A/N: A little later than expected, but finally here! And kudos to the guest that caught the Brave heart reference last chapter- also, did anyone catch the ATLA reference? Anyways… on with the story!

Disclaimer: Nope, not mine.

Tenzo was currently contemplating the pros and cons of becoming a nuke-nin.

Sure, it would mean no health plan or pension and being hunted for the rest of his life, but anything had to be better than staying in the hellish nightmare Konoha had become. To escape the shipping madness, he was currently hiding at training ground five. The training grounds, being one of Naruto's prime hotspots, were the only large scale locations where no betting sites had been set up. As such, they were a refuge from every other shinobi that had been driven mad by The Bet and had swarmed the stations to have their bets placed.

Tenzo had been planning to simply wait out the disaster in his apartment, but the brawls going on in the shinobi housing sector had been downright appalling. The last he had seen of them, many of the buildings had been set on fire or configured into deathtraps to aid in the shipping warfare. As a user of Mokuton, Tenzo knew that it would be him responsible for the majority of rebuilding. But not this time! He was a victim of this damn bet- he shouldn't have to deal with the fallout!

Hence the contemplations of possible nuke-nin aspirations.

The mokuton wielder was so lost in his thoughts that he didn't notice the approaching shinobi- the shinobi that was indirectly responsible for all of his current troubles.

"…and, that's why you should give me a chance! I am a strong, independent kunoichi who don't need no man, but, uh… I- I love you, and I want to be with you!... No, that's no good either…" Naruto mumbled to herself, oblivious to her lone audience member who was frozen in shock at the sound of her voice. The Uzumaki was currently wandering the many trails, and was staring with furrowed brows at her feet as she made her way through the training grounds.

Tenzo had trouble picking up his jaw at the sight before him (because Naruto was wearing a dress- and planning out her confession in front of him!), but he soon recovered and called out to the concentrated blonde with only a small quiver in his voice to hint at his unease.

"Uh, h-hey, Naruto… What are you doing out here?" Naruto whipped her head to Tenzo's seated form, body tensing into a ready position, blue eyes narrowed and terrifying. After seeing who it was, she instantly relaxed, and sheepishly smiled at the previous member of her team. She absentmindedly reached up a hand to ruffle her short blonde hair.

"Sorry, Yamato, didn't see you there! That's, uh, a nice tree you're sitting on. And I was… admiring the scenery?" At Tenzo's disbelieving expression, Naruto's smile dimmed and she sighed.

"No, that's not it… I'm… Well I'm actually practising what I'm going to say to this guy; I've liked him for a long time now, and… I want him to finally accept my feelings for him." Naruto made her way over to Tenzo, and sat beside him on the fallen tree. She didn't seem to notice that her dress was becoming slightly dirty from where she sat, or that Tenzo had become as stiff as a board at her sudden proximity.

"I've been putting it off for so long cause I guess I was, I dunno, scared, but Ino convinced me to finally confront him about it. The thing is, I have no idea what to say. How the hell do you tell someone you love them?! And make them acknowledge you, too, dattebayo!?" Naruto turned pleading eyes to Tenzo, who couldn't force himself to turn away from her puppy dog expression.

"How did you make senpai notice you?" Naruto demanded.

"…What?" Tenzo feebly responded.

"You heard me! How did you get Kakashi-sensei to accept you as a, um, 'respectable, mature adult capable of consenting to whatever they wish'?"

"…Isn't that from the law in regards to relations between shinobi?"

"It doesn't matter what it's from!" Naruto exclaimed. She leaned forward and grabbed Tenzo by his vest to pull them face to face, her eyes wide and riveted to Tenzo's. "I am freaking out here, preparing to confess to the love of my life, and you're dicking around the answer I need! Please, Yamato- I need to know- how do you make someone accept you as a responsible adult, worthy of acknowledgement? This isn't something I can just charge into like I normally do!"

"Why not?" Tenzo mumbled out. Naruto blinked in surprise at Tenzo's question, but narrowed her eyes after a moment.

"What'd ya mean 'why not'? This isn't something I can just beat up or therapy no jutsu! It's the 'subtle, fine details that build up to something great'."

Tenzo stared considering at the blonde, whose chest was heaving from her previous rant. She twitched under his steady gaze, and removed her hands from his vest to do that odd nervous habit of hers- fiddling with the hitai-ate around her neck.

"Naruto, 'subtle, fine details' aren't you though. I think you should just straight up tell him. You just need to be confident- you can't let this guy spin the conversation around, or get away from giving you an honest answer. So yes- you should just charge into this like you normally do, because from what I've seen, you always turn things around for the better in the most surprising of ways."

Naruto gazed back at Tenzo with surprise, before her wide-eyed expression shifted into a sheepish smile. "First Ino, now you- giving me the push I really need to do this… You're right! I'm gonna charge in and deal with this like 'Rei-chan', and make my 'Hiro-kun' acknowledge me! I can't keep holding back because I'm scared of how this might turn out!" Naruto was grinning full force now, and Tenzo was almost swept up in the moment. He wasn't thrown off enough to miss one detail in particular, though.

"…Aren't Rei and Hiro names from one of the Icha Icha books?" Naruto coloured a bright red, and shifted her eyes back and forth as though looking for an escape.

"Oh, y'know, after all that time as Kakashi and Jiraiya's student, I would obviously pick up some stuff, so that's not weird at all…" The blonde nervously laughed.

Naruto suddenly jumped to her feet, surprising Tenzo at the abruptness of the motion. "Thanks, Tenzo- I'm gonna go clean up a bit, maybe even put on some make up… And then I'm gonna tell him the truth, dattebayo!" Naruto beamed back at Tenzo and brandished the victory sign before finally racing away.

Tenzo hummed as he pondered their impromptu pep-talk. Naruto had noticed that she was dirty- apparently, she wasn't as oblivious as people thought she was, and things you thought you knew about a person weren't always as they seemed. People were always breaking past the expectations you had given them, because you only ever saw what you wanted to or expected to see. People were always maturing and changing…

Hell, Kakashi himself had certainly changed since Tenzo had first known him- he had even burned a copy of Icha Icha! If that wasn't proof of finding maturity in unexpected places that defied all reason, he didn't know what was!

Now; to be a nuke-nin or not to be- that is the question.

Xxx

Kiba, for the second time that day, woke up in an unknown location after being kidnapped.

Absentmindedly raising a hand to rub the tiredness from his eyes, he froze at the realization that he could move his arms, and looked down. This time, he had not been bound, and was instead seated on a stool. Upon looking up, he was pleased to find not cloying darkness, but the interior of a familiar stand- Ichiraku's.

"So you're finally awake…" a voice to Kiba's left droned. Whipping his head to the side, Kiba was surprised to find Iruka, as he had never seen him before.

The academy teacher's usually neat pony-tail was lopsided, and his chuunin vest was rumpled and open, decorated with splotches that Kiba was sure were dried blood. His knuckles were white as they gripped his chopsticks, and the ramen in front of him looked to be untouched. It was the dark bags and haunted quality of his old sensei's eyes that really worried Kiba though- he had never seen Iruka so zombie-like before, and he had had to deal with Naruto during her worst pranking years!

"Take a picture, it'll last longer," Iruka quipped, not once removing his gaze from his untouched meal.

The Inuzuka jumped slightly, embarrassed that he had been caught staring. "Sorry, Iruka-sensei. Are- are you okay?"

"Oh yeah, I'm just peachy," Iruka snipped back. After a moment, he sighed, and finally turned to look Kiba in the eyes. "Sorry for being so touchy, it's been… A rough day. It looks like you haven't had it so easy either- Takeshi dumped you in here earlier, said you had a run in with T and I…"

Kiba looked confusedly back at Iruka. "Takeshi?"

Iruka rolled his eyes with contained amusement, the emotion detracting from his previously ominous appearance. "Or Minion Number 6, as Anko likes to call him. That kid is way too eager to please…" A silence fell upon the two, only broken by the consistent sizzle of cooking food as Teuchi and Ayama puttered away behind the counter. After a moment, Kiba tensed, his memory finally catching up with him.

"Oh Kami, I'm a contender! I like Naruto, but not- not like that! Dating her would probably kill me, if someone pissed with the results of The Bet didn't get to me first…" Kiba stared sightlessly at the counter, slowly beginning to hyperventilate. His internal pity party was broken by Iruka's sudden snort of disbelief.

"Yeah, that's not going to happen. Naruto sees you as a good friend, but she thinks you're too immature to be serious relationship material. She also thinks you're a bit of wimp because you couldn't handle competing against her and Chouji in their eating contests."

Kiba blinked dazedly at this new information. On one hand, he wasn't in danger of being guilted into dating Naruto or killed because she had confessed to him, but on the other he was apparently an immature wimp in the blonde's eyes.

A sudden thought occurred to Kiba- Ibiki had said Naruto would probably reveal information on who she liked to a male friend. If Iruka's Intel was anything to go by, he was that friend. Who else could it be?

"Iruka-sensei, you and Naruto are pretty close, right?" A panicked expression crossed Iruka's features before he smoothed it over into an unreadable mask.

"Yes, we are… close."

"Then you must know who she's going to confess to!" Kiba exclaimed. Getting kidnapped might have turned out for the best- with help from Iruka, he could win The Bet!

Iruka's expression was stony as he looked back at the Inuzuka. "You're treading in dangerous waters, Kiba. I don't appreciate all this snooping people have been doing into… Naruto's personal life."

"But Iruka-sensei-"

"If you try and ply me for information on this, you'll end up like them." Iruka tilted his head behind him, and Kiba turned around to follow the direction he had indicated. Hanging from their feet were six orange splattered shinobi covered in feathers, a sizeable lump forming on the closest one's head from where he had been knocked out. Kiba was mildly terrified to note that some of them were jounin.

The Inuzuka turned back to meet the blank eyes of his companion, and audibly gulped. Scary…

"Uh, of course! It's your private life too after all, haha…"

Iruka flinched, but after a moment dropped his blank mask and turned back to his ramen. "So, are you going to go place your bet?" he asked, attempting to resume the calm atmosphere of the stand that had been present before.

"Mmm… the rest of Konoha is a shit show right now, ain't it?" Iruka nodded. "That's what I figured… I don't have a clue who she's gonna confess to, to be honest. Besides, if you've become this scary because of The Bet, I don't even wanna think about how bad everyone else is… If it's alright with you, I'll just wait out the storm here." Iruka seemed to be happy with Kiba's response, and motioned to Teuchi.

"A bowl of Miso on me," Iruka said with a small smile.

"Coming right up," Teuchi happily responded. A mischievous smile crept onto his face and he leaned over the counter. "It's not going to work- that girl is an unstoppable force." With that final parting quip, the chef retreated to the stove to cook the ramen, entering into quiet conversation with his daughter.

Iruka was still pale, but he turned to Kiba and made small conversation, slowly restoring the calm atmosphere of the stand.

"Iruka," Kiba began, pausing from enjoying his ramen as he looked over to his old sensei, "…You do know who she likes then, right?"

Iruka was quiet for a moment, but eventually sighed and tiredly rubbed at his bagged eyes. He looked up at Kiba with an absolutely haunted expression. "Yes. I do. And that bastard is finally getting what he deserves." Iruka turned back to his partially eaten ramen and starred into its depths like it contained the harbinger of the apocalypse. "Karma is coming…"

Xxx

It was after Naruto had returned from her training trip, Kakashi reminisced, that things really turned for the worst…

"What did I do to deserve this?" Kakashi whimpered. Across from him, Jiraiya snickered, smirking behind his cup of sake.

The bar the two were currently in was somewhat shady, but it was renowned for being a place of secrecy- privacy seals decorating each of the booths ensured that. 'The Broken Kunai' was thus the perfect place for Kakashi to converse with Jiraiya. They had much to catch up on now that the sannin was back from his nearly three years long training trip.

"I don't know why you're panicking about this Kakashi. You should be proud of your student! She hasn't just been editing them, either- she actually wrote the last one!"

Kakashi paled. "You mean Naruto wrote 'Icha Icha Sensei Sensei'?!

"Yep!" Jiraiya chirped. His eyes leered over at his twitching companion. "She was pretty good at writing the raunchy scenes, wasn't she? And that storyline, the emotion! Absolutely fantastic. It's almost like she had some personal inspiration helping her…" Jiraiya paused to take another sip of his sake.

"She's secretly really proud of it," the sannin continued, oblivious to Kakashi's twitching form. "Doesn't want many people knowing she's the author, but she handed a few copies out to her friends to get their opinions on her writing. That chunin apparently gave it back, he practically had a conniption- but the Yamanaka with the knockers really liked it. Pretty sure she figured out it was Naruto writing them though…" Kakashi glued his eyes to the table between them, his untouched sake reflecting his distraught expression back.

"I'm gonna be perfectly honest Kakashi- this… situation reminds me of a student I used to teach back in Ame. Had the biggest crush on me, believe it or not. Anyways, I had to leave, and I never really cleared everything up between us. I still regret that, to be honest, considering it's no longer possible for me to…" Jiraiya absentmindedly stirred a senbon in his cup, eyes glassy as he reminisced.

"…Jiraiya-sama, I'm sure Naruto doesn't have a- a crush like your old student did. This is probably just a phase, or even a joke! She loves pulling pranks. I remember Naruto saying that she had a huge prank in the works, and this it was going to fool everyone- this might be it!" Jiraiya was subtly leaning away from Kakashi by this point, eyes wide and posture clearly stating that he was weirded out. Probably worried that he would catch Kakashi's 'crazy'…

Noticing the sannin's discomfort, Kakashi took a deep breath and continued in a less crazed manner. "So what if Naruto writes porn- everyone has hobbies. The topic from her last book is a little… well. But like I said, it could just be a prank or, maybe… she is like your other student, and… it's about you?"

Jiraiya snorted, and turned disbelieving eyes on Kakashi. "Wow, you really like living in denial, don't you? And that book definitely wasn't about me. She acts nothing like Nagato did around me- he was always blushing, fiddling with that frog card by the door, giving me gushy eyes... She's more like Konan was with me, to be honest. Liked me as a teacher, and saw me as a father-figure. Plus, remember that sparring-turned sex scene between 'Rei, the former student', and 'Hiro, the scarred sensei'? Come on, who are you trying to fool here?"

Kakashi vividly remember that particular scene. When Rei had- with her tongue… and Hiro had- in all those positions… Oh Kami, Naruto had written that! He had basically gotten a sneak peek into her sexual fantasies!

Jiraiya lightly coughed to reclaim Kakashi's attention. "I'm not gonna pull the godfather card, because I haven't earned that privilege, and I understand that Naruto is mature enough to decide her own feelings, and make her own decisions. But let me make one thing very clear." Jiraiya loomed over Kakashi, eyes narrowed and emanating a heavy killing-intent. "Naruto is 16, and you're current student. She will have no relationships whatsoever until she is at least 18, and a consenting adult. Have I made myself clear?" Kakashi frantically nodded. Jiraiya leaned back against his side of the booth with a self-satisfied air. "Good. I'm glad we understand each other." Jiraiya smirked. "Besides, Naruto's love life is pretty important- I've gotta a lot of money riding on it!"

For the rest of the evening, they entertained more political topics, such as Akatsuki and the new Kazekage. Eventually, the sannin left, dramatically exclaiming that the hot springs of Konoha were calling his name. He predictably left the Hatake with the bill.

As Kakashi fiddled with the receipt, he absentmindedly reached into his flack-jacket's front pocket. Pulling free the book within, he stuffed the bill in his pocket so he could hold the book between his hands. He gave one longingly tender sweep of its cover, letting his fingers pause slightly as they traced the title. After a moment, his entire body tensed. His lone eye stared blankly at the lurid orange cover.

In a single frenzied movement, Kakashi dropped the book to the table and formed a rapid series of furious seals. The spark of lightning that formed between his hands shot towards his previously loved literature, igniting it into a flaming mess. Kakashi stiffly rose from the table, deactivating the privacy seal as he left to pay the bill.

Genma, along with Yamato and some of the other jounin who were enjoying their drinks in the various booths, looked up in surprise at the Hatake's sudden exit. The senbon chewing shinobi looked back to Kakashi's table, and blinked dazedly.

"Holy shit, did Kakashi just set porn on fire?!" Genma exclaimed.

Yamato smiled. "Senpai is finally maturing!"

The bartender, on the other hand, was not nearly as pleased, and stared dispassionately at the books smouldering remains. "Damn shinobi, always throwing hissy fits… That's the fifth table set on fire this week."

Kakashi was heedless of their words, and forcefully relaxed his tensed muscles as he left the bar. Strolling out onto the street, hands nonchalantly stuffed in his pockets and back lazily hunched, he appeared calm and orderly. His eye occasionally twitched, but otherwise there were no indications of his turmoil within.

"Crazy sannin, stupid bet… Damn orange idiot…" Kakashi murmured. He took a heavy breath, and with a final exhale cleared away his lingering thoughts. Nothing had happened in that bar. Jiraiya was delusional, and his gaki student was still a tomboy obsessed with ramen, not some fictional crush.

In 'The Broken Kunai', Icha Icha Sensei Sensei continued to burn…