"So, did we win?"

With a great deal of effort, Sasuke picked his head up to look at the corpse with the short sword through its skull. The other hand was still covering the left side of his face from when Tobi destroyed his other eye a second before he died. "He's dead."

"You're sure this time right? He doesn't have another Sharingan hidden up his ass that can press the reset button again? Cause I don't think I got another one of those fights in me."

"Shut up Naruto," Sasuke grumbled before he slowly stood up, propping himself up against the side of the cave to do so.

Naruto ignored the command as he slowly got to his feet, then fell flat on his face before he could even straiten his legs. He moaned at the condition of his body, and glanced over to the other shinobi. "So, what now?"

"What do you mean, what now?"

The conversation made Naruto slowly readjust himself until he was sitting up with his back against the cavern for support. Then, he spared a glance at Killer B's body for a moment before looking back at Sasuke. "I'm not stupid. You watched what's-his-face use the sealing jutsu on the eight-tails instead of undoing the paralysis on both of us so we could all take him on. Which means you know how that damn statue works now.

"I'm out of gas unless I try and use the nine-tails, but I don't even want to guess what'll happen if I go up against a Sharingan directly like that," Naruto explained. "So, what now? We finally get our big showdown?"

Sasuke smirked before he reached into his belt pouch. "Actually, you are an idiot. I'm in the same boat as you. I don't have the chakra to seal a tailed beast away, or the time. It took a month just for him," Sasuke explained he gestured to B. "And to be honest, the eight-tails host was annoying, so I just let Tobi finish him off for me." Having someone tear off part of your chest tended to make tended to make you dislike them.

Naruto rolled his eyes. "Yeah right. You're not that petty. So tell me, what's going through that head of yours? You can't possibly go and destroy the Leaf now. That would mean taking on the whole world."

"Destroy the…hehe, haha, HAHAHAHAHA!" Sasuke laughed after a brief pause in his words. "Oh that's right, there's no way you could have known." A evil smile formed on his face. "The Leaf is already gone."

Exhaustion kept Naruto from jumping up in shock. All he could manage was deadly glare. "What? How? If B is dead, that means you had to have here the whole time. There's no way you could have attacked the village!"

After regaining his composure, Sasuke gave Naruto a confused look, then shook his head. "Oh, the village I fine. It's the people you need to be worried about. When you and the other idiot were hauled off by Tobi and myself, moral dropped considerably. On top of that, Madara had already dealt with the five kages and wiped out a good number of your troops before Itachi forced Kabuto to release his jutsu."

"Even so, there's no way those pale grass guy clones could have taken the shinobi army!" Naruto shouted right before Sasuke pulled the food pill out of his pouch and crunched down on it.

"Who says they needed to?" Sasuke replied before slowly making his way to the exit of the cave. "Now if you'll excuse me, I think I'll go burn down the Leaf Village. If it's even still there I mean."

Naruto gritted his teeth, but waited for his body to recover for another minute. He needed to buy more time. "Hey, you ever answered my question! If the Leaf is really gone," something that Naruto sincerely doubted, "what're you going to do now Sasuke? SASUKE!"

Right at the limits of Naruto's vision, and looked back. "You think this is just about the Leaf?" he asked with venom dripping from his words. "It's bigger than one stupid village. This world…the village system…I hate it… I hate everything in it… the villages that raise the shinobi…the lords that control the people…the people that fund the villages…and so I will destroy everything in it. Returning this world to nothingness, that is what I am going to do Naruto."

With his jinchuuriki powers finally fixing his body enough to stand, Naruto got to his feet and followed after the other ninja a second after Sasuke disappeared into the darkness. Unfortunately, the sound of a summoning and a loud bird's screech told Naruto he would be too late.

Chapter 2: Republic City

Korra followed Tenzin down the covered open air walkway as she headed for her first Airbending lesson.

"So, my mother tells me you've had some trouble with Airbending," the master said without looking back as he broke the ice. He could see the girl was a tense as a rock. If she didn't loosen up a bit, it was going to be a long and painful morning.

Korra sighed. "Yeah, but I don't know why. The other elements came so easily to me. But every single time I try Airbending…nothing happens."

Tenzin nodded. "That's perfectly alright. The Avatar often has difficulty with the element in opposition to their personality. For Aang, it was Earthbending."

"Yeah, well I'm about as opposite of an air bender as you can get," the Avatar replied, feeling downcast.

"It just takes patience and training," Tenzin assured her before continuing on. "Since you can't bend air unconsciously like the rest of us were able to do, I'm going to start you off with something a little more advanced than the simple steps and basic forms."

For some reason she didn't understand, Korra was starting to get an uneasy feeling in the pit of her stomach. "Well I've already read a lot of the scrolls you sent to the Pole years ago that show how the basic moves work." Of course, that was a long time ago, before she had even realized that her lack of Airbending talent was a real problem instead of just difficult.

"This training has more to do with the philosophy behind Airbending than any of the actual movements," Tenzin told her. Although, he had to admit that if someone didn't know the basic Airbending steps, then they were in for a world of hurt.

Korra frowned when they came to the training ground where Tenzin's kids were waiting. Out in the middle of the square was a contraption that held more than a dozen pieces of wood about the size of a door in place on poles. She pointed to said contraption and raised an eyebrow. "What the heck is that thing?"

"A time-honored training tool for Airbenders," Tenzin told her before looking over to his eldest daughter. "Jinora, would you like to explain this exercise?"

The girl stepped forward and got ready to run through the doors, telling Korra about the training tool as she limbered up. "The goal is to weave your way through the doors without touching them."

"Seems easy enough," Korra mumbled. Although, some of the gaps looked a little tight.

"Jinora forgot to mention that you have to make it through while the gate are spinning," the middle daughter added in her usual energetic manner.

With the basic explanation taken care of, Tenzin stepped forward to send a blast of air through the gates to get them spinning. Then, he released a leaf and used a gentle gust of wind to guide it through the edge of the training tool. "The key is to be like the leaf. Flow with the movement of the gate. Jinora, would you please demonstrate?"

As soon as the girl started to move through the gates, Tenzin continued with his explanation. "The key to Airbending is spiral movements. When you meet resistance, you must be able to switch direction at a moments notice. Stay calm and don't lose your serenity."

"Okay," Korra told herself. "Be calm. I am a leaf on the wind…leaf on the wind." Then, she ran strait forward.

Sasuke looked up at the sign hanging in front of the school, then checked the pamphlet he had been handed while wandering around town. While he had learned all the forms from watching Korra practice in the South Pole, the lack of basic instruction had kept him from playing around with the local style of element manipulation for fear of blowing his hands up.

There was also the other question that needed answering. His Sharingan had seen a lot of the energy came from outside sources. For a little while, Sasuke had thought that Korra had been using Senjutsu when she was performing her Firebending. There was defiantly a connection between the two methods, but the effects were a great deal less than what Kabuto had displayed in his sage mode.

Instead of drawing power from everything around them, the benders had a specific source. Sasuke had learned to do it for his Kirin technique, but he had no idea what source of power that Firebending relied upon.

Still, age kept him from simply walking up and asking someone for lessons. It became obvious from the children playing in the streets that bending was almost second nature to most people who had the talent.

Before he went in, Sasuke took a look around the area. It was no wonder the teacher was fishing for students. The small school was in a pretty dilapidated neighborhood. I really couldn't see any parents brining their kids around here. But, it wasn't as if he was going to be coming back with a child in tow…

The inside looked a bit more respectable than the outside, with a fire banner hanging behind the reception desk and an older woman sitting down to read the paper with Korra's picture on the cover. Apparently her just showing up in Republic City had been a pretty big deal for everyone, although she had managed to keep the event to just a press conference rather than an all out parade.

I really am going to have to find out why everyone is making such a big deal about her one of these days, Sasuke told himself. Was it just the five/four elements that she could move around? And where did the lightning element fit in if they only counted four?

"Excuse me, is this Fong's Firebending School?" Sasuke asked while showing her the pamphlet when the woman lowered her paper to look over the edge.

The woman looked at the boy for a moment and frowned. The fact he was wearing a silk shirt of light blue and didn't have the telltale sign of a fire bender's amber eyes told her that talking to him was a waste of time. "Get lost kid, we already have a non-bender to scrub the toilets."

Sasuke forced himself to keep a neutral expression while he handed her a prepared lie. "Actually, I'm here to watch a beginner's lesson. My little brother is turning six soon, and the family is too busy to busy these days to teach him not to burn the house down."

She studied him for a moment, then simply shrugged. "Fine. The kids are set to start their learning in about ten minutes," she said before going into her standard disclaimer mode. "Be aware that Fong's Firebenders does not teach children anything more than history, breathing techniques, and basic self control for the first month. We believe that before one can bend fire, one has to respect it." Then he woman handed him a piece of paper. "Please sign this release form stating that Fong is not responsible for any injuries your child might receive as a result of his or her close proximity to the flames."

By the time he was done with the paperwork, Sasuke barely made it into the room before the teacher started talking. Luckily, it didn't seem he would be there alone. Several parents were sitting in the back, watching their children. Most of them being women, they were also whispering to each other a great deal.

"I've heard rumors that this place is supposed to be a recruitment center for the Agno Kai Triad."

"It is," another woman replied. "But where else am I going to go? Master Fong is the cheapest teacher in the city, and Kengi nearly burned down our apartment last week just playing with his bending. If this doesn't work, he's going to have to go out on the street, I can't afford to have an out of control fire bender for a son. I might be in the house next time."

"I hear you. I never wanted a bender for a son either, but one night and nine months later…he's here and his dad isn't. Look into the workhouse on 27th and Roku. I heard they're looking for young fire benders."

As soon as an old man with an extremely long beard entered the room, the women quieted down. "Welcome to the first class of Firebending for the new season. Today, we will be going over basic breathing techniques, while I will be lecturing on the history of our discipline. Anyone who fails the test at the end of the week, will be expelled from the class."

"Airbend!" Korra shouted before throwing out her palms in a basic air attack…only to watch the newspaper that showed the police chief hanging on the close line in front of her remain where it was.

She took in a deep breath, and then loosened the tension on her muscles. "Okay…leaf on the wind. I am a leaf on the wind!" she said again before throwing another punch.

"You look pretty sore."

Korra blinked, then turned around to see Sasuke standing behind her. "Oh hey Sasuke. Where have you been all day?"

"Library mostly. They have some stupid registration system and won't let me take anything outside without waiting a week to go through the process," Sasuke explained. "So until then, I'll just have to get all my reading done there."

"Oh…" Korra almost cringed at the awkward silence between the two of them, unsure of what to ask about. It really was easier to talk to a guy when he didn't know what you were saying. I suppose I can ask about the library… Although the thought didn't seem very appealing.

All in all, Sasuke's status as good catch had been in a drastic decline since the South Pole. He's gone from quiet and attentive listener, to silent and emotionless hottie, only to end up as apparently uninterested bookworm.

Wait, was the comment about he bruises an opening or me to talk about my training? Korra asked herself. Instead, she had asked about his day… So, what kind of message does that send?

Damnit! Am I suppose to be a mind reader or something? Korra asked any spirits who were listening. It wasn't like she had much of a social life before Republic City. A little handicap wasn't too much to ask for, was it?

The sound of a new voice in the distance drew her attention.

"Ladies an gentlemen I'm coming to you live from Pro-Bending Arena, where the best bending teams in the world are competing for a slot in the upcoming championship tournament."

"That's a pro-bending match," Korra muttered. It was pretty faint, but she could tell the direction. There was a small house that used to belong to some of the acolytes, but had been cleared out to make room for the White Lotus sentries.

"A wha-ugh!"

"Let's go listen," she said before dragging Sasuke along to the edge of the building. When they got to the house, Korra hesitated a moment. Tenzin had said he didn't want her watching a bending match, and while that probably meant he didn't want her listening to one either, probably was a long way from defiantly.

But the guards would more than likely take Tenzin's side, so she decided to be a little discreet about it. "Let's go on the roof," Korra suggested before leaping up top. When Sasuke didn't join her a few seconds later, she looked back down at him. "Need help?" Korra supposed she could bend some rocks to use as stepping stones…although, it would be pretty loud.

Sasuke frowned at the girl. He had come over to ask with some help trying out Firebending. With the sun down and fire benders weakened, Sasuke was guessing that this was the right time to practice. He no interest in pro-bending, what he figured was some kind of game from the way it was being talked about over the radio, but the insult to his abilities made him follow along.

Korra crept to the edge of the roof, and squatted down before motioning for Sasuke to join her. "So, have you ever seen a pro-bending match?" she asked.

"No," Sasuke replied, then raised an eyebrow when Korra put a finger over her lips in a shushing motion.

"This Mako's got moxey…"

"Right, first time in Republic City…I forgot," Korra whispered, then glanced over to the stadium where everything was taking place for a few seconds. "This is my first time actually hearing a live match. I still can't believe the stadium is right across the water."

"…Yomo is hammered back into zone three…"

The statement peeked his curiosity enough for Sasuke to ask. "So why are you here listening instead of there watching?"

"…the clock is winding down! Can Yomo hold on?"

Korra sighed and slumped he shoulders. "Tenzin says that I can't leave the island till I'm at least able to air bend a little bit."

"The clock is winding down! Ten! Nine! Eight! Bzzzt!"

Both the teenagers and the guards down below frowned when the radio suddenly cut out. "What was-"

Tenzin's voce cut her off. "Korra, come down here please." Despite the please, it was an obvious command.

After Korra dropped down from the roof to face her teacher, she looked over to the radio, and followed its power cord back to the man. "Why'd you unplug it, they were just getting to the best part!"

"I thought I made myself clear! I don't want you listening to this…distracting drivel," Tenzin said as he scolded her.

Korra held up her index finger to stop him and giver her point. "Technically, you said I couldn't watch a match. You didn't say anything about listening to one."

"You know what I meant!" Tenzin exclaimed before he let out a breath to clam down. "Anyway, it's time to sleep. Head off to bed, I need to talk to your…friend."

The thought that she might have gotten Sasuke in trouble made Korra wince. "Look, don't get angry at him. It was totally my fault, I dragged him along…literally," she explained, mumbling the last word.

"Korra, off to bed," Tenzin told her. "I will not repeat myself again."

As soon as Korra was gone, Sasuke stepped own off the roof and looked at the old man, keeping his expression neutral. He was at a loss of what to do in the situation. On one hand, he didn't give a damn about whatever the old geezer said. On the other hand, if Korra was connected to his final goal, Sasuke would need to stick close to her for the time being. That man controlled the island, and who could stay on it.

With little choice, Sasuke decided to play the respectful visitor for the moment. "Something wrong, sir?" he asked evenly.

"Hmm oh, well," Tenzin said as he tried to think of the best way to go about this. "First, I want to thank you for making yourself scarce during Korra's training today."

Sasuke nodded, then remembered the numerous bruises on her body. "What happened anyway? The wind element can cut and knock people around, but some of those bruises on her looked a little…square? …I guess."

"Let's just say that Korra's habit of trying to tackle a situation head on is her major problem when it comes to Airbending," Tenzin explained rather cryptically. "But that's not what I want to talk to you about. Now, Korra tells me that you're interested in the spirit world? In what way?"

"Well, it's not the spirit world per say, just…how do I put it?" Sasuke took a moment to review a lot of the information he had read earlier today on the subject as he tried to come up with a plausible lie. In the end, he settled for just going with a partial truth. "I'm looking for something, and everything I've read tells me that it will be a lot easier to find if I have the help of a spirit." All of which was true.

When the boy didn't continue, Tenzin decided to bring the answer out instead. "Which is?"

Since there was little reason to keep it secret, Sasuke just came out with it. "It's supposed to be the oldest animal in the world."

Tenzin quirked an eyebrow at that. "You're looking for the lion turtle?" he asked.

Only years of experience with having to live with a sadist before he truly hardened his heart kept Sasuke from breaking his mask of calm. "Yes," he replied. So that's what it is. But what makes it so important?

For Tenzin, all the other little facts he knew about the boy suddenly fell into place. Korra had said the boy had spent months just wandering around the sea without proper food, and probably a good deal longer when he had access to the right kinds of nutrition. "Well, I can see why you were at sea for so long. That thing may be the size of an island, but its only been seen a few times since my father's time. It moves around so much and doesn't have a migratory pattern, no one can ever pin it down."

Even the boy's appearance in the Soup Pole made sense now. What better person to contact the spirits to ask for their help than the Avatar? Although, Korra seems to be lacking in that area as well, Tenzin admitted to himself.

"Does this mean you can help me?" Sasuke asked, a bit of hope entering his voice at finding his first real lead on the subject.

Tenzin considered the boy's request. He couldn't see the harm in letting him see the giant sea beast. It wouldn't even take that long to travel to its location via bison. The problem was finding it; and Sasuke's chosen method was extremely dangerous, if effective.

If he's anything like Korra, he'll just go off and try something stupid on his own more than likely, the man told himself. "Very well, I suppose I can give you a hand with finding the lion turtle."

Sasuke blinked. That had been…easier than he expected. "What's the catch?"

"No catch, although…I would like you to try and limit the amount of distraction you present to Korra while you're here," Tenzin admitted.

"You mean say away from her," Sasuke reasoned.

"Oh heavens no!" Tenzin had experienced what girls were like when something came between them and a boy. If Korra was anything like Lin… "Just…let her have her practice time in peace. And I supposed you can help keep her mind off that pro-bending nonsense…"

Sasuke gave him a short nod. "Agreed," he said before waiting a moment to try and consider just what that entailed. It wasn't a pleasant thought. "So, how long exactly do you think it will take?"

"Don't worry, I'm sure she'll get past her problem within a month," Tenzin assured him. "We'll need to wait at least that long to get in contact with the moon spirit anyway." Upon seeing the boy's questioning glance, Tenzin decided to elaborate a little. "Oh…the moon spirit is one of the only two spirits I have come in contact with, and the easiest to talk to. She's also the best choice to help you, since she sees everything on a night with a full moon. Those are also the only nights she can manifest a form in this world. In that time period, we can easily track down the lion turtle and fly to it using my sky bison."

The man's words only made Sasuke loose confidence in Tenzin's ablates. "So, you're supposed to be some spiritual expert, and you've only had two encounters with the things?"

Tenzin cleared his throat. "Two spirits, several encounters. I've met with the moon spirit many times," he told the boy. "And besides…you have no idea how rare it is for humans to interact with the spirits. The only person alive today who can boast more spiritual encounters than me is Lord Zuko, and that's only because of his dealings with my father.

"Now if you'll excuse me, I'll be needing to get some sleep.

The next day came and went, with Korra not having much more success with the spinning doors of pain than she did the previous day. Although, she did manage to collect a few less bruises by learning how to roll with the impacts. After the sun went down, she found herself looking across the bay to the stadium once again.

"I sooooooooo want to go see a pro-bending match!" the girl whined.

"I still don't get what's so interesting about those things for you," Sasuke mumbled. From what he understood, it was some sort of mock battle. He'd been in enough real ones to know they weren't all that exciting, at least until you were standing over the corpse of your opponent and still had all your limbs attached. Although, that was more relief than excitement.

Korra rolled her eyes. "You wouldn't understand."

Then, Korra suddenly realized that they were sitting all alone, at the edge of the island, with the arena right across the bay. A tingle ran down her spine as she gave voice to the possibilities. "We can go watch one," she mumbled.

Not hearing the words loud enough to catch them, Sasuke looked over to Korra with and frowned. "What?"

"We can go watch a pro-bending match!" Korra exclaimed. "It's right there! All we'd have to do is swim across the bay." It would be like a date! Sort of…kinda…in a way.

The disbelieving look Sasuke gave her made Korra blink in confusion. "What?"

Sasuke sighed and rubbed his nose. "Weren't you ordered to stay on the island?"

"What Tenzin doesn't know won't hurt him…or me at least," Korra added as an afterthought.

Pressed up against a proverbial wall, Sasuke considered his options. The possibility of him still needing the Avatar for something one day was still on the table, but he also needed Tenzin to find the lion turtle; a definite need. Tenzin wanted him to make sure Korra behaved, and Korra wanted to misbehave.

So he just picked the obvious solution, for a shinobi anyway…

"You go, I'll cover for you," Sasuke told her. "If we both end up disappearing, we'll be found out."

Korra didn't quite follow the logic, but she didn't try too hard upon hearing that she'd be able to go watch a pro-bending match. The fact that Sasuke was willing to run interference for her brought his potential boyfriend material ranking up a few notches. "Wow thanks!" she said before grabbing him into a bear hug and let him go a second later to jump off the cliff right as the guard patrolling the area went past. "I'll bring you back a souvenir!"

As Sasuke watched the girl plunge into the water, he got a sinking feeling that this was going to be a bigger headache in the long run than he had experienced in awhile. If she start acting like…well, every other girl I've ever known, I think I'll stick with my Sharingan rather than spend a month waiting around here.

He clapped his hands together, and was covered in smoke a second later.

When the guard came back, he waved at the water tribe girl, then looked around for the other boy a for a moment. "Where'd the other one run off to?"

The girl let out a yawn and stretched her arms. "I getting late, so we're heading to bed. Still on South Pole time," she explained in a monotone voice before walking off.

As soon as she was out of sight and inside the temple, 'Korra' looked down at her chest and shuffled her feat around a bit. How the hell did Naruto put up with trans-gender transformations when he was a kid? It just felt weird. The center of gravity was slightly off thanks to the breasts, and then there was the feeling down below that made Sasuke want to cringe.

The changes may have been little more than a layer of chakra crafted skin and minor spatial ninjutsu to adjust for the size, but walking around in the shell of a girl was not a pleasant experience.

-The Next Day-

Since he met up with Korra on his walk to the docks, Sasuke found himself having to reap what he sowed while he walked down to take a small boat off the island. Since Korra felt bad about leaving him behind, she decided the best thing to do about it, thanks to some weird twist of female logic, was to tell Sasuke each and every minute detail about everything that happened at the arena.

"Although, I did feel kind of bad for Bolin," Korra told him. "I mean, he looked about ready to scream with excitement when I asked for an earth disc to take home before he signed his name to the thing. Then he tried to get all cool, and nearly fell over when I said I was bringing to back home for a friend…who was a boy."

Sasuke nodded. "Yeah huh…"

The rather uninterested tone coming from the boy made Korra give him a deadpan look. "Then Fire Lord Ozai came back from the dead wanting revenge."

"Gotcha," Sasuke replied.

"You're not even listening to me, are you?" she asked.

The question made Sasuke stop, and finally turn to look at Korra. "Well, I don't really like having to listen to you talking about how great two guys I'm never going to meet are."

Korra blinked a few times as she tried to find some deeper meaning in that before sighing. "Okay, I see you point," she admitted.

Then, inspiration struck, and Korra hammered her fist into an open palm. "You should come and see a pro-bending match! I bet they can even set you up with free tickets."

The idea didn't have much appeal to Sasuke. "No thanks."

"Look, I know you're not a bender, but-"

"Wait, what?" Sasuke interrupted.

Korra blinked in confusion. "What do you mean what?"

"What makes you say I'm not a bender?" Sasuke asked.

In an attempt to humor him, Korra started counting down the reasons on her hand. "Well you've never bent diddly since the moment I-"

Before Korra had said more than a single word more, Sasuke took in a deep breath from his nose and drew on the elemental chakra coming from the sun before focusing it through his fists with a punch directly to his side. The fire attack sent out a short but massive gout of flame, and had Sasuke regretting being so hasty in putting theory into practice.

Korra didn't know what kept her frozen longer: that Sasuke could bend fire or the blast of flame the size of a small building that came from his attack. When she was able to move again, Korra's first action was to drop her mouth open. "You can firebend?" she yelled before looking over to the dock to see where it T'd off to the right had been consumed in flames.

Annoyance crossed Korra's features and she brought in a wave of water to douse the flames before it could do more than singe the wood. "Hey, watch where you're-" she stopped talking when she glanced back at Sasuke to see him vigorously shaking the hand he used to throw the attack. "Don't tell me you actually burned yourself!"

She glared at him for a moment for being an idiot, then pushed her lips together when she got an odd feeling in the back of her mind when she looked at Sasuke's face. Like something was staring at her right in the face, aside from the boy in question that is. Well, whatever.

Sasuke grit his teeth at Korra's comment while she pulled up some water to wrap around his hand and transmit the healing energies. That was stupid, he told himself. Even though he knew just about every move of Firebending by watching Korra, and the mechanics of how it worked thanks to research, this had been the first time that he had actually tried it.

Once he had been healed, Sasuke gave out a grunt of thanks then got in the boat that would take him to the mainland. He took a moment to look at the oars, and wondered how the heck could people develop something like the satomobile, and not come up with a motor for a boat.

Then again, it's not like I know how those things work, Sasuke told himself. There was a chance the four-wheeled vehicle needed some kind of special mineral that wasn't found back home.

After a quick goodbye, Korra gave the oversized canoe a push via Waterbending with enough force that would keep it going until it was more than halfway across the bay; further if Sasuke rowed.

Back on the island, Korra watch the figure get smaller in the distance, then mentally kicked herself. Shoot! I forgot to tell him to wait at the arena instead of coming home tonight. Pretty much all the boy's worthwhile objections would be rendered moot if he waited for her at the arena instead of heading there from the island first.

Korra sighed at the lost chance to go see a game together with Sasuke, but she supposed that there would always be another one. Mako's team had a real good chance of making it into the tournament.

On the way to the shore, Sasuke couldn't help but study his formerly burned hand and curse his own foolishness. The amount of fire thrown aside, he should have guessed that dealing with an elemental attack in a new way would have been dangerous. Chidori had peeled off his skin plenty of times when Sasuke was younger, and learning his first fire technique left its own share of burns.

Looks like I'll have to go back to wearing protection. Korra's practice sessions had shown that they had fire resistant materials that were flexible enough to move around in freely. Then there was the question of where he could find someplace to practice without causing a scene, but Sasuke already had a good idea of where to go looking for that kind of thing already.

-Later That Night-

Bolin turned to look at the door to the locker room when it heard it opening to see Korra coming in, then smiled when she closed it right behind her. "Alone again?"

At least there was some hope for something good happening tonight. With the third member of their team missing, the Fire Ferrets would have to forfeit the match and kiss any hope of playing in the tournament goodbye. For a moment Bolin through about blaming Mako for blowing up at their Waterbending teammate Hasook, but the earth bender had to admit that the brothers had been pretty much carrying the guy for most of the season.

"I didn't miss your match, did I?" she asked when she noticed another team of players in the locker room. They only have stuff like this going on when one team is leaving and the other's gearing up, right? Korra was pretty sure that the Ferrets were the first game of the night.

Korra was a bit later than she had planned on being, but that was only because Sasuke was apparently running late in getting back to the island. He hadn't even gotten home by the time she had to leave without him in order to make the Ferrets' game.

She turned to the team's fire bender for answers. "Hasook's a no-show," the handsome brother grumbled in response. "Without three players, a team is automatically disqualified."

The obvious answer being right in front of her, Korra pointed over to the three other players. "Well, can't you just ask one of them to fill in?"

"No. It's still before the tournament so we can still add and remove members without having to go through a big committee and stuff, but people can still only play on one team," Bolin explained.

Korra thought about it for a moment. "Welllll then, how about me?" she asked. "I'm a first rate water bender, if I do say so myself."

The brothers shared a hesitant look as they silently debated the idea.

-Meanwhile in Another Part of Town-

Sasuke rubbed the thumb and fingers of his right hand together to get a better feel of the gloves he had stolen earlier that day. The material was flexible enough to do hand signs, but it felt a little odd. Still, it had held up under testing and kept his hands from being burned…although his palms felt pretty sweaty thanks to the heat.

Now, he just needed more advanced instruction and experience along with examples of Firebending to observe more closely. Which Fong's Firebending School was more than capable of providing directions to. Sasuke checked the five small throwing kunai, single large kunai for use in close quarters combat, and full dozen shuriken in his belt pouch before going in.

When he came in the door, the old lady behind the desk looked up from the currently newspaper and frowned at him. "Piss off ya little shit. If you want to sign your brother up for classes then bring the useful member of your family here tomorrow so we can see if he's even worth bothering with."

"Is the head instructor here?" Sasuke asked evenly.

"Yeah, what's it to-" she stopped when the boy reached across to grab her left shoulder with his left hand and turned the body clockwise as he laid a haymaker with his right.

The crack that resounded in the room when Sasuke struck the side of the woman's head was quickly followed by an audible pop as her neck spun too far and broke. After the body dropped to the ground, Sasuke went to the door leading to the business's training room and kicked it open.

Inside the room, there sere six students probably a handful of years older than Sasuke looking at the old guy that he'd seen from before. Whatever they had been doing stopped as soon as the shinobi made his entrance.

The six students looked like they had been in a few fires. None of them wore a shirt, and their chest showed at least three burn marks each as well as some mostly fit bodies with a healthy amount of muscle on them.

"This is some sort of recruitment center for a gang, right?" Sasuke asked as he looked over the other young men.

The young man closest to the door, a guy probably in his twenties with a large burn on his cheek walked up to Sasuke with a sneer on his face to get right in the boy's personal space. "Yeah, we're Agni Kai you want to…oh hell, it's just some limp dick non-bender. What the fuck does a little pussy like you want?"

Sasuke hid one hand behind his back as he fought to keep an even face. "I'm just wondering, do you have to breathe in order to use your Firebending?"

The young man started to take a step back, "You want Firebending you little shit! I'll-"

Sasuke drew a small kunai and slashed it across the boy's throat, then gave him a palm strike to the chest to force the air out of his lungs and create a rather gruesome display of blood flowing out his windpipe that stunned the rest of the students into inaction.

When the man grabbed his throat and started thrashing around, Sasuke frowned at him before turning on his Sharingan. There was no flow of nature charka around the guy laying on the ground. "You should be able to cauterize that wound with your Firebending. If you can still do it, I won't even kill you."

"Sun He!" the youngest looking student shouted before he ran over towards the man on the ground, and got a throwing kunai in the back of his head for his trouble.

"It's pointless if someone tries to help him," Sasuke told them as the second student dropped dead.

"FUCKER!" One of the other students shouted before sending a blast of flame Sasuke's way.

In response, Sasuke put out his hands and attempted to perform a flam redirection he had seen Korra do at the North Pole during her Firebending test. The fire touched his gloves and slowed, then he was forced to retreat several steps towards the door to keep from being consumed before he finally pushed the flames apart at their center and sent them past him to sputter out harmlessly in the air.

Need to learn to be faster on that, Sasuke told himself as he surmised his performance. The real question as, how to practice it? Well, there was always the option of a shadow clone, but the thought of having to use one of those techniques was infuriating.

"What the-How did you-"

To answer his next question about Firebending, Sasuke surged forward and drew his large kunai before the other students could join in the fight and sliced off the young man's nose. Then, he jumped to the next closest one and rammed his fist into the student's face to break that nose.

"Can Firebending be done if you can't breathe through your nose?" he asked.

Wong Pi, the student whose nose had simply been broken instead of fully removed, got up and took a deep breath through his mouth before trying to focus through the pain and punching at the attacker.

The eyes of everyone in the room became half-closed when the flames he shot out just curled upwards before sputtering out.

I'll take that as a no, Sasuke noted before he tossed his kunai into the air lazily to be able to form the seals needed for his fire technique and took a breath. Fire Style: Great Fireball!

The sphere of flame that shot from his mouth immediately consumed the two injured students. To his credit, the third managed to jab his hands into the attack and push the flames wide, only to find another layer of fire behind it that took him right in the chest and also turned him to ash a second later.

A concentrated force struck Sasuke in the side, and he absorbed the lightning before letting it disperse harmlessly around him. When the flames cleared, he turned his attention onto the old man. "And then there was one."

Fong's whole body shook in fear as he watched his lightning attack simply fizzle out around the monster that had come into his training center. The old man collapsed on his knees and clasped his hands together to beg. "Please don't kill me!"

"Is the leader of your group stronger than you?" Sasuke asked as he caught the kunai that had been tossed up earlier.

"Y-Yes," Fong stuttered.

"Tell me where he is," Sasuke demanded before he started walking closer to the old teacher.

Fong had to bite the inside of his lips to stop himself from shaking too much to talk. "We have a hideout in the western edge of the city, the warehouse district lot C. Warehouse 13 is ours. It's doubly reinforced with fire-proof walls on the inside and a thick wall on the outside to block out the sound. Every night he holds a pro-Firebending game at ten o'clock."

Since he had gotten everything he needed from the old man, Sasuke tossed his kunai into Fong's heart.

"But…why?" the old man managed to get out with his last breath.

"You take children and indoctrinate them into your own private army for the personal use of another man, and you have the gall to ask me something like that?" Sasuke demanded as the tight hold he usually kept on his emotions slipped. "The real question is why am I killing you so QUICKLY!"

Before the light could fade from Fong's eyes, Sasuke rushed and grabbed the old man's head, then used chidori to send a continuous stream of electricity through his body. Fong thrashed about widely and tried to scream, causing blood to gurgle up his throat. After smoke rose from the body for thirty seconds, Sasuke let go of the corpse and headed for the warehouse district.

An hour's worth of travel later, Sasuke was leaning over the edge of the warehouse's roof to get a look inside through one of its few windows at the very top of the building. Seventy-two people inside in all, Sasuke told himself as he mentally listed off the locations. Fifty three gathered around the ring, six people inside, four guards by the main door and six more walking around the crowd.

Then he looked over to the far side of the room from the entrance at the man sitting on an iron throne. Then there's what I'm guessing is the boss and two bodyguards. The bodyguards looked like every other goon in the place, nothing covering the body above the waist and a few burns on their bodies.

The boss of the Agni Kai was different. He was a big man, the tallest Sasuke had seen since coming to the Four Nations. He was dressed in some kind of dark red armor with overblown shoulder guards that curled up into pointy tips on the end. Most of his face and neck was covered by a strange mask that was stylized to look like the mouth of some kind of monster, with two fancy cords of golden silk rope hanging of the sides like some kind of stylized mustache if the mouth had been real.

Considering the numbers, I should play it safe and just leave the boss alive to study. If he did it fast enough there wouldn't be any problems. Even the guards by the door were trying to get a view of what everyone else was watching.

That being the six people throwing short blasts fire at each other in a circle that had been marked off by chalk and divided into six parts. Since it wasn't all that important, Sasuke didn't bother trying to figure out the mechanics of the thing.

With his mind made up, Sasuke slipped inside the one room building and walked on the ceiling until he was in position to drop down by the front door. Before hitting the ground, Sasuke dealt took out the guards by the doors with four kunai to the temple.

Once he was on the ground, the six backup guards took notice of him right as he finished forming the last sign. Fire Style: Grand Fire Majestic Removal!

Flames shot from Sasuke's mouth a formed a wall that swept over the room. Like before with the fireball in the dojo, a few of the fire benders managed to redirect the first layer of flames before the wall overtook them a moment later. Two guys actually managed to part enough flames to make it through the fire, only to have a kunai end their lives a second after they touched the ground.

Then the technique reached the back of the room, and there was a loud explosion that blew a hole in the center of fire wall, causing the wall of flames to fall apart without the constant addition of fire and guiding force.

Sasuke was overtaken by surprise for a moment, then smirked. Well it looks like coming here won't be a total loss after all.

-Air Temple Island-

When she reached the island, Korra jumped out of the water and bended herself dry. After running into Tenzin at the arena, and him noticing her participating in a pro-bending match…which she probably should have expected since the Lotus guards listened to the sport on the radio…Korra was feeling pretty anxious about coming home.

The way he had been in the arena when she pulled herself out of the water after being knocked out of the ring hadn't been the usual about to blow up at something Tenzin. The fact that her team only won the match because of Korra using Airbending forms to dodge only made his anger seem all the more justified to her.

Korra just hoped the five minute long apology she had tried thinking up on the way back would help smooth things over. At least it would help soften the blow about her joining the Fire Ferrets on a fulltime basis. Even Tenzin wouldn't stop her from pro-bending if others were depending on her.

She hoped…

After looking around the island for ten minutes, she finally cam across Tenzin at the door training exercise yard, and winced at the sight. When Korra hadn't been able to get through the doors during her second day of practice, which amounted to about one-hundred some odd individual failures, she had lost her temper and blown most of the doors to pieces with Firebending.

Now, the air bender children were hard at work fixing it with replacement pieces.

Korra cleared her throat, and swallowed what little was left of her pride that her guilt hadn't thoroughly crushed. "Look, I'm…really sorry about…well, everything," she said before gesturing to the burnt wood. "I was really angry with myself, and I took it out on you…and your stuff."

When Tenzin turned around, Korra was surprised to see he didn't look so angry, only…sad. "I think I owe you an apology too," he replied. "I was trying to teach you about patience, but I ended up losing mine."

"So…no hard feelings?" Korra asked.

Tenzin smiled at his student. "Of course not." Then, he brought hand up to stroke his pointed beard. "by the way, you were really good out there. You moved just like an air bender."

Disbelief colored Korra's tone. "Wait, you stayed and watched the match?"

"Of course. It looks like pro-bending turned out to be the perfect teaching tool for you," Tenzin admitted.

Korra smiled. Well…I'll see you tomorrow for Airbending practice." Then, she took in a deep breath and decide that it was better to break the news to Tenzin now rather than latter. "By the way, I kind of permanently joined the Fire Ferrets, and we're playing in the opening game of the tournament in a month."

The tiny smile that had marred Tenzin's face suddenly disappeared as he let out a sigh of defeat. "I don't suppose there's any way to talk you out of this."

"Nope!" Korra replied. "By the way, have you seen Sasuke? I wanted to tell him the good news."

Tenzin frowned at the question. "He didn't go with you to see your match?"

"No."

Jinora looked way from her work and over to the older benders. "I haven't seen him on the island since breakfast."

"Ooohh, do you think he went to watch your match?" Ikki theorized. "What happened anyway? Daddy doesn't let us listen to pro-bending. Is it fun to do? Can I be a pro-bender when I get old enough?"

Korra did her best to tune the girl out as she continued to ask questions that were now directed towards her father, and considered the first question.

-Warehouse 13-

The second bodyguard dropped when Sasuke threw a hand forward to cover his mouth and release a fire blast that both cooked the back of his neck and went down his throat into the lungs. It only took a few seconds for the man to stop thrashing.

With both his bodyguards dead, the leader of the Agni Kai Triad got to his feet. "Who are you boy," the giant demanded, although the focusing mask made it sound more like a coarse whisper.

For once, Jin 'The Golden Dragon' Tong was glad that the secret weapon of the Agni Kai boss's ruined his voice to such an extent where he had to nearly shout to be heard. The boy's dragon breath fire wall technique was a level of destruction that Jin had only heard stories about during the last days of the great war, when Sozin's comet had passed overhead and strengthened a man's Firebending to near unstoppable levels.

Then there were his eyes, those oddly glowing eyes that didn't belong to a fire bender at all. After seeing the majority of his organization's muscle wiped out in less than thirty seconds by a single man, Jin had to use all his nerve to keep from shaking.

Jin couldn't help but wonder how the boy had achieved such a feat. Did he have some type of special weapon of his own? A new piece of technology to help with Firebending like the dragon mask? Or was it something old? Had a piece of Sozen's Comet fallen to Earth, and the boy picked it up?

"Don't you people have manners?" the boy asked. "You're supposed to introduce yourself before asking something like that."

The almost bored tone the boy spoke with made Jin scowl. "This is who I am, boy!" Jin took a deep breath through his nose, then pressed his mouth against the focusing tube and let everything go in one fierce blast.

Sasuke raised an eyebrow at the small sphere of flame coming at him. It was faster than any previous form of fire bending he'd ever seen, even his own fire jutsu didn't travel with the speed whatever the mad had attacked him with did. Still, he had time to twist his body out of the way, but was knocked into the air when the ball impacted the ground behind him.

Everything would have been fine, if the attack hadn't exploded after striking the ground.

He twisted in the air and rebounded off the wall in time to see the Agni Kai boss breaking in for another attack right before the sphere came at him again. This time, Sasuke threw a shuriken to intercept the move and it exploded prematurely, giving Sasuke time to reposition himself back in the center of the room with a few quick steps.

When the man fired his next shot, Sasuke countered with a minor fireball jutsu, only to watch the flaming orb tear through Sasuke attack without detonating. This time, he jumped backwards and curled up to ride the explosion away from the other fighter, rolling with the impact to lessen the damage.

"Fool!" Jin shouted as loud as he could with the focusing mask on. "There isn't a fire bender alive who can match my dragon's combustion bullet!" It was the perfect mix of modern technology and Firebending, the idea taken from a powerful fire bender who had lived at the end of the great war and redesigned so that the user didn't need a hole drilled into his head and years of practice to focus his chi properly.

So the attack only detonates when it strikes something solid, Sasuke surmised. But why does it explode? He had a working theory, but there was another test he needed to run in order to prove it. Switching to a jutsu he had less experience with, Sasuke threw his hands together a few times, then drew in a breath after forming the tiger right as the triad boss drew in breath for another attack. Fire Style: Great Dragon Fire!

When then boss fired again, Sasuke breathed out a charka-laced fire blast that took the shape of a dragon's head. As the two attack collided, the dragon actually opened its mouth to swallow the fire bullet, then continued on to ram into the triad leader and knock him through the wall and washing over his body before ascending into the sky.

Laying outside the warehouse among the rubble, Jin tried to pick himself up, but his burned body screamed in protest and caused him to collapse. "My…my bullet…how?"

"It's simple really," the boy with the red eyes told him as he stood over the defeated man. "Your attack is really nothing more than a highly condensed flame wrapped in a kind of vacuum bubble that air flows around, which accounts for its speed. When that bubble pops, air rushes in and the oxygen is ignited, creating a powerful explosion. While it would cut through a normal flame thanks to the bubble, and explode when running into a fire wall since it still had oxygen to burn behind it, the insides of my dragon are nothing but tightly packed fire. With no air to feed on, it just fizzled out.

"It's a nice technique though, so I think I'll take it," the boy finished.

Jin didn't have the strength to laugh at the child's absurd claim. "Idiot, only someone with the mouth of a dragon can use that attack. Each mask must be hand crafted to fit each individual, as well as seared onto the flesh. Even if you take this mask, you'll never be able to use it."

In response, the boy put his hands in front of his chest as if holding something, then he took a breath through his nose while moving his hands in a strange way. It took a moment for Jin to realize he seemed to be tracing the outline of a sphere with his fingers. A flame appeared in the center of the sphere, and was forced in on itself as the outline grew smaller.

Jin's eyes widened at what he was seeing. In the middle of an unsteady sphere of blue energy, a fire bullet came to life. "T-that's impossible!"

"You know, I don't know what pisses me off more," Sasuke began. "That even after traveling around the world, I find the same kind of crap I thought I left behind, or that I'm actually using a piece of an idiot's technique which I swore to myself I'd never bother using after seeing how it was done!"

"NO WAIT!" Jin shouted as panic set in and he put he hands up in front of his face for protection.

"Fire Style: Blazing Rasengan!" Sasuke shouted before throwing his hands out and letting part of the chakra sphere disappear to shoot the combustion bullet in the direction that he wanted, tagging the triad leader right in the head and blowing him to pieces.

When he got back to Air Temple Island, Sasuke was relieved to find that everyone except the guards had already gone to sleep. He had nothing to explain the reasons for the scorch marks all over his clothing, although he had the sense to ditch the Firebending gloves in the bay so people didn't ask where he got them from.

After making his way to his room, Sasuke found himself look out the window and into Republic City. When he had first come to this land, he hadn't given much of a thought about the inhabitants. Yet, if Sasuke was to carry out his plans then everyone in the city, the continent, and the surrounding lands would be caught up in the destruction as well.

Killing a few innocent people for the sake of justice for his clan was worth the cost. But from what he could tell, the amount of people living in the Four Nations far surpassed that of the Shinobi Countries. Even with a war that lasted one-hundred years to help cut the populace down to size. They obviously weren't very efficient killers if the Agni Kai were any indication.

Still, how could he justify doing nothing when the corpses of his family still haunted his dreams and cried for retribution? Not all of the people in these lands were innocent either. In fact the triad recruitment process played along disturbingly similar lines to those of a shinobi village: raise a child with a sense of duty towards an organization, and they'd have a fanatically loyal follower ready to betray his own family at the drop of a hat.

Perhaps it was nostalgia, or the technique he had used earlier that night, but Sasuke found himself thinking about that idiot blond half a world away. Then, Sasuke frowned at his own weakness. "It's not like I wouldn't know what he would try to do."

-Meanwhile, on the other side of the world-

"Hey you brat! I'm not paying for this!" the man said angrily as he shoved the ramen back into his server's face.

"Oh yeah, why not?" Naruto demanded leaning over the counter of the extra large Ninja Noodles noodle cart.

"You just SNEEZED ON IT!" the customer yelled.

Naruto crossed his arms and 'pffted' at his customer's baseless complaint, then pointed to the ninja mask that covered everything but his eyes and hid his identity as the last living jinchuuriki. "What do you think these are for buddy?" he asked. "Ninja Noodles guarantees that you will never find a hair, fingernail, or other body part in your ramen that isn't yours, or its half off!"

The customer blinked, then looked at the name of the cart before going back to glaring at the boy. "If your called Ninja Noodles, then why does your guarantee only include ramen?"

"What else would people ever want to eat?" Naruto asked, genuinely confused.

In order to diffuse the situation, another person dressed as a ninja, this one a girl with short brown hair, kicked Naruto out of the window and into the cart's third occupant before trying to clam down their customer. "Well sir, we also serve oden, and several other dishes. Ramen is just out most popular seller. And our ninja masks do double as sneeze guards," Akane assured him as she pulled up her cloth over her nose.

Then, he studded he girl, and the two other employees wearing ninja costumes. "And you're not real ninja are ya?" There was a pretty big bounty on information leading to the capture of shinobi from one of the former five major villages.

"We're Leaf Academy flunkouts sir," Akane told him, which was true in her case, if not for the other two. "You could turn us in, but I'm afraid you'd be the only one getting in trouble. The last guy who tried fingering us to some grass ninja, well…I really shouldn't ruin your apatite with the details."

The man studied the girl for a moment, then took his food and headed on down the road. As soon as he was gone, Akane whirled on the other two real ninja. "Naruto, how many times have I told you not to pick fights with the customers. Geeze, when I agreed with my dad to help you guys with your cover, I didn't think you'd try and blow it at every opportunity."

"I know, I know," Naruto relented. "It's just…this sucks!" A little over three months ago, all of the major nations had united to fight the Akatsuki. Then, when the battle was just about over, they had been attacked by another shinobi alliance consisting of all the smaller villages. Even the Hidden Rain Village had been in on it…although Naruto had since learned that paper girl had died some time after Nagato, and the village had been retaken by the original rain ninja.

With the vast majority of the ninja from the five bigger powers either in no shape to fight or dead, the fresh army had bulldozed over them before breaking up their alliance. Now, a new Shinobi World War was being fought to decide who got which lands.

"A ninja that hates hiding…are you sure we're even related?"

Naruto looked over to glare at their resident redhead and medical ninja, Karin with a frown, "Hey, you're the one that said you were an Uzumaki when I found you in that stupid cell back at the Leaf Village!"

Then, he crossed his arms and grumbled. "Not that you've been much help." Just what was Karin to him anyway? She said that his mom and her aunt were sisters…or something like that…so what did that make the kids?

"Ugh! If you'd had any idea just how many patrols we've avoided because I came along!" Karin yelled. "You're the idiot who want us looking for a needle in a haystack. I say we just find a nice little corner of the world to settle down in and rebuild the clan."

Naruto resisted the urge to throw up. "Uh, aren't we related?" He could almost hear the banjo in the distance for even thinking about that.

In response, Karin nailed the blond ninja on the head. "NOT LIKE THAT!" the other Uzumaki shouted, then shuddered at the thought.

After recovering from the blow, Naruto picked himself up and rubbed his sore head before a melancholy tone crept into his voice. "Even if we did that, it wouldn't be long until everything came to an end. We need to find Sasuke."

Karin rolled her eyes. "Oh right, that whole Armageddon thing. Look, your whole stupid bromance aside, just what the hell makes you think Sasuke is even physically capable of carrying out something like that?"

The zombie Madara Uchiha looked down at Naruto's shadow clone with a pair of Rinnegan

"Personal experience," Naruto told her.

-?-

Sitting at an announcer's desk in front of a pink cutesy background, and deformed cutesy Ino cleared her throat. "And now it's time for….NINNNNNNNNNJAAAAAA CHANNEL!"

"Hello people I'm Ino Yamanaka, and this is my co-host…" she stopped and frowned when the camera panned over to reveal…no one.

"Ahem…HERE IS MY CO-HOST!" the girl shouted before crossing her arms and tapping a finger against her arm impatiently as she waited.

Eventually, a smoke bomb exploded next to her, and the cloud cleared to reveal Kakashi. "Sorry, guys, I got lost on the way here."

Ino glowered at the older ninja, then took a deep calming breath, and turned back to the camera with a fake smile on her face. "Right. Now as to the question on everyone's minds…why would a magnificent beauty like me have yet to appear in this cheap piece of work. Well my loyal fans, it's because a super star like me is obviously being saved for a true dramatic-"

"It's because we're dead," Kakashi cut in.

"Eh?"

"In the fan fiction I mean," Kakashi told her before he addressed the camera. "If the eight and nine-tails were captured, that means Guy and I are pushing up daises somewhere. As for Ino, her death isn't that big a shocker and she is the most popular female characters among the dead Naruto cast whose won't reveal even minor plot points in the story."

Tears ran down Ino's face. "But…how did I die?"

Kakashi shrugged. "No one really cares," he told her before addressing the audience again. "Now, for those of you who haven't figured it out, it's about four and a half months into the future of the Naruto storyline after the war ended on a good note for the alliance. We beat Akatsuki, stopped the…whatever the hell they were doing, and saved the world. Then a shinobi army consisting of ninja from the other lesser villages killed most of the five villages' remaining ninja, destroyed the five major villages themselves, and are currently hunting for important survivors of the war including Naruto, since he's the last living jinchuuriki."

"Sure I was right in the middle of the battlefield, but I'm a medic…and we were winning in that area!"

Ignoring his co-host's breakdown, Kakashi went on. "The dead Madara defeated the five Kages before the resurrection technique was released. I mean let's face it, five wood clones per Kage when they could barely take one? They're fucked. In fact, if you think about it, the only thing that's even kept my character around this long is plot armor made from popularity."

"Anyway," Kakashi continued. "Sasuke went back to the village to read the instructions on that stone meant for Mangekyo Sharingan users, and took off. Naruto showed up later, let Karin out of jail, and now they're looking for him while disguised as a traveling ramen salesman business."

"SO HOW CAN THEY JUST GO AND KILL ME OFF?" Ino demanded as she went on a rampage around the set. "IT MAKES NO SENSE! WHY? WHY ME? IF I'M DEAD THEN THERE'S NO WAY SAKURA SURVIVED! GET HER IN HERE TO HOST THIS DAMN SHOW!"

Kakashi sighed, then had the propter show him Ino's card. "So, join us next time as Amon finally shows up, and we learn that one of the kages is actually still around. Byeeeeeeeeee!"

"I HATE YOU ALL!" Ino raged, fire spitting from her mouth as several security personal tried to pin her down.