After their vacation and surprise illegal leaf ninja mission, the three women agreed to stay tight lipped about it. Kaeda seemed unbothered, but constantly was checking with Kohaku about if she had tattled on them. Kohaku would always pretend that she had no idea about the whole affair and Yasahashi took the Uchiha's lead.

The village seemed none the wiser about their off-the-books adventure. However, one day Yasahashi was called to the Hokage's office all of a sudden and she wondered if it might be the reason.

Though, she wasn't too concerned. There was a chance the visit would have something to do with a recent job she had begun involving some alteration of the hidden pathways beneath the village.

Known as Project Snakes Nest, the job was quite sensitive and involved getting clearance from the intelligence department and swearing an oath of secrecy. She wasn't looking forward to the possibility of seeing her older brother in the Hokage's office that day, but fortunately as she entered the hot, sticky, hokage's office during a late August afternoon, it was just the Hokage sitting behind his desk.

"Sir?" Yasahashi bowed.

"Yasahashi Koizuma," he smiled, "Welcome."

She stared at him expectantly. On his desk there were stacks of papers and a forehead protector probably left by someone.

"What is it?" she finally dared to ask, "Is this about Project Snakes Nest?

She still had a lot of questions about the project herself, though much of it was behind red tape and required higher security clearance. Although a professional, Yasahashi couldn't stand that in this instance, her brother knew more about her work than she did.

"Come with me," The Hokage smiled.

The third Hokage took Yasahashi up to the top of the Hokages monument. Wind whipped her dusty hair back as she stared at the village skyline. The Hokage pointed out.

"That intersection over there is one of yours isn't it?"

Yasahashi looked where he was pointing and nodded.

"I worked on that after the nine tails."

"And over there?" He pointed at another group of buildings.

"The Uchiha quarters renovations,"

"Yes, they look nice from up here,"

"Yeah."

"You're becoming a talented urban planner, Yasahashi."

"Thanks, my lord."

"No doubt following in the footsteps of your wise professor."

She nodded. She had never heard the Hokage mention Professor Ayame before, but she was glad to hear he held respect for him.

"Koizuma-kun," he said, "you may not know this, but when you were still in the ninja academy, your father wrote to me, begging me not to allow you to be graduated and given genin status in the village."

Yasahashi nodded, "I'd… I'd heard that, yes."

"And it was for good reason, you understand."

She nodded.

"I… regret that during the 3rd ninja war we relied so heavily on the youth. Please understand, it was a decision made by the full council. While it's true that we would have liked to have passed you, Yasahashi, you would have likely died on the battlefield. Your father may have saved your life from our mishandled leadership."

Yasahashi watched the traffic move below them. "It's alright, Hokage-sama."

"Of course, what was once the case for you as a child no longer applies today. The decision is your own now."

The old man looked at her. He pulled out the forehead protector which she had just seen resting on his desk earlier and handed it to her.

"Sir…?" She took it. She felt like a rush of wind had just hit her. And, it did, since they were so high above the village.

She stared at the shining object in her hands, mouth agape. Sunlight caught on it's silver surface, blinding her.

"Congratulations, Yasahashu Koizuma. As of this day, you are officially granted genin status." the third smiled, "you are hereby welcome to enroll in our genin missions programs as you see fit for yourself."

The headband felt lighter than expected in her hands as she walked home from the Hokage's tower through the streets she had built. She tried it on in the mirror that night, still wearing her civilian clothes. But as she stared at herself, she saw a strange young woman she didn't recognize. She put the headband in her closet with her ninja gear.


Although Yasahashi had been looked-over as a taijutsu teacher, she still found her reflexes useful in dealing with some of the more disreputable students.

"Catch, sensei!" shouted one of the 5th year boys. She dodged a kunai which was headed right for her, it hit the classroom wall behind her and stuck. With wide eyes, she looked at him.

"What's your name?"

"That's Hifumi," a girl called, "He's a psychopath!"

The boy threw another kunai and missed. The heavy object clanked onto the wooden floor. The students in the class shrieked and laughed.

"I missed on purpose that time," he grinned daringly.

"You want me to flunk you on the first day or something?" Yasahashi asked.

The boy was consistently a problem.

"Let us know if you need any help adjusting," Iruka said when he and the other professors had been helping Yasahashi get all set up in the teachers office. They gave her Mizuki's old desk. As she was inspecting her storage space, she found a crumpled up love note he'd scribbled to Kaeda in the back of a drawer. She'd have to burn it later.

"Oh, and if there are any kids you're having trouble with," Iruka said, "definitely let us know and we can help you out. I know there's a couple in your 5th year class…"

"Yeah, watch out for that Hifumi Tatsuyo!" Daikoku laughed from the other side of the pillar, "Him, and then Konohamaru in the 3rd years."

On the other end of the spectrum was an extremely shy girl named Chiyo, whom Hifumi often picked on. Neither of them did their homework.

"Why do ninjas need to know math anyway?" Hifumi bounced out of the classroom, stealing Chiyo's bento and cackling.

"N-no!" Chiyo cried. Then she buried her head in her hands.

"Dumb Chiyo, don't leave your lunch out," another student chided her, "That's inviting for him to take it."

Yasa watched the scene unfold with narrow eyes. The girl, Chiyo, began crying silently and she would continue to cry for the rest of the class period, She seemed to cry even more when you tried to talk to her about it.

The classroom was a bubble of noise and chatter. She stared at the students in a sudden moment of recognition, as she remembered being on the opposite end of all this. She never in her days as a ninja student imagined becoming a math teacher for ninja.

"Why do ninjas need math?" Yasahashi muttered, repeating the delinquent boy's question, "Well, why does the world need ninjas?"

None of the kids answered, as they were all distracted and talking amongst themselves. Yasahashi felt her face go flush. Is this how Professor Ayame felt?

She hit the chalkboard with her fist. "Someone answer my question," she said sternly. The children looked up at her in shock and grew mostly silent.

"Why does the world need ninja?" she repeated. She lowered her fist from the chalkboard and her gaze fell on the windows as the students whispered. She needed some plants over there.

A kid in the back row shot up her hand, "Oh! It's because we have to fight to keep everyone safe!"

"Pretty sure it's only because ninjas are super cool."

"So we can be better than other countries."

Yasahashi turned to the board and started writing out a list of professions. As she moved the chalk on the board, she remembered Professor Ayame's own hypnotic scrawl.

She turned around to face her students with a spring in her step. "Can someone tell me what all of these have in common?"

The kids whispered.

"They're all not ninja things?" said the same girl in the back, "Actually, are they all math things?"

"They all use math, very good." she said. Then she added "ninja" at the very end of the list.

"As you can see, there are many uses for math. And, the ninja profession is just one of them. Who can guess how ninjas might use math?"

Hifumi burst into the classroom and pointed at Yasahashi, "You're not a real ninja!" he said. He threw another shuriken at Yasahashi. She dodged it and demanded the boy sit down.

Ferns. She'd need plenty of ferns in here.

"Iruka, can I ask you about some students?" Yasa sighed, catching Iruka in the teachers office. She stared at the obtuse circular pillar in the middle of the teachers office like it had wronged her.

Iruka was crouched over his desk, in the middle of something, but nodded, "Is this about Hifumi Tatsuyo?"

Yasa's look said it all.

"He's always been hard to manage. He'd be like Naruto 2.0 if Konohamaru didn't already have that title."

Konohamaru was in her 3rd year class, but he wasn't at all on Hifumi's level. Sure, he'd taken the whole "why does the world need ninja" question pretty personally and spent the class period arguing obnoxiously with her about it, but she didn't mind. At least he responded to her.

"What about this kid, Chiyo Kabuchi?"

"Well, she's just shy," Iruka thought a bit more, then he looked down at his papers and sighed. "Look, we can talk more tomorrow after work. Sorry, I'm crunched suddenly with some mishandled entrance papers, and on top of some other work…"

"Sure, but do you have their files around here I can look at though?"

Iruka directed her to a cabinet, where she was able to pull out the academic files on both Hifumi and Chiyo.

Chiyo's file indicated that her grades had slipped drastically during the latter half of the previous year. There was a note about her being bullied by the other students consistently during this time, though for what, it wasn't clear.

Hifumi's file was much larger. It consisted of long strings of delinquent actions and reprimands over the past couple years, angry notes written by frustrated teachers, reports and complaints from parents of students he'd got into fights with. Lots of talk about him being a psychopath.

"What are Hifumi's parents like?" Yasahashi asked.

Iruka was preoccupied writing something, but chimed in after a moment, "They are both passed. He lives with his aunt, a chunin."

"How did they...?" Yasa trailed off, wondering if she was pressing the stressed academy teacher's attention, "Sorry, we can pick this up tomorrow?"

Iruka smiled embarrassedly, tapping his pen on papers he was working on, "Yeah, sorry, I'm really crunched. Have a nice night, Yasahashi-san. Please don't worry too much about the students. Trust me, it's easy to lose sleep over it."

Hifumi was absent the next day. Though, Chiyo didn't seem that better off for it. Something had happened in an earlier class which led her to be upset by the time she got to math.

At the end of the day, Yasa looked out at the empty classroom, contemplating the challenge in front of her. She left to find Iruka, but he wasn't in the teacher's office so she started packing up, wonder if she could make it to the plant nursery before they closed. Of course, she spotted the academy professor in the hallway as she was heading out,

"Yasa-san!" Iruka said, "Sorry, I was dropping off some papers with the Hokage. We can talk now, if you'd like,"

They didn't bother to go back into the teacher's office, instead choosing to stand outside the door in the hallway. Yasa had already seen both their files, she just wanted to know more about her student's home lives, and the both of them seemed to want to keep this brief.

"Chiyo…" Iruka looked up in recollection, "She has to learn to stand up for herself, and she knows it, or else all the other kids are going to keep barragging her."

"Did anything significant happen that caused her sudden shyness last year?"

Iruka pondered this, "I honestly can't think of any specific instance," he shook his head. "Ask Shizume, she might know more about Chiyo from their kunoichi class."

"What about Hifumi? How'd his parents die?"

Iruka frowned, "Hifumi's parents were killed in a freak accident in the home," he looked at her, "but, it's not what you'd think. I know he acts like he wants to hurt people, and he's always being labelled as a psychopath, but Hifumi.." he sighed, "I don't think he really wants to hurt anyone. I think he just… hurts." There was weight in the academy teacher's words, as if he personally understood the boy.

"He... have any siblings or cousins? His aunt, does she treat him okay?"

"As far as we know. His aunt is a pretty high-marked chunin. She's always apologizing for his actions. And there's no one else living with him. He used to have a dog, but the dog also died when the roof collapsed."

Yasahashi froze. "The roof?"

Iruka nodded gravely, "Yeah, the roof collapsed suddenly on the family in the middle of the night,"

She suddenly started to think back to every roof that she had ever built. Her face paled a bit.

Another person rounded the corner, interrupting their talk. It was her brother Shun.

"Yasa, there you are, I need your help-" he suddenly cut off and made eye contact with Iruka. They stared at eachother strangely. Yasahashi looked between the two chunin, trying to figure out what was going on.

"You two... know eachother?" Yasa asked.

"N-no." Iruka said slowly. "Sorry."

Yasa caught just the slightest blush on her brother's face. She rose her eyebrows.

Shun very quickly turned to Yasahashi, "I need help on that case I was telling you about. You know, the one with the underground tunnels the neighbors were fighting over?"

Yasa grimaced at that, "Hey, you know I'm busy here now. You gotta go to the planning department for that."

"Well... you did work on a.. specific project in that area, so you would be the most qualified to assess-"

Yasa nodded in understanding, "Yeah, okay, that does make sense, but…" she ran a hand down her face.

"I promise you won't have to deal with Kimura, don't worry. I got your back." Shun said, noticing her strain.

"No, it's not that-"

"Are you three going out drinking?" came a 4th voice echoing down the school hallways. They all recognized it as belonging to the 3rd hokage.

"Hokage-sama!" Iruka blushed, "I have the chunin exam papers in the office, one moment, I'm sorry."

He waved, "It's no trouble Iruka."

Iruka darted out of the situation and the leader of the village stood with the two Koizumas. He smiled at both of them, "Yasahashi, it appears you've got your foot in two worlds," he laughed.

Iruka came back out and handed the Hokage a folder.

"Thank you, Iruka. You three have fun, now. Don't do anything I wouldn't do!" the old man disappeared around the bend of the hall.

"Was he drunk?" Shun asked.


Kakashi's Prius, here! Just a PSA here: don't light candles in your vehicle! And definitely don't leave them on over night. If your car smells strange, put in an air freshener, exorcise the demon, or simply deep clean! Ain't no shame!