Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto

Arriving at the training ground I found Minato was already there - likely the work of the Hiraishin, being able to travel to any location you had set a seal seemed a little bit like cheating to me. I had found one of the seals outside my own house even though Minato lived just next door which spoke a great deal to how much he was using the technique.

Minato nodded seeing me "Ah Ko, How was your training? You look well."

I smiled as I greeted Minato "My training went better than I think you might have expected Sensei."

Minato rose an eyebrow and seemed to be about to inquire further but Kakashi streaked in from nowhere, Minato looked faintly surprised so he hadn't sensed his approach, I had only barely sensed some kind of chakra approaching from the very limits of my range before kakashi was suddenly standing next to me.

"Kakashi, right on time!" Minato exclaimed, "You look… different, it looks like Ko wasn't the only one to have some success with his training."

Different was right, disregarding my sense of his chakra which now crackled and snapped like it was lightning trapped in a bottle Kakashi had somewhat changed his clothing, gone was his heavier bulkier jacket which he used to hold much of his equipment. Instead over his torso he had a sleek, form fitting dark blue t-shirt that stretched up onto his face hiding the lower half, around his waist was a utility belt and below that were a pair of cargo shorts with more pockets, it seemed like he had really tried to cut down on the weight of the items he carried as well as cutting down his profile, looking at him I had no doubt that at nighttime he would be next to impossible to pick out against the darkness.

Kakashi gave what I interpreted to be a smile - it was still hard to tell with the lower part of his face covered and replied, "Orochimaru's training was… challenging and I had to make some changes but I have been able to adapt."

Minato nodded, "Good. Well, it only seems right that we have a good old fashioned spar to get familiar with our new skills but before that why don't we go for a meal to celebrate."

I nodded eagerly looking forward to a meal after a month at the Nara compound, Yoshino was a great cook but the food they provided was, matching with their lifestyle, very simple.

When I looked to Kakashi though he seemed almost stunned at the idea of food, Minato frowned and waved his hand in front of Kakashi, "Hello? Kakashi? Food?"

Kakashi blinked a few times before suddenly nodding enthusiastically.

Minato grabbed both of us and in a flash of yellow light we were stood in front of an Akimichi Yakiniku restaurant. I staggered a few steps before finding my feet and Kakashi stepped to a wall to lean against whilst we regained our bearings.

"Sensei," I groaned, "At least warn us."

Minato looked as though he had just been successful in his own private practical joke though and roundly corralled us into the restaurant where we were pointed to a half filled booth.

"Long time no see brats," Tsunade called as we walked towards the table, it looked like Minato had invited everyone here - even Gai was sat at one end next to a chuckling Sakumo. Next to them on the other side of Tsunade was Kushina and Jiraiya.

"Hey Kei, no fair I think you've grown taller than me since you went away!" Kushina exclaimed, and looking at her I realised she may be right, I was at the very least equal with her by my estimation.

Jiraiya pulled me in next to him as I made to sit down in the booth, "Hey kid, how's it going?"

I shrugged at him but grinned back, really it was impossible not to feel at least a little bit jovial with Jiraiya around, he was one of those people who carried his presence into every room he walked into.

Minato scratched the back of his head as he took his seat last, "I did invite Orochimaru Kakashi but he said he wouldn't be available."

It looked like Kakashi went a little green, though it could have been my imagination, "That's OK." He eventually replied.

"Bah! who needs that crafty snake when you have a soon to be bestselling author among you?" Jiraiya proclaimed.

"You a best selling author?" Tsunade snorted, "You can barely write mission reports."

"It's true! It's a tale of heroism, I've been working on it for a long time!" Jiraiya argued.

"I'll believe it when I see it." Tsunade dismissed.

"Why does nobody believe me." Jiraiya complained dejected.

"Can I read it Sensei?" Minato asked. I had not taken Minato for much of a reader, at least not of fiction.

Jiraiya seemed to gain back a second wind at Minato's question, "Absolutely, in fact any of you can have one of my signed first editions if you want them!"

I wasn't sure what to think, Jiraiya writing a book? It seemed pretty out of character for him, I didn't get much longer to ruminate on the idea though because our waiter appeared to take our orders after which the conversation turned to other things.

"So Ko, What did those Nara teach you?" Jiraiya asked as we ate our meal, Minato was showing Kakashi some new ninjutsu he was working on. Kushina and Tsunade seemed to be animatedly discussing something related to medical seals, I had been trying to follow the conversation but it seemed their ideas were fairly well developed already and it became harder to follow the more they talked. Gai was being as loud as he usually was but Sakumo seemed to be happily engaging him in conversation.

"Mostly tactics and strategy… and how to herd deer." I replied.

"Herding deer?" He laughed, "They must have taught you more than that, I have my own friends inside the Nara clan and they seemed very impressed with you."

"You won't tease secrets from me that easily," I signed back, I wasn't sure whether the Nara state was a clan secret but it was better so be safe than sorry with such information, besides I wasn't even sure how to explain it. "They were probably just impressed because I beat Shikaku in a game of Shogi."

Jiraiya's eyes grew large as he almost choked on his food, "You beat the Nara clan head in a game of Shogi?" He coughed, "I'm not sure whether I believe you kid."

"It's true, the whole clan came out to see since I was coming close the entire last week."

Jiraiya looked at me for a few moments before going back to his food, "You're either a very good liar or a prodigy in shogi as well."

I decided to turn the conversation away from my training since I wasn't sure what I could tell Jiraiya, "What is your book about anyway?"

Jiraiya actually seemed to grow somewhat sober at my question, "Do you remember the great toad sage?", I nodded that I did, he was a hard one to forget, "When I first saw him he said..." He seemed to debate internally for a moment, "Well, he predicted I would write a book anyway, I'm about as surprised as you about that but it seemed right at a certain point. But my book is about an idea I first heard when I was out of the village during the last war, about a world after all of the fighting. I thought for a time that after the war we would have peace but fighting continues. It's more subdued than it was before and a country wouldn't think of fighting another head on, at least not yet - no one's strong enough for that yet. So I got to thinking how would you bring about true peace. Lasting peace. And what kind of person would be needed to bring that about. I don't think I have my answer yet but I'm going to keep trying."

I nodded to Jiraiya even as my respect for him grew. True peace. Maybe my old life had something like it. Or at least the battles were going on so far away word of it never reached me. It was a worthy goal. Jiraiya brought me out of my thoughts suddenly with a question.

"Hey Ko, how would you go about creating a world like that?"

What a question. How indeed. Wars always broke out for a reason, sometimes it's the only way for a people to survive, sometimes it is over something as slight as a perceived insult. The problem seemed to be that making peace, forging ties, righting wrongs of the past - all of these things - they were all much harder than simply making war and attempting to accomplish them by force. It seemed then that I had some kind of answer.

"I would make war harder than peace. Most of the time people fight and make war because it is easier than making peace. I think if peaceful solutions were made easier than violent ones then we might see a world like the one you describe."

Jiraiya looked at me oddly, "You think warfare is easy for ninjas?"

"Oh no, not for the actually combatants, it is of course much harder for them but in war they are really more like innocent bystanders to the real perpetrators of war." I replied, waving away his misunderstanding.

Jiraiya hummed, "And how would you find these 'real perpetrators'"

"Find those who benefit." I replied simply.

Jiraiya nodded seriously in thought for a few moments before turning away and writing something in a notebook he pulled from seemingly nowhere. Eventually he turned back.

"It's a shame we didn't have this talk earlier kid, I've already sent off my final version to print but I think there is something valuable you could have added." Jiraiya lamented.

By the time we left it was still mid afternoon and Minato said he would meet us back at the training area to see how we had improved that month. Kakashi and I nodded, feeling a shared sense of relief that he wasn't going to use the Hiraishin to transport us back.

As Kakashi and I made our journey over the rooftops of Konoha I used to the time to make a deeper analysis of the change to Kakashi's chakra. Where before it felt like a gentle rumble now it crackled with an alacrity that was almost a little bit uncomfortable, it felt ready to lash out at any moment. When I observed how Kakashi moved I realised how close that was to the truth, when we move as ninja we naturally send chakra to out muscles to bolster them, what I realised Kakashi was doing now was converting some small part of the chakra he sent into electricity in order to speed up his movements, he was probably holding back for my sake on the way back to the training field but when he really tried moving I could tell already it was going to be incredible.

I frowned, there was a drawback though, he was sending charges of untamed electricity, no matter how small they were through his body. It must be incredibly painful. A glance at Kakashi's face gave no hint of that though, he didn't even seem to be concentrating much on the chakra which if left unattended could cause muscular spasms all over his body, maybe even causing damage to his heart or brain. He must be doing this subconsciously. By habit. His teacher must have been a truly fearsome taskmaster to ingratiate this level of subconscious chakra control in a month - I felt like I had been slacking off in comparison.

Naturally Minato was already stood awaiting our arrival, even if we had run at top speed we wouldn't have beaten him practically teleporting here.

"OK guys, it's time to see how much you really learned. It's you two against me, no rules but try not to hurt yourselves." he said with a small smile, he withdrew a kunai and continued, "We start when this kunai hits the ground."

He threw it into the air, it was hard to track its trajectory with the sun being out so I kept my eyes on Minato and slowly slid into my stance, I could feel Kakashi doing the same to the side of me, he flicked a quick sign my way, he wanted to regroup and plan after the initial engagement, I nodded and we both sweated out the precious few seconds left before the kunai hit the ground.

When it did I immediately summoned all of my strength and stomped on the ground, I couldn't cause any huge damage to the battlefield but with the earth as dry as it was it would be enough to fracture the ground far enough for our purposes. I suspected Minato may have laced this field with his Hiraishin seal prior to us arriving but even small fissures in the seal would disrupt their use.

I was proved correct when Minato immediately crackled out of sight after my stomp. We were just talking to one of his Hiraishin clones the real one was already out there watching, waiting to strike. Kakashi soon came to the same conclusion as I and deployed a smoke bomb which we used to escape into the surrounding trees and hopefully not into the waiting arms of Minato.

Happily he was nowhere to be found when we regrouped in a tree, I turned to Kakashi.

"New skills?" I inquired.

"I'm fast."

I rose my eyebrows, he was fast before he went on his training trip surely that wasn't all.

Kakashi saw my skepticism and followed up with "Really fast."

Really fast? Coming from Kakashi that was fast indeed but it didn't really help in formulating a plan against a man that could teleport at will. I needed more time to think.

"Could you distract?" I asked

"How long?" He replied

After precious moments deliberating I replied, "2 minutes."

Kakashi rolled his shoulders and I practically felt the electricity roiling through him before he said "We'll see."

With that speculative reply he jumped back into the middle of the training field and Minato appeared on the other side.

"You think you can take me alone Kakashi?" Minato goaded.

Kakashi didn't answer but took up a kind of crouched position. For my part I took up a comfortable position in the tree and slipped into the Nara state.

There was a crackle from Kakashi and then in a flash he was gone, at least to the untrained eye, Minato however never lost track of him though he was impressed with the improvement Kakashi had made in just a month. Minato waited a few moments for Kakashi to make the first move but realised after a few seconds that he was just running circles around him. Correctly surmising his aim was to buy time he decided to start making his own move.

Minato casually swatted a hand in a direction and a tri pronged kunai that couldn't have been there a moment ago flew from his hand straight into the path of Kakashi who somehow managed to anticipate the kick Minato was already midway into when he reappeared in a flash of yellow light in front of Kakashi.

Dodging above the kick Kakashi flipped and tried to deliver and overhead axe kick which Minato almost calmly sidestepped. Minato had a moment to realise he could smell ozone on the air before Kakashi's foot hit the ground and he was moving again at top speed, this time too fast for Minato to dodge a punch came unerringly at his abdomen it seemed to be about to hit but then Minato disappeared again in a flash of yellow light back to where he was stood in the middle of the training field.

Minato observed Kakashi consideringly from where he stood for a few moments before, at an unseen signal, Kakashi moved again and Minato threw a kunai and disappeared in a flash of yellow light.

I could see what Minato was doing. Every time he moved around the training field he claimed a little bit more of the battlefield for himself, he was careful to be covert but being I had seen him place the seals enough times to know what he was doing. The more he fought Kakashi the more seals were placed. Speaking of Kakashi, his speed was truly astonishing I had not seen such speed from anyone less than a Jonin. It was however visibly new to Kakashi and sometimes his actions were clumsy, coming either too fast or too slow. He also was falling into repeating patterns with little variance, comfortable attacks he had practiced a thousand times, effective especially at these incredible speeds but still limiting used alone.

It seemed that Minato had also realised the same thing and their exchange gradually escalated to become more ninjutsu oriented, this was where Kakashi really began to lose, he had a few useful electric based ninjutsu but he was by no means a specialist, as it stood his taijutsu and his agility were his two specialties.

I had seen enough and already knew the way to the end of this spar.

Using my Lions Mane jutsu I threw half of the kunai I had on me at Minato to force him to disengage with Kakashi - I would need a few moments to communicate the gist of my plan to him.

As he back-flipped away from the projectiles I followed my kunai and put myself in front of Minato I silently communicated with my hands behind my back to Kakashi before our Sensei realised what I was doing.

Minato caught on quick though and his eyes narrowed even as I was finishing, he didn't waste words and disappeared in a flash of yellow light to his first destination next to me and my plan threw itself into action with kakashi immediately throwing a kunai with ninja wire at Minato who disappeared again to a new location in front of me where Kakashi repeated the same the action as I leaped out of the way of his kunai.

By the time the 4th kunai was thrown Minato seemed to realise something was wrong but it wouldn't do to let him formulate a counter-plan and I engaged him wherever he went forcing him with my destructive taijutsu to teleport away. It was after almost a minute of this fighting that Minato began to try and fight back instead of merely dodging and running away, impressively he managed to catch both of my fists during an engagement and held me trapped there though he was unable to break the stalemate either. Kakashi would have helped but his part in this plan required him to stay where he was.

"I know what you're doing." Minato ground out, he was sweating a little, it seemed he wasn't accustomed to straining this much against an opponent.

"Then stop us." I replied with a smile.

Saying that I brought my hair to bear upon him like a spiked mace striking from above. Minato again disappeared in a flash but I picked up his chakra appearing in the area around Kakashi - It looks like he figured out our plan.

Kakashi held Minato off for the brief seconds it took me to reach him and drive Minato away, somehow keeping a hold of all the ninja wire he had thrown and once I was on top of Minato he teleported away again to a position close to Kakashi though not as close as before and I was able to defend Kakashi before Minato made it to him.

This game went on for a few more minutes with me defending Kakashi as we gradually ruled out the places Minato could teleport to, eventually he would be forced to teleport to a position with ninja wire already in position and Kakashi would zap him.

When finally there seemed there was nowhere left for Minato he smiled and engaged me in taijutsu again but to my surprise he moved much faster than before, internally I cursed, I should have known he was holding back - there was a reason he was a Jonin. I found myself defending on the back foot, but I didn't need a win, I just needed to get Minato into the trap so when he next threw a heavy kick at me - again almost too fast for me to react - instead of dodging I jumped with the kick and grabbed Minato's leg as I went, straight into the webbing of ninja wire that surrounded us.

'Now Kakashi!' I shouted internally, grinning at Minato as we fell into the wire. Minato though only smiled back and right on time I felt the electricity hit my body. There was only one problem though, in the final moments just as I was stunned unconscious by the electricity I saw Minato disappear in another flash of yellow light.

I came to propped against a tree, blearily I looked around and saw Minato and Kakashi talking a small distance away, seeing me awake they made their way over.

"Did you come up with that plan alone Ko?" Minato asked.

I nodded, I didn't really feel like signing a response. Something about that zap had made me feel a bit nauseous.

"That might be the best tactic an enemy shinobi has come up with to combat the Hiraishin thus far, your time with the Nara has served you well, were it not for the marker I managed to place on Kakashi that one time I got to him honestly I might have struggled." He said still grinning.

I put my head in my hands. We were so close, I should have known he would place a marker on one of us.

"Now don't take it too hard Ko, you two have shown all the qualities I hoped for from your training and more. This next month we are going to train solely on teamwork, with just two of you in the exam how you work together will have to make up for that extra man."

Kakashi nodded and so did I though I probably still looked a little upset at losing.

"You have the rest of this evening free, report back here at 7AM tomorrow."

The rest of that month we were drilled into the ground on our teamwork. It was valuable training though as much as Kakashi and I came close to resenting each other during that month, by the end of it we knew exactly where each other were in a battle situation and moved as a unit, anticipating and complimenting each other's movements, the hardest part was adapting to Kakashi's insane speed, he left me in the dust during most engagements. When at last the day came for us to leave to Suna we were just glad of the respite from training, it wasn't until I reached the gates of Konoha and stood waiting for Kakashi and Minato that it struck me that this would be the very first time I would be leaving Fire country. My entire life had been lived within its confines.

I didn't have very long to ruminate on it however for a tired sounding voice came from behind me, "You know I still want my rematch right?" I jumped and turning around found Shikaku Nara.

A little apprehensive I replied "I'd love to but I'm about to head to Suna for the Chunin exams."

His eyes seemed to glitter with something akin to amusement as he said "Oh I know..."

He didn't get to say anything more however as Minato flashed into existence a short distance away with a woozy looking Kakashi in tow.

"Ah Ko, good, you're here. Well it looks like we're ready to go. You lead the way Shikaku."

I looked up at horror at Shikaku and he seemed to read the question written in my eyes.

"Yes, I'm coming with you," He yawned, "Not for the Suna exams, I have a slightly more diplomatic business in Suna, it just happened to coincide with your departure so the Hokage chose to put us together for the trip."

He looked so innocent but I could tell there was no happenstance involved in his timing with whatever mission he had and his presence only promised untold grueling hours of Shogi to come.

I groaned internally as I hoisted my pack onto my back and made to follow them.

AN: A long time since my last update I know, stuff has just been super busy and this is kind of an in-between chapter so it has been harder to get through and I'm still not 100% happy with it. Hopefully the next one won't take as long. Please review, I hope you enjoyed this chapter and I'll see you in the next one.