Chapter 3 – Cut Time

This is totally chapter three. Dawg. Don't own Naruto, and thank god cause that would be a hassle.

Naruto sort of figured that going in the front gate wouldn't quite cut it for a covert operation, so he had planned a few other entrances. Of course, not being in a place for almost a year makes it slightly more difficult to enter unseen. Luckily, Naruto's old hidey-hole had proven incredibly useful for the second time, and, using a simple earth jutsu, he was able to fit himself, and then the rest of his team quietly into Konohagakure, the land of the leaf.

Going it alone would have been Naruto's preferred method of travel, as he was a loner by nature given no one had ever seemed to want to be around him. Being a jinchuuriki did that to people. Most of the common folk didn't want anything to do with a boy who had a huge overly powerful demon stuck in their stomach. Of course, in Naruto's mind, it didn't matter as now he would not give the time of day to any of those people even if they asked for it.

Passing by Ichiraku's under a strong genjutsu, Naruto resisted the urge to leave some money behind for the old man ramen chef. It was him who kept Naruto alive during the not-so-good and the worse times. Unfortunately, that could arise suspicion amongst his teammates, which could lead to his unfortunate end. Although he was definitely the strongest amongst his squad, he very highly doubted he could take on all four at once.

Finally, they arrived at the stadium, and split up immediately to avoid detection. Naruto had volunteered to take the furthest route around to their destination (a rooftop in the stands, across from the Kage booth. On the way he had the added bonus of scoping out the competitors. One Sabaku no Gaara, the target of this 'protective' mission was obviously present, just by the sense of a medium killer intent at all times. Others in the competition included Uchiha Sasuke, the bitter and selfish little brother of Itachi; Inuzuka Kiba, one of the few people to still hold a spot on Naruto's friends list, along with another spot holder, Nara Shikamaru; the indifferent yet strangely respectful Aburame Shino; the rest, a mystery to Naruto.

Naruto finally arrived on the roof, and turned to his Akatsuki counterparts, each under a genjutsu of their own.

"Looks like we got here just in time. The first three matches are unimportant. Remember, after Gaara's fight, in which we assume he'll turn to the one-tail's power, we should be looking for attacking sound nins and sand nins. I'll split up assignments based on what I see fit when that happens. Be on your toes," said Naruto, remaining somewhat calm. In truth he was quite nervous. Despite all the training he had been through to keep his emotions under raps, it was his first real mission, and he felt he had the right to be anxious, at least a little.

"We know already Hitokage-sama. It's not like we'd forget when you just told us four minutes ago." These words came from the oldest and most experienced of the group, Tor, a twenty year old missing ninja from Mist. Although he was sarcastic and disrespectful most of the time, he was still quite loyal and a good ally to have in battle.

Next to him sat Saix, the strongest and most boisterous of the group. He had removed his straw hat but his purple eyes and red spiky hair were separated by the cloud headband on his forehead. It, like all the others in their group, had a horizontal slash through it.

"You should be nicer to Hito-sama, Tor, we all know he could rip you in half in an instant." This response came from the cunning female of the group, Nel. Her dark black hair matched her dark attitude towards just about everyone, and it was common of her to make this kind of statement just to turn around and glare at Naruto. She wore a similar cloud headband, but sewn into her hat.

"Shut up guys, I'm interested in this match. The guy on the left is a Hyuuga. Who knows what could happen in a match like this." Coming from Blayn this was not a surprise. He may not have been the strongest, but he was definitely the smartest, and that was the kind of guy you needed to watch the fights. His plain messy black hair reminded Naruto a bit of seeing Shikamaru without his topknot when they were younger. His Star headband was worn without any pride on his left arm, underneath his cloak.

"It'll be boring. The fight's already been going on for a few minutes, and all the Hyuuga's done is talk. Bet that Inuzuka kid'll attack in a few seconds, but get knocked right back down." This came from Saix, his first words of the day, as he seemed preoccupied by something else.

It was almost exactly as he had said. After getting knocked down once, however, the Inuzuka stood back up and charged with his gatsuuga, but in the end it wasn't enough as the Hyuuga sealed off his chakra.

The next fights continued much in the same way. An interesting thing occurred when one kid had a girl in a complete trap, but surrendered saying it was too much work. The moment was ruined, however, when the next competitor surrendered before the fight even started. Finally, it was Gaara's battle, verse the infamous Uchiha Sasuke.

"This…will be an interesting battle." This came surprisingly from Naruto, who never talked past giving out orders and disciplining those who didn't follow them.

The battle went by pretty quickly, but as the end drew near for Sasuke, Gaara suddenly went on the defensive, and wrapped himself into a large sphere of sand.

"Shit. Tor, see that eyeball forming up there? Destroy it discretely, before anyone notices it." The eldest of the group did just that, with a small amount of water erupting from the inside of the eye. "That signifies his use of the Ichibi, however doing so would make him actually transform into it, giving it complete freedom. We cannot afford that."

Gaara came out of his sphere, confusion on his face, as Sasuke ran down upon him, lightning in hand. Gaara command the sand to instead surround Sasuke, and Sasuke wasted his chidori breaking out. Before any more fighting could commence between the two genin, however, a jounin Naruto knew as Baki appeared next to Gaara, and the jounin pair from leaf who had refereed the fights. The first jounin fired off a senbon from his mouth at Baki, and, after a spasm of coughing, the second jounin followed closely with a kunai. The arena genin went their separate ways, Sasuke flying over to Kakashi, whom Naruto could only assume was his jounin sensei, and Gaara running off with the two others from sand towards the forest.

"You four. See the kage box? The sand Kage…is not the real Kazekage. You should go after him, he may be the mastermind. I'm afraid sand is in on this attack, as well, so I'm going to go into the forest and fight the sound nins while you deal with the rest here. Protect the Hokage, he can be a valuble asset as there are no Jinchuuriki currently in Konoha. I'll follow Gaara. Go!" With that, Naruto flew off into the forest, following Sasuke closely as he tailed the sand nins.

Stopping at a crooked tree, Sasuke took a right and went about one hundred yards, and followed after Gaara again. Naruto soon found out why, as he ran into the female of the sand group who had apparently been sent back to stop Sasuke.

"I don't know who you are, but you're gonna have to get past me first if you want to get to Gaara!" The kunoichi growled as she un-strapped the large fan from her back.

"Ah, feisty. I like that in a woman, but I'm afraid there is no time for chitchat." Throwing all caution to the wind, Naruto reached into his cloak and pulled out the Black Sickle and aimed it at the girl. Throwing his arm back, he yelled, "End game!" and launched a small tunnel of raging winds at the girl, missing her by a foot but tearing her fan to pieces. "It's over. Give up now, I'm going to save Gaara."

"You won't get…wait, save him? Don't be silly, nothing can hurt Gaara!"

"Then what are you protecting him from?" His last words echoed in her mind as he disappeared, flying at speeds much faster than before, towards the fight. He passed an area carefully, where the puppet master of the sand trio and the leaf genin, Shino, from the tournament were fighting. Needing no distractions, he only went one thousand yards further, to find find Sasuke and Gaara fighting.

Sasuke was covered with black tattoos, and the Gaara kid was covered halfway in sand, making him look terribly like a monster. Sasuke was holding his own well enough, but it was obvious he was losing, and his pride was hurt in a much more un-repairable way than his body.

"Stop." It wasn't a shout, or a whisper, but it was the kind of low volume command few people had the will to ignore. Unfortunately, neither of these two fighters had this will, and turned to face him. "Sabaku no Gaara, you are a danger to yourself and this village. You are to cease fighting this instant." With a powerful chop to the back of his neck, Gaara lay on the ground, semi-conscious. "And you…you are Uchiha Sasuke?"

"Yeah. So what?"

"Your brother told me to say 'hi'" He turned to go, but quickly turned back to deflect three shuriken headed for vital points on his body.

"Who are you?! What do you know about that man?" Sasuke exclaimed, the red in his eyes burning stronger, and the malice in his cursed seal growing more powerful.

"Hahaha…so you planned to kill the only source of information? You don't even deserve it…but, I will tell you one thing. If you are maybe, half as strong as this Gaara fellow when he is halfway transformed, and Gaara is maybe, a fourth as strong as me in that state, then…Itachi is a thousand times as strong as me. I dare you to try and match his power. However, as he might tell you…hate and rage aren't really the real motivators for power. No one is truly as powerful as they are when protecting something important to them. Remember that. By the way, you were asking for a name? I won't tell you directly…but you can tell any of your jounin, or even your precious Hokage that Kyuubi came calling. They might tell ya. Bye now." Removing his forehead protector, he activated the second ability of his Fuzengan; hypnosis. Sasuke fell of the branch he was standing on, and Naruto turned to leave. Gaara, however, would have another say in things.

"Mother…Mother wants your blood…oh yes, and she will have it…" Gaara's half-transformation soon became a full transformation as he rose to the height of mountains on top of a raccoons head.

"Well. That doesn't look to healthy. I guess I've gotta go all out." Taking off his cloak and hat, Naruto stuffed his forehead protector in a common pocket and stared up at Gaara with bright green eyes. Seeing no other way about it, Naruto chose his favorite seal, the ram seal, and concentrated his energies on a single point. Releasing the energy, along with a quick breath of air, the gravity seals shone and as quick as that were gone. "Yeah, this feels about right."

Here stood Naruto, in a pure-black, skin tight shirt and black shorts that came past his knees. In all his glory, it was hard to wonder how hot it would be under all that clothing.

"Hahaha, it's too late for that! Tanuki Neiri no jutsu!(Forced sleep technique…I think)" Gaara cackled, before falling to sleep on top of Shukaku's massive head. The great beast changed in demeanor, from Gaara's mad form to the quirky yet insane beast known as the ichibi.

"Hehehehe, I'm finally free! Free, free at last! Mwahaha, finally!" The great beast failed to notice a small presence dashing straight up it's back, until it landed directly on it's head. The tanuki took a quick swipe, only for Naruto to jump right over.

"End game!" Naruto, pulling out the Black Sickle once again, unleashed a larger torrent of wind blowing straight through the beast's paw.

Quickly re-growing his lost limb, Shukaku tried in vain to stop Naruto again, but it was too late as Naruto landed a powerful blow on Gaara, waking him out of his slumber and sending him crashing through the now tumbling mountain of sand, straight into the forest below.

"It's over, Sabaku no Gaara. Feel glad that we cannot take the tailed beast out of you just yet. However when the time comes…we will find you." Without another word, Naruto grabbed his cloak and his hat, placed them back on his head, and, after forming a single one handed seal, seemed to disappear charging full speed back to Konoha.

"Blayn, we need to get going. Hito-sama is right, this Hokage could be a valuable asset to Akatsuki. As much as I hate to admit it, we gotta listen to that fruit." Tor could not have deemed it more clearly that he did not like Naruto, or Hito as Akatsuki knows him. However, Tor was the third in command, and even when Naruto was gone, Saix held power over him. As it was, Saix was the first to respond.

"You're right, and we'd better hurry. It looks as though it's about to begin," Saix was dead serious, but there was no telling why. It did not seem like he would tell them any time soon.

"Wait. We should go under the genjutsu. Even if they are kage level, they'd have to be looking right for us in order for our jutsu to be seen through." Coming from the tactics expert of Blayn, it would not have been surprising, but the suggestion came from the least tactical of them all, Nel.

And so, they set off for the roof that sat Orochimaru, the sound Four, and of course, the Sandaime Hokage himself.

On the roof…

"So, Orochimaru, you've finally come back," said Sarutobi, the Sandaime Hokage.

"Yes, and this time one of us will die. Given that I have my immortality jutsu, I guarantee it will be you!" Orochimaru licked his lips, and peeled off the mask of his former self, revealing a more masculine, although still rather feminine face. His wussy retard-robe, done all up with a large pretzel bow of purple rope on his back, did nothing to help his masculinity.

"So you've been preparing this whole time to kill me? Here I thought it looked like you were just preparing to come out of the closet. Or did you just assume everyone already knew you were gay? Because, you know, we did. It was quite obvious, really." Sarutobi heard a small gasp come from behind Orochimaru, but assumed it as the wind, and continued the stare down with his one time pupil. Suddenly, Orochimaru's two cohorts turned into four, who surrounded the whole roof before quickly enclosing the whole rooftop in a purple barrier.

"Sorry Sarutobi-sensei, it seems this is the end. Now die, like the pitiful old man you are!" Orochimaru formed handseals with the speed of a master, and launched a stream of white-hot fire at the Hokage, and with a dead on hit, the sandaime melted to the ground.

'Mud clone?! Hah, like you could fool me with my own technique!' letting a sneer adorn his face, Orochimaru barely dodged the roof tile shuriken sent his way from all directions.

"I may be old, but I will never die to the likes of you! Katon Ryuuka no Jutsu(Dragon Fire Technique)!" Spitting a larger and more impressive blast of white hot fire back at Orochimaru, he secretly followed it up with his favorite technique, "Doton Doryuudan no Jutsu(Earth Dragon Technique)." He whispered beneath his breath.

"Like this will stop me! Kuchiyose, Triple Rashomon no Jutsu(Triple Rashomon Summoning Technique)!" The white hot fire scorched the first gate, and the hidden earth dragon crashed through it, only for it to crumble to pieces on the second gate, only leaving a small dent.

"Alright old man, I'd like to show you the true power of my greatest technique! Kuchiyose Edo Tensei!(Summoning into an impure world) Behold, the ultimate technique!" Orochimaru's eyes were wide with insanity, his evil grin stretching to unknown proportions. At first, nothing happened, but then two coffins began to rise from the ground, one portraying the number one, the second showing the number two. As they began, the third's eyes widened, and as he tried to stop them, a third coffin started to rise, engraved with the number four. Sarutobi quickly launched tons of shuriken and kunai at the last coffin, causing it to sink back into the roof.

'Damn, if that last one had finished rising…I would stand no chance, and as it is the odds are still low, if those coffins contain what I think they do. This is no time for mistakes!' As his thoughts were on those lines, it came as a huge surprise to see two dead bodies fall out of the coffins, the two bodies of the sound genin from the exam.

"What…I…I don't understand! What's going on?! The technique is prefect, what went wrong?" Orochimaru screeched into the night, only for an answer from very close behind him.

"You fool Orochimaru; I can't believe you haven't noticed yet. You see, the fundamentals of this technique require arms, which you seem to be quite short on at the moment." As Orochimaru turned to view the mysterious spectator, his vision was blocked by a sudden spray of blood from the place where his arms were attached at one point in time.

"Aaahh…arrrggh! You…you're from Akatsuki! I'll get you some day! I'll kill you all! Sound Four, we retreat for now! I'll kill you another day Sarutobi!" Upon the retreat, the Akatsuki member, still holding Orochimaru's arms, turned his gaze on the sole female member of the Sound Four as she passed by.

"Nice job Saix, he totally wasn't expecting it! Good thing he wasn't actually, because you know you'd be ripped to shreds easily. He's way stronger than you! By the way, I saw that look you gave that girl. Got a little crush, do we?" Nel poking fun at Saix was a bit of a test on her part, the second tactical thing she had done that day.

"Oi, shut up before I take your arms too! And for you're information I would not have been 'torn to shreds' as you put it! I'm not second-in-command for nothin'!" Yup, Saix was back to his original, loud mouth self, that was for sure.

"Uh-huh, second-in-command behind Hito, who's second behind Itachi and Kisame, who're second to leader. That's real impressive." Nel shot back, both getting into yet another heated argument over useless things.

"You know, I know you both out rank me, but I'm gonna say that revealing all of that in front of a possible enemy was…hmm what's the word…not smart? Naw, too lenient…ah yes 'completely retarded', that's what I was looking for." Blayn pulling a smart-ass comment out of nowhere was another common event, and almost always it was completely truthful as well.

"Ah, don't mind me. I'll just mind my own business over here while you talk about the inter-workings of an S-class criminal organization right next to me. I won't be a hindrance, I hope?" Sarutobi did this more for kicks than anything, assuming that no ninja would be dumb enough to take that seriously.

"Alright, down to business here Hokage. We want a loose alliance with you, although it's only loose cuz it's a spur of the moment thing. See, Hito was sort of like 'Oh by the way sandaime's fine in my book' and left us to deal with it. We were sort of hoping we could be pals because Konoha doesn't have a j-…er, one of the things we're looking for. In return, we can help you guys out with probably the largest and best spy network in the entire world, second only to possibly Jiraiya's, but if combined with his could probably find out anything anywhere, anytime. Also, of course, having a bunch of S-class nin could help a bit, on top of giving you a closer watch on the new Sound Village which will probably be giving you a hard time for a while. So, what do you say?" Saix tried saying that whole explanation in one breath, but failed miserably. Meanwhile, the Hokage looked thoughtful.

"Well…I guess it couldn't hurt. However, no offense meant, you are a criminal organization. I will be giving you at max the information a genin is capable of getting, until I see fit that you are trustworthy enough for more. Deal?"

"Deal. Cya later Sandaime-san." With that he began to dash away.

"Good bye, second-in-command-san!" With a light chuckle, the sandaime hokage of Konohagakure walked down the roof towards the ANBU platoon waiting on the edge.

"Hey, how'd the mission go Hito? Er, Hito-sama!" Saix, with his lax attitude, still knew when to show respect to Naruto.

"Fine. Talked to the Uchiha brat, beat up a weak tailed demon, you know. Nothing big. What about here?"

"Konoha really is as strong as they say. A full on assault from another of the great five nations, along with another ninja village, and the casualties were low. The sound shinobi were driven back, while the sand shinobi came to an agreement with Konoha, seeing as how they had been deceived since the beginning. The sandaime is also save, and we have come to a loose alliance agreement. That is all Hito-sama." Saix contained his humor within himself for the time being, strictly business when it came to Naruto's reports.

"Fine. Team, good job, a mission completed with absolutely no casualties of any kind. Let's head home, I'm pretty tired." The other four jumped off towards the Akatsuki base, but Naruto stayed behind, and turned his head towards the giant gates of Konoha. 'To think, I could have lived such a peaceful life in there. Hah, too late for that. We'll meet again, Konohagakure. You can count on it!'

Yeah, I guess it's been awhile, you can complain if you like. Thanks for the reviews and the alert ads and stuff, at least I know people read this thing. I might write another chapter, I might not. Depends. I'm thinking about writing a story about Naruto and the gang getting involved in tennis. Maybe. Anyways bye for now. For some reason this chapter is still short even though it's 8 pages long :( intense.