A/N: Sorry about the delay, you know how holidays can be... Relatives, parties, more relatives… Thanks for the reviews, though. They're always appreciated.

Disclaimer: See Chapter 2.

AznNarutoGrl-91 – The Naruto Cast won't be coming along for a very long time, I assure you.

Rythmic – Weren't we all like Sakura at one point? ….Or maybe that was just me. Never mind. Sabaki will grow to become much stronger than Sakura, don't worry.

"Hurry up."

Sabaki muttered under her breath in response.

"What did you say?"

"...Nothing."

As Tsuimaru grumbled and turned around, resuming his stiff gait through the forest, Sabaki rolled her eyes at the middle of his back and followed, deliberately taking her time. It was still very early by her standards, but the morning sun had already gotten a good head start into the sky and was rising steadily higher, showering the trees with light. Most of it was blocked by the canopy, but what did get through splashed the forest floor with patches of golden-white. All around, the smell of dirt, bark, wild animals, and nature in general was serving to wake Sabaki up quite well.

Yet, she had never really been a morning person. She had been jolted from her dreamless sleep by Chinji knocking on the door at the very edge of sunrise. After hearing that she had exactly one minute to get ready before he busted inside and dragged her out himself... Well, it was the first time she'd spruced herself up at the crack of dawn in less than 60 seconds.

It was hard not to be scared out of her wits when Tsuimaru greeted her outside her room, standing upside down on the ceiling. He flatly announced that they would be training in a clearing in the forest, and since Yuumoya-sensei was not the patient type, they'd best get going right away.

So here she was, taking a lovely trek through the woods of who knew which part of Thunder Country, in who knew what direction, to meet with the man who commanded the Genin that had kidnapped her to do who knew what sort of torturous exercises. Tsuimaru was leading the way and acting coldly arrogant as usual, Sabaki was trailing behind him and attempting not to make faces behind his back, and Chinji was leaping from branch to branch a little ways behind them to make sure Sabaki didn't try to escape. As if she would try to right now. Her ankle was feeling much better, true, and she didn't have to limp anymore, but the pain of that evil kunai chain was still too fresh in her mind.

"Can I ask you something?" she ventured, jogging until she was about a foot behind him.

Tsuimaru pretended not to hear her.

"Hey, I got a question."

Again, no answer.

"Hello?"

Silence.

"I'm talking to y- Ow!" Sabaki prodded his shoulder, only to have her wrist be caught by him. Holding it very tightly, he turned his head to glare her. Apparently, he wasn't much of a morning person, either. They'd stopped walking.

"What do you want?"

With a great deal of effort, she wrenched her hand free and rubbed it. "I was just thinking... And you know, I find it very strange that you guys would kidnap me and then invite me to train with you guys. Why are you doing this, anyway?"

Tsuimaru snorted derisively. "Invite? Girl, if you'd refused to come Chinji and I would've had to cut off one of your fingers."

Was he threatening her? Was that statement a threat in disguise? Sabaki backed up a few steps and laughed nervously. "Uh... You're avoiding the question." She sweat-dropped. "Why am I training with you guys?"

With a shrug, he continued walking again, albeit at a much faster pace. With a simple glance upwards, Sabaki could see that Chinji had caught up and was waiting for them directly above. She shuddered. In the morning light the pale boy looked like some sort of giant, ape-like beast of prey.

He never answered her. Whether this was because Tsuimaru didn't know why or he simply didn't want to disclose that information, Sabaki didn't know. But since Chinji had now descended to the ground and was trailing not even three feet behind her, she didn't dare try to stop him and ask again. Each second spent with Chinji behind her made her believe that he would bite her on the neck and suck her blood out at any moment. It was certainly unsettling, not the best type of feeling to have in the morning.

Within a few more minutes, the three Genin reached a clearing in the forest, as Tsuimaru had told her. On the side opposite them, with his arms crossed across his chest and a scowl cemented on his features, was Yuumoya. His cloak, she noticed, was hanging from a low branch of a nearby tree.

Tsuimaru and Chinji immediately walked forward and bowed, leaving Sabaki behind them. "Good morning, Yuumoya-sensei," they greeted in perfect unison. And in perfect monotone. She raised an eyebrow. What were they, a pair of slave students?

"And what about you?" Yuumoya slowly strode the length of the small clearing, past his students and right up to Sabaki.

Her smug attitude quickly dissolved into fear of the creepy man in front of her. "What... What are you talking about? No way I'm calling you my sensei. You killed my sensei." Sabaki, you idiot! Think before you open your big mouth, for the love of Kami-sama!

She was expecting to get stabbed, get her arm broken, some sort of painful punishment for speaking like that to Yuumoya, the person who'd orchestrated the slaughter of her team and her kidnapping... but he only stared back. And then, he planted heavy hands on her shoulders. Despite the increased intensity of fright within her, Sabaki swore she'd felt herself sink several inches into the dirt from the sheer force.

"I see that Tsuimaru did not explain to you, Sabaki..." Spoken coolly, Yuumoya glanced sideways at the aforementioned boy, who looked away and merely shrugged again. The action was mirrored by Yuumoya, who somehow managed to make even that easy gesture appear malevolent, as if hinting towards Sabaki's doom.

She gulped as he spoke.

"Your last team was unfit to have you. They were, in fact, unfit to be a part of this mortal coil. So my students and I killed them to ensure that Cloud's strand of shinobi were not infected by this weakness..."

Even though his hands were still on her shoulders, she felt a powerful emotion rise in her throat. It wasn't fear, but boiling anger. He dared to speak ill of her revered teammates and sensei, made fun of the Hidden Cloud's shinobi force, even. Sabaki wouldn't forgive him for the insults, but she knew that if she raised a finger against him, she'd be dead in the blink of an eye.

But something she said bothered her. Her last team was 'unfit' to have her? Unfit? He made her sound like some genius ninja of an ancient clan when she wasn't. She was Shikeru Sabaki, plain and simple, Genin of Kumogakure... Or rather, used to be. Now she was Shikeru Sabaki, kidnapped Genin of Yuumoya the stalker and his two flunkies.

Meanwhile, he was still talking. "...I needed a third member for my team. So in order to claim you, I had to dispose of the previous owners. And now you are mine. My student. And from now on, you will refer to me as Yuumoya-sensei, and listen to the advice of your new teammates, Tsuimaru and Chinji."

She'd balled her hands into fists. Yuumoya made her sound like an object! Property that belonged to Jounin instructors and was passed from one to another! That rat, how could he be so calm?

Before she could stop herself, Sabaki shouted, "Shut up!" and tried to remove Yuumoya's grip from her shoulders. But she found that he only held on tighter, so much that it hurt. So she resorted to frantic struggling. "You're crazy if you think I'm going to call you my sensei! You're insane! Crazy! You and your students are out of your minds! I'm never going to join your team! Not in a hundred years! You'll have to drag me kicking and screaming and half-dead-"

Yuumoya suddenly shook her very hard, so hard it stopped her tirade right then and there. As she tried to get back her bearings, he leaned towards her ear and whispered in a calculated yet murderous voice that sent chills down her back, "You are already kicking and screaming. That just leaves the half-dead bit, neh? I'm more than happy to fulfill that requirement."

Just like that, her rage vanished. Yuumoya switched his hold from her shoulders to her arms, then lifted her up and tossed her into the clearing. She rolled a little before coming to a stop at the outer edge.

This was it. She was about to buy the farm. She was going to kick the bucket. She should've been saying her prayers at that moment, since Yuumoya was definitely going to slice and dice her into mince-size pieces. Or command Tsuimaru and Chinji to do it. But Sabaki was a prisoner to her fear, and all she could do was remain in a half-lying, half-kneeling position on the ground while shivering with trepidation.

"As the newest member of this team," Yuumoya announced, acting as if nothing had happened, "I will need to assess your current abilities. We'll start with dodging."

As if given an invisible signal, Tsuimaru and Chinji leapt into the trees and disappeared into the canopy. Sabaki's senses were at an all time high. It didn't look like Yuumoya was going to kill her yet, but still, maybe this was his way of toying with his victims before finishing them off...

"Get up!" he barked, stepping forward. "And listen carefully. I have only one rule. Step out of this clearing and there will be consequences." Cracking his knuckles, he glared at Sabaki venomously, and then said, "We begin now."

Faster than her eyes could follow, Yuumoya flashed through a series of hand seals, then cried, "Katon Ryuuka no Jutsu!" A stream of flame blasted forth from his mouth at Sabaki, who had frozen midway through the process of standing up.

At the last possible second, her shinobi training kicked in, and she jumped up as high as she could, twisting upside down as she felt heat press against her body, scorching the air but thankfully not her... As she came down, she thrust out a hand to shove off the ground. However, she landed the wrong way and let out an "Ow!" as her wrist collapsed under her weight. Rolling away again, she halted in a kneeling stance, cradling her injured wrist.

Before Yuumoya could chide her for slipping up, Sabaki heard something whistle through the air. Eyes widening, she threw herself to the side, towards the center of the clearing, and looked up as a kunai buried itself into the floor. Too close.

She wasn't safe yet. There wasn't even time to begin to wonder what had happened before the sound of more projectiles reached her ears. Swallowing hard, she swiftly jumped to her feet and kicked off from the ground, leaping to one side. There were two shuriken stuck fast in the dirt where she'd been not a split second ago.

The third attack hit home. Sabaki felt several little pinpricks of pain in the back of her lower right leg, and glanced down to see senbon sticking out of her pant leg, already growing dark with blood.

"Don't let your guard down!" She didn't bother to guess what attack was coming her way next, and haphazardly dodged to the side, rolling away and biting back yelps of pain as the senbon dug deeper and deeper. A couple of soft thumps came from where she'd been, and a quick look confirmed her suspicions: two kunai, three shuriken, and about a dozen senbon, all still shaking ominously on their points.

"You might have realized now what this exercise comprises of. I remain in plain view and strike you directly. Tsuimaru and Chinji remain hidden in the surroundings, and you never know when and from which angle they attack. How long can you last, Sabaki? If you must reach the half-dead point, you might as well go all the way..."

He's enjoying this. Wincing, she got back onto her feet, this thought weighing heavily on her mind. Yuumoya was amused, entertained to see how long she could evade the rain of deadly projectiles... At the first sound, that of a kunai, Sabaki jumped forward a couple of feet, knowing it was more than enough to get out of harm's way-

Kaboom. She was blown almost all the way out to the edge of the clearing by the force of the explosion behind her. Ears ringing, feeling very bruised, she was certain she heard Chinji's crazy laugh echoing around the forest. What the hell was that?

"Exploding tag," Yuumoya's voice, once again indifferent, carried the explanation to her. At the same moment she pushed herself up on her hands, the Jounin was there, crouching down, and he unleashed two rapid punches towards her stomach.

Dull but mighty agony shot through her body. Coughing up something warm, sticky, and slightly metallic-tasting, Sabaki was jolted into the air, then fell back down on all fours. She no longer sensed Yuumoya's presence nearby; just before attacking, she'd felt his chakra aura. It was huge, much bigger than Gasumi-sensei had ever revealed his to be... It was intimidating, and it reminded her that she was going to die, right here in this miserable clearing in the hands of three demented missing-nin.

Nothing would have relieved her more than to just fall over and rest for a minute, immune to further attack while she recovered from the throbbing of her shoulders, back, wrist, and stomach. And the still sharp pain in her leg. But her opponents were vicious. They would not give her a break.

Sabaki snapped her head up and rolled away as a slew of varied projectile weapons ate into the forest floor from two different directions, sending up a cloud of dust. Whew, escaped that one. But how many more to go? How much longer could she last against Yuumoya, Tsuimaru, and Chinji? It couldn't have been longer than two minutes... No, a minute and a half since training began.

"Do I have to tell you to get up again?"

Her tormentor's calm tone, almost lazy, scared her into jumping back onto her feet, however much it hurt. With one arm draped around her stomach, Sabaki took a chance and slipped a kunai out of her holster with her good hand, flinging it in Yuumoya's direction.

One moment he was there, the next he was gone, and the kunai flew uselessly through empty air. Such speed... She blinked; he was in front of her, slamming his shoulder into her already targeted stomach... He sent her straight out of the clearing and into the trunk of a tree. With a groan, Sabaki slid down and lay sprawled at its base, beyond the ability to move anymore.

And standing with the same poise he'd had all along, Yuumoya shook his head at her. "I warned you there would be consequences if you left the clearing. Kage Bunshin no Jutsu."

Her eyes grew round with renewed terror as three copies of him appeared, one standing perpendicular on the tree trunk above her, one at her left side, close enough to touch, and the other in front of her, perhaps a couple of yards away. Something told her these were different from the ordinary bunshin. She just didn't know what.

But one thing was set in stone. Sabaki couldn't take much more of this.

Katon Ryuuka no Jutsu (Dragon Fire Skill) – Sends a stream of flame at the enemy, coming from the user's mouth.

Kage Bunshin no Jutsu (Shadow Clone Technique) – Creates copies of the user that are fully capable of dishing out attacks and absorbing damage.