Kotori found Ensui smoking on his veranda later that evening. The lazy nod of his head the only indication that he heard her approach.

"I spoke with Tenzo. He's going to speak with the other captains tomorrow."

Ensui laced his fingers together as he rested his forearms on the railing. "Good. Ken's aware of the situation. He'll back him up."

She had told a little white lie.

She did know what Shikaku was planning. You didn't grow up as a ward of his brother without getting dragged into Shikaku's plans from time to time. He had caught her before the jonin assembly, stating it was a waste of time and he had a mission for her instead.

Shikaku had a long history of going off and doing his own thing when he disagreed with the Hokage's council. Ensui jokingly called it Shikaku's Shadow Council and that wasn't too far off from the truth. He had enough goodwill built up among the various clans and the jonin that people followed his lead without too much protest. He was a bit like Danzo, but far less malicious. There was no brainwashing kidnapped kids or committing genocide when Shikaku planned something. Which was probably why he got away with it. It was hard to argue with the one person who was actually protecting the village.

This time, he wanted her to convince the ANBU to go against the Hokage's plan and evacuate the civilians around the stadium. The clan leaders had met and agreed to enact their own emergency protocols. They just needed to be able to mobilize enough teams to secure the centre of the village before Gaara and Sasuke's match. With the help of ANBU, they could do it.

Shikaku materialized from the shadows, leaning against a tree. It took all of her self control not to startle, her heart racing. She hadn't even realized he was there.

"Are you sure Tenzo-san can be trusted?" Shikaku asked her.

"Yes. I've worked with him for several years. Kakashi trusted him."

Shikaku shared a glance with Ensui. Her former sensei shrugged. "If he's Danzo's man then he's deep undercover and has everyone fooled. You think Danzo is up to something?"

"Danzo-sama is always up to something. He would let the village burn to the ground if he could be Hokage when it was over."

Ensui's frown deepened. "Let's hope it doesn't come to that."

Shikaku was quiet as he stared off into the darkness of the forest. He sighed as he kicked a rock in front of him. "We'll have to wait until the Hokage and his council are seated before we can move. Not to mention all of the Suna guests. It'll be a tight schedule; Sasuke-kun's match is second."

"About that, Kakashi has agreed to stall Sasuke-kun until our signal," Kotori said. "It should buy us enough time to get everyone out."

Kotori knew Shikaku didn't trust Kakashi and hadn't wanted to approach him. He considered him too close to Minato and Jiraiya to go against the Hokage. Not to mention Kakashi was a wild card and Shikaku hated planning around wild cards. However Shikaku didn't know Kakashi the way that she did. Kotori knew he would always do what was best for the people of this village.

Shikaku looked thoughtful as he stroked his goatee. "I can work with that. I'll signal your birds once we're in position."

Kotori and Ensui met up the morning of the tournament. Shikaku had wanted to stack the stadium with as many jonin as possible. Not to mention, they doubled as his eyes and ears inside. Kotori had her birds positioned around the village to keep an eye on the evacuation process as well as signal to Kakashi when it was time for Sasuke to make his grand entrance.

As far as anyone was concerned, she and Ensui were there to cheer Shikamaru on for his match. Ensui stopped by to chat with Shikamaru and Asuma before they headed into the stadium. Shikamaru grumbled, but tolerated, Kotori hugging him and wishing him good luck.

"Don't go easy on her because she's a girl," Ensui warned him. "You knock her ass into the dirt, same as you would anyone else."

Shikamaru gave a dramatic sigh. "I'm not going to rough up a girl. She'll cry and it'll be a pain."

Kotori wondered if it would be offensive to cheer for Temari instead. Shikamaru needed a wake up call and Temari looked like the type to give him one.

"Kotori, have you ever cried because someone hit you?" Ensui taunted.

"No, but I made a couple of guys cry when I hit them back," she cheerfully responded.

Shikamaru gave them both a dubious look, as if doubting she had the ability to hit, never mind hit hard. Oh the little shit. Kunoichi knew exactly how to play guys who went easy on them because they were girls. It was a lesson he'd eventually learn and better in a chunin exam with a proctor than out on a mission with an enemy.

"If you lose, I'll give you something to cry about!" Ino appeared next to her teammate, cracking her fists. Sakura was awkwardly lingering behind her, clearly shy in the midst of so many strangers. Kotori gave the girl an encouraging smile.

Ino craned her neck as she looked around. "Hey Sakura-chan, where's your team? Shouldn't Sasuke-kun be here by now?"

Sakura anxiously twisted her hands. "I don't know. I hope they're not late. He's with Kakashi- sensei though."

"I'm sure they'll be here soon," Kotori tried to placate the younger girl. "Kakashi never misses the important stuff."

Kotori wondered when she had shifted from being annoyed by Kakashi's presence to advocating for him so much these days. It didn't help that she had to mentally separate Kakashi-the-shinobi and Kakashi-her-ex-boyfriend for the sake of this mission. The shinobi? Yeah, he had their back. Her ex-boyfriend? That was more complicated. Invasions made strange bedfellows, she miserably thought. Once this was over, she would be more than happy to go back to pretending he didn't exist. If she ever saw Kakashi again it would be too soon.

Kotori and Ensui took their leave and were about to enter the stadium when they were interrupted by someone.

"Dad! Tori-neechan! Wait up!"

A head with the same spiky ponytail as Ensui bobbed up and down amongst the crowds. Although bangs and a few wisps of hair escaping the ponytail gave her a softer, youthful look.

"Didn't I drop you off at school?" Ensui asked his daughter.

Rika gave a cheeky grin, a hint of mischief in her dark grey eyes. "I left a clone and hopped the fence."

"Troublesome." Ensui scratched the back of his head. "You're to go back to school. I don't want another report from your teachers that you're skipping class again."

Kotori didn't think he really cared about those reports. Kotori could tell Ensui was stressed, not wanting Rika anywhere near the fighting that would be happening. However he couldn't tell her the truth. They couldn't let on to the enemy that they were aware of the impending invasion and were slowly evacuating the village. Rika needed to be with the rest of her class. The academy was one of the safest places to be during an attack as it was the most heavily protected.

"But Dad, I want to see Shika-niisan's match! Just one and then I'll go," she tried to negotiate. "Besides, school is so boring. Hiroto-sensei won't even notice that I'm gone."

Ensui grimaced. The fact that a child regularly outsmarted her chunin teacher placed the man firmly in the moron category in his books.

"Rika-chan, if you go to school, Kotori will take you flying on her day off."

"Really?!" Rika's eyes lit up.

She had been wanting to fly since she learned Kotori had a ninja hawk summon. Her parents wouldn't let her, claiming she was too young. Which Kotori personally thought was a bit silly considering she had been flying since she could walk. But perhaps her danger meter was a bit broken. Working with genin made her question a lot of the stuff the adults allowed her to do as a kid.

"Really," Kotori promised. "But you need to go to school first."

She chuckled as Ensui sent a clone to escort Rika back to the academy and ensure she stayed put this time. He started grumbling about idiot chunin who couldn't tell the difference between a child and a clone.

"You know, I used to do that all the time as a kid."

"Yeah, I remember, your clansmen let you run wild. I'm not making the same mistake with her."

"Not my clan," she smugly retorted. "It's surprisingly easy to sneak out when your guardian doesn't think he can be outsmarted by a little girl."

"The fuck now?"

She walked off, leaving him to ponder over that fun little piece of information.

Kotori did a slow lap of the stands as she found their seats. She gave Aoba a little wink as she walked past him. She had told him she would be on duty for this event and couldn't go with him. Although he had been expecting that to mean she was dressed as an ANBU and lurking in the corners. Not that she would be in plain sight.

The truth was that any ANBU in the crowd was supposed to be dressed as regular shinobi or in civilian clothes. The only team that was dressed in ANBU robes were the ANBU commander, Hinoki and their teams. The foreign guests would assume they were the only ANBU on duty and be more relaxed. Kotori counted over thirty 'ANBU' in the crowd when there should be eight. Not to mention all of the Suna shinobi who had been permitted to come as spectators and guards to their Kazekage. Or anyone they had disguised as civilians.

"Large crowd," Ensui muttered once he caught up to her.

A little too large, the spectacle had drawn a good number of curious civilians out to watch. Not to mention the viewing platform that was filled with feudal lords and noble families. That was a lot of people who would be in the line of fire once the fighting started. Kotori hoped they could protect them all. It would have been easier if the Hokage had just forbad civilians from attending altogether, but that would have looked suspicious to their guests. This entire charade was supposed to show off their strength to potential clients.

"I'm surprised your team didn't make it," Ensui said once they took their seats.

Kotori shrugged. "It was an odd year, there was a lot of surprises. Usually rookies don't make it this far their first exam."

Besides, the reality was that two members of the same clan wouldn't have been permitted to make it to the finals. Their guests would have found that 'boring' and there was always pressure to put on a good show at these events. The flashier, the better. Ryoku and Shikamaru would have been pitted against each other in the preliminaries. And while Ryoku had three years of training and experience on Shikamaru, Kotori wouldn't count the younger boy out completely. He would have received more intense training from a young age as he was expected to one day lead the Nara. There would be pressure for him to be the best at his clan techniques.

Fortunately there was no ill will between the main and branch lines in the Nara. Neither would have been aiming to actually hurt the other. Not like the Hyuga.

Poor Hinata had been in the same hospital room as Mimi during her recovery. Mimi had quickly befriended the younger girl, making it her mission to cheer her up. It helped that they had Kiba in common. The Inuzuka cousins were an excellent source of distraction. And in turn, Hinata had been a temporary distraction from Mimi's own problems.

While Mimi had started walking again, she still faced a long road ahead of her. The last surgery wasn't as successful as the doctors had hoped. The next surgery they wanted to try was risky. Without it, Mimi would never be able to continue as a kunoichi. However, it had a high failure rate and could leave her wheelchair bound for the rest of her life. They were holding off until the tournament was over to do it, as the hospital had been warned to reschedule any major surgeries in case the emergency room was needed.

Ryoku had been released from the hospital within two days and had been sent off on a mission with Kouta as soon as the doctors cleared him. While the jonin and ANBU were being kept close to the village, the younger chunin and genin were being sent out on a lot of external missions. Someone had to keep the money flowing into Konoha. Kotori thought it would be good for the both of them to get more experience without her.

"Speaking of surprises," Ensui nodded to the match down below.

Naruto's eyes had narrowed to slits and had taken on an unnatural red colour. Kotori suddenly felt like she was being smothered by a thick, burning, malicious chakra. She felt hopelessly afraid, like a bird caught by a much larger predator. Naruto was drawing on the chakra of the nine tails fox, she realized. All around her, she could hear the buzz from other chunin and jonin. There was a nervous apprehension in the air. No one had anticipated this happening. The boy charged towards Neji and there was an explosion of dust and debris, leaving everyone on the edge of their seats. When the dust cleared, Neji was still standing while Naruto had collapsed.

Ensui lifted his eyebrow as the real Naruto popped up from the ground and dealt the final blow, winning the match. "That was - unexpected."

"The entire exam has been like that." Kotori couldn't help but feel a little validated. It wasn't just her students. Neji was another student who had been favoured to win the tournament and be promoted to chunin. Yet he had lost to Naruto who had been... well, viewed as dead last. However if Naruto had learned to control the nine tails chakra... that would be a game changer for him.

With Naruto's match finished, she quickly checked in with Shikaku and Inoichi. Her bird sang out chika dee indicating that the first match was over.

"Not yet," Shikaku said. "We're only halfway done."

Kotori returned to her body with a grimace. She didn't know how long they could hold off Sasuke's match before he was disqualified. After that, it was unknown how Suna would react. Fortunately, as Kakashi had predicted, the Kazekage intervened on Sasuke's behalf and it was suggested they move on to the other matches. Kotori could see Genma's annoyance when Kankuro abstained from his match. Having two matches ahead of Sasuke and Gaara would have given them more than enough time to evacuate the village.

It was all up to Shikamaru who was doing a remarkably good job at stalling, considering he wouldn't get up off the ground...

Ensui slowly ran a hand over his face, his eyes peaking out between his fingers."This is embarrassing. MOVE YOUR FUCKING ARSE."

As the minutes ticked on and the crowd booed him, it was apparent that Shikamaru had no intention of moving. Kotori briefly wondered if his father had put him up to this.

"Is he - ?" Kotori tried to ask.

Ensui seemed to catch on to her non-question. "No. He's just making a complete fool out of himself. I bet Ken that he would make chunin. That's how much confidence I had in him. And he does - what is this? Is he just going to lay there all day? I never thought I'd be rooting for some Sand princess to kick my own nephew's ass so badly."

Elsewhere, Asuma was sliding down in his seat looking mortified by his student.

"Maybe he's waiting to use cloud cover for shadows?" Kotori tried to give Shikamaru a little credit.

Ensui looked despondent. "No. He's lazy, just like his father. I always thought Yoshino was exaggerating when she complained, but this is worse than I thought possible."

In the end, Shikamaru managed to give a surprisingly good show as he subtly maneuvered Temari between the pair of holes and used his shadow possession jutsu to catch her from behind. Ensui was bragging about his nephew's genius right up until Shikamaru gave up.

Ensui's eye twitched. "Well, he doesn't need to win to be promoted."

Chika dee dee dee

She heard her bird sing out in her mind. Shikaku and the others were finished evacuating the village. Kotori glanced around before subtly holding the bird seal. She managed to find Kakashi waiting in his apartment with Sasuke. Her bird hopped on his windowsill, merrily chirping to catch his attention.

Chika dee dee dee

Kotori returned to her body. This was the moment they had been working towards. Everything had fallen into place. Except for one thing... Kakashi and Sasuke still did not appear, even as the Hokage agreed to wait ten more minutes before disqualifying him. Frustrated, Kotori returned back to her bird to tap on his window again, only for the two of them to be gone. She used her jutsu to search the village, but couldn't find a hint of silver hair anywhere.

"Did you - ?" Ensui quietly asked her.

"Yeah, five minutes ago," she hissed back. "They're not in his apartment and I can't find them anywhere in the village. I don't know what they're doing. Taking the scenic route?"

"I swear, planning anything around Hatake's punctuality - " Ensui grumbled.

Even Genma seemed perplexed, subtly glancing towards Kotori who could only shrug.

"Uh, because the time limit has expired, the last match - " Genma dragged his feet while making the announcement that Sasuke was disqualified.

Kotori could hear the tweeting of a bird behind her. She glanced up to see a familiar grey jay seated up in the rafters. He had a crest of feathers that looked eerily reminiscent of Kakashi's own hair. She smiled to herself. So he had been keeping an eye on the arena after all.

There was a whirlwind of wind and leaves in the middle of the arena. Finally, Kakashi and Sasuke had arrived. There was a deafening roar from the crowd, thrilled that Sasuke had shown up.

"Well, I'm sorry we're late," Kakashi cheerfully said, scratching the back of his head and appearing apologetic. As if this wasn't planned ahead of time. He and Genma bantered back and forth about Kakashi's tardiness rubbing off on Sasuke.

"Your arrival was barely in time," Genma said. "But he hasn't been disqualified."

The match itself was impressive and certainly worth waiting for. If it was any other year, Kotori would have been enthralled by it as her peers were. However this year, she spent the match observing the other spectators, waiting for some signal that an invasion was about to get underway. She watched as a pair of the fake ANBU patrolled the upper rim around the stands. Kotori could feel her eyes getting heavy as the genjutsu settled over the stands. It looked like Suna and Oto were finally making their move.

"Release."

She broke free of the genjutsu and looked around at all her fellow jonin who had done the same. Kakashi and Gai were fighting back to back against the enemy shinobi. Aoba had hopped onto the railing and was using a fireball jutsu to take out a few more. Genma had engaged Baki in a fierce battle down below, aiming to fulfil his promise to Yugao and avenge Hayate.

Kotori hopped onto the back of her seat, most of her techniques were long-range attacks and the fighting here was a bit too close. Taijutsu it was, then.

A nearby enemy engaged her in a fast and furious battle. Kotori kept trying to put as much distance between her and the enemy as possible so that she could take them down with her lightning arrow. She aimed a roundhouse kick to their chest, channeling chakra to her foot. However they threw shuriken that had her abandoning the technique halfway through to dodge the projectile. Annoyed, she hurled two wind blade jutsu at them in rapid succession. While a vast majority of Konoha shinobi were born with fire affinities, Suna shinobi were often born with wind affinities. Her wind blade was easily deflected by the enemy and her typhoon wind turned against her, knocking her backwards. Kotori managed to turn her fall into a somersault. She leapt to her feet with the intention of firing her lightning arrow this time, only to watch the enemy be engulfed by Ensui's flamethrower jutsu instead.

"Take them out, I'll guard your back!"

She didn't need to be told twice. Kotori's hands raced through her seals before pulling back her right arm in imitation of aiming an arrow. She let one fly, piecing the back of an unsuspecting enemy. She took out two more, one engaged in battle with Akimichi Junpei and another going for Kakashi's blind side.

"Take her down!" She heard someone shout, most likely in reference to her.

Ensui used the shadows from the seats to length his own, grabbing two shinobi in their track.

"What the - " One of them cried out.

"What? Didn't see the family resemblance between me and the kid from earlier?"

Kotori took them both out with her arrows before they had the chance to even look at the ground.

That's when she saw him. The jonin leader from Oto. The one who had held her captive all those years ago and who's team had been responsible for hurting hers. Kotori could hear her heart pounding in her chest as she aimed her lightning arrow, intending on ending his pathetic life once and for all. With a snarl, she released it, watching as it shot through the air. However he easily blocked it with his katana. The lightning arrow ricocheted off into the sky, exploding above them.

"Do I know you?" The man taunted her. "You look familiar."

"Oh, I'm no one important," she brightly responded. However underneath her tone was a deadly edge. "Just the kunoichi who's about to kill you."

She ducked and dodged as he tried to cut her down with his katana, ruthlessly sending wind blade after wind blade in retaliation. She parried and blocked his moves with only her kunai, allowing him to get closer and closer each blow. To the observer, he was winning, but Kotori knew she was in total control. The moment the katana cleaved through her shoulder, she dissolved into dozens of chakra birds, each of them swarming him. He swatted at them, trying to scatter or dissolve them as they pecked and clawed at his face. However her chakra birds could feel no pain, only her determination, so kept at it until they completely covered him. That's when Kotori detonated them, obliterating the last of her captors into dust.

The real her was knocked back from her own explosion, flying into the wall behind her. Kakashi appeared standing over her, offering a hand to pull her up.

"You good?" He asked.

It was like the world slowed down around them and all she could focus on was Kakashi. It had been a long time since both grey and red looked at her that way. Her treacherous heart was doing somersaults in her chest. She reached up, allowing him to pull her to her feet. "Yeah, I'm okay."

He clapped a hand on her shoulder before disappearing back into the midst of the fighting. Kotori tried to clear her head; fighting together had her reminiscent of their time together in ANBU. It was nothing. Refusing to be distracted for any longer, Kotori ran through her seals once more, shooting off more lightning arrows.

It was hours later when the battle was finally over. The enemy had retreated as soon as the barrier around the Hokage and Orochimaru fell. The jonin stood around the arena, surveying the damage when Hinoki appeared in the middle, still dressed in her white ANBU robes.

"Lord Third was killed," she gravely announced to the stunned crowd.