"Well," Naruto drawled, his voice muffled by the handkerchief he had tied over his mouth and nose, "D-rank missions have officially reached a new low."

"I can't argue that," Sasuke replied, his voice similarly muffled. "I can imagine a few ways this could be worse but, just to avoid tempting fate, I think Ill keep them to my self."

"Please do." Naruto jammed the pitchfork in his hands into the last of pile of horse manure and heaved in into the wheelbarrow Sasuke was pushing.

The pair then exited the barn and took the barrow over to the manure pile that Sakura was shifting to ensure that it did not get too tall. None of the three were sure who had the worst job. While Sakura did have the advantage of being outside rather than the confined space of the horse barn, her efforts to shift the pile unleashed pockets of fermentation that turned otherwise perfectly clear air into something the lungs simply refused to deal with.

"Please tell me that is the last load," Sakura pled as she saw the boys approaching.

"Sorry Sakura," Naruto replied with genuine sympathy. "There's just one stall left."

"The one with the horse that isn't 'feeling himself'," Sasuke clarified, repeating what the seemingly harmless farmer had said when the team had first arrived. The old man had smiled benevolently but the three genin were beginning to suspect a heart of pure evil lurked in the man's chest.

"Please hurry," Sakura hefted her pitchfork in anticipation of shifting more of the pile. "The sooner we finish, the sooner we can all go and decontaminate."

With visions of a long soak and the liberal application of soap filling their heads, the boys headed back into the seventh ring of hell otherwise known as the barn.

As the boys had said, only one stall remained to be mucked out. The stall's occupant, a large black horse, had remained perfectly still since the first time the boys had seen it with its head lost somewhere in the vicinity of the feed trough.

"Do you think we should move the horse?" Sasuke asked with uncertainty as he eyed the horse. The only sign the horse was even alive was the steady expansion and contraction of its chest showing it was breathing.

"Given that our combined knowledge of horse management equals zip and the farmer said not to move him, I think we should just leave him," Naruto replied, though he also cast a suspicious glance at the horse. "Besides, he hasn't moved in three hours, it should be fine."

With a resigned sigh, the pair slipped into the stall. For several minutes, the pair worked in silence as they pushed the accumulated manure out of the stall where they would later scrape it into the barrow. After a few minutes, however, the horse let out an odd snort and its head rose from the feed box to look at them. The boys ignored this development, continuing their task until the horse let out a whinny that had an odd note in it that triggered a primal fear in the boys.

"Sasuke, did that noise just make you picture your fan girls?" Naruto asked nervously as he froze.

"It did," Sasuke confirmed, equally nervous.

The boys turned slowly to look at the horse.

Deep brown eyes peered back at the boys. Eyes filled with a strange mixture of yearning and lust. Even as this disquieting thought was going through their minds, both boys also noted that the horse was in fact a stallion, as was evidenced by the flagpole that had made itself evident under the horse's belly. The horse took a small step forward, moving in an almost coy fashion.

Naruto and Sasuke came to the same horrified realization at the same moment: the horse had his rape on. The boys looked at each other very calmly and, after a split second of silent communication decided on an appropriate course of action.

With matching screams of terror, both boys leapt over the stall gate.

"Oh… dear… Kami…" Sasuke hissed.

"No, no," Naruto whimpered. "Why does my imagination have to be so vivid… Make me unsee it!"

No! Stop thinking about that! Kyuubi shrieked in Naruto's mind. No! Great Maker! No!

There was a splintering crash behind the boys. Glancing over their shoulders, the pair saw the shattered remains of the stall gate and part of the wall crumple to the ground. The horse stood upon the wreckage with a wild look in its eyes as if to say that its desires were not to be denied.

Naruto and Sasuke did not scream. They reserved all available air for running. The horse let out an impassioned snort and pursued. Without sharing a word, the boys bolted out of the barn yard and snatched a very surprised Sakura from her tribulations and were up a massive oak tree in a matter of seconds. The three genin then settled in as the horse circled the tree like a stalking hound.

"What the hell is going on?" Sakura demanded.

"The horse wants to violate us," Naruto and Sasuke replied in horrified unison.

"It smashed out of its stall," Sasuke added.

"Smashed a beam four inches thick to do it," Naruto continued. "We grabbed you because we couldn't just leave you on the ground with… that…"

The horse continued to circle for a minute before moving away. The trio at first let out a sigh of relief, believing the horse had lost interest. That hope was dashed, however, when the horse went over to a large haystack and hunkered into it so that it could rest while keeping its hungry eyes locked firmly on the treed genin.

"This… is going to take a while," Sakura drawled.

"What are you three doing?" Kakashi's voice asked casually from the bottom of the tree.

"Hiding where we won't get violated," Naruto replied, taking his eyes from the horse for a moment to answer the team sensei. When he looked back at the haystack, the horse was gone. "Uh oh."

"Shit, where is it?" Sasuke hissed in alarm.

"It can't have just vanished," Sakura agreed.

Below them, Kakashi let out a sigh.

"Come on down," Kakashi called out. "While the level of teamwork you are showing is admirable, you are failing the mission to muck out the barn."

The three genin looked down.

"Sensei! Behind you!" All three shouted.

Kakashi opened his mouth to say that such a childish trick would not work on him when he sensed an immanent threat to his health, mental well-being and chastity closing in on him. Kakashi turned to his left in time to see the horse and its weapon lunging for him. As man and horse collided, there was a puff of smoke and the horse stared in confusion at the log it was now straddling.

"So," Kakashi said in a trembling voice from a branch in the tree next to his team, "I think this mission just got bumped up to at least a high C."

"I vote we recommend that no missions from this farmer be accepted ever again," Sakura declared.

"Second!" Naruto said quickly while Sasuke nodded emphatically.

The tree trembled suddenly causing all four to look down.

"Wow, who knew horses could climb trees?" Sasuke observed in a calm tone before all four ninjas let out cries of alarm and scattered.

"We won't trouble you with the details of how we managed to contain the horse," Kakashi said as he began to finish up his verbal report to the Hokage. He, along with his team, were all battered and bruised from their effort. "Suffice it to say that it took all of our efforts to achieve without suffering any… lasting mental scars. Based on what had to be done, the mission rating of D was insufficient by at least two grades."

"I understand," Suratobi murmured, hiding his shudder at what he had seen in his crystal ball. "A-rank pay is authorised for this mission and a note will be placed in the submissions office to block mission requests from the horse farm at anything less than B-rank."