A/n: I do not own any Naruto copyrights.

Katsu took my punch and rolled, landing so that he could immediately launch a kick at my face. Rather than dodging, I leapt back onto my hands and allowed his leg to pass over me. Pivoting on my palms, I took advantage of my opponent's momentary confusion in a move that Gai would be proud of. Katsu's (still outstretched) leg was knocked aside as I used a pinwheel kick to smash one leg into the underside of his knee and the other one into his jaw.

The braided boy could only gasp as my attack sent him flying towards the training dummies. I didn't want to admit it, but Katsu was beginning to scare me. That kick he had tried to hit me with would have been powerful, enough so that I would've broken my jaw if he'd hit me with it. I didn't know why, but the normally suave clan boy was lashing out in a way that was both wild and reckless.

This wasn't the kind of fight two Academy students should be having.

I grit my teeth and used the momentum from my kick to launch myself well over the still falling form of my opponent. Knowing that I had to end this fight before Katsu ended up hurting himself (or me) any more than he already had, I plowed into his chest with both feet. The training ground erupted with dust as my blow sent both of us crashing to the ground.

I was breathing heavily when the dust cleared, still standing on the prone form of Katsu. He stirred after a moment but I didn't move from my position. Instead I held my hand to his neck in the traditional stance of the winner. I looked at him pointedly to see what he would do.

When he didn't say anything I spoke for him. "Do you surrender?" I asked.

Katsu sighed in a way that seemed far too old for a ten year old boy. After another long moment, he nodded.

I smiled in relief and stepped off of him, using my previously threatening hand to help him up. Katsu muttered his thanks as he awkwardly brushed the dust off his normally pristine clothes. I hadn't noticed before, but his outfit looked like it had already taken a beating long before I'd gotten to it. I shot the braided boy a curious look and remembered what he had said before our sudden fight.

I crossed my arms and cocked my head to the side. "So do you know now?" I asked.

Katsu paused in his task (he had moved on to straightening his hair) and gave me a confused look. "Know what?"

I sighed and uncrossed my arms so that I could run a hand through my hair in a habit that I had (unfortunately) picked up from Naruto. "Know whatever it was that attacking me was supposed to tell you." I said as his words repeated themselves in my head. "You did say something about needing to know."

"It doesn't matter, alright!" He snapped (a little too fiercely for my liking) as he aimed a rather vicious glare my way. I was about to snap out a moody retort of my own when Katsu's glare softened. "I don't know anything."

I frowned, the fact that these words were much quieter than his earlier ones not escaping my notice. Suddenly deciding something, I sat down in the dusty grass with a 'plop' and looked up at Katsu. "I'm not going anywhere." I said. "You should tell me about it. We have time and you said you would anyway."

Well, this wasn't exactly true. While Katsu did say he'd tell me if I won, we were working on a bit of a time schedule. It was only a matter of time before Mizuki sensei either noticed the fight (we had been pretty loud) or noticed that I'd been gone longer than I should've been. To be perfectly honest, we should just head inside now and avoid any problems.

Yet . . . as much as I didn't want to get in trouble, Katsu looked like he needed this conversation much more than I needed a spotless record.

The braided boy looked suspicious but it was only a moment later that he sat down next to me, crossing his legs in a way that almost looked practiced. He didn't say a word as he sat there and it was only after a full minute of silence that I realized that, if there was to be a conversation at all, I'd have to speak first.

"You said you'd tell me if I won and I did." I said, going for the blunt approach so that he wouldn't be able to weasel his way out of answering. "So the first thing I'm going to ask is how you got that black eye."

Katsu frowned and fidgeted slightly. His eyes moved downwards until he was staring at his feet and he went quiet for a long time. Finally he said: "I got it because I'm weaker than you."

I blinked once before slowly moving to openly gape at the boy before me. He got a black eye because of me? A horrible feeling of overwhelming guilt settled into the pit of my stomach and I couldn't help but wonder what would've happened if I'd shown off less it Taijutsu class.

"Me?" I breathed, suddenly feeling both sick and disgusted. My gaze hardened as I realized something that should have been apparent. In most cases, injuries like that were given, not created.

"Katsu," I began in a voice that was much scarier than I expected it to be. From the way Katsu had begun to pale, I'd guess I'd grown a rather fearsome looking scowl as well. "Who did that to you?"

"It doesn't matter." The clan boy said for the second time that day, only this time sounding much meeker than he had before. "I got hurt because I'm supposed to be stronger than you and I'm not, it was my fault."

I shot him an incredulous look. His fault? That had to be the stupidest (and as I lived with Gai, this was saying something) thing I'd ever heard.

"That's just stupid," I said as I voiced my slightly rude thoughts. "You can't be better than everybody, you know."

Katsu looked annoyed at this. "But I have to be!" He practically shouted. "My clan has always been the best!"

I quirked an eyebrow as I finally began to piece together where this conversation was heading. Obviously the slightly unhinged Katsu I'd been seeing today stemmed from some idea of his clan's reputation. Had one of his family members done this to him? I wondered as I subtly examined the boy before me. Was clan reputation important enough that you'd hurt your family just to protect it?

"You're not though." I replied back bluntly. At Katsu's almost angry look, I elaborated. "If you are deluded into believing you'll always be the best, you'll never learn to protect your weaknesses."

Just as Katsu looked like he was about to reply, I cut him off.

"Think about it." I said. "Do you think you could beat the Hokage?"

The eyes of the braided boy went wide. "What?" He spluttered, like what I had said counted as some form of treason (it didn't). "Of course not!"

"Than what would you do if you had to fight someone that was that much stronger than you?" I asked. "Would you jump into it believing you were better than them?"

He actually seemed to consider this for a moment. Finally he said: "No, I guess I would try to lay traps or something." He tapped his chin with a finger. "That, or work with a teammate to even it out a bit."

I nodded, a bit pleased with myself that he actually seemed to be getting what I was saying. "Exactly, just being strong isn't always enough. Sometimes it's the knowing what you're not good at that can help you win."

Katsu touched his eye almost subconsciously as a vacant expression crossed his face. It was obvious that he was thinking about something so I just smiled slightly and let him have his moment. After his thought seemed to pass, Katsu turned to me and smiled the brightest smile I have ever seen him wear.

To be honest, I was stunned. Around me, Katsu's expressions had never gotten happier than 'mildly hopeful'. Seeing him like this was almost a cultural shock.

The moment would probably have turned into quite the fuzzy one if it was allowed to last, however this was also the exact time a dark shadow fell over where we were sitting. Almost as one, Katsu and I looked up to find a rather irate looking Mizuki-sensei looming over our heads.

"And just what," Mizuki-sensei said as he began to turn a curious shade of red. "Are you two doing out of class?"

oOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

"Dad?" I asked as I was chopping the potatoes for that night's dinner. Putting the knife down, I slid the vegetables into the bubbling pot on the stove and turned to face Gai fully. "Why did you sleep with Junko?"

Gai had been sharpening his kunai at the table but at the mention of Junko he coughed (though this could've also been due to my phrasing) and whipped around. He moved so fast that, if he had been anything other than a ninja, he probably would've stabbed himself.

The spandex clan stared at me for a long time before he put the kunai down and stood up. For the first time in a long time, his words were serious. "You want to know why?" He asked, not even bothering to ask what had brought up the conversation in the first place. It had been a while since I'd met Junko in the streets, but it could be that he's been expecting me to mention it for a while.

I nodded and moved so that I was leaning across the counter on my elbows. "If it's alright." I said. "You two just seem so . . . different."

Instead of sighing at my curiosity (like I half expected him to), Gai made a wistful sort of noise. He leaned back against the kitchen wall and looked at me like he was seeing someone else. "Kaori-chan, the woman you saw was not the one I first met."

I bit my lip, confused. Was he saying that Junko wasn't my mother? That couldn't be true, I remembered my birth and (whether I liked it or not) Junko was definitely the one I came from. Not that I could exactly say that to Gai, however.

"I'm not quite sure I follow you." I said instead.

Gai fixed me with a contemplating eye. "Did you know Takayami Junko was once a medic-nin?"

I blinked and nearly started laughing before I realized that Gai was serious. Maybe we really weren't talking about the same Junko. The woman I had once known had hatedninja to a level that I hadn't seen since she dropped out of my life 9 years ago. I looked at Gai and suddenly remembered what Kakashi had said when I first came to live here.

'Junko acts differently around us.' Suddenly I could see how that statement could be truer than I originally thought it to be.

"What happened?" I asked Gai. "She said ninja's were killers."

Gai sighed and looked out the window at Kohona's sunset; it was a particularly pretty one today. "There was an . . . incident when she was pregnant with you." He said slowly, like he was trying not to tell me an important part of the story. "Many ninja's died. That was when Junko changed."

I gave him a skeptical look and moved over so that I could stir the (pretty much forgotten) stew. "I thought you didn't know Junko was pregnant with me."

Gai sighed. "Believe me Kaori-chan, I didn't. The incident that changed Junko was not because of you, it was a separate event that happened only once. I know that she was pregnant because of your age."

After stirring the stew I had the sudden realization that Gai had yet to go into one of speeches of 'youthfulness' or 'strength'. As the conversation had grown to be somewhat lengthy, I was struck with how serious this must be for him.

"What was the incident?" I asked even as I racked the rarely used 'anime-Naruto information' part of my brain for something that would make sense. For it to have made someone as spiteful as Junko was, it must have been something pretty traumatizing.

Gai looked uncomfortable for a split second before his usual 'Gai Grin' was back in full force, effectively erasing the tense atmosphere that had been occupying our kitchen. "Do not worry Kaori-chan!" He said in an almost painful show of exuberance. "It does not affect today!"

I sighed and went back to my cooking, recognizing the end of a conversation when I saw one. Frowning slightly, I wondered what was so horrible that he couldn't tell me. Or maybe, I thought as a new thought suddenly popped into my head, it's something he was ordered not to tell me.

My birthday was in May I realized with a start, only eight months after the disastrous events surrounding Naruto's birth. Suddenly I was looking at Gai with new eyes, could that be the event he couldn't tell me.

Had it been the Kyuubi attack that changed Junko so much?

oOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

I stretched lazily as Akio and I exited through the Academy's main doors, glad that it was our lunch break. For some reason, Mizuki-sensei had made today's lesson particularly boring. I wasn't the only one in our class who was glad to be away from calculating the path of thrown kunai.

"Hey Kaori-chan," Akio whined as he tugged at my arm, "Let's go into the Village for lunch today."

I raised an eyebrow at my friend and poked him in the forehead (laughing when he protested the intrusion). "Why not?" I said with a good natured shrug. "Our year is allowed to leave the Academy; we should take advantage of it."

"Sweet!" Akio grinned and made a sort of excited (and not very manly) sound. "I want barbeque beef!" He was actually grabbing my arm now but I didn't really mind. Smiling, I allowed him to drag me out of the school yard and on towards the restaurant district.

"Hopefully you have the money then." I teased, making a big show of checking my pockets. "I didn't bring enough to feed your appetite."

"It's not my fault you eat like a squirrel." He fired back as a wide grin began to spread across his face. "That has to be why you're so tiny."

I frowned at the jibe but didn't get to retort to it. Before I could even think of anything to say, Naruto ran right past us, holding a bucket of yellow paint and laughing loudly. Two angry looking Chunin were right behind him, obviously chasing him for some reason or another.

"Naruto! Come back here!" One of the two shouted as they sped after the blond.

"When I get my hands on you . . .!" The other one threatened, leaving his sentence unfinished as the other Chunin spoke up again.

"You crossed the line this time Naruto!"

Akio and I blinked in unison as Naruto used (an actually fairly impressive) burst of ninja speed to launch himself up onto the roof tops. After barely a second, my blond friend and the two unfortunate ninjas chasing him were gone.

"So . . ." Akio said as we both stared at the place where Naruto had disappeared. "What do you think that was about?"

"I have no idea," I said even though something about the situation seemed blaringly familiar. "But doesn't Naruto have a different lunch hour than us?"

"You're right." Akio said before he shook his head in what I'd guess to be exasperation. "Jeez, why does Naruto always have to skip class? He'll never become a ninja that way."

I shrugged and continued off in the direction we'd been heading before, waiting until Akio had caught up before I began talking again. "He'll be alright." I said with a smile as we turned into a more open street. "Naruto just has a different way of doing things."

Suddenly, Akio stopped.

"Oh wow . . ." The boy besides me said in such a way that I knew he wasn't talking to me. "I really hope that isn't what Naruto's been skipping class for."

"What is-?" I half asked before I followed Akio's line of sight (it wasn't hard, he was staring) and suddenly realized why this situation seemed so familiar.

The four Hokage faces were all covered with wide swirls of red, yellow, and white paint. I gulped, suddenly horrified even though I really had no reason to be. Naruto's paintjob looked exactly like it had in the anime.

I shook my head to clear it, knowing that I shouldn't allow myself to be so rattled by all of this. I had been just as horrified when Gai announced his decision to be a Jounin-sensei after all. If I allowed myself to let every series event shock me, I'd be frozen up far too often. I wouldn't be a very good ninja if I let that happen.

"Kaori?" Akio asked, probably curious to why I hadn't replied yet. With a firm hand, he set us to walking again. "Are you ok?"

I sighed and shook my head again. "Yeah, I was just thinking about . . ." I searched my head for a topic and settled on the last one that made sense. "Naruto."

Akio looked curious but he accepted my answer with a nod. "Aw don't worry Kaori." He said in a way that kinda sounded like a role reversal (as I was usually the one telling him that). "If they were going to kick him out for stuff like that, he'd have been gone a while ago."

I laughed and pounded Akio lightly on the shoulder. We had reached the main street now and were heading towards the barbeque restaurant at a rather fast pace. "I never said I was worried for him." I said with a grin. "I was just thinking about how well his perfected Sexy Jutsu turned out."

Akio rolled his eyes as he walked up to the restaurant and held the door open for me in a fashion that was a bit too gentlemanly for his age. "Of course you were." He muttered as I passed him by.

I flashed him a grin and led us over to a booth in the back corner of the room. The little grill on the table sizzled merrily at us as we sat down. "You know Akio." I said. "Maybe you should try to make a 'Sexy Jutsu' of your own."

"Ugh, never." Akio groaned while I giggled at the mental image. "I don't think I'd ever want to become that . . ." His face turned an interesting shade of red. "Revealing."

I swatted at him with a menu. "Don't pretend you don't look when he practices."

If it was even possible, the red of my friend's face had gone from 'sunburn' to 'apple'. "I do not!" He protested loudly, effectively getting several nearby patrons to look our way.

"Sure, sure." I said with a dismissive win and a smile. A waiter plopped down a bowl of raw meat and vegetables before usand I used chopsticks to place a generous amount on the grill.

"Now shut up." I pointed a chopstick at him good-naturedly and grinned a genuine smile. "The food's here."