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!)

13. Chapter 13

Chapter Thirteen: ...That Reality Doesn't Take a Snow Day

Winter was setting in for real now. Two weeks had passed since Sam's birthday, but that time had resulted in a surprisingly crowded Konoha. Apparently ninja wars went on pause (kinda) once the snows came in for the simple reason that it was harder to wage war or to conduct stealth missions when you were freezing and the snow and ice gave away your location too easily. So with the influx of the incoming shinobi and the shuffling about to help house the expanded ground troops of the fire nation's army, Kakashi's justified concerns about the legitimacy of Sam and Victoria's origins got shuffled aside. All of the village's leadership was so busy, there wasn't anyone to spare, so Team Minato sans Minato continued as they had: escorting Victoria and Samantha back and forth to the archives and supervising their book scouring, even if Kakashi spent the whole time glaring at them more than watching for possible interlopers. Or maybe it's just that we are the interlopers.. Victoria admitted to herself. So he's watching exactly what he thinks the danger is.

Flipping through the pages of what appeared to be some sort of plumbing specs manual, Victoria found she kept looking over at Kakashi rather than her book. It was still rather weird to her how different he was as a kid versus an adult. But trauma could do strange things. It seemed like right now, considering the death of his father and all that, that for most people, that would be enough damage to bring them to a life-changing point. But for this kid, it was just gonna be the beginning. It would end up being the death and loss of literally every one of the most important people in his life that would be the ashes he'd grow from. It was crazy, and a little heartbreaking to think about but..

If life is truly eternal, as I believe, then death is temporary, even in this world. There is a heaven where he'll see his friends and family sooner than he could have imagined. So, like a phoenix, the Kakashi that he could and will become, will only be possible because of the holocaust of horrible things that happen to him between now and then. Victoria sighed softly, feeling the heaviness of perspective. She flipped forward a couple of pages before she heard a distant commotion near the entrance. It seemed to catch everyone's attention, even Obito looked up from where he'd been messing with a finger-puzzle. "Do those people not know this is a library?" Victoria said, leaning her chair backwards to see around the far bank of shelves. There was a cluster of people in the battle fatigues and tactical vests all talking and gesturing. At their center was a series of three people. Tori's eyes went huge as she recognized the giant, spiky white hair of the wildman she and Sam had met in the woods. And next to him: the crowds parted for a second and revealed the busty blonde who some forty-odd years into the future would throw Sam and Tori into ninja-jail. Jiraiya! Tsunade! Then is that other guy..

Across the hallway, the crowd of lesser shinobis that surrounded the legendary Sannin ebbed and flowed, parting again momentarily so that Victoria could finally spot the tall black-haired one in the middle. That must be the Orochimaru guy Sam warned about. He was tall, and pale, like super-super-Dracula-would-be-jealous pale. Tori felt the back of her neck tingle a little with that fizzle of warning that kept her safe from the dangers of creepers, awkward social encounters, and hot men alike. She was embarrassed to feel her ears grow hot as she studied the villainous Sannin's sharply angled features and ridiculously silky black hair. Awh, dang it. Tori abruptly sat forward, staring at her book fiercely as though it could block out the fizzy feeling of attraction. Two crushes in less than two months? Forge-et that! And didn't Sam say he was a bad guy? The last thing we need right now, Victoria, is a stupid villain fangirl thing going on. It's just the stupid guyliner. Forget about it. Like, instantly, please.

"Look, we can argue about tactics later," Tsunade's voice cut loudly across the rest of the group. "But I've been off duty for twelve minutes now and I'm not putting in any free overtime. I'm gonna get a drink."

The crowd started to splinter, heading back towards the door. Over it, they could hear Jiraya saying "Hey, I'll go with you on that, Tsunade!"

"Stay out of my way, you pervert."

That's right, hormones, stay out of my way. Victoria chided herself. She closed the book with a sharp snap.

Samantha, for her part, had looked up the moment Victoria spewed her annoyance. Sam's heart nearly stopped when she realized that the Sannin were in the library. A part of her wanted to go and say 'Hey! You guys are so cool I am so excited to officially meet you without getting thrown in jail or the hospital!' but that would obviously not go over well. Chewing on the thought, Sam's eyes found their way to the one who caused some of the major issues in the Naruto franchise to begin with. Orochimaru… Sam narrowed her eyes, taking in the figure who was so repulsive to her, she couldn't imagine how people trusted this man so explicitly.

As with any unseen force that causes one's senses to recognize a stare, Orochimaru turned his eyes in their direction and Sam startled, looking away quickly, heart pounding. He didn't see me looking at him, did he? Her mind worried the thought. They did not need any undue attention. Sam glanced up and noticed the creepy snake sannin watching them with tiny interest smoldering in his slitted eyes. It was repulsive to Sam, the hammering of her heart unsettling her body, and she curled her fists to keep them from trembling too much. Deciding she did not want to have anything more to do with the man that was probably already betraying the village with his experiments, Samantha physically turned her body to face a different direction, pulling another book into her lap.

When she flipped through the pages, she sighed loudly. "I can't seem to find anything in here, either. This feels useless… we've been at this for so long…" Sam turned another page, "Ne, Tori, are you done for today?" Knowing Orochimaru saw them left Sam feeling too unsettled to really concentrate. She needed to move. To get up and do something.

Tori jumped a little as Sam's question cut through her inner debate on 'what's the stupidest crush I've ever had'. "Done?" she repeated, still processing the question. "Oh. Done. Um, yeah. Yeah. We could be done, I think. Rin? Hatake-san? Obito-kun? Do you guys wanna go?"

Rin started to nod and then sneezed harshly three times: the fourth or fifth time in the course of the day this had happened. "That's probably a good idea," the girl said, with the bleary congested sound of someone with a cold coming on.

Victoria glanced out the window where snow was still falling, clouds overhead promising that a bigger storm would break before the night was through. "I don't like the sound of that sneezing, Rin-Chan. I think maybe you should skip the long trip out to Kushina's place. Get yourself some vitamin c and maybe a hot tea."

Rin sniffled and tried to protest but sneezed again. Obito shoved his finger puzzle in his pocket and grabbed Rin another tissue from the box. "Yeah, Rin. You sound like you're getting sick. I can," his cheeks went bright red with the offer, "Walk you home, if you want."

The purple-stripes on Rin's cheeks were momentarily hidden by the tissue as Rin blew her nose. "Um, but then Kakashi would be all on his own," Rin worried.

"It's not that much farther," Obito pointed out.

"Rin-chan, a storm is coming in," Victoria added, "I think Obito's idea is a good one. Hatake-San can escort us if needed, and I personally promise to not give him a hard time at all if you promise to rest up and stay warm."

"I agree with them," Sam piped up, "You should definitely get some rest. Being sick is a terrible thing. Makes you lose too much energy." The five of them stood, Rin letting out another sneeze as she did so. Putting as much distance between us and that creepy Orochimaru I think is a good idea. Sam glanced back, relieved to see that the sannin and their group of followers were gone.

At the door, they all bundled back up in coats, cloaks, and furry hats. Rin asked Kakashi again if he was okay with the plan, to which he just shrugged. All decked out, the small group scurried away into the falling drifts. At the edge of the main town, Obito and Rin pulled off towards Rin's home at the nin-dog medical facility. Once they'd left, Victoria tilted her head up towards the snowy stars and let out a big sigh. "Man. I was so not feeling it today for parchment searching. I think I need a weekend."

"I know, right?" Sam agreed, "My brain felt like it was gonna explode from all that searching." If she had to sit still for another day, her anxiety would heighten for no reason whatsoever.

"I feel like nothing's changing anymore. I gotta like, move some furniture," Tori said. "Or color my hair or something. I thought practicing those new jutsus last night would help break the sameness but.." Tori sighed gustily, sending a few flakes spiraling quickly. "I have no idea how you are handling it, Sam. You must be bored out of your gourd at the archives."

"Yeah, I really am." Sam's fingers twitched while they walked, "I have too much energy that I need to get rid of or something! Like sparring or something… I feel like we haven't really relaxed in ages." Looking over, Sam watched while Tori messed with the edges of her hair then looked down at her own, "My hair could probably use more dye, too… I have no idea how to do that here."

"I feel like we should ask Kushina about it," Victoria declared. "Because my roots are looking so bad at this point, that I'm surprised a farmer hasn't come along to try planting turnips in my hairline."

"Yeah," Sam pouted, pulling the ends of her hair as well, "My hair has faded a lot, too. That beautiful blue color doesn't look so pretty anymore!"

"But the worst part is that the ninja village is like a walking pinterest board for crazy hair colors and cuts. It makes me so jealous! I wanna have pretty hair too, ya know."

"It's so unfortunate that they have natural hair colors that are bizarre. Too bad that wasn't the same for us. Kushina is probably our best bet for knowing how to remedy our situation." The gravel crunched while they walked; Kakashi silent and brooding next to Sam. He probably doesn't know how to change hair colors… I doubt he'd care about that kind of thing. Not when he has spectacularly natural silver hair!

Tori frowned at the ends of her hair. "So… who's hair would you most like to have?" she asked Sam. "Like, Kushina's is totally beautiful, but it's also pretty normal by our home's standards other than the color."

"I was hoping to have my blue color still... It's light and pretty and almost metallic in its natural state. Well… as natural as it can be, of course." Sam smiled, the cheek in her voice a telling sign that she knew exactly that a blue hair color wasn't natural.

Tori laughed brightly at that. "Well, I would totally adopt Pinky's hair if I could, but with it creeping towards winter, I think I'd like something darker. Like maybe a deep, dark purple. Ooh, or Hinata's color. Do you remember that? That deep midnight blue that was almost black?"

"Oooh! That's so true! I-" Sam began before being interrupted.

"Doesn't he have orange hair?" Kakashi asked abruptly from where he tromped along beside them.

"What?" Sam looked at the boy, trying to figure out where in the world he had gotten the idea that Hinata had orange hair.

"Orange, spiky hair," Kakashi repeated. The two women stopped and turned around to look at him in confusion. Kakashi gave a long sigh, hunching his shoulders as he did. Then he straightened up and in a much more animated expression and voice said "Then this short kid with orange spikey hair jumps up so freaking high and wham! It hits the other side like whoosh. And the others are none-the-wiser."

Tori blinked and then started to laugh. "He totally just imitated you, Sam!" she said between laughter. "That sounded just like you!"

Sam blinked, astonished, then a sly smile lit up her face, "You were listening." Listening clear back when she, Tori, and Kakashi had been making their slow and laborious way through the hills before the memorable canyon fight. Listening even back when he kept threatening to kill the both of them.

Kakashi shrugged nonchalantly, but the way the tiny kid adjusted his face mask and then hunched his shoulders totally gave away the fact he was a little embarrassed. "Hard to miss when you two talk even louder than Obito snores."

Tori was still giggling. "Hatake-San, I didn't know you were so good at impressions. They should call you the 'Copycat Ninja' or something." She smirked a little to herself at the totally intentional foreshadowing.

Samantha snorted herself, nearly rolling her eyes. They'd only begun calling the silver-haired shinobi the 'Copycat Ninja' once he'd gained his reputation with the sharingan. Her smile dimmed for just a split moment. We're gonna change that! she thought, determined. "You know," Sam continued her cheekiness, "I have more of that story I can tell you, you know. There's much that I didn't get to tell Tori!"

Kakashi tilted his head slightly without looking up at them.

Tori's eyes glittered with recognition. "Maaaaybe you should tell me the next part of it, Sam," she drawled. "Since we've still got a bit of a walk back to the compound…" Since that was obviously something that the little grumpy one wanted but was too proud to ask for.

"Okay!" Sam agreed, ever excited to talk about the amazing volleyball anime that her roommate had got her obsessed with. Especially if it meant that Victoria would be just as interested in watching it, too.

Victoria really wasn't any more interested in watching Haaikyu than before, but she was glad to have found some small way to make Kakashi happy. So she 'oohed' and 'dang son!'ed at all the right parts, grinning happily at her bff and future friend as they shuffled their way home through the softly falling snow.

---

"Why didn't Kushina tell us about the nice indoor, heated dojo before now?" Victoria mused rhetorically as she and Samantha dragged tatami mats into place in preparation of their training session. Kushina had said she would want to start as soon as she got back from some meeting she was at, and had instructed Sam and Tori beforehand about what to do to get ready. "We were practically frozen last week, even with Kushina showing us all the fire-style jutsus!"

"Mm, yeah. That's true. Who knows the inner workings of her mind? Or of a shinobi's mind for that matter. But I guess before it wasn't snowing then…" Sam mused, looking around the nice space. "Could you imagine how much this place would cost back at home? This compound is so huge, I bet only celebrities could afford it!"

"Well didn't you say that the Uzumaki was a whole clan that just barely all got killed? I would bet that back in the day, this wasn't just a place for one person to live. Certainly there are enough little houses and stuff for a couple of families." Tori dramatically flopped down on top of the newly placed protective mats. "I wonder how Kushina handles it all. Or maybe she wasn't that close to the rest of her clan..."

"Well, no. That happened years ago. Kushina was really young. So, technically, their whole clan didn't live here. So… It's weird for there to be a whole compound." Sam had been thinking about this for a while, "Maybe you're right… maybe there were families that came here before. I don't really know. The anime didn't really expound too much on it. Maybe she wasn't close to her clan…"

"Then, I guess it's just that she's super rich," Tori said with a shrug. "Certainly she seems totally unbothered by feeding and housing us without any warning." Tori pushed her glasses up her nose. "It's weird how different shinobi keep doing that. In our world, I can't imagine anyone taking a stranger to the bus stop, much less letting them live in their house. And not just that but like Kakashi spent lots of money on us, and Boruto and them must have bought like a hundred bowls of ramen for us in addition to all the other food and supplies. ...Maybe shinobis make bank.."

"Well… I know that shinobi make a lot of money the higher ranked missions they take. So… everything points to the fact that they probably do make bank." Samantha layed down on the tatami mats, her shoes sitting on the outside of the door, her shinobi socks keeping her toes warm. How the shinobi walked in the snow without socks, Sam did not know. "I wonder if that's what's taking Boruto so long to get back to us. Maybe they're on a mission?"

"I suppose that's possible," Victoria agreed. "Or Tsunade threw him in jail for helping us. Or maybe he died. Lots of people seem to die here."

"Hah! I highly doubt Tsunade would do that to him. Besides… he seems to be super powerful. I doubt in such a time of chaos, she would hide him away. I mean… in the manga - and I suppose the very beginning of the first episode - Boruto was one of the only remaining shinobi left. So… he must be super valuable."

"Speaking of Boruto!" Victoria smacked herself in the forehead and quickly sat up, pulling a scroll from the pocket of her tunic. Releasing the seal, she pulled out her phone. "I can't believe I forgot! The other day, I found something you totally need to see. I just… haven't found a moment when we didn't have Kushina or the triplets around. There's this video in my photos that wasn't there before."

"Wait… did you watch it already?" Sam accused, but quickly moved over towards Victoria holding her phone.

"I didn't get a chance," Tori reiterated, "I didn't want to risk Kushina overhearing or something." She glanced up at the clock on the dojo's far wall. Kushina's meeting had only started ten minutes ago. Unless she had run straight back after only five minutes, chances were they had enough time. Victoria had at least checked the time stamp and it was less than three minutes.

"So, he left us a video, huh?" Sam looked at the video message that had a serious faced Boruto on the front of it.

Victoria nodded, then turned up the volume and hit play. "Hey, you two, great job on getting arrested, you know. Since we can't really tell you in person ourselves, hopefully you see this. We're sending you back pretty far this time, all the way back to before my dad was born. We have good data that says that you'll find a piece of the parchment at the Kensaki shrine. As long as we didn't get our measurements off, that should be right near where we will be dropping you." Leaning back, Boruto held up a map. Whoever was holding Tori's phone tried to move in closer and the lens didn't refocus quite quick enough and they jerked it back. "Himawari! Stop messing around! We don't have a lot of time, you know!"

"Hey, if it weren't for Denki and me, we wouldn't even have this option," the younger Uzimaki sibling said, sounding a little offended. Himawari flipped the phone around to smile and wave at the camera. "You're wellllcome!" she half-sang. "Also, Tori-Chan, Denki and I set you up with a chakra battery. Just make sure you recharge it every once in awhile by holding the back of the phone against one of your chakra points."

Boruto suddenly grabbed the phone and turned it back around. "Himawari! We need to focus! We only have a few minutes to finish this before Big Brother Konohamaru comes and checks on us again!" Boruto held up the map and stabbed his finger at a squiggly road. "You guys should end up right around here. Just follow the road up towards the mountains and once you get to the shrine, you'll need to look in the pages of their sacred book. Try to keep out of trouble though because there's kind of a war going on. We'll pull you out as soon as you've got the parchment. Good luck!"

"Wait…" Sam said, slowly, "You mean we've been looking in the wrong place this whole time?" The more she thought about it, the more it made sense. In the past, they'd always been sent to a place where the parchment was nearby. "Honestly… how in the world do they know where these parchment pieces are, anyway? But man… a shrine? Good luck? They must be joking," Sam deadpanned, "There's no way we're not gonna find trouble there. Not with Minato and his team following us everywhere!" Swiping a hand through her hair, Sam fell back on her butt, the other hand behind her, supporting her.

Victoria gave a rather hysterical giggle. "Wow. They must be, like, so annoyed with us." She felt her hands quiver a little and she took a deep breath to try to quell it. "Cuz, like, we… we didn't do any of that. And now we are like snowed-in here for the foreseeable future and, well, we definitely have gotten ourselves in some crazy trouble. People are dead now because we were in this timeline.."

"I have to wonder how we can get back to that place. Because that was outside of Konoha's walls… on some weird road… I doubt we can ask the other's to take us back there. I mean… how would we explain that?" The question was puzzling to Sam.

"Not to mention, that's like a three week journey back there!" Tori exclaimed. "Well… at least at the pace I walk. Why the heck don't they have any cars, again?"

Sam shrugged, "Don't ask me. I didn't create this world." She scanned the ceiling, noticing the beams that decorated the top, with something similar to marble adorning each corner. "I guess we'll have to figure out how to get them to take us back to that place... Maybe we can say we wanna go sight-seeing!"

Tori snorted. "In the winter? I don't think they'd go for it.." Tori shook her head. "I think our best bet is to keep searching the archives til spring and then say 'We give up. We'll go check our next lead out now. Thanks for the help, here's some money for the mission.'"

"That's a long time to wait.." Samantha measured, fingers twitching against the floor.

"It is a long time to wait," Tori agreed. "But what else can we do? We've had absolutely no luck contacting Boruto, and the marble doesn't let us move ourselves. Little Kakashi is already so suspicious of us, and if we bug out unexpectedly now, I don't see how that'll ever change. It makes me wonder if the first Kakashi we met wasn't just some big deception anyways. Maybe he was only nice to us because he was actually guarding us and trying to discover the truth. We were so out of our element at that point, we probably did give away huge stuff."

"Nah," Sam countered, immediately tossing that thought away, "Kakashi has never been good at lying. We must've done something that makes him eventually like us. I mean… it's always possible we meet him again." Especially considering their track record thus far.

Tori sighed and rubbed the back of her neck. "This time travel stuff is hard." The thought of how convoluted everything was getting was giving her a headache. "Ugh. I miss being home. Why the heck were we the ones that have to do this? We are not even close to qualified! I swear, Boruto must just figure we are expendable cuz he sure doesn't seem to care how close we keep coming to dying." Tori pouted at that a little.

"I highly doubt he doesn't care. It's probably more like he can't see the future." Sam couldn't help it. She always tried to give someone the benefit of the doubt. "It definitely sucks that we didn't know about the video until now. Well… okay maybe it doesn't quite suck. I mean… we're learning how to control our chakra… so at least there's that."

"That's true," Tori said. "Which makes me feel a little better. At least we have some small hope now of saving ourselves if things get bad again." She snorted at her own optimism, adding with a dark smile. "Who am I kidding? My sandcastles couldn't even put out that fire the other day. All my jutsu skill could do is maybe make the attacker laugh themselves to death."

"Practice, practice!" Sam sang. Ah the beautiful words from The Swan Princess. "If we keep at it, imagine how far along we'll be in a few more months!" Sam whipped her head towards Tori, "Oh! Speaking of! If we're here for so long… I… I want to try and save Minato and Kushina. Ya know?"

"Hey guys!" Kushina popped into the room, "Sorry my meeting ran long! Hope you weren't too bored without me!" She beamed at the two.

Sam looked at the clock in surprise. She had no idea time had passed that quickly. Were we really talking that long?

Tori gave Kushina a crooked smile. "How was your meeting?" she asked, discreetly sliding her legs over to cover her phone where it still lay on the mat. Kushina seemed to not have heard about the phone from the triplets so Tori was low-key trying to avoid the redhead finding out about it while also not being totally obvious she was hiding something.

"Exhausting!" The younger woman declared, flopping down onto a stack of mats with a dramatic flurry of red hair. "Way too much yammering and not enough snacks. They should always plan snacks for the long, boring meetings, you know!"

"I so agree!" Sam chimed in, "Snacks are always necessary when sitting down in a meeting." Crossing her legs and leaning her elbows on her knees, Sam let out a breath. The sudden fright of Kushina coming in making her mind stress about what the woman overheard. Except that she seemed to not have noticed. "So… what's the plan for today?"

"Well..." Kushina clacked her teeth together thoughtfully for a few minutes. "I got guard duty all night and tomorrow, so let's skip taijutsu, you know. And after the way Sam almost flooded the whole compound last time maybe we shouldn't go for ninjutsus for a while until her chakra control is a little better…" Kushina sat up. "Welp, I guess it's time to teach you genjutsu!"

"Genjutsu," Victoria repeated. "That's the like illusion one, right? Like the woman with black hair did at Sam's party?"

Samantha grinned sheepishly, a light pink tingeing her cheeks. "Yeah, genjutsu is illusions. Which could be helpful if we really learned how to use it."

"Oooh," Tori cooed, attentively turning back to Kushina who gradually pulled herself up, grunting a little with the effort. Apparently boring meetings took more out of Kushina than missions or sparring did. It was kinda silly, but thinking back to some of the mind-numbing and soul-crushing staff meetings Victoria had endured, she could kind of understand.

"Genjutsus are all built off the same basic concept, so we'll just start with that. If you're any good, I'll get you more references for it. I, personally, don't have a very high affinity for the things, but even if you aren't good at it, it's still a good thing to practice, especially you, Sam, since genjutsu asks you to work on external chakra control." Kushina rubbed the small of her back for a second and then added a rather delayed, "Ya know."

"External chakra control, eh?" Sam pondered. "Well, okay then. How do we do this?" Sam sat, cross-legged, more than ready to learn something new.

Kushina gave a rather stilted explanation, which was peppered with questions from Sam and Tori, but eventually, she said, "Okay, let's just try it now. It's easier to try than to explain." (After a few weeks of such lessons, it was clear that Kushina was definitely a kinesthetic learner herself. She was not great with the lecture side of teaching.) "Let's start with the hand signs and then Tori, we'll have you try first. All I want you to do is focus on imagining that one thing about this room is different: let's go with that the color of this mat is blue instead of red. Hold that idea in your mind as clearly as you can and then with your chakra try sending that image to me and hold a slow, steady connection: just like when you were holding a leaf to your forehead."

Drawing in a deep breath, Tori carefully made each of the finger signs Kushina had coached them through. Then, she stared at the mat, looking at everything about she could notice: the glossiness of the plastic-coated fabric, the large, yellow stitches, the tear in one corner. And then, though she was staring right at an obviously red mat, she told herself it was blue. Closing her eyes, Tori mentally pictured her brain scrolling through color levels on photoshop until a purply blue covered up the red. Then, after all that careful prep work, she tried to gently waft some chakra and the image towards Kushina.

"Put more behind it," Kushina coached. "All you've sent so far is a feeling. Gotta build it up a bit bigger."

Eager to please, Tori tried to shove more chakra out and only succeeded in making herself half-fall over: her concentration broken and a good chunk of chakra wasted. "Darn it! Sugar glider ears! I was close, wasn't I? I felt like that was close!"

Kushina gave a one shoulder shrug. "You might have been. Genjutsu is tough 'cause it's hard to see what went wrong since it happens in someone else's head. Sam, your turn now."

"Um," Sam said, uneasily, "Okay. I'll try." Doing the hand signs, she could feel the chakra bubbling as she concentrated on the mat, trying to turn it from red to blue. Her teeth clenched as she focused, and in her eyes, the mat began to turn blue, like ink bleeding in the deep reserves of the mat fabric. To her, the mat turned a deep, navy blue and excitement jolted through her when the shaky color solidified. A bead of sweat formed on her temple and started to fall when Sam directed the vision towards Kushina. Imagining the line of chakra moving from her vision, Sam slowly watched the color fade. Fear sprung up and Sam prayed the image made it towards Kushina's own. The ability lasted perhaps little more than a minute before Sam lost the jutsu, panting. "Well?" She panted.

"Yeah, yeah there was something there," Kushina agreed. "It was kind of patchy, but there was certainly a blue feel to the mat in there." A smile grew across her face, some of the tiredness finally falling away. "That was a great job for a first try, you know! Hey, you might have some real affinity for genjutsus, Samantha-San!"

Tori's eyes widened. "She does? Oo! Oo! Sam, that's so cool!" she cheered. "Oh, man. I wanna see! Can she do it to me?"

"Uh, better not quite yet. I better teach both of you how to break out of genjutsus before letting you practice on each other."

"Oh! Oh!" Sam wiggled excitedly, "You use the phrase 'kai', while sending a pulse of chakra outward, right?"

Kushina paused. "Yeah. How do you know that?"

"Well... we've been around shinobi for how long now?" Sam pointed out. After all, they could've over heard many things or talked about many things in that amount of time.

"I don't know," Kushina said back, steadily staring Sam down. "How long have you two been around shinobi?"

"Um, close to three months, all told," Victoria said, trying to keep herself calm even as her mind was screaming at Sam for the misstep and poor cover up. Good golly! The last thing we need is Kushina doubting us too! Crap, crap, crap! "Or, no, two and a half months since we got picked up by Minato's team. Three months or so since we got to this side of the continent. We left home in September and Konoha has been our main stop. We did meet a few other shinobis on the way, but only briefly." She snapped as though pretending to remember something. "Sam, I bet it was Uncle Boruto who taught you that. Remember when he was teaching us seals, he went on that long lecture for like three hours of all the terrible things that could happen to us? I'm sure he said something about illusions and mind control. Is that where you got the kaw thing?"

"The 'kaw' thing?" Sam looked at Tori, complete confusion written all over her face, "What 'kaw thing'?"

"That you just told Kushina-San about. For genjutsus..?" Tori could practically feel the stressy sweat drop slide down her face. She thought that was just an anime trope. "You shout 'kaw' to escape?"

Kushina snorted. "Not 'kaw,' Victoria-San! 'Kai' is what you would say. 'Kai' and send a general burst of chakra out to disrupt the flow of chakra from your attacker." She shook her head a little, still chortling. "'Kaw.' You would sound like some angry bird or something, you know."

"It's true!" Sam piped up, "Almost like one of those birds in anime after the dude has been a jerk and it passes by saying something like 'aho, aho'."

"I think our birds here do that too, you know!" Kushina said with a laugh. "Maybe they migrate to Anime."

"Anime?" Tori repeated, a bit confused.

"You know, where you are from!" Kushina said with a wave of her hand. "Maybe we share the same birds!"

"Oh! Um, we're not actually from a place called 'anime'. It's just a style of television show." Sam corrected, "But to have birds like that in real life would be amazing!" she concurred with her own laugh, "Wait!" her head whipped fast towards Kushina, "You have birds that actually 'caw' that out?!" Sam's incredulousness lay unabashedly apparent on her face. "We definitely don't have anything like that where we're from."

Kushina frowned again. "Samantha-San, you say a lot of strange stuff you know," she finally declared. "Hard to know what to believe with you, I think."

---

"Do we really have to listen to this caterwauling?" Kakashi asked wearily. "It's making my ears bleed." The chunin had a pained look on his face that had much, much more to do with the music blaring from Victoria's phone than it did the fervid attempts of Obito to manage to land a strike as the two sparred with taijutsu.

"I like it!" Rin declared brightly as she gathered up the practice kunai Sam and Victoria had been (attempting) to throw into some straw targets. Team-Minato-Sans-Minato or 'the Triplets', as Tori thought of them, had been conscripted into longer guard shifts of Sam and Tori which included training and spar sessions while Kushina was off doing some mysterious ninja mission. Victoria kept telling herself that it was just that everyone was more on guard because winter and sneak attacks and all that, but the gnawing feeling in the pit of her stomach said that something had changed recently - pretty much since Sam's birthday and the discovery of the phone, it felt like the adults (as well as Kakashi, obviously) were more on their guard around the two 'cult-escapees'.

"Alright, I admit, Britney Spears isn't for everyone," Victoria placated as she grabbed her phone up off a pile of practice mats. "But I gotta have the upbeat stuff, so how about we try this one on for size."

A peppy giggle echoed ominously through the speaker. Tori smirked and winked at Samantha.

"Oh, heaven help us," Kakashi grumbled.

"Yo, I'll tell you what I want, what I really want!" Tori sang brightly with her phone, "So tell me what you want, what you really want!"

"So tell me what you want what you really really want!" Sam took up the next part, singing just as loudly as Victoria.

With a fistful of kunai, Victoria sang and danced her way back over to the line they had marked off for target practice. By this point she had gotten better with the weight and feel of the kunai (although these practice ones were seriously dull in order to prevent accidents.) She could now hit the target structure itself about seventy percent of the time, but had yet to hit the center. Lining up the shot, she summoned just a tiny bit of chakra - it wasn't cheating! It was practice! "I wanna, I wanna - I really really wanna hit a bullseye!" She threw the note, the kunai, and the wave of chakra all at once, spinning in a dramatic flourish that was well deserving of a dramatic slow pan.

Eyes closed tight and her back to the target, Tori held that image of a perfect bullseye tightly, mentally willing the universe to do what she wanted.

"Hey! You got it!" Obito shouted.

"Good job, Tori-Chan!" Rin cheered.

Tori spun back around, shocked and then confused.

"A perfect bullseye," Kakashi agreed grudgingly, also examining their target.

"Um.. haha, guys," Tori said, rolling her eyes. The kunai was barely in the outer ring and at least four inches from a bullseye.

Samantha, at first, saw what everyone else had - a kunai sitting on the bullseye - until Tori's hesitation distracted Sam and she then took a closer look at the kunai.

"Yeah, guys… it didn't quite hit the mark." Sam pointed, as if that would show everyone the kunai was slightly off.

Obito did a double-take. "Wha? Coulda sworn.."

Kakashi frowned and then held up two fingers. "Kai!" He said softly, his hair fluttering slightly as he released a wave of chakra.

Rin held a hand to her heart and then laughed. "Genjutsu bullseyes do not count, Tori-Chan!" She declared.

"Man, she got us!" Obito laughed. "Even Bakakashi got sucked in on that one!"

Kakashi promptly punched Obito in the gut. "Keep your guard up. The spar's not over." He tromped back towards the mat, not even looking backwards as he rolled away from Obito's sloppy attack from behind.

Tori blinked at Sam. "Did I really just do that?" she asked Sam. "You guys really saw it as a bullseye? Like, I imagined it like that, annnd I mighta been trying to cheat my aim by sending some chakra with it, but I didn't think it would influence you guys." It went without saying that Tori had not made nearly as much progress as Sam in their genjutsu practices: to the point that Kushina had said "Maybe you just don't have an affinity for it. Just keep working on Earth style."

Samantha shrugged, a small frown displaying her thoughts. That was definitely weird. "It really did work!" She encouraged Tori, "I mean… it fooled me, too, at first!" Then, Sam smiled widely. "Looks like you're finally getting that jutsu down!"

Tori grinned a little. Inwardly there were victorious shouts of "Hah! Take that Kushina! No affinity, my butt! I even fooled tiny Kakashi with that, and I wasn't technically trying! Hah!" Outwardly though was simply a pleased grin. "Took a lot of bad practice to get there I guess. Well, more homework for Tori-Chan, you know!" She declared in her best Kushina imitation.

"Yeesh, be careful what you wish for!" Sam warned, knowing the amount of extra work Tori was likely to gain from Kushina. Sam's own experience was rather strenuous and she frequently found herself perspiring from the effort. A much different feel from trying to mold chakra.

"Maybe we don't tell Kushina.." Tori said weakly, remembering vividly how totally worn out Sam had been after the last intense training session with Kushina.

Rin clapped three times and then waved sheepishly once the two adult women looked over. "Time to practice," she reminded them. Tori and Sam obediently returned to the line and resumed their kunai throwing.

Tori, though, was curious. It was hard not to be curious about the most mystical type of ninja art, after all. So... she played around with things as subtly as she could. Most of her attempts were no good. For example, she spent sixteen minutes trying to convince Rin that there was a strand of hair tickling her nose with absolutely no success. Victoria also thought she might have been getting away with genjutsuing Sam in regards to where her kunai were landing, but after the second time that Sam grabbed at air rather than the kunai when she went to pull it out of the target, it was clear that Sam had caught on. Tori flushed apologetically at Sam's flat look of 'stop doing that.' "I… was just trying to help you get a bullseye?" Victoria offered hopefully.

"Uh huh," Sam's dry reply echoed her look, before she turned back towards the target and threw the kunai in her hand. The kunai landed low and she let out a small "tch" at herself. "Dang. I always think I've got the flicker right and it always ends up going low." There had been a few times she'd hit the target, but she had yet to hit bullseye.

Rin, observing the two women stepped up to Samantha's side once again, a hand to her chin in obvious thought, "Maybe you're overthinking it?" After all, Rin had given Sam tips a few times now.

"I suppose that's possible," Sam agreed.

"I did the same thing!" Obito piped up, giving a nod to the conversation.

"So… try clearing your mind. Don't think too much about the target. Take a few deep breaths and just… throw."

"Do it!" Obito's burst of agreement amused Sam, even with her frustration with herself. "It took me a long time and practice to consistently get bullseye," Obito continued, "And a lot of that time in the beginning I had to clear my mind, too; but eventually…" He threw his kunai, a weapon that looked like kids shouldn't even try to use, landed on the bullseye. Samantha's eyes flew up, impressed.

"Wow," She drew out the word, "Okay, I'll give it a try…" I'm not very good at clearing my mind. It's hard to take your mind off what you want to happen! Sam tried to do as Rin said, despite her misgivings. She took a few deep breaths, pulled her body into a stance to throw the kunai, made her mind think of nothing but blank space, doing her best to clear it, and threw the kunai. A loud thunk was heard and Samantha realized she'd closed her eyes. Slowly opening them up, her eyes were immediately drawn to the target and with a start, Sam realized that the kunai was on the target. Bullseye, in fact. Stunned, she stared, her jaw dropping.

"You did it!" Obito fist pumped the air, Rin smiled, and Kakashi, well. Kakashi stared blankly, noticeably unimpressed.

Samantha mentally shrugged and turned to smile at Tori. "We'll see if I can do that again!"

Tori's cheeks hurt a little from smiling so wide. Sam, that Sam! She was doing so much better than she had in a long time. Victoria could just tell that time around Kushina and Rin had seemed to encourage Sam rather than making her feel bogged down. Certainly, Sam seemed to be much more emotionally resilient lately than since back when they were home on earth. So the happy victory dance Victoria was doing right that moment was much less about the bullseye and so much more about that moment, however small, where the super-awesome Samantha saw the reward of pushing through and not giving up. Unable to help herself, Victoria stole a hug. "Oh, Sam, you're the best!" she declared with a laugh. "Knew you could do it for realsies!"

"That makes one of us!" Sam laughed and turned to stare at her kunai on the bullseye. It was like playing darts, just with bigger darts. More lethal and dangerous; but fun. Definitely fun. Like kenpo just… not. She'd always thought she would learn the katana but… Kunai worked. She turned back to Tori, "Now it's your turn to hit the bullseye for realsies!"

Tori grimaced but grudgingly nodded. "Okay, okay, but gotta change up the tunes first!" It was a stalling technique, but no one seemed to object when she cut Taylor Swift off in the middle of singing about bad blood. "Hmm… knife throwing… Oh! Oh, but do I have it?" Tori scrolled all the way down to the bottom of her playlists to a little used playlist called "When Nothing Else Will Do." Here was her great shame: the playlist of early 2000s country music. Luckily, it had the track she needed. "Don't judge me," she said, pointing at Sam - which Sam totally was judging. Then, lining up with a kunai in hand, Tori swayed a little to the slow, steady beat as she mentally blocked everything out but the song, the kunai in her hand, and the target out in front of her. "Right now… he's probably slow dancing with some bleach blond tramp and she's probably gettin' frisky," she softly sung along with the recorded crooning of Carrie Underwood. Right at the chorus when Carrie 'dug her keys into the side of his pretty little souped up four wheel drive', Victoria flung the kunai, and it was close but not exact. But that was okay. She had another five choruses or something so she very calmly grabbed another kunai. Slowly the spread narrowed til the final kunai totally would have hit the center bullseye if it hadn't gotten knocked aside by the crooked handle of one of the ones already embedded in the straw-stuffed target. "Awh man, that was so close.." Tori said, pouting.

Samantha put a hand on her hip, snorting a quipped laugh. "Hmm, maybe we should've taken the other ones out, ne?" She promptly walked up, pulled out all the kunai, and walked back, ignoring their observers. "Here," she handed a kunai to Victoria.

"Noooo, not on meeee," Tori sang to her as a reply, taking the kunai back. She got a little distracted singing for a moment before lining up the shot. Letting a curl of chakra linger in her fingertips, Tori slowly let it flow over onto the blade itself. Maybe it was cheating? But in this world, it was still a legit choice, right? She flung the kunai, keeping that sense of connection and glaring the kunai to go right where she wanted it. "Yes! Victory dance time!"

Squinting at the target, Sam saw that Victoria's kunai was, indeed, on the bullseye. "Awesome, Tor! You did it, too!" Doing a little, gleeful dance Sam gave Tori a high ten. "How do you feel?"

Tori drew in a deep assessing breath and playfully collapsed at the waist. "Too tired," she said dramatically. "Must. Go. Eat. Sandwiches." With each word she dramatically collapsed to the mat, grabbing Sam and dragging her down with her. "All my energy is gone," she lamented. "I may never recover."

"Ooo, sandwiches, eh? That sounds like a brilliant idea!" Sam turned her body towards their mini guards. "What say ye? Hm?"

"Food sounds awesome!" Obito agreed. He had been working on several katas while Samantha and Victoria worked on their kunai throwing.

"Smart kid. Knows when yummy food is afoot," Sam acknowledged, smiling brightly at the young shinobi.

"Hey! Technically I'm old enough to live on my own!" Obito countered Sam's 'kid' comment.

"Really? How old are you?"

"Twelve and a half!"

"Yup," Sam confirmed to herself, "Definitely still a kid."

"Hey, I can beat you at sparring any day, any time! Then you'll see."

Rin giggled, "Obito, I don't think she was being condescending."

"No! I definitely wasn't trying to be! I was just saying that where I'm from, you would still be considered a kid." Sam held her hands up in defense.

"I'm no kid." Obito muttered.

"Okay, you're young." Sam placated. How did I get myself into this mess?

"If you don't know how babies are made, you're a kid," Victoria said definitively.

"I know how they're made!" Obito countered.

"So do I!" Rin declared. They all looked over at Kakashi who, after a moment of hesitation, scoffed and went back to picking up kunais.

"Hmm… what do you think, Tor? Think that means he doesn't know?" Sam teased, turning towards Tori as they watched him.

"Awh, let's not tease him," Tori said, feeling sympathy for the hunched shoulders of the tiny one. Nine was pretty young to have been told about the birds and bees, after all. No point in making Kakashi feel bad if he didn't know. "C'mon, let's help." Soon they had removed the evidence of their training and tromped their way back to the main house and its toasty kitchen. Along the way, they continued to debate what constituted 'adulthood' and whether or not the five of them qualified as kids or adults. "See, here's a thing that seperates kids from adults," Tori said as she flipped a piping hot grilled cheese sandwich down in front of Obito. "Kids have the distinct advantage of not having to be in charge of cooking for themselves. Any body lucky enough to have someone that greets them at the door with food and a smile gets kid status. And grown ups are the ones that do the greeting. So here, I'm the grown-up, and all y'all are the kids cuz you are eating the sandwiches I made. Hah!"

"Y'all should feel lucky. Tori, here, doesn't make these grilled cheeses for just anyone!" Samantha stated as Victoria put down a grilled cheese on Sam's plate as well. "Thanks, Tor." Victoria was always selfless when it came to doing things for other people. Samantha had learned long ago to allow her friend to do these kinds of things for her. Sam had other ways of showing how much she appreciated Tori. Usually by getting the things Tori really wanted or needed but wouldn't get herself. Sam had no problems spending money on other people. Or on herself really… 'treat yo-self' became a thing for her every paycheck. Really nice for her manga bookshelf but not so good when it came to food. Sam sheepishly smiled at herself before taking a bite of the perfectly cooked sandwich. "You've really outdone yourself this time, Tor! This is super good! Ya know, we should totally find a way to take the materials for this with us when we travel!"

"They are really good, Tori-Chan," Rin agreed. "And so unusual. I don't think I've ever heard of anyone toasting bread with cheese in the center."

Kakashi sniffed a little, somehow it was totally clear by that simple sniff that the strangeness of their sandwich preferences was somehow another proof against Samantha and Victoria. Victoria responded by rolling her eyes and starting a second sandwich for Obito as his was already totally scarfed. "Just something from our home in the mountains," Tori said simply.

"Best thing to come outta your cult," Obito agreed, fingers already inching toward the sandwich ready to come off the griddle.

"I like to think I'm at least as pretty as a sandwich," Tori said lightly, flipping the hot sandwich over for Obito. She could wait for the new one to finish.

"Man… you know what this food calls for?" Sam didn't wait for anyone to speak up, "Some amazing music! Like… Shippuden music or… Studio Ghibli or… Brittney Spears or Panic at the Disco!" Yeah. Sam's variety of music she listened to spanned wildly; but oddly enough (or not so oddly to her) she hated listening to classical. It was way too boring for her taste. Though playing it on the piano was a different story entirely. "What do you say, Tori-chan?"

"Oo! I'll do it!" Obito shouted, and before Tori could blink, the boy had zoomed around the corner and snatched the phone from where she had left it on the counter behind them.

"Hey! That's mine!" Tori protested. Obito poofed out of reach as soon as she got close even as he tried pushing every single button. "You're gonna lock it!" she protested.

"I'm trying to unlock it," Obito said. "Why isn't it working? You just push this one button, right?"

"Well that's cuz its coded for me!" Tori protested, still vainly following him around the too big kitchen. "You lock it and even I can't open it for like an hour! Obito! Stop!"

"C'mon, Obito," Rin said exasperatedly. "She asked for it back."

"Okay.." Obito extended the phone back to Victoria, but as soon as she touched it, there was the unexpected poof of a substitution jutsu and Tori was left holding a spatula instead of her phone with Obito nowhere in sight.

Kakashi silently pointed up over Tori's shoulder. Whipping around, she put both hands on her hips and glared up at Obito who was crouched on top of the upper cabinets, still stabbing his finger at her phone screen. "Obito Uchiha!" Victoria scolded sharply, feeling rather frustrated. (Tag had always been the number one on the list of games Tori hated playing.) With each word her voice grew louder and a bit higher pitched. "If you don't give me my phone back right this minute I swear I am going to inflict upon you one thousand years of PAIN!" Clenching her fists, Tori unconsciously poured some chakra into her final command as she declared: "Now get your butt down here!"

The air seemed to shift subtly. Samantha blinked in quiet surprise turning her eyes to look at the young Uchiha.

Obito visibly rocked at Tori's final words, almost losing his balance on top of the cabinets. He finally looked at Victoria with wide eyes. He hopped down and looked Tori up and down. "How'd you do that?" he asked.

"Seriously, Obito!" Tori said, shaking her open palm meaningfully, too flustered to even realize that her words had done anything.

After another second's hesitation, the tween grudgingly put the phone in her hand.

Samantha was a silent observer, her mind half drifting over the weird feeling in the air. Almost like an earthquake in her heart but… not directed at her at all. And she wasn't even the subject of the demand. Poor Obito, Sam could only empathise.

"What about his punishment?" Kakashi drawled even as he flipped the neglected sandwich on the griddle over with his ever-present kunai. "I believe you said he was going to be inflected with one thousand years of pain. I think I'd like to see that.."

"It's an expression." Samantha commented off-handedly, "Not something you actually inflict. I don't think that would work out very well."

"Oh, no, I'm gonna inflict it," Tori said. "Come here, Obito."

"How?" Sam asked, honestly curious, "After all…. I highly doubt any of us here will live that long."

"You wanna get punished too, Mr. Spock?" Tori asked archly even as Obito reluctantly took a slow step closer.

"You could certainly try." Sam said, a twinkle in her eye, winking as Obito gave her a nervous glance.

"This is the Thousand Years of Death. Or Pain. Same thing," Tori said darkly. She examined her phone briefly and tucked it in her skirt pocket. "Prepare yourself." Then, she glared Obito down before flashing through a few random hand signs. With her hands caught in tiger: both index fingers extended like a gun, Victoria lunged at Obito with a shout… and poked his shoulder. Just a plain old poke. No chakra even to deepen the blow. "There. Let that be a lesson to you."

The stunned expressions of not only Obito, but Rin and Kakashi as well, made Samantha laugh outright.

"What?' Obito asked, somewhat dazed, "Was that it?"

"Yes. I think you have been punished sufficiently now," Tori affirmed. Then her stern expression relaxed into an affectionate smile as she reached out to ruffle Obito's hair. "You are just a kid, after all."

---

It had been several days after that incident that snow had piled high on the ground. Crystals hung low off the rooftop of Kushina's home, and Sam and Victoria had been stuck inside learning the meditation side of using your jutsu. To say that Samantha was bored was an understatement. She was very much like Naruto in that way, unable to concentrate when she just felt bored. It made her antsy.

Having had lunch only an hour prior, Kushina had once again stuck them in the dojo. Or, as Samantha had begun to claim it, 'the dungeon of death by boredom'. Kushina claimed that it was a good idea for them to get used to meditation, as they would be learning how to 'meditate while fighting' once they had learned its effectiveness sitting still. Samantha was all too eager to get to the fighting practice, her legs bouncing just a little while they sat, until she decided to just give up.

"Okay, I am going stir crazy. We have got to do something different! At least for today." Samantha said, hands flopping in tune with her exasperation.

Kushina. at least had the decency to open her eyes, amusement starting to creep over her face. "You are lucky you have chakra reserves like you do, Samantha-San, or you'd never get anywhere, you know."

"She just wants me to lose," Tori said calmly, not moving from her own meditation pose. She was at least much better at sitting still than Sam. Maybe too good as just the thought of going out to shovel the snow again sounded just horrible. "Distracting me so I can't be as chakra-ready as her on the battlefield."

"Pfft, as if." Sam scoffed. She rested her elbows on her knees, "I can't help that I get bored easily. Doing this for days on ends is just, well, boring. I know I'm an adultier adult than you, Kushina," Sam stated - thinking mostly of their age differences - and pointedly ignored Kushina's giggle, "But honestly, I just don't see the point with meditation." She'd never been one to meditate, even though she was such an internal person. Even though Kushina had told them the reason for meditation in the beginning, but she had also said that sometimes it is easier to understand once you've experienced it yourself. Curse my kinesthetic learning! Sam growled her thought.

"I could explain it again if you want!" Kushina chirped.

"No!" Sam cleared her throat, "No, that's alright." She sighed, "Guess I'll just have to deal with it." Her mumble wasn't as much of a mumble as she thought.

"Well then! Why not we take your young, shinobi guards and have fun in the snow? I suppose we could do some chakra training with the snow itself. Kinda like tree-walking, but snow-walking instead."

"Yes! Please!" Obito's shout resounded loudly in the room.

"Awh, can't we do something easier?" Tori sighed. But then her impish side answered and she gave the wooden floor a quick triple knock. "Sam-Sam? Do you wanna build a snoooow man?"

"I suppose it would be fun to go and play." Sam spoke-sung the words, smiling widely. The overplayed songs from Frozen were so overplayed that it was hard to not memorize the words. So, here they were. Stuck with having memorized the words. But that was fine with Samantha. "Perhaps we could make Olaf!"

Rin giggled. "You two are so silly," she declared even as she stood up, using both hands to fluff her short brown hair back over her shoulders. "Although a snowman does sound kind of fun..."

Rin's small suggestion seemed to enliven Obito to 'fight for the needs of his woman.' He immediately crossed to Kushina and whispered rapidly in her ear.

The jinchuriki nodded after a second. "Alright, here's the deal: Samantha-San and Tori-San, if you two can manage to meet my three challenges with chakra control, then you can be done with training for the day and build a snowman with Rin and Obito. But if you fail, then you gotta meditate for another hour.. In the snow."

Tori shivered a little at the death-eater grin Kushina flashed at them. It was like the entire room's shadows gathered behind the redhead as she declared the evil consequences. "Is it… hard challenges?" she asked weakly.

"Only for cowards!" the Red Hot Habanero proclaimed.

"How do you expect us to stay warm!" Sam called out to the kunoichi. But Kushina was gone.

"Chakra!" Rin stated, a pleasant smile on her face as she skittered after her sensei's girlfriend. Sam gave Tori a look, before following after them.

"Well, time to lose some toes to frostbite, I guess," Victoria said with a fatalistic shrug. But she at least grabbed her Boruto-provided coat from the hook by the door.

A few minutes later found Samantha and Victoria along with their guards, all bundled up for the cold that was outside, standing on the edge of the door frame, just before the snow began. "For the life of me, I have no idea why I thought coming outside was a good idea. The snow sucks." Sam grumbled. She'd dealt with cold before and had vowed to never have to be in it again, yet here she was stuck in the snow.

"Alright, so!" Kushina stood in front of them, bundled up just as much as they, her hands on her hips. A natural - and by this point, common - stance she gained whenever going into 'teacher' mode, "The goal is to not sink when walking on the snow. It's got a lighter density than earth or trees, which in a way makes it harder, but also, makes it easier. Now. Pull chakra down to your feet then step onto the snow. Remember, if you put too much chakra to your feet, you're just going to sink to the ground too quickly and be blasted off your feet."

"Right." Samantha said. Sounds… medium amount of easy. She mentally called on her chakra. As much as she'd gotten used to the feeling, any time she truly focused on the feeling, it was the oddest of sensations. It was like… allowing this smooth river of water flow over your body. It didn't hurt, but the power it gave was something that even your muscles felt. Sometimes, it gave Samantha the creeps. Still, she shuddered the thought down, then carefully placed her dominant foot (the right one) onto the snow. She tested the snowy floor, feeling the firm density her chakra was giving, then pulled her left foot out and immediately felt the buckle as her foot fell through the snow. She hit the ground and the momentum pushed her backwards, landing on her back on solid ground once more. With the breath knocked out of her, annoyed that she didn't get it right away even though it seemed as easy as it was in her head, Sam blinked up at the porch ceiling.

"Well. That went well!" Obito grinned in Samantha's line of vision. Sam simply huffed, doing her best to hide her own smile.

"You got this!" Tori cheered from beneath her scarf. "Samantha Taylor Winters! It's right there in your name, girl! You go conquer that snow!"

Kakashi looked briefly up at Victoria and then down at the lopsided Sam. "So you do have a surname," he said to Samantha. "Winters-San."

Sam lightly glared her betrayal briefly Victoria's way, turning her attention quickly on their young, silver-haired shinobi guard slash future friend. Somehow. "Yes well, I don't go by that name. I go by my first name. Samantha. It's prettier." Sam's gaze challenged Kakashi. I swear I might tell him to respect his elders if he doesn't. The thought was actually amusing.

"What's her surname?" Kakashi asked Sam, pointing at Tori.

"Ah, revenge eh? It's-!"

"My name is pretty both ways," Victoria said pertly, "But I disallow you from calling me by my last name anyways. Jinx. No takesies-backsies."

Samantha snickered, "Well, I guess you'll never know. No one can defy the jinx."

Kakashi opened his mouth to reply, but then after another second, he shut it again. "Ksh. Who cares," he mumbled. And then he stepped out into the thick snow walking straight past Sam… and his sandals literally didn't make even the smallest dent in the fresh powder.

Kushina, hands fisted on her hips, cleared her throat meaningfully. "Alright, Victoria-San. You're up."

Tori nodded. "Go-Go Action Chakra SnowShoes." Tori, basically a pro now at the leaf-holding exercise even if her sandcastles were still more like anthills than molehills, pulled a stream of chakra and cascaded it down to her feet. She spread it out around her feet in a big pizza shape and then slowly shuffled forward like a penguin. The snow creaked ominously and a wide awkward furrow pressed down the entirety of the snow around Victoria's 'snowshoes.' "Technically… you can't see my footprint," she pointed out even as the snow dented in another inch deeper. Tori shuffled forward a little faster, still making full and unashamed use of the penguin stance.

Samantha watched, disappointment heavy on her heart; jealousy raging in her eyes. How does Tor do it so well! Sam pouted, knowing that part of her problem was impatience. It was like the piano. She preferred playing fast and got impatient when she had to slow her tempo down. Even the fast songs needed a slower tempo. Impatience was a rough lesson on her soul. Biting her lip, Sam turned her attention towards the snow, not wanting anyone to catch on to how much she wished she could do things just as effortlessly as Victoria made it seem.

"You should try again!" Rin, from behind Samantha, spoke softly. Sam grew rigid, before plastering on a smile and turning towards Rin.

"You're right! Practice makes perfect after all!" But one was allowed to feel depressed when one's practice was imperfect on occasion. Sam looked towards the snow once more before nodding once to herself. She stood, stretching her limbs, before taking a deep breath and feeling the chakra pull towards her feet. Last time, my chakra was uneven. Must. Concentrate. On. Even chakra pull! Talking in her head did little to help her concentration and Samantha allowed her mind to go blank and simply feel the chakra. It was subtle, but Samantha could tell that her chakra was even this time, and slowly, she placed her right foot onto the snow. Encouraged when she didn't sink, Sam tentatively placed her left onto the snow as well, carefully not putting all her weight into the action so as not to buckle under herself again. To her joy, it was a success! Walking forward - trying not to look like an idiot infront of the teens and pre-teen children shinobi - Sam made progress towards Victoria and Kushina. Turning to look behind her, Samantha saw that her footprint made hardly the indent into the snow. "Success!" She gave the Breakfast Club air-punch.

"Oh my gosh, that's amazing!" Tori cheered. "That's almost as good as Hatake-San, Sam!" Her vague attempt at a victory dance was thwarted by the heavy snow gear and Tori sunk another two inches deeper in the snow: her pizza platers now more like big old funnels arrowing down to her feet. "Awh, crunch. How am I supposed to?" Muttering to herself, Tori attempted to shuffle in a widening circle to regain her lost height.

"Nice work!" Rin called from her place still at the doorway. Neither she nor Obito had yet attempted to follow the other four out into the snow.

"Yeah, not bad, you know," Kushina agreed. "You certainly are better than last week! Welp! On to round two!" She twirled about with a flash of red hair and began to stride purposely forward over the snow.

Samantha watched the red-headed Uzumaki go, dread filling her features. She had to continue this chakra control? Already she felt tired. Why had she gone and complained about meditating? On second thought… This is much better than meditating! Sam began her march forward. Slowly. She felt like a penguin. Snow was always awkward. Sam looked behind her, saw that her progress hadn't led to deeper indents in the snow, and cheered silently for herself.

Tori and Sam were both so focused on remaining above the snow that they almost shuffled right past Kushina. Her "Hey, I'm right here, you know!" called them back from continuing to shuffle clear out to the outer wall. "You can sink down a little here if you want," she said as soon as they both stopped in front of her. "We aren't on the windward side of things so the drifts aren't so deep." The redhead's lips twitched, just holding back a laugh as her two students heads literally dropped four inches down as they settled into the powder. "Alright. So you got the walking down okay. Probably you two aren't ready for water quite yet, but at least we won't lose you in the snow anymore. So your next challenge is jumping." Twisting the jinchuriki pointed up to where Kakashi was tying Kushina's scarf around a tree branch twenty feet or so off the ground. "You just gotta touch the end of it at least." She gestured to their feet. "It's the same idea as walking but you gotta send a big burst all at once and make sure you pour part of the chakra into your knees since that's where the force of your jump comes from. Allright, give it a try."

Tori gave an incredulous laugh as she stared up at the distant scarf. "What do you think we are, sannin?" she quipped, shaking her head. "Oi vey."

Samantha's eyes widened, "Um…" She meekly lifted her hand, "I'm just a tad terrified of heights so… the falling part… that won't… hurt, will it?"

Kushina shrugged. "Eh. Not much. There's snow to land in, isn't there?"

"Seeing as how I've never actually had the opportunity to fall in snow, I wouldn't know if that snow would be soft or not." Sam was harshly reminded of why she'd not make a good shinobi. The idea of pain, getting hurt, terrified her. She'd never actually broken a bone in her life before. She didn't intend to start now. "Okay, so… how do we land, then?"

Taking a short moment to take Sam's question seriously, Kushina thought on it briefly, "Well, the key is to make sure you keep chakra in your legs. You get that burst and never let it leave! Make sure to land on your toes, like this." Kushina demonstrated, falling into a crouch, the balls of her feet the only part keeping her upright, before standing up once again.

Samantha nodded, half jogging in place now, "Right. Seems easy enough." She looked up where Kakashi was standing on the tree branch, her heart lurching at the distance, and immediately turned towards Tori, "Tor! You go first!"

Tori blinked in surprise at the panic she could hear hiding in Sam's voice. "It'll be okay, Sam," she placated. "It's not nearly as high as the tree you fell out of when you landed on Pervy Sage. We made it through that all right, didn't we?"

Sam gulped, not feeling any ounce of comfort in Victoria's words at all. She glanced up at the tree, and all she could think about was the fall. Twenty feet was twenty feet. A long distance! She'd gotten seriously injured because of that kind of fall! It could have been worse if Jiraiya hadn't been there, too. I… I don't think I can do this. Her hands shook, and her stomach twisted in uncomfortable knots. Kushina is… she's a sadist!

"C'mon Samantha-San! You can do it!" Rin cheered,

"Yeah! It's a piece of cake!" Obito gave her a thumbs up. Kakashi simply stared down at Samantha, face completely blank. Or maybe his mask is hiding his true emotions, Sam thought in the back of her mind. She stared up at the red scarf, her vision going black on the edges. She could feel herself freaking out. C'mon… you're better than this! There's nothing to be scared of. You can do this. Easy peasy. Samantha was reminded of a time when she went cliff diving in Oregon once. It was 30 feet and she had geared herself to jump for almost an entire half hour. It's not been that long, has it? Still, Sam, having tuned out anything but what she could see in front of her, finally made the pull of chakra to go into her legs, crouched down, then lept. It was exhilarating and weightless all at once! The red scarf grew closer and closer and Sam reached out a hand, ready to touch it. I'm like Superman! Came her thought, unbidden. Then, her fingers graced the scarf and it flapped as she began her descent. Her excitement for hitting the scarf was quickly dismissed as the butterflies of falling down filled her stomach, and Samantha felt panic and perhaps just a little bit of bile rise in her throat. Oh crap! Ohcrapohcrapohcrap! I have to- oooooh crap! I can't do this! I don't want to do this anymore! It was like she was back on the rocket ride at disneyland. When she was little, she got on the ride, and at the very top, decided she didn't want to be on the ride any longer. The scream left her lungs before it even could make a sound as they fell. This was like that. Except without the safety of not getting hurt. All these thoughts happened so quickly that before she knew it, she was remembering Kushina's advice on how to land. Sam prepared herself, realizing she'd almost let go of the chakra in her legs, and panicked efforts kept herself intact. She landed ungracefully. Though she landed correctly in the way Kushina had shown them, Samantha's mind sprung to thoughts of sprained ankles and the slam of the ground impacting against the soles of her feet. The awful ache that accompanied that contact. So, when she landed, fear got the better of her and Samantha fell about a foot forward onto her stomach with an 'umph!'

Groaning, Samantha slowly sat up, feeling the sting in her feet, but otherwise, unharmed. "Ugh… that… was not a fun landing." But I'm so glad I at least tried it. She'd always said to herself that even if she was scared, she'd make sure she did what she was scared of. Especially when it came to height.

"Sam! Sam, are you okay?" Tori asked worriedly, scrambling through the snow to fall beside Sam. "Your ankle? Your knees, are they okay? Oh my gosh, I - I saw you jump and you just went up and up. It was like seeing Rock Lee run up that wall the first time and oh my gosh, that was so cool and so scary and - " Victoria suddenly burst into tears. Somehow things suddenly got real again. All the chakra practice and training sessions had just felt like a fun distraction: a way to prove her smarts. It was like Victoria had just been taking an extra course and having fun showing off her inexplicable skill with the mysterious ninjutsu, but… but that wasn't what all this was at all. Sam could move like a ninja. Heck, after the last few months of sparring, she could even kind of fight like a ninja. Ninjas like the ones that chased them and the ones that died in the canyon. Victoria knew she and Sam had started the whole training thing as a way to protect themselves but... But it was like a dream or something. I'm not ready for this. I knew ninjas were real, but I didn't really realize we were becoming ninjas ourselves. I'm not ready for all this! Victoria scrubbed at her eyes, trying to quell the storm of tears. "It's like it's all real, Sam," she choked out, trying to explain why the heck she had started bawling in the snow. "It's all real, and I don't want it. I just want to go home!"

This new revelation surprised Samantha. After all, Victoria had been the one, right from the beginning, to claim that this was real and not some kind of coma-induced fantasy. Sam's brow knit, chewing her lip as she thought about it. "Yeah." She said quietly, "Me too." Sam looked towards the red scarf before looking back at Tori, "But we will make it back home, Tor. That's why we're working hard. Right here and now. To defend ourselves, and to make that way happen regardless of the situations we find ourselves in." Thoughts of Sam's family, of her cats, brought on its homesickness and the ache that was now in her heart was much different than the ach of an anxiety induced sickness. Or the ache of loneliness; though that was a similar ache. The need to hope for a way home was something Sam needed to believe in, however; and luckily, it was something she could pass on because she believed it so fully. "We will, Tor."

"Not if we die first!" Tori burst out, her eyes wide with old fear. "Not if - not if we end up having to fight someone, to kill someone. We might get home but we'll never be the same. It's like… like we aren't even us anymore." The last sentence she half whispered, hunching forward as the tears rolled down her cheeks to drip on the muddy snow. "This world is turning us into something else..."

Sam was quiet for a moment. "But… we're changing for the better. We're still us. Just… learning how to live."

"I'm scared," Tori whispered, tears still streaming down her face. "I don't think I'm strong enough for reality again."

"But you've been living reality." Sam said. It confused her, Tori's confession. After all, Tori was the one who convinced Sam that they were in the ninja world. It's what helped her believe that they had chakra they could wield. Tori had even been using sealing jutsu! It was just strange to Sam. Especially when she could feel the chakra running through her very veins if she concentrated enough on it. It was so different to how she lived before. A part of her wondered how she was going to live without this feeling when the time came. "I guess… I figured you had come to that realization way before I did. Now, I'm just excited by the prospect." Samantha bit her lip, knowing that everything she was saying was inadequate to help Tori at all. "At least we've got each other! And… we've got the Lord on our side. We can do anything."

Tori hiccuped and gave a teary nod. A pair of small boy sandals with the small boy attached suddenly dropped to stand atop the snow between them. His arms were folded over his chest and he gave them an appraising glance as Sam and Tori looked up at his approach. Kakashi's dark eyes darted aside, breaking the eye contact. "Cry too much and you're gonna grow icicles on your face."

Victoria snorted - half laugh, half final sob. "But I hear it's all the rage in Kingsbury," she quipped.

"Quite the rage," Sam agreed, even if it wasn't quite the right quote from Howl's Moving Castle, the accent was enough to make it seem so. She was satisfied. Kakashi rolled his eyes, and Samantha could only smile.

Sniffing quite hard, Tori shook her head rapidly to dislodge the last of the tears. "Keep Moving Forward," she said, repeating the mantra in her head as many times as possible. "Keep Moving Forward." Using her chakra to help keep her balance, Victoria shoved herself back up onto her feet. She offered Sam a hand up, but then Victoria's gaze caught and followed where Kakashi was looking. Minato Namikaze with his angel face of doom had appeared out of nowhere and was talking with Kushina a few yards away. Obito and Rin had hastened over to join them. "Oh, Minato-Sensei is back. Kushina-San must be happy."

As the pair watched, Minato looked up and after placing a comforting hand on Obito's shoulder, he began to stride over to the three of them. Blushing splotchily at how she must look, Tori tried vainly to dry off her glasses with the tail of her scarf but just succeeded in fogging them up more. Then suddenly Minato and his mind-numbingly perfect features were right there before Sam and Tori. "Samantha-San, Victoria-San, I need to speak with you," the Yellow Flash declared. He reached out and placed one hand on each of Sam and Victoria's outside shoulders.

Tori blinked and thought for a moment she had gone blind. They weren't in the bright day with sunlight gleaming off of the windswept snow. Instead they were in some dimly lit room with shuttered glass lamps and dark ebony wood floors that stretched the whole length of a football field. The air above them had the heavy empty feeling like the bottom of a cave. Distantly, distantly, above them was the sound of voices speaking rhythmically like a gregorian chant. "Wh… What is this place?" Tori said, unwrapping her scarf from her neck and peering into the deep shadows that surrounded them beyond the gentle spill of lamplight.

Samantha coughed, fighting down a wave of nausea, looking around the large expanse. With her fluffy coat tightly wrapped around herself, she was suddenly dying of heat and felt a strong desire to take off her coat. The place was muggy, but the Yellow Flash, who had turned a critical eye on the two of them, seemed perfectly comfortable. Even with such long sleeves. "I… don't know," came Sam's lame response as Minato wasn't giving any notion that he was going to answer Victoria's question. The sexy beast of a man stood before the two of them, intimidation bleeding off him like billowing sheets waving in the wind; and something else. What is this? Her body shuddered. Is this…? This must be what killer intent is. The thought briefly passed through her mind as Sam struggled to keep his gaze.

The sense of hostility was unnerving. With every breathless second of silence from Minato, the darkness around them seemed to grow deeper as the feeble flames flickered vainly against the thick air. The yawning emptiness of the strange underground room with its heavy, oppressive humidity seemed to physically push and pulse against them like a hammering heartbeat. Sweat started to bead against the back of Victoria's neck, somehow feeling freezing cold even in the oppressive heat. She could see the snow still tangled in Sam's fading blue hair melt away into nothing. And Minato kept watching them, his perfect features unmoving; in that moment he was less a heavenly messenger and more like a cold-hearted angel of purgatory ascended from the pit. The distant monkish chanting was drawing nearer and although she couldn't quite make out the words, Tori's mind could have sworn she heard the phrase 'bones and blood' repeating in the middle of it. A frantic giggle crept up Tori's throat, pressing hard and tight against her voice box til she almost couldn't breathe.

Then, when she nearly couldn't bear it a second longer, Minato's deep voice cut through the darkness. The flash of mistrust in his eyes a sharp slicing blow that belied even the way he said "Tell me. Where are you from?"

Though the Yellow Flash asked a question, he spoke it more like a statement. Expectant. Leaving no room to say 'no'. Samantha blinked back, not expecting that to be the first thing he asked. She thought frantically about what she or Tori could have said with him around to cause him to be so utterly, accusingly suspicious. The danger he presented them was what Sam could only think was that of Hokage Minato. Just like all those fanfics she read. Except the real deal was far more frightening, and once again, in less than an hour, Sam found her hands shaking.

Tori licked her lips, her mouth feeling drier than the deserts of Texas as she felt a quiver of fear slide down her spine. "I grew up in the mountains far from here," she said softly. "In a place called Jordan City. Sam has been my friend and she lives nearby there too. We've always told you that…" Despite the horrible heat, Tori couldn't even possibly imagine taking off her coat: its thick wool was the only armor to protect her from the icy glare of the future fourth Hokage. Unconsciously, her hand found Sam's and held it tightly.

Minato crossed his arms over his chest, the action shifting the weight of his fully stocked tactical vest and the candle light flickered off the metal handle of his deadly three pronged shuriken. "Considering how consistent you've been of that particular detail, I am inclined to believe you." He then took a slow step towards them and the girls stumbled back a step at the tangible threat of his aura. "However," he continued, his masculine voice still as even and musical as ever, "I heard some troubling news that you two yourselves admitted aloud. Which leads me to believe, with viable evidence that I witnessed myself, that you two" - here his lips and eyebrows finally turned down in a small frown - "...are lying." The words fell between them with more thudding impact than the stumbling final steps of the dead giant Yuta.

"I…" Sam began, choking on her words, panic settling into the pit of her stomach. They really weren't doing anything wrong. They had been thrust into their situation without their consent. It was just happenstance that they couldn't reveal everything they knew. "We… um. What did you hear, exactly?"

Tori felt her legs tremble as Minato's piercing blue eyes turned their full focus on Sam. The look he gave her: Victoria remembered it. That first, fateful morning, crouching behind a tree, terrified and sore from the week spent in Tusnade's detention cells, she had seen this man holding a razor sharp blade against Sam's throat. He would have killed her. Like without a second thought. If things had gone just one other way, Sam and Tori's bodies would right now be rotting under the snow drifts piled high by a howling wind.

"Many things which left me with many questions," he murmured, not breaking gaze with Samantha. "You mentioned 'your world' quite often. As if the place in Jordan," his gaze flicked oh so briefly towards Victoria, "Was not a physical place on Earth. Is it?"

A shiver raced down Samantha's spine, Minato's gaze expectant. Samantha, never a good liar, spoke the truth. Squeaking out her reply. "Technically… it is not a place that exists on this earth. No."

Minato nodded, as if that was the answer he figured he would hear. He then turned away, leaving his back to them as he asked, "And your 'Uncle Boruto' isn't really your uncle, is he?"

"No. No he is not." Samantha admitted, hunching her shoulders like a turtle fleeing into its shell.

"But he's not a bad guy!" Victoria blurted. "And we aren't either. I promise. We might not be very good at things and we haven't been able to tell you the truth about stuff, but Boruto just wants to protect Konoha, and so do we!"

Samantha nearly turned her head in a knee-jerk motion towards Victoria. No doubt the action noticed by Minato, even if his back was turned. Oh no! Her heart lurched, quick panic racing through her entire body. She just mentioned Konoha! That was definitely not a good idea!

"Konoha, huh." Minato murmured. "And what affiliation does this Boruto have to Konoha?" He casually twirled the three-pronged kunai between his fingers off to the side where they could still clearly see the twirling blade.

Samantha gulped. "Uh…" her voice wavered. She turned panicked eyes towards Victoria. Though when she would look back on this moment, Samantha just knew it probably wasn't the best idea to let her friend take over as Victoria didn't know that it wasn't a good idea to affiliate Konoha with Boruto but… But… she already blew that particular detail so… Samantha decided to let her roll with it.

"None, yet," Tori said, "But he considers it his home. I know he'd do anything to help protect it. Just like we would. Even though it's not our home, it's full of good people and -" Tori cut off in a squeak as Minato suddenly turned about.

In a blur of yellow and blue, he cut the short distance between them in less time than a heartbeat. His lean, muscled form towered over Tori. "What do you mean 'yet'?" he murmured, harshly. Victoria fell backwards, landing on the ground and shaking at the almost physical blow of his rage.

Wisps of Samantha's drying hair fluttered over her eyes with the quick movements of the Yellow Flash. Immediately, Samantha heard the rush of her blood with the realization that they were in real danger right then. Minato Namikaze had no qualms over killing anyone and to Sam and Victoria's unfortunate luck, they could be the next victims that met the sharp tip of his well-used blade. "It's-!" Sam began, momentarily stunned by the piercing blue, so much like Naruto's eyes that Samantha's heart ached for him, "It's because we're… we're… you see, we… well…" Saying they were time-travelers out loud intimidated her, but Samantha forced herself to say so. "We're time-travelers." Please don't die, Tori-Chan!

"Explain."

Trembling in shock from the cold, cruel anger in Minato's voice, Tori just let the truth spill out. "It wasn't our fault, all we did was pick up the thing and then it grabbed us and we ended up in Konoha, but not this Konoha, a different one where Kakashi is grown up and your son is in school-" A wanton desire flashed unnoticed in Minato's gaze at the mention of his future son, "And we didn't know why we were there or why it was even real because in our world, chakra isn't even a thing, except for something in movies."

"Um-" Sam tried to interrupt, hand halfway into the air.

"And that's the weird thing, your whole story is a movie in our dimension, so when everything started happening, we kinda had an idea of what might happen in the future, but then someone was kind of trying to mind control us and the marble thing started glowing again and then we got dropped on Jiraiya, but not this Jiraiya that we saw at the Archives last week, it's an old Jiraya, like twenty years from now, I think. I don't know when exactly that was but the movie for his book was coming out -" The words just kept spilling from Victoria's mouth like an endless torrent. She didn't know what it was that Minato needed to hear, so she told him everything she possibly could, gasping for breath every couple words.

Samantha could feel her insides lurching with every detail which Victoria spewed with horror maring her face. Even though Sam had planned to tell Minato about their time-traveling, she had never intended to tell Minato that his world was just a mere fantasy in hers and Victoria's. Tori kept on talking.

"But we didn't even stay with him long, just long enough for me to break my ribs," Tori continued ceaselessly. It was almost like the scene in The Goonies where Chunk is captured by the bad guys in the mine and when they start to interrogate him, he tells them literally everything he had ever done wrong in his life because he was too terrified to even distinguish between what was important and not. "And then we got pulled even further into the future to Boruto's time but it was awful. Half of Konoha had been destroyed by this Kowacky ninja and like Naruto's house was missing half its walls but also he was missing too and so was Kakashi."

"Na-" Minato began with a furrowed brow, but didn't even get a chance to finish his word.

"So Tsunade had to come back to be the Hokage again, and she threw us in prison but not before Boruto told us that it was his fault we were there and that the marble was supposed to bring his dad back from some other dimension but it brought us instead. But since they accidently figured out it could travel through time they were gonna use us to get some pieces of some special scroll that's supposed to change the timeline so that Konoha was never attacked and then make it so Naruto and Kakashi never disappeared, but like, I'm not sure why it had to be us except that since we don't exist in this world really then we won't overlap ourselves in the timeline and make ourselves not be born so we can travel and maybe the universe won't implode but i don't know cuz its all really confusing." Tears were streaming down Tori's face by this point and she was hiccuping every other word and it was about at that point that she managed to forget how to breath entirely and started coughing too hard to speak.

Samantha stared, jaw wide open, before she face-palmed. Tori-Chan! You just spewed our life's story to someone who I don't think wanted that much information. Oi.

Minato was silent for his part. He looked Victoria over, judging her facial expressions for any hints of lying or deceiving. Slowly. Slowly, the killer-intent receded into a mild, tense atmosphere so thick Samantha swore she could drink the air she was breathing. But she no longer felt the fear of dying as she had throughout Victoria's entire speech. Without realizing it, Sam had spaced out. Minato's glance towards her, however, knocked her back to reality. Sam gulped. "Uh… what she said!"

Minato, contemplating, narrowed his gaze. "You expect me to believe that story, do you?"

Judging by the release of killer-intent, Sam thought it was obvious, but no words came. She simply nodded, unable to hide her shaking body.

"I-I'll answer any- any question you want," Tori blubbered between her coughing fit. "Just - just please don't hurt Sam - " She coughed harshly enough she nearly knocked her head into her kneecap even as she stretched out a pleading hand. "Or me..." ...Yeah, Victoria was not prepared for an interrogation. Obviously…Minato being intimidating was really the only thing that lead to her spilling the all and sundry beans about their unbelievable situation.

Minato delayed responding to her plea, allowing his intimidation to leave the two women quaking in their shoes. So much so, Samantha felt a drop of sweat fall down her temple. She was acutely aware of their delicate situation.

Then, Minato stepped back once, the tiniest of smiles crossing his features, allowing a quiet 'hmph' to grace his lips. "Well. If I had thought you were spies infiltrating Konoha before, with such eager desires to tell me everything you've been through, it's easy to see that you're severely untrained in torture and interrogation." At the word 'torture', Victoria gasped and kinda sunk down into a hunched puddle, drawing her arms into her coat like a literal turtle. "But some things you have revealed are troublesome," Minato added, not acknowledging Victoria's terrified turtle impression. A piece of paper appeared in his hand where the kunai had been. "However, if what you have said is true, then fate is playing a very dangerous game." He gazed intently at the paper, a deep frown on his face.

For the life of her, Samantha couldn't figure out why her most favorite character in the Naruto series - a living, breathing, human being standing right in front of her with very real abilities to kill them before they could even blink - was holding a piece of paper. The dim lighting made it even harder. Silence reigned in the room. Not even sounds from above them disturbed the quiet that now entranced the sound. Why would he have a piece of- wait. As Samantha thought back on the only conversation she and Victoria had had that spoke of the things Minato announced he heard, Sam recalled their worries about getting the parchment paper that their lives, and the lives of Naruto and Kakashi, depended on. Instantly, she had suspicions. "I-Is that…?"

"A piece of parchment paper?" The future Fourth Hokage finished for Samantha, "Yes it is."

Samantha opened her mouth a few times before her question gave voice, "But… how? Where?"

Minato simply raised an eyebrow, glancing around the empty space surrounding the three of them.

Is this…? Are we… under the shrine!? Sam's mind shrilled.

After a futile attempt to return her arms to the sleeves, Tori slithered out of her coat all together and stumbled back up to her feet. "Is it - can I see it? I won't touch it, but can I just look at the… the handwriting?" Tori cowered slightly, like a puppy expecting to get reprimanded for tearing up the carpet.

Contemplating the parchment paper in his hand, Minato gave Sam and Tori a critical once over before he held the item in front of them both. Not for either of them to take, but allowed Victoria's suggestion, letting the two women to stare in astonishment at the parchment in his hand.

It's exactly like the other parchment pieces! This is what we've been searching for this entire time! Sam gawked, feeling her hands unconsciously reach for the textured paper. Minato, however, pulled back his hand, leaving Samantha slightly stunned that he would stall their 'mission' of sorts.

"After I hand you this piece of parchment, what will happen next?" Minato, it seemed, was not done with his interrogation.

"Well, we… we disappear in a flash of light…" Samantha unconsciously felt for the pearly ball she always kept on her person just in case.

"Well, maybe," Tori added. "Sometimes it's a few minutes later. Or if we've lost it again, then Boruto seems to give up on us and pull us away anyways." She had a quick mental flashback of Kakashi disappearing with the parchment scrap into the woods the night of graduation, and also of Jiraiya wiping toad slobber off of his recovered piece. "It seems that we only get one chance in the timeline to actually get it or not once we see it.."

"Yeah it does, doesn't it?" Sam agreed, mentally thinking about Kakashi taking their parchment. Why in the world did he do that, anyway? It was important to us! And obviously he liked us, and tried to help us out. So… what would make him react so… strange? How were they to get that parchment back?

"Hmm," Minato said, seeming to be lost in thought himself.

"I… I can show you some proof that we come from a different world," Tori offered. "If that'd help you believe us. You can also see Boruto." Somehow they'd managed to keep the phone hidden from the actual real eighteen-plus adults. Only Kakashi, Rin, and Obito had seen the phone.

"Proof?" For the first time, Minato allowed a miniscule of emotion display in his voice. Surprise. If very short-lived.

Tori nodded. "I..have to get it out of my scroll," she said slowly. "Promise, not gonna do anything dumb, so please don't kill me." After the slight nod of Minato, who now looked a little intrigued, Tori carefully pulled her scroll out of the buttoned pocket of her black cargo pants. A week or two before, she and Sam had evenly split up all the Boruto supplies into two scrolls, so the whole scroll showed their weird English-marks. Right near the front was the seal for her phone. Victoria released it and powered up the slim device that got them in so much trouble. "This is a cell phone," she explained. "Where we live, everything is technology based using electricity and other external stimulus. No chakra. But a cell phone is a form of computer that is small enough and powerful enough for pretty much anyone to use. It can also store data at an insanely tiny level." Unlocking it with her fingerprint, she flipped to her photos and scrolled up to click on a photo from last Christmas that showed the snowy street of her parents' house with the magnificent Rocky Mountains cutting through the horizon. "This is where I grew up," she said, turning the phone around so Minato could see.

She then scrolled past a few more photos: just ordinary things like her niece dancing in front of the tv and her sixteen year old brother who sent a selfie with his car. There was a photo Sam had sent from a hiking trip that overlooked the entire valley they lived in with its miles and miles and miles of densely packed homes and streets and buildings. They were things that were normal on Earth, but totally foreign and unexpected to Konoha. "And this is what we found when we came here." The first picture was the ear and chin of the first Hokage carved into the mountain. Then there was a pic of Sam at the ninja school. Tori blushed, but didn't skip over things, so the next pic Minato saw was the slightly blurry covert shot of adult Kakashi reading while he stirred a pot of ramen. "That's, uh, Kakashi," she admitted, "He still wears the mask thing even as a jounin."

Minato stayed silent. Observing. Neither Victoria nor Samantha could tell what the future hokage was thinking. Then, he sighed. "I have seen enough. It's better not to tempt fate and risk the unknown." If Minato had ever heard of time-travel actually happening before in his world, he certainly wasn't willing to express his thoughts on the matter.

"So… will you give us that parchment paper? Because we won't be a bother to you or your team once we have it in our hands…" Samantha's hopeful tone left little to be interpreted.

"So much not a bother that we kinda won't exist. At least, not til the future.." Tori slowly tucked a strand of her very sweaty hair behind one ear. "We really weren't supposed to even be here this long. But we messed up and didn't know where the shrine was."

"Was being in the shrine necessary for your time-travel?" Minato asked.

"No!" Sam was quick to respond, as if trying to placate the devilishly handsome man. Wow… thinking of his age… I probably shouldn't think like that but… his shinobi nature makes him such a sexy beast! Sam was still kinda stunned by the fact that Minato and Kushina were actually only nineteen years old. They seemed so much more mature than that. But it kinda made sense. They both died when they were only twenty-four and Kakashi was like twelve by that point.

"I see..." Glancing at the parchment in his hand, Minato contemplated for a moment longer, "But in order to leave, you need this parchment piece."

"Um, in the best scenario, yes?" Tori hedged hopefully.

"Are either of you aware of what this seal on the parchment does?"

"Ah. No." Samantha hesitated.

"I see." Minato said again, giving no indication of what he was thinking.

"It's a seal?" Victoria asked after a moment. "How can you tell? It's just a torn piece of it."

For the first time since they were all transported under the Kensaki shrine, Minato gave a hint of a smile. "If you don't know already, then I assume there is a reason. My lips are sealed." He then stepped forward, ignoring the subtle jolt Samantha gave at his approach - the intensity of their time together not quite yet forgotten - and indicated for one of them to take hold of the parchment.

After a second of hesitation, Victoria was the one to reach out and carefully take it. She then turned to Sam: the expression on Tori's face a confusing mix of relief and regret. "We, we got it," she said sounding a little stunned. She then nodded in the general direction of Sam's pocket. "Do you have the marble?"

Samantha fumbled out of her coat - a relief she should have done forever ago - hardly caring that her wet hair was dry enough to allow for static to emerge. Patting her hair quickly, Sam pulled out the marble, "Here it is!" She said, almost breathless.

Tori swallowed a bit hard at the sight of the innocuous ball. It was the thing that seemed to put them in danger a lot. Before reaching out to touch it, she turned back to Minato. "What will you tell them? The kids and Kushina? What will you tell them when we don't come home?"

The waned smile on Minato's perfect features nearly said it all, yet he spoke. "What they need to hear." And then he strode forward and placed a hand on the outside of Sam and Tori's shoulders. "Good luck, ladies, wherever you land. I'll wait for you to leave before I head back. Wouldn't want you two to get stuck under the shrine unnecessarily." This time Minato's brilliant smile was real as he stepped back.

Taking a breath, Samantha looked towards Tori, "So, you ready to do this?"

"Um, just a sec," Tori said, grabbing hers and Sam's coats off the floor. She also made sure her scroll and phone were both safely buttoned into her pocket along with the parchment scrap. As she did, the marble began its first faint, sparkly glow. Supplies safely handled, Tori pushed her hair back and then reached out, before touching the marble though, she looked back at Minato. "Will you at least tell them 'goodbye' for us?" she asked softly. "I - I know it seems weird when we were lying to them for so long and all, but - but I really care about those guys." Tori's throat went all weird and tight like it usually did when she felt like crying. "Especially that Obito kid. He seems like he just - just really needs a champion in his life for him right now, you know?"

Samantha waited to say anything, allowing Tori's words to speak for her as well. As the marble began to pulse a lot brighter, Samantha gave a head nod with her own wan smile to Minato, "Thank you." She said, her voice sounding more like that of an echo, "For everything."

"And tell Kakashi I'm sorry he lost his dad," Tori said, raising her voice as the light grew brighter and brighter. She grabbed Sam's hand, the marble linking their hands tighter together as it pulsed brighter and brighter waves of light. "Tell Rin her kindness makes her the strongest. And hurry up and marry Kushina already! But most of all, please tell Sar -" but whatever Victoria would have said to Minato was swallowed up in the last blaze of white light and then it was just Minato standing alone in the muggy darkness of the underground room.

---

It was a quiet, peaceful morning in the Grass Village. The moon was still hovering on the western horizon as though it just couldn't tear itself away from the sight of the soft, rose sunrise. Robins trilled their morning songs as they fluttered about, building safe nests for the eggs they would soon lay. In the older, dirtier parts of the city, a cheap inn was reluctantly waking as well, many of its temporary occupants groaning through hangovers and fumbling around to feel how empty their wallets were after another night of over-tipping the busty barmaids. One particular heathen had spent the night curled up in the pigpen, a bottle of sake still held tightly in his hand. The proprietress of the inn, smelling his approach, shooed Jiraiya the Toad Sage off the porch and around to the back doors that lead past the kitchen and to the inn's public bath. After a thorough dunking and rinsing the proprietress sniffed with satisfaction and sent the large and muscled shinobi back towards his room with a towel slung around his hips. "You can have your robes back when they smell less like a pig," she scolded him.

"Have Yoko be the one to deliver them to my room for me, Lady Koro," the shinobi said with a wink. "I think she still owes me a kiss from last night."

"It was the pig you bartered kisses with, you old fool," Lady Koro scolded, but her pursed lips twitched in amusement. "And you'll owe me 10,000 ryo's to rebuild that table you danced on."

Jiraya heaved a satisfied sigh at the reminder of the previous night's shenanigans. "You're the best inn in town, Lady Koro, but you drive a hard bargain. 20,000 for the table, the bath, and for you to send up some breakfast with my clothes. For me, and the kid."

The wrinkled features of the innkeeper split into a wide grin at the promised tip. "Your business is welcome anytime, Lord Jiraiya," she promised. "But move your arse before you get me fined for public indecency again." She thwacked her cane towards his legs, but the toad sannin jumped back in time, his mane of hair raining drops of water across the inn's floor. Lady Koro tsked her tongue. "Add 520 ryo's for mopping up this mess," she grumbled.

With a deep laugh, Jiraiya tromped up the stairs, heading back to the surprisingly decent room he had rented out for him and his new student. Sliding open the bamboo paper door he strode forward, barely glancing at the futon mattress where the fourteen-year-old Naruto was sprawled, his froggy nightcap pulled down tight over his spiky, yellow hair. But Jiraiya did a swift double take when he realized there was more than one head on the pillow.

Curled up on either side of the tiny genin were two grown women, fully dressed and fully asleep. The loud screech he gave would have woken up the entire inn had he not already placed privacy seals all over the room. Instead, he stood there with one hand pointing towards the three on the ground, the other loosely holding onto the only thing that kept him modest. His towel. All three were startled awake, looking groggily at the legendary sannin as he shouted "YOU TWO!"

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A/N: SUP our amazing reader's! Ya'll are so freakin' amazing! Seriously. While we haven't any reviews, just looking at all the places that people are reading from is just so... wonderful that it makes both Tori and I just ecstatic to see how many places our story reaches. Thank you all for taking the time to read our story.

Also! Just a funny side note. Tori and I tend to read this story outside to make sure that any mistakes we made are fixed (though, don't blame us if we missed any. We're... as the song by Kristina Perri "Only Human". xD Anyway... so... we're reading this out loud and Tori reads the part "None, yet" and it totally sounded like she said "nunya". Get it? Like... "nunya business!" bahahahaha it was amazing! Just thought ya'll might enjoy in the hilarity with me.

Please read and REVIEW! :D :D :D Until next time!