Though outwardly Sasuke showed no emotion, he could almost feel the accomplishment swelling inside of him. Provided, the mission specifics were a little disappointing, it was a C rank mission and if successfully completed while this young in his shinobi career, would place a definite foothold in advancement.

Thus putting him one step closer to the goal that had been set for him.

It came as no surprise to the stoic gennin when his thoughts turned to his life mission as he approached the Great Gate of Konoha. This mission would be a springboard for his future and he had no intention of ever forgetting his reason for existence. The reason why he lived.

He would never forget the one who slaughtered his family. The man that massacred them all without remorse, save himself, with no pity.

The one who killed Sasuke's own parents in front of him, blood gleaming off the dark robes he wore, pooling on the ground, around the boy's parents. What had happened next Sasuke would remember for the rest of his waking days, driving him to the point of insanity.

Sasuke had stepped into the foyer in time to see that shadow of a man pause before delivering the final stroke to kill his father. He watched in horror, tormented by the fact he could to nothing, too scared to even try.

Pausing in his activity, the murderer slowly swept his gaze across the room, making direct eye contact with the young Sasuke.

Those eyes…

Hauntingly empty eyes, dyed the color of blood, met the fearful eyes of the child who had just walked in to find his parents being killed.

The link between the two sets of eyes didn't break as the man gracefully slit the throat of the boy's father, the boy himself making no move to stop him.

Sasuke felt rooted to the ground in fear, he couldn't move at all, when everything quickly changed. The world around him bled away, leaving only him and those terrible eyes, which then slowly began to revolve.

Now feeling weightless, Sasuke was unable to tear his gaze away from those eyes, watching in his peripheral vision as the world around him began to come back into focus. The eyes then faded away, leaving him alone.

Then he saw them. The boy almost cried out in joy as he saw his parents alive again, walking slowly towards him, a dark shadow following them closely.

Sasuke tried to call out, to warn them of the darkness that followed them, but his throat refused to open. He then noticed that his hands and feet felt ridiculously heavy, burdened to the point where he couldn't move a finger as he watched the darkness overtake his parents and kill them once again.

He tried to turn away, but couldn't move; tried shutting his eyes, but it was as if his eyelids were transparent. He was forced to watch it all.

Then, as the final blow was struck, the picture faded again, returning to the vision of his parents walking towards him once again, being followed by the shadow of a murderer.

And Sasuke heard it.

"For the next 72 hours, you will watch as they are killed, over and over again. You are too weak to kill, not worth the effort. Train, train and become stronger than me. Train yourself to kill me. Train for revenge.

Foolish little brother…"

Sakura sighed as she and her team passed through the Konoha gates. Their first C rank mission, and the whole thing was a sham!

The Hokage had explained it rather simply. Though usually hidden villages shied away from taking these kinds of missions, apparently diplomatic reasons required them to try. It was totally ridiculous.

I mean, come on, she thought to herself, an exorcism? It's amazing what superstition can do to the views the public has on phenomenon they can't explain.

"Kakashi-sensei, you don't really believe there's a such thing as a vampire, do you?"

"Well, if there's one thing I've learned though most of my life, what I believe in, and what tends to happen, are two very different things."

"You aren't saying you've actually seen a vampire, are you?"

Kakashi chucked nervously, "I really haven't."

"THEN WHAT ARE WE GOING TO EXORCISE?"

"Hm," Kakashi pondered to himself, "Well, we really don't know what could be causing these disappearances, so it could be most anything. Kidnappings seem most likely, though, because in a few cases people reported signs of a struggle….

There really isn't much to go on right now, as you pointed out so we'll just have to wait until we arrive at Weed Country to see." Sakura glared at her offending sensei. He seemed to be mocking her with some tidbit of information he knew, but wouldn't share.

But really, what was the good of accepting a mission that you gave you no specific goal?

As if reading her mind, however, Kakashi added a final comment.

"Since the goal is exorcism, it seems we do what makes the populace happy enough to stop calling the disappearances the work of a vampire."

"Which basically means," added Sasuke, finally bringing himself into the conversation, "we have to figure out what's going on to figure out our mission."

"Those are really loose parameters…" Sakura mumbled to herself.

"Idiot, why do you think this is a C ranked mission? We can't and won't be spoon fed what to do for the rest of out lives, like we are in a D ranked mission."

Sakura looked back in surprise at Naruto, who was walking a good length behind the group. He seemed…vacant today, staring out into space as he walked at a just-quick-enough relaxed speed. The way his eyes were out of focus seemed like he was simply enjoying the scenery.

"Why are you all the way back there, Naruto? Aren't you going to come walk up here with us?"

"I'm the rear guard."

"Rear guard?"

Naruto nodded, continuing as if she hadn't included a questioning tone in her comment. Sakura shrugged, turning and reengaging in conversation. After all, this is Naruto; he never seemed to have too many reasons to be cautious…

As darkness finally fell on the traveling foursome, Kakashi stopped and clapped his hands, signaling the others to stop. He then gestured to the thinning woodland around them.

"All right team, time to set up camp for the night."

Relieved that the walking was over, the three gennin found themselves a comfortable spot on the ground to hole up for the night. Naturally, Sakura found a spot close to Sasuke's, while Naruto positioned himself in the lower boughs of a nearby tree.

Soon, though, the whole team was circled around a small campfire, eating some of what little they packed for the trip.

"Kakashi-sensei, how long will it take to get to the country of Weed?"

The silver haired sensei pondered the question for a bit. "Hn, I actually haven't visited Weed before, but it is relatively close by Bird Country. I suppose, two days until we arrive at their borders."

"Weed Country isn't that large, is it? It wasn't even featured in our standard issue maps."

"Mah, I think that's just because it's newly founded, but you're right. It is a small country."

After eating, each member of the team slowly drifted back to his or her assigned sleeping spots, finally leaving only Naruto sitting and gazing into the fire.

Kakashi woke early to find an already awake Naruto tending to the fire. Surprised but ultimately placing it at the back of his mind, he got the other two members of the team up and they had a light breakfast before heading out once more.

The day went on much like the first, and everybody voted to skip stopping for lunch in favor of eating on the go. Sakura carried on some meaningless conversation with both Sasuke and Kakashi to pass the time, but as much as she tried, Naruto remained in rear guard and refused to speak much.

It wasn't until they stopped for the second night that she noticed his rather sluggish walking. She inquired about it but was repelled by his evasive answers.

"No really, I just didn't sleep well last night," he had assured her. "I still have to get the feel of sleeping on the ground instead of in a bed."

"Yeah, I know. My back bothered me for most of the morning…"

"…Sakura you slept on a rock, just so you could be a little bit closer to Sasuke, remember?"

"It…it wasn't that bad…" Her face flushed red as his scrutiny. He shrugged.

"Whatever…"

Once again, everybody drifted off to sleep, leaving Naruto sitting nearby the still warm fire, staring into the flickering flames.

His eyes drooped a bit, but he straightened himself up and refused to return to his pre-picked branch as he slunk around his sleeping team and into the woodland.

Once again Kakashi awoke to find Naruto already awake and tending to the fire. His suspicions were aroused, however, when he saw how the boy carried himself when he walked over to his pack to retrieve breakfast.

Years of working as an elite jounin had given him the perception to tell when somebody was exhausted but faking being wide awake. Such knowledge was very important when leading a team for long journeys or watching them fight in battle.

Apparently the boy wasn't getting enough sleep, but why? This was perturbed the jounin. He himself had awoken a few times during the night for use of the bathroom, but had seen the fire out and assumed the gennin asleep.

Had he been wrong? Had Naruto been out doing some late night training?

Well, whatever it was could cause him to be a hindrance in the near future, and needed to stop. However, things weren't that easy.

"Where were you last night, Naruto?"

"Hn?"

"You weren't in your tree, and you seem tired this morning."

"Nature called and couldn't sleep."

"Really?"

"Hn."

It seemed like Naruto was refusing to tell, but the boy did need some rest. The team started out again on their journey.

Soon even Sasuke was aware of Naruto's condition, but none of them were giving any signs that they knew. All three kept quiet about it until lunchtime.

"How about we stop here for lunch?" Kakashi suggested, motioning to the others. "We can spare the time as we're due to arrive soon, but aren't expected until tomorrow afternoon."

The gennin all agreed, sitting down to eat their lunches.

Naruto sat in the shade of a nearby tree, feeling the nice cool breezes that floated through occasionally and watching the clouds that traveled lazily by.

Such a nice day, he thought as his eyelids drooped a bit, and Kakashi did find a nice…place to eat…at…

The rest of the team watched quietly as the blond shinobi dozed off in the sun. When he finally fell full asleep, they began to talk in somewhat hushed tones.

"It looks like he's staying awake all night. That can't be good for his health."

"Hn. I don't really care, but I do wonder…"

"If this keeps up, it could cause later problems to come up. However, since he won't tell us and none of us really know what he's doing, one of us is going to have to stay up tonight to see what he does…"

In the end, Sakura was volunteered to stay up with the boy to see when he would leave and what he would do.

That decided, the team turned to wake Naruto and found…

He wouldn't wake up. Naruto turned out to be a very heavy sleeper, and try as they might, they couldn't get him to wake up.

Finally they resorted to dragging him the rest of the way.

Naruto woke up to find himself lying close by a smoldering fire, covered in dirt and scratches. He took quick survey of his surroundings and surmised that they must have dragged him here to set up camp after dozing off in the sun.

Outwardly calm, but inwardly sheepish at having been dragged, he looked to find the others asleep, so he forced himself up and slightly stumbled off into the thinning foliage, unaware of the shadow that followed him.

Sakura watched as the boy moved surprisingly quickly through the forest, stopping from time to time to examine something, but moving on with confidence. He moved back and forth, in a zigzag pattern, his eyes searching for something.

She watched as he froze, looking closely at something and muttering to himself as he moved along even faster through the forest.

When he reached the end of the already thinning trees, she reached it soon after to witness what he had seen as well.

Wide, rolling plains, so different from the forest that she had known for her entire life. Few trees were in sight, but almost every square foot was overly thick in tall yellowish grass, so tall that might reach up to her waist should she walk in it. She stayed, however, well hidden in the forest as she watched Naruto move slowly and curiously through the grass.

"The way he's been moving, back and forth," she finally realized, "maybe he's been scouting the ahead territory every night, checking for ambush or broken paths."

As Sakura made her discovery, however, she wouldn't realize how Naruto stopped, cocking his head slightly to the side, as if hearing something.

She wouldn't notice how he seemed to tense up intensely and turn back in the direction of the forest, trying to run, but his movements hindered by the foreign grass that caused him to stumble.

She would, however, notice when he tripped, going down without so much as a thud, cushioned by the grass.

As Sakura waited for her teammate to pick himself up, she grew more and more worried. The grass should have softened his fall, resulting in almost complete unharm. Though reluctant to give away her position, after almost ten minutes of waiting, she was forced to make her way through the grass to the area where he had tripped.

What she found shocked her, causing her to turn and run back to Kakashi and Sasuke, hoping one of them would know what to do.

Or rather, what she didn't find.

The grass had been smashed, pushed down like somebody had been lying down, but there was no sign of Naruto.

Birds began to chirp as Sakura moved as quickly as she could back to camp.

The day of their arrival to Weed Country had begun.

From the Desk of Tyr'll

A rather ominous beginning, eh wot? But I do know it was probably a little bit boring…It had to be done! Sorry if it seemed pointless…

And so begins my first original saga. Hopefully it shall be well liked, and any mistakes I make pointed out…

Just remember that I do like keeping secrets, so don't expect too many things to just jump out at you. The storyline will be different and there shall be many Ocs. Expect much confusion in coming chapters.

I don't know how long this saga will be drawn out, but hopefully it will go on for a good long while.

And finally, to those of you wondering, why is Weed Country called 'Weed' Country…

The reason will be learned soon enough, but the pieces are there, so you might be able to guess. And, no, the word 'weed' does not reference to drugs.

The rating on this fic might go higher if it did…