Me: I do not own Naruto~
Kasumi: That's right. I don't know why you would own my teammate in the first place.
Me: *laughs nervously* You all should review and check out my blog.
Last time:
Kakashi sweatdropped and speedily whipped out his orange book. "Okay! To the Hokage's Tower, minions! The D-ranks await!"
Naruto's aghast cry of "KAKASHI-SENSEI!" scared all of the crows out of the trees.
Dogs
"Argh!" Naruto screamed, digging his heels into the ground. "Get back here!"
Predictably, the three large, strong, bulky dogs that the blonde was supposed to be walking paid no attention to him and continued to barrel ahead.
"... Dobe." Sasuke commented, eyeing the grooves Naruto was wearing in the street with annoyance. "Repairing that will probably be our next mission." He kept a handle on the pair of medium-sized dogs he had picked out with ease.
Kasumi let out a small laugh, pausing considerately when the young puppy she was taking care of went off to paw at some leaves, tail wagging. "Probably." She agreed, glancing ahead to where it looked like the dogs were walking Naruto instead. "I told him not to take all three..." She sighed.
Sasuke just smirked, stopping a few steps in front of her and tugging firmly on the reins when his dogs protested. "Hn. He's stubborn."
"Tell me about it." She murmured, pulling gently to encourage her puppy to keep on moving.
Half a street ahead, Naruto's eyes widened a second before he slammed head-first into a building. "AHHH!"
Water
"Eeh? Kasumi-chan, you want to learn a water jutsu?" Hiroshi stared blankly at his little sister, his chopsticks halfway held up to his mouth and in no way looking like they were going to budge.
Said girl gave him an amused look, her smile indulgent. "I do. Onii-san, please close your mouth and chew."
Blinking rapidly, Hiroshi did as bid, forehead scrunched up. He couldn't believe it! Kasumi was asking him to teach her water ninjutsu! He had all been trying to force them down her throat a few weeks ago!
"I suppose this is a product of that Wave mission you took?" He asked quietly, none of his usual exuberance in sight.
Her smile faded slightly, but her nod was firm. "Well, Onii-san?"
Hiroshi snorted, putting down his chopsticks to reach across the table to ruffle his little sister's hair to her exasperated sigh. "Of course I will!" He exclaimed with a wide smile. "Really, Kasumi-chan! You act like I haven't been nagging you to learn some for the past few years!"
Kasumi raised a cool eyebrow. "So, you do admit that you're a mother-hen, Onii-san?"
"Ah!" Hiroshi jerked back with a gasp, almost tipping over his chair. Eyebrow twitching, he pointed a trembling finger at her. "Don't say it! Don't ever say it again! I am not a mother-hen!"
"Mm-hm." The sarcasm was real.
"Kasumi-chan!" As was the horror.
Potatoes
"... I hate potatoes." Naruto declared sulkily.
"Shut up, dobe." Sasuke barked, but his glare was somewhat lessened by the streaks of dirt on his face.
"What did you say, teme?!"
"Boys." Kasumi sighed wearily, brushing the back of her hand across her forehead to wipe off the sweat. It was noon and the sun was scorching hot and the last thing she wanted to do right now was dig potatoes out of the ground. Her teammates' bickering wasn't helping much. "The faster we finish this, the faster we can leave."
Naruto grumbled and Sasuke scowled, but they turned their attention back to digging the accursed potatoes out of the ground, getting dirt everywhere. Again. Taking in a deep breath, Kasumi shot a quietly annoyed glance at their sensei, who was lounging under the shade of a tree with his orange book in hand.
She made a mental note to get her team started on the breaking and entering part of the shinobi life.
Sasuke had the fire and Naruto had the stealth and she had the brains. It would be good practice getting the porn their sensei was so obsessed with in their hands. And burning it. Yup, good practice. This wasn't about how Kakashi-sensei wasn't helping them with their missions at all. Nope.
Kasumi politely ignored that small voice in her head that pointed out she was being vindictive and their sensei was a jounin and an ex-Anbu to boot.
Half an hour later and three more bouts of arguing from her teammates, the kunoichi exhaled sharply and threw her hands in the air, immediately catching said teammates' wary attention. "I have had it." She said, not raising her voice but enunciating every word in a way that had Naruto inching away slowly and Sasuke looking faintly cautious.
God damn it, Kasumi was the most patient of Team 7 but she hated the heat. She supposed it came from being born in a land of rain and mist.
"Naruto-san." She turned smoothly on her blonde teammate, who stared back at her with wide blue eyes. "Shadow clones. Now."
Naruto lit up, a bright grin stretching over his face. Initially, Kasumi had been reluctant to allow her teammate to use shadow clones to get them out of every mission - there was a reason genin took these missions, after all, even if they were the most stupid time-consuming tasks she had ever had to do - but their teamwork was getting worse, not better, and she was going to get sunburns at this rate.
"You got it, Kasumi-chan!" Naruto snapped his fingers into the familiar seal. "Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Both Kasumi and Sasuke were both used to this enough that neither of them batted an eyelid when Naruto spammed a few dozen clones in the next second. Kasumi would have been fine with only a few more helping hands, but she didn't complain.
"Groups of three." She commanded crisply. "Potatoes in piles, please."
"HAI!" The Naruto clones chorused and, with plenty of ribbing and arguing, began to split up.
Behind her, Sasuke breathed a sigh of relief and sat back, shoving a strand of ebony hair out of his eyes. "We should have done this sooner." He muttered as Naruto collapsed next to him, panting and complaining about needing a drink. Oh, and some ramen.
Kasumi hummed in agreement, paying no mind to the mildly chiding look Kakashi-sensei had shot her before starting his giggling fest once more. "Naruto-san, how long do you think they'll take?"
Naruto shrugged, splayed out on the dirty ground without a care, each of his four limbs flung out in a different direction. "Dunno." He yawned loudly. "I'll know when they're done though."
"How?" She asked absently, frowning at her hair. God, she needed a shower.
"I just do." Was the unhelpful answer.
Kasumi frowned subtly, thinking over what she knew about the Shadow Clone Jutsu. It wasn't a lot - mostly her own observations and what little her brother had told her - but she was fairly certain that the Water Clone Technique didn't work like that. "Does it happen when the clone dispels?"
"Mm-hm." Naruto remained slumped on the ground, blissfully unaware, but Sasuke straightened up, giving her a calculative look. She assumed he wanted to know where she was going with this.
"Has it always been this way?" She questioned, feeling like this was important, important, important. That reminded her - Kasumi really needed to do something about her bloodline, too.
"Yeah." Naruto cranked open an eye to frown at her. "Why are you asking me so many questions, Kasumi-chan? I've been using Shadow Clone Jutsu for a long time and you never said anything before!"
Kasumi didn't answer Naruto's question directly, but turned towards their sensei. "Kakashi-sensei?" She called, continuing when he looked up to eye-smile at her. "Do you know anything... unusual about shadow clones?"
Kakashi chuckled indulgently, "Sharp as ever, neh, Kasumi-chan?"
"So there is something?" Sasuke said, a small furrow between his brows.
"That's right. Shadows clones are unique in that whatever the shadow clone experiences, the original user does as well once the clone dispels." Kakashi revealed casually as said shadows clones started to finish up with their given task.
"Eeh?! What does that mean?" Naruto didn't get it and he made that abundantly clear. Pouting, he turned to Kasumi; she always knew what was going on and was willing to explain it to him.
"It means," She said slowly, dark brown eyes distant like they normally were when she was thinking through complicated stuff, "that you have a very big advantage, Naruto-san."
He furrowed his brow. "Huh?"
"Think about it. If your shadow clones can relate all of their experiences back to you, then that means, with your inordinately large amount of clones, you could fit two months of training into two days."
"..." Naruto took a second to think about it before pumping his fist into the air. "That's so cool!"
"Hn. You should teach us that jutsu, dobe." Sasuke said with a scowl.
"No." To their surprise, that came from Kakashi, his voice sterner than they had ever before heard it. His one eye glared at them seriously. "Do you hear me? Sasuke, Kasumi, you two are never to attempt to perform that jutsu without me there to supervise."
"Why not?" Sasuke snapped, obsidian eyes burning. "What's so special about the dobe?!"
Kasumi saw Naruto bristle at his rival's dismissive tone. She also saw the pain that he tried to hide. "It's chakra." She said gently, careful not to irritate Sasuke further. "Shadows clones divide the user's chakra evenly, right, Kakashi-sensei?"
"Absolutely right, Kasumi-chan!" Kakashi chirped, previous solemnity gone in a blink. "Naruto has extremely large reserves. You and Sasuke don't. Trying to do what the orange munchkin does on a daily basis would probably lead to a coma, if not an outright death."
"Oh." Naruto had initially brightened up at the apparent compliment, only to deflate in horror. "That's... that's..."
Sasuke was silent, torn between grudging acceptance and acid fury. On one hand, the dobe was his rival, Uchiha Sasuke's rival, so of course he should be strong and enormous chakra reserves were obviously a part of that. On the other hand, it was Naruto and he couldn't help but hate that the dead-last was better than him in some way, any way.
"We won't try." Kasumi promised quietly, and there was a note of finality in her voice that no one dared to question. Kakashi eye-smiled and turned back to his book while Naruto and Sasuke, both silent for once, mulled over what they had learned.
The rest of the mission passed without incident, although Kasumi made a firm note to herself to do something about the animosity still boiling beneath the surface between Naruto and Sasuke.
Limits
"Alright," She said that afternoon as they gathered in their usual training field, "our rules need to change."
"Neh, Kasumi-chan, why?" Naruto asked, absently picking at the grass.
"Sasuke-san's two-tomoe Sharingan, my awakened bloodline, your shadowed clones." Kasumi listed crisply.
"You never did tell us about your bloodline," Sasuke reminded her, chin rested on his fist.
"Ah, yes." She paused, considered what little she knew about her bloodline.
Kasumi had been young, painfully young, when everything had gone to pieces, and even before then, her parents had tried to keep her in the dark about her bloodline; trying to protect her from the malevolence brewing in Kirigakure, she assumed.
That was all good and well, and she appreciated what they had done, but the downside was that she knew precious little about her kekkei genkai. Taishi-onii-sama had been... preoccupied in the few years he had been a ninja in her life, and Hiroshi-onii-san focused more on ninjutsu and taijutsu than their bloodline.
Which meant that Kasumi was rather on her own with this. She wondered if this was how her teammates felt about their own special abilities.
"It's called the Tentaiora." She said softly, aware of both Sasuke and Naruto's absolute, curious attention. "The Celestial Aura. The Tentaiora... it's a very obscure kekkei genkai. I don't think even my own clan knew everything about it; it would manifest a little differently in each individual."
"It's not a dojutsu, like the Sharingan or the Byakugan. The Tentaiora is a... type of chakra, I suppose, that's different from regular chakra. It's..." Kasumi struggled for a word to describe what she had always instinctively known, "foreign. Not entirely of this world. What this means for me is that I have a strong intuition.
"In-tu-ition...?" Naruto frowned, tipped his head to the side.
"It's a bit like instinct." She explained patiently. "Like, in battle, where you sort of know what your enemy is going to do next even though there's no logic to it."
"Oh. Okay." Naruto nodded, getting the feeling that she was talking about. He thought it was probably like when he was fighting the teme and he knew that Sasuke was going to punch with his right hand five seconds before he actually did it.
"I have a sense for danger, you could say." Kasumi went on, striving to find a way for her teammates to understand what was as natural to her for breathing. "Sometimes, I might get an impression of what'll happen in the near future."
"How specific is this?" Sasuke questioned, thinking back to the Wave mission. She had been so unnaturally twitchy at the beginning, and he guessed now he knew why. The Uchiha genius could see why such a bloodline could be useful, but it was evident that currently, Kasumi wasn't entirely familiar with the ability.
She bit her lip, shuffling through her memories. "It depends." She said at last. "My bloodline is normally always active, unless I intentionally suppress it. But most of the time, it's faint, vague. Just a hazy feeling that something is going to go wrong."
"Most of the time?" He prompted.
"I can tap into the Tentaiora at will." Kasumi admitted, recalling that fraction of time when she'd thought Zabuza would kill her. She could utilize that alien knowledge, but..."It's dangerous, though."
"Dangerous?" Sasuke frowned.
"There are certain risks." She said softly. "If I go too far... my existence could be altered permanently.
"You should be careful, Kasumi-chan!" Naruto piped up and, surprised, she blinked, considered the blonde. He was grinning at her, as bright and sunny as usual, but she caught a whisper of darkness in his cerulean eyes and she thought, yes, Naruto would know what the price of power is.
"I will." She said, and decided it was time to steer this conversation back on track. "I need to practice using my Tentaiora. Sasuke-san, you need to practice your Sharingan. Naruto-san, you need to practice using Shadow Clones to their full potential."
"Then let's do it!" Naruto pumped a fist into the air, thrumming with energy.
"Hn." Somehow, she wasn't surprised when Sasuke agreed with Naruto for the first time today. The boys, if anything, had always sided against her cautiousness with their eagerness.
The kunoichi was silent for a moment, sorting through her thoughts. "But we can't push ourselves too much."
"We'll be fine, Kasumi-chan!" Naruto gave her a thumbs-up, filled with faith, and she sighed, smiling fondly. Kasumi couldn't match her blonde teammate's utter confidence, but then again, she was the one who kept everyone from jumping too fast, too soon.
"Still. We'll alternate." She determined finally. "Two days normal and then one day all out."
"But Kasumi-chan! That'll be boring!" Naruto whined childishly. He wanted to get stronger and stronger, damn it!
"Hn. We could be wasting training time." Sasuke stuck his two-cents in. He needed to get stronger and beat That Man.
Kasumi sweatdropped. Why was it that the only time those two agreed with each other was when they were trying to gang up on her when it came to training? "Overtaxing ourselves won't get us anywhere." She said sternly.
"But - !" Naruto was stubborn.
But, in this matter, Kasumi was even more stubborn. "No. Chakra exhaustion is a nasty condition and can land you in the hospital for days. Do you really want to be out for days?!" She focused a steely look on Naruto and Sasuke.
Naruto squirmed nervously and glanced down, tearing some of the more poor grass into pieces. "No..." He trailed off, pouting.
"Hn." Sasuke glanced away from her gaze after a few seconds, looking somewhere over her shoulder. "It'll be more productive." He argued in an attempt to deny defeat.
She could only sigh at the pure idiocy of male pride. "In the short run, maybe. But not in the long run, and we're looking at the long run here."
Kasumi got no response as the boys sulked. Oh wait, no, that wasn't right; Sasuke was manfully brooding, and Naruto was dreaming wistfully of the Hokage's hat. And delicious ramen.
She restrained the urge to roll her eyes. My, it was as if Kami-sama had decided that today was the day to test her patience. "Alright." She clapped her hands lightly and glanced at the setting sun. They had one... maybe two more hours left. "Now that we've established that..."
Her sweet smile turned a tad vindictive, to the boys' alarm. Reaching into her shinobi pouch, she withdrew her hand, revealing four very sharp senbon. "Let's do some training."
And to Naruto and Sasuke's horror, her aim had certainly gotten better.
Garbage
"..." Kakashi sweatdropped as he eyed the trio of genin calmly eating Ichiraku Ramen. "Maa, maa, aren't you little ducklings supposed to be going around collecting trash?"
"Don't worry, Kakashi-sensei." Kasumi looked up to offer him a pleasant smile that Kakashi didn't trust in the least. "The trash is getting picked up."
"Yeah, yeah!" Naruto grinned at their sensei through a mouthful ramen. "We're almost done, too!"
"Hn." Sasuke smirked smugly, plainly gleeful that he was skipping on his D-rank.
Kakashi straightened up and made a show of looking around. He spotted... orange. And... orange. And... some more orange. "Cheating with shadow clones, I see."
"Not cheating." Kasumi denied mildly. "Simply making use of our resources. Naruto-san, chew and swallow with your mouth closed, please."
Naruto obediently snapped his mouth shut and started to properly digest his food, while Sasuke looked blandly disgusted. Kakashi could only shrug and plop himself down beside his team, whipping out his beloved Icha Icha.
"Kakashi-sensei!" Naruto leapt up and pointed an accusing finger at him, swallowing down his food at a sharp glance from Kasumi. "How could you read your blasted porn in such a sacred place of ramen?!"
"Hn. 'Sacred place of ramen'?" Sasuke deadpanned mockingly.
Predictably, Naruto fired up. "Shut up, teme! I wouldn't expect you to understand the greatness of ramen!"
"I wouldn't want to, dobe."
"I said shut up, teme!"
"You shut up, dead-last!"
"What did you say?!"
Sitting right smack in the middle of the epic battle going on above her ahead, Kasumi peacefully placed her chopsticks on her bowl of ramen. Slipping out two senbon, she idly threw them over her shoulder.
Two thumps promptly followed, and the kunoichi serenely picked up her chopsticks once more and returned to finishing her meal, pointedly ignoring the twitching bodies on the floor.
Those books that Sakura had ever-so-graciously lent her really were quite useful.
To her far right, Kakashi-sensei covered up a snicker. Whether it was at his male students' misfortune or at his orange book, Kasumi had no idea, and she had no desire to know either.
Next time:
"My brother wants to have dinner with my team." She repeated patiently.
Me: Okay, so sorta filler chapter. But, hey, things get explained! A little. Meh, things needed to be worked out. My lovely reviews!~
Anime hotty lover. 18: Yup, Sakura's a medic apprentice now! I couldn't just leave her out. :D. Thanks for the review, hun!
Shinan7: Thank you so much! I hope you enjoyed this chapter!
Rosy Fire: Well, she was a part of the original Rookie Nine so I would have felt a bit guilty at just booting her out of the story. Bloodline sorta explained in this chapter? Thanks for your review, sweetie!
TamashinoSuzume: Hmm... maybe... maybe not. :3 Lolz, guess you'll have to wait and see! Thanks for the review!
TheQueenofGoodbyes: I'm so glad! Ah, I searched up those two songs and I loved them! Thanks for your suggestions, hun; they're now part of my playlist. Hope you enjoyed this chapter!
wookie. cookie: Lolz, yup! Kasumi now has weapons, be very, very afraid, Sasuke, Naruto. Ohh, thank you! *blushes* I'll do my best!
Thoroughly Misguided: Ah... I love that song! Pft, sounds about right! Never heard of it described that way... hmm, I wonder what'll happen if Kasumi ever gets into a fight with a Hyuga that isn't Hinata or Neji? Something to think about. Anyway, thanks for the wonderful review, hun!
starrat: Awesome!~ Hope you liked!
SleepAroundTheClock: Amy Lee does have an incredible voice. Thanks for the review, darling!
rinievermilion: Reading many, many fanfics is always a wonderful thing! Kasumi does have a brother; he's mentioned randomly through this fic. Naruto and Sasuke... well, they never seem to learn. Good thing Kasumi's around! Thanks so much for the review, hun!
The Shadow Spectre: Here ya go! I hope you enjoyed!
Burned Spy: Gotcha! New chapter, as commanded!
1.1: Hmm... maybe? Lolz, that's a long way away. We'll see. ;D
Nikita: Oh yes, our favorite bad boy is feeling something. That song is beautiful; I'm so happy you introduced me to it! *blushes* All these compliments are going to go to my head! Tsunade... well, we'll see. Thanks for the beautiful review, as always!
1XxKiraXx1: Lolz, aren't they good practice dummies? I think this might become a habit for our heroine. It is a nice way to whip her boys into shape, yeah? XD. Thanks for the review, hun!
Sieban Nightwang: Oh, thank you! Next chapter? Here ya go~ I hope you like it, sweetie!
Wren: :O. Oh noes! I do that all the time though, lolz, so I know what it's like. Le gasp! How could I forget about my readers? Blasphemy! Here's your update and thanks for your review, darling! Get some sleep!
Suki: Well, we all know how Sasuke can be. But he's in my hands now! *laughs evilly* Ahem. Chunin Exams... oh, they're coming. I'm working on it right now; no worries, it's all coming along great! Thanks for the review, hun!
lucidatray7: Oh, I'm so happy you like my story, dear! Is this update fast enough for you? I hope you like it; ah, and thanks so much for the review!
Me: Okay! All these great reviews just make my day! Hmm... review and check out my blog?
Question: How do you think the meeting between Hiroshi and Team 7 will go?