Author's Note: Some things in my story will be different from the anime/manga. I came up with this story idea before we learned where the Ten-Tails came from. If you can't stand reading stories that are different from canon, then this story isn't for you. There will be some romance in this story, but nothing really graphic. I'm not homophobic and some of my characters will be gay. If that's a problem for you, then don't read this story.

Serena and Kira, age 5

"Serena, look at this!" said Kira, running into the room. Serena set down her dolls to look at the book her twin sister was waving around. "What is it?" asked Serena.

Her sister grinned at her, showing off her missing front tooth. "Two of the characters in this book are twins, like us. But they have the ability to talk to each with their minds. The book called it telepathy." she said.

"Telepathy?" she asks. Her sister opens the book to a specific page and says, "Here, read these paragraphs."

She takes the book and begins to read. As she does, her eyes get bigger with surprise and wonder. "No one can hear what they're saying. It's like a secret code but ten times better." she says.

"I know, right? Do you think it's possible we could create something like this?" asks Kira.

"What? How?" she asks.

"With seals," says Kira.

She blinks a few times, confused. "None of the adults have ever said you could do something like that with seals, though."

"No, but they have said that almost nothing is impossible with seals. Maybe when we're older we'll know enough about seals to create a telepathy seal." says Kira.

She thinks about it for a moment, then grins. "Okay, let's do it."

Her sister's answering grin mirrors hers. "Yes!"

Their mother, hearing the noise, comes into the room. "What are you two so happy about?" she asks.

We turn and look at each other. We can tell at a glance that neither of us wants to tell our mother what we're planning. However, it's impossible to lie to mother or anyone else in the clan. Everyone with the Hakuo Bloodline Limit can sense when someone is lying, as well as what that person is feeling. Kira comes to our rescue.

"I'm happy that I read this book. It's really awesome, you know? There are dragons and knights, and the book even has twins in it." she says.

Technically it's not a lie. Kira is excited about the book; she just hasn't mentioned that it's the telepathy between the twins and not the twins themselves that has her so giddy. Fortunately for us, mom can't sense the deceit and just smiles at us.

Serena and Kira, age 6

Serena and Kira were in their room playing when they heard the door slam. They could feel their mother's angry chakra enter the house. They exchanged startled looks, wondering what was going on.

"That horrible man!" they heard mother shout. The two of them got up and pressed their ears to the door. If they left the room, mother would notice and might not tell them what was going on.

"I take it that he still won't agree?" asked their father.

"No. Danzo is still interfering. He insists that if someone adopted Naruto, the other clans would throw a fit. Everyone else just wants to control the Nine tails. Sarutobi-san has sided with Danzo. He doesn't want to deal with the other clans if he lets us adopt Naruto-kun." replied mother.

"They're breaking the treaty. Did you mention that to them? Naruto-kun should have been given to the clan to raise as soon as his parents were killed." said father.

"I did remind them of that. Danzo didn't care. He doesn't believe we'll do anything about it. We don't have enough political power to do this peacefully. Our allied clan, the Uchiha, won't side with us on this. They want to control the Nine tails. And, although, we could ask the Void members of the clan to come here and deal with this violently; too many people would be killed. It isn't fair to the civilians to risk their lives over one child, no matter how close we were to his parents." she said.

Kira, age 7

"We've lost another ninja from our clan, Kenji."

'That's mother's voice.' Kira thinks. She was walking down the hallway when she heard her mother talking. She stays quiet and listens to their conversation. If they haven't sensed her by now, then whatever they're talking about is clearly important.

"What should we do about it, Rina? Should we ask the Void branch to send us a few clansmen?" her father asks.

"...No. All of them have families. Perhaps in a few years, someone from the younger generation will be old enough to journey here, if they're willing." says mother.

"I don't see why they wouldn't be. What teenager wouldn't want to have an adventure, fighting enemies in another dimension?" he asks.

The Village Hidden in the Void was a ninja village located in another dimension. A long time ago, someone from the Hakuo clan found a way to create a portal to another dimension using seals. Some of the people from the clan moved to that dimension while the rest stayed in this one. Eventually, the Leaf Village was founded and my clan moved here. We still keep in touch with the Void Branch of the clan.

"Maybe. Even if they don't, we've still got Kira and Serena. They're both good with seals and seem to be interested in being ninja. And it's also a possibility that one of the civilian's children will want to be ninja as well. We'll just have to wait. Eventually, our numbers will increase again." said mother.

Now that Uncle Takuma was dead, mother and father were the only ninjas living in the compound. Serena and I were still in the academy. The only other person living in the compound was the clan's blacksmith. He was responsible for making the clan's customized chakra conductive kunais.

There were five buildings on the clan grounds. Three of them were houses, one was the blacksmith's shop, and the other was a storage building. I had been in that building a few times. It contained canned food for the winter, extra clothes, scrolls, ink, and a small library consisting of five bookshelves.

There were currently three civilian families living in the Leaf Village. One of them was her aunt, Sayuri who had married a civilian. She has two children. Kira's mother has two cousins, Ken and Emi. They both married outside the clan and have children. So in total, Kira has six civilian cousins who are roughly the same age as her. But those are only the people who kept the Hakuo clan name. She still has distant cousins who chose to change their name when they married. Kira thinks of them and their children as distant family members, but they aren't clan. They don't have to follow Clan Law and aren't given the protection of the clan.

While she was lost in thought, her mother walks out of the kitchen. While slightly annoyed that her daughter was eavesdropping, she can hardly be blamed for listening to a conversation happening in such a public area of the house. Especially, since she should have been able to sense her daughter standing there. Losing her brother had made it more difficult to concentrate, though.

"Did you need something, darling?" asks Rina. She can tell her daughter is worried about her. Even someone with a weak empathetic gift would have noticed the grief Rina is trying to hide, and her daughter's ability wasn't weak.

"I was heading outside, to look at the garden. I heard what you were saying. It's important for us to have ninjas, right? Ninjas keep civilians safe. If we don't have ninjas in our clan, we have to rely on others to keep our civilian clan members safe." said Kira.

"That's right, darling. But our family's not in any danger. The Leaf village is safe at the moment. And if the village was ever attacked, our family can move back into the compound to take shelter under the seal barrier." said Rina.

Rina puts her hand on her daughter's shoulder. "Serena is already outside. Why don't you go play?" she suggests.

"Okay," says Kira cheerfully and runs out the door. She knows her mother hadn't been lying when she said the village was safe, but she had still felt worried. Did her mother think someone would attack the village? Perhaps the next time she saw her cousins, she would talk about how important ninja were. Maybe one of them would join her in the academy.

Kira and Serena, age 8; Naruto, age 5: January

Naruto watched from the edge of the park as a group of children gathered around a picnic table with their parents. It looked like a birthday party. He had never been to a birthday party and wanted to join them, but didn't want to get chased away. For some reason, the adults didn't like him.

Maybe he could get one of the children to play with him before the adults noticed. Other kids didn't hate him at first, not until their parents told them to stay away from him. He noticed one of the red haired girls staring at him. He smiled and waved, and was surprised when she smiled back at him.

The girl tugged at her mother's dress to get her attention. He couldn't tell what she said from this distance, but the mother handed her something. The girl then walked over to him, and he could see that it was a piece of cake.

"Hello," she said. "Would you like a piece? We have some left over."

"Really?" he asked. He was both surprised by her offer and suspicious. Nobody had ever given him cake before. "Won't your parents be upset that you're giving that to me?"

She just blinked at him, looking like that was the most ridiculous thing she had ever heard. "Of course not. It's my birthday and I can invite whoever I want. Besides, my family isn't ignorant like some of the other villagers. We know the difference between a storage scroll and the kunai sealed inside it."

"What?" he asked, completely baffled. What did she mean?

She looked at him sadly and shook her head. "I'm not allowed to tell you why the civilians don't like you. It's an S class secret. I believe the Hokage will tell you when you're older, though."

"The old man never answers me when I ask him about that." said Naruto, scowling. Why did it matter what age he was? Didn't he have the right to know a secret that was about himself?

"He has his reasons. For now, though, why don't you come celebrate with me? My sister and I turned eight today. My name's Serena and the girl over there that looks exactly like me is Kira." she said. She handed him the plate she was carrying and took his hand. He let her lead him over to the rest of the group. He hoped she was right and that her family wouldn't reject him. It would be nice to have friends.

When they got over there, he was happy to see that none of the adults looked at him with hatred or fear. They even seemed glad to see him! The children too seemed glad to have another person to play with. While they were introducing themselves to him, he noticed that all the children had red hair like Serena. "Are you all family?" he asked.

"That's right," said Kira. "Serena is my sister and the rest of them are our cousins. Noriko and Sumiko are Aunt Sayuri's children. Kyo and Kenta are cousin Emi's kids. And Sora and Yuki are cousin Ken's children."

Looking at them, he couldn't help but be sad. He would have given anything for even one family member, and this girl had a whole bunch!

Kira titled her head at him, sensing his longing for friends and family. She walked up to him and gave him a hug. He tensed up immediately, radiating shock. Judging by his reaction, she didn't think he got hugs very often or any positive touch. "You don't have to be sad anymore, ok? We'll be your friends." she said. The other children around her all nodded their heads and voiced their agreement. They could all sense emotions to some extent and anyone who felt that happy to have friends couldn't be a bad person, despite what some of the other villagers said.

Kira, age 8; Itachi, age 11: March

She had been walking through the forest next to the Hakuo clan compound when she sensed someone in pain. She began to run; and as she got closer, she recognized the person's chakra. It was one of her distant cousins, Itachi. She had only met him a few times when her family visited the Uchiha clan compound. Itachi's great-great-great grandmother had been a Hakuo who married into the Uchiha clan.

What was causing her cousin so much distress? Was he being attacked? She didn't sense anyone else, but mother had said that some people could hide their chakra signature. She didn't have enough training to sense people like that. When she got close enough, she hid behind a tree. She looked into the clearing, trying to figure out what was going on. While she was looking around, a kunai flew into the tree near her hand.

"Who's there? Show yourself," said her cousin. He was sitting on the ground, one hand on his head like he was in pain and the other outstretched from throwing the kunai.

"It's Kira, Itachi, your cousin." she replied, stepping into the clearing. Why had Itachi not known it was her? Could he not sense the difference between people's chakra? Either he had inherited a weakened form of the Hakuo Bloodline Limit or no one had taught him how to use it.

She suspected the latter because as she got closer to him, his distress increased. He had no mental barriers in place. Neither did she, but she did not normally need them. Ninjas like Itachi, however, should have shields in place when they went out on missions. Sensing the death of others without a shield to lessen the impact could cause physical pain.

She knew that Itachi was a chunin. If he had been damaged by something he sensed on his mission, then being around others would make the situation worse unless that person had a barrier in place. She stopped moving forward and closed her eyes. It took her a minute to put up her shield; but when she did, she noticed Itachi's distress lessened immediately. His level of surprise went up, though.

"What did you do? I can barely tell you're there." he said. He was no longer grabbing his head, but his pain had only decreased a little. There was no one around for miles, so his ability must be quite strong for his range to be that far.

"I put up a barrier, also known as a shield, in my mind. It makes it so the emotions I sense are dulled and makes it more difficult for other Hakuo to sense my emotions." she replied. "Your mother has the bloodline, doesn't she? If her ability is weaker than yours, then she wouldn't need a shield. If she hasn't taught you how to do this, then either she doesn't know how or assumed you wouldn't need one either."

Itachi's expression turned thoughtful. "She can't sense as far as I can. I don't think she knows how to create a...shield." he said. He made eye-contact with her and asked, "Will you teach me?"

"Of course. You're family and the Hakuos always help family memebers." she said, surprised he even needed to ask. It should have been a given that Kira would help him, though she supposed it was more polite for him to ask rather than assume. Kira walked over to him and sat down. "Creating a barrier for the first time can take a while. It requires concentration to put one in place, but it stays up after that. You have to remove it yourself; it doesn't fade over time." she said. He nodded to show he understood. "It's like meditation in a way. You'll need to relax your mind. Once you're in a more peaceful state of mind, you'll imagine a wall between you and everyone else. Go ahead and try it."

It takes about two hours, but eventually Itachi is able to put up a weak barrier in his mind. It only blocks about twenty percent of the emotions he can sense, but it's enough to get rid of his headache. He feels immensely grateful that Kira found him when she did. Although he knows she can feel his emotions, he says the words anyway. "Thank you."

She smiles at him, happy that she was able to help him. Something occurs to her then. If he didn't even know about mental barriers then he would not know about the risks either. She reaches out and grabs his hand. She can feel his surprise in response to her sudden seriousness. "Itachi, it's very important that you don't leave the barriers in place all the time. When you're feeling better and not on missions, you need to put them down. The barriers don't just block other people's emotions, they block our own as well. If you leave the barriers in place for too long, especially the stronger ones, then you'll slowly lose the ability to feel any emotion at all. You won't get angry, sad, or happy. Nothing. You'll loose yourself and become a sociopath." she says. She needs him to understand how serious this is.

"I know that some people think ninja shouldn't feel, that we should just be tools. But it's our emotions that give us a reason to go on missions. If we didn't care about our village, then why would we obey the Hokage's orders?" she asks.

"I understand what you mean." he says. "I fight to keep the peace and to keep my brother safe. I would not want to stop loving him." The very thought of losing himself is horrifying. He did not want to become the kind of person who could kill another human being without regret.

Kira and Serena, age 8: July

It was finally completed, the seal that would connect their minds together. Of course they were not 100 percent sure that it would work. They may have been seal prodigies, but they were still only eight years old. But as far as they could tell from all of the seal books they had read, the seal they had created shouldn't kill or maim them even if it didn't work.

"Are you ready to do this, Serena?" asked Kira. It had been her dream since she was five to be able to telepathically talk to her sister. That may have only been three years old; but to a child, three years was a long time. Her sister had gone along with her idea, even seemed happy with it; but did it mean as much to Serena as it did to her?

"I am. This may have started out at as your idea, but it became our dream, our goal. We're twins and I want us to be connected. With this seal, no one can keep us apart. We'll always be able to find each other, no matter the distance." replied Serena seriously. She knew her sister better than anyone; and could guess what her sister's emotions meant at least 70 percent of the time. With this seal, there would be no more guessing; she would always understand her sister from now on.

The two of them got out their ink and brushes. This particle seal would require their blood to work; so using a kunai, they made a small cut in their fingers to add blood to the ink. Using the brush, Kira mixed the blood into the ink and then began to draw the seals onto her sister's arm. By the time she was finished, the seal went from her sister's right wrist to her elbow. The ink dried quickly, so Serena was able to immediately begin drawing the exact same seal on her sister's left arm.

When they were done, they examined the seal, looking for any errors. Finding none, they began the hand signs that would bind the seals in place. They then pressed their hands together. The seals glowed and shrunk down to cover only their wrists like a bracelet. The two began to feel a pressure in their minds that gradually increased into pain. Eventually, they couldn't take it any more and let out a scream before falling unconscious.

When Kira woke up, she was confused to find lying herself in an open field next to a pond. Where was she and how did she get her? She got up and looked around. It was a beautiful field, but she did not recognize it. The last thing she remembered was trying to create a telepathy seal with her sister before blacking out. She looked around frantically. Where was Serena?

She saw something appear on the ground. The complete unexpectedness of it shocked her out of her panic. She walked over there and saw that it was a seal. Specifically, it was the telepathy seal she had made with Serena. It stretched out, leading farther out into the field. As she followed it, the grass around her became taller until it reached her waist. Because the grass was so tall, she almost tripped over her sister who was lying there unconscious. She looked behind her; they were less than a mile from the pond but the grass had been too tall for her to see Serena.

She knelt down next to Serena and tried to wake her up. "Serena! Are you alright? Wake up, please." It took a minute of coaxing, but her sister slowly opened her eyes. Her sisters reaction to seeing their location was pretty exactly what hers was. Complete bewilderment, minus the blind panic since Serena knew her sister was alright from the get go.

"Where are we?" asked Serena. She glanced around, trying to find any land marks she could identify. She failed. This place was beautiful but completely unfamiliar. It also didn't feel normal. Every living thing in the world had chakra in it; but plants and animals didn't have the same type of chakra. This clearing didn't feel like plant chakra; it felt human.

"I don't know," she replied. "But, I'm guessing you noticed the chakra as well?" Her sister nodded. She thought about what this could mean, trying to remember anything their parents had said that could apply to their situation. "Let's think about this logically for a moment."

"Okay," said Serena, wondering where her sister was going with this.

"Let's state the facts and work out way from there. The last thing we were doing before we found ourselves here was creating a telepathy seal. Our parents said seals can do pretty much anything, so there is a possibility that our seal teleported us here," said Kira.

Serena hummed thoughtfully. "Except, our seals didn't have any teleportation aspects to them; not even to teleport ourselves to each other. We intended for the seal to let us find each other, but that's about it."

"Right. So it's probably not teleportation. Also, I've never heard about plants that have human chakra." said Kira.

Something occurs to Serena then. "Our seals were all about the mind. You remember our parents talking about the major clans in the Leaf Village? The Yamanaka Clan has a technique to let them enter someone else's mind. Mother mentioned that people have a mindscape."

Kira's eyes widen in understanding. "Mindscapes look like physical places, a building or somewhere outside. Everyone's is different and the location reflects who they are or what they've been through."

They both look around, finding new meaning in their surroundings. This is what their mindscape looks like? A tranquil pond, which Kira saw contains fish and who knows what else, tall grass, flowers, and bordered by the tallest trees they've ever seen.

"I don't know what this place means about us, but the fact that it's so peaceful is probably a good sign," said Kira.

"That is nice, but I'm more worried about how we leave. And did you notice that we have the same mindscape? I believe that means our seal worked, though not quite in the way we imagined," replied Serena.

Kira examined their surroundings, looking for anything that could be an exit. "Why don't we walk around? We might eventually stumble upon a way out of here." she said. Serena agreed with her plan, so they began to explore their mindscape. The pond Kira had woken up next to was particular interesting. When she put her hands into it, she heard and smelt things that were not there, voices and smells. They were like echoes of her memories.

Her sister was at the edge of the clearing, examining the trees. Kira walked over to her, eager to share her findings. "Serena, I think that pond represents our subconscious," she says.

Serena's eyes flickered over to the pond, curious, before looking back to the tree. "We can explore it some other time, then. For now, though, I think I've found our way out of here. I believe these trees are the border of our minds. If we leave the clearing, we should wake up."

Kira 'hmms' in reply as she peers at the trees around them. "Alright," she says, somewhat reluctantly. She had been starting to enjoy being here, but they did have a life; and their parents must be worried about them. Who knows how long they had been unconscious? It could have been minutes, hours, even days. "Let's go then!" she exclaims, running past the trees, and startling her sister.

"Wait for me," says Serena. Her sister could be kind of reckless and impulsive sometimes. She had said that leaving the clearing might wake them up; but it could just as easily make things worse. Hoping for the best, she runs after her sister.

Kira and Serena, age 8: November

When mother and father come home that night, Kira knew something was wrong. Father had started coughing a few hours ago, so mother had taken him to the hospital. They wouldn't be this stressed out and angry if it was just the flu. Whatever was wrong, it was serious.

"Kira, Serena!" called their mother. The two of them went into the living room. Father was sitting on the couch, looking pale. Mother was pacing the floor, clearly agitated about something. When mother saw them, she tried to appear calm.

"Darlings, I need the two of you to pack a suitcase. We're going to visit our cousins in the Void for a week or two. Bring clothing and your toothbrush. They'll have shampoo and toothpaste for you to use there as well as plenty of scrolls and ink," says mother.

The two of them are completely shocked. They were going to the Void? They had only been there once before and it was when they were infants, so they didn't remember the journey. Their father occasionally received letters from his siblings via summons animal, though.

Although they both wanted to ask what was going on, they didn't think their mother could handle questions right now. Deciding not to protest, they went back to their rooms and began to pack. Naturally, their suitcase was actually a sealing scroll.

When they were done, they went outside to find mother, who was setting up the portal seals. It was an elaborate, large seal that took up a 3 by 4 foot piece of paper. The whole thing was made of about a hundred individual seals woven together. The seal had to be redrawn every time because after the portal was opened, the paper disintegrated. This prevented an enemy from learning how to travel to the Village Hidden in the Void.

There was a secondary security measure in place as well. The one drawing the seal had to write how many people were going through the portal. If they wrote four, the portal would close after four people went through. It limited the number of enemies that could sneak into the Void.

Kira and Serena had started learning how to create this portal last year. So far, they knew about 15 percent of it. It was a very complicated, dangerous seal. If they placed a single seal in the wrong place, it could blow up. And with the amount of chakra needed to activate the seal, the explosion would be large enough to kill them and anyone within 20 feet of them.

While mother was finishing up the seal, father was packing his and mother's belongings. He didn't look any better physically, but he seemed to have calmed down. His emotions seemed to have settled on sad resignation. It scared them. To distract herself, Kira studied the seal.

"Where are we going to get enough chakra for this?" asked Serena.

Mother looks up from the seal and smiles. "It is possible to store chakra inside of modified storage scrolls. We use a similar concept to power the barrier around the compound. You've seen your father and I touch the seals near the gate, correct? Those seals take chakra from us and store it. When the barriers need more chakra, they take it from there."

From her pocket, mother gets out a storage scroll. A few of the seals on it are different from normal, which is what allows it to contain chakra instead of physical objects. Mother places her hand on the seal and, using herself as a conduit, moves the chakra from the storage scroll to the portal seals.

The portal is six feet tall and four feet wide, large enough for a human to step through without touching the sides. When they step through the portal, the sight that greets them is a field. In front of them are the gates of the Village Hidden in the Void; behind them are miles and miles of trees that get larger the farther away they are. "Let's go," says their mother.

It takes them about ten minutes of walking to get to the gates. The person that greets them is a startling sight. He's got pointed ears and orange eyes with pupils slit like an animal's. But the most shocking thing of all is that he's covered in fur. He looks like a human-animal hybrid. The surprise on the twins' face causes him to grin, showing off pointed teeth.

"Welcome back, Kenji," says the man. "Who are your companions?" Our father was born here; it makes sense for him to know people from here.

"It's nice to see you again, Ezra. This is my wife, Rina; and my daughters, Kira and Serena. My daughters have only been here when they were infants, so this will be an interesting experience for them," says father with a smile.

"Oh? Do they know about my kind and about the dangers outside these walls?" asks Ezra. Serena steps forward to answer him.

"You're a Yokai: a human with the chakra of a bijuu." she says. Despite what the people from her dimension think, there are more than just nine bijuu. When her ancestors created a portal to the Void, the Ten-Tails escaped into the human realm. Eventually, the Sage of the Six Paths split the Ten-Tails into the nine bijuu. However, there are still many bijuu still living in the Void dimension. Eventually, the humans living in the Void started to make deals with the bijuu living here.

Using seals, a human can connect their chakra to a bijuu's, allowing the bijuu to give the human chakra. Generally, the chakra does not turn a human into a Yokai because they would have to use an unimaginable amount of chakra in a short period of time for their cells to begin to mutate. However, the chakra will cause their children to be born as Yokai, which is what the bijuu want. For some reason, it is difficult for the bijuu to have children.

It could take a strong bijuu, one who has seven tails or more, a few hundred years to have one child. For a weaker bijuu, it could take over a thousand years to have children. Like most creatures, the bijuu have the instinct to reproduce. The bijuu consider any Yokai children born from a human using their chakra to also be their child. Youkai can live for centuries; and it is not unusual for the Yokai to live with their bijuu parent for a while after their human parents have died of old age.

"So your parents have told of us," replies Ezra. "Glad to know your father isn't ashamed of his old friends." Father just rolls his eyes.

"As nice as it is to see you again, we came here for an important reason. If you come by the compound in a couple days, we can chat for a while." says their father. Ezra seems to understand how serious the situation is and just nods, letting them walk by him. The four of them continue on into the village. They end up walking straight across the village as the Hakuo clan compound is on the other side of the village, facing the gate.

The compound here in the Void was a lot larger than the one in the Leaf. "It looks like it can hold fifty people," said Serena, looking around with wide eyes.

"That's because it can," replied their father, amused. "There are more than fifty members of our clan living in the Void. Some of them live here, some don't. The civilians tend to live in a different residential area of the village. Most of the people that live here are ninjas or the children of ninjas."

One of their father's brothers greets them at the gate and leads them to the guest bedrooms they'll be staying in. Their parents only stay with them long enough to make sure that Uncle Haruki will look after them for a while. Kira isn't sure where they're going, but she suspects it's the hospital. Her parents have told her before that Void medic nin are able to heal some things that the Leaf Village can't. Hopefully, they'll be able to fix whatever's wrong with father.

While their parents are gone, Uncle Haruki gives them a tour of the compound and introduces them to several of the children their own age. Serena and Kira are pleasantly surprised to realize that their cousins know as much about seals as they do. Their civilian cousins are nice to hang out with, but they don't share the same interests. Even Kenta and Sora, who plan to be ninja in the future, aren't as interested in seals as they are.

They talk about seals with their cousins for a while, as well as comparing their two villages. One of the children suggests ninja tag; and they spend the next hour chasing each other from rooftop to rooftop. By the time their parents return, several hours have passed and the sky is dark. Their parents, seeing how tired they are, decide to wait to until morning to tell them what's going on. They would protest, but they really are quite exhausted.

Author's Note: This story is a work in progress. I do intend to finish it, but it might take a while if I have writer's block. If you have any suggestions about what you'd like to see in this story, then I'll consider them.