For some time, Host sat in his room cross-legged on the floor, gently tapping at the threads of this simulated reality, putting the finishing touches on the arena. He had chosen to do it while everyone else slept, for much the same reasons that operations are conducted upon patients while they sleep: just less fuss for everyone. The downside of this was that they would have to rough it another night on the hard ground of the arena floor. At least this time he managed to provide some futons and proper blankets; no more of that itchy wool.

For all it's complexity, Host's control over the environment's appearance was really rather limited, if not downright crude. He could influence basic shape and texture, but things such as colour or physical properties required a great deal more effort and concentration. Imagine trying to hold on to a few dozen eels who have recently been slathered in oil and are doing their utmost to regain their freedom, and you may have some idea of the difficulty involved in the task Host faced. Complex structures or machines usually had to be built from scratch, and all he could do was provide the materials (this was where Yukiko and her handlers came in). Transporting things was a cinch, it was assembling or giving them form in the first place that was the problem. So, how to transform dirt and clay into marble? For what he had in mind, Host needed marble. Brass too, probably.

The problem was that this whole place was made of thought, and you can't just transform one thought into a different one. All you can do is poke and prod and stubbornly work your way to advancing the existing thought until it more-or-less resembles what you want.

Host sighed and cracked his knuckles. This was going to be an all-nighter.

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"Ino?"

"Hm?" Ino looked up from the futon that she was preparing for herself. Her eyes met those of Tenten, and she thought she saw traces of worry in the older girl's face.

"Do you have a minute?" Tenten asked, and her tone of voice confirmed Ino's suspicion.

"Sure. What's up?" Ino plopped down cross-legged on her futon, the very picture of an understanding comrade.

"Well, I have a sort of a... problem," Tenten began, shifting her gaze uncomfourtably as she sat down across from the blonde girl and drew her knees up to her chest.

Ino frowned. "A problem?" she asked, "What kind of a problem?"

"Like a... guy kind of a problem."

"...a guy kind of a problem?" Ino repeated the words, still not comprehending their meaning.

"You know," Tenten persisted, "Like a problem with guys?"

Ino stared for a moment, then her eyes widened in surprise.

"Oh, um..." she stammered, tittering nervously, "Listen, Tenten, we're friends and all, but I actually just like boys. I mean, that's really sweet of you to think of me that way, but I wouldn't be able to return the feelings, you know? So I really think it's better if we just stay..."

"What are you talking about?" Tenten interrupted her babbling comrade, bewildered.

"Well, it's just you say that you're having a problem with guys, so I assume you mean that you don't have that same kind of problem with girls, right? I mean, I always thought you were just sporty, but now that I think about it it does sort of make sense that..."

"Ino!"

"W-what?"

"Stop there, you've got completely the wrong idea. Look, I like guys!"

"Oh," Ino visibly relaxed and let out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding, "Good, me too." Then after a moment she hurriedly added: "Not that there would be anything wrong with- !"

"Just shut up, Ino."

"Okay," she said meekly.

"Look, my problem is..." Tenten searched for a delicate way to phrase it, "I've got a guy who's... 'pursuing' me, but I like somebody else."

The Yamanaka kunoichi cheered up considerably at this deference to her expertise. "Does the guy you like know?"

"Yeah."

"Does he like you back?"

"Yeah."

Ino clapped her hands together delightedly.

"Ah! Congratulations Tenten!" she cried, throwing out her arms to hug her friend, "That's great news! Who is he?"

"Thanks, but can we stick to the point?" Tenten deflected, extricating herself from the suffocating embrace.

"Sure, as soon as you tell me who he is!"

"Please, can't you just tell me what I should do?"

Ino stuck out her lower lip in a pout. "You're no fun," she said sulkily, then redirected her attentions to the task at hand, "So what I'm hearing is that you've got two different guys after you?"

"I guess so, yeah."

"And that's a problem?"

Tenten glared. "Of course it's a problem! I don't know how I got mixed up in this mess but I want out!"

"My heart bleeds for you," Ino rolled her eyes sarcastically, "Two men competing over you at the same time? Why I can't think of a girl in the world who'd want that!"

"Ino, please! This is out of my field."

"Okay, okay, I'll give you what advice I can, but you should at least know beforehand that most girls would love to be in your position right now," Ino relented, though she still could not help feeling a tad envious. Out of all the girls in her year she would not have picked Tenten to be the first to end up in a love-triangle.

"Yes, yes, I know."

'But I'm not most girls...' Tenten protested inwardly.

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

Shikamaru was sitting cross-legged with his elbows rested on his knees, head and shoulders hunched in deep concentration. Beside him Temari lay flat on her back, staring vacantly at the arena roof as she too tried to make sense of the recent goings-on.

"He explained 'what' he is," Shikamaru spoke slowly, "And 'who' he is..."

"More or less," Temari interjected.

"More or less," Shikamaru agreed, "And also 'why' he is."

"That leaves 'where', 'when', and 'how'."

"Indeed; 'Where' are we? 'How' did we get here? And 'when' can we leave?"

"It seems that way."

The Nara heir furrowed his brow, following a train of thought.

"He said he was made of thought..."

"Which we can assume to be the truth."

"What, just like that?"

Temari looked at him questioningly.

"Do you have any better explanations, genius?"

He had to concede that, even if a bit far-fetched, it was the best working hypothesis they had.

"Fair enough. So, he claims to be composed of thoughts. Our thoughts. Also, judging by recent events, it seems safe to assume that our surroundings are made up of thought as well."

"So, what, this is some kind of dream?"

"Dream, illusion, genjutsu, hallucination, take your pick," Shikamaru made an expansive gesture with his hands, "That would also explain why none of us remember how we got here."

"Oh?"

"How can you tell where a dream starts or ends? It just kind of... happens."

There was a moment of silence in which they both contemplated this theory, then Temari gave voice to something which had been niggling at the back of Shikamaru's mind.

"This is, of course," Temari's tone was grim, "All under the assumption that anyone else in this dream is actually here. Who's to say they aren't just figments of the imagination?"

Shikamaru was quiet, still staring thoughtfully into space, but Temari's words seemed to have unsettled him. Even though he knew the question had to be asked, he was still reluctant to ask it, as though saying it out loud would somehow give it substance. The shinobi in him would never admit it, but deep down, a small portion of him wasn't sure that he wanted this dream to end. Since this whole business had started Temari and he had never been closer. What he had found they shared was not the wild, experimental excitement of passion that seemed to hold such allure for some of his comrades, rather it was a comfourtable closeness; a sort of unspoken fondness and mutual acceptance of one another. It was a kind of relationship that Shikamaru found agreeable.

He lay down on the pillow with his arms folded behind his head, in the same pose he adopted when watching clouds. Ever since the 'shift' he had felt somehow drained, as though his mind itself were heavy with fatigue. He closed his eyes and ruminated on Temari's question. How could he be sure that all the other people here weren't just all in his head? Who was to say that he wasn't actually lying in the Konoha hospital, deep in a coma and all this was just some extended hallucination?

'I hope that everyone is actually here,' he thought as he felt himself drifting off to sleep, 'This would all be... troublesome to have to deal with alone.'

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

It was in the early hours of the morning when Sasuke, by force of habit, awoke and grudgingly remembered his surroundings. Irritated, but continuing to be driven by routine, he threw the covers off of himself and sat cross-legged on his mattress, preparing to begin his morning meditation. Or at least to give the impression that he was meditating.

He couldn't tell exactly how long it had been since he had first come to be in this place (or places) but he knew that it had certainly been long enough that he could feel a rough, itchy stubble forming on his chin.

Sasuke did not like facial hair. He wasn't sure whether that were some innate part of his sense of aesthetics, or whether it were merely because he could never get his own to look quite right. While Sasuke did not consider himself a vain person, some small part of him had still enjoyed the attention paid to him by the Konoha's female population. Not that he would ever deign to actually pay them any notice, but neither was he exactly averse to the constant stroking of his ego. So, consciously or unconsciously, he still retained a certain compulsion to keep himself looking reasonably presentable. Then facial hair had happened.

Puberty had not been kind to Sasuke. In seemingly all other aspects he had won the genetic lottery, but this seemed to be where the line had been drawn. Hair grew on Sasuke's face in strange ways, with certain patches growing out thickly and others remaining either stunted or else completely bald. Such was the Uchiha's Achilles heel.

And now he had been sucked into this silly dare. Honestly, it was demeaning. Humiliating. Worst of all it was actually starting to get to him. He had resolved that he was above such trifles as personal appearance, but his ego seemed to be disagreeing.

As it was, he had retreated to a dark corner of the arena with his beddings to meditate in solitude. At least that was what he told himself he was doing. Deep down he may have simply been sulking.

However, his cogitations were interrupted by a quiet voice which he recognized as belonging to Juugo. He had not spoken to any of the erstwhile team Taka since the shift, so he wondered what his former teammate could want with him now.

"Sasuke?" Juugo approached him, voice low.

"Hm?" Sasuke for his part did not open his eyes, merely continuing to sit cross-legged on his futon, the very picture of calm focus.

"I just wanted to make sure that you were still in one piece. Some of us didn't fare too well in that shift, so I'm checking in with the team."

"I'm fine," Sasuke replied calmly, but curtly.

"Good," Juugo's voice trailed off. It had not been quite the exchange he had expected, but for that matter, what had he expected? Bemused, he wandered off in search of his other two teammates. He had already checked in with them long-since, but he felt it wouldn't hurt to make sure that they hadn't gotten lost or been hurt during the day. Just for his own peace of mind.

"May I walk with you?" a quiet voice reached his ears, and he looked down and to his right toward its source. A short, slight girl was walking beside him, looking up into his face for an answer. The girl was dressed in a long black coat, and her shoulder-length hair was tousled. Her eyes were big and pale blue, and there was something odd about the way she carried herself; something familiar, almost like...

"Host?" Juugo inquired, the surprise evident in his voice.

The girl nodded, taking two steps for each of his long strides.

"I've focused on your mind. This is your version of me."

Juugo considered Host's form; a small, mousey looking girl who's head only came up to his elbow, skipping alongside him to keep up. She looked harmless. She almost reminded him of some kind of small, soft animal; like a rabbit.

"What are you doing?" He asked, not rudely, merely curiously.

"Same as you," Host replied, "Checking in. How are you holding up?"

The former test-subject considered the question. He hadn't had any psychotic outbursts recently, so he supposed that was a success.

"Fine," he answered, slowing his pace slightly in order to cut Host some slack.

"Mmhmm," Host too sounded thoughtful.

The unlikely pair continued to walk in silence for a while, no longer searching for anyone, just making their way in a circuit around the arena. They certainly cut an odd spectacle: one a veritable giant, the other of almost dwarfish proportions.

Finally Host spoke up again. "You know you're probably the first person who hasn't asked me why you're all here."

"No," Juugo said simply, "I haven't."

"You're not curious." It was more of a statement than a question.

"It doesn't matter why we're here, only that we are here now."

Host considered that for a moment. It was not within the nature of the mind to simply accept things as they happened and then move on, so, to his surprise, he was having difficulty understanding Juugo's point of view. Admittedly his connection to Juugo's mind was not so strong as to, say, Naruto's, but nevertheless he should have been able to comprehend the former test subject's thought processes at the very least.

What surprised Host still more was that this conversation the two of them were having had actually presented him with a new idea. Usually whenever he bothered to engage in verbal communication it was either to aid his partner in better understanding their own thoughts, or else to explain some obscure concept, but not this time.

It was with a jolt that the metaphysical anomaly realized why this was.

'I'm losing contact,' he thought, a cold ball of panic dropping into his stomach, 'I'm developing and becoming autonomous.'

Being in such close contact to the minds that had conceived him for this long was having a profound effect on him, one greatly accelerated to that which he had anticipated.

He knew what he would have to do, although he didn't like the idea.

"Juugo," he said, breaking the silence that had fallen between them, "I'm going to be gone for a while. I'll be leaving Yukiko in charge."

Juugo looked at him quizzically. "Gone? Gone where?"

"It doesn't matter. Just be sure and tell everyone that everything is fine. This isn't any kind of emergency, and I will be back shortly. Maybe in a day or so."

"I don't think they'll worry, most of them don't like you very much," Juugo said matter-of-factly, "But why do you want me to tell them?"

"You're one of them. They'll believe it coming from you. From me or one of my people they might get suspicious."

Juugo noticed that Host had used the word "them". It was no secret that the gathering here was divided. There were the guests, and the hosts, and for all their hospitality, the atmosphere in this place was far from hospitable.

"Alright, I'll tell them."

"Thank you," Host sighed.

The pair walked through a doorway and down a corridor, stopping when they reached the end.

It was obvious to Juugo that they had arrived at their destination.

"You've been hard at work," was all he could say to the spectacle in front of him.

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

It was not for another hour that the general multitude began to wake up. When they did, it was largely due to the handlers scurrying around the place hurriedly, lugging large poles or bundles of fabric, weaving dexterously in between the bedrolls.

When the bleary-eyed sleepers were roused from their tranquility by the movement, they were presented with a sight that instantly shocked the vestiges of fatigue from their brains.

There was a large, deep red carpet leading through one of the archways that had hitherto been blocked by a large, wooden portcullis, and velvet ropes were slung between brass line dividers running the length of the long carpet. Handlers rushed down it on their various errands underneath date-palms set in huge blue china pots placed at regular intervals along the causeway, their fronds drooping over to form a leafy boulevard. The ground beneath the carpet and for three feet all around it had been seemingly replaced with white marble slabs, and handlers carried armloads of the same material down into the room beyond the newly decorated portal. A small sign hung from the archway that read: "Work in progress: handler entry only, please."

Naruto voiced the assembly's general confusion when he said: "What the heck is going on?"

Yukiko came rushing out to meet the multitude, hands raised in a placating gesture.

"Please, everyone, I must ask you to wait just a little longer before you can enter the great hall, we're just adding the finishing touches right now."

"Great hall?" Sakura asked, puzzled.

"Yes, Master thought that seeing as the conditions around here are relatively... medieval, he would put some effort into sprucing up a wing of the complex for everyone's comfourt. He really put a great deal of effort into it," she added admiringly, "I think this is his best work yet."

And indeed it seemed to be. Host appeared to have evolved past the bronze-age motif towards a more flamboyant, late renaissance style. Cypresses gave way to potted palms and small orange trees, bas reliefs had been replaced by large oil paintings set in gilded frames. The columns, however, remained, but rather than the segmented, doric behemoths of before, these were smaller, sleeker, with intricate Corinthian moulding. They were set at intervals down the hall on either side, supporting the ceiling and forming a corridor of decorative archways.

"Unfortunately," Yukiko continued, "Most of the more modern amenities that were provided for you in our previous habitation were lost in the shift. I'm afraid that we have little in the way of electricity, and it was all Master could do to provide this place with running water."

A murmur ran through the crowd. As shinobi they were perfectly accustomed to living rough, but that was usually whilst on a mission, and only for a period of a few days, or a week at most. Who knew how long they would be kept here?

"Now, Master wants to extend his apologies for the inconvenience, but as I'm sure you can understand, technology is extremely complex and it would take Master weeks to replace what was lost. However, there is plenty of food, and the new furnishings should be perfectly comfourtable," as Yukiko finished, a twinkle briefly appeared in her eye. From what she had seen, her master had worked tirelessly to ensure everyone's comfourt, and the new accommodations made the previous ones look positively spartan. As if to accentuate this point, a cluster of handlers shuffled past her carrying between them a large brass chandelier, followed closely by another handler so laden down with crisp, white linen sheets that he disappeared behind the mountain of fabric.

Curious, but willing to remain patient, the assembly dispersed to various edges of the arena to find or create what amusement they could. Juugo went around to the various groups and individuals, explaining what Host had told him and reiterating that there was no cause for alarm. The reactions he received ranged from worry, to confusion, to Tayuya saying: "Good. Cocky bastard was getting on my nerves."

Finally, just over an hour later, a lone handler emerged from the depths of the hallway and gave Yukiko a double thumbs-up. She nodded to the handler, and called to the masses for their attention.

"Everyone," she announced, unclipping the rope barrier and looping it over her arm, "Welcome to the Great Hall."

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Shoutouts

Akumalove97: Haha, thank you :)

nhairnuattoa7: Thank you very much! That means a great deal to me :D

Alexandria: I'm glad you like it!