Hello precious readers. This is a collection of Canon One Shots for the stories: Decaying Bluebells & Chipped Mask. Eventually a third story will be added to this, my last and final SI, but until then, every chapter will alternate with CANON One Shots. They won't be any specific order in the timeline.

First up, Decaying Bluebells.

Disclaimer: If Naruto was mine... Mmm... -Shifts off into dream land of wonders and magic-

Warning: ... Nuthin.

Beta: Lolnope. Not happening.

"You're graduating?" I asked, my eyes widening as I stared before Tenten. The girl glanced up at me from twirling her kunai and gave me a bright grin.

"Yep," Tenten said. "Just took my graduation test today and tomorrow we're getting our team assignments."

"Congratulations," I exclaimed, my eyes lighting up with excitement on my senpai's behalf. However, my outburst lasted only a moment before I blushed brightly and glanced away, shyly lowering my eyes. I heard Tenten groan in exasperation at my actions.

"Nao-chan!" Tenten bemoaned. "We've been friends for years now. Why are you still so shy around me? I'm not that scary, promise!"

It wasn't so much that I was afraid of Tenten, it was more or less that old habits died painfully hard with me. When I was young, I was always poked and prodded at by the doctors. I was sick, deathly so, from a disease that left me breathless and rarely conscious. I was forced to perform so many odd tests, strip down nude and be stared at by painfully blank faces. All the while they wrote down in so many ways of how wrong and messed up my body and brain was. Eventually I just became so self conscious of myself, I started to retreat. Anything that drew attention to myself, was quickly frowned upon because some small part of me wondered just how much more there was wrong with me.

It helped, immensely so, that my family was literally a therapist family. Papa knew what was happening to me right away. Even if I had such a young body I had already proven that my mind was vastly more developed. He talked to me constantly and I listened and learned. It was thanks to him that I didn't go down that road. However, old habits died hard, I supposed.

I would always, I supposed, feel some sort of self-conscious reaction to attention. I would always worry over whether or not my body was okay and if my mind was okay, because it wasn't and it isn't normal in the slightest. I would always have a more easily fatigued body, and I would always have that mutation inside of me, that one little DNA mess up, that left me excluded from the vast majority of the clan techniques.

I was hesitant and shy, only because I had been changed to feel and act that way at such an early age.

It was hard not to be. It took actual effort not to be so with my friends; with the ones I knew accepted and loved me anyway.

But I was grateful, nonetheless. Grateful that I had Papa, and grateful I had their support.

"I know you're not," I answered Tenten, smiling up at her.

"Good," Tenten declared, peering at me with narrowed eyes and a smug smile. "Now I want you to be my moving target again, I need to make sure my accuracy is at a hundred-percent when I meet my new team!"

I gulped. The things I do for friends...

（ര‿ ര）❀

My eye twitched.

"Nee-chan... are we done yet?"

"Shhh," Ino hushed me, a hair brush in hand and a hot iron in the other. "You're cutting your hair when you graduate so I have to take full advantage of it while it's long now!"

My eye twitched again.

I love my Nee-chan. I love my Nee-chan. I love my Nee-chan. I love my Nee-chan, I repeated the mantra in my head, and when it just didn't work, I started thinking of the biggest vocabulary words I knew and alphabetizing them to pass the time.

I was that desperate.

Pluvious. P-L-U-V-I-O-U-S. Pertaining to rain, it is rainy. Wet. Precipitating.

"Don't give me that look," Ino whined. "Come on. Smile. How am I supposed to put make-up on you if you don't give me a pretty smile to begin with? You're going to get wrinkles if you keep doing that, Imouto!"

"I don't care," I grouched. "Are we done?"

Ino stared at me another moment before her big blue eyes widened, her bottom lip jutted out and she gave me That Look™. Immediately, I felt guilty for ever causing my sister enough trouble for her to have to resort to that. It was only for a little while, and besides it didn't really hurt anyone... So what if I loathed it with a burning passion? It made her happy and I was still too guilty over the whole Sasuke-fiasco, that I couldn't bear to cause her any more...

I felt a small itch cross over my butt, but before I could scratch it, I remembered that she had me in a rather expensive kimono and scratching my butt, no matter how itchy it was, in it would be severely frowned upon and therefore I couldn't do it.

... Screw the look, I was out of here.

"Are we done?" I repeated, pointedly looking away from her.

Ino gave a mutter. "Oh fine. I guess I can live without you having a little make-up on... Oooh, but you look so cute, Imouto! Just look at you."

I gave a small sigh, shifting my stiff and tired legs-she had me standing the entire time so I would not wrinkle the kimono-before peering at myself in the mirror.

I flushed.

Ino gave another squeal. "OhmiGod. Chichi! Haha! Come here! Get the camera!"

In a matter of seconds, Papa and Momma were in the room, Momma holding her camera. She gave an awwing sound upon seeing me and I flushed even more so as she held up the camera and began to snap rapid pictures. Papa stared at me, a torn expression on his face.

"You look very cute, Nao-chan," Papa finally said. "You are forbidden from dating. Ever."

"Boys are icky, Papa," I said, crinkling up my nose. It wasn't so much as boys were icky, really. So much as none of them (with the exception of Shikamaru who was too much like family) were at my intellectual level and thus I felt rather creeper-ish if I had even the slightest attraction towards them. Thankfully, I wouldn't have to hold that attraction until my body was more developed and by then, hopefully I would have an idea on what to do.

"That's right. Boys are very icky," Papa said wisely. Momma and Ino exchanged glances, giggling all the while.

I didn't know why.

We were both being perfectly serious.

（ര‿ ര）❀

"So how is your team?" I asked hesitantly the night after Ino decided to dress me up like a doll (again). Tenten gave me this sort of pained expression, plopping onto the grass beside me at my home. Today we were using my clan's personal training ground, Ino was inside getting us some drinks and snacks.

"... I... I don't know... It was... So much green," Tenten whispered, her eyes staring off towards the sky. "It was... Oh God, it was..."

Suddenly feeling like I was talking to someone who was suffering from PTS (something Papa had described to Ino and myself a handful of times), I leaned forward and placed a hand on her shoulder.

"It's okay," I told her as gently as could. "You don't need to talk about it right now."

Tenten nodded her head. "Good... Good..."

"Got the drinks! Haha said she'll make the snacks, so no need to worry," Ino exclaimed, rushing to us before tackling into me and squeezing me tightly. I giggled, squeezing my sister just as tightly.

I hadn't introduced Tenten to the boys, quite yet. They knew of her, and she knew of them, but she didn't have any real desire to meet them. Because Tenten had often practiced at the compound, it was natural for her and Ino to meet and converse. The two weren't particularly close, but I knew they were at least fond of each other.

"Hi, Tenten-chan," Ino chirped, smiling brightly at her.

Tenten returned the smile with one of her own. "Hey, Ino-chan."

"I don't suppose you want to stay the night? Papa's bringing home the latest Ryoko movie."

Tenten's eyes lit up and she gave a thoughtful expression. "... Oooh, I shouldn't. My team is going to be hell tomorrow and staying up late just doesn't seem like a good idea, but..."

"We have caramel popcorn," Ino sung.

"I'm there," Tenten said instantly.

Ino and I erupted into a fit of giggles at Tenten's incredibly focused gaze at us before soon Tenten was laughing alongside us.

It was a nice day.

Unlike my other stories, there will be no set length or update. This will be spontaneous and whatever.

Reviews are love!

* This story is also a kind of compensation for whenever I update at a later date... Eheheheh... So whenever a story isn't updated for whatever circumstances, rest assured this one will be instead.