I'm slightly depressing myself with this chapter and the last one, but growth is necessary! Also, English Dub Kakashi is a whole ass mood. I wish Netflix in America had Shippuden to binge, but I guess I'll just have to go to crunchy roll and listen to the sub. Also, Tsunade is difficult to write simply because most of the Naruto cast is a bit one dimensional with how they express themselves, Tsunade has her back story but she also has a temper. She can be smart, but also a drunkard with a gambling problem. I believe that everyone can show a range of emotion no matter that their default personality.

18

A large, white, wolf stared at Yuzuki, and she stared right back. Ice blue eyes pinned her to her spot, and she wondered just what kind of summons she had made a contract with. She knew that her biological father had worked with a type of ninken, but this was ridiculous.

"You must be Aki's pup," The wolf said.

"Biologically speaking," She couldn't help herself.

He let out a snort of agreement and moved towards her. She was able to keep her slight fear under control and relaxed a bit when he plopped down next to her and put his head on her shoulder. She got a lick to the face and grimaced. She did not like that.

"You have better reactions then he did," The wolf said as he remained on her shoulder, "I am Yosuke."

"I am Yamanaka Yuzuki, it's nice to meet you," She introduced herself.

"Now, what can you do?"

She could say that a spar with a wolf was strange. It didn't take long for Yosuke to tell her not to hold back and that he could handle anything she threw war him. It didn't take long for her to hit him with all she had, he had flown quite a bit from the chakra enhanced blow. Really, anyone that knew her knew that was an accurate response. She was wondering when people were going to start watching what they said around her. Ah, no wonder she got along well with Genma they were the same person.

She was just more fucked up mentally than him.

"I suppose you should call us Okami," Yosuke informed her as he walked back, "I'm one of the third tier summons, with the amount of chakra you packed into that hit you could possibly summon the boss."

"Do you want me to try?" She asked with a slight frown.

He gave her the wolf equivalent of a grin and she took that as a yes. She took in a deep breath and quickly formed the hand signs for the summoning jutsu. Upon placing her hand down, she felt such a drain on her chakra that she almost fell on her face. She brought a hand up and waved at the smoke surrounding her.

"Who dares summon me?" A female voice grounded out.

"Lupa-hime, I found a summoner!" Yosuke announced.

Yuzuki kept in a flinch as she stared at a giant wolf with a long tail. She blinked upon noticing the type of wolf it was. Mediterranean, and darker in color. She stared into the light amber eyes and kept contact. Lupa…she knew that name, she'd heard it somewhere before.

"This is the Yamanaka's pup?" She asked.

"Biologically speaking." Yosuke answered.

"What is your name, pup?" Lupa asked Yuzuki.

"Yuzuki, ma'am," She answered, unable to keep the old military speech from slipping into her words.

She was reminded of the admiral she had first served under. That was a terrifying thought seeing as the woman had been a grueling taskmaster. She thought Hayate and Anko were bad, but they didn't have anything on her. She felt her hands tremble slightly as Lupa continued to scrutinize her.

"She'll do, this one has guts," Lupa snorted as she leaned down to be eye level with the scared genin, "But she's emotionally stunted."

"You figured that out too," Yosuke softly said.

"Now, what is it you want to do as a shinobi, pup?" Lupa questioned her.

Yuzuki almost said torture and interrogation the second she was asked such a thing. It was what she had been gunning for the entire time she was training. She thought back to the information she had read in the iryo scroll and wondered if she should become a medic-nin instead. Would it better for her to help people or hurt them? She didn't know anymore.

"I wanted to go into torture and interrogation," She admitted, "But now I find myself looking at iryo-jutsu and Fuinjutsu."

"You've come to a crossroads," Lupa softly said as she turned to Yosuke and gave a curt nod.

He vanished and the large wolf made the genin sit down while she took up the mantle of teacher. Pale eyes stared at her and she could see the uncertainty in them, and the burning need to change. She didn't want to be known as the heartless monster anymore, the unfazed kunoichi that was never bothered by anything.

"You are a reborn soul, aren't you?" Lupa questioned.

"I am," Yuzuki nodded.

"One that remembers everything, but that's causing you imbalance even more than the hormones that are brought about by puberty."

"It's what makes me, me."

"Is it? Then why are you so sad?"

"Because if I let go of who I was, I feel like I would be letting go of those I loved in that life."

Ah, that made sense. Lupa looked down at the girl who was being completely truthful with her, it was probably the most honest she'd been in her life. She couldn't really talk with those around her since they didn't understand the lost feeling such souls had. Those souls, like the one in front of her, had trouble letting go of the past and suffered for it eventually. They had emotional problems that carried over from their previous life, and that stunted them as children in their new life. It brought about psychotic adults that didn't feel anything.

"If you don't you'll go down a dark path with no return," Lupa warned the preteen, "Is that what those you love would want for you?"

"No, they'd want me to be happy," Yuzuki muttered in response, "In fact my brother would've hit me over the head for being such an idiot."

The smile that appeared on the girl's face was warm and full of remembrance. It brought some hope to her future if she could still have that warmth. Lupa brought her nose down and gently touched the girl's forehead.

"You fight so much to remember, yet your own body is trying to save you from that fate…how interesting," Lupa murmured, "Have you forgotten anything?"

"I don't even remember my own name anymore," She admitted, "And certain things are becoming blurry, I still remember places and food, but names and dates are getting harder to remember."

"Then let it go," A familiar voice caused the girl to jump and Lupa to stand over her and growl protectively.

"Genma, you really shouldn't scare people like that," Yuzuki scolded the man with a frown on her face.

"He does have a point, pup," Lupa said as she went back to calmly sitting next to the girl, she didn't react when the tall child leaned to the side and burrowed herself in her fur.

"I can't forget them."

Genma stared at her for a few seconds before gaining a look of understanding. Her older brother and niece, she refused to let them go. She was afraid to forget them. He gave the wolf a slightly weary glance and took the chance to sit next to his kid. She didn't look at him, even when he brought his arm up and rested it around her shoulders.

"Just because you let go doesn't mean you'll forget them," He informed her and she looked at him, "All of us on the protection squad would say that, the Yondaime was someone to look up to and respect and when he passed we had issues moving on."

She looked at him and gently reached forward and placed a hand on his shoulder. They were two idiots that felt more then they let on, but Genma was hoping to break that shell so that other people could see the playful personality that slept below the cold demeanor. He wanted to prove Sakura wrong that she wasn't a heartless monster, that she could feel just as deeply as the other girl.

"All right," She quietly said in agreement, "I just wish I had a picture of them so that I would've forget their faces."

"I know someone," Lupa sighed and the two konoha-shinobi looked at her, "You are one of the Yamanaka, yes, just send their faces to me and I'll give them to him."

Yuzuki looked at her as if trying to find a trick but slowly performed the hand signs. Lupa was welcomed to the images of a laughing child with dark hair and bright blue eyes, and an older man with similar coloring with a grin. Rose and Connor. The two people she cared the most about and didn't want to forget. She understood the need to remember family, and this would help her feel like she wasn't getting rid of their memories.

"What about the food?" Genma asked to lighten the mood.

"I'll make sure to write the recipes down, they aren't that difficult," Yuzuki sighed in amusement, "Be glad I stayed with someone in Korea that knew a guy who ran a street food stand, I learned all I could during that time. Tteokbokki was one of my favorites."

"What is this tteokbokki?" Lupa asked.

"Spicey rice cakes cooked in gochujang, its sweet and spicy," She answered with a grin, "It goes well with the banana milk."

To see her talking about food with such an expression showed what she had really wanted to be in her past life. She always had an interest in cooking food from around the world, she had taken to Asian foods since she was always stationed in that area of the world. She had walked the streets of Seoul so many times that when she had learned the food she made it for special events she had to go to. Being put in charge of a potluck had always made her troops happy.

"Sounds good, do you even know how to make gochujang?" He asked.

"Yeah, I was taught how to make everything from scratch," She answered with a nod, "I'll need to make sure to write that down as well…I don't think Konoha is ready for French cuisine."

French? The two didn't even want to know what she meant by that. Genma watched as the personality she had hid was carefully shown to them. An excitable person that loved to cook, and learn how to cook, good and interesting food. He really was going to kill her grandfather if he ever met him in the afterlife, he had beaten such a person down until they didn't even feel anything without second guessing it.

"Be more like this, but serious when on missions and training," Genma told her, "Besides, with you in torture and interrogation I don't doubt that you'll find something interesting in their heads that you could use."

"Do I even still have the right temperament for torture and interrogation?" She asked him as she calmed back down.

"Yeah, the ability to shut down your emotions like you do will be perfect for such a job," He answered, "And, if you do learn iryo-jutsu, you'd make a good addition to the medical corps when there's no one to interrogate."

"Huh, did…did you help the hokage's figure out how to manage their time?" She quietly asked him, the two barely noticed Lupa leaving them.

"We all do, there's always so much paperwork," He grumbled, "No wonder you didn't want to become Hokage."

"I had enough of paperwork to last several lifetimes," She huffed in agreement, "Though I suppose becoming a medical-nin negates that, but so does being an interrogator."

"You can't escape paperwork, even as a jonin," He told her, "But I think we should go back to training, I wanted to work on your second nature and teach you a few more tricks with senbon."

"Can we start with Senbon?" She asked him, "I'm running a bit low on chakra at the moment due to summoning, Lupa-hime."

It was the Okami's title and she would be glad to use it. She frowned as she tried to remember where she had heard that name before. She paused for a few seconds before it hit her. Genma saw the strange expression on her face and raised a brow.

"What the hell are you thinking?" He asked.

"Lupa-hime, the wolf that found Romulus and Remus and is the symbol of the city of Rome," She answered, "Oh hell, it seems your world and my past world interconnected at some point, though the translation of her name in Latin is just She-wolf."

"Right, well, lets begin," He said as he tried to remove her attention from that.

Whatever had allowed their worlds to interact didn't exist anymore. He knew that and he gathered that she had come to that conclusion judging by her faraway expression. He spat the senbon in his mouth at her and she barely dodged it with an incredulous expression on her face. It then clicked into place why he always had one in his mouth.

"No wonder you always have a senbon in your mouth, that's genius," She said with wide eyes, "But…have you ever swallowed one?"

"Get training," He huffed at her as she took out a few senbon.

He taught her new ways to throw them and areas of the body to hit that would bring down an opponent without much hassle. She had to put it to the test, and she didn't look happy whenever she hit him with one. He increased the speed that he moved and made it harder for her to get a hit in, but she was slowly getting faster. She ducked a kick sent her way and brought her tachi out. He was pushing her to return any attack sent her way, he wanted her to put those weapons to good use.

He easily parried her tachi with a kunai and moved back when she pulled out the tanto. It was a move set that he was glad she was finally showing. She had put distance between the two of them and sheathed the tanto before rushing towards him with the tachi. With a quick hand sign, he watched as two more versions of her appeared. The Dance of the Crescent Moon technique and used correctly. She had him pinned within seconds of using it, he knew the attack but wanted her to have a single victory against him.

"Nicely done," He told her as she sheathed her tachi and dispelled her clones, "Hayate would be proud."

"That's good," She said as she sat down on the ground to catch her breath, "Is it break time, or do you want to see how far I can be pushed?"

"Let's see how far you can be pushed," He grinned at her.

Two hours later saw him carrying a dead asleep Yuzuki back to the hotel. She had done well learning the water bullet technique and putting it to use. She could only perform it four times before she was out of chakra. He thanked the kami for her chakra control to allow her to even do it more than twice.

"How do you not put out body heat, you little weirdo?" He quietly grumbled as he felt the cold arms around his neck.

He supposed it didn't matter, though he wondered if it was because she had been knocked out due to the lack of chakra. At least she knew when to stop using it. She muttered something in her sleep and burrowed her forehead into his shoulder. He chuckled quietly at that; she sometimes did act like the twelve-year-old she was. That adult nature didn't seem to be able to compete with a preteen that was starting to mature. Kami help anyone who tried to date her, he was going to put his skills to use scaring them away. He had to put his title of 'dad' to use didn't he?

"Why do I get the feeling that you're thinking sadistic thoughts," She grumbled as she woke up.

"Don't worry about it, you up for dinner?" He asked.

"Yeah, I could go for something to eat, we didn't have lunch," She answered with a slight nod.

"You have to walk to know," He informed her.

He got a grumble in response, but she shuffled quietly behind him as they headed towards a barbeque restaurant. They didn't have fish on the menu, but that was all right. She understood that she needed the heavy protein after the amount of training they'd done that day. She didn't even say anything about the twin tailed blonde that was drinking sake a booth away from them.

"You look like you're going to drop any second, you sure you can eat?" Genma asked her.

"I can eat," She huffed, "I might take my time doing so."

"Too bad you can't drink yet," He teased.

She grumbled something that he didn't quite catch as he ordered a few plates of beef and several plates of vegetables. They both watched the meat cook, every so often he would catch her yawning before turning over a piece. They both ignored the amber eyes on their persons, if Tsunade wanted to be left alone then who were they to bother the sannin. It wasn't worth getting punched to the next town over.

"Eat your vegetables," He said, and she gave him a look.

He couldn't help but mess with her. She shook her head in disbelief before putting some of the vegetables into the bowl with her meat. It was a quiet meal with her slowly eating while fighting the need for sleep. He almost caught her falling asleep in bowl more than once. He had put her through the ringer, but she needed it.

The next week she trained harder than before, with one more appearance from Tsunade who was more than curious about the genin. She only had a few days left before she had to head back to the village. She learned more about the monstrous strength from the woman, and surprisingly Fuinjutsu from her wolf summons. Genma hadn't started on teaching her Hiraishin, but he was planning on doing so. He just needed the weapons shop to finish with the pack of specialty kunai he had requested.

"So, the chuunin exams huh?" Tsunade asked as the two females had a snack of dango together.

"What, does it take you back?" Yuzuki teased.

"Shut up you brat," Tsunade huffed, and the laughter from the dirty blonde did nothing to quell her temper, "I'm not that old."

"Right, right, you're only as old as you feel," Yuzuki chuckled as she bit into her dango, "I may look young but some days I feel ancient."

"You look it too."

The blonde couldn't help but snort at the look on the girl's face. It had been so long since someone had talked to her without acting like she was going to explode at them. Even her assistant acted as such, but this girl was either stupid or completely unafraid. She ate her dango and wished for some sake to have with the sweet treat.

"You worried about the exams?" She asked.

"A little bit, but I feel as though as long as I do my best the people I care about will be proud of me," Yuzuki replied with a smile.

Tsunade stared at the girl for a few seconds before finishing off her dango. She flicked the stick towards the girl and she easily moved back to dodge it. That was the perks of training with a senbon user who had stopped holding back.

"Don't go acting so confident, brat," Tsunade warned her.

"I'm not, my first match is against my cousin," Yuzuki informed her and the worried expression on her face caused the other blonde to frown, "I don't want to hurt her, but I'm going to have to."

"She's one of these people you care about, isn't she?" Tsunade asked.

"Yeah, but there's something else going on in the background of the exams that we genin will have to be ready for," At the serious expression on the girls face Tsunade wondered what it was, "I'm not permitted to tell anyone that isn't inside the village, so I apologize that I can't inform you."

"It's not like I care," Tsunade waved her hand.

"You say that, but you do," Yuzuki said and that got the older woman to pause, "I'm like that as well, saying things to make people believe I couldn't care less about the world around me."

Tsunade watched as the girl finished her dango before standing up. She sent the older woman a tiny smile and stretched. Her hands ended up in the pockets of her pants as she turned to the woman.

"That's something I don't want to do anymore."

She gave the sannin a wave before heading off to meet with Genma to see what she was going to be learning before they left. Tsunade watched her go with wide eyes before a smirk appeared on her face. That was someone who wanted to change, huh? She was an interesting brat.

"Genma, what am I doing today?" Yuzuki asked as she appeared next to the taller man's elbow.

"Don't sneak up on people," He warned her with a slight sigh, "You might get hit…how'd you end up so bruised and scuffed up?"

"Don't worry about it," She told him before fixing him with a look, "What am I doing?"

"The kunai are finally finished, I'm going to teach you the seal process," He informed her, "Then how to perform the jutsu."

"Okay."

That was it, an okay? He was expecting a bit more out of her from that. He looked down at her as she walked next to him, a thoughtful expression on her face. Ah, there it was. She was thinking again, probably about the news of the pictures that Lupa promised her. They were taking a while making a small shrine for her to add more pictures to if she lost anyone else.

"I can't wait to eat that food you were talking about," He told her.

"Patience is a virtue," She told him with a slight smile.

"Not something you always have in spades, you get bored during shogi and your mind starts to wander," He told her, and she gave him a slight glare.

They reached their training area and he noted all the craters in the area, some from her and another from a chakra that he could only guess was Tsunade's. She really was the kind of person that wormed their way into your heart and just stayed there with a frown on their face. He had her sit down and reached into his pouch for a scroll that had his seal on it, but not with chakra ink.

"This is the seal that the protection squad uses," He informed her, "The seal you'll be using is one of your own, the Yondaime had his own and it's not one that you could use without having the same chakra nature."

"Right, so I need to figure out a seal that will summon me, or just open up a pathway that I can use?" She asked him in a way to clarify what he meant.

"You need to open up your own pathway," He informed her, "Yondaime-sama used the character 'Ai' for his pathway, but never told anyone the reasoning behind it."

Smart man. Yuzuki started to find some respect for the deceased hokage. She stared at the scroll and thought back to the words that Genma told her. She grabbed a scroll of her own and took out a plain pen. With a quick thought she scribbled down the seal she wanted to use. Lightening, moon, and ocean. The type of nature she controlled plus the move that Hayate had taught her.

"Would this work?" She asked.

"Yeah, that could possibly work," Genma nodded.

"You'll need to pour your chakra into some ink to make it able to summon you," He informed her as he pulled out a brush and bottle of ink, "It requires some blood as well, I'm sure Yuna-san taught you how to pour chakra into ink."

"Yeah," She nodded as she accepted the ink and brush, "Should I do it on one just to make sure it works?"

He gave her a lazy grin and she gave a light chuckle. Of course, that's what he wanted her to do. She pricked her finger and added it to the ink before picking up the brush. She knew the reason why chakra control was key in Fuinjutsu, if one messed up the amount of chakra added to a seal then it could be problematic. She concentrated while writing down the kanji she had picked out and sealed the seal with the correct hand signs that were on the scroll Genma had.

"Did you create the scroll?" She asked him.

"Yes, I do have to destroy it after this," He informed her.

"Right, show me the next step," She said with a slight smile.

He couldn't help but gain a slightly sadistic grin. He tossed the kunai near a tree and had her form the hand sign to summon herself. She pushed the chakra through and not even five minutes later he heard her losing her lunch. He couldn't help the light chuckle from passing through his lips.

It was just like when he had first used it. He hadn't been able to eat for the rest of the day. He had wondered just how many times the Yondaime had used it to not even be bothered by it anymore. The man was notorious for using it without hand signs, so he had to have used it quite a bit. Was he trying to make a mini-yellow flash? No, her hair was completely different from the man, but she needed the speed.

"I hate you, Genma," She informed him from her spot on the ground, "This is why Hayate is my favorite!"

"That's why you call me dad," He told her.

He got a very grumbled curse and snickered to himself. He was such a demon that he made her finish the other kunai, and then practice with them. She spent the next thirty minutes using it, flashing around the clearing, before collapsing while holding her stomach. She looked mutinous at him.

"Right I think we're done for the day."

"You are truly evil."

"Keep that up and you'll have to train with it all day tomorrow."

She wisely kept quiet after that, but little did she know he would still do that.