An: IMPORTANT IMPORTANT IMPORTANT!: Alrighty, there will be some armor making in this chappy. i will put up links on my page for those that wish to know what each armor is like.


Chapter 7: Fire to the leaf?

The konoha 12 turned to see a red haired kid with a large gourd on his back which was where the sand was coming from, a blond haired girl with a large fan on her back and a dude in a cat suit with make up on his face.

"Gaara, what a pleasant surprise!" Naruko said nervously, she knew she had been forgetting something all of those months she had been in konoha. Sending Gaara a letter. She had met him after they clashed on a mission where she was supposed to kill the person he was protecting. She had sensed he was a jinchuriki like her and since the boy was unstable she fixed his seal which obviously worked. He had allowed her to get the guy he was protecting since she explained he was a child molester and wanted dead by over 10 people.

She could see her friends preparing to attack the boy and told them no.

"Uzumaki, what happened to keeping in touch?" Gaara said glaring at his blond friend.

"I forgot I'm sorry, you know how I get when I have too many things on my mind. I forget stuff even if they are important to me. You know I would never abandon you, we are the same and you are my best friend. Please let me down and let me make it up to you?"

"Fine." Gaara said giving a small smirk "You have to take me out to all I can eat BBQ."

"Deal." Naruko said and she was lowered to the ground and looking around she could see everyone looking at her with a questioning look.

"I'm guessing you are here for the Chuunin exams Gaara?" Naruko asked ignoring the questioning looks and walking over to embrace her old friend.

"Hai." Gaara said before glaring at her for being taller than him. "I hate my shortness..."

"You just haven't had your growth spurt yet. Don't you worry, I bet you will be taller than me in no time."

Naruko and Gaara then started walking away from the group with cat suit dude and then girl with the fan in tow, Asuma called after her to be on the training ground at 8 am for training. Everyone looked at Itachi to have him explain what exactly was going on between the two.

"Naruko met the kid while on an assignment 2 years ago. They share many similarities including being shunned in their village for things out of their reach, Hokage-sama. I will explain further in private with you later. The short story is that they became friends and Naruko forgot to write him back since she has been busy around the village. I guess he was slightly miffed about it. But he would never intentionally hurt Naruko in any way which is why I did not interfere and also why she did not allow you to attack him." Itachi simply said and everyone nodded in understanding slowly.

"Alrighty then." Hiruzen said as the genin were dismissed and then headed to his office with the jounin and chuunin instructor to discuss what they had seen.


-with Naruko and the sand siblings-

Naruko sweat dropped as Gaara consumed a mountain of grilled BBQ ribs, he had fallen for the thing when she was eating some once and had been obsessed with it since then. She personally had fnished two mountains of them earlier but Chouji was the biggest eater of their team so she wasn't worrying about her wallet becoming empty. They were sitting in Chouji's family run BBQ place so Naruko got some discount when she paid but Gaara did not have to know that.

She then led the sand siblings to her apartment where they sat down in the living room and started talking. Naruko noticed that Gaara was being unusually quiet.

"Something the matter Gaara?" Naruko asked after tolerating his silence for long enough.

"Our father is planning an invasion of the leaf during the exams." Gaara replied making his siblings nod.

"Why, when and how?" Naruko asked all three questions in one go.

"Orochimaru of the sannin has his own village, otogakure, he made an allegiance to bring fire to the leaf with our father. Our father has been insane for some time now and the village is suffering for it. They will strike in the 3rd exam, they are relying on me losing control of the shukaku and bring ruin to the village. Normally I would not have minded attacking the leaf because it treated you badly but you live here now, you will be fighting in the battle and I do not wish to see you get hurt. There is also a traitor in your midst, a man named Kabuto. He is Orochimarus lackey."

"I see. Would you mind telling all of this to the Hokage?"

Gaara just shrugged before Naruko made them all grab her so she could use the shunshin to get there undetected. When they got there Itachi was in the middle of explaining Gaara to the hokage. He stopped when he saw them there.

"Gaara told me important information and I will not tolerate him or his siblings being harmed due to it." At the hokages nod she continued. "Suna and Otogakure are planning on an invasion during the final exam. Orochimaru is the kage of Otogakure and has a informant in our midst named Kabuto who is working for him so he can probably give us more information if he is brought in for questioning." Naruko said before allowing her friends to take over from there to explain the rest.

After everything was explained the hokage summoned Shikamaru's father to his office to discuss sand siblings eventually went to their motel room so that their sensei who was a supporter of the war wouldn't suspect their betrayal. Naruko stayed behind and only returned home at 4 am and when she did she saw that Itachi had cooked dinner for her and left it for her to heat up when she came home. She quickly ate before heading to bed, she had never felt as exhausted as right then.


-With Team 8 to 10 the next morning at team 9's training ground-

Asuma, Itachi,Gai and Kurenai all walked into the training ground at 8am sharp and saw their genin waiting. Though eventually it was obvious they were one short. Itachi frowned since his blond sister figure hadn't been home for dinner last night and was now late for training, it wasn't like her at all. They took their genin with them to check whether she was at her apartment. Itachi letting them in and soon saw that she had been home last night at least since her dinner was gone.

He told them to wait while he checked the rest of the apartment and found her sleeping in her bed with her alarm clock broken into tiny pieces. He walked back into the kitchen and grabbing a bucket and filling it with cold water dumped it on the blond who jumped up screaming bloody murder.

"The hell Itachi?!" Naruko growled once she realized who it was who threw water over her. Itachi kind of felt bad when he saw how tired his little sister figure looked.

"You were late for training."

"I was up all night speaking with the hokage idiot. He was going to send a message to all jounins to join him in his office today since Gaara brought him information from Suna. Now leave me alone while I dry my bed and go back to sleep." Naruko ground out and kicked Itachi out of her room before locking her door. Naruko then used a light fire jutsu to dry her bed while grumbling stuff about stupid people. She then laid back down on her bed after changing clothes and going back to sleep, she would worry about making stronger security seals later that day.


-With Itachi and the rest-

Itachi just stared at his sisters bedroom door in surprise since he had never expected her to throw him out. She had almost looked upset with him even when he had woken her up like this many times before. He then looked at Asuma, Gai and Kurenai before they dismissed their teams and shunshined to the hokage's office. They were the last ones to arrive to a meeting like Naruko had predicted.

"Alright, now that everyone is here. Last night I got some serious information from an ally of ours in Suna. Otogakure and Suna are going to attack us during the final exam of the Chuunin exams. We have captured and are currently questioning an informant of Orochimaru's that he has had stationed in Konoha for years. We would never have known of the invasion before it was too late if it weren't for Gaara of the sand, his siblings and Naruko who convinced Gaara to speak with me personally. They are on our side if anyone's in this fight." Hiruzen started before continuing.

"I have already started preparations for the security system to be strengthened before the exams. Our seal masters are working on strong seals which will do all sorts of damage to enemy troops during the invasion and Nara Shikaku has the strategy team working on new positions to patrol and how we can use our forces in the best and most efficient way. The informant had already given the information up of patrols and our military strength so I will be calling all available ninja home as soon as they are able and missions outside the village that can be held off until after the exams will be. We will be stronger in numbers and catch the enemy off guard. I expect of all of you to do your best in the upcoming 2 months and those of you with a genin team to inform them of the situation and to train them to their best ability before the start of the exams in a month. Dismissed."

Itachi turned to the other 3 jounin and all of them gave a nod, knowing what he was thinking. It was time for some harsh survival training in the forest of death.


-Naruko's workshop later that day-

Naruko had 20 clones working on security seals while she had other 3 making leather and another 3 sharpening weapons. She was herself making some new armor for shinobi's of the village that would protect them against all sharp pointy things but allow them the same amount of speed, she had been working on the design for months and already had over 500 armors ready for use. The hokage had asked her to speed up the production so for the next week Naruko would be making more. She heard Itachi entering the workshop but didn't look up from where she was hammering a piece of steel into place.

"Naruko. The jounin and I are planning on taking the genin teams into the forest of death for survival training for the 3 weeks before the exams. We would be leaving in a week and it would be wise to take you too along with Zabuza and Haku. I know that you are busy making seals and armor for the village but if we help you maybe we can get it done in time." Itachi said quietly and Naruko just kept the work up until Itachi sighed and turned to leave.

"I will come with you on the training trip. But I will finish this myself. I am almost done. Only 500 armors to go. The golden spear is taking care of the weapon's not me and the clones are doing a good job on the seals. I will help the hokage put them all over the village later." Naruko finally spoke up and Itachi nodded before hesitating slightly before asking.

"What is bothering you today? You haven't been like this for years, so serious and detached it's unnerving for me when I know the real you."

"People I know will die or get hurt because some idiot out there desires to bring war to us. That's the problem. You, Jiji and Jiraya are the most precious to my heart along with Gaara, Zabuza and Haku. And the team along with Asuma and team 8 and 9 are fast becoming close to me. All of you will be in danger because of Orochimaru's plan." Naruko said finishing her 503rd armor and starting the 504th.

"I don't like it nii-san. I want to be able to protect you all and not lose anyone. I know it is stupid and foolish but I can't help it. I know that being a shinobi means eventually losing a friend but I can't help but think that one day, everyone will understand each other and be allies and peace will reign once more. I want to see that day, and I want everyone else to do it too."

"I agree Naruko, but this war is coming up and we have to fight, all of us. You can be the biggest asset in the fight and protect us all by giving us your armor and seals. But you can't change when someone's time is up. One day all of us will die, some will go before anyone else. Most of the genin will be in evacuating the citizens and protecting them along with some chuunin like you know. Jiraya will be fighting Orochimaru with you, Hiruzen and me. Gaara will be hidden away so he wont freak out and let the shukaku free on accident with his siblings. Everyone will be relatively safe and yes, there will be casualties but not that many and we will prevail. We have to." Itachi said ruffling his sisters hair before sitting down and making some clones of himself, started helping her and made the gauntlets for the armor she was making.

She had already finished 550 of them and was ahead in that matter but it never hurt to finish one thing and then start helping with the other. They worked in silence throughout the night and then went to bed at 8 am leaving clones of themselves to keep working.


-5 days later, on top of the hokage tower-

Naruko stood with Hiruzen atop the hokage tower along with over 100 chuunin and jounin shinobi. She was going to create over 100 clones of herself who would draw seals all over the village with the help of the shinobi in front of her who would tell her where to place them. She had been working almost non stop on different designs and testing them to perfection. Eventually she had seals that would throw powerful genjutsu over enemy shinobi once activated. A team of chuunin would be standing by each seal and activating it and then kill the enemy while it was under.

Then there were seals which would throw explosives and nets at enemies when activated by jounin from afar.

She created the clones and then headed home to finish the last pieces of armor needed. She already had her own piece of armor which was made of black leather. The village was as ready as it could be by the end of the day and everyone went in for testing the armor and Shinji Higurashi took care of fitting each armor to each person, only making minor changes. Not giving away the maker only telling them that it was a shinobi of the leaf which made them safe. Naruko had also made armor for the dogs of the Inusuka clan which was greatly appreciated by the clan.

Naruko stood in her room packing stuff that she would use on the training trip. She put on her armor and claws before sealing the back pack and scrolls with seals, traps and all of her hunting gear, arrows and her bow,her tent and sleeping bag. She also took twin hatchets with her which she liked more than any of her weapons.

After placing the scroll into one of the pockets on the front of her armor she put the hatchets into their place on her back and then shunshined to the meeting place in front of the forest of death.


-x-x-x-x-

An: All done for now. How do you like? the next chapter will be training in the forest.