It was 7:00 a.m., and Sakura had been sitting and resting, having run to their meeting spot at top speed from home. 'I guess Kakashi was right; I haven't put much effort into the physical aspects of ninja-dom. That wasn't short for a sprinting distance, but I shouldn't be this tired.'

Sasuke walked up, right on time. Deciding that their sensei really would be late by an hour or more, he started punching drills on a large tree.

Sakura pushed off the ground and stood up, walking towards her crush. "Sasuke, after team time is over, would you like to go to-"

The boy turned around with a look that made her stop. "Sakura, I will not have you constantly asking me for dates. I will work with you as a teammate, but I don't particularly like you. Or Ino, or any of the obsessed girls who hounded me for years.

Do you have any idea how many times I found my trash gone through? How many girls got injured by my clan's security seals?"

Sasuke had been getting closer to her, and was holding back a bit of killing intent, though Sakura could feel a tiny bit leak through.

"And the most insane thing was, you all prevented the very thing you wanted." Stepping up to her, he asked what was most definitely not a rhetorical question.

"Do you remember Mayumi?"

"Huh?"

"It's a simple question! Do you remember Mayumi? She was in our class until half a year ago, good with shuriken. One of the less insane girls in class, probably was only a member of your club because of peer pressure. That Mayumi?"

Sakura winced, "Yeah, I remember Mayumi. That… shouldn't have happened."

"Really? Do you know how injured she was when she was admitted to the hospital? Ten fractures, three breaks, internal bleeding over a large area, not to mention how much blood she lost! It took her so long to get out of the hospital she had to be held back a year! Because your insane club from hell couldn't stand the idea that I touched another girl. You all think that your love is true love and that it will conquer all, excusing you from such petty things as morality, or even the fucking law!"

Sasuke turned away. "She didn't deserve what happened to her. I was shellfish and immature, I should have thought of the ramifications. But damn it, I shouldn't have needed to ask myself if making out with a girl would get her almost killed!"

Sakura's face winced. "I know…" she choked out, "Ino and I were the ones who got the ANBU. We had no idea when we organized the club it would all go so wrong. We really thought about shutting it down several times, we almost did it after Mayumi, but by that point we were the stabilizing force, if we had stopped, the club would have kept going, only with Kimishi leading it. If that happened, it would only be a matter of time before something even worse happened."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow, Kimishi had recently been taken out of the Academy for psych reasons. He had managed to figure out that she had led the attack on Mayumi. There were ninja families in Konoha that weren't as notable as the bloodline clans, and these had marriage arrangements with one another. Sometimes, just like dogs, you'd get a kid with too much aggression, even for a ninja. Unlike a dog, unfortunately, you couldn't just put them down, no matter how many problems doing so would prevent.

Sasuke calmed, and tried to moderate his tone. "I'm glad you tried to fix some of what you caused. That doesn't make you innocent though. Please understand my dislike of all things fangirl. While I doubt I can get you to stop forever, please don't ask for at least a few years. I'm not looking for a relationship."

With that, the boy walked off, leaving Sakura there to think.

Hands covering her face, Sakura knelt on the ground. Her dream was effectively ruined. Sasuke was not going to be hers, or be with any of her friends it seemed. That left her with her goal. Hadn't she wanted to be a strong kunoichi? One that could help people, and be spoken of like Tsunade-sama? The whole Sasuke thing had side tracked her for so long, could she recover?

"Hey, come on, stand up."

A hand grabbed hers, and pulled her to her feet. Looking up, she saw Naruto. She was reminded of the way he used to ask her for dates, was she really no better? She had been so certain that she would be vindicated in the end; she hadn't realized how annoying she must have been.

"He was a bit mean about it, but Sasuke told the truth, basically. He's an interesting guy; I haven't seen him act like that before. Still waters run deep? Hello, base to Sakura, calling Sakura! You all right?"

"Sorry Naruto, I've just been getting shock and revelation one after another between yesterday's 'test' and this morning. It feels like everything I assumed was true yesterday morning just got yanked out from under my feet. It's disturbing."

"I know the feeling pretty well, unfortunately. You want to talk about it?"

"Um, thanks, maybe later. Right now I want to sit and think about some stuff."

"OK. If you need something, I can make a clone to go get it. I know munching on something sometimes help me think."

Sakura made a small smile, "Thanks, I might take you up on that. I'm going to go ponder now."

Naruto watched her walk away, before sitting in front of a tree and leaning against it.

"While it'll make things awkward for a while, it might be for the best, long term. If she's actually over Sasuke, she could focus on improving and become a serious asset," Naruto thought.

Looking for said raven-haired teammate, Naruto spied him throwing projectiles at a crude target he had cut into the bark of a tree.

"Hey Sasuke!" he said, walking up to him.

"Hey."

"I have a proposition. I could use a sparring partner since my friends are all in other teams now, and you usually have to hold back when you spar, to make sure you don't kill your opponent. I suggest that I provide you with as many autonomous clones as you can handle, and you practice killing them."

"… How does my popping your clones give you a sparring partner?"

"I learn everything they do once they pop. I figure I need to train against small groups of superior opponents, since inferior enemies are well… inferior, and if there's a large group of superior forces we're sort of screwed."

"… You mean kage-bunshin are not only a force multiplier, but also an experience multiplier?"

"Yep, they're pretty awesome!"

"Please teach it to me. Name your price."

"Umm… Okay, I would, but the Hokage made me promise not to teach it to anyone, it's technically a forbidden jutsu. Even if I were allowed, you'd probably kill yourself if you tried making more than two at a time. You saw my reserve test; I've got more chakra than almost anyone. I'm really the only person besides a Kage who can do what I do the way I do it. Sorry."

"Well damn," Sasuke said, disappointed.

"Then again, I won't get kickass eyes that give me eidetic memory, and let me pull off any move I've seen," Naruto stuck his arms out to make a balance, tipping to one side.

Sasuke smiled, "True, once I get the sharingan, I'll be able to learn quite quickly, though one still needs to practice the things the sharingan sees." He paused before nodding towards Naruto. "Deal. Should we start now, or save energy for whatever sensei wants us to do?"

"Well, he did say not to waste the time he was gone for. The way he said it, I wouldn't put it past him to be spying on us now to see what we do without him here."

Sasuke nodded, the idea had occurred to him as well. "Yes, we would never know if he was watching. Why don't we spar for 45 minutes and then do cool down stretches and rest after that?"

"Great, hold on a sec." The blond turned around and made the cross seal. It wouldn't hurt to be a bit cautious around someone as determined as Sasuke. Activating the jutsu, he created roughly a hundred clones, which ran off into the woods and circled Sasuke. "Ok, no rules on your part, I won't be in the mix, so as long as you keep enough energy to do team stuff, go as wild as you like! I'll try not to kill you, but my clones will attack your limbs with kunai and shuriken, as well as use non-offensive jutsu. Any problems? Do you want a safe word?"

"It's fine, and I don't need a safe word."

"On second thought, I'm giving you one anyway. If you want to stop the fight, shout 'punctual Kakashi'. All right, we'll start in 60 seconds, have fun!"

The whiskered teen fled the area, not eager to be mistaken as a clone. This would be an interesting experience. He had done this with all of his friends, but except for Hinata, none of them had such an emphasis in taijutsu. Of course, Hyuuga Jyuuken was so different and unique; learning to fight against it wasn't that helpful against other taijutsu users, though it certainly helped build speed and fluidity when defending against it. Truthfully, while Naruto always gained experience clone sparring with Hinata, the girl gained much more in terms of confidence and willingness to cause harm.

Finding a bridge over a stream, Naruto sat down and started meditating. Shikamaru had taught him the basics when they were younger, and though he sucked at it then, Naruto had kept practicing it. It turned out to be a blessing when he learned kage-bunshin, as the returned information could lead to headaches. The medical ninja said that he would have likely given himself a grand mal seizure the first few times he messed around with it in the library, if it hadn't been for his furry tenant. Even so, the headaches had made Naruto want to kill himself. Once he had had a clone pop while meditating, he recognized the difference immediately. Naruto had practiced using meditation for accepting clone memories from then on, and could now understand and process information clones gave him much faster. Of course, he couldn't do it as well while his real body was in a fight, but he understood that masters could have entire battles while in a meditative trance. So it was possible, he just needed practice.

A clone sat next to him and pulled out a book that had been copied just like all the kunai were. It started to read it, a beginner's book on sealing; something the blond had been interested in since he understood the importance of his seal. If you could subdue a force of nature with the help of the Shinigami, there seemed to be little one couldn't do with enough knowledge of seals. Naruto had been trying to get through the book off and on for nearly three years, but it was dense, terminology-laden theory, and the blond seemed to never have enough patience.

That, and the fact that his penmanship sucked at the beginning. After getting far enough into the book, the blond tried to make an extremely basic storage seal. He had read the warnings, and quadruple checked the design. But when he tried to seal a shuriken in it, it blew up in his face. It wasn't quite an exploding note, but there's a lot of energy involved in moving matter from one dimension to another, even if it doesn't take much chakra to activate it in either direction.

Confused as to why it didn't work, the boy had taken the problem to Iruka, since most chunin could make simple storage seals and crude exploding tags in the field. Running out of exploding tags in the middle of an extended mission could kill you, so it was always a good idea to be able to make more, even if they were of poor quality compared to retail versions.

When he replicated the seal to show Iruka, the chunin had nearly thrown it across the room. While it was true that the shape was the same, the lines and glyphs were so crudely drawn that the seal became unstable. Iruka had made the blond swear not to activate any homemade seals until his handwriting had improved.

The clone sat, mumbling and reading, as Naruto Prime meditated and pieced together the memories of his popped clones. Sasuke was taking him at his word, and killing Naruclones with vigor. The first five clones tried to go one on one with him, just to start things off. Naruto had to admit; Sasuke was skilled. The five clones lasted about 30 seconds each. Then a group of 25 clones had tried to melee combo the prodigy, attacking in groups of three or more, covering for one another and pressing from multiple sides. Ten minutes later, that group of clones was gone. Next a formation of fifty clones tried mixed tactics, some going in close, while others stayed back, sniping with shuriken to prevent Sasuke from getting the upper hand. Naruto Prime had gotten worried, if that level hadn't worked, he couldn't escalate it any more without putting his teammate's life in danger. Thankfully, with that number of clones watching out for one another and mixing short and long range, the speed Sasuke popped the clones at was down to one every few minutes.

Forty minutes after they began, Sasuke was in rough shape. While the clones hadn't pressed continuously, the teen only had so much stamina. Covered in shallow cuts, and bruised from many punches, Sasuke finally called it quits.

"Punctual Kakashi!"

The clones immediately stopped, and backed away. Out of the 70 or so that were left when they had tried the third style of attack, there were now 45. Most of them walked off a ways and started sparring with each other. One stayed and handed Sasuke a water bottle.

"I'm surprised you didn't try and hold out the last five minutes."

"A ninja must know his limitations," Sasuke got out between heavy breaths. He sucked down some water and nodded his head in thanks.

"True, you just always seemed rather arrogant in class. But I suppose it's not arrogance if you can back it up. That was impressive."

Sasuke glared at the first part, then shrugged as Naruto finished. "Hnn. I must thank you; that was probably the best training session I've ever had. Would you be interested in doing this regularly?" Sasuke asked hopefully. "It was… fun."

Naruto grinned, "Sure, I don't mind. We'll have to talk with sensei and find out what days are best, so you don't get too tired to do team stuff."

Sasuke nodded, "What about you? If making two might kill me, making that many clones must have drained a lot of your chakra."

"Eh, about 15% or so, I'm fine. Original me is a little tired mentally from the meditation, probably. But we can still kick ass."

"Wait, you're not Naruto?"

"Of course I am, we all are."

"I mean the original Naruto, the one that won't pop if I poke him."

"Oh, no. He's still meditating. We need to practice it a lot because I'm pretty bad at it."

Sasuke ignored the flip-flopping pronouns, "I'm beginning to get jealous, dobe. You have the ability to create more of yourself, almost totally indistinguishable from the original. Most ninja would cut off a finger for that, but you have chakra reserves on a level that's terrifying, meaning you can spam techniques from here to Hidden Rain, and you have accelerated healing. I know you're an orphan, but you must have some idea of your lineage just from the kekkei genkai you have."

Naruto froze, not knowing how to respond. "Not really, I've asked lots of people about my family, no one can tell me anything. Heh, I've never even thought of it as a blood limit before, but I suppose it must be. Maybe I'm the first? How cool would that be?"

"Hnn. Well, you are lucky to have such gifts, if you don't make any stupid mistakes you could go far with such abilities."

The Naruclone held back his opinion on how 'lucky' he was. He supposed that in a way, he was blessed, though he had paid for his great potential. His childhood, while not fun, was better than many children's that had both parents in some countries. The Land of Water and Land of Mist were both said to be pretty hellish for ninja, let alone civilians. Being lonely hurt, but it was better than going hungry.

"I hadn't really thought about it like that. Thanks! Do you want a snack while we wait for Kakashi-sensei? I can go grab something from a stand while we wait, unless you like cup ramen, I've got a few of those on me."

Sasuke winced, "While fresh ramen is acceptable, I would rather eat ration bars than eat a cup ramen. Unfortunately I only brought enough money for lunch, but perhaps next time."

"All right. Flag one of us down if you need something, I'm pretty used to being an errand boy for my friends and myself. Otherwise, I'll let you rest until Kakashi shows up. Ja ne." The Naruclone popped itself.

Sasuke sat, thinking about his odd teammate. The blond had been the class clown for so long that most of the class had dismissed him, though the fact that so many heirs hung out with him had raised a few eyebrows. The loudmouth did better than average on practical exams, but his paper tests were just passing. Sasuke had noticed a change a few years ago in Naruto, but hadn't given it much thought. They were all growing up, and even Kiba had matured.

Perhaps something significant had happened to the blond. 'Maybe his kekkei genkai woke up,' Sasuke thought, 'or he was made aware of it. Whatever it was, he's still a strange guy.'

oooooo

Oddly enough, almost the same thought was running through Kakashi's mind. "That Naruto is a strange one. I like it so far, but the fact I can't always predict him is going to drive me nuts. Oh well, Sensei told me I'd go crazy when I got a team of my own. Although I got the feeling it was more of a hope than a prediction."

The boys had been right in thinking the cyclopean teacher was watching them. Kakashi believed in being informed, and knowing how his students interacted on their first day together would let him predict and understand them that much better. Today had been a gold mine, Sasuke and Sakura were much more complicated than they appeared to be on the surface. He had already known Naruto was deceptively deep, a loudmouthed pranking fool on the surface, a kind and somewhat philosophical schemer underneath.

The way they had acted, in conjunction with the fact that they wore their thoughts on their faces for him to read at a glance, had made his models of them much more accurate in just an hour's time. And watching the 'spar' had been enlightening too. Both boys were quite skilled, though in almost totally different ways.

Naruto's mind and body were at odds with each other, almost schizophrenic in a sense. His body was a tank: lots of stamina, healed itself, and moderately muscular, though not overblown like a taijutsu master's. His mind was built for trickery and evasion. Distractions and slick moves, that was how he wanted to act. As he was, he was figuratively tripping over himself. Kakashi would have to help him pick a way forward, or if possible, train him in both mindsets.

Sasuke was the latest model of Uchiha, with all that that entailed. Built for speed and agility over brute strength, the Uchiha had bred themselves (as all clans did), the goal being taijutsu mastery. While the Uchiha style of taijutsu was built around the sharingan, Sasuke used it very effectively even without it. He was lacking in certain areas of it, no doubt because his clan wasn't around to teach him the finer points. He had obviously made good use of the written instructions however, and Kakashi was pleased with what he saw overall.

Sakura's introspection was a pleasant surprise, he had expected her infatuation to last years, and while he expected she still harbored feelings for Sasuke, it looked as though she was seriously reconsidering the path she was on.

Yes, this morning and yesterday's test told him more about his team than their entire Academy files. He could work with them.

"I guess it's time to show up, plus if they expect me to show up when I tell them I will, it'll be funnier when I disabuse them of that."

The silver haired man moved down to the bridge from his current vantage point in the trees with a casualness that belied the awesome speed with which he did it. Naruto Prime was still meditating, but the clone reading the sealing book stood and gave a casual salute, before popping itself. The remaining blond stirred, and stood up, waving at his sensei.

"Hey, I took the initiative to send some clones to collect Bubblegum and Princess, they should be here in a minute."

"Thank you Mud, that's considerate of you. I'll wait until everyone's here before I begin."

The blonde nodded and leaned back against the rail of the bridge. He didn't have to wait long, Sasuke had jogged over immediately after Naruto told him, and Sakura wasn't far. She had an ambiguous look on her face, sort of distracted, but with an undercurrent of determination. Once the three teens were standing in front of their teacher, Kakashi began.

"I didn't mention it last night as you hadn't been here, but this bridge is where we'll meet every morning. I don't mind if you're off on your own, but be close enough to tell when I arrive please. I arrived when I suggested I might today, but I did that as a courtesy. I could be anywhere from ten to 120 minutes late. I don't expect you to like it, but you will put up with it. You'll find that strong ninja become… peculiar. Doing the things we do puts stress on your soul, either it bends, and you become odd, or it breaks, and you get hunted down and killed for the community's good. If you want to be normal, don't expect to go any farther than special jonin, and that's pushing it.

"I looked around briefly before I made myself known, and I'm glad all of you used your time wisely. I'll expect you to continue to do so, whether physical training, mental exercise, learning from a book, or occasionally stopping to find yourself. Just because I refuse to show up on time doesn't give you the excuse to nap. Unless you've been kept up at night by missions and the most productive thing you can do is to catch up on missed sleep, but that's another matter. Every day we'll do a mission until we graduate to C-ranks. As I said last night, we'll also be doing team exercises and situational training, as well as personal tutoring and other things. Today we'll focus almost entirely on teamwork, so that you can get more used to working with one another before your mission. Meet me at training ground twenty one-C."

The three weren't surprised when he disappeared this time; it seemed to be a habit of his. Sakura knew where all the training grounds were, despite most academy students using only academy training grounds, so she led them to it. When they got there, the teens found several structures and landmarks packed fairly close together compared to most training grounds. Kakashi was leaning casually against a boulder by a wide, shallow stream. The genin noticed it must have been man made from the unnatural appearance of it.

"Ah good, one of you must have known where this was, I was expecting to wait a while for you to ask someone and so on."

"Why didn't you just tell us?"

"Because that wouldn't have taught you anything, or allowed me to learn about you. But enough about that, we're here at Teamwork River. I'm sure you've noticed the odd look of it," the teens nodded, "that's because it was built with a purpose in mind. It's twenty feet across along most of it, and only four feet deep. It's been lined with gravel and concrete in places to keep it from eroding, and those large rocks are placed very carefully. If you hadn't guessed, it's today's challenge. You are going to cross the river at different points, without swimming, jumping, or water walking. In fact, you shouldn't use chakra at any point during this exercise."

The man pulled out a storage scroll and activated it on the ground, releasing four planks of different lengths, and a box.

"These planks are the only tools you may use. You are going to take the box with you. Start over there, and cross back and forth, going to the east each time. If one of you falls in or accidentally uses chakra, you start that section over. Meanwhile, I'll be practicing my wind composition, so expect the occasional gust, and to get very cold if you get wet!"

Sakura looked surprised, while Sasuke was intrigued and Naruto annoyed that their sensei was going out of his way to make them uncomfortable.

"Get going, the more you impress me every day, the more I'll be inclined to teach you cool things, on top of the necessary stuff."

The genin looked at one another and picked up the planks. Going over to the edge of the water, Naruto looked at the stones. "This first one looks easy, though they'll probably get tougher. Let's take a bit of time to plan it out."

"Yes, or else we might find ourselves trapped. Obviously we lay planks in front of us, and pick up the ones behind us, but we'll need to plan which length plank to use. The rocks were almost certainly placed so that certain planks will need to be used in specific places. Most of the rocks look too small to stand on without sticking to them with chakra, we'll have to stay on the planks," Sasuke mused.

"We'll have to keep the planks as dry as possible to prevent slipping on them. Does anyone have a spare cloth to dry things off with? I should be able to figure out which planks to use…"

Kakashi left them to their planning, it sounded like they had things well in hand.

"Sensei, is it alright if I walk out on the river before we try to cross it?"

"Hmmm. It's sort of against the spirit of the premise, but I suppose so."

Naruto nodded and walked out on the water, looking at the rocks and so on. "Yeah, this could get tricky guys. Luckily the water should be pretty warm." To confirm this, he knelt and stuck his hand in the water. "Yikes!"

"What is it Naruto?" Sakura asked, concerned.

"I was wrong, this water's freezing, it makes no sense!" He looked around the river, trying to figure out the cause. "I'll be back in a minute guys."

Running towards the river's source, the blond looked at the bottom of the river, trying to see if there was anything odd about it. He didn't go to far before the river suddenly stopped, it's origin made obvious. A spring.

'Spring water can be cold, but not this cold, something is yelling at me that this river is funny.' He stuck his hand in the river again, finding to his surprise that it was merely cool. 'So something between here and the test makes the water cold.'

"Hurry up Naruto, we're ready!" Sakura shouted in the distance.

"One minute!"

Thinking fast, the blond picked up rocks in the stream, looking for a machine or something. Picking up a large one, he saw a design on the bottom.

"Ha, a seal! Of course, it's leaching thermal energy and pushing the water along faster with it. Hmmm…"

The blond made a familiar cross shaped hand seal before running back to his team.

"Sorry, I was curious, but I couldn't figure out what made it cold."

"It doesn't matter, we just need to not fall in," said Sakura.

"I guess. I'm taking off my shirt and jacket, the water is freezing," Naruto warned.

"Good idea."

Sakura blushed a bit as the two boys stripped off their tops. 'Focus! This isn't the time for daydreaming.'

"Alright let's start!"

oooooo

Fifteen minutes later, Naruto fell in the water with the crate, knocking his teammates in with him.

"Gyah! It is freezing! No wonder you wanted to find out why! Do you think Kakashi is doing it?" Sakura complained.

The two boys shrugged, shivering, as they pulled the supplies back to the start. They were on the third crossing, and it looked like there were 30.

"Sasuke, do you know a weak katon jutsu to warm us up? If we're shivering like this, we'll be even more likely to fall in," asked Naruto.

"Hnn. I think so, stand back."

The Uchiha made some seals and a three-foot flame shot from his mouth, warming the area quickly.

"That's great! Thanks!" Sakura fawned a bit before catching herself.

Sasuke nodded, then blinked a few times before walking quickly back to the water's edge.

"What's wrong with him?" she asked Naruto.

"I'm not sure- hmm. I don't know how to say this politely, but it might be because your girls are standing to attention."

Sakura frowned, then looked down. "ACK!" she screamed covering her breasts. "Stop looking you ass!"

Thankfully she wasn't wearing white, but her top still clung to her figure. Her nipples were definitely poking out, and she had no idea how to prevent the boys from getting a show during the entire training exercise.

Naruto walked back to the river laughing, "Princess, you scared of nipples?"

"Shut. Up." the boy warned. "It's not the nipples themselves, it's the juxtaposition of them with a fangirl."

Naruto looked confused. "You have trouble thinking about fangirls having nipples? Man, they really did a number to you, man!"

Sakura stood, arms crossed, trying to ignore them, while Sasuke shook his head. "Never mind Naruto, let's just get on with it."

The team returned to river crossing, though it was harder now as everyone was wet. The katon had warmed the three up, but it wasn't nearly enough to dry them. Between that, Sakura being self-conscious, and Sasuke's occasional blushing fits, they were going much slower now.

Still, they were careful and made progress, and they didn't fall in again until a strong gust knocked them off the plank during the tenth section.

"Damn it sensei! Go practice wind composition somewhere else!" Naruto yelled at the man who had followed along with the three.

"Oops, did I do that? I'm so sorry. And you were doing so well, too!"

"Geez, I must have adjusted to the temperature, the water doesn't seem so cold," Sakura claimed, getting out of the stream.

Another breeze blew by, freezing all of the genin.

"You just had to say it, didn't you," Naruto growled.

They had gotten to the fifteenth crossing when a plank slipped off a wet stone, sending them all into the water again.

"Huh? It's not-"

"Shhhh! I fixed the problem; it just took time to take affect. Don't let sensei know!" the blond whispered. "Brrr, it's freezing! How many more times are we going to fall in?" He said at a normal level.

Sakura and Sasuke looked at each other and shrugged, if the blond had figured out how to make the water warm, that was great!

Kakashi, who was alternating reading his precious, and seriously practicing wind composition (it was his weakest), looked up. Something was fishy. Looking around, he wasn't able to put a thumb on it immediately, and decided he'd ignore the feeling for now.

They were on the 21st crossing when Sakura and Sasuke fell in again. Sasuke had needed to switch places with Sakura, a bit of a problem on the thin planks, but they'd been doing it all afternoon. This time though, the two were chest to chest, and the two froze, embarrassed, as Sakura's breasts pressed against Sasuke and the two realized how close their faces were to one another. Kakashi chose that moment to send another gust of wind, knocking the two off balance, and into the water.

This time the water was warm, and Sakura couldn't help making a noise of appreciation.

'Hoh? Not freezing anymore is it?' The jonin thought. 'How odd, the munchkin must have found the seals. Did he cancel them, or reverse them?'

Naruto was chuckling at his two teammates, carrying the logs back to shore by jumping from rock to rock after tossing the empty box ashore. When no one was looking, Kakashi slipped down to the water and checked the temperature. 'Hmm, he must have read a fair amount of that book; it looks like he reversed the seals. I wonder if he's good enough to have put a maximum temperature on them though?'

The genin kept crossing the stream, Kakashi occasionally testing them with a breeze.

"Finally, the last one! I bet there's a trick to it. Any takers?"

"No bet!" the other two said immediately.

The three teens looked over the rocks and planned. They would probably find the trick the hard way, but with the water warm, it wasn't so big a deal. They set out, and nearly got to the other side when the plank slid off the last stone.

"!"

The genin rushed to the shore, holding in shouts of pain, as the water nearly boiled them. It was as hot as a bathing spring, and since they hadn't expected it, or adjusted slowly, it was painful!

Kakashi smiled at them, "Getting that cold? It shouldn't actually be painful."

Naruto wilted. "Damn it! You know don't you? When did you figure it out?"

"For a while. I guessed you didn't know enough to set a maximum temperature, and decided to let it play out. I'm not going to punish you; thinking outside of the box is what ninja do. You will have to change all the seals back, though. If you start at the beginning and work your way down, the water should be cool enough to get in.

"Since it's your first day, I'll even let you use shadow clones. Now come on, it's lunchtime. Decide where you all want to eat. I'm not paying, but we eat lunch together."

His students looked surprised, but after Naruto sent off a bunch of clones to fix the seals, the three started to argue about lunch.

"Sorry Naruto, but I'm going to make a command decision. We aren't eating ramen more than twice a week. Period," Kakashi decided.

The ramen fanatic pouted; letting the others to try to settle it. In the end, they decided on a diner Sakura was fond of.

ooooooo

"It wasn't bad, but I still want two ramen lunches a week," the blond put forward, exiting the eatery. "I'm not the only one who thinks Ichiraku's is a great place, they had to expand recently to fit all the customers."

"Fine! We'll go to Ichiraku's. Just shut up about it!" Sakura demanded.

Sasuke nodded, not liking to agree with a former fangirl, no matter what her nipples felt like through her shirt. He stopped and shook his head, trying to free it of that thought, before continuing to wherever Kakashi was leading them.

Naruto tilted his head. "Are we going to the Hokage tower?"

"Yes. When you were in the Academy, the teachers gave you missions. As actual ninja, you go to the tower, where mission handlers, or if it's important enough, the Hokage himself, will give them to you. Today we'll probably see the Hokage since the new genin will be getting their first missions. Most teams pick up a mission or two in the mornings, but I reserved a special mission for us."

"Special? Oh god, I know that tone, it's the same tone I tell my friends what kind of adventure we're going to go on when I know it's going to be hell! This mission, it's going to be horrible isn't it? Can't we take a boring mission to start?"

"Yare yare, Naruto. So young to be so cynical. You're too high strung, calm down. I admit you might be challenged by it, but every genin team gets this mission eventually. You're just lucky to get it now!"

Naruto groaned, and Sakura and Sasuke looked worried, no doubt remembering some of the D-rank missions that the academy sensei would assign for punishment.

Kakashi mused to himself, "Naruto can have moments of uncommonly powerful common sense. It's strange the way his mind works. Metaphorically, it's like asking him to solve 10 plus 10, getting 100 as an answer, and then realizing two days later he was doing it in binary."

The teens followed their sensei to the tower with some trepidation, though Sakura was excited to meet the Hokage. She had seen him out in public several times, but never had the chance to talk with him. She realized he would probably be to busy to do more than wish them luck, but it was still cool.

Sasuke had spoken with the Hokage several times since the incident, and while he respected his leader's great skill and power, obvious from just the way the old man moved, Sasuke was familiar enough with him not to be excited.

The receptionist inside the entrance looked up and pushed a button as the team passed, but didn't stop them. As they went up the tower, they passed several offices and workers busy taking care of all the paperwork an operation like Konoha produced. Konoha's government was more complicated than simply the Hokage in charge of everything. Bureaucracy had arisen by necessity. Finally, they found the mission room.

"Hey gramps!" Naruto greeted immediately upon entering the room. Sakura tried to hit him, but the blond was too quick for her.

"Apologize to the Hokage! You don't call him 'Gramps'!"

"I do, he's never had a problem with it before," he said, dodging a fist.

*Cough Cough*

Sakura froze, and brought herself to attention. Naruto stopped and waved. Sasuke bowed and stood at attention, though less rigidly than Sakura.

"My my, you must have your hands full, Kakashi. Such spirited young genin, how are they doing?"

The Hokage sat in his seat, a copy of the one in his office (it's good to be the Hokage). Next to him were some clerical staff that none of the aforementioned genin knew, and surprisingly, Iruka.

Kakashi answered his leader, "Well, it's been an interesting two days. I've given you the report about their test of course, and today I took them to do the river crossing exercise."

"Ah, that explains their damp appearance. Was the water cold enough for you Sakura-chan?" he asked with a smile.

The girl nodded, wide eyed. Kakashi interrupted, "Actually, there's an interesting story there. A certain blond munchkin was curious why the water was so cold and found the chilling seals. Apparently he's taught himself enough to reverse them to warming seals, but not enough to make them stop raising the temperature. I found out about it shortly before they fell in again and nearly boiled themselves."

"Naruto! Can't you do anything without making it into a production?" Iruka started.

"Whoa, calm down, Iruka right? If he had pulled it off, I would be rewarding him. If you aren't cheating, you're not trying hard enough. See, Hokage-sama agrees with me."

Indeed, the old man was chuckling, confusing some of the clerks. "Ah, you're not the first to do that, Naruto-kun. You're the latest in a line of notable people including Jiraiya, the Yondaime, and myself. None of us got away with it either, though none of us boiled our teammates. Ah, that brings back memories. On an unrelated note, I have to apologize for Kakashi's tardiness, I've tried almost everything to get him to be punctual, but short of a direct order, he doesn't show up on time for anything less than an A-rank."

Sarutobi chuckled, "But you're not here to listen to me go on, you want your first D-plus-rank I'm sure. It's a good thing your sensei saved you a mission, as awful as you're going to find Tora, it's better than cleaning the sewers."

"Who's Tora sir?" Sakura asked, curiosity winning out over anxiety.

"A sound question. She is the cat of Lady Shijimi, the Fire Lord's wife. Tora, and Tora's mother, have been the bane of young genin since the Yondiame's reign."

"What makes this cat so difficult? What task must we accomplish?" asked Sasuke suspiciously.

Several adults smiled as Naruto's eyes widened.

"I knew it, you did send us on a suicide mission! I've heard about that cat! It's evil!"

It was Sakura's turn to panic, "You mean Tora, the Devil Cat? The cat said to have helped the Yondaime defeat the Kyubii? That cat?"

Sasuke looked at his teammates. "I can't believe a cat can be that bad."

Naruto shook his head, "No, you don't understand. Rumor has it she has some fire country tiger in her. I've heard chunin take border patrol rather than catch this cat."

"So we have to catch it? That could be difficult, we aren't a tracking team…"

The adults were holding back laughter as Naruto and Sakura panicked, and Sasuke grew increasingly annoyed.

"You still don't get it do you? This is assigned as punishment to ninja who screw up! The cat is smart!"

Sasuke looked at the adults at the table. "May we get the mission scroll already? I don't want to listen to this all day."

"Certainly, Sasuke-kun, here it is." Iruka handed over the scroll to the black haired teen, who snatched it before bowing and marching out of the room.

"I'll tell you all about it later," promised the masked jonin, dragging Mud and Bubblegum out the door after Princess.

oooooo

Team seven was standing outside the summer home of the Fire Daimyo, from which Tora had recently escaped. Naruto and Sakura had finally calmed down, and had resigned themselves to their fate. Sasuke had read the mission scroll out loud, and then lead them off to the balcony Tora was seen escaping from.

"So were you being serious about making problems on missions?" Sasuke asked his team leader.

"Yes, but this mission is considered tough enough that we aren't supposed to hinder you for it."

Sasuke facepalmed. "Don't tell me those two are right? I refuse to accept that a cat helped defeat the Kyubii."

"Well, that bit is hyperbole, obviously, but the cat is tricky. Your brother got mad enough once that he tried to kill it. He's not the only one to try."

"This is absurd. Fine; Sakura, Naruto, do either of you remember anything about where it hides?"

"That's valuable information, no one would just talk about that. I heard someone say that Tora likes seafood, though," said Sakura.

"That's a start, maybe we can lay some traps."

"Today's Tuesday, right? If the cat likes seafood, I know where it might be," the blond pondered.

"Where?"

"Behind Ichiraku's, eating all the Tuesday's Catch of the Day ramen leftovers."

"Cat's don't eat ramen, Naruto!" Sakura exclaimed. "But Tora might be eating behind a restaurant."

"No, hear me out, tons of cats hang out behind Ichiraku's on Tuesdays. Dozens of them, they all want the fish heads and tails Ayame and her dad throw out after they strip the meat off the fish. Look, it's a place to start, I don't know of a bigger cat attraction then that anywhere in the village. Do you?"

The two shook their heads, and reluctantly followed Naruto to his home away from home, Kakashi amusedly trailing behind.

"All right, when we find her, don't rush in. I've heard dozens of ninja say she's as quick as lightning and knows where all the tiny holes are. I know you don't want to believe this Sasuke, but what's worse? Being over prepared and looking foolish, or a cat making us to look foolish?"

"Hnn."

oooooooo

"See? Cats," the boy whispered, gesturing down at the alley. The four ninja were on the roofs looking down at a cat convention. There were literally dozens of cats in all shapes and colors.

"What were the distinguishing features again, Sasuke?" Naruto asked in a hushed tone.

"A red ribbon bow on the right ear, and slightly orange-ish brown fur; try to remember this stuff."

Team seven (minus the instructor) searched among the cats for a red ribbon bow. There were plenty of cats with collars, and even a few bowed ones, but no one found Tora until…

"Found her!" Sakura whispered, "She's just now walking in."

The genin rubbed their eyes as most of the cats bowed to their leader, as much as cats understand the concept anyway. Tora skipped the line and took the best seat, right in front of the dumpster, before communicating with the other cats.

"Hey, we've got a quarter of an hour before the fish guts get thrown out today, let's go requisition some animal tranquilizers, and put them in the fish bits! All the cats will fall asleep, and we'll take Tora easy as you please!"

"I don't know Naruto, poisons are tricky, especially if more than one thing eats the food. Dosage will be hard," contemplated Sasuke.

"I think… yes, I can do it! … If one of us mixes it evenly into the fish… stuff," Sakura said.

The three teens balked at diving into fish guts. There were things even ninja hesitated to do.

"Ugh, if we get some gloves and a clothes pin, I'll have my clones do it." Naruto groaned.

"Fine, I'll get the tranquilizer, Sasuke can get the gloves and pin for Naruto. Naruto, you should make sure your friend is all right with us screwing around with his trash," Sakura directed.

The two boys looked at her oddly. "What, do I have something on my face?" She looked down at her chest, just to make sure.

"Nothing, it's just that you're not usually so assertive," Naruto explained.

"Well get used to it. And hurry up!"

The boys, and now Kakashi too, stared at her, observing. Instead of becoming anxious, the girl glared back, "What's wrong? Aren't I allowed to be in charge occasionally? It's a good plan! Let's move!"

"I think they're concerned that you seem to have totally shifted your mannerisms and body language, though they likely couldn't have put their finger on it. We need to talk about this later, Sakura; for now though, do as she says guys," Kakashi explained.

The teens frowned at him, though for different reasons, before Sasuke and Naruto nodded and leapt off to do their tasks. Sakura paused a moment as Kakashi watched different muscle groups relax and tighten, before she turned to him.

"Sensei, would you please sign a note of consent to me buying a tranquilizer? I have one in mind, but I'm not sure if the derivative version we need is available to genin or not, and I want to be sure I'll be allowed to buy it."

"Which one?" The jonin asked, pulling out a spare scrap of paper and a pen.

"I think tranquilizer family four, sub 17. I'll have to ask the owner if I want a, b, or c."

"I didn't know you were so knowledgeable in poisons, that particular mixture isn't a common choice," Kakashi commented, while he scribbled on the paper.

"Ah, well, I'm very good at memorization, so I put it to use on several topics."

"I'm sure that will come in handy frequently," he said, handing her the note.

"Thanks, I hope so!" The girl smiled, before running to the Potion Shop, as it was euphemistically named.

ooooo

Sakura got back with not much time to spare, and looked around for her team. She found them on a roof a few buildings over, with two full black bags, and Naruto wearing gloves.

"You have the stuff? Great, the cats will wait a bit, but I expect Tora might get anxious if we wait too long," the blonde said.

"Be careful not to spill any on yourself Naruto, it's a good thing that we got you gloves."

"I'm not sure what happens when my clones get poisoned, but I'm not eager to try. Kakashi-sensei, could we try an experiment at the hospital later? I'd like a doctor to be on hand, but not knowing what'll happen could get me killed."

"That's good thinking Naruto, I know that most lethal poisons will just pop a clone, but there have been reports that mind altering substances can affect the main body. We'll take a look at it in a few weeks."

Meanwhile, Sakura picked up one bag, and then the other, estimating their weight. Pulling out a small bottle, she opened the first bag, wrinkling her nose. She turned the bottle upside down and gave it five pats. Then she stood back and motioned for Naruto to start. The blond frowned, but proceeded to make three shadow clones, which put clothespins on their noses and stuck their arms in. The original Naruto began to meditate, preparing to try and stop the clone's memories from coming back.

Soon the first bag was mixed, and Sakura opened the second bag, then added the appropriate number of drops. The Naruclones looked pretty disgusting, covered up to their elbows in goop as they started to mix the second bag. Kakashi was standing on the next roof over, glad he was upwind of the whole affair. Sasuke tried to join him, but he was told to stick with his team.

Finally, the clones popped and Naruto Prime smiled, to the surprise of his teammates. "Hah, it's about time I managed to block an incoming clone's memory!"

The rest of team seven nodded, now understanding. They wouldn't want to remember that either.

"How do we deliver it Naruto? You did talk about that with um… Teuchi-san, isn't it, right?" Sakura asked.

"Yes it is, and yeah I did. I'm going to take the bags in through a side door so the customers don't get queasy, then he'll take them out as normal and throw them in the dumpsters. He seemed excited to be part of a mission, he's a pretty awesome guy."

"Hnn. Well, let's get on with it." Sasuke said, disappointed he hadn't been able to contribute much this mission.

Naruto nodded and grabbed the bags, the tops already retied, and hopped down to the side door, out of sight of the cats. He knocked a few times before his favorite cook opened it and took the bags with a smile. The boy actually bowed a tiny bit, before leaping back to the roofs to watch the results.

Team seven gathered to watch, anxious for their plan to work. Even Kakashi was curious, he was too old to have caught Tora, but he remembered her mother, Shishi. She wasn't quite as bad as Tora was rumored to be, but the genin back then had still hated Shishi with a passion. If his team's plan worked, this would put them near the top for fastest completion for this mission. He might even get a few free drinks out of it from the other jonin-sensei.

Teuchi walked out the back door and started to whistle, and act oddly. Naruto slapped his face and explained, "He's trying to be nonchalant. Ugh, civilians. He's like an uncle to me, but seriously…"

The cats were too focused on the food to notice the man's odd demeanor, and since he smelled normal, even Tora didn't give it a second thought. Teuchi threw the bags in the dumpster and walked back inside, still acting 'sneaky'.

The cats immediately jumped in the dumpster, tearing the garbage bags open and picking prizes to carry off a ways and munch on. Tora found a particularly large fish head and climbed to the top of a pile of junk, before starting to eat.

"Alright, now all we do is wait I guess. How long should it take Sakura?"

"I wanted to make it as safe as possible, but still be sure to knock them all out. The best choice was a rather slow acting agent for ninja work, but it should only be ten to fifteen minutes, and the only chance one of them will die is if it's really old or sick already. We'd never hear the end of it if we killed that many pets, even if almost all of them are strays." Sakura explained.

Sasuke rose an eyebrow, "Sensei, should we contact the animal control? While some are obviously pets, many of these could be taken off the streets."

"Hmm. While it's not part of the mission, ninja do need to know when to take initiative and seize opportunities. Okay, you three wait here for your main objective, and I'll contact the Inuzuka, they're in charge of the pound." Kakashi was off in a flash of movement, as they were becoming accustomed to.

Naruto frowned. "You realize that most of these cats will get put down now, don't you? Sure, some will be adopted, but the pound won't be able to take in so many cats at one time. They're not hurting anyone, ass!"

"Actually, while a small population of cats is beneficial towards keeping rodents down, beyond a certain population they start killing good things, like songbirds. And you must've had to lay through a night with two cats outside your window during mating season, right? This is necessary population control."

Naruto looked like he was about to stop whispering, before Sakura interrupted the argument. "Actually, there's a lot of controversy about feral cats, they do kill wildlife, but some people think the popular numbers are wrong. And just killing them only makes the rest reproduce faster, since there's less competition. I read a magazine that said there wasn't any good answer, because even if you killed every single feral cat, eventually pets will get away and start it over again. Still Naruto, we need to leave the decision up to the animal control, they might neuter and release them, or not even do anything."

Naruto and Sasuke both frowned and went back to looking at the cats, some of which were looking drowsy. "I knew you were smart Sakura, but that's kind of creepy that you know that much about random topics."

Sakura rolled her eyes, "I just read stuff and pay attention. It's not hard. If you ask questions whenever you don't know something, you start to know lots of stuff," she huffed.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to offend, my mouth just works without my brain sometimes," the blond apologized.

"Well work on it before you get assigned to something diplomatic," the girl replied.

"Ah, I'll keep working at it, but I doubt I'll ever get diplomatic duty."

"One can only hope," Sasuke added with a chuckle.

oooooo

Kakashi returned at a quick jog, which was quite slow compared to his normal entrances and exits. "How's it going?"

"Most of the cats are out, but some of the healthier looking ones are awake, and Tora is barely drowsy, despite eating a second fish head."

"Hmm. Well, she comes from good stock, she might take awhile. The Inuzuka are getting together some people, this many cats are going to take some effort, even if they are asleep."

The four ninja sat and watched, Naruto practicing keeping still. Finally, 20 minutes after they had started to eat, Tora swayed back and forth, before falling over asleep. Naruto pumped his fist in the air, but remained quiet; grabbing a burlap sack that Teuchi had given him. Wary of her reputation, the blond made twenty Naruclones and positioned them around the alley. "Does anyone want the honor?"

Sasuke shrugged, "Sure, I haven't done anything else so far."

He took the bag and hopped down, stealthily walking up to the cat. Sasuke opened the bag and slid Tora in as fast as he could, drawing the bag closed. Immediately, the lump inside woke up, totally ignoring the tranquilizer, and started flailing around and hissing. Some of the cats started to stir, and Sasuke jumped back to his teammates as if the Raikage was on his tail.

"Damn, the stories don't do her justice! We're lucky, let's get back before she tears the bag open!" Naruto said excitedly.

Sasuke held the bag as far away from himself as he could, looking at it uncertainly, "Okay, I admit I may have underestimated her slightly. Let's return quickly, shall we?"

The four (plus one) headed off towards the Hokage's tower, eager to complete their first mission as genin.

oooooo

"You're what?" asked the secretary in front of the mission room.

"We're done, we have completed the mission," Sasuke said slowly, holding the writhing sack as if to ward off evil.

"Sorry, that can't possibly be Tora, the sack's in one piece."

"What if she was on tranquilizers?" Sakura put forward.

"Hmm. I suppose…"

"You'll take my word for it, won't you?" Kakashi said as he walked in. "Sorry, I wanted to speak to an acquaintance."

"They really caught Tora in less than two hours?" the man asked, somewhat dubiously. "Most teams never manage it that quick, and certainly not on their first try!"

"We're going to have to do this again?" the three teens asked, annoyed.

"Yes, that's why everyone except her owner hates Tora, whenever Lady Shijimi visits Konoha, the cat escapes on a daily basis. I understand they keep a special jonin at their main manor whose full time duty is to catch the little jerk. The income from the daily Tora missions pays for most of both the chunin and jonin lounge. That's the only way to keep the miserable little fur ball alive, otherwise people would have killed it by now," the secretary explained.

"Kakashi, you said that powerful ninja become strange. Is there any chance I'm a delusional jonin in a padded room? It might explain some things about my life," Sasuke griped.

"Sorry Princess, this is reality. Let's meet the mission staff and talk to the Hokage again."

They walked into the room since there were no other teams reporting, and saw a large black board on an easel, with what looked like odds.

"Are you taking bets on missions gramps?"

Sakura's eye twitched at the method of address, but withheld her anger.

"Ah, team seven is back, and with a sack full of annoyed cat," the Hokage noted, ignoring the blonde's question. "Did anyone have 'under two hours'?"

"No sir, you were the closest with 'between two and three hours'."

"Hmm. And that's why I'm the Hokage," he said before turning to the group. "The answer is yes, but only fresh genin missions. It helps take the monotony out of things. There was a lot of money riding on you three, I'm glad I was optimistic."

"You're so happy, you're going to thank us by taking us to dinner with part of the winnings we won you right?" asked Naruto, bold as brass.

"Hmph, I'm using some of it to get a better door to replace the one you broke on the balcony, so maybe I'll take your teammates to dinner…"

Sakura and Sasuke were finding this rather surreal, their genin teammate joking back and forth with the leader of Konoha, one of the most powerful people in the known world.

"Geez, talk about thanks…" the goof grumbled.

"Anyway, this is quite impressive, good job on your first mission, Team Seven. Normally we'd give Tora to Lady Shijimi, but she doesn't come in to pick her up for a while since it usually takes longer," Iruka explained, looking at the sack. It had been tied with rope at the top, and despite her best efforts it didn't look like it would open up soon; he shrugged. "Put it in the corner over there, and I'll finalize the paperwork and give you your checks."

The Hokage smiled at them, "How are things working out? Any problems?"

"None we won't be able to overcome, Hokage-sama; except possibly Kakashi-sensei's tardiness, though it hasn't been much trouble so far," Sasuke answered politely.

"That's a good attitude to have, Sasuke-kun, I'm aware the three of you have somewhat clashing personalities. I'm glad you were all able to put that aside to complete what is normally a challenging mission," he said cheerfully.

The three teens beamed back at him, excited by praise from such an authority.

"Here you are, everything's set," Iruka interrupted the moment, handing them their checks.

"Ah, are there any D-ranks left? I didn't expect them to finish this quickly to be honest."

"Sorry Kakashi-san, we're out for the day. You'll have to request more tomorrow."

"Hmm, I wonder what I should do with you three?"

Naruto immediately had a suggestion, "You could try teaching us something awesome, that would be good!"

"Maybe. Come on, let's go back to training ground seven."

The teens waved goodbye to Iruka and the Hokage and followed Kakashi back to their 'base'.

ooooooo

"So what are we going to do next sensei?" Sakura asked.

"Well, normally we'd do all the learning in the morning, but I suppose I should teach you if we finish early."

"Are we going to learn a cool jutsu? Go over tactics?" Naruto started fidgeting from excitement.

"No, I thought we'd learn some new chakra control exercises."

The genin slumped. "Seriously? I mean I know it's important, but we've been doing control exercises for years," Sakura complained.

"You obviously don't quite understand how important," Kakashi entered lecture mode. "Chakra is the life blood of a ninja. Without it, you are dead, either by an enemy, or by chakra exhaustion. There are two ways to make your chakra last. Grow your reserves, or increase your control. You can increase each of them only so fast, but both are very important. If your reserves are like a cup, it doesn't matter how precisely you measure out your chakra. Likewise, if you throw out a bathtub of water every time you use a jutsu, even if you have a swimming pool's worth of reserves you'll run out quick."

"We went over all this already in class, sensei."

"I'm telling you this because you don't get it. You think you get it, which is not the same as actually getting it. Get it? Fine, I'll teach you all a diagnostic jutsu, and you'll get a visual representation of what I'm trying to get at. Here are the seals, you should get it in a few tries."

The jonin went through a large number of seals slowly a few times, then activated the jutsu.

"Wow, it's beautiful sensei!" Sakura cooed.

She was referring to a large, flat, rich blue circle that had appeared in front of the jonin. It was about four feet across and had a wave zigzagging in the middle. On second look, the students noted that it was slightly squashed, an oval.

"What does it mean?"

"Well, the size, shape, squiggly line, and border tell a lot about my chakra. The size obviously refers to my reserves; I am a jonin after all. The fact that the shape is nearly round means I have pretty even physical and spiritual energy. The fact that the squiggly line isn't completely smooth means I could stand to practice my control a bit myself, although it's very good for the amount of reserves I have. The border tells you how good I am at nature composition. As you can see here, I'm best at lightning, though I'm quite good at everything except wind, which I'm poor to mediocre at."

"Does the color mean anything? It's a nice blue," Sakura inquired.

"They don't tell you this in the academy because it's really hard to do anything about it, but your chakra has a potency. It's mostly affected by your genes, but with enough work, you can make your chakra more potent, though usually one would wait until special jonin or higher to worry about it. Chakra is sort of blueish for some reason, so almost everybody will have a shade of blue, deeper the more potent your chakra.

"All right, your turn! Bubblegum first. It's called Chakra Diagnostic by the way."

"Um, all right, here goes. Chakra Diagnostic no jutsu!"

In front of the girl appeared a skinny oval, light blue, about the size of a tea saucer.

"What? That can't be right! I know I'm just a genin, but mine's so much smaller!"

"Well, let's go over the results. You have relatively small reserves, which is somewhat natural in girls, but this is mainly from your lack of exercise. The fact that it's skinny vertically means you have more spiritual chakra than physical. More proof you haven't been exercising enough. You have plenty of spiritual chakra, so your reserves should grow fairly quickly if you follow the plan I'm going to give you before you leave. Your calm, smooth line indicates you have exceptional control, better than mine, although that's partly due to your small reserves; keep practicing control and it will stay that way though.

"Your nature is water, though you don't have any skill in elemental composition yet. It looks like you'll also be better at earth as well. It'll take you a great deal of effort to learn lightning jutsu on the other hand. Given your good control, and the fact you are good at memorizing things, I suggest you try to study medicine. I'm afraid I can barely help there, but I can get you in touch with some people who owe me favors."

The three genin were impressed with their sensei's ability to analyze the girl so quickly, and come up with a plan for her.

"Me next!" Naruto pleaded.

"Actually, I'd like you to go last, considering…"

"Oh, right."

"Considering what?" Sasuke asked, curious about the blond.

"Personal stuff. While we are all a team, I'm sure you understand the value of privacy, Sasuke," his teacher replied.

"Hnn, then I suppose it's my turn. Chakra Diagnostic no jutsu!"

A blue oval appeared, fat, and about the size of a dinner plate.

Kakashi began to explain. "You have more physical energy than spiritual, although it's not too off balance. It's probably not because you don't think, but because you exercise so much. A… fellow jonin I know has the same problem, he's deceptively sharp mentally, but he is so physically focused he has more of that chakra type than spiritual.

"Your reserves are slightly larger than most fresh genin, and your chakra is slightly more potent than average, a result of your heritage and hard work. Your control is slightly below average, but it shouldn't be hard for you to fix that if you redirect some of your physical training towards it.

"Your primary affinity isn't a surprise, but you have a second smaller affinity to lightning. You are an above average Uchiha, which makes your fighting style fairly obvious, so I won't bother telling you what to study."

"Hnn. I still have a long way to go."

"No one ever reaches their maximum potential, Sasuke. I'm still increasing my abilities myself. All right, Naruto, your turn. Sasuke, Sakura, expect an odd result. I don't know what will happen myself."

Having seen his display at the Academy, the two understood why there might be a problem. Ready to leap away in case he exploded or something, they waited with baited breath.

"Chakra Diagnostic no jutsu!"

A giant oval appeared, twelve feet wide, and four feet from the center to the top, with some of the bottom half going into the ground. It also had the slightest hint of red in it, making it slightly purple. The squiggly line was very long, due to the size, and very squiggled. Everyone, including Kakashi, was stunned.

"…Well damn."

"Interesting, I thought I was ready for it, but you've surprised me again Naruto."

"Heh. What can I say? I wish I could say it was because of something I did, though."

Sakura just stared at it, in a bit of shock.

"Well, you can probably guess what I'm going to say now that I've done two, but let's go over it anyway. You have enormous reserves, larger than a Kage's. But the line says that you throw away quite a lot of chakra every time you do a jutsu, so a Kage could out last you anyway. I didn't bring it up previously because for almost everyone it's the same, but you seem to recover chakra faster than others do. You have more physical than spiritual chakra, obviously, though I really can't say why since no one really understands your gift," he made a gesture to Naruto that the blond interpreted as, 'we may know the cause of the chakra, but understanding it is unlikely.' It was a complicated gesture.

"You have a very large affinity to wind and a tiny one to earth. I suggest you focus on ninjutsu and taijutsu, but specifically practice chakra control. It'll be hard, but if you get your control just to chunin average, you'll be able to spit out techniques all day."

Naruto drunk in the knowledge. He knew his control was poor, Iruka had figured that out by his continual inability to produce normal bunshin. He had improved dramatically, as proved by his tree and water walking. Still, as Sasuke had said, he had a long way to go. The earth affinity was news though.

"So, while I suggested teaching a new chakra control exercise, maybe I should teach that quickly and let the boys practice that, while I go over Sakura's exercise program."

The genin nodded, having decided that their sensei probably knew best, even if his advice was a bit boring.

"Actually, I heard that Naruto was taught the one I was planning on sharing with you, so I'll give you all that one, and a tougher one. The first one involves letting out chakra in a wave over your skin, pushing anything on it in a direction. This will allow you to stay dry, and keep yourself from getting too dusty. I'll overpower it so you can see the effect."

He demonstrated the technique, and let them practice a few tries, before pouring a little water on each of their heads to see how they were faring. Naruto still hadn't made much progress with it, despite knowing it over the weekend. On his last attempt before they moved on to Sakura, he managed to blast the water away from him, which was impressive, but not practical. Sakura managed a distinct wave, but wasn't able to push the water very far as it was too weak. Sasuke was once again in the middle, able to push the water a ways, but unevenly, and not in a particular direction.

"Not to worry, if you could do everything I taught you immediately, you wouldn't need me, they'd just hand you a pamphlet to teach you! The next exercise is chunin level, and although there are more intermediate ones, this will be useful building up Sakura's reserves, and somewhat easier for Naruto as it requires more chakra force. You all are familiar with sticking leaves to yourself and floating them right?"

He received a nod, a 'Yep', and a grunt, which he chose to interpret as confirmation.

"Well you can also do that with heavier objects, like kunai or shuriken." He demonstrated, floating a kunai over his hand and giving it a lazy spin with his other hand. "You can get good enough to stick rather heavy things to your body, or spin objects in mid air," he countered the spin as he said this, making the knife stop, then spin the opposite direction without touching it. "It's fairly obvious, but I'll point out that this can be combined with other exercises at the same time, such as water walking. Now why don't you two start practicing one of those while I talk to Sakura about her physical exercise regimen."

The boys nodded, Sasuke grabbing some sand and trying to get his chakra to push it around his palm, while Naruto tried to make a shuriken float.

Kakashi took Sakura aside. "You're quite bright, but brains will only get you so far."

"I know, sensei. I focused on the intellectual side because I found it more rewarding, but now I'm starting to regret it," she explained. "It didn't help that I spent a lot of time organizing the club with Ino. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but now it's obvious he seriously hated the whole situation. It's frustrating to find out all that work was for nothing."

Kakashi nodded. "Life is one long learning experience. Now you know better, and can correct things. However, we need to discuss your behavioral oddity. Do you know what is going on? I'm afraid I can't let you go beyond D-pluses if we can't get to the bottom of this. Of course, we could contact the Yamanaka clan, and set up an appointment…"

Sakura looked despondent, then sighed. "I guess it doesn't matter know that you've noticed it. I guess I need to see the Yamanaka officially, but I know what it is."

Kakashi gestured her to continue.

The teen took a breath. "I kind of have a separate personality that is more aggressive, and sometimes takes over if I panic. Ino and I have been trying to subsume it into my main consciousness, but it's tenacious. It's almost a personification of my survival instinct."

Kakashi seemed surprised, he hadn't expected something this complicated. "That could be a great asset; why are you trying to suppress it?"

"I've done some archive trawling for it. Apparently it's a recessive bloodline limit," she chuckled nervously. "But I also found out that ninja with this trait are almost without exception put into deep cover roles at some point in their lives…" she drifted off.

Kakashi considered this. It made sense, unfortunately. The biggest problem with deep cover agents wasn't exposure, but rather that your agent would turn native. Either the cover persona consumed them, meaning the loss of the agent, or worse, the agent liked life better with your enemy, giving them information! An agent with a separate personality could watch over and guide themselves for years at a time with practically no chance of failure- if trained correctly.

"I can see why that might be scary," he began, and he honestly did. Being a deep cover agent was spooky. You basically lost several years of your life pretending to be someone else, and that was the best-case scenario. "But I have good news, you're too old to be trained as a primary agent. And while I can neither confirm nor deny Konoha's use of such agents, I imagine anyone other than a primary would only be assigned such a mission voluntarily."

"And the primaries? How are they chosen?" Sakura asked.

Kakashi sighed. He knew she would pick up on that, but he had hoped she wouldn't anyway. "In most hidden villages, they select them from the orphan population."

Sakura nodded weakly, having guessed it was something like that.

"… Well, I am going to need you to see the Yamanaka, and I suggest you try to work with this ability, not against it. Of course, they'll be able to tell you more, but as I said, this could be an asset. In the meantime, you can continue missions. However, your teammates are rather concerned. I won't force you to tell them, but it may be a good idea to explain things to them."

"I'll think about it, but not right away."

"Fine. Now about your physical training…"

ooooooo

Half an hour later Kakashi stopped the three genin. "Alright, team time is over. You don't have to go home, feel free to continue, but what you do now is up to you. If you want to screw around that's fine, but I'd make sure you get some practice in sometime or you'll end up dead sooner."

"Or later?" Sakura finished for him.

"No, probably sooner."

"What are you going to be doing sensei?" Naruto asked in a joking tone.

Kakashi surprised him by actually answering. "I'm going to be telling the rest of the jonin about how my team caught Tora in under two hours, and hopefully getting a few drinks out of it. But if you were alluding to if and when I train, well I don't as much as I used to, since missions push you pretty hard. But now that I'm teaching, I'll be spending some time each week keeping my body and mind in condition. You never stop needing to train, if you do, you die. The Hokage sets aside at least a day every week for nothing but training, as old as he is."

"Yeah, I've seen him go through katas, it's intense. He won't let me watch him practice ninjutsu though."

"Probably because you'd try to reverse engineer them and get yourself blown up. All right, I'll see you rugrats later. Stay, go, train, goof off, whatever. Show up same time same place tomorrow!" With that said, he shunshin-ed away.

"Well I'm staying at least for another hour, I don't have anywhere else to be, and I've got leftovers I can heat up," Naruto said. "Anyone else staying?"

"I can stay a bit, but then I have to go to dinner," Sakura declared. She had been trying out her new exercise regimen since she didn't need as much practice with control.

"Hnn. I think I'll return home. I'm more comfortable with the training grounds there."

"C'mon Sasuke, don't be a stick in the mud. Stay around here for a bit. If we're going to be a team we need to be able to be around one another during missions and stuff."

"Just being around one another should be useful; if we can get used to one another's presence it will make our teamwork that much better," Sakura said, pausing between exercises.

Sasuke looked back and forth between his teammates and shrugged. "Fine, but I need to cook dinner soon. I'll try to have something prepared in the future," he returned to sitting cross-legged, and picked up more sand to push around.

The three continued like that for half an hour before Sasuke insisted on starting dinner. Sakura started cool down stretches as he headed off, since she needed to head home soon herself.

Naruto waited until he was certain Sasuke was out of earshot, and began, "He's really a loner, huh? I'm going to have to make him have fun, or I won't be able to stand it."

Sakura chuckled, "The fanclub tried for years to figure him out, or even what his past was, but no one would really tell us anything beyond that his clan is gone."

"Ah, well, since I'm sort of the Hokage's unofficial nephew slash grandson, I got to hang out at the Hokage tower occasionally. Now obviously I never heard anything classified, but the odd rumor and whisper I did manage to overhear."

"Oh, so that's why you're so comfortable with the Hokage. How did that happen anyway?"

"Ah, well, that's a bit of a story. Rather personal. I'll probably tell you someday."

"Oh, sorry. I won't push."

"Thanks. Back to Sasuke, I heard bits and pieces over the years. His clan was slaughtered overnight by one man."

Sakura's mouth literally dropped, and she didn't speak for a few moments. "What? How? Who could even do that?"

"Well, I had heard the name of the guy, Itachi, but I didn't know the most important part until Kakashi told Sasuke to find a new dream."

"Of course, Sasuke wants to avenge his family by killing this guy! But what's the most important part?"

"Well, he mentioned Itachi was under him in ANBU, and the only important Itachi I ever heard of was Itachi Uchiha. Even worse, when sensei mentioned Sasuke's brother wanting to kill Tora, Sasuke leaked some killing intent. I think Itachi killed his entire clan and left his brother, Sasuke, alone for some reason."

"… What." Sakura said flatly, not even really making it a question.

"Yeah, it sort of boggles the mind. So I'm making it a goal of mine to get him to loosen up and have fun!"

"That's really nice, Naruto, I think I'll help."

"Great! I already have a few ideas, but nothing complete. When's your dinner?"

Sakura looked at the sun, "Shoot, I should go! See you tomorrow!"

"See ya!"

Sakura nodded and ran off, and Naruto resumed trying to float a shuriken. He could get it to lift off, but keeping it steady was difficult.

After a bit, Naruto stood up, "I guess I'll head home too, Sasuke's right about doing this type of work at home. If no one else is here, I might as well do it in my kitchen."

So ended team 7's first day together.

OOOOOO