When I finally got home, my parents were already waiting for me. A grin on their faces and a medium sized box on the table next to them. I was fairly tempted to give mom the stink eye, She definitely knew about the genin test. Instead, I proudly showed off my hitai-ate. "I passed!"

With gaining my new status as genin of team 7, training with dad got even more intense. There was more weapon training, chakra control exercises and the occasion surprise spar to see how I had progressed. In addition I was also learning new elemental jutsus now. Only the academy three and my ice release: hidden in the snow justu wouldn't cut it in a real battle. So between team training and being pummelled into the ground by my dad I was greatly improving. I was still below average in several categories but my speed, stamina and skills with ninja wire were not to be messed with.

Another perk of being a rookie genin were the D rank missions which brings me to the situation at hand. "What's the distance to the target?" the four of us were on yet another D mission. They were meaningless, everyday tasks for the villagers that sometimes bordered on child labour. But this was perhaps one of the more interesting we've had so far. Everyone was hiding in their own spot, ready to capture the target.

"5 meters, I'm ready any time." Came the voice through the earpiece followed by three other confirmations "GO!" the four little shinobi pounced on the target ready for a chase if needed. Naruto however was the one who caught it.

"Got ya!" the cat was struggling to escape the blonde, when this however failed; the animal resorted to physical abuse in the form of scratching. I took pity on both the cat and my blond teammate.

"Ah come here Tora" I tried to coax the scared animal into my arms, and thus saving Naruto from the abuse. This however proved to be a bit more difficult than I initially thought. I earned myself quite a few scratches before the poor thing finally relaxed into my arms. I gave a little scratch behind its ear and followed the rest of the team.

"Thanks Ririko." I offered Naruto a smile.

-o-

Back in the Hokage tower, we met the client who embraced her darling cat so hard all four of us started to feel sorry for the poor thing. No wonder it ran away. The Daimyo's wife was very enthusiastic with her affection.

"Now…" the Hokage started, grabbing our attention once again while the lady went to the mission desk to complete the transaction.

"Kakashi's team 7 your next duty is: babysitting an elder's grandson, shopping in the neighbouring village, and helping with the potato digging—" he was cut off Naruto's clear objection to these meaningless tasks.

"No, no, no thank you! I want to do a more, you know, incredible mission. Find us a different one!" to be completely honest, everyone was thinking of it like that. This is just a way to get the stupid tasks done cheap and easy. I nodded my head in agreement, I was still dead last in the team ranking most likely but even I was itching for a C-rank mission. A nice delivery mission or an easy escort would be great. No immediate danger but a reason to get out of the village for once.

"You idiot!" Iruka stood up from his seat, directing his attention to the blond shinobi. "You are just a rookie! Everyone starts with the simple duties and works their way up!" the Hokage just sighed

"But we just keep getting the crappiest possible duties." This earned him a knock on the head and a 'be quiet you' from our sensei.

"Naruto! It seems I have to explain to you what these duties are all about. Listen, every day the village receives numerous requests from babysitting to assassinations." I couldn't help but cringe at the mention of assassinations, my father got those once in a while. He never spoke about it but I knew enough about the inner workings of the shinobi rankings and my father's prior experience to take an educated guess.

"Each request is written down on these scrolls and divided into A, B, C, or D rankings based on difficulty. The village is also divided—" I already knew this. No point in listening to the lecture again. My eyes wandered around the room, looking for anything interesting. Naruto much like me wasn't paying any attention.

Despite both of my parents –and basically the rest of my family- having a shinobi background –my dad being from a major Clan—, they were mostly against the idea of their only child entering the academy. They pushed aside their reluctance knowing it wouldn't help and instead started training me at an early age. It became apparent that I had inherited the ice release instead of my mother's bloodline limit. This only helped motivate my father to see me succeed.

I smiled at the memory, but was snapped out of my day dreaming by Naruto's excited voice "Who, who, a feudal lord? A princess?"

"Calm down I'm about to introduce him. Hey, will you come in here?" The door opened and we were greeted with a rude "what's this' by an old man with a bottle of sake in his hand. This was the man we were –most likely—assigned to escort?

"They are all a bunch of brats" he took a swig of his bottle "Especially the shortest guy with the stupid looking face and the little kid. Are you really a ninja?" He was leaning against the door post as the four of us lined up.

"haha who's the shortest one with the stupid face." Naruto looked from side to side; Sakura was taller than him, Sasuke taller than here and then there was me who was shorter than Naruto. "Hey you shouldn't insult Ririko like that!" He shouted at the man while grabbing me by my arm and dragging me to stand next to him.

I coughed gently "Euhm, thank you but he said guy and… I'm still a girl Naruto. I think he referred to me as the little kid." I kept my voice low only the four of us could hear it –and our sensei but he always hears and knows everything when concerning his team.-

Realising that the man had insulted him he got angry and needed to be held back by Kakashi. "I'll kill you!"

"What's the point of killing the person we're supposed to protect idiot." The bored tone in Kakashi's voice just made the scene so much more comical that I couldn't help but let out a giggle.

"I'm the bridge builder Tazuna. I expect you to provide me protection until I get back to my country and complete the bridge."

After the mission debriefing, we were given the okay to go home and pack for the journey. On my way home, I went over the possible items I would need for this mission. Weapons, ration bars, a basic survival kit, spare clothes and underwear, toothbrush, perhaps some explosive tags and ninja wire…

My first stop was in my mother's bakery to notify her of my mission. The next was our house in the Chomesuke compound. While my father was technically disowned from the Mitsuhara Clan and thus carried my mother's last name I wore the Mitsuhara symbol on my shirt. I was still a descendant of the main clan and with the manifestation of the ice release I was eligible for the role of clan head. The hexagonal snowflake and swirling arrow combination didn't make a very intimidating or elegant picture. Very unlike the Chomesuke peach blossom that decorated the compound.

After packing the necessities in a sealing scroll I picked up my brand new pouch of senbon. Afterwards I was on my way.

-o-

The weather was wonderful, warm enough to be comfortable, sunny with only a few clouds drifting about and a soft breeze.

I was walking in the back with sensei, at a slightly slower pace enjoying the light atmosphere and only mildly paying attention to what was being said. Lately I've been spacing out more frequently, only meaning that I felt at ease in this group. I couldn't help it but my eyes softened as I looked at the light hearted bickering of my teammates. During our first few training days, I was mostly overlooked and perhaps a bit excluded but bit by bit I became more open and on occasions I would join in the playful bickering.

While walking my eyes fell on a puddle. I frowned because that's not supposed to be here. my eyes locked with Kakashi's who also noticed something was off about it. "Sensei—" I started but he just nodded.

Right after we passed it, two figures emerged, wrapping Kakashi in chains and shredding him to pieces with a 'one down'. I quickly recovered from the shock of seeing my sensei being ripped to pieces and made my way to our client. I got into a protective stance and fished several senbon out of my pouch. Kunais and shuriken were slightly too heavy for me to properly use –by which I mean that I can't throw them hard enough for a solid kill or serious injury.— senbon however, were light and with a solid knowledge of the human body and with great accuracy they became deadly.

"Two down" they appeared behind Naruto who was quickly saved by Sasuke. He pined the chains to a tree by throwing a Shuriken and setting it with a kunai in the middle. He landed on the two shinobi's claws and kicked them in the face making them fly backward and thus disconnecting them from the chains.

Naruto was still frozen and Sakura had taken a spot a bit closer to Tazuna –though not completely in a protective way-

One of the men went for Naruto, striking from the back and scratching his hand with one of the claws while the other went for Tazuna making Sakura react and pull out a kunai herself.

It was an automatic reaction but I jumped in between Sakura and Tazuna and acted as a second defence line. I told her to stay put and protect the client. Before I could actually do something though, Kakashi appeared and caught the two men. "Naruto, sorry for not helping you right away, I got you injured. I didn't think you wouldn't be able to move." There was a slight regret in his voice but it was soon gone as he complemented Sasuke, Sakura and I

"Anyway, good job Sasuke, Ririko and Sakura too." Naruto's eyes were wide, flashing with several different emotions and despite noticing Naruto's distress, Sasuke added more fuel to the fire by provoking him with an insult;

"Naruto save it for later, there is poison on their claws we have to remove it quickly." Kakashi was still holding the two shinobi under his arms.

"We must open the wound and release the poisoned blood from your body. Don't move too much or the poison will spread through your body." The blonde's eyes showed determination

"Tazuna-san, I need to talk to you. These guys are chuunin class Shinobi from Kirigakure." Said men were already tied to a tree in their own chains. "They are known to keep fighting no matter what."

"How did you read our movements?"

"Ririko?" was he testing me?

"It hasn't rained in days, the puddle was very much out of place. You didn't conceal your chakra either." I put away my senbon and rubbed at my arm just so I had something to do while everyone was watching me.

"Why did you let the brats fight if you knew?"

"I could have killed you if I wanted to but I needed to confirm something: the target." His eyes darkened slightly.

"What do you mean?" came the bridge builder's reply. My eyes widened and I glanced over at Tazuna who still stood between Sakura and I

"Meaning, were they after you or one of us? We didn't know there were shinobi after you. Our mission was to simply protect you from thieves or gangs. This however has now become at least a B-rank mission. This was supposed to be a simple protection mission until you complete the bridge." The old man was silent his eyes cast downwards. So he did deceive us.

"If it was known that shinobi were after you, this mission would have been an expensive B-rank. I'm sure you have a reason, but it causes problems when you lie about the mission details. We are now operating outside of our duties" Sakura found it the right time to give her own thoughts on the matter.

"We aren't ready for this mission. Let's quit! We will need medicine for Naruto's wound. We should go back to the village and take him to a doctor…" while trying to keep up a brave face, there was an uncertainty and nervousness in her voice. I felt very much the same way. This was already out of our league. Unlike other teams we didn't have a specialisation yet, except for disrupting the peace. Only Sasuke and I knew any elemental jutsus and even that wouldn't be enough. Naruto while he had an immense chakra pool was very bad at controlling it and Sakura only had her book smarts at the moment.

"hmm, this might be too much, I guess we should return to the village to treat Naruto."

Naruto's eyes hardened, determination only becoming more obvious before he stabbed his wounded hand with his kunai. "Naruto what are you doing!?"

His hand trembled, whether it is from adrenaline or pain the others did not know. "With this kunai—" he started

"With this kunai I'll protect the old man. We're continuing the mission!" he lifted his head and there was a pained yet determined grin on his face. There was a moment of silence before Kakashi-sensei made his way towards the blond.

"Naruto, it's good that you're releasing the poison but…"I looked at the wound that was still dripping blood on the ground. "any more and you'll die from blood loss." Naruto began screaming in panic and Sakura stepped away from our client to lecture her other teammate. Somewhere along the line Sasuke joined too and I was the only one still paying attention to the man we were supposed to guard.

"Sensei, I—I have to talk to you."

-o-

When we could go no further by land, we rented a small boat to take us safely through the misty waters. While we could have taken one of the ferry ships it wasn't advised. There was a bigger risk of another attack.

"We should see the bridge soon. The wave country is at the base." I was on edge, my fingers were twitching as I tried to use my painfully small sensing range as a means to keep track of any possible ambushes. It took all my concentration to broaden my range by an additional 10 meters so it was no surprise that I had missed quite a lot of the ongoing conversations. Neither did I take any notice of the change in scenery until we docked at a rundown little village.

"ok! Get me home safely." I felt the need to scoff. Stupid lying clients. We continued in silence. Naruto saw danger everywhere but it wasn't until he actually threw a shuriken in the bushes that he grabbed our attention

"heh, just a rat." My hand clenched and I took a deep breath, let them argue I'll make sure no one attacks us from the back. My breath hitched as I briefly felt someone enter my range. That was definitely not something or someone to mess with. "Sensei there's someone- " I tried to grab his attention but was quickly told to duck. As I was still closest to Tazuna I brought him down with me. A massive sword was stuck halfway in a tree with a man balancing on the hilt.

"Well, if it isn't the hidden mist's missing nin; Momochi Zabuza." I knew that name. he was in dad's bingo book. I know I shouldn't be snooping through his stuff but which 11 year old can say they have access to an official bingo book and not leaf through it? Naruto was ready to charge but was quickly stopped by our sensei. "Everybody get back. This one's on a whole other level." Zabuza looked at us from over his shoulder.

"it will be a little tough, unless I do this." Kakashi-sensei lifted his headband from his other eye and revealed his hidden sharingan.

"You appear to be Sharingan Kakashi, sorry but the old man is mine." I glanced at my other teammates was I really the only one still paying any attention to Tazuna? I almost felt like yelling at them for not immediately assuming a protective formation about our client but sensei gave us our orders soon enough.

"surround and protect Tazuna-san. Do not enter the fight. That's the teamwork here." He direct his attention back to Zabuza. "Zabuza. Fight me first." He finally turned around and faced us all. His face was covered in bandages and I swallowed nervously.

"Ah, I already get to see the famous sharingan. I'm honoured" when Naruto asked what the Sharingan was, it turned into an impromptu dojutsu lesson and I faintly wondered how we all found the time to do so. Wasn't there a missing nin standing only a few meters away from us and the person we were supposed to protect. I pulled out a couple of senbon and held my explosive tags nearby just in case. "now, let's end all the talking; I have to kill that old man." Zabuza was perched on top of his sword. "but kakashi, it seems I have to beat you first." He kicked loos his sword and landed on top of the neaby water. "ninja technique: hidden mist jutsu.

A/N: here is the next chapter. My updating is all over the place because of my busy student life combined with a weekend job. So I write when I find the time. Hopefully the next update is in a week. See you then dearies.