A/N: I know this is later then I said, but I had exams and then my beta was sick. Thank you so much Brick, best beta ever. This chapter is dedicated to bored411 for being the only one to review the last chapter. I'm not planning on working on the next chapter until after my birthday, Monday, and Christmas, so don't expect it for about a week and a half.

If you think I own Naruto you can just leave now because it should be more than obvious that I don't.

…

The next morning Rie met her team in front of the Hokage's office. They had to wait to be seen much to the small girl's annoyance. When the team was told they had to wait, Guy and Lee immediately started doing push-ups in the hallway, TenTen sat against the wall cleaning one of her weapons, while Neji just casually leaned against the wall. Rie on the other hand was not as content to wait as her teammates. It had been a while since she had spent time with her Grandpa and she had been looking forward to seeing him, if only for a few moments. When she was told of the wait, the tiny ninja began calmly pacing in front of the Hokage's door. As the wait grew, so did Rie's impatience. Her walk became something close to a combination stomp, run and her face wore a deepening scowl. The rest of team Guy was incredibly curious as to what had their smallest member so worked up, but no one was willing to ask and risk her frustration being turned on them.

Finally, when it was time for team Guy to enter the office, a brown blur zipped past her taller teammates and tackled the Hokage in a tight hug. Iruka, who was sitting next to his aged leader, started chuckling at the child's display. Lee looked to Guy in shock and asked "can she do that?" Neji and TenTen just stared at the odd spectacle in front of them in a slight stupor.

"Well it is her Grandpa so I guess she can" Guy answered shrugging. The older members of team Guy turned to their sensei in complete shock.

The Hokage was too busy asking his granddaughter about her team, with said child nodding in reply, to pay much attention to the confusion of the young ninja in front of him. Neji suddenly blurted "you're the Hokage's granddaughter," catching everyone in the room by surprise. Rie just shrugged, smiling happily atop the Hokage's lap. Neji gave a grunt, obviously embarrassed by his outburst.

The Hokage chuckled "you never change Rie." He then turned to her team "I'm not actually her grandfather. I have helped raise Rie so it was natural for her to start calling me Grandpa." His face then hardened as he became serious. "Now then for your mission … let's see here…how about pulling weeds for Mr. Kanagawa?"

"Right and we will finish in 45 minutes" Guy responded.

"I think we can do it in 30" Lee argued.

"I like the way you think. Let's make it a challenge and do it in 20" Guy continued with growing enthusiasm.

"It will take you two hours" the Hokage said sighing tiredly. After being given the full mission briefing and being dismissed, team Guy turned to leave before the Hokage added "oh and Rie when Guy is finished with you can you go by the hospital? They need your help on a few cases." Rie nodded before following her team out.

The Hokage was right. Mr. Kanagawa had a massive garden. The team's newest member worked as hard as she possibly could, not wanting to be seen as weak or a burden. It was a hot day with no shade to protect the ninja from the merciless rays of the sun. It wasn't long before Lee pushed up his sleeves sweating. "Man it is hot today. Rie why don't you take off your coat" he asked as he reached to help remove his friend's coat. Rie jerked back and slapped his hand away before she even realized what she was doing. Even now when someone reached for her she saw it as a threat. Neji looked at his newest teammate curiously as Lee backed away apologizing profusely.

It took the team two hours just like the Hokage had said. When the job was finished, team Guy went to some nearby trees for a much deserved break. Rie flopped down and hungrily gulped her water. Neji leaned against a tree and TenTen collapsed beside her only female teammate. Guy and Lee were off on another rant that everyone else ignored. After a few minutes TenTen looked over at Rie, "hey you're not wearing shoes again today." Still not understanding the big deal Rie shrugged not giving it much thought.

After a long break, and what Guy dubbed team bonding, all four students lined up in front of their sensei at attention. "Good work today! You all really showed your flames of youth! Now we have the day off tomorrow, but that doesn't mean you don't need to train. You are dismissed" he cheered excitedly.

Rie turned to leave when Neji once again walked up to her. "We have to go by the hospital first today, right" he asked in a board tone. Rie nodded and eyed him suspiciously as he sighed and fell into step beside her.

Rie walked into the hospital and straight to the front desk. "Rie, thank goodness you're here" said a very relieved nurse that was currently manning the desk. "We have a patient with severe muscle damage and we can't see well enough to treat it. We also have a couple broken ribs and a child that swallowed a jar of marbles that we would like for you to take a look at." Rie nodded as she looked over the group of charts handed to her before tilting her head to one side. "They are all three in outpatient" she answered Rie's unasked question. Rie nodded, still not looking up from the charts, and tilted her head a little farther. "Oh yes, he is in room 342 and thank you."

"Wow. They understand you perfectly" Neji said as the two genin walked toward outpatient. Rie shrugged at his comment while wondering if he planned on following her around the hospital.

As the two entered the outpatient wing of the hospital, several doctors and nurses looked up and called a greeting to the small girl and ignored her Hyuga shadow. Rie raised her hand in greeting as she walked to the third curtained off area. She checked the number on the chart before tapping lightly against the curtain. "Come in" a young man called out to the two genin. When the two entered, the man smiled brightly seeing who would be treating him. "Hello Rie" he said in greeting. The girl nodded as she checked his medical id bracelet even though she already knew it was the correct patient. It was protocol and Rie was very good about following orders.

Her patient, Kotetsu Hagane, was a young man with long, spiky, black hair and dark eyes. Neji noticed that he had a strip of bandage running across the bridge of his nose that looked more like a fashion accessory than something for an actual wound. It wasn't rare for Kotetsu and his partner Izumo to do something stupid and manage to get injured. Rie had never seen either one of them seriously injured, but it seemed that one, if not both of them, ended up in outpatient more often than not. In her year at the hospital Rie had treated both of them many times.

Rie gently pushed Kotetsu back so that he was lying down. Broken ribs were not hard to treat, precarious work, but not hard. The staff at the hospital would almost always pass off broken ribs to Rie if she were at the hospital. The fact that they were so close to the lungs made them a little dangerous to treat and Rie's Gyoshi-ho negated what danger there was. As Rie activated her eyes, she saw that Kotetsu only had two fractured ribs that would be a fairly easy fix.

Neji stood in the corner of the curtained off area watching Rie work, looking bored. "Oh Rie, you never introduced me to your boyfriend" Kotetsu said grinning at the two dumbfounded genin.

Neji opened his mouth to respond, but no sound came out. He shook his head before trying again. "No. I have simply been asked to make sure that Hatake makes it home safely. Nothing more." Rie's hands stilled for a moment at Neji's cold tone before she composed herself and continued to heal Kotetsu.

"Ah you're no fun" Kotetsu said pouting. "Thanks Rie" he said as the girl finished up. "You know this wouldn't have happened if it wasn't for Izumo."

"Hey" came a startled cry from the other side of the curtain. With a sinking feeling Rie looked at her chart to see that Izumo was the other patient with broken ribs. Rie bemoaned inside her head as she went to the next curtained off area to treat Izumo. Neji and Kotetsu followed after her. "It was not my fault" Izumo said defending himself as the threesome entered.

"Was to" Kotetsu argued childishly as Rie treated his partner. "We were on a mission to take out a group of bandits on the border" he explained. "It went smoothly until the very end when we went to take out the leader. We were going to use a new combination that we had been working on to finish him off. Izumo hesitated, so our timing was off and …"

"It was not my fault" Izumo shouted sitting up. Rie slapped him in the back of the head for moving while being treated. Only one of his ribs was injured, but it was a complete break unlike Kotetsu. If Rie didn't have fast reflexes she could have really hurt him when he jumped up like that. "Sorry" he apologized sheepishly as he lay back down. "Like I said, it wasn't my fault. We just started work on that combination and it was nowhere near battle ready. I tried to tell Kotetsu that, but he just had to charge on in anyway" Izumo said heatedly staring at his teammate.

"You never said we shouldn't use that combination in battle" Kotetsu argued as Rie finished. Rie quickly grabbed Neji's hand and pulled him out of the curtain to escape the fighting Chunin. Once in the hallway Rie dropped his hand without even looking at him and walked down the hall before tapping another curtain.

They went in to find a frazzled father and a hyperactive two year-old boy. The boy was currently climbing up the cabinets, while his father tried to get him to come down before he fell and hurt himself. Rie walked over and, standing on her tiptoes, plucked the toddler from the cabinets and carried him over to the bed. She dropped him with a light thud, causing the boy to giggle.

"I'm so sorry about this" the father said as Rie examined his son. "You see, she took a couple years off after our son was born, but with him in preschool now, she returned to active duty. It's the first time I've been on my own taking care of him and I'm at a loss" he explained.

Rie smiled gently at the man tickling the squirming boy, causing him to go into another giggle fit. When she was done, he laid still allowing her to treat him. It wasn't difficult. All she had to do was make sure that none of the marbles had caused any damage, use her chakra to compress them into a smaller size, and move a few to a better location for them to be passed. Rie smiled at the father–son duo before bowing in farewell and handing his chart to a nurse to be dismissed. He would be fine, but would need to come back in a few days to make sure that all the marbles had passed without incident.

The genin made their way to the third floor to see Rie's last patient of the night. Neji smiled slightly as he looked at his young teammate. "You are really good with children" he said in the warmest tone she had heard from the serious Hyuga. Rie blushed slightly and looked away, not expecting the complement.

Upon reaching the third floor they walked into a room where a jonin was lying on the bed in obvious pain. The nurse in the room handed information to add to his chart. "Hold on, why do you have a kid treating me? This is crazy" the chunin demanded causing Rie to sigh in annoyance.

"Well to be honest, she's one of the best medics in Konoha and she is not as young as she looks" the nurse answered for Rie. Rie activated her Gyoshi-ho and frowned, seeing that it was indeed serious.Rie then tied back her hair as she prepared for a difficult case. The poor Jonin had been hit by a powerful earth jutsu. He was almost crushed to death before his teammates were able to save him. The bones in both of his legs had been crushed, causing bone fragments to dig into his muscles. Rie's job would be to remove the fragments from the muscles because no one else would be able to find all of them.

Neji gawked at her when he saw the severe scaring on her face. She blushed a bit embarrassed by his stare, but quickly covered it and shrugged. Neji turned around with a huff, pretending that he wasn't just staring.

It took a long time, almost three hours before Rie was done. She sat on the floor, breathing heavily and drenched in sweat. It had been hard on the patient and both he and Rie were exhausted.

"Well you were right, she is good" the jonin said between huffs. Rie smiled her thanks, leaning her head back against the wall.

"Told you" the nurse bragged. "Rie that's enough for today, good work" she said turning to the downed medic. Rie nodded while beginning to stand, only to fall back on her butt. "You used too much chakra again didn't you" the nurse chided. Rie looked down to avoid making eye contact. "Ok, well you can rest here. I'll let Kakashi know to come get you … again" she said sighing.

"I was supposed walk her home, so I can just take her" Neji suddenly spoke up. Rie had forgotten he was there in her fatigue and was completely caught off guard at his offer.

"If you don't mind that would be great. Make sure and let Kakashi know about her chakra exhaustion though" the nurse said smiling at the brunette.

"Of course" he said picking Rie up bridal style and leapt out the window. He was jumping from roof to roof when he spoke. "You sure are a lot of trouble."

He didn't have to do it. I don't know why he's upset Rie grumbled in her head.

"Do you think Kakashi is home yet" Neji asked, arriving at the Hatake door. Rie shook her head as he went inside and gently placed her on the couch. His stomach then grumbled and Rie pointed to the kitchen looking smug. "Its fine, I can eat when I get home" Neji assured, looking away from his petit teammate. Rie just continued pointing, looking just as smug as before. He sighed "fine."

Rie heard him in the kitchen and leaned back to wait on Kakashi.

…...

Rie woke with a start as Kakashi came in the front door. He gave Neji a surprised look, seeing him sitting in the chair looking through a magazine. "Hey … Neji is it?" Neji just nodded. "Did uh, Rie invite you here" he asked, still confused at the Hyuga's presence.

"Not exactly sir. You see, she nearly passed out at the hospital and …" he started.

Kakashi cut him off "again Rie." She avoided his stare.

"I made dinner. Rie made me go get something to eat. So I thought it would be nice" Neji ventured unsure. Rie cocked your head to the side. "Don't give me that look, I really can cook" Neji said giving Rie a mock glare.

"Ok then, let's go eat. I'm starving" Kakashi said picking Rie up and slinging her over his shoulder. Neji smirked seeing this.

Dinner was mostly quiet except for the occasional question from Kakashi. Neji made a wonderful herring soba, which he said was his favorite. Neji left right after dinner, thanking Kakashi for the food.

When Kakashi was tucking Rie in that night he sighed and asked "so you still haven't spoken in front of your team?"

"I'm sorry Kakashi" Rie answered, genuinely apologetic.

"Rie I know this is hard for you, but they are your team. You are going to have to learn to trust them."

"I know" Rie said looking at her quilt.

"At least that Neji kid seems to be able to understand you pretty well. Speaking of which, why was he with you exactly" Kakashi asked, smiling like a goon.

"It's your fault! When you asked Iruka to walk me home he asked Neji" Rie said pointing an accusing finger at her father.

"Oh, sorry about that" Kakashi said lamely.

"It's ok. Good night Kakashi. I love you" she said as Kakashi kissed her on her forehead.

"I love you too Rie. Sweet dreams" and he cut out the light.