As her teammates and summons were running towards the clearing, Hitomi went to the trap she wanted to use against the Jōnin. Fortunately, she had found another clearing, smaller than the first, almost at the fence of the training ground. Without that, her only trap to have a small chance of working against the sensei would have been unusable. Even this way, she was tense and anxious at the idea of using it. But the alternatives…

"Well, well, leaving all the work to your teammates, uh?"

The girl tensed and, before she could even think, a pair of senbon flew from her hand to the source of the voice. The Jōnin dodged by leaning in slightly, the two needles embedding themselves in the trunk of the tree behind him. The killing intent she didn't seem able to control yet started to bloom on Hitomi's skin, thickening the air around her.

"What a welcome," Kakashi drawled. "Breathe, Hitomi-chan."

Her eyes wide, she watched him form the Tiger Hand Seal and disappear, slowly dissolving in a storm of dead leaves. It didn't look like a shunshin, nor like any substitution technique she knew. She took a few hesitant steps, in the hope of discovering what he had done, when a scream tore through the air. Unable to breathe, she ran to the source of the sound, not caring about the low branches whipping at her cheeks and neck.

When she arrived at the place where the scream had come from, she froze, icy sweat rolling along her spine. Her eyes wide in disbelief, she fought, fought to understand what she was seeing. On two spears planted in the ground Naruto and Sasuke were impaled, their blood already watering the soil beneath their feet.

"Hi-Hitomi… Help…"

"Save me… Please… Hitomi… It hurts!"

Tears bloomed in her eyes and rolled on her cheeks, burning her skin and blurring her vision, as her dark red stare registered every detail of the situation unfolding in front of her. She took a trembling step towards them, then two, then kneeled next to the spear going through Sasuke's chest, her throat so constricted she could barely breathe. How did it happen? Even if Kakashi had decided to fail them from the beginning, they were Konohajin citizens, he owed them protection, he…

She broke the illusion so violently that the rush of chakra burned through her arms. Her surroundings immediately shifted, the broken shapes of her brothers dissolving into nothingness. Killing intent was now buzzing so hard around her that the animals of the forest had started running away from her. It had probably attracted the attention of the closest patrol, but she didn't care. She was furious that she had to see such a scene, to feel her mind anchoring this memory in her Library. She had to breathe deeply a few times before she could even enter her refuge. She grabbed the book containing the memory and took it far, far away, deep under the surface, where anything that couldn't see light was kept. She needed a better place for those memories, something guarded and protected.

The number of chains she wrapped around the volume before putting it next to the one containing her knowledge of foreign languages was probably excessive – but so was the cruelty of the vision Kakashi had imposed on her mind. She left her Library still furious, but the abject terror that had haunted her when she had seen her adopted brothers agonising in front of her had somewhat dissipated, smothered by the weight of the chains that stopped it from paralysing her.

She was close to the meeting place and, when she arrived, she was more focused than ever. Not once did the killing intent fade around her, and her logic whispered that a patrol should have arrived and checked what was going on – but she doubted even one shinobi in the village was unaware of what was happening that day for the newly graduated Genin. A bit – a lot – of killing intent on a training ground probably wasn't out of place under those circumstances.

Naruto appeared first, three clones behind him, and froze for a second when he felt the tension emanating from her. Since he wasn't the target for her will and anger, he didn't exactly feel the effects of it, only a strange distortion in the atmosphere around her. Sasuke, who arrived just after him, met Hitomi's eyes; his dreary expression made her understand that he knew what it was, and that she was doing it. She nodded and signed to them, her hands telling them to go hide in the undergrowth behind her.

She seemed alone when Kakashi came. Before he could even talk, because she would probably have lost control of her emotions if he had said anything, she formed the Rat Hand Seal as she took a step back. Her shadow came alive; one moment later, her chakra went through the holes she had drilled in the soles of her shoes and activated a seal she had drawn there long before dawn. Barely a meter behind her, flames appeared with a terrible roar and extended towards the sky, brutally giving fuel and power to her shadow, which connected to Kakashi's. She had control.

Immediately, she understood she had made a mistake. The sensei's strength was monumental in comparison to her own, his reflex of trying to step back and his body brimming with chakra threatening to tear away the bonds that kept him in place. Unable to stop herself, Hitomi screamed in pain, her mind trying in vain to push back the pain she felt from just keeping the Jōnin still. In barely a few seconds, almost all the chakra she had had left before evaporated and she was forced to let go. She fell on all four, shadow and flame disappearing at the same time, and threw up her breakfast on the grass.

He had stopped resisting immediately after his reflex to step away from the flames, but Hitomi could still feel the places where tension had turned to fire in her muscles, her bones, and even on the deep and intimate level of her nerves themselves. Her cheeks were wet, her limbs shaking and spasming, her breathing ragged and shallow. She was so dizzy she couldn't even sit up.

Piercing the wall of pain and brutal exhaustion raised between the world and herself, her brothers' footsteps approached quickly. She managed to open her eyes and saw them standing in front of her, like a shield between the sensei and her body, too weak to continue fighting. In front of the two boys were her three giant cats, hissing and growling with their fangs and claws ready to maim.

"Well," Kakashi said, "you three are a surprising bunch. To say I had prepared a whole speech about how important teamwork is… I see the Academy has now decided to do all the work for me. Congrats, you pass!"

"What? But we didn't get the bells!"

"But, Naruto-kun, the goal was never for you to actually get the bells. In the beginning, I thought you and Sasuke had decided to ditch Hitomi, but I understood she was still with you when I saw the cats." The man stepped around the cats and boys without much resistance then kneeled next to Hitomi, his large hands helping her to sit up. His only eye registered the cold sweat, the sickly pale tone, the spasms running in the muscles under his fingers. "As for you, young lady, nicely done. If I had been your equal, your plan would have worked. You still have a lesson to take from this: against an opponent that is immensely stronger than you, direct confrontation rarely works."

"Ugh…"

"Yeah, I know, it hurts. Naruto-kun, Sasuke-kun, I'd like one of you to go warn Kurenai that her daughter is at the hospital for chakra exhaustion. She's with Team Eight on the training ground number five."

Sasuke ended up handling it. In an instant he had disappeared, his legs faster than they had ever been before. Kakashi's hand started rubbing comforting circles against Hitomi's back as she felt her eyes close against her will. "Good. Now that that is handled, Naruto, take her stuff and follow me."

"What about us?"

Hitomi recognised Hoshihi's voice and a little smile appeared on her lips. She wanted to cuddle against him and nuzzle against his neck, where the skin was warm and the fur so soft. One of her hands twitched harder than before, probably in answer to the longing she was feeling. Her smile turned to a mask of pain.

"No," Kakashi growled softly, "you stop trying to move right now, young lady. You're just going to hurt yourself. As for you three… I don't know. Do whatever you want, I'm not your summoner and she isn't available to decide right now. You can follow if that's what you want."

Those were the last words Hitomi heard before her eyelids won the battle and closed down, the sounds and feeling softly fading around her until they were only silence and comforting obscurity.

She regained consciousness in a hospital room, which she recognised by smell long before opening her eyes. She wanted to take her time before fully waking up, savouring the heat of the three heavy bodies on the covers. Finally, when her thirst became too pressing to be ignored any longer, she blinked and grimaced when light stabbed her eyes. A sigh of relief escaped her lips as soon as the feeling stopped: Naruto had just closed the blinds, and the room was now comfortably dark.

"Ah, Hitomi-chan, finally. We were starting to worry, your friends and I."

"K-Kakashi-sensei?"

"Hm hm. Niji-sama, the girl is awake, as you can see. I think her mother would like to know. Hitomi, your mom couldn't leave her students in the middle of their own test but, as you can see, she still wanted to be kept in the loop."

The girl nodded and watched the huge dragonfly, Niji, taking flight and leaving the room, his wings shimmering even in the semi-darkness of the room as they brushed against the frame of the door. "I had never seen my mother's summons," she whispered hoarsely.

When he heard the pain in her voice, Naruto jumped to her side and presented a straw to her lips, so she could drink effortlessly.

"Niji is Suisei's eldest daughter, and Suisei is your mom's familiar. Trust me, you do not want to meet Suisei, Kurenai only summons her when her ninjutsu needs an enormous boost, and the results are terrifying. Now, let's get back to you. When were you deprived of chakra to the point of disturbing your growth?"

"I… What?"

Hitomi looked so shocked, her eyes wide and her shoulders tense in a way that had to be painful for her exhausted body, that it made Kakashi reconsider and stop himself from scolding her. "Naruto-kun, can you please leave the room for a moment? I have to discuss private subjects with Hitomi-chan. She can tell you about it afterwards if she wants to, but right now I'd prefer it if it stayed between us. Maybe you should go find food for her."

The blonde boy obeyed, but not without throwing a suspicious look at his sensei as he walked past him. Once he had closed the door behind him, silence settled on the little room and stretched for a few moments, until Kakashi decided to break it. "As a sensei, I have been granted access to your medical file. Naruto's and Sasuke's too, of course. When I brought you here, the nurse who reversed the damage caused by chakra exhaustion, especially in your arms, told me she felt traces of repeated scarring in some places, especially in your muscles and around your organs."

"I… I don't understand."

"Chakra exhaustion is a very dangerous state for the body. When it only happens once in a while, it's not that big of a deal, but this nurse says that you have been in that state countless times during your childhood. And yet, you're a Yūhi, which means you have massive chakra reserves, larger than any of your peers, except for Naruto. I just want to understand, Hitomi-chan, why your health has been put at such a risk."

"I… What… I don't think Ensui-shishou knew about… all this."

"Ensui… Nara Ensui, right? Kurenai told me you had left the village with him for a year and a half before entering the Academy."

"Yeah. I have an illness that could have stopped me from becoming a ninja. It's been in the clan for generations, according to Ensui-shishou. Until he took me out of the village, Mom and I lived in a house in the Deer Forest, as far away as possible from the rest of the clan, because I felt like I was caught on fire with too many people around." Hitomi sighed and rubbed her hands on the blanket before petting Kurokumo, who purred softly. "Once he taught me to muffle my meridians, so I'd only feel chakra to a useful level, Ensui-shishou taught me other things. He told me about a method that would stretch my reserves by emptying them again and again."

"Ah, yeah, that method… I understand, now," Kakashi assured in a calming tone. "The research on the long-term consequences of chakra exhaustion is recent. Your shishou probably hadn't heard about it, or he wouldn't have put you through that training. When he comes back to the village, I'll have a talk about it with him."

"Am I… Am I gonna be in trouble?" She hated the way her voice betrayed her fear, but she couldn't have hidden it. She wasn't strong enough, not yet.

"You'll have to be looked at by a doctor regularly, especially once you hit puberty. You'll stay tiny all your life and will have trouble gaining weight or building muscle mass. You won't ever be a taijutsu specialist… But I don't think it's a problem. You have a lot of other interesting skills, after all. The most important thing to do now is to make sure you don't get chakra exhaustion too often in the future."

Frowning, Hitomi nodded. Her eyes glared at nothing in front of her, but it was only an expression of focus, not anger. She knew Ensui had meant well. He wouldn't have wanted her to suffer any long-lasting consequences from his training – even seeing her in pain then and knowing it would pass had been hard on him. Besides… It was probably the best choice in the long run. All the fields Hitomi was interested in implicated the use of chakra, kenjutsu excepted. She needed her reserves as they were and as they would be. Staying scrawny all her life seemed like such a small sacrifice to receive what she needed to fight.

"Don't worry, Hitomi-chan," Kakashi said after a while. "We don't know each other yet, but you'll learn that I look after my team. Besides, your mother would skin me alive if I neglected one of her precious children. Even without that threat, I want to see all three of you become accomplished shinobi. That weakness of yours we just discovered isn't more serious than Naruto's impulsivity or Sasuke's stubbornness. Yes, I already noticed that."

"Thanks, sensei," she whispered as her eyes softened. "Uh… You can leave, if you want. You probably have other things to do."

"Not at all. Making sure one of my cute little students isn't left without supervision in a hospital is the top item on my to-do list today." On those words, the teacher left the wall he was crouching against all this time and sat at Hitomi's bedside. From the pouch where he should have stocked shuriken and kunai, he took a novel the girl immediately recognised: Icha Icha Paradise. While he started reading, she sat up with a pained grimace and guided Hoshihi, the closest of her cats, even closer. She put her head on his shoulders, ignoring the way his fur tickled her nose, then stayed like that for a moment, a warm and soft body pressed against hers.

"You know most of our warriors would never accept that kind of cuddle, right?" he said playfully after a while.

"But you like it, right?"

"Yeah, I like it. We all like it here. Please don't tell the adults?"

"Okay," she whispered after a while against his pelt. Her eyes closed and she stayed in that position for a long time, cradled by a concert of purrs. After a few moments, Haīro and Kurokumo joined in – when Kakashi looked up from her book, he couldn't help but raise an eyebrow as he saw his little student under a pile of giant cats.

When a nurse left her room two hours later, after chewing her up about her chakra exhaustion, Hitomi still hadn't moved, only exchanging a few words with Kakashi from time to time. It wasn't much, nothing extraordinary, but it still was enough to appease something hidden deep inside her, something that had grown agitated these last few weeks.