"You're joking right?"

Of course the idea of going back to Tokyo was insane for Ino, she had just managed to get him out of there in one piece and now he wanted to return for his father's weapon not even considering the amount of danger he would be in if Fugaku Uchiha discovered his location, she had enough experience at this point to know the corporation had too many eyes in the city and would rat out Naruto without second thought the moment he stepped in again.

"Why would I? The only way I'm gonna be able to find mom and dad is if I get my hands on that kunai."

"How exactly? You don't know the Hiraishin!"

"No but once we have it it won't matter, if I pour my chakra into it I'm sure dad will notice and come to us right away, It's the fastest and safest way to bring them to Konoha."

"Naruto, you're not thinking about this clearly, let's say we get the kunai, what if your dad can't sense you?"

"Look, we won't know until we try and besides, I think it would be worse if Uchiha Corp gets it before we do."

"Okay you have a point there, but they don't even know where it is, it's safe for now..."

"That's a risk I'm not gonna take, dad's jutsu cannot fall into their hands and that kunai is unprotected right now, sooner or later they will find it if we don't do something..."

"You going back there is also a risk, don't you see?!"

"Then you lied."

Ino's mouth stopped before anything else was said. "Huh?"

"About me making progress, you lied about that."

"Wha-? No! That's not a lie!"

"It is, you don't believe I can handle myself out there."

"Naruto I didn't lie! You've improved a lot!"

"I don't believe you, you and the old man Hokage treat me like a child, the only who believes in me is Jiraiya-sensei." Naruto crossed his arms behind his head and started walking away, Ino followed.

"You're not listening to me! Just because I don't want you to get hurt doesn't mean I see you as a child! I know you're more than capable of handling your own now but you don't know Fugaku Uchiha like we do."

"So that's the plan huh? Konoha remains in the shadows while this guy keeps pushing... I thought being a Shinobi meant more than hiding you know."

Ino knew Naruto was right, being a Shinobi definitely meant more than just hiding but she could not disobey the village's doctrine or else she could doom their existence, yet Naruto's words echoed within her strongly, he was far more stubborn than she was and maybe this was a good thing. She touched his arm as a sign to make his stop his pace.

"Look, I need to hear a plan first..."

Naruto's smile came back "So you'll come with me?!"

"Do I have a choice? Someone needs to watch your back." Ino said with a teasing tone that made Naruto chuckle "But we can't go back without a plan, we're taking a high risk..."

"Good! We get to the rooftop and use the stairs to get into the apartment, find the kunai and go back up to leave, simple!"

"And how did you plan on leaving?"

"I was hoping like last time and have Chōji and the others pick us up."

"Hey wait a minute! You didn't say anything about involving my team in this!"

"You got them involved in getting me out of Tokyo right? And besides, I'm also part of the team now so I say they come, unless you want to do another bike stunt like last time...?"

"Well... not really, no."

"Look it'll be quick, we go in, grab the kunai, get to rooftop again and fly out, what can go wrong?"

"I don't know Naruto..."

"Oh come on! It's foolproof!"

"... Look, this is a bit dangerous so we'll talk with Asuma-sensei first, deal?"

"Deal!" Naruto gave her the cheeky smile.

"That reminds me!" Ino extended her hand to his face and touched his cheek making him blush.

"Uuuh... What are you doing?"

"Shindenshin... I'm linking out minds together so we can communicate telepathically as well, you know, in case we are not around each other..."

"You can do that?! But wait... wouldn't that be invading each other's privacy a bit?"

She removed her hand from his cheek "This is only for us to listen to our voices inside each other, not to actually see what we're thinking, you're free to block me if I get too annoying by using a hand seal." She chuckled as she showed him the one hand seal.

"Heh, kinda like a smartphone?"

"You could say that."

"Whoa... I can hear you!"

She smiled at his surprised expression. "Try it."

"... Hey! Naruto to Ino here, do you copy?"

She giggled like a little girl "Yeah, you're good, let's go."

"Where to?"

"To get the team ready."

Night arrived soon and Naruto waited impatiently at home for the rest of the team, he continued pacing through the living room endlessly and started to worry due to the hour, he had spent the entire afternoon preparing his own scrolls and gear just in case something happened, not that it was supposed to happen but just to be ready in case something went wrong. No, he needed to focus and stay in a positive mentality at all times, this was technically his first mission and asking him to keep a calm mind might have been too much at the moment, a simple mission perhaps but it still made him uneasy, that and the fact that Ino was not responding his mental calls. He thought maybe the last twenty three times he tried in the past hour he was doing it wrong, maybe the link between them had failed or disconnected at some point.

"Dammit... Ino where are you?"

Or perhaps she simply had opted to block him for now, maybe she was doing what she said she would do and he was a distraction too big to deal with, was that it? was he being too obnoxious? No, that was not it, he was certain she was still there, he could feel her, she was only ignoring him. Great, now a wave of new thoughts came rushing to his brain and they were not pleasant. Luckily for him at that moment the door of the house opened and both Shikamaru and Chōji entered to find him frantically walking from one end to the other.

"Hey, something wrong?"

"Something wrong?! Ino didn't talk with you guys already?!" Naruto looked over to his friends almost in disbelief.

"Oh, that... I don't think we're gonna be able to help you there, we kinda planned the evening already with a couple of girls..." Shikamaru replied scratching the back of his head innocently, the look on Naruto's face was to say the least, hilarious.

"WHAAAAAT?! THERE ARE THINGS AT STAKE HERE AND YOU'RE TELLING ME GETTING LAID IS MORE IMPORTANT?! I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU!"

Chōji could not contain his laughter any longer, Shikamaru soon followed, Naruto's rant was too much for both of them.

"WHAT THE HELL IS SO FUNNY?!" Naruto kept ranting comically.

"You are dummy! Did you seriously believe them?!"

Naruto stopped his frantic and quite entertaining ramble as soon as he heard Ino's voice inside his head, right away she entered the house trying to contain her laughter like her partners but failing miserably at it, Naruto finally grasped the joke to which of course, he did not find any amusement.

"Really guys...? Not funny..."

"Oh c'mon Naruto, it was! Cheer up a bit!" Chōji said calming down slowly from his laughter.

"Yeah, you should've seen yourself just a minute ago!" Ino said wiping a tearful eye.

"Tch!" Naruto only looked away annoyed at his teammate's childish behavior.

"Lighten up a little will ya? We only want to take off some of the weight off your shoulders, everyone's first mission is stressful sometimes..."

"Well I certainly didn't get any stress off..." Naruto muttered almost to himself still looking away, Ino finally calmed down and approached him but continued avoiding her eyes.

"Hey Naruto, it was just a silly joke, don't take it so hard, we're your friends and we're here for you remember?"

His gaze remained elsewhere, his tone of voice still low "Why didn't you answer me when I called for you?"

"Because while you kept insisting I was gathering everyone and convincing them to join us, there was no need for you to call for me 23 times like a desperate boyfriend or something." She tilted her head slightly and raised an eyebrow keeping a smile always.

A slight blush crept to his face but he tried his best to shrug it off as he continued "I thought the idea behind this mind link was to keep in touch with each other while we were away, not to make jokes..."

"... You're right, I'm sorry, I won't do that again."

Naruto's gaze slowly switched to Ino's ocean blue eyes, her expression had changed almost into that of a pup looking for a hug, God it was hard not to believe her when she was being so genuine, so beautiful, so... No! He had no business thinking that way about her, again the redness in his face rushed, great timing and of course Ino being Ino, she noticed.

"You okay Naruto?'

"Y-yeah! Yeah! Hahaha! Let's just go okay?!" His voice went into nervous mode and started walking to the door. "W-where is Asuma-sensei by the way?"

"He's at the main gate waiting for us, he's taking us to a 'field trip' around mount Tanzawa so play along." Shikamaru responded as Naruto went past him.

"Alright! What are we waiting for then?! Let's go team!"

Naruto kept laughing nervously until he went outside, once he left the house an odd silence filled the air, both the Nara and Akimichi boys looked over to their teammate quizzically hoping she knew what that was all about.

"Look lady, for the 10th time, I don't know where he is!"

The room where Chen was being kept was a small space surrounded by four walls and a mirror that he obviously knew was a window from where others were watching the interaction, he sat on a small and uncomfortable iron chair, there was also a large table in the middle, a dim light bulb above his head was pretty much all the light he had there since from the shadowy corner Anko and Iruka stood watching the small man, Anko decided to step into the light and face him.

"You expect me to believe that load of crap from a lowlife that runs an illegal fight club?"

"I already told you what I know! It's been over a month since he last went to work!"

"And you don't know where he could be now? What places he frequents the most? In your line of business I'm sure you must have some sort of insurance when it comes to hiring fighters or am I overthinking things here...?" Her tone at the end being clearly sarcastic.

"No! not at all, you're right, just... Naruto never did anything out of the ordinary! He went from work to his home and that was it! The boy was very normal!"

"There's nothing normal about that boy, you should now that by now..."

"What... ? Listen, I don't know what you have against Naruto but that kid has done nothing wrong!"

"You sure about that?..."

Anko looked over to Iruka and nodded letting him know he could come over, he took the folder from under his arm and after opening it threw a couple of large pictures in front of Chen who looked confused over the material, he recognized the blonde girl as well as Naruto riding a bike together at high speed apparently running from someone.

"So what? He's not driving here, this isn't a crime-"

"Keep looking." Iruka interrupted.

Chen fumed over his tone but continued looking regardless and this time his expression changed to one of shock, there were several dead bodies as well as the picture of the motorcycle they used in that same location, their dining moment inside the restaurant and finally the shots of the same now dead men entering the place before their demise.

"He's a suspect for the murder of those men, he fled the scene with his new girlfriend, it is out job to bring him here for questioning."

"Naruto wouldn't do this..." Chen threw the pictures back to the two detectives in disgust "He's a tough boy but not a murderer!"

"Then he can tell us that himself once we find him, where is he? Where did that girl take him?"

Chen remained silent for a moment looking over the empty space of the table, he truly did not know what had happened to Naruto since then but he felt uneasy about telling them more than what they already knew, during the last few weeks Anko and Iruka had visited his office questioning him about the young boy and he initially refused to share any knowledge about him, to the point of denying he knew who he was but the agents were smarter and with enough evidence against him and the threat of other business partners witnessing the police visiting him almost everyday he agreed to cooperate with them. In reality he had already shared everything he knew about Naruto save for how much he was being paid per fight, that information was not relevant anyway.

"C'mon Chen-san, give us something to work with, the sooner we can find the boy, the better for all of us."

Chen took a deep breath "I already shared with you all I know, his whereabouts are not of my knowledge." Anko was about to protest but then Chen continued before she could "But the girl he ran off with... she's an assassin."

Both inspectors looked at the small man curiously.

"Who is she?"

Chen stood from his chair and walked over to the glass mirror, he knew very well the entire conversation was being listened to, revealing more information than he already had would put him in serious risk of becoming a wanted man, he sighed.

"Look, I've been here long enough, unless I'm actually and legally detained, I got business to attend to..."

He was right, Chen was only there for questioning but was not under formal arrest so there was no way to keep him against his will for much longer, Anko gritted her teeth in anger due to the short man's lack of collaboration but decided to let the matter rest for now, there was no point in keeping him there further.

"Get him out of here Iruka."

"But senpai!-" he was startled at how easily she gave up.

"You heard me!"

"Inspector Anko, if I may have a word with you outside..."

Anko ignored the man's request and simply left the room in anger, Iruka knew it was a bad idea to follow her at the moment unless he wanted to end pulverized by her fists, he mentally thanked the heavens he was not as stubborn to get such a death wish.

The female inspector literally stomped her way out of the station all the way to the front entrance, she wanted to scream but decided against it as the attention from nearby spectators could bring her trouble, having all eyes on her for such a childish behavior was the last thing she needed at the moment, instead she opted to smoke of of her cigars, she had told herself someday she would quit but the stress she had developed during the years in her job made it impossible, the feeling of being powerless in a situation she should have controlled was awful. She used her lighter and inhaled deeply then letting the smoke leave her lungs slowly while keeping her eyes on the streets as people walked to whatever destination they had.

"Damn it!"

"Excuse me..."

Anko turned her head to see Chen just beside her making her just more annoyed than she already was.

"Why are you still here?"

"I asked if I could speak with you, since you simply stormed out I took that as a yes..."

"For what? You said you did not have anything else to say in there." Anko looked away as she took another drag of her cigar.

"Because I didn't want to say this in front of your superiors, it's not wise, besides..." he went past her with his back turned "To know about shinobi business means you are one yourself, am I wrong?"

Anko froze.

"As I thought... look lady, you're getting yourself into dangerous waters here and i'm risking myself as well, but Naruto is a good lad, whatever you think you know about this case is irrelevant now..." he walked past her and continued to speak "The girl he took off with is Ino Yamanaka, a well known assassin nicknamed the Slayer, she has indirectly killed a few rivals along the way so I never thought of her as a threat."

"You knew who she was and let him go with her anyway?! Why?!" Anko almost yelled.

"Because she visited me earlier that day and told me what she intended to do and believe me, I want to keep my head intact..."

"What did she want with him?..."

"..."

"I thought you wanted to talk to me..."

"She intended to take him to Konoha and turn him into a shinobi as well."

"Konoha...?" Anko's mind struggled with the information.

"If you're truly a shinobi then surely you must've heard of that place before, the village where shinobi live, hidden somewhere in Japan, that's probably where Naruto is right now."

"And I suppose you don't know how to get there, right?"

"Me?" He chuckled "I'm just a simple businessman lady, your best bet is if somehow he returned to the city, then you can ask him yourself, assuming you're not going to arrest him of course... Now if you'll excuse me, I have other things to do."

Chen casually walked away until he disappeared among the crowd, Anko simply stood there processing the information she was given, if this man knew about her shinobi ties it meant it was not a wise decision to restrain his liberty further than they already had, she had dealt in the past with manipulative behavior but this man was also a shinobi like her, if they were good at something was in lying and deceiving, she had to thread carefully and think her next step before executing it, yet a part of his last sentence resonated in her mind.

"Your best bet is if somehow he returned to the city..."

"Senpai!" Iruka came running out of the station looking worried.

"Get the car keys Iruka."

"Huh? Where are we going?"

"To watch over that apartment..." and then she walked away, leaving the younger detective confused.

The night sky was very clear, yet the helicopter carrying the team flew silently in the air, as good shinobi they were a silencing barrier was placed around the machine to avoid attracting unwanted attention, for good measure an invisibility barrier was also placed so their mission could also be carried out without prying eyes. The trip itself was not that long but the crew was not very chatty either, Shikamaru focused on counting the bullets for his rifle while also going over the plan silently with Asuma, Chōji as the pilot, could only look to the front for the area where they would eventually leave the blonde duo, Ino herself silently rested against the edge of the open door of the helicopter watching the night sky and wondering who knew what, Naruto just looked at her trying to read her.

"Oi Ino, are you ok?"

She was a bit startled "Huh? Yeah I'm fine, why?"

"You seem a bit off, is all..."

"Nah nah, I'm good!" She said almost laughing "It's just... I can't stop feeling uneasy about tonight."

"Care to share?" Shikamaru suddenly asked joining the conversation.

"Ever since we left the village, I feel uneasy about something..."

"Hey, that's why we talked about the plan already. Why are you thinking about that all of a sudden?" Shikamaru started shining his rifle.

"I don't know... it just came as a thought, that's all."

"If something goes wrong, are we prepared for it though?" Naruto asked, the attention of everyone shifted to him.

"Don''t joke about that Naruto." Asuma said.

"I'm not joking, just think, if something goes wrong for some reason, not that it should but if it did, are we ready to respond?"

"We train our whole lives for any type of situation, that's why we have sharper senses than your average guy, besides, you're my team and I trust in your abilities as you should."

"Asuma-sensei, have you ever lost someone in a mission?"

Asuma raised an eyebrow, the rest of the team looked at each other in confusion "Not once, why?"

"That's the thing, I don't mean to come as a pessimist or anything you know, just wondering how a person can adapt to something like losing a teammate during a mission, say Shikamaru, Ino or myself, if something happened to us and you've never been in that situation before, how can you be sure you'll respond correctly?"

"Hey hey Naruto, what's with the gloomy conversation?" Ino asked smiling but at the same time curiously wondering what this conversation meant "It's not like you to bring that topic."

"Just trying to relate to your earlier thoughts." He responded also smiling confidently.

"You guys done playing prophets of doom? If we focus and do what we're supposed to do, nothing will go wrong, stop being so troublesome you two, jeez..." Shikamaru resumed annoyed to which both blondes chuckled, even Asuma had a similar reaction, at least his team got along.

"Hey guys heads up, we're arriving to the place." Chōji said. Both blondes looked at each other and their expression changed to a serious look as they nodded in acknowledgement.

"You both know the drill, go in, get what you came for and leave, we'll rendezvous on the rooftop in 5, no more, no less."

'Yes Asuma-sensei!" Both blonds responded simultaneously.

In a few seconds they arrived to an apartment complex where Naruto's old home was located, Chōji started descending slowly to let the duo land safely, both approached the edge to take a look down below.

"Nervous?"

"No, you?"

"Why would I? I've done this a hundred times." Ino replied.

"Figures, as we planned then!"

Once the helicopter was close enough to rooftop level both teens jumped landing safely, they felt as Chōji lifted the machine again away from them, only a current of air being felt.

"I hope they don't go too far..."

"If Asuma-sensei said 5 minutes, the in 5 minutes they'll be here, don't worry." Ino assured.

"Ok then, let's do this!"

Both teens went over to the locked door that led to the emergency stairs, it was surprisingly unlocked from the other side so they entered silently into the building.

"Let's keep it silent from here, don't want to wake up anyone."Naruto thought, Ino nodded and kept close while they descended the stairs.

"My place is just one floor down."

"You almost make it sound as an invitation to sleep over." she giggled.

"H-hey! Quit it will ya?!"

"You should know by now I like teasing, get used to it." She finished, Naruto just kept his composure while they continued walking. Once they reached the hallway both blondes continued walking until they saw the apartment they were looking for almost at the very end, the main door was covered with yellow tape indicating the police had already been there.

"Damn it..."

"Do you think they found it?"

"With some luck no, I doubt they knew about it, I'm sure it's still here."

He proceeded to remove the tape and use his old key which surprisingly still worked, the door creaked as it opened and he entered first, Ino soon followed carefully. As he expected the whole place had been turned upside down, the police had walked all over the place and did not seem to know what they were even looking for, boxes, loads of paper, some photographs and even clothes were laying all over the apartment, this did not bother him however, he knew his father was a crafty and ingenious man.

"Do you know where it could be?"

"Sorta, give me a minute."

Naruto knelt and started to make several hand seals, Ino surprisingly did not know for what jutsu until he stopped and used his right hand to touch the floor, immediately a green glowing pattern of kanji surrounded all the surfaces around the apartment.

"A barrier jutsu?"

"More like a detecting jutsu, I studied earlier the barrier around the village as a start and figured I could use something similar to detect chakra imbued things, my dad's kunai for example."

"... And you created it all by yourself?! This is awesome! Why didn't you tell me earlier?!" Ino's internal voice sounded genuinely amazed.

"Didn't think of it as a big deal..." Naruto casually responded as he searched around the apartment with his hand extended, the glowing kanji seal around his hand moving with him.

"Not a big deal?! Naruto, you just created a jutsu on your own and that's not a big deal?! This is HUGE! Hokage-sama and Jiraiya-sensei will be SO proud of you!"

"Do you mind lowering your voice? I'm trying to concentrate here..."

"Oh, sorry..."

It didn't take long for him to find the item he was looking for, right above them in the living room, he could make the silhouette of a small weapon buried behind the concrete.

"Found it!"

"How are we supposed to get it now?"

"Leave that to me, this is the other half of the jutsu!"

He started to pull the kanji seal to himself and it glowed with more intensity, the kunai started to move on his own slowly to his relief until it eventually detached from the structure.

"Bingo! Now let's get out of here."

Naruto did not respond, he simply held the kunai in silence as he started to form a thought in his head, wondering if it could work.

"What are you doing? Let's go!"

"Hold on, I need to try something..." he spoke this time.

"This was not part of the plan! We have what we came for! Let's get out of here before-"

It was too late, she could literally sense several faint signatures from all directions starting to surround the building.

"Damn it! The police is here! They knew we were coming!"

"Just give me a second..."

Naruto poured his own chakra into the kunai hoping his parents would be able to sense it, he naively thought this action would get his father to actually show up right there and then and take them away from danger, the chakra was just a way to trigger the weapon into reacting to his father's, or at least that was what he believed would happen. Ino felt the signatures coming dangerously close to where they stood, inside the building from across the street she could start to see several figures also moving close to the windows with what she assumed were sniper rifles, she moved over to grab his arm.

"Naruto we have to go, NOW!" she proclaimed now worried.

"Hold on!" he insisted.

Now several footsteps could be heard just outside the door, an entire squadron probably, they were now surrounded, their only escape now being through one of the windows, Ino frantically grabbed Naruto and tried to pull him but he jerked away and continued to hopelessly put more chakra into the kunai, nothing happened.

"NARUTO!"

A loud explosion interrupted them, the front door had been blown away, smoke and splinters entered the living room where the duo stood, several armed officers entered at a quick pace. Ino found herself in a predicament, if Naruto did not move she could not risk to fight in such a narrow space with so many people without risking his safety or hers, in a split second she opted to follow what her instinct told her at that moment, escape.

"FREEZE! ON THE GROUND NOW! Shouted the squadron leader as soon as he saw the pair, the others followed aiming their assault weapons at them.

With a heavy heart, Ino threw a smoke bomb and the place was immediately darkened, blinding everyone already inside and also the sniper team across the building, the window broke and a silhouette surrounded by the smoke jumped followed by a barrage of shuriken that flew hitting some of the scopes of the rifles on the other side, they tried to fire but only managed to hit the walls of the other building, Ino took advantage of the distraction to dash the wall and get quickly all the way to the top, more shots were fired from the ground below but none of them found their target.

Inside Naruto's apartment the smoke slowly started to dissipate as the squadron surrounded the blond teenager.

"DROP THE WEAPON, NOW!

Naruto was forced to oblige, hands behind his head and face down on the ground.

-0-

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

I feel like it's been forever since I last updated the story, sorry 'bout that, funny thing is I have a lot of free time at work yet I choose to do other stuff like play WoW or watch a movie lol, that's how much free time I get once I'm done with work which is usually one or two hours at most, with that much free time I could probably write a whole chapter every single night but as I said, well... Anyways, back with another chapter, not the last one for this year I believe, I can at least put two more soon, cheers!