14

Naruto and company entered the training grounds not an hour after leaving Sasuke's home. It wasn't too difficult to make their way there without anyone spotting them since most everyone was preoccupied with the beginning stages of rebuilding. Throughout the early morning, carpenters and merchants who had been sent for had been arriving. Most of the regular villagers of Konoha were meandering around the village, searching for possessions, or in some cases, family members and friends.

It was too early yet for them to feel happy about the realization that they had survived. At the moment, the most anyone could hope for was a state of shock; a pallor that surrounded the village. And the only group that didn't seem to be affected were the ninja of the village. Tsunade had called a meeting for all the ninja that had fought against Madara's attack. She had told them, in no uncertain terms, that most of them were lucky to be alive. And it was hard to be sad about that, really.

All the ninja of the village were energetic, unless they were injured, of course. Anyone who could work did so with great pleasure, and the frames of buildings were already being raised. But none of them were aware enough of their surroundings to notice Naruto's group travelling through it and they made their way to the training grounds with ease.

Seconds after walking into the large open field surrounded by trees, almost a mile and a half from the village's walls, the four of them were greeted by the sound of a huge explosion and the forms of two rapidly moving figures moving past them.

The blond recognized both of them as Sakura and Temari. They were being chased by what looked like, no, what was a large cloud of sand. Sakura saw Naruto out of the corner of her eye and shouted to him before continuing her retreat.

"Help, please!"

Naruto grinned. He turned back to his companions, all of whom were amused by the sight.

"Want to join in?"

Suigetsu and Karin both grinned back at him while Konan and Juugo just smiled and nodded.

"Okay, then. Me and Konan will be in Sakura and Temari's group. Karin, Suigetsu and Juugo will be on Gaara's team. How's that? Good? Alright! Let's go!"

The two groups separated and shot off to join their respective teams. Naruto, once they were on their way, immediately sent twenty clones, in the guises of him and his assumed teammates, out in all directions to get Gaara's sand off their tail.

Naruto and Konan caught up with the two kunoichi shortly after that. Both Sakura and Temari pulled kunai on them the moment they stepped onto the branch they were apparently resting on.

"Hold on! We're on your team!" Naruto summoned five more kagebunshin to demonstrate he was indeed the real thing and sent them off as well as soon as the two of them lowered their guards.

"I'm guessing you sent the other three to join Gaara?" Temari asked.

"Yeah. Not that he needs any help, though."

How did you know we were here? We were masking our chakra." Sakura asked.

"I can sense chakra probably just as well as Karin now, if not better. That sage training I went through did a lot to magnify my abilities."

She nodded in understanding.

"How long have you guys been at it?" he asked.

"Only about half an hour. Gaara suggested that we have a quick warm-up before training starts." Temari stated wryly.

Naruto barked a short laugh. "There aren't too many people who would consider this a quick warm-up," he said, noting the out-of-breath state of the two women. "But Gaara is one of them. Not to mention-"

He stilled suddenly, then a playful smile broke out on his face. "Those rats! Suigetsu just took out one of my clones! And Gaara just took out five!" The blond turned to his three teammates. "Let's go get them."

Sakura noticed the eager look on Naruto's face and smiled in understanding. He always had used training to forget.

"So, who are we pairing up with?" She asked. Temari and Konan just looked at each other and shrugged.

"Well I'm gonna take Gaara, of course. I think you would have a fun match with Juugo, Sakura. He's pretty strong." She nodded. "What do you two want to do?" Naruto directed the question at Konan and Temari.

"I wouldn't be a very good match with Suigetsu, with his water abilities, but I can take Karin down. Can you take Suigetsu, Temari-san?"

"Of course!"

"Then we're all set?" The other three nodded to him. "Alright then. Let me tell you where our targets are…"

xXx

She crept along from tree to tree. Suigetsu was a few feet behind and to the left of her. She made to jump to the next branch but lost her balance as an abnormally strong gust of wind sent her careening sideways when the branch she stood on jerked and moved under her.

Suigetsu shot forward to steady her but was forced back when some needlelike objects shot towards him. She managed to catch herself with another smaller branch below the one she'd stood on and jumped back to join Suigetsu.

"They're here." She said as she sensed two revealed chakras. "It's the wind-witch Gaara was telling us about and Konan."
"I have a name, you know! It's Temari." came a woman's voice from above them.

Konan and Suigetsu looked towards the voice and saw its producer standing in a short kimono with a large, open fan held in her right hand.

Next to her stood Konan in her newly acquired garb of something resembling a Jounin's uniform, only the vest was black and only had two scroll compartments on the front. She wore a long-sleeve fishnet shirt under that and her pants were long, beige khakis that ended at her ankles and were pulled into the tops of the regular sandals.

"Shall we fight?" Konan asked with a smirk.

"Why not?" Suigetsu pulled his sword from his back and jumped forward, with Karin not far behind.

xXx

"Hello, Juugo-san. Would you like to spar with me?"

They were in the middle of a small clearing on the forest floor. They'd been so quiet in their arrival that only at Sakura's question did a deer bolt from just beyond the edge of the trees.

Juugo smiled slightly. "Please go easy on me."

xXx

"Now we finally get to have our rematch!" Naruto exclaimed.

"I'll win this time." Gaara replied

"I won't use Kyuubi this time." Naruto told the red-haired kage.

"You don't really have a choice in that, do you? Since the two of you merged, her chakra is nearly your own, now."

"True enough. But I won't use the cloak."

"Have it your way. Don't go too easy on me, though." The red-head said with a raised eyebrow

"Oh, shut up, Gaara! I bet you could take me even if I had the cloak on. C'mon. Let's go!"

The pair of them stood in a setting similar to where they'd last fought. However, this time, instead of being in the treetops, they mirrored each other at the ends of a small oblong field.

Gaara's wall of sand flowed into itself in a continuous wave at his back and he stood in his near famous cross-armed stance, his gourd (although it was now noticeably larger than it had been the last time Naruto had seen him) still strapped across his back. He wore a more battle-suited version of his hokage's robes; loose fitting brown pants and a dark red shirt with a long, beige cloth draped from around his neck to his waist, same as it was the time he and Naruto had met after his demon had been extracted from him.

Naruto stood facing him in the clothes he'd "borrowed" from Sasuke's closet (borrowed meaning that they'd probably end up in such a bad condition that he wouldn't be able to return them). He'd managed to find some long grayish colored pants that fit him pretty well, taking in the fact that Sasuke had been twelve the last time he'd worn them; Sasuke always had been taller than him, and Naruto hadn't filled out too much anyway, to his irritation.

Besides that, though, Naruto had also discovered a shirt of Sasuke's, without the flared neck. He'd found that he didn't really mind wearing the fan Uchiha crest that covered that back of the navy blue shirt. At the time that he'd found it, he'd actually wondered about the fact- why that particular thought would make itself known in the first place- but he'd pushed it to the back of his mind.

Naruto slowly pulled a kunai from his own weapons pouch; on guard for any movement from Gaara. He dropped into an almost unnoticeable crouch, but he could see Gaara tense at seeing the possibly offensive stance. He brought his hands together and concentrated his chakra.

Gaara, noticing the blond's suddenly active chakra, sent his sand cloud shooting towards Naruto, wondering just how much he'd learned over the years. If he'd been expecting to get a hit in on the man, however, he was sorely mistaken. Just as the sand came within inches of the blond's face, he disappeared. Gaara hadn't even seen the man move. There was only a puff of dust left in his place.

"You told me not to go easy on you. Don't hold back on me."

Gaara didn't even get the chance to answer back as he dodged a fist that came within inches of his face. Naruto's attack didn't stop there, apparently, and, just as Gaara's sand reached its guarding position by his face, Gaara was pushed backwards by some powerful force, throwing him almost twenty feet before he found his feet again. Naruto jumped back and grinned at him, allowing Gaara to recover. It was only a spar after all. No need to go all out.

"Where did you learn that?"

"It was part of my Sage training."

"That was what your master was trained in, right?"

"Yeah. I'll tell you about it later."

"Hn."

Naruto created two Kagebunshin and had them create two Rasengan in both of his hands. He started forward and Gaara dodged to the left, only to be met by one of the two clones who also held a Rasengan in hand. Seeing that he would be trapped between the two of them, he pulled all of his sand over him and made his shield.

When all three Rasengan hit, the shield barely held. But considering the power that even one Rasengan had, that was impressive in and of itself. As Naruto stepped back to behold the damage he had wrought, he saw hairline cracks in what appeared to be a material not unlike diamond. He could see a partially distorted form of Gaara crouching low. At a gesture from the form, the shield disintegrated into sand once more and Gaara stood up fully.

Naruto looked on with an approving look. "Nice…"

Gaara smirked, only slightly. "Thanks."

Naruto jumped directly to his left as he sensed two tentacle-like chakras darting in from behind him. The two sand arms passed little more than three inches from his right side. He could feel a new draft of air as his borrowed clothes gained two new holes. Naruto landed in a crouch and turned on the balls of his feet to flip backwards and away from the wave of sand that Gaara sent tumbling after him.
If I didn't know any better, I'd say he was actually trying to kill me. Naruto laughed under his breath. He did a quick chakra search of the training grounds. Of course he knew where Gaara was, but he wanted to see how his team was doing.

Karin, Suigetsu, Temari, and Konan were fighting furiously. It was pretty easy to see that Karin and Suigetsu were a good team together, as Temari and Konan were getting worn out quickly. Naruto was pretty sure the two of them-Suigetsu and Karin, that is- had something going on between them. Sure, they fought a lot, but that's what couples did. I mean, look at him and Sasu-. Ok, backing off that topic.

Juugo and Sakura were out of his range, but he was pretty sure they were a little ways east of him. He also felt what seemed to be a familiar chakra a little ways off to the south, probably Kakashi. Hopefully Yamato-sensei and Sai would come with him. They needed all the help they could get when they went after Madara.

Naruto dodged yet another arm of sand that Gaara threw his way. The young Kazekage had apparently outgrown his habit of keeping his arms crossed during a fight. Either that or he was taking the fight with Naruto very seriously. The man was using his sand to the fullest, guiding it with his hands and arms, making its movements even faster and more powerful.

He sent three kunai at Gaara and they were blocked easily by the sand. Naruto backpedaled as three arms of sand tried to maneuver him into a spot where he'd be surrounded. Just as he stepped back, however, the ground rose around him encasing him in a tomb-like cylindrical area.

"Great, Gaara. You just had to go and learn another sand tomb attack…" He muttered. Naruto concentrated his chakra into his right fist. Around it, he shaped his blades of air-

Kit, why don't we try something new? I've thought of a good technique and everything. Kyuubi said out of the blue. Naruto jumped at the suddenness of her voice. He'd thought she'd been sleeping until that moment, and Kyuubi apparently knew it. She laughed.

But I told Gaara I wouldn't use your help.

No, you told him you wouldn't use my chakra. She corrected. Plus, this is especially for breaking a trap. It won't affect him in the least; it'll only get you out of this ill-decorated sand-tomb. She started pouting.

Fine, Fine. What is it?

Well…She started to whisper to him, even though she knew no one could hear her. She was just getting into the fight. It'd been a while since her host had been in a fight for anything but his life. All the better to make the best of it.

…That's a great idea, Kyuu! Naruto eventually said. He'd practiced something like what she was proposing when he'd first gotten a grip on his control of wind chakra. He grinned. It had been rather fun, and, well, destructive.

Naruto let his chakra flow from his body. He reached out to the air around him, willing it to spin itself into sharp blades guided by his chakra, typically creating a huge Rasengan around his body. As he was lifted off the ground by the air pressure, he curled his legs up into his chest so that he could move the air more freely. He moved his arms in circular motions around him to make the air move faster and faster until… There!

Naruto suddenly pushed the air outwards with a strain of his muscles. The hair-thin blades sliced easily through the now hardening sand and he was left to stand in a foot-deep carved-out crater. And there was Gaara, standing a few feet away, looking as astonished as one could possibly expect. After inspecting the ground around him, he saw why. Gaara had been covering the outside of his sand tomb with the same diamond-like substance he had used for his own shield, which would have made it impossible to get out if he wasn't, well, Naruto.

You were right, Kyuu! It worked even better than we thought! And it didn't take as much chakra as my Rasen Shuriken either. He grinned.

Like I would have been wrong. She said, faking haughtiness.

Never! Naruto laughed internally.

Gaara, meanwhile, had uncovered from his stupor and raised his arms to direct his sand at Naruto once again. Naruto was preparing to jump when he felt a brush against his senses.

No…It can't be…

Gaara's eyes widened as he realized that Naruto wasn't going to jump out of the way like he'd thought. He pulled back on his sand as hard as he could, the pressure of the many tons pulling heavily at his arms. The sand spikes were a hairs-breadth away from Naruto's face when the blond disappeared, leaving three muttered words for a confused Gaara to decipher:

"It's not possible."

xXx

He raced across the training grounds, through trees and opens clearings, branches tearing at his face and arms and legs and clothes, but he didn't care. If that person was really there…

Please let him be there. Please.

He ran south of the village, where he'd originally thought Kakashi had been coming from. He'd been wrong. He could feel Kakashi's chakra clearly now. The man was now quickly headed Naruto's way, feeling his fluctuating chakra. But the Copy Ninja was not coming from the Southern region of the outskirts of Konoha. He was at the Northern end. This chakra... The very existence of this chakra wasn't possible.

Naruto was at his destination within minutes and was within sight of the person he was looking for. He was there. He was alive. Naruto opened his mouth to speak but he could get any words to form so he closed his mouth and tried again:

"Jiraiya-sensei?"