Sakura didn't know what to think as she'd headed home. Sure, she'd heard that training after the Academy was supposed to be more intense, but she hadn't expected to be sent on a two month camping trip right off the bat, especially at this time of year. That whole thing that Naruto had said about teamwork made sense though, especially when she stopped to think about it and applied what she'd seen while wandering around the village as she was growing up to what Naruto had pointed out. Though she hadn't really noticed or payed attention to it before, there were always two Chunin manning the guard desk at the gate, and there were teams of Chunin manning key points of the village walls. Rarely in fact had she seen a ninja by themselves, and when she did, that had almost always been because they were either running messages or off-duty. Even then, the off-duty ninja tended to cluster together in groups of two or more.
When she got home, she headed straight up to her room in order to pack for the camping trip. As she sorted through her belongings, she found she didn't quite know what to bring and what to leave behind. She'd started off by following the Academy guidelines for extended missions in wilderness environments, but noticed that other things she needed to bring with her had not been on the list, such as the beauty products she needed in order to remain pretty enough to catch Sasuke-kun's attention amongst other things. When she'd packed everything she'd thought she needed, she couldn't lift her overfull bags, much less carry them. She didn't know what to get rid of or what to keep however.
Her mother came upstairs an hour later and found her crying as she tried to sort through her stuff.
"What's wrong sweetheart?" her mother asked as she hugged her and did her best to comfort her.
"Sensei's taking us on a long camping trip, and I don't know what to bring." she finally wailed, hoping her mother would be able to fix everything like she used to when she was little. "I have to be ready and at the training field in an hour!"
"How long are you going to be gone dear?" her mother asked.
"Two months." she replied sniffing as her mother dried her tears with the hem of her long skirt like she used to when she came home crying because the other girls at the Academy had picked on her when when she was younger.
"Two months!" her mother exclaimed, dropping her skirt in shock. "That can't be right. Come on dear, we'll be having a word with your new sensei in order to clear up this misunderstanding."
With that, her mother dragged her out to the training field where Sasuke-kun would most assuredly see that she'd been crying since he was already sitting there with Naruto, both of whom were seated next to full packs. The silver haired man who had been with their new sensei when he'd arrived, and who had restrained Sasuke-kun as easily as if he were merely an unruly toddler, arrived as they approached, carrying a rather light looking pack himself.
"That's a rather unusual piece of luggage." her new sensei commented sarcastically when he noticed her and who was with her as he came in from a different direction. "Do you intend to carry it the entire way?"
"What's the meaning of this?" her mother asked, clearly intending to cow her new sensei the way she did her father when he did something she didn't like. "Making my daughter go away for two months with two strange men and that...that boy for company?! It isn't proper! I have half a mind to..."
"Proper? Proper?" her new sensei said incredulously, cutting her mother off before she could build up steam. "Lady, the day your daughter became a ninja, "Proper" got thrown out the window. Your daughter is now a ninja under my command, and it is what I say that goes. If I want to order her to go on a hundred mile hike in her underwear in the middle of a thunderstorm for no reason other than because I want to be a sadistic bastard, I can. If I want to take your daughter for two months of intense training in order to bring her up to something approaching my standards, that's well within my rights as well, and there's nothing you can say or do about it. You signed away your rights to your child the instant you put your name down on the Academy admission form. It is only out of the kindness of the Hokage's heart that you were allowed to keep her in your home. Some villages I can name don't even allow you that much."
Considering the fact that her mother turned pale and then bright red at this before puffing up in indignation, her sensei had obviously gone so far beyond saying the wrong thing it wasn't even funny. This was going to be bad, and not just because her mother had just completely embarrassed her in front of her team and a total stranger. The last time someone had upset her mother that badly, she had caused them to be ostracized by the rest of the neighborhood, and they'd had to move. From the looks of it, her mother was gearing up for an Extreme Mode like no other. She could only imagine what would happen if her mother tried that with her new sensei. Her seinsei wasn't a family of foreign civilians, and more than likely wouldn't be nearly as easily brought down as they had. If he was brought down though, a man like that, a man who had trained someone as dangerous as Naruto, could easily kill her mother in revenge.
"Well I never...!" her mother angrily exclaimed. "I'll be having words with the Hokage about this."
"You do that." her new sensei replied snarkily, clearly upset with her mother over something she'd said earlier. "And, since Sakura seems confident enough in her survival skills that she only packed the clothes on her back, we'd better get a move on. We need to get our team photo taken and be out of the village by sunset, since our first mission takes place twenty-five miles away from here, we're due there at dawn tomorrow, and the Rookie Genin are going to slow us down considerably."
An instant later, she found herself being dragged off by her sensei who had ignored her mother who was yelling and sputtering behind her. Apparently, he had actually been serious, and there would be no going home to get her stuff. There would be no hugging her mother goodbye or stopping by the bank to tell her father where she was going either. There would just be her, her new team in front of whom she'd just been humiliated by her mother and her sensei, and two months of wilderness.
The last view she had of her mother before she was dragged around the corner and towards the administration complex was of a red-faced woman whose bosom was heaving angrily.
Haruno Barako stormed over to the complaint desk. Not that it had done her any good the last time she was here, but it was the last official option available to her. She had tried to get an audience with the Hokage earlier, and failed. The important looking old woman who had been exiting the Hokage's office when she'd tried standing outside it hoping to catch the man as he left hadn't helped her at all either. As soon as the woman had heard what her daughter's name was, she'd congratulated her for having such an exceptional daughter and walked off.
Since she wasn't going to be getting any help from the Hokage, she would be filing a complaint, and then she would be telling everyone about this outrage. If that bastard who had taken her daughter had any family in the village, they'd be sent packing if she had anything to say about it. She'd already sent one family packing for the capitol, she could do so again.
"Hello," she said once she'd reached the complaints desk which had been worse than useless last time, as the man there had further traumatized her poor daughter who had been traumatized enough by the ordeal that the demon child had put her through. "I'd like to file a complaint against Shimura Tetsuo and a shinobi with silver hair and a mask that covers most of his face."
The bored looking man behind the desk, who had obviously been put there because he was old and crippled and refused to do the decent thing and retire, looked up at her blankly. For a moment, it seemed as if the man had sized her up and dismissed her as worthless, and she didn't like the way that made her feel. If this geezer didn't do as she asked, she would be making his life a living hell as well.
"What has the boy done this time?" the old man asked, sounding resigned.
"He's kidnapped my daughter!" she exclaimed, hoping that would garner the reaction necessary in order to call that contemptible man the Hokage had rather foolishly placed in charge of his daughter's education and his team back to the village before they got too far away.
After her Sakura was returned safe and sound, she'd make sure the man couldn't take her daughter away before he tried to leave with her again. Then, she'd do everything she could to make sure that the bastard was thrown out of the shinobi forces. A disrespectful man like that had no business being a ninja. Seeing as he was the demon brat's teacher, she was certain that she would have little problem accomplishing her goals and chasing him and his family away from the village, especially considering that accent of his that was clearly not of Fire Country origin.
Danzo blinked in surprise. What the woman who was standing in front of him had accused The Boy of didn't sound anything like his son's and the Tea Country whore's child at all. As far as he knew, despite some recent difficulties in the relationship that seemed to stem from the changes that the birth of his first great-grandchild has caused, The Boy had been entirely faithful to his wife. That, and it wasn't like The Boy to shirk his duties in order to run off with some harlot, especially when he was supposed to be taking the Weapon and the Uchiha brat on a training trip in order to prepare them for the upcoming Chunin Exams in January which, in his opinion, was a futile effort considering the Uchiha's current attitude, and how weak the third member of the team who was little more than baggage was.
The reason he was manning the complaints desk today was because when Sarutobi got particularly bored and was feeling mischievous, or was exceedingly unhappy with them, he had a tendency to give him and the other Council members somewhat demeaning assignments. On more than one occasion, he, Koharu, and Homura had been forced to pull guard duty during the midnight to 4 a.m. shift. It wasn't worth the potential fallout to defy the Hokage when he was such a mood, and he didn't particularly mind being relegated to the Complaints Desk all that much. It usually gave him a few hours of peace and quiet in which he could curl up with a good book, which was something he otherwise hadn't had the time for in years. Sometimes however, there were people like the woman in front of him though...
He swiftly got over his surprise over the accusation that had been leveled at his grandson when he noted the woman's resemblance to The Boy's female student. The Haruno girl had only been this year's Top Kunoichi because there had been a spectacularly mediocre crop of students this year. The Haruno girl was just a bit smarter than the Yamanaka girl, who had also been neglecting her physical training in order to gain the Uchiha's attention, and a great deal smarter than the rest of the pack aside from the Hyuuga girl who should have easily been able to shove her from the position if she'd even bothered to try, but lacked the confidence to do so.
If he remembered correctly, the last time the Haruno girl's mother had been in here had been because her daughter had needlessly antagonized the Weapon. The person who had been at the desk then had put the girl in her place when she'd tried to register a complaint over the fact that she'd gotten what she'd deserved, but had apparently failed to do so for the woman. Because the man had failed to put the elder Haruno in her place, he was the one who was forced to deal with her now. Deciding that he would be needing a little help if he was going to be dealing with the woman when she was like this, he got up to leave for a coffee break.
"I'll look into it right away ma'am." he said false politely, in order to placate the rampaging monster who had given birth to The Boy's female student, as he left for his unannounced break.
As soon as he was in the Administrative Department breakroom, he checked to make sure he was alone before pouring himself a cup of coffee and reaching into his robes and pulling out a flask which he opened with his teeth before dumping a generous amount of its contents into his coffee. The cup, which had previously been half full was now completely so. He then sat down in one of the chairs that were tucked in the corner that gave one a good view of the entire room and, most importantly, the entrance, and slowly drank his coffee before grabbing a breath-mint and popping it into his mouth. He sucked on the breath-mint as he put his mug in the sink and shuffled his way back to the desk where the Haruno woman was still waiting despite his somewhat forlorn hope that she wouldn't be, and would have gotten herself arrested for storming off and bothering Sarutobi.
As if he would be so lucky.
"Ma'am." he said once he'd reached the desk that half an hour earlier had been a peaceful oasis in a sea of activity "I checked, and according to the information I was given, your daughter is on an authorized training trip with her new sensei Shimura Tetsuo and the Jounin Hatake Kakashi. As such, I cannot file a complaint of kidnapping against the man or his companion who matches Hatake's description."
He then leaned back and waited for the expected storm. If it weren't for what Sarutobi would do to him if he ordered the assassinations of random Konoha civilians because they'd bothered him, he would have given the kill order when he'd gone for his coffee rather than rather liberally laced it with alcohol. It was a pity that Konoha didn't follow the example of some other villages he could name and impose a fine for the killing of a civilian rather than jail time. He could run ROOT from prison if he had to, but it would be damned inconvenient.
Edited 10-04-12