(LMD yawns widely as its nearly 2 in the morning) okay next chapter for you lot

Yup enjoy!

Team Three's Weak Link

The two jounin and the chuunin where on the side lines of the training grounds while the genin carried out the capture the sash exercise. Hinata sat on the grass beside Shikamaru and stroked Feisu the fox, whom she kept around just to pet. She was watching her team with her Byakugan. Megumi had taken the lead, as usual, and was trying to come up with a plan. Team three was crouched in a thicket with Aiko keeping an eye on the surrounding area. Hinata took note of this, that was wrong right away, Shin was more suited to look out duty with his Serpents Gaze, he'd be able to spot them coming easily by their body heat. She swept her gaze over to team ten and Ino was having an argument with the replacement genin, and Chouji was looking about in case their fight attracted attention from the other team. Hinata let out a sigh, her team was inexperienced and Asuma's was mismatched it wasn't going to be pretty. Feisu stretched and yawned and wrapped herself into a small ball with her head resting on her tail, Hinata continued to scratch behind the little fox's ears.

"Wasn't she bigger than that?" Shikamaru asked, bringing Hinata out of her daydream.

"yeah, but there wasn't a need for her to be that big when she was only going to get the genin"

"Oh right…" he remembered how small the fox had been during the test, small enough to ride in Ino's back pack, then when Tenten and Lee attacked the fox was bigger than Kiba's giant dog.

"Ino really doesn't like that guy does she?" Hinata asked looking back at team ten, Shikamaru followed her gaze but he couldn't see through trees and bushes.

"No not really, but then again he isn't a very likeable person." Shikamaru replied, he settled himself on the ground as well and stroked the fox's back, it was cute.

"Shikamaru's right, but we need him if Ino and Chouji have a shot at passing the chuunin exams this time." Asuma added.

"What happened to his team?" Hinata asked.

"One of their members dropped out, only leaving two of them, so they had to either get a new member or be split to other teams. They were split, I got one, and the other guy was spent to Kurenai's team to take over your spot."

"I remember him… Kiba told me he was a right asshole as well." Hinata recalled the boy that had been training with team eight.

"yeah… but as I said we need him if they are to pass this time." Shikamaru lay back to stare up at the clouds. "Ino really wants to make it to chuunin this time."

"Neji's a chuunin…" Hinata pondered aloud.

"Yeah but technically Tsunade wasn't meant to promote him like that." Asuma said.

"What do you mean?" Shikamaru asked.

"Giving a lower rank a promotion just like that isn't really allowed."

"But I did and by who?" Hinata asked, Feisu bumped her hand looking for her to resume scratching, she did. Asuma took a drag before answering.

"Well yes you because you where becoming a jounin, but there is an agreement between the Shinobi Villages about the chuunin selection exams. It helps maintain the balance of power because of the number of entries are equal in proportion to the power they came from. For example, in the last exam, we couldn't send too many teams because at that time we had the one of the highest numbers of chuunin out of the villages, where as the grass sent much more teams because they had relatively few chuunins. So basically at any one time, each power knows the number of chuunin that the others have. Jounin selection on the other hand is entirely internal within each village. That's how you got promoted Hinata, along with the other quick pros, but this meant there were less chuunin and when the next exams came Tsunade would have to let the others know how many chuunins Konoha has so they could set limits on the exams and if we show up with a large number of chuunin missing then the others will know we have a great deal more jounin." Asuma continued on after a glance at the teens confused expressions. "So to fill up the numbers up again Tsunade promoted a number of exceptional gennin on the quiet"

"So basically she's cooking the books… to make it look like we are weaker than we really are?" Shikamaru said.

"That's the general idea, yes. The missing chuunin could have been either promoted or killed so when the other villages review the numbers they can guess roughly our strength and Fire is still in the top five, but if someone does choose to attack," Hinata knew he was referring to the sound but only the jounin knew about that threat so he didn't say it out loud with Shikamaru here, "then they would underestimate us and give us a distinct advantage."

"huh, okay I didn't know that, but that's not what I meant." Hinata said, she was amazed that Asuma managed to keep his cigarette on his lips through that entire explanation, "I meant that with Neji being a chuunin it leaves Tenten and Lee out, they're still genin too." Asuma blinked at her a few times as he absorbed Hinata's suggestion and a sly smile spread across his face.

"That's true…" he thought it over, "I know Kurenai is fed up of that other one as well, I must mention this to her later on."

"LEMEGO!!" They looked back into the training grounds, the red head and cocky fucker (A/N he doesn't deserve a name) had rolled into the clearing, each had the others sash in their grips and were trying to steal the others while holding on to their own. The other four came out via a path, they seemed to have a neutral agreement to let the two violent ones fight each other. They stood to the side and watched, Ino and Chouji still had their own sashes as well as Aiko's and Shins, but Hinata's genin just stood there. Hinata, Shikamaru and Asuma came nearer.

"Why aren't you trying to get your sashes back?" Hinata asked as she got nearer.

"Because it's already over, they got all ours, but Megumi managed to get his before I lost mine, I was last to be caught, and then he starts shouting that Megumi cheated and it wasn't fair, then he tackled her. She grabbed our team sash that he had and both of them have been fighting over them for about," she checked her watch, "ten minutes now."

"We gave up trying to split them up…" Said Chouji with a sigh.

"My nose!"

"She's biting me!" Hinata hung her head as the genin forgot about the sashes and just tried to pummel each other, then both she and Asuma ploughed in to pull out their respective genin away from the other.

"Meg! Calm down." she gripped the genin's shoulders tightly as she tried to kick the boy, there was a small trickle of blood running from her nose. Asuma pulled his genin away with more force that silenced him right away and he nursed his forearm that sported a distinct bite mark. Megumi was still cursing and trying to reach for him. "Megumi…" She repeated with a dangerous tone, the red head stopped fighting and crossed her arms angrily.

"What was that about?" Hinata asked her with the same tone.

"He tackled me I was defending myself" she muttered.

"You liar! You provoked me" he shouted from Asuma's grip.

"You're in enough trouble as it is so I would recommend that you keep your mouth shut. I'm gonna mention your idea to Tsunade as well Hinata…" Asuma said as the cocky genin shrunk under his stern gaze.

"Yeah hopefully it will work out for you…" Hinata said, Shikamaru went over to Ino and Chouji to explain Hinata's suggestion about Tenten and Lee. Both seemed to like it.

"We didn't do well ,did we sensei?" Shin asked. Hinata looked over her team, both Shin and Aiko looked upset that they had lost whereas Megumi, who she was still holding by the shoulders, just fumed and glared over at the cocky fucker. Hinata quickly established team three's weak link.

After the exercise both teams spilt to return to their own training grounds. Hinata let the team have a breather, while they did she pulled out the file with the teams details and flicked to Megumi's section. She scanned past the stats to her history. Meg was an only child of two shinobi that had died in the Ninja wars when she was an infant, since then she lived with her grandmother who had died a few years ago, since then she'd lived in a dorm. On her own.

After the training session Hinata called Megumi back.

"What!? I already told you he started it" she said and shoved her hands in her pockets.

"That's not what I want to talk about."

"Then what? I got places to be." the girl said with a scowl. Hinata knew she was lying.

"Megumi, you have to calm down. You can't just take your anger out of others, especially your team mates." Hinata started.

"Who says I'm angry?" Meg shot defensively.

"The bite mark on the other guys arm." Megumi looked away from Hinata and kicked at the ground.

"Yeah, well I have a good reason for the way I am." she shot.

"What's that?"

"Like you care…" Megumi muttered quietly.

"Would I be asking if I didn't?" Megumi was quiet for a second.

"'spose not…"

"So you wanna tell me?" Hinata asked, Megumi bore a defiant look, she didn't. "Megumi…"

"Why should you care, no one else does!" Megumi shouted suddenly cutting off Hinata. "No one has bothered with me for two years so why should I care what anyone else thinks of me?"

"I get it, no one helped me so I'll help no one." Hinata looked down at the red head.

"Yeah, I was left alone to fend for myself for two years, and no one has even tried to help me." the girl ranted, Hinata couldn't help but be annoyed at her.

"Really, two years? Wow" Hinata gave a slow, fake clap. "You are so wrapped up in self pity you have completely ignored any help that has been offered. The dorm you live in, a monthly living allowance, they where provided by the village. If not you would have had to live in the streets. I know what it's like to grow up with out a parent, and I know someone who has been alone his entire life. He doesn't bitch and moan about what he never got handed to him, he worked hard, made friends, and now he's one of the strongest chuunin level shinobi in the village. You're right to expect nothing because with that attitude no one will help you because their offer would be scorned."

"Well who are you to judge me!?" Megumi shouted. "and no one ever has offered so how could I…"

"See that right there is what I'm talking about. You are getting help but you're not accepting it. Aiko and Shin tried to but you did nothing but sling insults and threaten them, so they stopped. Kuro-san tried but all you did was trick him and play joke on him so he not only gave up on you but the other two as well, because of you. Megumi you told me that Kuro didn't let you do anything because he thought the team was inexperienced and weak. Well I tend to agree with him, the team is lagging far behind the rest of your age group, and guess what Meg," she continued on before Megumi could argue, "it's not Aiko and Shin that are the problem. So you know, what you need to grow up and start pulling your weight in the team because if you keep this up, you're going to end up forcing me to give up on you as well, because if your just going to scorn any help I'm giving you then there will be no chance of you turning in to a decent shinobi. But when I go, I'll take Aiko and Shin as well, they don't deserve to be pulled down because you insist on wallowing in self pity." Hinata got up from the rock and started to walk away but paused beside Megumi. "I leave the choice to you, either grow up and accept help from me and your team mates, or keep going they way your going and lose the people who do care."

Hinata continued on with out a second glance at the girl, who was staring at the ground. Megumi's attitude annoyed Hinata, she did nothing but whine and blame others for anything that went wrong. She was fully prepared to help the girl when she called her back but after that display she came to realise it wasn't help she needed it was a reality check, or a smack across the face, but the reality check was enough for now. At the top of the hill Hinata glanced over her shoulder Megumi was walking in the opposite direction towards the dorms. Hinata sighed to herself, she knew she wouldn't carry out the threat of giving up on her and leaving but she hoped she'd got her point across at least. It was up to her now so Hinata decided to leave it until tomorrow and continued on her way to the flat to pick up the bag of clothes she'd left there that morning.

"I thought you had a mission today?" Takara said from the sofa as Hinata came into the flat.

"So did I, where's Gai?" Hinata threw her bag in the bed room door then sat on the sofa with Takara.

"Lunch run, there's nothing edible in here." she offered a smile, her leg was propped up on the coffee table again and a drink and book had been put within reach.

"I don't doubt that," Hinata dumped the file on the coffee table and curled up on the sofa, and rested her head on the arm.

"What's wrong with you?" Takara asked. Hinata answered without looking up or opening her eyes.

"Remember the genin I was looking after a while ago? Yeah well now they've got me to take over it completely."

"Nice" Takara added and tried to reach the file on the table but couldn't without hurting herself so she gave up. Hinata just moaned and pulled a cushion from behind her to cover her face and block out the light. "Not nice?" Takara questioned.

"Not really…" came the muffled reply.

"So question…." Takara continued.

"Yeah?"

"Where did you sleep last night?"

"Why were you concerned for me?" Hinata teased from under the cushion,

"Maybe…" Takara replied.

"Only maybe?" Hinata chuckled, "I stayed over at the flat, with Naruto away the beds spare." the comment got a disapproving sounding 'hmmm' from Takara but no comment. If Naruto wasn't there, there was no foul, this time.

"Hey nee-chan, can I ask you something?" Hinata lifted up the cushion to look over at Takara who was reading the novel.

"Yeah, what's up?" Takara placed her finger in the book to keep her place then closed it on her lap.

"Have you ever closed yourself off with me like Gai says you did to him?" Takara's smile cracked a bit, but Hinata waited to see if she would answer.

"To be honest, yes… at first…" she answered.

"What do you mean at first?" Hinata let the cushion fall to the floor as she sat up to talk to Takara.

"Well after I got you outta the village and you asked to be my apprentice, that's what I saw you as, an apprentice. But, I dunno, after a while I just stopped…" Takara was finding it hard to word it.

"Stopped what?" Hinata pressed.

"Protecting myself, I mean there you where trusting me with everything, your training, your future… everything. So after a while I… well I don't even know when, I just stopped." Takara offered a half shrug, due to the sling. "I dunno, maybe it's the pain killers talking but… you matter a lot more to me than that…" Takara scratched the back of her neck with the book, she was obviously finding this uncomfortable. Hinata smiled widely.

"I thought so…" she said sounding chuffed.

"Oh really? Did you?" Takara said the light tone returning to her voice and an eyebrow raised.

"Well yeah, I mean who couldn't love this face?" Takara laughed at the joke, Hinata had picked up more than fighting techniques from Takara but seem to absorb some for her sense of humour too.

"Alright okay point taken, but don't spread it about okay?" Takara said.

"What that the great sannin Takara has feelings like the rest of us lowly mortals?" Hinata teased.

"Oh you think because of these bandages I can't get you?" Hinata stuck out her tongue. Takara reached over with her good arm and pulled Hinata closer then pinned her against the sofa with her good leg then rubbed her knuckles roughly over Hinata's head.

"Ow, Hey! Pack it in!?" Hinata shouted between laughs.

"Do you give?" stopped long enough to poke her in the nose.

"Never!" Hinata trapped the cushion on the floor between her feet and flicked it up with a well aimed kick launched it to hit Takara in the head.

"Oi!" she protested, using the distraction Hinata slipped out from under Takara's leg and jumped behind the sofa and stood over Takara with an evil grin. "Aw come on! That's not fair!" Hinata ducked her attempts to grab her and poked her side that was unprotected due to the sling. "Hey" Takara grabbed the cushion and cuffed Hinata on the head. Hinata ducked another onslaught by the cushion and rolled over to the arm chair, and snatching up the cushion from there, threw it Frisbee style getting Takara again in the face.

"Oh that's it, its war" Takara threw one cushion at Hinata and kept one to use as a shield since she was immobile.

Not long after Gai walked in on the cushion war with a carrier bag filled with the ingredients for a slap up fry.

"Ha reinforcements!" Takara said deflecting another cushion that sailed over the sofa and landed near Gai, He grinned, and dumped the food on the table snatched up the cushion and chucked it at Hinata.

"Hey no fair, two against one!" Hinata called as she was hit by two from Gai and one from Takara. "Alright, I surrender!" she shouted after another one from Takara got her in the stomach, and the childish game ended. Hinata retrieved the cushions and returned them to their proper places before flumphing down on the sofa again. Gai chuckled to himself and returned to the abandoned bag on the table.

"So… back to the problem at hand, your genin?" Takara tried to start a conversation.

"What about 'em?" Hinata asked, she lent over to pick up the file, which had been knocked over during the pillow fight.

"Well you did say that something was wrong with them."

"No I didn't, I said 'meyh'"

"Same thing…" Takara said and accepted the file from Hinata to looked over the teams stats. "It looks like a pretty balanced team.."

"Looks can be deceiving… their team work is crap, and the red head won't pull her weight and threatens the other two… I had a word 'if it could be called that' with her after training there, but I dunno if it sank in"

"Guess you'll just have to wait then. How did you get the other two to shape up?"

"Bribery mostly… but I helped Aiko control her chakra and Shin with his sword skills, and they must like me because it seems they requested I take over their team completely…… I'm screwed." Hinata tucked her legs under herself and lay her head on the sofa arm again.

"How so?" Takara asked.

"You want something made Hinata?" Gai called from the kitchen as he warmed up the frying pan.

"No thanks, I'm good," she called back, "I dunno what I can really do with them, I was running out of ideas last time and I only have then for two months, less even…"

"Don't worry about it, if Tsunade didn't think you were up to it she would have denied the request."

"Or she wants a good laugh out of it…" Hinata moaned.

"Well you've got them now, so make the most of it. At least you get outta A missions with the nickname team." Takara flicked her novel back open to find her place.

"True…" Hinata stayed curled on the sofa for a while with her eyes closed and listened to the sizzle of Gai cooking and the occasional page turn from Takara. Finally she rolled off the sofa and went into the bedroom. She lifted the pack from the ground and dumped the contents on her bed. Repacking her Pjs, she threw the dirty uniform into the washing basket which was nearly full.

"I'll have to do a wash soon…" she muttered to herself before turning to the wardrobe. Since they were staying in the village now they had finally emptied their massive travel packs and stored their clothes in the drawers and wardrobes. She dug out a few sets of clean clothes, a clean uniform, and another flak jacket. She had left the damaged one in the flat since the giant burn made people stare as she walked up the street. Hinata packed up the clothes and put on the jacket. Just as she was about to leave she spotted something on the shoulder of the jacket in the mirror. Dropping the bag, she pulled the jacket off the get a closer look. On closer inspection she noticed that this wasn't her flank jacket, it was a darker green and a bit small and on the shoulder there was an embroidery. A deep crimson circle, within which was a snake coiled around a sword with a herb clasped in its mouth. The Royki clan symbol, this was Takara's old chuunin vest. Hinata remembered that this was the dorm she had moved into after the conflict in her clan about her so it was only logical that some of her old stuff would still be here. She returned the jacket to the wardrobe, as she did it slipped from the hanger and knocked over a box.

"Shit…" She picked up the jacket and hung it up again, something that had fallen out of the box caught her eye. A photo frame. Hinata checked out into the other room, Takara was still reading and Gai was serving up the food, curiosity got the better of her and she dug in to the treasure trove of Takara's past. The frame on the floor was a picture of a very young scarless Takara with a wide grin and waist length hair, she had her arms thrown around the necks of a young Gai in a martial arts gi, and a young Asuma with a lollypop stick protruding from his mouth, Gai had his arm around Takara's neck as well and Asuma had his held up in a victory sign, behind them was their sensei, a woman Hinata didn't know. The next picture looked like it wasn't taken long after, it was the team again, minus the sensei. Gai was in the spandex, and Takara had an eye patch over her right eye with stitches running up into her hair line, Asuma was crouched in front of them, not looking any different from the last picture, he was looking warily up at Takara whose hand was on his shoulder and looked to be gripping it harder than needed. Hinata smirked at the photos of the young jounin and set the frames back in the box, Hinata next dug out a small chest with the label 'random pics' in the small box there was a pile of unsorted photos and it looked like this box hadn't been touched in years.

The picture at the top of the pile in the box seemed later on again as each one of the team was holding a flank jacket in front of them with large grins, it seemed they had just passed the chuunin exams, standing behind Asuma was his father, the Third, with his usual broad grin and pipe. Gai was flashing a cheesy thumbs up and next to Takara was her brother with a hand on her shoulder and at the other shoulder was Orochimaru with a wicked looking smirk. It seemed strange to Hinata to see the S-class missing nin in a Konoha uniform and flank jacket and as he had his hand on Takara's shoulder so to did the Third have his hand on Orochimaru's, his old student. Looking again at the picture Hinata saw something slightly disturbing, the young Takara was wearing earrings similar to Orochimaru's as well as small purple lines under her eyes matching those on her uncle and trainer at the time. Hinata put that photo back where it came from the smirk on Orochimaru's face was making her skin crawl.

The next picture showed a dramatic change in Takara. She was standing half turned towards the camera, dressed in a shinobi uniform with the flack jacket Hinata had just hung up. There was a scowl on her face, her hair was chopped short, the earrings and purple lines where gone, her face seemed longer and paler, and her grey eyes looked dead, she looked years older than the last picture, despite the time code in the corner only saying it was a few weeks after the last. Her hands where in her pockets, the exposed wrists showed faint scars as did her neck, from restraints although Hinata was unaware of the experiments carried out on Takara. Beside her was Asuma with a cigarette in his mouth this time and the beginnings of a beard, he offered a half hearted smile, his eyes flicked in Takara's direction with a look of concern. A photo taken directly after that one showed Takara walking away and Asuma shrugging to the one holding the camera, Hinata assumed it had been Gai. The two must have been trying to cheer her up a bit and failed. It seemed that these was taken not long after the truth about Orochimaru was relieved.

Hinata shoved these depressing pictures back in to the box. The next was taken long before that, it was a family shot. A large man with the characteristic dark hair, serpentine features and grey eyes of the Roykis stood at the back his hands resting on the shoulders of a seated fair haired woman, sitting in front of her was a young boy with a wide toothy grin, on the left was a older boy with his mothers gentle features but his fathers large build, around his neck was a small snake, Hinata recognised as Sam the snake in Hebi's house. On the right was Takara, without the scar meaning it was before she became a gennin, she had her fathers pointed features. All three of the children had jet black hair and grey eyes. This was Takara's family? Hinata knew about only her brothers, Hebi, the eldest was currently the clan leader and lived in the Royki village, Hinata had met him before. Gata, the youngest had died in the Kyuubi attack, that was all she knew of him. Takara's mother and father where unknown to Hinata, Takara had never told her anything about her family, other than Gata's fate but that only because Hinata questioned Takara's recurring nightmares.

Hinata leant back to peek into the other room, the meal had been finished and the dishes washed and both adults were on the sofa reading the novels again, Gai had his arm draped around Takara's shoulders. Hinata silently slid the door closed and returned to the wardrobe, she was determined to find out what happened to Takara's family. She lifted the boxes out of the wardrobe to get better access to each. One box contained a pile of old clothes, another a small mountain of scroll texts and the usual documentation of a shinobis rank. Hinata was about to pass over this one until she saw a yellow file near the bottom of the pile. It was the type of file used in the hokage offices. Hinata pulled it out and read the first page, it was an investigation report into Orochimaru's suspicious activities, along with it there was a few lose sheets of paper shoved into the file. The file was too large to read here without being caught so she stashed it into her bag to read later. Under the report was another yellow clad file it was thinner than the other and the tab read 'Royki Hizu', Hinata flicked it open and found a photo of the same fair haired woman from the family photo, Takara's mother. Scanning the text it became clear that she was a shinobi, a medical one too with a knowledge of poisons and was once apprenticed to Tsunade until she got married to Takara's father, since then she took on less risky missions and taught medical jutsus to younger shinobi. Hinata skimmed past this to the 'current status' box in which was written, 'deceased- KIA' (A/N KIAKilled In Action) Hinata winced, she hadn't expected that. Reading on she found the circumstances of her death.

'Participated in the medical recovery and treatment of Shinobi injured during the attack of the Nine-tailed Fox, during which sustaining a demon-fire wound resulting in blood poisoning. Despite near fatal injuries continued to aid the wounded until the end.'

Hinata replaced the file in the box, that explained why Takara didn't want to talk about her mother, it was too painful. She dug further into the box trying to find her fathers file but found none. She replaced the boxes she'd searched though in the wardrobe the last box contained trinkets and keep sakes, including a genin head band. As she put this last one back into the forgotten corner of the wardrobe she heard Takara calling her.

"Er Yeah?" Hinata paused suddenly feeling guilty.

"Are you staying here tonight?"

"No, I'm just getting some clothes together then I'm going…" she called back hurriedly shoving the clothes into the pack along with the thick file and a box of photos.

"Okay then, just wondering." Takara made a quieter comment to Gai and he let out a loud bark of a laugh. Hinata zipped up the pack and returned to the main room, Gai was still chuckling to himself.

"I'm away then" Hinata said swinging the pack on her back.

"Okay see ya" Takara waved with her good arm. Gai raised his in farewell as well.

"So any improvement in the arm?" Gai asked a little while after Hinata left.

"A little I can move it now…" she demonstrated by lifting it from the sling, "can't for long though." she let it rest on her leg. Gai took the sling off from around her neck and chucked it out of the way.

"And the leg?"

"Still sore…" she replied and rubbed her thigh to get the blood circulating again since her leg had been still for so long. "I'm guessing that you're gonna insist on staying over again tonight?"

"Yup" Gai answered quickly.

"Okay then." Takara said and twisted around to lean against Gai and wriggled into the warm spot under his arm. Once comfortable both returned to their issues of the Makeout Tactics series.

End chapter 10

Why are you pouting?

Cuz I what a plushie of my fav charactors but I've only got Gaara-kun… I want a Hinata plushie too but I can find one……yes I'm weird! I know…

Calm urself! Anyway read and review please and thank you!

Oh and I need help on something, it's Hinata's Bday soon and Naruto has to get her something nice but my poor brain is tapped and I can't think so… you u leave a suggestion in ur reviews? Best gets in the story