I refuse to put a disclaimer here cause everyone should be bright enough to know that I don't own Naruto. I'm pretty sure that's why this is called FANfiction.

├Part Thirty-One┤

Day after day of pointless training. Well, it seemed that way to me at least. I could only tell the passing of time by the way the leaves on the trees would change. Green to red, yellow or orange and then they would fall.

That's when the snow would start to come down. Sometimes it was gentle, like feathers floating, other times it would be like small pebbles being thrown violently.

After the snow, when things started to turn green again, it would rain so much, you'd think someone decided to pour all the oceans above your head.

And yet, I still had to train. I saw nobody else besides Kabuto in the mornings and Orochimaru in the afternoons.

It wasn't always fighting, there was a lot of meditating involved too. That was usually when Kabuto was there, though. I couldn't really see Orochimaru trying to meditate, although it'd probably be funny to see.

"You're doing great, now just concentrate," Kabuto's voice broke through the silence, "Just think of it like all the other things you touch."

I closed my dark eyes and I tried to concentrate at the best of my abilities. I felt a familiar warm tingle flow through me and I opened my eyes to see the markings glow a medium blue. It went all the way up to my neck this time, and a little bit below too.

"Now try it," he said and backed away.

I too stepped backwards and eventually hopped into a tree. Kabuto's clone stayed below and we both watched it intently as I put my hands together.

There was a loud boom, just not the kind we wanted to see.

"Hmm," Kabuto said thoughtfully as he looked deep in thought, "I'm sure I had everything thought up correctly…"

I remained quiet as I watched him talk to himself.

"…Well I suppose it may be because it was a clone, nothing real honestly," he said, "Maybe you would want to try on a fish or something small?"

Giving him a blank stare, I shook my head, "I don't like performing on live animals," I said.

He gave a deep chuckle, "Well then how are you supposed to train?" he asked, "And you only affected the clothing on my clone, thus killing it in an instant."

I nodded, "I know, I felt it," I said in a monotone voice that I had quickly adapted to.

He stood there, nodding slowly, staring at the area the clone had been in. Then he turned his gaze back to me and said, "You're going to have to train on something now, right? A fish isn't such a big loss. And besides, if it doesn't work then we can eat it for dinner, how's that?"

I thought it over in my head. It was reasonable, I guess. It'd die without water after a while anyways…

"Ok," I said simply and followed him as he made his way to the river close by.

Once he had caught a fish, which took a moment with him struggling to catch a live one, he placed it on a large flat rock nearby.

"There," he said, panting a bit and wiping his forehead with his arm, "Now practice before it dies."

I placed my hands above it, waiting for them to turn that nice shade of blue before I touched it hesitantly. I grimaced inwardly at the slimy and scaly feeling, not breaking my touch.

After a second, I pulled back and jumped away slightly. I then put my hands together, not caring if Kabuto had gotten out of the way or not.

…

Nothing.

"Oh well," Kabuto said, "That's what practice is for right? Practice makes perfect, after all!"

I nodded and he set out to catch another fish, seeing as the one I had made my attempt on was now dead.

And so I practiced. And practiced. And practiced some more. The sun had gone rapidly across the sky and now Kabuto was sitting up in a tree. I didn't know if he was even paying attention anymore.

"Damn it," I muttered, wiping my forehead and backing away. I put my hands together but still nothing happened.

Kabuto had eventually gotten a ton of fish in a bucket full of water, so he wouldn't have to get it every time.

I grabbed another and slapped it on the rather wet rock. Frowning slightly, I placed my hands over the fish and closed my eyes. I felt a sudden burst of pain in my head and cried out, clutching at my forehead.

Before I had hit the ground, I felt someone catch me.

"You overdid it again today," Kabuto said quietly as he placed me on the ground gently. I opened my eyes a crack to see his right hand have a kind of yellow aura around it.

He then put it up to my head for a couple of minutes before right under my collarbone.

Helping me up, I saw him shake his head.

"You've got to say when you are tired," he said, "If you overwork yourself, you get sick. Orochimaru doesn't want you to get sick now."

I shook my head, "I'm fine," I said, "How many fish did I go through anyways?" I asked.

"Um…" he glanced over, "About a million it looks like. Ok fine, maybe fifty or so," he said after I gave him an annoyed look, "It's still enough to feed an entire village!"

"Yeah, yeah," I muttered and stood up straight, "Well let's go feed this to a village then!"

He rolled his eyes, "Uh huh, you stay here and meditate while I go do something with these fish…" he said and walked away.

This seemed to be the beginning of the second summer I've been here, since I arrived in spring last year…seems so long ago…

Read and Review, please! Anything extremely negative will be ignored, any real good advice will be appreciated and considered seriously

-Jen-