Anko Mitarashi's Student

by AbientEcho

(AR/Fem!Naruto/OOC-ness) After the fall of Root, Hiruzen Sarutobi is left with some troubles forming teams. When a certain special jounin takes it upon herself to turn the most hated genin in the village into a well-rounded apprentice, she has her work cut out for her. But will she prove capable of making the defiant, kind-hearted brat, into a kickass kunoichi?

11. Chapter 8: Part Two

Chapter 8.5

"..Ain't it fun, living in the real world?!"

---

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This chapter is over 40k words, good luck reading this! You'll get whiplash as we bounce from friendship, first kills, trauma, to first kisses. Enjoy~

---

The next morning, Naruto woke up with a quick start. She bounded from her bed, immediately throwing on her trench-coat and outfit.

She danced around her apartment with a childish vigor, grabbing every little thing that she'd need.

She'd packed her primary weapon, sealed away, her kunai and shuriken, and even her special senbon.

In one scroll on her hip, her camping supplies and rations were stored, along with a few books.

With those two scrolls on her hip, she hesitantly looked at a third. This scroll contained her, 'works in progress' for lack of a better term.

It had poisons, their respective antidotes too of course, seals, and fuinjutsu supplies. The poisons were general, nothing strong enough to kill, certainly inconvenience. Seals, from silencers, to explosives and flares, yet all unused and untested.

She shrugged, they could come in handy, if things got messy for some reason. Besides, the seals were probably functional, seeing as they were the work of her and Tenten. The poisons were a guaranteed benefit.

Picking it up slowly, she gave it a final glance before sticking it into the final loop in her leg-garters, before heading straight out the door.

Locking up her apartment, she headed off to a familiar shop to ask a favor.

---

Yamanaka Flower Shop

---

It didn't take long to locate and enter the Yamanaka Flower shop, waving at the blonde behind the counter as she stepped in.

"Hey, Ino!" She greeted, with an excited wave.

"Fish-cakes! What's up?" The Yamanaka asked amicably, wringing her gloved hands. Naruto rolled her eyes at the nickname, clearly calling back to the day they rekindled their friendship.

"Ah, I'm going to be out-of-town for a while, and I was wondering if you could take care of my plants for me?" The shorter blonde asked, rubbing the back of her neck sheepishly. Her eyes strayed around the flower shop for a moment, seeing Ino's mother working in the back.

"Yeah, no problem! Are you going on a mission?" Her fellow blonde questioned, curiosity gleaming in pupiless periwinkle eyes.

"Yeah, it's my first mission outside of the village. I should only be gone for a few weeks." Naruto specified, digging around her pocket for the key to her apartment.

"Oh, cool. Good luck, we'll talk about it once you get back! I want all the details." Ino said, accepting a tattered key that Naruto had passed her.

Naruto gave her one of her typical toothy grins, walking away backwards as they talked.

Ino was more amused than offended, despite it being a slightly rude gesture. It wasn't exactly respectful, but things like manners rarely occurred to the Uzumaki. Unless she and Tenten were trying to shove them down her throat.

"Thank you, Ino! Seriously, you're a lifesaver! Well, a plant life-saver, but still. I've gotta get going, I need to say bye to Tenten now, so I don't end up late!" With that, the pig-tail wearing girl turned and ran, making Ino snicker with mirth, a hand over her mouth.

She rolled her eyes as Naruto ran out the door, not even noticing the gentle smile across her own features. The door slammed shut behind her, making the bell above the door ring loudly, causing her mother to peek out from the back.

Tucking the key into her back pocket, Ino sighed contentedly.

"Who was that?" Inquired the brunette woman, her hair tied up into a fancy bun atop her head. Ino grinned, resting her head against her hand on the check-out counter.

"Just my friend, Naruto." Said the Yamanaka girl, gazing at the door. Her mother hummed, patting her head before turning to go back into the shop.

"I'm glad you decided to help out today, Ino. I've missed working in the shop with my daughter." Her mother remarked, causing a certain warmness to bloom in the blonde's chest.

"It's nothing." She replied easily.

---

Tenten's Weapon Shop

---

At a nearby weaponry shop, Naruto barreled through the doors, detecting her best friend's chakra signature in the back rooms.

"Bunny, come say goodbye to your best friend! I'm leaving for a C-Rank in like, twenty minutes." Naruto called, just as Tenten opened a door and walked into the shop-area.

Immediately charging to her friend and squeezing the life out of her, the brunette gave her friend a bright grin. "That's great, I hope everything goes well! Did you pack all your camping materials? Your weapons? Books? Clo-"

"Yes, yes! I packed everything, they're all in my scrolls!" Naruto said after a snort, causing Tenten's mother hen behavior to stop abruptly.

"Good! When you get back, we're going to have tea and spar, no matter what day it is. We can even invite Ino! Now get going, before you're late!" The brunette said, pointing at a clock above the shop's entrance door.

Noticing she'd spent ten of her twenty minutes already, the blonde bristled. "Right! Bye, Bunny! I'll miss you, 'ttebayo!" She said, turning on her heel and zooming out of the room as if hell-hounds were at her heels.

She really didn't want to be late for her first C-Rank!

Her blonde pigtails whipped behind her as she sprinted to the eastern gate, a childlike excitement filling her bones in a way she hadn't experienced in a very long time.

It was like the kind of excitement she got when she first befriended Tenten and Ino, she realized. The kind of exhilaration that told you something momentous was going to happen, that this moment would be significant and unable to be forgotten.

A feeling of hope lingered in her chest inexplicably. A mission should make you wary, alert, not like a kid in a candy store, she internally reprimanded herself. Ibiki would probably give her that look if he ever saw how thrilled she was. Her face screwed up a bit, she hated that look, it was the disbelief mixed with stern disapproval face. She got that when she managed to do something right, but also in the wrong way.

(Like the time she gave a kid candy to tell on his parents, instead of just interrogating the parents…)

She was at the gate in no time, with exactly 3 minutes to spare, though she didn't know that.

Her sandals had just enough traction to keep her from sliding too much when she stopped running abruptly, stirring up a cloud of dirt as she skirted to a stop.

Taking in a sharp inhale, she straightened her stance and pretended she didn't just tread large marks into the ground.

Aburame Shino and Kiba Inuzuka were already there, standing on either sides of her. She was surprised, not only because Kiba was early, but because they'd also been just separated enough to avoid her running into them.

Well, she wasn't surprised that Shino was early. He was always the first one in the academy back then. Every time she had actually come early, he had been there already. Sometimes, he'd been there before the teacher..Which had been a little creepy.

As for Kiba- he was the one who actually surprised her. The Inuzuka was hardly punctual, he had always been the type to scramble in the doors just a few minutes before he'd have been late. Much like herself, actually.

Though, Naruto had never cared if she was late back then, whereas Kiba did. He'd told her once that his mother would "wear his hide as a coat if she got another visit from a chuunin teacher about his lack of punctuality again." Naruto had decided then, that the Inuzuka matriarch was not to be messed with

"Hellllooo gentlemen!" She greeted brightly, disrupting the momentary silence between the trio of genin.

"Greetings, Uzumaki-san." Shino said, giving a slight nod of his head. For an Aburame, that may as well have been an excited wave.

She grinned. "Oh, no need for that, just call me Naruto." She said, waving him off without a care.

Shino hummed for a minute, or maybe it was his bugs, before pushing up his glasses with an index finger."Very well then." He returned, much more quietly this time.

"So I can just call you Shino, right? Or do you prefer Aburame-san?" She asked, attempting to be polite.

She wasn't great with manners, but she was working on it! (Even if Ino and Tenten were convinced she'd never learn.)

He stayed silent for a moment, making the blonde jinchuriki slightly uncomfortable. She wasn't a big fan of silence, really.

"...Shino is fine." He finally replied, causing her to release a sigh she hadn't noticed she was holding in.

"Cool!" She replied, smiling at him in relief, scratching the back of her head bashfully.

"Mornin', Naruto." Kiba greeted, inwardly feeling as though he'd been forgotten. He was only a little miffed that his childhood rival had greeted Shino first, only a little.

"Yooooo!" She greeted again, swerving to her left to face him, making finger guns his way. He snickered, a bark from Akamaru telling her not to forget him, as well.

Spotting the white dog at his feet, she crouched.

Patting the puppy's head, Naruto greeted him as well. "Hiya, Akamaru!" She said, before standing up again. Kiba bumped her with his shoulder, causing her to bump him with her hip as a response. He only grinned, looking up to see Kurenai and Hinata approaching, the short bridge builder walking between them.

"About time." Kiba muttered fondly, causing Naruto to send him an amused glance.

At the sight of them, Shino turned to the chuunin gate guards, signing himself out wordlessly. Izumo and Kotetsu, the eternal gate guards, didn't even notice the odd expression on Naruto's face when she noticed them.

She thought back to the spectacular prank Tenten and her had pulled, all whilst pretending to be them. A sliver of guilt was easily shoved aside though, as she and the rest of Team 8 signed themselves out. As shinobi, it was a requirement to sign out everytime you exited the village. Civilians could avoid it, but civilian merchants could not. Konoha's travel laws were odd, Naruto thought.

"Alright, then, team. If you're all ready, let's move out." Kurenai said, her voice as melodic as a choir and as smooth as honey.

Soon after that they had left the confines of the village, the six- Seven, if you count Akamaru- of them beginning their trek to the Land of Waves.

Kurenai was a source of tranquility the entire time, listening to the clients incredibly boring stories as they walked along. About his grandchildren, his early days, his favorite fish and how to catch it, the best methods for building bridges, the various types of bridges… It went on, and on, and on for what seemed like light-years.

Her genin however, weren't nearly as relaxed as her.

Kiba and Naruto were looking at everything around them with wide eyes, practically bubbling with excitement.

Though it was less noticeable with Shino, they could notice his head turning towards beetles and other insects they passed along the way. For an Aburame, it was like he was loudly exclaiming to the world.

Hinata was curious as well, her off-white irises flickering around their surroundings. Her eyes mostly seemed drawn towards flowers and passing wildlife, whereas Kiba and Naruto were excited to see everything. Hinata smiled when squirrels ran up trees, or birds flew just overhead.

Kurenai was the only one who seemed to notice, not that she pointed it out.

They chatted amicably. They, being Kiba and Naruto. Shino was quiet, Kurenai was preoccupied with "listening" to Tazuna, and Hinata was far too shy. She rarely did more than speak in small sentences, all of which were ridden with stutters and stammers.

"You know, it's really good seeing all of you again." Naruto finally said, expressing exactly how she felt to them.

It was true, even though she was by no means close to them. It made her feel a tad nostalgic to chat with Kiba, both of them being just as playful with one another as they had been during the academy.

It was like no time had passed at all.

That brought a slightly grim realization to Naruto. It had only been a couple of months since they'd been in the academy. They surely hadn't changed much since then, unlike her.

She felt eons older now, having gained experience which forced her to grow up.

She had tortured people, she'd realized harsh truths, forged strong bonds, discovered the identities of her dead parents…. She'd worked herself into dust enough times that even her flesh and bone felt older, Naruto mused, sparing a glance to her calloused hand.

Those weren't things someone just walked away from, the same as they were before.

"It's good to see you, too! It's been ages since anyone has seen your ass. Except Ino, apparently. She's always talking about you, on and on and on. Shikamaru- Choji too- asks her about you when we're all at Akimichi Barbecue together. She's the only one who knows what you're up to." Kiba told her, surprising her greatly. Her heart warmed in her chest. Ino talked about her? About her? Damn, she didn't know why she was so touched.

But.. She was. She'd need to thank the blonde for that, maybe with free lunch. Or maybe she'd let Ino play dress-up with her, that'd probably be more up her alley.

"I speak for Hinata and myself when I say, we also are pleased with the arrangements which led to seeing you after these many months." Shino said, his voice even and stoic, making Kiba snort. "That's Shino-speak for, they're happy to see you too." Kiba explained, making Hinata giggle.

"I-It's true, we see Team 10 often, but not you or any of the members of Team 7. It's nice!" Hinata added, pressing her index fingers together bashfully.

"You know, that gives me an idea. You guys know Team 10, and I know Team 9, we could all hang out together. Maybe even hunt down Team 7, too. That'd be fun, huh? It'd be like a giant hang-out session!" Naruto suggested, tapping her chin as she looked up to the blue skies.

"T-that would be quite a large occasion." Hinata agreed, not-so-subtly being nudged forward by Kurenai, right beside Naruto.

Her face flushed, but she said nothing as she flanked Naruto's right side, Kiba and Shino on her left. Behind Naruto, Tazuna and Kurenai.

Naruto turned her head to the pale Hyuuga girl, giving her a radiant smile that made her heart thump in her chest. "Yeah it would, but imagine! It could be like a party! Well, maybe that's not something you'd like. You don't seem like the party type." Naruto said, before turning back to staring overhead.

Naruto herself had always dreamed of attending parties, the big bashes that all the cool people went too. That seemed like the kind of environment she'd love, full of people, and noise, and music. And food, too. The idea made her all kinds of giddy.

But Hinata- Shino too- Seemed like wallflowers, the types to prefer quiet environments with few people.

"N-no, a party would be l-lovely!" Hinata corrected, her voice a little louder than it had been before. Almost as if to sound vehement, though Naruto doubted she was capable of sounding stern.

She chuckled, "For sure, well, if I ever have one, I'll invite you." Naruto replied, tucking her hands into her pockets. She pretended not to see Hinata's smile.

"I, for one, think the idea of a mass-hang-out-slash-party, also sounds lovely. When we get back to the village, we should totally do it! It'd be great if we-"

"No underage drinking." Kurenai piped in, and Kiba momentarily looked sour, as if that had been what he was about to say.

Naruto laughed, because, wasn't it hilarious that they were expected to kill, but not drink? It was also because of Kiba's face, as she admitted moments later.

When Kiba asked, "What's so funny, blondie?"
Naruto immediately replied, "That mug of yours, bastard."

Hinata squeaked, in a way that sounded oddly like a giggle, not that either Kiba or Naruto noticed.

Shino decided then was the perfect time to contribute to the conversation, "I agree with Naruto, your face happens to be the funniest thing for miles." He said it so smoothly, neither Naruto or Kiba realized what he'd said at first.

Naruto tried, and immediately failed, to contain her laughter. Kiba, who'd still been processing what was said, immediately did a double-take.

"Shino, man, what the hell! Teammates are supposed to stick together!"

Another suspiciously giggle-like noise from Hinata, causing Kiba's head to swerve in her direction, "Hinata! Not you, too! Gah!" He threw his head back in mock-surrender.

---

At some point in their walk, they'd all changed positions, resuming formation around Tazuna to optimize their protection capability.

They were in an odd formation around the client, with Kurenai behind him. On each side, Shino and Hinata stood. In the front, Kiba and Naruto were side-by-side, guarding his front.

It would've been called a Diamond Formation, if it weren't for the extra guard up front.

Who suddenly became a bit more serious.

Naruto closed her eyes, to double check what she was feeling. And of course, she was right.

"Stop." She commanded, placing her arm forward abruptly, before explaining.

"There are two enemies ahead, hiding out in some sort of space-technique? I'm honestly not sure, but it looks like they're waiting for someone to trigger a trap." She said, eyes still closed.

Hinata shifted uncomfortably, not bothering to activate her byakugan. Apparently, it would be unnecessary as long as Naruto had her ability. Part of her felt a little bit useless now, though she didn't bother to say that.

"Can you guess their strength?" Kurenai inquired, mostly out of curiosity. Regardless of how Naruto answered, they'd be taking a detour.

Kurenai was going to avoid as much conflict as possible, she wanted to ease her students into tougher missions. Not just through them right into the craziness of shinobi life all at once.

(She didn't know it then, no one did, but that was exactly what would be happening on the Wave Mission.)

That being said, Kurenai was incredibly curious about this sensory ability of Naruto's. In her time spent with Anko, she'd described her student as having a powerful sensory kekkei genkai. (Though, at the time, she hadn't known Naruto was Anko's student.)

"Yes. Chakra is above average, well-condensed, but incredibly erratic. Basically, they've got good control, meaning shinobi, but they're certainly itching to fight. Seriously, these guys are bloodthirsty." Naruto explained, her eyes shut tight as she used her mind's eye to examine the area ahead.

"Alright then, we don't know what they're up to, and frankly, I don't want to find out. Chances are, they're just looking for easy loot. Let's avoid this all together and take a detour." Kurenai decided, raising her arms to gesture towards the trees, where a beaten off path could be seen on the forest floor.

"It will make the journey to wave a day longer, meaning we'll have to make camp in these woods. That said, it's preferred over conflict, as far as I'm concerned. Does anyone disagree?" Asked the raven-haired jounin, getting nods of decline.

Following that, the team made for the woods, taking a wide berth from their original path. At points, they had to clear their path of debris or make further detours, navigating their way through much less cleared areas of the woods.

They continued onward, up until the sun began to hang lower and lower in the sky, the blue slowly becoming stained with orange around the edges of the horizon. Once the world was bathed in orange and yellow sunlight, Kurenai stopped her group once again.

"Let's stop for the night, everyone. We'll build up camp in this clearing." She said, tastefully deciding not to acknowledge the incredibly weary Tazuna. Her students, who didn't even look the slightest bit worn, looked smug at his expense. Even the sweet, kind Hinata Hyuuga looked a bit satisfied.

"About.. Time.." The old man wheezed out, causing Naruto to snort. "Hey, I offered to carry you a few times!" She said with a shrug, taking out the scroll that contained her camping supplies.

She carefully unrolled the roll of parchment, whilst Kiba wrestled his own tent out of his bag. He carefully drew it from it's container, grimacing at the poles and pegs that always eluded him. Wordlessly, he began attempting to assemble it, fighting with it for several minutes.

Naruto had momentarily left her roll of parchment in its place on the ground, straying off to go do who knows what.

She'd came back just in time for Kiba to look up and see that everyone else had already finished assembling their tents, causing him to groan loudly. Even Hinata, who was hammering stakes into the ground at the very minute he looked over.

Akamaru barked, and judging by the way Kiba bristled, it must've been something rude.

"Shut it Akamaru! Naruto hasn't yet, so ha!" He said, making the blonde in question tilt her head.

"Naruto hasn't what?" She asked, biting her thumb hard enough to draw blood. She smeared it across the parchment she'd laid it down, right beside Kiba.

Kiba looked over at her, prepared to say something snarky. Alas, he didn't have the chance, because a large, fully-assembled tent, along with a burning fucking campfire appeared from thin fucking air.

The Inuzuka boy wanted to be mad, he really did, and if he wasn't so busy being amazed, he would've been.

"You little fucking- You better be prepared to share, you dick." He said, after several minutes. He threw one of his tents stakes at her halfheartedly, which flew so far off the mark, she turned to watch it go.

He never claimed to be a marksman, at least. Or a tent-setter-upper.

"Sorry, I sleep naked." Teased the blonde, which hardly fazed the Inuzuka. He narrowed his eyes at her. Half of his clan got drunk and streaked on Friday nights, merely because it was Friday, so it's not like the thought of that would freak him out.

The innocent Hyuuga girl, who'd been listening, squeaked indignantly. "That's unnecessary! I-I'll help you set up yours, Kiba!"

There would be no co-ed, naked-sleeping as long as a Hyuuga was around, Naruto thought with amusement. She imagined Neji would've reacted similarly, but with less politeness, and more blatant disgust.

Shino glanced over at her with a raised brow, and Naruto wasn't sure why; Whether it was that she proudly proclaimed she slept naked, or if he knew she was teasing. She gave him a playful wink.

Tazuna had snorted at the exchange, but was now just staring at the campfire she'd unsealed with suspicion.

He really didn't have a goddamn clue how all that ninja magic worked, but somehow magically summoning a campfire and tent seemed far-fetched.

For the sake of his health, he decided not to mull over it any longer. And if he wasn't going to point it out, you can bet no one else was going to, either.

---

By the time morning arrived, the group was refreshed and ready to continue their journey to the Land of Waves.

It had been entertaining to watch Kiba struggle to put down the tent, and even more so when he finally spazzed after watching Naruto seal her entire tent (and campfire) up with little effort at all.

That had been most of it though, because once the second day of their mission arrived, they'd become much more serious. The novelty of being out of the village faded, and left only mission-mode to take its place.

A grim feeling was invading Naruto, something in her stomach filled with a bit of sickness. She didn't know what it was, because despite her sensory ability not being fully-activated, she'd felt absolutely nothing approaching them. But for some reason, the hairs on the back of her neck stood up. She felt someone was watching, like a rabbit surrounded by wolves.

Flinty blue eyes flickered over to her teammate, Kiba sniffed the air, checking for any unfamiliar scents, but shrugged to himself.

Her brows furrowed, studying the rest of them. No one looked the slightest bit worried like her which might've erased her suspicions had she not closed her eyes.

The blonde shinobi stopped suddenly, skirting to an immediate stop whilst the others followed her example. The lines on her face seemed to deepen, her healthy tan seeming a bit lighter than usual

"There's a shinobi- A jounin-" Naruto said suddenly, her eyes closed tight.

"What?!" Kiba asked, his hackles immediately raised. The Hyuuga's lips parted in surprise, because despite what she'd thought, apparently her Byakugan would've come to use. The weaknesses of Naruto's sensory ability were pointless to dwell over now, though, because there was a battle coming.

"I don't know how the hell I didn't notice him sooner, but-"

"Get down!" Kurenai interrupted, shoving Tazuna and Kiba to the ground, whereas Naruto, Hinata and Shino dropped in an instant. Akamaru whined, he'd dropped before any of them. Kurenai's hearing may have been excellent, but the senses of a nin-dog easily surpassed humans.

Seconds later, an enormous sword whizzed overhead.

As Naruto straightened herself, stepping back onto her own two feet, she thanked the lucky stars for Kurenai. Because without her warning, they'd have been beheaded. This guy had suppressed his chakra to the point she'd only felt the flicker when he'd been shunshinn-ing closer to them.

"Heh, would you look at that, you're only a bunch of kids." The man's voice was low and gravelly, with an undertone of sinister amusement. It was then that the man released the chakra suppression technique he'd been using, and a mountain of chakra battered into Naruto's senses, leaving her wide-eyed.

She could hear Kiba growl low in his throat, with a similar snarl coming from Akamaru.

She didn't miss the buzzing from Shino's insects, either.

For good reason, of course. This man was radiating killing intent, hatred, disgust..

And god, not to mention those massive reserves so full of chakra.

"You're Momochi Zabuza. One of the Seven Deadly Swordsmen, also known as the Demon of the Mist." The stoic voice of Kurenai announced, causing Naruto's eyes to widen further.

She'd heard of The Seven Deadly Swordsmen before, and she'd heard of Zabuza Momochi, too.

Hayate and Yugao had discussions about them before, because as swordsmen, that was one of their primary interests.

From what she remembered of that conversation, the Seven Deadly Swordsmen were called that for a reason. They were Monsters, with a capital M.

"Are you a fan of mine?" The man asked Kurenai, who's eyes narrowed at him with a dangerous glint.

Naruto wondered if Kurenai had any sort of plan, but continued mulling over what she herself knew.

Both Yugao and Hayate agreed they wouldn't be able to take one of the Swordsmen on alone without losing their lives. And they were two of the best tokubetsu/special jounin.

Seeing as Kurenai didn't reply to him, he continued. "You've got an Aburame, an Inuzuka, and a Hyuuga.. You know, those white eyes of hers would sell for a pretty penny." Zabuza drawled, letting out a dark chuckle as he stared at Hinata.

Said girl shrunk in on herself almost immediately, looking terrified.

Naruto glanced around at her other than teammates. With one elite jounin, they had a chance. Then there was herself, and Kurenai's three genin.

What the hell could they do against Zabuza Momochi?! He was a swordsman, with excellent ninjutsu, good taijutsu, and an enormous sword to boot. She ran it through her head over and over, the conversation Yugao and Hayate had.

No matter how much she thought it over, she could recall no details on his particular fighting style. Hell, she could recall hardly anything about him in particular. Except well, something Yugao had called silent killing. Concealing Mist to hinder the senses, most notably of which being hearing.

Thankfully, she and Hinata couldn't be hindered by that, she noted with relief.

Her eyes shot to Kurenai, then back at their enemy.

Kurenai was a long range genjutsu mistress, she wasn't a good opponent for someone like Zabuza at all, but she was the only one with the skill to fight him one on one. Even then, could Kurenai even hold her own for long enough?

There were too many questions, too many what-ifs, but Naruto couldn't let that make her lose hope.

The blonde steadied herself, a fierce determination settling in her eyes. There was no way they'd make it out of this if they didn't work as a unit, that, she knew.

Out of all of the genin, Naruto bet herself as being the strongest, despite how conceited it sounded. Anko had said herself, she was practically chunin-level.

A plan formed in her mind, and though it was shoddy, it was all Naruto had.

"Just hand over the bridge builder, and maybe I'll let you kids live." Zabuza offered sadistically, still standing atop his blade, which was embedded into a tree.

"No way in hell!" Kiba shouted at him, just as mist began to fill the roads they stood in.

Zabuza was infamous for this. She remembered Yugao and Hayate discussing ways to counter it, but only coming up with either a high-powered wind ninjutsu or a sensor-nin to guide you.

Seeing as Naruto didn't know a single wind jutsu, it seemed they'd be going with the second.

"Hinata, activate your Byakugan! He's using concealing mist." Naruto shouted suddenly, causing the mousey girl to give a determined nod. "Right away!" She said, using a hand-seal to activate her dojutsu.

Internally, Naruto remembered that a byakugan was allegedly rather draining to maintain. She didn't know how long Hinata could keep that up, but she had to hope Hinata could hold it until the mist was gone. If she was anything like Neji, she could keep it up for a few hours, but Naruto wouldn't place bets on that.

As Naruto looked to Kurenai for a split second, she could see approval in her ruby eyes.

"Kiba, Shino, you're on standby protecting Tazuna. Only step in if absolutely necessary, or if there's a large opening. Kurenai-sensei, I'll be your eyes!" She said, taking up position behind the woman. No one fought against her judgements, immediately following her orders.

"You'd make a great squad-captain, Naruto-chan." Kurenai said quietly, as the younger girl went back to back with her.

"Thanks, but I'm aiming a lot higher than that." Just as Naruto said those words, a drastic wave of Killing Intent was released from Zabuza.

From the fog, Naruto could barely make out the three genin guarding Tazuna. But she could at least see how terrified they suddenly were.

Hinata was trembling, Kiba was biting his lip so hard his teeth might tear through, and Shino looked like he was going to be sick.

Naruto herself had to swallow audibly, trying to quell the fear in her. She'd felt the crushing sensation of KI, from Inoichi, from Anko, and from Ibiki. And yet, this was so much more.

Even so, she couldn't let this guy knock her down with Killing Intent alone. She had to be better than that. An A-rank shinobi stood before them

"Stay strong, everyone. As long as I am alive, I will make sure you make it out of this." Kurenai said, her voice lacking any fear or uncertainty.

Naruto sighed, letting her fear ease out. They would be fine, so long as they played their cards right.

"As you heard from Naruto-chan, stay behind and protect Tazuna. Hinata, you'll be your teammates' eyes, so stay strong." Kurenai encouraged, getting a loud, "Y-yes, sensei!" from the indigo-haired girl.

Just as the fog filled the field, and nothing could be seen anymore.

Naruto's eyes were glued shut, but she didn't need them, as long as she had Mind's Eye of Kagura.

"Kurenai-sensei, there's another shinobi hidden in the trees, about 45 feet up, 70 feet away- And- There's four Zabuza clones, moving through the mist incredibly fast-" Naruto stopped abruptly, drawing her hands up into the Shadow Clone seal.

Without hesitation, she spawned 8 copies of herself, sending two to go after each Zabuza clone. "Busying the Zabuza clones with clones of myself currently." She finished.

"Perfect." Kurenai returned, running through hand signs at lightning speed. She was going to cast a genjutsu on the shinobi in the trees, one which showed all the symptoms of being poisoned. She hoped it would be enough to knock them out, for her to question later.

One might ask how she would do such a thing, without being able to see her target.

It was simple, Kurenai Yuuhi had long ascended past the need for that.

Faster than one could blink, she drew her chakra into a perfect cord, thin and unnoticeable. Only the caster could see it anyhow, so long as the victim wasn't a sensor, or majorly attuned to chakra.

Without further thought, she sent it surging towards the location Naruto had mentioned. Naruto's measurements had been shockingly correct, Kurenai realized, just as she connected the genjutsu to the shinobi's cerebral nervous system.

With her chakra injected into the mysterious shinobi, she returned to their more pressing issue. Zabuza.

The blonde was stunned, it was her first time seeing how a genjutsu really worked. She didn't know what she'd expected really, because it made perfect sense. A dose of chakra injected into the body, slowly spreading through the brain and harrying their senses. At least she understood now why she'd never be able to do one, because the control that required was mind-boggling.

"Naruto, status." Kurenai demanded, returning to the mindset she'd experienced in ANBU, all those years ago. The blonde immediately pushed away her surprise, tearing her mind's eye from the chakra spreading through the mysterious shinobi's brain.

The ravenette's hands were already in movement as Naruto immediately spoke, "I've been making clones back to back, to keep his clones at bay, but he's off the tree now- He'll be engaging any second! He's headed for us!" Naruto declared, and Kurenai hummed.

She wondered for only a second, how long Naruto could maintain pumping out those clones.

Her fingers halted in their place, her brows furrowed together as she planned her move.

Sending out four more chakra-cords she located Zabuza in an instant.

Seconds before connecting the genjutsu cords to his nervous system she screamed, "Raiton; Lightning Rain," which, of course, was a made-up jutsu.

No, it only served to solidify her genjutsu. One which gave the sensation of frying the nervous system, of being shocked. The cords went past the skin without so much as a sensation, entering the body and injecting her chakra into his circulatory system. They rushed towards his brain, without even nudging his own chakra.

It was clear to Naruto, who'd watched her cast the last two genjutsu, that Kurenai wasn't considered Konoha's Genjutsu Expert for nothing.

"It g-got him!" Naruto cried out in surprise, her eyes flickering open, but that wasn't all. Before she could continue, a loud roar was heard to her left. "Gatsuuuga!"

It was none other than Kiba Inuzuka, and his partner Akamaru, tearing through the mist to destroy a Zabuza clone, with the help of a Naruto clone.

Kurenai's eyes darted over to the sight, her lips parting in silent surprise. "Kiba, do that again, you cleared some of the mist!" She declared, getting an affirmative shout, just as a large fist came to greet her face.

Luckily enough, she and Naruto managed to drop in time, dodging Zabuza's sudden punch.

Kurenai wasted no time, attempting to sweep his legs from beneath him. However, the hulking man grabbed her by the ankle and threw her like a fucking rag-doll.

Naruto Uzumaki was frozen for only a second, before being forced into action when he cleaved his sword at her in an attempt at a killing blow. Hitting the round, hard and sudden, she rolled to the side and leapt back to her feet.

Evasion, thankfully, was her strong suit.

She immediately put distance between them, drawing out her own precious weapon. Out of a roll of white parchment, Naruto yanked out her meteor-hammer. Leaping yards behind, she assumed a perfect defensive stance.

"Well, well, I didn't know little Konoha dogs used brute weaponry like that.. Let's see if you're any good with it, little girl." He said, tilting his head just slightly.

Naruto, who was suddenly happy she'd prepared cool one-liners for moments like this, spoke calmly. "Let's dance, fuckhead."

She really didn't have a reason for sounding so confident.

He chuckled, and swung his sword at her again, only for Naruto to slink away from him like water-snake. Her heart stuttered in her chest as the blade whizzed by, again and again, her narrowly dodging time and time. She wasn't even getting the chance to fight, she realized frantically, this was nothing but barely maintained defense.

His sword cleaved down again, swiping a loose blonde hair in half. Naruto's jaw clenched, and she figured that a weapon's battle wouldn't work well here. "Shadow clone jutsu!" She hollered, unable to make the hand-signs.

Springing forth clones, Naruto managed to get far enough away to breathe, and to hope for just a second that Kurenai would hurry her ass up.

---

With his visibility returned, Shino Aburame moved into battle. Hinata remained firm in front of Tazuna, veins bulging from her skin.

Sending waves of bugs towards every Zabuza he could see, his aid came as the perfect distraction to save Kiba from a hulking water-clone.

The swarm of insects crawled up the clones back, swallowing up as much of it's chakra as quickly as they could. Before the clone could finish Kiba from where he sat on the ground, the clone roared, swatting at his back furiously.

Seconds later, the clone burst, and water splashed all over Kiba.

The Inuzuka boy sighed in relief, "Thanks, man."

"No need." Shino replied quickly adjusting his glasses.

Taking in a few shaky breaths, Kiba brought himself back on his feet. "C'mon Akamaru, let's see if we can hit a clone and clear mist at the same time." He said, narrowing his eyes at one of the newly formed Zabuza's, which was currently being occupied by a single Naruto.

The battle raged on, with Shino retracting the bugs which had already consumed far too much to continue. He counted the current clones, there was one occupying Kurenai, one that Kiba had his sights on, two engaged with Naruto clones. And then there was the real Zabuza, who was currently in a weapon's match with the real Naruto.

Metal struck metal, glinting sparks flew, and Kiba had to force himself to look away.

Behind his stoic mask, Shino grimly realized that the chakra reserves to keep all these clones going must be monstrous. Four clones with massive reserves, fighting independently. Four might be his limit, but Shino was uncertain. Could he divide his chakra further, making more? Naruto could, but hers were shadow clones, not water clones. Was there even a difference? He was left with two many questions to deduct any logical solution to their current predicament.

He heaved in a deep breath, his already body felt sluggish. His beetles had consumed far too much chakra when taking out just one clone. At least that was chakra Zabuza wouldn't be recovering.

His leftover bugs had been sprawling the area, and they found a shinobi within the treeline. Sending several of his kikai into the forest, he intended to drain the shinobi slowly and subtly.

He looked up just in time to see Kiba end both a Naruto clone and a Zabuza clone in one fatal Gatsuuga.

Without further hesitance, he ran across the field to grab an exhausted Kiba before he could give himself a case of chakra-exhaustion. Kiba was panting, Akamaru whining by his side and nudging the boy with his nose.

Shino slid on his knees, immediately searching his teammate for any injuries. Apart from some scrapes and bruises, Kiba looked to be okay.

"I did it. Two birds, one stone. Cleared the mist, killed the clone." Kiba grinned, and Shino hummed, eyes searching the field. He was waiting for another clone. Zabuza had practically been spamming them before now, but…

The new clone never came. Zabuza was finally tiring, it seemed.

"You've done excellently. But it's time to return to Tazuna." Shino declared, standing up on his own two feet. He pulled Kiba up from the ground, and with Akamaru at their side, they started the trek back across the battlefield.

Shino led the way, his hand locked around the wrist of Kiba as he focused on reaching Tazuna. Only to be interrupted.

A kunai whizzed overhead, nearly freezing the blood in their veins.

Shino's mind went into overdrive for a minute, wondering if the fourth clone had finally appeared. If they could even handle it. If they could even survive it.

"Sorry!" A blonde clone shouted, giving him a sheepish smile.

His face went deadpan. "You should be! I almost shit my pants!" Kiba shouted in reply, and that was enough to send Shino back to running towards Tazuna.

They rejoined Hinata' side, who frowned at Kiba's battered body and Shino's slowed pace.

She bit her lip to keep it from trembling.

Hinata had watched the blonde die gruesomely a few to many times, she decided, even if they were just shadow clones. Now that her teammates were back to protect Tazuna, she could contribute, too.

Something in her chest burned, it burned with fear, having watched Kurenai-sensei get tossed aside, after watching so many clones meet ends, after watching Kiba exhaust himself. She'd seen Shino send out waves of bugs, providing distractions and saving Kiba. Twice.

And yet, she'd done nothing. Hinata didn't want to be dead-weight.

She wouldn't just stand aside. She was going to fight.

Hinata readied herself, subtly eyeing the way Shino ran through hand seals. Joining in the clone-creating nonsense, Shino made a bug clone, which set off to join their sensei in battle.

Three Zabuza clones remained. Naruto was slowing on her clone production, only keeping four going to battle one Zabuza. In her real fight, she had no one to aid her, except the clones she was using as body-doubles.

With every hit Naruto narrowly avoided, Hinata's heart beat faster.

She felt like crying, she needed to do something, anything. Naruto's leg had sprouted a massive bruise, there was sweat coating her skin, and Hinata didn't know how the hell she was doing it.

(None of them took into account the fact that if Zabuza wanted her dead, she would be.)

How she could move so smoothly, how she could play defense so well, all with unmatched ferocity.

Hinata Hyuuga had been many things, but she'd never been so fierce. So strong.

Her face felt red hot, but her body was ice cold, and Hinata suddenly felt like doing something foolish.

Her body carried her away from Kiba, away from the real Shino, and into the center of the battlefield. If Shino could do a wide-area attack, she could too.

She had to.
She had to be strong.
For her team. For Naruto. For her sensei.

Her hands raced through seals, through one of the only ninjutsu she knew. It was one of the few in the Hyuuga library that she'd managed to master.

Her chakra entwined with the lingering mist, filling the air with the distinctive Hyuuga flair. A blonde clone looked her way with blatant curiosity.

"Mizu Hari! Thousand Water Needles!" Hinata cried out, materializing water needles from the vapor in the air, from the remains of Zabuza's mist and clones, from the natural humidity of Wave Country, it all came together to form her attack.

It went unsaid, but the glinting needles of water were an excellent show of chakra-control and elemental prowess.

But even more impressive, was when Hinata directed the shrouds of needles in every direction, all with the help of her all-seeing Byakugan.

Aiming for killing blows on every single clone, she managed to disrupt two of the three all on her own.

It left one alive, who'd narrowly dodged. Thankfully, Kurenai and the Shino clone would be finishing it off very soon.

Aside from the real Zabuza, who'd been really pissed by her intrusion.

"Haku! Come take care of this damn brat, now!" Roared the man, feeling where a dozen needles had stabbed his shoulders, yet not met any of his vital points. Blood leaked from the puncture holes in his flesh, his back stinging with pain.

Frankly, Zabuza had never expected that these Konoha genin would pose any threat at all.

Let alone the mousey girl, but that was beside the point.

Zabuza wasn't sure what the hell they were feeding Konoha genin these days, but he wasn't going to be naive enough to not take them seriously any longer. No more mercy.

A team of genin would not be finishing him off. Not today.

Haku leapt from the trees instantly, feeling a sense of nausea in his stomach. His stomach lurched as he landed, his head spinning. The boy was sure he was experiencing food poisoning, but even so, he had to fight for his master.

The black-haired Hyuuga's eyes burned with a certain determination, one that denoted she was here to fight for her precious person in the same way he did.

"You're within my divination! You will not defeat me!" Hinata cried, two Naruto clones flanking her side. Frankly, Haku didn't even want to.

They assumed refined stances, staring each other down with a certain measuring look that foretold a battle of skill, not brute force.

They slowly circled each other, like panthers preparing for battle.

Tens of feet away, Shino's clone had been destroyed by Zabuza's clone, but not for nothing. Kurenai wielded a kunai, ready to blitz the Zabuza clone, despite how unwise she knew it would be.

She kicked off the ground, her body a blur until finally she and Zabuza clashed, the clone parrying her blade with a kunai of his own. It was stupid to engage it this way, but by now Kurenai was desperate.

Her students needed her, she couldn't waste time.

The clone was fending her off with one hand, Kurenai realized fatally. Both of hers were occupied, and as Zabuza withdrew another blade, Kurenai readied herself for pain.

She closed her eyes only long enough to let the blade hit, clutching her own weapon tight. She felt it tear through her epidermis, embedding itself between one of the crooks in her rib cage.

The searing pain made her world flash white for only a second, but the jounin moved nonetheless. She drove her knee into his crotch, forcing him to release both of his kunai.

The clone stooped slightly, and with one blade still buried in her skin, Kurenai drove her own kunai through the base of his skull.

With that, the clone was destroyed, showering her in the water that it had been composed of.

Her body shook, but Kurenai steadied herself.

Now, was the grand finale, it was time to end this once and for all.

Her reserves were low, but she wouldn't stop. She promised her students she would protect them, and as adrenaline filled her veins, she sprinted to Naruto's battle.

"Your fight is with me!" Shouted the voice of Kurenai Yuuhi, delivering a harsh kick right to the back of the man's knee. He buckled immediately, but saved himself with a quick shunshin, before Kurenai could tear through his neck with the very same kunai that ended his clone.

She buried her feet into the ground, stopping right in front of the amazed blonde genin.

Naruto wiped the sweat from her brow in relief, knowing she couldn't have kept up that battle much longer. She hadn't even gotten a hit in on him, and yet.. She looked down, from where he'd struck her leg whilst she'd blocked his sword. A large purple bruise had already begun forming. Their battle had only lasted a little over ten-minutes,

Naruto drew her hands together for the hundredth time, forming the two clones to go aid Hinata. Who'd just begun circling the other shinobi, she noted.

Reaching for her pouch, Naruto withdrew a small scroll full of very choice weaponry. To be specific, a dozen quick detonation explosive tags, all attached to kunai. Even when using shunshin, Zabuza wouldn't be able to hide from her sensory ability.

Kurenai couldn't see him, but Naruto could.

"Dance for me, Zabuza!" She shouted, throwing the kunai at his feet haphazardly. His shunshin around the field, only fast enough to barely avoid Naruto's blazing projectiles.

She was attempting to buy time for Kurenai, as she began blowing up the area with little regard for her destruction. The terrain was getting far more damaged than Zabuza himself.

"Sweet mother of god!" An elderly voice cried, watching as plumes shot up from her explosions.

The battle that would've happened between Haku and Hinata immediately halted, because flying bombs were something one must avoid.

Zabuza shunshined away every single time, only getting some minor burns on his legs from one or two close calls. When the girl suddenly halted, he immediately assumed that Naruto had finally ran out of explosives.

Unfortunately for him, his final shunshin had stopped right to the side of a tree, which correlated perfectly to Kurenai's signature genjutsu.

Without uttering the words, Kurenai activated Demonic Illusion, Tree Binding Death. With a strained cord of Chakra activating the genjutsu, Kurenai prepared herself to end their enemy here and now.

The tree itself wrapped itself around him, pulling him flat against the trunk, despite his struggling.

Haku, who'd been narrowly avoiding explosions and keeping away from enemies, looked up just in time.

"Zabuza-sama!" He cried out, shocking Kurenai just enough to disrupt the pathway her kunai was headed. The voice was so young, so sweet and heartbroken, it made the soft part of her ache. It was the voice of someone not much older than her genin.

Instead of slicing clean through the man's carotid artery, she tore through his shoulder, slicing down past his collarbone. Blood spilled everywhere, covering her hands and sleeves, some of it her own as a flurry of ice-needles hit her. She didn't even have the time to blink before Haku had thrown them, but it worked to disrupt her genjutsu well enough.

The seconds all of that took had felt like hours, before Naruto suddenly restored the flow of time with a few choice words

"Move, Kurenai-sensei!" Naruto shouted, and despite Zabuza having thought she was fresh out of bombs, he was wrong. Kurenai used a small chunk of her remaining chakra to flit away, landing at Naruto's side just in time. The woman heaved as she landed in a partial crouch, but Naruto didn't spare her a glance.

With two kunai in each hand and three tags tied to each, Naruto threw them. This time, they were aimed to kill.

Or better yet, blow him straight to hell.

Zabuza was low on chakra, his body was aching and bleeding, and he was running low on ideas.

A large ice-mirror appeared right in front of the standing Zabuza, another appearing a few feet ahead. The man had just grabbed the hilt of his sword when Haku slammed into him, shoving him into the next ice-mirror.

Before Haku himself could make it through, however, the explosions erupted.

The blasts made Naruto's ear ring, because those were a powerful bunch. The edge of the explosion caught the masked boy's leg, sending shrapnel up his retreating form and scorching his calf. Wood embedded itself up his leg and back, and surely Zabuza had gotten bits of the shrapnel, too.

She winced. Those explosions would leave a lot more than a mark; it'd leave third degree burns and a scar for life. The masked shinobi was lucky that it would be the worst of it.

With that, the battle was over.

Naruto's gigantic reserves were halved, the same could be said for everyone else, too. The adrenaline stopped pumping, and the exhaustion was setting in. Her blue eyes turned to Kurenai, and that was when she noticed.

Kurenai was bleeding, and she was bleeding bad. The ravenette nearly crumbled, but Naruto caught her before she could hit the ground.

"I-is it over?" Kiba asked, as Kurenai's eyes started to dim. Now that her adrenaline was going, too, Naruto knew she wouldn't be conscious much longer. Kurenai's chakra was near empty, using all those high-powered genjutsu had taken it's toll. Her reserves weren't large in the first place.

"Yeah." Naruto said, her throat feeling incredibly dry.

She gingerly lifted Kurenai into a princess carry, to better accommodate their differences in height. Naruto forced herself to ignore the way her head was aching.

"S-sensei.." Hinata murmured sadly, her eyes glazed with tears.

"She'll be okay, Hinata. We just need to get her a place to rest, and then stitch her up." Naruto explained, knowing full well she couldn't be certain of that.

"You can stay at my place, we've got extra rooms. We should try an' get there before sundown." Tazuna said, and that's when Naruto remembered his existence.

Her half-lidded eyes gave him a sharp look, but said nothing, as he took over the lead. She knew they'd be having a nice, long talk once they got back to his place.

Thankfully, it didn't take long, something their group was grateful for.

The moment Tazuna's daughter spotted them walking towards the old house, she ran out the door to intercept them.

"Oh, heavens! Come in, come in!" She said, throwing open the door for Naruto, who was still holding the prone form of their jounin. Wordlessly, they followed, the woman gestured for places to sit.

"Sorry, we can't relax just yet. Do you have a spare bedroom, and maybe a med-kit? Our jounin needs her wounds cleaned and stitched." Naruto managed to say, her eyebrows furrowed in an expression of passive worry.

"Yes, of course. Dad, get the med-kit from the bathroom, I'll help the girl get her teacher upstairs!" The dark-haired woman fretted, and Tazuna agreed wordlessly.

With ginger steps, they made it up the stairway. The lady immediately rushed into her spare room and rolled out a mat for the unconscious woman, Naruto following a few steps behind.

As soon as the mat was down, Naruto gently laid the woman onto it, finally giving her arms a rest. She sighed aloud, mentally thankful that Kurenai had been a relatively light load.

"I've got the first-aid kit!" Tazuna interrupted the brief silence, waving a white box in the air with a frantic arm.

The blonde jinchuriki immediately let down her hair, tying it back up into a tight bun. She tossed aside her fishnet gloves, fully intent on stitching up Kurenai all on her own.

She'd never done it before, but she had a steady hand and decent knowledge of the human body.

She opened the white box, seeing the plethora of medical tools, she noted it was far more supplied than any field kit she'd seen.

"Out, dad! She's going to have to undress the woman!" Tsunami said, wagging her finger at her own father as if he were a child.

"R-right!" Tazuna turned on his heel and left without further interruption, and Naruto gingerly removed Kurenai's bandage-like romper.

Beneath it, Kurenai's burgundy shirt was even more soaked with blood. Across the torso, and a splatter across the single sleeve. At least the white shorts she wore under the romper weren't stained, she thought with grim humor.

Without further hesitance, she rolled up the hem of the shirt, and spotted the wound in all its horror.

Her skin had been flayed to the bone, Naruto could see her damn rib-cage.

The smell of iron was cloying the air, and Naruto heard the woman next to her make a vague sound of disgust. Taking in a shaky breath, Naruto reached for the antiseptic, and a cotton round.

She gently wiped at the blood, trying to clean what she could. The wound continued to ooze, and Naruto grimaced, before she was interrupted.

"I-I'll d-do it!" A soft voice cried, and Naruto hadn't even noticed that Hinata had come in.

The room was tense, and Tazuna's daughter looked a bit green in the face when Naruto glanced over at her.

"I- I- Have medical training. Not a lot! But enough to do this!" Hinata proclaimed, clenching her fist up to her chest.

Naruto glanced back at the seeping wound, before giving a solemn nod. "Right. Shout for me if you need help. Er, Tazuna's daughter-" Naruto stood up.

"Tsunami." The woman clarified, and the blonde continued. "Right. Do you think you could, um, get the blood out of this fabric? If not-" Before she could finish, the woman was nodding emphatically.

"Of course, anything you need!" The dark-haired woman said, gathering Kurenai's bloodied romper into her arms.

Naruto figured the woman was probably grateful to get away from this.
Without a word, both Naruto and Tsunami left Hinata to her work, and the young Hyuuga took in a steadying breath.

"Don't worry Sensei, I- I'll help you." The dark-haired girl said to her unconscious teacher, pure determination settling on her face. There was shame burning Hinata up inside, because she'd only managed to do one, small thing in that entire fight. She hadn't even got to fight Haku..

(If she'd only intervened, sensei wouldn't have been hurt. If she'd killed Haku, he'd have never escaped with Zabuza.)

On her teacher's arm, a few puncture wounds weren't in desperate need of treatment. Haku had caused those, the Hyuuga knew. She quickly dumped the antiseptic around the major wound, putting on latex gloves and preparing to begin the stitches.

"It's going to be okay. I promise." Hinata declared, and she wasn't sure who she was trying to convince. Herself, or the pallid Kurenai.

She tied the wire around her curved needle, lamenting that she'd have to do this without a needle driver. It would have to be her own fingers.

Piercing the needle through her teacher's skin, she noticed the faint furrow Kurenai's brow. There was no numbing agent in the first-aid kit, and for that, she was truly sorry.
The first suture went in without a hitch, tying the knot tight and flat.

Time seemed so slow as she continued down the wound, moving less than half an inch to begin the second stitch.

In. Out. Tie.

Third stitch.

In. Out. Tie.

Fourth.

In. Out. Tie.

Fifth.

In. Out. Tie.

---

In the small bathroom, Naruto scrubbed Kurenai's dried blood from her hands with fury.

Her skin was red and raw, as the burning water scorched her skin until she'd finally scratched away any leftover bits of aged blood.

For good measure, the blonde tossed water into her face, once, then twice, and a third time.

Free of the blood and sweat, she allowed herself to close her eyes for a second.

That moment ran away as quickly as it came, though, because when she closed her eyes, Kurenai's wound was all she could see. Her grip on the sink basin tightened, but the blonde jinchuriki swallowed her emotions before they could get the best of her.

She didn't want to destroy Tsunami's sink.

Naruto shook her hands dry, before outright wiping them on her kimono shirt. There was still work to be done.

Leaving behind the quaint bathroom, Naruto marched down the stairs and into the living room. Therein, Kiba was fighting off sleep on Tazuna's couch, whereas Shino was guarding the door.

"Hey, losers," She tried to greet them kindly, but her voice came out raw, and tired, and plain out desperate.

They both immediately turned to her, questions burning on their tongues. If it weren't for her tone, Kiba probably would've fired off all his inquiries.

"I know you guys are exhausted. But, here's the current plan. I've got to talk to Tazuna, and then once Hinata is done, we need to come to some kind of consensus. Whether we stay in Wave, or call for backup, or- Well, you get the idea." She finished lamely, blowing an errant strand of blonde hair from her face.

"Maybe uh, take a nap, while we wait. I'll wake you guys up, okay?" She tried, rubbing the back of her neck sheepishly. "You, you want us to sleep?! After that?!" Kiba questioned harshly, looking older than Naruto thought he had any right to. "Kiba." Shino interrupted, his tone as stoic as ever.

"Think about it, you guys need to get cleaned up and well-rested. In case any trouble comes, we need to be at the top of our game." Naruto explained, using the small amount of kindness she had left in her.
It was hard not to lash out, hard not to shout.

Thankfully, Shino was on her side. Which pacified the Inuzuka just enough. "It is most logical this way. Kiba, you can take the shower first." He decided, his tone cutting enough to leave no room for argument.

The brunet boy growled, running a hand through his wild hair. "Fine. C'mon, Akamaru." Kiba stood up from the couch, stomping his way down the hallway and up the stairs.

The room almost felt empty now, with only Shino and herself. But, now that most of the tension was gone, she could hear the bugs in his body buzzing loud and clear.
She swallowed, "Thanks." She choked out, and for the first time, she saw Shino without his glasses.

She was careful not to point it out, lest she make it awkward.

He removed them quickly, untucking a small alcohol pad from his pocket. He fidgeted with the wrapper for a minute, before she eventually held her hand out.
Shino reluctantly passed it to her, and she tore it open with little resistance.
She was careful not to point that out, either.

"For what?" He eventually asked eyes narrowed from the sudden light in his face. He used the alcohol pad to wipe off one of the lenses of his dark glasses.

She nearly groaned. "Cajoling Kiba."

He looked to her, eyeing the enormous bruise on her leg for only a second. "My assistance was to be expected. Why? Your point of view is much more logical."

She was silent for a minute, but Shino's eyes never left her. He studied the slump in her posture, the tightness of her expression and the twitch in her fingers. She would've been lying if she said she wasn't studying him, too.

"Well, I've gotta go interview our client. Nice eyes, by the way." Naruto finally spoke, interrupting the moment of pure observation.

She straightened, the exhaustion in her eyes quickly replaced with cold determination. The crick in her neck disappeared, assuming the exact look that belonged on someone who worked in T&I.
It was until she had left that he'd caught her compliment. He was too busy being amazed by the swift change of demeanor.

Stepping into the kitchen, Naruto spotted her target. Tazuna, cradling his head in one hand, and holding a bottle with another.

She approached him with no hesitance, dropping into the chair across from him.

He met her silence with guilt so thick Naruto thought she could taste it. It was almost smothering.

"I didn't-'' A hiccup interrupted his words, but neither of them took notice. "Mean for all this ta' happen. I never thought he'd send some big shots." His words were slurred, and his breath stunk of liquor, yet Naruto stared at him with a burning ferocity nonetheless.

She was too damn tired for all this. Excuses wouldn't fly, she wanted an explanation.

"Go on." She urged, the two words laced with killing intent. She didn't even mean it to sound so deadly.

The alcohol in the elder's system must have kept him from noticing. "Gato. He's tha' one after my head. I thought the money I'd took with me to Konoha would cover a real team- Er, I mean uh, a team of adults, at least." The blonde didn't even need to prod further, because with that, Tazuna started rambling.

She sucked her teeth, careful to keep the irritation in her from bubbling over the surface.

"We ain't got much, I took all I had. They said C-rank, I wasn't gunna say otherwise. I knew I couldn't go home empty-handed, I'd have been as good as dead. And then what would happen to Wave? To Tsunami? And, god, Inari too." He shook his head, utter misery rolling off of him in droves.

Naruto chewed the inside of her cheek, silent as he spoke. She'd seen the state of this place, buildings were crumbling and aging beyond belief. The streets and piers were littered with scum and trash, and dirty orphans lingered in allies. The people looked depressed at best, and in absolute despair at worst.

This place was the textbook definition of poverty.

And because of that, she knew this wasn't just an act, or him playing things up.

"But we're done 'fer, now." He finished solemnly, and for every bit of his grief, none of it was facetious or false.

If it had been, Naruto might've been smarter about this.

"No. You're not, I'll do anything in my power to help, but I need to know everything. All you know about Gato." She said firmly, and in his eyes she saw a spark of hope. It was dim, faint, but it was worth saving. He cleared his throat, blinking away the mist in his eyes.

"Gato is the head o' the multi-million dollar Gato Company. It's all a front, for smuggling. Be it drugs, jewelry, kids. Gato's got his fingers in every pie. He ran out the other businesses, and then destroyed Wave's economy by outsourcin' everything to criminals and goons desperate for work. That's cheaper than payin' living wages, after all. And that's not all of it.." Tazuna said with clear disdain, the slur in his speech slowly fading.

"Once he'd ran all the competition outta town, he became the only source of imported goods, at way higher prices. Fabric, booze, wood, can't get 'em easily here. Gato made it harder. If it weren't for the few things Wave can produce on it's own, the whole nation would be nothin' but a bunch o' old buildings."

At some point, Naruto got her notepad out and started jotting down notes. "Right, so, the few stores Wave has.. Those are the ones open because of Wave's exports." She nibbled on the end of her ballpoint pen, feeling a headache coming on. Economics, outsourcing, she didn't know shit about any of that.

All she knew was that Wave needed help. And if that meant working her poor little brain into mud, so be it.

"Mhm. Anyone who's tried importin' by their own means is killed.. Or worse. It really ain't my story to tell, but Tsunami.. She'd fell in love with a man after Inari's father had been long dead, name was Kaiza. Real stand-up guy, he was the only source of hope here in Wave after Gato took over.. But.. Well, Gato's men beat him to near death, and…" Tazuna swallowed, a haunted look in his dark eyes.

"Kaiza was made into an example. A horrible one. Worse yet, everyone saw it. Including Inari and Tsunami. I think they're still traumatized to this day." Lon pauses followed every statement Tazuna made, allowing the Blonde the time to write everything he said.

Naruto nodded, writing down that she'd need to speak to Tsunami. She wanted every scrap of information, she might even have to interview other civilians.

She was a member of the Intelligence department, even if it was under the T&I division, she was an intel-nin nonetheless.

Taking a few minutes to take a sip of alcohol, Tazuna settled himself down, clearing the dark emotions from his expression.

"Not much more I can tell ya. Gato's got men positioned at the harbor and around his mansion, you can find that farther away from town. Never been there myself, so I couldn't tell you where to find it." Tazuna declared, just as his daughter entered the room.

Tsunami was looking somber, walking in the kitchen to wash her hands. She froze when she noticed Naruto and Tazuna seated at her table, looking at them with wide eyes. She was connecting the dots, Naruto realized.

The blonde glanced up at the clock on the wall, her conversation with Tazuna had been a little less than two hours long.

Naruto stood up from the oak table, "Don't worry. Your dad was just filling me in on all of the details about Gato. I'll need to talk to you, too."

The dark-haired woman nodded slowly, "Right. I'm going to prepare dinner for everyone, so if you'd prefer to wait until I'm done, I understand." She said, and Naruto gave her the best smile she could.

"You'll be cooking for a lot of people. Want my help? I've got some decent cooking skills." Naruto offered, taking off her trench coat to drape over the kitchen chair she'd been sitting in.

"That would be lovely. I'm making zosui with some rice I cooked earlier this evening. Could you get out the chicken and begin preparing it?" Tsunami asked gently, giving a soft smile of her own. Naruto blinked, because wow, Tsunami was pretty when she didn't seem to be on the verge of vomiting.

She nodded dumbly, opening the fridge where chicken had been thawing in a large, sealed bowl. She didn't say it, but she was surprised it was so well stocked. She answered her question with the realization that Tazuna and Tsunami must have plenty of money left from past ventures.

She took the bowl to the sink, washing her raw hands thoroughly before she began removing the skin from the chicken.

Tsunami bustled around the kitchen, taking a pot out to begin the broth. Naruto knew from memory that zosui was one of those dishes that could be made purely from things lying around the fridge. So it was of no surprise when Tsunami used leftover broth from what looked like hot-pot to start her broth.

Tazuna stood up, "I'm gonna go check on.. Things, I guess." Tazuna said with a vague wave of his hand, whilst Tsunami hummed in amusement.

Naruto slid the blade along the raw poultry with clean precision, skinning chicken was much easier than skinning a person, she thought.

Though, she had no experience with the second bit. Yet.

She blinked.

The boil of the pot was beginning to get louder, as Tsunami began swiftly chopping shiitake mushrooms.
"I'll just outright ask. Can you tell me about.. About the last few years, I guess." Naruto suggested vaguely, careful to be gentle with her wording.

Naruto wasn't sure if Tsunami's chopping got louder, or if she imagined it.

"I suppose I should start with.. Before Gato came along, yes?" Tsunami looked up from her cutting board wistfully, before moving onto chopping green onions.

Naruto hummed in the affirmative, and Tsunami began her tale.

"Before all of this, I made clothing. Western-style blouses, and skirts, and pants. Commission work, it made plenty of money to put aside for Inari's education. With the money from my father's architect and carpentry work, we were well off. Comfortable." She said, eyes narrowing at the onions she was cutting into perfect slices.

"My first husband was gone before Gato came along. Good riddance, but that's not what you need to know about." Spoke Tsunami, with the same sweet lilt she'd held the entire time.

"Once Gato came, all that went away. Fabric was too expensive to buy, couldn't make clothes anymore. The same could be said for just about anything else, except for maybe food and water. People lost their jobs, and Gato had no plans of giving them back. So they left," Tsunami scooped up the mushrooms and onions and dropped them into the simmering pot.

She took the pieces of chicken Naruto had begun dicing, "Good, you're doing good." The dark-haired woman complimented, before going back to her story.

"Friends, family, acquaintances, packed up and fled. A lot who didn't leave, well, they died. We lost about a thousand citizens in the first year of Gato's take over."

Naruto nearly did a double-take. "A thousand people? Who just died, or fled?"

"Mhm. Deaths came from all directions, some natural. Others because they couldn't get medicine, or treatment. Or food, or water. Some were direct causes of Gato, part of his intimidation. Oh, and the suicides…" Tsunami trailed off, her face scrunching with sadness at the mention of all the senseless deaths.

"But there was hope, until.. Until Kaiza's death, then it was gone." Her voice dipped, losing the sweetness it had held just moments ago. Naruto was almost hesitant to ask. Almost.

"Kaiza?" She asked, feigning ignorance as an attempt to hear more.

"My second husband. My soulmate. Inari's idol. He was an immigrant, moved to Wave in hope of bolstering his career as fisherman. Kaiza was stronger than any civilian I've met, physically and mentally. He actually saved Wave when a dam door opened up, he was Wave's hero." Tsunami recalled with fondness lacing her words. The crow's feet by her eyes seemed to increase whilst she smiled for just a moment, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

"He had this phrase. 'With these two arms, I'll protect you.' He swore by that, that with his own arms, he'd protect everything he cared about. People loved it. Inari loved it. But," Her words suddenly lost their mirth, the joy draining from expression at a moment's notice.

She took the diced chicken and put it into a smaller pot to boil.

Naruto busied herself with cleaning the kitchen, whilst Tsunami seemed to reminisce for a moment.

"But, Gato saw it as a taunt. It took an entire gang of his men to beat him enough to drag him to the center of town. From there, they tied his body to a wooden post. The entire town was there, including me and Inari. Some of his men pushed us right to the front, there was nowhere to escape." Her hands started to tremble, but she shook her head and continued.

"They broke his arms. I could cover Inari's eyes, but he could still hear the sounds. The snapping- The breaking- but that wasn't it. Couldn't be. If you thought breaking his arms was bad, imagine watching your husband's arms get ripped clean off his body." Tsunami's eyes became hollow, a darkness extending into the very depths of her soul. Her voice broke with every word, emotions slowly seeping in.

Naruto's heart ached, clenching her own fists so tight she thought her skin might tear.

"After that, they lit him aflame. At some point, Inari had wrestled me away and scampered off. But I was too numb to notice. I couldn't move, even when my father eventually had to drag me home before Gato's men took notice of me." Continued the woman, wrapping her arms around herself in a self-consoling measure.

Naruto couldn't take it anymore, she wrapped her own arms around the shaking woman and pulled her in tight.

Tsunami accepted the hug with no resistance, leaning into her arms with a sniffle. Naruto knew by now she had begun crying, and the guilt in her stomach only seemed to grow.

With that hug, the much older woman broke. Naruto wondered how long it had been since a friend had hugged her.

"They burned him alive! He was screaming so loud, I could hear him all the way at home. I still do, every night when I go to sleep.. That night, I snuck out to retrieve his ashes. There were still.. Chunks of bone, on the ground. I still keep his ashes by a shrine in my room." Tsunami finally finished, tears streaming down her cheeks.

The woman looked positively shattered, her dark eyes seeming bottomless but still brimming with grief. A feeling of sickness lingered in Naruto, one she couldn't smother out.

She pulled away from Naruto eventually, wiping harshly at the tears that had run down her cheeks. The woman was piecing herself together already, right before Naruto's eyes.

"Gato never paid for what he did for Kaiza. I wished for weeks, months, that I could kill him myself. I'd nearly even attempted it. But Inari needs me, and I'm just a civilian. I could never hope to storm my way through that damned fortress of his." The woman spat, her words sharp with pure hatred.

Naruto managed to read behind the lines of what Tsunami said. The civilian woman had, at least once, nearly pursued revenge on the man. She even knew his location, evidenced by her calling it a fortress. It was only Inari that had kept her from going on what would've essentially been a suicide mission, one that likely would've had extremely low chances of success.

Instead of pondering the logistics of a civilian woman managing to kill a guarded millionaire, Naruto pointed out something much more pressing.

"Fortress..?" The blonde pressed, and the woman nodded emphatically.

"It's a gated estate on the outside of town, guards posted up along the inside and outside of the perimeter. He only lets in prostitutes, thugs, or business partners so I've never seen inside. But it's the perfect picture of opulence." The woman said with no small amount of disdain, sniffing the air as she added the now-cooked chicken, along with the rice into her broth. The color was slowly returning to her face, wiping her face on the inside of her shirt. With the tear-tracks gone, and her eyelashes dry, you could hardly tell she'd been sobbing just moments ago.

"Y-you know how to get there?" Naruto questioned, snatching up her notepad to write this all down. If the woman noticed her urgency, she didn't say it.

"On the northern end of the outskirts. Continue straight for about forty-minutes, and you can't miss it." She explained, breathing out a sigh. She collected herself quickly, straightening her clothes and forcing a smile.

"Well, now that all that sappy stuff is over, go wake your friends. Dinner is almost ready." Tsunami said, regaining all of her earlier kindness in the span of a few minutes.

Naruto's mouth filled with a terrible taste, because she saw how performative the expression was. She did the exact same thing herself.

"Of course." Naruto said, offering her own weary smile in return.

By now, the exhaustion had set deep in her bones. One battle, medical emergency, and two grueling interviews later, she was so beyond physically tired.

She wasted no more time in leaving the kitchen, the sooner she could get everything done, the sooner she could get some sleep.

Silently, Naruto entered the living room, where Tazuna was gazing out the bay window with his hands crossed behind his back. He at least looked sobered up again.

Not far from him, Shino and Kiba were both passed out on the couch. Kiba's feet were dangerously close to Shino's face, Naruto thought. Akamaru wasn't far off, huddled in a nearby recliner all on his own.

If she weren't so tired, she might've snorted. Instead, however, she sighed with fondness.

Before she woke them up, however, she had another she was more concerned about.

Hinata.

Poor, sweet Hinata, who she'd left to stitch up her very own teacher.

She was the oldest amongst the squad, the most experienced, the most skilled. So it fell upon her shoulders to be the leader while their Jounin was unconscious. Naruto was fatigued beyond belief, but it was her responsibility to take care of things as well as she could.

So, when she stepped into the guest room, and saw Hinata sitting next to a stilled Kurenai, she didn't say a word. Her eyes studied the scene, and she found her gaze softening.

Because Kurenai was still breathing, no longer bleeding, and that was what mattered.

Her shirt was still rolled up, and Naruto could see the large wound had been perfectly sutured, with some kind of salve glazing the surrounding skin. Around them, many dirtied cotton rounds littered the ground.

Worst of all was Hinata, who at some point had ditched her gloves, because her hands were soaked in crimson. Her pale skin was smeared with blood, even on her face and neck, and Naruto gently approached.

"I did it. Sensei is stable. Her wound will heal, she's stable. I did it." Hinata repeated, quietly and Naruto felt a swell of pride.

"You're damn right you did, and you did a great job at it. But she needs to be bandaged, and you need to be cleaned up for dinner. So, let's do that, hm?" Naruto suggested gently, though she internally scolded herself for speaking to Hinata like a child. Wasn't her fault, she just didn't really know how to deal with someone who'd just had to save their first life, been traumatized, and was also twelve all at once.

Hinata nodded, and so began the process of bandaging Kurenai's torso. Naruto lifted the woman up gingerly, and Hinata began wrapping the white gauze around her wound.

Over that, a second layer of bandage was tied as an additional barrier, and Kurenai was gently laid back down onto her bloodied tatami mat. Naruto gathered the unused materials back into the first-aid kit, but otherwise left it in the room. With the medical supplies put away, and Kurenai stitched and safe, Naruto turned to her remaining task.

Hinata's eyes were dim, with tiredness and the loss of naivete, and though Naruto pitied her there was still much to be done.

She placed her hand on Hinata's upper back, guiding her out of the guest-room, and into the bathroom.

Hinata stood in front of the mirror, yet held her head down to stare at the floorboards. Haggardly, Naruto took paper towels from the rack, wetting them with tap-water before wiping off the girls arms and neck of any blood.

Once the wet towel touched her face, it was like Hinata snapped out of the fatigue and trauma induced trance she'd been in, shaking her head like a wet-dog. Naruto blinked in surprise.

"I-I can do it myself! You don't have to do this for me!" And so, Hinata's stutter returned, but Naruto just smiled. She allowed the girl to take the rag, wiping herself off as quickly as she could.

"It's okay! You're a comrade, it's my job to look after you." Naruto said, in her usual raspy voice. Any other time, Hinata would've shrunken in on herself.

But for some reason, the sincerity in Naruto's words just made her smile.

That was enough to make Naruto grin, too. She tussled the girl's silky hair, which only fell back into its usual immaculate state. She was almost disappointed, seeing a Hyuuga with wild hair like hers would be nice. Tossing the paper towels into a small trash can, Hinata finally glanced up at the mirror.

"Look at ya! All prettied up, now let's go wake up your teammates and eat, I'm starving."

The girl with blue-toned hair nodded emphatically, following on Naruto's heels without words.

Naruto went to wake Kiba, while Hinata woke Shino.

Needless to say, the Hyuuga girl was much more gentle about it. Naruto shook the brunet boy violently. "Dinner's ready, up and at 'em, boy!"

Akamaru barking in his other ear must've made it even worse, because when Kiba sat up, he looked both petrified and angry.

He shook away all the remaining dazedness quickly, blinking away his tiredness and giving Naruto a light glare.

"You're a dick." He said with little inflection.

Naruto grinned evilly.

Shino sniffed sharply as he regained consciousness, straightening abruptly. He wasted no time in regaining his barings, however, because the moment he was up, he slid on his glasses and stood at attention.

"It's dinner time, Shino-kun." Hinata explained softly, and Naruto then noticed the wince on Kiba's face. Apparently, that wasn't a typical Shino mannerism, she concluded.

Which then led to the realization that Shino must be more tense, or maybe just downright anxious, then she'd thought.

A few minutes of silence passed, with all of them forcing down any of their tenseness. It was a silent agreement of sorts, to enjoy dinner for just a bit. To stop stressing for a moment.

The Aburame boy's posture relaxed in the slightest of ways, and with no further words, the team of four left the living-room to take seats at the dining table.

Tsunami had already set the table, with bowls of soup and glasses of ice-water at every seat. Kiba was incredibly surprised not only by the hospitality, but also that her table had enough room for all of them. He hadn't got the chance to look around before he'd showered then collapsed on the couch.

They bustled into seats, with Tazuna across from Kiba, and Tsunami across from Naruto. Shino and Hinata sat across from one another, whereas the two heads of the table were empty.

"Inari wanted to eat in his room today, so I'm sorry for his lack of manners." Tsunami said, breaking the silence bashfully.

"It's of no issue." Shino replied quickly, only for Naruto and Kiba to agree. "Yeah, no need to worry, Miss Tazuna's Daughter!" The brunet boy quipped, only for Naruto to elbow him in the ribs.

"As the bastard said, Tsunami! It's no big deal." Naruto said, adding extra emphasis on her name. The woman in question giggled, because she did not miss the glare the blonde was directing at her compatriot.

"E-exactly! We're incredibly g-grateful for your housing and feeding us, Tsunami-san! It's very kind of you!" Hinata added, trying to salvage the remains of their thankings for the woman.

"Yeah yeah, this that and the other, let's dig in already." Tazuna helpfully interrupted, and Naruto snorted loudly.

The woman to his left collected herself enough to nod, "Agreed, dad. Let's eat now, before it gets cold. Naruto and I worked very hard on this." She said, giving a wink to the blonde across from her. Naruto grinned bashfully, scratching her chin.

Kiba wasn't sure, but he thought she might've blushed. Though, he was more concerned with something else.

Very slowly, his head turned to Naruto as everyone else began eating.

"You can cook?" He asked, drawling out the first word with narrowed eyes and raised brows.

Naruto's oddly bashful expression melted immediately, replaced by her typical self. She rolled her cerulean eyes. "Obviouussly, orphans gotta learn that young, pinhead."

He gave her a skeptical glance before turning to taste it. To his surprise, it wasn't bad at all.

Then suddenly, he caught the insult she'd tagged onto the end.

"Who're you calling pinhead?!" Kiba asked, pointing his spoon at her dangerously.

She looked at him, then the spoon, her face getting progressively more unimpressed.

"You, dumbass." Quipped the blonde, taking another bite of her her relief, it actually returned a bit of her lost energy.

He chewed his food slowly before swallowing, "Dickhead."

One would've thought that having the attention of the entire table would've stopped them, but somehow, neither seemed to notice.

Shino gave them an exasperated look, whilst Tsunami looked more than amused. Hinata wasn't sure who she wanted to win the insult-war, and looked to be confused.

And Tazuna just chortled, before looking away to start telling everyone a story about boats and architecture.

Naruto leaned towards Kiba, conspicuously covering her mouth with her hand.

"Whore." Naruto whispered in his ear.

He hid his laugh by clearing his throat.

From that point on, dinner was shared in relative silence, (Excluding Tazuna's story-telling) all the way until they cleared the table and Kiba began washing dishes, while Shino helped Tsunami put away leftovers.

Hinata shooed the mother from the kitchen, swearing they'd take care of it. The woman was happy to oblige them, saying she'd go prepare the spare bedroom for them instead.

Naruto leaned against the counter while everyone else busied themselves, but she found herself far too tired to offer helping. Hinata was quick to join her side after wiping down the table, and then Shino finished, and finally Kiba.

They were standing silently in a sort of a huddle, until Naruto released a bated breath and spoke.

"Let's sit down, there's a hell of a lot to go over." She said, rejoining her spot at the table. Everyone else got situated whilst Naruto retrieved her notebook yet again, spinning her pen in her fingers.

"I found out from Tazuna and Tsunami that our enemy is a millionaire by the name Gato, head honcho of the Gato Company. He's the one who sent the shinobi after us, he needs Tazuna dead to keep his grip on the country of Wave." Naruto explained slowly, her head resting on her palm.

Hinata spoke up then, raising her index. "Is.. Is he why this place is so,er, impoverished?"

Kiba was quick to huff, because impoverished was being far too charitable.

"Yeah. He ran out of the businesses, beat up or killed anyone who stood against him, and started charging so much for goods that no one here can afford them.

Caused a huge population drop, skyrocketed unemployment, and a lot of deaths."

"That's awful.." Hinata replied sadly, fidgeting with her hands nervously. "Would I be correct to conclude that the bridge is the only way the citizens can thrive again, without Gato?" Asked Shino, to get a nod in response.

"Basically, yeah. If we don't step in, there'll be no hope for.. For an entire country, really. But don't take that the wrong way, you aren't obligated to help-" Naruto was only saying this, because they weren't obligated- This mission wasn't what they were hired for. She knew she would be staying, but they didn't have to.

Kiba was quick to interrupt, "Oh, hell no! There's no way we're leaving, not with the people starving in the streets, buildings crumbling- No way, man, no way. We'd be leaving all these people to die." He said, accentuating his words with wild hand movements.

"I am in agreement, Second, we would have to leave Kurenai, she cannot be jostled with such an injury. We have to stay." Shino rationalized, and Naruto scratched her cheek.

"Actually, my plan was to send you guys to get back-up, while I stay here with Kurenai, but that was only if you three didn't want to stay." Revealed the blonde, tastefully hiding the fact that she was just going to blow Gato's mansion off the map in that plan.

(She thought that was a pretty good idea.)

"W-we're staying! We certainly can't leave you or Sensei here, it's not happening!" Hinata blurted loudly, slamming her hand against the table in blatant disapproval.

As soon as she realized she'd said that, she flushed bright crimson, and sputtered in embarrassment.

Kiba laughed, loud and rowdy, "You're damn right, Hinata! Tell her ass!"

"Yes Hinata, tell her." Shino added tastefully, a teasing inflection in his usually monotone voice. Naruto snorted, while the blue-haired girl squeaked in humiliation.

She sighed in amusement, raking a hand through her golden locks. "Well, that calls for Plan B."

"What's Plan B?" Kiba asked curiously, getting a yip of agreement from Akamaru. Loudly, the oldest of the teens cracked her neck, before she continued.

"Shoddy. Incomplete. But that's fine, you, my three disciples, can help with that."

Kiba made a very offended expression at being called a disciple, he not-so subtly flipped her the bird as she explained. If Shino had done the same, no one noticed.

"First step, we need to send for back-up tomorrow morning." Naruto started, with Shino helpfully piping in.

"I agree. There is likely a civilian postal service, which will take a long while to get our mail to the Hokage. Hence, we must send it out as soon as possible. I can do this for us." Shino offered, adjusting his glasses. It went unsaid that it was far too late to go now, postal offices closed early in the mornings, and by now it was night.

Naruto grinned, "Great, I'll send a clone with you tomorrow, just for safety."

"After that, we need to hunt down Gato's mansion. I'm thinking we blow it into bits, I can make some gnarly explosive tags from scratch."

Kiba whistled, prepared to approve, but Shino was already disagreeing.

"There may be innocent civilians in there. We cannot take such extreme action." He denied, and Naruto shrugged.

"Guess we'll have to work on that part. Either way, someone will need to constantly be with Tazuna and Tsunami, they'll need to be guarded. We'll be stretched pretty thin for the next few days, because we'll need to guard the bridge, too. All in all, we've got a good bit of planning left and a lot to do." She concluded airily, waving her hand vaguely. She was intentionally trying to look more relaxed than she was, and by the looks of it, it worked.

Kiba raised his hand like a kid in the classroom. "I've got an idea! We should scope out the mansion, see what we can discover by skulkin' around, see who goes in about. Then we sneak in, and assassinate him!" He waved his hands flamboyantly, accentuating his every word.

There was momentary silence, because it really wasn't that bad of an idea.

"I'm an intel-nin, I'm trained for that.. So if we went that direction, I'd be the one to do it." Naruto considered, her eyes narrowing in thought.

"N-not alone, though!" Hinata interrupted, giving her a very stern expression. One that Naruto thought Neji would be rather proud of, considering she swore she'd seen the exact same look on him.

"Lemme go with you! I can get us in easy, Kurenai-sensei says my charm can get me anywhere." The brunet boy interjected loudly. His white dog barked, and Kiba nodded at whatever his partner had said.

Naruto's expression made it clear that she doubted Kurenai had ever said that. She sent a glance to Hinata and Shino, expecting one of them to validate his claims.

"It's true, despite Kiba's intelligence, he can be a decent conman." Shino clarified, and Kiba shook his head emphatically.

Naruto wondered if Kiba realized he was being insulted. Probably not, she concluded with mirth.

"We can't just walk right in, Kiba. We'll have to take more than one trip out there to scout the place out, and we need to get as much reconnaissance done in the village as possible before we even consider entering. It's how intelligence missions work, at least." Naruto said with a shrug. She knew Inoichi and Ibiki would be less than proud of her rudimentary explanation, but oh well.

He grimaced. "Fine, so then we scout tomorrow. Then we kill him the day after. If possible."

The group of four exchanged glances.

"M-maybe we should sleep on it." Hinata suggested shyly, not willing to accept it at face value.

Naruto sighed, prepared to fully lay out the plan before they did any sleeping.

"Alright, here's what we've got so far. Shino will head out as soon as we all wake up, to call for back-up. Kiba and I will do some reconnaissance around the village. Hinata will guard Tazuna and Tsunami in the meantime, and when Shino returns, he or Hinata can leave with Tazuna to work on the bridge. That's all for tomorrow, we'll have to plan as we go." Naruto declared, finality laced in her words as she spoke, cool and calm.

Kiba looked eager in regards to the plans, his eyes sparkling with something unrecognizable. "Akamaru will have to stay here while we gather intelligence. Sorry buddy, you're just too recognizable." The brunet told his dog, who whined in response.

Hinata and Shino exchanged looks, and the Aburame boy spoke first. "How will wqe decide who accompanies Tazuna?" He asked the table, and Hinata frowned momentarily.

"I-It'll have to be you, Shino. I need to be here in case K-Kurenai-sensei wakes up. I am the only one with medic training." The girl said, not looking overly excited about her position. She fidgeted with the sleeve of her oversized coat.

He nodded. "Very well."

"Great, now that we're all done here, it's bedtime, folks." Naruto stood up abruptly, pushing in her chair roughly. The wooden chair squeaked against the floor, but everyone else was scrambling to follow her in no time at all.

Kurenai was in the guest-room they'd be sleeping in, and thankfully Tsunami had cleaned up all the aftermath of her medical emergency. She'd laid out all their sleeping mats, and put large blankets on the hardwood floors below them.

It looked more like the sleeping area for kids having a sleepover, instead of ninja taking their rest after a long day. But no one said that, of course.

They settled in, and knocked out in no time at all. Naruto was obviously the first one out, the moment her head touched the pillow she fell into a dreamless slumber.

---

Day Two in Wave Country…

---

Somehow, the next morning, Naruto was also one of the first ones up. Her bleary eyes blinked open slowly, her body feeling like it was made of lead as she came to consciousness.

Her clothes from yesterday had the faintest foul smell of sweat, which was enough to force Naruto to force herself to sit up.

She needed a shower.

The clarity hit her then, after she'd wiped the sleep from her eyes and taken a look around the room. Hinata was curled up in the fetal position, under a blanket that Tsunami had given them. Kiba was similarly unconscious, only he was sprawled out like a starfish. Kurenai laid flat on her back, sweat dampening her dark hair.

Looking to her left side, Shino was also awake, sitting with his knees to his chest. He'd ditched his coat last night, wearing an oversized black shirt and his usual pants. It was probably the most casual he'd ever looked.

"Greetings." He murmured, his voice softer than usual. Naruto blinked slowly.

He turned to meet her gaze, but seemed to wince when the light from a nearby window shone directly in his eyes.

"You okay?" Naruto slurred out, brain still foggy from having just awoken.

He hummed. "Fine. My eyes are light-sensitive. As is the case with all Aburame clan members, hence our sun-glasses."

Naruto looked over, her glasses case was right next to his, and slowly nodded in understanding. "Did somethin' happen to yers? You can totally wear mine, 'ttebayo." She gave him a bold thumbs up, and when Shino looked at her this time, he swore she looked just like when she'd had in the Academy.

Her eyes were squinted to the point of nearly being shut, hair wild and sticking up in every direction. There was nothing, "trained ninja," about her current look.

The girl didn't notice the slight uptick of his lips. "I needn't borrow yours. Mine are fine, I am unsure what gave you the impression they weren't." He said, a small amount of amusement in his tone, as he gingerly opened the case and returned his glasses to his face.

"Feh." The girl waved him off, but then blinked, as if slowly coming to reality. She wiped her face harsher than the first time.

"Wait a minute- You said Aburame's got a light sensitivity?" She suddenly seemed to be on the brink of something, like a light-bulb had appeared over her head and was about to turn on.

The garbling in her words long gone, Naruto was no wide-awake.

"Indeed." He replied immediately, wondering where she was going with this.

She gasped, the imaginary light-bulb blinking to life. She slammed her fist into her open palm. "Aha! So that's why you never see your clan out in the morning! You guys must be day-sleepers!" Her mouth in a small O-shape, clearly amazed at her own conclusion.

Shino raised his eyebrow, "You mean nocturnal?"

"Yeah! That's the damn word!" She said, snapping her fingers.

He couldn't help but wonder how the person who'd fought a missing-nin just yesterday had forgotten the word nocturnal. How a T&I nin could be such a different person in the morning.

"But yes, you would be correct. Some of my clan are nocturnal." He confirmed, pulling on his jacket from where it had been on the floor. She nodded. "Cool, 'ttebayo." She told him, very seriously. A few beats of silence followed.

He hummed. "I owe you an apology." He finally admitted. Her head swerved to look at him, an expression of pure confusion etched across her features.

"Eh?! What the hell for?!" She asked, openly shocked by the abruptness with which he'd changed the topic.

"In the Academy, I shunned you. It was rude, you would've made an excellent companion. I should have never allowed the nonsensical rumors to cloud my logic."

Naruto sighed loudly, "Man, I thought you'd done somethin' bad. Scared the shit out of me. That was ages ago, don't worry about it." She stood up, doing a few stretches.

He hummed. "Only a few months, to be clear." He adjusted his glasses and pretended not to see the incredulous expression on her face.

"Whateeeever! Doesn't matter, we can totally be friends now. Apology accepted, I need a shower." She declared suddenly, walking out of the room as speedily as possible.

By the time the teen had finished her shower, Hinata had woken up and tended to Kurenai, tying the woman's hair into a bun and putting an ice-pack on her forehead.

Naruto's hair was still sopping wet, as she decided to give herself a different hairstyle for today. In honor of her two friends back home, Ino and Tenten, she did her hair in respect to them both. The Yamanaka often wore her silky blonde hair in a braid, whereas Tenten always wore buns.

Naruto did them both, braiding her hair and wrapping them into two buns. The tightness of the style wasn't something she enjoyed, but it at least kept her hair up and out of the way.

"Y-You look very lovely, Naruto." The blue-haired girl across the room said, her face slightly flushed. Naruto grinned, "Thanks, you too!" She returned, only for a loud snore from Kiba to ruin their compliment exchange.

Shino, who'd been sharpening his weapons, looked up then. A slight smirk appeared on his face as he stood up and walked over to Kiba. Naruto raised her brows, and for some reason Hinata was already looking exasperated with what was ahead.

Shino drove his foot into Kiba's side.

The Inuzuka squawked indignantly, sitting up immediately. Looking around the room, his face soured. "I hate you bastards." He declared, stumbling over his words slightly.

Naruto cackled like a madwoman, and he turned his glare to her.

"Bastards." He repeated, and Hinata giggled.

"Maybe don't damage our eardrums with your annoying snoring, then!" The blonde suggested.

He clicked his tongue. "I think you kicked my bladder. Now I gotta piss." Kiba loudly proclaimed, and Hinata looked slightly disgusted.

"Incorrect. My foot landed nowhere near your bladder, if anything, I struck your liver."

Naruto looked up at the standing Shino, "Bold of you to assume he knows what a liver is."

The Aburame boy snorted, something Naruto prided herself on. Kiba's affronted face made her snort, too.

"Course I know what a damn liver is!" He said, crossing his arms over his chest.

Even Hinata gave him a look, one that screamed disbelief.

Throwing his arms into the air, "It's what filters the piss!"
Everyone exchanged glances, and Kiba groaned. "I don't need to take this shit! We're on a mission, don't you bastards have anything better to do?"

"Don't you have a bathroom break to take? Better go before you piss yourself." Naruto retorted, sneering at him.

Blinking, he suddenly got up and ran to the bathroom. She guffawed, and Shino finally called their attention back to their plans for the day. "Kiba makes a point, I believe it's time we.. "Get down to business,' as one would say. Does anyone happen to have paper and a pen?" Asked the dark-haired boy, and Naruto's expression cleared of all joy.

She reached over to her pile of things, fishing out her notepad and pen from the mess."Here, use this." She directed, after flicking to a blank page.

He immediately took the notepad and the pen clipped to it, staring at the blank yellow pages for a moment before he began writing.

Naruto peeked over at the page, even as Shino was hurriedly jotting down neat letters.

She immediately noticed that the letter was.. Odd.

The message seemed almost inane, with odd phrases sprinkled throughout. Nothing about needing emergency assistance.

Hinata joined at his other side, looking over the notepad curiously.

"Aburame clan code," H explained, with no prompting. "Each of these phrases had a distinct meaning. Here, you see, "The crickets are loud during the night here." Meaning, I've reached the destination, and enemies are in the area." He continued, his finger stopping below the phrase.

He moved his index to another phrase, pointing at it this time. "I miss my companions dearly," Meaning, send reinforcements." Naruto's jaw dropped but Shino was still going. Even Hinata looked surprised. "This line, 'My closest friend is unhappy here.' Means our captain is injured, but in our custody," making blue eyes widen.

"'Who knows how long until the next full moon," means that we have no idea when the next conflict will occur." Shino explained, before finishing with, "You understand the idea."

Naruto turned from the notepad, to Shino, then back to the notes. "Cool, 'ttebayo," She nodded.

Hinata's eyebrows furrowed, "I've never heard of such a thing, clan-specific code, that is.. I don't believe the H-Hyuuga have one."

Naruto found her respect for the Aburame clan growing.

"Ah, perhaps they do not. It is only logical for the Aburame to have one, we are often used for missions requiring code. Infiltration, capture and retrieval, are specialties of ours." He nudged his glasses up with his middle finger, and Naruto continued the conversation.

"Makes sense. I bet the Yamanaka have code, too, they do a lot of intel-work. It's their specialty." As Shino passed the notepad back to her, he nodded. "Most likely."

"W-what about the Uzumaki clan?" Hinata asked shyly, and both Shino and Naruto looked at her suddenly. She ducked her head immediately.

Shino was unaware of the Uzumaki clan, and thus, seemed incredibly intrigued.

Naruto scratched the back of her neck. "No idea, wish I knew. Maybe I'll find out someday, 'ttebayo."

Kiba re-entered the room, and Shino straightened. "I am going to find the post office, I must be heading out now." He announced, and the group nodded in agreement.

"Hinata, I'll leave Akamaru with you. Me and Naruto gotta head out, too." Kiba said, and the blue-haired kunoichi seemed unsure.

"Are you certain you shouldn't send him with Shino?" She asked, and Naruto made a clone of herself in the blink of an eye.

"It's cool, I'll send my clone with him!" Piped the blonde, which relieved her comrade immensely. She didn't want anyone to be alone.

Kiba clapped his hands, a grin on his face. "Let's get this shit started! We need to get revenge on this Gato fucker as soon as possible!" Said the boy, getting an equally bright grin from his blonde partner for the day.

"Hell yeah!" Naruto cheered, leaving her trench on the ground. She wore her belt, keeping her scrolls and pouch on her. Reconnaissance met blending in, as she would soon discuss with Kiba.

Shino and his Naruto-clone headed to the door, whereas the real Naruto was opening the window of the guest room with no hesitance.

As she leapt out, Hinata nearly fell out the window trying to grab her. The blonde landed on the neighbors rooftop, giving the Hyuuga girl a fervent wave.

Hinata blew out a sigh of relief, in disbelief that she'd actually been frightened for a moment. The blonde giggled, and Kiba gently pushed Hinata aside to leap out after her.

"Hope you can do a good henge, Kiba, you're gonna need it!" Naruto shouted to him, before turning and running.

"Slow down, damn it! He hollered after her, and Hinata watched them go. The dreary atmosphere of Wave Country seemed to brighten because of them, even if there were dark clouds hanging overhead, foretelling of thunderstorms that would inevitably come.

A breeze blew through the area, and Hinata forced down a feeling of bitterness as Naruto and Kiba disappeared from sight. She ignored the part of her that wished she wasn't going to be sitting here, in this creaky old house.

The bitterness didn't disappear, but Hinata could at least ignore it.

When she turned around, Shino was gone. But his blonde clone wasn't, and neither was Akamaru.

"E-er, shouldn't you be Shino?" Asked the shy Hyuuga, tilting her head.

"Nope, nope! Shino's clone made another clone, now I'm here, 'ttebayo."

Hinata smiled.

In the center of the town, two teens were completely unrecognizable.

A yellow-haired boy, a likeness comparable to Minato Namikaze, stood with his hands on his hips. Next to him, a girl with brown-hair stopping at her waist.

"I don't see why I gotta be a girl." The brunette whispered to her blond friend, who grinned. "Because it's funnier." Replied the blond.

"True enough. But Naruto, what if someone hits on me?" She asked, folding her arms.

The blond looked him up and down, and for a moment, Kiba Inuzuka thought their disguised friend might downright declare it'd never happen.

"Just tell them to buzz off in a deep voice." The blonde replied with a shrug.

Kiba thought it over for a minute, before shrugging. "Right. Guess this is where we part ways, then?"

"Mhm. Meet you back here in a few hours." Agreed the blond, and with that, the two turned and separated.

Kiba, who was disguised as a beautiful brunette, was on their way to skulk around the only bar in the entirety of this village.

Naruto, disguised as a beautiful blonde man, was headed to ask around the few shopkeepers left.

---

Finding the bar was tougher than Kiba had expected, and by the time she had finally found it, she needed to give her henge a last minute check.

She checked where her pants had been turned into a long skirt, where her short hair had been made long. She even managed to change her scent with this henge, which was something she couldn't do in the Academy.

Mentally, Kiba was having a hell of time trying to decide whether she was proud of how good she looked as a girl, or if she should be embarrassed to be cloaking as a gender which she didn't identify as.

She shrugged, she had a relative that cross-dressed all the time. It was nothing.

Opening the door to the place slowly, her eyes were immediately attacked by a layer of cigar smoke that was desperate to escape the room.

Green sconce lights illuminated the smokey room, making the rich wood paneling on the walls and furniture looking surprisingly glossy.

A pool-table was surrounded by a couple of people, too entranced in their game to look up. The green carpet on the floor was dingy and stained, which was more in line with Kiba's expectations. Empty tables and bar stools filled the room, the seats of chairs in desperate need of reupholstering.

Kiba found a stool and took a seat, where a barmaid eyed her skeptically. "Can I get you anything?" Asked the woman, and Kiba's mind blanked.

She'd never been to a bar.

"Er, a beer will do." Kiba answered slowly, remembering to use a higher pitch now. One last glance around the dive bar later, and Kiba noticed a man sitting a seat down from her.

"What's got you so down?" She asked the stranger, and the man who was cradling his head over a glass of whiskey, looked her way.

He snorted, and the barmaid shook her head. "You must be new here." Replied the barmaid, sitting the cheap beer can in front of Kiba.

The boy-disguised-as-a-girl cracked open the cold can, lifting the can to her lips and pretending to take a swig. He did take a sip, and immediately found he hated the taste of beer.

It took everything in him not to outright toss it in the trash.

"I'm guessing Gato decided not to pay you, again, Fuji?" The barmaid asked the somber man, who nodded before finishing his glass of whiskey in a single guzzle.

"You bet your ass he didn't. Another one, on my tab." The man, who was apparently named Fuji, replied.

Kiba, who knew she had her wallet on her, spoke up. "No need, I'll pay for it." She said, and the two Wave citizens were outright shocked.

The man stared at her, and Kiba felt a little cowardly under such a scrutinizing gaze. Until finally, the man hooted, "Thanks, kid."

"No problem," Kiba returned, and the barmaid winked. "Wow, a real charmer, you are." Said the woman, and Kiba twirled a long strand of hair around her finger.

"It's the least I can do. Pardon me if I'm overstepping, but what happened?" Asked the brunette, fishing out some ryo to pay the barmaid with. She took the money, turning to put it in the register. Kiba left the change on the counter, even as the man spoke again.

"Since you're buyin' me a drink, I guess I'll humor ya. I'm a gardener, just like my parents, and my grandparents before them. Gato needed some gardening done, I'm desperate for work, so I took my chances. I worked my ass off, and-" The man stopped, long enough to hold out his glass for the barmaid to refill.

Once it was full to the brim, he took a long sip.

"And he didn't pay me, not once. Says my work ain't sufficient." He concluded, and didn't elaborate further.

A man in the back piped in suddenly, "Same to me, I've just gotten used to it. You better too, Fuji. Gato hears ya complain and he'll have your head."

The man named Fuji snorted. "Let 'em. I ain't got shit left to lose."

Internally, Kiba disagreed, the man still had a head to lose.

---

Slinking through the streets as inconspicuously possible, Naruto hadn't been having as much luck as his brunette accomplice.

A loud racket caught the girl-disguised-as-a-boy's attention, the noise originating from an alley just down the street. He could hear feel hushed cursing, hushed shouts, and something in him demanded to see the cause,

And so, Naruto turned on his heel. They passed an abandoned building, which sat right in front of the alley the noise was coming from. On the other side of the alleyway entrance, another storefront seemed abandoned.

Naruto paid it no further mind, turning down the alley.

It was a dead-end, a dumpster at the end and bags of trash littering the ground outside it. Three children, three dirty, skinny children stood in front of the green dumpster.

What caught his attention, though, was the teenager before him.

The teenage boy snatched up one of those three kids, and Naruto saw red.

(Memories of being a homeless orphan lingered in Naruto's mind. Memories of being picked on by rich teens and hateful adults.)

Storming over to the teen, Naruto cared not for whatever lecture the bastard was trying to give the kids.

Naruto cocked back one arm, and snatched the boy by his collar with the other. The boy was yanked around to look at Naruto's face just as the blonde slammed a fist into the teen's nose.

A resounding crack seemed to silence the world, the breeze stopping and the few birds no longer chirped. "The hell were you doing to them?! Huh!?" Naruto asked, shaking him by his collar.

"T-those shitstains stole Hiro's wallet! Let go of me, crazy fuck!" The boy tried to fight against Naruto's grip, but the fourteen year old was much stronger. He had no clue who the fuck Hiro was, but it didn't matter to Naruto.

"You're lucky these kids are here, or I might've killed your ass right here and now!" Naruto released a smidge of Killing Intent, directing it solely at the teen. He was bluffing, killing wasn't something Naruto had any plans of. But the bluff worked.

A civilian, he realized, because the boy lost all of the color in his face. He looked on the verge of wetting his pants, frankly.

Naruto snarled. "I'm going to let you go, and when I do, you better run home to your mom, and never look back." Flicking another henge over his eyes, Naruto made his eyes flash vibrant red.

The teenager lost all fight, and Naruto dragged the boy to the edge of the alley, tossing him to the ground in an instant.

Oblivious to onlookers, Naruto let him hit the dirt carelessly. The teen scrambled to his feet, and Naruto was already yelling. "Go! Get your ass out of here! Don't ever touch them again!" Screamed the blonde, and the boy did just as Naruto asked.

He ran and didn't look back.

Turning around, Naruto huffed. Looking down the alley, those three kids had slowly approached him.

"T-thank you, Mister.." Said one of the two girls in the trio, fidgeting slightly. Naruto was momentarily confused, until he remembered that he was currently hinged as a guy.

"It's okay, I hate bullies! I was just like you once, yanno." He said, crouching down to be at their level.

Naruto fished around his pockets, finding a handful of spare ryo. "Here, take this. Do you have a place to stay?" Naruto asked, and the boy of the trio nodded.

"We been stayin' in my auntie's old home." The boy said, stumbling over the words.

Naruto nodded. "Right," She patted their heads lovingly, before continuing. "Head home, okay? It's going to rain soon."

The kids exchanged glances. "Thank you mister," The kids echoed each other, thanking Naruto again and again, before they all said their goodbyes and headed out,

Once the orphans had disappeared, Naruto breathed a sigh of relief. Clenching and unclenching his fists, Naruto considered going on a hunt for this Hiro person. Something about it stunk of Gato, he just knew it.

This was confirmed, when an elderly man walked out of the storefront by the alleyway.

"It was a brave thing you did there, lad." The old man called, and Naruto turned to look at him. At Naruto's silence, the elder continued.

"Been causin' trouble for weeks now. He's trying to get into Gato's gang, by impressing some Hiro fellow." The man explained, noticing the way Naruto's eyes glinted brightly.

A distant flash of lightning was followed by a loud rumble of thunder, the grayscale sky casting the usually vibrant teen in its coloring.

"I'm new around here, if you couldn't tell. Mind telling me who the hell these people are?" Naruto asked, and the old man looked around the empty streets warily. Signaling for the teen to follow him, Naruto did so wordlessly.

Stepping inside the store, he was immediately led into the back, where a fluorescent light buzzed overhead. Another rumble of thunder shook the building, but the old man was unperturbed.

The two of them stood in a kitchen that was mostly white, and the man maneuvered through the kitchen with ease, starting a fresh pot of coffee.

"You'll need to keep your head down, lad. If that boy tells Hiro what you've done, word will get back to Gato, and Gato will make you a dead man." Warned the wrinkled old fellow, ominously. The scent of coffee beans filled the air, an aroma that Naruto found quite pleasant.

"Gato, as in Million-dollar Gato?" Asked the blonde, and the man nodded gravely. He withdrew two mugs from the cabinet as the coffee machine dinged, signaling it was done.

"That'd be the one," He rasped, before coughing roughly. Taking in a deep breath, he continued.

"Hiro is one of his lackeys, he's the one who collects the local.. Business tax." The man told the teenager, passing him a mug of coffee.

Naruto took a slow sip from the ceramic mug, hating the bitter tar-like flavor. He didn't let it show of course. Swallowing the black coffee, Naruto slid his tongue against his front teeth before he spoke.

"Business tax?" The teen asked, and the old man nodded, "Might as well just say armed robbery. They come here with weapons and demand part of our profit, so we can keep our businesses and our lives." For the sake of the caffeine in the drink, Naruto downed the coffee despite it's flavor.

Naruto shook his head to show he was listening, showing his disagreement with the situation. "That's awful, sir. They'll get what's coming for them soon enough, trust me." Naruto said, feeling the pockets on his person over again, smiling softly when he found more coins tucked in the back pocket of his shorts.

Pulling the handful of coins out, Naruto placed them on the kitchen table he stood by. He also left the mug, after finishing it off with a final swig.

"Thank you for your hospitality, sir, but I've got to get going." Naruto turned, and before he could walk out of the kitchen, the old man raised a question.

"You're a ninja, aren't you?" Asked the old man, and Naruto tilted his head. Stopping abruptly, Naruto decided to be honest.

Turning to grin at the old man, Naruto spoke. "What gives you that idea, 'ttebane?"

The old man chuckled. "You don't get far in this world without bein' observant, lad. If you're planning to put a stop to Gato, you should know he's got several ex-employees around Wave. They might be of some help." Tipped the old man, causing the blond's lips to screw to the side.

"Ex-employees?" He questioned.

"Yes, indeed. Cuts loose his employees before he's got to pay them, the greedy son of a bitch." Said the elder, and Naruto laughed incredulously. The old man had been nothing but cordial and well-maintained, hearing him say such curse-words surprised the blond.

"That's interesting, thank you for letting me know. It'll be a big help." Naruto said, his hand on the door handle now.

"I hope to see you again, lad. If you manage to take down Gato, I'll treat you to my finest coffee." The man promised, and Naruto chuckled.

He didn't even like coffee, but as he opened the door, he replied. "I'll hold you to it!"

And with that, Naruto entered the rain that had begun pouring outside, immediately heading towards the location where Kiba and the blonde had agreed to meet.

Somewhere along the way, Naruto undid his henge, once again becoming a girl instead of a boy. The rain poured, soaking every inch of the teenager, and by the time Kiba arrived, they were both drenched.

Kiba leapt under the tree Naruto had sat under, the both of them back to their original genders.

"So, you find anything out?" Questioned the Inuzuka, and Naruto nodded. "Well, I didn't figure out anything about Gato's mansion, but I did figure out that the man doesn't pay anyone he doesn't have to."

Kiba blinked, "Seriously? Me too."

She chuckled. "Well, I guess if we run into Zabuza, we can just be like, 'Oh, mister enemy-nin, Gato won't pay you, please don't kill us," Joked the blonde, and Kiba snorted. "Not a bad idea!" He agreed simply.

"I guess next time we head out, we'll have to go to his mansion itself. Get an idea who goes in and out." She suggested vaguely, and Kiba picked up where she left off.

"We could henge as one of his routine visitors, sneak in, and kill him. No Gato, no more problems." Kiba said with a shrug, and Naruto's face scrunched up in thought.

"We'll discuss it with Hinata and Shino later, but I doubt that it'd be so easy."

Kiba extended his hand out to her, and she took it. Pulling her up from where she sat beneath the tree, they slowly began their trek back to Tazuna's house.

They'd been out most of the evening, and so it would be dark soon. They'd left around two in the afternoon, so they'd been out for ages by now.

As they walked through the muddy streets, Naruto bumped Kiba with her hip, only for him to return the gesture. She smiled at him, but the brunet boy sighed. Naruto could feel his sadness.

"Is it just me, or uh.. Is all this crazy to you? We're genin, on a mission gone wrong, planning the assassination of a millionaire? All while our jounin-captain is knocked out." The boy kicked a pebble, and Naruto watched it go.

"A little. But we're ninja, we'd have to be doing this eventually." Shrugged the teenager, looking over at him.

Kiba swallowed thickly, "Yeah."

"Yeah," He repeated again, with more finality this time around. He even nodded his head, and Naruto just snorted.

---

On the Outskirts of Wave…...

---

"Haku, I told you already. I don't give a damn what you think about Gato, we need the money." He grumbled, bedridden in the small cave they'd made home over the past few months. A tarp blocked the entrance, no rain or wind could burn out the fire they'd started near the mouth of the cave.

Even so, the rain seemed to pour a little louder, the whistle of wind was a distant concern.

"Zabuza-sama.. It's not just that.. You said it yourself, those leaf-nin were special.." Haku muttered, thinking of the little girl so full of determination as she stared him down.

A shiver ran down his spine, bright eyes with transparent pupils, with more emotion than pigment.

He slowly removed the white bandages from the burn on his leg, bits of skin and pus coming with, and it took everything in him not to flinch. The cloth, peeled away, revealed the burns that would surely leave splotchy scars up his leg. "Actually, I said they were something else. Negatively." Zabuza replied, his tone dry and biting. Haku ducked his head to the side, chewing the inside of his lip.

Using a small bit of an herbal paste he'd made, he gently wiped it on the wounds, at the least the spots he could. Painfully, he realized he'd have to get the ingredients to make more here in a few days.

After gingerly reapplying the rough gauze, he continued the argument. "I don't trust him, is all." Haku said finally, using every bit of rebellion he had in him. Which, admittedly, wasn't much.

"Don't trust who?" A distant voice asked, coming from the exit of the cave. Pulling back the tarp, in stepped a short man with wiry hair and an expensive tux on.

One they recognized as Gato.

Haku's eyes widened, and immediately both he and Zabuza straightened. "I don't see why anything my tool says concerns you, Gato." Replied the muscular jounin, and Haku winced. Not from being called a tool, no, because Zabuza had surely torn his stitches when sitting up like that.

The stocky millionaire outright cackled. "Oh, it doesn't. I'm more concerned with why the jounin and chuunin I hired, is made invalid before the pair of regular chuunin." Gato practically snarled, and Haku forced himself to his feet in the blink of an eye.

For once, Zabuza followed his example. "Do we look invalid to you?" He asked, towering over the man, hand tight around the hilt of kubikiribocho. Gato took two precautionary steps back, fidgeting with his tie lie like it was choking him.

"You best hope those Demon Brothers don't do your job for you, before you're done licking your wounds!" The short man managed to retort, and Zabuza made eye-contact with his partner for a mere second.

The minute or so of silence gave Gato the time to get a hold on himself, and he turned to leave, before uttering something under his breath that neither of them could hear.

Haku gave Zabuza a look, one that screamed, "I Told You So."

---

Tazuna's House, Third Day in Wave.

---

By the end of the night, the children had regrouped and slept until the next morning, and began their planning all over again.

Hinata tried to listen to her while her teammates discussed plans of action, as she wiped down her sensei's wound with antiseptic covered paper-towels. Rolling down the woman's shirt, she grabbed another paper towel, using a water-bottle to wetten it.

Upon sitting the wet paper-towel onto Kurenai's forehead, her eyes twitched, and Hinata briefly paused. Rheumy eyes blinked open slowly, and the Hyuuga girl squeaked in surprise. "S-sensei!"

Kurenai very nearly sat up, but Hinata laid a hand against her in a way that silently advised otherwise.

The other three quickly clambered over to the Hyuuga's side, Kiba on her left, and Shino on her right. Naruto's head peeked up in the space between Hinata and Kiba, sitting behind the two of them.

"Hello, there." Kurenai's beautiful voice was raspy from lack of use, but remained recognizable nonetheless.

Her expression, though clearly strained, was fond as she looked at them.

"I.. Don't know how long I can stay awake, so we don't have the time for chatter. How long have I been out?" Inquired the dark-haired woman, and Hinata immediately answered. "Nearly two whole days, we're going on our third day here.."

"And what have you been up to?" Interrupting her sensei's questioning, Hinata lifted the bottle of water to her teacher's lips and let her take a long drink.

"We did some reconnaissance, and Shino sent a coded letter to the Hokage for back-up. We decided to stay here in Wave, to put an end to Gato." Naruto told the woman pridefully.

"Coded? Reconnaissance?" The woman inquired with slight amusement, even as her ruby eyes dimmed slightly.

Naruto's face scrunched with worry, looking to Hinata immediately, who was gnawing her bottom lip.

"Me and Naruto just did a bit of intel-gathering, is all." Kiba explained, and Shino took his chance to speak. "The code used was one specific to the Aburame clan."

Kurenai hummed. "You children are brilliant, you've done good so far. But please, don't do anything rash, I won't be able to help you. Instead of seeking out Gato, or Zabuza, train, and guard Tazuna." Her words slurred near the end, and it seemed she was losing consciousness already.

The four of them exchanged glances. Some things couldn't be avoided, they thought unanimously.

Kurenai sniffed, breathing out a sigh before she passed out yet again.

"She's.. Unconscious, again." Hinata said sadly, causing Kiba to grimace outwardly. Shino's bugs seemed to buzz for a moment, whether out of worry or displeasure, no one was sure.

"Her chakra exhaustion must be worse than previously expected." Spoke the Aburame boy. Coming to a sudden realization, Naruto clamped her eyes shut and activated Mind's Eye of Kagura.

She didn't know why she hadn't thought of it beforehand, blame it on her being an airhead, she supposed. Or maybe she'd just expected Hinata to do it.

Upon closing her eyes, the world became painted gray and black, the only things standing out being the chakra signatures all around her.

Now that she had the chance, she took a moment to commit all of Team 8's respective signatures into her memory. Hinata, who reminded her of sitting by a campfire in the middle of winter, Kiba, who reminded her of days spent in the vibrant summer sun. Shino, who felt like a humid spring day, and Kurenai who felt like standing in a breeze full of the autumn leaves.

If she looked harder, she'd probably be able to pick out the important details, like the amount of chakra and their elemental affinities, which were completely unrelated to the overall feel of their chakra.

Focusing on Kurenai's signature, she could see the pathways, which days ago had been full to the brim of flowing blue energy.

But as she took a closer look, the energy had been almost entirely depleted. There was about a quarter of chakra left in her, which made Naruto grimace as she thought about how bad it must've been directly after the battle.

If it was a quarter full now, what could it have been then? A fifth, or a sixth of it's full capacity? Worse possibility, it could've been an eighth of the way full.

Add on top of that, a severe wound and physical exhaustion, it made sense that Kurenai had been out two days already.

With her eyes flickering back open, the mental image of chakra and gray and black surrounds faded away.

"It's pretty bad, but, she's recovered a lot I think. She should be up for good pretty soon." She told the group, scratching the back of her neck.

The other three looked amongst each other, but to Naruto's surprise, Shino was the first to speak.

"Even so, we cannot wait around for her to awaken. One of us must stay here to guard, but I will be leaving with Tazuna soon. Kiba and Naruto will be surveillanc-ing outside of Gato's mansion. We can only hope nothing will occur while Sensei is incapacitated." The Aburame stood up from his place by their teacher's bedside, taking a wide step back.

Kiba nodded ferociously, "Yeah. I know she'd prefer we stay safe and all, waiting for her to get up. But that's not gonna happen." He said, repeating the words like a reassurement to him and his teammates.

A minute or so later, Naruto spoke. "That said, let's get to it, eh?"

The blonde stretched, rolling her shoulders to release any of the tension left in her body.

"Damn straight! We get a millionaire to stalk!" Kiba rallied, giving her an uplifting grin full of ferocity.

Hinata was the last to stand, dusting off her lap and breathing out a sigh, "Stay safe, everyone." Said the girl, feeling like the dead-weight of the team. Her emotions were tightly kept, sourly wishing she could contribute more, that she could be a part of the action.

Naruto raised her hand in a closed fist, which Kiba promptly bumped with his own. Then, she moved her fist to point at both Hinata and Shino, wiggling her eyebrows coercively. Hinata's eyes widened, her heart fluttering in her chest when she looked to Shino and back.

If he wasn't going to take a fist-bump from Naruto, she sure as hell would.

Naruto grinned when their hands met, but the blonde pulled her in and gave her a side-hug.

That seemed to make Shino even less inclined to accept her fist-bump.

She rolled her eyes. "Fine then, I'll get one from you eventually." She said, mischief dancing in her features. Turning, she went back to the very same window she'd leapt from yesterday. Funnily enough, it was still cracked, albeit just slightly.

Pushing the window open again, she stuck her legs out first, dangling them over the ledge. "C'mon, Kiba!" She called, right before she leapt out. He chuckled excitedly, vaulting himself out after her, saying no further goodbyes to his team.

Hinata smiled fondly, turning to see Shino with his eyebrows slightly raised. Looking to one another, Shino slowly spoke. "Was that a threat, or a promise?" He asked Hinata, seeming caught up on what Naruto had said.

Hinata lifted a hand over her mouth and giggled, before she gave a shrug.

"Maybe both?" She suggested, and he nodded. "Most likely."

"Aye, Bug-boy, you ready to head to the bridge?" Hollered an elderly voice from downstairs, clearly calling for Shino. Hinata's face showed her distaste with the nickname Tazuna had assigned her teammate, though Shino seemed indifferent.

"I must be going, then." He said, right before he left her there alone.

Her white eyes, naturally downturned and serious, flickered to her unconscious teacher.

Internally, Hinata refused to spend another day just sitting around Tsunami's house and being of no help to anyone. Pulling the window Naruto and Kiba had left fully open, and an idea sparked in her head.

In the academy, Iruka and Mizuki had taught a week-long trap-making course. Like a good little heiress, the Hyuuga had retained every single bit of that lesson.

Smiling to herself, she ran down the stairs and right into the kitchen, where Tsunami and Inari were standing. Interrupting their conversation, Hinata wasted no time for manners.

"I'm going to be setting up traps by the back-door and blocking all the windows to the best of my ability. That means, please do not use the backdoor, okay?" She told the pair, as sweet as always. Tsunami nodded, whereas Inari directed her a foul glare.

She couldn't bring herself to care about the animosity of a child, and thus, set off to trap the door first. Even so, she didn't trust that Inari wouldn't use the door anyway, and decided not to use any dangerous traps.

After a few minutes, she came up with the perfect idea. A home-made door alarm.

"Tsunami-san!" Called Hinata, withdrawing a spool of ninja-wire from her weapons pouch. The woman hurried into the room, "Yes?" She asked, rushing over to help however she could.

"Would your son happen to have any noise-making toys? Like a squeaker, or buzzer?" She asked, and the woman thought it over for a minute. She hummed in thought, before her face finally lit up in remembrance. "Like an air-horn? He has one somewhere.. He uses it for pranks fairly often.``

Hinata smiled, "Y-yes, that's perfect!" She confirmed, and Tsunami immediately turned to go get it from her son's room.

Hinata then began rigging up the ninja-wire, setting up a square perimeter of trip-wire around the outside the door. She then slid it under the crack between the door and the floor.

She closed the door behind her, stepping back inside, and drawing it around the frame of the door. When Tsunami returned, she passed the obnoxious-looking air-horn to her and Hinata found the trigger to be a pull, rather than a push.

Pulling back the trigger, the loud noise rang true, far more obnoxious-sounding than it looked.

With that, she went back to her trap. Putting the air horn in the upper corner of the door frame, she wrapped her wire across the door. That way, there were two ways to trigger the alarm, by tripping the wire outside or just opening the door.

Either way, the force on the wire would cause the air-horn to blare, and would alert her or Tsunami to an intruder.

"Do you have any strong adhesive?" Hinata asked Tsunami, who'd been watching her the last few minutes.

"Like superglue?" The woman asked, getting a nod in the affirmative.

It took a few minutes, but by the time she'd returned, the last thing Hinata needed was the glue, and her trap would be completely finished. She accepted the small tube of glue, adding the adhesive to keep the air-horn firmly to the wall, and a few other places.

With that, she grinned, and prepared to rig the windows to be unopenable. Kiba and Naruto might not like that they can no longer jump in and out of them, but they'd have to get over it.

Heading out the front door, Hinata found the nearest tree and ripped off a large stick.

Using a kunai to whittle the stick into several pegs, Hinata went around the house, and placed the pegs atop the windows. The wood prevented the window from being lifted up, and therefore it could not be opened, even from the outside.

The process repeated itself, over and over, until Hinata had every window she could lock and trapped. The bay window in the living room couldn't be rigged, nor could one of the ones in the guest room, but it would have to do.

Smiling to herself, Hinata felt she'd actually accomplished something, and then decided to spend the rest of her day aiding Tsunami with the housework.

---

"Kiba, look, there it is." Naruto said, from where she and Kiba were high in the treetops, looking down over a sprawling mansion just a few yards ahead.

With western-style architecture and white paneling, fancy windows and a porch with massive white columns, it was the perfect image of wealth. Even further, finely trimmed henges wrapped around the perimeter, blocking the mansion in.

Kiba's eyebrows furrowed together. "Look at that place!" And look Naruto did, spotting the massive pool in the yard, a greenhouse and shed. There were people in the lawn, scantily clad women and large guards by the entryways.

"It's almost as big as the Hokage's manor." Naruto said with unmasked distaste. Kiba nodded, before doing a double-take to give her a confused look.

"What?" She asked, and seeing as he didn't reply, Naruto closed her eyes suddenly.

After a few minutes, Naruto's shoulders slumped. "Fuuuck." She murmured, and Kiba's hackles raised immediately.

"We've got trouble. Two chuunin signatures heading this way. Hostile, for sure." She explained, massaging her temples.

"We can't let 'em talk to Gato, what if he sends 'em after the bridge or Hinata? She's tough and all, but I don't think she can handle two chuunin on her own.." Kiba shook his head, ready to leap.

Naruto was hesitant, and though the smarter part of her brain said this wasn't the perfect plan, and after a second of thought, she nodded. "Fuck it- Let's get their asses."

Akamaru let out a low whine in agreement, and Naruto wondered for a moment who thought it was a good idea to put two irrational brawlers together. And then, sourly, she remembered it was them.

Leaping from tree to tree, Kiba and Naruto leapt to the ground in front of the two chuunin, clearly missing-nin from the Hidden Rain village, just like Zabuza.

Gato must enjoy hiring local, Naruto realized.

The two men straightened immediately, hands flying to their weapon. "Konohans, Meizu! These damn tree-huggers must be the ones that the bridge-builder hired!"

Kiba snarled, giving Naruto a precursory glance.

The men were faster than expected, immediately rushing to blitz Naruto and Kiba both. Kiba threw himself into a roll, avoiding the serrated chain the twin-chuunin were bound together by. The one referred to as Meizu disconnected his metal gauntlet, following after Naruto, who'd leapt over their first attack.

She landed upright, but narrowly avoided where Meizu threw his fist, the gauntlet landing by his feet and cracking the ground.

Thinking fast, Naruto kicked her foot right into his exposed eye. The chuunin wore a headband with a horn, and a mask covering his lower face, but both of his eyes remained unprotected.

The man fell back onto his haunches, one hand going over his eye. Instead of leaving time to engage, Naruto continued, raising her leg to give a quick axe-kick to the man's head.

He at least had the decency to dodge, correcting himself and moving onto his feet. Naruto threw a wild punch for his head, the man barely able to avoid her nonstop barrage of blows.

His gauntlet wasn't of much help, because he wasn't getting any chances to attack.

Even if he had, he'd be nowhere near fast enough. Naruto, despite being a genin, was out of his league.

She herself thought he was nothing in comparison to Zabuza. That was a battle for her life.

Roaring like an enraged animal, Meizu tired of being on the defensive, swinging his gauntlet armored fist at her.

Though it didn't hit her skin, the bladed gauntlet caught on her trench coat, effectively pinning her. With one fluid motion, she retrieved a kunai from her pouch. He growled, desperately trying to yank his gauntlet from the dirt he'd pinned her coat into.

Snarling at the sight of her coat being torn, she pulled her legs back fully and delivered a harsh double-kick to his abdomen. He wheezed, retching from the sudden blow to his stomach. He hit the ground to her left.

To her misfortune, the gauntlet was still deeply embedded into the ground, so it only managed to flip him off of her.

She had to leave her coat embedded to the ground, freeing herself and pinning him in retribution. With her knees on either side of him, she took her kunai into both hands, and full-force rammed the blade right into his chest cavity.

Right into his heart.

Her eyes widened, the realization of what she'd done slowly coming in. A final breath escaped his lips, his eyes wide with shock.

It had been a terrible match-up, he'd never stood a chance, especially not alone.

But watching the life leave his eyes, the stillness of death take over his form, Naruto's stomach lurched.

"Meizu!" Screamed his brother, followed by the cry of, "GATSUUUUGA!" But Naruto was too busy processing to look.

Her heart pounded, so loud she couldn't hear a thing, blood rushing to her ears

.THUMP.

She remembered to breathe, suddenly.

THUMP. THUMP. THUMP.

Shakily, she exhaled, slowly releasing the kunai.

Quivering hands slowly clenched, unclenched, and steadied.

THUMP. THUMP. THUMP.

She'd killed today.

A voice in the back of her head, one that sounded like Ibiki, Anko, and Inoichi all at once, supplied her with comfort. Words they'd told her several times, knowing this was something she'd eventually had to do.

Tenten came to mind, Tenten had killed once.

"It was them, or me."

Him, or her, Naruto repeated.

A hand on her shoulder snapped her back to the moment, swerving her head to look for the source of the pat.

"Shit.. Yours is dead too, huh?" Inuzuka asked, looking askance.

She nodded slowly. "Uh, yeah.."

"You wouldn't happen to know that academy incineration jutsu, would you?" She asked slowly.

Kiba winced.

---

An olive-green bottle of sake swished around, the owner gazing at its contents resentfully.

Warm bar-lighting illuminated the glass, making it obvious the bottle was half-empty.

It's purple-haired owner sighed, lifting the liquor to her lips and taking a swig.

The newly promoted jounin has brought herself to this bar hoping to unwind, spending the free-time away from her student getting wasted. Or at least having fun.

For some reason, though, the sake just didn't taste the way it used to.

"Oi! Mitarashi," Someone called, and the purplette's ear twitched.

The person clapped onto her shoulder, and tilted her head to see who'd dare interrupt her drinking.

The person, a taller man with a bandanna over his hair and a senbon dangling from his lips, gave her a slight grin.

Genma Shiranui, her mind supplied.

"Senbon-sucker," her voice greeted.

He snorted, taking the bar stool next to her. "Been a while since I've seen you around here."

She watched him guarded emotions, a careful mask of boredom on her face. When she wasn't pretending to be an evil sadist, that was the mask she wore.

The glint in Genma's eyes showed that he knew that already.

"Haven't had the free-time." She replied, taking another long swig.

He hummed, raising his hand to the bartender to bring him a shot. "Yeah? A little birdie told me you got a student. I didn't think you were the type."

She shrugged, thrumming her fingers against the hickory-wood bar. "Tell me who the little birdie is so I can go strangle 'em."

He chuckled. "It's more like a little doggy, actually. I was having drinks with Guy, Asuma, and Kakashi a while back. Pretty sure the Hokage put them up to it, trying to encourage me to take on a team from the genin corps. Hatake made sure to mention that even you had a brat of your own." He explained, rolling his eyes with zero fondness.

That got a surprised laugh from the purple-haired woman. "Man, that's a surprise. I throttled him once during my elite jounin exam, didn't think he'd want to see me so soon!" She said warmly, losing a bit of her previous attitude.

Genma laughed with her, until ultimately he blinked and turned her way. "Wait, he's the one who administered your exam? And you passed?" Asked the man, his senbon slipping from his lips.

Anko grinned, feral and wide. "You bet your ass! I didn't even get to tell my student that before she was whisked off on a mission, either she'd have been hella impressed."

Genma shook his head. "To hell with her, I'm impressed! What even happened?"

Anko downed more sake, taking her sweet time to reply. "Two parts, one is a direct spar, and the first is a mock-mission sort of thing. Mine was to avoid being tracked, by the village's best tracker." She raised her hand to wave nonchalantly, but both she and Genma shared a look at that.

They'd known each other a while, she and him, and they also knew that a test like that would be near impossible for some of the existing jounin. Though she and Genma were no telepaths, they both knew that the test had been rigged against her.

Even so, Anko was a tracker, and a decent one at that. Who'd ever arranged their match-up wasn't thinking it through. It just went to show that, In Konoha, there was still someone working against her. (Albeit, not well. Whichever idiot arranged that test had also set within Forest 44, so they clearly had no idea that Anko's domain."

"How the hell did you manage that?" He asked slowly, his voice low.

"I have my student to thank, actually. I used one of her jutsu. Stripped naked and sent a bunch of clones off running in my clothes. Leapt into a river, stifled my chakra, and hid like hell was after me. For some reason, I got the feeling that Mr. Hatake wasn't trying too hard." She explained with a grin.

Genma sucked his teeth, but couldn't contain his laughter. "Of course you fuckin' did. I doubt Hatake wanted to deal with wrangling a naked Mitarashi, he probably just decided to read his little porno instead." The man said, waving his senbon between his two fingers.

Anko clicked her tongue, but Genma was already continuing. "It's kind of genius, though. His only method of tracking is by scent, enough fake trails and he'd be occupied for a few hours." He thought it over, rubbing his chin.

"Exactly, and the test only ran for three. Besides, it was in the Forest of Death. I think the odds were tilted in my favor honestly." Anko said with a shrug, but Genma gave her a skeptical look.

"It was probably unintentional, though. One of those grumpy old jounin who doesn't even know you probably set the thing up, treating you like every other jounin-wannabe." He said with clear distaste. The older, retired jounin often ended up becoming desk-nins, the ones who handled manners like promotions and shinobi disputes when the Hokage didn't feel up for it. That said, most of those older-nin didn't like Anko, because of her involvement with Orochimaru.

They didn't really like Genma, either, but that was because he wasn't the most respectful kid growing up. Still wasn't, really.

"Yup! Guess they didn't bother reading my file." She chirped with a shrug, uncaring.

A distant voice in the back of her mind screamed about becoming the Hokage and changing everything. (No more enemies in high-places.) The same voice that promised to remove the mark on her neck. (No more curse.)

Subconsciously, Anko's hand moved to cover the seal, and Genma noticed. "Geez, Anko, where's all your loud and boisterous personality? You're supposed to have enough for the both of us." He ribbed, lightly elbowing her arm.

She took a deep breath. "Dunno, bastard. I've got this real bad feeling in my stomach." Anko said honestly, trusting Genma with the truth. They weren't close like they were a few years ago, but when you're a shinobi, any friend is a friend for life.

Unable to resist wisecracking, Genma spoke. "Why? Eat some spoiled dango?" She shot him a sharp glare, and he immediately raised his hands placatingly.

"Seriously, though, is it because of the specifics around your test? You passed, there ain't much more to worry about." He said, returning the senbon to its place between his teeth.

She rolled her eyes. "It's not that. My brat went on her first C-rank outside of the village. Guess I'm just worried."

Over the bar's speakers, a song started. A jazz-like melody filling the area, which marked the beginning of happy-hour. Genma immediately signaled for two more shots, still listening to Anko.

"You're really that attached to the kid?" Genma asked, and at the barbed look Anko sent him, he spoke again.

"I mean, I'm sure your kid'll be fine. Who's she with?" Asked the brunet man, before taking his long-awaited shot of vodka.

Anko sighed. "She's with Nai-chan and her three genin." She said, her nose twitching as she sniffed.

Genma hummed, giving her another clap on the back.

"She'll be fine. If I know anything about Kurenai, that woman is a fierce protector. Besides, if anything happened to your genin, Kurenai would be too guilty to ever speak to you again. And because of that alone, you know nothing is gonna happen to her."

Genma was a better comfort than she had expected, Anko would reluctantly admit.

Clearing her throat slightly at the last part, Anko was surprised when Genma actually seemed interested in her genin.

"The guys said that the Hokage was tight-lipped about who your genin was, so even Hatake couldn't tell me who. But you can tell me, right?" Genma asked, his tone fairly jovial.

Anko blinked at that, but when she realized why the Hokage had been tight-lipped, she huffed. Of course, the two village pariahs being paired together might cause some dissidence.

"Take a guess, senbon-sucker." The senbon-sucker in question groaned slightly, rolling his head towards her.

"Can't you make it easy and just tell me?" He asked softly, attempting to be charming.

Unimpressed, Anko scoffed. Genma raised his eyebrows, lifting the shot-glass to his lips.

Before he could swallow, Anko spoke, and he spewed vodka everywhere.

"Naruto Uzumaki."

Vodka came out of Genma's nose, and Anko couldn't help but wheeze when the perfect, cool, collected mask Genma wore was utterly destroyed.

---

"You- You were in a fight?!" Hinata repeated, horrified despite the lack of injuries on her two teammates.

Activating her byakugan in an instant, Hinata scanned their bodies for any kind of injury, any lack of chakra, anything at all.

After confirming the two were fine, she sighed in relief.

Shino, who sat beside Hinata at Tsunami's table, adjusted his sleeves.

"Who were these enemies?" He asked, eventually. Narutoshifted slightly, giving a glance to Kiba.

The Inuzuka gave a look that said, you tell them.

"Chuunin, but they were a terrible match for us. They were collaborative attackers, so when they separated, it was done for them." Naruto said with a shrug, then Kiba picked up where she left off.

"Me and Akamaru hit 'em head on with our joint attack.. He uh, didn't survive it. They had poison on their weapons, never got to use 'em on us, though!" He added, trying to end it on a positive note.

Naruto deeply grimaced.

Hinata deflated a bit, "Well.." She trails off, and like Kiba, she tries to be positive. "Surely there couldn't be more shinobi around here, so at least there's that.."

She prodded her index fingers together, and Naruto's grimace seemed to worsen substantially.

"Don't jinx it." The blonde muttered.

---

Day Four, Wave Country.

---

On the fourth day, the team changed up their rhythm slightly. Kiba and Shino went together to the bridge, whereas Naruto found herself staying behind.

"Holler if you need me, Hinata! I'll be out in the clearing up north." She shouted from the doorway, sure that Hinata could handle herself for a few hours. Besides, Kiba or Shino would be back anytime now to switch with her.

Her extra scroll felt heavy in her hands, full of all her experiments and results from her training.

Inoichi had once told her after a psych-eval, that she used training as a coping mechanism. She'd laughed at the time, but now she'd realized it was damn true.

"Don't worry about me!" Hinata yelled in return, and Naruto smiled.

She just needed time away from everyone, was all. This mission was exhausting, and she needed to recuperate by working her brain and muscles into mush.

She closed the front door quietly, heading towards the empty meadow she'd spotted yesterday. Weaving through tall trees, she could no longer see the house behind her as she furthered through the woods. Until eventually, she'd reached the clearing.

Dropping onto the grass into the lotus position, Naruto bit her thumb until blood dripped, smearing across her sealing scroll and unlocking it.

"Well," She spoke, bringing forth all of her various unfinished projects. "No time like the present." She finished with a shrug.

---

Hinata headed around the side of the house, where Tsunami's small garden was shockingly unwithered.

Although it lacked the refined and beautiful plants of the Hyuuga garden, with no fancy flowers or extravagant blooms, it felt like a chunk of home.

Tsunami had told her she was allowed in the garden anytime, and that made Hinata think that the woman knew she was a plant-lover, somehow.

White eyes strayed the small garden, spotting a planter growing carrots and rhubarb in a far corner. Ultimately landing on a lovely hydrangea bush, Hinata moved into the seiza position, sitting in front of it.

Gently caressing a bright blue blue bloom, her other hand plucked a way of a long-dead bloom.

The world seemed so tranquil, relaxed, as the cool air rustled her hair and the nearby leaves.

Until it was interrupted. The sound of blaring airhorn tore through the peace, shocking her still for a minute.

For just a minute, she thought maybe Inari had triggered the airhorn. Or maybe a teammate, or Tsunami herself, maybe even Tazuna.

Until a blood-curdling scream followed.

Hinata was on her feet quicker than one could blink, her mind speeding as she thought of the quickest way inside in just seconds.

A fence kept in the back door, but the front door was farther away, so she threw herself over the wooden fence and raced to the door. She managed to land upright, wasting no time to marvel her perfect landing.

The door was closed, but one swift kick blew the fucker wide open, her hands busy with activating her byakugan.

The tell-tale bulging veins appeared on her skin, her eyes all-seeing.

"Touch my son, and I'll bite my tongue out! You'll have no hostage if I'm dead!" A female voice screamed, one Hinata identified as being Tsunami.

She wasted no time in following the voice, right into the quaint kitchen where two men stood over her.

Something inside Hinata took over, there was no fear or Killing Intent to stifle her skills.

Her eyes told her these men weren't even shinobi, but that wouldn't stop her from disabling them.

One man swung down to strike Tsunami with his fist, but Hinata skidded between them, ending his attack by sending a jyuuken strike directly to his closed fist.

Tsunami skittered back, putting distance between herself and the upcoming fight.

During the fight with Zabuza, Hinata had felt so helpless, and weak, even after she'd helped to her best ability.

It had been weighing on her the past few days, how she'd disgraced the Hyuuga name by not even using her family's techniques. She couldn't help but feel that Neji would've been so disappointed, because even after Neji had tried tutoring her, she couldn't use her skills.

But faced with the ability to protect, Hinata felt something awaken. She was the only one here to protect Tsunami, and Inari too. She was the last-line, and these men were no match for her.

Years of training finally came to fruition.

On the ground, a chakra circle came to life, the ring capturing both men within it.

(Hyuuga can't do that. The Hyuuga princess shouldn't be able to do that, a voice in her head said.)

"Art of the Gentle Fist: Eight Trigrams!" Her soft voice screamed, assuming a perfect stance.

"Two palms!" She cried, crossing her arms to hit both men at once. (Improper. Incorrect. A voice hissed.) Being mere thugs, both men were immediately stunned into paralysis. Hinata didn't stop.

"Four palms!" Immediately followed after her, striking one man with two fluid movements, before immediately continuing her strokes on the second. "Six palm," She cried afterwards.

"Eight palms!" Her speed steadily increased, her movements comparable to jaguar with their perfect fluidity.

Both men could hardly stand, but Hinata didn't stop. Adrenaline rushed her veins, pride stung her heart. "Ten palms!" She continued her harsh punishment, evening the amount of attacks on both men.

"Sixteen palms!" Changing her family's perfect stances, Hinata struck widely, landing eight more palms on the two of them "Thirty-two palms!" She continued, panting a worn breath. Her fingers surged with chakra, a buzz under her skin which felt overwhelmingly familiar.
Pulling back both arms, Hinata readied for her final attack. Without her oppressive father, and the clan council watching, Hinata let her creativity surge, forcing the Eight Trigrams to become usable against more than one opponent.

"Sixty-four palms!" She screamed, dividing the number sixty-four between the two men, ending them both with two fatal strikes.

Her arms crossed again, the men long-since dazed and immobile, and her fingers jabbed one head, and the other's heart.

The circle of glowing chakra faded, and Hinata heaved in quick breaths as the two men crumbled into lifeless heaps.

The young Hyuuga startled, nearly falling backwards, only for Tsunami to catch her. "Shhh, shh." The woman comforted, pulling the young kunoichi into her arms. Hinata's lip trembled.

(Killer. Murderer.)

"It's okay, honey, you saved my life. You saved me." Tsunami consoled, and that was when the two of them noticed another figure standing in the kitchen entryway.

"A-Ah, Shinobi-san, you're awake.." The woman tightened her hold on Hinata protectively, as if in fear Hinata would face some sort of backlash for what she'd done.

"Hinata, you showed exemplary skill in defending the client's family. You're in no trouble at all," The raven-haired jounin said, her typical bandage-like romper nowhere to be seen. She was wearing her red shirt, with the fishnet cut out neckline and a pair of black shorts.

Though she hardly looked the part of a shinobi, her presence commanded one to think otherwise.

"You two, if you would leave the room for a moment, I can deal with the bodies. Maybe go enjoy the fresh air for a moment." Kurenai said softly, though Hinata could tell it was more like an order, and less like a suggestion.

Swallowing thickly, she was gently led out by the older mother, who grabbed her son by the wrist and dragged him out with them.

"D-did you kill them?" The young boy asked, and Hinata's shoulders squared.

"Kill who?" Another voice asked, approaching them at a lackadaisical pace. Upon seeing the face of his teammate however, Kiba quickened in his approach.

"Inari, Kiba-san! That is quite enough!" The woman reprimanded, and Hinata thought for a moment that she sounded a lot like her mother.

(Before she died.)

"It's okay, Tsunami-san.." She said, taking the hand that had been petting her head and moving it to her shoulder. Tsunami caressed her gently with a callous thumb, speaking again.

"Well, then I'll tell you. Hinata here bravely saved me and Inari from two attackers at once."

Kiba's jaw went slack. "Who were they? Gato's men? Are ya hurt? How'd you do it?" He bombarded her with questions, his eyes wide as saucers.

At Tsunami's warning look, his jaw clamped shut.

"They were meant to kidnap me and Inari for hostages, to lure my father in for Gato. No one was injured, thankfully," The woman paused to pat Hinata's head. She furrowed her brows, trying to think of a way to summarize what exactly Hinata had done, but, well..

She was civilian, she had no idea what the hell the girl had done.

"I-I used 64 Palms.." The girl managed to say, gathering herself back into a state of calm. Kiba and Naruto had killed just yesterday, and she didn't hate them for it. They'd done what they had to.

And thus, she managed to shove aside her guilt. She'd done what she had to, as a shinobi, and that was okay.

(Doesn't mean she liked it.)

But she would do it again, to protect another.

"Hinata! That is so fuckin' badass! Seriously, you've been working your ass off on that way to go!" He grinned, widely revealing his fanged canines and sharp incisors, in a way that felt so incredibly heartwarming.

He practically leapt over to hug Hinata. "Eep!" She squeaked, the boy giving her a noogie as he held her in a hug.

Tsunami, who'd essentially just had the girl shoved out of her arms, giggled softly.

Hinata didn't seem to find it funny, even as Kiba howled. "N-not funny! Let me go, you donkey!" She squealed, fighting against him, all for naught.

He froze, before his cheeks puffed with barely contained laughter. A bit of air escaped his lips, and he couldn't help but ask. "You can just say jackass, yanno, it's the same damn thing."

Kurenai stepped outside, only getting to see a very red-faced Hinata finally tearing away from Kiba. Huffing, she patted her thick coat straight. "Hyuuga don't say curse-words." She told him, and he raised his eyebrows in silent questioning. The grin on his face was barely held back.

"It's ineloquent." The bluette answered, and Kurenai took the chance to interrupt.

"Hello, you two. Where would your other teammates happen to be?" The red-eyed woman drolled, making them flush at their own behavior.

They were supposed to be ninja, not children.

Tsunami clicked her tongue, "Miss Shinobi-san, I do believe you should be worrying about the fact you haven't eaten in days. Whatever needs discussing, can be discussed while you eat." The older woman wagged her finger chidingly, and Kurenai's lips parted slightly in surprise.

The audacity it took for a civilian to tell a shinobi what to do-

"Yes, sensei, you must eat." Hinata agreed, her voice solemn. Kiba nodded, "Yeah! You gotta get some calories in ya, before your gut devours itself." He agreed.

The audacity it took for two genin to tell a jounin what to do-

"Fine then, come back inside." Kurenai allowed, feeling a bit annoyed that she was being treated like an invalid.

And so, they did.

At the kitchen table, their discussion waited as Tsunami whipped up a quick lunch, making bowls for everyone else too, and putting them in the fridge for them to eat later.

It was a basic soup, some sort of family-recipe, Kurenai guessed as she eyed it skeptically. Hinata, like the dignified little girl she was, showed no particular emotion as she ate it. Kiba was gobbling it up like some kind of wild animal, though, which gave her a bit of hope.

Then again, Kurenai knew that Kiba would eat anything, so.. Her wariness was not relieved.

"Oh, right! With that injury of yours, you probably shouldn't be lifting your arms too much! Here," The older woman used Tsunami's spoon to pick up a large bite, angling it in front of her mouth. "Open up!" The older woman chirped happily, seemingly happy just to be able to mother-hen someone.

"Ma'am, I'm in my twenties, there's no need-" She was cut off by a spoon shoved between her lips, in less than a millisecond. Kurenai blinked in surprise.

"And, I'm in my forties!" Tsunami returned, and her pleasant words sounded vaguely threatening, despite her closed-eye smile.

Hinata hid a snicker behind her hand, whereas Kiba nearly choked on his soup.

Kurenai sent him a ferocious look, even as Tsunami raised another spoonful to her lips, one that dared him to laugh. Kiba wondered why everyone always picked him to threaten.

---

It was well into the evening when Naruto's eyes blinked open.

Sitting up abruptly, Naruto rubbed the sleep from her eyes as the realization dawned on her.

She'd gotten zero work done. She'd fallen asleep moments after she'd opened the damn textbook in her scroll. Stretching her arms, she let an enormous yawn escape her lips.

Well. At least she'd gotten some much needed rest. She'd been exhausted this whole mission, since the Zabuza fight.

Her unrolled scroll sat before her, various projects strewn about the field messily. Wasting no more time, she gathered her wits and did a few more stretches, before beginning the clean-up process. The sky was a rapidly darkening blue now, with specks of white and yellow stars slowly starting to show. The air in Wave was much colder than Konoha's, Naruto noticed, her nose burning slightly.

She took each of her things, one by one returning them to her scroll, before finishing by rolling it up and returning it to its place in her belt loop.

Plopping back onto the ground, Naruto's hands wiggled in the dewy blades of grass and she allowed her mind to wander for a moment.

She'd killed yesterday. And for some reason, Naruto didn't feel the self-hatred or disgust she thought she would.. She just felt, angry- and a little sad, too.

Because no one deserved to die for Gato's cause. Hired or not, those guys seemed young, hardly adults. People like Gato cause so much senseless death, and Naruto decided she hated that.

She would kill, for her friends, for her village- But never would she enjoy it. (Unless it was Orochimaru, her mind amended.)

Naruto considered herself a protector of her friends and Konohagakure, and thus she would do anything she had to for them. But, she vowed, she would never kill anyone she didn't have to.

And maybe that wasn't the noble vow another would've taken, but she was T&I nin for fuck's sake, don't expect too much.

That said, if Naruto had to kill a bastard like Gato to save the innocent lives of others like Tazuna and Tsunami, she would. Gladly.

She nodded to herself. Perhaps other people had a problem with hypocrisy, but she could overlook it. She just wanted to do what she could for those she loved, for the world, and that was that.

The sound of rustling to her side alerted her to the presence of another, her eyes closing to identify the signature. Coursing chakra, tightly contained and decent in size, felt like ice so cold it could burn you. Chuunin, her mind supplied a bit later.

Naruto forced herself to calm, because there was only one person she could attribute such a signature to. Zabuza's apprentice.

Even with her surprise, every bit of her prior knowledge kicked in. She couldn't let on that she knew, not when the enemy had the capacity to kill her.

So when the person stepped into the field, in the dead of night, holding a wicker basket...

Naruto was even more surprised by how fragile the shinobi looked. He had a certain femininity to him, with thick dark eyelashes and silken hair.

Despite herself, Naruto felt a slight blush creeping up her cheeks. She could imagine the way Ino would squeal at the sight of the stranger. If she were here, she'd probably be cheering her on some romantic venture.

Naruto forced down the surprise, forced down any combativeness left in her. Moments ago, she'd swore to cause no more senseless deaths, and thus she would not attack the stranger.

Especially when they seemed so startled by her presence. Noticing the particularly masculine gait, the bob of the Adam's apple in their neck as they swallowed thickly, and various other features, Naruto took a guess that the stranger was a male. That, and she'd heard his voice on the battlefield days ago.

She could feel the alarm coming from him, the fear, the uncertainty. She made sure her face didn't portray the way her eyes scanned him, picking up any details. Favoring one leg, the other must be more severely injured. From her bombs, to be specific.

Looking over his face, Naruto concluded they were roughly 15,13 at the youngest. 16 would be her guess for the oldest, she concluded.

"I-I didn't know anyone was training here, I'll leave you be." He turned on his heel, but Naruto interrupted. She couldn't just let him leave!

She told herself that she couldn't let him leave because she needed to gather intel on him. That was totally why.

"N-No, it's cool, 'ttebayo! You'll be no bother!" She answered, waving her hands in a mollifying way. The boy looked askance, hazel eyes flickering around the field.

"Well, if you insist.." He ran a strand of dark hair between his fingers, Naruto's heart sputtered as she interrupted. "I do." She assured, giving him a warm smile.

His eyes flickered away shyly. "Very well, I only need to collect some herbs." Tucking the strand behind his ear, he made his way to one of the many bushes surrounding the clearing. Naruto tried to identify it, but it was dark and she was only trained to identify poisonous plants.

Deciding to make more conversation while she could, Naruto got a bit more comfortable before asking, "So, what's your name?"

"It's.. Haku, and yours?" He plucked leaves from the bush, filling his basket. "Naruto." She stated simply, and he raised his brows slightly. It was an odd name, they both knew it.

"So you're a shinobi, then?" Haku asked, tapping his forehead where Naruto's hitai-ate was currently tied. She blinked, surprised he'd move right into such questions, but answered nonetheless. "Yup! Official kunoichi of the Leaf Village." Chirped the blonde, but her happy facade was quickly soiled.

"So.. You kill for your village?" He asked slowly, moving to another bush, this time collecting it's blooms. Naruto inclined her head slightly, thinking it was incredibly fitting that he decided to ask such a question.
She didn't know why she decided to give such a truthful answer. "I have. And will, again, if I have to." Her voice was so full of conviction, it caught Haku's full attention.

"I see… I'm not sure I could ever do that.." He told her, deciding not to push back against whatever made her decide that she could. Naruto hid her surprise.

"Is that so?" She asked softly. "It is. I'm much too soft for Shinobi-work.. I do not believe I cou;d ever kill my heart enough to do such things." He forced himself to be silent, if he said anymore, he'd reveal himself.

A wriggling sensation of guilt in him grew.

"Right, well, I've done worse, so I don't think I have to room to preach the evils of killing." She said with distaste, remembering the reputation of T&I nins. Torture wasn't a glamorous profession, you'd gain no fans from it.

Haku put down his basket, turning to look fully at the blonde. "How so?"

She gave him a crooked grin, showing a bit too much fang. "I'm a member of the Torture and Interrogation unit. People don't take kindly to that." She shrugged, and Haku's eyes widened. His adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed, and Naruto could practically feel his unease.

"I suppose they think of you as some kind of monster." He stated, without much inflection. She wondered if that was supposed to be a question.

"You're damn right. Not just because of that, but yeah." She turned her head, looking away from him. "Doesn't matter to me. I'll do anything I have to, to keep my friends and my village safe." She told him, utter conviction dripping from the words.

Haku gnawed the inside of his lip.

"Someone precious to me is also often called a monster, though I do not believe them to be. They simply do not know him like I do." Haku said, cursing himself mentally the entire time. He was saying too much, too. Damn. Much. "Knowing that, I doubt you're the monster anyone thinks you are." Haku couldn't maintain eye-contact anymore, staring down at his hands.

Naruto was silent for all of a minute, before chuckling. Haku, who'd been embarrassed by her laughing at him, quickly added. "Furthermore, your desire to do anything for your friends is a noble cause, it's selfless. A monster is neither of those."

He felt his face heat up slightly, even as he justified his thinking.

"Wow," Naruto trailed off teasingly, channeling her inner Anko. She could practically hear Ino cheering her on. "You really know how to flatter a girl." She said, and Haku's face practically glowed red.

The sensible part of her said she was being ridiculous right now, because this person was an enemy, not someone to flirt with. Another part of her discovered she really liked flustering people.

Haku raised his hands defensively, "I-I'm a boy, just so you know!" He sputtered, and Naruto snorted.
"I thought so. But you're so pretty, I wasn't sure." She complimented, wiggling her eyebrows.

She couldn't contain the laugh that followed. Pumping her fist, Naruto congratulated herself. "Damn, I'm smooth."

Haku, who was still blushing furiously, scratched the side of his head. "A-Ah, but isn't pretty a term reserved for women?" He asked, choosing to focus on semantics than what she'd actually said.

Ibiki would kick her ass for flirting with an enemy. Anko would be proud. "Trust me, boys can be pretty." She nodded seriously, stroking her chin in mock-thought.

He raised his index finger to correct her, "But-"

"I know," She drawled, slowly. "Because I'm looking at a pretty boy." She gave him a comical wink.

At this point, Haku was staring at her with something unreadable. Naruto clenched her fist again, "Smoother than butter." She mumbled to herself.

Haku made a series of very strange noises, vaguely like choking, before Naruto looked up at him, and he erupted into peals of laughter.

She couldn't help but grin.

"I think there might be something deeply wrong with this..." He told her, shaking his head softly. Scooting back, she and Haku were seated right beside each other, the basket of herbs sat long forgotten.

"What, me hitting on a boy I just met?" She glanced at Haku's hand, sliding her hand closer to his just slightly.

Gone were her thoughts of him being the enemy, right now he was so normal- so lovely- she wasn't even thinking of it.

Her guard was entirely down, and Naruto wouldn't realize until later just how stupid she'd been.

She looked away, glancing up at the night sky. The city was so small, there was little light pollution. But being out here in the forest made that so much more obvious.

Naruto swore she could she the galaxies painted all over the night sky, with zero clouds to obstruct the view.

Taking in a sudden, sharp breath, she realized this was something you just didn't see in Konoha.

Haku looked at her in alarm, her inhale was so sudden, he worried maybe something had gone wrong. Because he recognized her, what if she recognized him? Then she'd realize they were enemies, and she'd kill him- or she'd run away from him- or, or-

"Haku, look! Shooting star!" She exclaimed, pointing up to the sky.

He looked up, catching a glimpse just before the star disappeared. It was the first time he'd ever seen such a thing, a shooting star. It was all so stereotypical- Yet, His mind was elsewhere.

In this girl, in Naruto, he saw just how complex humans were. She was called a monster, a demon, just like Zabuza.

But even so, looking at her now, she was nothing of the sort. She was goofy, teasing, flirtatious... She was excited by small, insignificant things like shooting stars, and she even laughed at her own jokes. (Her very, very corny jokes.)

But looking at her, seeing the way that the interstellar night reflected in her lively eyes...

It was breathtaking.

She was so contradictory, and that was amazing, wasn't it?

Perhaps, he too was contradictory. Did that make him breathtaking?

Zabuza was contradictory himself, a monster, with an obvious soft-spot for himself. Haku saw it in Zabuza, he saw that he did truly care. Even if he tried his best to hide it, humans always have a way of letting their true feelings surface.

Not long from now, he'd be fighting this blonde, who was fixated on the sky.

His bleeding heart ached, he could never kill her. He couldn't, just like he'd never be capable of killing Zabuza. But he owed this girl no debt, so why?!

He was so pathetically soft, all it took was a bit of kindness, and this girl had somehow managed to make it past his walls.

Zabuza would be so disappointed, wouldn't he?

Haku swallowed.. That feeling of guilt in him could be ignored no longer.

"I.. I am sorry for deceiving you, Naruto.. But I am not a harmless civilian." He said suddenly, and oh god, why did he say that?!

He could've just left, maybe she'd have never connected the dots between his own contradicting sides.

"I know." She answered simply, meeting his hazel eyes. His stomach did a cartwheel at the sight of that soft smile-

and- Oh. She knew.

"Respectfully, why haven't you tried to kill me?" He asked softly, and he wondered if he might cry. Had she been deceiving him this whole time? Why did he care? God, it must be the hormones making him like this. His medical texts had described this to him before.

"Why didn't you kill me? You've had plenty of opportunities." Naruto answered, which really wasn't an answer at all. She'd known it was him long before he'd said his name, but even then, she'd heard his name on the battlefield. He must've forgotten that Zabuza had said it, Naruto realized.

Possibly because of Kurenai's genjutsu?

Haku sighed.

"I don't want to fight you." He muttered.

"I don't wanna fight you either, or your freaky accomplice Zabuza. Honestly, I was hoping I'd be able to dissuade you and him once we met again. I've found out that Gato has a history of hiring expensive employees and not paying them." She told him, and Haku's eyebrows furrowed with unbidden frustration.

"I-I tried to tell him once, but.. Maybe if I tell him that, he'll listen." Haku hugged his knees to his chest, he hated going against Zabuza's wishes, but.. There was something wrong with this whole situation. Gato was a shady character, he just knew it.

Naruto sucked her teeth, thinking of a spur-of-the-moment plan. She knew better than to do this, it was practically traitorous, but well..

"Alright, I've got an idea. Me, you, and Zabuza meet by the docks tomorrow, and I'll tell you both everything I know. If you don't show, I'll assume you'd prefer to stay enemies than to work together. If nothing comes of this, I won't tell my team a word of what happened here." She exhaled seriously, and Haku knew just how serious her proposal was.

She was putting her life on the line, here. It was obvious. Unless she planned some kind of ambush, which Haku doubted. He knew it was illogical, but he already trusted the blonde far more than he should.

Staring at her with no small amount of amazement, he slowly shook his head. "What time?" He asked,and Naruto thought it over.

"About, two pm. Sound good?" She asked, her heart thumping in her ribcage wildly.

With a single, solemn nod, Haku took his basket from where he'd left it. Naruto extended her pinky out to him, and he stared with confusion for a second.

"Pinky promise?" She asked, and Haku bit his lip, before conviction settled on his face and he nodded.

They linked their little fingers, and she gave him a smile. "Right, see you tomorrow, then?" She asked.

Haku's face was rid with emotion. "Hopefully." He replied, standing onto his two feet.

With no goodbyes or well-wishes, Haku turned and left, swiftly heading to his base.

Naruto considered tracking him with her Mind's Eye, but a part of her would feel like absolute shit if she did. And thus, she let Haku leave unwatched.

Groaning to release the dread building within her, Naruto brought herself to her feet and did a few minor stretches. Her teammates were probably worried sick, and thus, she needed to get back to Tazuna's.

She walked on the beaten path through the woods, pushing brush out of her way and stepping over vines and debris by her feet. It was harder to navigate the woods in the dark, Naruto thought sourly.

Even so, it didn't take long for her to reach the edge of the forest, and she immediately took off in a jog to the two-story house she knew belonged to Tazuna.

The door was, thankfully, left unlocked. When she opened the door, she was shocked to be nearly tackled by a brunet boy and a fretting bluette, who rushed over alongside him.

Hinata activated her Byakugan to scan Naruto for injuries, whilst Kiba shouted questions.

"Where the hell ya been, Naruto!? We were worried sick! Hinata had to fight off enemies all by herself, and then you didn't show up, we were seriously scared for you! Don't do that again!" Words jumbled out of his mouth rapid fire, and it took a good minute for Naruto to decipher what had even been said.

"I concur." A monotone voice said, which Naruto's eyes traced back to Shino, who was seated by Kurenai on the couch.

Tsunami's head peeked out of the kitchen, "Oh, you're home! I've got leftovers for you in the fridge, hon!"

With that, she ducked back into the kitchen, and Naruto gave a ditzy smile to those remaining.

"I passed out on the clearing out in the woods." She said, scratching her chin. No mention of Haku, of course. Though.. The sensation of guilt in her stomach told her, she'd have to let Kurenai know. To not do such, would be traitorous.

Even Shino gave her a very incredulous look. Kiba, however, could picture himself doing the same thing. Nodding in acceptance, he spoke, "Right, well, don't do it again! There's way better places to nap." He said, and Akamaru yipped in agreement.

Naruto nodded, and finally asked a question of her own. "You said Hinata was attacked? I'm really sorry, I shouldn't have left you here alone." Naruto said, directing her attention to the shorter girl.

Hinata waved her hands frantically, "No, no, it's okay! They were no trouble! I handled it!" She declared.

Naruto's brows rose to her hairline. "They?" She asked, wondering if that meant there were multiple attackers, or just a gender-ambiguous attacker.

"Yes." Kurenai said smoothly. "Hinata managed to take out two attackers all her own, without getting a scratch. She should give herself more credit." The woman complimented, and Naruto grinned brightly.

"Hinata! That's amazing! Damn girl, you didn't even need my help!" Naruto cheered, eternally grateful to shift the subject away from herself.

Hinata blushed, and Naruto raised her fist. "C'mon, bump me! You deserve to be proud of yourself for that, how'd you even do it?" Naruto inquired happily.

She and Kiba had managed to take out those two shinobi, but despite their chakras, they didn't have the skills of chuunin in the slightest. The flaw of collaborative attackers, she guessed, because even though they were chuunin together.. They certainly weren't apart.

"W-well… I modified a Hyuuga jutsu, and used it to fight them both off at once.. They weren't even genin, I think." The girl said, poking her fingers together shyly. Naruto didn't know much about the Hyuuga, but to her it sounded like an enormous feat to do something like that.

Naruto clamped both hands onto the girl's shoulders. "That is so cool! Seriously, way to go!" Hinata bumped her fist into Naruto's, and even Kiba was cheering for Hinata. "Tell her, Naruto!"

The blonde snorted, tussling Hinata's hair. Kurenai felt her heart warm at the sight of her students laughing and cheering on the shy girl who she'd known longer than any of them.

Looking up though, Kurenai saw a grim expression on the blonde's face, one that practically screamed, 'We need to talk.'

"Team 8, please head upstairs and go to bed, I'll have Naruto here bring me up after she's eaten." Kurenai told the trio, in a way that felt subtly forceful. Hinata sent a worried glance to the blonde, whereas Kiba just looked confused.

Shino decided not to ask, grabbing Kiba by the sleeve and leading him away silently. "R-right!" Hinata chirped, giving Naruto a nod before following after her teammates.

Once the raven-haired woman was certain her trio of genin were gone, she patted the spot by her on the couch.

"What's bothering you?" The woman asked slowly, as Naruto took the place next to her.

Naruto prepared to.. Blurry some of the details, about what she was about to say.

"There's something I didn't want to mention in front of the others." Naruto started, causing Kurenai to cock a finely plucked brow. "That is?" She asked, and Naruto scratched the back of her neck.

"After I woke up from my nap, I encountered Zabuza's accomplice… And he raised an offer to me." The nervous girl said, rolling her shoulder. Kurenai's eyes widened slightly, before narrowing. "What offer?" She asked, with a bit of skepticism.

"He told me that he didn't trust Gato, and after I told him what I knew, he promised he would try and convince Zabuza to stop working with him. But there's a catch," Naruto explained, waving her hand as she spoke.

Kurenai nodded, signaling her to continue. "I have to meet him tomorrow, and tell Zabuza everything I know. Haku thinks he's more likely to be convinced by me, I guess."

Kurenai seemed a bit startled by how Naruto said it, so lacking in fear or hesitance. "It would be very dangerous to send you to talk with them alone." She said slowly, as if waiting for Naruto to catch onto that.

She nodded. "Maybe, but I should be able to flee if needed. Haku, the accomplice, is still injured greatly. He's favoring one leg so outwardly, it has to be bad." The part of her that trusted Haku wouldn't harm her went unsaid, mostly because she didn't want to admit to being so naive.

"Besides, even though we called for back-up.. It wouldn't hurt us to make an alliance with them."

Kurenai clasped her hands together, taking in a deep breath. She would admit, if she went alongside Naruto, she could hold her back if escape were necessary. And assuming Naruto wasn't walking into an ambush, her bringing someone else would be seen as hostility.

"Do you feel like you will accomplish something by meeting with them?" Kurenai asked eventually. She didn't say it, but she absolutely agreed that an alliance would be the best course of action. No one knew when backup would arrive, after all. If Zabuza attacked them suddenly, or while they were sleeping.. Kurenai was dread to think about it.

Naruto drudged up any confidence she had within herself, choosing to smile.
"I know I will."

---

Day Five, Wave Country.

---

Naruto stood on the docks over the tumultuous, dark waters of the bay, letting the sea-salt filled air sting her eyes just slightly. Her world seemed much more melancholic, having committed her first kill, and because of that the dreary grayness of Wave seemed to fit perfectly.

She sat down on the wooden dock, leaning back on her hands as her feet swayed over the edge.

In the depths of her mind, she took notice of approaching chakra signatures. Her lips quirked upward, knowing that Haku must've followed through on his word.

It was proven, when Zabuza flickered onto the water in front of her.

An intimidation tactic, she knew, and thus she did not flinch as he appeared from thin air.

Haku stepped up to her back, his hand tracing a finger across her back before settling to clamp on her shoulder.

She wasn't sure if he too, was trying to be intimidating, or if it was a show of support. "Hey." The blonde greeted smoothly.

Zabuza grunted, and Naruto tried not to let the awkwardness she was feeling show. A part of her wondered if this was a mistake. She was going behind the back of her captain to negotiate with the enemy. The enemy who'd incapictated her, to be clear.

The man stared her down, sharp eyes unblinking as she smiled softly. Just play it cool, she repeated internally.

"I- I brought Zabuza-sama here to discuss what intel you've found on Gato." Haku spoke, breaking the hard silence.

Zabuza's eyes didn't leave the blonde as he spoke. "Intel?" He repeated skeptically, and for some reason Naruto knew that Haku probably hadn't mentioned her status as an Intelligence-nin. Smart of him, considering that no one ever wants to talk to them.

"You heard right. I'm a Torture and Interrogation ninja, and I managed to find a few things out about your employer, Gato, Things that might convince you not to work for him any longer." Okay, so, Naruto knew it was a bit snobby to drop her department like that, but it served a purpose. She knew she hadn't done any torture or interrogation to get her info, but Zabuza didn't.

She hoped it would serve to gain her a bit of respect from Zabuza, and by the slight raise of his nonexistent brows, it seemed to work. He grunted again, before speaking. "That explains it."

Naruto blinked. "Explains what?"

"You ain't like the other Konoha dogs." He said with a bit of snide amusement.

Naruto decided not to engage with that line of conversation any further. "Right, well, do you wanna know what I've got to say, or not?"

The tall man loomed over her, casting a shadow over her and Haku. He tilted his head to the side, "Oh? What makes you think I didn't come here just to kill you where you sit?" Asked the man, and Naruto fought the urge not to snort.

Well, she could say that she could very much tell he was still injured. That his shoulder and chest were hardly moving, not only that but she could see the bulge of bandages under the calf of his pants and the fabric of his shirt.

Because of that, Naruto had enough faith she could at least make a hasty escape.

"Go ahead, kill me. Then you won't know what I know, and worse, you'll be taken out by a team of Konoha-jounin in retribution for killing Konoha's jinchuriki. And of course, that's assuming you can." Naruto checked her nails dismissively, something she'd seen Ino do numerous times before. It was a subtle power-play.

The wind quieted, and Naruto felt the subtle leak of Killing-intent in the air.
But she knew Zabuza wouldn't act because she felt the pricks of unease in him when she mentioned being a jinchuriki. Even Haku had been made uncomfortable by the small remark.

"A team of jounin..?" Haku asked quietly from behind her. She leaned back to look up at him, discovering he wasn't wearing his mask.

Giving an assuring smile, Naruto said, "Mhm. Reinforcements should arrive any day now."

"..Then, why are you here to speak with us?" Softly inquired the teenage boy, sounding unsure all of a sudden. She blew a strand of golden blonde away from her face.

"Enemy or not, I don't want to see two people die for a corrupt bastard of a man who won't even pay them." She explained, knowing her reasoning was probably too sentimental for Zabuza to understand. She shrugged lightly, sitting up straight to look up at the hulking man yet again.

He was at least caught on the last part of her statement, though. "The hell do you mean he won't pay us?" The man raised his voice slightly, and Naruto was careful not to let her face show any emotion.

"He doesn't pay most of his workers, especially the expensive ones. How much is he offering you?" Naruto asked, and Haku replied immediately.

"One million ryo to prevent the bridge being built." He winced, however, when Zabuza nearly snarled.

"Haku, stay out of this. Tools don't speak unless asked." He reprimanded, and Naruto heightened her sensory ability to pick up his growing emotions. Haku was confused, but a bit angry, and she felt it growing in him.

"Right," Naruto started slowly, not enjoying the tone he used with her friend. Nor the word choice, frankly. Her jaw clenched minutely, she didn't want anyone talking to Haku that way.

Picking up a bit of nerve, Naruto started again.

"Well you're definitely out of his price range, sorry buddy, but you're not going to get paid. He doesn't even pay his gardeners, so good luck with that. Matter of fact, Gato's been known to hire cheaper men to wipe out his other employees right before he'd have to pay them. It's a cycle, really." Maybe Naruto was bluffing a little, but that was the conclusion she and Kiba had come to after discussing their findings fully.

Zabuza's eyes widened, but Haku's head whipped to look at her, then back to Zabuza. The blond stayed carefully impassive, as their argument began.

"Zabuza-sama, I told you something was up with that man. We won't make the money needed for Kiri if we get killed by Gato before he even pays us." The boy's voice carried so much emotion, and Naruto's ears perked up at the mention of Kiri.

She knew there was something more to what Haku just said, something she didn't know. There was more to them working for Gato than just greed or necessity.

"Haku, damn it!" Zabuza growled out, clearly furious. Naruto decided to interject, "He's right, and you know it. I don't know what you're planning with Kiri, but you might as well kiss that goodbye if you keep working for Gato." Naruto egged him on, pushing him against Gato. She could only hope it would work. If she was crossing her fingers, no one noticed.

There were several minutes of silence, and Naruto felt the air growing more and more oppressive as the silence reigned on.

He raked a calloused hand through his ragged hair, clearing his throat roughly. "Listen here, little girl. I'm going to do some digging, and if I find out you're fucking lying-" He leaned down to look her dead in the face, and she winced just slightly. "Then you and your team will be dead before you know it. Understand?" He asked harshly, and though Naruto's mouth felt dry, she swallowed down any uncertainty.

She growled barely, in an attempt to clear her own throat.

"Sure. And if I'm right?" She demanded, standing on her own two feet. Their dark expressions seemed locked on one another for a moment. Up until, Zabuza let out a single laugh, his face still intimidating and harsh.

"Then, I'll do us all a favor, and kill Gato as painfully as I can." He heinously told her, and Naruto backed away slightly.

"Good. That'll be one less problem for me to deal with." Naruto forced out, and Haku's grip on her shoulder slackened, moving down to hold onto her upper arm.

He stared at her angrily for just a minute, but his eyes narrowed. "Now, go." The man snarled out.

Her eyes widened, but before she could comprehend what he was saying, Zabuza repeated himself. "Go, both of you, out of my sight. Before I get pissed off, you tools." He roughly shoved Naruto back, knocking her against Haku.

Whilst Naruto was still realizing what had happened, Haku had taken her hand and taken off with her, running down the dock. It wasn't until she pulled ahead, and looked over at him and saw him smiling, that she wiped the shocked look off her face.

They two of them jogged along in silence, all the way until Naruto and Haku ended up in the very same clearing they'd met in. Naruto took in a deep breath, wiping the slight perspiration from her forehead. They'd ran all the way from the harbor, and then back to the clearing that was in the woods, a pretty decent trek.

Collecting herself, after a minute of reflecting on the conversation she'd had minutes ago, she looked up to see a visibly giddy Haku. Her blue eyes locked onto his own hazels, and she asked a question slowly. "What.. The hell just happened?"

Haku grinned, for once actually showing his teeth. "You- You convinced him! He believed you!" Haku cheered, whereas the blonde girl raised one brow, the other furrowing. She leveled all the skepticism she was feeling against him.

"Yeah? Because he didn't seem convinced to me. He literally made us scram, and threatened to kill my whole team." She remarked dryly, her face going deadpan by the end.

Haku winced, "Yes, but well.. He laughed, Zabuza never laughs like that, he was just testing you, so to speak." The boy explained, realizing that Zabuza's mannerisms would probably confuse any normal person.

Naruto blinked, shaking her head slightly. "Eh? You're sure?" Haku nodded passionately, and Naruto stood straighter. "Like, really sure, 'ttebayo?"

Haku nodded again, much more excited this time.

Naruto's spine went ram-rod straight.

"Oh." She blinked.

"Oh!" She said louder, a jitter going through her whole body as her face broke into a large grin.

She groaned in relief, "Good, my heart was literally going to explode there for a minute. Fuck, what a relief, I thought I'd been all traitorous for nothing. So, what now?" She asked, her body thrumming full of vigor. She'd done it, she'd turned two enemies into allies.

Haku paused.. "Well, I suppose Zabuza-sama is off to validate your claims, so we'll be free for a few hours.." He tapped his chin, thinking it over.

"Say, what were you here for yesterday?" Haku asked curiously, interrupting the funky little happy-dance Naruto had started doing.

He forced himself not to laugh as she stayed frozen in place, awkwardly.

"Oh I was supposed to train, but I ended up taking a nap before I could decide what to train." She said frankly, abruptly straightening herself.

He blinked. "Ah… I'm not exactly able to do much training myself," He said with a bit of embarrassment, and Naruto grimaced. She'd caused the worst of injuries, after all.

"But perhaps I could help you with something?" He asked, lacing his fingers together.

Naruto thought it over, much more animated than usual as she struck a thinking pose slightly reminiscent of Guy. Haku thought her excitement was endearing, at least.

"There's a lot I could work on..Seals, poisons," She grimaced, then continued. "Senbon." She finished, clearly sour at the mention of throwing-needles. Haku, however, perked up.

"I could help with that!" He offered cheerfully, wringing his hands with a slight smile.

Naruto blinked. "I don't think you want to. My sensei is one of the best in Konoha with senbon, and even she isn't much help."

Haku frowned thoughtfully. "How has she been teaching you? I learned by textbook, perhaps you're also better suited for that kind of learning-"

"Hell no, I read when I have to, but I'm no textbook learner. Anko-sensei usually just demonstrates once or twice, explains it, and then cheers me on 'till I get it." The blonde explained, pulling the scrunchies out of her hair to tie it up differently. The two pigtails fell down, and Haku stared as she gathered it back into a single, high-ponytail.

He nodded. "Well, maybe demonstrate to me your skills, and I can help? Throwing needles are a difficult thing, it requires a touch of perfection." He softly spoke, cheerful not to offend her.

Naruto screwed her lips to the side, but ultimately decided she might as well allow his help.

Straightening her posture, she stuck her hand into her weapons pouched and took out the tin of senbon.

Haku eyed the bronze senbon closely, "The material is copper, no? That makes it a bit lighter than the typical silver they're usually made of." He noted, and Naruto felt a bit stupid due to the fact she'd never even noticed that.

And Haku guessed it at first glance, she moped internally.

"Try throwing one for me, hm?" He said, and she had to fight down a sensation of embarrassment.

She took the senbon into her hand, and threw it at the three with a fluid movement. She'd aimed for the center, and though it reached close to its destination, the needle landed crooked. After a few moments, the needle outright fell out of the tree.

She hung her head. She'd landed them in a perfect circle around neji in their fight, but that was because of chakra, and that she'd been throwing them in dirt.

Haku didn't chastise her though, which at least saved her pride. "May I correct you?" He asked, and her face went deadpan.

"Go for it." She said dryly, because wasn't that the entire point?

Haku hummed, and first he straightened her arms, which she usually held in a more fluid position. Blame that on her katas, she supposed.

"Instead of just moving your forearms with your throw, move your whole upper half." He advised, and Naruto nodded. He shifted her leg further ahead, and jabbed his finger to the back of her knee. "Don't keep your legs so stiff." He said, moving to check the rest of her form.

"Try again." He asked kindly, and she did. The needle was much straighter this time, sinking through the tree bark.

"Much better!" He chirped, before continuing. "Put a bit more force behind it, but don't sacrifice your stance to do so. Can you hold it in your hand for me, just so I can take a look?" Haku gave her a smile, and Naruto blinked, taking out a third needle.

She put it between her fingers again, holding her wrist exactly how she'd thought Anko did. "Aha! That's it!" He realized, using his hand to move Naruto's forward.

"You bend your wrist at the wrong angle entirely. Now, turn it upwards- Yes, much better!" He subtly corrected even the slightest error, before giving her a smile again, Her face felt a bit warm.

"Looks perfect, now try."

Tightening her grip on the needle slightly, she did exactly as Haku instructed. It felt slightly uncomfortable, but after landing the needle perfectly, she realized he was absolutely right.

"Awesome," She murmured to herself, noting the way the needle had penetrated halfway through the bark, perfectly straight. Even after a few minutes of staring, the needle remained firmly stuck, and she grinned wide.

"Ah, Haku-kun, you're a genius!" She declared, attacking him with a sudden hug.

"Not really! They were simple fixes, is all!" He assured awkwardly, his hands forced to his sides and Naruto clung to him in gratitude.

"Ha! I can't wait to see the look on Anko's face when I get her with these! It's gonna be great!" She gladdened visibly, a devious look across her face for just a second. "Give yourself some credit, no average person would notice tiny stuff like you did. And it really helped!" She reaffirmed, refusing to let Haku downplay his contributions.

Naruto finally decided to release the boy from her crushing hug, and he immediately started straightening his clothes, exhaling softly.

"Naruto, are you out here?" A male voice called, one Naruto identified as Kiba fairly quickly.

"Shit, that's my teammate." She said, and Haku looked briefly panicked.

"Can't let 'em see you, so I'll go ahead and leave. Maybe see each other again tomorrow?" She asked quietly, and Haku nodded. She quickly gave him another hug, before turning and running towards the outside of the forest. She gave him a wave, looking back to Haku giving her one in return.

She narrowly dodged being hit in the face by a tree branch, exiting the woods and running out to see Kiba standing by the edge of the forest. If he'd went a little further, he'd have been well on his way into the clearing she and Haku had been in.

"Tazuna is taking the day off so all of his workers have the time to recharge. Tomorrow, Kurenai-sensei is sending all of us to the bridge with him to help out." Kiba told her, smacking her on the upper back. Naruto narrowed her eyes, nodding at the consensus the team had come to without her.

"Man, I had to track your scent all the way to the docks, then up here. You smell different today, so it was harder than I thought." He sniffed her blatantly, and she swatted at him with disgust.

"Don't sniff me you weirdo!" The threat in her statement was left unsaid, and Kiba stopped immediately. "Sorry! You just have some weird scent on you! Geez!"

"Mind your business, dog-boy!" Squawked the blue-eyed girl loudly, waving her fist at him warningly. "Che, whatever, we're supposed to pick up groceries for Tsunami, so come on." He said, folding his arms over his chest and taking off in a brisk walk towards town. Akamaru, who Naruto somehow hadn't noticed, barked something demeaning.

"Akamaru! You're supposed to take my side!" Kiba wailed, pulling his face in exasperation.

"What'd he say?" She asked with amusement, deeply wishing she had the Inuzuka dog-whispering ability at that moment. She had a gut-feeling that Akamaru was a funny fella.

Kiba sniffed, narrowing his eyes slightly. "Mind your business." He said, mocking Naruto's voice terribly.

Her eyebrow twitched, "Do you want me to kick your ass?" She asked, just as they entered the center of town. Almost immediately, their playful bickering died. This village was far too melancholic to enjoy yourself in.

The four main streets of the village joint together into one plaza-like space, which was depressingly empty. Clearly, there should've been something here, fountain, a statue, anything. Yet, it was just an empty circular pathway.

It wasn't surprising, honestly, that whatever they'd planned for that spot went undone. This village didn't even have street-lanterns.

Together, Kiba and Naruto walked around the alleged, "market street," picking up various items from the few stands that sold produce and products, carefully choosing to spend a little money at all of the open merchants. Tossing an eggplant in her hand, Naruto passed it back to Kiba as she fished out her froggy-wallet.

Taking out the necessary money, she passed it to the grateful shopkeep.

"Hey!" A voice hollered, cherubic yet hoarse and Naruto's ears twitched with a sensation of familiarity, she saw a trio of three kids, one she'd met days ago.

"You're the person who helped us tha' other day!" The voice of a little girl chirped, and Kiba turned like he was on a swivel.

Naruto laughed nervously, noticing the eyes of nearby people on her and the children.

Dropping into a crouch before them, Naruto gladly took some more change and offered it their way.

"That's me! Now do me a favour and shoo, eh?" She asked, dropping coins into each of their hands. It wasn't that she didn't want to be seen with them, it was more like… She really didn't want to deal with Kiba teasing her for being kind. She waved her hand in the universal gesture for shoo, but the kids did not budge.

"You're a girl now!" The other female orphan chirped, and Naruto's eye twitched. "It would seem so." She agreed, even as Kiba's shoulders shook with laughter.

"That's so cool!" The boy of the trio said, giving her an approving thumbs-up. "I wish I could do that!"

Naruto blinked. "Er, like in a gender-switching way, or in a cool-ninja-trick way?" She asked carefully, truly unsure which it was.

The orphan shrugged.

Naruto sucked her teeth. "Well, either way, you'll get there one day! Believe in yourself, or something.." She remarked uncomfortably, truly unsure of what to say. The child grinned brightly, showing off a missing tooth.

"Old Man Benjiro has been on the lookout for you. No idea why." The first girl said, twirling a strand of hair around her finger.

"Benjiro..?" Naruto inquired, furrowing her brows. A second passed, before she snapped her fingers. "He's the one who owns the little place by where I found you guys, hm?"

The little girl nodded, "Yeah! He's the one with all the gray hair and the creepy hands!" She held up her hands, bending her fingers to make them look gnarled as she wiggled them.

Naruto snorted, and the other kids giggled, too. "I'll see him in a few days, I'm sure." Naruto said, though no one else knew why. Naruto was certain that given a few days, Zabzua would have Gato strung from a tree like a Christmas ornament.

She grimaced at the thought, which caught Kiba's attention.

"Well kiddos, me and my buddy gotta go, so bye-bye!" The younger boy snatched Naruto by her collar, in true Inuzuka fashion, dragging her off as quickly as he could. She blinked, as we literally pulled away from the orphans and marketplace, led back to the empty plaza where all the streets met.

Yanking the brunet's hand away, Naruto glowered. "The hell was that for?" She asked, dusting herself off. "You started makin' this worried-guilty-weird ass expression. I thought maybe you sensed something." The boy said, raising his hand in a way that said, 'duh.'

Naruto kept the grimace from her face, this time.

"I already told Kurenai-sensei, so I guess I can tell you.." Naruto then realized it was inevitable. She'd have to tell them all, eventually. Putting it off would only make them upset. "Tell me?!" Kiba questioned harshly, putting his hands on his hips. Akamaru whined.

She sighed, and visibly deflated. "Sorry I didn't tell you sooner, but this morning, I had a meeting with Zabuza and his partner, Haku, to negotiate." Kiba's eyes widened so much, they practically bulged out of his head.

Waving her hands frantically, Naruto continued. "Hey! Kurenai sensei told me I could, I wasn't in any real danger," Only half of a lie, really. "And it was totally necessary!" She declared, huffing.

Kiba blinked, taking the time to process it. "BY YOURSELF?!" He hollered, moments later. Akamaru barked furiously.

Naruto held a finger to her lips and hushed him, which he seemed quite offended by. "Cool it, bastard! I told you, I was in no real danger! They were both still injured, and I coulda escaped if it came to it! Easily, 'ttebayo!" She said, in a furious whisper.

"You didn't even take me, or Shino, or Hinata, or Akamaru! Or even Tsunami! What if they just murdered you, eh?" He asked, his face twitching in a way that foretold of his growing aggression. Even so, his yell was confined to a whisper.

"They wouldn't have got the chance! Besides, his partner Haku likes me, he wouldn't hurt me." Naruto said haughtily, voice still hushed.

"He would've, like, four days ago! How can you trust a guy who literally fought us less than a week ago!" His arms moved wildly, stomping his foot animatedly as he quietly argued with her.

Naruto scowled, "I can sense when people have bad intentions, or they're lying! It was fiiine!" She assured, and that got Kiba to raise an incredulous brow. "No way." He retorted childishly.

"Yes way." She returned. "Then what color are my underwear?" He asked petulantly.

"Are you stupid, or just dumb? I don't have a Byakugan, jackass. You gotta tell me what color your underwear are, then I'll tell you if you're lying." She snarled, making a motion with her hands that said, 'duh.'

Raising both brows and squinting his eyes in a comically disbelieving expression, he and Naruto had a short staring contest.

"Blue." He said eventually.

Naruto deflated slightly more. "That's a lie."

He blinked. "Red." He tried again.

"Lie."

"Pink with dog-bones and purple hearts?" He asked, raising his brows to his hairline.

Naruto paused, before doing an outright double-take. "Why the hell are you wearing those?!" She asked, a disgusted expression etched into her feature.

He grinned. "Mom got 'em for me."

Then he blinked, "Hey, why are we still whispering?" He asked, leaning closer to her, all conspiratorial.

"Because we were just arguing about shinobi matters around a bunch of civilians?" Naruto inquired, her face clearly bored of all this.

"Right, that.." He seemed to think for a moment, before sticking his nose up. Akamaru barked something, and Kiba finally nodded. "I guess you're fine, so I can't be mad.." He trailed off, screwing his lips to the side.

"But don't do it again! You're pack, means you can't run off and do stupid stuff alone! Friends do stupid stuff together!" He decreed, slamming a hand on her back.

Naruto didn't say how touched she felt by the show of support, by proclaiming she was pack, but she couldn't fight the smile off. "Yeah, well, I'll remember that." She said finally. She was also careful not to mention that Kiba couldn't have come with her for negotiations anyway, lest this argument continue.

"You better!"

Their walk back to Tsunami's was mostly uneventful, and because of that they were relatively slowly in their pace, lumbering along and chatting the whole way.

"I can't believe you made friends with some random kids just by meeting them once." Spoke Kiba, who walked a few steps behind her. She turned and walked backwards to face him.

"It's because I'm awesome. If you were even half as cool as me, you'd have a ton of orphan friends." She said smugly, before turning back around to look ahead.

"Hey!" He shouted back, but Naruto took off in a sprint. "Last one into Tsunami's house is a total loser, 'ttebane!"

Her hair whipped behind her as she ran, while kiba sputtered. "This isn't fair at all, you know!" Akamaru yipped his agreement, just as Naruto was about to breach the door, it swung open and a small child barrelled into her.

The boy grunted, shoving at her with disgust. Inari, both teens realized.

"What're you doing?" The boy asked harshly, and Naruto cocked a brow. "Carrying inside your groceries. What are you doing?" Asked the blonde, a bit of snark in her tone.

Kiba walked up alongside her, holding plastic bags in both hands.

The boy seemed to study them both, before rolling his eyes and stomping off. "Be back for dinner!" Naruto chirped sarcastically in a sweet voice, making Kiba snort

.She shrugged, stepping inside before Kiba. Akamaru yipped, clearly something derogatory. "By the way, Kiba, you lose." She said, in reference to their race.

His face reddened as he prepared a retort, but she just stuck her tongue out, before scampering off. Instead of saying something intelligent or witty, Kiba let out a groan that came from the very depths of his soul.

---

Upstairs, Hinata was checking her conscious teacher's wounds.

"The puncture wounds are healing nicely, but I'm going to rebandage them anyway." The girl said, eyeing the sheen on her teacher's wounds, caused by the herbal salve she'd applied. It was a Hyuuga clan recipe, one which hurried the healing process. Allegedly, at least. "Well, that's good news, doctor Hinata." Kurenai said with a bit of warm amusement, and Hinata felt her face burn.

Taking her scissors, she began cutting off the bandages around Kurenai's more severe wound. The one on her ribcage, that is.

The scraps of cloth bandage fell off, and the well-stitched wound was revealed.

Redness tinged the skin around the wound and congealed blood made dark scabs around the stitch-line. Thankfully, though, there looked to be no infection.

Hinata breathed a sigh of relief, whereas Kurenai looked at her wound with unmasked surprise. "My, your stitchwork is phenomenal. Maybe you really should become a doctor." Kurenai said, noticing the perfect spacing between every stitch, how perfectly aligned they were.

"T-Thank you!" Hinata ducked her head, and the woman nearly frowned at how.. Normal, she was being. It seemed that her shyness was returning, for some reason. She'd hoped her experiences over the past few days would encourage her to come out of her shell.

"Don't be so meek, Hinata." The woman reprimanded, and the Hyuuga girl shifted under her intense gaze.

"R-right." She agreed quietly, keeping her eyes glued to the bandages she was tying around her teacher's midsection.

Kurenai wondered if her student's behavior yesterday was a one-off occurrence. She decided to hope that it wasn't, for Hinata's sake.

"I do believe Naruto's back now," The woman began, not missing the way Hinata's head instantly rose. "Kiba too. Perhaps you three, and Shino, could help Tsunami-san prepare dinner?" The woman suggested, a warm smile gracing her lips. Hinata's white eyes somehow seemed to brighten, and she nodded emphatically.

"Do you need help going downstairs?" The dark-haired girl asked cordially, and Kurenai snickered. She could tell Hinata was eager to go downstairs. "No, no. I'll be down soon, I'm just going to get cleaned up first.

"Are you certain?" The girl asked again, and Kurenai was much more firm. "Yes, absolutely. Now go, I need to change."

Hinata flushed, nodding as she rushed out the door, closing it behind her.

Quietly going down the stairs, Hinata walked through the entryway to the kitchen, seeing Naruto and Kiba bantering with one another.

"Oi! Hinata!" Kiba called, waving at her fondly. Naruto turned to see her, and her cheeks warmed as the blonde gave her a closed-eye smile.

"Hinata!~" She called sweetly, beckoning her over. "Tsunami-san is gonna teach us to make rhubarb pie-" She said with a bit of excitement, whereas Kiba interrupted. "The rhuu-barb is from her garden." He told her, equally excited.

Who knew that those two could be excited about baking, Hinata wondered.

"You said it wrong, dumbass." Naruto said dryly, folding her arms. He flipped his middle finger at her, and Hinata giggled.

"I-I'd like to help, too!" Hinata said, getting a grin from the rowdy pair across from her. "C'mon then," The blonde said fondly, and Hinata happily obliged, quickly rushing over to the sink to wash her hands. She made sure to scrub all the way up to her elbows, just as Shino walked in from the backdoor, alongside Tsunami.

"Oh ho~ We've got ourselves quite the team." The woman said with a wink, noticing she had a new helper in the kitchen. Hinata smiled bashfully, whereas Naruto and Kiba both gave goofy salutes. "Yes, ma'am!" She said playfully, puffing her chest.

The woman laughed, making the crow's feet by her eyes become more apparent. Naruto's fake-stern expression was faltered by the way her lips quirked up.

The Aburame boy placed the freshly picked radishes on the counter, right by where Kiba and Naruto had put all the groceries.

"Shino, honey, can you watch the udon noodles while I show these three the ropes?" The woman asked, flitting over to the trio of soon-to-be bakers. "As you wish." The boy replied stoically.

The woman hummed, clearing off an area on the counter and wiping it down. With a workstation designated, she began directing.

"Kiba, you'll remove the leaves from the rhubarb, then pass them to Naruto, who will peel them. Then slide them to Hinata, and she'll slice them." She said, carefully ensuring each of the three had something to do.

She didn't want any of them to feel left out, after all.

"When you're done, I'll put the rhubarb in a pan to gently cook, and then you'll start the pie crust."

Her three bakers nodded, and Tsunami giggled behind her hand. A wistful expression danced across her face, because her son wasn't there with them, because Kaiza wasn't.

She squashed down the feelings immediately, no need to ruin a good moment, after all. Inari would be home soon, and she would make him eat dinner with the rest of them, Tsunami resolved.

Naruto glanced over at the first prick of negative emotions, only to see that Tsunami had already righted her expression. She gave Naruto a grin, showcasing her smile lines, and Naruto returned it.

Naruto turned back to the radish Kiba passed her way, and almost began peeling it with a kunai. "Ah, ah!" Tsunami reprimanded, "Use a regular knife." The woman said, passing the girl a kitchen knife.

She nodded dumbly, putting the kunai back in her pouch, and Tsunami moved to help Shino instead. Kiba elbowed Naruto lightly, "No using murder weapons on the food." He reprimanded, and Naruto lowered.

He felt a bit guilty for his poor attempt at humor. "Sorry. Too soon."

She nodded. "Good joke, just give it a few years." She told him, and he gave a solemn nod.

"S-so," Hinata began, changing the subject. "What's the reason f-for the pies we're making?" The hyuuga girl asked, directing a look to the three awaiting pie tins.

Tsunami hummed for a moment, the warm kitchen air full of the smell of spices, the sound of bubbling noodles playing in everyone's ears.

"My dad says that the bridge should be finished in a day or so. The workers have been working their hardest to get done before Gato's men can recover. The ones you fought, I mean. I just felt like treating all of us." The woman explained.

"T-they know about that?" Hinata inquired, and Shino answered. "Rumors spread fast in small villages." He said nonchalantly, adjusting his foggy glasses.

"More like my dad can't keep his mouth shut." The woman said, a visible twitch in her brow. Naruto snorted.

Kiba quickly ruined her mood, though. "I don't think anyone needs to worry about them, though! Naruto went and negotiated with 'em this morning." He piped in, and the room went so quiet, crickets could be heard outside.

"Ah, yes. How did that go?" A voice, smooth like honey, asked from the doorway. Collectively, everyone in the room's head turned to see Kurenai, leaning against the entryway.

Naruto forced a smile. "Well, Haku was really excited about how I convinced Zabuza." She replied, and Hinata made an affronted sound of surprise.

"N-Naruto!" She said harshly, and Naruto winced.

What followed that, was a very long winded explanation, for which everyone was mostly silent, even as they continued cooking and prepping. The whole time, Naruto was faced with disbelief, disappointed nods, mixed with intrigue and various other emotions.

"So, really, it was fine! I'm fine, and now we're allied! Here is nothing to be upset over" Naruto finished her rant, shrugging lamely.

Tsunami tsk'ed, putting a pan lid over the cooking rhubarbs. "J-just because things went well, does not mean it was okay to do that without telling us!" Hinata said, a bit of ferocity in her as she wagged her finger at the blonde.

Kiba nodded along, glad she was agreeing. Naruto glowered at him.

"I told Kurenai-sensei, and she approved it." The blonde said, shifting the attention onto her.

"Sensei!" Hinata put a hand over her heart, looking genuinely betrayed. The woman winced, and Naruto felt a bit smug at that.

"I told Naruto, she can't be stupid by herself! That's like, extra stupid!" Kiba added eloquently.

Shino grunted, taking off his glasses to wipe away the fog on them. "Although I agree Naruto's behavior was reckless and dangerous, it did procure positive results, and thus we cannot be upset. Her actions resulted in an unseen course of action, one I would have never considered." Shino eventually spoke, and Naruto nodded emphatically at his perceived compliment.

Kiba wondered if she caught onto the insult in that statement. Probably not, he realized.

Tsunami bopped her on the head. "At least everything has turned out well, if Gato's men follow through on this alliance.. There'll be nothing to worry about anymore." She said, her heart fluttering at the thought. The idea of a world out from under Gato's thumb.. It sounded like utopia.

None of them had noticed that Inari had been listening in the whole conversation, no one except Kurenai. She pretended not to see the amazed look on his face though. The first glimmer of hope he'd held, in a long time, was visible all over him.

He ran up to his room, thundering up the steps.

"Oh, Inari must be home. That was quick." The woman noted, albeit late. A frown appeared on her lips, briefly.

"I can talk to him later, if you'd like." Kurenai offered, knowing that in her heart she had a soft spot for children. She'd been able to cheer up Hinata various times when she'd been serving as her ANBU guard, surely she could do the same for Inari.

That made Tsunami brighten. "Oh, would you? I've tried a hundred times, but I never get anywhere.." She trailed off, and Naruto bit her tongue.

She didn't have a very high opinion of Tsunami's son. His mother was a wonderful woman, she had spunk, was an excellent cook and had a fire in her that Gato hadn't managed to snuff out. She was unique, and sweet, and homely- She was everything that Naruto would have wanted in a mother.

The girl tasted blood in her mouth- She'd bit her tongue too hard- and forced herself to release that build up of emotion.

Feeling the aggravation slip away, Naruto exhaled.

She didn't gain anything from being angry at someone more fortunate than her. Bitterness was unproductive.

"I'll talk to him after dinner. I'd offer to help, but… It looks like you've got that covered." The red-eyed woman said fondly, causing Tsunami to giggle. "Why yes, I have quite the team of helpers." She chirped.

---

Day Six, Wave Country.

---

The night before, everyone in Tazuna and Tsunami's household went to sleep with overly full stomachs, each of them feeling hopeful about the day that was to come. Even Inari, who'd had a talk with Kurenai, seemed full of a new kind of resolve.

The next morning, Team Eight, including Naruto and Tazuna, got ready hours after dawn. Bustling around the house as they took turns in the bathroom, eating breakfast, and getting ready. Today, they'd all be working on the bridge, in hopes of speeding up it's finish.

"Bye Inari!" Kiba said, to the boy who is substantially different today. It was as if overnight, he'd changed into a whole new person. He'd even eaten breakfast right beside Kiba, which had shocked everyone except Kurenai.

Naruto guessed that whatever the woman had said to him, must've been a big deal. It had affected him greatly.

When the five left the house, they noticed something was… Different.

People bustled in the streets freely, and for the first time since they'd visited, Wave sounded lively. Compared to the usual hushed whispers and quiet voices, the town was downright loud.

People were shouting and talking, and at first, Naruto attributed it to the soon-to-be- finish of the bridge.

Kiba whiffed the air. "Somethin' reeks." He remarked, and Akamaru whined in his agreement. Naruto thought Wave's usual smell wasn't all that pleasant, mostly consisting of trash and sea-salt.

The closer they got to the center of town, though, the worse the scent was, and Naruto found herself agreeing. "Eugh, what is that.." She agreed with disgust, her face screwed up. "Decomposition." Shino answered, and Hinata's eyes widened.

That was when they saw the first body. "Oh my god." The Hyuuga said, face etched with horror.

She looked exceptionally pale. Shino flinched, whereas Kiba held his nostrils closed. "Aw, gross!"

The group of them kept walking, right into the plaza Kiba and Naruto had bickered in just yesterday. The plaza that was now littered with bodies.

In the center of it all, Zabuza's sword was in the center, skewering a lifeless body to the ground. There was no crying, no horrified watchers. People were spectating, yes- But with hopeful eyes and mugs of liquor, they stared at the murder scene with no remorse.

Gato's body had been stabbed directly through the midsection, though it was clear by his scattered organs that the sword had skewered him posthumously.

Zabuza had made a show of it, Naruto realized with delayed horror. There was a ringing in her ears, one that said this went against what she'd vowed. All these men were dead, because of her alliance with Zabuza.

Naruto felt her naivety ripped away from her. There was no room for vows like that in the shinobi world.

She understood now why everyone had been so exasperated with her last night, and had been so upset she'd recklessly run to make an alliance with Zabuza and a boy she hardly knew.

This situation had worked in her favor, she knew. Had things gone realistically, had she not been an edge case….. It could've very well been her body lying there, in the center of town.

The horror made her ears ring. The gore of it all, it was.. Terrifying, but the T&I nin within her found it impressive. Something deep and dark, in the very depths of her, saw it that way, too. Something she refused to recognize.

Kiba clapped a hand on her back, and she remembered to breathe. The world, which had lost its color, came back to life. She came back to the present, she came back to life.

The dead bodies were still there, blood and gore still littering the dirt, and the people still bustled around the edges of the scene.

As Kiba patted her back, she heard him retch.

Against her will, Naruto's ears picked up on a distant conversation..

"...Vigilante justice if I've ever seen it."

"If I find the person that did this to Gato and his henchmen, I'll buy their depraved ass a drink! Hell, I'll buy them a whole round."

Naruto forced down her disgust, her shock and horror and what-ifs-

She settled on one particular thought, one thought she refused to let go, no matter what. One thought that was like a raft in the ocean, the oasis in a desert.

Naruto clung to the idea that these men, and women, and young and old- That they deserved it.

They had this coming.

Working for a man like Gato would promise that Justice would one day swing her gavel at you- more like his sword- and you would face consequences for your misdeeds.

Their consequence happened to be death.

Fatally, Naruto realized that very same consequence likely awaited her, at the end of her career.

Suddenly, the world seemed much more grim.

She looked over, and she saw Hinata, who surprisingly looked less upset than herself. Tazuna was throwing up somewhere in the distance, and Shino had his back turned to the scene, taking in shaky, erratic breaths.

Naruto wondered if things had to be this grim. For everyone, forever, did it have to be this way?

"No," She said softly to herself, which no one seemed to hear.

She forced herself to straighten, trying to ignore the sickness cloying in the back of her throat.

"I'll take care of this, guys, take a detour to the bridge." She managed, first getting a nod from Shino, who clasped Kiba's wrist and prepared to drag him.

"By yourself?" Both Hinata and Kiba asked. Tazuna was already running off in the direction of the bridge.

"Mhm." She affirmed, and Shino grabbed Hinata's wrist and dragged his two teammates.

Good on him, Naruto thought. Putting his teammates before whatever morals might keep them here for clean-up.

Naruto took out her scroll full of experiments, the one she'd thankfully decided to carry, and withdrew an experimental sealing scroll.

A stasis seal, one designed to keep things cool. Originally, she and Tenten had made it to keep ice cream and soda in… She couldn't help but think she was defiling it, by using it for this. Unrolling it, she gagged, crouching by the nearest body.

This one, though it's arm was mangled, was in one piece.

Naruto numbed to the disgust as she continued her clean up. Picking up large intestines, spleens, livers and lungs, she couldn't even find in herself to be made at Zabuza. So long as she clung to the idea that they deserved this, she couldn't even be disgusted with him.

Though, she was certainly disgusted with the mess he'd made. Her body wouldn't stop quivering, blood on her palms and dirt on her knees from crouching on the ground.

She would certainly give the man a lecture though, if she could find it in herself.

Gato was the last body she sealed away.

Yanking Zabuza's sword free, the rancid smell of a body that had sat in the sun all day hit her nose like a brick to the face.

She was nearly sick, holding a hand over her mouth to keep herself from vomiting.

Sighing, she pushed away her disgust as much as she could sealing away the last body.

She sat there for a minute, blood and dirt on her knees, the entire plaza cleared of bodies and organs by now. Blood still wettened the dirt, puddles of it and trails across the ground.

She refused to clean that up, at least.

Forcing herself back unto wobbling knees, she felt like a deer foal just learning to walk. Looking up, she absently noticed that the people of Wave were staying at her with pity and horror. She supposed they saw something wrong with a 14 year old cleaning up the results of a massacre.

She probably would have too, were she in a different career path.

She heaved breaths, in and out, over and over. Eventually, she gathered herself enough to hobble away from the scene, back to Tsunami's house. She just needed a shower after that.

As she continued her walk, she found herself steadying, her emotions taming and eventually stilling. Her mind, too, seemed to calm.

Moreso, it became harder to think, harder to feel.

Though she didn't know it, her mind and her body were separating from one another. She didn't even notice she was seeing the world from higher up than usual.

Dissociation, Inoichi would've called it.

Tsunami must've been in the garden, because she walked all the way to the bathroom uninterrupted. She stripped of her clothes, essentially on autopilot until the ice-cold water hit her skin and brought her back to her body.

Her day had just started, and that had happened twice already. Not a very good sign.

That said, it couldn't get much worse, could it? She'd had to fight twice, kill once, look an enemy in the face and make negotiations, and then clean up intestines. Really, the only way it could get worse, was if her intestines were next to be scattered.

But she doubted that, feeling the pitter-patter of ice-cold water drops on her skin.

Copper blood rinsed away, she stepped away, leaving her dirtied socks and gloves off. Her trench-coat, tattered and torn, made her frown. Following this mission, she'd probably decide to retire it. It was clearly an impediment for an active-field ninja, and she didn't want the whole thing destroyed.

It was Ibiki's gift to her, and she'd rather cherish it at home than have it torn to rags.

Putting back on her clothes, she dug in her travel scroll for some fresh gloves, and socks too, but her hand fished out a small lip-gloss.

The lip-gloss Ino bought her, she realized, sniffling. For some reason, she applied the peach-scented gloss, but all it did for her was make her want a hug.

Desperately so.

She allowed herself to cry, alone in the guest bedroom. Sunlight from the windows cast her in rays of light, specs of dust dancing in the air.

"Can't cry forever." She mumbled, wiping at her eyes haggardly.

She was a shinobi, so this should never have hurt her as badly as it did. Realizing the inevitability of her death, the unpreventable loss of life and the ugliness of the world.

She'd had to learn this lesson twice now. More than that, actually. But it never quite hit like it did now, so far away from home. Away from her support system, away from distractions.

That said, perhaps she felt a bit betrayed by the world right now. Not Zabuza or Haku specifically, but by the world, for being so ugly. Despite her vows, the world would be ugly so long as no one worked to make it better.

Vows meant nothing.

Naruto cleared her throat, looking up at the ceiling. She hoped, then, that when she became Hokage, she could try to make the world less ugly.

But right now, she just needed to hug everyone here.

She never thought of human life as so fleeting.

A knock at the guest door caught her attention, as Naruto slid back on her sandals over her replacement knee-highs. "Come in." Tsunami opened the door slowly, "I saw blood on the bathroom sink, are you okay?" The woman asked quietly.

Naruto cleared her throat again this time, ridding herself of that sick sensation in the back of her esophagus. She nodded, "Am now."

Once again dressed and ready, Naruto barrelled into Tsunami's arms. "Umph!" The woman accepted the hug easily enough, however, patting the girl on her back.

"Gotta go- They'll get worried if I'm not back soon." Naruto told her, pulling away from Tsunami and immediately running past her. The woman simply stood there, shocked in the doorway as Naruto continued down the hall. Inari was her next victim, whom he bent over to rustle the hair of.

"Be nicer to your mom." She said simply, before speeding down the stairs and right out the front door.

He, just like his mother, was stunned still for a moment.

Naruto was already gone, however, intentionally avoiding running through the plaza again. She had no desire to see all that blood again.

She wanted to be happy, not have another breakdown. Her mind refused to even think about what she had seen, lest she remember it's impact on all five of her senses.

It didn't take long for Naruto to actually reach the bridge, and she found it to be just as glorious as her imagination had pictured it.

Enormous beams held it yards above the water, with a small portion of it still needing assembled.

Even so, the gigantic structure was impressive.

Ahead, she could see that Team 8 and Tazuna had recovered from the incident at the plaza. They seemed to be chatting by some metal beams, whilst various workers bustled around working. She supposed Tazuna must be assigning jobs, because the moment he saw her he beckoned her over.

She immediately felt a bit disturbed by how.. Normal, they all looked. Well, Hinata was still pale as hell, but aside from that… They didn't seem so upset.

Then, Naruto realized clan kids were probably prepared for that sort of thing. Subsequently, she also remembered them showing pictures of that sort of thing in the Academy.. But she'd refused to look, then.

Numbly, she figured she could've been a whole lot more prepared. "Blondie, what do you say to whippin up some of them clones of yours and transporting this metal?" The elderly man asked, and Naruto grinned.

"I'm on it!" She said, with false bravado. Summoning ten clones to lift it, she was delighted to find it only took ten of her to lift such an enormous hunk of metal.

With that, a day of manual labor began.

No one even mentioned what happened in the plaza again, and if Kiba woke up in the middle of the night because of a bad dream, no one took guesses about why. No one asked why Shino, or Naruto, or Hinata were up anyway.

They knew they'd have to report it to the Hokage here soon, but they decided they'd rather spend their last few days in Wave bantering and having fun, now that there was nothing to worry about. No need to unpack all that trauma.

---

Day Seven, Wave Country.

---

"Kiba, you're disgusting." Naruto said, as the boy squeezed a mountain of ketchup onto his scrambled eggs.

He shrugged, and she shivered with utter revulsion. Tsunami had put time into that breakfast, she'd even woken up early to make it for them before they got up.

Inari, who'd witness Kiba dump ketchup on his eggs, did the same.

Naruto let her repugnance show on her face, and Hinata did the same. It was a show of solidarity, at least. Even Shino looked slightly… Averse, to their food choices.

Kurenai was surprised at best, and disappointed at worst. Tsunami didn't even notice. Naruto supposed that, when your father was having a glass of gin at breakfast, it was probably easy not to notice a little (lot) of ketchup.

Deciding to pay them no further mind, she shoveled her food into her mouth quickly, with a small regard for manners.

"Yup. Today's the day we finish the bridge, I'm callin' it." Tazuna proclaimed, out of nowhere. Even so Naruto found herself inclined to agree.

They'd worked their asses off yesterday, both her teammates and the citizens of the village. Man, woman, and child were contributing yesterday. They'd done amazing, too, because of that.

Part of her desperately hoped Haku would show up. She wanted to see him again before she left for Konoha. If she didn't, she'd probably never see him again…

Even after Zabuza had murdered those people- Enemies, she reminded herself- She didn't feel any hostility towards him or Haku.

Better for Zabuza to murder them, than for her and Team 8 to have to, she realized grimly.

Part of her wanted to ask Tazuna to get her a shot of his strongest, just to clear her head.

Fortunately, she was more rational than that. And Tsunami probably wouldn't allow any children to drink in her household.

"I think you're right, old man." Naruto said finally, before taking the last bite of her breakfast.

Tazuna cackled. "You know what kid? We got off to a rough start, but I think you're starting to grow on this old man!" He patted his stomach with a sigh, and Shino's bugs hummed.

"I think Naruto grows on most, after a certain amount of time." Said the Aburame, getting a brilliant grin from the blonde as he pushed in his chair. He gathered the empty plates, and headed over to wash them while Hinata, Inari, and Tsunami finished eating.

"Like mold! Or bacteria!" Kiba added, standing up to help Shino wash dishes.

Naruto scowled, the moment ruined.

"Bastard." Mumbled the blonde, shoving in her chair.

Tazuna hid a laugh behind a cough, and the edges of her lips curled up. Unlike yesterday, Naruto had a feeling that today would be a good day.

The sky seemed brighter today, she thought, looking out the window. The clouds, tinged with yellow, seemed warmer- fluffier. She could hear the others readying behind her, finishing the dishes and getting up from the table. They were chatting, but Naruto wasn't paying much attention.

Fuzzy clouds drifted through the light blue sky, incomparable to the dark grays it had been yesterday, and the days before.

"Naruto! You ready?" She turned her head, looking over everyone. Inari was clinging to the fabric of his mother's shirt, paying no mind to the rest of them. That made her smile, atleast.

Hinata was fussing over Kurenai, who'd be accompanying them at the bridge today, and Shino stood with his hands tucked in his pockets, near Kiba.

In the back of her mind, she had a hard time believing it was all real. They'd been here for a week, and soon it'd be coming to a close.

"I'm ready!" She chirped in reply, and with that, she and Kiba went together out the door, Shino following a few paces behind.

Kurenai made it out the door with Hinata's watchful eyes right alongside her, Tazuna right behind them. Tsunami and Inari, to Naruto's surprise, came out too.

Naruto cocked her head slightly, an action mirrored by Akamaru.

"Inari begged me to come along, if I keep watch of him, is that okay?" The woman asked, an intentionally apologetic tone. Naruto could feel it though, Tsunami herself wanted to accompany them.

She couldn't really blame them. Kurenai looked hesitant, but Naruto spoke for her. "Sure! I'll keep a clone with you guys, just in case." Naruto said, and Kurenai gave her a sharp glance, then nodded in the affirmative.

"If Naruto will watch over you, then I see no issue." The woman affirmed, and the usually moody boy hooted with joy.

Thus, their walk to the bridge began, just as it had yesterday. Naruto tried to listen to their conversation, she really did. But she just couldn't focus. The temperature was warmer today, she could feel the warmth on her face and the slight breeze on her legs.

When they reached the plaza, the teens of the group felt their hearts still just for a second, but the rest recovered before Naruto herself. She forced herself not to look at the copper stains on the dirt.

She wondered, if she'd seen the last of Haku.

On the bridge, Inari nearly took off in a sprint, but Tsunami snatched him by his shirt quicker than Naruto could blink. Raising her hand in the vlone signal, she brought forth a copy of herself. "No exploring without your momma." Naruto reprimanded, and he nodded with a respect he hadn't had, just a few days ago.

Frankly, Naruto had no idea where that came from. Not that she cared, though.

There were an absurd amount of people out today, people with alcohol and water and books. They were waiting, she realized. For the bridge to finish.

Even the old man, who'd promised to treat her to coffee, was sitting near the edge of the bridge with a mug in his hand.

She gave him a wave, remembering his name to be Benjiro.

It took a minute, but his eyes sparkled with recognition as he chortled in surprise. "Hey there, lass!" He hollered from afar.

Naruto just grinned, "Heya, Benjiro-oji!"

Tazuna gave her a look of surprise, "Eh? You know that old fogy?" He inquired, stroking his chin.

"We've met." She replied breezily. "Feh! Me and him used to be academy buddies. Gotten into a fair few tussles with him!" He told her nonchalantly, and in order to avoid one of Tazuna's hour long story-times, she decided not to ask.

"Welp, bring out some of them clones of yers. We've got a couple bits of metal left to transport." The old man instructed, and Naruto obliged wordlessly.

Another ten clones, "Get to work, maggots!" Naruto demanded of them. Saluting her, with various, "Yes!" "At it, Boss!" "Right away, Master." "You got it." Came from their mouths, and Naruto headed over to see what Shino was up to.

Tazuna hollered orders from behind her, but she paid him no mind, watching Shino hammer nails into the service booth he was finishing up. "Want any help?" She asked.

He took a minute to reply. "Your assistance is welcomed." She grinned, "Cool."
Taking a spare hammer from the toolbox, she helped hold up the large wooden board.

As she pounded a nail firmly into place, she figured a hammer would make for a pretty damn good weapon.

Then again… She nearly shivered, a headshot with a giant hammer would have some gruesome results.

With one panel finished, she moved to the next, only a few left to do. She held the nails between her teeth, taking one out to put this board up. Shino eyed the way she held up the enormous board with one hand, and she gave him a playful wink as she flexed her free arm.

"Damn." He replied, completely stoic and inflectionless. She guffawed, but he was already hammering again.

It didn't take long for the two of them to finish the tollbooth, working together. The dark oak wood suited the charcoal colored metal the bridge was made of, at least.

Stepping away, Naruto looked over the bridge in search of another menial task to do.

That was when she spotted them, on the cliffside, a bit away from the bridge.

"Haku!" She shouted in surprise, before she could stop herself. The boy certainly noticed, because his head immediately turned her gave a shy little wave, but Zabuza pushed him so hard he nearly flung off the cliff.

Thankfully, Zabuza grabbed him by the back of his kimono, and used a quick shunshin to bring themselves straight in front of her.

Naruto thought that, despite his height, Zabuza wasn't so scary without all the Killing Intent.

Haku smiled softly at her, a light pink tinge across his cheeks. "Hello, Naruto."

"Hey!" She greeted with a charming grin, but the looming Zabuza maintained most of her attention. It took a moment of her scouring her mind for something to say to him, but eventually, she was taken back to their first battle. The battle that could have been avoided, if she'd been able to detect him.

"Hey! I've got a question for you!" She said, raising her index finger. If Zabuza had eyebrows, they would've been raised.

"Go on." He urged, voice as deep and gravelly as Naruto remembered. He was at least intrigued by whatever Naruto wanted to know.

"I couldn't sense you until you were right up on us, during our initial fight. How?" She asked, folding one arm over her chest. None of them noticed the way people were staring at them.

"How the hell am I supposed to know? Maybe you're just a shitty sensor." Zabuza said with a bit of snide amusement, only for Haku to direct him an alarmed glare.

"What kind of sensor are you?" Haku asked, his gentle speech contrasting greatly with Zabuza's gruffness.

Naruto took a minute to think about it, scratching her chin. "All of them? My sensory ability is a lot more than some simple category." She shrugged.

Haku hummed, eyes widened a touch. "What can it do? Does your ability have a name?"

Naruto nodded. "Mind's Eye of Kagura. I can sense emotions, chakra, lies, and intent passively." A look of shock crossed the two in front of her. "When I close my eyes and focus my chakra, I can see entire signatures, along with traces, and if I study them long enough I can pick up certain qualities." She paused to take in a deep inhale.

"And that of course includes being able to see their elemental affinity and the amount of chakra they have." She finished, then Zabuza and Haku exchanged glances. "But none of that matters, because I couldn't sense you coming 'til you were here. What'd you do?" The blonde inquired, tapping her foot once.

Haku hummed in thought, scratching his cheek. "All Zabuza-sama did was compress his chakra and shunshin us both to your place in the forest. When did you detect him?"

She frowned, "I don't even remember now, I guess it was on the flicker after he left you in the upper forest. I'd have noticed sooner if I hadn't just been relying on my passive ability." The teen girl griped, tilting her head slightly.

"Then that's it, ain't it? Chakra compression plus shunshin equals lapse in sensory ability. Problem solved." He drawled sarcastically, seeming completely uncaring of the weaknesses of her ability.

Her expression soured, puckering her lips to the side. She eventually rolled her eyes in acceptance, figuring she wouldn't get much more of an answer.

"Hey, you three!" Shouted the voice of Tazuna, who was standing next to an empty slot in need of a beam. Zabuza, alongside Haku, turned with a touch of reluctance. Haku looked especially uncomfortable.

"Get over here, we're puttin' in the final beam!" The old man beckoned them over flamboyantly, a grin stretched across his wrinkled face.

Both of the males seemed stunned to stillness, but Naruto moved for them. Grabbing them both by the wrist, she dragged the two all the way to Tazuna. Her clones placed the final beam before the empty slot.

She poofed the ten copies at once, making a cloud of collective smoke that took a few minutes to dispel into the daytime sky.

"Come on, let's push this thing into place." Tazuna said, and Naruto looked over to see her whole team assembling behind the beam, prepared to push it in.

Looking down the bridge, she saw Inari was longingly staring their way.

"Hold on." She said, raising her hand. Kiba looked her way, giving her a grin. "Inari, come over here!" He finished for her, and the boy across the bridge had sparkling eyes. He looked to Tsunami for approval, and she shrugged with a smile.

With that, Inari took off in a run towards them. He took a place beside Kiba, not noticing the way Hinata giggled. Kurenai wasn't allowed to help push, apparently, because Hinata made her stand aside. Probably to prevent her from splitting her stitches, she realized.

"Alrighty then! Push!" Tazuna shouted, and so they did.

Pushing the beam all at once, it slid with ease, all the way into the empty slot. It fell into place, and a beat of silence passed.

Until downright celebration began. Cheers, shouts and cries erupted all at once, and picking up on thousands of emotions at once, Naruto didn't even feel overwhelmed. However, she at least could not avoid laughing.

People started to sing, songs she'd only heard during festivals or while walking outside of bars. Drinking songs, she figured, as out-of-tune voices carried through the day.

People clinked mugs of liquor together, they danced in the streets and hollered joyously.

Naruto held her stomach, absolutely losing it as Kiba joined in their singing. He prodded Shino, trying to get the boy to join in their singing.

Naruto could feel the waves of happiness bleeding into her, it was something she'd never experienced before. It had been described to her, how a sensor too attuned into the emotions of others can experience those emotions themselves.

Haku looked at her with unbidden amusement, and Naruto couldn't help but flush at how absolutely beautiful she found him.

Straightening suddenly, Naruto found some courage in her, and said something just to test the waters.

"Haku! I'm so happy I could kiss you!" She chirped, and the boy's face gleamed red.

Zabuza got some mischievous glint in his eye. Well, a glint more mischievous than usual.

Haku was flustered, but slowly inched closer, intent on taking that offer, even if it was a manner of expression. Nodding his agreement, he was prepared to stammer his own agreement. Zabuza patted his back, not-so-subtly shoving him forward.

Naruto seemed to notice this, grabbing the collar of his kimono and pulling him down to her height. (Which, there was a sizable difference in.)

It was spur of the moment, not some true-love's kiss. It was just, well, teenage-hood in action.

Their lips met, and the crowd was cheering for them now, even Zabuza was whooping and hollering. Amongst the laughs and hurrahs, a little boy's voice broke the crowd. "Ew. You guys are gonna have cooties." Inari said, completely deadpan, and Kiba wheezed.

Naruto separated from him just to laugh at Inari's joke, ignoring a childish part of her that agreed.

"Oh. Look. Our backup arrived." Shino said dryly, catching Naruto's attention. She looked to him, and followed to where his finger pointed.

Which was where Team 7 stood. Team 7, as in Sasuke Uchiha, Sakura Haruno, some boy she didn't know, and that bastard Kakashi Hatake.

For some reason, seeing the harried look on a beet-red Sakura and a blatantly disgusted expression on Sasuke made her want to kiss Haku all over again. For some reason, the gray-haired jounin was slumped, looking a bit sweaty with an aghast expression. Well, she guessed he had an aghast expression, based on his single visible eye.

"Haku, can I kiss you again?" She asked, and Zabuza choked. "If y-you'd like!" The boy squeaked, and yes, she would, in fact, like.

So she kissed him again, with significantly less fanfare, but it made Team Seven react more negatively, and she smiled into the kiss.

"Stop makin' out already, you're gonna corrupt Hinata!" Kiba demanded, covering the Hyuuga's eyes. Who looked like she was going to faint any second, to be fair.

"I'm fine! They're fine!" She squealed, her voice so high it could fracture glass. Judging from the faint shattering noise in the distance, it did.

A man came running up to them, shoving a mug of beer into each of their hands. Naruto eyed it skeptically, and Haku immediately passed his up to Zabuza.

She sipped it, and ultimately decided to pass it up to Zabuza, as well.

"So, where are you guys going after this?" Naruto asked, after Zabuza finished chugging a whole mug. Haku took it from him before the taller man threw it, wordlessly holding it.

He looked up to Zabuza to answer, who wiped his mouth before speaking, at least. Naruto pretended not to be surprised by his face without the bandage-coverings he wore over his mouth.

"Kiri." He stated simply, and Haku deadpanned. "We're taking the money Zabuzalooted from Gato's mansion and heading to Kiri, so we can aid in the rebellion." He explained, his tone dry.

She inclined her head to side slightly, but didn't admit she had no damn clue about Kiri or whatever was going on over there.

"Don't worry, though! We'll see you again!" Haku assured much more cheerfully, and Naruto couldn't help but smile.

"Well, you could always come see me kick ass in the chuunin exams! It's not long from now!" She spoke in a sing-song voice, and Haku immediately nodded his agreement. He didn't even ask Zabuza first, to his own surprise.

"You teenagers and your damn gushy nonsense, I'm over it." Zabuza rumbled quietly, downing another mug full of beer.

---

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

Hey everyone, it's your beloved author here.

Let me first make some excuses as to why this chapter is both shoddy, and took so long. First, I have no beta, and following this, I'd like to ask if any readers would be interested in becoming my beta-reader. You could help influence the path this story takes a lot, and help eliminate all the bad stuff here. Given the enormous size of this chapter, it's hard to edit and write it all by myself. I do research for a lot of the stuff I write, too, which contributes to the time.

And finally, my dad passed away. The past few weeks have been hard for me, my depression is back and it's disheartening considering I was just getting better. I do not say this for pity, so please, do not take it that way! I merely feel bad for how long this took, I really do love my readers, and I don't want anyone to lose interest in this story because of the time between chapters.

Now, onto chapter content.

There are a lot of flaws here, you guys were right when you called me a perfectionist. But let's talk about what I tried to do in this chapter. In this chapter, I tried to give everyone their own little badass moment. Hinata uses Mizu Hari, something she does in the anime, and Shino uses his bug clones. I admit, Hinata got the most badass moments. With her trap-making, and modification of 64 Palms. I am always angry with how Canon completely nerfed Hinata, and thus I couldn't help but write good moments for her.

I also gave Tsunami far more depth and dialogue than in canon. I love her. I depicted Zabuza as much more friendly than in canon, die mad.

This chapter was originally a bit darker, but I modified it to try and balance the trauma and the love. But also, I fully intended to give the reader whiplash, because this is pretty accurate to real life. When you endure something traumatic, you still wake up the day and continue as usual. Sometimes. Sometimes you don't.

We also get to see how reckless Naruto is, and how she can be overly selfless. It's who she is, and it has it's downfalls.

Through this chapter, I learned that I despise writing fight scenes. I hate romance, too. I'm sorry the fight is lackluster, both of them. They fight much more as a unit against Zabuza than in canon, because of Naruto's vast difference in skill, and the fact that it's Kurenai and not Kakashi. She would need some backup in this fight. Also, I believe that Team 8 could outperform Team 7 at this point in canon. Don't come for me.

The newfound trauma of cleaning up Zabuza's mess is really complex and I don't want to write an essay explaining it, but this was the final nail in the coffin for Naruto's pure-heart. She knows the ninja world is ugly, and lacks that vibrancy canon Naruto does. She won't be like him. It'll be a while before Naruto stops repressing this moment, but thats after a whole 'nother horrible thing I have planned. Blah blah theres foreshadowing this chapter, blah blah you get the idea, parralels and shit.

Also, theres a reference to my other story, Of Styian Twins and Frightened Civilians.

I could address more, but I don't have the energy. I'm sorry. I should also reply to reviews, again, no energy. There's so much more I should/could say.

Should I make a tumblr or discord server for this story? Just wondering if that's something you all would be interested in. Also, do you all read these chapters in one sitting? If so, congrats, because these chapters are huge.

Next chapter, the first Chuunin Exam! Be excited. In the mean time, PLEASE check out my other stories. I'd love it a lot.