Panting hard, body aching, drenched with sweat and shivering in the comparatively cool predawn air, Sakura tried to remember the exact distance she'd run. How far had it been? The miles had bled together until she wasn't sure if had been one, two, five or more, and all without stopping to rest or rehydrate. She'd tried to keep up but somewhere along the way she'd fallen behind, been separated from the others by a genjutsu or a missed turn or something, not willing to admit that maybe she really was in that bad of shape to not be able to keep pace with the rest of her team. Finally she broke through the brush to see that they were there, out in the waves illuminated by the setting moon and the first inklings of morning twilight, and certainly they didn't look happy to be there at all.

Naruto's lips were blue as he tried not to shiver and Hinata, well, she was so pale that the blue of her veins could be seen against the stark white of skin, and both of them seemed to be absolutely miserable, if not for the fact that they were both holding large logs above their heads then for the fact that the water must have been somewhere around fifty degrees at best—she didn't know for sure. It had to be cold if it was inducing hypothermia. A smell from nearby brought Sakura's head to the side, peering to her left to spot a large fire with an equally large boar spitted over it. A voice she recognized as Anko's caused her to cringe as she called loudly for Naruto and Hinata to move deeper into the waves. Before she could move closer to the flames a booted foot pressed itself between her shoulderblades to drive her down into the sand. Spluttering madly, Sakura tried to push herself up but the weight was simply too much to bear and after a moment of struggling, she finally collapsed in defeat.

"Pathetic. That's all you've got in you?" Anko's voice was chiding—there was nobody else to speak to her, not really—and in response Sakura growled something very unladylike. "Look at you, and you call yourself a shinobi? I bet you spend more on your hair than you do on ninja gear. Alright then, Sakura, strip down." The foot removed itself and Anko's face appeared in Sakura's vision. "Then grab a log, tie it to your back, and give me fifty push-ups. Oi, brats!" her ire turned itself onto Naruto and Hinata, who visibly cringed under the verbal assault. "Don't just stand there! Pump those logs! Work those muscles!"

Cowed by the anger rolling off of their impromptu teacher, the affected genin began to lower the logs to their shoulders and push them back up, Hinata having to put visible effort into it, unlike Naruto who seemed to have figured out how to use his chakra to keep his body warm—or was just very good at hiding his distress. Though there wasn't any insult beyond the word 'brats' both could sense her annoyance with them, the reason why they were out in the cold surf to begin with. After all, what was Kakashi's first lesson for them? Without the team there is no mission, without the mission there is no ninja. Those who abandon the mission are trash; those who abandon their comrades are worse than trash. And what had they done? Naruto wanted to smack himself for not checking to see if Sakura was still keeping up with them; he'd been so preoccupied with the team's headlong flight that he didn't even check his surroundings, and wondered why it was that he had become de facto leader in Kakashi's absence.

He took a moment to examine the facts. True, Sakura had come far since the genin test, and could probably kick her Academy self's ass, but she'd only been putting effort into it for a month and her physical shortcomings had to be accounted for. Hinata on the other hand was physically capable, but she possessed an annoying tendency to go along with what others said regardless of what her own opinion was. And with Naruto being the most headstrong member of the group it meant that she would follow him without question, never mind that she apparently had a fangirl crush on him! What was it that he'd heard? A team needed to be able to trust each other, know when to act and how without any exchange of words.

Right now they didn't have that. In a way he was actually glad that they had been thrown onto the island with a slightly mad kunoichi. It would give them a chance to work on their shortcomings, improve their team dynamics and just generally become better shinobi without the distractions of make-work missions or petty rivalries and obsessions. But if that was the case…why was Hinata there? Not for the first time in his life Naruto grumbled in confusion as he tried to ascribe some logic to the team assignment that he really hadn't had time to before. One thing was certain, though: he'd have to get it into their heads that he was no leader. Not yet, anyway.

It was hard to ignore the fact that Sakura was stark naked as they sat around the fire, warming up and eating heavily of the animal that Anko had been cooking in between shouting orders at the genin. Fighting off a blush, fighting off the urge to let his eyes slide to his left, Naruto focused instead on the meat in his hands as he tore it mercilessly from bone, savoring the cooked flesh even if it was lacking in any sort of flavoring beyond that of pork, saltwater and smoke—standing in the waves until sunrise after having been woken and sent on a miles-long run through the woods took its toll, even on him, and hopefully they'd get a chance to sleep soon. Ruefully he realized that wasn't going to happen, somehow, and that the trio would be lucky to get five hours out of every forty.

"Ugh! What, is she trying to get us up to ANBU level or something?" Hinata proclaimed out of the blue, coincidentally giving voice to Naruto's thoughts. "I know we need some work but this is just ridiculous!" Both he and Sakura were staring at the Hyuuga now, Naruto in mid-chew as he processed a few facts. Fatigue makes Hinata bitchy; combine that with high stress and she gets mouthy. Filing that away for future reference, Naruto shrugged and took a swig from his canteen to wash down the morsel he forgot to finish chewing in the wake of the outburst. He added a mental note to never piss Hinata off. Shy though she may be he had seen what antagonizing her resulted in the one or two times someone was dumb enough to provoke her and the results were, to say the least, not pretty.

"Maybe she just thinks it's funny running us into the ground," Sakura groused, before peeling a strip of meat off of a rib with her teeth and slurping it down as if it were a noodle, fat and all. She wasn't even complaining about it ruining her diet, but then again after being put through sets of fifty from everything to crunches and squats to lateral lunges and handstand push-ups, she was too wiped to think about something as pointlessly silly as keeping her figure. She recalled her mother's cooking and the mildly disapproving stares she'd get when she skipped dinner or hung out in the library instead of training. Well, she wasn't skipping meals anymore; the last month's intense efforts to keep up with the pace Kakashi set for them combined with demeaning but physically demanding D-rank missions left her with an appetite that was sure to have Matsuki smiling in secret.

So far, though, the pace that Anko had set far outstripped anything that they had to endure under Kakashi. The sun hadn't even risen yet and she'd already run them ragged, and kept them at whatever strenuous activity she thought up for them until finally calling for a rest at daybreak. Out of the corner of her eye she noticed that Naruto had a scroll open, from which he unsealed a set of anatomy textbooks and a fuuinjutsu codex. He then created a number of clones, setting them to work on reading the material within. Every so often Naruto would look to their temporary instructor while he ate, though she didn't apparently have any reservations against him doing any study work. Finally, Sakura's curiosity got the better of her.

"Naruto, why are you having your clones read that stuff, and how did that scroll not get destroyed?" She paced over to one of the clones and took a peek at its book over the shoulder. What does he need theoretical biology for? And this one is a dissertation on sealing in relation to the human body…chemistry…internal medicine…man,these are some random subjects.

"Let's answer your second question first," Naruto replied—after giving a long, attention-generating belch, that is. "The scroll is waterproofed, and as for why clones, anything and everything they learn will be passed on to me. I actually didn't realize this at first; Kyuubi clued me in on it, since he apparently was looking when I read the scroll containing the technique. I only skimmed over the description…" He shifted uncomfortably, as the night he stole the Kinjutsu Codex was not a particularly fond memory for him. The truth of that night was something he'd rather sweep under the rug. "Sometimes it helps having a second consciousness sharing your body, other times not so much." Sakura nodded; she could certainly sympathize with that, if not to the same degree then at least with the fundamental basis. She watched as he moved off to be by himself, settling a good fifty yards away once he had finished stripping the meat from the bone he held. Moving to follow, Sakura stopped when she felt one of the clones grab her arm and shake his head at her disapprovingly.

"Boss doesn't like to be disturbed while he's training," he told her. "Kyuubi's chakra is dangerous and if he gets out of control it's safer if we have a head-start."

"He's training to control the Kyuubi's chakra?" Anko queried the clone, who nodded at her before turning his head back to the book.

"Yes he is, and has been doing so for the last two years. The idea is that he'll use the Kyuubi's energy to supplement his own power, or in place of it, so he still has juice to power techniques left over if we get into a prolonged fight. On top of that he thinks he could use it to supercharge any seals he makes, especially barrier or explosive types, but in order to do that he needs to be able to access it at will and…well, Kyuubi's a bit of a bastard and doesn't like his power being taken for trivial stuff."

"So, in other words, he's more or less in a mental battle with the beast every time he needs to use its power?"

"Something sort of like that, yeah," the clone replied with a shrug. "Though let me tell you, trying to find an isolated spot in the village is tricky. Now that the secret's out he's probably gonna start asking for help."

"I can see how not wanting to wake up the whole damn village would be a problem." Stroking her chin, Anko considered the possibilities. Other villages had jinchuuriki, of course, sometimes two, and in one very rare instance in the past, three, and they were all taught to harness their bijuu's abilities…with one exception. There have been, to date, three Kyuubi jinchuuriki and the first two didn't even try to utilize it unless absolutely necessary. Naruto, for all the revelations about his real ability, lacked the skill and experience that his predecessors possessed, and even though he was already showing the Uzumaki penchant for surprising advances he was still leagues behind the other known hosts, and to make matters worse there was next to no information on what benefits he could gain from using his prisoner's chakra.

The abilities of the other bijuu were well-documented, naturally, and it stood to reason (she'd seen a few of the dossiers herself) that Konoha had intelligence on the other bijuu if not who currently possessed them; Kyuubi, by contrast, was a mystery, and though Anko remembered the night of Naruto's birth—unlike other events from that year—the Fox had used few, if any, of its unique powers. From the look of things Naruto was going to try and change that, and use versions that were more suited to humans and their limitations, if he could learn any of them at all. A pang of regret stroked itself against her heart, quashed ruthlessly beneath cold logic.

Sandaime didn't want Naruto used for a weapon against other villages, wishing for him to have as normal a life as possible. Reflecting on the original decree, Anko sighed. Fat lot of good that did for him, didn't it, old man? It's starting to look like Naruto is going to shape himself into a weapon, though what sort I just don't know, nor if he will succeed in his endeavors or not. While she was meandering in her thoughts, save for giving an order that the clones share the anatomy texts (it was stuff they needed to know, too, after all), a pressure came from where Naruto had isolated himself. All three turned to watch as an orange shroud wreathed the boy, followed by first one, and then a second tail. The intense energy was worse than any killing intent that Anko had felt in her life, bringing back memories of that day twelve years ago, nearly thirteen now.

Just as suddenly as it began, it stopped, the cloak dispersing in a flash like flames extinguished by the wind. Naruto tried to stand but fell over, panting hard as he lay there on the sand. Slowly he staggered to his feet again, and trudged over with a sour expression on his face.

"Bastard still doesn't think I'm ready for anything more than two tails. That's fine, if I find myself matched against the Ichibi or the Nibi, but the ones between them and me are going to kick my ass." He explained to them as much as he could on how much the Kyuubi actually knew of the circumstances surrounding his creation, how to the bijuu were connected to each other, and how as a result the jinchuuriki containing them had a sort of telepathy between themselves. It got stronger the closer they were, of course, and against an experienced host his thoughts were an open book. At the end he had three very bewildered kunoichi staring at him and he realized that he'd just wasted an hour explaining something that they weren't going to comprehend.

"Okay, look at it this way: I'll know if there's another jinchuuriki within ten miles of me, and the closer we get to each other the better able we are to pinpoint the other's location. Within five miles we are able to detect each others' emotional states—or so Kyuubi tells me—and within a mile we can actually use telepathy to talk to each other. The older a jinchuuriki is, the stronger the telepathy gets and they can read another host's thoughts if they wanted to.

"In other words the Rikudo Sennin, when he was creating the nine, set it up so that we could avoid having to fight each other. I don't know what he was thinking when he showed people how to seal the bijuu inside human hosts, but most of the time the containers end up being weaponized. And why wouldn't they be? A human with the power of a bijuu could eradicate an entire army, and if the jinchuuriki gets too uppity they can be killed and the tailed beast placed in someone easier to control." Anko nodded in understanding, realizing that there were now added benefits to Naruto being there on the island with them; just as the clone had said, here he could train jinchuuriki techniques without causing any undue alarm. She almost asked how Naruto could know anything about the Sage of Six Paths when they didn't teach that in the Academy and Kakashi certainly hadn't told them, but remembered just in time that Naruto did contain the Kyuubi, meaning that the beast likely had insights into the Sage's intentions that contemporary scholars lacked.

"You know, with all the terrible secrets being revealed in the last few days, I think I need a cigarette to forget all this," Hinata announced, shooting Anko a sour look. The jounin just smirked and drew the pack out from the things she'd confiscated from the Hyuuga princess, dangling it in front of the genin's face and grinning as Hinata made a grab for it, only to fall on her face following Anko jerking it sharply away. "That's not fair, sensei! Give! I special-order those!"

"Wow, really?" Naruto was doing his best impression of a gecko, staring goggle-eyed at her while at the same time sporting his idiot's grin. "That I did not know."

"You know smoking's a bad habit for a ninja to have, Hinata-chan," was the jovial reply. "You get hooked on things like this and they'll ruin your career."

"I'd say she's already hooked," Sakura quipped, crossing her arms over her breasts. To his credit Naruto didn't glance in her direction which, admittedly, stung a little bit because she'd come to expect all sorts of attempts to get looks at her skin and now that she was under enforced nudity he wasn't so much as peeking. Then she noticed that one of his shadow clones was staring right at her and blushed. Of course he doesn't need to look himself, he can just have his clones do it and enjoy the memory later. That's goddamn fucking cheating.For a moment she allowed herself to scowl at the original, before softening again as she acknowledged that they were ninja and thus cheating was part of the job.

"Anyway, brats, I've decided your training regimen. Morning is going to start with a run to get your blood flowing. Then you'll spend an hour in the surf doing even more cardio. We'll break for breakfast, do some academics for about an hour or two—geography, history, math, and whatever else I think you need to know—and then in the afternoon you're going to use elemental training to burn off as much chakra as you can to bring you to the brink of exhaustion, followed by flexibility training until evening, then dinner and after that you have time to yourself, though I expect you to bed down for the night no later than three hours after sunset. Every third day, I'm going to use a nifty little genjutsu to teach you everything you need to know about sneaking in, sneaking out and most importantly how to build and maintain a cover. And last but not least you're each going to have to pick up an instrument—lucky for you I've brought some along. Before you ask, no, you can't use the illusion training for that last bit. Real musicians have calluses, and traveling performer is one of the easiest covers you'll ever have. Not the only one, but the easiest."

"What genjutsu would you be using, then?" Hinata asked, curious as to what sort of technique their sensei would employ.

"Glad you asked. It's actually one of Kurenai's original creations. One hour outside—which is how long I'll have you in there—equates to a full month within the effects of the genjutsu."

"Why not longer?" This question came from Sakura, who was looking at her teammates to gauge their reactions, though she had her guess as to what the reason was.

"One hour is the longest I can maintain the illusion, at my current level anyway. I have heard there's a similar technique which can stretch three seconds into three days, but it's bloodline-exclusive. Ordinarily I wouldn't even consider using this technique on genin, but out here in the middle of nowhere my training options are limited. There is one more thing. Pinky, get your clothes back on, punishment's over."

Biting her thumb and swiping the bloody digit across the plate covering her left shin, Anko unsealed a trio of outfits, what looked like standard mesh shirts and pants appearing on top of neatly-folded sleeveless black shirts and brown trousers; the outfits had the red spiral common to Konoha chuunin vests on the back when examined, and weighed quite a bit more than regular clothing did. The mesh as well wasn't made of netting, but rather an elastic material that tried to shrink back to its original size when stretched.

"You'll wear this stuff during your dexterity practice and any other time I tell you to. The clothing isn't heavy enough to slow you down, but rather to force you to put effort into your actions, and the same deal with the mesh. It's not designed to restrict your movements any, but rather build your stamina above and beyond what you'd gain from weight training. I don't intend to teach you any fighting techniques, by the way, only the basics of elemental manipulation and of course how to dodge so you don't need to learn any taijutsu forms. Most ninja, you'll find, abandon set taijutsu styles by the time they're veteran chuunin, and few jounin that I know of even use taijutsu at all, let alone a particular form. Now…let's start learning. If this works out I'll recommend it to Kakashi; otherwise I'll let him decide what you need to work on and what can be left alone."

Matsuki steeled herself and then lifted her hand to knock on the door to Kakashi's apartment, hoping the man was in. She hadn't seen her daughter recently, though her sensei had been seen around town doing various things; hopefully it was just a fluke and he wasn't actually still in Konoha while Sakura was off heaven knew where with just her teammates—especially that Naruto boy. Not that she had anything against the Kyuubi container but he was at that age where young ninja started to figure out all the nifty things their bodies could do, and she didn't mean anything that required the use of chakra. The elder Haruno kunoichi knew that the Uzumaki heir wasn't as dumb as he played for the crowd, not by a long shot—Matsuki was fully aware that behavior was as much a weapon as any kunai or tanto, and Naruto could play a crowd like a fiddle.

That and he had far too much of his mother in him. The Bloody Red Habanero was a monster on the battlefield, true, but she had also possessed a sharp tongue coupled to a sly wit that more often than not left people flustered at the double entendres she could work into a conversation as effortlessly as breathing. Minato may have been a fan of his sensei's little orange books, but there was no denying who the real pervert was. Hand poised to knock again, Matsuki damn near smacked Kakashi in the face instead, as he had opened the portal while she was lost in thought.

"Good morning, Haruno-san. What can I do for you?"

"Oh, I'm just…wondering about Sakura's whereabouts. I haven't seen her lately, have you?"

"Mm, let me think…yes, I hired one of my fellow jounin to supervise my team on a short excursion to a remote location where they could train undisturbed by other genin or missions that might disrupt their concentration…you were concerned?"

"I am her mother, Hatake-san. Concerned is nothing compared to my current state of mind. May I come in? I don't mean to stay long." Kakashi nodded, stepping aside to let the woman in and invited her to sit at the tea table, where another woman was already poised to serve, wearing an elegantly embroidered kimono. "Oh, pardon the interruption. I didn't realize you had a tea service in progress."

"Don't worry too much about it. In fact I was expecting you."

"You…you were?" Matsuki asked as she took her place kneeling opposite Kakashi.

"I like to keep up to date on my genin and their families. Now I know I should probably have cleared this excursion with you first, but I was hoping it wouldn't be too much trouble. You are returning to active duty yourself, aren't you, Haruno-san?"

"Yes, that's right. I have the papers all signed and ready to submit. I'm pretty sure I'll need reevaluation and a considerable amount of effort to get back to where I was before Sakura was born…and I was hoping that I wouldn't be turning them in until after my daughter completed at least two C-ranks. I have to know that she can take care of herself, Hatake-san." Pausing in her speech, Matsuki took a sip of the tea that was laid before her, savoring the blend of herbs and wondering if this was one of the brands imported from Lightning, or an esoteric variety grown in River.

"I understand your concern as both a shinobi and a parent, Haruno-san," Kakashi spoke to her gently. Even if he wasn't a parent himself, he understood quite well the sort of worries that family could submerge themselves in. "Which is why I have hired only the best to ensure that Team Seven will be adequately prepared for whatever challenges may await them. I admit that it means I am slacking off in my duties as their sensei somewhat, but as you know they are the first team I've passed since I first became a jounin and I have been shown in no uncertain terms that I need time to prepare myself, as well. Rest assured, Haruno-san, that I know how the team functions together. All they really need is experience, and someone to motivate them to excel. Your daughter especially has the makings of a great kunoichi and hopefully when she returns, she can learn a few tricks from her mother."

The two sat in silence for awhile, drinking the tea as it was served and snacking on sugar wafers; before long though the service was complete, the porcelain set aside to be packed away and the hostess keeping a low profile while waiting to be dismissed.

"Might I ask, Hatake-san, what you think their role will be, as a team and as individual shinobi?"

"Infiltration and espionage is what I'm leaning toward, Haruno-san. It's high time we started training more sneaks, don't you think? Free up ANBU to focus on more important things like internal security and eliminating spies."

"So long as they don't encounter any scarlet scrolls I will keep my objections to myself, Kakashi. The art of seduction is one skill I wish not to pass on to my child. Were her father alive I doubt he would have a conflicting opinion on that matter."

"You know as well as I do that those sorts of missions are never given to genin or at least not to rookies." Sighing as he regarded Sakura's mother, Kakashi continued. "If it helps, I don't expect them to be taking very many long-term assignments requiring any false identities. For the most part I'm seeing them as being the sabotage and information theft sort of infiltrators, rather than surveillance and reporting. In fact I am hoping that the genin teams that were formed this year will become very familiar with each other. From what I can gather, Asuma's working his team into battlefield recon specialists while Kurenai's focused on making capture and interrogation experts out of the old Ino-Shika-Cho combination. Team Ten—excuse me, I think Asuma's headed for calling them Team Falcon—scouts, Team Eight gets the pertinent details, and Team Seven makes the grab. At least, that's the dynamic I'm looking to foster, at any rate."

"Out of curiosity who did you hire?"

"Anko Mitarashi."

"The Snake Charmer's teaching them? I hope all goes as well as you say. I'd like to tell you one last thing, Kakashi-sempai." Matsuki caught him with a look that could have immolated stone. "I understand that as their sensei, no one short of the Hokage has authority to tell you how to handle your team, but as the mother of one of your genin I would appreciate it if you inform me before you send my daughter off to be alone with the son of the most lecherous kunoichi to have ever worn the Leaf."

"Ah, it's no trouble, Haruno-san. I'm fairly certain Naruto knows how to control himself." It's Hinata that I worry about. Anko, you'd better break her crush on him.

Kiba lunged and landed a solid strike inside Sasuke's guard, knocking him back a few paces and forcing him into a different stance, his perpetual scowl taking on a tone of irritation. Angered, the Uchiha engaged in a lunge of his own, smashing the plate of his hitai-ite against the inu-nin's cheek and sending him sprawling to the dirt of the sparring field. Rubbing the bruise forming on his face, Kiba grinned and rolled backward to avoid the stomp that would otherwise have connected with his gut and as he gained his feet propelled forward, sweeping a roundhouse kick at Sasuke's head, which he ducked underneath and countered with an uppercut which was in turn stymied by the follow-through kick from Kiba's other leg.

The two ended the exchange occupying each other's previous positions, Kiba in a loose Wolf stance, arms out and bent at the elbow in preparation for a grapple, while Sasuke settled into a textbook Horse, staring down his sparring partner. It seemed to Kiba that he drew Sasuke for a sparring partner far too often, as if Asuma were trying to get the two of them to work out their differences through open combat rather than letting them stew and cause problems down the line. Their teacher's lecture was fresh in his mind, as it had only been delivered a scant hour before. Team Ten had met, as usual, in front of the twin oaks that served as the unofficial southern gate to Training Ground 12, where Asuma had posed to them a question.

"What do you see?" he'd said to them.

"A pair of trees, sensei," Shino replied. Asuma spared him a glance, and then gestured down at the roots where they dug into the ground.

"How many roots do you see, Kiba?" The genin answered that he couldn't count them all, because they ran underground and were perpetually splitting off from each other. Asuma had then pointed up at the boughs of the oaks, to where they intertwined with each other and wove into a natural fortification.

"What do you see, Sasuke?"

"I see a worthless tangle of limbs."

"I'll tell you what I see. I see deep roots, running farther and broader than the branches. I see thick boles that have weathered countless storms. I see branches intertwining, lending their support to each other, each making its brother strong enough to support three times the weight it could otherwise. Do you know why I asked you what you saw?" Kiba had rolled his eyes in that moment, seeing another philosophical lesson on the Will of Fire coming. He hadn't been wrong.

"The roots run deep, but they can be poisoned, or wither from drought and disease. The trunks are sturdy, resilient and firm, but even the thickest of bark can be cut into and let the tree fall. The branches are broad and provide shelter from the sun, and yet they can fall to the storm. But look here. These two trees are in fact one—if one's roots wither, the other will nourish it until it recovers. If one trunk is severed, it will lean against the other for support. And these branches, on their own fragile and weak, are together stronger than any wind.

"The different parts of the tree serve many different symbolic aspects—the roots your foundations as shinobi, the trunks family and clan techniques and teachings, the branches the individual shinobi—but no matter what you must remember this." His arms spread wide to encompass the whole of the forest that surrounded and was part of Konoha. "None of us stand alone. Individuals may fall, true, whole portions, whole families may disappear, but regardless of what befalls us we are stronger together than we ever are apart. The roots of Konoha shinobi run deep, and like these twin trees we are reliant on each other lest we are cut down."

Of course such lessons were hard to take to heart when one of the people who was supposed to be learning them was still hell-bent on proving that he was the best…not that Kiba couldn't sympathize, since he was pretty sure that if one of his family members flipped out and killed everybody he'd be pretty solidly attached to the idea of proving he was the strongest just to avoid that feeling of vulnerability, himself. But his mother had her own take on it. There was always someone stronger, always someone who can take your best hit and keep coming, and in those times you have to get smart, get sneaky. Run away, set traps, be a right bastard if you have to but don't try to take your enemy head-on if you know it won't affect him.

Tomorrow they'd be running an actual recon mission, if all went well, albeit one that was confined to the village and people would be in on it. Kurenai had the idea for her team and Asuma had cribbed it off of her, though Kiba wasn't sure that Konoha's citizens would be quite as appreciative in that they would be Team Falcon's test subjects.

As they left the training ground for some much-needed sustenance, Shino was praying to the gods for their teacher to get some better analogies.

Hinata frowned, opening her eyes to look at her friends again. She'd done this before, reading the chakra coils of her team (purely as a means of measuring their progress) and Naruto's were the same as ever… Sakura's, on the other hand, seemed larger than before, though supposedly that was due to the training that they'd been at for a little over five days. The frown deepened. She had noted growth in Sakura before—prior to their arrival on the island Hinata had recorded that her coils were bigger than they had been at Team Seven's formation, but that was due to a month of hard work—but this growth had occurred after a mere week. Something just didn't make sense.

Her vision tightened onto the narrow thread of chakra that connected her to the object of her admirations, and the frown mutated into a scowl. It vanished from her features though, and as she shut off her bloodline ability Hinata happened to sweep her eyes over Sakura. There, for a fleeting moment, she caught sight of two things. The first was a little knot of chakra between the cerebrum and the cerebellum, a darker indigo compared to the normal blue of Sakura's life-energy. The second, much more fleeting, was a ball of green settled behind the hara, and it appeared to be feeding into Sakura's chakra network.

Rather than solving the mystery Hinata found that revelation had only deepened it, and as her vision returned to normal she caught on to the fact that Sakura was gazing at Naruto in contemplation. What else does she know that I don't? Of course, she couldn't know without straight up asking what the other girl was thinking about, and at the moment it didn't really matter. Their first session of image training, as Anko called it, had allowed them to progress in leaps and bounds, learn about each other and interact on a level they never had before. The time spent in the illusion had been…odd, to say the least. Since they didn't feel fatigue, hunger, thirst or anything detrimental in the genjutsu unless Anko wished it, the trio had pretty much been awake for four weeks straight, with very little in the way of breaks. Those breaks had, however, come with the revelation that Naruto and Sakura both had rather vivid imaginations, if the things they were conjuring up with thought alone were any indication.

Thoughts of nubile bodies aside, Hinata contemplated the question of Naruto yet again. Their conversation the day after his admission to them had suggested Sakura knew exactly who his family was, who his father was, the same as Hinata herself knew—or at least possessed enough related facts to piece things together. It had taken a few carefully worded questions to Anko, but the reaction to them had only confirmed her suspicions. And then she'd been told in no uncertain terms that neither she nor Sakura were going to inform Naruto of his parentage—that even if they were no longer in the Fire Nation or Konoha its laws still applied to its citizens. It had been a major blow to realize that what she had believed to be a lie she'd dreamed up to someday soon divulge to her teammate and give him something positive in his past was not only true but a high-level secret.

Anko had relented on enforcing the law because as she stated it didn't fully apply to the younger generation and one couldn't fault another for being smart enough to put two and two together; she was, however, adamant that Naruto not be told "directly", to use a word she had let slip her tongue. There were those who feared that if he knew that he'd go on some roaring rampage of revenge. Sakura had immediately stood up to protest that Naruto would never do such a thing, that he cared about them more than he cared about himself, and promptly stalked off, though as they had been inside their teacher's genjutsu at the time the pink-haired girl had ended up stomping right back into the room she'd just left.

With a heavy sigh she resolved to ask her questions in the morning, and laid herself on the furs they'd been gathering. She had to admit that snuggling into Sakura's side was almost as much fun as snuggling into Naruto's, though he always managed to wind up sandwiched between them no matter what position they were in upon attaining slumber.

Sakura, for her part, did not know what Hinata had seen with her brief scan and could only guess at what her inner self knew. The truth was hard to accept, and didn't reveal its secrets easily, no matter that she wasn't trying. At this point all she knew for sure was that she didn't know enough, and that had to change. And the first step in that would be to stop denying the truth; the façade could remain, but it was going to become just that, a false front. With her friends, with her team, she would let the real Sakura shine through. As with Hinata, her thoughts turned to Naruto, the question she had asked their teacher, and the tacit confirmation in her reaction and reply.

The fact of the matter is, she thought with a sigh, is that Naruto probably won't care either way who his parents are. He's lived this long without them, trying to make a name for himself, and even if his father was the Fourth, Naruto would never invoke his name for personal gain; that would be too much like riding someone else's coattails and if there's one thing I've learned about Naruto is that he would rather be known for his own accomplishments. That was something Sakura could respect, being a second-generation kunoichi herself. Fortunately, or perhaps not quite, Matsuki Haruno had never been one of the shining stars that everyone looked to for inspiration, preferring to stay somewhere in the middle where she could be effective while also going unnoticed, but there were still those who recognized Sakura as Matsuki's daughter and wondered if she could be counted on the same way as her mother had been.

It was those people that Sakura longed to please, those people—and her team—that provided Sakura with the motivation to press forward even when faced with her own inadequacies. Someday…someday people would know Sakura. She'd make sure of it.

There are many fortune tellers, mystics and so-called clairvoyants in the world, but few true seers. One such person was an elderly woman who lived in a shrine in Lightning Country, near the sea and far from the Cloud village. It was here that Tsunade found herself, her usual gray yukata and green haori traded for austere white robes that barely contained her figure, ascending the stairs to the shrine slowly. It was not by choice that she had come, but every prophecy, prediction and foresight given by this ancient maiden had come true. When she summoned you, you did not delay.

Soon she had entered the shrine proper, kneeling on a thin tatami before an illuminated screen. Beyond was a figure in shadow, a voice as soft and pretty as a child's floating out to her ears. Despite her age, the Seer sounded much as she did those eighty years ago when she had received her first vision and predicted an earthquake that, to her shame, had gone ignored until the day the tremor struck, exactly when and where she had said. The Seer's attendants were gone from the temple, as this prophecy was for Tsunade's ears alone.

"Tsunade of the Sannin, listen well," the Seer began. "My Sight begins to fail me, as does my health, and soon my Gift shall pass to another. I have lived a life of austerity, knowing not the touch of another, the joys of a life lived for selfishness or selflessness—those who tend me fear, incorrectly, that were I to belong to another I would lose my Sight. It is not so, but they are too set in their ways. Soon their lines will end and the next Seer will be born to enjoy the life I could not lead, but that is not why I have summoned you." Tsunade remained silent, not given leave to speak. In a way this woman was far more powerful than the five Daimyo and five Kages combined, if only for the fact that she spoke the unerring truth. And she didn't mind letting the woman ramble on a little bit; such was her right, after all, for the role she had played in keeping the balance of power between the Elemental Countries.

"Your former companion Jiraiya has heard a prophecy from the Sages of Mount Myoboku—a prophecy which even now is on the verge of proving false. Twice he has thought a student to be the child foretold by the ancient Toads, and twice have they failed to meet his private expectations. One more shall he have, from the lineage of the blue dragon. I speak to you now your own prophecy: the carrier of the Leaf's burden will be in the palace of many pleasures, seeking a comfort he knows not. To spare you the risk of misinterpreting my words, I will tell you directly. Twenty-eight days from now you must be in the trading town of Akikawa, more specifically at the Golden Lion, and meet a person who shares many similarities to those from your past. I cannot say for sure what will happen if you do not meet this person; far too many possibilities stem from the event though no matter what happens I can tell you in all certainty that the scion of Madara will come for the keeper of the chains. When this will be, or why, is not within my Sight to know. Only what I have been shown can I tell.

"I trust you will heed my words, noble Sannin, and return to the woman you once were. My vision has been shared; I release you to meet destiny or defy it, as you will."

Bowing her head to the ground, Tsunade excused herself from the visionary's presence, and made all haste she could without seeming disrespectful to descend back to the house of supplicants, where she met Shizune with a grave look in her eyes. She hadn't set foot in Akikawa in almost twenty years, as, like Konoha, there was nothing left for her there.

"Pack your things, Shizune. We're heading out."

"Yes, ma'am, but where exactly are we going?"

"To the place of my birth," she replied solemnly. It was not going to be a happy journey.

Ino allowed herself a grim smile. Today they were going to put their skills thus far to the test against a chuunin that the trio knew quite well, and who knew their capabilities as he had been one of the men to impart his wisdom while they were yet students, aspirants to the shinobi program. For the past month, when they weren't training their overall stamina, Kurenai had them trying to invent variations on the clan techniques they already possessed, and giving the three genin supplemental materials to play to their strengths.

Genjutsu for Chouji, drawing on the massive amount of chakra needed for the Akimichi clan's Multi Size technique to interfere with another's senses. Medical techniques for Shikamaru, highlighting his incredible intellect and picture-perfect chakra control—the only one in their year who could do better was Sakura. And for Ino, an array of 'soft' techniques, centered on her knowledge concerning body language and emotions. She did feel a little guilty in not giving her something more powerful to play with, but the incipient heir to the Yamanaka fame already had her own ideas on how to modify the Mind Transfer.

They weren't allowed to practice any interrogation techniques just yet and Ino's progress on passive telepathy wasn't coming along as well as she liked; most days off she'd spend her free time simply watching people, picking one or two individuals to follow and trying to gauge their moods based on body language and posture. It was important for an intelligence operative to be able to recognize the smaller tells, which most didn't even realize they had, and use those tells to guide a conversation—or an interrogation—to get the needed intel from the target.

C&I squads practiced, for the most part, catch and release, especially during peacetime; 'hard' techniques and outright torture were reserved for enemy infiltrators, missing-nin and Bingo Book entrants. It was something of a game for Interrogation teams to try and catch each other, the loser would be held in detention for a few hours or a day, and then set free on their own side of the border, no harm save for bruised egos. Kurenai had informed them, as well, that oftentimes a capture squad would be hired out in tandem with a recon team to track down and locate an individual of interest, then engage and subdue the target for retrieval by the hiring village's own ninja. The reason for this was that each village used different methods for the task, and while a missing-nin from Iwa, for example, might know how to escape an Earth Dome Prison technique, a Lightning Cage (a specialty of Kumo capture squads) or Devil Snare (one of Kurenai's signature genjutsu) would be outside their realm of experience and allow an easier takedown. Very rarely was a kill-on-sight order attached to such missions, seeing as how despite being traitors the missing-nin could easily have picked up information about any ninja village they may have chanced to enter before their arrest.

More importantly the hired squad almost never got the full details of why a person left their village and almost always it had something to do with politics or psychology. Often times there were mitigating circumstances behind a ninja's defection which warranted a live retrieval. Of course there was the matter of Kiri, who had their own independently trained hunter-nin which were separate from the regular shinobi, and who had a high percentage of kill ratios on targets, but that was another matter entirely.

The grim smile turned feral for a brief instant as Ino anticipated a successful first test. A 'mission' like this one would serve to highlight how they had improved, and where they still needed work, not to mention it was a good reminder of why squads like her own drew missions direct from the Hokage instead of being hired out by clients within the country and from its neighbors. After all, information was only useful if it was up to date. Reconnaissance, infiltration, and interrogation were the three facets of true shinobi life. Forget all the flashy techniques and large-scale battles. Wars were won and lost behind the scenes, in silent struggles between small groups of specialists as they fought for knowledge, the most valuable weapon a ninja village could have.

That or a bijuu, but information on those was so highly guarded that it would be easier trying to work the secret of fire out of a stone than to try and divulge information on a country's bijuu from one of its' shinobi. The most that could be gained at any one time by any one C/I squad was which bijuu a village held, and whether it was sealed or not.

Breaking out of her introspective state, Ino turned her gaze over to Shikamaru, who was going over some last-minute preparations with Chouji and their teacher. Personally, the Yamanaka would rather she had a more active role in the ambush than simply shadowing the target and reporting his position to the other members of her team, but as they were in 'friendly' territory and her repertoire of offensive techniques was rather limited, could not be used to goad the victim into a trap.

Unless she somehow got an opportunity to snare him with the Mind Transfer technique and literally walk into the trap, but such a move was risky and without someone nearby to sequester her soulless husk in safety could have disastrous consequences. She had been working with her father on a method to actually split her spirit in such a way that she could remain conscious and at the same time force a target to do her bidding, much like the Shadow Possession that Shikamaru specialized in, but either she didn't have enough chakra or she was missing something very important. So for now she'd pulled the easy job. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Kurenai leap away, followed by her two teammates. The mission was on. Ino suppressed the urge to rub her hands together in devilish glee.

Deep beneath the sea, between the Land of Fire and the Land of Water, the remains of a once-great fortress rested, the hulk of an armored pyramid slowly rusting as the ravages of time and tide ate away at the high-tech polymer covering meter-thick alloy plates and into the metal beneath, opening holes into a stronghold once deemed impenetrable by human efforts. Of course, that had proved false, as readily as was proved there to be no such thing as an unsinkable ship, but those who made such claims were long dead, perished at the hands of the countrymen they once protected.

Kisame was one of a rare handful of beings who could actually enter the mausoleum, and enter it he did, swimming as deep as he could and then some, chakra reinforcing his body against the incredible pressure and biting cold. Breathing through the gills he had been bestowed with, eyes piercing the darkness with what amounted to ocular sonar, he returned to the fortress as he had done in times past, always at the behest of his leader, to raid its supply of spoils yet again. As before he was instructed to collect whatever he could that had not been damaged by saltwater, that had not been corrupted by a millennium (or more) of disuse.

Always he was told to ignore the computer equipment and focus on collecting things like bottles of pills, prosthetic limbs, medical records and chemistry tools. Twenty years ago the word 'cybernetic' had no meaning to shinobi and most people were still unaware of what it was—even Itachi, for all his intelligence, could not properly grasp the method by which man and machine could be connected, intertwined. But Leader could. He could and he did, and he supplied those he trusted with the fruits of Kisame's labor. Yet the man would not speak of where he gained such knowledge of this trove of advanced technology from, and the masked man who was sometimes seen conversing with Leader or his trusted lieutenant was recalcitrant to say, proving adept at escaping whatever trap he and Itachi set up to capture him in.

The production of advanced prosthetics, so much more refined than a simple replacement for aesthetic purposes, was as yet a cottage industry, as the demand for such things (at least among Ame ninja) was not high; most of what was made was sent to the Leader's agents in other villages, other nations, bribes to have them align themselves with his plans. Many of the Shinobi Villages, both major and minor, had experienced soldiers they wished to put back into the field, and these artificial limbs and organs were instrumental in that. For now those plans remained secret, though Kisame knew that soon they would be made aware of the Leader's intentions.

Until then, however, Kisame followed orders, and those orders said to collect what he could from the sunken stronghold. He knew his way around by now, the same gills that let him breathe underwater allowing him to inhale the fetid air inside the tomb without any trouble. Inward he swam, past the giant crucifix, past the many rusting hulks of giant metal skeletons, into a partially collapsed hallway and then up a shaft, clearly for an elevator though the cab was long gone; he took a brief detour into the room with the three towers, metal pillars of a roughly square shape topped by what was clearly a command deck. There was air in this room, strangely enough, even though the door was open to the flooded hallway beyond. Some power he didn't yet understand was keeping this room pristine, and he dared not linger, even if one of the screens was lit and displaying information.

Making haste to the hospital wing, Kisame unfurled his special waterproof sealing scrolls and got to work. Leader wouldn't like it if he spent too long in the tomb. Distracting himself from the potential of raising his master's ire with the task at hand and thoughts of that cute little Isaribi, Kisame began to sequester away everything he thought that would be of value. Unheeded, the screen in the command center continued to display its warnings, the intermittent contact from nine distinct energy signatures displayed in their last known locations, a pattern of movement overlaid on a map nearly two thousand years out of date.

The same message played over and over, with nobody to read it, not even the ghosts of the men and women who once tended the machinery even now performing its duty tirelessly.

Sitting in the evening light, tending to the remains of dinner and vowing that she was going to teach those three brats how to hunt, Anko allowed herself a moment of relaxation and self-reflection. The beauty of the False World technique was that it was exactly what it said on the tin. Unlike other genjutsu which required at least some measure of input from the caster, once False World was in place all that was required was a steady stream of chakra. Maintaining a single genjutsu for an hour was taxing on the best of days and if not for soldier pills, Anko could probably only have held it for a few minutes at best. But an hour was what she had said, and an hour was what she gave them. She'd held it for an hour, which to the genin was a month inside an illusory space, their bodies unmoving on the outside, as they wandered a mindscape replete with all the nuances of a true existence. The interval period between castings was the minimum amount of time she needed to recover to the point where she could cast it again.

Inside the dreamlike space, the three genin and their instructor could practice all sorts of infiltration methods—she could drill them in theory and execution, planning and subterfuge, all the exquisite details that otherwise would have taken literal years to impart given the necessities of eating, sleeping, missions and training. They would leave the genjutsu with skills they had not possessed a mere sixty minutes before and though they and Anko would be quite exhausted the price was worth it. Their time would be spent refining their methods and their teamwork, their knowledge of each other, until the three could act as one when the situation called for it. There would still be the necessity for a trial by fire but it was one that Anko was sure they'd pass with flying colors.

A pity that they couldn't have brought Kakashi along as well, as he was the one who had been officially named their sensei, but he'd believed, and rightly so, that they'd learn better from someone who was used to dealing with people. He'd been kind enough to volunteer the use of what had been, before the founding of Konoha, a secret training ground for the Hatake clan; being the last survivor of that old and venerated tribe of warriors, Kakashi had little need to keep it hidden.

As skilled in the arts of combat as Anko might be, her real strength lay in her effectiveness as a field agent, her skill at handling other human beings. Kakashi was a powerful warrior, true, but he was not that good a teacher, or so he thought. He'd laid a foundation, and it was up to others to build on it. So while she did feel a little guilt at spending a virtual year (or nearly so) and a literal month with his students, Anko wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. These three, Naruto especially, were special to her.

She reflected briefly on Naruto's rather dismal past, and thought of the strange kinship with the boy that she also held with Iruka, a familiarity that Kakashi couldn't really share. His isolation from Konoha had been his own choice, his own doing. Not so she or Naruto, and to a degree her Iruka-kun. While she may have loaned her body out to the Copy Ninja on occasion to fill a mutual need, it was with the Academy teacher that she really felt at home, that she had someone who would understand all the trials she had endured upon her return after being discarded by Orochimaru. So too it was with Naruto, who from birth had had the deck stacked against him, and yet continued to thrive. Even the strongest heart, though, got lonely, and many were the times when she'd visited the young jinchuuriki late at night, singing to him while he slept, and while Iruka kept watch for the blond's official minders. Somehow Kakashi always managed to be absent on missions those times, and though she had tried singing for him once, the masked man had never said one way or the other whether he enjoyed it or not, and eventually she'd given up. Kakashi's own hardships in youth had forged a terrible weapon, but as a person he was somewhat lacking in communicative ability.

Some part of that must have been why Iruka had grown attracted to her, his being one of the few people who'd seen her softer side, the part of her that wanted to be held and comforted, not leered at or used for a night's pleasure and then left like a common whore. He'd given her that, and though they'd been getting intimate for only a short time their acquaintance went much further back. Before he'd been a loudmouthed brat, shouting for the world to recognize him, and now he'd grown up and become a man that Anko could respect, and even love.

He'd found the recognition he'd always wanted in the halls of the Academy, rather than out in the field. Iruka's was the voice people thought of when they imagined a stern but fair teacher, the guiding hand which set their children on the path to greatness. It didn't mean that his skill as a shinobi was lacking, far from it, as one needed to be exceptionally skilled to teach the children of the clans and keep them safe; she knew how he puffed with pride at hearing his students' accomplishments, and how thankful he was every time he got a letter from parents saying that if not for his role as an educator their children would be ill prepared for the trials they faced.

Enter Naruto, the boy who held the keys to a demon's wrath. Like Iruka he had been ignored, outright shunned, and like Iruka taken things to an extreme just for a moment of acknowledgement, the slimmest margin of approval. For the longest time he'd had only the Hokage, and in the shadows his watcher Kestrel; then came the ramen vendor and his daughter, followed by Iruka and the one-armed kunoichi Miyuki, the latter quite literally out of left field, it seemed (a little digging had revealed that they occupied neighboring apartment buildings, however). And through Iruka he'd gained friends like Shikamaru and Chouji, rivals like Kiba or Sasuke, and admirers such as Hinata and Konohamaru. It may not have been the 'whole village' that he desired, but for someone who had been alone his whole life, it was a start. She saw it in his eyes, whenever he thought nobody was looking.

Oh yes, Anko saw, every glance, every flick of his vision, every tense of his jaw as if he couldn't countenance the thought of losing one of his teammates. In those brief moments she witnessed a level of possessiveness that was borderline psychotic, telling her that he would do anything to keep them safe. As much as she'd like to prevent it, as well, the time would come when he would lose one or both of them to injury or death, and when that happened she hoped he was trained well enough to not completely freak out and start rampaging. He had little enough and to have what few friends he'd gained stolen away from him would either destroy Naruto or temper him into something fearsome to foe and ally alike.

Should the day come that Naruto witnessed an ally, a friend, fall in battle, she feared that there would be nothing that could stand in his way save for his own conscience and will, even if he were completely stripped of the Kyuubi's power. Things could get even worse if the person was one with whom he'd been intimate, and though normally she would encourage teammates to shack up in order to promote familiarity (having indulged in a little matchmaking here and there) this was one time when Anko would attempt the opposite. Mental shenanigans and punishments aside, his teammates could not afford to get intimate with him and it pained her to be embarking on a tactic of isolation when he'd been alone all his life; she only hoped that the girls didn't beat her to the punch.

Snapping out of her thoughts, Anko started to make her way towards the genin's camp, taking her time as there was no real rush to interrupt the trio's personal time. Creeping up on their camp with all the practiced ease of a veteran sneak, she peered into the shack that had been set up with a little elbow grease and a lot of clones. Upon seeing the sight therein, she smiled, as there was apparently no need to worry. Sure, Hinata's shirt had somehow gotten down near her feet and Sakura's face was pressed up against Naruto's stomach, but they were so deeply asleep that there was nothing untoward about the scene at all. Leaving the trio wrapped up in each other as they were, Anko retreated back to the tree-line, hopping up onto a sturdy branch to get some rest herself.

Damnit, Iruka, your worrying is rubbing off on me. Oh well; small habits were the easiest to pick up.

Writer's Rant: some of you are complaining that too much is going unexplained, that I am too rough and lack any real flow.

My goal is not to rehash the same three months before the Chuunin Exams WITH EVERY STORY (for all I know that's how long it is, anyway) when the manga's writer didn't spend any great deal of time exploring the team dynamics before the Wave arc and barely even delved into their relationship during the whole Exams—I'm not doing anything Kishimoto hasn't done so please stop complaining that I'm not detailing every day of their lives with painstaking scrutiny. That's not how I work. Too often you see authors spending twenty chapters describing what amounts to two weeks' worth of events, and there's so much more to tell. You aren't present for everything your friends do, are you? Please stop getting on my case for not exhibiting every small interaction. I know what's important to the story and that's what I'll be portraying.

There's a lot still to tell and my muse has been kicking me in the nuts, so if the pacing's a little rough, well, I'm sorry I can't do better but I am not perfect and I do not strive to be. I'm just trying to tell a story and have people (hopefully) enjoy it.

One other thing that I'm not sure I've complained about before: why do people feel the need to remind us of what characters look like? It's not as if we can't go look them up on a wiki or something, or that, in the transition from drawing to text they somehow lose definition and we need to be told their appearance once again. I find it odd, as well, that so many fics involve new wardrobes of the all-black/grey variety (I'm somewhat guilty of it, too, shut up) to the point that it completely deconstructs a character's reason for wearing a particular outfit to begin with.

I'll try to have the next chapter up BEFORE the end of the world.

P.S.: I know, this chapter probably sucks. The next one's gonna be better, I swear.