Full Summary:

I was six when Sarutobi saw my strength, before that I'd hidden my abilities, because if someone realized they'd train me even more. And so a compromise was made. I could earn money working for him and he'd gain another Jonin. Mataku, how much more troublesome could this get.

Prologue – (Must read, important info for the rest of story)

I stared out of the window as I tuned out the droning teacher standing at the front of the room, Seriously… what is the point of making me sit through these lessons if I've already learnt all this before?...sigh but then again, that was one of the reasons that I was chosen to do this mission. Mataku…..

You see, my name is Nara Shikamaru, I am a high-jounin level ninja in everything…but name. But unlike most other jounin level ninjas in the village I am only twelve; another reason that I was chosen for this specific mission. Now I'm sure you're all now wondering "What in the world is this mission he keeps mentioning?" well then I'll tell you…but I should probably tell you from the very beginning, just so you understand it more thoroughly. I was eight when my battle and strategy prowess was discovered by someone other than my family, the Sandaime. It was the very first time that I had tried training in one of the public training grounds, careful to remain hidden; I checked if there was anyone in a 500 metre radius (my chakra sensing range) of the training area, however, through my own excitement I'd forgotten to calculate in the fact that a ninja above my level would be nearby. Because of that I was found the second I started using chakra.

Though the Sandaime was curious as to why a kid was even doing in ninja only training grounds, the third shinobi war had hardened the man and taught him to never underestimate anyone, therefore leading him to stay hidden and watch as the child started training, since he was obviously an aspiring ninja, the Sandaime continued to watch, if only for his own curiosity to see how determined the child was. For the first fifteen minutes all the child did were light warm ups; jogging around the field and stretching. He was about to leave, assuming he was just a child with dreams of being a ninja, but then the child stopped and started running through a series of hand seals, ram, tiger, rat, monkey, dog, boar, ox, serpent … he recognized those seals, they formed the A-class jutsu Fuuton - Renkuudan (Drilling Air Projectile). Knowing that the jutsu needed great wind chakra manipulation, he rushed towards the child trying to stop him before the last seal was formed and the backlash of uncontrolled chakra destroyed the child. But at the rate he was going, he wouldn't make it. But the child didn't die either, the child completed the Jutsu perfectly and without flaw as the pressured air annihilated the three trees in front of the child.

I was almost six when Sarutobi saw my strength, up until then I had been hiding my abilities, solely because of the fact that it was too troublesome to have someone to realize this and give me extra training, it would also be annoying if that resulted in me being treated differently. So the Sandaime made a compromise for me, I would take missions and work with shinobi of his choice, those whom he deemed trustworthy enough to bear my secret and not treat me differently. All of them will be chosen by the Sandaime based on my level in ability.

The Sandaime also gave me a new trainer, specifically because my clan, which could only teach me so much, mostly being specialists in intellect, strategy and Clan jutsu. I was taught with a young girl whom my new sensei had found orphaned on one of his missions, she was trained not as a Konoha ninja but one of the same loyalties but without the title, she was supposed to become a spy, her not being in any Konoha records would have benefited Konoha a lot, if Konoha had ever given her a mission. My new trainer was part of ANBU, so his techiniques were more effective than a normal Genin sensei, but a normal Genin sensei probably wouldn't think of spending twelve hours a day dedicated to training, he'd taught me so much. But a sad fate met him, after just a year he was labeled a missing-nin, all because of something he did under orders. Now everyone thinks of him as a traitor, only the Sandaime, his other student and I know the truth, but we couldn't do anything to his banishment, political boundaries laid by the elders stopped us from doing anything.

Despite this, as our training was incomplete, so the Hokage personally looked over the previous training schedule and using it as a basis continued to train us. After only 6 months our training was 'complete' as we'd both reached the minimum of high jonin-ANBU level. The other student left the village for her first yet indefinite mission, I was also given a mission related and also indefinite but I was only needed as a courier, so I could live my life normally and only leave when needed. Both were deemed long-term S-class and to be kept as a secret of the same rank, so I'm not really allowed to tell you anything more than what I've already told you.

This carried on for about two years, by then, a few jounin in Konoha knew of my abilities while four people of my age group knew as well. Ino and Chouji were told a year after the discovery when they observed that I was constantly gone for long periods of time and since they were my friends they were sure to know if I was or wasn't in the village, they already knew that I was stronger than them but they didn't know by how much. When they found out just how much stronger, they completely freaked out, Ino didn't talk to me for a whole week, she thought our 'relationship' was better than that. But they got over it after a while, they then saw the advantage of no one knowing their strength and decided to improve and hide theirs as well. Chouji didn't plan on revealing their strength until they'd either graduated or when they were given their first C-ranked mission. However Ino just wanted to 'wow' everyone when they actually became ninjas, in the very beginning but she soon saw the real advantages and agreed to what Chouji decided to do. Hinata and Neji were next to find out, only half a year later…but not quite how I'd expected.

I was out for a midnight stroll, I don't usually sleep well after short assassination missions, too much adrenalin if I'm not too injured. Halfway through my usual route around the ninja district, I saw light flashing off a metallic surface, judging by the fact that it reflected off at the average height of an averge shinobi, I could make an educated guess that it was a person. There was also the fact that it was moving and flashed by too fast for a civilian, but you can never go too far with deduction. I didn't know if they were from the village or not but being outside at this time was not common for Leaf ninja's, so I decided to tail them. I landed silently on a thick branch once I got within range, I saw, with the aid of the bright moonlight, two young Hyuugas, a girl and a boy, who were probably around the same age as me, fighting another man.

They were in quite a large clearing, reasonably far from the Hyuuga compound, and there was practically nothing else surrounding them but trees, more trees, and even more trees. It was the perfect place for a battle to take place, no civilians dared come into the forest. Ninjas are known to like taking their frustrations out on trees. And honestly, they were faring rather well against, from what I could tell off his skills and hitaiate, a high level chuunin, maybe jounin, from kumo. Come to think of it why would you send a chuunin into the middle of enemy territory, arrogance? Or is it not a mission? It's more than likely that this wasn't a mission, he was probably hoping for a promotion or recognition by bringing back a set of Hyuuga eyes. No Kage would be stupid enough to send a chuunin directly into enemy territory, even if he was a jounin, he would either be with a team and another back-up team or with an ANBU team. But that really doesn't seem to be the case since the guy's being driven back by a couple of pre-genin and no one's come to help him.

The two already had their Byakugan activated so I assumed that they'd already noticed my partially suppressed chakra. Neither of them had indicated that they knew I was here, so I took that to my advantage. Channeling a small amount of chakra into my hands, I started to form hand seals. Because of the chakra put into my hands the two Byakugan users would see the seals perfectly clearly, I used the standard Konoha seals. You . Two . Push . Back . I . Bind . You . Hit. Enemy . Unconscious.

Seeing new found determination in their fluid attacks, I knew that they'd understood me. I lowered myself from the tree silently and continued to suppress my chakra until I was only just visible to the two Hyuugas. Quickly covering the last few meters, I brought myself directly behind the Kumo ninja. Peering through the undergrowth in front of me, I waited for the offending ninja to get closer. Just one more step … NOW! I flashed through the two seals needed and whispered Kage Nui (Shadow Sewing) I never understood the need of shouting out your jutsu to the opponent that you wanted to defeat, my own shadow moved forward as it slipped towards its target, melding with the shadows of nature as it started to split and rise off the ground. The tendrils of the shadow hovered as they reached their target, then they shot forward and pierced the man in his knees. Effectively helpless under pain, two crushed knees and his blood flowing freely, the ninja crumpled and fell with undignified scream. The young girl, who'd been standing in front of the fallen man, comprehended what happened and rushed forward, jabbing, with a chakra coated hand, the tenketsu located at the base of the neck to knock him out.

That was the very first time I met both Hinata and Neji. After Hinata had knocked the kumo ninja out we introduced ourselves, both parties questioned at how the other reached their level of ability and both reached the answer that they began training with their family at the age of five, which was the standard age for heirs to start training in ninja families, members who weren't heirs only started training to be a ninja at eight. Neji, because of being appointed Hinatas guardian started training at five as well. The first three years for the successors were spent on advancing ninja training, all three of us had easily soaked up the basics of being a ninja and had moved on to practical work very quickly, the next two years are usually used for etiquette and clan politics. However, our own training was quickly accelerated, we didn't need the whole of the appointed times to learn everything put out for us, this resulted in us receiving more advance training, though that didn't slow our progress. It ended up that the two Hyuugas were high chuunin level by the time we were ten, the only reason they weren't jounin level was because they lacked experience, something that I'd had for three years. I myself had probably reached high jounin or ANBU level.

It also seemed that the Nara and the Hyuuga knew that announcing their prodigies to the world didn't help them in any area other than politically, so we were kept a secret. By being kept a secret it assisted the clan much more in terms of military prowess, we became their secret weapon, small bits of information was leaked that we had a powerful member but that was all. We became the best of friends after that. They'd also chosen to tell the Hokage about their skills and work with me as a team, seeing as that they were both at high chunin level. Their specialty in taijutsu complimented my focus in mid-long range attacks, using the fact that the opponent was too busy defending from the Hyuuga attacks. But that wasn't our specialty, our specialty was in infiltration, assassination or recon, with two well developed Byakugans on the team we would always be aware of enemies, making them easy to avoid and with my shadow techniques, we were always unseen to them.

Now that you know that, I can get to that mission all of you are wondering about, Neji, Hinata and I were all put into the academy to keep an eye on a certain person named Naruto, you see the Hokage had reason believed that he is also stronger than he seemed to be, but because of the way that he was treated during his childhood the Sandaime wanted to make sure that he didn't want to betray Konoha. You see Naruto is something…no someone called a jinchuuriki, a human sacrifice, fifteen years ago the Kyuubi attacked Konoha and the Yondaime Hokage had no choice but to take a newborn child and seal the Kyuubi within him.

Now the Hokage wanted to put the whole team on this mission and because Neji is older than Hinata he used the fact that he was Hinatas guardian, therefore allowing him to be closer to us after class at the same time. Sadly this also meant that we couldn't just leave the academy when we completed the mission, if we did the discretion we needed as the Hokages best team specializing in stealth, we needed to keep a low profile to stop other countries catching wind of us. That discretion would be compromised if people found out we dropped out of the academy then saw us working as high level ninjas afterwards.

By the way, just so you know, everyone who knows of our secret only knows we are on a mission, we are often seen coming out of the jounin or ANBU briefing and debriefing rooms. Only the jounins that we've worked with actually know what the mission is Kakashi, Kurenai and Anko are the people that we trust, we know we can trust them because they helped us through some of our hardest times. Predominantly our first kill, first interrogation…Anko and Kurenai were especially helpful to Hinata after almost getting kidnapped…again but after a much harder battle. Hinata had been getting the impression that she was burdening us when she'd allowed enemy ninjas into our camp during her watch however she was ultimately outmatched because she was facing two jounin and one chuunin. She'd held up for ten to fifteen minutes before being sent crashing back into our camp and waking us. After that Hinata used a quick regeneration technique whilst Neji, Anko and I distracted the other ninja before joining us in the fray to help us defeat them, we didn't come out unscathed and Hinata would have to sleep after fifteen hours as the regeneration technique she'd used was specially designed for escape, giving the user fifteen hours to escape the vicinity. Hinata kept blaming herself for our minor wounds after that, it wasn't a very big psychological problem but it did take more than a week for her to revert back to normal.

I stared at the clouds drifting outside, this is going to be one long year I thought trying desperately not to think of my current bout of boredom.

End of Prologue

Mataku – an expression that means you are annoyed, exasperated, or just bored out of your mind.

Kami – God.

Tenketsu – Chakra points, Hyuugas use them to immobilize or cut off chakra flow.

AN- Thx for reading!

Since, I'd had this idea in my head for so long I decided to just put it up, but as you can tell it still doesn't have a title, so if anyone has any ideas (even with the limited information) Please don't hesitate to tell me.

Also updates will be varied, please read profile for excuse.

Lastly I don't own Naruto

Icetail