I do not own Naruto.

Enjoy!

Satsuki and exchanged a quick look with Naruto as she reached her arm behind her towards the bookshelf she remembered leaving her weapon pouches that morning.

"If you think I would leave weapons around where my enemies could easily get at them, you're mistaken." The voice sounded again.

Satsuki looked to her right and confirmed that both weapon pouches were missing from where they were left that morning. A glare crossed her eyes as she looked back towards the voice.

"Imagine my surprise this morning, when I was alerted by my ANBU that a nine-year-old seal was activated in this very apartment, a seal that has been untouched since it was placed."

"Jiji," Naruto's voice danced with confusion next to her. "What are you talking about?"

Satsuki refused to look at her best friend, her eyes trained on the man who had stepped out of the shadows of the room. He was an older man, his hair completely white and deep wrinkles running trails along his face. He wore a deep red kimono with a white cloak over top, and on his head, he wore a red hat with a sole kanji on the front: 'Fire'.

"He's the Hokage. Kneel." A voice in the back of her head growled.

Almost instantly her knee hit the ground and she bowed her head, her long silver locks lying in small pools on the floor before her.

"I was told that no-one was here. That it was a false alarm." The Hokage stated, his tone even, ignoring Naruto as he walked closer to the kneeling child. "Then, imagine, when I was told by Umino Iruka that the child that I had supposedly assigned him to walk to school that morning from this address was covered in blood, and attacked Uzumaki Naruto." With each sentence his tone got more of an edge to it. "Imagine my surprise, when I learn that Naruto is actually friends with this person, and justified her actions. Imagine, when I received word from the Inuzuka Clan head, that a red-headed student at the academy could track her, an experienced kunoichi, from down the hall and tried to get her son to stop bullying another student. And now," the Hokage stopped in front of Satsuki and kneeled down to her level. "Imagine my surprise when I find out, that this red-headed child that I had no knowledge of, was wearing a disguise. Who. Are. You?"

Satsuki's eyes were trained on the floor, her heart thumping against the inside of her ribcage, her body shaking, and her mind racing. The Hokage didn't know that she was here this morning. Who sent the message to Iruka-sensei? If it wasn't the Hokage, then why would someone impersonate them? Thoughts ran through her mind at a mile a minute as she refused to meet the gaze of the elder shinobi in front of her.

"Jiji! She do-"

"Naruto, I asked her the question. She needs to answer." The Hokage's suddenly kind voice overlapped Naruto's anxious tone.

"Breathe."

Satsuki took a deep breath and steadied her racing mind and trembling body.

"You are transporting classified information that could destroy your country if it falls in to the wrong hands." Her father's words rang through her ears. "Your mission is to get it back to the leader and without getting captured."

Without a second's hesitation, her head shot up and her eyes met the eyes of the man kneeled down in front of her. His eyes, despite the kind tone just taken with Naruto, were cold and calculating, silently demanding an answer to all of his questions. Her eyes drifted from his up to the kanji for 'fire' on his hat.

"Fire," She whispered.

"Excuse me, child?"

"The Hokage, he's the leader of the village, in the fire nation, correct?" Satsuki dared ask a clarifying question. After receiving a curt nod, she continued. "I'm on a mission." She paused her delicate ears picking up the noise of something moving just inside the nearest window. "Please," She turned her head to the window, "I am of no danger to him, please, let me finish!" She pleaded her ears twitching, trying to hear further sounds of someone moving.

"They will not interfere, unless they feel it is necessary." He stood up to his full height, and motioned her to do the same. "So, you're on a mission?" There was a slight edge of amusement in his tone as he turned his back to her.

"I know it sounds amusing, Hokage-sama," she took a deep breath as she stood up and dared a look at Naruto. He had taken up resident on a bar stool in the kitchenette side of the room, his arms crossed and a small pout across his face. "But it unfortunately, is anything but."

The Hokage turned around to face the silver haired child and saw mixed emotions dancing across her eyes, a small frown barely visible through her dark mask.

"I was attacked." She ignored the small gasp that came from Naruto as she continued. "Sunday afternoon at 1500 hours, two men in black cloaks broke in to my home in attempts to kidnap me, for reasons that I am not aware of. With the assistance of Daisuke, a nin-ken of ours," her voice started shaking as images of the Great Dane danced through her mind, "I was able to escape the house and ran, trying to get away from them. In my haste I ran into my father, who was running errands that afternoon. He was wearing a hitai-ate, although I never knew him to be a shinobi, but it was without a doubt my father." A small smile graced her face as she took a deep breath, almost smelling the peppermint that had clung to her father like glue. "His hitai-ate was of the Leaf-village, this village." She paused for a moment seeing a curious look cross his face. "He looked at me and said "Your identity has been compromised and you are in the enemy's territory." The mission that he gave me was transporting classified information to the leader, without being captured." Satsuki produced two scrolls with the Kanji for 'fire' from within one of her pockets, having been placed there after changing that morning.

The Hokage took a step closer to her, a frown creasing his brow.

"My attacker was getting close, so we had to move. My father led us to the walls of the village, using jutsu to keep the attacking men away from me. When we got to the wall I was almost caught by one of the men, but my father kept them away allowing us to get across the wall." She suppressed a shudder as she remembered the snake-like man's hands around her neck. "It was a trap. They were waiting for us and had cornered my father. They thought that they had taken care of him and had captured me. My father though, still apparently had a few tricks left up his sleeve, and distracted the two men. It all happened so fast. There were kunais coming at me, my dad getting ready to fight the two men, black designs wrapping their way around my hand, and then all of a sudden I'm here, confused, and passing out on the floor." Tears were streaming down her face as she finished her tale. "The next thing I know, Naru-kun and Iruka-sensei were here to take me to school." She left out a nervous chuckle trying to will the nerves and the impending sense of worry away.

Satsuki wiped her sleeve across her face to dry the falling tears. With a deep breath she took a step closer to the elderly gentleman in front of her. "I believe this was meant for you." She said, holding her hand out that held the two scrolls given to her by her father.

No sooner did he pluck the two scrolls from her hand, did one of them start glowing and unrolling.

"That sly man," The Hokage chuckled as he started to read the scroll, a sad smile crossing his features.

"What's going on?" Naruto had shaken himself from the shock of his friend's story and slid off the stool, now standing next to the two.

The Hokage ignored the question and opened up the scroll, taking his time to read over the contents.

What seemed like hours passed before the Hokage finally looked up from the scroll.

"Hayashi, Kumo." The Hokage called her alias. "Mission complete. Job well done." He said putting the two scrolls in to one of his many pockets. "Red hair and purple eyes, that is an interesting combination. Don't you think?"

Satsuki blushed and sheepishly looked up at the Hokage. "Naruto helped me come up with it," She mumbled. "She's the heroine in my favourite book. Naruto already looked like the hero, so we thought it was a good idea." She scratched the back of her head and closed her eyes in embarrassment. "Dad got a good chuckle out of it, and since I was never allowed to leave the house without a henge, it turned into one of my favourite disguises."

The Hokage seemed to hum in agreement to what was being said as he walked around the silver haired and blonde-haired children.

"Now, come-on children, we have somewhere we need to go." He motioned the two to follow him as he walked through the door, as if the conversation that had just taken place, had never happened to begin with.

"Wait, Jiji! Where are we going?!" Kumo could only stare at Naruto in shock as he bounced up in down in anticipation of where they would be going.

"You'll see, just follow me," There was a small chuckle as the Hokage started to walk down the stairs from the apartment to the street, the two children scurrying after him to keep up.

Kumo had never been to a hospital in her entire life, but she knew as soon as she walked in that she hated it.

The air reeked of stale blood and harsh chemicals that stung her nose with every breath she took. Everyone talked in low hushed whispers and heels clacked quickly across the floor as doctors-medical ninjas-scurried from patient to patient. The rooms were a stark white colour with two beds dressed in white sheets, and the two windows on the far wall had, once again, stark white curtains.

Kumo sat on the edge of one of the beds with a scowl across her face as she fidgeted with the hem of the hospital issued shirt that she was forced in to changing in to.

"Why do I have to do this again?" Kumo huffed, crossing her arms across her chest.

"Every student in the academy needs to have a physical done before their first day," The Hokage stated plainly walking in to the room with someone else in tow. "And you already started your first day without it, so-"

"I have to get this 'physical' thing done." Kumo mumbled in response.

"Exactly. Now Kumo-chan, Naruto-kun, this is Itou, Kaito."

The ninja who walked in behind the Hokage gave a small smile as he put on a pair of latex gloves.

"Hokage-sama has filled me in on everything that has happened, the last few days. You are a very brave girl." He flashed a small smile. "Don't worry your secret is safe with me."

"Kaito is my personal medical advisor, so he is to be trusted." The Hokage added seeing the suspicious look on Kumo's face.

Kumo took a moment to adjust the surgical mask that she had covering the bottom half of her face, before sighing loudly and allowing her shoulders to slump. "You could have at least allowed me to wear my own clothes."

"You should be glad they're not making you wear the dress with the hole in the backside," Naruto laughed in response, causing the adults to chuckle as Kumo's mouth dropped open in shock.

"Alright, Naruto-kun, we are going to wait out in the hallway while Kaito does his checkup of Kumo-chan," The Hokage made a motion to leave the room and Naruto faltered directing a worried look between Kumo and the Hokage. "She will be in no danger. I trust Kaito completely. Let's go talk about your day in school today. It must have been pretty eventful, finally having your best friend join you in class today."

"But-"

"It's alright Naru." Kumo mumbled in to the itchy surgical mask. "If anything happens, I'll just scream really loudly." She started to laugh, a glint of mischief appearing in her eyes.

Naruto froze in his spot and shuddered. That was not something he wanted to hear again, even if it was through the door.

"YOU WOULDN'T DARE!" Naruto shouted wagging his finger at Kumo.

Naruto received no response other than a one-eyed wink. "Kaito-san!" Naruto turned, this time pointing his finger at the medical ninja. "You don't want her to scream. No-one does. So, don't do anything stupid."

Kaito chuckled nervously as he ushered the blonde into the hallway with the Hokage, shutting the door behind the two.

"So, Kumo-chan." The man smiled at her as he walked back to her sitting location. "I'm just going to ask you a few questions and then were going to make sure your healthy enough to be preparing for the life of a shinobi. Is that alright?"

There was a long pause as Kumo studied the gentleman in front of her. He had long dark brown hair that was contained in a holder fixed in a low ponytail, and soft emerald green eyes. He wore the standard shinobi uniform, with a white lab coat overtop of his chuunin vest that ended just above his calves, and his hitai-ate fixed across his forehead.

Kumo blinked her eyes and gave a small nod allowing him to start.

"How old are you?"

"Eight."

"Date of birth?"

"October tenth," Kaito raised an eyebrow while writing her answers down.

"Have you ever been sick?"

"No."

"Broken bones?"

"No."

Kaito hummed as he finished up his questioning and walked up to Kumo.

"So far, so good Kumo. Now we just have to run a few checks the old-fashioned way, since we don't have your previous medical files, okay?"

"Do I have a choice?"

"No." Kaito chuckled and motioned her to stand up, which she begrudgingly obeyed. "Don't worry, I'll tell you what I'm doing the whole way."

The medical ninja then proceed to walk her through an eye exam, a check of her heart, and her spine before motioning her to sit back down on the bed.

"All that's left now is to check your chakra network." Kaito paused seeing the suspicious look once again appear on Kumo's face. "I'll I'm going to do is use my medical nin-jutsu to make sure there are no abnormalities." Kaito focused his chakra to his hand it started to glow a soft green colour. "Here, touch my hand and you'll see it won't hurt."

Kumo narrowed her eyes at the ninja in front of her, and looked from his eyes to his green glowing hand.

"Have I done anything to hurt you up to this point?" he waited for a shy head shake from Kumo before continuing. "So, you'll have to trust me on this one last thing. What do you think, can you trust me?" Kaito asked flashing her a small grin.

Kumo hesitantly reached her hand up to touch Kaito's but recoiled halfway there as if she had touched an open flame.

That snake guy was from the leaf village and he had tried to kidnap her. Her father had worn a hitai-ate from the leaf, she trusted him, no? Well and there was Iruka-sensei, and he had been extremely nice, despite not knowing anything about her. Mizuki-sensei though, well he didn't seem as if he should be trusted at all.

Kumo internally groaned as she calculated the odds. At this point she had about a fifty percent chance that he wasn't actually trying to kill her.

She let out a small whistle and tightly closed her eyes as she reached her hand up to meet Kaito-san's.

Her hand gingerly touched his as she prepared for the worst.

A moment passed and nothing had happened so she snapped her eyes open to see everything still in place and herself in one piece.

"Happy?" Kaito smiled, reminding Kumo briefly of her father.

"Hmmmm," She hummed in response before sliding back and unceremoniously falling back on the bed, allowing the borrowed light blue shirt that she was wearing to reveal the bottom portion of her stomach.

Kaito started his assessment of the red-headed child in front of him, making quick work until stopped mid-assessment over the girl's stomach.

He stood above her, his eyes widening at what he was noticing. For an eight-year-old child, she had an enormous set of reserves. Easily Jounin, if not higher. Up till now, he was chalking it up to an over-driven shinobi parent. Shinobi parents were known to start training their offspring extremely early, but this was exceedingly high, even if that was the case.

In fact, the only other child he had known with reserves that high was-

Kaito Itou took a deep breath and shook the thoughts from his head before focusing once more on the task at hand.

He looked back down at Kumo and noticed the pushed-up shirt, when something caught his eye. Trailing across the skin from underneath the shirt was a dark black mark, almost as if someone had spilled ink across her stomach, and had refused to wash it off.

"Kumo," the name came out quick and short, causing the girl to jerk herself up into a sitting position. "Did you spill ink on yourself?" Kaito silently cursed as the question fell out of his mouth without his permission.

The girl in question gave a funny look in response.

"I mean," he rubbed a hand across his face. "What's on your stomach?" The question had less tact than he had wanted, but it would have to do.

"Oh, that!" Kumo laughed, "It's just a birthmark. I forget it's there most of the time."

Kaito watched as the girl scratched at the back of her head in embarrassment and he felt his heart drop.

"Do you mind if I take a peak?" Upon seeing her curious look he added quickly "It just needs to go on the records is all"

Kumo nodded hesitantly. Her father had always told her that no-one could see her face, but he never said anything about her stomach, so this wouldn't hurt anything, would it?

Kumo pulled her shirt up to show off her birthmark and Kaito did all that he could do to keep from audibly gasping.

On her stomach, situated in a circle around her belly button was not a birthmark, but rather a very complex seal. He could only pick out pieces that looked even slightly familiar as he copied the pattern down as quickly and accurately as he could without raising suspicion of the child.

He couldn't even pin-point what part of the seal was familiar to him, he was no fuinjutsu specialist, causing most of the seal to look like a foreign language. Whatever part of it he recognized, it was almost as if it was copy and pasted from the original location to here, blending in so well that it was almost impossible for him to pick out where he had seen it before. The seal wove in intricate circles around her belly button and as the chakra powering the seal pulsed, he swore he could see vines snaking its way in and around the main circle.

Around the main circle was a second one, which had what appeared to be kanji stretching away from the center, but he was at a loss as to what they said, or what its main purpose was supposed to be. He did though, have a very deep sinking worry as to what it was.

Kaito mentally sighed and shot Kumo a wide smile as he continued to hide the emotions running rampant through his mind.

"All done here!" Kaito dropped his clipboard down to his side. "I'll let Naruto back in while I let Hokage-sama know that you are all clear."

Kumo nodded her head absentmindedly as she dropped the shirt back into place.

As soon as the door opened up, Naruto came bounding back into the room chittering about his conversations he had been having with the Hokage.

Kumo smiled politely, only half listening to her best friend as she stretched her sense out to just behind the closed door.

"Hokage-sama, we may have a problem," She could hear the whispered voice of Kaito-san.

"Jiji said that he would take us to Ichiraku's later!"

"Seal on her stomach,"

"A seal on my stomach?"

"Until you've had their ramen!"

"It contains?" Kumo frowned only hearing part of the question.

"One time I had SO much ramen-"

"Hokage-sama, you said her village burned to the ground, I don't understand-" Her village hadn't burned to the ground. Did the Hokage lie to Kaito-san?

"But I still go back, and eat it every day!"

"Paper-work, classified." Her eyebrows shot up, why was her information classified?

"There are so many choices of ramen, I bet-"

Kumo heard footsteps as one of the voices walked away, leaving one heartbeat gently drumming outside of the room

"Minoru-kun. I thought you both had died on that fateful night years ago." Kumo focused completely on the voice outside the door. "Yet you were keeping her safe all these years." She heard him sigh on the other side of the door, "I don't know what you did to her."

"My father never did anything to me!"

"But I hope for her sake, that you are safe. Please, come home. Alive."

I hope y'all enjoyed!