A/N: One more chapter up before I leave on vacation. I'll try to continue to write while I'm gone but I sincerely doubt I'll be able to update for the next three weeks. This one chapter is dedicated to Sailor Cosmos. Thank you for your review and your loyalty, I'm sorry I kept you waiting for so many years.. your review made me smile, here have a cookie *gives weapon pouch shaped cookie*

It was Iruka's shift at the mission desk when the genin of Team Seven arrived to receive their missions, so naturally the other shinobi manning the desk shooed his ex-students to him, not wanting to deal with them themselves.

"Separate or together?" Iruka asked while visually evaluating them. He had been told of the punishment missions they had been assigned but not what had occurred for them to deserve them. By the looks of the new bruises each sported, they might have been scuffling among each other or picking a fight with another team… which he could expect from Naruto and even Sasuke, but not Sakura. And it would be unlikely that the bruises and injuries would be so proclaimed.

"Separate, Iruka-sensei"

Iruka nodded looking down at the specific instructions their jounin-sensei had given the mission desk ninjas before he had left on his mission. The number required, nothing outside the village walls, nothing too physically strenuous, but also nothing pleasing as it was a punishment of sorts after all.

"With most of the village's civilian workforce being focused on reconstruction and a large percentage of shinobi being away on missions, the normal day to day needs have been somewhat neglected and need to be addressed." Iruka explained handing out each individual three folders with the mission details.

"Naruto, your mission is to clean the faces of the Shodaime and the Nidaime. You know where the tools are, report back when you're done."

Naruto's eyes widened and opened his mouth to complain but Iruka's glare silenced him. "It's your mission. Missions are not up to debate. Go."

Grumbling under his breath, Naruto skimmed the contents and handed back the folder with the mission description. He gave his teammates a last glance and a grin "See ya guys later."

Sakura watched Naruto with slight pity, that wasn't a mission she envied. Opening her folder, she hoped hers wasn't similar." Sakura, your mission is the proper maintenance of the first two Academy training grounds. Replace broken targets, re-stuff straw dummies, etc.

Sakura nodded and returned the folder as she finished reading it. "Hai, Iruka-sensei. Bye Sasuke-kun, I'll see you soon."

Sasuke grunted a farewell to his teammates, not looking up from the folder he was reading. These missions were obviously designed to be unpleasant, and it was no coincidence he and his teammates were assigned to them. Sensei was a thorough man.

"Sasuke, the Daimyo's wife is preparing to go on an extended trip. She has requested our assistance in preparation. Report to her." Iruka-sensei addressed the last member of Team Seven.

"Hai." Sasuke returned the briefing folder, and headed out to the Daimyo's residence.

All genin were aware of who the Daimyo's wife was, and it was perhaps Naruto who had described her the best as that "annoying old hag". She thought that because she was the Daimyo's wife, the shinobi of the Leaf were completely at her service and discretion, to chase her constantly run-away cat, and do her errands. However, because she WAS the Daimyo's wife, most of her requests were humored, to keep the shinobi-civilian relationship positive and civil, to many genin's dismay... those (mostly unpaid) missions usually fell to them. Howe

It was a harsh mission, as the mission parameters pretty much ordered Sasuke to do anything she said within reason for the next few hours. Looking up at the Hokage's Monument and seeing a tiny Naruto hanging off a few ropes wiping down the Shodaime's face however made him decide that the dobe had the worst mission of the three.

Coming up on the Daimyo's residence, he noticed the long line of wagons waiting off the side to the road, most likely for the Daimyo's wife's trip. He nodded curtly at the guards who upon seeing his forehead-protector let him in without question and headed towards the entrance of the large home to be greeted by one of the house servants and led to the Daimyo's wife.

"Shijimi-Sama." Sasuke bowed greeting her respectfully.

"Oh, you must be the ninja sent over to help me prepare for my upcoming trip!" She greeted him in a loud and obnoxious voice, hugging her cat tightly.

Sasuke winced, she was worse than Naruto, and that was saying a lot. "Yes ma'am. What services may I help you with?"

"The first thing I need you to do is to load those packages to the caravans waiting out in front. Be very careful! I have delicate things and gifts for my hosts!" She gestured behind her to a room that seemed to be overflowing with crates and packs.

"Hai."With a sigh and a thought of the long day he had ahead, Sasuke got to work.

Sakura let herself groan as she entered the first Academy training ground. The field was a mess not just from academy students using the training grounds, but there was also minimal damage because of the invasion. She guessed some of the fighting had occurred here before moving to some place else.

With the Academy officially out of session for the past few weeks and reconstruction underway in the rest of the village, no one was spared to fix it. Academy students could have managed, but they weren't allowed in here without supervision.

It wasn't a hard mission to accomplish, but it was definitely going to take her most if not all of the day without help. That meant she'd only get one mission off Kakashi's required number today, less than she had hoped for.

Walking around the clearing, she decided to pick up the miscellaneous trash, objects and weapons lying around first, then she'd move on to fixing or replacing the actual targets and dummies, and then she would… well, then she'd decide where to go from there. No sense in getting ahead of herself, the first two tasks would take hours to finish.

Naruto wiped the sweat off his brow. The sun seemed to be unbearably hot today, though it probably was this enormous mind-numbing task that made it seem so. Scraping some bird poo from the Shodaime's chin, he groaned wondering what his teammates were doing.

"Whatever it is, it probably isn't as bad as this!" Plummeting down to sit on the wooden platform, he looked out toward the village…

Sasuke knew there was something inside him making his chakra weird, but he hadn't said anything or treated him any different than usual because of it… the battle on the rooftop had been because of Naruto's strength, not the monster that lay within him. Maybe it was because Sasukee was the one person who could understand him; with the curse mark that Orochimaru had given him was sort of the same, wasn't it? A source of great power but also of great evil.

Naruto's eyes narrowed. The rest of the village didn't see it that way, to them he was just a demon walking amongst their midst… He loved Sakura and valued her friendship vey much, but that was all coming to an end… she'd learn sooner or later about the stupid fox inside of him, and then she would turn against him too. She barely tolerated his presence before, but now she would hate him like the others… Naruto wiped the unwanted tears away. He wasn't sure he could deal with Sakura's hate.

He checked the sun's position before deciding that the break was over. He was lucky the mission only included two heads, and not the five. He smiled in memory of thhe time he had painted over the Hokage Monument, Iruka had been furious and he had been forced to stay into way late into the night to clean all the paint off.

Turtle, the rookie of his ANBU team, watched in sympathy as Naruto cleaned the stone faces. He had overheard the young blonde's muttered thoughts. He was well aware of the hatred directed towards the young genin because of his unwilling host, but he hadn't known how much it affected him. This protection mission was the first instance he had the opportunity to be near with what the others had called the "Demon-brat", but he hadn't seen any 'evil' attributes that many claimed he had…

Phoenix could hardly wait the time for a shift rotation. He was convinced that Wolf-Taichou had chosen to punish him as well by assigning him to guard Sasuke for the first shift. He had been trained to tolerate the most unbearable of circumstances and would do battle with a hundred opponents for his village, but he was willing to compare this duty with torture, even if the poor Uchiha heir was bearing the worst of it.

Raccoon comfortably perched on a high branch of a tree, as she guarded the only female-member of Team Seven. She was still sore from her injuries, and while she could perform any of her duties without much trouble, it did not mean that she couldn't take advantage of an opportunity like this to give her body a small comfort or rest. The training ground was ideal for this, easy to conceal oneself yet still be readily available.

She watched Sakura move about picking up the litter in the clearing in an efficient yet very slow manner. This task would have gone a lot faster if she had her team with her, or…. Thinking on the dysfunctional match that team made, maybe not.

It was a lot to do… maybe she would help out just a bit. No one would notice the disappearance of weapons within the small forest, and she could use some spare training sets.