Sakura and Kabuto were the last to arrive at the dimly-lit training field. It was late evening, with the sun already passed over the horizon, covering the world in darkness. Waiting there were Sasuke and Kiba, both with fiery expressions, and Shino, who blended in with the tree he was leaning against so well, Sakura's eyes passed him over twice.

She was nervous. Kabuto had assured her of his confidence, but to place so much of the match in her hands... Seeing those disappointed looks from her teammates was something she didn't want to ever have to face again.

Guilt flooded her chest. She didn't mean to be a burden. She'd thought she'd been doing well. Iruka's subtle pushes to train more physically echoed in her mind.

"You're doing it again." Kabuto said, with slight reproach.

"Oh. Right, sorry."

From his walk beside her, he slipped his hand into hers, clenching it. Then, he let go, and the rest of the team stood in front of them.

"We need to discuss who will be staying out this match." Sasuke said.

While his eyes did not look pointedly at Sakura, the tension in regards to her was clearly present. Kiba abandoned subtlety altogether, and made his point by glaring at her, along with his small companion.

"That will not be necessary. I plan to withdraw."

The surprise was evident on Kiba's face, and although Shino and Sasuke did not react visibly, it was clear that they were surprised. "Unacceptable." the former Uchiha said, frowning a bit. "You have more experience than any of us. Your value is-"

"I wasn't asking, Sasuke." was the teen's reply. Sakura looked up at his face. He grinned down at her.

"I won't be participating in this match, one way or another."

"...Kabuto." It was clear from the boy's tone that he was unused to diplomacy. "We cannot afford this right now. If we fail another match, we might not be able to recover."

"I am aware of the potential consequences. I have faith that she will be more useful than me though."

"I don't." Kiba said bluntly.

Further argument was prevented by the appearance of two figures, one masked and cloaked, the other in his familiar green vest.

"Alright kids. We're gonna have to pick up the pace with these." the man said, in the tone a medic-nin might use while dealing with a very irritating patient.

"Orders from up top say we need you guys decked out and ready for field combat within the month. Rounds will be taking place every day, so I suggest you get your team situation figured out soon." He chucked a pair of scrolls at Sasuke, which the boy deftly caught.

"We usually wait until halfway through before having you learn these, but the clock is ticking. If your entire team does not learn both of these techniques within a week, you will be disqualified."

While Sasuke and Shino considered the possible causes of such an order, Kiba took the more direct approach.

"What's got the Hokage so riled up?"

"The Lord Hokage's thoughts are not privy to me." the white-haired man said, sounding slightly affronted. "Nor you, until you have proven able to hold up against extended torture. Luckily, that particular training is only necessary for those going into the Advanced Program, something I doubt many of you will be."

The tightening of Sasuke's fist only seemed to increase the man's satisfaction.

"Alright. Through that forest over there is another marked platform. I trust you'll be able to find it. Once my friend here is sure all three teams are in position, he'll send up a flare. That will be your cue to assault. Last team standing gets a set of advanced gear for each of their members, along with legal authority to purchase explosive tags."

"All three squads?" Sakura asked.

The man bared a toothy smile.

"All three. Try to survive out there."

With that, he and his companion vanished into the shadows. Kabuto gave Sakura a reassuring pat on the shoulder, while Kiba and Sasuke shared a glance. Shino came up from against the tree, and walked over to join them.

"I hope you know what you're doing." Sasuke muttered. Kabuto merely gave a shrug, and walked back the way he came.

"Good luck out there. Let me know how it goes."

"This time, that boy will not defeat me!" a teen yelled, round eyes burning with determination. At his side, a pale-eyed Hyuuga grunted in dismissal, turning to peer with his doujutsu across the forest.

Two other boys stood silently, masked and armored in the vests they seemed to have been born in. "Root" lay emblazened on their chests in a massive kanji. On her own looking very unhappy, Ino Yamanaka sat on a fallen tree.

Why does Sakura get the team with the nice guys? She wondered bitterly. Her squad had thus far succeeded in denying her existence completely, despite her attempts at friendliness. The most she had gotten was a slight tilting of the head from the blond baby-silent, and while eyebrows was at least not an asshole, he was too busy with his own declarations to talk to anyone else.

Hrmph. That one with glasses had looked like a bit of a pushover, but at least he smiled, not like crazy-hands and the two toasters over there.

Stupid Hyuugas with their stupid stuck-up egos..

"If we want to last long, we need to win this match." Shikamaru muttered. One hand was holding a bag of ice up to a sizable bruise on the side of his face. He was still having trouble controlling his facial muscles, even after Hinata had reversed the closed tenketsu.

Hinata was busy staring at her hands, which lay neatly on her knees. Tenten was leaning against one of the trees, picking her nails with a kunai. Chouji sat munching furiously through a bag of chips, while Yoroi looked ready to strangle anyone that got near him.

"Our best hope is to let Sasuke and his team wear down the others." He said, brushing off his shorts as he stood up. "Problem is, they'll probably be attempting the same thing, and Squad Eleven isn't going to be just twiddling their thumbs."

"So... what can we do?" Chouji said, inbetween munches.

Shikamaru frowned.

"Not much." he admitted. "We have Hinata at least, so we can be aware of what's going on. Problem is, Squad 11 has one of their own. It won't take them long to find us if they want to."

A kunai flicked out and embedded itself in the tree behind Shikamaru.

"I'll beat that little brat next time." Tenten grumbled. "Why the hell are those two even in these? I thought Root Trainees were supposed to be in the advanced program."

"It's troublesome that they're here, regardless of why. My only coherent theory is they weren't good enough. That, or they're supposed to be socializing with us academy students."

Tenten clenched her fist.

"So we're getting beaten by the leftovers?"

Shikamaru shrugged.

A sudden lighting strike illuminated the sky, briefly bathing the dense forest in pale-blue light.

"That's our cue. Let's get out of here."

"Anything yet?" Sasuke asked quietly.

His red eyes constantly flickered over the trees around them. The drain wasn't much, but he knew any longer than an hour would overcome him, even without using a single jutsu.

"No," was Shino's curt reply.

Sasuke's eyes didn't glow exactly; not in the way one sees a vague shimmering haze around them. They simply were vibrant, even in the near pitch darkness of the forest. Up above, massive canopies blocked out what little light there was from the moon and stars.

Shino, Kiba, Akamaru and he all were concealed in the shadows of a massive trunk. The Aburame had his eyes closed in concentration, hands spread outwards with a constant stream of bugs coming from beneath his thick coat.

In a massive perimeter around them, an invisible circle of bugs spread out, silent and un-noticeable in the shadows. They searched, and searched, always on the lookout for heat signatures not marked as friendly.

It didn't take them long to find some.

"North-east. There's three of them." Sasuke and he turned to look at Kiba, who had his nose in the hair. The boy took a long sniff, then shook his head. "They're too far away I can't tell who they are."

Half a mile away, Hinata and Shikamaru were running desperately through the forest, not attempting at stealth. They ran as fast as they could, while behind them, Neji Hyuuga walked with calm purpose. His raised hand was visibly cloaked in Chakra.

"Running away, cousin? I'm disappointed."

The pale-eyed teen exploded forward, shaking the leaves around him with the force of his Shunshin. Within a second, he had breached the gap between him and his targets, and his arm lashed forward like a knife.

Hinata gave out a yelp of pain as four rapid impacts struck her in the back. She fell, struggling to pull breath back into her now empty lungs. Shikamaru dived to the ground, sending out four massive claw-like shadows to encircle his attacker.

Neji casually activated a flash tag, smirking as Shikamaru was forced to avert his gaze, and the shadows that were meant to ensnare him dissolved under the light.

"Your tricks will not work on me. My eyes see your fate clearly."

He viciously gripped Hinata's head and slammed it into the ground, which vanished before the impact. Her clothes fluttered to the ground, landing just as the teen held Shikamaru up by the collar, staring into his face with bright eyes.

"Is this the most of your supposed genius, Nara?" He said with contempt.

The boy only smiled. It was then that Neji caught a few small chakra signatures nearby, that had gone unnoticed during the fight.

"Kikaichu?" he said to himself, eyes widening. "No-"

He turned to smack the insects out of the air, and it took all of Shikamaru's undertrained strength to hold his arm from completing the act. The bugs landed on the teen's neck, and immediately set to work injecting their collected toxins.

The pain was immediate. Neji fell to the ground, clutching at his neck where it now felt as though he had been lit on fire. The poison filtered through him, internally causing damage to the teen's bloodstream as it went.

"You.. you imbecile." he forced out, and hit the boy square in the stomach. Shikamaru went flying backwards, impacting a tree at an angle that thankfully didn't snap his neck. Even in the pain, the boy mused that he'd probably be allowed to lay down for a while with such damage to his ribs.

"How did you know we would attack him?" a voice asked nearby, over the pained screams of Neji. Shikamaru couldn't see through the blurriness of his eyes, but he vaguely recognized the voice as Shino's.

"It was the intelligent move. He was a greater threat than I was." the boy chuckled, then winced as the action brought increased pain. "I was hoping I'd survive, but it doesn't look like it worked out that way. Finish me off. There's nothing more I can do now."

Shino nodded, and quietly tapped the side of the boy's neck, in a place that would have been a killing move with enough pressure. The boy vanished, leaving a pile of clothes behind, and a handful of shuriken.

A few seconds later, the screams stopped, and Neji's white robes too fluttered to the ground. Sasuke, Kiba, and Akamaru leapt down from a tree to join their companion. "So. They went after them first." Sasuke said.

"Better for us." said Kiba. "That's at least three people we won't have to fight." Akamaru yipped in agreement. Sasuke turned his red eyes in the direction the three had come from. His two companions both looked to him in a silent question. After a pause, the boy reached into his leg pouch, and pulled out a handful of shuriken.

"We need to know what's going on. If there's too many of them, we'll retreat."

"Will that even be possible given our enemy?" Shino said.

"We've taken out the Hyuugas. While I'm sure those two will have their own methods of tracking us down, let's hope that at least one of them was killed as well." With that, the four figures shot off into the night, their footsteps silent thanks to the padding of their sandals. Whatever was out there, they'd face it.

The figure of Shikamaru Nara walked out to join his team. Only Tenten and Yoroi remained, both of which turned to look at their approaching companion. Under the Henge, Sakura desperately hoped that they couldn't see through the disguise.

"Troublesome." She said, in what she hoped was an apathetic tone. Tenten rolled her eyes and looked away, arming herself with a Kunai. Yoroi however, remained suspicious. "What happened to Hinata?"

"She took a hit for me." The boy said, giving a small shrug.

Suddenly, a figure rocketed into the small clearing, slamming into the ground between the three of them with such force, a small crater was formed.

"Aha! Here you hide!" the boy yelled in triumph, and quickly rushed in for an attack on Tenten. She cursed, and leapt high into the air, pulling out a scroll as she did so. However, Lee was too quick, and a spinning kick sent her rocketing back towards the ground, where she created yet another crater.

Yoroi had summoned up two water clones, both of which ran towards the boy, their hands cloaked in ominous green chakra. Lee's round eyes narrowed in determination, and he hammered the group down with raw power.

While he was occupied with these, Yoroi thrust forward in a Shunshin, and caught the athletic teen with his right arm. Immediately, Lee felt the drain on his Chakra reserves, and smiled.

"That is a very interesting technique. I am curious where you learned it."

Yoroi's shock was evident when he was kicked back with the exact same strength as before. With the amount he'd taken, there should have been some serious decrease in speed.

Unless...

"That's not chakra enhancement?" he muttered in wonder, bringing his legs around to form a taijutsu stance. Lee grinned, and took a stance of his own.

"Indeed. Now, let me show you the extent of my power!"

Sakura watched this curiously from the upper branches of a tree. Tenten hadn't even known it was a poisoned shuriken that had ultimately removed her from the battle, and likely would assume that it was the force of Lee's kick that had done her in.

In truth, the pink-haired girl had silently thrown one at her, catching the older girl in the leg and forcing her to vanish.

She resisted the urge to pump her fist to the sky. There would be plenty of time for that alone, in her room, with nobody watching her. She ultimately decided to leave before a victor was decided, and flew off through the trees.

And so, she never saw Yoroi and Lee both vanish, or the small red bug bites on their necks.

Naruto Uzumaki, as he might have been named in another life, was meditating.

He held in himself the strong assurance that no matter what happened, he would be the ultimate victor of this battle. More important was wondering what it was Lord Danzo sought for him to learn from this.

The boy did not think in words, but hand signs, as it was all he had ever learned. He of course could understand speech, but had never spoken a coherent word in his life, and as such could not model it in his mind.

Mentally, movements weaved the most complex thought they could, which admittedly wasn't much. Danzo had never much cared about his soldiers thinking, merely that they could communicate quickly in battle.

Nevertheless, the boy persisted. Danzo wanted something from him.

Growing up, the boy had never had anything one might call a father figure, outside of Danzo. His surrogate mother had never shown him any care, never comforted him, never even spoken a word to the boy.

His cries had been punished, and before long, the child learned to be silent. To never say a word or ask a question. There were many who would flourish in such an environment, and such people often rose to the top levels of Root, but he was not among them.

With the creative genius he had inherited from his father stifled, the boy had nothing but hopeless attempts to fit into a role that he simply couldn't function in. The disappointment of Danzo was evident. He had wanted a Minato of his own, but broken down, and easy to control. The man had not recognized the paradox of such a thing, and the boy never learned why he was such a disappointment.

This was his last chance to prove himself. His only chance. Lord Danzo had made it clear that if he could not even succeed at the base academy level, then he was not worthy to bear the great Kyuubi, and it would be passed on to another host.

The boy did not fear death, nor pain. Those he had grown up with all his life. He feared being a greater disappointment to Lord Danzo, and to the village he revered with almost religious fervor. To do so would be a fate incomparable, and to disappoint the man he considered both his master and his father, was something he would avoid at all costs.

His ears picked up on three approaching figures, and his two sharp blue eyes opened beneath his mask. Two of them were identical, and beastlike in appearance. It took the boy barely a second to recognize them as an Inuzuka pair.

The third boy was a bit different. His eyes were a bright piercing red, always fixed solely on him, even as the boy stalked around, as the other two took positions at his back.

Nami vaguely acknowledged that they were surrounding him. This was of little importance. He had been fighting tougher opponents all his life, and they had been to kill.

The three of them sprung into action, each rushing towards the sitting boy at the same instant. The boy blurred up into a stance with a small Shushin, an action so simple he barely spared a thought as he did it.

When the three were within range, he released a wind Ninjutsu, spinning in a circle as a sphere of wind blades surrounded him. It was similar in function to the Eight Trigrams Palms Revolving Heaven, which it had in fact been based off of, but instead of raw chakra, it was wind, honed enough to cut through fabric and skin on contact.

Luckily for his assailants, rather than slicing them to ribbons, the force of the wind sent them each flying backwards, injured in different ways. Akamaru lost his enhancement instantly, and landed in a heap with a thin red gash across his small chest.

Kiba was no better. His attack had shredded his hands, which now bled openly. The palms of each were cut down to the bones in perfect thin lines, and he screamed in pain.

Sasuke's twisting leg attack had sent him rocketing back, spinning the other direction to hit the trunk of a tree. His leg broke on the impact, and his sandal had barely spared him from losing several toes.

Nami watched them with pity, though he did not regret his actions. What was necessary was never wrong. So he had been taught.

And so he had no reason not to believe.

He was, however, surprised when Sasuke Uchiha forced his way to his feet. The boy's Sharingan had given him a split-second warning, and allowed him to prevent a more crippling injury. He stood on his one leg, while his other was bent at an unhealthy angle.

Kiba lay on the ground, staring as the impossibly-thin cuts on his hands became thick with blood, pooling under where he held them. His mouth was open in a scream, but he had no more breath to release, and so only harsh gasps could be heard.

The next second, he was gone, along with Akamaru.

Nami cocked his head curiously as Sasuke hobbled towards him, one hand up armed with a Kunai. The next moment, the boy was knocked to the ground with a small push of air, thankfully not landing on his leg.

The boy got up again.

Once again, Nami pushed him down.

The boy got up again.

And again.

Eventually, Nami considered that the best solution would be to put the boy out of the fight, and give him access to proper medical attention. In his mind, it was much more mechanical a concept, but still tinged with the aching pangs of empathy.

There were no words for compassion in his vocabulary. Nevertheless, he knew what it was he felt, and he did not like it.

It was painful.

Sasuke's clothes fluttered to the ground softly, and Nami walked away, resuming his place of meditation.

Failure Not Option. He thought sadly.

Two hours later, a flare erupted in the sky, signaling the end of the match.

"It truly pains me to see you like this Itachi."

Danzo turned from his stand at the window, to look down at the injured man. Once, his eyes had been a permanent red, vibrant and powerful. Now, they were black. No, not even that; they were simply a dark grey.

A respirator was attached to his face, making odd noises as the drugged air filtered in and out of his lungs. The man didn't even turn his head, but his eyes looked up at the figure he had once considered his mentor.

"The village will be worse without you." the Hokage continued, taking the seat Sasuke had not two days ago. "Once, I had considered you to be my successor. More than that; proof that the Uchiha could be loyal and devoted to this village." Itachi merely continued to peer at his teacher.

"That brother of yours. I can only hope that he will prove as effective a student as you were." Itachi's eyes softened, and his right hand made a few sparse symbols. Silence reigned for a few moments, aside from the airy sound of Itachi's breath.

"Ah. You have that much faith in him?"

Itachi tilted his head to the right, and closed his eyes. Danzo stood up, dusting off his robes as he did so.

"I will leave you to rest. You deserve that much."

In that very hospital, several floors down, a boy lay resting on a large mattress. His leg was wrapped up tightly in a cast, and a bandage covered his foot to far above his ankle. Seven others lay in their own beds, silently being attended to by physicians.

In the green light of the room, two eyes opened together. They were a deep vibrant red, almost seeming to shine like stars in the dim light. An impossibly small pupil sat in each of them, while black tomoes whirled around, sharpening vision like a lens.

Both eyes closed tightly, and squeezed. Two fists tightened hard, causing three small red droplets to hit the white sheets from each.

Flashes of memory entered the boy's mind. A building alit with black flames. Two white eyes, and arms gripping him. Shouting, and blood. Bright, vibrant blood. A woman, tall and wild, and a beast massive enough to ride.

The smile of his brother, wide and accepting. The screech of steel against steel. The smell of smoke and the stench of burning flesh.

The moon, shining in the sky through thick black clouds.

And the words,

Sleep now, brother.

And so,

Sasuke slept.