Even though it was only a little, I'm annoyed that I needed to use the security day so soon. With my morning updates, I was given the rest of the day after my update to write as well, so I could still update every two days and have a third if I needed it. Still, I managed to get enough done last night so I only needed a few hundred words today. i successfully met my limit, and am posting while it's still morning, so yay.

Disclaimer: Do you think if a girl slipped rohypnol into Shikamaru's drink, would he even care?


A crashing cyclone of wind and water

Fuu sat on the bough of a tree, her legs dangling loosely over the edge as she watched the match below. Naruto and Yagura had both taken to using their shuriken and kunai, running around the area dodging and throwing.

Neither had made a successful hit, though Fuu wasn't really surprised. She had come to realise Naruto's speed not long after she joined the group. It was about the second day when she had challenged Naruto to a race to decide whether or not they used an inn or slept outside. Naruto had accepted the challenge and raced even with that blade on his back. To Fuu's annoyance, they slept outside that night.

"Man, this is bor-" she began, before a shuriken embedded itself in the tree just inches next to her head. She cried out in shock and nearly fell over, hanging upside down by her legs as she yelled out, "WATCH IT!"

Naruto sniggered, accidental though it had been the result was actually pretty funny. Her reactions were better than Yagura's anyway, so far the straw haired boy was yet to show more than a glassy look in his eyes. Naruto could tell the boy was concentrating, but did he have to act like he wasn't?

"Ok, think this has about reached its limit." he thought, before throwing down a smoke bomb. As soon as the purple fog had grown large enough, he allowed himself to disappear into the trees. He landed in a place well hidden amongst the leaves, his smirk fading as he looked to the spot where Yagura had been. To his annoyance, it looked like the other boy had also used the distraction of the smoke to hide away.

He took a pause, listening out as the smoke cloud expanded. He couldn't rely on his eyes; the foliage was too thick anyway. He needed to catch Yagura by ear; it was his only opening at the moment.

"Where is he?" he thought, scanning the trees as he listened out. If he hadn't been so conditioned otherwise, he would have closed his eyes to focus better. And such a thing seemed to pay off, as he was suddenly surprised by Yagura leaping out of the smoke with his eyes locked on Naruto, "He was in there?!"

He quickly leapt back into the trees, narrowly avoiding a swiping kick from the rapidly approaching Yagura. However, instead of maintaining distance, he aimed not to land on the tree behind, but instead pressed his feet against the side before launching himself back off.

Yagura crossed both his arms in front of his face to defend against Naruto's attack, failing to realise until it was already done that Naruto had deceived him. The moment his arms obscured his eyes, Naruto rapidly changed direction and darted off into the trees.

Yagura followed as quickly as he could, chasing Naruto through the trees as he tried not to lose sight of his opponent. The two of them flickered through the trees at great speed; the only real indicator of their presence was the scattering leaves as they burst through the sky high shrubs. Yagura was quick, but Naruto was fast. The former had to come to a sudden stop as a kunai unexpectedly flew past his ear, Naruto was behind him?!

He whipped around in every direction, searching for any signs of Naruto's presence. How could he have gotten back there without his noticing? There was no way he had set a trap, there wasn't the time. Did that mean he was really that fast?

"Wait a minute." Yagura thought, pressing his back against the tree behind him. He looked around warily, checking above and below too, "Even if this is just training, how could he miss a target that had his back to him?"

That didn't make sense; it could only be a ruse. That meant that the kunai was never meant to hit him in the first place, and so could easily have been an imprecise trap. That didn't change his situation though, he needed to-

He whipped his head to his right, the smell of sweat catching his nose. It was steadily growing stronger, just what was Naruto-

"FUCK!" Yagura thought, his head whipping in the other direction. Naruto had appeared right beside him, his leg flying straight for Yagura's head in a high kick. The straw haired boy barely managed to duck in time, the bark cracking from the impact of Naruto's leg. Yagura used his low position to dart out of the way, pulling out a pair of kunai and throwing them straight at Naruto, "What was that?!"

"Don't forget, I was trained by Hoshigake Kisame." Naruto said, smirking as he dodged the kunai and landed on a bough to his left, "E rank Jutsu, Futon: Misdirection."

"He's showing off." Yagura thought, spreading his arms to the side in preparation. Naruto did the same, his confident look remaining, "Using the wind to change the direction his scent carries. Not bad for an E rank."

The two boys stared each other down, their stances steadily lowering as they challenged the other to make the first move. Yagura had the disadvantage that Naruto was faster than him, but luckily Naruto had already gone through some pretty strenuous training beforehand. As a result, despite the blonde's arrogant look it was clear he was strained by the sheen on his chest and arms.

They moved, Yagura dashing to the left while Naruto headed to his right. Both of them ran parallel to each other, Naruto matching Yagura's speed as the straw haired boy ran through hand seals. Judging from the way he ran with his upper half directed towards Naruto, he was opting for offensive Jutsu.

"Suiton: Violent Water Barrage!" Yagura called, before spitting out dozens of combining water orbs. Naruto wasn't fazed by the unfamiliar attack however; he simply dodged them or used the trees to make a wall between him and them. Meanwhile he formed his own hand signs, before making a long leap through the air.

"Futon: Crescent Mirage!" he called, whipping around and throwing his outstretched hands in a rapid spin. Yagura's eyes widened as a large arc of wind suddenly flew from Naruto's hand, firing at him with dangerous force. He leapt clean over it, feeling the wind blast beneath his feet. But almost immediately after he was struck by a second, much smaller arc of wind, one that he had failed to notice.

"Gah!" he thought, as he was thrown back by the force. Though this one was much weaker than the first, it was still enough to knock him off course. He fell through the air, plummeting down to the ground below. He recovered quickly and tried to act, but Naruto had taken advantage if his distraction and now appeared directly above Yagura.

"Futon: Wind Palm!" Naruto yelled, throwing his hands to his opponent's chest. Yagura could already see the wind focusing in Naruto's hands, and knew what would happen if he was struck by those.

"Now!" he thought, lashing out with his own hands. He grabbed both of Naruto's wrists and spread them apart, before curling into a ball and turning through the air. He used his smaller frame to move his legs above Naruto's head and clamp them around the blonde's head.

"Wha?!" Naruto exclaimed, surprised by how nimble Yagura really was. Though he struggled, Yagura's position allowed the two of them to rotate through the air, so that Naruto was facing the ground with Yagura above him. He gritted his teeth, hitting the ground like this would at least break his ribs, if not worse.

Fortunately however, he had managed to maintain the Futon chakra in his hands. He halted his attack and instead channelled more chakra into both his palms, making the attack stronger than it currently was. When he was just a few metres from the ground, he suddenly released all the chakra in one blast, and managed to knock both him and Yagura off course.

The two boys struck the ground and rolled across it, the shorter of the two managing to move further ahead and skid back to his feet. Both of them quickly rose to face each other, but just as Naruto began to charge, Yagura suddenly raised his hand, signalling a pause.

"That's enough." he said, deciding to stop the match, "I can see what-?!"

Naruto, taking a moment too long to catch Yagura's meaning, had failed to stop his attack. He had already thrown his hand out, pumping wind straight towards Yagura with enough force to send the boy flying off his feet once more. Naruto's expression blanched as he realised he messed up, but fortunately Fuu arrived in time to catch Yagura before he struck the ground.

"WHAT THE HELL?!" both Yagura and Fuu exclaimed in unison. They both openly glared at Naruto, their eyes almost popping out of their heads. Fuu took the lead, spit flying from her mouth as she yelled at the top of her voice, "YAGURA-KUN SAID STOP!"

"YOU FREAKING IDI-" Yagura chimed in before coming to a sudden stop. He looked at Fuu questioningly, his eyebrow cocked as he posed a half question, "Yagura-kun?"

"Well- I" Fuu began, before rapidly turning on the spot to hide her reddening face. This of course caused Yagura to lose his support and fall onto his back, to which Fuu hastily spluttered, "Sorry!"

Yagura let out a short, sharp sigh as he lifted himself to a sitting position, supporting himself with his hand as Fuu knelt down behind him. Her face was bright red from embarrassment, Naruto wondered how she could seem so timid with Yagura and yet be so brutish with him.

"Anyway…" Yagura said, getting to his feet. He brushed dirt from his clothes and placed his hand on his sore stomach, letting out a deeper sigh of annoyance that made Naruto grin nervously, "Your Jutsu aren't bad, but they all have one thing in common."

Naruto blinked in surprise, he hadn't expected such a quick assessment, especially from a match like that. It made him all the more curious as to what Yagura would say, and so he waited for further explanation to clarify.

"Your nature manipulation is pretty strong, I don't doubt that." Yagura said, as Fuu rose up behind him, "However your shape manipulation isn't particularly impressive in comparison. That Jutsu you were trying to use requires you to maintain the shape while applying the Futon chakra at the same time, which is a hard enough task in itself since both are a constant."

He then glanced back at Fuu and muttered something, to which Fuu hastily nodded. She turned back to look at her pouch and opened it, digging inside as she searched for something, "Since shape and nature manipulation are hard to combine, you should try using an aid to start off." Yagura said, as Fuu found what he had requested. She handed him a thick roll of bandages, which he took and showed to Naruto, "Considering how you use that Jutsu, these might help you out."

He tossed the bandages over to Naruto, who caught them in both his hands. He looked down at them with a raised brow, these were supposed to help him? There was nothing extraordinary about it, it was just some plain medical gauze. But that wasn't the only questionable factor, he looked up at Yagura too with an expression of mild suspicion.

"Y'know, for a guy with no memory you sure know a lot about this sort of thing." he said, watching Yagura's face carefully. Fuu bore a look similar to what Naruto had been wearing a few moments ago, staring at Yagura with her brow almost reaching her fringe.

"Your memory?" she repeated, her confusion both evident and expected. Yagura glanced at her, deciding to offer explanations to both at the same time.

"It's true, I don't have many memories of my past." he said, slipping his arms into a folded position, "But for some reason, all my knowledge of ninjutsu and the likes is still intact. My guess is this is because of the Sanbi, but since he won't say anything, I'll have to leave it at that until something changes. Is that ok with you?"

Naruto had worn a frown all through this explanation, little to none of it made sense to him. But since this was an area he didn't know anything about, he was hardly surprised that this was the case. All the same, he couldn't help being interested.

"Tie those bandages around your arms, so that the overlap moves away from your hands." Yagura continued, taking Naruto's silence for an adequate answer. The blond nodded to the instruction, and began wrapping the roll around his left arm, "For safety sake, cover both your arms up to the shoulder."

"Got it." Naruto replied, working as quickly as he could. He still couldn't see sense in this method, but by this point he was willing to try just about anything if it meant finally gaining some progress with his Jutsu.

He could already feel a sense of excitement rising up, wondering just how effective this would be. He finally covered his entire left arm, before tying the bandages in place and switching hands. Yagura and Fuu both waited as he continued, Fuu was as interested as Naruto but maintained her position of not looking at him. He was even sweatier than before, and it made her a little uncomfortable.

Finally he was done, both of his arms wrapped in a thin layer of white bandages. He had also wrapped them around his thumbs and the base of his hand, though that was more preferential than anything else. Satisfied with his work, he looked to Yagura to learn the next step.

"Don't bother applying Futon chakra, just use your regular kind." Yagura instructed, as he and Fuu stepped closer towards Naruto. The two reached him and studied closely as Naruto listened to his orders, "Channel your chakra into a single arm, and slowly release it."

Naruto stared for a moment, expecting something more complicated. But he did as he was told, looking down at his arm as he tensed it. He channelled his chakra to his forearm, just like he did with the Jutsu he was trying to perfect. It felt strange to do it without using Futon chakra, it was a little too still for his liking.

Then he released it, allowing it to steadily flow out of his arm without any effort to manipulate it. Though the chakra wasn't enough to become visible, he could faintly feel it, like a warm wave passing out of his skin. For a moment, he wondered if anything significant was happening, he couldn't notice anything out of the ordinary. He began to doubt Yagura's method, but when he glanced up at the straw haired boy, he saw a reaction different to his own.

"Good, it's working fine." he said, as Naruto stopped releasing chakra. The frown Naruto was already wearing deepened considerably, exactly what was working fine?

"I don't get it." he announce, waiting for whatever it was that Yagura seemed pleased about. Fuu appeared to be in the dark too, she just looked dumbly between Naruto's arm and Yagura.

"As your chakra was leaving your body, it was guided by the bandages." Yagura explained, looking up into Naruto's eyes with his still expression, "You didn't feel it? The chakra was moving in the right direction because that was the easiest direction for it to move."

Naruto's eyes widened, before quickly returning to his arm. Now that Yagura mentioned it, he had noticed that. But it had seemed like such an obvious thing, he had almost been certain that he was looking at the wrong thing. So that was what the bandages were for?

"That's it?" he asked, with a look of annoyed disappointment. Yagura shook his head, a condescending smile on his lips making Naruto feel even more annoyed than before.

"No, that's not it." he said, raising his hand indicatively like he did before, "Now try making the chakra spin around your arm along the path of the bandages."

"This is going to help?" Fuu asked, leaning in with a questioning look. Yagura gave a confident nod, which invigorated Naruto a little more. He didn't have many other options, so he decided to give it a try.

He channelled his chakra and released it again, this time willing it to coil up his arm as if it were a snake. Like the other steps, he took this slowly too, allowing the chakra to gently rotate on its path. He looked up at Yagura again, the boy seemed to know what he was doing even if nothing special was happening.

"Now…" Yagura said, his eyes narrowing as his smirk widened. He looked almost sinister with that look, as if he truly felt he had a right to that arrogance. Naruto felt uneasy from watching the shorter boy, what was he planning? "Try spinning it faster."

* * * * *

Gaara and Utakata both sat at the bar in the base, studying the files closely. Utakata had found some preserved food in the kitchen and made up a couple of sandwiches, and poured a couple of drinks between him and Gaara. He took a sip from his glass as he turned over the sheet of paper in his hand, moving on to the next piece of information inside.

"This looks like a map of Sunagakure." Utakata said, skim reading the paper with bored eyes. However he wore a grin as he looked to Gaara, showing him the map revealing guard posts, black market representatives and the likes, "Feel like raiding your old home?"

Gaara picked a piece of his sandwich off with his fingers, glancing at the sheet Utakata held. He then removed his eyes from it, putting the piece of food in his mouth as he returned to the file he was reading himself. Utakata let out and inward chuckle, this was as much of a reaction as he was expecting.

"Do you plan on ever revealing Yagura-san's ability?" Gaara asked, finishing the paper in his hands and exchanging it for another. Utakata looked up in surprise, he hadn't been expecting such a direct question, especially when there was nothing that brought it up. But once he got over this fact, he returned his eyes to the map in front of him, though failed to really see it.

"I don't think it would be really fair to tell you, since Yagura-niisan doesn't know himself." he replied, in a quieter voice. Gaara watched Utakata from the corner of his eye, there was nothing he had to say to that. However, as he picked up one of the files he had read before, he decided to make aware the reason that he had brought the topic up in the first place.

"According to this there have been eight assassination attempts made on him during his time as Mizukage." he said, reading the file over once more. Utakata's head whipped to the file, his eyes widening with a worried look. Gaara ignored this however and read on, "And from what this says, including Momochi Zabuza's, there were only three other attempts that were unsuccessful."

He placed the file down onto the bar and moved it towards Utakata, who immediately took it and read it himself. From his look of disbelief, and his heightened level of agitation, Gaara could tell that the boy beside him hadn't expected to find this information amongst the other contents of the folder.

"Eight?!" Utakata breathed, moving his head away from the paper like it had spat at him. He kept his eyes upon it, willing the writing to be false, "There were eight?!"

Gaara watched Utakata for a moment longer, before turning his eyes away. It was clear now wasn't going to be the time that then answers he sought would come to light. And so he returned to the file he was currently reading, allowing Utakata some peace to think.

"Niisan…"

* * * * *

"Grr!" Naruto grunted, gripping his arm as sweat dripped from his brow. He glared down at the darkening bandages which were absorbing his moisture, almost feeling anger towards them for his unsatisfactory result, "Is that it?!"

He tried even harder than before, pushing his chakra along the spiralling path. He could feel it moving around his arm, even faintly see it rippling the air around. But for some reason, no matter how hard he tried, he could never get it to move anywhere near as fast as when he used Futon chakra.

He squeezed his arm tighter, his breath coming out in pants as he forced more chakra in. Surely the more chakra he sent out, the faster it would move, right? However, he was unable to discover if there was any truth to this, as it was then that Yagura stepped in.

"That's enough." he said, grabbing Naruto's wrist to draw the blonde's attention, "You don't have the stamina left to do anything worthwhile."

"No, I can do this!" Naruto snapped, pulling his arm from Yagura's grip, "I can go way faster than this!"

"No, you can't." Yagura sighed, letting his arm fall to his side. Naruto looked over to him with a half glare, wondering what in the hell that was supposed to mean, "Your Jutsu is an illusion, the wind in the Futon chakra only makes it look like it's going that fast. In reality, your Jutsu is probably slower since you're not able to put the same amount of focus into the shape."

"Hey… um…" Fuu interjected, her eyes raised to the sky, "I think it's going to rain."

Naruto and Yagura both glanced up to the sky, it was true that clouds were gathering, but that only served to annoy Naruto even more. Yagura however took it as a positive, looking back down at Naruto with a semi-serious look.

"You're running low on stamina, and standing out here when the rain hits won't do you any good." he said, walking past Naruto and taking his staff from its place against a nearby tree, "Lets just head back to the base and call it a night, it's not like you need that Jutsu anytime soon, do you?"

Naruto gritted his teeth, finding out the truth of his Jutsu only made him want to train more. It aggravated him to no end that he had been fooling himself this whole time just because he jumped the gun. But he could see Yagura's point no matter how much he regretted it. He too turned around and headed for his things, slipping his haori on and placing Eko on his back.

"Why don't you just go back, get something to eat and then train in your room? It's not like you can tear up the place with this kind of training."

Naruto glanced back at Eko, he hadn't thought of that. But now that it was in his mind, he felt a little better. He nodded to the blade with a smile, before heading after Yagura and Fuu as they made their way back to the base.

They walked in relative silence, both of the shorter Jinchuriki unsure of just what mood Naruto was in. They gave him sideward glances, but his appeased look didn't make too much sense to him. It wasn't until he stretched his arms high and yawned that they realised he was more relaxed then he had been a moment ago.

"Hey Yagura-san, you know that village we passed on our way here the first time?" he asked, glancing down at the straw haired boy with a raised brow, "You think that's the nearest village?"

"Uh… I guess so." Yagura replied, in truth he didn't really know. But that place was just about a mile or so away, it wasn't too far off, "Why, is there something there that you need?"

"Yes, and it's very important." Naruto replied, with a sharp nod that caught both Yagura and Fuu's interest, "When the time comes that someone must go to collect supplies, Gaara absolutely must be busy at this time. That way, I can sneak out and collect something very precious."

"Something very precious?" Fuu repeated, with a distant look. In truth she had no idea what it could be, she didn't know Naruto well enough to work that one out yet, "What is it?"

"It is…" Naruto began, raising his finger in a self important manner while he wore a serious expression, "Instant ramen."

It didn't take long for Fuu and Yagura to hang their heads, though they hadn't known what to expect of an answer, they both realised they should have expected something stupid. And of course, not one to disappoint, Naruto had delivered on time.

"I'm going back to Kiri." Yagura said, making a sudden turn to his right and walking away. Fuu and Naruto both looked at each other in alarm, before diving after Yagura and hooking their arms under his, "Hey- I WAS KIDDING YOU IDIOTS!" he yelled, as they began to drag him away.