Naru came awake with someone patting her cheeks with their hands. Their breathing harsh. Coming out in short small bursts as she heard the faintest of growling and someone snapping, "Oh shut the hell up before I rub your nose in the dirt!"

She opened her eyes a little bit and saw Jiriaya hovering over her. His expression grim and worried. "Riaya?" Naru rasped tiredly. She must have used more energy than she had meant too. She felt absolutely exhausted.

"Naru! Oh thank god! Are you okay?" The Toad Sage asked, his expression still grim and worried.

"What's wrong?" Naru asked as her eyes drifted closed. Jiriaya slapped her and she opened her eyes and gave him an questioning look as he growled at her.

"Don't. Go. To. Sleep."

"But I'm very tired."

"Yes, I"d imagine re writing history and having your former sensei siphoning off a majority of your chakra to weaken you- would do that." Jiriaya said in a slightly disapproving tone as he brushed some of her hair back from her face so that he could see her more clearly. Her face was an off chalk white color due to the fact that Kakashi had drained her chakra to a dangerously low level before he had managed to stumble upon them.

Naru frowned. "Kakashi siphoned off-"

"Yes, dammit! Weren't you paying attention in school when the teacher said that when sensing weakness the enemy will tend to exploit it! Kakashi is a Hatake-" The last word was spat like a curse. Letting Naru know just how worried the elder was about her.

Kakashi snarled, "Not an enemy."

Jiriaya waved his hand indifferently and muttered "Same dif." under his breath and Kakashi stopped straining against his wire bindings long enough to slip off a shoe and pick up a rock with his toes and threw it at the elder. Naru looked at Kakashi, noting that he was still tied to the tree and-

Good lord he was huge!

Not just in muscle mass but bulk too. He must now weigh three hundred and twenty pounds! His arms and legs looked longer by several inches, his hair was so long now that it reached the middle of his back. He wasn't freakishly large like his father had been. Though he looked damn close.

Naru had imagined that Sakumo had been three hundred and eighty pounds of pure monster.

Kakashi was still fairly small by comparison, but still this was a mite alarming. "Anyways, Hatake's in their present state are much like enemies are. They will do anything no matter how underhanded to mate with their chosen woman. If this means running you down, backing you into a corner and siphoning off your chakara to weaken you to the point where they can more easily control you- Then yeah, they'll do it."

"But I wasn't running-" Jiriaya slapped her again and almost shouted hysterically.

"My god your delirious! I need to get you away from here!" Kakashi banged his head on the tree trunk and rolled his eyes. Naru blinked as Kakashi growled at the sage.

"Stop slapping her before I break free and rip your arms off and beat you to death with them." Jiriaya looked at the copy nin then back at Naru who's lips curved a little bit at the tips as she muttered.

"I think he means it."

"Oh I know he means it that's part of the reason that I have to get you out of here. That wire won't last much longer with the rapid development of his muscle mass. And I need to hide you somewhere safe until you're on your feet again." Jiriaya said as he started to slip an arm under her legs so that he could pick her up when she pushed against his chest, making him pause.

"I can't go. Not yet. I have to stablize Kashi."

"And just how the hell are you going to do that?"

"I just need to give him a bit more of my chakra..."

"You don't have that much left to spare, leave him for now. He'll be up and driving us mad in an hour or so." Kakashi let out a strained barking laugh and said.

"Ten seconds-" Jiriaya and Naru both looked at him, both of them frowning in confusion while wondering, Ten seconds till what? Luckily or unluckily depending on how one looked at things, Kakashi decided to throw them a bone and fill them in on what was going through his mind and said with an wicked looking smile. "You have ten seconds before I'm free."

Jiriaya paled in realization and quickly scooped Naru up in his arms and vanished into the trees as Kakashi counted down. "9...8...7...6...5...4...3...2-" The wire around his wrists finally snapped and he let out an inhuman sound as he quickly got to his feet and went after the elder and his mate.

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Before I write anything for the next chapter I would like to ask the opinion of you the readers about a potential story.

I was watching the Lord of the Rings again the other day and was thinking that it would be fascinating to try writing a fan fic story where Froldo is actually an orphan half human/elf girl that was taken in by the hobits up until the whole journey thing began.

She would be the ring bearer, but because she's half human half elf she would have some peculiar powers that make her just as much a threat as destroying the ring of power.

What do you think? Would that be something any of you would be interested in reading?