Chapter 3! Yay! This one gets a little cheesy/fluffy, so bear with me.

Tried again to bribe someone into bribing someone into jumping into a plane to fly to Japan and steel Naruto rights… Still don't own it, but we'll see.

When he returned to the large clearing the next morning, Okami was already standing in the same spot she had been in on the first day. As Kakashi silently approached, she lifter her head and turned to his general direction. She had an uncanny ability to sense when people neared her, but by the way her eyes darted from shadow to shadow, he could tell she could not find his exact location.

"How long do you plan on following me around, Shinobi?" Her voice was crisp and demanded respect.

Kakashi did not trust her enough to reveal his position with a reply. After a short silence, she shook her head.

When she spoke, it was with a contemplative, casual tone. She was not chatty, as many were when they were trying to figure out a possible enemy's position, but spoke slowly and without a shred of nervousness. She merely looked calmly at the shadows of the trees around her.

"You're better than most. I'm impressed. It explains how you were able to get so close the first day. Unfortunately for you, I now know what to look for. It's a lot different from most who come looking for me. Usually, I just sense anger, hatred, greed. You know. Typical human emotions." Kakashi remembered his thoughts when she had first sensed him. One mystery solved. "You're tougher than that. Not many sudden shifts, mostly calm and intent on completing your mission. I guess that's why they made you leader, eh Kakashi?"

He resisted the urge to jolt and swallowed. Okami's gaze came close to his hiding spot. Too close.

He could hear her smile. "You're not the only one doing a bit of observing. I picked up your trail last night after I was done…" she trailed off and looked down. Shrugging it off after a second, she continued. "You really shouldn't be so shocked. Wolves are much better at tracking and staying hidden. Even the pups can get within a few yards with out me noticing. You could use a few point-er-s…"

Her head jerked to the side, and she sniffed the air. Even with her mask on, Kakashi could see here eyes were wide with panic. She raced off into the woods, with the jonin just out of sight behind her.

She stopped so suddenly that Kakashi almost crashed into her. At the last second, he jumped up into a leafy tree branch.

Her body was rigid and she trembled slightly. The smell of fear came to Kakashi a split second before a stronger, much worse scent came. Blood. A lot of blood.

Okami slowly stepped into the clearing. Her shoulders slouched with defeat as she surveyed the scene. Seven dead. The bodies had been hacked apart, their heads thrown in the center, frozen forever in wide-eyed horror.

There was a small noise from the undergrowth at the far side of the clearing. Her hand flew to the kunai at her side but froze. A second later, Kakashi could see why.

A small girl of eight or nine crouched in a bush, her face red from recently fallen tears. Okami slowly walked to her, but stopped and crouched down about two yards away.

"It's alright, little one. I'm not going to hurt you." She spoke with a voice that could calm a thunderstorm.

The girl shuddered with a silent sob and raced into Okami's arms. The woman gently picked her up and held her until most of the tears had passed.

"What's your name, little one?"

"M-Masao," she managed to choke out.

"Can you tell me what happened here, Masao? It's alright if you can't right now, but it will help a lot. Are you ok with that?" her voice was soft and forgiving. She was not forcing anything on the girl, but asking permission to take something off her shoulders.

"W-we were j-just walking out t-to our herb garden. M-my dad-dy heard something and told m-me to hid-de." She broke down again. "They just came an-nd—" Okami held the girl, slowly rocking back and forth, until she stopped crying. The woman placed her on her feet and wiped her eyes.

"How about you find some nice white stones to mark their graves?"

The girl nodded and moved to the little-used path next to the clearing. When Okami turned back to the bodies, Kakashi caught a glimpse of eyes that had seen this painful scene many times before. He remembered those eyes. His thoughts flashed back to his first morning in the village. So she was there, posing as an old herbalist. A pang of sorrow struck through him. Her own village turned against her and has been framing her for who knows how long.

She worked quickly, and, before Masao returned with the stones, she had the bodies placed back together with their faces arranged in less horrifying expressions. There were four men and a boy of 16, along with an older woman and a 20 year old. Okami took a kunai from one of the older men, and a necklace from the older woman.

"Come here, Masao. I have a feeling they wanted you to have these." She tied the necklace around the girl's neck, and tucked the knife in her belt.

"How did you know who my parents were?" asked the astonished girl as she looked at the pendant around her neck.

"They both died trying to protect you. It's an easy thing to sense, if you know what to look for. Come stand over here and will them goodbye."

They stood in silence for a moment, then Okami moved her hands in front of her, making signs in quick succession.

"Earth type, burial seal," she whispered. Again, Kakashi had never seen this type of technique before. It was definitely not a regular jutsu. The ground gently pulled up around the bodies, leaving patches of freshly turned soil where they lay.

"Put the stones where their heads were, then come back here."

The girl silently obeyed.

Again, she made hand signs.

"Plant type, growth seal."

Kakashi felt the small tingle of chakra as it pulsed from her hands, now lying in the soft loam. Slowly, small, white flowers grew out of the earth. They pushed toward the sun and opened delicately until the entire clearing was covered. The jonin's mind flew to the big clearing back in the woods. So it was not just a quiet escape from the world. He wondered who had been buried there, and who was so important to the girl that she visited the site every day.

Okami stood and swayed slightly. That last jutsu must have taken a lot of chakra, though Kakashi.

"Come on, Masao. We need to get you someplace safe." She started walking towards a path.

"But the village is in the other direction!"

Okami stopped and slowly turned to the girl. Kakashi caught a glimpse of two sorrowful eyes.

"The village is no longer a safe place for you," she said, almost at a whisper. "If you go back, they will kill you, just like your parents. I'm taking you to the house of a friend of mine. He is taking care of other people in your situation. Masao, there are very few people you can trust now," she paused. "I'm sorry I didn't get here in time."

She turned back to the path, and the girl silently followed.

……………………………………………………………………

After winding along the tiny path, they came to a small house in the wilderness.

The mortician's house? Kakashi hoped he wouldn't have to tell Gai his suspicions were correct.

It was a plain cabin, with few windows and a boor. Next to it in the clearing stood a larger, more uniform, building, which served as a morgue and office. A large graveyard surrounded by an iron fence sat silently behind it, ancient ivy twisting in and out of the rusty poles.

Okami stopped and squatted down to Masao's height.

"Little one, I have to go now. This is where you will be staying from now on. Gravekeep will take care of you. You are to trust no one: not family, not me, not even Gravekeep until they identify themselves as a friend. Now listen closely, and remember this:

"Whenever you meet a person, the first person to talk will ask 'nice weather today, isn't it?' The second will reply 'yes. We should be able to see the moon tonight.' Then the first: 'if it decides to show its face,' and the second will reply 'it always does when we need it to.'"

She had the girl repeat the safe-words several times, then sent her to the house. Kakashi watched silently. Had she forgotten he was there? If what she had said about sensing emotions was true, than that was impossible. His mind was restless as he struggled with thoughts of all shapes and sizes. He wouldn't be surprised if the entire village could feel his rage. She had been set up by her own people. Who knew if the first incidents were real. Who knew if any of it was real? Not only that, but they had dragged innocent bystanders into the fray. It was impossible for that murder scene in the woods to de set up. He had been with Okami when it happened. He knew she was not a clone from her scent, and knew she didn't have clones out to do the work for her because of her chakra signal. And no wolf could make those slash marks.

What if she had accomplices? No. He almost laughed a grim laugh as he shook the idea from his head. As far as reading people went, he was one of Konoha's finest. One cannot create a self-induced panic of the magnitude that he had felt from her. He knew what faked emotions felt like, and with such a surge of them, even the tiniest bit of pre-knowledge could be detected. His own mind had created his doubt out of denial that humans could be so cruel.

He wished he knew which family she came from, so he could give them a piece of his mind.

His inner rage-fest was interrupted as the girl reached the cabin door. An older man answered. He was short and plump with a scowl on his face and stubble on his chin. His white hair was slowly receding from his forehead.

He narrowed his already squinting eyes up at the bright sun.

"Nice weather today, isn't it?" His voice was a low growl.

"Y-yes. We should be able to s-see the moon tonight," stammered the frightened girl.

The grizzled man blinked and quickly sent a weary eye to the woods. His attitude changed to an unreadable stare.

"If it decides to show its face." His voice was soft and sad now.

"It always does when we need it to." Masao had regained some of her confidence.

The man surveyed the girl for a second, then let her inside, eyeing the forest one last time before shutting the door behind him.

Below Kakashi, Okami sighed, leaning her back against the tree and hanging her head in defeat. Slowly, she pushed herself off of the giant trunk and walked silently back into the forest.

Kakashi silently cut a corner to stand in front of her on the path. She came an inch from running into his chest, and the tiny trace of a frightened gasp escaped her as she caught herself with a back step. Pride kept either of them from being the first to put more space into the awkwardly small gap between them.

So she did forget about me. Kakashi smirked under his black mask. He caught a glimpse of an intense sorrow in her eyes before she snapped into shock and then anger. Still, he could see the tails of fallen tears leading from her eyes to somewhere beneath her hard, white mask. This close, she could be read like an open book. Even under the layer of anger, most likely from not remembering he had followed her, Kakashi could see the trace of long held pain.

"What do you want?" she snarled.

He said nothing for a while, simply watching her eyes. In the sketch drawn into her file, they gave her small, narrowed eyes; eyes thick with murderous defiance. In person, they were full of sad memories, barely covered by her current emotion. Blue surrounded soft grey-green and finally the thinnest tint of yellow immediately around her pupils.

She became uneasy in his close gaze and shifted her eyes down. She had never seen anything like it. His cool grey eye. The other was hidden under his headband, but one was enough for such a close distance.

That one, calm, cool eye saw right through her. It held the knowledge from a hundred of the people of her former village, and the experience of a thousand.

"What do you want?" she growled again. Her voice suggested that she was in control and in no way intimidated by the taller jonin, but her eyes told a different story. He smiled inwardly and lessened the intensity of his gaze.

"How long have they been framing you?"

She turned her head to the side, trying to shut him out. His soft tone had visibly shocked her, if only for a second.

"Long enough," she retorted, again using different emotions in her voice and eyes.

He took a small, easy step towards her, closing the gap that had formed as she subtly inched away from him. He watched the hairs on her neck stand up, despite her crossed arms and lack of eye contact. She doesn't know what to do when someone is kind to her.

He softened his voice again, trying his hardest to calm her into stepping out of her tight shell.

"We can't help you if you don't help us find answers."

"Don't." Her voice was a small, pleading whisper. Kakashi was about to try once more, but she continued, with a sad smile in her eyes.

"The last person who tried to help me ended up as another page in my file. Stabbed and torn to pieces, just like the rest of them."

The jonin made an attempt to grab her, but to no avail. The tell-tale pop of chakra sounded, and she had already disappeared.

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Phew. Got through that one alive. Please review. Please. I need story-line advice.