I give you the next chapter!

Enjoy.

Sakura watched as a set of hanger doors, opposite of the ones she originally came through, began to open. The other side of the slowly widening gap held a metal room. It was slightly smaller in size when compared to the current one she was in, but not by much. Is that where she needed to go? As if the ship heard her, the lights on the control display lit up with a quiet hum. Not even a second past and the ship was moving on it's own.

It flew into the newly opened area, stopping as quickly as it arrived. The doors behind closed with a heavy clang, and her heart fluttered with anticipation. This was it, she was off to save Inner. Hissing echoed out as the wall in front of her retracted, casting her thoughts and the rest of her plans into silence.

For a moment, she could only stare out at the black expanse.

It was beautiful.

Out of all the things she saw today, never in her life did she imagine she would be this close to the night sky. The ship flew out and Sakura inhaled in surprise. Even the times she spent stargazing with Ren couldn't fully capture the beauty that was currently before her. Tiny beacons of light in the endless darkness surrounded her, all twinkling like diamonds. It was a sight she would remember forever.

Too bad she had no one to share it with.

Sakura blinked back the sudden emotions and closed her eyes. She wouldn't be alone for long.

'How much longer until we get to Inner?'

'We are heading into hyperspace soon, then it should only be a matter of minutes. Hold onto something.'

Sakura grumbled at yet more words she didn't know, but complied and held onto her seat.

"Hyperdrives engaged, entering hyperspace in three… two… one. Hyperspace travel has been initiated. Estimated time of arrival is two minutes standard time."

The change was immediate.

Sakura could barely keep her eyes open. The action itself fighting a force that seemed to want to flatten her against the seat. The ship vibrated with power as it traveled through a rainbow of colors, and she really hoped the two minutes the announcement said would be over soon. This was something she did not want to experience again.

When the pressure released Sakura nearly melted into her seat. One would think an alien race who could travel through space would make travel like that more comfortable. She certainly would have.

'We have more important priorities than your comfort, you must leave this ship as soon as it docks.'

'It's called having standards.'

'Time to move, focus.'

'You don't get to tell me that.'

"Arrival imminent. Docking has commenced."

Sakura looked out one of the side windows and her eyes nearly popped out of her head. Right there was a world larger than anything she had ever seen before. The surface was filled with different stripes of color, Reds, oranges, and pinks all blended together in an intricate pattern. Were they clouds? It was hard to tell.

When she could finally tear her eyes away she noticed they were approaching a small building. The shape was strange. Multiple circles of various sizes stacked on top of each other. Like coins, if she had to give a comparison. But that wasn't the weirdest part, no. That would be left to the hovering? Floating? Nature of the building itself. Sakura didn't know how to describe it, just that it was somehow there sitting in the middle of space. It made her want to learn more about everything once she got home. She's heard whispers about space and spacetime jutsus before, but now that she's has seen the real thing it made her more interested to find out.

The ship approached the lowest ring on the leftmost side, in what she assumed was the area the ship would be docked at. She was grateful that she didn't have to steer the ship herself, not that she would have done a bad job of course.

'What's the plan?'

'As soon as we dock, you will exit the ship, leave the hanger room, and turn down the third hallway on the left. There will be a supply closet close by, the only door without a glass panel in it. Once you are inside I will give more instructions.'

'Sounds simple enough.'

"Docking completed. Lowering rear hatch."

Sakura unstrapped herself, grabbed her gun, and left.

'You don't need your gun for this part.'

'Really? Why?'

'No one will stop you. That body has a high rank, Major, and the uniform is of the previous generation. Only those who have been in the military for years are allowed to still wear it.'

Then why didn't she do that earlier at the other building?

'That was a station for material transfer and heavy trauma medicine. An El'os of your rank wouldn't have been there as anything other than a patient.'

Sakura holstered the gun unwillingly. Nothing had gone wrong yet listening to the voice's words, but she couldn't help but be suspicious.

'If I get caught it's your fault.'

'We are running out of time, go.'

Sakura scrunched her nose but left the ship, stepping out into a copy of the previous hanger. Exiting the room led her out to a hallway. The only way to go was straight, so without further prompting she began to walk, searching for the correct turn. A minute passed when a few El'os entered her view, and it took every ounce of training for Sakura not to tense up.

The few men and lone woman saw her and froze, moving to the sides of the hallway, where they crossed their wrists and bowed.

Was she supposed to do anything?

'Ignore them, they are saluting a superior officer.'

Sakura walked past them with her head held high. It was a great feeling, being treated with the respect she so rightly deserved. If every El'os she met was going to greet her like that, then she might enjoy her time in this body more than she thought.

It wasn't long before she was standing outside of the supply door. Unlike all the other doors it didn't open before her, nor was there a blue scanner for her to place her hand on.

How was she supposed to get in?

'These scanners are hidden, place your hand on the center of the door and it should open.'

As soon as Sakura did it opened. Quickly she stepped inside, though there wasn't much to see. More blue scanners lined the walls, and crates were stacked below them.

'There should be a square vent somewhere close to the floor. Find it, get inside, and open the box along the inner wall.'

Unfortunately for her, all parts of the lower wall were blocked by crates. An annoyance for sure, but she would make due. Picking a wall of the room at random she started the search, moving crates away to look for anything that resembled a square. Minutes passed before Sakura finally found it, and swung her leg back before kicking the grate. With a clang the metal crumpled. A smile formed on her face at the sensation, these boots were quite nice indeed.

She pulled the metal out of the way and crawled in. The box wasn't in that deep, or at least that's what she figured considering half of her body was still sticking out into the room. Opening the box she saw a variety of switches, flipped up in down in a sequence Sakura didn't understand.

'Any ideas?'

'Flip the top row into their opposite positions, then flip the two in the bottom right down.'

'And…. done. Now what?'

'Now we head to the cells.'

Sakura crawled back out the way she came, making sure to put the crumpled metal in the vent, and covered the opening back up with the crates she moved. As soon as the door opened there was chaos.

"Western quadrant breached, all personnel to their stations."

The message chimed off again, seeming to repeat itself in a loop, while a red light flashed from the ceiling.

'What exactly did that do?'

'Powered down the cameras and opened a few exterior doors. It will give us time for the extraction. Continue down this hallway, she should be at the end through the door. First cell on the right.'

Sakura didn't waste time. With no El'os in sight she quickly reached her destination and approached the cell. She placed her hand on the scanner.

"Door opening."

She finally made it.

.

For the third time Naruto flexed his hands, as if he could still feel the bitter cold of the river deep in his bones. His body had already healed thanks to Kurama, but it didn't stop him from flexing them again. He was happy his punishment was done, he learned his lesson…

A lesson about how much Kakashi-sensei sucked and how his stupid book needed to be thrown into a fire.

He never wanted to wash his smelly sensei's clothes ever again.

Naruto flopped onto the ground with a groan. Sasuke, the bastard, brought out the worst in him. And with Sakura-chan not here to take his side and prove how awesome and right he was, Naruto knew he had more dates with the river in the future.

He was an honest man, if nothing else.

'You? A man? At least your jokes are pleasing worm.'

'Eat me.'

'You aren't worthy.'

'That's not… whatever I don't care.'

'Do not be envious worm, perhaps one day you will attain that honor.'

Naruto rolled his eyes and decided to block him out for the rest of the day. He would rather spend his time looking for his horrible sensei, than try to converse with an uppity fossil. On the bright side it was almost time for his genjutsu lesson, but like usual, Kakashi-sensei was off doing who knows what somewhere else. At least he didn't have to wait long anymore.

Thirty minutes passed and Naruto began wondering if he was wrong. Unless… was the lateness on purpose? Was it all apart of the lesson? He frowned. That would be something his Sensei would do, maybe he was hiding from him like Sakura-chan would do when they sparred.

Naruto stood from his spot on the grass searching for any signs of his elusive teacher. Nothing obvious stood out, and he couldn't hear any giggling in his immediate surroundings. That ruled out Sensei reading close by at least. He would have to search further away. Naruto made a sign and two clones appeared in front of him. He pointed in two opposite directs, one heading deeper into the woods, and the other heading towards civilization. With a nod each clone saluted and darted off without a word.

He continued to search, checking the river, trees, even a random hole in the ground, but found nothing. What was he missing? It hit him all at once and his face turned bright red.

He needed to flare his chakra, right. Naruto put his hands together and pushed.

A flash of gray appeared out of the corner of his eye as his chakra coated the surrounding area. He smiled.

He found him.

Naruto sprinted towards his teacher, withdrawing some kunai and throwing it. His aim was true but the ash colored blob moved too fast for him, the kunai's reaching their destination a hair too slow. Naruto did his best to track him through the trees, but after one hard collision with a branch he lost sight. He continued in the direction he last saw Kakashi-sensei and ended up out in a small clearing alone.

"Naruto? What are you doing out here?"

At the question he turned around, seeing Kakashi-sensei standing behind him. Naruto narrowed his eyes.

"Looking for you! I saw you hiding from me in a genjutsu, don't try to lie to me!"

Sensei looked at him confused.

"I was making sure Sakura-chan was alright before our lesson when I saw you gone. Whatever you saw wasn't me. "

Sensei looked out into the words before focusing back on him.

"Now, are you ready for your lesson?"

Naruto wasn't convinced. Sensei has lied to them before, he couldn't take his words at face value at all. Still, a part of him did wonder if he was telling the truth.

If that wasn't Sensei, who did he see? Naruto shook his head, he didn't have time for this, it was time to learn about genjutsu.

.

The pair moved back to their original spot by the river, and Naruto sat down eagerly to listen to his Sensei's lesson. He had been waiting for this for days. He would finally be able to help Sakura-chan!

"So you want to learn how to cast genjutsu?"

He nodded his head rapidly. His body wanted to bounce with excitement but Naruto contained it.

"Good, because that will never happen!" Kakashi-sensei said with a bright eye smile.

It took a moment for the words to register before it hit him.

"What! What do you mean I won't be able to cast genjutsu! You said you would teach me! How can I help Sakura-chan now?"

"I said you would have a genjutsu lesson, not that I would teach you how to cast it. And with the way you are now you will never be able to. Your body is completely out of balance and heavily skewed towards yang chakra. If you had all of Kurama inside it would be different, but since you only have the yang half genjutsu will be impossible."

Naruto felt his heart drop into his stomach. What was he supposed to do now?

Sensei walked over and patted him on the head.

"Fear not my cute genin, I will teach you an alternative that should work just as well."

Naruto perked up at that.

"Really? What?"

"That… is a secret." Sensei brought a finger up to his lips before pulling out a stack of paper, ink, and a brush tossing it at him. Naruto scrambled but was able to catch everything before it dropped to the ground.

"I will tell you after you copy the character on the top sheet five hundred times." With that, Sensei left in a swirl of leaves.

Naruto groaned.

Besides learning that he would never be able to do genjutsu, he learned another lesson. Sensei not only sucked, but was the worst teacher ever.

Naruto plopped onto the ground, and sluggishly picked up the brush.

It was going to be a long night.

Sakura sees space for the first time, and Naruto gets his dreams crushed. You know, everyday stuff, lol.

Had a rough time writing this one for whatever reason, but I finished it!

Next chapter like always, will be out on a Sunday at some point in the future.

Thank you for reading!