Infinite Sharingan

by Arthur Hansen

My take on "Team Sharingan" and what those cursed eyes will do to all of Team 7's genins. With a bit of help from Fanboyinmusprime.

3. Finals and Assassins

Ino Yamanaka landed lightly on the ground, thinking furiously about Sasuke and Sakura. The girl had been her 'rival' but she had never really taken her seriously until Sakura had ended up on Team 7.

"You seem to be confused and distracted? Perhaps you should bow out so you can consider your love life in depth," Shino Aburame said in a chilly tone.

"Oh, don't worry, Aburame, I have more than enough to take you out, even being a distracted damsel," the blonde said to her opponent in a scathing tone.

"So you feel your are ready? I sincerely doubt that you are in any way, shape or form prepared," Shino commented as he doubted Ino knew even the basics of her family's fighting style. She was also a huge fangirl who fawned over Sasuke Ichiha and going by rumors he heard even went on diets to stay thin. It honestly surprised Shino that Ino had made it this far. Still Shino wanted to fight a worthy foe and Ino would not cut it. Shino sent out a swarm of his bugs in a spiral formation at Ino.

She just flipped backwards while throwing a kunai that the destruction-bug user intercepted with a stream of bugs. "Is this truly the best of this generation of Yamanaka? You should have at least rested up better," Shino remarked as if bored.

"I guess it's time to take it up a notch then," the blonde replied.

Shino ordered his bugs to land on Ino and drain her chakra. Best to end this complete farce of a battle now instead of let Ino make an even bigger fool of herself in front of everyone. For the good of Leaf of course.

But she was too cagey, keeping herself just far enough away and avoiding the pitfalls of being trapped in a corner. Shino knew he should have told her he used a bug to poison her and then use a minor genjitsu to make feel a fever, sweaty and taste bile in the back of her mouth. He narrowed his eyes.

Suddenly she made regular clones to quickly confuse him and surround him. Each of them went through a handseal, but only the one in the far back slumped over. Shino immediately leaped to the side. According to what he knew, she was helpless if she missed.

His bugs came at her in streams, slamming... through her illusion? He started to push his sense to detect where she really was...

That was when he suddenly lost direct sense of anything. Ino had slumped over from right within five feet of him and too quickly to dodge. Shino's body raised his hand, grimacing behind his collar. This was a very disturbing body to be in. Ino could literally feel bugs inside of Shino.

"I, Shino Aburame, forfeit to you the Proctor officially," Ino said in as best an approximation as she could of his speaking habits.

Gekko Hayate coughed, hiding his smile. It seemed like the Yamanaka had not lost their flair. "I accept, per the rules of the Exam."

That was when Shino came back to his sense. "She managed her mind switch jitsu? It appears I underestimated her skill and guile," he said to himself. He suddenly glared at her as she stood up. He would long remember this affront.

"Wow, that was really cool!" Naruto shouted. His own Sharingan eyes had seen through the illusion clones, so that would not have worked on him.

"She'll use a different tactic against us," Sasuke said seriously. Probably something to hamper mobility. Though Sasuke did wonder if telling her off and that he never ever held the slightest bit of interest in her would be very effective if he had to fight her. It was worth a shot.

"Oh, Shino? You might not want to always dodge to the right," Ino said with a smirk. "You still haven't lost that bad habit from the academy."

Hinata looked over to where 'Team Sharingan' was conversing. She wondered if there should ever be a 'Team Byakugan' and what sort of strengths that would bring.

Ino smirked over to Sakura as she came back over to their group. "Looks like I made it to the finals on my own power... Forehead."

Sakura just seethed at that. "I'll show you how much power I have in the finals, Ino-piggy."

They were almost butting heads, they were so close in their glaring match.

That was when the electronic sign started to whirl to life, spitting out the next match.

Tenten of the Leaf vs. Kankuro of the Sand.

The kunoichi from Konoha landed on the ground in front of the odd statue, taking in the teen across from her. While she wore a Chinese-style outfit and her hair in little 'dumplings', he had on an outfit that covered him in black, blank cloth. The only thing that stood out was his painted face, his Sand Ninja head-protector and an item on his back. Which was probably his puppet, but he was not readying it.

That meant something then.

Kankuro yawned as he listened to the Proctor instruct them. It was time to show that Sand's puppet ninja were still to be feared as he walked forward.

Tenten smiled as she got her answer. She was facing a puppet, which meant the real Kankuro was probably in that wrapping on 'his' back. She was glad she had listened to her father's old war stories. With a smirk, she sent a brace of Kunai at the puppet, but used her own chakra-string technique to spin one kunai around so that it hit ring first on Kankuro's real head.

"Ow!" the puppet-master said, quickly disengaging from the back of his puppet. "You saw through that then? But that won't help you now. Puppets are the ultimate long-range weapon."

Tenten just smiled widely as she judged the distance. "That sound like a challenge." She started pulling out more and more weapons all the while avoiding the puppets many traps and needle launchers.

Sakura watched and wondered how good of chakra control someone would need to form chakra strings like that to control puppets or weapons. She was sure if Naruto tried his strings would cause the puppets to burst into flames. She then realized that Naruto might try it anyway because burning puppets that were as life-like has Kankuro's first one would scare everyone in a fight.

Kankuro was smirking, as this was the exact sort of fight he was set up for. He was impressed at the girl's arsenal, as she had thrown over a hundred shurikan, knives and kunai at him and his puppet so far. And he was glad her Hyuuga teammate managed to get himself thrown out of the tournament for a being a prick in front of the village's Kage.

Beads of sweat were forming on Tenten's brow. That stupid puppet was absorbing all of her attacks, but he had finally stripped away enough of its 'clothing' to do what she really wanted. "Here I come!" she shouted. The first two kunai slammed into its knee joints, then followed by two into its hip joints, then two to its shoulders.

"What?" Kankuro knew that he could unjam the joint attacks, but he was terribly vulnerable for a moment.

A explosion of smoke covered the girl and her two scrolls for just a second. Tenten then leaped into the air as two scrolls unraveled around her as the appearance of two dragons of smoke spiraling upwards. "Twin Rising Dragons!" Dozens and dozens of kunai, throwing knives and shurikan all appeared from the seal on the scroll. With smooth precision and utmost speed, she threw the weapons at the suddenly defenseless puppet-master.

Kankuro could not dodge everything and put up his arms and legs to block his vulnerable torso, neck and head. As Tenten landed, she threw two more shurikan from a special pouch, cutting him again. "I'd give up if I were you."

The puppet master flicked his finger, setting off the launcher in his puppet's right arm that happened to be pointed in her direction. She was actually surprised and failed to dodge all of the needles.

He started laughing. "I'd give up yourself. You've been poisoned."

"So have you. And you are bleeding a lot worse." Tenten pulled out the needle and then unwrapped one of her hair buns to tie a quick tourniquet to her arm with the cord.

Kankuro glared at her, but he did feel the poison in his system and with his other wounds... he was done. "I give up, Proctor."

"Winner is Tenten of the Leaf," the special jonin called out. Ninja medics quickly descended on the two to administer first aid and stop the poison and bleeding.

Gaara was frowning heavily suddenly. He was the only one on his team that was going to pass. That would upset his father greatly. The Leaf was not as weak as Sound had said it was. And the spies that Sound had just lost... the invasion could not happen any more. He would have to kill his two siblings later. And Sound's spies for being idiots as well.

The other three genin were thinking of the possible upcoming match. Finally the electronic sign lit up.

Kiba Inuzaku versus Sikamaru Nara.

"This is going to be great," Kiba exclaimed loudly. The little puppy on his head barked happily. "Don't hold back, slacker. I'll take you down!"

"Troublesome," Nara said in seeming abject apathy. "And here I am without stink bombs or a rolled up newspaper."

"Why you-!" the Inuzuka ninja-dog handler yelled out.

The Proctor the exam coughed. Then he again explained the rules and started off the match.

Kiba and Akamaru both moved back quickly, even as Shikamaru palmed a couple of shurikan and tried to hit the Ninja-Dog.

"We're too fast for you," Kiba crowed, even as he fed his puppy a modified soldier pill and then ran through the hand-seals for his special clone jitsu.

After they were done, there were two animalized Kiba clones.

Ino and Choji blinked in shock as they saw their lethargic team mate moving faster than they had ever seen, tying two exploding tags to kunai as he dodged. They saw why, as the Ninja-Dog pair slammed into the ground where he had been, tearing up the solid rock.

"Whoa, that's pretty powerful," Choji admitted.

"Are all the dead lasts just poor at taking tests?" Ino asked as she was quite shocked.

The paired-clones did not let up in the slightest, forcing Shikamaru to dodge and dodge and not allowing him to attack with his tags. They finally had him cornered and were spinning towards him in another buzz-saw attack when he set off the tag in left hand. Green smoke filled that corner as they slammed into it.

Kiba and Akamaru both staggered out of the corner holding their noses while coughing and wheezing, their jitsu dropped. Shikamaru was visible as the stink cloud dispersed, clinging to the walls above the shattered crater. The young Inuzuka barely had a moment to sense the attack as the Nara leaped from the wall and hit his face with a double-punch attack, sending the boy into unconsciousness and sliding across the ground.

The ninja then looked at the growling Ninja-dog and then growled right back, sending the puppy scurrying over to his fallen master.

"Man, this stink is going to take forever to get out," he complained as the Proctor called out his win. Looks like he still had the skill to modify his exploding tags into stink-bomb tags. Too bad that Kiba had forgotten that prank back in the Academy.

"Note to self," Naruto said with a crazy grin. "Eat a lot of cabbage and beans if I have to fight an Inuzuka."

Sasuke upped the 'I need to rebuild the clan so Naruto doesn't have to' part of his plans in his head. He also wondered what kind of woman would actually like Naruto. Frankly it scared him a bit wondering how crazy they'd have to be.

Hinata Hyuuga sneezed a few rows over while Sakura rubbed her itching nose.

While Sasuke started pondering what women didn't annoy him and might be able to survive a brawl with Sakura, Ino and several others. Off the top of his head was Haku, Tenten, and Temari of Sand. It kind of saddened him a bit that he didn't know many women that weren't fangirls of his. And realized he should have told them that he wanted a girl that could fight and was decently pretty.

And help him kill his brother Itachi, he finished with a mental snarl.

That would have cut down the fangirls easily. And they'd likely give up on him or on being ninjas if they tried to do what he wanted. Either way it would have made his life easier. And likely have cut the amount of fangirls in the academy way down.

"Would the final contestants come down?" the Proctor, Gekko Hayate, called out.

Shikamaru happened by Choji as he was walking down. "You should forfeit. He's way more powerful than you," he warned.

"You should have more faith in your team mate, Shikamaru," Asuma said in disapproval.

"I know Choji, but this guy... He's dangerous."

Choji looked torn, then he smiled widely. "Don't worry. I might lose, but I can show off how much I've grown in power!"

"I'll treat you to all you can eat barbecue, how's that?" their jonin leader said. "Do your best and we'll celebrate."

Shikamaru shook his head sadly. They weren't listening. Gaara of Sand looked like he could kill someone just to see what sound it'd make. And killing someone wasn't against the rules of the exam, merely something that was usually frowned on. And they'd seen Gaara kill several people already in the Forest of Death.

Gaara of the Sand appeared in a swirl of sand on the amphitheater floor as Choji tromped up. Bloodshot eyes studied the chubby boy with disdain as Gekko explained the rules again.

"Begin," the Proctor called out as he bounced back over to the Hokage and the jonin watching the preliminaries.

The red-head studied the taller and bigger teen for a second. "You won't help me."

"Huh?" Choji asked.

"Killing you won't validate my existence," Gaara explained coldly. His sand was starting to swirl out of its container on his back.

A cold sweat broke out on Choji's wide brow, even as he went through his size-change jitsu. He suddenly turned comically fat, round and over six feet tall. With a shout, he started rolling towards the unmoving target in front of him.

"Pathetic," the red-head sneered. His sand erected a solid wall that Choji's 'meat tank' form just bounced off of. He careened off a wall. Before he could start moving again, spikes of sand pierced Choji... ending his size-change jitsu. With a demented snarl, more sand lashed out, crushing Choji's legs and knocking him out from the pain.

"Gaara is the winner-" Gekko suddenly realized that Gaara was not stopping, as the sand then crushed his upper legs. He and Asuma suddenly flashed over faster than his sand could react. "And you can stop now..." he said threateningly.

The Team 10 jonin held the chakra infused knuckle-knife to Gaara's throat.

Gaara finally let the sand collapse, then flowed it back into his gourd on his back. Medics rushed up to work on saving Choji's life.

"As I was saying, Gaara of the Sand is the winner," the Proctor continued as he moved back in front of the Hokage.

In the stands Kakashi wondered who could train Sakura and Naruto. He could cover Sasuke for training, but he couldn't train them all as effectively as they would need in case they ended up fighting Gaara. They were going to need every bit of training they could get to survive that killing machine.

The Hokage started explaining how the finals would be run as individual fights under the view of important ninja and lords across the Ninja Nations. The Proctors then handed out numbers to match up individual fights.

Kakashi was pondering who he could get to train his team. Sasuke would probably gain the most from his tutelage. Naruto was going to require the most work, as Gaara looked to be extremely dangerous and wanted to kill him. Perhaps one of his colleagues from ANBU?

That just left Sakura and for a moment Kakashi imagined Anko training Sakura. And then getting stabbed in the gut by Sakura in retaliation. Kurenai Yuhi would have been a good person for genjitsu, but would be busy training Hinata herself. If the young Hyuga was not trained by her family, though that was debatable. Perhaps he could convince Ebisu to help her build up her speed and chakra? With her Sharingan allowing her to quickly learn ninjitsu, she should be fine. Though Ebisu needed to told that his 'trainer of Hokages' made him sound stupid given the only man still alive that could claim that was Jiraiya.

"The first match will be Rock Lee versus Hinata Hyuga. The second match is Sasuke Uchiha versus Tenten. The third match is Ino Yamanaka versus Sakura Haruno. The fourth match is Naruto Uzumaki versus Gaara of the Sand." Gekko Hayate coughed then continued. "Congratulations all and good luck in this month of training in preparation."

Kiba looked at Ino and Sakura and said with a wild-ass grin, "Awesome! We're going to get to see a cat fight!"

Both girls clubbed him to the ground, then kicked him a few times for his troubles. "Jerk!" they cried at the same time.

"Akamaru must the brains of that duo," Sasuke commented with a hard smile.

"I say that everyday," Shikamaru said as he rolled his eyes up at the hidden sky.

"Very funny," Kiba grumbled on the ground as two heels pushed down. Akamaru enthusiastically barked and Kiba then grumbled, "Just for that, I am not getting you any slippers to gnaw on."

The puppy just continued to bark happily.

Kakashi was suddenly looming over them. "I need to talk to my team now. Shikamaru and Ino, I believe Asuma is wanting to talk to you."

"Hey can you tell me where their Sensei got those cool knives?" Naruto asked Kakashi.

"Asuma's knives are quite special and expensive. And they might not work for you at all," their leader explained much to Naruto's frustration. "All three of you are going to need dedicated training for this month. You have come farther than most people would believe. The problem is, I really can't dedicate myself to all of you. So I am going to have call in some favors to get people to help me."

"So who are you going to train?" Sakura asked carefully.

"Most likely, Sasuke as we share affinities. But that really depends on who else I can get to help me. So you three had better work very hard."

They all nodded. Sasuke was happy that he was probably going to be trained by the legendary jonin himself, but the fact that he was not actually being given preferred treatment made him feel better about his team. When Kakashi disappeared in a swirl of leaves, he looked over at his two new clan mates. "So... are you guys ready to move into the Uchiha district?" Sasuke was not showing his dislike to moving back there.

"Huh?" Naruto asked. "You want us to move in to your house?"

"We're Uchiha now, Naruto. It would not be right to live outside that district. And it tells the villagers that the clan is reforming." Her inner Sakura was pumping her fists and shouting, 'Take that, Ino-piggy!'

"That's right. Just grab enough supplies for an overnight stay for now. We'll have to move your personal items later-" Sasuke was saying.

"Bah, no way! I'll handle moving us! Just you watch!" Naruto exclaimed. "Oh. Hey, Sasuke? Can Haku stay with us for now?"

"Fine," Sasuke said in an aggravated tone. He had forgotten about the girl for a moment. "Though you will have to fix up of the guest quarters for her, Naruto."

"No problem," Naruto said. He had actually done that when he sent out his original clones that cleaned up the compound. He guessed that Sasuke did not really realize that he really had fixed it all up.

---

It was a meeting of the Hokage's 'advisers' but larger and more inclusive than most had seen. The civilian and merchant councilors looked on from the room as imposing jonin and retired ninja took their places.

The last to enter was two elders of the Hyuga and Hiashi Hyuga. The later took his place among the jonin.

"Thank you for all arriving so quickly. This is a matter that I felt would be best handled today before the rumors of what happened in the Chunin Exam became rampant," the old man said as he set his still smoldering pipe down and tipped the Hokage's ceremonial hat back a bit. "Sasuke Uchiha has accepted to new members into his clan, both having active Sharingan."

Danzo started at that. "What is this?" the bandage covered contemporary of the Hokage demanded. "I thought that the only Sharingan in Konoha was Sasuke's and Kakashi's eyes?"

"So we thought, but a bastard child of a rogue ninja has luckily found its way back to Konoha. Perhaps it was fate that led that survivor here from the Land of Whirlpools. Her child graduated from the Academy and was one of the Rookies that attempted the chunin exam." His grim eyes looked around. "The matter and reason that this is of import, instead of just celebration, is that he is Naruto Uzumaki."

"That monster?" a merchant shouted. "That's too dangerous!"

"Indeed, it is a bit worrisome. We are lucky that Naruto still hold Konoha in his heart and cares for it," Hiruzen said to them all. "In spite of the hatred and distrust that he has grown up under."

"Why were we called here then?" his son Asuma said. He had seen their eyes himself and had been a bit shocked.

"So that if anyone asks, you can tell them the truth. Sasuke Uchiha has started reforming his clan and adopted Naruto and Sakura, who has also managed to acquire a Sharingan," the Hokage stated. "So there are three Uchiha now."

Danzo frowned. "How did she gain the Sharingan? That sounds suspicious."

Homaru nodded. The old team mate of the Hokage carried a lot of influence in these councils. "Is it a secret that the Uchiha had; that they can give anyone they want the Sharingan?"

"I wonder what sort of sacrifice that would require? In any case, the young kunoichi gained it from a fallen ninja. But she has accepted special training and swore fealty to Uchiha because of it. Unlike Kakashi," the Hokage said with a nod to the ninja reading in the back of the room, "she has control over her eye. And is learning to use it every day."

Maito Gai's draw dropped at that. "She can do something as a genin that Kakashi still can't do? What sort of team did you put together, Lord Hokage?"

"The best team possible, it seems. They also helped ferret out traitors to the Leaf her in Konoha. At least one jonin and possibly all three of his genin were actually spies from Sound." He let his gaze drift among them. Quite a bit of surprise from the civilians, none from the ninja. "They were working for Orochimaru."

Danzo frowned at that. "What does he want?"

"He wants the Sharingan. And it appears he no longer holds any love for Konoha. Kabuto Akado believed that the Sound was preparing to attack us. All Sound Ninja will be expelled."

"Something does not sound right," Kurenai Yuhi said as she concentrated. "Sound could not believe that they could succeed."

"True, but if they had the correct allies, things could become a problem. There are rumors that the Hidden Village of the Sand may have been part of this. But if they did, their showing at the Chunin Exam has made them reconsider their position. Only one of their genin made it to the finals. And we believe he is special in some manner. He's probably already at least high chunin in skill."

The Akimichi nodded. "Choji may never be a ninja again. He almost died from his wounds."

"His actions are very monstrous. We had best not underestimate him," another jonin called out.

"We shall leave that to Kakashi."

The jonin nodded. "I may have to recruit some help, so please try to help me with assignments."

---

"Get out of here, monster! You won't take my daughter away!" the elder, male Haruno shouted at Naruto.

"Dad! I've already told you what has happened. I've been adopted into Clan Uchiha by Sasuke Uchiha," the auburn-haired girl shouted right back. They were in the entryway of the Haruno home. "Naruto is just helping me move my things."

"And why have you been adopted? You keep avoiding telling us-," her mother started to call out, when Sakura wheeled about on her.

"Because I have a Sharingan!" she shouted into her mother's face. "And Uchiha needs all of the Sharingans it can get to rebuild itself." Her left eye had activated itself in anger, two tomoe spinning around the red pupil.

"How did you get that eye?" the father asked.

"I can't say. It's a clan secret, though I can say it was not purposeful. But I agreed and now I have it," she countered while tapping her toe impatiently.

Naruto grinned sheepishly. "Yeah. Not on purpose."

"You're still my parents, but this is really me moving out on my own. There's a lot of empty houses in the Uchiha district. And I'm going to be a chunin soon. Just you wait."

"Chunin already?"

"Yeah, our whole team made it to the finals! And we intend to win," Sakura said carefully. Then a thought occurred to the young girl. "The Hokage said something unusual, about our family having a bloodline limit."

"An old rumor about being able to call up a secondary personality that can be trained in its own strengths. It's hard to say if it is a bloodline or just insanity that is passed along the family," her father explained. "Neither I nor my father had it after all."

'I'm real?' Inner-Sakura asked in a strange voice. 'Quick! Make a shadow clone! I wanna introduce myself to mom and dad.'

"Wow, that sounds cool," Naruto exclaimed in surprise.

With a poof, she finished creating her clone. "Um, Mom... Dad? This is part of me, I think."

"Wahoo! I'm real, dammit!" the clone shouted in glee as she pumped her fist.

"So I went on a clone-date with your other self?" Naruto asked in confusion.

Inner-Sakura nodded. "That's right, but we didn't think about being seperate. And we're still Sakura, after all. I'm just the voice that pushes her to do everything." She started doing a victory dance around the room, surprising everyone else with her exhuberance.

"Quit embarrassing me!" Sakura shouted before she thumped the clone to dispel it.

"That explains sooo much," her mother said. "And that's a bloodline limit? You do have some scrolls that explain this, right?"

"I'll have to dig in the attic," her father said quickly.

---

Two crowds of noisy Naruto Clones met up outside the Uchiha district, causing Sasuke's stress level to increase. Each clone was help carrying furniture or clothes.

A single head of auburn-dyed hair stood out next to the long, black hair of Haku.

"Have you figured out our rooms?" Sakura asked as she bounced along. Inner-Sakura was singing happily in a low tune.

"We'll be in the main house. It's more than big enough and we can share cooking chores," the Uchiha head of the household said. "That reminds me. Naruto, just be aware, you are heir to the clan. So there are going to be some etiquette classes you are going to have to take after the chunin finals."

"Etiquette?" all of the Narutos chimed out in horror. Sasuke resisted the urge to rub his forehead and ask what he'd done to deserve this.

"It isn't that bad, Naruto," Haku said with a soft smile. "And it will help you on missions. There are times you will have to be polite to your client in fancy settings. You may have to pretend to be a noble to sneak into a party to kill someone. A ninja must be adaptable."

The nearer clones frowned, but nodded. That was something everyone knew that ninja did, even if Naruto did not like the thought.

The clones were busy filling the three bedrooms when there was a voice outside calling for them. "Hello?"

"Kakashi?" the nearest clone asked as he opened the door.

"Yo!" the jonin said. A figure just behind him looked at the genin with keen, dark eyes. He was wearing a standard jonin outfit, but he wore a head-protector that was reminiscent of the First Hokage and looked quite young. "This is... Yamato. He's agreed to help train you, Naruto. Expect to work very hard."

Sakura looked up from where she was going through a box. "Who did you get for me?"

"A special jonin by the name of Ebisu is going to be working on your chakra reserves and fighting strength," the Team 7 leader explained.

"Pack as if for a mission out of the village, Naruto. We don't have any time to waste," the new jonin said. "We will leave today, so I'm sorry about the lack of rest in your new home."

"You too, Sasuke. And Sakura, you will probably be working just as hard," Kakashi called out. "So be ready for him in the next half an hour."

"I'm ready!" Naruto called out as he came down the hallway with his backpack.

"You're going to leave this work undone?" Yamato asked.

"Nah, the clones can finish up and then dispell themselves," the genin replied.

"Exactly how many clones can you make?" the new jonin asked.

"Hundreds of them." Naruto then explained, "Never have tried to see exactly how many I can make." Didn't he make almost five hundred when he beat up Mizuki? And six hundred to help on that farm. Maybe he should try to see how many he could make some time.

Yamato hid his surprise and now understood why Naruto had trouble with the standard clone techique. He just had so much chakra it was hard to control. Plus from what he'd heard Naruto's chakra control wasn't the best either, though it had improved a lot as Kakashi had drilled his team with tree climbing and water walking already.

He would have to discover what is Naruto's primary element. That was when Sasuke came down with his own pack and the four of them departed.

Sakura sighed as she thought. "Okay, okay. Quit nagging me." With a poof, she created another clone.

"It's dark in there," Inner Sakura said while waving her arms around. "And frankly boring. Let's go make up our room."

"You know, there's going to be a time when people are going to want to refer to you seperately. And 'crazy voice in your head' doesn't sound appealing!" Sakura stuck out her tongue at herself.

"Ringoame!" the clone immediately piped up with. "I've been thinking of it for a week or so ever since you let me go on that date with Naruto!" She pumped her fist in victory on that.

"You can keep things from me..." Now Sakura was actually a little worried. 'This was probably going to be bad,' a small voice said very quietly.

"I only, uh, distracted you from the fact that I acted differently. And wasn't Naruto just so cute on our date? We've got two great guys! And now we can have them both! Weee!"

Haku just blinked from down the hall. She had wandered into the kitchen to see what was there, only to find a severe lack of food. It appeared that the food that she had brought from Naruto's was the lion's share of groceries. She coughed, then made a small wave. "Let's get you something to eat before your trainer arrives."

"Yah!" the newly christened Ringoame called out. "I wanna try spicy stuff!"

All of the clones were thinking the same thing; Naruto like an odd girl. Though odd was not boring, in their minds. So all was good.

Twenty minutes later, another voice called out. "Is Sakura Haruno here?"

Ringoame opened the door. "We're in here. Are you the teacher that Kakashi got to help us?"

"That's correct. Though I do believe that he said that he and Yamato would be getting here before I could," the special jonin wearing the lighter-weight outfit and sunglasses said. Unlike regular the higher ranked jonin, he did not have the flack-jacket that was so common.

"Here he is, Sakura. Say, what's your name? I'm Rongame, Sakura's active bloodline," the boisterous girl exclaimed suddenly.

"You may call me Ebisu. Twins? Or some form of clones?" the prideful teacher asked.

"An extra mind that I can put into a shadow clone," Sakura explained. "She's a lot more aggressive and open than I am."

"Interesting. This may be the key to getting the most out of your training," Ebisu said thoughtfully. "Kage no bunshin are incredibly useful."

"What are you going to teach us?" the clone piped up in query.

"We are going to be doing very focused physical exercise and building your chakra coils. This will be dangerous. If you over do my training, you could permanently hurt yourself," the special jonin explained.

"I didn't think you could do that," Sakura said in surprise. "None of the books I've read say that."

"That's because it's very dangerous so Academy books are prohibited from mentioning it. You have to nearly overload your chakra coils from exhaustion, then try to refill them as quickly as possible. I hope you don't think you are going to be on a diet, because you are going to be eating quite a bit while converting it to chakra as quickly as possible," Ebisu explained.

"Is ramen a good food for that?" a Naruto clone wondered.

"We aren't going to like this are we?" Ringoame said in mute horror.

'No, I don't think we are,' that quiet voice in the back of Sakura's mind said.

"What the hell? Another voice?" Sakura shouted as she stood up in shock.

"Ooh! Make a clone and let her introduce herself!" the first clone said.

Sakura opened her mouth comically, then decided that it might work as Haku and Ebisu looked on in surprise. Another poof and there was another clone, almost knocking out Sakura.

"Um, hello?" the new clone of Sakura looked very timid.

"I have my own inner Hinata," Sakura said in shock.

"That's not very fair," the new clone protested softly. She suddenly had a small, shy smile. "You can call me Suika."

"Cherry, apple and watermelon? Cute," Ebisu said blandly. "Dispel your clones. It's time to start exercising."

---

Naruto was groaning as he collapsed. "Explain to me why I agreed to this?"

"Because you don't want Gaara to kill you?" Yamato said in a bland tone.

"Oh, yeah. Good point," Naruto said with a sheepish grin. "But this exercise is crazy. Gathering all the chakra I can into this stupid ninjitsu and then blasting through in one hit?" He pointed at the earth wall that the jonin had created with some earth jitsu. It has some very anemic circular craters blown in it with an wind ninjitsu that Naruto had been practicing with. Naruto thought he'd have made huge holes given the amount of chakra he had.

"Your normal tactic of throwing clones and fire ninjitsu at your foe that you've been trying to learn aren't going to work against this one. His sand defense is immense against the level of skill you have."

"Isn't there a way to improve my clones?" Naruto asked.

"Yes," Yamato said "And we'll cover that later. You need to expand your tactics Naruto. And now that we've verified that you are wind affinity, you are going to have to work hard on it. Luckily for you, wind trumps earth."

"But fire trumps wind." That had been maddening to Naruto that his wind affinity was so outclassed by fire.

"And water trumps fire. You're rivalry with Sasuke is going to have to wait until we make sure you survive Gaara."

"But he's probably learning a thousand ninjutsu," Naruto grumbled.

"Naruto, I doubt Kakashi is teaching Sasuke that many," Yamato said with as much patience as the young jonin could muster. "This will also make it easier for you to summon, in the future."

"You're going to teach me to summon?" the young genin asked in glee.

"No, not at this time. You don't have the control to muster even the weakest summon." The placid looking jonin suddenly nodded. "If you can succeed at this whole exercise, then I'll see what I can do to get you a summon. How's that?"

Naruto went right back to it, but his progress was not very fast. It was not bad, but it was not fast enough for the limited time of training they had.

"I don't think we have enough time," Yamato said flatly during their lunch.

"You mean I need to learn faster? Why didn't you say so," the genin exclaimed as he jumped, spilling his his riceball on the ground. With his trademark single seal, he created dozens of himself that immediately started training.

The jonin's mouth fell open slightly as he watched for an hour as Naruto days of training in a fraction of the time. He was going to be able to do the physical training then. "Hey. I need the real Naruto. Make a replacement clone and let's start to seriously spar.

Naruto just grinned as he summoned another clone.

---

Sakura huffed and puffed as she walked across the water of the hotspring under the weights that Ebisu had her wearing. Working with practice forms at the same time was pure pain. This was the third day of tiring herself out to near chakra exhaustion. Finally, she fell through her water walking technique and was quickly pulled out by Ebisu.

"This is working, if not quite as quickly as we would like," he explained as he had her drink a noxious soup.

She really hated the taste. "What is this stuff?"

"Ah, this is an old recipe that predates the soldier ration pills. It works better, but has to be made fresh each meal and is not suitable for the war front, of course. It can recover your chakra stores quite quickly, especially if you meditate like I explained." The special jonin pushed his sunglasses up his nose.

"It seems impossible," Sakura muttered. Without Naruto or even Sasuke around, it was hard to keep motivated.

"This is something that the Akimichi children learn by the time they are five," the dark-haired ninja said with a smirk. They were not good at it by that time, but that would probably push her button to get her to try harder.

"This could be useful. Could I get the recipe?" she suddenly said as she tried to desperately focus.

"Only if you promise to not use it in your training without your team leader present." He cut her off. "I know how you kids can be, you'll try this and almost kill yourself. I'm not having your death on my hands."

"I promise," Sakura finally said. And she really meant it. After finishing off her barely warm soup, she focused on her stomach, trying to will it to absorb the chakra-replenishing food as quickly as possible. And she could see why Chouji used potato chips for this given even putting ramen noodles in that soup couldn't get Naruto to like it.

Ebisu had to leave, but promised to be back in an hour while she rested. Twenty minutes later, when Sakura felt her legs were wobbly and not made of rubber, she heard a giggle. Sneaking over, she saw an older man peeking through a hole in the wall to the women's side. He seemed to be taking notes... which was odd. If she had more energy, she'd have punched him in the head really hard.

She cleared her throat from behind him, causing him to stop writing.

"Wow, I must have let my guard drop since I'm home," the man said as he stood up. "And exactly why aren't you more upset?" He seemed to be wearing traveling priest clothing, face paint and a strange head protector with 'oil' written upon it.

"Too tired, actually," Sakura admitted with a droop on her shoulders.

"So what are you working so hard toward?" he asked curiously.

"I'm working hard to fight my best in the chunin finals next month," she explained in a drained tone. 'Heck yeah!' Ringoame shouted internally. "So I'm working on my chakra reserves. I'm a lot better than I was, but I still can't pull off powerful ninjitsu easily. Every other day we work on taijitsu and physical training. It's been very rough so far."

"Sounds a little extreme for just an fights against genin," the old man said with a frown.

"One of the battles could be against Gaara of the Sand. He's crazy and crushed Choji's legs like they were dry twigs," Sakura said carefully. "And Choji's an Akimichi; he was the physically strongest of our Academy days." She wondered if she should tell him about what Team 10 had seen during the second exam, where Gaara had killed three Rain Ninja almost instantly. Shikamaru had let her know about that yesterday, as a bit of friendly advice.

Now she was worried about Naruto. He was the one that would have to fight Gaara and she didn't want to see him crushed like one would see a bug after being hit with a hammer. She wasn't sure his ability to heal and regenerate body parts would be enough.

"Gaara of the Sand? I've heard some rumors about him. Yeah, you probably do need everything you can to beat him," the old man said. "And since you're a cutie, I'll do you a favor! I, Jiraiya of the West and East, Super Sage of the Toads, will take you as my apprentice for this month!"

"One of the three Sennin of Konoha?" Sakura blink-blinked in surprise.

Jiriaya grinned and remembered the last time he taught a female student. He wondered what Konan was up to now. Then his face fell. What was he actually going to teach her in less than a month that would actually help her?

---

Sakura staggered back home early morning of the day before the final exam. Surprisingly, she felt she really had become stronger under Jiraiya and Ebisu.

"Hey, Sakura!" Naruto called out from down the street. He had his backpack on and looked as tired as she did.

'Want out! Make a clone!' Ringoame mentally yelled. 'Don't make me start singing.'

Sakura sighed while making the sign for the powerful shadow clone. "Don't yell. It's still early."

"Naruto! Yahoo!" Ringoame called out and charged down the road and gave him a quick hug.

"Uh, hi Sakura and... Ringoame, right?" Naruto said as he scrunched his forehead in remembrance.

"You remembered! How's your training going?" Sakura's clone asked happily.

"Supposed to be resting," Sakura muttered.

"Oh, okay. I just wanted to say hi. You won't let me take over," Ringoame complained before she dispelled herself.

Sakura blinked at that. "Huh. I had not thought of that." Internally, she pulled her main consciousness back and let Ringoame take over. Her posture changed immediately. "Or maybe she would. So how did your training go?"

Naruto blinked. "Oh, I've become really strong. Yamato really put me through the ringer." He taught him a lot of taijitsu and to increase his strength and speed.

"Ebisue did too. I've learned some new ninjitus, but it's really my strength and speed that have improved the most." Ringoame smirked at that. Jiraiya had shown her how to start enhancing her body like his old team mate did.

"Good. That means that we've all gotten a lot stronger," Sasuke said from the top of a wall . He was crouched down, looking at them with a cold smirk.

They all continued the half block down to their house and opened the gate.

"Oh, Sasuke? This is Ringoame. I guess she's this cool mind thingie that the Haruno can do. It's a bloodline limit," Naruto explained to the other boy.

"You're both Uchiha now, though bloodline limits are always kind of cool," Sasuke admitted. Was she a fan-girl too?

They entered the house to see a barely awake figure stumbling towards the kitchen.

"Hey, Haku! How's it going?" Naruto shouted.

"I'm fine, Naruto. How are you?" the kunoichi asked as she turned on the stove while putting on a pot of water.

Sasuke just grunted, trying to ignore the girl. Now that she was not trying to hide her gender, she confused him a bit.

"Fine, Haku! Let me help with that. These two guys are such boys when it comes to the kitchen," Ringoame exclaimed. She started to put some rice on to cook.

Sasuke blinked as that was totally unlike Sakura to say anything remotely negative about him. It appeared the other personality was not as hung up on him. This should be interesting.

"Naruto? Egg drop soup or miso?" Ringoame asked sweetly of the boy.

"Eh, miso should be fine." Now that he was not moving, Naruto was starting to slump at the table and almost asleep.

That caused Sasuke a bit of surprise. "So where is Sakura?"

"She's resting. Slacker is a bit tired," the auburn-haired girl said as she tested the soup.

Sasuke grunted at that.

The girls had finished the quick breakfast and everyone quickly ate in silence, too tired to really muster much conversation.

"So tomorrow is the big day?" Haku asked cheerfully.

Naruto's snore was not quite the answer she expected. Sasuke and Ringoame both nodded though.

"I guess our teachers all decided that we needed a real day of rest," Ringoame said in deep consideration. "I want to do things though." Her voice was filled with complaint and suffering.

Sasuke tried to not look like he wanted to run away. "I'm going to do some reading up in my room." He retreated quite quickly.

The younger kunoichi looked at Naruto with a small, fond smile. "I guess we should put Naruto to bed." She was blushing at that thought.

Haku just sighed. The dynamics of this household were going to be complicated, she decided.

---

The nine prospective chunin sat at the front edge of the amphitheater, looking down over the oval 'ring' of dirt and grass, with trees at the edge of the area.

Temari and Kankuro were glaring at the Leaf Ninja as they talked to Gaara who looked more pale than ever.

"Gaara, just make sure to make it to the finals. Then follow the plan," Kankuro was saying softly.

"This is our only chance to show that our village is still a power to be reckoned with," the sister said to her two siblings.

"I know. Now shut up or I'll kill you," the red-headed boy said in an almost growl as he looked at 'Team Sharingan'. Each one of them would be destroyed by him, he swore to his dead mother.

The Hokage and the Kazekage presided over the contest, both giving a small introduction speech. The Third Hokage greeted all of the many visiting dignitaries, while not drawing attention to the many missing nations. The representative of Sound had been expelled weeks ago even as ANBU squads had scoured the surrounding areas to chase out any foreign ninja.

"I will now turn this time over for a small speech from the Fourth Kazekage," the hosting leader said.

The robed and cowled figure wearing stood up. "Here we show the fruits of the Hidden Villages and our power. Show your might to the world," he called out in a strong voice.

Gekko Hayate's cough drew everyone's attention back down to the arena floor. "Hinata Hyuga and Rock Lee, please come down." As soon as the two genin were down by him, facing each other across twenty feet, he continued. "Fight until knockout, death or until you can not continue." With a swirl of leaves, he appeared back up by the other Proctors of the exam.

Rock Lee took up a taijitsu stance. His large eyes held no animosity under his brows as he concentrated. "You are not the foe I planned to fight, but I will show the world the strength of my genius of hard work against a Hyuga today."

"I am no genius, but I too will show those I care about that I can overcome my fate," Hinata said softly as she slid into her own, softer stance.

"Yosh! Then let us do our best!" Lee then charged forward in a blindingly fast sprint.

Hinata had her Byakugan active, moving with surprising speed as she bent backwards to avoid having her head taken off by the bowl-haircut boy's kick. Her fingers seemed to barely brush his leg, but Lee immediately pulled back.

The Hyuga Heiress charged back at him, seizing the initiative. With a quick feint to his arms, she suddenly switched to a finger-jab that slipped through his guard. His whole arm seemed to shudder, but Lee was made of very stern stuff and kept fighting.

Her Byakugan saw as chakra drifted through his arms as he unlocked his first gate and into the bandages on his arms. He suddenly blurred faster than she could directly react. His kick lifted her up and into the air with punishing force. He appeared behind her in a burst of speed as the bandages started to wrap around her.

With that, he slammed them both into the ground with explosive force.

"Whoa! Is Hinata okay?" Ino asked worriedly.

"Fuzzy-brow missed," Naruto said with conviction. "He let her observe his Lotus Blossom during the semifinals, after all."

"That will be a bother to him, as it doesn't appear that he has a lot of different techniques other than pure taijitsu. Which is fairly suicidal against a Hyuga," Shikamaru said with an aggravated look as he leaned over. He filed away that Naruto's Sharingan did allow him to see things that were too fast for normal eyes to follow.

Sasuke and Sakura nodded as they watched. They did not have their Sharingans activated, but that was only because they did not want to wear themselves out before their own matches. That was something that Naruto did not have to worry about.

Lee pulled himself out of his crater looking around frantically for his foe. He found her about fifty feet away, holding her left arm to her ribs and trying to move behind the line of trees. With a confident smirk, he opened his second gate, the Gate of Life, and charged across the field before she could escape his burst speed radius. Hinata ducked under his first kick again, but not his three follow-up punches... that dispelled a classic illusionary clone.

That was when Hinata appeared as her genjitsu of camouflage dropped, striking at six chakra locations on his back to paralyze his lower back and legs. She had actually been behind the tree.

But there was nothing wrong with his speed and he had seen a bare glimmer of distorted air in his peripheral vision. So he actually threw himself through where the illusion clone had been, opening up the distance slightly.

Hinata was able to start breathing hard, fighting the terrible pain of her bruised or broken ribs. At this rate, she was going to lose. Again. Above and behind Lee, Naruto's smiling face was just at the edge of her area of view, steeling her nerves.

"That was very close!" Lee admitted with a happy grin. "But I have your measure. I am faster and stronger at taijitsu." He started to go through the physical and mental preparations to open the third, inner-gate.

"That is true. You are stronger than I could become in a month. So I will not try to match you directly. I will use my own strengths against you," Hinata declared in a stronger voice. Her fingers went through a genjitsu that she used... upon herself. This new technique had been accidentally discovered while she was being trained this week. Kurenai Yui thought it was possibly a revolutionary new technique and possibly the re-discovery of a powerful technique that might make Konoha the premiere Hidden Village for centuries.

Lee was not sure what she had done, so dispelled any genjitsu that might be upon him. He knew that he had to worry about that and he knew who Hinata's team jonin was. "That was foolish and a waste of your power," he bluffed.

Hinata merely nodded, then used the replacement technique.

Naruto's mouth dropped as he saw the girl flicker between the two locations... while striking twice in the middle. One of the attacks cleanly missed by three feet, but the second one landed home on Lee's kidney with her juken strike.

Lee just blinked as he suddenly doubled over, realizing what Hinata had done even if he had not seen it. "How can you move so fast?" He suddenly blitzed forward to quickly overwhelm her.

She disappeared again. This time Naruto was joined by Sakura and Sasuke in watching her strange double-strike again, but this time missed ahead of the very fast moving Lee.

"She's able to strike while moving that fast?" Shikamaru asked with his mouth dropped open. "That's like jonin speed."

Naruto was going back over what he was seeing. The replacement technique she was using was almost genin standard. So it must be that jitsu she cast on herself first. His fingers made the seal, unraveling the chakra strands into himself.

And he saw everything slow down all of a sudden as he felt the genjitsu take affect. It felt like he was moving through molasses as he tried to move. Then he saw Hinata finish off Lee as she moved in strobe-like flickers. At the shock, he dropped the genjitsu. "That's it!"

Sasuke, Sakura and Shikamaru all whipped around to look at Naruto as Lee collapsed, paralyzed even as Hinata appeared across the arena, panting and holding her hurt ribs.

"Well? Explain?" Ino asked crabbily.

Naruto opened his mouth... then closed it. "No. If it works like I think it does, it's probably at least an A-Rank jitsu. And Hinata hasn't even perfected it yet."

The other genin (except Gaara) were suddenly frowning as they realized one of the stronger challengers had just moved to an upper-tier in level.

"Hinata Hyuga is the winner," Gekko called out after a minute.

The young heiress kneeled next to him and started to open the chakra-points carefully.

"Truly the Byakugan is a wonder," Lee tried to say gamely, hiding his tears.

"Ahem... I really didn't win that with just the juken and the Byakugan, so my father will probably not be too happy," the girl said softly.

That caused the young boy to deeply consider. "But you are a winner, so that says something."

Hinata wondered exactly how many fights with her clan were won because they thought their bloodline limit made them superior to others in a fight.

"That was cool," Naruto thought aloud. Other than the genjitsu, that had been rather simple in a cunning way. Lee had lost because he had tried to deal with it like a slugging match. Even if Lee had won by pure brute power, would he have made chunin? "Come on over here, Lee! This is still the best place to watch the matches."

Lee's huge eyebrows rose up under his bowl haircut. He had thought he would be expelled from the contestant line up.

Sakura smiled. "If Temari and Kankuro can be here, so can you."

Gekko Hayate was calling down the next combatants.

Sasuke and Tenten jumped down with lithe grace. The slightly older kunoichi hid it well, but she was actually slightly intimidated by the Uchiha.

The Proctor finished explaining the same rules over the roar of the crowd.

Sasuke had to hide his grin as he saw Tenten figuring the distance between them carefully. Just like against Kankuro. He had planned for this and forced Kakashi to teach him a genjitsu that he could use with his Sharingan. Just like the jonin had used against Zabuza. This was one a little devious, if he had to say so himself.

Naruto frowned, then smiled as he saw what Sasuke was doing. "Oh, that's sneaky. Poor Tenten."

Shikamaru and Ino were not used to Naruto saying very smart things. "Why's that, dead last?" Ino asked in derision.

"Because she's going to miss. A lot."

Naruto was proven correctly as Tenten did start to miss a lot, even as the air filled with weapons. It was like a weapons shop was being thrown at Sasuke. The only things missing were a black smith's hammer and an anvil.

Oh, there they went.

"How?" Tenten demanded in a rage. He was not moving that fast. Even using her twin dragon rising technique would be useless.

"I can see the future," Sasuke stated in an arrogant tone designed to frustrate his opponnent. "And you lose." That would rile her up. And really, she had not even attempted just a single punch. His estimation of her skill had plummeted. She was a one-trick pony.

She then in desperation and annoyance with Sasuke tried kick him in between the legs. It was petty and an impulse but at this point she really didn't think she had anything to lose in doing that.

It was woefully slow for someone with the Sharingan. Sasuke also found it vaguely funny.

"I know Lee can't use chakra," Sasuke commented like he was talking about the weather. "I thought the rest of his genin team could. I guess I was misinformed."

Tenten threw a kunai at Sasuke. He easily avoided it when Tenten yelled, "Dynamic Entry!" It was better than nothing, after all. She came flying at Sasuke.

After a minute of traded punches and kicks, she really was convinced that Sasuke was seeing the future. And when that did not work, she found her lack of other tactics... lacking. Just like Sasuke had said.

She was covered in bruises and definitely not feeling well. It was not until he slid under her to kick her into the air that she realized that the fight was likely over. Sasuke's Lotus Blossom left her pancaked in the dirt and unable to continue, but mercilessly just awake enough to hear the Proctor call out Sasuke's win.

"Well, Forehead," Ino said with a grin. "I didn't show all my tricks when I fought Shino."

"Like you have anything interesting." Sakura smirked as they both landed in the middle of the area. "Ino-piggie, this is not about Sasuke. Even if he hates girly-girls. This is about us as rivals."

That got the young blonde to frown. And coming from Sakura made it very likely. "Right this is about us."

Both of them moved their Leaf head-protectors to their foreheads as Gekko Hayate explained the rules and then started the match.

"Since Sasuke doesn't like women that are girlie, I'll just cut my hair short. It's been a pain in the ass anyways." Ino cut off her long ponytail.

Sakura looked at her oddly as her Sharingan activated for just a second as the long blonde tresses covered the floor. With a sigh, Sakura made three hand seals and then with a low blast of water, sent the hair to wrap around a tree under the stands. "You do know the Sharingan can see chakra, right?"

Ino snarled at the unfairness, but nodded. She had just been hoping that Sakura would not bother after her act. "You're a bit more paranoid than I thought you would be."

In the stands Shino watched with interest. The more he saw of Ino the more he realized she was more then he thought she was. But he was still going to remember her defeating him bitterly.

"Let's see how your taijitsu fares then." Ino suddenly charged forward, only to be met head on by Sakura.

Punch was met by block, even as kicks and knees were deflected. Ino pursed her lips as she realized that the other kunoichi was hitting a lot harder and with faster punches. She was having to defend more than attack. And that was galling to admit.

It was time to up the ante, as if she did not do anything, she was going to be crushed by her rival. While she was not going to use her possession jitsu, she could use her disruption technique with quick one-handed seals. She would have to thank Haku for that later.

Sakura suddenly found herself curling up in nausea, only to take a full power knee to her stomach.

'Move over!' Ringoame mentally shouted, taking over their body to land on her toes and one hand's finger-tips. "That was your one, free shot, bitch!"

Ino blinked as she realized Sakura had somehow already recovered. That should not have been possible. "Losing what little manners you learned from me... hag?"

Sakura burst from her 'starting position' leaving a small crater behind, dropping a heel-kick down on the spot that Ino had just vacated. There was a large explosion of dust from the new crater that appeared.

From the stands a roar of shock had erupted. They had not seen that technique used in a chunin exam in almost thirty-five years.

"Who is that girl?" one of the older men asked. "Is she a new Senju?"

"What the hell was that?" Ino asked worriedly.

"That's Ringoame's (me!) favorite technique. We haven't perfected it, but I love smashing boulders!" the personality exclaimed loudly.

Ino just blinked. "Oh, great. I'm going to be beaten by a crazy rival. Wonderful."

"You better believe it!" Ringoame called out, suddenly moving much faster in a burst as her feet stuck to the dirt ground with chakra for traction.

The blonde barely had a moment to move both arms to block the attack, which still launched her thirty feet backwards. "What a monstrous strength," she complained. But she was very linear and liked to charge straight ahead. As Sakura charged forward again, Ino managed to guess where she would end up to send another disorientating attack, sending the auburn-dyed girl spinning across the ground.

'Suika!' Ringoame shouted as she realized that Sakura was not quite recovered yet.

Ino's dropping heel kick slammed to the ground where Sakura's head had been.

"I'm sorry, Ino, but I can not allow you to win," the battered girl said as she seemed to almost float to her feet in a series of several spins.

"You aren't Sakura or Ringo-me are you?" the kunoichi asked with a frown.

Her answer as a zig-zag charge at frankly ludicrous speeds. Her strength was lower than the other two personalities, but she was much, much faster.

Shikamaru and Lee just stared as Sakura 'schooled' Ino in the fine arts of taijitsu.

Sakura let Ino back away as her primary personality took over. "You fought very well, Ino. But I've been training this hard since we left the academy."

"Why?" Ino asked through her panting as he wiped blood from her lips.

"So I can be there for my team when they need me," she admitted. "I still feel weak compared to them, but I am stronger."

"I haven't lost yet," her opponent snapped out.

Sakura just went through several hand-seals in a blindingly fast pace and then slammed her hand down on the ground. Ino was just starting to move, but her battered body betrayed her and was not quite quick enough to leap out of the earth ninjitsu that buried her up to her neck.

One hand moulded the earth into near rock hardness while Sakura's other hand held a kunai up to Ino's throat. "Proctor, I do not think that Ino can continue."

Ino just bit the inside of her cheek. At least Sakura had not forced her to concede.

The Proctor agreed, then called for the last of the 'first round' challenges to come down.

Naruto stared at Gaara from thirty feet away as Gekko explained the rules yet again to both of them, then started the fight.

"You will validate my existence," the young red-head said as his bloodshot green eyes focused on his foe.

"Is that all?" Naruto said with a cheesy grin, looking quite at odds with his double-tomoe Sharingan eyes. "I'm going to make everyone acknowledge my existence! You better believe it!"

"You will never be acknowledged, because I will feed your blood to Mother," Gaara said as he suddenly lashed out with his sand.

Gekko and Naruto both dodged. The sand lazily blocked both kunai that Naruto used as a counter-attack.

Then it blocked both fireballs that Naruto sent out and nearly skewered him in return with a spike of sand. Only his active Sharingan had allowed him to see the strikes coming at him with super-human speed.

"Is that all you got?" Naruto cat-called as he went through several handseals, creating an incandescent ball of fire in his hand. The next spike of sand he met head on, melting it down to droplets of bubbling glass.

Gaara frowned, then just shook his head slightly. Behind his back he made a small ball of sand. His eye technique would be very useful in a bit as he tried to kill the pathetic Sharingan user in front of him. "I guess I will have to validate my existence upon another Uchiha," he muttered.

Naruto frowned as his plan to melt the sand so it was glass was working way too slow. Time for Plan B. With a poof of smoke, he created over a hundred clones to rush forward and to try to hammer through the sand.

Gaara merely raised a wall of sand around him and then spun it like a saw blade, dispersing the attack in blinding smoke.

"Here I come!" Naruto shouted as he unleashed a horizontal tornado at Gaara, shocking everyone in the stands as the wind blasted right through the wall of sand.

Gaara seemed to look at him for a long moment, a hole punched through his shoulder... before the sand-clone blew away on the wind.

"Oh, crap!" Naruto started to look around frantically. That's when he felt the ground below him give away as he was suddenly encompassed in darkness, his arms and legs making a sickening crunch to the horrified screams of Sakura and Hinata.

"More. I need more blood for Mother," Gaara said in a creepy voice as he rose from the ground as if using a hidden elevator. He raised his hand even as Kakashi and Yamato flashed forward at him.

Naruto abruptly found himself in a festering sewer, the hot breath of fetid steam in his nostrils. Behind massive, rusty bars (and a small paper seal) a voice spoke. "Do you wish to live?"

"Of course I do! Who are you- Wait, you're the Kitsune Nine-Tails. What's going on?" the young Sharingan user shouted.

"You are about to be crushed to death by Shukaku, the One-Tail. To be so defeated by such a pathetic demon is something that can not be let to happen," the Kyubi said in a wordless snarl. It smiled nastily, letting the screams of two girl's voices echo in the room. "Release me! So that I can save you!"

"No way in hell! You'll just destroy everything I care about. Give me your power! You're living in my body, so it's time to pay rent!" He would not trust the demon that nearly destroyed Konoha. His Sharingan flickered and spun, three tomoe in each eye for the very first time.

The demon laughed from the darkness behind the bars. "Wonderful! Those eyes! I'll grant your request this time, Naruto Uchiha." It's laughter roared from the blackness as...

...the sand around Naruto started to vibrate under intense pressure.

Kakashi and Yamato stopped as cracking bones and an earthing shattering roar almost shattered the Desert Coffin.

"What-? What is he?" Gaara asked softly even as he sent more sand to try and crush the figure.

A claw made of red chakra ripped a hole in the side of the sphere as if it truly were just weak sand.

The Third Hokage suddenly stood up. "No. It can not escape now."

The Fourth Kazekage was watching just as intently. This had become a battle of Jinchuriki. Demon Containers.

With a massive snarl, Naruto exploded out of the sand. His eyes were glowing red with three spinning tomoe in each eye. His 'whiskers' were quite enhanced, as were his claws. A glowing chakra form of a fox-monster encompassed him. The killing intent that escaped from him smothered the civilians, some of whom lost control of their bladders.

Gaara realized immediately what he was seeing. This was a demon, just like the One-Tail bound within him. There was only one way he would win this fight now.

"I'll need to stop him," Yamato shouted to Gekko, who looked shocked. He was just starting to go through the seals to summon the bloodline limit within his body when he felt another shocking presence... behind him. He and Kakashi turned around to see Gaara's head bowing down as if he were falling- asleep?

Sand exploded from the gourd, forming a massive and growing body even as it sprouted a single tail. It's aura was overpowering, causing Naruto to flinch under its weight.

The Kazekage nodded to himself. "Well, I guess that's the signal... eh, Professor?"

Hiruzen Saratobi narrowed his eyes as he realized what was going on. Behind him, outside the edge of the city a massive snake appeared as if summoned to smash through the walls. "Orochimaru. So you were not here only for the Sharingan."

The Snake Sennin had a small kunai up to the old man's neck even as he ripped away his false-face of the Kazekage. "Indeed, I was here to crush Konoha and kill you. But my invasion plans have been derailed by your Sharingan brats. So I'll just have to settle for just killing you."

Out on a roof in Konoha, Jiraiya narrowed his eyes as he bit his thumb and slammed down his hand as he imbued a huge amount of chakra into his summoning technique.

In a massive poof of smoke, the 'boss toad' Gamabunta appeared, towering over the buildings of Konoha. "Why'd you summon me, Jiraiya?"

"No time for pleasantries today, Gamabunta. Let's take out that snake in one hit!" the Toad Sennin shouted out with a smirk of combat driven happiness.

The Third Hokage managed to disrupt Orochimaru's control of his arm and escape without a scratch, but the sennin then managed to disrupt the touch genjitsu by jabbing the kunai into his own hand.

They both flipped up onto the roof of the VIP booth of the arena.

"It's just you and I, now old teacher," the Snake Senin said.

That was when the two bodyguards of the 'Kazekage' broke into four figures. Each one wore the symbol of the new Hidden Village of Sound. Taking position at four corners, they created a barrier even as Hiruzen showed that he was prepared to fight, ready in his armored battle-gear.

Shukaku tried to flatten Naruto in front of him down below, but was finding that the figure was far too fast.

Someone tried to use a genjitsu to put everyone in the stadium to sleep, but there was far too much demonic killing intent in the air. Kakashi and Yamato flashed out of the way, leaving a swirl of leaves behind them.

"Naruto seems to be still in control," the older jonin said.

"Protect the Hokage!" came a shout from the roof, dragging both of their attentions away from the jinchuriki battle.

An ANBU almost made it through the barrier that was being created, but immolated instantly. Yamato and Kakashi both winced as they recognized the death of one of their comrades.

"This was not part of the plan," Temari said to Kankuro. "What's going on?"

"Gaara's losing it already? We're all going to die. And what's with that loudmouth?" the puppet user as he looked on Naruto as he blocked an impossibly huge attack.

Shikamaru and Sasuke had both been listening to them. Sharing a quick nod, they both attacked the two Sand genin. Temari was just starting to reach for her war fan when her hand froze.

"I don't suggest trying anything," Sasuke said to the puppet user as Kankuro realized he was surrounded by remaining genin. "Tell us what this is about. Quickly."

Down in the arena itself, Hinata and Sakura were regretting their instant reaction as they avoided swipes of chakra infused sand and the almost invisible form of Naruto dashing around.

"We need to wake up Gaara," Hinata called out. "He put himself to sleep to call up the demon."

"That explains his bloodshot eyes," Sakura muttered as she wished she had a fire as her primary element. Then she might have a chance to turn all the sand to glass. Of course, she saw how well that had worked when Naruto tried that. Though fire wasn't Naruto's primary element either.

That was when both of the genin disappeared just before Shukaku could step on them with an earth-shaking smash.

"You two stay out of this fight. This is far beyond you," Kakashi said.

"I'm borrowing your student, Kakashi," Yamato said before he snagged Sakura who squawked at the indignity and leaped up to the roof where energies were blocking the ANBU from protecting the Hokage.

Inside the rectangle, the four Sound Ninja concentrated on their double-layered ward.

"Tenzo, there's no way through," the raven-masked ANBU called out.

"I refuse to believe that. Naruto says you can sometimes get the most out of your Sharingan, Sakura. So prove it... show us the weakness of this barrier," Yamato said with an incredibly cold voice.

"Of course I will." Adrenaline hyped her activation as three tomoe appeared in her left eye, even as her right eye burned. She clapped a hand over the normal eye. "Should I be looking for the point with the greatest energy or the least amount?"

"The greatest energy, genin," Raven immediately called out.

"Are you ready?" she called out. At their nods, which she saw from her peripheral vision, she suddenly snapped out, "There! Five feet up!" She was pointing towards the further corner.

Yamato had already started making his hand seals, instantly sending branches of a tree into the directed spot. The wood burned and sputtered and then finally broke through. Three ANBU were immediately through the breach, stabbing at the surprised ninja and breaking his concentration

"That's not supposed to be possible!" the chunky bodyguard of Orochimaru shouted even as his arms bled from blocking the straight blades from cutting his neck..

Orochimaru looked over in shock as he realized that his ward had been broken through. "How did you plan for this, Hiruzen?"

"This, Orochimaru, is the Will of Fire. It has inflamed the younger generation. You will not succeed this day," the Third Hokage said with a grim smile that hid how very tired he really was.

They both started to go through dozens of handseals, before the Snake Sennin had to dodge a tree that grew from the rooftop and almost crushed him.

"One of them survived..." he snarled as he looked at the flat anger of the unknown jonin. "Retreat!" he called out.

It was too late for two of his bodyguards. With a very fast summoning jitsu, he summoned a large snake that swallowed him and his last two bodyguards, then disappeared.

Back down below, Shukaku was flailing around as civilians screamed and tried to flee. Naruto suddenly appeared on the edge of the arena as he blocked the One-Tail from crushing ten people.

"Hey! You could have hurt someone with that!" Naruto yelled, his voice distorted but still clearly understood.

Shukaku let out an inhuman roar and tried to swat Naruto like he was an extremely annoying fly. The loud ninja dodged the massive hand and ran up the arm. He let out an incredible burst of wind that literally blew Shukaku's right arm off.

"Naruto... are you in control?" Kakashi asked from Naruto's right-side and from behind.

"Nhhn- Barely. The Kyubi pays rent in bad money," he complained with a growl.

Kakashi really did not want to know. "I'm going to kill Gaara when you give me the opening." In a flash, he dodged a swipe.

"No way! I'm going to wake him up and beat him fair!" Naruto growled as he charged. All he was doing was dodging and hitting the other sand. He just wasn't powerful enough. 'I need more power!'

A burning sensation suddenly covered him as the chakra sheath around him grew thicker and darker, then split off a wavering tendril in the shape of a bushy tail.

Shukaku snarled his anger as the other jinchuriki was suddenly matching him. "Damn you, Kyubi, for being so powerful!" its roar screamed, terrifying even more people.

Now that Naruto actually had his 'own' tail, he was blisteringly faster, almost blurring in jonin-level of speeds.

The crowed was still mewling around in confusion. The evil chakra in the air was overwhelming when Kakashi blasted Shukaku's right paw apart like a bolt of lightning. "Now, Naruto!"

Konoha's own jinchuriki needed no other prompting, exploding through the cloud of sand from his team leader's Chidori. The demon-raccoon roared in anger as Naruto came through his weakened defenses and saw Gaara on the massive sand beast's head.

Naruto would not be surprised if Shukaku was so over confident that he could have his container sleep on his head.

"Coffee call!" Naruto said as he hit Gaara with an axe kick.

Not only did the kick hit the other boy with stunning force, it also physically disconnected him from the sand. Gaara's sleep deprived eyes snapped open. "Mother!" he screamed, trying to claw back his sand with outreached hands.

"Let's finish this!" Naruto shouted as he let the evil chakra fade away.

The crowd blinked as the evil feeling from over a decade ago faded away, leaving them in the presence of the still continuing fight.

Temari and Kankuro's jaws were slack in shock. The blond loudmouth had beaten Shukaku.

"Stay back!" Gaara cried out, fearing for his life for the first time. He struggled to his feet, the sand listless as it swirled around him.

"Naruto Uzumaki special attack!" the other boy shouted as he charged. He slide under Gaara and launched him into the air in a flurry of kicks, then disappeared. In a flash, he was behind the red-head, blasting him back down to a section of ground that was not covered in sand.

"Hey Proctor! I don't think he can continue!" Naruto shouted out, as he stood over the insensate form of the defeated genin in a crater.

The examiner nodded slowly at that. "Winner: Naruto Uzumaki of Clan Uchiha!"

"Wahoooo!" he shouted as he started to dance a victory jib around the fallen genin. "I won! Just you wait, Sasuke! I'm going to show everyone how strong I've become!"

A titter of laughter drifted up, slowly picked up by a child that stopped crying in surprise. Another older man started laughing and suddenly the panic gave way to uproarous laughter. Then they started cheering.

Sasuke and the rest of the chunin-hopefuls just shook their head. "I guess he is finally finding that acceptance he's always wanted," the older Uchiha said softly.

"If they don't make him a Special Jonin for this, I don't know what he has to do," Shikamaru commented. How bothersome.

"The Chunin Exams is currently on hold. There will be a recess as the arena is checked for assassins!" one of the ANBU called out from the roof.

"Assassins?" Naruto started to look around, noting that Sakura was missing while the other genins had captured the other two 'Sand Siblings'. With a quick scurry, Naruto scrambled up the wall. "What's this talk about assassins? Where's Sakura?"

"Someone attacked the Hokage-" Shikamaru started to explain, causing Naruto to panic.

"Old Man?" Naruto shouted, running towards the VIP box. He let loose a breath when he saw the old man walking with a group of ANBU, jonin and Sakura. "Hey, Old Man!" he shouted again, tackling him about the waist. "You're all right?" his dark-blue eyes had tears in them.

"I'm all right, Naruto. See?" the Hokage said as he patted him on top of his head.

The young man hid his tears by burying his head in the stomach of the Hokage's battle-garb. "I wasn't worried. You're the Hokage and strongest of the Leaf."

Sakura nodded to herself. She had known that Naruto had a special relationship with the old man, but had not realized how strong it was. He was pretty much a grandson to the Hokage, which was fitting given Konohamaru looked up to Naruto as an older brother.

"I suggest canceling the rest of the chunin exam," Gekko Hayate said with a small cough. "We have enough information to base our decision." He was kneeling in front of the hokage.

"Even on Shikamaru Nara and Naruto Uzumaki?" the Hokage asked.

"Even them. Shikamaru's performance against Kiba Inuzuka was quite interesting," Gekko explained. "I believe we have consensus on Hinata Hyuga, Sasuke Uchiha, Sakura Haruno, Ino Yamanaka, Shikamaru Nara and Naruto Uzumaki all being moved to Chunin. They were a very strong group this year. Naruto really surprised us."

"You don't feel that Rock Lee or Tenten should advance?" the Hokage asked.

"We do not feel they are quite in a position to have overcome their weaknesses. Hopefully they learn from this exam and continue to grow stronger."

"Then let us make the announcement." The Hokage went down to the VIP balcony. "Ladies and gentlemen, the proctors have come to an early decision due to the irregularities of the exam."

Gekko Hayate took over, explaining which genin had advanced to chunin. Several of the genin that had been promoted felt that Naruto should have been made a Special Jonin for his fight.

"There is only one thing left to go over. Gaara and his siblings will be held here as a high level peace conference is called between the Sand and the Leaf. Temari of the Leaf, your Kazekage is dead; murdered at the hands of Orochimaru."

"What?" the blonde screamed from between two ANBU. "You are lying!"

"The man you saw at my side today was not the Fourth Kazekage, but Orochimaru disguised using his face. The... technique he used is quite fatal and vile." The Hokage held her gaze until she could no longer meet his eyes.

Now it was time to deal with the fallout.

---

The next morning, the Hokage looked over as a figure knocked on the outside of the bay view of the Hokage tower. "Jiraiya. I thought I saw Gamabunta out there."

"Yeah, we got some exercise yesterday," the Toad Sennin said with a grin.

"So, do you have the answer to my question?"

"No way, old man. It would be a disaster of epic proportions if you made me Hokage. And your jonin know it too."

"That does not leave a lot of choices available, Jiraiya." The old man sighed as he filled his tobacco pipe and lit it. "The only other one I could see of your generation is Tsunade. And I doubt she would consent."

"You have to ask first. And you might be surprised, depending on who you send out." Jiraiya flipped upside down for a second, then walked over to his desk. "How about you let me borrow a ninja or two to go after her?"

"Naruto? And Sakura? I saw that you had been training her." The Hokage puffed his pipe a bit. "Orochimaru is still out there, too. Morino Ibiki broke Temari and Kankuro. The Hidden Village of Sound is his creation. His attack upon me was a declaration of war. The Leaf will crush his village."

"Leading a war is tough business, old man," the white-haired man said as he considered it. "So that's why you want a successor. She won't want to fight a war."

"We won't go to war quite yet, but it will have to happen." The Hokage was only speaking the absolute truth.

"And neither of us want Danzo in charge for that."

Both men looked uncomfortable even thinking about Danzo leading Leaf. The things they man did his ROOT forces were really disturbing. They were like flesh versions of the clockwork robots used in the Jonin training areas. And the pair were fairly sure Danzo would run for cover the instant his life was put in danger. All things that made Danzo completely unworthy of being Hokage.

"Very well, I will assign Team 7 to go with you. If she says no, I want her to tell me herself why. Do you understand?" Hiruzen Saratobi was not normally a hard man, but he showed why he was the most feared ninja of Konoha.

Jiraiya blinked, looking at his old teacher in a hard light. "Of course, Hokage."

As Jiraiya departed, the Hokage called in his secretary to summon Kakashi Hatake. The Hokage had spent the time while waiting for Kakashi (a remarkably short half hour) clearing the room of any surveliance. "Team 7 has a B Rank mission. You are to accompany Jiraiya on a mission to recruit Tsunade." He'd kicked out one of Jiraiya's toads with a warning not to spy on him again. "You will also have a personal S Rank mission. If Tsunade attempts to go anywhere other than to Konoha to either accept the position of Hokage or explain to myself why she thinks she is not acceptable, you are to kill her as a Missing Ninja."

Kakashi let his one eye consider the person making the request. "I assume that I may have to deal with Jiraiya also?"

"You should be able to use his gullibiliaty against him, but do not attempt to fight both of them in any case."

"And should I have my team assist?"

"They are your soldiers and all chunin now. There is a reason I told you to train them as hard as I did," the old man said gruffily.

"Of course." That was enough of an answer for now.

---

Naruto was looking around, spotting his team leader. "Kakashi! What is our mission?" Sakura and Sasuke were already there with him at the north gate of Konoha.

"We're to accompany Jiraiya as he makes an offer to the Slug Sennin, Tsunade," the jonin said.

Sakura blinked while Sasuke frowned.

"An offer?" the Uchiha head of house asked.

"That's up to Jiraiya if he wants to tell us or not. This mission may take us a few months." Kakashi knew that his team had packed everything they needed.

"Let's go!" Naruto cheered. He hoped he could get out of those etiquette lessons because of this. Seriously a fork was a fork. It didn't matter if it was for salad or whatever. Same with spoons. And who cared if tea was poured left or right?

"We have to wait for Jiraiya," the jonin noted aloud.

"Oh, yeah. So where is he?" Naruto was looking around frantically. He activated his Sharingan to help him.

"Probably at the nearest bath house," Sakura complained. "He is such a-"

"There you are! That's a really cool jitsu! Teach me!" Naruto bellowed as he charged over to the mostly invisible sennin.

At Naruto's shout, both of the other chunin had activated their Sharingan.

"A self-genjitsu... interesting," Sakura said in considering thought. It must anchor itself, but how to keep it from affecting yourself?

"I'm not teaching that to you," Jiraiya snapped as he dropped the mirage invisibility. "Man, that's why I don't like eyes like that."

"Then you are definitely in the wrong team," Sasuke noted in a cold tone. "We have all but one pair of Sharingans in our team." His fist clenched tight at that.

"Ah, come on! It looks really cool. And I can finally be stealthy!" Naruto whined louder.

"Naruto, you can bug him later. We need to go now," Kakashi called out.

"And he's really a chunin?" the Toad Sennin asked.

"Are you really a sennin and not a pervert?" Sakura shot right back.

"I'm a super-pervert! Remember it!"

Naruto and Sasuke just looked at the old man in shock. Sakura just sighed.

Kakashi just sighed. This was going to be a long trip. He also remembered a bit of advice his sensei gave him about going on any long term mission with Jiraiya. And that was to keep him sober and out of the arms of women. Otherwise the mission would be three times as long.