Smoke floods the spaces between the trees, trailing from half a dozen banked fires, turning the air hazy near the canopy. Several craters dot the landscape, crackling with ozone, framed by unnatural outcroppings of harsh rock and pools of water that sink into the cracks between them. Movement flickers in the shadows, flashes of metal glinting in the light.

This is war.

Both sides have pulled reinforcements, bolstering ranks and adding to the chaos.

Naruto hasn't had this much fun in ages.

~Come on, kit. We've caused enough havoc here, time to rendezvous with your team.~

"Yeah, I think we need a war council." He agrees, body flickering back into the depths of training ground 31. With the ease of long practice Naruto reaches out with his senses, seeking familiar chakra signatures in the mess of energy they've turned the area into. As usual it's Sasuke he finds first, the familiar cool sharpness of his chakra a beacon against his senses. By the dark smooth texture of the chakra signature nearby, he's with Shikamaru. He finds them hunched together in conversation in an alcove covered by a curving wall of natural granite, the entrance blocked mostly from sight by a pair of wild cherry trees. Naruto lands nimbly on the low branches of one, just as he hears Sasuke call; "About damn time. Get in here."

"So grouchy," Naruto laughs, swinging into their little camp. They have a couple of scrolls open between them, new jutsu by the look of them, along with a surprisingly detailed map of the area drawn into the soft clay.

Sasuke grabs him by the arm and tugs him in, and they hunker down over the map.

"Where are the others?" Shikamaru asks, a smoothed-out tree branch held loosely between his fingers. He doesn't take his eyes off them map.

"Not sure where Kiba and Choji got off to after they clashed with Anko and got separated, but last I saw Ino and Sakura were giving Aoba hell around here, before Genma almost cornered me by the river rise and I had to book it," Naruto informs him, pointing out the place on the map where he'd last seen the girls. "Where's Hinata? I thought she was with you two."

"She was, but she went off with Shino to grab Choji and Kiba," Shikamaru mulls, rubbing his jaw as he ponders the map. "We have to get everyone together and regroup or this is going to dissolve out of our favor quickly."

"This site will be compromised soon," Sasuke adds. "We disengaged from Hayate too close to here for it to be undiscovered for much longer."

Shikamaru nods. "You two find Ino and Sakura, break them off of their fight if you have to. I have a good lock on Choji's location– I'll go get him and everyone else." He taps the end of his stick at another spot on the map. "We'll meet here by the springs in training ground 27."

"Sounds good to me," Naruto chirps, and Sasuke scoffs but follows him as he stands, a tiny smile lurking at the corner of his mouth.

They honestly hadn't meant for it to escalate quite this badly. But Genma had just been so much fun to mess with, and it had been his idea to pull in crazy lady Anko to even the odds.

Things had just kind of devolved from there.

None of the Jounin instructors have gotten involved yet, which is probably a good thing– especially if they're anything at all like Kakashi-sensei.

Right now though, Naruto is liking their odds.

They find Ino and Sakura fuming on the river, obviously aggravated about having lost their prey.

"Aoba give you the slip?" Sasuke asks Sakura as they land at the bank.

Sakura growls and aims a kick at a river rock so hard that part of it splits in half and goes hurtling through the air, missing Naruto's head by a couple centimeters max. Naruto sends her an annoyed look and doesn't flinch– even when angry Sakura's control is close to flawless, and Naruto has pretty solid faith in that control, whatever her emotional state.

"Slippery asshole," she snarls.

"We'll get him," Ino insists. "He can't have gone that far, body flicker or no." She looks towards them from where she had been scanning the trees, flaxen hair swaying in the light and catching it. It's a little bit singed on one side and her bangs are uneven lengths, but she doesn't seem to be that upset about it at the moment.

She spots Sasuke and waves. "Hi, Sasuke-kun!" she calls, and Naruto has to give her some credit–it's only a little bit dreamy.

"Ugh," Sasuke grunts, and then very pointedly maneuvers himself so that Naruto is planted firmly between them.

Naruto snickers a little as Sasuke's discomfort, earning himself a jab in the ribs. Naruto knows that it's not actually the attention that bothers him– at least that's not all of it. He hates people who are in love with the idea of him, and that's not just fans– it's well wishers too, and the strings that come with a stranger's pity. Naruto doesn't blame him one bit.

"We're falling back for now," Naruto informs them. "Shika's got a plan in the works."

"Rodger," Sakura says brightly, bumping arms with Ino. "Come on blondie. We'll get him back for the haircut later."

"We'd damn better," Ino growls, but follows after readily, trailing behind Sakura as they leap up into the trees.

On the way to their meeting spot Ino eyes him strangely, gaze flitting back and forth between him and Sasuke before she sidles up to him, leaping side by side with him through the branches. "So…" She starts vaguely. "You two are pretty close, huh?" The way her eyes keep tracking towards Sasuke's back make it obvious who she's talking about.

Naruto blinks at her for a few seconds before his gaze turns suspicious. "Why?" He doesn't actually answer her because the answer is obvious, and she smiles slyly at the unspoken acceptance of her statement.

"I'm curious how you managed it, is all," She says with false casualty, waving her hand as if to dismiss his suspicions. "Any advice you can give would be welcome. Care so share?" She asks sweetly, and now Naruto's bullshit sensors are going off in earnest– something is up, and for some reason he gets the feeling that Ino isn't asking for herself.

"No," he says firmly. Eyeing her warily.

For some reason that only seems to encourage her, a mischievous glint firing off in her periwinkle peepers that makes Naruto feel like he's stepped on a trip wire. "Oh really? Not even one word of wisdom?"

And Naruto has no idea what her game is, but that protective instinct in him is flaring again. "I don't fall all over him for being someone or something he's not, if that's what you're asking," he says lowly. He doesn't mean it as an insult, but he doesn't like what she's implying either.

She doesn't look hurt, but the syrupy sweet smile she'd been sporting drops away into something surprised. "Wow. You two really are close," she observes.

Naruto shrugs. "It's not that odd. Are you not close to Shikamaru and Choji?"

"That's different. Our parents have been friends for forever. We were practically raised as siblings," Ino counters, leaping a little farther ahead of him so she can face him as they travel. Her spacial sense must be almost as good as his– she hardly has to look around her to know where the branches will be.

"We've been friends for two years. Why are you just now asking about it?" Naruto wonders.

"Because you two aren't just friends. You're friends with Kiba, but that doesn't mean you two read each other's minds. I saw you and and Sasuke thrashing Genma together; do you click like that with all your friends?" Ino demands, her gaze probing. "Because that was something else to watch."

Naruto is shaking his head before she's even finished. "That's different."

"How so?" She asks, genuinely intrigued, and Naruto makes a face.

"You honestly want me to try and explain that?"

"Can you not explain it?"

Naruto grimaces again. "What's with the grill session here? I'm bad with words, okay?"

Ino holds her hands up in placation. "Easy big guy. I'm just curious, is all."

"You get really curious really fast then," Naruto grumbles. "Look, it's just different. He's different. We just… sync, I guess."

"Sync?"

"Yep. And that's all I'm going to say about it."

"Alright, alright. So defensive." Ino sidles up next to him again, but drops the subject, instead going into the topic of mixing up styles– she'd gotten a look inside Aoba's noggin for a couple of seconds and even though the Tokujo's head had been heavily compartmentalized (a byproduct of being a spy apparently) she'd gleaned enough off the surface to know that he was starting to clock the patterns in their movements and it was time to switch things up.

"Shikamaru was probably thinking the same thing," Naruto agrees.

Ino snorts delicately. "I'd be surprised if he hasn't already figured out how to wrap this tiny war up in a neat little bow. He's been crazy on point lately as far as the strategies go."

"Waiting? What kind of tactic is that?" Naruto asks, curious rather than accusatory.

"A psychological one." Shikamaru replies lazily, hip cocked against a boulder at the edge of the springs tucked deep into training ground 27. "Let them worry themselves sick about tracking us down while we rest up and change strategy. And lick our wounds in Kiba's case."

"It's a scratch," the Inuzuka growls, leaning back against a fallen tree trunk with his legs crossed over the forest floor. He'd stripped out of his fluffy jacket and has his mesh shirt pulled up over his chest as Sakura mutters over the gouge in his side. It's a nasty wound mostly because it tapers in a jagged arc from over his hipbone to curl up over his lower ribs, flared at the edge like the teeth on a saw.

Shino leans down to watch the proceedings with interest, eyes fixed on Sakura's hands as she pulls energy back and forth, channeling chakra in concentrated streams to stitch tissue and focus healing.

"Fascinating." He murmurs. "Your chakra control is prodigious. I don't suppose you'd be willing to teach me a few of your first aid techniques? I feel that keeping this idiot on his feet is going to be a full time job."

"Screw you, bug boy." Kiba mutters amicably.

Hinata stands hovering nearby, twisting her hands together nervously. "You're sure he'll be okay?"

Sakura laughs shortly. "He's fine. A stubborn idiot, but fine."

"I don't suppose you have a cure for that?" Shino asks blithely, swaying out of the way when Kiba takes a swipe at him.

Sakura pins his shoulder back against the tree crossly. "What about 'sit still' was so hard to understand, dog breath? Don't. Move."

Kiba winces at the shove and gives her a nervous lopsided grin– as if reminded suddenly that Sakura could crush the bone under her hands with vey little effort. "Yes ma'am." He says sweetly, and then turns his head to Akamaru. "Sic'em boy."

With an affirmative yip Akamaru leaps, springboarding off Sakura's back and launching himself full throttle at Shino's chest, knocking him back into the dirt with a grunt. Kiba snickers, and smiles wide when the antics startle a smile and a giggle out of Hinata.

~Quite the bunch you've gathered here.~ Kurama muses, curled contentedly in the back of Naruto's thoughts.

Naruto hums in agreement, his attention called up when Sasuke comes out of the surrounding trees and sits beside him on the warm boulder he'd claimed as his own.

"Traps are set." He says with a huff.

"How's the burn?"

Sasuke holds up his arm instead of answering– other than a slim streak of red the burn he'd gotten from their fight with Genma is practically gone.

"Sakura's getting good at that." Naruto muses, and Sasuke narrows his eyes.

"You got that flashfire jutsu worse than I did."

Naruto shrugs. "Side-effect of the mach-nine healing factor. My burn was gone in a few minutes."

"Seems like cheating to me." Sasuke mutters, but he's not actually cross about it.

"And having super sight that can practically predict the immediate future isn't a cheat?" Naruto ribs good-naturedly, and Sasuke bumps their shoulders.

There it is again, that click, that synchrony. Naruto suddenly remembers Ino's words about their friendship being strange, but that's the thing– nothing about this feels strange. Sasuke just slots so easily into his life, like there's a place carved out in Naruto's spirit made just for him. It hasn't always been that way, obviously– there had been so much emotional debris and fractured pride in the way at first, old hurts left unhealed and festering, too much of a mess of dark feelings to be room for much else.

But once they'd cleared everything out, washed light into the cracks of their dark places and dealt with their demons, everything had settled. Naruto wonders sometimes if they hadn't accidentally swapped pieces of themselves in the confusion, in those first few months of pain and conflict where they'd raged and crashed against each other. It would explain the way boundaries and thoughts start to blur when they sit alone together, it would explain why their body language tunes in a fight or even just standing still, it would explain why he can tell what Sasuke is thinking just by the way his eyes crease at the corners.

"Do you think this is weird?" he asks quietly.

"Hmm?" Sasuke questions, eyeing a scratch on the blade of his tanto with distaste.

Without really thinking about it Naruto pulls one of his storage scrolls off his belt and unrolls it, trailing his fingers across the seals until he finds what he's looking for. With a quick flick of his fingers and a pulse of chakra he unseals a whetstone and hands it to Sasuke, who takes the tool with a soft nod of thanks and goes to work on his blade.

"This." Naruto murmurs, tapping a knuckle to Sasuke's chest and the gesturing between them.

Sasuke looks up, brows furrowed for a moment of confusion. But then blue eyes meet black and Sasuke blinks a few times, his expression smoothing out into understanding.

He snorts, a little slice of a smile flashing the white of his teeth. "I have no idea."

Naruto laughs at that. "Me neither."

"I'm going to string Kakashi up over the Hokage tower by his intestines."

Anko looks up at Genma's dramatics from where she's wringing out her vest. "Cry me a river, Shiranui."

"What the hell are they teaching those Genin?" Hayate asks, still bent over a little, his breath coming too shallow to be good for Aoba's blood pressure.

"Forget that." he growls. "What the fuck is Hatake feeding those three monsters of his? The pink one hit me with a earth-water combo most Chuunin couldn't pull off. Not to mention those twin demons got the drop on you."

Aoba directs the last part at Genma, who scowls and clicks his senbon against his teeth. "I'll tell you one thing. I've seen a lot of pair fighting in my life, taken down my fair share of dual acts; good ones too." Genma takes the senbon out of his mouth gingerly, like the way one might hold a cigarette, and points it towards the edge of the lake that had been their battleground. "And I have never seen that before."

The span of the bank at the lake's edge looks like ground zero for a natural disaster. The ground has been upturned, charred, electrocuted, flooded, blown up and pounded down until it's nothing more than a cracked black mess of broken earth reminiscent of a meteorite crater. Aoba had seen the first half of the fight but missed the tail end of it when the she-devils had gone for his throat. Literally.

It had been pretty surreal to watch Genma, The Flashfire, wanted man and cold blooded assassin, struggle to take down a couple of pre-teens.

Then again, Aoba hasn't seen a couple of pre-teens that strong, not since Kakashi himself. And two powerful pre-teens that could flow together like old partners? Never.

Genma grunts and rubs the back of his his neck in frustration. His left eyebrow is doing that twitch thing that it does sometimes after really long missions or dealing with Gai too much, his eyes slightly wild as he scans through the trees for any sign of the nine ninja brats. "I'm supposed to be watching Kakashi's kids, not hunting for them through the woods like this is a B-rank tracker mission."

"Relax, Genma." Hayate soothes as he takes a seat on one of the upturned boulders. "Knowing Kakashi, he probably knew something like this would happen."

"They don't listen." Genma growls. "How the does Kakashi wrangle these little shits regularly?"

"Kakashi doesn't have this kind of trouble with his brats." Anko cuts in. "It must just be you they don't like."

"Oh they like us just fine." Hayate counters. "The Uchiha even asked me to show him some kenjutsu while we fought. I just don't think they see us as authority figures."

"We outrank them." Aoba whines.

"Only on paper, apparently." Anko mumbles, pulling off one of her long boots to shake the rock dust out of it. "Why the hell are they still Genin again?"

"The exams aren't for another few months." Hayate supplies helpfully.

"You proctoring that?" Aoba asks.

Hayate nodds.

Genma checks the position of the sun and grimaces, cracking his knuckles in preparation. "Come on. I don't know about you three, but I'm not letting a bunch of Genin catch me unaware."

They catch him unaware. The Tokujo lose the war.

Kakashi stares down at Genma as he lies scowling over the grassy ground, hand placed suspiciously over his masked mouth. Genma flips him off.

"I hate you."

Kakashi does laugh at that, low chuckles under his palm. "I did tell you they could be obstinate."

"Unless obstinate is some kind of code for demonic, that was not an appropriate disclaimer."

Kakashi laughs again, which is weird since Kakashi's quota for real laughter usually never exceeds a maximum of twice every month or so. "To be honest, I didn't actually expect them to get the entire graduating class involved," he defends.

"Get it off, get it off, GET IT OFF!" Anko shrieks from nearby, hopping about and waving her arm wildly like it might send the seal etched on her skin flying if she just shakes it hard enough.

Kakashi raises a dry eyebrow at her. "It's a seal, Anko. Not a spider."."

"GET IT OFF." she demands viciously. "I CAN'T. CHANNEL. MY. CHAKRA."

Aoba curses colourfully from halfway up the pine tree he'd been shadow possessed into. Judging by the difficulty he's having getting down, he still hasn't managed to break the genjutsu he's under.

"To the left, Aoba. Left." Hayate directs. "No, no your left."

"Fuck it, I'm jumping." Aoba declares, and before Hayate can gainsay him otherwise Aoba leaps, obviously aiming for the loudest thing he can use for direction, which in this case happens to be Anko. They go down snarling and striking like cats, cursing and hissing.

Hayate sighs, rubbing the bridge of his nose with the back of his thumb.

"A couple tents short a full circus." Kakashi drawls.

"Just help me up, jackass." Genma growls. He's still out of breath from where he took Choji's expanded fist right to the diaphragm, not to mention dizzy from the combo platter of Yamanaka mind altering jutsu– which had swapped his sight with Hayate's, he's pretty sure even Inoichi can't do that consistently– and Hyuuga taijutsu that he got caught up in when he was paying too much attention to the Inuzuka brat.

Kakashi readily offers a hand and pulls him up slow and easy, so that Genma's already rattled neurons don't shake anymore than they already are. "It's not like you let someone catch you unawares." he comments offhand.

"Well excuse me if I wasn't expecting Genin to use guerilla tactics." he snarls.

Kakashi claps him on the shoulder amicably. "If there's one thing I've learned, it's that underestimating them is a bad idea."

"Did anybody clock where they went?" Aoba asks after he and Anko have managed to extract themselves from each other.

"Oh hell."

Genma turns around at the low voice and smell of smoke to see Asuma alight at the edge of the clearing.

Kurenai appears not long after, tucking a bright laugh behind her curled fingers. "I think we've created a monster."

Asuma rubs the back of his head wearily. "It's not like they needed much encouragement."

Kakashi hums, casting his gaze up into the trees. "Okay you three, come on out. Fun's over for today."

"Aww."

Kakashi's three brats drop out of seemingly thin air, followed not long after by teams 8 and 10.

Asuma looks thoughtfully up into the trees where the brats came from, noting the strange composition of the illusion that had been cloaking them. It's not a genjutsu– Genma would have noticed a genjutsu. Asuma's eyes then track immediately to Shikamaru, who has his hands stuffed low in his cargo pants and a bland expression on his sharp Nara features. "How long have you been keeping that little trick up your sleeve?" he asks his charge.

Shikamaru shrugs. "Couple weeks."

Asuma hums approvingly, but doesn't say anything more.

"Asuma-sensei! I figured out the cross perception jutsu!" Ino chirps, dancing over towards her teacher.

Asuma ticks an eyebrow up with a smile. "Did you now?"

And then suddenly the air is filled with the sound of chattering twelve-year-olds as they talk over each other to tell their Jounin-senseis what they learned, and Genma watches with no small amount of fascination as the three strong willed little brats that had been giving him so much trouble practically clamor for Kakashi's attention. And he gives it– crouching down to listen and respond as they ask questions and show him hand signs and tell him theories and ideas, even reaching forward to gently correct a sequence of signs for one of Naruto's jutsu that didn't quite go right.

To his right Kurenai is ruffling Kiba's hair with both hands and praising hinata for her ingenuity at the same time. She then reaches over as Shino starts to speak coolly as well, adjusting his hood fondly and nodding as he recounts his use of her teachings in illusions to disrupt Aoba's special senses.

Asuma is laughing as Choji recounts his courage against Genma and Anko, rubbing the Akimichi's head with his knuckles. Ino practically hangs off his arm and chatters in his ear all the while, adding her take to Choji's story and telling her own tales in between. Shikamaru doesn't talk other than to clarify a few things, but softens his rigid stance when Asuma rests a hand on his shoulder.

...Well shit. Genma finds his sour mood evaporating quite against his will, bringing a reluctant smile to his face. Anko harrumphs from behind him and drapes herself over his shoulders, leveling an accusing finger at Naruto.

"You."

And the kid has nuts, Genma will give him that, because he has the nerve to blink and look around, as if to imply who, me?

Anko nearly lunges, but Kakashi steps in before she can get too fired up.

"She has a mission tomorrow, cub."

Naruto sighs dramatically "Oh fine," and squeezes between his teammates to go over to Anko and Genma, unafraid, and hold his hand out expectantly. Anko eyes him suspiciously but hands over her arm. The kid makes a few hand signs, including one Genma doesn't even know, and then touches two fingers to the center of the seal on Anko's upper arm.

With a flash of white-hot chakra and a sound like breaking glass the seal dissolves right off her skin. Naruto, job done, hops back over to his sensei and settle next to his partner in crime again, the dark haired Uchiha swaying out of his way to make room for him without thought.

Kakashi laughs and straightens, turning to the Tokujo as they pick themselves up and crowd behind Genma. "Well we did inconvenience you all day." he allows. "How about we make it up to you with an early dinner?"

"Food?" Aoba asks, focus instantly captured.

"Oh! We can make curry! Our curry is the best." Sakura claims with feeling.

"We have enough room now, I suppose." Sasuke reasons.

"Can everyone come?" Naruto asks Kakashi.

Kakashi tilts his head. "Of course. It's as much your home as mine."

"Did I hear curry?" Choji demands.

Asuma laughs. "Now you've done it."