Author Note: So I don't have much to do, I check ffnet for decent stories around three times a day. Loser? Probably. But I swear on the spirit of my blade that I will see stories fit that Naruto and Tsunami filter if it's the last of me!

A Demon's Dream

Chapter Eleven: Back to this Again?

Disclaimer: If you've got a witty way to do a disclaimer, you write a story. If you write a story, you run out of ways to say you don't own the subject matter that the story contains. True in this case.

Uzumaki Naruto visited the Wave country, and the ninja academy therein five months ago now. In that time, the Wave ninja had grown farther from the city folk from whom they were recruited, a trade delegation moved into Konoha, and was received wonderfully this time. A meeting was scheduled for another two months following that, and it was for that meeting that Tsunami was currently preparing. She glowered, for the umpteenth time, at her reflection in the full length not-quite-mirror.

After Naruto's brief visit, Tsunami's talents in particular had bloomed and grown even stronger than they had been before. Her mirror was therefore a wooden board with chakra-held water staying stationary over it. Her reflection in that water was what made her rather angry just then.

Like most women from Wave country, Tsunami had a body designed with an eye towards physical strength and endurance. Wave had been an agricultural society for a long time before Gato's destructive influence swept over the country, so naturally women who were strong enough to work the fields with their husbands prospered, and had more children. Simple nature. It gave her a bit of an edge over most kunoichi, but it wasn't enough to put her on par with the majority of male ninja.

Of course, in her mind she had to be strong enough for Naruto. The village had to be strong enough that he would be proud of them. And in her mind, she just didn't look like a real ninja.

No matter what she wore, from the green and brown camouflage patterns, to her jet black bodysuit, nothing seemed right. Finally she sighed and settled for the sea foam green clothes and the pseudo chuunin-vest that she had worn last time Naruto visited. She shook her head at the reflection and the mirror collapsed into its bucket.

Finally she strapped her kunai holster and shuriken pouch her legs. She casually walked out of her new home, a home which contained her apartment, and two sets of three-bedroom apartments. The complex was just another step in the advancing nin-theory of Wave country. The concept was that the teams would be together constantly, with their instructor, coming to rely ever more on one another. It seemed to be working, every now and again the teams under her would start speaking as one, or finishing one another's sentences. It should have been unnerving, but it wasn't.

The two teams, already waiting for their sensei, looked up to her and she smiled at them softly. A slight nod, and chakra began saturating their bodies. Then they were off, stinging smoke, heavy with chakra, streamed from their seven bodies as they ran.

Even running as they were, the group wasn't as fast as Naruto had been when he came to Wave country the second time. However the sudden surges of chakra from their running, was felt three days after they left their home and stopped directly in front of the chuunin guards at Konoha's southern gate. Receiving curious looks from the chuunin guards, they caught sight of the orange-clad team on Tsunami's right and one of them smiled slightly.

"Ehh… Excuse me miss, may I ask the purpose of your visit?" The chuunin smiled slightly nervous, these visitors were armed, that might mean trouble.

But the woman flashed a disarming smile at him, and two reasonable facsimiles of Naruto's fox grin were beamed from six sources at him. The overwhelming level of cheer was slightly nauseating to him, so he was quite relieved when the smiles dimmed down a bit. "Yes, of course, sorry, my students and I are just a little excited to be here. Konoha is where He's from, after all… Anyway, we're here to see the Hokage, we're from the wave's new ninja academy." This prompted a vacant stare and a confused look from the Chuunin, he glanced down to a file, bearing all registered individuals who were to be allowed entry to the village.

"Oh, ah, here it is then. May I see your identification papers?" Tsunami smiled again, more quietly this time, and handed over a sheaf of documents. The Chuunin flipped through the papers and nodded contently, handing the documents back to the woman. "Everything seems to be in order then, enjoy your stay." He turned to call one of the gatekeepers to open the gates, but the pull of chakra nearby made him look in frank amazement as all seven of the informally trained ninja candidates jumped over the gate in one leap.

He sensed their seven chakra signatures as they moved quite fast through the village towards the Hokage's tower. A smirk spread over his features slowly, he pitied the Hokage right now.

Tsunade looked up from her desk where she was deciding just how to force the stupid civilians to stay in line. After all, martial law could remain effective for only so long right? Well that was irrelevant for the moment. What was of some peculiar relevancy were the seven completely unhidden chakra signatures rapidly approaching her office.

For a brief moment she thought it might be some kind of bad assassin, but the signatures were along the lines of a chuunin and six mildly experienced genin. She tried to match them to any ninja on her duty roster, but they didn't sync up completely with normal ninja, so she tossed that notion out. She wasn't supposed to meet with anyone that she knew of today so who the devil could it be?

And before she realized it they were outside her office, smiling their way through the ANBU guards posted there, and waltzing into the office in a way that reminded her of her little brother. Or maybe it was the trio in bright orange pants and vests. And then it was quiet while Tsunade and Tsunami regarded each other appraisingly. One with a broad, foxy smile, the other with a slowly developing nervous tic.

After a few minutes Tsunami stopped smiling and looked in puzzlement at the hokage. She had a suspicion that the blonde wanted to stress her into an early grave. Finally Tsunade spoke, breaking the awkward (for the wave ninja) silence. "You have half a minute to explain who you are and why you're in my office, or I'll sic those ANBU on you."

Tsunami balked at that and put her hands on her hips in a defiant gesture. "And here Naruto-kun said you'd be a nice old lady." The orange clad trio stepped forward and leveled accusing fingers at the hokage.

They spoke, oddly, in total synchronization. "Yeah! Naruto-sama said you'd listen to us this time!" Tsunade blinked at them all, confusion outweighing rage at being called old lady. Again.

"How… how exactly do you know Naruto?" Tsunade's eyes narrowed just slightly as her tone turned slightly accusatory.

Tsunami blushed at what she saw as an implication, "W-well, you see he saved my son late last year and my father the same day and a week earlier as well and I was his team's host while they were in Wave and so…" Tsunade blinked as the woman started to ramble.

Wow, she's almost worse than Hinata… Well alright, so timid isn't in her vocabulary, but still. Tsunade didn't give a hint as to what passed through her mind, and instead seized upon another part of what she said. "Ah, so you're the Wave contingent, why didn't you say so? Frankly I didn't guess it was you, your genin are quite advanced…" The naruto-clone team blushed and scratched the backs of their heads simultaneously. The mini-kakashi snorted while his teammates gave no outward indications that they were embarrassed.

Tsunami's continuing rant faltered as her mind dissected what the hokage had said. "Actually… these are ninja trainees… See that's the problem, we don't know any jutsu in our village and that's primarily what we lack in becoming effective ninja. That's why we're here. We've traded with other villages for chakra theory scrolls, kunai, shuriken and taijutsu techniques, and several of us have begun genjutsu work. But we have no basis for real ninjutsu experimentation."

The hokage leaned forward in her seat, curious despite herself. "Why did you approach leaf if you traded with other villages for those other things?"

Tsunami blinked again, thinking that the hokage had read the letter she sent earlier. Obviously this woman was letting others handle most of her job… Tsunami wasn't sure how she felt about that. "Uhm… Hokage-sama, we tried to trade with Konoha first, however we were rebuffed by the village's elder council. Their response said 'country rubes should stay in the fields, and leave the fighting to real warriors'. That's why we talked to the other hidden villages. They wouldn't trade jutsu with us though, so we'd given up on them until Naruto-kun showed up again…" She got a rather faraway look in her eyes as her very active imagination took over.

"He was just so…

The mini-kakashi finished for her. "He was Naruto. It was kind of hard not to be dedicated to our dreams and ideals with him around." The kid was quickly on the receiving end of Tsunami's glare, but it didn't appear to faze him.

With a defeated sigh, Tsunami turned back to the Hokage. "He said that with you being the new hokage, you wouldn't let the council 'pull shit like that' anymore. Frankly I just thought that the previous hokage was annoyed at my father's recklessness still."

On the other side of the desk, Tsunade was still fuming and her fist was shaking with just barely suppressed rage. She tapped a button on her desk and a masked figure quickly came into the room. The voluptuous woman leveled a steely gaze at him, and the ANBU operative let a small shudder pass through him. "Round up every jounin instructor without a team, and six ANBU members, have them here in my office in thirty minutes, or I will be irritated. Violently, suddenly and all through the tower." Behind the mask, the ANBU paled and sprang to obey her orders. With a sickeningly sweet smile, Tsunade looked back to the Wave contingent, all of whom quickly decided that they did not want to be around an irritated Hokage. "Now then, I'll be sending along some of our best ninja with you when you leave, so lets talk about what Konoha gets out of this deal, shall we?"

Uchiha Sasuke, former ninja of Konoha. Survivor of the Uchiha Massacre. Cold-hearted bastard.

Scratch that.

Uchiha Sasuke, former ninja of Konoha; survivor of the Uchiha Massacre, loyal citizen of Konoha. The man with the golden kunai, and a whole shit-load of that stuff.

Also a gopher. Or rather he was, for some considerable time and right now he was kneading dough that would be made into his former friend's favorite dish. Money was no issue to the Uchiha, he reminded himself of this every time he looked at the pitiful sum old man Ichiraku gave him for his troubles. About a month ago, Ayame, the old man's daughter and the only other employee of Ichiraku Ramen, had begun to show Sasuke how to make the broth for the noodle-soup. A week before, he had begun to learn the rather simple dough-mixture and now he was being taught the process of bringing the dough to its proper consistency and how to slice it into the even, thin noodles that would be cooked shortly thereafter.

As usual he spent several hours at the stand, alternately ignored and berated by the old man, while Ayame was her normal supportive and helpful self. Sasuke understood largely why Naruto always ate ramen now, and he didn't think it was for flavor or price, but rather for the old man and his daughter. Even to Sasuke, who was as emotionally scarred as any veteran shinobi, they were like an uncle and cousin. Although at that precise moment, he didn't much care for his uncle.

But the day ended, as it usually did, when the dinner crowd began to appear, the old man sending Sasuke away because he wasn't quite up to a dinner crowd yet. So the raven-haired boy left, ducking out a rear exit to evade his civilian fan-girls. The ninja community did not like Sasuke, because he was a traitor, but he was the golden boy of the civilians. In an ironic twist, Sasuke genuinely wanted to befriend the pink haired girl once idolized by his teammate, but she was now pressured against being seen with him. So now that Sasuke finally made time for Sakura, she couldn't find time for him.

Sighing, slightly depressed by this particular train of thought, Sasuke walked home, keeping to alleyways and back streets all the way. He gave a meandering train of thought to what he'd do tonight… Perhaps go take in a movie, he didn't feel like being in the Uchiha compound for a while yet. Yes. A movie sounded good.

He ducked and wove through streets, using all the speed and stealth he'd gained as a ninja, at least, as much as he could without active chakra use. He didn't pay much mind to the girl he passed who stared straight forward, whispering and not blinking.

Yamanaka Ino was a decent shinobi, a better interrogator, but most of all, she would've made a good politician. She had been a potent gossiper before, but after she got to chuunin rank in the last exam (hosted by the Grass at the time), she lost all her social influence. That didn't mean she couldn't tell which way the wind was blowing though, and she could sense where the ninja were targeting their anger at no longer being accepted by the civilians.

So it was Yamanaka Ino who pressured Sakura most into staying away from Sasuke, poisoning her mind as much as she could against the boy. Sure, once she'd been among his most ardent supporters, but needs must when politics drive. The appearance of her rather coldhearted manner caused Shikamaru and Chouji to quickly and suddenly reassess their friendship with her.

But others of the rookie nine and team Gai stayed close to her, and those that did she worked to poison them as well against one who numbered among them. And it wasn't hard to convince Shino or Kiba that he was a worthless, evil man. Strangely, Hinata fervently agreed with her, which might also have altered Kiba's stance somewhat.

Ah yes, Kiba had something of an interest in the once-timid genin, although now he was trying to get her interested in him, rather than simply trying to be strong enough to protect her. Perhaps the new Hinata seemed a little more like Shino than Kiba would've liked, but she made up for it in strength, in Kiba's more animal mind.

Sakura herself was still learning at a fevered pace from her mentor, who had actual time to teach now that she didn't get caught up in paperwork. She was presently learning the more practical C and B ranked healing jutsu, those used by chuunin in actual combat. Tsunade had told her student during one session, that she would not be teaching Sakura her earth-shattering strength until years into her training. While at first this disheartened the pink-haired girl, she came to acknowledge later that she probably wasn't mature enough to use it wisely.

After all, she had thought to herself,Tsunade herself wasn't normally mature enough about her strength, and she had created the technique. She indulged in a very covert giggle the next time she saw Tsunade belt someone out of the room.

However, despite her success at the training, Haruno Sakura was not really a happy girl. No matter what she tried, she could not seem to get away enough to see Sasuke, and Sasuke seemed content enough to let her keep her good name in the shinobi world. And perhaps worse than that, was the ever widening rift between civilian and ninja populations. It was a harsh shock to the girl who had always believed Konoha to be a fairly cohesive society, and she truly did not enjoy the way it was now.

Sakura reminisced over most of these facts as she joined the dinner crowd at Ichiraku Ramen. She sighed heavily, noticing the tension from the civilian customers seated near her, and ate her noodles doing her best to ignore it.

As she walked home later that evening, she noticed a dog running from its owner, down the street.

Tsunami lay calmly in the hotel room, unable to sleep. It just didn't feel right not being around her teams. A timid knock came from the door and she moved gracefully towards it, sweeping the door open to reveal the six little children she'd just been thinking of. Their expressions were more troubled than she felt her own was and she quickly pulled them all inside.

"Now what's wrong?" She asked the trainees, who shuffled around, half-guiltily under her scrutiny.

The Naruto-clones spoke together. "We couldn't sleep… Something Very Bad is coming." Tsunami's brow furrowed in confusion until the mini-Kakashi spoke.

"It is Uzumaki-sama, but at the same time…" his female teammate picked up when he trailed off. "It isn't him as we know him."

Tsunami frowned at that, pushed away her concern and set about calming and soothing her students. Two hours later they were sleeping peacefully, huddled together in their teams as if seeking support in bad dreams. She pulled her own blanket down and went to sleep on the floor nearby, and as soon as sleep claimed her, she too realized that Something Very Bad was coming.

But Uzumaki Naruto would be safe, she believed that. He would be safe, and he would come back to her, because her dreams said so.

End A Demon's Dream Chapter Eleven: Back to this Again?

Author Note: Posting this together with twelve.