Hey everyone, reading over this story, I got to say it was really badly written, or at least the beginning was. I'm really sorry about that, I really appreciate everyone who stuck with this story, all I can ask is if you can stick around for a couple more chapters!

Thanks greenteamoose, you completely make any day un-sucky for me. Like even if I had romantic issues and was sobbing my eyes out (Let's hope that doesn't happen for a good long time because it hasn't happened recently) I'd start hopping up and down after reading your review! You could totally guess everything that happens from here on out but then you might get it right and I'd have to make more plot twists (NOOOO!!). But go for it if you want. ;)

Me: Good grief. I need someone to disclaim. Zabuza? Nahh… Wait! I know! Get on over here, you Hyuuga heiress, you!

Hinata: H-hai, TheC-ContheDistance-chan. What d-did you ask me here for?

Me: Aww Hinata, you rock! …More than Neji at least.

Hinata: Y-you shouldn't be mean to N-Neji-nii. H-he's very strong.

Me: But he's a prick! I hate him more than Sasori! But nevermind that, can you disclaim for me, please?

Hinata: H-hai. TheContheDistance d-doesn't own N-Naruto-kun.

Me: Or the show.

"Ano… is something on your mind, Emiko-chan?"

"I can't stay in Konoha anymore. I need to train, and I'm not getting stronger here. I want to be an ANBU and its best that I leave so I can get more control."

Sakura's face fell and she looked down; she didn't want to believe it. It didn't matter that this was perhaps the longest sentence she had ever heard Emiko speak. Even if it was softly spoken it still hurt. It didn't matter. It mattered that her friend wanted to leave. It hadn't been so long ago that Naruto left. And before that the boy she declared her love for left as well. They all left for training, and now Emiko would go too? It… it wasn't fair.

"Don't go… Please! Emiko, I know we had our fights, and we haven't known each other for long, demo… but you are my best friend! I don't want to be left here, I don't want to be left behind. Don't leave… Emiko-chan," Sakura whispered.

Ino hummed curiously to herself, why is Forehead girl talking to Emiko? She strolled closer, still pretending to peruse the assortment of kimonos. She peeked between the hangers to see a distraught Sakura. Memories of her now-rival flashed into her mind, and she frowned. Ino sometimes wished that things were different, that Sakura didn't cut her off because of Sasuke. It hurt. More than she really could say, but because Ino was proud, stubbornly so, she refused to admit the extent of the damage it did to her. And now she fought back with all her strength as a rival.

Emiko's expression softened slightly, and when she spoke it was lower, "Sakura… I… It's uncertain if I'll leave yet. But, you will know when if I do."

Sakura's frown deepened. There was hardly any reassurance in her statement, and she wanted to press it further but she highly doubted she'd get very far if she did.

"Oh forehead!" Ino practically crooned, "I can't imagine how long it will take for you to find a kimono that will give you some curves, not to mention, your humongous forehead."

Ino was worried (not that she would ever admit it), Sakura looked close to tears, it didn't matter that she didn't know why her rival was upset, but it did matter that she was. Ino had indirectly helped Sakura by insulting her, if she was distracted by Ino's mean taunts, then she stop being distressed by whatever it was that was causing the problem.

"Ino-pig!" Sakura sputtered, suddenly glaring evilly at the blonde. She replied by glaring defiantly back. A small bolt of electricity erupted between them and Emiko sweat dropped. If she didn't do something fast they might have another never ending argument. The muscle underneath her eye twitched, she needed to intervene. Fast.

"Neither of you have chosen a kimono yet," Emiko interrupted, casting a weary look at the cashier. The older woman was still giving the three kunoichi the evil eye.

They resumed their search for the 'perfect' festival yukata. The orange-haired girl was leafing through the robes thoughtlessly, really just listening for a sound of approval from ones of the other girls signifying that they saw something that would be 'totally cute'. It was only until she could hear a squeal of joy from Sakura that she turned around.

"It's perfect!" she flourished the red yukata in front of her friend and rival. The cloth was made of cotton, the bright red matching her customary dress. The pattern on the fabric was of large white flowers spread throughout the entire kimono.

"You're right forehead, it does suit you! The problem is, it still won't give you any hips."

Emiko groaned inwardly. She still couldn't head off the imminent row between the two rivals. So much for trying.

...

"So Isamu, how are you doing with Emiko?" Asuma chortled, providing him a knowing look. Much like his student inside the store, Isamu groaned and scratched the back of his head.

"I've actually been meaning to talk to you about it, Kakashi-san."

"Hm?" the ex-ANBU raised his visible eyebrow. Asuma paused a moment to light a cigarette, blowing the smoke out thoughtfully. Isamu chuckled awkwardly, still scratching the back of his head. It was fairly intimidating to his skill level to be conversing so casually with an ex-ANBU captain and one of the members of the Twelve Elite Guardians. He was just a new ANBU recruit after all. It had taken him a long time to convince Sandaime Hokage of his resolve and the leap from Chuunin to ANBU was practically impossible to achieve. Still he managed to do so, and still he wasn't a captain.

"I've been training her on chakra control still, mainly out of selfish reasons I guess. I haven't let her practice her kekkai-genkai or teach her any Ninjutsu. I… I guess I'm scared. I've seen that student of yours, Kakashi-san, Naruto-kun. And I've never seen such a raw hatred in anyone's eyes other than his, but Emiko comes close sometimes. She seems fairly powerful as it is, and… I don't think it's a good idea to teach her more techniques. Maybe some defensive jutsu but nothing else to improve her fighting. Tsunade-sama briefed me on all the details of how the Council feels about her, and it's clear that they don't want her to stay in Konoha. If she proves to be more of a problem they might go as far as to permanently exiling her."

They continued to walk down the street, mulling over the conversation.

"What do you think, Kakashi?" Asuma offered. Kakashi didn't reply as he brought out his orange book and held it in front of his face. It was his thinking tactic, and was frequently using it around his team and people who looked up to him. He's asking for my advice. But I didn't want to involve myself further. Well, this is a problem.

"I think you are… right. To an extent. Emiko's not going to take kindly to the fact you want to spend the more time on chakra control. She's impatient and she wants to become stronger."

Isamu frowned, He didn't really help me at all though. Asuma chuckled lightly, releasing the cigarette and stepping on it. Good old Kakashi, he never gives a proper answer.

"We should turn back now, ne?" the grey-haired Jounin asked coolly. Asuma placed another cigarette in his mouth, chuckling casually.

"Do you really think they'll be ready now?"

Isamu laughed to himself, Emiko's probably suppressing the urge to throttle them both by now. I knew it was going to be an interesting day when Ino and Emiko met.

"We should probably go back." Interesting day, indeed.

...

"So you're all done, right?!" the store keeper practically begged. Ino and Sakura sweat dropped, she was crazy alright. Emiko managed to restrain the threatening twitch under her eye.

"Aa," she handed the yukata over to the store keeper and quickly counted out the money she owned her. I'm almost broke, I might have to ask Tsunade-sama to lend me money. But then the Council would probably think of me as more of a burden. Kuso.

"Here's the obi that goes with it, and thank you very much!" the store owner, Orimono laid a red cotton obi on the counter, obviously taking great care in smoothing out wrinkles.

"Arigato."

She nodded and pulled out an orange obi with a green thread around the middle. Sakura smiled clearly pleased with what she got, despite Ino's taunts, and paid for her kimono. The blonde stepped up and laid her kimono on the counter. She had taken by far the longest time to pick her yukata, but there was a reason for it. Ino looked good in everything she picked, she had a great sense of color and style and she had a hard time choosing which robe to buy. She settled for an orange kimono with one line of kanji from the bottom to her knee, and there were small white flower petals stitched onto the fabric. The obi was a dark purple, almost navy with a simple bow in the back.

"Arigato, Orimono-san!" Ino and Sakura chimed.

"No, no, thank you! …I need some sake," she mumbled under her breath as she shooed them out the door. The sign on the door that said 'KAITSUU' was curtly flipped over to the other side that said 'KURO-ZUDO'. For the third time that day, the girls swear dropped. That shopkeeper was definitely crazy.

………………………………..

The little orange-haired girl stared at the gate to the desert. There was such a huge world beyond those gates, it was scary and provoked her curiosity all at the same time. She wondered if her home was beyond that barrier, if there was a family waiting for her out there. She didn't know. She had been having weird dreams lately. She would stand on a hill, watching a fire and she would cry. It felt so realistic to the nine year-old. Her shoulders shook slightly as she tried to stop the flood of tears threatening to spill out.

"Emiko-chan!"

Her eyes brightened at the sound of Temari's voice, she quickly wiped away any remainder of her unhappiness.

"Temari-chan! I didn't see you!"

"Sorry Emiko-chan," the blonde giggled, "I had to beat up Kankuro after he tried to scare me. Oi, let's go up to the hill to watch the sunset!"

The other girl grinned, following her best friend eagerly. They climbed to the top, sitting in the sand. They could see a little over the entrance to Suna, just enough to be able to enjoy watching the sun sink behind the wall.

Temari sighed happily, legs crossed and leaned back. It was a few rare moments a day when she got to be carefree and enjoy herself. Most of the time she was worrying about Gaara and she had to constantly gauge his mood in case he lost control.

"Can you believe that next year I'm going to graduate the Academy? I'm going to buy this fan in the weaponry store as a celebration."

"You might not pass the graduation exam though," Emiko reminded her. Temari stuck her tongue out childishly.

"Hey! You could at least be a bit more encouraging," she scowled, turning back to the sunset, "I still wish you could be in the Academy with me, or at least with Kankuro. For all you know, you could have been the number one student at your old Academy."

"It doesn't matter even if I was, I still don't remember anything. Even if you did teach me all the basics."

They both sighed.

"I bet you would ace the exam. I taught you well!" Temari grinned cheekily. She remembered how all the time she would spend training and practicing jutsu, Emiko would come along. She eventually started teaching the copper-haired girl everything she learned at the Academy.

Emiko didn't look convinced. She looked down, sobering almost immediately, I don't even know where I'm from.

"You think you'll ever look for your family?"

She turned toward her blonde friend, and nodded. Emiko hugged her knees to her chest, and settled her chin on her arms. Her lip trembled.

"That means you have to leave though." Temari bit her lip and stood up abruptly.

"Hey! Promise me… Promise me even if you do leave, you come back, okay?"

Emiko stood up wearily, looking at Temari's outstretched arm. She was holding out her middle and pointer finger, obviously waiting for the unspoken gesture she was supposed to respond with.

"Okay?" Temari repeated, her eyes showing anxiety. She straightened her arm, and squared her shoulders. Emiko looked right at her and slowly lifted up her hand to hook her two fingers with Temari's.

"I promise."

Emiko stepped out into the bright light, shielding her eyes from the sun. Too bright, way too bright. The mid-afternoon sun seemed determined to force everyone indoors, irony being that the villagers were hastily making last minute preparations for the festival. She was somewhat surprised that she hadn't noticed the new lights stringing across the streets and the cleaner streets and shops before now.

"Oi! Out of the way!"

A cart jostled past her, pushed by a visibly cross man. He was shouting at everyone to clear the way for him as he headed to the main street.

"Teme." She growled under her breath, she had half the mind to break the wheels on his cart.

"I love seeing your bright and happy face so early in the afternoon."

Emiko inwardly groaned and her eye twitched. He really had to show up every minute of her life. She turned around unenthusiastically knowing full well who it was she would see. Of course, her stalker.

"What, no 'good afternoon Isamu, I'm happy to see you'? You're acting so cold, I consider myself offended."

She gave an unladylike snort. As if he would really be 'offended' because I didn't wish him a good day.

"Why are you here?" She asked irritably. It was like this every time they saw each other. She would act hassled and annoyed, Isamu on the other hand would act sarcastic and enjoyed making her even more exasperated. It was not a good combination.

"I'm not allowed to see my favorite student? I figured since the festival is a good four hours away we could work on some good old chakra control."

"No. Thank you," Emiko hissed, giving each word its fair share of venom.

"Well what are you going to do for four hours?"

"The library," she replied, shrugging. Isamu chuckled, she quickly regained her glare. He swung a kunai on his finger, still laughing at her comment. Emiko scowled.

"That's really lame, you can't find anything else to do with your precious time? Let's do some nice and easy chakra control."

Easy and nice for you. Not easy for me. Like hell, I'm going to do more chakra control. Emiko scowled, disgruntled by the fact that things would never change. Isamu is always going to be an annoying prick.

"I'm getting lunch." She forgot to mention that she wanted to go alone. Isamu gave her a cheeky grin.

"I'm in the mood for some dumplings too."

The muscle under her eye twitched as he sped up to walk beside her. Emiko felt like screaming and throwing kunai at Isamu, he was just plain infuriating. Doesn't he have something better to do, like leave me alone?

"Itadakimasu!"

The kunoichi gladly popped the dumpling in her mouth, hoping that her sensei wouldn't speak if he was eating. She was probably going to spend the entire day with him now that he was having lunch with her. Emiko highly doubted she'd want to spend time with Sakura, who was probably going to be dancing and yelling at Ino. Temari and Kankuro would be speaking to feudal lords and or special people. She really had no choice but to hang out with Isamu the entire time.

"Isn't it early to be drinking sake?"

"Never too early to have some sake," he chuckled, swishing the liquid inside the cup. Emiko rolled her eyes and bit into another dumpling. It was going to be a long, long day.