Hey everyone, not dead~!

Just haven't been feeling good and been dealing with family stuff for a while, still don't have a laptop either, but I've decided to try typing up more chapters

I just wanna thank Abyssal-Samurai-Noih for giving me the drive I needed to start typing again, thank you so much 3

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or anything related to the anime or manga

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Team Anko ran straight into the Forest of Death without hesitation, spotting a trail of blood and quickly following it, finding Fu about 10 seconds later, bleeding from a deep gash in her side with her two teammates standing over her with their kunai drawn. "Hey assholes, what do you think you're doing to Fu?!" The two Genin turned and sneered at Team Anko with looks of hate in their eyes. "Oh great, the demon lovers are here." "Just go back to wherever you came from, this demon bitch hogged the spotlight and kept us from getting promoted to Chunin!"

Ryuko was content with just beating them up a little and making them run back into the village, but her half of Kurama agreed with her for the first time since she'd been put inside of the young Nakamura, these two needed a life lesson. The two Genin watched in horror as her fingernails grew into claws and her eyes went from their cold ice blue to a glowing crystalline red that seemed to stare into their very souls. "If you two really want to see a demon, then you shouldn't be looking at Fu."

Ryuko held up a hand to her teammates as a signal to stay back as the two frightened Genin charged at her with their kunai ready to impale her, only for the Elite Chunin to end the fight before it would even start. Without much effort, she grabbed the forearm of the first while leaning forward to avoid the overreaching stab of the second, before breaking the forearm trapped in her strong grip and using the first foolish Genin to hit the second in mid air and send them both flying into a tree hard from the momentum.

"You two aren't ready to become Chunin, you're not even ready to be shinobi if all you care about is your 'time in the spotlight,' now get out of my sight before I break something a little further south!" Both boys quickly ran away in the direction of the village, while Team Anko quickly ran over to Fu to check over her injuries. "This cut is really deep.. Don't worry Fu, we'll get you to Tsunade." "Yeah, you just try to tune out the pain, we've got you." Ryuko then picked up the injured Jinchuriki and began jumping through the trees with her teammates right behind her, not wanting to waste any time.

It only took about three minutes to get to Tsunade, who was currently at the hospital, but in that time Ryuko's arms and parts of her clothes had soaked with blood. "Tsunade, we've got a bit of a problem! Fu's teammates turned on her and attacked her in the Forest of Death, she's losing a lot of blood and I'm not experienced enough with medical chakra to stop the bleeding!" This not only got the attention of Tsunade, but also Sakura who was a few rooms down from them, and she gasped when she saw all of the blood soaking Ryuko's arms and clothes. "Oh my Kami! Tsunade-Sensei, we need to start fixing her up right away!"

The busty blonde didn't need to be told twice, quickly taking the mint haired girl from Ryuko's arms. "Thank you, if she dies we're gonna have an extremely pissed off Tailed Beast flattening the village looking for her teammates.." Whether Tsunade didn't hear her or had simply trained herself to not stop what she was doing while working, Ryuko didn't know, but she noticed that Tsunade's hesitation from seeing all of that blood had all but completely vanished as she used a mixture of medical chakra and various tools to stop the bleeding and seal up the wound.

When Fu (who had paled considerably) opened her eyes an hour later, everyone breathed a sigh of relief, Ryuko would've hugged her but she and her team hadn't left the girl's side since she got there, so she still had quite a lot of blood on her and her clothes. "Lucky Seven indeed, I was scared that we lost you for a minute there Fu.." Tsunade smiled softly at the friendly aura filling the room, but soon shooed the girls out. "Ok, you've seen that she's gonna live now, go on and do something fun for the day, or get back to teaching your class with Iruka and just bring your teammates with you."

Team Anko reluctantly left the hospital knowing Tsunade wouldn't let them back in until some time had passed to let Fu rest and recover a bit more, leaving the blonde Kage alone with the girl. "Now then, as you probably figured out, you're not going to be able to leave for a few weeks, so you won't be going home with your team, not that I would allow such a thing anyway. However, my sensei, the Third Hokage, sent a letter to your village about a proposal he had after the Chunin Exams, seeing as you did so well to protect us during our time of need when you weren't required to."

Fu looked up at Tsunade with curiosity and a bit of confusion in her eyes. "Um.. A proposition?.." Tsunade chuckled a bit and pulled up a chair, sitting down next to Fu with a small smile. "It's nothing bad, honestly I think you'll like it. Sarutobi-Sensei wants peace for the Elemental Nations, he thought perhaps some representatives from each village living here would be a good idea, as a way to keep others informed of what we may need help with and vice versa, and your team has been chosen as your village's representatives, but now it seems it's just you. In the end it's your choice, we can't force you."

Fu sat there in thought for a while, she'd basically be leaving her home, the place she'd lived all of her life, to come and stay in a village that she barely knew how to navigate. However, here she had friends, people didn't overcharge her for food or kick her out of stores, and nobody was trying to kill her besides her own teammates. "Hmm... I think I'll go with..."

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Meanwhile, with team Anko

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Ryuko sighed softly after she changed her clothes and finished cleaning the blood off of her body. "Damn it, I know we need to let Fu rest, but I still can't help but worry, I know her teammates are right there in the same hospital right now.." Haku and Mina hugged their lover and smiled. "Don't worry, Tsunade probably had guards watching over Fu." "Yeah, and she's probably gone and told all of the staff to not let those two anywhere near Fu."

"I know I know, it's just difficult leaving her alone after what just happened, teammates are supposed to have your back no matter what, and they tried to kill her. It's a violation of trust that I can't stand for, it pisses me off.." The others didn't have to be sensory ninja to feel that Ryuko's half of Kurama was beginning to act up a little, covering a clenched fist in red chakra. "If only we could take her away from that awful home that doesn't even appreciate her for the good person that she is. Fu isn't a weapon or a demon, she's a living, breathing human being, just like the rest of us."

"And that's why you're gonna be leading Uzu into a new age Ryuko." Their heads snapped up in surprise when they heard that voice, seeing Kizami watching then from a branch high up in a tree. "Most villages see jinchuriki as weapons, maybe not their Kage, but most military officials and civilians don't really think of them as normal people. You, however, would never let people in your village think that, right?" When Ryuko nodded in confirmation, Kizami's smirk grew and she hopped down in front of Team Anko, landing on one knee.

"Consider this my pledge of loyalty to you and Uzu, once you bring back the people lost in the siege that originally destroyed the village, I'll start wearing your forehead protector, deal?" To say the entire team was shocked was an understatement, but after a minute Ryuko's mouth began to curl into a smirk. "Heh, to think you'd be kneeling before me after the way our first meeting went, if anyone told me this would happen I would've called them nuts. The civilian council's gonna lay an egg when they hear about this, they were probably hoping to get war reparations out of you via your techniques."

This caused the wild looking girl to huff and cross her arms with a scowl on her face. "The only thing they'd be getting out of me is my boot in their face, though honestly their sons and daughters in the shinobi force would probably turn to stone if they tried using my techniques because of the Nature Chakra. Would be a fitting punishment for those greedy bastards." The others nodded softly in agreement. "So Kizami, what's been going on with you lately? I heard they put you in a one person team for now like how I started out."

The Wolf Sage nodded with her signature fanged smirk directed at Ryuko. "Yep, maybe you set a good test run or something, seems I'm on my own for a bit, I don't even have a Jonin assigned to me since the Hokage gave me Chunin rank right off the bat. I'm sure things will sort themselves out soon, maybe I'll stumble upon one or two good fighters to add to my team like you did Ryuko." "That... T-that was just luck, shut up." Ryuko blushed softly as Haku and Mina smirked at the young woman, remembering how they'd reunited in the forest at Wave.

Kizami shrugged and ruffled Ryuko's hair playfully. "Oh come on, the timing was practically perfect, perhaps it was fate that you'd reunite with your childhood friends on your first real mission~" The blush became deeper on Ryuko's face as she began to glare half heartedly. "S-s-shut up about that fate stuff damn it, I hear it enough from the girls themselves." This caused Kizami to smirk even wider. "Heh, well if you think about it, not only were you reunited with them in a cliche way, but you also hold half of the nine tails, with the other half being in your first girlfriend, it's obviously fate~" "S-shut up Kizami, I'm gonna hit you!"

As the other girls began to laugh, nobody noticed the blue haired woman with piercing yellow-orange eyes watching them from a nearby alley, and listening intently. "Hmm, this confirms Zetsu's theory, Naruko Uzumaki truly is no longer the only jinchuriki of the Nine Tails. I must inform Pein immediately, he will wish to know about this." With that, she faded away into a swarm of origami birds, flying off into the wind and out of Konoha to inform her master of her latest intel.