"So it's you again," the masked ninja spoke quietly.

"Yeah," Sasuke smirked, "it's me again. This time you aren't getting away!"

"I don't believe you have a choice. I'll make sure you never leave this dome of mirrors!"

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Haku sent yet another barrage of needles- this time directed at Sasuke. 'Damn it' Sasuke thought 'I need to get these two out of here. I can't fight and protect them.' Haku's movements were drastically slowed due to the sharingan letting Sasuke see him as he jumped from mirror to mirror. Touching her wrist she summoned ninja cord, which she swiftly threw towards the boy. The amusement was made clear by Haku when he began to chuckle lightly, Sasuke just smirked- she hadn't been aiming for him anyway. The cord wrapped it's way around one of the many mirrors of ice, after completing another series of hand seals she preformed her dragon fire technique. As the fire quickly flew up the cord it made it's way to the mirror, torching it. Once the fire cleared Sasuke let out a glare- the fire had barely melted the ice at all.

"You'll need something much hotter than fire if you want to melt these mirrors."

The only response she gave was a glare.

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Kakashi stood not far from Tazuna as he waited for Zabuza to make another move. This fight had been dragging on much longer than it should have due to the thick mist that hindered Kakashi's sight. Not to mention the sharingan placing a continuous strain on both his eye and chakra reserves. If Kakashi wanted to win this he would have to end it quickly, there wasn't anytime to mess around.

"Still worried about the brats are we?" Zabuza's voice came in through the mist, "Or is it that you're worried about yourself now, eh, Kakashi?" He stressed each syllable on his name.

"No I'm still thinking about that gravestone of yours," Kakashi smirked, "what do you think sounds better, 'he was good with a sword,' or 'I guess we'll never know why he wore those bandages?'"

Zabuza came charging full speed at Kakashi. The gray- haired ninja began a long series of seals that- several seconds later- caused a loudly crackling bright blue ball to form in Kakashi 's hands.

"Chidori!"

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As Sasuke helped Naruto and Sakura escape another deadly barrage of weapons she silently went over all of her jutsu in her head, and no matter how she matched them up she could come up with only one solution: Amaterasu. It was much hotter than regular fire, and there was no doubt in her mind that she could melt the mirrors with it, but she knew all too well the consequences of the jutsu. That jutsu was always used only as a last resort- it overstrained her eyes far too much and would cause them to bleed as well as slowly making her blind. If she could just get the other two out of here she wouldn't have a need to use it, but as it was she knew that the ninja would use Sakura and Naruto as a diversion go get her hurt. She couldn't waste much time and even if she did the ninja wouldn't allow her to summon up a full scale trap to counter his jutsu. She gave a sigh: there was no other way that she could beat this guy and for all three of them to leave relatively unharmed.

Sasuke closed her eyes briefly while taking a large intake of breath while she focused her chakra to her eyes. Instead of re-opening both eyes she only opened the left eye- it's appearance changed to a black background with several crimson decorations.

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The chidori had sliced right through Zabuza like butter, causing a bloody stream to flow on the bridge.

"I think I like 'he was good with a sword' better. It's shorter," Kakashi said with a smirk before casting a worried look towards the ice dome. 'Naruto, Sakura, please be okay.'

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"Naruto, Sakura," Sasuke called, "don't go near the flames."

The two blinked in confusion for a moment, as there weren't any flames yet, but not soon after her eye opened and the instructions left her mouth black flames consumed the dome of mirrors- along with Haku. Either the boy truly didn't think his technique could melt or he was too surprised to do anything about it as he simply stood there while he was engulfed in the intense heat.

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Kakashi let out a yell as the dome of mirrors irrupted in flames. He had once again failed his teammates and Minato-sensei. How could he be so careless as to let two genin fight on their own? He should have beaten Zabuza faster, he should have taken out Haku first, he should have done something. Kakashi turned his head away from the sight as a few tears slipped from his eyes. He couldn't watch them die- he couldn't stand to watch more comrades perish because of him.

"What's the matter Kakashi- sensei?" He could almost hear the blond. How could he allow his sensei's son to die? He had promised he wouldn't let him die.

"Is he in a genjutsu?" And Sakura, she was from a civilian family of course she wouldn't be strong enough to fight Haku. Sakura had never been able to learn those clan techniques that other children did- the only ones she knew were the academy basics.

"Kakashi!" And the other girl, she hadn't been his student, but she was just a child. How could he let her die with- wait. She hadn't been here, had she? So why was he- "For the love of God would you turn around already?"

As he did so his eyes widened considerably, "You- you're- alive?"

"Who did you think were talking to you?" The pink girl cocked her head to the side.

"Yeah sensei! You must be crazier than I thought if hearing voices is normal for you!"

As Kakashi stared at them he noticed that they weren't exactly fine, but at least they were alive. Both Naruto and Sakura had several senbon sticking through them, and they looked as if they were about to faint from chakra exhaustion. Sasuke's left eye was bleeding, but other than that the girl seemed fine. Come to think of it, when did the girl get here?

"Sasuke," Kakashi said as he pulled his headband back over his eyes, "I thought that I told you to stay with Tazuna's family."

The girl shrugged, "While I was kicking these mercenaries asses I heard some noise coming from the bridge, I figured you could use some help."

Kakashi smiled, this girl had saved his students lives, at the risk of her own. It was against his morals to trust a strange, unknown, ninja, but he supposed he could make an exception just this once. They didn't have time for a timely reunion however, as an army of bandits, mercenaries, and missing ninja could be seen invading the bridge.

"Who the hell are you?" Sasuke demanded while she wiped the blood off from under her eye.

"My name is Gato girl," a short ugly man sneered at her, "now get out of my way before my band of thugs re-arranges your pretty little face."

Sasuke's eye was twitching in annoyance, but she chose to say nothing. It would only fuel the fire more anyway. The small army behind him started to cheer at something Gato said before they started to charge forward. Sasuke took a low fighting stance along with the rest of the worn out ninja. Before Sasuke and team seven could attack however, a small army of civilians of the land of waves walked in front of them-led by Inari.

"I know I said hero's die young," the boy spoke, "but heroes also saved my mom, and - and I don't want to be a coward anymore! I don't want to be weak, and I want to protect what I love! It might mean I die young, but I'd rather live as a hero shortly than live forever as a coward!" With those words the civilians dashed forward slaying Gato's army.

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The four of them sat in Tazuna's living room drinking green tea.

"To the death of our enemies and the birth of the bridge!" Tazuna yelled before he took a sip of his tea.

"I'm a little worn out Tazuna. I think I'm just going to go to sleep now," Kakashi informed the man as he got up.

"I think I'm going to go to sleep early as well," Sasuke spoke.

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"Sasuke," Kakashi called as they were about to enter their respected rooms, "you never did tell me where you were from, but if you don't want to go back…the leaf village could be a home for you."

"Thanks Kakashi," Sasuke sighed after a few moments of silence before entering her room.

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The room was dark- the only light coming from the half moon in the sky. Sasuke stood next to her window- writing a note of some sort- before she set it on the bed and jumped from the window- landing with cat-like grace. With the moon as her only guide Sasuke walked over towards the graves that Naruto had convinced Kakashi to make.

"Sensei," Naruto murmured- unusually quiet, "before Sasuke showed up that boy- Haku- was talking about how ninja's were just tools. How we're just tools. Is it true?" Everyone was quiet as they waited for Kakashi to answer.

"In a way, yes, it is. Ninja are hired by men with little power to do their employer's will. The same way summons or kunai are used."

"Well I don't like it!" Naruto huffed, "From now on I'm not going to be a tool! I'm going to be own person! I'm going to follow my own way of the ninja!"

She had finished digging up Zabuza's grave, only to slice his head off with her katana. Picking up the decapitated head she stuffed it into her bag before heading off into the night.

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"Sakura," Kakashi asked, "could you go see if Sasuke is coming with us?" Sakura nodded her head firmly before heading off to Sasuke's room.

The room was empty, except for a lone piece of paper left abandoned on the bed. Curious Sakura bend down to pick it up, it contained only one word: Goodbye.

A/N Ah there you go. I feel this chapter was a little rushed- sorry for that. I just REALLY want to get to the chunin exams, which as fun as they are to write they're also a pain in the ass. I haven't started writing the actual chapters so I don't have an exact idea on how things are going to go down, but I do know who will be on who's team, who will fight who, ect. It may be a while for the next chapter to be posted.