Elder Runa had helped her out in more than a couple of ways when she had visited that day. She gave her comfort, companionship, knowledge, guidance and a goal. While the ugly bruise on Kasumi's face was not directly addressed Elder Runa had still been able to help her with this as well. All the knowledge that the years had given to Elder Runa she was starting to pass on to Kasumi and it wasn't just about flowers, poisons and antidotes but healing as well; they did go hand in hand after all. With a couple of lessons in the basics of healing, some tips and a few more books discreetly left outside her door Kasumi was able to start her journey along the path of healing. She couldn't be happier. Finally, she had a way of being able to repay and protect everyone that she cared about. It also helped her feel less bad about not being able to practise her training while being kept under house arrest in the small room.

Elder Runa had given her determination to keep her head down and work hard in order to break away from the monsters who also inhabited this house. So the next few days passed with zero interaction with any other people. Most meals were left outside the door, sometimes Airi conveniently forgot, and the days were spent working hard. Academy theory, flower knowledge and the new healing techniques. A little bit of time was also spent cleaning the room. It was a storage room after all as well as her room but according to the other people in the house it was a storage room first. She barely had room to sleep let alone do anything else. Kasumi also felt better after the massive effort it took to clean, it was a physical sign of her new-found resolve.

It also meant that she no longer felt like trash. They had surrounded her with rubbish but instead of sitting around doing nothing she changed it into something productive. Everything now had a place in that room and she too had a place but it wasn't in that room.

Kasumi had decided that when she was able to heal herself that would be when she would go back to the Academy. Surely Airi wouldn't make a huge deal of it. It would get suspicious if she was absent for too long and Airi's reputation meant everything to her. A couple of weeks would be acceptable and nothing much would change anyway. The little time that Kasumi would spend in the same house as the beasts would be the same as it is now. Food would be left outside the door and Kasumi would not leave the room unless to leave the house or use the bathroom. She wouldn't see her family and would spend all of her time with people who actually cared about her or in the room studying her theory or sleeping.

That was the plan anyway.

Something was bound to go wrong with Airi and Ino around but at least Kasumi now had something to work towards.

As soon as she was a genin she was out. It would be hard but worth it.


"Kasumi!"

Said girl was not expecting the first voice she heard to be another female. She also didn't expect the other girl to embrace her so fiercely that they both ended up in the dirt with Kasumi completely immobilised. Hopefully this wasn't a sign of how bad her taijutsu abilities had gotten in the past few weeks of isolation.

"Where have you been? You've been gone forever!"

Kasumi couldn't help but laugh at TenTen's enthusiasm. Too bad it couldn't last very long.

"Thought you could get some extra training in,"

Neji came along at just the right time to kill the mood but fortunately he didn't stay for long.

"You better have gotten stronger,"

With that he left the two girls speechless on the ground in a far less energetic embrace with that obvious threat and declaration of war.

Kasumi was the only one who knew how much trouble she was in if Neji decided to take this seriously. She was under no illusions that he hadn't weakened during her time in isolation and it was going to take more than a few hours to get her strength back or even her basic fighting instincts and reflexes. It would probably take a few good weeks of training with Nami to get her back to where she was before and then even more intensive training in order to avoid conflict with the Hyuga. Neji was undoubtably training hard himself. He had it out for Kasumi and unless she could get to and maintain the same power as Neji then there was going to be trouble.

Neji had issues and this was causing trouble for Kasumi.

It was obvious that Neji hated to lose and Kasumi had proved herself to be competition.

Even if it was only intellectually at this stage.

Hyugas were known for their taijutsu as it was enhanced due to their clan's kekkei genkai and Neji was undoubtably going to use his advantage and strength in combat to beat Kasumi. Make up for his second place in the classroom. The problem for Kasumi was that losing in combat hurt a lot more than losing intellectually.

"What a killjoy,"

"Such a jerk,"

For TenTen's sake Kasumi was just going to have to shake off the dread that was building up as herself and TenTen final got up off of the ground. Good thing that the other girl seemed to be naturally good natured and didn't seem to suspect any of Kasumi's true thoughts.

Both girls didn't have much time to laugh things off before Kasumi once again found herself lying in the dirt. At this rate it was going to take her all day just to make it to the entrance of the Academy.

At least there were people that wanted her around.

"KASUMI!"

Before the Yamanaka had time to catch her breath, respond or try to pry the now two people that were on top of her the two culprits of this situation were already rambling on incoherently.

Fortunately, TenTen hadn't left and Katsu had followed his partner to the reunion. Unfortunately for Daiki and Tatsuya they were both firmly on Kasumi's side in this good-hearted struggle.

"Hey! Both of you stop! Get off of her. You do realise that she can't breathe, right?"

These remarks were accompanied by Katsu's barks and gradually decreased in volume as the girl started to break down into uncontrollable laughter. As with TenTen's smile and enthusiasm it was contagious as the trio on the ground found themselves following suit with the two boys now releasing their friend to lie either side of her as their sides burnt from the strain of the laughter.

In that moment Kasumi realised that if she ignored the issues concerning Neji and focused on the fact that she had people who cared about her and that she could call friends then today would be a very good day, just for the fact that she could be with them again.

Once the laughter had diminished and promises were made to catch up during their breaks the trio stood back up and the five of them finally completed the journey to the Academy entrance to start the day. All of them were happy with wide smiles and for Kasumi it was extra special as it was all completely genuine.


Even someone as experienced as Itona was unable to hide the surprise from entering his expression as four of his students walked through the door just before class was due to start. It wasn't the fact that they were usually punctual and almost late today it was the reason for their delay; the fact that one of the members of the group hadn't been seen for the last couple of weeks. There were a few issues that the sensei faced with this situation and Itona had very little experience handling situations like this.

Did he act like everything was normal in the hope that no unwanted attention was drawn to Kasumi? If her classmates, or anyone, started asking questions about her absence too soon, would it make things worse? If he greeted the students that just walked in, which Kasumi is a part of, would that bring attention to her anyway but if he didn't greet them as he usually would then…?

There was no way for him to win this. Was there? Why was this so hard? They're only children after all, it wasn't as if they had to fight a war or anything. This generation was at least blessed with a childhood. For most of them anyway.

There was obviously a reason for the last couple of weeks with regards to the young Yamanaka and it was part of his duties as her teacher to help her with issues that would try to prevent her journey to become a competent kunoichi. If the reasons for her absence happened to be bad, which it likely was, then trying to pry information about it could lead to another bout of absence for the Yamanaka.

"Morning Sensei,"

While Itona was lost deep in thought, his brain was panicking and getting side tracked with potential future problems he barley noticed or registered when the group of four approached the front of his desk where he stood to greet him. At least his years of training and experience as a shinobi was able to prevent him from falling over at the surprise due to his carelessness and even allowed him to recover fast enough to reply.

"Morning you lot. Hope you're ready for a big day, we have a lot to cover for the assessment at the end of the week,"

While Itona watched his students take their seats for the beginning of class he noticed that Kasumi was surrounded by her friends. A good sign that she could get through whatever had been troubling her recently and that there was the potential for her to be more open if he approached her about the topic. Kasumi sat with Daiki and Tatsuya at her sides, Katsu in her lap and TenTen behind her already passing notes to the other brunette before class had even started. Another thing that he realised was that it was going to be a really long day. He had to both teach and try to help Kasumi. He had to come up with a way to breach the likely sensitive subject of her absence and try to obtain as much information on the matter as possible before doing so. He also had to choose his timing right and make sure that she was caught up on all of the work she had missed before the assessment. The problem with all of this was that he also had to make sure that the rest of his students were ready for the test and so he couldn't focus on her completely or it could be a detriment to her classmates.

It was going to be a very long and tiring day but worth it for the welfare of all of his students.

With this somewhat unsettling revelation of the days to come Itona got to his feet and addressed his class with his usual cheery smile.

"Okay class. Let's get started. We have a lot to cover today. Now, who remembers what we went over last time about the founding of the five major hidden villages and thee theory behind the basic transformation jutsu?"

As the morning class progressed Itona was able to come to the conclusion that Kasumi wasn't in as bad as a situation academically as he had originally feared. Even though she had not been in class for the past lessons she was still knowledgably enough in the subjects to be able to answer all of the questions and had the confidence to put her hand up for all of them as well. Kasumi displayed that she was still the top of the class with this work and Neji didn't seem pleased that he was being given a run for his money again. Itona no longer had any doubt that she needed assistance for the impending assessment which fortunately meant that there was now one less thing for the teacher to worry about concerning the Yamanaka girl. This meant he had more time to focus on the rest of the class to ensure that everyone was able to pass but also meant that he could spare a few extra thoughts towards the rest of the concerns plaguing Kasumi.

Before everyone knew it, they were let out of class for a break with the promise of some physical training afterwards. As his students filed out of the classroom Itona was able to notice that some of them seemed a lot happier than they had previously and it was very unlikely that Kasumi's return was a coincidence concerning this matter.

He had seen the distress that the lack of presence of the young girl had on some of his other students, in particular Daiki and Tatsuya. While it was mainly these two boys there had been repercussions throughout more of the class as well. TenTen and Kasumi had become somewhat close throughout the year and Neji seemed more irritated than usual at not being able to have a proper challenge. Now that Kasumi was back they all seemed happier, some definitely more than others, but all happier nonetheless.


"Where have you been all this time? I thought you were dead or something with the way that Daiki and Tatsuya kept moping around. So spill. Is everything okay? You won't be leaving us again anytime soon, right?"

TenTen couldn't even wait until they had left the educational institution building before she started bombarding Kasumi with questions, even if the last one was said in a slightly shaky and uncertain voice. While Kasumi had promised to talk and give answers during the break it was still somewhat shocking to be interrogated almost as soon as the class was temporarily dismissed for lunch. Thankfully Daiki was as quick as ever to speak his mind and tell his side of the story which meant that Kasumi found a reprieve from TenTen's inquiries into the past weeks.

"Now wait a minute! Who was moping? As I recall you were suddenly our best friend and wouldn't leave our side because you wanted answers so bad. Where's Kasumi? Is she okay? I miss her!"

The last three parts of Daiki's remark was done in a very poor and unflattering imitation of TenTen's voice and only managed to aggravate the girl. Kasumi and Tatsuya could only smile and shake their heads at the pair's antics. The levelled headed duo followed their friends out the building as the banter began to fly between the other two members of the group.

The friends continued in this manner as they made their way to their usual sitting spot. It was nice for them to all be together again and even better that TenTen had somewhat officially joined the group now as well. Kasumi never realised how nice it would be to have a girl as a friend. With everything that had happened with her mum, sister, Sayuri and most of the rest of the Yamanaka clan, Kasumi never really wanted to interact with other females for fear of the past repeating itself and the present replicating itself. It was probably only thanks to Nami and Suzuka that Kasumi even had the emotional strength and resilience to begin to trust TenTen in the first place. It didn't really matter though because either way the Yamanaka girl was grateful to be friends with TenTen now.

Even if it was only a few friends Kasumi was just glad that she had them all in her life and was able to trust them. Even if it stayed the five of them forever, she wouldn't mind. She would just be thankful that she had friends like them anyway.

It was quality above quantity after all.

TenTen had noticed the daydreaming Yamanaka as the group crossed the fenced enclosure of the Academy. The girl cast a mischievous look towards Kasumi and this act didn't go unnoticed by the Inuzuka which she was still engaged in a friendly war of words with. The two shared a look which was miraculously able to transfer a telepathic message between them. Unfortunately for Kasumi these two had the same evil idea and this seemed to be the only occasion that the two were willing to work together. The pair both had to expel a bit of frustration over Kasumi's absence. They knew it wasn't her fault, even if TenTen didn't know the whole story, but they honestly couldn't help themselves.

And so, it began.

Daiki started.

"Hey, Kasumi,"

Said girl was pulled from her trance just as the group neared the tree that marked their usual spot. When she turned her attention to Daiki TenTen took the opportunity to strike.

"Take this!"

A repeat of the morning events occurred. While looking at Daiki, Kasumi had turned her back on TenTen which gave the girl an opening to attack. Kasumi suddenly found herself face down in the dirt with a chuckling TenTen holding her tightly in a massive bear hug. Daiki couldn't contain his laughter or his own evil expression as he reached for something in his bag, the group took turns bringing their bags out with everyone's lunches in it and once again Kasumi was having the worst luck as it just happened to be Daiki instead of Tatsuya. While Daiki and Tatsuya were executing their plan, Tatsuya was standing around like a deer in lights and Kasumi was just as confused and motionless form her pinned position on the ground. It wasn't until Daiki finally revealed what it was that he had been searching for in his bag that Kasumi finally reacted.

"Tatsuya! Katsu! HELP!"
Once the severity of the situation was realised these two were more than happy to be called upon.

For once Tatsuya took charge. Saying that it was only with Katsu after all.

"Attack!"

At the signal the dog attacked with the boy with impressive speed with Tatsuya tackling Daiki in a similar fashion to the hold that TenTen currently had on Kasumi and Katsu went straight for TenTen's face with a barrage of slobbery licks. There were exclamations of surprise form the two new victims of the attack but everyone ended up in fits of uncontrollable laughter shortly after. The pen from Daiki's had rolling forgotten along the ground.

The luck of the Yamanaka really was at an all time low as it just so happened that the discarded pen rolled towards the feet of the Hyuga who happened to be making his way past the group at that moment to his usual secluded spot within the fenced area. The only fortunate thing about the situation was the fact that Neji didn't say anything, just gave a few death glares and an eye roll before continuing on. This still didn't stop everyone in the group from freezing in their less than comfortable positions as they waited for the boy to leave their presence, and possibly react a little more than what he ended up doing.

"What's his deal?"

TenTen was the first to speak what was on everyone's mind out loud and Kasumi was more than willing to give the obvious answer as well as a sassy statement of her own.

"Don't know but I have this sneaking suspicion that he doesn't like me,"

There were some muffled snorts from the males while the other female decided to continue the conversation about their less than friendly Hyuga classmate.

"Yep,"

"He's going to give me a lot of trouble and a massive headache, isn't he?"

"Without a doubt,"

With a few exasperated sighs from the group they finally decided to get to their feet and finished the last little leg of their journey to their spot. Once they got themselves on the ground again, seated a bit more comfortably this time, they were finally able to begin their break. It started with a bit of food that was eaten quickly in peaceful silence and then they were finally able to get down to business.

There was the initial awkward conversation regarding Kasumi's absence. Daiki and Tatsuya knew most of the story as they knew her past and would talk to Elder Runa but TenTen was a different story. While Kasumi had grown to trust TenTen and count her as a friend she still wasn't prepared to tell the other girl everything, just in case she scared away her only female friend.

At the same time, she still deserved answers.

For the time being TenTen would just be informed of the basics, that there were some issues with Kasumi's family, mainly her mother and sister, and that she treasured her friends as family now. If anything, the conversation went from hesitation and sad storytelling to an emotional, heartfelt and tearful reinforcement of friendship. Once TenTen wiped away a runaway tear the conversation was driven to the topic of the Hyuga again.

Daiki was more than happy to start off this particular subject and sometimes he knew just how to make a serious issue light-hearted.

"Honestly, what is that dude's problem?"

Thankfully this was one of those times that he was able to get chuckles and giggles from his friends when breaching a topic that was somewhat concerning and sensitive.

"I don't know but all he ever seems to do is either insult us, ignore us, act condescendingly, challenge me or dismiss you guys,"

Kasumi listed all of these things off on her hand but once she rand out of fingers on it she decided to finish the list there, they would be there forever otherwise. A testament to how much Neji was capable of getting on their nerves. The other three could do nothing but nod their heads in agreement, they really would be there all day if everyone started listing off why they found him such an annoying jerk. TenTen did have something to add to the conversation though and brought them back onto why this particular conversation wasn't completely light-hearted.

"Speaking of challenge didn't he kind of issue you one this morning? And don't we have training next? I'll give you one guess who he will try to convince sensei to let him fight,"

"That's bad,"

"It won't be that bad Kasumi. I know he is strong but you were amazing in our fight and as Neji said I'm sure you've gotten stronger,"

Kasumi got a little sheepish at this as was evident by her not so subtle gesture of rubbing the back of her neck. She felt guilty and ashamed about letting all of Nami's hard work go to waste, she was basically back to square one now in terms of her taijutsu because of all the time she spent locked up in her room and unable to practise.

"Well, the thing is I haven't fought in a few weeks TenTen. Neji may believe that I've gotten better but I can assure you that it's the complete opposite. Neji would have undoubtably gotten stronger though. In other words, I'm in a lot of trouble if I have to end up fighting him. Between my lack of skill and his hatred towards me and his insane desire to prove himself better I'm toast,"

Similar to the previous conversation of the break, this one ended in a sad silence but Tatsuya tried to come to the rescue with a few comforting words.

"Don't worry. I'm sure we'll think of something. You always have something up your sleeve Kas. If anyone can figure a way out of this it'll be you. You seriously can do anything you put your mind to,"

"Thanks Tatsuya,"

His confidence and sincere words did indeed lighten the situation and gave everyone just a little bit of hope for the next lesson.