When they arrived outside the training ground for the second stage Sakura and the rest of the team filled out the consent forms and in return received an earth scroll. They picked an entrance to start at and waited for the signal to enter. Choji looked warily at the gate as he waited. Suddenly the signal was given and they rushed in.

Choji stopped them soon after, "so uh, do we have a plan to get the other scroll?" he said careful to leave which type of scroll they had in case of potential eavesdroppers.

Ino turned around surveying the surroundings "I say we wait in the shadows for a team to pass us and then tail them long enough to find out what scroll they have," she said with a smirk.

"Right, then we can wait for them to pass an ideal battle ground and use the element of surprise to gain the upper hand," Sakura added. Choji looked pleased with this plan and so they waited in some of the thicker brush up above until a team eventually did pass them. With adequate tailing they found that they were lucky enough to find a group with a heaven scroll. They followed them for about twenty minutes when they all saw something strange below. They dropped to inspect and were horrified with what they saw. Ino gasped as she inspected the corpses hanging by wire strings from trees. They had shuriken perfectly puncturing through their ribs, back to chest. They hung there lifeless, like abandoned puppets. Their faces were pale and limbs dangling.

Choji began to shake but was the first voice of reason "c-come on guys, if we wait any longer we will lose that other group."

The sand siblings had been traveling toward the inner tower. They had already tracked down one of the weaker groups with the scroll they needed and kindly threw them against a tree so hard they passed out. No ritualistic killings this time. As they traveled Temari turned to Gaara, "you do know we have been followed for the past ten minutes."

"Yes," Gaara replied and wit that he stopped and turned toward their pursuers. He spoke up, "How long do you intend to follow us?"

The pursuers appeared turning out to be the darkly adorned petit shinobi that Sakura took note of earlier. The male looked to him seriously "you do not posses anything that interests us. We bare no mal-intent."

His voice was almost robotic, his face blank. Gaara didn't like what he was seeing, "if that's true then move on and we won't harm you."

They stared for a moment, the male seeming ready to respond again, but this time Kankuro interrupted "why follow us for so long after you find that we don't have what you need. That doesn't make any sense!"

"We are not obligated to answer," came the reply.

Temari was outraged by this, "Answer or we have no choice but to attack! And why doesn't your teammate have anything to add to this?"

"She is not permitted to speak."

This was getting bad quickly and needed to be resolved. These two could be dealt with later in a more proper manner, "please, leave us now and we can both continue on our way." Gaara said in hope of salvaging the situation. The two masked figures then nodded and dropped from the trees, disappearing amongst the bushes and other plants.

Sakura, Ino, and Choji had caught up with the group that they had been tailing and found them taking a rest. It was obvious from their actions that they were inexperienced rookies. They watched for a moment until they spotted the scroll in the hands of the female of the group. Ino readied her mind transfer jutsu and hit while Sakura held up Ino's limp body. Ino, now their trusted comrade got up and walked towards the inexperience team.

"What's wrong Harumi?" one of the others asked. The whole group was now both turned away from Sakura and Choji's position. Choji leapt from the tree "Partial expansion jutsu!"

Choji used his two enlarged hands to pin down the other members of the rookie team. Their comrade walked up to Sakura who also emerged from the tree, Ino draped over her shoulder, and handed over the Heaven scroll, "Harumi! What are you doing?" One of them yelled from beneath Choji's grasp.

"Sakura!" called out their comrade.

"I got it," Sakura said as she laid down Ino and went up to the restrained genin. She carefully focused chakra into her hands and hit them both upside the head. They were both out and Choji released his grasp. He then readied himself to grab the girl. Ino released her jutsu and immediately the girl was held down and knocked out.

"Hm, mission accomplished," Ino announced proudly. They then turned their attention to the center of the forest and headed to the tower that they knew lay there.

When they arrived at the tower they were greeted by the sand siblings who predictably got there first with no hassle. There were a few other teams that had made it already, both being the ones singled out in the first phase during Sakura's inspection. As they waited for the others, Ino and Sakura argued as per usual and Choji just watched in confusion. Gaara had his attention focused on the mysterious team of two in the corner that they had encountered earlier.

"I thought you needed a three man squad to enter the chunin exams," Sakura commented as she approached Gaara from behind.

"That is what's bothering me," Gaara said, inspecting the two in front of him. Sakura was going to ask another question when Kiba and his crew entered the tower.

"Yo! Sakura! Ino! You made it here before us? I thought you two would at least be slowed down by your constant arguing," Kiba yelled as he entered.

Both females in question turned to the hound master in question, "We work well together when it matters, fido," Ino chuckled at the poor, now dejected looking boy. Sakura also laughed.

"Hey, no need to resort to name calling," he said annoyed, "any idea how long until the preliminaries start?"

"The test started three days ago, we got here yesterday," Sakura was sure to add their arrival time to further injure the boy's ego, "so two days."

"Well then… we should talk about our experiences so far," Hinata suggested quietly. Gaara was still present at the time of this suggestion.

"I think that is a good idea, let's find an area with less people around to hear," Gaara suggested.

They all headed to a higher level of the tower and Kankuro looked to the team of sensory ninja "You should keep a look out for unwanted listeners; this is for the ears of the people in this room only."

Shino told them that he had his bugs inspecting the perimeter so no one could slip through and Kiba insisted that he and Akamaru would smell anyone coming. Gaara explained the circumstances of their encounter with the team of two.

Sakura looked at him shocked "Ino! Choji! Do you think they might have something to do with-"

Ino turned to Sakura "No way! No genin is that accurate!" After being shot questioning looks from the rest of the group present they explained their run in with the hanging corpses. The whole group looked uneasy.

Shino was the first to speak up after a long silence, "We must be vigilant. We can't let anything like last time happen again."