Hello, lucky reader. If I sound sarcastic, it's because this book, titled Scarecrow's Spring Fields, is not the happy-go-lucky type of read [no pun intended (pun definitely intended)]. This is my story, a story of a life spent fighting and killing, just because it was my job. Of course, the killing was usually sadistic, hardened criminals, and I would also rescue people (Heck, when I was a kid, I rescued cats from trees and flesh-eating pansies). But I'm off track. This is the story of a young woman who is the last of her clan, the survivor because she ran away from her parents. And where did she run? To a small village, hidden deep in the forest, a thousand miles from her former home, where she (or I) trained to become a dangerous killing machine. A ninja. My name is Akumu Kaguya, and my first name means Nightmare.

I yawned and stretched. My clock read 5:30 AM. Oh, well, I was late for work once again. I hopped out of my bed and grabbed my Jonín uniform and my raggedy red book. My cereal was shoveled down my throat so quickly it didn't have time to soak up any milk. When I glanced at my mission papers, I remembered with chagrin the person I was paired with.

Shit. I'm stuck with Hatake again. That jerk has always treated me like a wall hanging. The freak has worn a mask for twenty frickin' years, for crying out loud. He's probably going to be late for our semi-required pre-mission sparring match. I'll probably be there an hour and a year before him…hmmm.

I glanced at my mission data.

"Aw, crud! Is Tsunade-sama really this fruity-in-the-loop?"

Mission Data

The daughter of the daimyo of the Land of the Lilies has been kidnapped. Due to the lack of a ransom demand, the daimyo found a man who knew where his daughter was. A market in the Land of Merchants, to be specific, a slave market. The girl, by name of Miyumi, must be retrieved unharmed at all costs. You are posing as a loyal slave of wealthy but injured Lord Yokohama. Kakashi is the mission leader. You must not use a henge on this mission. The rarity of your bloodline may come in handy. Good luck!

"Great. Time to get out that silk dishrag in the bowels of my closet."

Silver bustier embossed with lavender designs, less than 5 inch lavender skirt with lace-up sides, fishnet tights and three-no, five-inch silver stiletto heels, as well as a gigantic makeup bag (all a birthday gift from a former comrade) went into my backpack, along with kunai, shuriken, exploding tags and other basic weapons. I then glanced in my mirror and gave myself a preliminary once-over. I traced the red marks on my face. The marks, two perfectly round dots on the middle of my forehead, which gently sloped at an almost perfect angle, two red flashes underneath each of my narrow, translucent green eyes. They were like tattoos I had been born with, marks of what I was. They grew in size each year from the time I was eight to the year I turned sixteen. Each dot was about half an inch across, and the flashes, at their widest point, about an inch. Those features were part of a heart-shaped face with high cheekbones and a thin, straight, perfectly centered nose, a well-defined jaw line, and flawless alabaster skin. My face was framed by my medium-long hair, which was a bright, silvery white. I had a jagged part running down the middle of my head, and my fingers were long, slender, and had self-manicured nails. My overall body build is slight, tall and rangy with very long legs. I turned my head, saw the clock and bolted out the door.

I moved fast enough to scare my neighbor's sweet little dog as I pelted towards Training Ground Three. I took a shortcut over the roofs of Konoha, and peeked into Kakashi's window. The man has no sense of time. He was sitting in his apartment feeding his nine talking ninja dogs with his sloppy stormy-silver hair hanging over his eye. He had been wearing his signature mask, so no glimpse of his mysterious face. The rest of the way to the training grounds, I pondered his reasons to wear the thing (buck teeth, lipstick fetish, birthmark, etcetera). I all but ran over several civilians (and ninja), and skidded into the training ground. I looked around, saw nobody, and settled into a warm-up to wait. Ten minutes later, he showed up. I had just sat down to read my much beloved copy of-don't kill me- Icha-Icha Violence! It would probably be good reading for the upcoming mission. Kakashi took one look at the book and said the last thing I wanted to hear:

"Did you steal that from my bookshelf?"

I looked up, shocked.

"Hell no!! This was a gift from Jirai-"

"Jiraiya? I had no idea you know him or read his books."

"W-well, I, uh, um, I kept it in the back of my shelf and decided I should read it for acting tips on this mission"

"Bullshit," he replied. "I see how much you love it. The spine is practically falling off and the pages have been dog-eared so many times they're permanently curled."

Unfortunately, the jerk was right. It was my favorite book and I carried it around like a talisman. Most likely, I read it so much due to lack of (more like totally nonexistent) love life. My friends were all girls with the exception of Gai, and I could barely tolerate his presence on a really good day. I shut the book after carefully bookmarking the page with an old leaf, and replaced it in my backpack.

"Well then, lets get started, Kakashi. Come at me with everything you've got."

"With pleasure."

The man disappeared in a cloud of smoke. I had expected this, and closed my eyes. His heartbeat was to my upper left, in a tree. I swung around and quickly, a squelching sound came from my fingertips, then a loud BANG!! Ten small bullet-shaped bones flew from my fingertips, right on target. Ah, yes. The bones. A strange, rare Kekkai Genkai that only I possessed. I was able to manipulate my bone structure, armoring everything under my skin, blocking weapons with bones, even (and especially) creating weapons. As far as I knew, I was the only person who could do this. My clan was wiped out, probably the little brother I never really knew as well. On the other hand, Kakashi's vest barely stopped the fingerbones.

"That's a new one, Akumu."

I sneered. "Like it matters. Plenty more where that came from."

I wasn't able to use my personal favorite bone weapon, as I produced it from my shoulder, which was covered in my vest. Still, I could make Kakashi sweat a little. Next thing I knew, he was charging at me.

"A frontal attack? He's gotta be kidding me."

BAMMMM!!

I was flat on my back on the ground, and Kakashi was on top of me. My vest, which I kept unzipped, had fallen off, and my bones had torn Kakashi's to pieces. Because of this, my rather large chest was quite firmly shoved into his torso. I screamed.

"Kakashi you bastard! Get the HELL off me!!"

That was when I realized he was unconscious, as my hard head (My hitae-ate was tied to my thigh) had hit him on the temple. I realized that some useless genin had left an exploding tag in the ground, and, when Kakashi's chakra had come near it, it had activated.

"...At least he has a nice chest...What the hell am I thinking! This is not just a guys' chest, this is Kakashi's chest that my boobs are squashed under!! He wakes up on me and I am in BIG trouble!"

I resorted to my last chance. I reached down low, grabbed something, and squeezed. Hard. Luckily for me, the sensation caused Kakashi to roll off of me and onto the ground. I grabbed my vest, put it on, and breathed deeply to get rid of the blush I knew reddened my cheeks. Of course that would be any girl's reaction to a.) getting her chest shoved into a guy's or b.) having to grab said guy's... thingie... to get him off of her. So, with my PG-13+ escapade over, I sat down to wait out his unconciousness. He came around five minutes later.

"My head hurts."

I snorted in a very unladylike way.

"That's because you banged into me. Now then, if we're done with this farce you call sparring, I'm ready to leave. The Land of Lilies is to the west and will take two days to reach. I don't want to do this mission at all, but Lady Hokage insisted, as I am (and I quote) 'The prettiest woman with a rare bloodline who has the best ability to complete this mission in the village'. Can we just go?"

I could have sworn he was laughing under his damned mask.

"Of course, my slave, we should go!"

He ran at top speed before I was able to kick him seven ways to Sunday.