First, let me say that I'm super sorry about leaving you all hanging like that. Trust me when I say that I had no intention of doing so but school and work ended up being too much on me to do any sort of recreational writing, what so ever. For the last few months, if I wasn't at work I was in class or doing homework. I had no down time. I'm going to try to go back to the every Monday scheduled, or if I can't work that it will be the every other Monday. But either way I've got a plan and I shouldn't be leaving you guys hanging for three or four months like that again.

Anyways, thank you for your patience, and without further to do, here's the new chapter.

Hope you enjoy,

Trouble 1
~~~~~~~~

Neji looked angry as I focused on my other Echo Points, opening them up in order to level the playing field. I was still adjusting to my new vision when he charged at me, attacking in a flurry of movement. It was all I could to do to dodge them all let alone keep track of him. The later I was apparently doing a worse job at than I thought I was since he somehow ended up behind me, poised to strike my spine.

I dove to the side dodging the strike by mere millimeters. I rolled once across the ground before stopping in a defensive kneeling position. I kept focused on Neji as paused in his attack in order to just stare at me.

"You should not have seen that coming," he stated, sounding confused. "You were facing the other way. How did you evade it?"

"Byakugan isn't the only way to see everything." I smirked as I continued talking. "At least, not any more.

"Impossible!" Neji hissed as he charged one again. I climbed to my feet and dodged again, just in time.

"Not exactly, if you know how to do it. Guess the Byakugan isn't as special as you lead on."

In his fury, he attacked again, finally giving me a small opening. With a smirk I side stepped him before kicking him hard enough to send him flying across the arena, straight into a circle of clones.

Half of the clones attacked directly while the others pulled out kunais, aiming them at my opponent. I was a brilliant plan, after all, no matter how much you can see, it doesn't help very much if there's too much going on for you to dodge.

"KATIN!" Neji shouted, surprising me when a spinning wall of chakra deflected my weapons and hid him from view.

Before I could react the wall disappeared and he leaped forward, attacking me once again. Only this time his hits were too rapid for me to count, let alone avoid. But apparently he was able to keep track because he was constantly shouting the numbers during his pauses. I think he called its name too but I missed it. I ended up flying across the arena and slamming into the back wall with a crack.

"Do you finally see your place?" My jutsu was acting up as he walked towards me, his steps seeming to stutter like a movie that was missing several frames. "Neither you nor your pathetic jutsu can hold a candle to me. You are inferior!"

As soon as my vision stabilized, I began to slowly climb to my feet. Most of my chakra systems were unusable. In fact I couldn't use any of it except in small amounts, which was all I need to keep my 'eyes' working.

"What…the hell is…your problem?" I demanded, making him stop as I swayed in place.

"How are you still standing?" I started getting perturbed that he was ignoring my question, that and I was getting underestimated again.

"I'm tough. But seriously. Is that stick up…your ass too tight, or what?"

"Give up, you will lose. Fate has dictated it."

"Yes, yes, you keep saying that." I brushed off his statement, trying to gain time so the Kyubi could work on getting me some semblance of chakra control back before continuing the fight. I figured if I got him started on a monologue, that would do just fine. "But why? The rest of your clan…isn't so obsessed with 'fate'. Why you?"

"My fate was sealed by my supposed clan!" He yanked his headband off his head dramatically, obviously trying to show me something. I heard some mumbling from behind me, something about a strange seal on his forehead, which was all I needed to hear.

"Clever pun."

"Don't you dare belittle me!"

"Don't worry, I just want to know when you were actually going to answer my question."

"This seal IS my fate! It is the fate of every branch member in the Huuga clan." I hid a smirk as he began what was bound to be one of those really long monologues Jiraya said they were famous for. "This seal is placed on every branch member under the guise that it protects our dojutsu from being stolen when it's actually used to control us! It's used to keep the branch family in line!

"Just because my father was the second twin, he was placed in the branch family making it so I was born into it. It is because of this that my father was forced to die in his brother's place! It is—"

"You shouldn't blame fate, or even a single seal for everything wrong in your life," I interrupted, his self-centered monologue already getting to me. "If I believed what you did, I wouldn't be who I am today."

"You know nothing of my pain!" Neji yelled.

I narrowed my eyes at him, deciding enough was enough. I was going to end this fight now, whether my chakra control was back or not. I shot forward angrily, throwing punches and kicks until one caught Neji, knocking him to the ground.

"I don't need to. Your pain is nothing compared to some people out there. You might not have your father but you still have a family. A family you hate but a family none the less. Hinata cares about you like you're her brother and what do you do? You almost kill her over something she didn't even do!"

"She's too weak." He spitting a bit of blood before climbing to his feet. "Because of her I lost my father. It was her fault!"

"That was years ago Neji! My sensei told me about it. What was she, three? She was a toddler, how could she be expected to fight back?!"

It was obviously that he wasn't listening when he charged at me once again, only this time I was ready for that sixty-four hit thing he was going to do.

As soon as the first undodgeable strike was about to hit I substitute myself out with a spare clone. Lucky for me he had no way of stopping the attack once he started it, so even though he knew the real me was gone, he couldn't do a damn thing about it. But I was nice and waited for him to finish his attack before starting mine.

Alright, it wasn't to be nice persay, I was more rubbing the fact that he wouldn't be able to have done anything if I had and judging by the frown on his face he knew it. As soon as he threw his last hit, I leaped forward and punched him right in the face, knocking him into the wall three yards behind him, and then tumbling to the ground.

When he tried to get up again, I was already there to knock him back down. After that he didn't try to get up again, the only way I knew he was still conscious was from his pained breathing.

I dropped to my knee next to him, I leaning close to whispered in his ear, not wanting the whole audience to hear me.

"And just so you know you're not the only one who's life changed from a seal," I said quietly, lifting my shirt to show my own. "This was placed on me the day I was born. I'll leave what it's for to your imagination. I'll only say that my life could have been a lot better without it, but I could have taken it a lot worse. I could have turned out like you."

After I finished that, his breathing slowed, most likely because he was finally knocked out. The proctor came over and checked his pulse just to make sure. He nodded, straitening to his feet.

"Winner! Uzumaki Naruto!" Genma exclaimed.

There was a stunned silence before Fu shouted "HELL YEAH!" which started a whole ton of cheering from the audience. More than I thought I would ever get in Konoha. I climbed to my feet, stumbling a bit as I smiled.

"You good?" Kakashi asked, appearing next to me as medics came to take Neji away.

"Yep, I'm great." I dusted myself off as I headed out of the arena. "Well, other than a couple of fractured ribs and a messed up chakra system. But the fox is working on that as we speak."

"Will he be done by the next match?"

"Depends on how lazy he feels," I answered. Kakashi turned to look at me, probably with some sort of worried expression on his face. "Stop being such a worrier. I can handle myself now. After all, with my healing abilities, I should be the last one you should be concerned about. I'll be as good as new in time for my next match while everyone else will be suffering from exhaustion. And I could seriously win this whole competition because of it."

"That is quite possible, as long as you're not put up against the Taki girl," Kakashi said, making me freeze in the process. "Speaking of which, did she do that to all of them?"

Kakashi motioned towards my jacket.

"Every single one," I answered as I pulled at the jacket glumly.

"That was AWESOME!" I heard a girl shout as felt a pair of arms flung themselves across my shoulders. It was all I could do keep from falling to the ground. "You totally showed that stuck up ass what's what!"

"Thanks for the complement," I said flatly. "Happy you enjoyed my fight to the death."

"Oh don't be so dramatic." I felt her let go, allowing me to straighten myself up once again.

"Was that necessary?"

"Nope, but it was fun." She latched onto my arm as the Kyubi and I silently cried in self-pity.

"Well, I'll just let you two love birds head up yourselves. I'm supposed to be in a different box."

"Wait! You're leaving me alone with her!"

"You two were alone all day yesterday," Kakashi pointed out.

I gawked at him, trying to come up with a response, but before I could, he shinshued away with only a quick "Ja ne."

"Asshat."

"Well, come on foxy, the next match is about to start and I want to see it!"

! ! ! !THAT SAME TIME! ! ! !

Orochimaru sat in the kage box, looking quite confused, or he would have if he wasn't wearing the Kazekage's robes and veil. The source of his confusion was one, blond kitsune child. Kabuto had told him that he, in no uncertain terms, had disabled the boy and there was no way he could continue to mess with his plans. But after seeing him destroy the Huuga, he was seriously starting to doubt this.

Orochimaru made a hand motion a second before one of the Suna ANBU dropped down next to him. He leaned closer so that his old sensei wouldn't hear him.

"I thought you said you took care of the boy," he whispered tensely as he watched the boy in question chat with his comrades.

"I did sir," Kabuto replied, equally startled.

"Then why does he fight as if he can still see?"

"I heard that he has been training with your old teammate, Jiraya. It's possible they found a jutsu to counteract the lack of sight."

"I have never heard of such a thing."

"They could have created it."

"A new jutsu?" The disguised sannin's curiosity peaked. "How intriguing. I must see how he does it."

He watched with interest as the boy kept a mint-haired girl from lunging at one of the Kazekage's boys for dropping out before the fight began.

"Find out what you can about it."

"That's a pity," the Third Hokage stated, breaking the other man from his thoughts. "I was looking forward to seeing your eldest son fight."

"You're not missing much," Orochimaru replied as Kabuto stepped back into the shadows.

"That's awfully harsh of you. He is your son." When there was no reply, the Third cleared his throat and continued. "Anyways, I think the next match is going to start."

Just as he finished speaking two girls, one being the mint-haired girl and the other a Yamanaka, pushed one of the next combatants off the balcony and into the arena.

"Yes, it seems to be," he stated, sending one last look at his new interest before turning his eyes reluctantly on to the next, sure to be, drawn out match.