So many fuzzy, indistinct sensations scampered around. Malformed half-born thoughts tumbling turbulently together trying to tie themselves together in some semblance of sense. Naruto wasn't able to name a single feeling rising above the others in the cruel red haze that suffocated rationality... Cold and clammy, something caressed the hot wet pain on his chest. It started low and moved its way up, both calming the burning heat with its dampness and eliciting etching excitations of discomfort as it moved.

Thoughts finally cut through the malaise that he had sunk into. Naruto began to take stock of his situation, a task made infinitely more difficult by the sensation of pain bombarding his brain from every direction; they threatened to drag him into complete unconsciousness and most certainly would have succeeded but for that cold dampness that had moved back to his belly and was sliding its way up his chest again; that and some undefinable sense that falling asleep now would permanently transport him to the land of Nod.

His sight was dark and blurry except for the bright splashes of color and light that seemed to come from behind the lense of his eyes. Focussing hard on the world outside of his head, he could make out ghostly blue shadows and reflections that were too steady to be pain overwriting his vision. Something moved in the lower corner of his view. Commanding head and eyes to move so that he could better assess the situation he looked down, but his muscles complied only begrudgingly and with many uncomfortable complaints. Something black and shaggy was sliding up and down his torso, clearly the source of the cold wet feeling that still slithered over his skin.

That was another thing, his clothes, long tattered and ragged, were now ripped and torn. The vast majority of the front of his wardrobe was missing. Rough uneven edges showed that they had been unceremoniously defaced, much like the skin underneath. Like the clothing above it the skin of his chest looked like it had been scraped off by a massive medieval cheese grater. Blood dripped as crimson tears until they met a flowing stream, making a complex river network on his chest until it pooled in the oceans on the rocky floor beneath him. When they dark mop of hair moved down to his belly again, Naruto saw that the cold sensation had disturbed the blood, seemed to be sucking it away.

The cold sensation was a tongue, Naruto's fuzzy brain supplied, the young girl - possessed by a demon - was hungrily, but tenderly lapping up the sanguine liquid that was flowing from his chest and face and misplaced nose. Unbidden a wave of terrible, incomprehensible melancholy rose up in his throat; even for a second shutting out the panic that was settling in his stomach. The moment passed, however, before his lapse in awareness did any lasting harm.

Still his kunai was aglow with chakra, so he made a swipe at the demon with it. Leaping back she hissed and sputtered. With blood dribbling down her chin and neck she looked at Naruto with wide eyes. Emitting a terrible screech that sent more shivers down Naruto's spine then when Iruka accidentally scraped the chalkboard in the Academy. It threw itself at him.

Naruto was barely able to roll out of the way of her tiny but terrible hands. Forcing himself to stand, Naruto again narrowly avoided certain death. Now she was crouching in front of him, suddenly her hand shot out and wrapped itself around his ankle. Again Naruto felt the impossibly powerful grip of the young girl threaten to crush his bones. A foot applied with considerable force to her face was enough to persuade her to let go this time.

Naruto jumped back as quickly as his injured body would allow. Slowly the girl rose in the gloom and turned to face Naruto. He stared at her face, carefully watching for any movement that might give away her next action, and maybe give him a fraction of a second more to dodge. Suddenly the overwhelming sense of sadness returned. As he watched her face, the expression of rage and hunger couldn't hide the deeper pain expressed by the two solid onyx eyes. Unbidden the thought arose: what was this girl like before the demon took her body?

There was no time to further ponder that question. At the moment he didn't have a navel to contemplate much less a second to spare for silly thoughts. A demon was upon him.

Clumsily Naruto dodged the strike and somehow again tottered back out of her immediate reach. The cave was broad here and the floor dry and well trod, obviously part of the main trail that cut through the earth. Naruto backed up as far away from the wall as he could when the light of his glowing kunai revealed the demon child crawling up the wall like some oversized four legged spider. She launched herself of the wall, knees and elbows bent in such a way to provide the maximum amount of thrust regardless of normal human anatomy.

She, thankfully, landed just short of Naruto. The momentum of the leap not totally expended yet, Naruto lunged at the opening. Training, sparring, forms, or kata, none of that mattered now: stick it with the pointy end was about all Naruto could remember of his training. Fluidly the demon girl dodged the glowing blade. Somehow bending her arm reflex, far beyond a straight line, she made a swipe at the throat. Before she could sink her nails in his flesh however Naruto slammed his fist into the unhinged joint and the demon screamed.

Naruto smiled grimly, at least he wasn't the only one who could feel pain in this fight to the bloody death. The demon slunk back toward the shadows, but hovered menacingly at the edge of the circle of blue light cast by the kunai. Naruto notice that she held the elbow close to her body, obviously he had managed to inflict some retribution for the wounds she had caused him.

You know, right now, she didn't look like more than a dirty lost child. Scared, hurt, and alone, she could have been an ordinary girl, separated from her family who had been passing through the cave. Her hair, oily, tangled, covered in grime and blood hung limp from her pale scalp and dragged against the ground. How long exactly had she been living here like this?

Well if the brief had been correct the rumors of a demon in the cave had started months ago.

Then again, something occurred to Naruto: who could tell rumors if everybody who had seen the demon had died? The books that he had read about the Dark Trail Tunnel had talked about how easy it was to get lost in here if one wasn't careful. There were dozens of people who got lost every year in here, even big important groups of people.

No time to think much more about that now. She was attacking again. Naruto dodged and dove away from the girl, taking opportunities as he saw them. Unfortunately this was the best he could do. He didn't feel as terrible as he had a few minutes ago, but he had still lost several layers of skin off of his chest and his nose was still out of place.

He had to stay away from the walls as best he could, because there the demon had access to another dimension of movement, which place him at a severe disadvantage. As if all of his other problems weren't bad enough.

The fight wore on. Some how the unstoppable ball of deadly movement that was the result of a demon possessing a young child began to slow. It was kind of funny, Naruto could almost see the girl, happy, clothed, and with shorter hair driving her parents crazy running around the house. She might have crawled into cupboards and banged pots and pans together to draw attention to herself and away from her siblings. She was hungry for blood and the flesh of man now, but when she had been an ordinary girl she probably loved attention.

There was no way her hair could have grown that long while she lived in this cave. It was the growth accumulated over her whole short, but unfortunate life. It probably only knew the blade for small trimmings and touch ups. Maybe that was why Naruto felt another bolt of sadness and sympathy for the pitiful creature when his chakra enhanced blade chopped through her hair as she dodged one of his swings.

Naruto wondered if she had any siblings. Probably a brother, Naruto's blood-starved brain suggested. Sure, why not? She could have had an older brother. She could have had a mother and a father and an older brother. They could have been a happy merchant family; not wealthy but well to do in the "we-know-when-our-next-meal-is" kind of way, carrying their trade by themselves from one end of the Land of Fire to the other. Well, before some creature from the abyss interrupted their journey.

Naruto didn't know why he was creating some sympathetic backstory for the thing trying to kill him (and very nearly succeeding every time she attacked). It wasn't particularly useful in helping him dodge, nor was it doing anything to help him come up with a way out of this mess. Suffering from blood loss due to the massive leak in his circulatory system though, his brain seemed to only have two tracks for his trains of thought: one connected "DODGE" station and "STICK IT" terminal and the other meandered through his imagination revealing the landscape of this girl's made up life.

Stupid brain.

Carefully she crawled up the cavern wall, turning her head to keep Naruto's shining blade in the corner of her eye. After the frenzied action this break was agonizing. Naruto's muscles, skin, and bone protested, hating the idea of staying in this position for so long. Naruto's brain on the other hand finally decided to get back on a more useful track. Going back over her attacks Naruto realized a pattern. If she could, the demon girl would attack from behind or from the left. As expected, attacking his weaker side and avoiding the glowing blade in his right hand was common sense, but there was more to it than that. Even when his thrusts and jabs were way off the mark she would shy away from the blade.

Perhaps there was something there.

Naruto's bones hated sitting still, but apparently they hated moving even more. The command to move forward was only partially fulfilled. Spotty service in his body turned out to be worse than no service. Naruto tumbled forward when he shifted his weight in preparation for a mad dash at the kid on the wall but his legs weren't ready to run.

The ringing, not quite sound, sensation of falling was still echoing in his ear when he heard the soft sound of small feet hitting the stone floor. His head was situated in such a way so that he couldn't see her, but he could hear her approach. Slowly, cautiously the sound of her small bare footstep got closer and closer. His body had finally had enough, movement was no longer an option. His joints had locked up and worse than feeling frozen, there was this odd sense of unnatural heat against his skin.

He could hear the blood pumping in his ears. It threatened to drown out the footsteps.

The hair on the back of his neck shot up.

He felt the thin, small, burning hot fingers slide around his throat.

It was officially do or die.

Her hands clamped down on Naruto's neck and the spindly arms lifted him up. A small foot slammed itself down on top of Naruto's spine making him bend in ways almost as unnatural as the girl herself. This grip could juice whole oranges, smash melons, crush skulls.

Which would happen first? Would his head pop off? Would she snap his spine?

Something inside Naruto made him choose: do. Spasmodically Naruto jerked his arm back and caught the girls ankle with his blade severing the achilles tendon.

The hands around his neck disappeared. The pressure on his back fell away. Naruto dropped face first into the cavern floor and rolled over to look at the complete blackness above.

And then the shrieking began.

It was the kind of sound one expected to issue forth from the deepest pit of hell and torment. The kind that appealed to the deepest most primitive part of the brain, the part that dealt in the purest form of fear. As the single sense that Naruto had left - darkness filled his sight, his nose was still in the wrong spot, his whole body was numb with pain, and the only thing he could taste was his own blood - it was so much louder than it should have been.

He felt some unidentifiable thing land on his hand. On their own his fingers curled around it and held tight as it spasmed and struggled, wriggling and flailing around in the darkness. No matter how it struggled, Naruto's stoney grip wouldn't release it.

Unbidden, but inspired by the screeching dark Naruto's mind wandered back to the possessed girl. Images flitted through his mind.

Father smiled down on her.

Clinging tight to her mother as they passed into the mouth of the dark cave.

Brother bent down and ruffled her hair, "Don't worry. It's just a little dark. You're not scared of the dark, like a baby, are you?"

"No! I'm not a baby!"

Brother laughed, "you sure sound like one to me."

The shrieking, impossibly, grew louder. Echoing inside and outside Naruto's head.

There was something in the darkness!

Father stumbled to the ground. The torch he had been holding landed on the damp stone floor, sputtering and sparking, but it didn't go out. It cast strange evil shadows against on the wall. One like a hand reached down. Moving toward them, moving toward Father, the shadow grew.

It had a face.

It smiled.

It opened it's mouth.

Crack. Crack. Crack.

Screams. Starting deep and masculine growing louder and higher every second.

Crunch.

Screams stopped.

Mother was screaming.

In her arms running.

Brother was crying.

They were running.

Into darkness.

Running.

Black on black,

Huge white eyes.

Great big fingers.

Reaching.

Suddenly light.

A room with a torch.

Stumbled. Falling.

Tumbling. Crawling.

Mother?

Black on red.

No more mother.

No more brother.

Just her.

And blood stained darkness.

Skin the color of ink it walked. Forward, staring at her. Smiling.

Dribbling from it's cheeks.

Darkness.

No!

Get away!

Stop!

Please no.

Don't touched me.

Don't grab me.

Leave me- NO!

STOP!

Don't do that!

Alone.

Not my face.

Don't touch my face.

Not my mouth.

Disgusting.

Stop!

Don't open my mouth.

Don't open my mouth.

Stop.

Touching me.

Crushing me.

Opening me up.

Skin peeling back.

Red.

NO!

Don't open me up!

Don't come inside me!

No inside.

No more!

I don't want-

It hurts.

Mother!

Father!

Brother!

Save me!

Help me!

Some one!

NO!

Don't.

Darkness flowing in through:

Mouth

Eyes

Nose

Ears

Can't breathe

No more.

no more

Can' breathe

no

more.

.

.

.

.

Darkness.

The face in Naruto's mind merged with the face like an anglerfish hovering above him, suddenly thrown into sharp relief by the strange flickering orange light.

It could only be the face of a demon.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Once, a long time ago, in a place far removed from where he was standing now, Penguin-san the ANBU had been ridiculed by his peers for being short and skinny. "Scrawny" "Twiggy" "Blow away in the wind." For some odd reason, his not-really-that abnormal height and body mass had served as a constant amusement to them.

People didn't make fun of him for that anymore. Partly because he had grown a great deal since those early days, partly because he was a highly skilled ninja capable of de-veining anyone who ticked him off. Details.

Up till now, Penguin-san hadn't minded growing up at all. Growing taller, stronger, quicker, what wasn't there to love about this whole "maturity" thing. Oh yeah, sure there were some places that he had used to hide in but couldn't anymore, but who cares? He could blow up buildings now. Not that he should blow up buildings, but he could. And that was reassuring to know.

Now however, not being able to fit through ridiculously skinny holes in rock walls was something of a problem. Hell, Naruto was about as scrawny as they came and he and only mostly fit through the gap that he had been widening. Even then Naruto's journey hadn't been exactly... slick. Okay, now the rock walls were pretty slick as they happened to be covered in blood and a birthday party's worth of skin confetti.

The kids arm was on there tight. Penguin-san was pretty sure if any normal person had suffered the jolt that Naruto had just gone through, their body would have said "forget this" and given up the arm. Naruto, as far as Penguin-san knew, was still whole on the other side of the rock curtain.

The annoying old man was silent. Mercifully. He had fainted when he witnessed Naruto's sudden exit. Wimp.

Okay, Penguin-san had jumped a little to when it had happened, but there wasn't a highly trained ninja watching his every move that could mock him.

That he knew of...

No. Penguin-san the ANBU was at a little bit of an impasse here. On the one hand, he needed to get through this gap to complete his mission. On the other hand, he wasn't supposed to leave any indication he was here, and you know the simple solution of just busting the wall down, kind of left a mark. Plus with Naruto's blood anywhere subtle changes would be kind of hard to do too. Hell, it had been difficult enough finding a place to stand that wouldn't leave behind bloody footprints.

Such was the life of one having to hide from the Scarecrow. There was no way that he wouldn't notice if even a couple of drops were smeared by his shoes. Competent people sucked.

Jumping past with a burst of instantaneous movement was a bust: to many ways to leave behind a trail, plus Penguin-san didn't exactly know what was beyond that wall and he didn't want to run into anything at blind speeds.

He did have one recourse, but as cool of a jutsu as it was, Penguin-san didn't much like using it because of what it did to his body. At the moment though, unless he wanted to admit that he had failed his mission because of a wall, it was his only option. So, Penguin-san the ANBU mentally prepared himself for the disconcerting experience of losing all his arms and legs.

And that was about the time that the screaming started.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

The horrifying sounds echoed out from the depths of the cavern. Sasuke shot forward like a rocket, swinging around the corner he dove deeper into the cave. Just behind him ran Sakura, she was starting to fail, but the source of the shrieking had to be close by now. The two of them had been running at full tilt for almost ten minutes after the first peals had reached them.

Sasuke scowled a little bit as he shoved off a wall. He couldn't run nearly as fast as he wanted to right now. The flare in his hands only illuminated a fairly small area around him, and the cavern twisted in such a way that he had no idea what kind of terrain would come next. Even as it was he only had a fraction of a second to respond if the cave twisted in an unexpected direction.

They came around a corner to find two bodies lying in a huge puddle of blood. The whole cave was absolutely drenched in gore and the ground was slick. Behind him Sasuke heard Sakura gasp with shock and revulsion. Even he was a little taken aback by the magnitude of the carnage. Sasuke tried to fight back memories of his old home during the massacre.

Suddenly a third figure materialized from the darkness. Stretched and misshapen the thing hovered over one of the bodies. With a bulbous head and soulless black eyes it had a distinct lack of anything that could be called skin, just blackish muscle ontop of bone. It leaned down toward the head with bloodstained blonde hair.

Sasuke dropped his flare and was moving almost before he realized it. "Sakura!" He barked, "follow me and get Naruto's body. Move!"

"Right!"

Just as the thing was opening is malformed jaw, Sasuke kicked it. His foot connecting hard just under the monsters chin, it's head snapped back with a sick crack. It's whole spindelly body arched back as the head was carried up by the force of the kick. Before it could recover, Sasuke, foot planted on the slick stone, spun quickly, kicking it away. Pressing his advantage Sasuke followed the demon as it rolled away from his teammate, yanking a sharp kunai from his pouch. Behind him, he was aware of Sakura picking up the shredded body and dragging it away.

The demon recovered before Sasuke had a chance to make another attack. Moving in the same disturbing manner that the girl from before had, it bent its long thin arms at strange angles and shoved itself into the air. Twisting it the air it grabbed ahold of a fissure in the low ceiling. Clinging above him, the thing looked at Sasuke with its huge black eyes. Sasuke let his kunai fly, aiming right between those disturbing onyx orbs. The thing didn't have time to react and the blade landed true.

There was a bone freezing swack and it jumped away, out of the sphere illuminated by Sasuke's flare.

Kakashi was with Naruto, looking over his wounds, Sasuke wasn't sure how severe they were, but the body had looked pretty bad to him out of the corner of his eye. Judging from the amount of blood covering the cave, his bet was that the old man that had fallen along with Naruto had already been violently killed by the demon.

Speak of the devil. The monster returned to the light, clearly furious. The blade that Sasuke had so expertly lodged between it's eyes had disappeared, but it had left a sign of its presence. In the center of the demons face, splitting its non existent nose in half was a deep black hole, from which no blood poured. Sasuke supposed that he shouldn't be too surprised, but even so seeing something walk away perfectly fine from a lethal shot like that was a little disturbing. There was even proof that if that thing had been alive it would have died!

It made a leap at Sasuke—no! Over Sasuke! It was heading for the body that it hadn't finished eating yet. Sasuke spun around and chased after the demon as it bolted toward Sakura, Kakashi, and Naruto.

Sasuke expected Sakura to freeze up again, like last time. But it looked like she was holding her ground. True she flinched when she realize that the demon was coming toward her, but almost instantly she steeled herself and prepared. She might not have been as good a shot as Sasuke, but she waited just long enough so that the demon was well within her range before she fired of a pair of sharp shuriken. One looked like it nicked its chest, the other one appeared to lodge itself in its throat.

It didn't do much, hardly slowed the thing down. It must of not been able to feel pain, or not have a concept of physical pain at least. But it was just enough for Sasuke to catch up and block off the easiest means of escape when the demon realized that Sakura wasn't going to go down easy. She made a swipe at the demon, who pulled back, right into Sasuke's jab.

The kunai he had drawn and stabbed into the creature sunk into its back several inches. Sasuke had been expecting it to cry out in pain again, but instead it twisted and threw its surprisingly solid elbow into the side of his face. Sasuke was knocked aside, giving the demon back its escape route, which it immediately used to dodge another attack from Sakura.

Prowling one the dim edge of the sphere of light it reached back and tossed aside the blade stuck in it's back. Sasuke took the lull to consider their position. If that thing had been human it should have died at least three times already. Both of Sasuke's kunai should have been nearly instant kills and Sakura's shuriken would have caused a normal human to die too. This thing was still alive and kicking and aside from leaving disturbingly dark holes in the creatures not-really-flesh, their attacks didn't seem to be doing anything. Clearly another approach was needed.

Flashing through hand seals, Sasuke drew chakra from his core into his lungs. Sasuke took a deep breath, sucking in air until it felt like he might burst. He held it in, imagining the fire ball he was about to spew out, feeling its heat, envisioning it consuming everything unlucky enough to get caught in it. Then he pushed it all out, through the smallest hole his lips could muster. The blast of chakra laced air lit itself with the small point of intensely hot energy he had willed into his finger, and became a great orb of fire aimed straight at the demon.

As soon as the fire dissipated, Sasuke regretted his decision. If he was honest, he had to admit that he probably hadn't incinerated the demon with that attack, but he had obliterated his night vision by staring directly into his bright ball of flames. And the roar of the flames eating up the air would have masked the sound of the demon moving into another position.

Sasuke clamped his eyes shut and focused on the sounds around him, hoping to catch even a hint of that things movement. He wasn't good enough. Without warning Sasuke felt something slam into him, hard and fast, knocking him to the hard wet floor. His eyes popped open and he saw the angry terrible face of the thing leaning over him. For a second he was sure it would start eating his face, but a blue sandaled foot knocked it away.

"Are you alright, Sasuke-kun?" Sakura glanced over her shoulder as she stood above him defensively.

"I'm fine." Sasuke said, jumping up from the ground. "How is the dweeb."

"Um, alive? I think?" Sakura responded.

"Right, Sensei is with him. Right now, we don't need to worry about him. We need to slow this thing down."

"Right."

Sasuke caught some movement in the darkness out of the corner of his eye. "I'll go high, you go low."

It wasn't really a plan, or even a tactic, but it was something and until they could figure out how to put some permanent damage on this thing, it was as much as they were going to get. The thing made a gangly leap at the genin. Sasuke threw a brace of shuriken at its face. At least two of them stuck deep into its eyes. Sakura waited for the thing to land and delivered a low kick. Unfortunately she didn't have enough power in her sweep to knock the thing over, but she did manage to trip it up, giving Sasuke the opportunity to grab its arm and swing around behind it.

Had this been a normal person, he probably would have dislocated its arm. Unfortunately it wasn't a normal person and didn't seem to understand the how joints behaved. It didn't seem to suffer much pain from the wrenched arm, but even though it could move it with ease it still didn't have the leverage to escape Sasuke. It tried spinning about, but Sakura punched it in the face. Not elegant, not even really any kind of proper taijutsu, just a sucker fist into the things' eye.

The demon shrieked and wailed, surely causing some pretty serious damage to their eardrums, and violently yanked itself away from Sasuke.

As the two of them regrouped Sasuke caught Sakura gingerly holding her right hand were blood trickled out of a relatively deep wound. She must have punched right into Sasuke's shuriken, probably driving the ninja tool deep into the creature's skull. Judging from the terrible sound, that was something between tortured child and dying cat, they had finally managed to deal some pretty serious damage. Though it came at a price. Sakura's effectiveness was down a whole ton.

The thing was moving again. It was running toward Naruto... no, toward the other body. Sasuke's mind raced. If he could assume that this thing was actually the demon that had been possessing the girl, Naruto some how managed to separate the two of them. In this form it was a whole lot weaker, than it had been possessing the girl. Faster, but it didn't hit nearly as hard. It was standing over the body of the girl now, lowering itself toward her face, shoving its fingers into her mouth.

"Don't let it get the body!" Sasuke shouted, leaping forward.

Obviously it took some time for it to possess a body, time that it couldn't be interrupted. Before Sasuke even got close, the demon stopped whatever it was doing and grabbed the body trying to make an escape. The extra weight however slowed it down, giving Sasuke enough time to catch up and head it off, getting between it and the infinite dark of the tunnel beyond.

The demon hissed and turned back, only to be met by Sakura rushing in with a kunai in her off hand. For the moment that seemed to deter the demon, which dropped the body and jumped over them into the darkness.

"Get the girl over to Cock-eye-sensei, in case it comes back."

There was no "in case" however, because even before they had managed to drag the body a couple feet the demon was back, clearly perturbed that they were trying to steal its home.

"Why. Don't. You. Just. Give. Up." Sasuke grunted slashing ineffectively at the demon, who had somehow learned to dodge in the past couple of seconds. His frustration getting the better of him Sasuke committed himself to a strong jab at the demon. Sensing it's opportunity the thing flowed around Sasuke's attack and smacked him hard with the back of its hand. Sasuke was caught off guard and fell to the ground. Suddenly he found himself pinned to the ground by the monster. It ground his hand into the stone. He felt his skin being scraped off his knuckle by the rough stone floor. The thing jabbed a knee into Sasuke's gut, expelling all the air in his lungs and surprising him enough to let go his grip on the kunai.

The thing's face flashed towards Sasuke's neck before it was deflected by a strong kick from Sakura. The thing still wouldn't let him go even after several hard curb stomps, but his teammate had given him enough time to get back into the fight. Curling up, Sasuke planted a foot into the things chest and kicked out. The thing went tumbling down the cave, right toward the body it had just been trying to retrieve.

Sakura didn't wait for Sasuke and rushed on ahead to harass the demon away from its former residence. Taking a second to right himself Sasuke followed behind her.

Sakura reached it first. Grabbing its arm she swung it about, right into another bloody punch. Unfortunately the blood was all hers. Mostly ineffective and painful for the wrong party, Sasuke took the moment to draw one of his remaining kunai and plunge it deep into the demon's chest with unfortunately predictable results. The blade buried several inches deep was just about as effective as Sakura's punch.

"Grab it!" Sakura suggested, holding tight to the demon's arm. Without pausing to consider why, Sasuke followed the order. With both it's arms held tight it tried lashing out with its feet. The attempt to free itself, however, ended up being more disastrous than helpful and it tumbled forward onto the bloody ground pulling two genin on top of it.

And so they reached something of an stalemate. The demon had neither the strength nor leverage to extricate itself from the genin, but Sasuke and Sakura were completely tied up keeping the thing from escaping. Even if Sasuke could both hold the demon down and form hand seals, at this close range none of his fire jutsu would be a good idea. They were more likely to burn him and his teammate than the demon. Stabbing it had proved wildly ineffective, plus Sasuke could feel he had only one blade left in his pouch. Sakura was holding on pretty well, but it was unlikely that she had any surprises that could get them out of this mess.

So that left them, for the moment, in a mess of limbs on the bloody ground, keeping the demon down. Sasuke had the sinking feeling that if it came down to a test of endurance, the demon would eventually get the upper hand.

"Sensei," Sakura cried out, "how do we kill it?"

"Hn. Well you don't."

"What?"

"You don't kill demons, Sakura."

"Of, course you don't," Sasuke grumbled fowley.

Cock-eye-sensei continued, "You exorcise them, and either seal them or wait for them to disappear. You really can't kill something that's not alive... at least not in the technical sense."

"So what do we do?"

"Oh, just hold it there until it de-corporates."

"Sensei?! Help!"

"You two seem to be handling things quite well. I wouldn't want to get in your way."

While Sakura bickered with their worthless sensei, Sasuke focussed on keeping the demon from slipping away. Under his breath he grumbled, "Damn it dweeb. The one time you stupid seals would have actually been useful, and you're out cold. Typical."

Almost like he had some kind of Sasuke's-wenching-about-me-senses, Naruto began hacking and coughing. After several very wet and painful sounding coughs, he wrasped, "Is it still here?"

"Yeah, it's still here. Couldn't even clean up your own mess could you dweeb?" Sasuke wasn't particularly sure why he was so frustrated with Naruto right now, but he was. And oddly enough that felt very normal, and since that was about the only normal part of this whole royally boned scenario, he must have latched on to it. It felt good to be ticked off at Naruto, so he allowed himself to indulge a little.

"Oh." Came Naruto's hollow reply. Dang it Naruto, now he had to go all weird too.

"Yeah. Sakura and I are holding it down until it apparently disappears or something, however long that takes, because someone has made it clear that he won't be helping."

"You wouldn't want me to deprive you of a great learning experience now would you?"

Sasuke was just about to reply and tell their sensei just what he thought about this whole learning experience and display some very matured language. Unfortunately for rant chroniclers everywhere, Sasuke had to grit his teeth and focus back on the task at hand as the demon made another particularly spirited attempt to escape.

"Naruto, if you had something for sealing away a demon, now would be the time!" Sasuke grunted, straining to keep ahold of their prisoner.

Naruto stayed silent.

Of course. Worthless dweeb. Incompetent, unprepared, loudmouth, bookworm...

"I think I can do something. Have you got it immobilized?"

"We've got it, but just barely." Sakura answered.

"Okay, keep restraining it, while I make some preparations."

"No, duh!" Sakura retorted.

"Rodger, just hurry, Naruto." Sasuke responded.

"I'm hurrying. You try thinking in the throws of hypovolemia... It's oddly refreshing actually. It's like there was this massive pounding in my head that I hadn't noticed until it was gone. My mind is so clear and cold. Maybe I should lose vast quantities of blood more oft-"

"FOCUS! Naruto!"

"Right."

Several agonizing minutes passed as Naruto whispered quietly to himself. Lifting himself up just a bit, Sasuke look over the demon's body and see Naruto waving his arms around in the flare light like he was some kind of madman.

"I think I got it." Naruto at last exclaimed holding up a kunai that for some reason looked slightly blue, "but you're both going to have to hold this and stab the demon with it."

"Alright, give it here." Sasuke wedged the arm underneath his knee so he could free on of his arms to grab the blade from his teammate.

"Okay, Catch!"

"Wait no-" Before Sasuke could point out what a fantastically dumb plan this was, Naruto had already let the blade go. It sailed high up into the air, tumbling gracefully in the darkness. It almost seemed to glow. It reached the top of its arc and then began its rapid descent towards the ground. It accelerated quickly, its sharp point racing. It clattered on the ground, dangerously close to the leg of one Uzumaki Naruto.

"Wow, that was the worst throw. Ever. Of all time."

"Hey, I don't know how much blood I'm working with here. I'm pretty sure if I tried walking and chewing bubble gum right now I die because there wouldn't be enough blood for my brain." Naruto retorted, "Sensei, you want to help?"

"Mmm. Nope."

"This is some kind of 'go beyond your limits and discover new potential" cockamamie isn't it?"

"Yep."

"Uhhg." Naruto sounded just about as disgusted as Sasuke felt with their teacher at the moment.

"I've made sure you weren't going to die, and based on my knowledge of your abilities and my observations of your opponent, I have every confidence you will be victorious."

"Do your calculations include how much blood I'm going to loose?"

"No, I'm going to let the be a surprize. If you'd like we could start taking bets."

"Well, I suppose you're not actively trying to kill us, so that puts you above some jounin-sensei," Naruto mumbled, "Alright, Sasuke we're going to try this again!"

"How about not throwing a deadly blade at us when you can't even see straight."

"Alright, Alright."

Naruto screamed with pain as he sat up. But he managed to pick up the blade and slide along the ground towards them. It didn't get nearly as close as Sasuke would have liked, but he thought he could work with this. He snaked his legs around the demon's arm and forced the arm into a position that, if the thing had been human, would have been very painful. It was mostly just inconvenient for the demon.

Stretching his arm out as far as he could Sasuke's finger tips just barely managed to brush against the Kunais edge.

Come on, come on, just a little bit more...

Bingo! Sasuke managed to hit the edge of the blade hard enough for the weapon to flip over, putting it easily in his grasp. He grabbed the chilly metal blade and sat up.

"Sakura!" He called. She rearranged herself so she could hold onto the kunai too. For a brief terrifying second it seemed like the demon might actually get free. It was thrashing and twisting much more wildly now, like it some how knew what was coming. It turned its neck so that the onix black eyes could see the blade grasped between the hands of Sasuke and Sakura. If it had eyelids it might have actually squeezed them shut in anticipation as the genin started to plunge the blade into its exposed back.

"Wait!" It took all of Sasuke's strength to cancel the momentum of their thrust when Naruto called out to him.

"You have to do it on my signal."

"That would have been nice to know before, Naruto!" Sakura growled.

"Sorry!"

Naruto winced as his hands clumsily ran through some hand seals. Then he slammed his hand against the bloody rocky ground. The cave suddenly shifted. For a moment Sasuke thought that the shadows had come alive, but no, now he noticed that the dark liquid that had been splashed all over the cavern was beginning to move in a very unnatural fashion. Some of the blood was actually creeping up over them. Kanji and other strange symbols began to form on his and Sakura's skin and all over the dark purple muscle of the demon.

Just as the shadowy liquid was slowing down Naruto called out, "Now!"

Together Sasuke and Sakura plunged the cold metal blade into the wildly struggling demon. It began jerking and twisting wildly, actually throwing them both off. As he tumbled away Sasuke felt the frustration well up in him like his fire jutsu. But when he came to rest and looked back at where the demon had been, he found that it was some how still there. Like a bug pinned into place, the demon flailed about, trying desperately to get away, but it could not.

The kunai was most definitely glowing now, a violent hungry violet. The strange bloody symbols were moving again. The ones on his skin, Sasuke noticed, had already disappeared. The words on the ground and walls were all being sucked toward the glowing blade like water down a sink. The demon was screaming again, just like the sound it had been making just before they had rescued Naruto.

The light from the glowing blade started to fade... No! The blade was sinking into the monster's flesh. Carefully Sasuke stood up. He could see the strange way that the dark flesh of the demon seemed to bubble and pop, and get sucked in, devoured by the hungry purple light. The creature imploded in slow motion, first the chest, then the head, and finally the bony arms and legs.

Finally the purple light really did start fading. The kunai clattered to the ground. Sasuke and Sakura approached. It looked pretty much like a normal Kunai, albeit with some odd designs etched into the metal. Sasuke reached down to pick it up when he stopped. The air around the blade stung. Pulling his hand back, Sasuke scolded himself: really? That blade had to be cursed or something now, touching it first thing was a truly awful idea.

"Naruto, get over he and make sure that you did it right."

"I can't exactly move very well, would you mind, uhh, bringing it over here?"

"I'm not touching that until I'm sure you didn't screw up."

"Fine, then help me get over there. Wimp."

Sakura rolled her eye and helped the last feeble bloody member of their team over to the blade. Naruto didn't seem to have any problems picking up the blade. Carefully he looked it over, "Nope, I think this right. I mean, when we get home I'm definitely putting it into something stronger, but this should definitely hold until then."

"Good." Sasuke nodded.

"He, Naruto. Where's Lord Izo?"

"Umm, I think he's back at the squeeze." Naruto looked about, trying to figure out where that was exactly.

"You left our client alone! He's probably dead by now."

"Hey, I did not leave him alone, I was grabbed by a possessed girl. I didn't have much choice in the mater. Besides, aside from the time that I was unconscious, I had eyes on him on the whole time. I mean I guess I didn't when I was being attacked, but there is no way she could have hurt him."

"Right. Aside from the time you were unconscious. That's real reassuring Naruto! Plus, even if the demon didn't get him I sure there are about a thousand other things in this cave that could have killed him!" Sakura, must have thought they were all safe at this point because she started off on one of her shrill ear splitting rants. "Like spiders or scorpions or snakes or bats or he could have fallen and hit his head..."

Sasuke did not abandon his teammate to at terrible chewing out, nor did he flee to protect his ears. He just had better things to do than stick around. He just hadn't thought of them yet. Let's see, he could try finding Lord Izo. Yeah, that's what he could do! Even if he was dead, they should probably bring back the remains so that he could rest in peace. Though on the other hand, he never let anyone around him have any peace so maybe...

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

It didn't take them particularly long to find Lord Izo's unconscious and most certainly not dead body. Unfortunately someone had the bright idea to wake him up. Sakura felt no remorse for the wounded and expressed her displeasure with Naruto in her standard mannar. Which only made Naruto complain even more as he had to be carried around. He didn't seem to have broken any bones and was already making a miraculous recovery. Cock-eye-sensei had gotten straight to bandaging up Naruto as soon as they had gotten there, so now, aside from his head which felt like it was full of helium, we was mostly okay. Izo was perfectly able to walk, even if he complained about it. There was, however, one body left.

The girl wasn't dead. By all respects she should have been. She was so skinny she put twigs to shame and her skin was so pale it was a shade of blue. Sasuke helped Naruto over to her and he bent down. Carefully Naruto checked her pulse. He felt her heart beating rapidly underneath her delicate skin. Slightly at first her body began to shiver, but soon the shaking turned into spastic flailing.

He didn't know her. He had just been inventing stories inside his head about her, right? But Naruto felt a clammy stone forming in his gut.

"Naruto, are you... crying?" Sakura asked quietly as she knelt down beside them.

He tried to swallow back the stinging tears, but it seemed he had completely lost control. Suddenly, acting on the nearest scrap of an idea he leaned forward. Opening the girls lips and pressing his mouth against hers he tried forcing air down her throat. He vaguely recalled a lesson in the academy about something like this. Wasn't it suppose to help people who couldn't breath, like when they had drowned? Well in his hallucinations, when he thought he had been the girl before being possessed, it had felt like they couldn't breath, like they were drowning in the darkness.

Over the pounding of blood in his ears, Naruto could almost hear Sakura trying to say something to him. Almost. He had to hold the girl tightly to keep her from thrashing out of his grip. He could feel bruises forming on his lips. Was she shaking worse? Of was he starting to shake too?

Someone was trying to pull him away. Shouting shrill at him. NO! He couldn't stop, not till she was okay. She needed air, oxygen. That's why she was turning blue and bluer under him.

More hands joined. Pulling him. Strong hands wrenched him from her. Then his muscles, despite mostly working through blood loss and battle and fear, turned to quivering jello. He shook and shivered like the arctic was devouring him.

Move! His brain commanded. MOVE! It shouted again with growing panic as more and more of his body stopped working. The problem was even parts of his brain were slinking off to go hid in a soft dark corner away from everything else. Trapped inside his own body, he watched as Kakashi picked up the tiny, fragile girl and took her away.

Some logical part of Naruto's mind, that cold heartless bastard part of his brain, knew what Sensei was doing. He was taking her away, where his could mercifully save her—kill her—away from their young eyes. He was glad he didn't have to see her die, but imagining it was almost worse.

"Miyako," the name slipped from his lips without him even realizing it. That was the girls name. He didn't know how he knew that. The same way he had seen all those things in his hallucination. And they were all true. Somehow he knew that all those things were true.

"Naruto, it's okay." Sakura softly put a hand on his trembling arm.

"I couldn't help her."

"What? Naruto, there was nothing you could have done."

"I know." Naruto sobbed, "I know that. I know that I shouldn't feel bad. But I do! I couldn't save her! She died because I couldn't do anything."

Sakura was trying to be comforting, she really was. She wasn't used to this kind of Naruto at all. Even when that librarian had died, she hadn't seen him cry. Sure he had gotten moody and quiet, but that was about someone he had known for practically all his life. This was just some random girl, who had tried to kill him even. "Naruto," she cooed quietly, "You did everything you could, I'm sure. But she lost her humanity along time ago. You don't need to feel guilty about this."

The anger actually came before the memory. For a second he didn't know where this new and powerful emotion had overwhelmed him so completely had come from. But then he remembered something else he had learned in the hallucinations brought on by the darkness.

Maybe that was why he felt so connected to the little girl.

In one way they were the same.

His brain, low on blood as it was, couldn't handle the anger and betrayal and hurt that Sakura's words stirred up in him. The guilt and grief had already filled up his emotional cup to overflowing. So many strong emotions—

He was just like her

—were pounding in his head—

demons in them both

—his body couldn't take it—

lost her humanity long ago

—he was boiling out of control—

what did that make him?

—

Naruto toppled forward and met the darkness rushing in.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"And there were no further complication on the return journey?" Danzo asked.

Penguin-san the ANBU shook his head.

Sarutobi leaned back in his chair and took a heavy drag from his pipe. In the darkness Penguin-san couldn't see his leader's expression. Well he could have, but that would have been very rude and required chakra... which was liable to get him killed in this high security room. Admittedly Penguin-san wasn't exactly part of the folks-in-high-places-that-hate-each-other loop, but even he found it a little weird that he was reporting to both of people that he was acting at a double agent for. (What did that make him a quadruple agent? A double-double agent? He didn't know) And that these two kage level rivals were having a nice cup of highly poisoned tea as he reported to them.

"What was his behavior like on the way back? Did you notice any signs of psychological trauma?" Sarutobi asked.

"Hokage-sama" Danzo stuffed the word with patronizing care, "is that really important? The boy is a ninja, he's going to be traumatized a lot in his life. He might benefit from some conditioning early on."

"We're not going to agree on this and we never will. I will not raise a village of emotionless automatons as ninja. A healthy mind is important both to operational effectiveness and standby safety. Look, the boy has just been exposed to an existence which he might very well have taken as a mirror of his own. Additionally, as Penguin has reported, he fainted after clearly suffering from a panic attack. I want to make sure that there is no further damage to his psyche."

"You are right, we won't agree. Penguin, continue your report."

"Naruto-kun, did seem very subdued on the return journey. I noticed no more panic attacks and he slept soundly at nights. However he spoke very little and tended to stand away from Sakura, a marked difference from his normal behavior."

"Hmm." Sarutobi took a long draw from his pipe, "I fear there may be more going on they we can see right now."

"You could let me take him down to my place and train him. I could help solve a lot of those invisible problems."

"Forgive me if I don't take you up on your generous offer."

"As long as the boy is being used effectively I will forgive you." What when unstated was 'And if he's not I'll take him anyway."

"And whose determining what is effective?" Unsaid was, 'I will end you if you try.'

"I'm sure you could set up a committee." The hidden answer was: 'Certainly not you, you inefficient old coot.'

"I might do that. The problem is I can only think of people ill suited for the task at the moment." The petty dart in his tart reply was: 'Oh yeah? Well I know who your confederates are, and they're all dispicable people."

"I expect we're thinking of some of the same people." It was a little difficult to tell if that actually meant, 'I know your friends are but what are mine,' or 'unfortunately I have agree with you there, good help is so hard to come by these days.'

Penguin-san the ANBU thought he caught most of the conversation happening underneath the underneath but from this point on their jabs started accruing too many subtle layers for him to keep track of. It was like they were having three different conversations at once. Suffice to say, when ninja's turned political they got scary.

"Well," Danzo finally returned to the matter at hand, "the important thing is that the boy is alive. It looks as if this mission has given him some well needed experience." Then Danzo rose from his seat and made his way to the door. As he opened it, he stopped and turned back toward Penguin-san. "Out of curiosity, who lost the little bet that the team had?"

"Naruto, sir. He did not bring any clothes besides the outfit he wore."

"Really?"

"I do not think that he owns another set of mission suitable cloths."

"Hmm. I appears this folly has brought even more benefit that I could have hope for, Hokage-sama."

Sarutobi leaned over his desk and looked at his old rival with honest confusion.

"It's a lot harder to hit somebody who's not wearing target-me-orange."

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Amongst people who could be classified as "not wearing orange," Uzumaki Naruto was now the primer member. After years of hard work, enticing recruitment drives, subtle and obvious threats, and on occasion bodily harm the orangeless forces had finally converted their prize target to the not-orange side. However, in a sickening twist of fate that offended the decency of any fashion capable member of society it seemed that the army of the green spandex had moved in on this prime piece of real estate with terrifying speed.

"ERRRRNT." Sakura cried, crossing her arms in an sharp "X." Sasuke just shook his head and tried to sink deeper into the late morning shadows. Unfortunately for the brooder extraordinaire, the morning shadows were pretty shallow and he had already been pushing it.

"No! No. No. No. No. No. That is not acceptable Naruto!"

"Yeah, I'm not exactly thrilled about this either, Sakura, but for the immediate future were both going to have to persevere, until I can get something that doesn't ride up all the wrong places." Naruto pause to adjust the elastic fabric, "Which if you're wondering is everywhere."

"Naruto," Sasuke emerged a little from his pretty poor hiding spot, "I normally think you look ridiculous, but this..."

"Oh, no. I fully admit that this is a new low, and most of my clothes have come out of the trash."

"Why did you even..." Sakura brain having a lot of trouble just accepting the reality of this situation, because honestly it was a whole lot more likely that this was just some dream.

"Look, I didn't have much of a choice. For a while now every morning at about 5 I get transported to a remote training area to go through morning exercises with greenaldee and grennaldum. Hon-san's seal also dresses me, unfortunately I had to throw out most of my cloths because they were either rags unfit for beggars, or encrusted with so much blood they cracked when I move. So yesterday when I poofed like normal, I poofed in my underwear. So my options were put on the spandex given to me, or train with Guy-sensei and Bushy-brows in our underwear. I picked the spandex."

"But you just got paid, why don't you go buy some cloths?"

"Because I– hold on. Sasuke..." As he turned toward his teammate, he noticed his fellow genin trying to disappear with desperate nonchalant. "Something's different about you."

Sasuke didn't answer. Sakura did. "Oh yeah, don't they make him look so cool and refined."

"Oh those are two words that you can choose to describe them."

"I don't want to hear it dweeb."

"But I haven't said anything yet, four-eyes."

"There, you just said something."

"Oh, I guess I did." The phrase "fox-like grin" has perhaps never been more accurately applied to a being not actually a fox that it right now: a giddy fox-like grin crept its way across Naruto's face. "I'm just glad I'm not the only one who suffered from this mission. But in all seriousness, what is with the glasses?"

Sasuke fidgeted with the new pair of glasses. "Nothing."

"What, finally got a doctor who was willing to admit that the almighty Uchiha eyes could be less than perfect?"

"I think they look great on you Sasuke." Sakura didn't catched the tremendous eye roll Naruto performed, which is a shame because as a well practiced eye roller and connoisseur of the art she really would have appreciated it. It was a marvelous expression, his eyebrows moved in perfect sink to the long and perfectly executed arc of his eyes which lingered for just a second at the one o'clock position, expertly conveying exasperation and annoyance. But what really set this apart from your standard eye roll was the way Naruto used his whole face to highlight his preformance. In the olympic art of eye rolling there is no doubt this would have gotten solid 8s all around.

"For your information, yes. I had this white hair glasses wearing freak who just obsessed over my eyes. He wasn't interested in anything else, like things that actually could have been damaged during the mission, my mental state for instance."

"Okay, I get that's a jab at me. Well played. But really you need glasses?"

"Aparently it's easier to hit targets when they're not kinda fuzzy."

"Is this new? Because even I have to admit you had the best accuracy in our class; it was like you had something against dead wood or something."

Sasuke shrugged, "I knew where the targets were."

"And the moving targets?"

"It wasn't hard to guess."

"Sasuke, that's so awesome!"

"This revelation about your actual ability is disturbing on several different levels. And disheartening on quite a few more." Naruto sighed and then looked around. Normally this would the the part of the show where sensei comes out to demand a silly chore. He remained conspicuously absent. "Hey, you guys wouldn't have..."

"Happen to see cock-eye sensei anywhere? I was just about to ask you." Sakura said.

"Yeah, he's not coming to day," said a deep grovely voice. The voice gave the distinct impression that its owner had grown up smoking cigars and drinking whisky instead of pacifiers and breast milk.

Wide eyed Naruto and Sakura looked around. Only Sasuke and his best "I could care less, but that would actually require more effort because I would have to go negative" expression was to be seen.

It looked like Sakura was having trouble deciding what she thought of Sasuke's new straight from the chain saw voice.

"Wow, Sasuke," Naruto fought desperately to hold back the giggles, "puberty hits like a truck, doesn't it?"

"You're an idiot." Sasuke said with his very normal just on the edge of an emo, emo puberty voice.

"But you heard that too? Right?"

"Nope. You're going crazy." It took quite a bit of familiarity with Sasuke to be able to distinguish amongst his expressions. They were "subtle" as Sakura liked to put it. It made him "mysterious." Naruto, who had occasion to see Sasuke actually have some real expressions, thought it made him "as dull as a sheet of pale pasty paper." Which went a ways in explaining his desire to draw all over his perfect complexion. That all being said, the nearly microscopic twitch along the corner of his mouth was clear indication he was joking. Heck as far as Sasuke expressions went he was practically wearing a goofy grin.

"Aww, that's a cute little dog."

Naruto and Sasuke looked down in response to Sakura's fawning. Cute was a word. The dog was little. But it took just a little too much effort for Naruto to connect those two facts for his liking.

"Woof," the dog said pawing at Sakura's leg. And there was something about that struck Naruto as being rather odd. But it was a dog and dogs go woof, so then why did he feel...

"Hey, what's this." Sakura bent down and pulled a piece of paper out of the leash scrunched up over the dogs head.

"It's from sensei." Sakura looked over the letter, "he says we have the day to train by ourselves."

"Lazy bastard." Sasuke swore, not quite under his breath.

"In that case, Naruto. Come on where getting you some new clothes." Sakura violently grabbed Naruto's arm and started dragging him off towards the shopping district.

Naruto however struggled against her and finally wrenched his arm from her grasp. "Thanks Sakura, but no. Ummm. I have a standing invitation to train with Team Eight, and they got back from a mission while we were gone. So I thought, uh, I'd stop by and hear about it. Thanks for the offer." Naruto finished lamely looking away from his teammate.

Sakura was caught completely flat footed. While she was still processing Naruto's rejection he jumped away from their meeting place.

"Did he just-" Sakura turned to her crush sputtering, "I can't believe he– was that really Naruto?"

Sasuke shrugged, "Just be glad he's not hanging on to you all the time."

He started walking off towards their training ground. Sasuke looked over his at Sakura, the morning light glinting off the edge of his new glasses. "Hey, come on. I want so see how far these things can increase my range."

A smile broke through the clouds of confusion and Sakura rushed after him.

The transformation technique puffed away and the ninja dog watched his summoners

0o0o0o0o0o0

Kurenai Yuhi was not a sensing specialist. That fact might seem a little odd when put next to the team of genin that she had been given, because every member of her team was, or at least had the potential to be a fantastic sensor. Kiba, for his warish nature, had developed extremely acute olfactory senses even when compared to the others in his clan. Where others trained beside their ninja canine partners and developed incredible bonds of trust and friendship, Kiba had gone beyond them. Akimaru and the boy were more that inseparable, they were brothers. Kiba tried his hardest to be like his older brother. Yes, Akimaru was actually three weeks older than the human, it had surprised her too. Hinata was a Hyuga, there was no denying her uses as a sensing ninja. And Shino, at least under her tutelage was revealing a sisable talent for sensing chakra even without the aid of his "companions." She just had to get the stoic little brat to speak up when ever he noticed something.

No Kurenai was an infiltration and genjutsu specialist. She was a god when it came to hide and seek, as long as she was the one hiding. Seeking she was below average for a Jonin. So it cause her no small amount of consternation when, several months ago, she had been given a team of seekers and instructions to train them as such. But, since they were orders for The Professor, the God of Shinobi, the Hokage, she hadn't questioned them. So for her little "test" she played hide and seek with them.

They didn't find her.

But they tried astoundingly hard, refused to give up (even after the time limit), and worked very well together. Kurenai hadn't even been trying very hard, there were lots of gaps and signs she left for them to find. Just to make it more fair. So when they missed them, she at least had an idea where to start.

Now, after several months with her adorable little team, she had come to understand the Hokage's logic. It was reasonable for someone like her to teach talented sensors, just a little counter intuitive. She knew how to hide and all the little tricks that made disappearing easier, better. She just had to betray all the other hiders in the world and teach the seekers how to notice them.

And she found that her own skill in that regard was improving as well. That being said, it didn't take much skill at all to feel the massive chakra signature approaching presently.

"Sensor check," she cried out from her hiding spot. It was kind of a little game that they had begun on their C-ranked mission after Hinata had revealed she had proximity sensing seals from Naruto. She would call out at random times, when they were walking, eating, sleeping and they had to use their innate chakra sense, compare it to their individual talents and report their findings to Kurenai, who would check it against her own sense and Naruto's seals. In all everybody's accuracy improved quite a bit during the mission. The game had even come to save their bacon when they detected some rogue ninja closing in on their position. The rogues turned out to be no better than genin, but they still didn't get the jump on her Team 8.

This time most of them were able to roughly identify their teammates location, were clueless about where she was, and surprisingly able to easily identify Uzumaki-kun even though he was quite a ways away.

"Nobody smells like Naruto." Kiba had explained.

"Why? Because my colony has become familiar with Uzumaki's chakra since he has helped in our sorting rooms." Shino said staring intently at a small bug on his finger.

Hinata merely blushed, which Kurenai understood. She was well aware of her infatuation with the boy, so she was probably quite aware of how his chakra felt.

It seemed that Uzumaki-kun was headed in their direction. She was thinking about the rumors that she had overheard concerning the boy's most recent mission when she was reminded of the declaration that he had made when he had begun occasionally training with her team. This would be the perfect opportunity to test if he could overcome, or even notice, an illusion he was not expecting. So she quietly slipped away from her team, trusting them to continue on without her, if they even noticed she was gone at all.

Slipping into the dark foliage above the boy she observed him carefully for several seconds. He hadn't noticed her. Good. Carefully she molded a subtle and powerful illusion. From previous experience she had learned that the boy's chaotic chakra made it impossible forweaker illusions to take hold and his surprisingly keen mind caught most crudely made illusions. It felt like a little bit of overkill to use this particular genjutsu on a genin, but he was the kid who wanted to be immune to all genjutsu. Beside, the kid enjoyed overkill.

Preparations complete, Kurenai began the delicate process of slipping her molded chakra into her target's system and melding it in with his own. Carefully, so that he wouldn't notice the intrusion she released the chakra in a diffuse misty wave. As soon as she felt his chakra system through the mystic feedback her technique provided, she began searching for a foot hold. She thought she found one and began worming her way into the boy when he suddenly slowed his pace and began looking around.

There was no way he could have actually detected that, Kurenai thought, but to be safe she pulled back. She waited for another gap in his attention to appear. It took much longer than she had anticipated for her to find a foothold in the boy's chakra than she expected. Even though it wasn't a particularly good connection she began trying manipulating her intended sensation into the boys senses. Suddenly the latent chakra circulating through the boy's body went ridged. So did the boy's body. He definitely noticed her now. He'd dispelled the genjutsu too.

No. The genjutsu was still active. He hadn't scrambled his chakra or "starved" the illusion by suppressing his chakra. Her structures were still moving around in his system, they just weren't sticking to anything. If she were a lesser master of genjutsu and if he were better at hiding the rigidity of his chakra he might be able to fool someone into thinking the genjutsu had taken hold when it had done no such thing.

That kind of awareness and control escaped the grasp of all save the most talented or diligent ninja. A mere genin achieving it was impossible. No. Kurenai smile ruefully, it wasn't. Ninja who denied reality with words born from pride and expectation, words like "impossible" or "inconceivable" seldom remained ninja for long. Usually because they no longer met the most important qualification, namely a beating heart. Somehow Uzumaki-kun had reached that level. If she thought about it he had been developing it for quite a while.

Something must have happened on the mission, she figured, some revelation had shown light on details of his unique chakra that she could never hope to impersonate.

Well damn, the kid was well on his way to making good on his threat and becoming every genjutsu users worst nightmare.

If they survived the ringer she wanted to put him through he would be terrifying. Because, hey it would totally be worth the bragging rights to train the first ninja completely immune to genjutsu. So many bragging rights. Oh so worth it.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Naruto slumped into the chair, the weight of the day threatened to splinter the chair's legs. He had been smiling all day, or as near to a smile as he could make. His mouth seemed broken, it wouldn't stop smiling.

No, Naruto was afraid to stop smiling. The broken smile was the only thing keeping everything else from breaking.

Tomorrow would come too soon, he decided, to stay much longer here. Just like yesterday at the hospital and today with Team 8 and the business he had to take care of for the library, tomorrow was going to be full. Training and missions and studying– maybe he should get some new clothes tomorrow. Spandex was not very comfortable. Maybe he could get Ino to help. He knew she didn't particularly like him, but he hadn't heard of her turning anyone down if they wanted to be her dress up doll.

Maybe, just for fun, he would read another chapter in the book on summons that he had been working on before they left. Or what about the scroll on blood style...

Naruto was already jamming his head full of things to think about. Full enough that there was always something new to ponder. So that he didn't have to think about small helpless girls, or demons, or pits and stars, or...

What he was.

No, there were too many other things to think about. He would have no time for such depressing and unproductive thoughts.

Besides, even though they had been delayed a little, the chunin exams were coming up and he wanted to impress Cock-eye sensei enough to let him participate with Team 7.

No time, no time.

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Onyx: And there we have it! The end of this second arc of the Librarian Chronicles! Unfortunately it seems that I can't go faster than one chapter every three months. However, if you want chapters faster, reviews are definitely the way to go about that. Any review helps. It helps new readers find this little work and it helps me have the energy and motivation to write more.

Crazy: Tell him you want more of us! We're dying back here, DYING!

Onyx: Oh, hush. I have plans for you three.

Psycho: Good plans?

Deadpan:Good plan, as in plans not to harm us plans to give us a future and hope? Yeah right, this is Onyx here, he's probably hoping to go GRRM on us here.

Onyx: that's not entirely false.

Onyx: regardless of silly fractures of Naruto's personality, it has been fun writing this for a good three years now. I do plan to continue this, but expect me to put my own special twist on everything. A particular thank you to the extremely kind reviewers who really pushed me to finish this up.