"That's the Fire Swamp?" Naruto sounded totally unimpressed, like he'd been expecting a great billowing inferno instead of...well.

"That's right," Kakashi confirmed, surveying the line of dark, tortured-looking trees looming in the near distance as they paused near the end of the ravine. "It's dangerous territory, but it's the fastest route - "

"Oh, please," Naruto scoffed, one hand fisted confidently at his hip while the other flapped dismissal. "I've trained in the Forest of Death - how bad can a little Fire Swamp be?"

"I don't know, Naruto," Kakashi mused, vaguely unsettled by the haunted look of the place. "This isn't Konoha. We're not even in Shinobi territory anymore. Doesn't hurt to be a little cautious, ne?"

"Ah, whatever." Naruto clasped both hands behind his neck and kicked at a stone on the ground. "We're still going in, right?"

Kakashi glanced sideways at Naruto. "The client says we'll never survive, y'know."

"Psh." Naruto flapped that dismissive hand again, eyes closed and head tilted away in a gesture of easy confidence. "He's probably only saying that 'cause no one ever has."

Kakashi failed to be entirely reassured by that logic. The mission was the mission, however, so in they went.

It was sort of anti-climactic at first; the giant, gnarled trees thinned out some past the border and the sunlight filtered weakly through the greyish foliage high overhead, leaving the landscape dim and washed-out looking. Great ropey vines and curtains of stringy, mossy growth drooped from massive trunks and the odd low branch, twining from one tree to the next in a loose, giant web, but a kunai easily cleared them from the path when necessary. The air was surprisingly dry for a swamp, and the ground was pleasantly solid and firm underfoot.

"Maa, well, it's not that bad," Kakashi mused, when they'd traveled almost half an hour without encountering any of the dangers their client had warned about. He was tempted to let himself relax. "I'm not saying I'd like to build a summer home here, but the trees are actually quite lovely."

"Toldja it'd be a piece of cake," Naruto gloated, five steps ahead and turning back to flash his grin.

Naturally, that's when the first jet of flame decided to flare up in their path.

Naruto yelped and jumped back, flailing at the fire on his sleeve and quickly managing to pat it out.

Kakashi peered over Naruto's shoulder, unable to help feeling just the tiniest bit vindicated. "Singed a bit, are we?"

Naruto shot him a somewhat surly glare. "That's nothing." The hint of a pout he was sporting turned into his usual broad grin. "If that's the worst this swamp's got, we can beat it easy!"

And he was right, of course. The random jets of fire, they soon learned, were always preceded by a rapid burst of hollow popping noises, and shinobi reflexes made it simple to steer clear. Kakashi almost relaxed again, but their client had warned about three specific dangers of the swamp, and they had yet to encounter the other two.

"Remember, Naruto, just because we've mastered the Flame Spurts doesn't mean we're home-free. There's still the 'Lightning Sand' - "

"Yeah, but that's probably nothing. I've fought Gaara!"

"I'm pretty sure it's not the same thing," Kakashi drawled, amused despite himself.

"Whatever - sand is sa - "

Naruto's dismissive retort cut off abruptly as he sank and disappeared in an instant, swallowed up by a sandy patch of earth before Kakashi could even blink.

The Copy-nin cursed, leapt back and hacked through a loop of vine with one stroke of his kunai. He seized the loose end, fully prepared to dive in after Naruto, but a sudden surge of chakra from underground stopped him. A line of clones popped into existence, bursting from the pit, hands clasped to form a chain that disappeared into the Sand.

"Pull!" they shouted in unison, heaving together, and in mere seconds Naruto was scrambling up out of the pit on the heels of his last two clones. They all collapsed on solid ground, heaving in huge breaths and coughing out the Sand that had gotten into their lungs, and then Naruto dispelled the clones with a gesture and grinned up at Kakashi.

"That's two down!" he enthused, dusting Sand out of his bangs.

"Yes, yes," Kakashi said, slightly irritated-he'd been genuinely worried for a second there, but he wasn't surprised that Naruto was sort of taking this whole thing like one big challenge. "As I was saying, there's the Lightning Sand - you were clever enough to discover what that looks like, so we can avoid it in the future, and that just leaves - "

"The Rodents of Unusual Size!" Naruto crowed, sounding entirely too gleeful about it, and pointed behind Kakashi.

Kakashi ducked and whirled, kunai slashing high at the animal leaping toward him from a low-hanging branch. It gave a hoarse, garbled yelping sound as it tumbled to the side and rolled and righted itself, not seeming terribly wounded. It came at them again, waddling rapidly on all fours and looking like nothing so much as a botched breeding experiment between a rat and a crocodile. Kakashi easily dodged the snapping teeth and plunged his kunai into the creature's neck, angling up under the skull, and the thing died with more of that hoarse, garbled wailing.

"Ah, they're not so tough," Naruto said then, and he sounded distinctly disappointed.

Slinking movement in the corner of his eye caught his attention, and Kakashi looked up to see more of the Rodents edging into view, stalking, surrounding them. "Naruto - "

"I see 'em," Naruto answered, and there was anticipation in his voice. His hands crossed in the familiar seal. "Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!"

Several clones popped into existence and leapt forward without pause, attacking the encroaching Rodents with a lot of enthusiastic yelling.

"Didn't I tell ya?" Naruto grinned at Kakashi over all the noise. "Piece of cake, right?" He charged into the fray himself, whooping, and punched a Rodent back into a Flame Spurt just as the popping noise gave way to actual fire.

"Right," Kakashi sighed, waving his kunai in front of his face in a futile effort to ward off the stink of burnt fur and charred Rodent; giving up, he put the knife away and pulled out his Icha Icha. There was a large tree-trunk to his left out of the path of direct chaos; he leaned comfortably up against it and flipped the book open to the marked page. He glanced down, skimming for where he'd last left off, and raised his voice. "Just let me know when you're done, ne? And watch out for the Lightning Sand!"

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Originally Posted: 7/16/11