Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot.
A/N: Sadly, I have not read the Naruto manga. I get all my information from the anime, but I knew that there was a gap between the part where Sasuke left, and I knew that during that space of time Naruto trained. I researched everything as much as I could in order to write this fic, so if anything is wrong, I'm really sorry. For example, I have no idea when Gaara made Kazekage, so I decided that I wouldn't specify a precise time when this fic took place--just somewhere in the two and half year gap. If this becomes a problem later on, I'll figure something out I suppose...anyway, I'm done wasting your time...continue :)

Inside his dimly lit apartment, Umino Iruka sat stupidly on his bed, gazing down at the mission scroll that Tsunade had issued him hours earlier. He had read it and reread it over fifty times, and he was still having a hard time believing what was being asked of him.

He was a chuunin, for the gods' sakes! One-step-up-from-a-genin, teaching-five-year-olds-to-throw-shuriken, hadn't-been-on-a-real-mission-in-years, twenty-something- chuunin. Did Tsunade not understand that?

As he asked himself that question, he felt a sick sort of smirk cross his dark face—a smirk few had seen, and even less were alive to tell about. Tsunade understood, all right. Perhaps she understood too well; after all, she had Sarutobi's records.

Iruka shook his head, looking down at the mission scroll once more. An A-Class mission with Genma and Raidou, to—of all places—Sound. Their orders were to gather information, by any means necessary, on an alliance between Sound and Sand, as well as what such an alliance might mean for Leaf.

In other words, Iruka thought bitterly, as the lines around his eyes hardened, Find out whether Orochimaru and Gaara are going to try an take us down like they did at the Chuunin Exams.

Iruka found it more than a little unnerving that Gaara, who was close in age to Naruto, had become Kazekage so quickly. Then again, the military cutdown that Sand had experienced in the past might have something to do with it. Gaara, however, was not one to be taken lightly, as he had proved. If Sand did join forces with sound once more, Leaf could be in serious trouble.

Sound, too, could not be underestimated. It was small, but it was home to Orochimaru, the most dangerous nin to have ever gone missing from Konohagakure; that is, until Sarutobi had rendered his hands useless. After that, the title might have to go to Uchiha Itachi, with his little brother Sasuke coming in second.

Sasuke. Iruka still felt a pang of loss whenever the boy's name was mentioned, although he probably could not be called something as innocent as "boy" anymore. What innocence had been left to him after his torture at the hands of Itachi and his experience as a genin ninja had most likely been drained from him by Orochimaru. If it came down to war, Sasuke might have to be killed, and Iruka might have to do it. Iruka, or Kakashi, or even Sakura—perhaps even Naruto, if he returned from his training with Jiraiya to help his village fight.

Iruka wasn't sure if any of them could do it, save maybe Kakashi.

That's why he's a jounin, after all, Iruka mused, that cruel smirk marring his kindly face once more. To be a jounin is to be a death-dealer, and if there's one think Kakashi knows, it's death.

Ironically, it was also the one thing Iruka knew, and knew too well.

xXx

"God dammit, Asuma, we told you to stop smoking!" Kakashi snarled, shifting the position of his head so Asuma could spit out the blood he had coughed up.

"G-gomen, Kakashi..." Asuma muttered weakly, "But I don't think th-this has much to do with my cigarettes."

Kakashi didn't answer—he hoisted the injured nin higher on his back and waited for Gai to return. Five more minutes, and Kakashi was to leave without him—which meant five more minutes before he put a shapeshifting jutsu on Asuma and took off after Gai's spandex-clad ass.

Luckily, Gai dropped from a tree limb just as Kakashi was about to explain to Asuma why he was going to have to temporarily transform him into a rock.

"They're gaining on us," he said flatly, sans his dramatic flair for once. "And gaining fast. Let me take Asuma. I'm quicker."

Kakashi grunted, but let Asuma down from his back. He felt the warm, sticky circle of wet cloth on his back peel off his skin as Asuma's weight left it, then touch down once more. When he looked at the doubled-over Asuma, he knew it wasn't sweat.

"How much longer can you hold out, Asuma?" asked Gai, kneeling so that the larger ninja could climb on to his back in the least painful way.

"Just leave me," Asuma whispered, going into another coughing fit. His mouth sprinkled drops of crimson over the dirt.

"Get on his goddamn back, Asuma, and shut up," Kakashi snapped. "I'm going to take your leg weights off, Gai, and you're going to haul ass, understand? Don't worry about me—I'll be right behind you in case those Sand-nin get too close," he added.

Gai stood up, shifting Asuma to a more comfortable position on his back. "Take them off, then," he said, and Kakashi did as he was told.

"Call for me if you need me, Eternal Rival, and I shall come to your aid!" Gai cried, striking the best nice-guy pose he could with an injured ninja on his back. With that, he sprinted into the forest, leaving Kakashi in the dust.

Kakashi somehow found Gai's momentary bout of sparkling oddly comforting. He hurled Gai's leg weights into the darkness of the woods, and leapt into a tree to follow Gai via the above-ground route.

He tried to keep his mind focused only on two things: following Maito Gai, and listening for the Sand-nin. Thinking of Asuma, thinking of the stolen scrolls tucked into his vest, thinking of anything except Gai and the Sand-nin would more than likely get him killed.

And Kakashi really, really wanted to live.

The trees were passing by in a blur, with green fading into brown mixing with grey. He didn't hear the shzing! of the shuriken until a split second before it was firmly planted in his shoulder.

He snatched it out without missing a beat, sensing the chakra wave of his opponent and hurling the same shuriken toward it. There was a spike in the chakra flow before it winked out, and Kakashi knew he had hit his target. The other three chakra waves disappeared instantly, and as Kakashi hid his own chakra signature, he hoped Gai had remembered to do the same. Asuma's would be too weak to give anything much away.

Amidst the smell of blood, the the trees that hid him, and his own sweat, Kakashi was unable to detect the scent of the Sand-nin. The leaves around him might keeps his enemies from finding him, but it also kept him from finding his enemies.

"Come out, come out, wherever you are!" called a scratchy, harsh voice. Kakashi grinned beneath his mask—he had hoped they would make this mistake. He pinpointed the location of the voice.

"Where are you hiding, scarecrow? Come out and fight!"

Higher pitched, softer, and to his left; a kunoichi. Shame. Kakashi hated to kill women.

He flung a kunai in the direction of each voice—from the woman there was only a brief gurgling sound, but he heard the man cursing loudly.

Two down, two to go. Kakashi leapt silently into a different tree, just as a shuriken and kunai pierced the wood where he had just perched.

"Enough of this," said another voice—it was deep, and unsettlingly monotonous. "It ends now."

That was when the trees began to fall.

A/N: Shapeshifting jutsu? I have no idea if it exists or not. For the purposes of this fic, it does, mmkay? It is, after all, fanfiction...I control what happens to them...muahaha...(but I don't own them so don't sue me!)