Satora wasn't sure how she felt after beating Rock Lee. She and Naruto left the arena in a fine fashion, even slamming the door behind them to add to the effect. Once the young Tasogare had stepped out of the shadow of the large building, and into the light of day, she knew one thing for sure—defeating one of Konoha's most elite genin had made her rather hungry.

"Umm…" The young Tasogare looked sheepishly over at Naruto, "Do you want to go and try another ramen shop? I'm still starving."

"Sure, sounds good." Naruto was still a little quiet, and as they headed to another of Konoha's many ramen shops, Sato felt she should comment on this strange new behavior.

"OK…Naruto, I know I don't know you all that well, but I think I've been around you long enough to get this impression. You usually don't have such few words to say, and I want to know why you're acting all dumb all of a sudden. The first time I met you ya wouldn't shut up and Sakura had to knock you out."

Naruto grinned and rubbed his head, "Yeah that hurt."

"So what's the deal? I'm not moving until you tell me." And Sato stopped dead in the middle of the street, looking sullen. She even crossed her arms over her chest, and stared imperiously at her escort.

Which forced Naruto to actually think about why he wasn't being his normal self. He couldn't outright say that there was something about her that left him tongue tied, so he seriously considered his options, and came up with this crowd pleaser:

"Sasuke's always been able to best me in everything," Here Naruto clenched his fists and scowled, "And then we ran across Lee, who completely thrashed him, it was amazing. Now you come along and beat him without even breaking a sweat…I guess it makes me feel…"

"Low on the food chain?" Sato suggested unhelpfully.

Naruto's scowl grew deeper, "Yeah."

"I know how that feels." Sato murmured. To this Naruto gave a derisive snort.

"I doubt it. Everyone keeps telling me how you could destroy the entire land of fire with one pinky finger if you had a mind to." Naruto held up the finger in question, eyes narrowed as he continued, "Everyone keeps telling me how you're not to be messed with, and everyone keeps telling me—"

"Well for one second listen to what I'm telling you, and now what everyone else keeps telling you! Sato cut in rather heatedly, "I'm powerful enough to take out some of my fellow genin and more than one jonin, but…but…"

Satora faltered, wondering how much she should say. She was torn between having this leaf genin fear her for all the legends and stories he had heard, and setting him straight that she really was as scared and as vulnerable as anyone else.

"But I…I'm not invincable." She finished softly. There. She had said it. The three words that had been chasing each other around in her head were finally out there in the open. Her cell knew it, and so did her sensai but deep down she didn't want to believe it.

Believe it, princess. There are much bigger fish in this pond than the genin in the selection exams.

A mental picture of Itachi taking off his panda mask suddenly loomed in the girl's imagination, and she repressed a shudder with rather a lot of effort.

"How about that ramen, then?" Naruto said quietly to cover the awkward silence.

Sato heard the doors to the arena open behind her. She didn't feel like taking crap from Neji, getting fawned over by Lee, or receiving frightful glances from Tenten. The young Tasogare grabbed Naruto's wrist and hauled him off.

(BREAK!)

(BREAK)

(BREAK)

After the pair had rounded the corner, Sato let Naruto lead the way again. They were heading towards the eastern part of the city. Naruto was starting to talk a little more now that they were in the busier part of the village. Sato let him chatter. She was still lost in her own thoughts.

Konohagakure was truly the greatest village in the land of fire, or in any other land. It didn't take a genius to figure out that's economic standings were superb—most of the homes here had electricity and running water. It was all so very different then Yoru, small dark and secluded Yorugakure where Sato had spent the majority of her life holed up, just waiting to be unleashed.

Naruto was blathering on about something or other, All Sato had to do to complete the illusion that she was listening was to say, 'yeah' and 'mmhmm' every few seconds, and she was good.

"Here's a good place!" Naruto interrupted himself, and herded Sato into a hard right. Sato recognized the ramen shop—it was the very same place that Makuro had to pull her away from on the way to the academy.

Obviously Naruto was a regular because the instant he sat down at the table out front, there was a hot steaming bowl of ramen in front of his face.

"One for her too, Len!" Naruto said to the young woman serving. The lady wheeled around and took a good look at Sato, and beamed.

"You're that Tasogare everyone keeps talking about! Well then, it's an honor to have you here!"

"An honor?" Satora said blankly, sitting down in the chair opposite her escort. She had been waiting for this woman to shriek and run away rather like the man who had first caught sight of her, "The last ramen shop we went to—"

"I'm fine with you being here as long as you don't kill anyone, and as long as you leave a decent tip!" The woman smiled again, and slipped behind the counter, "I'll get you your bowl in just a sec, dear!"

"She's to young." Sato muttered as Naruto began to slurp loudly.

"What?" Naruto looked confused.

"She's to young to know about…well…she would have been about our age when…it happened so obviously she wouldn't know the full extent of…"

"What the heck are you talking about?" Naruto glanced at her sideways.

"When my family was—I mean—she'd have no way of knowing about…oh never you mind." Sato huffed as Len came back around the counter with another bowl of ramen.

"Alright, dear would you like chopsticks or a spoon?"

"Spoon please." Sato said, dipping her head respectfully to the waitress, still marveling at the fact that she was being called, 'dear'.Sato nodded at Naruto, "I'm buying."

"It's free, smarty!" Naruto laughed, "Everything in Konoha is pretty much free for all the genin in the exam."

"Free ramen?" Sato felt a genuine smile spreading across her face, "This truly is the greatest village in the entire land of Fire!"

With that Sato took her spoon and dove into her ramen. For a few minutes neither of them talked, they were to busy slurping up the goods. After they had finished, Naruto motioned Len to get them another bowl.

"What sort of training have you done for this third part of the exam?" Sato asked conversationally as Len set another two bowls down on their table. Naruto stirred it a little distantly as he considered his answer.

"Well…nothing yet really. What am I gonna do in three days?"

"Listen dude, I came here to use the training grounds that Konoha's got!" Sato snorted, "You're lucky you live in the big city, you get the best of everything. The stuff we've got in Yoru doesn't compare at all to what you have here. I suggest that after we eat we head down to one of your training arenas and get something done today."

"Sure, whatever you say!" Naruto started eating again.

Sato kept talking even though Naruto was immersed in his ramen and probably wasn't listening, "I'm not exactly nervous about the exams…I mean, yeah there'll be some people here that can give me a run for my money, but I can handle any genin. It's when you get out of the genin and more into the elite crap that I get tripped up. Still…it looks like this is going to be a hard exam. Did you hear that since to many cells made if out of the forest of death alive that they have to have preliminary rounds? That's just furthering the agony in my opinion. I love a good fight, but lately I've been getting a little nervous about…" Sato grinned. Naruto wasn't listening, "Good thing you've got ramen in front of your face and aren't paying attention to me else I'd be pretty ashamed at what I'm saying here…"

"What?" Naruto looked up.

"Nothing." Sato grinned again. Her happy mood was returning to her.

"Oh hey!" For the second time that day Naruto saw something over Sato's shoulder and waved. "Look who it is! It's Master Kakashi!"
Sato whipped around. She had heard lots of things about Kakashi Hatake, but had never actually met him. He was Yoake's good friend, but outside of that she didn't know much about him at all, powers, abilities, or even demeanor.

A tall, lean jonin was walking towards them. He had a shock of white hair and only a sliver of a face showing, and he seemed to be reading a small orange book. Sato distinctly saw him roll his one visible eye when he caught sight of Naruto waving frantically. The man seemed to be fighting the urge to turn around and walk away. Walk away quickly. Sato grinned.

"Hey Naruto." Kakashi said dully, feeling obligated to shuffle over, "getting a lot of training done?"

Sato snorted, and Naruto looked guiltily down at his ramen.

"And well well, who do we have here?" Kakashi peered intently down his nose at Satora, "Everyone's favorite Tasogare…."

"The one and only." Sato said carefully, holding out her hand for the man to shake, "It's nice to meet you, I've heard way to much about you from Yoake."

"Yoake, eh?" Kakashi paused just as he was about to grasp Sato's hand and gave a small chuckle, "Yes…I suppose she would have a lot to say about me. All good things I hope. I have a few stories about her that might make your hair curl…"

Kakashi took her hand, and gripped hers fiercely refusing to let her go. Sato was a little surprised.

"Wha-a—"

Kakashi reached up with his free hand and raised his headband as though it were a panda mast, baring both eyes to the world. In that terrible moment Sato knew the truth. She saw both the blood-red Sharingan flare to life in both the mans eyes, and unexpectedly Sato's world exploded into a thousand little pieces.

It was as though the top of her mind had blown off, all of a sudden she was seeing things that she had no business seeing. Things like the Dream.

She saw them all again, their faces falling into sharp and terrible detail under the light of a blood red moon, The forest was of scarlet, and the sky was the darkest crimson you could ever imagine. Sato stared into the faces her father, her mother, her aunts and her uncles and this time she knew it wasn't the Dream, it was something deeper and more horrible and she didn't know what it was.

Her body was wracked with the visions, and she could feel herself twitching.

The faces and the images spun wildly and Sato found herself on the battlements of Konoha. However this was not a Konoha of the present—it was a bloodstained and shattered Konoha, a Konoha of hell

Your legacy is written in blood, Satora Tasogare. Born from killers to be a killer. The future is bright, isn't it?

Bright as shining blood. Sato's gut lurched as the rest of the scene came into focus. Bodies everywhere. First they were unrecognizable, and then they started to become more familiar. Naruto. Sasuke. Lee. Sakura. Makuro. Shinri. Yoake. Kakashi. And then—

Sato's heart leaped to her throat and hovered there along with her lunch—

Her mother. Her father. Everyone she never remembered, everyone that she only saw in the Dream

And then She saw herself.

Sato stared motionless at her own dead corpse, a self that was as broken and as bloody as the rest of her terrible vision.

"A Tasogare dies many deaths, but Cowardice is the first…"

Sato whirled, frightened. The voice was coming from everywhere and nowhere at once. Where was the speaker? Rage replaced fear and Sato clenched her fists. Cowardice…

Satora heard a scream coming from somewhere, and it took her a second to realize that it was coming from her own mouth. Was it a scream of fury, or a scream of terror? MAKE IT STOP…

"Sato…Sato? HEY! Earth to the Tasogare!"

And then as quickly as it had come, the visions and images were gone. Sato was back in Konoha, sweet normal prosperous Konoha. Her own scream was still ringing in her ears, and as she swayed on the spot she saw the crowd that had gathered.

Let them look at me. I am, after all a Tasogare.

Or dying. One of the two.

As darkness closed in on the girl she caught sight of Naruto. His eyes were wide and he looked scared.

Blackness embrassed her like an old friend.

(ANOTHER BREAK!

(ANOTHER BREAK!)

"So…in all…not the best first day in Konoha." Shinri said wryly an hour later.

Yoake, Naruto, Sasuke, Sakura, Shinri, and Makuro were all crowded in one of the Blue Moon Inns' tiny rooms, kneeling around the bed where they had laid Satora. Makuro had been the first to arrive on the scene back at the ramen shop. No one had yet asked the genin how he had known about the incident, but no sooner than five seconds after Sato passed out, he was there pushing through the crowd with an anxious Sakura on his heels. Naruto remembered clearly how the linen-clad genin had looked down at the girl prone at his feet, stooped, picked her up tenderly and without further ado sprinted off using long strides.

Naruto remembered this clearly because he knew that he should have been the one to do it.

Even as he sat there at the foot of Satora's bed, watching her fevered slumber he clenched his fists and gritted his teeth. Why had it taken him to long to shake out of his reprieve? Why had he stared frozen, transfixed as the girl shuddered and moaned and screamed on the ground? Why hadn't he helped her?

It had taken a strong stream of cursory from Kakashi, a rough push, and a harsh, "GO AFTER THEM!" to actually get him moving. Even then he was stumbling and barely walking straight.

Yoake looked older and more careworn at this moment than she had any right to. Despite still being quite young, she heaved a sigh heavy enough to have come from an old woman on her deathbed. She reached past Sakura, and gently placed a hand on Sato's forehead.

"She's sill burning up," Yoake said calmly, though the look in her eyes contradicted any illusion of peace, "Sakura, go get a washcloth and a bowl and fill it with cool water. We need to bring her temperature down."

"Right." Sakura said smartly, rising immediately.

"I'M ON IT!" Naruto declared, leaping to his feet. He was burning with a strange passion to do something to help his new friend, and it didn't matter how basic or mediocre the task was. Whatever it was he would do to make up for his slip up…

He sped past Sakura and blustered into the room's tiny bathroom and from there proceeded to make as much racket as possible in the process of getting a washcloth and finding a bowl.

Sakura slowly sat down again, "I don't understand what happened. Why did she faint, and why was she screaming bloody murder? Makuro and I could hear her shrieking, and we were on the street over before he started running…"

"My guess is as good as yours." Yoake said wearily.

Shinri and Sasuke had no comment. They all sat for a few seconds in silence while Naruto was making a great din in the next room. The next person to speak was Makuro.

"It was the Sharingan." He said simply and softly

"What do you mean?" Sasuke spoke for the first time since entering the room. He was gazing cautiously at the night genin, sizing him up as though using the word, 'sharingan' was a terrible deed.

"Kakashi's Sharingan." Makuro cleared his throat and continued a little louder, "No one told Sato that he bore it. I think it's rather obvious—the Sharingan is the one thing that can break down a Tasogare, and Sato's never been exposed to it before. Maybe this was a strange way for her powers to respond to the newness of it all."

"You're saying the eye can do that?" Yoake sounded a little skeptical. She looked sideways at Sasuke, "Your mirror-wheel eyes can effect people like that? Without your will or consent?"

Sasuke shrugged, "I've never heard of it happening, but I suppose considering this Tasogare is a special case anything could have come of it."

Makuro didn't like the cool manner that the Uchiha was using to respond to these questions, but he let it go, "I can't pretend that I know all that happened there, but I'm willing to bet Sato saw some flashbacks of the past, and maybe some glimpses into the future."

Shinri snorted. He wasn't going to stand for this, "So now the Tasogare is clairvoyant? What's next, she's got a cure for cancer in her bosom?"

"No….not the future," Makuro corrected himself, as though Shinri had never spoken, "I think it was more of…a nightmare."

"A nightmare." Yoake repeated, sounding skeptical once more.

Makuro shook his head hard, "like I said, I've got no idea what happened. We'll have to wait till her fever goes and she wakes up before we find out. Did you ask Kakashi if anything happened on his end that might give us some clue as to what…well…you know what I mean…"

"No." Yoake rose, "I will find him and do that. All I said for him was to get away in case just being in proximity with Satora was going to set her off again."

"Proximity," Sakura shook her head, "No, if that were true then she would have started…whatever it was she was doing when she laid eyes on him. It's the touch that's important more than the eyes or just being near him."

"I'M BACK!" Naruto announced, racing back into the room slopping water all down his front. He handed the bowl and the washcloth to Sakura, who looked at him as though he had grown two heads. However she accepted the bowl and dipped the cloth in the water and started dabbing at Sato's forehead with it.

"I'm off to grill Kakashi." Yoake said. She still sounded way to calm, as though she were going to explode, "And when I get back I don't want you all at each others throats. There had better not be any dead bodies when I come back, and that includes you, missy!" Yoake pointed a finger sternly at Satora in a feeble attempt at a joke. With that the tall young woman turned on her heel and walked out of the room.

Naruto unexpectedly got up and followed her.

"Yorukage…." He caught up with her just as she placed her hand on the door.

"Yes?" Yoake wheeled around and drilled the boy with a level stare, one eyebrow raised.

"I-I want to come with you."

"Come with me? Are you certain?" Yoake's gaze hardened, and she pulled on jacket, "Why?"

"Because…." Naruto lowered his voice to make sure that his fellow genin in the next room couldn't hear him, "Well…I felt pretty useless when Sato started…you know. I should have done more to help her, I should have helped her up I should have—"

Yoake silenced the flow of words, and placed a soft hand on the boys cheek.

"You did all you could." She said, and Naruto was quite surprised to find tears welling in the woman's clear eyes, "I don't know what I would have done myself, Sato isn't prone to visions and seizures and this sort of thing. Come along if you'd like, then I guess. But be warned…if my suspicions are right about what really happened you'll hate me for letting you come along…"

Naruto dipped his head respectfully, and he and the Yorukage left together.

Back in Sato's room, Sakura was desperately trying to start a lasting conversation that could not be answered with the usual male nod/grunt technique. Really all she wanted to do was prevent the boys from sinking into another sullen silence…

"So…" She said in a falsely cheery tone, "What was everyone doing in Konoha before…umm…before…"

She glanced hopefully at Makuro, her eyes praying that he would finish the sentence for her, but he was most unhelpful when he simply shook his head and then lowered it.

Shinri was even more unhelpful with a flat, "Kuro…I've been meaning to ask you this. What the hell is on your face?"

Makuro looked up, sounding amused, "Oh, this?" He pointed to the mascara on his face, which had smeared a little but was otherwise relatively intact, "I don't know, shall we call it a bad case of acne? People were staring at me even more than normal today because of it, but that's alright."

"Mmhmm…" Shinri rolled his eyes.

Sakura blushed a little. She wrung out the washcloth, dunked it in the bowl of water, and then reapplied it to Sato's forehead. There wasn't much else they could do for the girl at this point, unless they were to drag her all the way to the bathroom and give her a cold shower. That would certainly lower her temperature significantly, but Sato wasn't sure the boys would be up to it.

"I say we just let her sleep it off." Shinri suggested, his cold and calculating gaze drifting over Sato, "It's not like we can wave a magic wand and make it all go away."

It was as though the snake-nin had read her mind, and Sakura didn't like that feeling at all. In fact, she found that she was disliking Shinri more and more with each and every comment he was making. It wasn't going to be long before she would smack him over the head hard, even if it was the last thing she would ever do. Sakura had a feeling that Shinri would simple kill her if she tried to get him to lighten up a shade.

"Shinri's got a point." Sakura was flabbergasted when Makuro agreed with the snake-nin, "If she were wounded, that would be another thing—and her chakra would just take care of that. Right now she just needs some rest."

"Then I'm out." Shinri said at once, rising, "And Sasuke can have off as well, him being my escort and all. I'm only going to my room next door. He can see me there if he so chooses."

"Sakura, you'll stay with her wont you?" Sasuke stood up as well, looking at her from beneath his dark hair, "I should get going…"

"And where are you off to, then?" Sakura asked, eyes narrowed

She wasn't at all surprised when Sasuke didn't answer. He and Shinri left rather abruptly, the door snapping shut behind them.

Sakura had to grin when she took a look at Makuro, "You really should go wash that mascara off Kuro. It's starting to look quite…quite…well….umm…"

"And I was just starting to get used to it, too!" Kuro said mildly. He rose as well.

"O-oh, are you leaving too?" Sakura tried hard to keep the raw disappointment out of her voice, "After you wash up? I-I mean you can if you want to of course, B-but I mean…."

"No, I don't think so. Sato needs me." Kuro nodded his head, "I'm just going to wash this stuff off…you didn't use waterproof stuff on me, did you? I'd have to kill you if you did."

This last comment was presented quite seriously. Sakura smiled thinly, because she knew Makuro probably wasn't the type to wave that sort of threat around without meaning it, "No you'll have no problem washing it off."

"Let me know if she wakes up." Kuro walked into the bathroom and shut the door.

Sakura sighed and brushed a stray lock of hair out of the young Tasogare's pretty face and muttered grimly, "Oh, believe me Makuro. You will be the first to know."