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I had no plan. I left the clan compound, dodging the watchful eyes of the adults who were rushing around. They were all preparing for the festival that was taking place later that night. I walked into the streets of Konoha and marveled at the decorations that were being strung up on the buildings. They'd look beautiful at night. I shook my head, mind still on the goal. I needed-

Three Kumo shinobi walked through the streets. They looked no more suspicious than any other Shinobi who walked the streets. They looked young, maybe max fifteen or sixteen years old. They noticed me watching them and waved hesitantly. I turned and ran away to hide behind the corner of a building. I poked my head out and saw them looking between each other in confusion.

'What is your plan, exactly?' A voice whispered inside my mind.

I gasped and spun around, but there was no one behind me. I sighed and rubbed my face aggressively with the heel of my palms. 'This isn't going to become a habit, will it?' I asked, sitting down against a wall, and pulling my knees up to my chest. 'I can't have a voice in my head, people will think I'm crazy.'

'Maybe you already are," it laughed. 'But seriously, I'm curious, what are you going to do? If you just say Hinata Hyuga is being targeted, people will just think you're being a pest. A bratty kid.'

I thought for a moment. It was, I doubted that anyone would believe me, not right away. Then when the kidnapping was brought to light, there was a possibility that unwanted attention would be leveled at me. They'd ask a lot of questions that I didn't want to answer. 'I know where she's going to be kidnapped, but not when.' I stood back up, thoughts running through my mind. Hinta Hyuga was turning three years old today. It was a momentous occasion for the Hyuga clan when the heir reached that age.

'Why do you even care?' It asked. 'It's not like you've ever met her before.'

'True. But what kind of person lets a toddler get kidnapped, and doesn't even try and stop it?' This wasn't just a show anymore. I couldn't just stand to the side when I might have the chance to do something good.

'Which brings me back to my point, what are you going to do?'

I smiled and sighed. 'I guess I'm going to have to buy her a birthday gift.'

Convincing Yuuto was the had part. It wasn't uncommon for clans with lesser standing to 'pay respects' to the heirs of larger more powerful clans. But the Fukumura clan was a group of unfortunately proud people. We were even managing to pull ourselves out of the financial rut under Yuuto's careful management. They considered acknowledging Hinata essentially begging for help.

"No," Yuuto said firmly, not even looking up from his paperwork. Hikaru was sitting beside him, studying. "We will not attend."

"But other clans are going," I offered.

"Yes, clans that don't have to prove themselves on the political stage." He finally looked at me, more like a bug than a person. "I will not crush this clan's chances for power simply because you wish to make friends."

"Itoko-sama," Hikaru said, closing his book. "Maybe you're looking at this the wrong way? There's no doubt that the Hyuga heiress will hold a lot of political influence when she grows older. Would it really be such a bad idea to foster a friendly relationship with her, while she's still young? And we were invited."

"You don't understand," Yuuto said, shaking his head. "The Hyuga...they're..." he sighed deeply and looked at me with a much more gentle expression. "The answer is no, Hitomi-chan. I'm sorry. But, Shino Aburame's fourth birthday is in late January. You can attend that one. Don't worry, dear. I'm sure you'll be able to make lots of friends."

Hikaru looked at me and frowned. "Sorry," he said, before going back to his work.

I bit the inside of my cheek and left them. I closed the sliding door, but I was no less determined. I went into my room and found something that I could give to Hinata. Eventually, I settled on a stuffed bear. I had a few ribbons in my room that I used for my hair that I tied around its neck. My small fingers had trouble tying the bow, but I managed it. The next problem was getting that invitation from Yuuto's office.

If I could get there on my own, and get back before anyone noticed, I'd be fine. No one would be the wiser. Yuuto left his office for a lunch break every afternoon at 1200 hours. So I crouched behind the back of the building and waited. At the stroke of twelve the sliding door opened. Yuuto and Hikaru were talking quietly about the trade routes they could set up in Kumo now that the war was officially over.

"Our clan stands to gain a lot from this alliance if the deals go through," Yuuto said.

"What do we do if they don't? They might not want to allow us to trade with them if there are still any hard feelings. There were a lot of atrocities committed on both sides."

"That's always a possibility," Yuuto said. "But most people want to move forward. New goods from a foreign country are just the thing people need to forget about the past."

"If you say so," Hikaru sounded unsure.

The two of them walked away and I stepped behind them. I silently opened the sliding door and stepped into Yuuto's office. I was mindful of the fourth floorboard from the door. It was squeaky. Yuuto's desk was an organized disaster. I carefully sorted through the paperwork. Most of it was just trade agreements. A few of them were mission reports from the shinobi Yuuto hired to protect the caravans that were traveling through the country. I stepped back and sighed in frustration when I came to the conclusion that it wasn't on his desk. It didn't have any drawers either.

The trashcan caught my attention and I kelt down to look inside it. It hadn't been emptied yet by the house staff. I shrugged and looked through. At the bottom of the can, was a tan envelope wrapped in a black string. I grabbed it and turned it over. "Got it," I whispered triumphantly. My head snapped up when I heard the giggles of one of the maids.

"Did you see Haru-san? He's very handsome, don't you think?" A woman's voice asked. Right in front of the door. My head looked around and I saw the window. It was too tall for me, so I sprung up as far up as I could, managing to hook my fingers around the windowsill. I opened it and rolled out into a group of bushes outside of Yuuto's office. I heard the door open and ran as quickly and quietly as I could, back to my room. Mission complete.

I pretended to be mad at Yuuto for the rest of the day. Mad enough that he got sick of it and sent me to my room with 'no dinner.' I put on my best clothes, that I would still be able to move in, and grabbed Hinata's gift. The party wouldn't start until the sun was already down, so I wasn't in a rush to be gone. I climbed out of my window after making sure that no one was around. It was fairly easy to leave the clan compound. There weren't very many of us left, and so no one really had time to be patrolling through the compound roads.

The Hyuga spared no expense on Hinata's birthday party. In fact, the small bear almost seemed insulting compared to all the grand gifts the small girl would be receiving. But it was taken anyways and put among the others.

'I still don't hear you coming up with a plan,' It said.

I looked around the party and spotted Shino and his father tucked away in the corner. 'Sometimes, the most destructive weapon against a shinobi is being noticed," was my response. Shino and I had played together a few times, It wouldn't be that strange if I talked to him. "Shino-san, hey!" I said happily. I bowed respectfully to Shibi, Shino's father. "Hello, Aburame-sama," I said.

"Hello Hitomi-san," Shino said lightly.

"We were not expecting you to attend," Shibi said.

"No, I wouldn't miss it!" I said, throwing my arms up. "Even the Kumo shinobi are attending!"

"Hm?" Shibi raised an eyebrow. "And where were they?" He asked casually.

"They were waiting outside with the others," I said. "It's really great that we've managed to form a bond strong enough with Kumo that we can even go to parties with them!"

Shini nodded and put a hand on Shino's back. "Keep your friend company, Shino, I want to go talk to the adults for a while."

Shino nodded and moved closer to me. "We should play Menko again, soon. Why? Because it's fun."

"I'd like that," I said with a smile. He was a tinny little cutie. "You should come over soon so we can play. We can play with my brother too."

He nodded and we stood together quietly, watching the other party goers. A felt something small land on my shoulder. It was just a winged beetle. I scooped it off of my shoulder and handed him to Shino who seemed confused for a moment before letting it go on the ground. I liked Shino. He didn't force conversation and while he wasn't loud or rambunctious, when he did come up with a game it was usually really fun.

"I am giving you an invitation to my birthday," he said.

"It's not for another month though, right?" I asked.

"Yes."

"Alright, I'll be there," I looked over and grinned happily when the servants brought out huge plates of food. "Come on, let's go get some food." I led him towards the table and we waited along with everyone else to be served.

'This isn't really a plan." It said. 'And if it is, well, it's a bad plan.'

'Shut up,' I grumbled quietly, taking a bite of the well-cooked beef. 'I did what I could, all things considered, it all happened pretty smoothly.'

'Hmm,' It sounded like it was laughing. 'Maybe this will teach you not to be so hasty.'

The peace talks fell apart. There was no treaty, and the war went on as if it had never even stopped. And the question on everyone's mind was why? Why did it happen like that? On the Night of December 27th, three young Chunin were killed while they were attempting to crash a birthday party. Fifteen-year-old Yuki Shion, sixteen-year-old Akemi Hotaru, and fifteen-year-old Hideaki Tanaka. While their actions were technically illegal, their intentions hadn't been malicious. The 'Head Ninja' Kazuo Ken had been furious, leaving the village with the rest of his party.

Strangely enough, during the fighting, a main branch family member of the Hyuga clan had lost his left eye.

'Your actions have consequences,' It whispered. 'Maybe don't forget that next time.'

The war lasted another year and a half before the two Kage managed to come to an actual agreement. The fighting stopped. The broken spirits of a countless number of our Shinobi trailed back into the village. The cries of family members who'd lost those precious to them pierced the ears of any who heard their wretched screams. The lives lost would be memorialized by a stone rectangle placed on the battlefield. It read: 'The price of war.' On the sides were marked all up and down it. The number of shinobi who had died during the war.

And in the end, how could I say it wasn't my fault?

I started the academy when I was five years old, like the majority of children did. By the second year, children would start branching off. Half would leave to attend the civilian public school. It was weird for me, to finally be sitting in our classroom. Before school had officially started, the Hokage himself came out from his office to give us a speech about the will of fire. How we were the next generation of protectors. It was both creepy and inspiring. On the one hand, he was encouraging us to be child soldiers who'd probably kill people before they even became teenagers. On the other hand, he really did know how to make a bunch of snotnosed brats feel like they could take on the world.

'Sit in the back, by the windows,' It said. 'They'll be taking notice of your instincts.'

I sighed and sat in the left back row, right next to the right window, away from the doors. I laid out the notebook and pencils that Hikaru had gotten for me as a gift. He'd been so excited that I was finally going to school with him. I wondered if he even realized that I wouldn't be in the same class as him. He'd seemed really disappointed when our teacher's assistant had rounded us first years up. He'd given me a wave before following the rest of his classmates to a different part of the academy.

Iruka walked into the classroom with a hesitant, yet excited smile. We all stood, a bit unpracticed, most of the class had never been a formal schooling situation where standing to greet your teacher was normal. "Good morning class, and welcome to the first day of your education," Iruka said. He had a stack of paper in his hands and divided them in half, putting them down on the desks of the first children on either side of the class. "Please take one and hand them back while I call Roll." He looked to the first name on his list. "Aburame, Shino?" He called.

"Here," my quiet friend said from the back of the right row.

"Akimichi Chōji?"

"Here!"

I mostly spaced out until I heard my own name. "Present," I said raising my hand. Then he continued down the list until we all had a paper in front of us. He allowed up to sit down but told us not to flip our paper over.

"In front of you, we have a simple test," he raised his hand when we all started groaning. "Don't worry, so long as you complete it, you will receive full marks. It's just to gauge how much you all know about these subjects already." He pulled out a stopwatch and put it around his neck. "You have ninety minutes, you may begin...now." He pressed the button.

As one, we all flipped the papers over. It was divided into three sections. Math, Language, Logic, and History. With four questions under each section. Math...my old nemesis. 'Not going to help me out with this?' I asked.

'No,' It answered. 'You're going to want to know how to do this on your own. Just trust me on that.'

I sighed and looked at the first math problem. It seemed reasonable enough for a five-year-old. 'You have seven kunai and your friend takes three. How many kunai do you have left?' So that one was no trouble. You have four kunai.

Next one was a little harder. 'Haru has seven times the amount of books as Hanako. Hanako has half the amount of books as Hisa. If Hisa has 40 books, how many books do Haru and Hanako have?'

Then it got harder. 'Factor' was the instruction that was given for the next question. (3x-7y)-(-8+10x)^2.

The next math question almost made my head explode: The equation 24x2+25x−47ax−2=−8x−3−53ax−2 is true for all values of x≠2a, where a is a constant. What is the value of a?

But eventually, I finished and moved on to the next portion of the test, language. Good thing my cousin had been drilling that crap into my head. It was all just correcting the improper use of Kanji in short 'mission reports.' Then we had to explain why it was wrong.

Next was logic, which was...weird. The first question was a moral dilemma. 'Your team has been captured on a mission to recover a stolen scroll. You're able to escape on your own and you have two choices. One, save your teammates and abandon the mission. Two, leave your teammates and recover the scroll and leave your teammates to die. What will you do?"

Hard choices for a bunch of small children. But I did my answer. 'Just because you go to regroup doesn't mean the mission has failed. I'd rescue my teammates so we could come up with another plan to take the scroll.'

The next was just a riddle. 'A man returns home and sees that he's been robbed. He alerts the authorities and they ask what's been stolen. He says "as far as I can tell, nothing." Why?

Oh, that was easy. "His house was stolen."

'A woman is sitting in her room at night. She has no lights on, no candle, no lamp, no light at all and yet she is reading. How is that possible?'

I hummed. 'She was reading brail.'

'I can't be seen, found, heard or smelled. I lie behind stars and under hills, I fill empty holes, come first and follow after. What am I?'

That one took me a bit longer. 'The Dark.' Was my answer.

The last portion of the test was all history questions. Most about the founding of Konoha, but there was a question about the last war. When everyone was finished we handed back our tests and Irula-sensei put them down on his desk. Everyone had their attention drawn to a loud growl at the front of the class. "What is this supposed to prove anyways?!" A small, blond boy demanded. "What has any of this have to do with being a ninja?!"

'Oh, that's Naruto.' I thought, watching him rage. I felt a smile brush my lips. Iruka sent him out of the classroom and made him stand in the hall. I sighed and shook my head. Iruka-sensei was trying to get the class back under control. At least out academy days would be interesting with Naruto there. When it was mostly quiet, Iruka-sensei started teaching about the different branches of the shinobi path. I thought the Codebreakers was an interesting idea to consider. It really would make me feel like a super spy. Something to think about, for sure.

'Ugh, that's boring,' It whined. 'Go big or go home!'

'Then I guess I'll go home.' I answered.