The Problem With Self-Inserts Is

by manga.geek.3

Life-long best friends and anime nerds, Sam and Tori are unexpectedly dropped into the Naruto universe. How will they survive without wifi? What will they eat? How many times can they embarrass themselves in front of hot men? But also..why in the world did they end up there in the first place? (Crack-fic, bursting with fan service and anime jokes. But we promise, there is a plot!)

12. Chapter 12

Chapter Twelve: ...That Anything Can Seem Normal if You Do it for Long Enough

Samantha sat at an island counter, chomping away at a sandwich with the weirdest innards ever, yet surprisingly good. A feat that was hard to manage with her picky taste buds. It was a sandwich with soft, rice bread (apparently actually made with rice) that had been slightly toasted (so not so soft after that) filled with a poached egg, bok choy leaves, sprouts, salt, pepper and another seasoning that left the sandwich a little tangy (it tasted similar to banana peppers), what looked to be something like hummus, and just a little dash of soy sauce. All in all, it was yummy and Sam cherished every bite. She let her feet dangle for a minute on the stool she was using, half daydreaming, half looking around herself. If she were reading a comic, this would be the time she'd be asking "WHERE ARE YOU!?", full of anticipation for what was next. Her eyes drifted to an old picture of Kushina Uzumaki, proudly displaying her forehead protector in front of a, what Sam concluded, was probably a picture of her on her graduation day at the academy.

She half-smiled, especially as her eyes wandered over to the picture of Kushina with her genin team. It was all so… nostalgic. Well… as nostalgic as a Naruto fangirl could claim. All Samantha could remember is Naruto's team photo and all that came with that whole thing. In fact… the more Sam thought about it, the more surreal her and Tori's situation felt.

Taking another bite, thoughts of Kushina popped up. It was weird to think that Kurama, the nine-tailed fox! was sealed inside her belly. That he would one day be controlled by obito and destroy some of the village and kill Minato and Kushina herself. The very idea saddened Sam, and she wished that Tori was back from the hospital already so Sam could at least try to convey these feelings to her. After all, Samantha had been living with Kushina on her own while Tori recovered. That made it even more bizarre. To think that Sam had met one of the famous characters of Naruto on her own. And Kushina was every bit the same as the anime portrayed. (It was uncanny, really, how eerily similar they were. It made Samantha hesitant to truly believe they weren't just under some kind of mushroom or coma or something more realistic. Except that Tori was there, too. Unless Tori was also a figment of her imagination. Sam knew Tor quite well so it wouldn't be unimaginable. What if I turned out to be like Buffy from that one episode! Where it left the viewer questioning whether or not this was all in her head or not. Ack! That would seriously suck!)

From the moment Samantha was left on her own, she found herself questioning her reality. Wondering how it was even possible to be here, and why would they be here, anyway? She and Tori of all people. What made them so special? Why not someone else? Plenty of people would die just to be in the Naruto world. Fanfiction proved that theory. So… how was it that Sam and Tori were the two to end up there in the first place? It brought back the thought that this was all just in her head a little closer.

"Aah! That shower was just what I needed! A long hard day of a quick mission can leave you feeling just as grimy as a long one." Kushina ambled into the decent sized kitchen, a towel wrapped around her head, concealing her long, luscious hair. And luscious it was. Samantha had never seen hair that was naturally as red as Ariel from The Little Mermaid. And somehow, it was softer than any hair that Sam had seen in her world. And it seemed to move with the emotions Kushina was feeling. Maybe it was some sort of jutsu she used? That made the most sense.

Samantha hummed her acknowledgement. She really had no idea what that was like; she worked at a call center, after all. Ugh, call centers, she grimaced, briefly. Her eyes followed Kushina as the jinchuuriki opened up cupboards of her own to find something to eat, herself. Samantha took the second to last bite of her sandwich before responding. "Were you gone all night? That must be harsh."

"Nah, it's no biggie. Do it all the time, ya know." Kushina said.

"All-nighter missions?"

"Nah, missions in general." Kushina grinned cheekily, as she pulled down a plate. Making her own sandwich, it seemed.

"Ah, I see." Sam said, unsure with what was appropriate to ask concerning missions. "So…" Sam drawled, as the silence stretched on, with only the sounds of Kushina's humming and sandwich making in the background. Kushina glanced up briefly at Sam, a smile still on her face. "You said you were going to teach me the gardening you'd like help with?"

"Oh yes!" Kushina brightened up, accidentally flinging lettuce in the air as she remembered talking to Sam about that, "With you and your friend staying here for the foreseeable future, I could definitely use the help."

"Well, I'm all ears!" Sam said blithely, standing to put her sandwich dish in the sink (because everything inside it definitely had a tendency to spill out). Kushina then proceeded to tell her all about her gardens. Yes, that was plural. Apparently the woman really loved plants! That must be a reason why Naruto had a few in his apartment. I wonder if loving plants was the only reason he had them… Sam briefly wondered while she listened.

"So! You ready for me to show you around? This place is kinda large so, if you need me to draw you a map, I can certainly do so, ya know!" Kushina announced, showing Samantha outside the kitchen, her walk was nearly a skip. Sam was pretty sure that was just her natural way of walking. Despite being the kyuubi's jinchuuriki, the woman had made a way for herself to be happy. I'm glad Sam thought in passing, then diverted her attention to the area's Kushina was pointing towards.

When Kushina said she could draw a map for how huge her home was, Sam was astounded to see that she would probably actually need it! Kushina walked them along a little a cobbled walkway that was covered by the traditional tops of japanese roofing. To the left was a large clearing with gardens creating aesthetically pleasing designs, one of which was the Konoha leaf symbol. To the right was a smaller, circular area encompassed by trees, bushes, and in the middle was a small pond with koi fish. The last, rather sad looking flowers of the summer still surrounded the fronts of the bushes. It would seem getting the gardens the rest of the way ready for winter would be among the duties Sam and Tori would be in charge of.

"Wow. This is amazing! So beautiful! And you're the only one to keep it up?" Samantha gushed, taking in the sights and smells of the garden. Birds chirped in the tall trees, making it even sound just as beautiful.

"Nah, I do tend to have missions for the genin to come and water my gardens once a week, ya know. But while you and your friend are here, I don't need to have them come! It'll help me save some money. Ya know!" Kushina winked. Samantha smiled.

"That makes sense," Sam said, thoughtfully. She really should have thought of that herself. Of course Kushina would assign genin to help out. What a way to get experience for the genin, too! "So… is this all of your garden area?"

"Oh no," Kushina smiled slyly, "This is only one area. I live in a huge compound. Left me with plenty of space!"

Sam blinked. Oh boy. Poor Tori is totally gonna grimace when she learns this little fact. Samantha had been visiting Tori a few times since coming to the Uzumaki compound, but that day she didn't have to. Tori was finally permitted to leave the hospital! Sam couldn't wait to show Tor around. It was super exciting to be living with the Red Hot Habanero! HopefullyTori felt the same.

Samantha didn't have to wonder for too long. Just as Kushina was closing the tool shed back up after their tour of its contents, there was the distant sound of feet on the neatly raked gravel path. Rin's voice reached them first as she said, "You're doing great, Tori-Chan! We're nearly there!"

"Miss Victoria, are you certain you don't need my help?" Minato offered in his always perfectly, inscrutably polite way.

"Minato!" Kushina gasped, not nearly loud enough for the group to hear, but her instant maneuvering of her hair to, possibly, "comb" out any twigs she may have thought were there, gave her away. Sam couldn't help her knowing smile in any case.

"I've got it," Victoria promised somewhat raggedly. "Totally. Ninja-doctor Holmes will be so proud at my te- tenacity." The recovering Earthling limped into view, a helpful Obito shouldering her along like any good granny-watcher. Rin and Obito walked on either side, Kakashi lingered behind at the rear as an obviously reluctant rear guard.

Aw, I wish I could've been there to help Tori's discharge! Sam thought as she watched the group coming into view. "You made it!" Sam decided upon to say, waving dramatically to them all. Minato smiled, though it was obvious it was for the sight of Kushina than anything else, while Obito responded back with just as enthusiastic of a wave as Samantha. Watching Tori walk slowly, Sam was immediately glad that she'd been to the hospital. Who knew what could have hindered Tori if she hadn't gone in the first place?

"Almost," Tori quipped in response to Sam's dramatic welcome. "We still have to battle the dreaded driveway beast. It might be what defeats us."

Samantha smirked, "If it's the driveway that defeats you… I'll make sure to give you a more dramatic end in your autobiography."

"Heh. All roads lead to a DEAD end," Victoria punned badly. "Sorry, that one didn't quite pave out like I intended. I must be TIREd."

"Oh good grief!" Sam giggled, walking up to the group to help Obito help Tor. Sam offered her arm. Kushina followed up behind Samantha, deciding to walk next to Minato. It was quite easy to see the small blush she had gained, though it was too tinyily tinted to notice without looking at her closely.

"The urge to make puns has led me down many a rocky road," Tori confided to Rin, "It may seem a little PATHetic to you, but the round-a-bout way I talk sometimes..it's all a road-iculous attempt to make Sam laugh. Guess that's what you should expect from a Tor...ia. Heh. Did you see what I did there? I even punned my own name."

Samantha giggled at the first pun, but furrowed her brow in confusion by the last one, "Wait… I have no idea what you were trying to say there." She completely ignored Kakashi's near snort (Sam would swear it was a laugh!) while Minato and Kushina chatted quietly to themselves.

"Like… like a tour - tour guide? But my name, Tori.." Having finally reached the porch, Tori reached out and rested her hand against one of the large and elegant columns with a heaved sigh of relief at having made it to her destination. "It was a stretch."

Sam snorted briefly, "Okay, I gotcha now!" She looked over at the other two adults nearby. "So… what now? Tor and I do still need to go to the archives at some point."

"Yes, we will make sure that you two have your time to look for what you need." Minato agreed.

"Oh," Kushina sang, "So, are you two secret anbu on a mission for your clan or something?"

Samantha blinked in surprise at how closely Kushina was to being on the mark.

"Mind reader!" Tori whispered to Sam. Sam made an agreeable noise.

"Something like that," Sam grinned.

"Ah-heh, I'll explain more to you later," Minato complied as Kushina comically scrutinized him.

…...

"Say what." Sam deadpanned, hardly registering she made no conscious effort to stare at Kushina. The redheaded woman had a sparkle in her eye that Samantha wasn't quite sure what to think. The woman was notorious for pranks (at least, that was the general assumption, based on her persona and all that jazz in the anime ((because, though Sam owned most of the manga, she hadn't gotten to read it yet.)))

"That's right!" Kushina placed a hand on her hip, "I've heard you know some martial arts, so I wanna see what you've got!"

"Uuuh… well…" Samantha gulped, looking desperately at Tori for a way out of this, "I mean… I do know some martial arts but… I mean… it's been a few years since I've really done some training and-"

"Great! This will be a fantastic sparring match! We'll get to see what you remember and go from there! Maybe help you add some chakra moves in with it," The beautiful kunoichi placed her hand on Sam's wrist, beginning to pull her, "C'mon! Let's hop to it!"

Two minutes later found the two ladies standing in what could be called the Uzumaki compound training ground Or could this be considered the backyard? Samantha wearily looked around herself. She was excited, yes. Absolutely she was; but the look in Kushina's eyes made her nervous and while Samantha practiced with Hinata some, Kushina's sparring methods, Sam could tell, were most likely going to be more on the aggressive side. Her heart thudded at the thought of it. She wanted to spar and learn and grow from everything she'd been unable to do before, but… could she do this? Would she… would she fail like like had when defending Victoria? In a real fight- ack! I gotta stop actin' like I'm never gonna get it! Sam berated herself. Her self-esteem wasn't all that high; never had been, though her policy was 'fake it 'till you make it'.

"Alright," Kushina took her stance, "We'll start out first by assessing what you can do, and move from there. We'll keep ninjutsu and genjutsu out of it since I'm sure you're not familiar with either of them, so we'll stick with taijutsu."

"Uh, right." Sam nodded, watching as Kushina took her stance, smiling gleefully. Sam bit her lip before deciding to take on the stance which Hinata had shown her. Kenpo, though super useful, was more for self-defense than anything else. The moves which Hinata had shown her had at least given her a way to start the attack and perhaps startle her opponent rather than waiting for them to make the first move. That was more to her style anyway.

"Alright. Ready?" Kushina asked. Sam gave a shuddering breath before nodding slowly. "Go!"

The difference between Kushina and Hinata was paramount. Hinata, ever the gentle child in her youth, seemed to have continued on in that essence. She'd instruct Samantha carefully and precisely, noting the major challenges which she needed to fix and then continue on in that manner; helping Sam to perfect that particular move before moving on. Not to mention the sparing Hinata did with Samantha… well, she was certainly counting her blessings that she'd had that one time to truly understand what sparing was like otherwise… she'd be in deep doo-doo.

Kushina took no measures to wait for Samantha's prepared mind. One minute Kushina was five feet away, the next thing Sam knew, she was on the ground rubbing a bruised shoulder. Scratch that, I'm in such deep doo-doo now! Ouch!

Kushina smirked, "Where's that talk of training?"

"Yes well," Samantha grimaced, slowly standing, "It's been a while…" Itching her temple, Sam frowned over at Kushina, who never lost her large smile, feeling just a little discouraged.

"Well! Good thing you've got me! Now, let's continue! You said you had some moves, didn't you?"

"Um, well, yes-"

"Great! I'll go a little slower for you, so show me what you got!" And again, Kushina got into her ready stance, but as she said, this time she rushed for Samantha just a little slower. Sam wracked her brain, remembering all the things Hinata had taught her. With the slower movement's Kushina was allowing, it left room for Samantha to slow her brain down and remember the things Hinata taught in what felt like a life-time ago. Blocking and parrying, blood rushed loudly through Sam's ears. Her heart pounded with a flurry of excitement, easily ignoring each time she blocked Kushina's punches or kicks Even if they do leave bruises. Battle scars! Thoughts swirled through Sam's mind, concentrating with massive effort. Her eyes saw only her opponent and never left. So in tune was Sam to watching her kunoichi partner that she nearly stumbled when, with impossible movements (and somewhere in Sam's mind she knew it to be the body flicker) the redhead was nowhere to be seen. Gulping down air, allowing the burn in her throat to dissipate, Sam looked left to right, at a loss for how she should find her opponent.

A small tingling befell her neck, causing Sam to swiftly turn, only to see Kushina coming at her as if with the intent to kill. Just as quickly as Sam felt excitement, it was replaced with a fear so overwhelming she could no longer move. She saw Kushina, even saw the smile of joy in sparring on her face, yet Sam couldn't help the shock stifle her own fun in learning how to better her skills. Unable to move, to allow a single call to action, all Sam could do was quiver. To briefly think I'm finished before Kushina jumped forward and nearly slashed her hand across Samantha's neck, when she stopped herself.

"I win," Kushina smiled. Not two seconds later, when Kushina let her hands rest and her brow furrowed, Sam realized she was shaking. "Are you alright?"

"I-"

"Hey! Ms. Kushina!" The two sweaty women glanced left, noticing Rin (holding a picnic basket of sorts), Kakashi, and Obito entering the clearing. Sam backed away a step, ignoring the brief glance Kushina sent her way, and wrapping an arm around herself. Sam placed a plastic smile on, while Kushina sent the trio a genuine smile. The tightening of Sam's heart was palpably lighter when she realized that Kushina was gonna let the incident go. I really don't understand it myself… I hope she forgets it!

Kushina ran up to the trio, chatting away and listening to replies when her shriek of delight overroad anyones tone of voice as Minato came belatedly behind his team. At his side was the slow-moving Victoria who gave a happy, if a bit tired wave to Sam as they approached. Her medical check-up appointment must have gone okay for her to be joining them in the picnic rather than going back to the main house for a nap.

"Ah, nice to see you too, Kushina!" Minato replied, a light laugh to his voice as Kushina nearly bowled him over.

"Ya know, Sunshine, you just missed some awesome shinobi action over here!"

"Ah, c'mon. Get a room." Obito scrunched his nose, pretending to gag.

"Hey! When you get old enough, you'll totally understand what it means to like someone!" Kushina shot back sticking her tongue out. It was like night and day as Obito went from his normal shade of pinkened cheeks to a bright cherry red as he tried to hide his glances towards Rin. Kakashi rolled his eyes, silently scoffing knowingly at his teammate.

"What awesome shinobi action happened?" Victoria asked Sam curiously as she finished shuffling her way over to where Sam was toweling off her forehead and taking a drink from her canteen. "Were you and Kushina able to train like you hoped?"

"Hah! Yeah, something like that." Sam said after the deep gulp of her water, wiping her mouth briefly. Kushina and Obito were still hashing it out, and Sam could see Kakashi slowly sliding away from the group. "How are you feeling?" Sam asked, focusing on Victoria.

Victoria gave a loose shrug. "Still really, really tired. But apparently I am coming along nicely in the healing department. Doc accused me of using my chakra to speed things along, but I pointed out that there was totally no way that I could have done that if I didn't know how to use chakra for that, right?" She pushed up her glasses and sighed. "I'll just be glad when I can move without having to think about whether or not I might knock a rib into my lungs."

Sam blinked, "Is that possible to actually knock your rib like that?" It was an off-handed comment, one that Sam did not expect to be answered, "But… ya know… it kinda makes me feel a little dizzy thinking we can actually use chakra. Who knew, right?"

Tori laughed. "I know. But, it makes sense. We got bodies and spirits and electrical currents between our atoms just like everybody else. Why not chakra?"

"Because we're not from this world?" Sam deadpanned, briefly interjecting quietly.

For Victoria, as long as a world system was consistent and seemed to have some sort of scientific explanation that could be used to test its bounds, she was willing to accept it as a possible reality, even if she didn't really know the full hows or whys. She had more questions about where the jelly went when you wiped the table clean than about how it was she was using alien ninja magic. "And, I was being hyperbolic, bytheway," Tori added as almost an after-thought, "My rib was just a little cracked, not split through and apt to run away through the chest cavity. You won't get rid of me that easily, Samwise Gamgee."

"I suppose you're in luck, then." The newly dubbed 'Samwise Gamgee' half-smiled, "I think it would be a little more frightening to be in this situation if you were suddenly gone."

"Just look for me in Shelob's Lair," Tori quipped. "I'll be wrapped up all snuggly-wuggly about to be eaten by a giant buggly."

"Shelob's lair" Sam furrowed her brow, thinking.

"The spider!" Tori said. "Big, old spider. Tries to eat Frodo about half a minute after he stomps away from Sam."

"Oh! Right. Hah. I forgot that that spider had a name." Samantha scratched her temple, cheeks slightly pink. It was then that she saw Kakashi seeming to be creeping up closer to them. So… Sam smirked, "How's it goin' there, Kakash-uh, Hatake-san?" Man… it's gonna take forever to remember to call him by his last name.

The tiny Kakashi for once didn't have a kunai to sharpen as a way to hide. So instead, he put his hands on his hips and tilted his head slightly to one side. "We begin your new mission tomorrow. We can do the briefing now if you two are done talking nonsense."

Victoria's lips quirked into an exasperated pout. "It's not nonsense. You just didn't catch the reference. It's fine. Can't expect a chunin to know everything, right, Sam?"

"Yeah!" Sam pouted, agreeably, "Besides. You'd love it if you could read it." She nodded matter-of-factly, before registering what Kakashi had said, "Wait. Mission? We're going on a mission? Oh wait… right." It took Sam a second to remember that they were going to be searching the archives, having lost focus from the more… hard-pressing fight with Kushina than she had expected. "Well… we have plenty of time to talk awesomeness, so… speak ye, henceforth, young shinobi!" Sam waved a hand comically, ushering Kakashi to talk to her and Victoria.

Kakashi's look of confusion and slight hesitation meant he was now totally at the mercy of Sam and Tori's teasing. "Oh, but verily, forsooth, Lady Winters," Victoria said, laying a hand on Sam's elbow and leaning close in playful concern, "Squire Hatake must not be denied the opportunity to be most immediately indoctrinated into the sacred knowledge of the Tolkien."

"Hai, Hai, but he shall be verily besotten by the lengths with which we, his senpais, shall speak thusly of said masterpiece." Samantha, though she enjoyed the fun banter, was sorely terrible at coming up with witty comments to say right on the spot - and yet, she tried. To a fault she tried.

"No. Stop. Please."

Victoria snorted at the look of disconcerted horror that had flashed through the child shinobi's eyes. "Methinks he doth protest. Mayhap we should show mercy?"

Kakashi glared at them both, his arms now crossing tightly across his chest. "You're behaving like children."

Samantha giggled, mimicking Kakashi's pose, though less imposing. "Us? Behaving like children? I think not." She turned to Tori, "Mayhap we should continue the ritual of the teasing? The white-haired youngin' has an adorable pout." Sam teasingly poked out her tongue.

"I think he caught it. The adulthood. It's a shame to see it having infected one so young," Victoria said solemnly.

Rin and Obito popped up on either side of Kakashi's shoulders. "Did you need some help, Kakashi?" Rin asked gently.

"Bakakashi? Needing help? As if." Obito chimed in, though he stood next to his teammate with every intention of backing him up.

"Ah, Tori-Sama, me thinketh we are officially outnumbered. Our time may have come."

"Ah yes. We must do what we learned in French class, Sam." Victoria waved a tiny invisible white flag. "We surrender!"

Sam nodded her head matter-of-factly, humphing her acknowledgement of their defeat. Then, giggling, she placed a hand on her hip. "So, you wanted to talk to us about a mission?" Though the question was directed towards Kakashi, Sam looked at all three. Kakashi, Rin, and Obito. (Out of the corner of her eye, Sam could see Minato and Kushina in the background, smiling fondly.)

"Can we do this sitting down?" Tori asked hopefully. "Maybe with lunch?" Kakashi clearly wanted to protest, but was swept under the tide of everyone else's eager agreement. As they all chowed down on the rice balls and sweet dongo, the plan was discussed and basically boiled down to this: tomorrow morning Sam and Tori would be waiting at the doors of the compound for the three youngest members of Team Minato to be escorted by them to the Archives where they would be given extremely limited and well-supervised access to the materials while searching for the mysterious bit of parchment with unknown writing upon it. Kushina asked several questions about the mystery and when Obito helpfully parroted back what Victoria had said about their supposed cultish upbringing, Kushina asked several hundred more questions.

Victoria and Sam kept it as close as possible to the truth, while still following the set up Victoria had established in their later conversations with the Third Hokage.

"Wow! Ya know, for how modern our world is, I never would've expected there to be some cult hiding out in the wilderness, being all… un-modern. Ya know?"

Kushina's astonishment was genuine and immediately Sam bit her lip. Man, I'm such a bad liar. I really hope that she doesn't see through my terrible acknowledgement face. "Yeah. We were certainly left in the dark! It's like a completely new world to us here where all the shinobi reside. Let alone learning we have chakra!"

"Oh! That's right! I never got to show you how to use your chakra, did I? We should continue the lesson after looking in the archives, ya know? How about it?"

"Ah, right. Molding chakra… you're right. We never even started it. Um…" Sam was hesitant. "Are we going to spar again?"

"Nah, we don't need to spar to learn how to harness chakra! We'll start off easy, like holding a leaf to your forehead! How about it?"

"Alright. That sounds fine." Samantha agreed. Kushina turned her question towards Victoria.

Tori perked up. "I certainly would like to learn more about using chakra!" She agreed. "But… doc did say I would have to be careful for a bit longer. But just small practice should be okay."

"Yosh! Okay! Let's get to crackin' those parchements, ya know!" And Kushina trudged ahead.

Tori tilted her head and looked over to Minato. "Do you think she heard the part where this starts tomorrow?"

Sam smirked, "Probably not! She's a shinobi through and through, I suppose!"

...

It was a bright and beautiful morning. A perfect day to spend outdoors in most people's eyes. Victoria, of course, had been greatly enjoying life back on the inside of things, but even she was a little excited about hiking across the Uzumaki compound to the training grounds. Today was the day she was finally cleared to start using chakra again! And thus, it would be the day that Kushina would start training Samantha and Victoria in the mysterious and awesome power of the shinobi world. As a fantasy nerd, Victoria had grown up dreaming of magic and flying and finally, she was going to get to do some of that stuff! She just hoped her little mitochondrias were ready for it this time. She did not fancy another three weeks of misery and bedrest. The thought made her pause. She did some quick counting. "Sam," Tori said, "Sam! How many days has it been now since we landed in Konoha. Sixteen, right? Nine while I was in the hospital and now another week since I got out. Add that to the time getting us here, the Boruto nonsense.." She laughed. "Dude. I think back home, it might actually be Halloween. That's weird."

"Ya know, I'm actually a little sad about that," Sam replied, slightly downtrodden, "I love Halloween! I wonder if there's some way to incorporate that holiday here… I bet that the ninja would just love halloween!" Sam plotted.

"And it's almost your birthday!" Victoria said brightly. "We should make a cake."

"My birthday isn't for another month away! Don't make me old, Tori!" Sam pouted I'm so glad that no one else heard that!

"Your birthday is next month? We should have a party, you know!" Kushina's sudden appearance before them made the two Earthling women jump.

"Exactly!" Victoria said with a grin. "And presents!"

Samantha nearly smacked her own face too hard, groaning, "Oh no…" she sighed, "Ya know, I do love my birthday but… I am just old this time round! I don't wanna celebrate being old! Especially since my life has never been as exciting as a shinobi's life…" Sam didn't want to call her life pathetic but… she hardly had anything to live for except for her cats, her best friend, and her family. She'd never accomplished anything in her life, and so there was quite a lot of it that felt pointless in the grand scheme of things. She'd often thought 'what's the point?' but would then ignore it because she loved her family (which she included her friends in that category) and cats too much.

"Which is why we comfort ourselves with sugary carbs and gifts, SamSam," Tori said with gentle firmness and a comforting shoulder squeeze. "We can't stop the inevitable and devastating march of time, so we must be stalwart against its cruelty. But also! Think of how much adventure we had this month; we might have twice as much adventure under our belt by the time we actually get to your birthday. Plus, we are about to practice literal, actually ninjutsu. That's gotta be awesome."

Sam exasperated, "Man… way to be logical." She winked at Victoria, "I thought that was me. Mr. Spock, remember?" Samantha playfully sighed once more, "Well, we can celebrate if you want, but I ain't gonna be remindin' ya. Probably."

"Yay! A party!" Kushina cheered. "Now, let's get cracking on that chakra practice. We haven't got all day, ya know!" At the kunoichi's urging, Sam and Tori hurried the rest of the way up the hill and to the training grounds where Kushina had clearly been busy setting up several different 'stations' each with random objects meant to help them practice their chakra or test different things. The first thing she guided them to was a table where there was a tiny pouch of light yellow papers. "These are litmus papers, you know. They are so we know what chakra nature you each have."

Victoria looked cautiously at the paper and then took the one Kushina wiggled at her. "What do we do with them?" she asked. "Do we have to, like bleed on it or spit on it or something?"

Sam giggled at Tori, holding a hand up to her mouth. Kushina laughed brightly and shook her head, her bright red hair waving and springing up and down with her laughter. "Just flow your chakra into the paper and it'll do something. Like this." Kushina grabbed a paper and held it between her hands like she was praying. After a second, she parted her hands to show that her paper was neatly sliced from top to bottom. "Alright, you try."

"Oh kay.." Victoria said slowly. She then held her paper in both hands like Kushina had. It took her a moment longer than normal to gather the chakra feeling. The warm tingle tickled her palms. She opened her palms, expecting to see a paper sliced up like Kushina's own. "What!" She shared a panicked look with Sam. "I think I ruined it," she said regretfully. Her hands were covered in tiny shreds of paper; it had just deteriorated without any warning!

Kushina smiled knowingly, "Don't worry about the paper crumbling into pieces. In fact, it's a good thing. Means we know just what your chakra nature is."

Samantha, while waiting to hear what Kushina said that Tori's chakra nature was, did her best to wrack her brain at what the crumbling of a paper meant. She'd seen the episode… she knew that it was when Naruto was learning his rasenshuriken, but for the life of her, couldn't remember what each nature did to the piece of paper. Luckily for both she and Victoria, they didn't have to wait long to find out. "The crumbling of this litmus paper means that you've got yourself an earth chakra nature! Congratulations."

Victoria couldn't help feeling a little disappointed. Dirt clods. Dust. Not exactly giant fireballs or that crackly shrieking lightning that Adult Kakashi had somewhat reluctantly demonstrated their first week for a starry eyed Sam. "Hm." Victoria wanted to sigh, but instead she remembered to put a smile back on before looking up at the eager Kushina and Samantha. "Earth style, huh? I always knew I rocked!" She quipped cheerily.

"Heck yeah! That's so exciting, Tor!" Sam held her hands close to her chest - usually the beginnings of her excitement. Especially for friends and family. Her heart pounded as Kushina turned towards her with a litmus paper. Samantha grasped it lightly, blinking at the plainness of its texture, having expected it to be as rough as parchment. The paper was smooth, however.

"Okay, now go ahead and siphon some chakra into the paper and we'll find out what your chakra nature is!" Kushina directed, waiting expectantly.

Having only dealt with chakra to the most minimal extent, Samantha had to really dig deep to begin moving her chakra. But when she did, she widened at how quickly it seemed to be rolling through her veins, as if she could feel her blood pumping rapidly. She felt it gather towards her fingers holding the paper and then… the paper wilted like a wet paper towel. So surprised by this, Samantha squeaked and dropped the paper. Kushina laughed.

"Looks like you're a water nature!"

"Water?" Sam repeated, thinking of all the possibilities that that meant. She was like… a real life water bender! "I'm a water bender!" She said aloud a second time, slightly stunned with excitement.

"A water what?" Kushina said with slight confusion, "It's not quite like bending water, ya know."

"I know, I know," Samantha waved a hand dismissively, "There's this… story that I'm quoting which talks about bending water particles 'n stuff. It's basically the same thing." Sam stared at her now easily shreddable paper which, surprisingly, didn't turn into little balls of paper at the first sign of being contaminated with water.

"Heh. Should we start calling you Sokka?" Victoria teased. She then struck a pose with her fist up. "Watch out, naughty shinobis! Toph-Sama is coming to get ya!"

Sam 'ahemed', giving Tori a look, "I believe you meant to say Katara, dude."

"Sure. Sure I did," Tori said with a smirk that belied her promise.

Sam giggled, looking back to Kushina who watched the two, amused. "So… now what?"

"Well… now we can begin your training!" Kushina clapped her hands, then went to a tree and picked off a leaf. "Now, try and hold that piece of leaf to your forehead using only your chakra."

"Both of us?" Victoria asked, picking up a leaf. "Or does Sam need like..a water balloon or something?" She summoned some chakra into her fingers and then realized that she needed it going the opposite way. Victoria tried to imagine a little bubble of chakra rolling back up her arms and towards her neck. She got about as far as her nose before she sneezed violently twice. "Whoops. That's hard moving it to your forehead!"

Kushina giggled, placing her hands on her hips, "No, Samantha-San will also use a leaf. It's the best way to begin learning chakra control."

"I never woulda thought to ask if I'd have to use something different… that's a good question, Tor." Sam replied, taking her own leaf and lifted it to her forehead. "Okay," she prepared herself. Chakra was such a weird feeling, it made Samantha want to shiver as she felt the rush begin. It went from her core - her heart - and Sam felt it begin to move upwards, coursing through her like a swift river. It went up her cheeks - tickled her nose, making her want to sneeze like Victoria - and paused right where Sam had imagined it to pause. Her heart floored from excitement. Okay… I think I can let go! So… she did. The leaf stayed on her forehead for a second, before it suddenly blew away from her face as if thrust by the wind before falling slowly to the ground; twiddling as it did so.

"Um…" Sam questioned, her brow furrowed in confusion, "Is that supposed to happen?"

Kushina chortled, "Well, you certainly got your chakra where you needed it to go! But it blew out like that because you gathered up too much of it."

"So… that caused it to suddenly fly away?"

"Yup it did!" Kushina gave her a thumbs up, "But way to go, ya know! That was a good first attempt. For both of you!" She praised.

Victoria was not having so much luck as she had with the seals, and between the accidental sneezes and the tickly, itchy feel of chakra that went the wrong way down her throat, she kinda looked like she'd developed a cold in the interim. "I am having some hard time visualizing this," she admitted, raising her hand like she was in third grade again. "All the stuff we've done so far has started with building chakra up in our hands. Is there a way to build it up in your forehead or something? Or maybe a best route to send it from fingers to head?"

Kushina 'hmmed', her fingers stroking her chin, "Well, your chakra is meant to build up on your forehead rather than through your fingers, since you will be using your forehead to hold the leaf up and not your fingers. What you could try, before using your forehead to hold up the leaf, is having that sensation on your fingers. Holding the leaf to your fingertips without letting the leaf fall to the ground. Gain what the sensation is meant to feel like that will you help in building it up to your forehead in the same manner."

Well of course I can do that.. Victoria thought to herself, feeling no more enlightened about forehead chakra than before. At least, I would assume I can. She narrowed her eyes at her tiny leaf and then held it up in front of her in one hand. With her other hand, she mentally imagined a marble-sized twirly ball of chakra whirling up to the tip of her opposite pointer finger. She glared even more fiercely at the leaf as though willing it to listen to her and then poked her chakra-infused finger into the face of the leaf with the same confident squish she would have used to apply a dollop of glue on a craft project. "Hold on, hold on, hold on," she chanted under her breath as she delicately released the leaf. It was trembling and wobbling and skittering like it was stuck in a gale, but the leaf stuck to her finger for a good thirty seconds before ricocheting off to gently smack Victoria's cheek. "Woohoo!" she cheered. "Finger Glue Jutsu achieved!" And of course, that meant a victory dance.

"Yay!" Sam gave a victory fistpump, happy that her friend was getting the jutsu down.

"Good job!" Kushina approved, "Now go ahead and give it a try on your forehead. Remember the sensation!"

Victoria chased down her leaf from where it had floated off to the ground in the wake of her dance and as she straightened up, she lightly declared, "Just so you know, Sam, this one is not a contest." She gently pressed smooth a wrinkle in her leaf and then fiddled with it a few more times to cover up the impending embarrassment of failing to get it on her forehead again. "Mainly cuz I don't think I'm gonna win." She furrowed her brows and glared at the leaf, trying to imagine and feel the chakra energy gathering in the crinkled up skin of her forehead rather than the-easy-to-sense tips of her fingers.

"Oh, this is so a contest!" Sam countered, placing her own leaf back onto her forehead and doing her best not to add too much chakra and cause the leaf to blow off.

"In that case, I'm going to beat both of you, you know!" Kushina declared, fixing a leaf to her own forehead. Hers did not fall off. "I bet I can keep this on for the next hour! The whole night!"

"The next week?" Victoria asked, a little too innocently. She delicately tucked a strand of bangs out of the way before trying to once again do her Finger Glue jutsu, but this time imagining the chakra was a magnet and her forehead was a big metal fridge. The leaf didn't tremble quite so much, but it did slide down, down, down before tumbling free after hitting the nose-bridge of Victoria's glasses.

"Definitely!" Kushina declared, taking on the challenge.

"Uh," Sam laughed nervously, "I'm not going to try for a week… that's a bit much, don't you think?" Losing concentration, Sam watched as the leaf fluttered to the ground.

"I think I'd be happy to manage five minutes," Victoria mused, pushing up her glasses and replacing the leaf for another slow fall. "So with sealing they told us to have a focus word. So are there mental tricks or focus things that can help with holding the chakra in place?"

Kushina placed a hand on her chin, thinking seriously about Victoria's question. "Generally, at least when it comes to a physical representation, I could place a dot or something like it on your hand where you could focus your chakra. Mentally is a little tougher because you can't see it. What you could do, is place your finger and touch the point on your forehead - keeping in mind the sensation of chakra having flown to your fingers before - and take that feeling and imagine it going to where you feel the pressure on your forehead. Try that and see if it works."

Samantha hummed when hearing Tori's question, listening intently to Kushina as she decided to take action on the red head's method. She touched her forehead, with the leaf between, and imagined her chakra rushing up towards the sensation. Imagining it to ball up and pause right where she wanted it to. And it did, for a second. Until it didn't. Sam was able to get the leaf to stay pressed to her forehead for a minute before the leaf blew away from her face and fluttered to the ground.

"Gosh darn rotten!" Sam cursed, "I thought this was supposed to be easy."

Kushina giggled, "If you thought using your chakra was easy, you were severely misinformed. Molding chakra takes a great effort. If you're one of the lucky ones who doesn't give up, you become someone great! Like me." She winked. "So don't give up! You have great potential! I can sense it. Both of you do." She pointedly looked between both Sam and Victoria.

Kushina's advice was only a subtle change from what Tori had already tried, but she swallowed back the part of her personality that always wanted to be the smartest person in the room, and tried building up her chakra from the point where she wanted the leaf to stick. Always a more visual learner she had to think of something to help her picture her own forehead..a part of her anatomy that she just really didn't pay much attention to. "Unicorn," she murmured under her breath. It was cheesy but with her eyes closed she imagined a tiny pearlescent unicorn horn poking its way through her otherwise nondescript forehead. It had an elegant tapered shape and was barely an inch long- just perfect for stabbing a leaf. Or, not stabbing a leaf, holding a teeny tiny flower crown. Yes, she could imagine that the stem of the leaf she held was a tiny crown, right? With careful deliberation, Victoria imagined that she was crowning her unicorn horn with the rather battered leaf. Ah. So elegant. So pretty. Nothing to ninja magic, because what's puny ninja magic to a mystical and fabulous unicorn. Obviously I'm brimming with magic to my toenails, so my little flower crown wouldn't dare to fall right? Right. The distant, logical side of her mind was holding its breath as it counted the seconds passing with no tickling leaf falling down her face. She peeked one eye open, hopefully not scaring the chakra to flee her forehead. "Sam," Tori whispered. "Sam, look."

A twinge of jealousy pierced Sam's heart when she noticed the leaf sticking to Tori's forehead, but then she smiled. "Dude, Tor. That's fantastic!"

"You've got that right!" Kushina piped up, "Looks like you're finally getting a handle on it!" As soon as Kushina praised Victoria for her accomplishment the leaf drifted down.

"Well, at least you were able to hold it for almost as long as I just did!" Sam cheered for Tori, turning back to her own leaf. Look, darn you. Kushina was ever so kind to teach us how to use our chakra, so you better stick to my chakra on my forehead! Sam knew it was pointless to berate an inanimate object, but the situation seemed to need it, somehow. She placed the leaf on her forehead and gave out a frustrated noise when it, once again, fell to the ground. Nearly growling when it looked like Tori wanted to speak up, Sam picked up the leaf once again and imagined a dot on her forehead, like a laser or the sun's reflection through a magnifying glass, and took a deep breath.

"Work," She muttered, acutely aware of Kushina's observation. She imagined the chakra flowing to her forehead, flowing like water falling to the middle of a bowl, or dip in the ground. To her surprise, the leaf stuck to her forehead for a mere four seconds before it fell. Why wasn't it staying on her forehead as long as it was earlier?

"With such large chakra reserves, it'll definitely take you more practice." Kushina stated, "But with time, you'll definitely be able to hold it on your forehead for an entire week!" she winked.

Sam smiled, turning to Tori and giving her a thumbs up.

"Such large reserves?" Victoria repeated curiously, Samantha shrugged. "What do you mean by that, Kushina-chan?" It had rattled around in Tori's brain for awhile that Boruto and Co had told Sam she was using too much chakra when they were way back first learning seal releases. Since the same hadn't been said to her, Tori figured that must mean something important for down the road. But, also, wasn't that a little weird that one person would have more body-energy than another? Like, what does that mean? Does Sam have more cells or something? A bigger spirit-self? Just cooler mitochondrias that spit out chakra for her than mine do? Darn lazy cells!

"Yes!" Kushina went into that 'teapot' pose that teachers often used when explaining their lesson, "You see, Samantha-San has a lot of chakra pooling through her body, which makes it a lot harder for her to be able to mold it to what she wants. She's kinda like me!" Kushina smiled proudly.

Samantha's eyes went wide, "I'm like Naruto?" She muttered to herself, half smiling at the idea, half annoyed that it was just as annoying as Naruto had cringed about throughout the series when he was trying to mold his own chakra. "That's so cool!"

"It is!" Kushina agreed, happily, "But it also means you're going to have to be more dedicated to learning how to use your chakra than Victoria-San will."

"Why?" Tori questioned. "Wouldn't I need to study it even more if I don't have as much extra as she does?" Realizing that it had come across a little harshly, Tori blushed and added, "I mean, like from a philosophical standpoint. There's a lot I still don't understand here."

"Well of course, Victoria-San. You can't have too much studying! I just mean that it'll be easier for you to get the hang of molding your chakra because you don't have such a large reserve. Though it does mean that there are certain jutsu that you can't do because of this."

Samantha deflated slightly. It's gonna be harder for me? She couldn't help the frown on her face as she thought about it. I don't know if I can do this… do I have enough dedication to truly learn.

"Can you teach us some defensive jutsus?" Victoria asked, cutting straight to the matter of things. "Stuff is a lot scarier out here than we thought it would be."

"Stuff? What do you mean 'stuff'?" Samantha turned her question to Tori. Kushina stayed silent as well, as if she wanted an answer to Sam's question, too.

Tori's face fell into a flat frown of the 'are you kidding me' meme man. "Like, remember how someone straight up tried to murder us last week? Or two weeks or whatever ago. And the thing before that with the scarf boy and the toad - like, we keep almost dying like a lot this month. That stuff."

"Oh." Sam thought on it for just a split second, "Stuff was a weird word to use." She teased, a small smirk-smile forming, "But Tor is right!" Sam turned her eyes towards Kushina, "If we knew some defensive jutsus, that would be super helpful."

"Well, I don't see why not." Kushina smiled, "But it's going to take a lot of hard work for you two. Especially since you've never really molded chakra before."

Tori tucked her hair back behind her ears and gave a firm nod. "We aren't afraid of hard work, Miss Kushina," she declared. "Just dying. And… maybe hiking too."

The ninja archives were way more ordinary than an earth-born mortal would have assumed. It was literally and literarily a reference library, well-organized and guarded on the outside. Oh, there was probably more sensitive documentation kept somewhere else, but at least the parts that Sam and Tori had been granted access to looked strangely like the old library Tori visited as a child before her city built a newer building. She kept expecting to turn the corner and run into Ms. Joan the librarian. Instead, she would turn the corner to meet the scowling angry little eyes of a nine-year-old Kakashi. She had learned to accept his trademark standoffishness at this point, even if her homesick little heart wanted to hug him tightly and pretend it was her baby brother. The giant crossed katanas on his back and the omnipresent shurikens helped her remember that that was a bad idea. So instead Tori and Sam did what they always did these days: went to a shelf, pulled down all the books from a row and methodically flipped every page looking for a loose piece of the legendary parchment. Of course the odds of them actually finding anything was pretty much zero, but until they figured out from Boruto what the heck they were supposed to do next, Sam and Tori were killing time while hopefully not getting themselves killed.

Flipping closed yet another tome, Tori placed it on top of the 'done' stack and leaned back in her chair with a big yawn. "Man. I wish I could manage one of those clone jutsus Kushina showed us last night. I'd make two: one to do all the book carrying for me and a second to massage my shoulders!"

"Except those clones are nothing but holograms." Sam stated, leafing through her own book, "So… we'd still be stuck doing the work ourselves."

"Don't wreck my dreams, Sam," Tori huffed.

"What you need is an element clone," Rin offered, looking up from a book of medical ninjutsu that she had been studying at the table with them. "Like a water clone or a sand clone. Clones with physical forms can perform tasks, and if you get good enough, they can even learn things for you or make decisions. Mainly they are used for stealth and espionage though, Tori-Chan, not for back massages."

Samantha snorted, a tiny giggle taking over.

Tori narrowed her eyes at Sam. "Is there a jutsu for making Sam carry all the books for me?" She asked Rin. "Cuz she's teasing me and should totally be punished for it."

"Hey!" Sam lightly smacked Victoria's arm with the back of her hand, feigning her offended tone, "It was funny!"

Rin smiled with a little giggle of her own, "I suppose we do have the Nara clan that can do something like that."

Sam's jaw dropped, and she whipped her head in shock towards Rin. "I cannot believe you just helped her plan my demise!"

"Someone's demise is being planned? I want in!" Obito nearly hopped over into one of the seats at the table Sam, Tori and Rin were sat at.

"No!" Sam said quickly, "We are definitely not planning someone's demise here."

"Oooh, I heard you say 'definitely'. Sound exciting!" Obito grinned widely and Samantha was just as shocked to see the young boy teasing her just as easily as the other's.

"Man. Y'all are mean." Elongating the last word, Samantha stuck out her tongue, silently happy that there was happiness happening at all, period.

"Gosh, don't call them average, Samantha," Tori said. "That's rude."

"Well, they are," Tiny Kakashi's voice came from the window sill. He had taken to crouching there as it gave him the best view of all exits. Unlike the other two young shinobi, he seemed to take the command of 'guard against any suspicious behavior' seriously from one day to the next. "Average that is."

Samantha turned to the moody teen, "I didn't call them average, ya punny weirdo." She turned her last comment towards Victoria, narrowing her eyes in a 'I see what you did there' way.

"Puns are just my mode, Sam," Tori said blandly. "They come to me unbidden. Like ghosts to a medium." She fluttered her eyelashes at the collective gathering. "It's a big plus in being my friend."

"I think opinions might be divided on that matter," Tiny Kakashi said lightly, earning a snort from Victoria.

Samantha stifled a quipped laugh, "Oh good grief. You just had to egg her on, didn't ya?" She was never good at coming up with puns on her own, but she was always good at giving them a good laugh.

"I'm not average, Stupid Kakashi!" Obito growled out, standing abruptly with a fist towards his teammate, "If you wanna fight, let's just take this outside!"

Kakashi didn't even bother looking over at Obito. "We're on duty," he said. "Or have you forgot?"

"Obi-Wan-Tobi-One," Tori soothed, "He was just teasing back. I'm the one that said it first, remember?"

Sam's eyes went wide at the smoothly coated relation Obito had towards the name 'Tobi'. Holy Hannah she's gonna blow our cover! Sam froze, unable to move as Obito responded, teeth grit tight.

"Yeah, but Stupid Kakashi always has something to say. Whether you started it or not." He turned towards Kakashi, "I don't care that we're on duty! They wouldn't mind! Would you?" He looked at both Sam and Tori, eyes hopefully expectant.

"Uh," Sam let out, exasperated.

"Yep. I would mind," Tori said, "Cuz if you guys get in trouble for fighting on duty today then you can't come to Sam's birthday party tomorrow." She raised a finger to punctuate her point. "And that would deprive both of you of cake. Which to me sounds like a loss for everybody. So let's not fight and just stick with gentle, friendly teasing, fam." (Tori was oblivious to Sam's near panic. The only context she knew for the name 'Tobi' was that it was the person that gave Sam her hat. There were at least a few spoilers she was still blissfully ignorant of.)

Sam's eyes went wide once more, "O-oh. Right. My birthday party." She wasn't overtly excited about the party (which was actually weird, considering she'd had slumber parties for her birthday for nearly sixteen years) and had, surprisingly, forgotten that it even existed in the first place. A part of her felt sad she wouldn't be seeing her family. That bothered her a bit. She was too sad these days. I just gotta get over it. Yup. Be happy and have fun. Think on the awesome things! "You certainly wouldn't want to go without cake, right?"

Obito visibly deflated, muttering as he picked up his chair and slumped into his seat. Rin smiled at him, "Don't worry, Obito. You can fight Kakashi all you want at the party. I'm sure Samantha-San and Victoria-San would enjoy watching you two spar."

"Oh yes, definitely!" Sam agreed, quickly. Which was true. She hadn't lied. She would definitely be interested to see them fight. Maybe I can get Minato to do a little sparring too… The idea of watching him fight was exhilarating to her. No harm in small attraction. She was sure she wasn't the only one in the whole of Konoha who thought him super sexy like a beast. Beyond Kushina, anyway.

"Oo! Oo! And we could, too, Sam!" Tori said brightly, clapping her hands. "We can show off what we learned from Kushina-Chan! Ooo, that'll be so fun. Like a chakra talent show!"

Kakashi smirked a little at Obito. "Maybe Obito can show you his fireball jutsu.."

Rin frowned at the smaller kid. "Kakashi," she scolded warningly.

Obito growled. He did that a lot where Kakashi and his responses were concerned, "You wish you could do a fireball jutsu as amazing as me!"

Samantha held back a laugh, the scene from the second movie of Harry Potter popping into her head. Harry facing off Malfoy. Malfoy challenging him and Harry stating 'You Wish'. His lip always made a weird twinge as he spoke the word, and Samantha forever giggled at the reminder of it.

"Why would I need to learn a fireball jutsu as weak as yours when I could just drop a mountain on your head instead?" Kakashi countered.

"Hah! You wish!" Obito shot right back.

"I don't have to wish. I already have that skill."

"Ladies! Ladies!" Victoria interrupted in her best 'teacher' voice. Rising from her chair, she raised a hand up to both of the quarreling boys, and said quite firmly, "We are in a library. I expect you both to behave appropriately."

"Sorry, sensei," Obito instinctively responded and then blushed bright red when he realized what he'd said.

"Man, Tor. That was very…" Samantha searched for the right word, "Strict?" she mumbled to herself, "No…" another short moment of thought, "Draconian of you." She smiled and wiggled her eyebrows, immediately enticing a smile out of Obito. Sam silently cheered. She didn't want him to be sad. It was… terrible… when he became sad. Not that Obito would go ballistic while being in Konoha, but one never knew.

"I'm serious about wanting these hoodlums to get some cake," Tori said with a shrug. She leaned over a little and the hand that had been held up to warn Obito back was used to ruffle his hair behind his goggles. "They've been working hard for us on our annoying project. I'll be a dragon if that's what it takes to get them some fun time." She shot a look over to Tiny Kakashi but he was staring out the window again, as unreadable as ever.

"I'm not sure Kak- Hatake-San would consider a birthday party, fun. Knowing him, he'll probably be on alert the whole time, right?" Kakashi grunted, barely gracing Sam with a glance.

"On the contrary." Rin interjected, "Kakashi actually does enjoy relaxing every once in a while. Even if you can't tell that he is." She had a small, blushed smile as she spoke about her teammate, giving him a once over before looking at Samantha, "He'll have fun tomorrow, too." She stated.

"I'm super glad about that!" Samantha smiled softly. Even though he was a terribly moody teen, Sam hoped Rin was right.

"Plus Minato-San and Kunisha-Chan will be there," Tori said, directing it more towards the tiny Kakashi than anything else. "I am one hundred percent certain that the two of them could hold off the apocalypse itself if it started during our party, so there won't be anything at all for the rest of us to worry about. Right, Hatake-San?"

The tiny ninja adjusted his face mask and shrugged a tiny bit. "...Probably," he finally muttered.

"Phew. Glad we all agreed on that. It was getting to be a bit of a long division." Tori gave Sam an exaggerated wink.

…

"So." Sam said as she watched Tori fluttering about the kitchen, "We're really making a cake? I don't think I know how to make one without a pre-made batter fluff…"

"I can… do it," Tori promised with all the hesitant confidence she had for the situation. "I have most of a recipe memorized for a spice cake, just gotta find the right stuff… And if nothing else, I can always make a crepe cake." She gave a triumphant shout as she located the cinnamon among the herd of little spice jars. Being illiterate kinda sucked. "Kay, we've got flour, spices, eggs, but I'm having a hard time finding oil.." She ran her hands through her hair several times, making a mess of it. "Or sugar for that matter. Can't even make crepes without that.." She began to rummage through the cupboards again. "Think, think, think. What can sub for oil in ba - oh! Applesauce! That'd be perfect in a spice cake anyways. And I know just where to find some!" She darted down the hallway, leaving Sam to continue sketching and munching on pocky.

Distantly the doors opened, and the sound of three sets of feet shuffling in: after so many days of arriving to escort the Earthling women to the archives, the junior members of Team Minato had learned to show themselves in.

"Hi, Samantha-Chan," Rin greeted with a smile, a brightly wrapped present in her arms. "We came early to see if you need help setting up."

Samantha glanced at the present in slight surprise. They might've been throwing her a birthday party, but she still didn't expect to receive anything. After all… they hardly knew her. "That's really nice of you! You didn't have to come so early."

Obito rubbing the top of his lip with his pointer finger, trying to hide a blush, "We wanted to. Besides, what good body guards would we be if we didn't?"

At that moment, Victoria bounded back into the kitchen happily brandishing their epic adventuring scroll. "We have applesauce in here!" she cooed. "Oh, hey, guys," she greeted. Victoria went straight to unraveling the scroll, looking for the little apple symbol she remembered seeing.

"Man, that's super convenient!" Sam cheered, watching as Tori opened the scroll.

"I know," Tori said with a grin. "Way better than going to the store. It's like our own personal Netflix of weapons and supplies." The little wobbly circles of her and Sam's seals took up a lot of the first section, but after scrolling past the almost endless length of ramen bowls, she found the place where the backpack and books existed. Right at the top was the little rectangle with an apple on it. Thank heavens for Himawari! I'd never know what I was doing without her thoughtfulness in adding all those little pictures. Summoning her chakra was easy thanks to all the practice sessions with Kushina and Victoria easily released the seal. Her sudden shriek of surprise caught everyone's attention: Little Kakashi pulled a kunai out of nowhere and Obito inexplicably jumped on the counter, arms raised in a fighting stance. Rin stood protectively in front of Samantha. "A-Apple!" Victoria stammered, trying to explain her shock to the concerned Sam and the others. "It wasn't applesauce, it was an apple! The Apple! Sam! Sam, it's my phone! Boruto and them found my phone!" Clutching the smartphone to her chest, Victoria did a happy victory dance around the kitchen. "It's back! I have civilization again! Finally!" My pictures! My music! My writings! I'll finally have something to frickin' read!"

Samantha stared at the apple iphone, jaw hanging, "I cannot believe they found your phone." She hovered closer to Tori, who was diligently examining the new giant crack in the screen as well as peering at the charge ports for toad slime, "Man. I miss my phone. It had so many songs on it!" Sam'd momentarily forgotten that they were in the presence of shinobi who had quite cleanly seen something that did not exist in their world. Something that stood out far more in this particular era than Boruto's.

"Whoa!" Obito said, awed, coming up comfortably close to Victoria, "What is that?" He brought a hand out to touch Victoria's phone.

Victoria instinctively pulled it back and then reluctantly tilted the dark phone screen back so that the kid could see but not touch. "It's a, um, communicator of sorts. I don't think it'll really work here now that we are so far from the range of our home mountains, but it has some memory storage in it which has things that are really important to me." She frowned a little, realizing that it didn't much matter anyways. The odds that it would turn on at this point were low considering it hadn't been charged in nearly two months and had been through toad slobber and being sealed away in a scroll. "Not that I'm sure it still works.."

"Memory storage?" Rin asked, sauntering up next to Obito, "What jutsu did you use to make that," she pointed to the phone, "store memory?"

Tori laughed. She couldn't exactly explain basic computing knowledge so she leaned into an established "cult" lie. "I have no idea," she told Rin. "Remember that our clan forbade us to learn any kind of ninjitsu. All I know are the controls that the maker left behind." She gave a vague shrug and said. "Well, might as well see if we have any signs of life to it. No point in carrying it around if it's destroyed." She shot a glance over to Sam as though checking if she thought it was a good idea. Now that the little shinobis knew it existed Sam and Tori trying to hide the phone seemed like it would look really suspicious.

"Might as well," Sam agreed, not sure if she felt eager or dread at having this moment entertained by their little crew of three as well. One of these days, their little 'cult' lies were going to get them in a whole heap of trouble. I just hope we have those defense jutsu down by then! Her eyes were glued to the iphone as she waited for Tori to give it a test try. If it worked, they'd have music again, if not? Well… they'd lasted this long without a phone - Sam more so than Tori - they'd get by.

Tori held down the power button and after what felt like forever, the screen lit up with the Apple boot logo. Everyone clustered around it, even Hatake seemed intrigued. It dinged musically and then switched to Tori's lockscreen: a picture of herself and one of her cats. Victoria felt her nerves fizzle with internal electricity as she fought the worried frown. "Himawari- I wonder if she messed with this somehow." She pointed the screen at Sam. "Look at my battery life." It was at 100%, not 11% like the last time Tori had had her phone on to take pictures of Sam on Hokage mountain during their picnic.

"Fully charged?" Sam commented to no one in particular, "After this long? Yeah. That's definitely strange." She agreed, a slight frown on her face. "Himawari must have done something to it if your phone hasn't died yet. Too bad we can't ask her what she did, eh?" Samantha gave Tori a pointed look, as they actually did have the ability to contact their friends of the future Konoha. Sam made a mental note to check up on that once they were alone. "Well, are you going to see if everything is the same?"

Tori used her fingerprint to unlock the phone and giggled a little at Rin's tiny "Oh" of surprise. "Let's check what's functioning." Facebook obviously went straight to a 'you are not connected' message, which wasn't surprising. Victoria's contacts app opened fine, but just seeing her mom's name under the 'recent calls' made her tear up a little. She avoided opening photos - didn't want to risk any compromising evidence of their time-traveling ventures OR alien heritage to be stumbled across. The furtive distant shot of adult Kakashi that Tori might or might not have there certainly wouldn't reassure anyone. Except maybe herself. "So far so good," she reported to Sam, "But I know what you are really curious about.." Tori was grateful for once for the poor cell quality of her past commute because it meant that she was one of the weirdos who still downloaded music instead of just streaming it. Smirking, she flipped to her 'Apocalypse Mood' playlist and started up a Nightcore version of "The Zombie Song."

Samantha burst into laughter, much to the startled ninja surrounding she and Victoria. "Nightcore. I honestly am not surprised. I love them! You don't happen to have 'Dam Dadi Do' on there do ya?"

"What in tarnation is that noise?" Obito, who had seemingly jumped a mile high, had an almost electrified look on his face. Samantha giggled.

"This is what we - civilized non-shinobi - like to call, techno music! The beautiful sounds of your TV right here!"

"TV's don't normally make that kind of noise…" Rin interjected, hesitant, but curious.

"Well. It's not actually a TV," Sam clarified, cheeks tinting red, "Just something that makes noise like a TV…" Wow… I'm explaining this so well. She turned to Victoria for some help.

Victoria snorted. "Imagine if someone tried to imitate the sound of a piano through an electronic speaker but messed with the frequency," she said, giving Sam a look of "wow, you made that so weird." "Technology-based music," Victoria continued. "It's something our clan experimented with. It's really popular on the other continent. Here, here, I'll get something more this world's speed.." If Himawari liked 90s boppers then her grandpa would have probably liked.. Victoria scrolled down through her 'Chillin' in the Car' playlist til she found "Hey Jude" by the Beatles. She would work them up to the awesomeness that was Queen later.

Rin's eyes went wide as the song popped up, Obito squinting like he was thinking deeply about the mechanics. Either that or he was simply suspicious of the song. Samantha smiled at their interest, turning to look at Kakashi, who had his own eyes narrowed, looking deep in thought with his eyes directed towards the phone.

"What do you think of the song, Kak- Hatake-San?" You'd think after so much time, she'd be used to saying his last name. Alas, it was not to be. Kakashi shrugged, silent for a small moment. A slow smile gradually tilted the edges of Sam's lips, "You like it. Don't you." She stated her question easily, enjoying how easy it was to see the young shinobi's interest.

"The music is fine enough, but I want to know more about the device. The navigation seems intuitive," he offered. "And the output from such a small device is impressive in both picture and audio quality. Overall, it seems… odd. That a clan hiding in a distant mountains would have a piece of technology that is so advanced as to have motion-tracking command sequences, and that its simple enough that a chakra novice could control it." His darkly silver eyes met Sam's squarely. "Unbelievable, really."

Victoria abruptly switched the music off, pressing the power button to lock her phone and then promptly shoved it into her bra far from the eyes and questions of short ones. "Well. Time to make that cake. But since there's no applesauce to be had, can I bribe you guys to run to the store for me? There's a few things we need to make a proper birthday cake but I gotta work on the main food too. What do you say, Obito, Rin, Hatake-san? Wanna make a few easy bucks?"

"Bucks" Obito repeated, "What is 'bucks'?"

"Oh! She, um, meant Ryo's." Sam smiled sweetly. "Money, essentially."

Obito's eyes alighted in recognition "Oh! You'd give us money?"

"Which," Rin piped up, "We obviously wouldn't be taking. Being ninja, and all." She gave Obito a look. He looked disappointed for only a second before he was back to grinning again.

"Of course we wouldn't take your money! We'll for sure go get the stuff you need from the store. It's Sam's birthday, after all!"

...

The party had been better than Sam had expected. Kushina had invited several of her friends (of which, Mikoto Uchiha had been a part of that friendship) and Sam had to smile bashfully when Kushina had made them bring her a gift. Even if the friends had no idea who she was, Sam appreciated the gesture Kushina made to have them be so generous.

Several kunai appeared in Samantha's gifts. A couple smoke bombs. A satchel to hold them all in, etc. Someone had even given her wire, though Sam was sure she'd never be able to use the stuff. Not in her mouth like Sasuke, anyhow.

Busy admiring one kunai that Kushina had given her - some awesome swirl etching engraved into the sharp edge - Samantha never noticed Kakashi having come closer. His skeptical gaze watching as she twisted the kunai in her hands.

"You're holding that kunai wrong." He deadpanned.

Samantha looked up, surprised, "Well, what do you expect? I've never truly thrown a kunai before. Besides… how can I hold a kunai the wrong way when I'm not even preparing to throw it?"

"Very carefully."

Blinking, Samantha narrowed her eyes before realizing Kakashi was trying his darndest to be friendly. Then promptly burst into laughter.

"Wow, Kakashi. I had no idea you had a humorous side!"

"Kakashi? Have a humorous side? I doubt it," Obito, holding a plate of cake in his hand, spoke through the mouthful he was currently chewing, effectively skewing his words.

Samantha giggled again. "It's too bad you missed it, Obito. It was quite brilliant."

Victoria gave a weak smile. She had been about to contradict Sam's claim about never throwing kunais but the brief and horribly vivid flashback of the fight in the canyon made her a little woozy. Over the past month she had slowly pieced all her memories of it together but it was still horribly difficult to think about, much less casually bring up in conversations. "Hatake-San is quite clever with puns," Victoria said, diving into the conversation. "But I can understand why you are surprised. After all, he wasn't born into the funniest clan." She paused just a second to let them all mentally consider which clan that could be before tossing on her punchline. "You know: the Uciha-ha-has."

Obito's surprise was worth more to Samantha than the actual joke itself. While hilarious in and of itself, Obito blinking in slight shock before laughing made Samantha laugh herself.

"That was amazing!" Obito laughed, wiping a tear from his eye.

Victoria grinned proudly. "It was, wasn't it?" she said, dramatically tossing her hair over one shoulder. "I was worried it whou-bito much of a stretch," she said, trying to make the words 'would be too' into Obito's own name. "A bad pun Kakash and burn if not timed quite right."

Samantha giggled some more, shaking her head, "Whoa, guys. Look what you've gone and done. You broke her."

"If this is what happens when she breaks…" Obito laughed again. Rin smiled behind her hand.

"Kunai really be blamed for this?" Victoria protested. "I'm Rin-nnocent, I tell you! Rinnocent!"

"See? What'd I tell you? No one's safe!" Samantha gave the three shinobi wide eyes. Even if Kakashi looked unimpressed, Sam still played the part.

Kushina, having heard the laughter, bounded up to the group, Minato trailing behind, "You guys look like you're having a bunch of fun!" Kushina placed her hands on her hips, smiling widely. Minato had a smile as well, though his seemed to be directed towards his red-headed love.

Man. He's got it bad. Sam smirked to herself. "Tori's gone and gotten herself all punned up." Samantha explained.

Victoria patted Rin's shoulder sympathetically. "It's true. It's a deadly disease. I hope you aren't punished by contracting it yourself. Influpunza."

"She's hilarious!" Obito agreed.

"I did find her rather funny," Rin blushed.

"You ready to start those spars now?" Kushina asked the birthday girl, "We can't keep everybody all night, you know, cuz shift change is soon." At Sam's eager declaration that they should start the spars right away, Kushina fisted her hands on her hips and loudly barked out to the rest of the crowd that it was time for the real fun to start! The whole of the party grabbed coats and torches and tromped across the Uzamaki compound to the training grounds. The crowd of shinobis all spread themselves out, planning who would spar with each other as the Earthlings pulled their coats around them a little tighter. There was a sharp, cold bite to the night air that promised frost and possible snow before the morning. "Let's start with the third cutest among us," the redhead declared, pointing to the trio of youngsters. "You know what the birthday girl wants: show off the fancy stuff but don't kill anyone." She gave Obito a little wink.

Kakashi rolled his eyes, but everyone had formed a circle and there started the bout of spars. He goaded Obito into joining him and Samantha watched with awe fascination at the two young boys, sparring so effortlessly. A part of her was sad that such young kids had to know how to fight so well, but the other part was amazed and jealous. She wanted to be able to do what they did! Even though they sparred against each other, Obito was keeping up quite well. The two bunt arms and legs, keeping a pace that was easily visible for the audience to be able to watch. Or rather, making sure that Sam and Tori would be able to watch with their "civilian eyes". It was still impressive. A loud shout from Obito and an impressive fireball erupted from his mouth. The heat of it splashed over Samantha and she was breathless.

"It's amazing, isn't it?" Minato said, quietly. Samantha jumped, not realizing the yellow flash had come to stand next to her and Victoria.

'Yes," Sam agreed, "It's quite beautiful." Even as she said that, Kakashi used his earth jutsu, a massive wall at least two stories high jutting from the ground, effectively blocking the fireball and blowing out its flames. "And Kakashi is very skilled to be able to block that fireball!" Sam looked around herself to see that the other Uchiha in at the party were watching the fight with analyzing eyes. Mikoto, who stood next to Kushina, however, had an expression that said she was impressed with the fight. Probably with Obito. He's come so far. Soon. The fight came to an end and the boys shuffled back to their little group.

"Wow! You guys were so awesome!" Samantha chimed.

"Dang, son!" Victoria cheered, clapping enthusiastically. "That was way cool! Both of you!" She gave Obito a high five and Tiny Kakashi an enthusiastic thumbs up. She turned back to Minato. "Hey, I have a question for you. Who cleans up stuff like this?" she asked, waving to the sineged earth wall before them. "Like, is there an insurance company the village uses? Or do y'all just roll with it and have random cliffs and waterfalls show up as a normal occurrence?"

Minato laughed sheepishly, "No. No, we do have a contingency plan for most places in the village. Most especially at our training grounds. Places like Kushina's home… because we have such skilled shinobi around, we can do the repair work ourselves. Otherwise it would cost a great deal to have someone come in and repair."

"So, basically, you're your own cleanup crew." Samantha summed up.

"Pretty much!" Kushina agreed, enthusiastically.

"Essentially," Minato said.

"Hey, that's cool," Victoria declared, watching as Kakashi sent his cliff wall back into the ground, the dirt rumbling in protest at being replaced. "I was a bit worried about the little foxes and snails and stuff that live where the battlefields pop up."

"We try to be careful," Rin said, looking a little fretful at the thought. "But when you are fighting to defend your team or the village, things can happen."

"Hey, this isn't supposed to be a sad party, you know!" Kushina interrupted, and then she sent Rin out to spar with a young Uchiha girl that had showed up with Kushina's friend. It was incredible to see all the different kinds of taijutsu and ninjutsu going on. One kunoichi even did a genjutsu for everyone: a nice one though where she showed them all as being in a starry night sky with fireworks exploding in brilliant showers of light.

"Well, I think it's just Minato and I left!" Kushina declared with a rather predatory grin.

"Wait!" Victoria interrupted. "I… I wanted to do my little thing," she said, blushing a little. Stepping out into the circle she gave a shy wave about. "This isn't going to be very good!" she warned everyone. "I am a total noob at all this, but I am gonna try my best." Victoria wiggled her hands nervously and drew in a deep slow breath. "Okay. Here we go." Reaching deep within, she felt her chakra rise up like a draft of warm, golden light. Raising her hands, Tori did the different hand signs, using them as a way to focus and visualize the jutsu. "Earth-Style Jutsu: Sandcastle!" she said, pushing the flow of chakra out, down through her feet, and into the earth ahead of her. Not daring to peek or even breathe, she pushed the chakra, willing it to lift and push the soil and sand and rocks up and up and up. And then the need to breathe cut her efforts short. Finally opening her eyes, Victoria laughed loudly at the little lop-sided row of dirt towers that she'd grown. None of them were over two feet tall, but they were hers: and she had made them with chakra. "Ta-da!" she declared, barely able to speak through her own laughter. "It's the most - most ridiculous little sand castle of all."

Samantha, while amused, was impressed. "Tori, that was amazing! I didn't know you had improved so much!" A part of Sam thought she should go and try to be impressive herself, but realized that she didn't have quite as impressive jutsu to try and quickly gave up on the idea.

"Ya know, for being a newbie at jutsu, you did pretty good." Obito commented, poking at one of the little dirt mounds.

Victoria laughed, hoping that in the glow of the torches and firelight that her blushing face and ears weren't too obvious. "The one I made yesterday during practice was actually way better than that. It was like, two whole inches bigger."

"Well, I'm definitely impressed." Obito continued despite Victoria's caveats.

"Me too!" Sam declared while Rin nodded her agreement. Kakashi 'humphed' but said nothing more. Samantha liked to think that he was impressed, too, but was too bashful to say anything more.

"Definitely an improvement to your skills," Kushina complimented.

"Thanks," Tori said shyly. "It's thanks to all your help, Kushina-chan."

"Now how can I follow that up?" Minato asked, in his angelic-man voice.

"Pff, Sensei, you're just being modest." Obito said, forgetting that tact was something to be revered. Samantha tried to hide her smile.

"In any case, it'll just be cool to see what you do." Sam turned to look at Minato. He gave her a heart-pounding smile Holy sexy beast his smile is amazing Samantha could look but not touch. She could appreciate someone's appearance even if they were taken. No harm done. Besides… whew!

"Now… Who should I have as my sparring partner?"

"Minato, dear, you could out-do every single person here." There were nods of agreement from the other adults in the room. Kushina laughed at Minato's tiny, but dramatic, pout. "Oh alright. I'll be your sparring partner!"

"Wonderful!" Minato said, as if that had been his plan all along.

The atmosphere around them all seemed to fizzle brighter with anticipation and excitement as Minato and Kushina squared up across each other. As they both raised their hands in the seal of confrontation, Victoria took a half step forward. "Oh, my sand castle," she mumbled, just remembering that she hadn't cleaned it up like all the others had. A small hand shot out to stop her from stepping any further onto the spar grounds.

"You don't want to go in there," Kakashi muttered, not looking up at her. "Worse idea than the canyon."

Victoria blanched but siddled backwards. "I just hope one of them doesn't trip because of it," she fretted.

Kakashi probably snorted at that, but it was hard to tell under the sudden roar of flames as Kushina released a dragon made of flames from a scroll. Her fire-red hair billowed behind her as she lept backwards, anticipating which direction Minato might go. Minato's yellow hair seemed to be the only thing that lingered for a second as he blurred away to the other side of the grounds: literally moving too quickly for regular eyes to follow. Almost at the same second that Kushina landed in a fighting stance, Minato was there. Their arms and legs began meeting and parting in a series of blows so quick that it looked like dancing more than battle. Kushina let out a shout and swung both fists around in a hard blow to Minato's ribs. Victoria flinched, anticipating the cracking sound of broken ribs, but a cheery pop and poof of fog proved that that Minato was simply a shadow clone. Kusina had less than a second to raise a barrier around herself before a barrage of three-pronged kunai clattered and struck against her invisible barrier, black seal marks crawling quickly across the ground to keep pace with her as she darted to a further distance: obviously trying to get away from the kunai pelting down from a nearby tree. .

As she ran, Kushina's hands were moving rapidly in a series of signs and she gripped a scroll between her teeth. Minato was nowhere to be seen, but clearly that didn't mean he was out of the game as a sharp wind blew out of nowhere, tearing at Kushina's barrier almost as though it was dragging the chakra apart. Finishing the last hand sign, Kushina unraveled the scroll in her teeth with one hand and then shouted a release call. Suddenly a colossal dragon made of water swamped out of the scroll, whipping its tail through the crowd as it chased down the errant yellow flash and all his clones. Across the way, the other shinobis were shouting and cursing Kushina for getting them soaking wet considering the cold of the night. Victoria shouted in surprise when she saw the water dragon whip back around and plow through the crowd a second time to grab Obito.

"Hey! That's me!" Obito shouted from Sam's side, pointing at a second version of himself caught in the water. Kushina figured it out before Tori could put it together. Tightening her hand Kushina shouted triumphantly as the extra Minatos the dragon had ferreted out all poofed into bubbles within the dragon's sinuous water form. Just the Obito lookalike remained and he was clearly caught pretty fast in the swirling water.

But not tightly enough. The transformed Minato managed to get one hand free and with that cast a fire style jutsu that started to boil away the water cage. "Hey! No fair!" Kushina yelled, her hair whipping up in anger. She didn't even have a chance to counter before a seal shot out of the water and slapped onto Kushina's hip. Almost instantly the chakra-draining seal weakened her control on the dragon. "I taught you that jutsu, you know!" The Red Hot Habanero protested. She threw up her other hand, drawing on her impressive stores of chakra to regain control, but the moment of temper was her downfall because she missed the flicker of movement.

Behind Kushina, forgotten in the battle, was one of Minato's three pronged kunais, and from the seal printed on its handle suddenly sprouted out Minato in all his well-muscled glory. A faint blur and his toned arms encircled Kushina from behind: one holding her waist and the other holding a kunai to her throat, gently of course. "You taught me that one too," Sam and Victoria could just barely hear him murmur into Kushina's ear. A little louder he said "Do you yield, Miss Kushina?"

Victoria felt a little weak in the knees on Kushina's behalf. Dang, but that man is dangerously attractive!

Samantha watched the duo with awe and a twinge of a pang in her heart. Two things came to her during that fight. One: Sam felt a strong desire to learn such a strong water jutsu. If Kushina could do it, and Sam had nearly as much chakra as the Uzumaki woman, then surely she could one day produce something so strong. Second: her thought process went as such. That was… the sexiest thing I have ever seen! And a part of Samantha hoped that she'd find a love so passionate that it stirred her heart the way just watching Minato and Kushina did. Man… it really is such a tragedy that Naruto never got to grow up with his parents! He was denied so much! Watching Kushina blush feverishly and turn to punch Minato, claiming that he wasn't allowed to make her heart race so much in a fight, Samantha found that she didn't care about the timeline. She wanted Naruto to have his parents. Her eyes drifted towards Obito who was whooping with a fist in the air and Rin applauding, also yelling out her joy and Kakashi… Kakashi had a look in his eye Sam couldn't quite perceive. Knowing his past, Sam could make a guess. Most likely something to do with missing his dad… but Sam didn't want to make assumptions. She turned her eyes to Victoria who was also looking at the couple with as much awe as Sam and Sam knew Tori would want to do the same thing for Naruto as Samantha now wanted to do. The other dripping Uchiha clapped politely for the couple, and then, as the party was winding down after all the sparing, many made to leave. They gave last happy birthday wishes and pats on Minato and his team's back for a wonderful show. Kushina beamed alongside her… I think he's her fiance? If not, her boyfriend…? Samantha mentally shrugged.

"Wow… Minato is… holy crap!" Sam gushed to Tori, who knew Sam's unrequited crush with the blonde man.

Victoria was still fanning herself a little and nodded. "Yeah.. for real. Kushina was way cool and he was still like.. yeah. That's one scary op ninja, yo." Tori couldn't possibly discuss how hot he was, she still felt a bit like a voyeur for having seen the shared moment between the two shinobi. Tori ambled her way along the gravel path towards the house, helping Sam carry her presents. "Watching something like that, I really don't understand how we managed to not get taken out by those mercs. We must have the power of both heaven and anime on our side."

Samantha snorted, "Seriously! We really are in over our heads, aren't we…?" Samantha glanced back at the shinobi behind them a short distance away. Thoughts swirled in her head, nearly making her dizzy. "But honestly? I don't care. We're going to learn our jutsu and we're going to set things right! No matter what."

"I'm… kinda getting really worried that we haven't heard anything from Boruto yet," Tori confessed quietly. "Maybe we should inspect the rest of the scroll all the way. Make sure there aren't any other surprises," she added, thinking of her phone.

"Hm," Samantha chewed on her lip, "Well… if you think about it… the only times we've actually heard from Boruto and them is right after we've found the parchment piece. So… maybe that's why we haven't heard anything?" It was plausible, "But I agree. With not having heard from them in a month or so… we should definitely inspect that scroll all the way." Why haven't we done this before now, anyway? It was a 'never-to-be-answered' puzzle.

After the evening was all cleaned up and Kushina left for her turn on night guard duty, Tori and Sam met up in Tori's room with the last of the birthday cake and the scroll. Tori's phone was also set next to the scroll and Sam gently strummed on the acoustic guitar(ish) that Tori had gotten her for her birthday. "Okay," Tori said, carefully unraveling the scroll across the bed. "Let's see what we can decipher." She pointed a finger down at the scrolls with English words scrawled through them. "All these we know because we did them ourselves." She then pointed to the next section of seals. "These were the ones Obito helped us with right? So those are just camping supplies and blankets." And then that brought them to the food section. "Can you double check that all these just say ramen or burgers or whatever?" Victoria asked hopefully. Sam had been working on her kanji reading lately.

Samantha looked over the whole scroll, through all the available options for the two of them to use their jutsu and what would be the most effective to pull out. Most of it was food. She chewed her lip as she looked over everything (though she was beginning to read kanji better than she had when they first landed in Konoha, she still couldn't remember the meanings for every one of them). "Well," Sam said, "Nothing seems to be out of the ordinary." Her eyes continued to scan, then lit up, "Hey! My hat!"

"No," Tori said flatly and firmly. "That hat almost got us killed by Might Guy, remember?" She plopped her hand over the seal to hide it. "That's waiting 'til we get home, girly."

Samantha pouted, "I guess you're right…" She sighed, lamenting the fact that she didn't have her Zelda hat on when they were transported. If only, if only the woodpecker sighed. "But at least we were able to see that nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary. Well… except for the kanji I can't read. But I think the pictures speak for themselves." Sam flicked the scroll, nodding matter-of-fact.

"Honestly… I think I'm starting to at least recognize the shapes of the kanjis now," Tori admitted, scrolling her finger down the rows to check for any other inconsistencies. "I have no idea what they mean or how to say them or anything, but it doesn't just all blend together as gobbledygook anymore. I bet it's all the page flipping at the library. My brain's so bored it soaked some up." Victoria pushed her glasses up. "Maybe when we get Earth-side I'll finally learn Japanese with ya."

Samantha's face lit up in a large smile, "Yes! That'd be so cool! And then we could totally speak Japanese together and it'd be so fun!" She'd been dying to have a friend learn Japanese with her. In part because it would give Sam more motivation to truly learn the language, and also because it would be just as she said. Fun. "I'm not surprised that you've begun to recognize the kanji. I wish I could be more help to you in knowing what it said. I'm afraid my skills at Kanji aren't as impressive yet…" shrugging, Sam looked over the scroll, "I can't believe that apple picture was your phone! In retrospect… we probably should've realized that…"

"It's been kind of a hard life so far," Tori pointed out lightly. "Not surprised our cognitive skills are a little low right now what with all the near death experiences and guys hot enough to literally melt the brains out of our ears.." She unraveled a little more and got to where the 'applesauce' had lived. "Okay, let's open each of these just so we know for sure what we are dealing with."

"Alright! I'm ready." Sam said in her best Anastasia voice, pulling up a fake sleeve.

Tori started to release the seals, the ability to raise just the right amount of chakra for the task basically second nature at this point. (She had been doing lots of practice once the doctors declared her fit for use again.) Most of the contents were exactly what they expected: blank notebooks, pens, an empty set of the weird floating fanny packs that ninjas seemed to favor, and the froggy purse. Victoria rolled her eyes at Sam's fan-girl squealing over it again, and then she undid the third to last seal: revealing a hand-sewn book. Flipping it open, she saw that it was a series of diagrams of different finger signs. Carefully written across the top was a series of painstakingly spaced out hiragana. Victoria turned it around. "Hey! This looks like a jutsu instruction page, right? Sam, can you read those across the top?"

"Daiyō-jutsu," Sam pronounced aloud, reading the hiragana. She wasn't the fastest reader, but she also wasn't so slow that her pronunciation was stilted. She looked up at Victoria, who seemed to look almost astonished. "What?"

"Substitution jutsu," Tori whispered. "I - I think that's what you said, but that's not the sounds I heard, right? You actually said like "Dai-oh" or something, right? My brain heard it as 'Substitution jutsu.'"

Samantha blinked in her own astonishment, "Da-ee-yo-ooo." She supplied, not registering what Tori said for another second longer, "Wait… you… understood me? In English?"

Tori grabbed the manual and turned it a few pages forward. "Try this one."

Samantha shuffled her head to look at the jutsu Victoria was pointing at, "Tō Akira-jutsu!" she couldn't help the enthusiasm her voice held.

"Distant hearing," Tori said automatically. "Or, far-hearing. Something like that."

A slow smile began to grow on Samantha's face, her eyes sparkling. "Do you know what this means?"

"We can know what we are ordering at restaurants again?"

Sam scoffed, "No! It means that if words are in hiragana - or have hiragana above kanji - we can actually learn how to read Japanese! Can you imagine how much easier this is gonna be!?"

"That is true!" Victoria said brightly. "Oo! This makes things so much easier doesn't it?" She smiled brightly, her blue eyes sparkling. "It's not perfect, of course, but just having a bit of a way to be literate again: man, that's so good! We will have to test this out with some other things. And!" She wiggled the book. "Try out some of these jutsus!"

"Heck yeah we're gonna have to! Wow… this was so thoughtful of Boruto and them to give us. And super useful! At least… it will be once we are able to control the basics better." A small squeal erupted from Sam's lips. "I'm so happy! I wish there was a way to thank them." Her brow furrowed at the thought, "Come to think of it… I wonder if we could. Couldn't we just talk back to them through that ball like we've done before? Maybe we should try it."

Victoria looked less comfortable with that idea. "Um… Maybe? But I think I'll put my shoes on and put the scroll away first. Don't want to risk ending up who-knows-where without shoes or anything useful again. Did that with toadman. Not repeating it now."

"Do you really think that we'll get sucked in again? I mean… we haven't found that parchment paper yet…" Sam's skepticism was quite evident. "They'd not want us to leave without that. I'm pretty sure… based off past experience…" She was second guessing herself, "I guess it wouldn't hurt to be prepared."

"Let's finish the scroll goal first," Tori said. "And we can try contacting Boruto tomorrow when we are all ready to bug out if needed. I'm not living a triple day with no night again. That was terrible." After Sam's agreement, Victoria went back to the scroll. "Alright, just two left. This one has a little flame symbol… I'm guessing matches or a lighter."

"Oo that would be extremely handy! I'm totally no good at making fire. My sister got that ability."

"Obito's your sister?" Victoria teased with fake shock as she undid the seal. Real actual flames started burning a scant inch above the scroll and that shock very quickly became real. "RAMEN!" Tori shrieked, leaping from the bed. Somehow her brain had jumped from "dangerous fire" to "our scroll might burn" to "if the scroll burns all our food is gone." to "that means Sam's ramen too." With the adrenaline-fueled logic that somehow kept her alive thus far, Victoria snatched the tiny bowl of practice dirt she kept on her nightstand and dumped it on the flames shrieking "Earth-Style Jutsu: Sandcastle!" The tiny pile of dirt valiantly lifted itself up into a spindly little tower: the flame now a full six inches above the scroll like some bizarre dirt candle. "Ack! Ack! What do we do?" Victoria fretted, "We can't throw water, it'll ruin the scroll!"

Samantha, for her part, while she had jumped back in shock at the actual flames, the second Victoria screamed "ramen" in retaliation to the surprise, Samantha was in stitches. In fact, she nearly fell over with laughter when Tori used her earth jutsu to try and squelch the fire. "Well. At least we know the fire will stay lit!" She laughed again, the feeling of wanting to laugh being so nice. Sam felt like it had been forever since she really wanted to laugh herself into fits. When she finally got control of herself, she placed a hand on Tori's shoulder, still stifling some giggles, "You do know that it's not gonna place the scroll on fire, right? It's a jutsu, after all." Sam giggled some more, "And we can just seal it back away, right? Er… you can? 'Cause I'm not as good at it?" She gave her panicking friend a large smile.

"There's a fire," Tori said, clearly still processing the threat level as high. "On my bed. Like, floating there. It's a fire."

"Mhm," Sam agreed. "That's true." Her eyes couldn't seem to move away from the fireball. She just stared at the fire: partially in awe that it could just… float there, above the scroll. "I wonder if we just turned the scroll upside down if we'd be able to light a fire that way." She thought about it some more, "Or, I suppose we could just stick some sticks in the fire and see if they light that way… that might be more efficient. Either way… this is exciting!" Sam walked close to the fire, placing a hand nearby as if to warm herself. "Yup! It's definitely got some heat emanating from it."

"But I moved it," Tori said. "With the dirt. To save your ramen." She stopped in her worried pacing and shook her head several times. "Dang, that's just - just the coolest creepy thing, isn't it?" She shook her head a few more times to try to reset her cognitive functions. "Why the heck would those kids seal fire away in a scroll? Like that seems like a horrible idea."

"Maybe they saw how terrible we were at making our own fire? Man… we really suck as cavemen, don't we?"

Tori laughed a little at that, her nerves still jangling as the fire peacefully blazed away atop her tiny tower. "So bad," she agreed. Hesitantly, she took a half step back towards the bed and its weird pyrotechnics. "I guess if it came out, it can go back in, right? And we've sealed like sopping wet clothes in before. Fire can't be that much worse.."

"Exactly!" Sam agreed, "You'll be fine! I totally believe in you." She stepped back from the bed, allowing room for Tori to work.

"Then why are you backing away?" Tori pointed out as she pushed up her sleeves and did the tiger finger sign to help her focus and concentrate before attempting the seal.

Samantha smiled rather than reply, waiting to see the result of her best friend resealing fire into the scroll. "Man… having the ability to use jutsu is super convenient. I wish we had this forever!"

"It'd make taking out the trash easier," Victoria agreed. Finally feeling steadier, she strode forward with a totally feigned boldness and did the familiar re-sealing jutsu without giving herself another moment to pause and fret. The flames innocently sealed away just as her tiny soil tower collapsed in a little poof of dust. "Bwah. That was mildly terrifying. Good to know that now rather than in the middle of the wilderness though, I guess."

"Huh. I wonder if the woods would've actually caught on fire," Sam mused, "Definitely a good thing that we tried this out here." She looked around the room, "Definitely glad that it wasn't flammable." She contemplated the thought a moment longer, "I'm definitely glad my guitar didn't catch on fire!" A pregnant pause. "Well. Now what?"

…...

Now what turned into the two of them going to sleep, and Samantha waking early in the morning. She was never good at sleeping a long time. Especially when her nerves were on end. Half wondering if her bestie was awake yet, Samantha clambered out of the bed sheets, allowing her socked feet onto the wooden floor and quietly found the scroll that she brought into her room the night before. With the sun seeming to be barely popping its rays onto the earth, it gave enough light that Sam could see perfectly just what she was looking at on the scroll. If only slightly dimmed.

Opening the scroll, Samantha stared at its contents, half in awe that this was a thing and half in awe that this was a thing. It was moments like this that Sam had to really look at her surroundings to remind herself that they weren't in the real world. Still, a part of Sam wondered if she weren't in a coma and dreaming all this up. Then again, with Tori's wit, I highly doubt I could come up with something that I could clearly remember.

She was rolling her eyes over all the items sealed away, until she came upon one that had her name underneath it, written in Katakana. She knew it well. She'd written it so many times herself in Japanese class.

"Hm… I wonder what this could be?" That particular kanji was unfamiliar to Samantha, and so… with the light of the sun growing brighter, she took a breath, placing both hands on the scroll where she wanted to unseal the specific item. She could feel the chakra buzzing within her, using the exercises which Kushina taught her to wield that power, and gasped wtih joy when it worked.

With a poof, the item appeared on top of the scroll and Samantha's jaw dropped slightly. I'd completely forgotten about this! Looking upon the three-pronged kunai, Sam felt her heart beating faster with the realization that the actual man who could use this particular item was actually around. She looked around herself, somehow feeling like she would be in trouble by the man in question just for having the kunai. Can he sense it? Now that I've taken it out of the seal? Is that even a possibility? She reeeally hoped not.

"I should probably put this back…" Sam muttered aloud. Victoria was by far better at doing this than Samantha, but without the knowledge that her friend was awake, Samantha didn't want to risk Minato seeing that she was in possession of one of his kunai. Thinking it like that… it's like I'm stealing… but I'm really not.. Hm. She eyed the kunai, handling it with reverent care, before setting it back down and drawing another breath. Using her practiced form, Samantha had to concentrate just a little harder to actually seal up the kunai, but let out a loud "yes" when she was successful. She looked around herself, hoping to share her excitement with Tori when she realized that her friend wasn't in the same room as her.

Then. Her stomach growled.

Sheepishly, Samantha stood up, shaking out her legs from the lingering effects of nearly falling asleep, and walked out of her room, hoping to find a decent meal. As luck would have it, as she trundled to the kitchen, she could hear the distant voices of Tori and the three stooges, and with it, a divine smell.

"I'm just saying, Hatake-San," Tori could be heard to say, "It wouldn't hurt you to throw me a compliment once in awhile. Rin and Obito-Kun do it all the time and for that they are rewarded with my undying love and extra pancakes."

"Gewd Parnkafs," Obito confirmed around a huge mouthful of food.

Victoria wielded a spatula at the large hibachi griddle that dominated the center island of Kushina's kitchen. Various things were frying away including eggs, bacon, and several face-sized pancakes sprinkled with chocolate chips. "They are good pancakes, Obito, I agree," Tori said as she added a dash of salt to the eggs.

"Fine. I'm impressed you understood that drivel." The sulky silver-haired shinobi stood off to the side, not sitting at the stool beside Rin despite the empty plate it offered.

"Mm, close, but you lose the point for using it as a chance to be mean to someone else," Victoria responded patiently. "Try again."

Kakashi gave the same long-suffering sigh as always and then glanced over at Sam as she came in the room.

"Well. Looks like I walked into something ominous." Sam cheekily smiled, "And dude, your pancakes smell so good, Tor!" Grabbing a plate for herself, Samantha piled on two pancakes, then spread raspberry jam (or the equivalent) over her breakfast and began to eat. "Mm, mm, mm. This is so good!" Sam said between bites. "Thanks, Tor!" Samantha smiled at the squinting Kakashi. "Have you eaten already, then, Kakash-uuh, Hatake-San?"

"Hatake-San has not eaten," Victoria tattled, "Because he is anxious to start the day at the archives. I pointed out we couldn't go 'til you joined us anyways but he would rather stand in readiness than relax and try my cooking."

Samantha observed Victoria closely, noting that her friend, while speaking cheerfully, didn't make eye contact with anything but the pancake she was flipping as she said this and Sam frowned. She knew her friend. She knew that Tori needed those she cared about to acknowledge her achievements, and Sam could see by Tori's avoidance that she had probably felt a little bit hurt by Kakashi's shunning.

"I promise, even if I wanted to poison you, Hatake-San, I wouldn't even know how." Victoria continued.

"A shinobi on duty doesn't accept favors," the small Kakashi declared. "Especially from someone he doesn't trust."

"Wow. That's harsh," Samantha frowned, placing her fork on her plate.

"C'mon, Kakashi," Rin tried to placate, "They're really good. Besides! Obito and I ate them and nothing happened to us. Do you really think that Victoria-San would poison us in Kushina-Chan's home?"

"Yeah! Stop being stupid, Kakashi." Obito agreed, taking another bite of his extra pancakes.

"Well, I don't trust them," Kakashi said, folding his arms over his chest. "Neither of them. I think we shouldn't let our guard down around these two at all. They are obviously not who they say they are."

"Hey! We're not that untrustable. We're completely trustworthy. Just because you don't know every detail of our lives doesn't mean you can't trust us. Good grief." Sam said, exasperated.

Obito frowned, eyeing his teammate, then sighed. "Kakashi is a little right, though." He turned towards Samantha and the careful avoidance of Victoria's eye contact, her back still facing the group, "Firstly, these are definitely not poisoned, Bakakashi. But you two do seem to be… different. It's hard to fully believe your story when your hair is just so…." he waved his hands in the air, trying to think of the word.

Samantha rose an eyebrow, suddenly worried and also surprised that even Obito was agreeing with Kakashi's assessment.

"Losing its colorful essence?" Rin supplied.

"Yeah, that!" Obito cheered.

"Well… you have heard of hair dye, haven't you?" Sam asked, confused.

"Yeah, surely you guys as ninjas have reasons to change your appearance for missions," Victoria said, plunking a pancake down a little too forcefully on a plate for Sam. "Is it not okay for civilians to do it for fun? My normal hair color is rather boring and ugly for my complexion if you must know."

"Exactly. For missions. For subterfuge." Kakashi's eyes narrowed. "It's a trademark of shinobis, not civilians."

"You've never wanted to change your appearance just for fun?" Sam blinked.

"He wears that little face mask thing, Sam," Tori pointed out before Kakashi could reply. "I don't think he even wants an appearance besides the forehead protector."

Kakashi shot Victoria a sharp look, but then pointed instead to Victoria's phone where it was very quietly playing a Studio Ghibli soundtrack. "You aren't equipped like civilians. You have tech no one has ever heard of. No one. I checked with the Offensive Strategies Unit myself last night."

Victoria grew pale at that. If Kakashi had spoken to a tactical unit about her freaking phone, that was going to bring down more scrutiny than what their cult excuse could possibly support.

"I guess that was probably a good move if you're suspicious…" Sam muttered her grudging praise, "But that doesn't automatically mean we're suspicious! What have our actions done to give precedence to your concern?" Sam felt just a tiny bit weird to be arguing with a thirteen year old. At least… she hoped he was at least thirteen. (In a different world, back on earth, Masashi Kishimoto cried to the sky 'he's nine!')

"It was the sandcastles," Victoria declared solemnly. She tossed the last pancake off the griddle and crossed around the end of the counter to stand closer to Sam, physically taking a stand beside her, arms crossed, and a spatula still held up in her hand like a pharaoh's staff of office. "That's what sealed your suspicions, wasn't it?"

Kakashi gave her a look that was both baffled and annoyed. "No. Your sandcastles, as you called them, have nothing to do with it."

"Oh, was it the repetitive page flipping then? Or - oh no. It was my incessant puns, wasn't it, that labeled us as enemies of the state?"

"Uh, well." Sam half whispered, "I guess you could call our page flipping suspicious. I mean… who spends that much time in a library? Er, well… except us, of course." Blast. Sam thought. We really need to find that parchment piece. That is super weird for ninja, isn't it? "Anyway!" Sam picked up her fork to eat another bite of pancakes.

Tori tilted her head, feeling a little dangerous and certain that pushing things just slightly might actually help toss suspicions off them in a reverse-psychology sort of way. Tori was so not wanting to see what the nasty ninja jail looked like 40 years before Tsunade threw them in it the first time... "I'm curious what he thinks we are really up to, Sam," Tori said in a lower but obviously audible voice. "Espionage wouldn't make any sense seeing as we literally never leave the house without an escort. And, well, frankly, he's probably noticed by now that we can't actually read. So what do you think his theory is?"

"Maybe we're ghosts possessing these bodies? I mean… the paranormal, right? Totally creepy and ghosts could totally have the smarts of a shinobi. Oh! Oh! Maybe it's a shinobi ghost!" Samantha wiggled her eyebrows at the three young shinobi, (internally giggling at Tori's quiet 'Okay, Danny Phantom'), a small smile forming on the corners of her lips. The incredulous look Obito was giving was quite priceless.

"Oo, or time travelers," Victoria offered, "Coming from the distant future with a single goal: to kill Sarah Connor. Maybe we are secretly robots, not humans at all. You know: 'I'll be bacccck,''" she added, imitating Arnold Schwarzengar from the Terminator movies.

Samantha laughed outright, accidentally spitting a piece of pancake back onto her plate, "Man... poor Sarah Connor. She never saw it comin'."

"Whose Sarah Connor?" Obito asked Kakashi quietly.

The younger boy 'tsk'ed in disgust. "They are being sarcastically obtuse," he said flatly. "Next, they will try to tell us they are gods in search of a new temple."

"Nope," Victoria said brightly, "Just aliens from another dimension brought in to save your future butt, Hatake-San."

"Precisely!" Sam agreed, chomping the last bite of her pancake. "Man that was delicious. You're seriously missing out, dude." Samantha directed her comment toward Kakashi who made no comment of his own while Sam placed her plate in the sink.

"She's not wrong," Victoria said, her arms tightening around herself just slightly; she was about to try to stick up for herself. ...Hopefully it wouldn't start a screaming match like it did the day after the canyon debacle... "After all, having someone who wants to take care of you: make you food, greet you at the door, wash your socks: that kind of thing should never be overlooked. Any warrior who belittles the strength of heart that caregiving takes… well I think that that kind of a person shouldn't be trusted to fight for a village if he or she doesn't actually care and respect the people who are trying to help them."

Samantha nodded her head in agreement. "Rabbit is good, Rabbit is wise!" she quoted Twister. It was appropriate for this moment, she thought.

Tori's lips twitched and she just shook her head at Sam's cheekiness. "This Rabbit is also a little tired of ungrateful kids, but oh well." She pulled off her apron and set it down on the counter. "I'm gonna go change, but I'll be back to clean up." She grabbed her phone and quickly hurried off so she wouldn't have to continue living in that uncomfortable moment even a second longer.

After she left, Kakashi huffed a little, shaking his head. "I'm still reporting all this to Minato-sensei," he warned Sam. "Something is clearly off and you can bet the Leaf Shinobi will get to the bottom of it."

"Go ahead," Samantha shrugged, unconcerned. She had nothing to hide. Well… we do but… "Whatever floats your boat."

"I still don't get it," Obito muttered crossly, "Who is Sarah Connor?"

---

A/N: HEY! So... We're back from the dead with a freakin' long chapter! Yay! Just in time for New Years! w00t! Hope you all enjoyed the lovely filler fluff that is this chapter. Next chapter isn't gonna be so filler as this one. Hah. But! There IS a purpose to all this filler fluff, just so's you know! There's a purpose in it. Promise! Anyway... thank you for reading you lovely readers, you.

Please Review if you get a chance! It makes our day AND... well.. we would cry for joy. Probably just as loudly as Sam and Tori would when learning and succeeding at new jutsu. Or Obito when seeing Minato win his amazing fight. Whew! But yes.