, and the invitation itself made no sense either. It was written in a decent calligraphy, not his usual childlike doodles, and announced that "Haruno Sakura was invited to the evening outdoors meal that Uzumaki Naruto was hosting in the lookout of the Hokage Monument". It even indicated that it was an informal gathering, so they could dress accordingly.

Since when Naruto hosted parties, informal or otherwise! And delivered invitations! She had not shown the contents of the invitation to anyone yet, since she wanted to know what Naruto was playing at in the first place; if it was another of his crazy schemes to get her to go on a date with him, she was going to clobber him right through the nearest wall she could find.

Fortunately for Naruto, Sakura had not much time to get worked up during her trip, the ninja express really was express, and when she landed in the roof of his apartment building, she was still calm enough to let him explain himself. Maybe. But putting that aside, Sakura jumped down gracefully unto Naruto's balcony.

It was pretty common in Konoha for houses to have doors in the upper floors and balconies in the windows, since it allowed the ninja population faster access to their homes. Sakura intended to just push open his window and let herself in, but she found the window already open and a potted plant sitting in the corner catching the morning sun, the dark soil proof that it had just been watered. Sakura heard a soft voice coming from the inside, the same Naruto-but-not-the-same voice of yesterday, and it was humming a tune. Sakura entered the house, and the mouth she opened to demand him explaining the ridiculous invitation stuck open at the sight she found.

There was Naruto, still using that female form of yesterday, pigtails and all; humming the tune she had heard, using a cleaning rag to clean the dust off his scarce furniture. But the things that made her swallow her words were the clothes that Naruto was using: a pink handkerchief tied over the hair, a light green short sleeved blouse under a pink apron, complete with frilled borders and a knee-length skirt in a darker shade of green. A pink apron! And a skirt! Without turning to look or stopping the cleaning, Naruto stopped humming and said:

-"Good morning, Sakura-chan. What can I do for you?"-

Haruno Sakura was at a loss. What was happening with Naruto? At first, she had thought that his female appearance in the Hokage office had been one of his tasteless jokes, but here he was, in his own house at the early hours of the morning, without anyone that could be the target of the so-called joke, and the female appearance remained; the return of the "chan" suffix to her name didn't even registered at the moment, or the deeply hidden feeling of relief that came with it. Then, Naruto looked at her and gave her a welcoming smile before moving to fetch a broom. Naruto glided more than walked to get the broom and then began to sweep the floor, humming again, giving Sakura her time to speak up, since she just stood there looking at Naruto with wide eyes.

Sakura's patience with Naruto was nothing to write home about and normally she would have already planted his head in the floor or the wall with her fist, but there was something in the scene that was keeping her explosive anger in check. Sakura was an intelligent young woman, and there was something that was tugging at her mind with the whole, surrealistic scene developing in front of her. It was no normal prank of his, however skilled he was in the area; there was something more, something…

The oddness hit Sakura like a sack of potatoes: it was the femininity of it all! Naruto was behaving like a, well, like a girl! It was like watching her mom doing the house cleaning on the weekends, completely in her element, with the sureness given by long hours of experience, like an old fighter in the battlefield. Sakura could not find anything to say, it was just too weird and she was just about to fall back in her usual reaction to Naruto's pranks, namely an overhand right to his head, when another Naruto in blouse, skirt and pink apron appeared from the doorway of the tiny kitchen and said:

-"Hey, Sakura-chan. Will you be staying for breakfast? I managed to scrap together some rice balls and miso soup. It is not half bad, considering I had to use road rations. Still need to refill the fridge"-

Sakura's eyebrow ticked in annoyance. Two girly Narutos! Two girly and polite Narutos! She exhaled heavily; it was just too bizarre to be angry about. Instead, she answered the second Naruto's question:

-"No, thanks, I already ate. So, which one of you is the real you? I need to have a word with Naruto right now"-

Cook Naruto just nodded and returned to the kitchen, while housekeeper Naruto answered:

-"Neither. I can talk with you if you want, but if you want the original, you'll have to wait a little. Mistress is taking a shower right now."-

Sakura took a deep breath, nodded and went to the balcony to catch a breath of air and calm down a little. Mistress? Wasn't Naruto taking this girl prank too far already? It turned out to be a short wait, since barely two minutes after that, a third Naruto came out of the small bedroom drying her hair (yes, this one had a female shape too) with a white, fluffy towel, and the same black-and-orange ninja outfit she was using yesterday. This Naruto waved to Sakura and went into the kitchen, and Sakura went after her.

Cook Naruto was finishing to serve bath Naruto her breakfast, and with a thank you and a hearty Itadakimasu, bath Naruto began to eat. She motioned for Sakura to sit in the only other chair in the house, but Sakura remained standing, and irritated by the weirdness of it all, slammed the invitation on the table, making the dishes jump slightly.

-"What is this, Naruto?"-

-"Well, Sakura-chan, it is an invitation."- Naruto answered after passing down a mouthful of rice, and continued eating.

-"Don't fool with me, Naruto. What I mean is what the meaning of this is? Evening outdoors meal? Since when do you host an evening outdoors meal? And quit it with the girl prank already! It's grating on my nerves!"-

Naruto stopped her eating and placed her chopsticks next to her plate; then, she turned to look fully at Sakura and with unusual seriousness replied:

-"An evening outdoors meal is akin to a picnic, but a little more formal and for more people. And I do host that kind of gathering since today, apparently. And if you're so bothered by my appearance, why don't you dispel it? You've always had a knack for genjutsu, am I wrong?"-

Sakura's temper went a little bit more into the red at the, in her opinion, sarcastic answer, so with one hand she reached to touch Naruto's shoulder, and with the other formed a hand seal to concentrate her chakra, and with a shout of "kai!" flowed her chakra into Naruto, a sure way to disrupt the delicate chakra matrix that held the henge no jutsu together. The little smirk ready to form in her face was crushed by a open mouthed, shocked face, as Naruto's female form remained unchanged, it didn't even flickered a little. That was just not possible! No transformation technique could withstand a direct dispelling like that; otherwise it would have been used years ago to infiltrate enemy villages by everyone that knew of it! This person in front of her really was a girl! So she couldn't be Naruto!

With that thought finally getting through her shocked brain, Sakura realized just in which situation she was in. There were at least three unknown, possible hostile girls in the house with her, and at least one of them was in the room she was giving her back to. Sakura's whole body tensed, her hand retreating quickly from "Naruto's" shoulder, and she backed against the wall, ready to fight this stranger pretending to be her teammate. But instead of being attacked by the just discovered imposter, she cleaned her mouth with a napkin, thanked again the supposed clone that was washing the dishes and stood calmly, saying to Sakura:

-"Right now I have an appointment with baa-chan in the training ground 7. You may come, if you want"-

Naruto, for Sakura had no other name to refer to this girl in front of her, walked past her to the balcony, and jumped to the nearest rooftop. Sakura quickly decided to keep her eye on the imposter; if she was going to see Tsunade-shishou, then Sakura could simply point her out as the fake she was and get her detained by ANBU on the spot.

True to her word, the blonde girl sped towards the training ground 7 as if she knew the route by heart. It made sense that Naruto would know the route, since it was the gathering place of team 7 back when the team had been formed, but how the imposter had obtained that knowledge had yet to be explained. It was entirely possible that Naruto had been captured while in the training trip, and the information extracted through torture. That thought put a lead weight in Sakura's stomach; however obnoxious, Naruto still was her teammate and friend, and imagining him in a dark cell, tortured to death for his knowledge of Konoha did not sit well with her. That was unlikely, however, since if they had captured Naruto and got enough information to train an imposter, how come they could not send a boy to pass for him? It made no sense that they would send a girl that behaved so differently from the normal Naruto that it would stand out like a bonfire in a starless night. And it was even more unlikely that such an imposter would deceive Jiraiya-sama. However pervert the man was, as her shishou claimed, he still was one of the Sannin, a kage-level ninja in his own right. The whole thing made no sense at all, the whole capture-and-replacement scenario was as ridiculous as the super-unbreakable-henge theory. Nevertheless, Sakura fully intended to keep the girl well within her sights until she could alert Tsunade-shishou, since she surely was a risk to Konoha's security.

They arrived quickly to the training grounds, to find Tsunade, Shizune, Jiraiya and the little piglet, tonton, already there. Naruto landed softly in front of the gathered ninjas, and said cheerfully:

-"Good morning, baa-chan, Shizune-nee-chan, Ero-sennin."-

The piglet jumped to her arms and Naruto catch it in a hug, and added:

-"Yes, good morning to you too, tonton-chan"-

Sakura landed next to the fake Naruto, and was just about to speak when a poof of smoke to her right announced the arrival of another person to the scene. Standing there was, dressed in navy blue standard shinobi attire, Konoha jönin vest, blue mask covering his lower face, headband stylishly lowered over his left eye and silver, spiky, gravity-defying hairdo, none other than Hatake Kakashi, her jönin sensei of the old team 7, and elite jönin of Konohagakure.

-"I'm glad you received my message, Kakashi."-

Tsunade said with a smirk at the newly arrived shinobi, who sweatdropped in a comical fashion and replied:

-"Good morning, everyone. You know, Hokage-sama, threatening to burn one item of my collection for each minute of tardiness was a bit over the top."-

For a second, Sakura forgot her worries and giggled at her sensei predicament. It served the lazy bum right for all those team meetings where he arrived four hours late. Then Sakura remembered what she came to do, and before anyone could interrupt her any further, she said:

-"Tsunade-shishou, this Naruto is an imposter. She is a girl!"-

All the while pointing accusingly at the blonde female, who just sighed and hung her head. Tsunade looked at her second apprentice and smiled lightly. It seemed that the girl had not forgotten her lessons about being alert at all times, even if this was a rather out of the ordinary situation. Then, she said:

-"Thank you Sakura, but I am aware she is a girl. And let me assure you, she IS Uzumaki Naruto, the same blonde brat that you remember"-

Before Sakura could protest, Tsunade continued:

-"Do not worry, Sakura, everything will be explained to your satisfaction this afternoon at the gathering"-

Sakura was left speechless. Her brain refused to make sense of it. Had her shishou, the most renowned medic-nin alive just told her that her male teammate was now her female teammate? Did that even make sense at all? She had noticed Kakashi had only blinked twice at that declaration, and then shrugged nonchalantly, seemingly accepting tsunade's declaration at face value; either that or trusting a logical explanation would be provided later. Before she could say something else, Naruto was already greeting Kakashi-sensei and Tsunade was in the process of explaining that the following was an exercise to evaluate Naruto's general level of skill as a shinobi. That they would stage a redo of the bell test, one where Kakashi as the sensei would hold onto a single bell, and Naruto had to retrieve it by any means at her disposal before midday, with the only limitation that neither of them was allowed to leave the training ground limits. Then Kakashi said to Naruto that he was expecting her to give her all, and that he would not read his smut novel this time. Naruto only answered she had a surprise for Kakashi for after the test, and moved with him to the center of the clearing. Sakura just stared after them, forgetting completely that Tsunade had told her a couple of weeks ago that when Naruto returned, both of them would redo the bell test to gauge their progress as a team; right now she was in a mild state of shock and could not care less about being left out of the planned test.

Hello there. This is my first fanfiction ever, so I'll ask for forgiveness for the mistakes that may appear all around the place. The story has been bugging me for a while now, and since I began to write it to get it out of my head, I decided I may as well put it up here. Credits go to my youngest brother who has helped me brainstorm stuff for the story, to the guys at the Narutopedia (Naruto dot wikia dot com slash wiki slash Narutopedia) who keep the information about the series up to date and where I checked out jutsu names and stuff and to all the excellent authors in this site that have written many good stories about Naruto. Of course, to Kishimoto too who came up with the Naruto world in the first place, even if I don't like the way he has took his story for a while now. But hey, that is what fanfictions are for, to go your own way if you feel like it, yes?

If anyone wants to know, no, I won't be able to update regularly. I write when I can, which is not often, and so I cannot promise a schedule =(

Most of the stuff that happens in the series up to the time Naruto and Jiraiya leave for the training trip will remain as canon; the stuff that gets changed will be indicated appropriately. The trip itself and everything after it is being completely thrown off the window in favor of my story, so don't be surprised when stuff begins to go out of whack. Prime example is Naruto's gender, but be ready for changed identities (I'm looking at you, Tobi), personalities and whatever I decide to roll with. All I promise is that I'll do my best to keep consistency through the whole thing.

The jutsu written in Japanese are directly from the series and were consulted in the Narutopedia. The stuff I come up with will most likely be in English since I don't know jack about Japanese and while I'll try to translate it whenever possible, I'd rather not mangle the poor language too much. Whatever jutsu I come up with, I'll try to explain it at the end of the chapter, too. Ah, and it got rated M because I know myself, and sooner or later this is going to go down the gutter, where my mind usually is, so better safe than sorry. =P

So, with that being said, I'll see you all next chapter. Waaaaa!

Oiroke no Jutsu: Sexy Technique