Woot! New chapter! And yes, if you've read any of my other stories and think this one's any different, that's because it is; I'm experimenting with different writing atyles. I might stick to this for this story, and continue to write my other fanfics normally...I dunno. But anyway, please enjoy the 2nd chappie!

O...O

Over the week, Tsunade and Shizune have helped me recover almost constantly. Although Tsunade usually seemed to be very busy and only stopped to check on me about twice a day, Shizune kept me company, for which I was glad. Also, what Tsunade had said about the curse mark was true; within three days the pain had almost completely vanished.

When it had been a week since I had been rescued, I finally felt strong enough to start walking on my own. Soon I knew my way around the place, so I could come and go from my room when I pleased, as long as I didn't go outside. But I often became bored in the confined space, and attempted to relive my boredom by staring out the windows for hours on end, learning about the village and the people in it. My favorite perch was in the sill of a large window overlooking a busy street, from which I could watch different people go about on their daily business, meeting with friends or hurrying home for dinner with their families. How I longed to be able to walk down those streets, not as an outsider, but as one of those friends, or perhaps someone sitting at the family's dinner table. Yet I could not be; for some unknown reason, Tsunade and Shizune kept saying that I was still too weak to go out into the streets just yet, although I felt strong enough.

On the tenth day since my rescue, there came a knock on the door. Shizune rushed to answer it, and I followed her purely out of curiosity, yet staying partly hidden in the hallway. She opened the door, and in its frame stood a tall silver-haired man. The bottom half of his face was concealed by a black mask, and his shinobi headband was tilted to hide his left eye for reasons unknown to me.

"Oh, Kakashi-san, you're finally here!" Shizune exclaimed, stepping aside to let him in.

"Yeah, sorry I'm late, but Naruto got sidetracked when we passed Ichiraku," replied Kakashi. "You know how he is."

Just then I noticed that three people around my own age followed Kakashi through the door. First came a boy with raven-colored hair, who looked like he would rather be anywhere than where he was now. Following him was a pink-haired girl in a red outfit, attempting to pull another boy through the door, who was screaming that they just couldn't pass up the ramen shop like that. He had bright yellow-blond hair and strange whisker-like markings on his face.

Suddenly Shizune turned to my hiding place. "Hey, you can come out now. I want you to meet these people."

I wished that I had at least been able to brush my hair and change out of the light blue kimono that I wore, which was wrinkled from being slept in the night before. But I listened to Shizune anyway and stepped away from the wall.

...O...

Suddenly a black-haired girl timidly stepped into sight. She stood partly behind Shizune, staring with interest at the newcomers. Her silver eyes almost reminded the genins of the Hyuuga clan, except that they weren't as pale.

"This is the girl I told you about, Kakashi," said Shizune. "We want her to train with your team for now, until we know how strong she is."

"WHAAAT?" Naruto and Sakura said at once. Sasuke's eyes widened.

"You never told us anything about this!" exclaimed Sakura. "And here I was, wondering why the hell we were here…"

"You think you were confused, Sakura-chan?" asked Naruto. "I thought we were going out to get ramen, but noooo, we had to come to Tsunade baa-chan's place instead!"

Sasuke crossed his arms. "Whatever. She's probably much stronger than she lets on, so make sure you don't annoy her too much, dobe."

Naruto's face contorted angrily. "Teme!" he shouted.

"Dobe."

"Teme!"

"I'm not gonna say it again."

"Grr…"

Sakura looked at the two boys, exasperated. They're both idiots, she thought.

Kakashi sweatdropped.

At that moment, Tsunade walked into the room and froze at the scene. The strange girl hid behind Shizune, who held Tonton; Kakashi with a large sweatdrop on his forehead; Sasuke and Naruto facing in opposite directions with their arms crossed; and Sakura looking slightly embarrassed about her teammates causing a scene.

"What's going on here?" asked Tsunade, making everyone jump.

"Tsunade-sama!" Shizune exclaimed, walking over to Tsunade, the girl following her. "There you are!"

"Have you introduced everyone?" asked Tsunade.

Shizune shrugged sheepishly. "Well, they sort of introduced themselves…"

O...O

"Oh well, it doesn't really matter. They can all get acquainted with each other as soon as this girl is ready to start training." Tsunade walked over and placed her hand on my shoulder. I was highly confused; no one had told me that I could start training so soon. After all, Tsunade and Shizune had forbidden me to leave until now.

"So?" asked Tsunade. "How soon are you ready to leave?"

All of a sudden, I wasn't quite so sure if I really wanted to leave the safety and comfort of this place. I had gotten so used to living here that it came as quite a shock to have the opportunity to go anywhere else. But then I remembered how much I had wanted to be free of here, to live normally for once. Finally, I gave my response.

"I'll go pack."

...O...

It's a little short, but I've been having a bad case of writer's block...But I'll try to get the next chappie up soon! Oh yeah, the dividing lines aren't working on my computer at the moment for some unknown reason, so I just used wierd smiliey things until they can work again...so please bear with me...

-.O