...three 10,000 word chapters in 3 days? Don't get used to it. I did it for the word count, and to help me appease the dragon boss looking in my head telling me to get it out before the plot bunnies tried to mess with this story.

One does not simply mess with plot bunnies...heaven help those who do.

I don't own Naruto or the identity of some of the dragons here. I do own their personality and my own personal ramblings though, so ha!

Who Walks Among Dragons

The wind whipped around his head as he flew through the air, a large smile on his face as the sunlight fell on him. It felt like the world was alight and all was well in life.

"Sweet glorious freedom!" Naruto shouted as he leapt from roof to roof, allowing himself a couple seconds hang time to really feel the falling motion before landing and sprinting to the next one. "Hahaha, suck it Sasuke! I totally finished the last houses before you!"

"Only because you ripped up everything behind the walls too." Sasuke replied, rolling his eyes at Naruto's attitude. He was like this in every mission they took; he'd do it the way anyone else would, and then Naruto would try to one-up him. Surprisingly, Naruto's over the top method of finishing out the inside of the last house had worked, and Kakashi had allowed him to help Sakura. She hadn't been paying attention to what Kakashi was saying when he'd spoken to her, thinking he was yelling at Naruto, and let out a loud shriek when she found Naruto coming up the stairs with half the wall falling behind him. Needless to say, his head got one nasty wallop quite quickly.

Sasuke pled silence to any form of laughter upon hearing that, imagined or not.

"It needed to come down, and I was just the man to do it!" Naruto shouted, slamming a fist to his chest with a large grin.

"Naruto, calm down already." Sakura huffed as she watched him practically flip off any surface he could put his feet on in glee. "We get it, you did good. Now will you please stop with all the jumping? You're making me dizzy."

"Oh come on Sakura-chan! I'm not that – whoa jeez!" Naruto shouted, barely catching himself as he almost slipped and fell when his foot caught the very edge of a tile and slipped before he could apply chakra to it.

"…you were saying?" Sasuke said with a smirk. The glare he got in return was worth it.

Sakura on the other hand, had a better method of defusing the situation. "Naruto, didn't you say we were going to Ichiraku's for dinner?" She was going to have a real meal afterwards, but he didn't need to know that.

Naruto's eyes brightened. "Oh yeah! Hehe, sorry, I was just lost in the moment." Bounding again to the furthest roof he could see, he turned back to them and waved them on. "Come on guys! We're losing light out and I want to beat the night rush!"

Both rolled their eyes, neither really believing that there was any sort of 'night rush' for a ramen stand, but they still followed after him. As they did so, Sakura glanced between Naruto and Sasuke before she finally decided to ask what was on her mind. "Um…Sasuke-kun? Why are we going to get ramen again?"

"Hn." Sasuke muttered, hiding a more embarrassed look. "The dobe said he'd pay for it, so we figured we'd humor him this once."

"Ah." Sakura sighed. Once the mission had been completed, things had suddenly turned into a whirl of activity; or rather, Naruto had been racing around shouting about how awesome he was and making her dizzy. When he'd suddenly kept yelling for them to follow him, she was worried he'd somehow gotten her to agree to a date or something like that until Sasuke jumped after him too. She'd 'trained' herself to have an automatic reaction to his date question, seeing how she was keeping herself for…later.

Watching their teammate and his ever bounding enthusiasm, they both shared a look. Both had an idea of what the other was thinking, but neither was sure how to say it without sounding harsh. Rather, Sakura didn't, Sasuke didn't really care since it was the truth. "Do you think the dobe even thinks about Nami no Kuni anymore?"

Sakura blinked, glancing to her crush with wide eyes at the question. Both because it was a question running through her own mind, and because Sasuke had just initiated a conversation with her! Fan girl tendencies almost rose back to the surface, but Inner Sakura quickly smacked them down. "This is my chance, sharrano!"

"W-well…" Sakura stuttered as she glanced at Naruto and his jumping and hopping through the air. "I don't know. Sometimes I catch him staring out of Konoha, like he's thinking about it, but then he turns around and keeps acting like his normal self. It's like, he thinks about it, and then immediately pushes it down. It doesn't seem healthy to me."

"Maybe that's how he's dealing with it." Sasuke muttered, watching the big grin of their hyperactive teammate as he pointed and shouted to where the stand was. Sasuke's own hands gently brushed against some of the small pinpoint scars on his bod; his ever present memento of his brutal loss against Haku. "He said he would be a ninja in his own way, so him still being like he was before the mission might be his way of…proving he can still be 'him' while still being a ninja."

Sakura nodded, that logic sounding right to her mind. As she watched the blond bouncing on his heels as he waited for them, she silently wondered if she could do that herself were she in his shoes. If she were honest with herself, she likely couldn't. She certainly wasn't the same little girl who had left Konoha just over a month ago; she'd proved to herself that when things go down she can defend people and keep them safe with the help of her team. In a way it showed how their teamwork really did matter seeing how she could defend the target while Naruto and Sasuke did a full court press to take out the opposition.

Then again, both times she'd needed to protect Tazuna, there had only been two opponents. How would she fair against three or more attacking them? It wasn't something she wanted to admit, but the thought had kept her up some nights and caused more than a few nightmares of what could happen to her and her team. Even with the speed she'd added to her jutsu from having learned how to better control her chakra, she still had a long ways to go.

"Come on you guys, ramen calls!" Naruto shouted, finally darting into the stand. To their shock, they heard a small shout of surprised followed by Naruto falling back as he ran into someone. "Ow…what hit me?"

"I think the better question is who did you hit dobe." Sasuke replied, stepping around Naruto who glared up at him as he picked himself up. Pushing the cloth up, he raised an eyebrow as he looked down at the victim of an overeager Naruto. "Kiba? What are you doing here?"

Kiba shook his head as he picked himself up. "Well, I was done getting something to eat, but then I ran into someone." Glancing around Sasuke, Kiba grinned in his usual feral-like manner. "Looks like the baka still doesn't know how to look before he leaps."

"Oi, who you calling a baka!" Naruto shouted.

"You, baka." Kiba said, knowing he could continue to push Naruto's buttons all day long if he wanted. It was rather fun in his opinion.

Sasuke in the meantime, looked Kiba over with a touch of scrutiny. It had been several months since he'd last seen the Inuzuka, and from the look of him he was…less than impressed. He still had that wild look in his eyes, and from the way he was goading Naruto on he was still cocky as he'd been in the Academy. On the other hand, he was dressed down today, not wearing his fur jacket like normal and was only wearing a grey short-sleeved shirt with his regular dark-blue pants. Likely he'd stopped here on his way back from a training session, and they'd just gotten lucky enough to run into him.

"Naruto, we didn't come here to start a fight, remember?" Sakura, of all the people to diffuse this situation, intervened to prevent it from becoming a small fight in front of the stand. She didn't want to get kicked out before she'd even gone in after all.

"Eh? Oh right! Ramen!" Naruto shouted, sidestepping Kiba as he hopped onto the stool and shouted back to Teuchi. "Oi! Two beef ramen please!"

"Coming right up Naruto!" Teuchi shouted back, having already started the order upon seeing one of his top customers heading in.

Kiba blinked at how quickly he'd been ignored, the whiplash causing him to actually take a moment to recover from. Grinning, he stepped back into the stand and sat next to Naruto. Messing with Naruto was something he rarely got to do nowadays, though he was also curious to see how he and his team had faired recently seeing as they had Naruto on their team. The teasing was more in good fun than anything else.

"So Naruto, how've things been?" Kiba said, watching as Naruto kicked his feet in eager anticipation.

"Hehehe, I've been great!" Naruto all but shouted, watching as Ayame and Teuchi glanced at him as well. He had a small audience here now, so he might as well indulge a bit. "We've been learning all kinds of awesome stuff, and we've taken two C-ranked missions now!"

"Really?" Kiba raised an eyebrow at that. His team had taken one themselves, but two? That was mildly impressive. "What kind of missions were they."

"Well –"

"Guard duty and glorified demolitions crew." Sasuke said, cutting Naruto off.

Naruto blinked and scowled at Sasuke. "Hey, I was telling what happened!"

Sasuke rolled his eyes. "We would've been here all day if you'd told it. Besides, you aren't the only one who was on those missions; we were there too, remember? And really, if they want to know more, they'll ask."

Naruto silently fumed while Inner Sakura cheered at the fact that Sasuke had indirectly referenced her. Luckily for Naruto, Kiba was somewhat interested, although it was more of a 'rub it in your face' type of interested. "Really? Heh, that's pretty cool. We've been on a C-ranked mission ourselves. We had to scout out and take down a camp of bandits. Our team really got to show off our stuff on that one. Kurenai-sensei was really proud of how well we did."

Team 7 shared a brief look with each other, almost as though they were all debating on whether they should tell Kiba about how their guard duty mission really went. Since Sasuke was between the two, he suddenly became the improvised center of their inner debate. Taking a stand as 'leader of the group', he slowly shook his head. Kiba didn't need to know, and really he didn't feel like divulging any information about what had happed; keeping a few surprises for later might be useful.

"That's great Kiba." Sakura said, smiling politely at the wild boy. "Hm, if I remember, your team has Shino and Hinata from our class on it, right?"

Kiba perked up at the curious attention, just as willing as Naruto was to tell his story. "Yeah, that's my team alright. Heh, Shino's pretty cool when you get past how quiet he is. Plus his ability to track stuff with kikaichuu made him really useful on the mission. I mean, I can get a good track on scents once I have them, but with his mini scouts Shino was able to actually find the camp before I ever caught scent of them. And Hinata…well, she's been getting better and stronger, so she was able to tell us more about them all before we had to ambush them. It made taking their weapons away before they could retaliate almost too easy."

While Kiba had missed the pause Team 7 had shared, Sasuke and Sakura were able to notice Kiba's small pause much more clearly. Sakura, having more curiosity then Sasuke about the matter, spoke up. "Hinata did all that? So, she's been getting better about her introverted nature since the Academy?"

Kiba winced slightly at that, fiddling with some leftover chopsticks in front of him. "Well…yeah, sorta. She's come a long way, and she's definitely stronger then when she was in the Academy,but…"

Even Naruto wasn't dense enough to miss that pause. "But what?"

"She still freezes up during some missions." Kiba admitted, scratching his head with a worried look. "Of all my team, she's probably got some of the best sensory abilities, but she doesn't like hurting people so she hesitates to hit people when it's really not good to. If Kurenai-sensei hadn't cast that genjutsu on the guy, she might've gotten really hurt."

Naruto frowned, a small reminder of Haku popping into his head. Despite not liking to hurt or kill, he'd pushed himself to fight him and Sasuke, even though he didn't use lethal methods to do so. In a way, it sounded a bit similar to Hinata's situation; put into a place where she was doing something she didn't really want to because she wasn't that kind of person. Or at least, that's what he thought. He didn't actually know Hinata all that well, so he was probably the worst person to ask in judging her character. He barely remembered seeing her once or twice at the Academy, her strange shyness standing out surprisingly.

Before he could delve further into that, the amazing distraction of ramen was placed before him and he put that thought on hold. It was time for deliciousness beyond compare. "Itadakimasu!"

Sasuke and Sakura shook their heads at how easy it was to distract the blond, and returned their attention to Kiba. Sasuke decided to delve a bit deeper this time. "Isn't Hinata a member of the Hyuuga clan?"

"Hm? Oh yeah, she is."

"So doesn't that mean she has the Byakugan?" Sasuke asked, remembering hearing stories about how the doujutsu (eye technique) was considered the competitive equal to the Sharingan (copy-wheel eye).

"Yeah, that's how she knew about the layout of the bandit's camp before we got there." Kiba had a proud smile on his face despite the rather downgrading statements about her taijutsu just a moment before. "Her eyes are amazing. Complete view of everything in her sight, and she was able to point out stuff even Shino had missed. Kurenai-sensei thought that was pretty awesome too."

Naruto paused in mid bite, cutting it off to quickly chew and swallow before speaking. "If she's so good, why did you make it sound like she wasn't that good on the mission?"

Kiba blinked and scowled at Naruto. Naruto had no idea what he'd just said that had angered the Inuzuka so, but he had a feeling that it was a rather touchy subject.

"I didn't say that dobe. I said she froze up in the middle of the fight and almost got hurt." He said, his hackles raised and ready to grapple with Naruto should he continue to verbally poke at him and his team. "She's got some of the best taijutsu on the team, but she doesn't like hurting people with it, and she hesitated before actually hitting them which almost made them hurt her."

"If she doesn't like to hurt people, why did you have her in the middle of the fight then?" Naruto asked, trying to wrap his head around what appeared to be a ridiculous concept.

"Because it was her idea!" Kiba snarled, not catching the flinch from Naruto at his shout. "She's trying to prove herself, but she keeps getting hurt. The thing is, we know she can! In team practice we've seen her give a hundred and ten percent every time. I know she can do it, Shino knows she can too, but when it comes time to act she –" Kiba bit his bottom lip, quickly forcing to calm himself. "You know what, I said too much. It was nice seeing ya'll again."

All but storming out, Kiba didn't see the looks Team 7 gave him as he left. Sasuke could see how Kiba had felt he'd given too much information seeing how they really didn't need to know it, but he couldn't see how it would matter much right now. Sakura felt for Hinata, having an idea of what was likely going through the other girl's head. Unlike Hinata, she wasn't nearly as confident in her combat skills, which was why she stayed back; for Hinata to be willing to jump into the middle of any sort of battle spoke volumes about her courage and her inability to harm others told that her gentle nature could be her downfall.

Naruto on the other hand, had too many things running through his mind. With so much input of information from Kiba, his mind wildly latched on to whatever stood out most in his mind. "…wait, they have team practice?"

Sakura and Sasuke stared at Naruto, unsure how dense he was being at the moment. Kiba had been going on about his teammate, and telling them all kinds of personal information, and that was what he'd caught? As they thought about it though, they started to see some sense in it though. In all honesty, they also felt that it would be better for them if they forgot everything that Kiba said and acted like it didn't happen for now. Kiba was likely embarrassed by his actions, and it wouldn't be nice to expose that…unless he did something stupid enough to get it out of them.

In the meantime, they had a new topic to discuss.

"…Kakashi-sensei hasn't had us do any kind of team practice." Sakura said, mussing about this new revelation.

Sasuke blinked, thinking back to their first team meeting. "Which is weird, since his first lesson for us was teamwork…"

Naruto scratched his cheek, looking from where Kiba had been to them. "Maybe we're supposed to just do it on our own?" Seeing their curious looks, he explained. "Kiba didn't say Kurenai-sensei had them doing the training, he just said they were doing it. So…maybe they just decided to do it. You know? Show initiative and stuff."

There was a heavy silence in the stand as the words sunk in. It made sense to them in a way, seeing how Kakashi wouldn't always be there for them; the first battle against Zabuza in Nami no Kuni was a clear indicator of that. It would also let them trust each other more, since they wouldn't be leaning on Kakashi's instruction all that much. Ironically, it was Kakashi's first less that was bringing them to this conclusion.

Now they were learning the lesson underneath the lesson.

"Damn it Kakashi-sensei!" Sakura yelled as she gripped her head, everything finally clicking for her.

Sasuke scowled, silently wishing he could smack his head against a hard surface. It was obvious that's what jonin instructors were meant to do now. After all, a dependency on their sensei could be the end of them if they weren't weaned off of them; in Kakashi's case it was more cold turkey from the get go to give them absolute freedom. Damn hindsight being twenty-twenty.

Naruto on the other hand, had another thought altogether. "We should totally prank him."

Both of his teammates slowly turned to look at him. "…what?"

"Yeah, think about it!" Naruto said, a mischievous look in his eyes as he explained his thoughts. "Kakashi-sensei didn't tell us about this, but he is our sensei too. So, if he wants us to train as a team on our own, we'll need a…training dummy. And Kakashi-sensei is so much stronger than us, if we get even one hit on him that means we're that much closer to doing it all the time!" Rubbing his hands together, he cackled maniacally. "Plus, it'll be sweet, sweet revenge."

There was a small silence between them as they processed this. Under normal circumstances, Naruto's idea would have been turned down post-haste. However, with their reeling emotions from the discovery and desire to cause some havoc for their sensei, it became the one and only option they could think about.

"I'm in." Sasuke said, his mind already thinking of several things that might be useful.

"I'm in too!" Sakura replied, though only after she'd confirmed that Sasuke was behind it too.

"Ossu!" Naruto shouted, digging into his ramen once more. Finishing it in record time, he wiped his mouth and grinned. "Alright, let's head to the training grounds and get started then!" Just as he was about to go though, he paused and glanced at the two. "Wait…did you two order anything?"

Hearing a growl from both of their stomachs, Sakura chuckled nervously. "Um…how about we finish eating first, and then we'll head to the training grounds?"

"…agreed."

"Agreed." Naruto said, nodding happily. Turning back around, he grinned as his second bowl was put before him. He'd almost forgotten about that what with Kiba's explosiveness earlier.

Teuchi, for his part, stayed quiet about all this. He knew they were in way over their heads trying to prank Kakashi, but it might be fun to hear how things went for them. Plus, they were still buying ramen from him, so who was he to deny his customers his roof to plan under? It was a good day to be him.

Musshu poked his head out of Haru's hair as they flew, enjoying the feeling as they whipped towards the mountain range. He could hear the boom of thunder, but at the moment he didn't care. He felt too much was going his way, and he was happy.

"First flight in a long time?" Haru asked, eye glancing back to Musshu. From the way the small dragon kept letting his whiskers flap in the wind, he was enjoying the flight almost as much as a newly hatched dragon. It was rather amusing to watch, especially for a fire dragon who were known more for being aggressive then for being free-spirited. He was young though, so it was likely just until he molted once or twice before that took root.

"Yeah it is." Musshu said, throwing his hands into the air. "I'm kind of the world! Mwahaha, bow before me little – oh snap!" A quick grab with his tail kept him from being thrown off as he pulled himself back up to Haru's neck. Hearing a chuckle, he pouted. "Oh come on, it's not that funny."

"You should see yourself sometime." Haru replied. In the distance, a glimmer of something within the clouds caught his attention. "Ah, we're almost there."

Musshu perked up, looking down at the mountains in confusion. "Where? I don't see where they are. How do you –" Hearing a sudden crack of thunder, his head whipped up. Eyes widening, he stared at the scene before him with his jaw dropping rather swiftly. "…oh."

In front of them, a huge thunderhead was looming before them over the mountain range. As the lightning arced within it, the form of a serpent-like entity appeared. Unless his eyes betrayed him, the dragon's forehead was smooth and hornless; not often a common trait among dragons except for one or two. Its body was also larger in body then it was in length, making it a far more imposing creature of size rather than simply in coiled length. Towering above them, it was clear that this dragon was powerful, and that this awakening was going to be a bit more…destructive then the others he'd done.

"Raiu. A dragon of thunder, and youngest master of Shiroirai (White Lightning) in a generation." Haru whispered respectfully. Glancing back to Musshu, he gave him a confident look as he motioned to the cloud. "You ready?"

"…no?" Musshu was not ready, but he had a feeling that he didn't really had a choice; he was starting to lose Naruto's chakra boost, and if he didn't act now he might be unable to wake Raiu until later that evening.

"You'll be fine." Haru coiled in the air, bracing himself as he aimed for the center of the cloud. "Hold on tight, it might get a bit bumpy. And don't forget to wake Raiu up before we leave, or else we'll have to do it again!"

Before Musshu could say anything, Haru launched himself into the cloud. The unexpected jolt caused Musshu to be nearly launched off, and he wound up hanging from Haru's mane as he screamed from the change in velocity. Then again, few people wouldn't after a change like that one.

As they raced into the cloud, bolts of lightning arched around them, coming close at times, but never quite hitting Haru as he fluidly 'swam' around them and delved towards the center of it. At the epicenter, a particular glow was present, which Haru figured was the sleeping form of Raiu. "Now Musshu!"

Still screaming his lungs out, Musshu barely registered the shout as he took a deep breath. Letting the chakra slip out, he screamed again with the blue flames leaking from his mouth as Haru flew them around the stationary dragon in the sky to allow the chakra to wrap around it much like it had with Haru. Unlike with Haru, the flame-like chakra became wilder upon contact with the dragon, dancing and leaping across its form as it quickly spread over it. With the chakra completely encompassing it, the cloud around it began to become even more volatile. Thunder and lightning cracked around them faster, and the smell of ozone increased exponentially.

"…time to go." Haru whispered, diving down towards the mountains. With all the lightning in the air, he was practically a bull's-eye in the middle of it all. Water conducted too much for his liking, and with Musshu on his back that only made this a more precarious situation. He'd avoided them easier before because he hid himself in the water of the cloud. With all the lightning crackling around them though, he knew better then to press his luck against the probability of getting struck by lightning.

Upon reaching the mountains point, he realized that there were no caves for him to take refuge in. Cursing lightly to himself, he began racing through the spike-like protrusions of stone that littered the path between where he was and where one of the few caves he knew for certain was. Running the mountains like a gauntlet, he winced upon hearing cracks of lightning striking the stones around him as he moved. The stones were set there by other cloud dragons as a method of taming their lightning so that they would better understand how to aim their lightning at things other than simply the tip-most point of an object. Raiu was certainly one of the better shots, but with the awakening he had a few seconds before the lightning become more instinctive in shooting him down through the rocks.

Hearing the roar of thunder that echoed through the sky as Raiu's awakening completed Haru put on a final burst of speed and barreled into the cavern. Coiling quickly within the cave, he waited for Raiu to finish the dangerous 'morning wake up' routine he'd seen only once before when their last summoner had arrived. While always impressive, it still caused him to wonder where all that vibrant energy came from.

A moment later, he felt a shaking hand touch the top of his head as Musshu pulled himself up. "…what…was that?"

Haru sighed, resting on his paws as he looked upwards. "That was evasive maneuvers to avoid being hit by one of the most dangerous dragons I've ever had the pleasure of meeting. Just be glad waking up throws off one's aim. Being electrocuted in the middle of flight doesn't tend to help when gravity keeps calling you back down."

"R-right. Thanks for that by the way." Musshu said, chuckling nervously. The idea of being a Musshu pancake wasn't very appealing to the young dragon. Scampering to the cave entrance, he stared up at the storm above them. "Is…this how Raiu normally wakes up? It seems kinda…violent."

"No, normally it's quite a bit calmer." Haru admitted. Continuing on, he explained. "When a dragon is awakened from a deep slumber though, some of them can be a bit…crabby. Especially when they're younger."

"I didn't snap this much when I woke up!" Musshu said indignantly, throwing his hands out as an indicator of what 'this much' was.

Haru chuckled patting Musshu on his head with one of his whiskers. "Of course not. You're still young, and your fire abilities have yet to awaken fully as you have not molted yet. Raiu on the other hand…has molted, and has gained a startling proficiency with lighting over the years."

Musshu shivered, nodding slowly as he stared up at the way the lightning arched around said dragon. "…I've heard it said she's a prodigy."

Haru snorted. The very idea of a dragon prodigy was ridiculous in his eyes, and was in the eyes of many others. "There's no such thing. There's only those who have talent, and those use their talents. Those who say that Raiu's a prodigy simply don't have the same talent used when unleashing hell with lightning strikes. It's likely they do have their own talents…it's just not the same as Raiu's."

"Oh. Well, that makes sense I guess." Musshu said softly. Staring down at his own hands, he slowly glanced at Haru again. "What…what's my talent?"

Haru lazily glanced at him, chuckling softly. "Do I look like a mind reader to you? The only reason I know of Raiu's skill is because I've seen them before. Give yourself some time Musshu. You'll see what your skills are, and will learn to mold them into the form you desire. Be patient though. All good things take some time to grow before they can be used correctly."

Musshu sighed, sitting down slowly and flopped onto his back. "I know…I just feel so useless now that we have a summoner. I mean, what am I going to bring to the table? Raiu is god-like powerful, you're smart, Shinryuu's wise, and…I'm just not sure how I'll help."

Haru raised a brow at how he glanced over their final member. Clearly he'd heard the rumors, and was either still holding onto the grudge all fire dragons had, or was so terrified of the very thought that he simply couldn't speak without quickly regressing and pushing it to the side. It was fascinating to see how he was handling it to be sure, but with the council meeting preparing in just a few hours, he was going to need to super speed his way through this mental block. Otherwise, he'd end up just as useless as he felt he was now. Still, that was his problem. He'd work through it eventually.

Hearing the thunder die down, Haru peaked out at the sky as the sun began to peak out from behind the clouds as Raiu began circling around and moving them away. He swore he heard a giggle, which caused him to smile. With no lightning raining down on him, he glanced down at Musshu and motioned him to climb aboard. Once the small dragon had scurried his way up, he once more launched himself into the air, flying up to the carefree Raiu as he let out a bellow of a greeting.

Hearing the noise, Raiu paused and flipped around. Bright blue scales caught the light and gleamed brightly. If one looked at them from the glint of the sun, they almost seemed white in how they soaked up and reflected the light around them. Blue eyes glimmered with a playfulness as Raiu whipped around and raced towards them. Pulling up just short of them, Raiu grinned happily. "Haru!"

"Hello Raiu." Haru smiled back, his tail brushing against Raiu's in a traditional flight bound greeting.

"It's good to see you my fellow cloud mover!" Raiu said with a giggle before circling around him. "So, what's with the wakeup call? Did I miss something big?" Seeing Musshu slowly peaking over Haru's head, Raiu perked up even more. "Oh WOW you have a red dragon?! That is so cool! How did you find him? He's kinda small. Is he close to molting yet? Ooh, does he know where the –"

"Raiu. Calm down, and listen to me." Raiu's mouth snapped shut at Haru's calm tone, bowing slightly as Haru continued. "Now, first off, this is Musshu. Say hi Musshu."

"Uh, h-hi."

Haru nodded, glad that Musshu didn't seem put off by the questions. "Now, we're being called together for council at the top of Shinryuu's mountain."

"Shinryuu? He's awake? But why would he be awake? I mean, nothing big enough for a council involving him has happened since the last summoner." Head tilted to the side, a thought seemed to be racing behind Raiu's bright blue eyes. "Hey wait a second…how'd you wake me up anyways?"

"Human chakra."

"Human…chakra." Raiu said, sounding disbelieving for a second. Musshu resisted the urge to palm his face as he watched the spectacle. Even he had gotten it faster than this! Then again, with great power comes…well generally a lack of general study in other areas. Finally, the light bulb clicked on. "Holy crap are you serious?! You don't mean we have a summoner do you?"

"Yes, that's what I'm saying." Haru said, nodding slowly as he watched Raiu suddenly become a whirling thunderbolt once more; babbling in excitement and zipping around Haru in circles that would make any other dragon dizzy in a few moments. After waiting for Raiu to make the obvious connection that there was more to hear, Haru finally spoke. "We'll be heading to meet with Shinryuu soon. Musshu is going to bring the human to our realm as soon as he can after the boy summons him again."

Musshu silently wished Haru hadn't said it like that, as Raiu didn't miss the implication of what he'd just said. "Again? You mean you've already been summoned? What's it like? Is it as cool as they say? What's the summoner like? Are they cool or cute? Tall or short? Come on man, details!"

Gripping his head from the rapid fire questions, Musshu slowly shook his head. "Could you repeat the question? I wasn't able to keep track of all of them since you talked so fast."

Haru held up a paw to stop Raiu from going into it again. "Enough. We'll all find out together once he's brought here. In the meantime, we should head on our way to meet with Shinryuu. Musshu still has one more dragon he needs to awaken before we can begin."

Musshu paled at that, scratching his head slowly. "Are-are you sure?" He squeaked, feeling only too nervous about having to go out and do something like that. "I mean…we don't need to wake 'em all up right? There's three main dragons with you two and Shinryuu, and I…well I can fill a part if need be. I'm small and young, but there's stuff I can contribute."

"True, there is a lot you can contribute." Haru replied, keeping his tone even and soothing so as to help Musshu calm himself. "However, none of us have the experience with a summoner. While Shinryuu is the closest, we'll need someone who knows the inner workings of it all so we can adequately teach him what the ins and outs of our summoning includes."

"If he survives the first couple tests." Raiu mumbled, also knowing who they were referring to. The dragon was known to be efficient…if not downright scary and near bloodthirsty at times. "Yeah…we'll have to see how it all works out."

"Agreed." Haru said, nodding slowly. Glancing back at Musshu, he sighed at the look on his face. Clearly he could now see that Musshu was one of the 'frightened masses' rather than 'angry'. "Don't worry, we'll stand by you when it's time to actually speak, so there's no need to be frightened."

"I'm calm, I'm calm." Musshu said, mostly to himself. He was not calm, but for what they were going to do, he needed to be. "Alright just…gotta keep cool. Play it cool. Yeah…I can be cool."

"You're a fire breathing red flying lizard." Raiu said with a deadpanned expression. "Oh yes, you are so able to be cool."

"Dragon!" Musshu hissed, his tongue sticking out as he did so. "And I'll have you know that I can be oh so cool if I want to!"

"Prove it!"

"I will!"

Haru quirked his head at the display, noting Raiu snickering. As his questioning glance, Raiu's eyes rolled playfully. "He'll be fine now. Come on, let's go meet our summoner!"

With a hoot and a holler, Raiu raced through the sky towards the awaiting plateau where Shinryuu was waiting. As he followed, albeit at a slower pace, he heard Musshu scurrying about as he mumbled and grumbled about what Raiu had said.

"I'll show them cool…I can be cool…the coolest! So cool I'll be hot. Yeah, like spitfire. No wait, that's not cool at all. Hm…I need a cool fire sounding thing."

Chuckling despite himself, Haru lazily allowed himself to continue his glide as he ignored Musshu's indignant shouts after hearing his chuckle.

Kiba felt like a complete tool. Slapping his head repeatedly as he stormed away from Ichiraku's, he couldn't stop going over what he'd said and done when Team 7 had shown up. It had come out so easily, and then he'd just snapped at Naruto when he'd accused him…okay it was less accused and more Naruto asking a question, but still!

Finding a bench nearby, he quickly stomped over to it and sat down, hands pressing against his head as he tried to calm down and think it through. It was a trick his mother had once told him to do when his emotions got out of control and he had a chance to step back and review. She had then shown that she didn't always follow this practice, but then he was the most likely candidate for clan leader, so he figured that he should learn it if nothing else.

The Academy had been a pack of kids crammed into a small room and forced to learn together. Even from the young age, Kiba had recognized the mentality that they all had as being similar to his own family's at times, while mixing in their own family practices. No one looked at Mizuki or Iruka as a true alpha enough to respect them and follow them into anything without grumblings or bemoaning though, so that left the other kids in class. Who was it that if another was told to jump they'd ask 'how high?'

Uchiha Sasuke.

Despite this though, he wasn't truly an alpha. He forfeited this by being a loner, his lone wolf mentality making it so that even though he naturally held several good qualities as a leader, he failed at doing so because he rarely paid attention outside himself. As such, Sasuke wasn't class alpha. Regrettably, Kiba had quickly realized that his class was without a true pack leader early on, and had tried on a few occasions to remedy this by being a pack leader, only to realize he still needed fine tuning to be that person.

There was another though, one who almost could be, but lacked tact and much of the other skills needed to be the alpha they needed. Uzumaki Naruto. Because he lacked the skills and tact, he was viewed most often as the class omega; the bottom of the food chain laughing stock that others viewed only in a bad light. He and a few other kids had grown a bit fond of his pranks, and sometimes would follow his lead after being 'punished' by Iruka to go do something else. Hooky usually got him in trouble later, but at that moment he was perfectly fine with it. He's jokes and many of his other stunts also unified the class in laughing or mocking him, which didn't do well for his image. Kiba himself was more than certain that he'd be Hokage before that dobe would ever get close.

Sakura on the other hand, was a wild card. She followed Sasuke like a beta; a silent second in command who would voice what Sasuke wanted, and help push things around with his silent guidance to make it get done. He'd seen a few of the looks he'd given her, even if she hadn't. Sasuke wanted to ask certain things, but he knew he could wait because Sakura would do that for him. It was almost scary how well he could read her now, considering he'd avoided his fan girls like the plague before they'd graduated.

'Alright, so I was contending with two of them…good to know.' Kiba thought to himself. Naruto wasn't the problem, it was the other two. Naruto had just asked the right question at the wrong time. Being wound up by the other questions, he'd obviously snapped at Naruto because it was the easy way out; Naruto had been the easy outlet before, so why wouldn't he have seen him like that now?

It wasn't the right thing to do of course, which made Kiba angrier at himself. As one trying to be a pack leader, snapping like that wasn't what he was supposed to do; he needed to keep his calm, focus, and above all else keep control of his emotions. He…still had plenty of trouble with that.

Then there was his question. "If she doesn't like to hurt people, why did you have her in the middle of the fight then?" Such an innocent Naruto question, but there was something else behind it. His tone was all too aware, and his eyes had held a sharp quality that he hadn't seen before. Why did it bother him the way he'd asked that question? It was Hinata's choice of course, that's why.

And yet still…why?

Shaking his head again, he heard a small whimper from next to him. Glancing down, he blinked as he saw Akamaru sitting next to him. Cursing under his breath, he patted the spot next to him for Akamaru to jump up and join him. The small dog barked loudly, leaping up and quickly hopped onto his lap. Leaning back, Kiba let Akamaru stand on his chest, looking at him curiously.

"Yeah, yeah, I know, Ichiraku's sucks because they don't let dogs in." Kiba chuckled, scratching Akamaru's ear gently. With a small sigh, he let his head roll back to look up at the sky. "…what am I gonna do Akamaru? I mean…you heard me. I sounded like such an idiot in there."

Akamaru whined softly, gently scratching his shirt before yipping at Kiba in what one might've said was a comforting manner.

"I know boy, it's just…I know better." He scratched his cheek, he grumbled as he sat up. "I guess I should go apologize to Naruto for yelling at him. Don't really want to, but it couldn't hurt to –"

"Hey Kiba."

Kiba blinked, raising his head before raising an eyebrow at the people standing in front of him. The fourth person behind them he didn't recognize, but the three people directly in front of him he could definitely remember; Shikamaru, Ino, and Choji, some of his old classmates who'd clearly graduated by the look of their headbands. "Oi, what are you guys doing here?"

"We're on our way to get come barbeque. Asuma-sensei's treat. You want to come?" Shikamaru said, getting an indignant grunt from Asuma.

Blinking at the random offer, Kiba grinned and nodded. "Sounds sweet! Let's go." Hearing Akamaru whine softly, he chuckled softly. "Yeah I know, but I didn't have a lot of money for any snacks then. If they're paying, who am I to say no?"

"Snacks? Need some?" Choji asked, holding out a bag of chips to Kiba.

"Hey thanks Choji." Kiba said, taking a couple and munching on them as he walked with them. As he chewed on them, he glanced at them from the corner of his eye. "So, what's been up with you guys lately? I haven't heard from you in…well, since the Academy honestly."

"We've been alright." Shikamaru shrugged, his slumped over posture still as lazy-looking as ever. "We've taken a couple of missions lately that were real easy, especially since the exam is coming up soon."

Kiba perked up at that. "Oh? So your sensei told you guys too?"

As Kiba glanced back at Asuma, the man chuckled softly. "What? Do you think I would tell my students about the Chunin Exams? I'm not really going to let them walk right past that without even knowing it was coming."

"That, and it'd have been a hassle to keep Ino from yelling at him if he did forget." Choji supplied helpfully.

"Hey, I'm not that bad guys." Ino huffed, crossing her arms indignantly. "Seriously, you guys make me sound like I whip you around or something."

"If you had the physical strength, you would whip us around." Shikamaru countered, getting Ino to squawk a bit at that. "Then again, you'd probably find it as troublesome as me to do that, seeing how we are still training…even if it's not always what you're expecting us to do."

"Yeah, because being reminded that Choji can basically eat food for extra chakra reserves is totally a comforting thought." Ino grumbled. While a part of her wondered if techniques like that could get her to be thinner, she knew enough to know that Choji had a tendency to overeat a bit more then he needed to seeing how his reserves would be fine when he'd do so.

Right now though, they were at the barbeque place, and for a post training pick-me-up it was one Choji had earned this time. Hearing him give a whoop that would've made Naruto proud of the other food enthusiast, Ino turned to Kiba. "Hey, have you seen Naruto or his team around? They disappeared a while back, and it's been nearly impossible to hear anything about them."

"Hm?" Kiba asked, blinking at the question. "Well…I saw them today before I met with you guys –"

"YOU WHAT?!"

"…and the last I saw of them I was leaving Ichiraku."

Ino twitched slightly at this information, making Kiba silently wonder if her shaking hands were her attempt to keep from jumping on him and strangling him. After she took a second to calm down, she stared at Asuma with a torn look. On one hand, she clearly wanted to go look for Team 7; on the other hand, she'd clearly promised the team that she'd eat with them.

Her decision was decided for her as Choji all but dragged his teammates into the restaurant and shouted for them to get a booth for five. Kiba and Asuma briefly stared at the display for a second before they both chuckled. Glancing at each other, Kiba raised an eyebrow before shrugging at the man's curious gaze.

Before he could join Choji in the feast of meat, Asuma spoke up. "So, you met Kakashi's kids huh? How were they doing?"

Kiba paused, glancing back once more at the bearded jonin. "Uh, they seemed to be alright. They all seemed normal enough, though Naruto only ordered two bowls of ramen. Hm…maybe he was paying?"

Asuma, rather than chuckling at Kiba's attempt at a joke, sighed softly. "Good to hear. I was worried a bit. It seems they're doing just fine though."

This most definitely had Kiba's full and undivided attention. "Huh? Why would you be worried about them? I mean, yeah they're probably the most dysfunctional team ever thought up, but they seemed to be working well for themselves." Kurenai had never seemed to poke her nose into Asuma's students affairs whenever they left to go – ehem – 'discuss' things. So why would Asuma, even if indirectly, do just that? It didn't make sense. Unless… "Did something happen?"

Were Kiba like Shikamaru, Asuma might've cursed his luck about how the kid had basically outplayed him. However, a Shikamaru Kiba was not, which meant that he didn't know if he had to worry about dropping a few hints for him to put his nose to and follow. Knowing an Inuzuka though, he would likely need to just to let Kiba follow the trail and find out for himself.

"Well, that depends." Asuma said slowly, rolling his cigarette in his mouth as he thought of how to word this. "Did they tell you about their latest mission?"

"Um, which one?" Kiba frowned, vaguely remembering that they'd brought up having taken two mission before he'd proudly told them about the one Team 8 had been on. The second was easy enough to remember with how they'd put it, but the other was a bit more difficult. "The…glorified demolition job, or the other one?"

Asuma raised his eyebrow at that. "Two huh? Wow, didn't think Kakashi would give them another C-rank so close to the exams. Gotta admit, the guy's got some stones with that kinda choice."

Kiba frowned, refraining from his instinct to growl at the man. He was a jonin after all. Akamaru on the other hand, had no qualms about yipping at Asuma to bring him back to focus on the question at hand. Good dog.

Scratching his cheek, Asuma muttered under his breath. "Uh, no, the other one."

Kiba shrugged. "What about that one?"

"…if you don't know, then they didn't tell you." Asuma said with a shrug. "It's not my place to tell, so I'm sorry, but that's all I'm gonna say."

As Kiba watched Asuma walk into the barbeque, he scowled and scratched his head. What was Asuma talking about? What kind of a mission had they taken that would make an elite jonin worry about them, even with their sensei around? It wasn't like many C-ranked missions were difficult; the way they had talked about the other C-ranked mission was clearly an indicator of how boring it – wait.

Musing silently, Kiba bit his cheek and tried to remember how they'd reacted to it. It was like it was no big deal anymore. He himself would've been jumping all over the place for any kind of mission, especially one that was more than just mundane things that D-ranked missions were known for. They had just brushed it off and moved on, not even bothering to say anything about it. As for the first mission…

He had nothing. They had not said one word about their first C-ranked mission. While he'd been covering all the boasting rights privileges with the tales of his team's first C-ranked mission, they'd been quiet and merely listened to his. And even then, they'd seemed more interested in talking about his team then about the mission itself! To him, that was absolutely crazy.

Something was going on with Team 7…and he was just the Inuzuka to find out.

"Hey Kiba, you coming or what?"

…right after he got himself some grade-A barbeque. Then he'd find out what was going on with them.

After going over the basics, and looking through what they all collectively knew, Team 7 had retired for the night knowing several things and one major fact; Naruto was the only one who knew how to pull pranks. However, he still needed help from them seeing how his skills in other areas were less developed. After a prank the scale they were going for, they'd need to know how to adequately defend themselves and each other. This meant that they were going to have to train like hell was coming upon them for a while to ensure that they pulled it off.

They only were going to get one chance; any attempts at it later and Kakashi would be on guard.

Agreeing to meet bright and early at their regular meeting spot, they'd then use the three hours Kakashi 'gave' them by being late to begin fine tuning their teamwork. In the evenings they'd spend one more hour together to review how their mission(s) had gone, and then point out where they all could improve. Once that was done, they'd all split up to work on their flaws separately so that Kakashi wouldn't notice them being together more often seeing how they'd just have left and gone home to train in his mind. On the days off they'd take care of any business they needed to like normal, unless one of them figured they should practice something different. In that case, they'd let them know beforehand so they could make sure they could all work together and get it down.

It was the beginning of a…strange teamwork exercise, but one that they were going to take seriously and do everything they could to come out on top.

Naruto, happy to have been a source of the inspiration for this silliness – er, team training – made his way home so that he could once more have some privacy. It had been a long day with plenty of physical labor, sweat, and thinking. Now he just wanted to go home, relax, and summon Musshu like he'd been asked so that he could have some more fun with him. He had to admit, the idea of summoning a small dragon wasn't what Naruto was expecting, but now that he was starting to get his head wrapped around it, he was starting to think a bit more logically about this like he had before Musshu had been summoned a second time.

If Musshu was one dragon, what were the other dragons like? How big were some of the other dragons? The ideas and images his mind conjured up were almost too much as he cackled wickedly on his way home. As he raced into his apartment, he quickly slammed the door behind him and threw his jacket to the side. Stretching and making himself comfortable, he bit his thumb till he bled, and went through the necessary hand signs. Slamming it on the floor once more, he waited in a crouched position, patiently for the normal smoke to clear to reveal who he'd summoned.

"Oh wow, that was really great timing!"

Naruto grinned as the familiar voice cut through the smoke. "Hey Musshu."

Musshu grinned up at him. "Hey Naruto!" His grin quickly fell as something seemed to dawn on him. Before Naruto could move, Musshu jumped up at him and knocked him from his crouched position onto his back. "Oh man, am I glad to see you!"

"…uh…okay?" Naruto said, clearly confused by Musshu's sudden words and actions. "We just saw each other this morning. Remember?"

"Yeah, but I kinda sorta made a mistake and now everyone's waiting on you to get on over so that we can handle some stuffs." Musshu said, rushing through his words, trying to forget the angry look he'd been getting just a moment before he'd been summoned by Naruto.

"Wait, what? Why'd you get in trouble? Did you do something wrong?" Naruto asked, sitting up and pushing Musshu down off his chest so he could pay better attention.

Musshu held his tail in his hands, wringing it out as he struggled for the right words. "Well~ you see…I was kinda supposed to summon you to our realm but I didn't know about that until I talked to Shinryuu and when you summoned me I went back and fogot you again only to wake up Haru who took me to the mountains so I –"

"Musshu!" Naruto said, his eyes shut at he held his head. "Slow down, I can't understand what you're saying!"

"…you're right!" Musshu said, snapping his claws. Jumping back onto Naruto, he wrapped around him as he began channeling some chakra into him. "It's better if I just show you!"

"Wait what?"

With a poof of smoke, the two disappeared from Naruto's home, leaving it quiet and serene for once. On the other side in the dragon realm, things were less calm.

"Greetings Naruto-san, and welcome to the realm of dragons."

"WHAT THE HELL?!"

AN: Alright, a few things.

1. I like Kiba, but I didn't get to work much with him in Word of Honor, which means he'll likely be down played a bit there. As such, he will be messed with a bit more here, seeing how...I can do that. Also, Choji is another character I haven't gotten to work with, so I'm going to play around with him a little more.

2. Raiu was based off of a dragon many people know and love as a power house. Since it's a bit difficult to tell exactly who (the more direct references should be obvious)...actually I think I'll wait till my next big reveal to tell who all the dragon's are based on. Hehehe, that should be fun.

3. Hindsight is a pain, and realizing that when Kakashi told them teamwork was the key, you'd think they'd train more together...but a lot of their disjointed attacks and lack of faith in each others movements in the manga/anime made me wonder. Especially since Kiba knew Hinata wasn't good enough to take Neji on; it was dumb and painful to say, but we can see later he was right. So how did he know? Obviously he trained with her.

Those are my thoughts. If you have other theories, let me know. Until next time, Guru out!