Chapter 20

A/N: SNNOOOWWWMAAGGEDDOONNN! This is Day 2 without school, I'm not complaining. Anyway, here's Chapter 20 my dears.

Infinite Katalyst: Quite quite touchy, mostly for Sai. Katsutoshi...he's something.

Stallion6: Thanks and thanks.

NicolaiGrey: No, no tragic deaths, at least I think... And thank you!

Guest: Aww thanks, anon.

As always leave a nice review and vote in my poll!

"Hiromi, come say hello to our guest."

"Yes, Katsutoshi-nii."

Hiromi looked over to see her brother with another man, the leader of Ishigakure, Shogo. He had graying brown hair and dark, beady eyes. His skin was tan and wrinkled from too much time in the sun.

"My my, what a pretty little thing you have here Katsutoshi-san. Your sister, I presume?" Shogo said, leering at Hiromi. She bristled.

"Yes, Shogo-san. This is Hiromi. She is checking in all of our guests. She only stopped to greet you, didn't you Hiromi?" Katsutoshi said nonchalantly.

She bowed, but had a tiny frown on her face. "Welcome to Tanigakure, Shogo-san."

"Thank you Hiromi-chan, I look forward to making you're acquaintance." Shogo said, a lecherous grin plastered on his face.

At that moment, a Chunin burst into the room. "Hiromi-san, there are village leaders here to check in!"

Hiromi nodded and bowed once again to her brother and Shogo, before leaving to attend to the needs of the visiting leaders. She wondered who it would be, the handsome leader of Getsugakure? That Shibuki fellow from Taki? Or maybe the closest village's leader, Ame?

As she reached the village gate, she saw that it was none of the above. In fact, it was a very tall woman with powder blue square bangs falling into her face, and a bun perched at the top her head. She wore a coat of a color slightly darker than her hair, the sleeves being quite skin tight, and have gloves built into the coat. White boots went above her knees, and she had a headband of Shimogakure tied around her waist.

"Name please?" Hiromi asked, looking up at the woman, who was a few inches taller than her. The woman's silver eyes narrowed. "I am Setsuna, the leader of Shimogakure."

"And your gaurds?"

"Hatsuyuki and Nadare."

"Thank you Setsuna-sama. I shall take you to where you'll staying."

"You had better hurry. Kaede of Kusa wasn't far behind me in travel."

"Ah..yes. Right this way then. You're earlier than I expected Setsuna-sama." Hiromi said, as she led the 3 nin from Shimogakure to where they were staying.

"Katsutoshi-san asked me to come early in my invitation. I suppose he wants to have a meeting with me."

Hiromi frowned. What was Katsutoshi planning with Shimo? She sighed as she went to continue showing arriving leaders to where they would reside during the summit.

Another village leader arriving somewhere about the same time, but in another village, Konoha. Gaara led the way as the group he was traveling with stepped through the gate of Konoha. The redhead turned to his siblings. "Stay out of trouble. I'm going to go speak with Tsunade and then visit with Hinata-san. Find us a place to stay."

"Ooooh you're going to visit with Hinata, eh? That sounds like it will be fun." Kankuro said with a teasing smirk. Suprisingly the one to set him straight was Neji, as he gave Kankuro a Hyuuga death glare and crossed his arms.

Shikamaru sighed. "I'll go with you Gaara, I have to file.a report with Tsunade anyhow." Gaara nodded, and the two left the group, headed toward the center of the village.

Neji picked up his pack. "And I should go to the Hyuuga estate to prepare Hinata for Gaara's visit." He gave a final glare to Kankuro and set off in another direction.

Aya gave a small cough. "Excuse me, what am I supposed to do? Shikamaru-san and Neji-san have both left." Kankuro and Temari looked at each other with a puzzled expression, but were interrupted bya person approaching.

"Is there an Aya Takemori here?" a blonde Chunin about 18 or 19 asked, looking at the group."I'm supposed to show her around."

"That's me," Aya said with a blush. Temari smiled."Well, since it looks like everything is settled now, Kankuro and I are going to get a hotel room, ok?"

Aya nodded and waved goodbye to the Sand Siblings. The Chunin smiled brightly. "I'm Toshiro Haruno, nice to meet you, Aya-san."

"Th-thank you Toshiro-san. I'm supposed to be learning in the hospital from someone named Shizune?"

"I can take you to her," Toshiro said. "I'm assigned to be your companion the next couple days so I can show you around. And besides, spending time with a pretty girl is much better than all the chores my mom makes me do."

Aya looked around as Toshiro jabbered on with various facts about the village, though few were historical. He pointed out a spot where pulled a clever prank on one of his sisters, the restaurant where he had a horrible first date, the place he met his Genin team for the first time. Still quite interesting Aya thought, as she looked at the bustling village, twice the size of her own.

The pair stopped for lunch at a dango stand, and were suddenly interrupted by a voice.

"Toshiro-nii!"

The pair looked to see that a pink haired girl and a younger blonde girl were approaching with some shopping bags. Toshiro rolled his eyes. "These are two of my sisters, Aya-san. Sayuri and Kameko."

Aya studied them for a moment and noticed something. "Wait," she said, pointing to Sayuri. "Aren't you supposed to be filling in for me at the the Ryugakure hospital?"

Sayuri gave a nervous laugh. "Am I? Nobody told me, besides I'm a horrible ninja, I would muck everything up really. I'm actually thinking about quitting like Mom and Dad did because this one time, I-"

Toshiro covered Sayuri's mouth. "She wasn't talking about you, dummy! She meant Sakura."

Sayuri brightened. "Oh yeah, no Sakura's my twin. That's actually gotten us into trouble sometimes, one time this amazing guy named Rock Lee was being really nice to me and I was gonna ask him out but it turned out he thought I was Sakura, even though we wear our hair different and everthing."

Toshiro facepalmed at his rather loquacious sister, while the one with blonde hair like Toshiro's and blue eyes observed them suspiciously. "Are you on a date?"

Toshiro's face turned red."No Kameko, I'm showing her around! She's from a different village, the one where Sakura is."

"Oh yeah, Sakura's gone I hadn't really noticed..." Sayuri said with a thoughtful expression.

"Frankly, I'm starting to miss her compared to you two!"

"You don't mean that she's a stick in the mud..."

"And you have a stick for a brain!"

Kameko got between her older siblings. "Ok you two, break it up, you're making a scene at the dango stand."

Aya merely sighed. It seemed everywhere she went, she couldn't escape fighting siblings. Toshiro turned to her. "Sorry about that, Sayuri's a twit and Kameko is precocious."

"I thought Kameko was precious."

"You're the only one."

Sakura shivered slightly as she shut the window to the room she and Yumiko were working in. The younger girl noticed, and gave a small smile. "Its going to be snowy before too long. You're going to need some warmer clothes."

"Winter in Konoha isn't that bad. It gets a little chilly, snows a tiny bit." Sakura said, still looking out at the window at the gloomy skies.

"Sakura-sensei! I did it! I did it! I brought the fish back to life!" Yumiko cried, excitement making her face glow.

"Yumiko, that's wonderful!" Sakura said, rushing over to the table and placing the flopping fish in a fish tank. "That's a first step towards becoming a great medical ninja!"

They heard clapping from the doorway and turned to see Naruto standing there. "Congratulations, Yumiko."

She rushed over and hugged her older cousin, almost knocking him over. "Thanks so much for asking Sakura-sensei to train me!"

Naruto met Sakura's eye and saw the proud smile on her face. "You should be thanking Sakura, not me."

The girl wiped some tears off of her face and turned to the rosette. "Thank you, Sakura-sensei."

"No problem, Yumiko. Why don't you take the fish tank back to where we got it, ok?"

"Yes, Sakura-sensei!" The girl said as she ran off.

Sakura turned to Naruto, and greeted him with a small kiss. "She's progressing nicely. I think she really does have that 'Byaki talent' everyone talks about."

Naruto nodded. "Well like my aunt Mana explained, there is only 4 Byaki descendents left who seem to have inherited it. Yumiko, that little Tsubaki girl, this girl named Aya and that uptight Suka woman."

Sakura looked around carefully. "Naruto, be careful, she works here!"

Naruto shrugged. "Anyhow, you wanna go todinner tonight? I feel like we haven't seen each other much with all this drama going on, y'know?"

Sakura smiled and nodded. "I know exactly what you mean. This doctor here, Tomomi, she was telling me about a restaurant her and her husband like, we could go there."

"Its a date!"

"Sakura," said the Head Medic Mitake, poking her head into the room. "Take Yumiko and go help Ino treat some Jonin that came in injured."

"Right away, what happened to them?" Sakura asked, as she rushed to grab her things.

"They were attacked by some Iwa rebels on patrol. Accused them of supporting Kitsuchi."

"I'll be right there, Naruto, I'll see you at dinner tonight."

Naruto stared after her as she waved and left. Turning, he opened the window and leapt out of it, landing on the street.

At a nearby stall, he noticed his aunt Mana shopping for vegetables with Mitsuo in tow. "Aunt Mana! I just was with Yumiko and Sakura!"

The older blonde woman smiled brightly when she noticed her nephew standing there. "Oh did you? How is she doing?"

"She just brought a fish back to life!"

Mitsuo peeked up from the large basket full of vegetables he carried. "You can do that?!"

Mana nodded at her son. "Yes, silly. Ninja can do all sorts of wonderful things. My brother could do a lot of really cool things."

Naruto coughed a little. "I can too y'know!"

"Oh you don't have to convince me, Naruto. Are you coming to dinner tonight?"

"Actually, Sakura and I are going to dinner tonight! Thanks for the offer though."

Mitsuo grinned wickedly."Ooooh, date night with the lady friend, have fun with that one dude!" He followed his comment with some smoochy sounds, and a wink from his amber eyes.

Mana spun around quicker than Naruto could follow and grabbed her son's ear. "You're only 12, don't talk like that! I swear, it's almost as if you knew that damned pervert Jiraiya who trained my brother!"

Naruto snickered a bit. Mana calmed down and turned back to her nephew. "Well, I hope you enjoy your date tonight but when Mitsuo gets his genin team assignment you have to come to dinner that night. I'll be making all of his favorite foods."

"Of course, but isn't it kind of late in the year for that sort of thing?"

Mitsuo crossed his arms in a huff. "They postponed it cuz of all the crap happening with Iwa."

Mana sighed, patting her son's blonde head. "Well, anyhow Naruto, we need to go make dinner, but it was nice talking to you. I'm glad Yumiko is making such good progress."

"Bye, Aunt Mana. Bye, Mitsuo."

And with that, Naruto set off to get ready for dinner with Sakura, a pep in his step.

Once again in Tanigakure, Setsuna waited to be allowed to meet the Katsutoshi who had summoned her here. "Hmph, calling me here and making me wait..." she muttered to herself with a roll of her eyes.

Finally, after feeling like she had waited years, the door opened and Shogo of Ishigakure looked at her. She was a few inches taller than him, and he leered at her as he did any female nearby. "Katsutoshi and I are ready for you Setsuna-chan."

Shogo placed a welcoming hand on her shoulder, but she grabbed it tightly and removed it from her shoulder. "Don't call me that," she threatened with a menacing glare. Continuing into the room, she glared at Katsutoshi for making her wait.

Katsutoshi smirked at the Shimogakure leader. He'd heard that she was somewhat of a hardass, tall, cold, and stubborn. She was much less likely to pliable to his will like Shogo was.

"Why have you called me here?" she said, seating herself without invitation.

"I understand the 4th Great Ninja War brought a lot of damage to your land by being used as a battlefield."

"Yes, but the 5 Great Nations evacuated us, we suffered no casualties." Setsuna replied, coolly.

"Nontheless, its been troubling for your economy, and I understand they've given no compensation for use of that land."

"We haven't asked for any. Our growing season is long since over, and we are helping those without homes rebuild them."

"I understand your village is paying out of pocket for it."

"Only for the poor. I don't understand why you're so concerned over it. I know for a fact you aren't going to charitably help us, you merely want to use our manpower. If we want compensation, we'll ask for it."

"If you joined myself and Shogo-san here, we could get you compensation and more. You could have more fertile land, and stronger ninja." Katsutoshi said, with a twinkle in his maroon eyes.

Setsuna eyed Shogo. "He seems like weak deadweight, and you don't seem trustworthy. Excuse me if I don't believe you."

"That civil war that's happening in Iwa, that was the work of some Ishi nin and my idea. Everyone doubts the power of the smaller nations because they lack numbers, but look at what we did. Think of what we can do if we join together."

"You're trying to manipulate my village because we have some anger at the 5 Great Nations. I can see through you. Without us, part of your plan is ruined, so you'll need to give me better incentive than that idealistic small villages overthrowing the large ones bullshit." She stood and turned towards the door. "Call me back here when you get a better idea."

Katsutoshi glared at her back as she left. Shogo looked at him. "What are we going to do about that bitch? She came in here like she knew everything and was totally disrespectful. I wanna show her a thing or two."

"We're going to provide her with better incentive to join us obviously," he sneered. "And if she still won't, we'll force her hand."

A/N: Well here we are, finally in the 20's! Can you believe it? Can you? Can you? Can you?

I hope you enjoyed the chapter, it was hard to write at some points.

As always, leave a review pretty pretty please, and don't forget to vote in my poll!

MyHikari