Summary: While they were learning how to get stronger, while they were learning as many destructive jutsus as they could to become the strongest they can be, Team 8 was learning to kill.

I got a lovely request from gingerqueen4 on Tumblr asking for a one-shot where the rest of the Konoha 12 kids realise how badass Team 8 is (thank you, I will take any and every excuse to write about them) Also, I included Sai bc he's a Good Boy and I have no self-control.

For such an observant person, it takes Shikamaru an embarrassingly long time to see it.

But, Shino stands over him and Shikamaru stares up at his back, clutching his bleeding shoulder and Shikamaru doesn't know how the hell he missed it.

How did he not notice the raw determination and confidence, the untamed ferociousness that lurks underneath the surface of Shino? Shikamaru forgot about Shino, but now, all he can be is thankful that Shino is on his side.

Shino raises his arms slowly, hordes of insects following his movements. There's no battle cry, no dramatic speeches, instead, there is just the soft, terrifying hum of a thousand insects.

Shikamaru doesn't need to see Shino's face to know he's not smiling.

The insects surge forward, engulfing the enemy in front of him.

Shino doesn't turn away from their screams.

When it's done, he turns back around to face Shikamaru like he didn't just murder half a dozen people. He crouches down and picks up Shikamaru into his arms.

"It's okay," Shino says like he's consoling a child, Shikamaru wonders what his face must look like right now to warrant it. "I killed them all. You are safe now."

Shikamaru takes a deep breath and knows he shouldn't be scared of a fellow teammate, but it settles in his chest and it refuses to leave.

Shino leaves the bodies behind him, the bugs following him like an ever-moving shadow.

Shikamaru wonders when Shino got this strong.

Hinata likes to smile, and once Neji thought that was a flaw

She still smiles, but now Neji knows that she has learnt what she can do with a smile. Now, she is only smiling to manipulate the situation to her advantage.

Hinata is small and delicate but her hands are calloused and her skin is forged from iron - and she is just playing with her enemies.

Gai had told them trackers are the most brutal. They don't have time for mercy, no time for bravado. They're more like assassins, silent killers.

Neji had never reconciled that too little Hinata.

The shinobi in front of them fall for it, hard and fast. Neji can see it in their loose stances their amused expressions.

Hinata is nothing like what he thought she was, he realises with a jolt. Hinata isn't as strong as him, but it doesn't matter that Neji has the stronger Byakugan, because Hinata has brutality in her blood and success sewed into her skin.

She has more determination, more fierceness than Neji could ever hope for.

Hinata darts forward, a kunai brandished in each hand and they're embedded in the two shinobi's stomachs before they realise what's happening.

A gentle fist strikes the next one down and he doesn't move. She stabs the next in the eye with their own weapon.

She kills the last one with a slice across the throat.

Hinata pulls back from the mess and looks back at him and she smiles.

"I can look after myself," she says with a voice of steel.

Neji nods and doesn't dare say anything else.

She retrieves her kunai, wiping the blood on their enemy's shirts and pockets them.

Hinata is a shinobi. A brilliant shinobi.

Neji wonders how he didn't notice.

Kiba takes two kunai to the arm for Chouji on a mission.

Kiba takes two kunai for Chouji on a mission and brushes it off like it's nothing.

Kiba kills the last three shinobi and there's no loud yelling of victory. There is just Kiba and the blood staining his hands and the bodies surrounding them. There is no bragging, no grin, no Kiba. Not the Kiba he thought he knew.

Chouji pulls himself off the ground and he doesn't know Kiba anywhere near as he thought, nowhere near as much as he should.

"It's nothing," Kiba tells him as he quickly bandages himself up in a practised sort of way meaning Kiba knows what he's doing. "Won't even need stitches."

"Oh," Chouji says and he blinks because the Kiba he knows is arrogant and hot-headed and loud and the Kiba sitting in front of him is quieter and determined and efficient.

Kiba pauses and looks at him, a frown slowly forming. "what is it?" he asks.

Chouji throws the words around in his head, tries to work out how to politely say I thought you were the weakest of all of us. I didn't think you were strong.

"Who taught you?" Chouji asks instead and he fails to keep the shock out of his voice.

Kiba smiles, revealing too many teeth "Kurenai taught me," he says, and he pulls himself upright so he's standing. "This is what being a shinobi is, Chouji. It's this," he gestures to the bodies behind him. "So, she taught me to be a shinobi."

And Chouji gets it. Everyone has been so focused on becoming so strong no one can face them, but while Team Asuma have been desperately trying to become more destructive, while Team 7 are becoming powerhouses, while Team 9 are full of scarily strong people, Team 8 learned to kill.

While everyone else was working on becoming unmissable, Team 8 were working on becoming invisible.

"Oh," Chouji says again. Kiba helps him up, and winks at him. Akamaru sends him a long look that Chouji isn't sure what to make of, but finds himself suddenly wary.

Either way, Kiba isn't someone he wants to get in the way of.

War brings out the best in people and the worst in people. It brings out the parts of people they didn't know they had.

Sai has been at war his whole life, really, so it's nothing he hasn't seen before. It's what Danzou prepared him for.

It's morbidly interesting to see how the others handle it. A tell-tale of their personalities.

Shikamaru struggles, but he does not break. Sai can see how tense he is, how on edge he is, but his mind is still clear. Plans, strategies still rolling through his mind.

There are tear tracks down Ino's face and Sai is pretty sure that not only is she sad, but she is angry. But Ino turns her anger into brutal efficiency and she doesn't break.

Chouji flounders. Sai can see it in the wide eyes and the heavy breathing and how he keeps looking at the bodies that surround them in all directions. But he keeps his head on, with Ino and Shikamaru by his side, Sai is sure he will be fine.

Lee stands next to him, his hand on Sai's shoulder, and he hasn't missed a step, never hesitated, and never lost faith. His surety and kindness is appreciated more than Sai can explain.

Tenten stands tall, as she has the entire time. As she always will. Sai knew it the second he saw her. It would take an awful lot to get Tenten to even bend, let alone crack.

Sakura rages in a loud way that's also quiet. Naruto and Sasuke have told her to stay out of the way, blatantly ignoring how much braver and stronger Sakura is than them. How Sakura can hold a hundred lives in her hands, but also shatter bodies in a single punch. Very few have that balance, and she knows it. She knows she is not weak, and as much as Sai has come to be… fond of Naruto, he can't understand why she would put up with his or Sasuke's ignorance.

But the ones that stand out the most, are the ones that everyone is only just becoming aware of.

Shino, Hinata, Kiba and Akamaru are unlike the rest.

There is no friction between their unit, the perfect team. Off-duty, Sai hadn't paid much attention to them. Unremarkable. Hinata too shy, Shino too apathetic and Kiba too loud.

On the field, they change. They smooth out, Kiba fights with more efficiency than Sai has seen in a long time, Hinata strikes with a surety of a thousand shinobi and Shino protects them both with a fearless wrath.

Sai isn't good at a lot of things, but being a shinobi is not one of them, and Danzou trained him to know who he should stick by and who he shouldn't, who he should see as an enemy and who isn't worth his time.

And Team 8, are people he absolutely knows he needs to stay near.

He's sure the others are starting to notice it too, the way Shikamaru and Kiba talk in rushed voices, the way that Tenten, Hinata and Ino stand shoulder to shoulder in an iron wall Sai himself would want to avoid. The way Chouji hovers near Shino, with equal amounts of determination to protect their friends that Sai is slowly beginning to understand.

There's still a lot Sai doesn't know, still so much about people he doesn't understand. And Sai has never really had friends before, Naruto and Sakura being the only ones. Still, he can't help but wonder if these shinobi, forgotten, underestimated and always fighting, so much like himself… if these shinobi just might be the friends that he needs.