[FFML] [Naruto][AU]Clients Lie 3-5 + 20 Lies Interlude

[Nugar]

After chapter five I decided to start playing around more with my
style and plotting. Comments welcome!

Also, I have a sneaking suspicion that the formatting for this is
going to be slightly unusual.  Hopefully, it'll still be readable.

As always, current progress can be found at
http://nugarwrites.livejournal.com/  and
http://www.fanfiction.net/~nugar






	
	"Good morning, Kakashi-sensei," Hinata said quietly as
she emerged from the tent.

	"Good morning, Hinata, Naruto," he replied, not looking
up from his book.

	"Are you cooking?" Naruto asked, right behind Hinata.

	"Sasuke started some rice."

	"Ah.  Nice."  Naruto headed for the stream, Hinata
beside him, and crouched by the bank, splashing water into
his face.  He spluttered for a moment, wiping his face with
one hand, while the other casually dangled into the water.

	Hinata scrubbed lightly at her hands in the clear
stream, picking carefully at her fingernails.  Anyone with
good eyes might have seen how the water around her hands
seemed to gel and thicken.

	A bit of rotten leaf, floating on the water, swirled
between their two hands, then stopped, as if it had ran
aground.

	Naruto ran his hand through his hair and shifted
position, his other hand moving slightly in the water.

	The leaf tugged his direction a fraction of an inch.
Hinata smiled and nodded to an unseen question.  And, as if
its journey had never been interrupted, the bit of leaf
resumed its trip.

	Breakfast was quick and quiet.  Sasuke made enough rice
for everyone, serving himself and retreating as an
announcement it was done.  Hinata served Naruto and Kakashi
before taking a bowl for herself.  It was plain, but filling.

	Kakashi waited until the gear had been packed before
motioning to them and heading to the pool.

	Naruto grinned.

	Sasuke looked bored.

	"Okay, I want this to be a casual spar," Kakashi began
lightly.  "Don't kill each other.  Don't wound each other.
Stop when I tell you to stop.  Remember that we're on a
mission.  Sasuke: no fire jutsu.  Naruto: no kage bushin."

	Naruto carefully kept the disappointment from his face.

	"No kunai, senbon, or shuriken," Kakashi continued.
"The purpose of this spar isn't so you can settle your
issues, to impress me, or to woo Hinata,"

	Hinata and, surprisingly, Sasuke blushed a little at
those words.  Naruto just looked startled.

	"so whatever is running through your aggressive little
minds, forget it.  I want you to show me that you can fight
on the water."  He smiled.  "And, to make things more
interesting, I think you'll do it blind."  He pulled out two
black bandannas, already folded into strips.

	Naruto opened his mouth, looked at Sasuke, then closed
it with an audible snap.

	They let Kakashi tie the bandannas over their eyes
silently, then turned and walked to opposite sides of the
pool, Sasuke gliding over the surface of the water, Naruto
raising little splashes with each step.

	Kakashi grinned in obvious delight at his students'
antics.

	"Sensei?" Hinata asked.  He rarely seemed so…
delighted, unless it was on the days he'd show up with a new
book.

	"Begin!" he said loudly, then crouched down beside
Hinata.

	Sasuke immediately started sliding across the water,
smooth and silent, and Naruto froze in place.

	After a moment, she copied her teacher.  "Sensei?" she
asked again.

	He glanced at her, back to the boys, then back to her,
and shrugged.  "Okay, here's a lesson for you.  Tell me what
they're thinking, and how it relates to their personal
styles.  I'll make sure they can't hear us."  He began
forming seals for a concealment jutsu.

	She blinked.  That was unexpected.  But… okay.  She
activated her byakugan and peered at the other two.  Her
clan's bloodline gave her many of the same abilities to read
and predict an opponent as the sharingan did, just not the
ability to copy them.

	After another moment, she began to narrate.

	"Sasuke is skilled and confident.  He immediately went
on the hunt, trusting his ability to be silent as he waits
for Naruto to make a mistake.  He does not underestimate
Naruto's abilities, and expects a many layered trap, so he
doesn't stay in one place very long, but he expects to spot
the first opening and use it."

	Kakashi nodded, watching as Sasuke silently zigzagged
back and forth across the pool.  "He also hopes to run into
Naruto by chance, and rely on his superior taijutsu to win
the battle.  And Naruto?"

	Hinata paused, looking at the blond.  "He specializes
in deception tactics, so he's very hard to read.  He can…  he
believes he can beat Sasuke, but he mostly practices the most
deadly techniques because he says it takes more skill to
leave an enemy alive than to kill them, but the best way to
live long enough to gain that skill is to leave a trail of
harmless corpses.  He made a lot of noise at first to conceal
his real skill, knowing Sasuke expects that, and is now
remaining still and perfectly silent to convince Sasuke that
he's really skilled and not going to make a mistake."

	"Hmmmmm…" Kakashi said thoughtfully, watching Sasuke
orbit silently and Naruto just…  stand there.  "That's not
exactly it.  It's true Sasuke is bold and confident, but
Naruto isn't so much drawing him into a multilevel web of
deception as he is simply being cautious."

	"Naruto is not afraid of Sasuke," Hinata protested.

	"Mmm, perhaps that is true, but his skill with
misdirection is largely because he works to hide himself,
keeping any potential enemy, or in this case, Sasuke, from
getting something he can use against him."

	"Naruto is full of confidence," Hinata again insisted.

	"That's true," Kakashi admitted, mollifying the
increasingly distraught kunoichi.  "He believes in his mind
absolutely.  However, he also knows that Sasuke is better at
taijutsu than he is.  So he forced Sasuke to move cautiously,
buying him time to gather all the information available and
think it through.  When he moves it will doubtlessly be to
implement some well reasoned plan."

	Sasuke had paused towards the edge of the pool, and
crouched on the water, letting his hand fall silently through
the water's surface as he rummaged around beneath his feet.

	"A trap?  Maybe…  no.  Ah.  Pebbles," she said as
Sasuke's hand emerged from the water, his other hand poised
to catch the drip of water.

	Sasuke tossed six rocks in quick succession, making a
series of splashes as if he'd suddenly darted forward,
abandoning stealth for speed.

	Naruto twitched, a kunai springing into his hand as he
started to throw, then stopped himself and carefully slid the
kunai back into his jacket sleeve.

	"And the question is," Kakashi said thoughtfully, "is
did he really almost forget and try to kill Sasuke, or did he
just want to make me think that?"

	"Think, probably," Hinata replied.

	Kakashi looked at her.

	She shrugged.  "I guess."

	Sasuke threw several more rocks, this time hard and
fast, in a closely spaced arc that covered the area where
he'd made the splashes.  They sailed across the water to hit
the soft earth on the other side with tiny thumps.

	Naruto chose that moment to start moving, stepping
gingerly as he silently slid four feet to one side, coming
within inches of the edge of the water.

	Sasuke did likewise, once again crouching and rooting
through the water for more rocks to throw.

	Naruto, on the other hand, grabbed handfuls of dirt and
started throwing them in the air as high as he could without
making a telltale grunt of effort.

	However, the swish of his arm gave him away, and
suddenly Sasuke was springing forward, scattering rocks
before him.  Most hit the bank, but one bounced off Naruto's
chest and hit the water with a plop.

	Naruto dived to the left, channeling chakra as he hit
the water with his shoulder, staying on the surface and
rolling to his feet in an instant.

	Loose dirt mixed with larger clumps rained down as
Sasuke charged, throwing a series of quick silent punches at
where he thought Naruto was.

	He was quite close, Naruto having been unable to keep
silent as he rolled, but Naruto had stepped forward to meet
the onrush, and Sasuke attacked from the side, his blows
coming inches from Naruto's back.

	They both froze, listening to the pattern of splashes
at the dirt hit water, none of it near them.  But some of the
sound was blocked by Sasuke, and Naruto suddenly spun, one
leg coming up in a sweeping kick.

	At such close range, however, Sasuke heard the small
movements of the cloth and breath, and countered with his own
kick.

	Their legs met with a horrific crack, right across each
shin.

	Hinata winced at the impact.

	A shiver ran up both boys' spine at the pain, and the
legs were almost instantly retracted, chambering back with
the foot near the hip as they assessed the damage.

	Near identical snarls twisted their faces, and they
simultaneously kicked again even harder.  This time the crack
of shin against shin was even louder, punctuated by grunts.
They drew back and kicked again.

	This time one leg was high and the other low, Sasuke
kicking high, spinning with the miss, then leaping over
Naruto's head and coming down with a double fisted blow aimed
at the blond's head.

	Naruto's leg was low, falling short of Sasuke's by less
than an inch, and he quickly stuck that foot to the water
with chakra and launched a cross scissor kick with his other,
pushing himself forward with his right hand.  Sasuke's attack
ended nearly a foot over his head, but Naruto heard the
splashes as he landed.  He held himself still and silent.

	Sasuke, wary since he'd missed, silently stepped to one
side, his hand reaching out for contact.  There was none.

	The brief exchange had ended, and now, once again,
neither knew where the other was.

	Naruto slowly changed his position into a crouch, hands
and feet on the water.  Then he began to concentrate.

	Sasuke walked silently back and forth, questing for his
opponent, his steps getting faster and faster as he grew
better at keeping silent.

	Naruto lifted one hand from the water, but it brought a
rough globe of water nearly the size of a human head with it,
stuck to it with chakra.  Using his other hand, he quickly
pinched off a series of handfuls, then let them fall back to
the surface.

	Splash, splash, splash.

	Sasuke turned to the sound, but did not immediately run
to the attack, wary of a trap.

	Splash, splash, splash.

	Sasuke slipped closer, gliding across the water as if
he was on skates, a tricky application of chakra.

	Splash, splash, splash.

	Splash.

	Sasuke moved even more slowly, perfectly silently,
never letting himself be off balance or unready.

	Naruto crouched again, both hands in the water on
opposite sides, his face stern with concentration.  Then,
slowly, he stood up.  And the surface of the pool came with
him.

	It looked much like he was standing in the middle of a
bed and had the blanket in each hand.  As he stood, he pulled
it up as two handfuls in a solid sheet.  And like a sheet,
pulling up in the middle drew back the edges, pulling
everything closer to him as he did so.  But water slid much
more smoothly than a sheet, and Sasuke was unknowingly about
two feet closer to Naruto than he thought.

	"Saaaaassssuuukkeee…" Naruto cooed.  "Surprise."

	Sasuke rose onto the balls of his feet and froze, his
senses straining for some indication of the coming attack.
How did Naruto know where he was?

	And suddenly Naruto spun, pulling at the water with all
his strength and all his chakra.  A suiton master could have
used a jutsu, but Naruto didn't know any water techniques, so
all he could do was make it stick to him, and itself, and
pull.  It was heavy, but he was strong, and he pulled hard.

	Like pulling a rug out from under someone, Sasuke
suddenly found his footing unstable.  He didn't curse in
surprise, but he did stumble, making two small splashes as he
did so, furiously channeling chakra as he tried to regain his
balance.

	Naruto had no such problem, and was in the air in an
instant, dropping the water as he did so.  The resulting
splash was tremendous, and the wave of water upset Sasuke
just one more fraction of a second.  Long enough for Naruto's
flying tackle to hit.

	One arm was pinned to his body by Naruto's bear hug,
and Naruto's legs wrapped around his waist at the same time,
ankles locking behind his back.  They toppled backwards to
the water, both using chakra to stay on top.

	"GOT!-CHA!" Naruto crowed in triumph despite the punch
which thundered into his cheek as he did so.  He threw his
head back, taking another punch in the process, then slammed
his protected forehead into Sasuke's face.

	Sasuke punched him three more times as he pulled his
head back, then he did it again.  And again, despite more
punches.

	"YIELD!  YIELD YOU BAST-OWW!" he yelled, then slammed
his head into Sasuke's chin again, pressing his face to the
dark haired boy's neck as he tried to finish his declaration.
"You can't pry me loose and you can't stop me without killing
me!  And I can take more pain than you!  Yield!"
	
	Sasuke punched him again, this time in the ear, and
spit blood in his hair.

	"OWW!  What is it with you people and my damned ear?!"
He slammed his head into Sasuke's face again.

	Kakashi chuckled at the sight of his two students
beating each other bloody.  "So much for subtle," he noted
wryly.  "I don't think deception is Naruto's real fighting
style.  More like bloody minded hard headedness."

	Hinata didn't say anything, watching in consternation
as Naruto, the smartest, most devious person she knew,
abandoned all pretense of style and thought and proceeded to
continue to slam his bleeding head into Sasuke.

	Sasuke was getting more and more desperate.  This
wasn't fighting, this was two cats in a sack, sinking in a
pond.  Naruto's legs were making it harder and harder to gasp
a breath, and he used his head like a club, heedless of the
damage he was accruing himself.  But he wasn't called a
genius for nothing.  So he took a deep breath, punched Naruto
in the throat, making him gag, and changed the way he
channeled chakra.  They both sank slightly into the water,
but then his flailing feet caught the shallow bottom and
stuck as if it was a tree.  Using the powerful muscles in his
legs, he pulled himself, and Naruto, under.

	The surface of the water continued to ripple with the
struggle below.  Kakashi watched it with interest as the
seconds ticked by, becoming a minute, then two.  Then three.

	Then four.

	"Ano, Sensei, shouldn't we…?" she asked hesitantly.

	He shrugged.  "They should be able to take ten to
fifteen minutes under water without significant brain damage,
easy.  I'll pull them out in…  mmm, call it another fifteen
minutes."  He gave her a reassuring smile.

	Another two minutes went by.  The ripples were just as
vigorous as before.

	"Sensei…" she said worriedly.

	"Another fifteen.  Don't worry, they'll be fine."
	
	Naruto burst to the surface, gasping, his blindfold
askew, but still blinded by water and blood.

	Sasuke appeared on the water's surface behind him,
still blindfolded, but in considerably better shape despite
the cuts on his lips and chin.  And he very deliberately
waited a second, until Naruto had managed his clumsy climb
back onto the water's surface, then kicked him very hard in
the side.

	Naruto rolled across the water with a grunt of pain,
then rolled more as he dodged the heavy stamps of Sasuke's
feet, thankful for his new advantage of being able to see,
however blurry.  He rolled to his feet...

	And Sasuke made a certain movement with his left hand.

	Naruto ducked right and under, and three strands of
ninja wire looped over his head, missing instead of
entangling him.  He pulled his own out with twin sweeps of
both his arms, catching Sasuke's legs, then twisting his
hands just so, making the wire kink and bind itself behind
him, effectively hobbling him.

	But a sinuous whisper of wire against cloth alerted him
to the return of Sasuke's coils of wire.  There was very
little time.

	Sasuke ignored his trapped legs for a moment, his split
lips twisting into a smile as his wire encircled Naruto, then
frowning as, instead of hard resistance, there was a brief
tug before only gentle friction.  A large splash at almost
the same moment told him the story.

	He had pulled a kawarimi, swapping a chakra laden ball
of water for himself.  And since you had to be touching water
to put chakra in it, that made him-

	Naruto cursed silently to himself as Sasuke back
flipped away from his rising uppercut.  He pulled on his
wire, but it was too late.  Sasuke had already slipped the
coils.

	"Alright, Naruto," Sasuke said calmly, controlling his
breathing with some effort.

	He held his tongue, silently beginning his stalk of the
Uchiha.  Vision was going to be a tremendous advantage, and
it wasn't exactly cheating.  Sasuke had pulled his blindfold
off himself as he'd raked Naruto's eyes underwater.  He had
no one to blame but himself.

	"I acknowledge you as the best of us three at
leadership.  If you have a suggestion, I will give it all due
consideration," Sasuke proclaimed.

	"WHAT!?  REA-"

		
	o/~


	Naruto's pack was unusually light for something
supposedly well stocked with equipment for a mission, for all
that it was as full as mine or Hinata's, but that just made
him easier to carry.  Hinata carried mine, an admittedly
lighter burden than Naruto, but neither were exactly happy
with our assignments.

	'You knocked him out, you carry him,' Kakashi had said.

	…Fine.  So now his arms were loosely draped to either
side of my neck, and I supported him on my back by holding
his thighs.  It should have been more humiliating, but I just
got through kicking the shit out of him so it was okay.

	So now, we ran quickly and smoothly along little
traveled roads, having exited the forest about half an hour
after we resumed our trip.  Naruto had been out for nearly
two hours, a fact I took some pride in.  I had put quite a
lot of strength into that axe kick to the back of his head.
It had been a thing of beauty.  Even Hinata had congratulated
me on it, which was slightly odd.

	He woke up, finally.  He didn't move, didn't stiffen,
didn't say anything, didn't change his breathing, or give any
of the other telling signs of awareness.  No, I knew he woke
up when I caught a faint wave of killing intent, quickly
clamped off.

	Hmm, deliberate?  Accidental, but noticed?  Irrelevant.
I had already decided to mess with him.

	I kept carrying him.  I bet he didn't expect that.

	What would he do?

	Move to choke me?  Reach for a kunai?  Ride all the way
to Tomahigiro?  Something freaky, designed to unnerve me?
Heh.

	If he moved to attack, I, naturally, had a little
surprise for him.  Wire, looped around his neck and down to
my fingers.  I could let go of his legs and pull on that wire
in an instant, and he'd be forced to let go or be garroted,
and at the speed I was running, he'd be falling to the ground
as I ran ahead, plus I'd probably just hold on to the wire
and pull him along by his neck, garroting him anyway, which I
found a pleasing mental image.

	If he didn't try to attack me, well, I'd just have to
see what the path of most inscrutability would be.

	Because I had Naruto's measure.

	It's amazing what inspirations you can have in the
early morning darkness, keeping watch.

	So I just kept running.

	After about five minutes, I felt him tense, and the
killing intent was back.

	My fingers tightened on the wire.

	And then it choked off again.  Naruto was pretty
unhappy.

	Heh, this was kind of fun.  Completely unseemly,
incredibly degrading, but fun, and oh so completely worth it.
			

	Then I felt his weight shift, but not like he was
moving.  He just… changed shape.  And suddenly, instead of a
flat chest leaned against my back, there were two large, soft
lumps being squished between us.

	I'm ashamed to say it actually took me a moment to
understand what he'd done.  I'm even more ashamed to admit
that I blushed.

	…Seems like he took the freaky route.

	But okay, I can deal.  My blush faded.  So Naruto has
breasts.  Big deal.  Hinata has breasts, too.  Perhaps
infinitesimally smaller, but nicer because they're real.

	Or something.  Shit, I was blushing again.  This is not
helping.

	I mentally shook myself, and Sensei slowed us down
again to a walking pace to allow us to gain our breath.  Feh,
as if I needed a break.  Hinata didn't look like she was
having any trouble, and Naruto certainly didn't need a break,
the lazy bastard.

	This was about the point Hinata looked over and gasped.

	"Naruto!  You're… a girl."  She shook her head and
changed her pace to come to my side.  "Is your head alright?"

	"Tee hee!" Naruto giggled.  "Who's Naruto?  I'm
Naruko!"  She giggled again, though not quite as annoyingly.
"Who are you and where are we going?"

	"Naruto, there is something wrong with you," I noted
quietly.  Now was about the time I suppose I'm supposed to
put him down and let Hinata tend to him, but I didn't do
that.

	Hinata giggled.  "Sasuke, you know Naruto is just
making a joke."

	"I stand behind my words."

	Long silence.  I could actually hear Naruto pout.

	"Well, if I'm so messed up, why are you still carrying
me?" she said, and she sounded genuinely curious.

	"You have nice tits," I replied neutrally.  Thought of
that line right after Hinata gasped.

	Sensei actually stumbled when I said that.  Hinata
froze and fell back out of sight, so I don't know what she
did.

	I walked on.  I thought about shifting one hand and
squeezing 'her' ass, but I doubt Naruto's surprise would be
worth having to cut off my own hand.

	"…Duly noted, Sasuke," Naruto said, with a note of
something indefinable in her voice.  Admiration?  Respect?

	Her hands snaked down my chest and traced my muscles as
her breath suddenly grew loud in my ear, close enough to
tickle the tiny hairs.  "Thank you.  A girl likes to know her
assets are appreciated by the sexy man in the group."

	And she bit my ear!

	I nearly dropped her, doubtlessly the idea, but I
didn't, since I had a ready counter literally at my
fingertips.

	"gurk" was all she said.

	She let go of my ear pretty quick after that, and I
held the tension for another few moments before I let the
wire loosen around her neck.  Oddly, Naruto seemed to think
the ride was over after that, and nearly fell on her cute
little ass in her haste to get to her own feet and the wire
from around her neck, leaking killing intent in little fits
and starts the whole time.

	Naruto dropped the jutsu and resumed his shape as a boy
as he shucked the wire and threw it in tangles on the ground,
his hands actually shaking as he did so.  He gave me another
look I couldn't hope to decipher and stomped off ahead of us.

	Hinata looked at me, then Naruto, with fear, confusion,
and hurt, clearly started to go after him, then just as
visibly hesitated.  She finally scurried after him with a
final backwards glance at me that said she would be having
words with me later.

	Kakashi-sensei looked at me.

	"Was it something I said?" I asked.  Mentally, I ticked
another check.  Me two, Naruto zero.

	Oh, yeah.  I had Naruto's measure.

	
	o/~


	Hinata had to run hard to catch up with Naruto, who'd
managed to disappear quickly after he'd gotten only a hundred
yards in front of the rest of the group.  Using her byakugan
let her catch a glimpse as he fled into the woods, and she
quickly followed.  Still, it took several moments before she
found him again.

	Actually, there were two of him, and for one heart
wrenching moment, she thought it was the real one that had
one of Naruto's guardless wakizashis in his ear.  Blood
trickled down from where the razor sharp steel was being
slowly pressed through the thin flesh and bone, and his eyes
were screwed shut in pain and effort as he struggled to break
the arm lock the other Naruto had him in.

	But no, Naruto wouldn't do that.  Hinata had perfect
confidence in him.

	Still, he was doing something she'd never have
imagined.

	Finally, the blade broke through the bone with a quick
convulsive thrust, reaching deep enough to hit something
lethal, and the clone disappeared with a poof.

	The real Naruto flinched as if it had been him under
the knife when it had suddenly gained those last inches.
Absently he wiped the pristine blade on his pants leg and
slid it into its sheath behind his back before collapsing
onto the ground and hanging his head.

	Slowly, Hinata drew forward and sat with her legs
crossed to his side, close, but not touching.

	He didn't look at her.

	"A-ah…" she began hesitantly.  "D-did you forget to
make the s-shadow clone look like…  him?"

	"Hinata, you're stu-stu-stuttering again," he snapped.

	She recoiled as if slapped, pressing her hands to her
mouth, her eyes wide with shock and hurt.  It took her a
moment to get to her feet, as she nearly lost her balance in
her rush to rise, but there was barely time for Naruto to see
the first few tears glimmering in her so-pale eyes before she
leapt for the trees and was gone.

	"SHIT!" he cried.  "KAGE BUSHIN NO JUTSU!" followed a
split second later, and the new clone was still forming, not
even able to raise its hands in self defense before Naruto's
blade split its right eye on the journey to the brain, and
for a second it lingered between forming and unforming, hate
at it and hate at himself, chakra looping and twisting in
upon itself.

	Caught in the feedback loop, Naruto stiffened like he'd
just cut a live wire.

	Darkness claimed him.


	o/~


	I must confess, I sort of thought Kakashi-sensei was
going to have something witty or insightful to say.  Instead,
he whipped out his book and proceeded to ignore the hell out
of me.

	Perhaps that's a lesson in and of itself.  I should
pick up some reading material next time.

	A particularly loud brush of leaves against each other
shook me out of my musings to see Hinata standing in the
road, her face in her hands.  She stood like that for a long
moment before clearly sighing and dropping her hands, turning
to walk our direction in the next breath.

	I watched her with an expression of mild disinterest,
though I was curious what she'd say.

	"Naruto is close to a group of three small silverleaf
trees seven hundred and thirty yards that direction," she
said as she drew even with Kakashi-sensei, pointing behind
her as she walked.  "He wants some time to himself."

	"How much time?" I asked, smirking just the tiniest
bit.  "We don't have all day."

	HO~LY shitIforgotshenoshe'snever-

	I felt like I was moving through syrup.  I blinked and
then she was there, her hands striking for my chest.  I
twisted, bringing my arms up to sweep hers aside, but instead
of the two fingered juken strike she grabbed my arm, her
hands moving as fast as Sensei does sometimes when he wants
to make a point.  And then her shin connected across my lower
stomach, her hands pulled, and the world did this funny
spinning thing and I was on my back with Hinata kneeling on
my chest with one hand on my throat and her finger pointed at
my head for one heart stopping moment-

	I saw death in that finger.

	-and the finger curled as the hand made a fist which
connected very quickly with my split lip, which had finally
stopped bleeding about an hour ago.  Then it hit my eye.

	So I punched her.  Nothing fancy, just a right cross to
her jaw that snapped her head to the side and sent blood
spraying.  Pretty strong, that punch.  Pretty satisfying.

	It hurt a lot when she hit the nerve junction in my
right shoulder and I couldn't use that arm anymore.  Kakashi-
sensei usually calls out 'cripple' strikes when she makes
them, and I continue the fight appropriately.  The actual
experience is a little different.  Naruto is right.  There
really is no substitute for actually trying to kill each
other.

	Naturally, she hit me in the face again.  So I punched
her again, this time with my left, and this time I really
gave it to her with a nice solid tap on her temple, right
behind one of those wild, wide, incredibly crazed eyes of
hers.

	It should have knocked her out cold.  Instead, she hit
the nerve junction in my left shoulder.  All in all, I could
have planned this better.
	
	And…  she hit me again.  Probably trained in this
technique with Naruto.  What the hell is it with Naruto and
his stupid ass ideas on trading blows to the face?  I could
just see the two of them, wrestling with each other out at
one of the training grounds, trading full force blows to the
face.  It'd be just like Naruto to think that up.  And it'd
be just like Hinata to go along with it.

	Lacking any better option at the moment, I decided to
point out the pointlessness of this exercise in futility to
our jounin-sensei.

	 "Ah, not that t-ng-this isn't fun-grk, but shouldn't
we nng be moving again?" I asked in what I hoped was a normal
conversational voice, twisting my head to both avoid another
blow and send a meaningful look his direction.

	Kakashi looked up from his book and smiled, at least I
think it was a smile, at me.  "Nah, it's fine.  I booked
extra time for this sort of thing."

	"Proper mission planning is essential," I agreed
thickly as Hinata punched me in the mouth again.

	Stars exploded behind my eyes.  That one had had a
touch of juken to it.  Hinata grabbed my hair with her hand
and shook my head lightly.

	"Look at me," three Hinata's hissed.

	"You have my attention," I admitted truthfully.  All of
them did.

	"I don't know what you said or did to Naruto, but you
need to listen to me."  She gave my head a little shake,
which made my vision swim just that much more.  "Never, ever,
NEVER do it again."

	"Are you finished?" I asked.

	She stopped, blinked, and frowned.  "I-"

	"Good."  I kicked upward with my right leg hard enough
to throw her body upwards, though her hand was still locked
into the fabric of my shirt at my throat so it wound up
making her do a sort of hand stand on my neck.  My left knee
shot up faster than she was moving and slammed into her
sternum, forcing all her breath out with a whuff and
hastening her arc to land on her back.  I kicked with my foot
against the ground, spinning myself around while she curled
around her stomach, writhing in pain, and dropped a heel
right across the side of her head with, I admit, a certain
amount of vindictiveness.

	That time, she stopped moving.

	I quickly flipped to my feet, my arms still flopping
uselessly at my sides.  I frowned at the unconscious
kunoichi.

	"And a little advice to you," I replied.  "Never, ever,
NEVER try that again."

	Kakashi-sensei looked up from his book again.  "It kind
of loses its sting when they're unconscious, you know."

	I glared at him, and I could already feel my eye
swelling shut.

	"You gonna carry her now?" he asked.

	My reply was simple and definite.  "No."  Let Naruto do
it, when he got back from his cry or his planning session or
whatever the hell he was doing.

	"Don't do it Hinata," he warned.

	What- Like a fool, I glanced at the ground first,
where, of course, she was no longer laying.  A blur appeared
in the corner of my vision.  Very, very slowly, I turned just
enough to see that it was a hand, two fingers extended,
pointing at my temple.

	"Next time, I'm just going to kill you," Hinata said
quietly, the fire gone from her voice.

	 "There won't be a next time," I warned.

	Kakashi picked that moment to stand, closing his book
as he did so.  "Well then, so long as we all understand each
other," he said brightly.

	
	o/~


	The streets were clean, the buildings looked newly
painted, and throngs of people bustled about, each one intent
on his or her own little mission, but the buzz of polite,
meaningless conversation filled the air.

	The only strange thing about the city was that there
was no sky.

	Instead of white clouds and a yellow sun and pale blue
sky, it was dark.  But it wasn't like night, with a field of
star splattered velvet.  And it wasn't like a cloudy, pitch
black moonless night, either.  Instead, up just kind of kept
going up… until up was indefinable and lost.

	There was light, though.  Plenty of light.  The colors
were cheery and bright, and the people had ready smiles on
their faces when they saw each other.  There weren't any dark
alleys or shadowed expressions.

	Oh, wait.  There was one more strange thing about the
city.

	All of the people, from the stumbling, barely toddling
along little girl, to the man selling figs and plums under an
awning, to a curvaceous woman attracting lustful glances, to
a teenage boy and a teenage girl holding hands…  they all had
his face.

	Nah.  Not all that strange.  The lack of sky was what
was really weird. 	

	Naruto wandered aimlessly among the people, never being
jostled or impeded despite the numbers, just another Naruto
in the crowd, staring up at the strange, skyless...  …up.

	None of the rest of him looked up.  It was like they
couldn't see it.  Admittedly, he couldn't see it either, so
he finally gave up and started looking around him.

	People.

	So many people.

	And every one of them had his face set incongruously on
top of whatever body they had been graced with.  They were
all talking, nearly constantly; just a continuous flow of
words that individually had meaning but when listened to
sequentially failed to say anything at all.

	It was comforting, really.  He liked it here.

	There was one place, though, that none of him went.

	Almost against his will, he found himself going there.

	The crowd just stopped, and he walked along a now
deserted street, heading for the biggest building in the
whole city.  It was huge, like a warehouse the size of
Konoha.  It had a wall around it, and a rusty gate hanging
slightly ajar.

	He slipped inside the gate and immediately saw a door
set into the side of the building.  It was a normal sized
door, but it seemed incredibly tiny against the immense
vastness of the side of the building.
	
	He opened it and stepped in.

	The warehouse was empty.  If it seemed huge from the
outside, it was even bigger from the inside.  The walls
stretched away forever from him, and the far side was a hazy
promise rather than something he could actually see.  A row
of colossal fans were set into the wall far off to his right,
turning slowly, their blades chopping the fading orange light
filtering in from the outside.  But despite the appearance of
being in a building, the ceiling was just like the sky
outside.

	It wasn't there.

	Naruto wandered in, following no set path, though he
didn't appear to get near any wall, even the one he'd come in
from.  Or, at least, the one he thought he'd come in from.
He stared upwards the entire time, searching for some sign of
rafters or roof or anything, but there was nothing but more
gloom and nothingness.

	"Why do you look up?"

	Naruto whirled around, staring, looking for the source
of the voice.  It appeared to come from everywhere and
nowhere, ageless and genderless at the same time.

	"Why do you look up?" the voice repeated.

	Again, Naruto couldn't find the source of the voice.
Hesitantly, he opened his mouth and replied.

	"Because there's nothing there?" he hazarded.

	"Why don't you look around?"

	"Because there's nothing there, either," he replied.

	"You see nothing and you want to look at nothing?" the
voice asked, sounding incredulous, and slightly contemptuous.

	Naruto felt stupid.  "Look, what else is there?" he
demanded.

	"Try looking down."

	Blinking, Naruto did just that, and was startled to
find himself on the edge of a hole in the ground, maybe ten
feet across, with a sharp slope down along one edge, leading
into the darkness.  There was a fox sitting primly along one
edge, tail curled around its hips.  It had red fur and a pale
chest, and couldn't have been more than a foot tall.

	It looked at him.  Its eyes were bright.

	He stared at it.

	"You?" he asked.  "Were you the one talking?"

	The fox didn't say anything.  It just kept looking at
him, following him as he walked around the rim of the hole to
the slope.

	He paused, looking at the fox.
	
	"I uh, I guess I'm supposed to go down, huh?" he asked.

	It just kept looking at him.

	Naruto swallowed nervously, then went down.


	o/~

Begin chapter four.


	He awoke to someone shaking him.

	"Huh?  Whazzat?" he said blearily, sitting up and
holding his head, which throbbed with pain.

	"NARUTO!" Hinata cried, throwing her arms around him
and sobbing helplessly into his jacket.

	"Hinata?  Hinata!" he exclaimed, his brain catching up
with what was happening.  "Hinata, I'm sorry!"

	"Wannnh!" she cried harder, fingers balling into his
jacket.  She knelt, one leg to each side of his right thigh,
giving him enough room to rise and her enough room to slump
against him as if she was a puppet with its strings cut.

	With a start, he noticed that her face had an ugly,
purplish bruise across it, her lip was split, and one of her
eyes had swollen shut and was turning deep red.  His heart
seemed to stop, and his blood ran hot for one long moment.

	His fist tightened on her jacket and jerked her up, her
tear streaked face meeting his.

	"Hinata, what happened?" he demanded, his voice low and
angry.

	Hinata blubbered for a moment more, too distraught to
answer.

	He slapped her, just a light tap, on the unbruised side
of her face.  The shock made her stop crying for a moment and
stare at him.

	"Hinata…" he growled.  "Who hit you?"

	"S-s-s-sas-ssuke…" she finally got out.

	He nodded, having expected that answer.  For a moment
he just sat there, the neck of her jacket in his fist, as if
he'd forgot about her, staring into space.  Then he shook his
head, one quick jerk, and looked at her again.

	"Why?"

	"A-a-ah…" she stuttered for a moment, then swallowed
and looked resolute.  "Because I attacked him and threatened
to kill him if he ever did…  whatever he did to you again."
The tears fled from her eyes as a look of silent murder
filled them.

	"You threatened to kill him?" Naruto asked with a tone
of mounting shock and disbelief, edging towards anger.  "I've
been cultivating Sasuke since we ended up on a team together,
and while he's been openly distrustful of me, you were never
on his threat list!  And now you've threatened to kill him?!"
	
	She flinched, expecting him to hit her.  "He attacked
you with wire, did something that made you very angry.  I
didn't understand it, but I didn't see everything and I'm
sorry," she said in a rush, losing the determination in favor
of self recrimination.  "I failed you, Naruto, and I promise
it will never, ever, never happen again!"  She grabbed at his
hand with hers, holding it tight in her grip as if afraid
he'd pull away from her.

	"You didn't notice the wire, fine.  Sasuke is a fiend
with wire, even I didn't notice it and it was around MY neck.
But you may have ruined…"  He trailed off, then gave her a
hard look.  "What happened?"

	Tears welled up in her eyes again.  "After seeing you
so upset I…  I…" her voice filled with self loathing,
"abandoned you and went to confront that bastard Sasuke.  I
held my intent, just like you showed me, took him down,
showed him that I could kill him with a finger, then punched
him in the face for a while."  Despite years of family
training in reading expressions, Naruto remained blank to
her, neither approving or disapproving.  She hurried to
complete her report.  "He got in several blows to my head and
face before I disabled his arms, then proceeded to make
ironic comments to Kakashi-sensei, completely ignoring me as
a threat despite the damage he was taking."

	"Ignoring you as a threat?" Naruto asked.

	She frowned.  "I don't really understand it.  He acted
like he was in pain when I hit him, but he never seemed
afraid for his life, even when I showed that I was prepared
to make a juken strike that would have killed him in one
hit."

	"Really."

	"Yes.  Then I threatened to kill him.  Again, he didn't
seem like he believed me.  Sasuke can't hide his emotions
like you can, Naruto-sama, and he was not afraid.  He did not
believe me.  I was confused, and let myself be distracted
long enough for him to kick me off and use a heel drop kick
across my face, here," she said, indicating the ugly red
bruise and swollen eye.  "I pretended to be knocked out as he
rose and spoke to Kakashi-sensei, and when he looked away I
rose and decided to kill him, but Sensei stopped me," she
hastily assured Naruto.  "And he still didn't believe I would
do it."

	Naruto nodded, still looking at her with a blank,
unreadable gaze.

	She wilted under his stare.  "I'm so sorry, Naruto-
sama, I took it upon myself and hurt your plans, and I
abandoned you, and you got hurt somehow and I came to get you
because Kakashi-sensei says it's time we moved on but you
were hurt and unconscious and I couldn't wake you and I was
scared and you woke up and I was so happy and I started
crying and-"

	He shook her gently, enough to cut off her babble.

	"I'm sorry, Naruto-sama," she said meekly.  "Please
punish me as you see fit."

	Suddenly his hands appeared, one on each side of her
head, his fingers spread over the hinge of her jaw, his
middle fingers digging into the hollow behind her ear.

	Tears sprang to her eyes, one open wide, the other
barely half open due to the swelling, and her jaw moved
involuntarily with the pressure as twin lances of pain
reached deep into her skull where Naruto's fingers touched
her.

	Her mouth parted slightly, and a faint "aaaaa," of pain
came tremulously from her lips, and Naruto just looked on
impassively, his fingers digging harder.

	Her vision started to white out, but his face loomed
larger and larger, and then his lips pressed against hers
hard enough to bruise, forcing her mouth wider despite the
increase in pain it caused.  His tongue slipped inside and
found hers waiting, and, impossibly, Hinata kissed back,
fighting the immense strength of his hands not to get away
from the agony, but to take more of it and kiss back harder,
completely accepting everything Naruto was doing to her.	

	They kissed for a long, long moment-

	And then the pain was gone and so were his lips.

	Freed from the paralyzing effect of the pain points
behind her ears, Hinata moaned deep in her throat as she
collapsed on him, her hands on his jacket, her breath coming
hot against his throat, and her hips thrusting unconsciously
against him.

	Naruto wrapped his arms around her and shifted, raising
his right leg beneath her to press from below.

	Caught by this unexpected sensation, Hinata shuddered
and quaked in his arms, her eyes rolling back in her head as
she tucked a fold of his jacket in her mouth and bit down.

	Naruto studied her little fit with the same impassive
face he'd worn since she'd finished her story.  Reaching a
decision, he formed a seal behind her back and formed three
clones which sprang into being around them, all of which
stopped and stared at the quivering kunoichi in his arms.
Two immediately turned to face one another and slapped each
other lightly across the cheeks before one transformed into a
clone of Hinata and they both leapt to rejoin the team.

	The third paused a moment, kneeling beside them and
stroking her hair a few times as she nuzzled into his chest.
Then it, too, hurried away.

	Gradually, the intense sensations faded to the point
she could sit up and awkwardly smooth out the wrinkles she'd
put in his jacket, rubbing briefly where she'd slobbered.

	He grabbed her chin gently and tilted her head so she
looked him in the eye.  "I'm not mad.  Things have been being
kind of stale, and it takes conflict to shake them up.  While
I would prefer that things had been a little more
controllable, I learned something vital about myself today,
and we've got important clues about the situation we just
have to put together."  He fixed her with a stern look.
"However, no more threatening potential allies without my
approval, okay?"

	"Yes, Naruto-sama!" she replied quickly, her tone light
and happy.  He rather thought that, flushed and breathless
and completely hanging on his every word, she was rather
adorable.

	Naruto sighed.  "What am I going to do with you?"

	"Anything you want," was her prompt reply.

	He smirked and jerked his chin slightly, as if
repressing a single noise of amusement or pleasure.

	"And what should I do with Sasuke?"

	"Wait until we're in a fight with a reasonably
dangerous enemy.  Kill the enemy.  Kill him.  Make it look
like enemy action."  Her words were clipped and prompt.
She'd been thinking about the question.

	He smiled, and it was not a nice one.  "My little
vixen."  She preened under his words.  "No, no, that's always
an option, and admittedly, after my unfortunate discovery, it
was the one I favored for a while.  But we will not kill
allies just because they are dicks.  It sets a bad precedent.
In all likelihood, at least a third of the people we will end
up having to work with will be assholes who are hard to deal
with."

	She pouted, ever so slightly.

	He laughed and pushed her off him, rising to his feet
and pulling her along.  "Come on.  I sent some clones in our
place, but we still need to keep up."  He began leading the
way towards the road.  "First, I'll tell you what really
happened when Sasuke choked me.  And then, we've got some
plans to make.  You've gathered the puzzle pieces, now we
just need to figure out what it means."


	o/~


	The road grew wider and better maintained, but they
still didn't see anyone traveling it.  As the day wore on the
temperature soared, and they started running into more and
more streams, mostly spanned by bridges, though there were a
couple with stone laid washes.  Sasuke walked across them on
top of the shallow, fast moving water.  Naruto and Hinata
paused to splash their feet through the cool water.

	The two of them had caught up and used kawarimi to take
their doppelgangers' places while Sasuke looked in another
direction.  Kakashi looked up briefly from his book at the
back of the pack, but Naruto figured that if he didn't say
anything, it was either approval or tactic permission and,
either way, quiet.  Freed from their masquerade, the clones
sped ahead to scout.

	For the first several hours, including during the
walking period that let them wolf down rice balls and drink
from canteens, no one said anything.  Sasuke, for all that
his face looked exactly like his two teammates had spent a
significant portion of the day pounding on it, traveled with
an air of security and smugness that honestly made Hinata
want to take another swing at him.  At least every now and
then he'd rub his shoulders, Hinata knew exactly how much it
hurt and tingled after a limb had been disabled by a juken
strike and was gradually getting its function back.

	Naruto spent his time deep in thought, relying on
Hinata to watch the surroundings.  He spent a lot of time
staring at the inside of his head.  One thing he had not told
Hinata was the dream he'd had after the chakra backlash from
a clone stuck between forming and dispelling had knocked him
out.  Ordinarily, he'd dismiss a dream as just noise in the
neurons.  But Naruto didn't dream like that.  Mostly, he
dreamed of memories, memories, both bad and good, which came
to him disconnected and nonlinear.

	Walking through a town full of him, however, able to
think, move, and remember like he was awake, that spoke of
something new.  It still might just be a psychic backlash
from the clone, but he wasn't sure.  It bore investigation.

	Kakashi took them off the road at one point, and it was
even hotter and more oppressively humid in the stillness
among the trees, which changed from the massive, sheltering
species that dominated the lands around Konoha to new types,
mostly thinner, with fewer limbs except for the very tops and
craggy, shaggy bark.  Bogs and swamps became common, and it
was getting rare to see dry land between the trees.  Kakashi
led them across the water at a run, and they were all
grateful for the water walking lessons the previous day.
Slogging through the water and muck would have quadrupled the
time it was taking them to use the shortcut.

	Finally, they emerged from the bogs onto another road,
this one smaller and obviously not heavily traveled.  Kakashi
signaled for a stop and immediately pulled out his book again
while his team of genin quickly took seats along the side of
the road and rested.  After a few minutes, a gentle breeze
started blowing from the east, drying sweat and setting the
leaves to rustling.

	Hinata activated her byakugan and looked around, then
rubbed her calf muscles thoughtfully, staring at her own
legs.  She looked around again.

	Naruto pulled out three small rice balls from his pack,
wrapped in seaweed.  He tossed one to Hinata, and the other
to Sasuke, aiming to hit the boy in the chest if he didn't
catch it.

	He caught it.  "What kind of poison did you put in it?"

	Naruto snorted.  "Don't be stupid.  It's antidote for
the poison I put in your fish last night."

	Sasuke looked at it dubiously, then ate it when the
others did.  It made about two bites.
	
	"Ano, Sensei, the chakra coils in our legs show signs
of strain," she said, having finished her own rice ball.

	Kakashi looked up.  "Feeling sore?"

	"Some.  But I'm beginning to have trouble focusing
chakra properly, and I see the same indicators in Sasuke."

	"Naruto?"

	"Except Naruto," she agreed.

	Kakashi hummed thoughtfully to himself.  "So not
everyone.  Other than your legs, how are you feeling,
Hinata?"

	"Tired and sore," she said, rubbing lightly at the now
black bruise along the side of her face.  "Sasuke kicks
hard."

	"And you, Sasuke?" he asked, turning to the once
handsome Uchiha.

	"Nothing that would affect my ability to fight," he
replied stoically.  His entire face showed bruises ranging
from nearly black to light purple.

	"Naruto?"

	"Tired," Naruto admitted.  "Nothing hurts anymore, but
I'm tired like I got my ass kicked this morning and then ran
all day."  His own bruises and cuts had completely faded
before they'd even had lunch.

	Sasuke turned and looked at him, one eyebrow arched
painfully.

	Naruto gave him a wry smile.  "You won this morning, no
argument."

	"Actually, I was thinking about the fact that I carried
you for over two hours," Sasuke replied just as wryly.  "Yet
you still say you ran all day."

	Naruto smirked in return.  "Are you sure you carried
me, and not a clone?"

	Sasuke's smirk dimmed.

	"At any rate, I've…" he trailed off, looking
thoughtful.

	Kakashi lowered his book.

	Hinata formed seals and looked around suspiciously, and
Sasuke got to his feet, looking wary.

	"What is it?" Sasuke asked, eyes scanning the trees.

	"Blood," Naruto replied quietly.  "Old blood."

	"You can smell it?" Kakashi asked, his visible eyebrow
raised.

	"I have a nose, don't I?" Naruto replied.

	Kakashi inclined his head.  "Tell me, then, about the
blood."

	Naruto frowned, closed his eyes and concentrated.
"There's a lot of it, but it's a long way away.  It's really
faint…  Hold on."  He formed a seal.  "Kage bushin no jutsu."

	Two dozen clones were formed, spreading out across the
road, some leaping into the trees.  They all took up
thoughtful stances, eyes closed, sniffing into the wind.

	"Lots of it," one clone in a tree confirmed.

	"Probably spread out over an area," another added from
a tree on the other side of the road.

	"Day, maybe day and a half old."

	"And…" another clone said thoughtfully, and paused.
With a series of pops, the clones began disappearing, finally
leaving only the real Naruto behind, who took a deep breath.

	"Has the scent of punctured intestines in it," he said
finally.  "Real savage, whatever spread that carnage around.

	"Good, Naruto," Kakashi said.  "Now, what kind of blood
is it?"

	Naruto frowned.  "I…"  He frowned again.  "I don't
know."

	"Good nose.  You need to train it."  Kakashi gave him a
smile mostly hidden behind the mask.  "It's cow."

	"Looks like we're going in the right direction, then,"
Sasuke said.  "Maybe we can kill whatever it is tonight."

	"I like that idea," Naruto admitted.  "And maybe have a
good meal tonight.  The smell is making me hungry."

	"The beef?" Sasuke asked.

	"The carnage."


	o/~


	The sun had dipped low in the sky as the road widened
into a large clearing lightly screened with trees on the
eastern side.  There was a large house with a stone fence
around it in the center of the clearing, wide and sprawling
and brightly colored.  A big barn, stone around the bottom
and the rest wooden, loomed over the house a few hundred
yards away, and split log fences ran every which way,
especially around the several acre garden, warding it from
the depredations of farmstock.
	
	Naruto's nose flared.  The scent of congealed blood was
everywhere.	

	Sasuke stared.  Hinata pointed.

	"Live cows, next to the barn," she said.

	"They look… skinny," Sasuke added.  "And wary."

	Three emaciated cows stood close together in the shadow
of the barn.  Periodically, their heads would dip and grab a
mouthful of hay from the small piles strewn there, but they
would quickly raise their heads and look around suspiciously
again.

	 "The house, first," Kakashi said, breaking into a
sprint, slow enough they could follow.

	The house was dark and quiet.  They prowled through it
without so much as a squeak of loose floorboard, noting the
lack of dust, the long cold kitchen, the lack of mess.  No
blood marred the place, other than the ever-present stench
that wafted in from the outside.  There were things missing,
however.  Walls with blank spaces clearly meant for pictures.
Blankets.  Clothes.  Personal effects of many kinds.

	They met again outside the front door, and a second
Naruto joined them.

	"Found the source of the blood," he began without
preamble.  "Barn doors have been smashed open, looks like
about two, maybe three cows' worth of bits.  There's another
spot just outside the barn where I think a dog died.  And
there's over a dozen separate kill sites in the trees and the
pastures on the other side of the trees, ranging from about
as old as the kills in the barn, to pretty damned old, weeks
at least."

	"The people got scared and left," the real Naruto
noted.  "When did they send someone to Konoha to pay for the
mission?  Did we have a time we were supposed to be here, or
did they just get nervous and run?"

	Kakashi shook his head.  "This was a low priority
mission that came in four days ago, and they sat on it
waiting for the right team to be free, before they gave it to
us.  If they'd been immediately worried, they could have paid
to make it more of a priority.  Something changed."

	"There were nine people living in the house, and four
more living in the quarters behind it," Sasuke added.  "It
looks like they took as much as they could, but only the
essentials.  Whatever it was scared them even though there
were at least ten, maybe eleven adults living here."

	"I saw wagon, horse, and several sets of people tracks
leading away," Hinata chimed in.  "Looks like they were too
heavily loaded to carry everyone.  This was not rushed, they
took at least a half day to prepare."

	"Excellent job," Kakashi said.  "Now, to find out who
else has been here."  He pulled a scroll out of a vest
pocket, bit his thumb, and unrolled and streaked blood down
the scroll with a series of smooth, practiced motions.  Then
he formed a long series of seals, blood splattering both his
hands, and thrust his hand down at the ground, where lines of
chakra seemed to spread.  "Kuchiyose no jutsu!"

	With a large puff of smoke, five large dogs and one
small one appeared, each dressed in oddly appropriate garb.

	"Yo, Kakashi," the smallest said, raising one paw.
"Smells like a slaughterhouse."

	Naruto raised one eyebrow, staring at the nin-dogs with
undisguised interest.

	"Hey, Pakkun," Kakashi greeted in return, giving a
subtle nod of welcome to the other dogs present.  "I'd like
you all to meet my cute genin team: Sasuke, Naruto, and
Hinata."  He gestured to each in turn.

	Pakkun got up and walked around them each in turn,
staring up at them.  Naruto crouched to the ground and Hinata
quickly followed, while Sasuke remained standing, looking
down his nose at the small, pug nosed dog.  Neither Naruto
nor Hinata made any move to pet the dog, fearing that the
gesture would be condescending.

	"You smell like death and old blood," Pakkun said
thoughtfully, completing his circuit around Naruto.

	Naruto looked surprised.

	"You smell like lust and pain," he said, coming back to
the fore after his circle around Hinata.

	Hinata looked embarrassed.

	"You smell like hatred and frustration," he finished
thoughtfully, sitting on his haunches and appraising Sasuke's
look of indifference before turning to Kakashi.  "And these
are your genin?"

	Kakashi nodded happily.  "Death, bloodlust, pain, and
hatred.  They're like wild dogs just recently met."

	The small dog nodded, then turned back to the motley
trio.  "Well.  I'm Pakkun.  If you're good, I'll let you
touch my pads," he said, lifting one paw again to show the
underside.  "They're really really soft."

	Ignoring the tempting offer, Naruto leaned forward,
placing one hand on the ground for balance but keeping the
other lifted, the way a dog might.  He sniffed deeply.  "And
you…" he said thoughtfully, letting a puzzled expression form
on his face.  "You smell like floral shampoo and… trust?"

	Pakkun and Kakashi exchanged a look.

	"Yes," was all Kakashi said.

	"Anyway," he continued, "I need you to tell me how many
people were here, when they left, and what direction they
left in.  Also, I want to know what and how many killed the
cows, where they came from, and where they left to."

	The dogs scattered in the blink of an eye.

	"We'll watch from the roof of the barn," Kakashi
announced, and led the way.  As they moved he watched his
students carefully, noting their reactions to the nearly
overpowering stench of day old cow shreds.  Naruto and Sasuke
seemed to have no reaction at all, and even Hinata didn't
have much, though she did dab a touch of salve onto her
nostrils.  He wondered what their reactions would have been
if it were the family brutally murdered in the barn, rather
than just cattle.  Being inured to wanton slaughter wasn't
exactly a good thing.  All of them needed more empathy.

	The roof of the barn was a series of angles ranging
from pretty steep towards the sides to not very at the peak.
They clustered up roughly in the middle, since the side of
the barn faced the house and it gave them relatively
unobstructed views of both the house and the eastern
pastures.  The barn's shadow was getting extremely long as
the sun touched the horizon to the west, making the house all
but lost in the glare, and the trees to the east took on a
more sinister air as the shadows between them deepened.

	Kakashi's nin-dogs ran swiftly back and forth,
following the invisible trails of scent.  Pakkun and two of
the others concentrated on the house, while the rest scoured
the fields at a breakneck pace.

	"That's a pretty useful technique," Naruto commented.

	"Yes, it can be," Kakashi agreed, but didn't volunteer
anything else.

	Shrugging slightly, Naruto collapsed onto the roof,
taking off his jacket and using it for a pillow.  After a
moment, Hinata did the same.

	After several long, quiet minutes, Sasuke took a seat
as well.

	It took nearly ten minutes before a small brown and
blue blur shot up to the roof of the barn in a series of
leaps.  Pakkun didn't seem the least winded by his exertions
as he appeared in a seated position in front of Kakashi, the
doggy equivalent of standing at attention.

	"There were thirteen humans and four dogs living in and
around the house long term," Pakkun began.  "Seven females
and six male humans, two and two of the dogs.  Three of the
dogs were killed, one just outside the barn, two more in the
trees.  One female was a fearful sort and stayed close to the
house, it left with the people along the road.  It and all of
the people smelled stressed and anxious, but unhurt.
Additionally, two more human scents came, entered the house
briefly, and left last night or early this morning."  The dog
paused thoughtfully.  "There were thirty seven dead cattle,
mostly concentrated in the pasture beyond that screen of
trees and more than a week old."  He paused again, looking at
Kakashi.

	Kakashi raised an eyebrow.

	"I don't know what did it, exactly," Pakkun confessed.
"They smell musky, almost like a bear, but not exactly.  It
had more of a…  greasy, predatory smell to it almost like a
wolverine, but not like that either.  The smell of rotting
meat was left in the tracks, like something that killed with
its claws and didn't clean them very often."  The dog
wrinkled its pug nose in distaste.  "It's not a pleasant
smell.  Whatever they are, they're foul and wasteful.  Most
of each cow killed was spoiled and left behind, we found the
graves where the farmers must have buried the remains."

	"How many were there?" Kakashi asked.

	Pakkun gave a dog equivalent of a shrug.  "I'm not
sure.  At least five, there were three separate scents from
two nights ago, but at least two more that were older and
didn't match those.  There may have been eight or more over
time, but the scent was mostly washed away and I can't be
sure."  The dog shook its head and stood up, walking up to
the very peak of the roof and staring off to the northeast.
"I can't even tell you exactly where they came from," he
said, and there was a trace of surprise in the tone.  "They
came from the swamp, and we lost their trails pretty quickly
in the water, and I can't tell you how they managed that.
They returned to the swamp as well, not always exactly where
they came out from, and again, we couldn't follow the scent
very far even though the scent should be easy to find in the
stillness between the trees and pooled over the water."

	"Well, so much for tracking them down now," Naruto
commented.  "I guess we'll have to wait for them to come to
us."

	"There was one odd thing," Pakkun added.  "The two
humans who visited after the main group left, their scents
came in from the road, and left by the road.  But we also
smelled them again at the edge of the swamp.  I can't tell
you how they got there, or how they left.  But they were
there, briefly."

	Kakashi nodded.  Then, oddly, he closed his eye for
several long minutes, clearly thinking about the problem.

	Naruto, privately, got a kick out of it.  Watching
Kakashi ponder thoughtfully was a lot like listening to
Sasuke's say 'hn' instead of real words.

	At length, he opened his eye again and fixed them with
a piercing look.

	"Okay, students," he began.

	They perked up subtly.  Clearly, it was lesson time.

	"Knowing what we now know about the situation, what do
you each think we should do?" he asked, raising his eyebrow.

	"We should follow the trail our clients left behind and
speak to them," Sasuke replied promptly.  "It's getting late
in the day, but your dogs are following scent, the sky is
clear, and there's going to be a waning quarter moon
tonight."

	Kakashi inclined his head, acknowledging the answer,
but not replying to it.

	Hinata looked at Naruto, who had a thoughtful
expression on his face.  He shook his head and motioned for
her to go ahead.

	Frowning nervously at suddenly being forced to say what
she thought, she swallowed and spoke up quietly.  "A-ano, I
think we should stay here for the night.  The mission is to
kill what was killing the cattle, and there are three cows
left.  If they didn't come last night, they should be getting
hungry by now and should come again tonight.  We can kill the
ones that come tonight, then find our clients tomorrow."

	Kakashi inclined his head again.

	"We should stay," Naruto said quietly, then closed his
mouth again.  He looked down at the roof, then out across the
pastures to the swamps beyond.

	Kakashi gave him a moment, but it was Sasuke who spoke
up.

	"Stay?  Why?" Sasuke asked, his tone becoming derisive.
"Because you're too tired to keep going?"

	Naruto gave him an even look in return, his eyes hard.
"You have your point, Sasuke.  We need to find the clients,
because they may be in danger and we clearly need their
information to deal with what is obviously not just a pack of
wolves killing a few cows."  He paused, looking at Hinata.
"I'll even admit that there's a very low chance of whatever
it is returning tonight.  Regular animals don't attack when
large numbers of people are around and then stay away when no
one is home.

	"However," and he leaned forward to make his words a
bit more intense, "there are still things to be learned.  We
haven't looked at the tracks.  We haven't looked at the
remains of the cows.  But most importantly, we ARE tired.
You and I fought hard this morning.  You and Hinata fought
after that.  And if none of our injuries are crippling, they
still slow us down.  Yes, we could keep going.  None of us
are even close to our limit, but we are tired and are
hurting.  If we hadn't spent a large portion of the day
beating the hell out of each other, I'd say keep going.  If
there was some sign that the clients were in immediate
danger, I'd say keep going.  But as it stands, it's a risk we
shouldn't make.  Stay here, learn what we can learn, eat,
sleep, heal, kill what shows up if anything does, and find
the clients in the morning."  He finished, never wavering,
maintaining eye contact with Sasuke the entire time.

	Sasuke wavered, looking to Kakashi, who gave nothing
away, then at Hinata, who was looking at Naruto, then back at
Naruto.  He blinked slowly, then nodded.  "Okay."

	Naruto didn't smile, just nodded acknowledgement.
"Okay, then my first suggestion is we look at the tracks, try
to find any hair left behind, and then I want to look at the
dead cows in the barn.  How they were killed will tell us a
lot about how the beasts we're after fight, whether they use
claws, teeth, or what."

	Kakashi nodded.  "We'll do that, then.  You three do
it, I'll watch."

	Naruto hesitated a second, then gave Kakashi a crooked
grin.  "Hey, since the people are gone, do you think it'd be
okay if I sent a clone or two to raid their kitchen for
anything left?  I'm not kidding, the smell really is making
me hungry."


	o/~



	"Hair, Naruto," Hinata said, bringing two strands back
from a small bush.  Tracks were all over the place, but the
pasture had thick grassy sod and didn't take a print well, so
they'd ended up in the boggy, wet ground at the edge of the
east pasture where it met the edge of the swamp.
	
	Naruto looked up from the large paw print he, Sasuke,
and Kakashi were squatted around and carefully took the two
hairs.  The light was dying fast, and the shadows were
getting long, but they looked more or less brown to him.  He
held them out to the other two, who had looked up from their
intense study of the track to see the hair.

	"Brown," Kakashi noted.  "That's consistent with some
bears, at least."

	The track was, as pointed out by Kakashi when he found
that their tracking skills weren't adequate to read details
into unknown prints, more or less consistent with a bear, at
least if the bear had steak knives for claws, given that the
marks the claw tips made in the mud were nearly four inches
from the pads.  However, as Kakashi pointed out, the print
was very large, but the track was disturbingly light in the
extremely soft muck, indicating the animal must have been
extremely gaunt, an odd characteristic given it killed the
cattle but did not eat them.

	"So we're looking for a really big, really skinny,
brown bear-thing?" Naruto said dubiously.  "You know, I
always wondered how useful the academy lessons were, but I
learned them anyway.  And now, here we are out in the wide
world, and, just like I thought, no one covered stuff I would
actually like to know, like what the hell made this track."
He shook his head.  "It's a damned good thing I studied stuff
outside the academy lectures, or I'd be feeling pretty
useless right now.  Let's go look at the bloody remains."

	The barn doors were closed, such as they were.  The
hinges of one were broken on the bottom and so warped up top
it seemed strained just trying to keep the door upright.
Naruto managed to get the opposite door to swing open, noting
the large chunks of splintered wood missing from it as well,
and released the miasma of blood and offal, which rolled out
as an almost physical cloud.

	The inside of the barn appeared to almost be painted
black.

	Blood, when fresh, comes in a variety of shades of red,
depending on how oxygenated it is.  When allowed to sit
around and clot, however, it turns so dark as to be nearly
black.  There was no mistaking it as anything but blood,
though.

	And bits of cow.

	LOTS of cow bits.

	The cows had been ripped to shreds and tossed violently
around the insides.  Stall walls, support posts, and part of
the hayloft had been broken into shards and splinters by
flying beef.  Part of a head, the largest single piece in the
entire barn, dangled by a strip of skin from a smashed part
of the underside of the hay loft.  One side, probably the
side that had met the sturdy timbers of the loft, was smashed
to pulp.  The other side…  There was a piece taken out of the
left side, including the eye, ear, and horn.  It didn't look
much like a bite, more like a scoop, as if something had
taken a swing at the cow with a razor sharp spoon.

	Short lengths of guts dangled from nails and jagged
ends of boards.  Intestinal contents had be spattered across
the ceiling.  Some boards simply ended, sheared off as neatly
as if they had been cut to length.

	"Wow," Naruto said softly, impressed.  "Now THAT is
impressive."

	Hinata looked around carefully, looking for incongruous
clues which might be found under the gore.

	Sasuke stood frozen in shock for nearly half a minute,
which escaped no one's' notice, before he swallowed and
regained his composure.  "Yes, the cows were killed with some
violence, as if the killer or killers were enraged."

	Naruto shook his head.  "Nah, anyone can go nuts and
slaughter an entire…"  He hesitated, looking at Sasuke, then
continued, "…barn of cows.  Takes a little time and some
effort, but you can get the blood smeared around just fine.
No, I was talking about the flies.  Or, that is, lack of
them.  I have no idea what could scare off flies from a feast
like this.  It's not like the barn was sealed, and the smell
reached us miles away.  Every fly in the surrounding twenty
miles should be here buzzing around, but I haven't seen a
single one."

	With a start, both Sasuke and Hinata realized he was
right.

	Naruto looked at Kakashi, who stood a little way apart
from the group.  "Sensei?  Your student freely admits he does
not know what the hell is going on here, and humbly asks your
guidance."

	"Don't be sarcastic, Naruto, it makes you smell
bitter," Kakashi replied.  "Pakkun was just too polite to
mention it."

	Naruto looked offended.

	"However, there is no trace of any chemical scent here
that should keep flies away.  I even looked for traces of
chakra, like a lingering genjutsu aimed at flies, but there
isn't anything of that nature either.  The absence of flies
may well be important to determining the nature of our prey."

	Naruto sniffed deeply, apparently with some
satisfaction as he carefully took off his jacket and put it
on a 'clean' patch of dirt outside the barn.  He also
produced a flashlight from his backpack, and, stepping
gingerly, walked into the barn.

	"What exactly are you doing?" Sasuke asked, following,
his curiosity getting the better of him as Naruto pulled a
senbon out of his pouch and started poking carefully at a
lump of flesh about the side of two fists put together.

	"I'm looking for tool marks.  Actually, bite marks or
claw marks.  Everything, sharp, dull, pointy, edged,
whatever, leaves unique marks in flesh," Naruto explained
absently turning the meat over.  "Round teeth like the
canines in dogs, cats, or most other predators make puncture
wounds.  Incisors cut into the flesh, but they're usually
really dull.  Molars grind and tear.  Most animals have to
use their whole body to tear off chunks of flesh with
strength, not by cutting.  Claws, on the other hand, create
curving puncture wounds.  If they're pulled through the
flesh, they leave big rips because they don't actually have
sharp edges.

	"You see, claws aren't actually used for killing.
They're there to hold on to things.  Grip.  A cat grabs the
mouse with its claws, but it kills with its bite.  A dog
mostly uses its claws to grip the ground while it bites.  I'm
not familiar with bears, but I imagine they'd do much the
same thing, maybe a little more clawing.  If I find claw
marks and teeth marks on the meat, we know it fights one way,
and if I just find teeth marks, we know it fights a different
way."  He lifted another chunk of meat on the senbon and ran
his finger down one side.

	Sasuke watched neutrally.

	Naruto shrugged.  "Anyway, it's kind of difficult with
everything spread out this way, but I should be able to
figure out something of how whatever it is fights and kills."

	Sasuke didn't say anything.  Naruto rather thought he
looked tense, which was odd.  Sasuke didn't seem like the
type to freeze up around a little gore.  He'd have to ask
Hinata about it later, she was the expert in reading people.

	Hinata, for her part, was looking around with her
byakugan, looking underneath the blood for anything unusual,
like perhaps something painted on the inside wall before the
violence.  It was sort of difficult, however, since the blood
had soaked into the wood quite deep in most places.  Focusing
on her eyes had the additional benefit of tuning out her
sense of smell.  Despite a dab of salve in her nose, the
place reeked.

	"It's like they painted the barn with cow," she
murmured, turning slowly in a circle.

	"While ordinarily I find cow to be very tasteful, I
can't help but think this comes off as rather gaudy and
gratuitous," Sasuke replied quietly.

	They stared at him in complete astonishment.

	He ignored them.  But there was a tiny smile at the
corners of his mouth.

	"Niiiice, Sasuke," Naruto said, sounding tremendously
impressed.  "I didn't know you had it in you."

	Sasuke said nothing.

	Shrugging, Naruto went back to his investigations,
moving slowly through the barn, picking at the largest
pieces.

	"I'm a little worried about this, honestly," Naruto
said some time later.

	Hinata looked at him in concern.

	"I know I said that animals kill with their teeth," he
said thoughtfully, "but I've looked at nearly three dozen
pieces of cow larger than a fist, and I haven't seen a single
tooth mark.  Unless Sensei cares to enlighten me with
knowledge of some sort of animal that kills only with its
claws, I have NO idea what we're dealing with."  He looked at
Kakashi expectantly.

	No enlightenment was forthcoming.

	"There are claw marks, for sure.  They match what we
saw in the mud, a big curving puncture with a sharp tip and
thick base, often opening up into big ragged tears.  Makes
sense, I guess, the bear-things must have batted the cows
around like a cat with a ball of string and made some nasty
wounds in the process.  But, really, look at this."  He held
up a flat, largish piece of meat not unlike a big steak,
although of an unconventional cut, since the flat, smooth
side clearly showed tendon and bone near the middle.

	"It's trimmed neatly," Hinata noted.  "The edges aren't
ragged."

	"Exactly!" Naruto said with some frustration.  "And
that doesn't make any sense.  Claws are dull.  Teeth are
dull.  But almost every piece of cow in her has been cut with
something incredibly sharp about a foot long, and I have no
idea what it is," he hissed.

	"A kunai?" Sasuke asked.  "Maybe a kodachi or something
similar?"

	Naruto shook his head.  "I'd recognize a kunai cut,
they're really thick compared to regular blades.  Each knife
is different, too, and while a katana, kodachi, or something
similar might be sharp enough to cut meat this cleanly,
they'd leave different tool marks."

	"Are you sure?" Sasuke asked carefully.  "I know you
said you studied outside the academy, but I've never heard of
being able to tell knives apart by their cuts."

	"We're also dealing with animals, not people," Hinata
added, interrupting Sasuke.  "Pakkun and the other dogs would
have said if people had done this."

	Naruto shrugged.  "That's true, but still.  I was
taught how to tell tools apart by the marks they make in
flesh by a master.  This wasn't a knife.  I don't know what
it was."

	"I believe," Kakashi said thoughtfully, making them all
look at him in alarm, "that the reason for the shallow prints
and your incredibly sharp cuts is one and the same."  He
smiled at them, his eye crinkling in pleasure.  "If you think
about it."

	"One and the same?" Naruto asked, disbelief in his
voice.  "…okay…  I'm gonna have to think about this one a
minute."

	Hinata frowned, also thinking hard.

	It was Sasuke who voiced the answer.

	"Chakra."

	Kakashi smiled and nodded.  "Very good, Sasuke.
Naruto, you're thinking animals are all unintelligent and
plodding.  Did meeting Pakkun not teach you anything?"

	Naruto's eyes widened.  "Pakkun uses chakra when he
runs, doesn't he?  That's how a little dog would be able to
keep up with the bigger, stronger ones."

	"Actually, they all use chakra.  But Pakkun is
exceptionally gifted with it."  Kakashi seemed inordinately
proud.

	"Are all animals able to use chakra?  I mean, is it a
training issue or a nature of the beast issue?" Naruto asked.

	"Are you trying to ask if the ability to use chakra
means that the animals have been trained or are being
controlled?" Kakashi asked.

	Naruto frowned thoughtfully.  "Yes?"

	Kakashi shook his head.  "Not necessarily.  Look at the
tailed beasts, for instance, like the kyubi no kitsune.  It
could use chakra very, very well, and I'm sure it never had
training from any human."

	"Ah.  Well." Naruto looked around.  "Tailed beasts,
huh?"

	"It is unlikely this small scale carnage was caused by
a tailed beast," he added.  "They are powerful on such a
scale that this would be an insult.  However, we are clearly
dealing with something quite a bit more dangerous than just a
rogue cat or wolf."

	"Yeah," they all agreed.

	"Are you finished, Naruto?" Hinata asked.  "I couldn't
find anything unusual under all the blood."

	Naruto shrugged and nodded.  "Yeah, we learned what we
came here to learn.  It fights with its claws and chakra.
Don't get caught by either of them.  I wouldn't recommend
letting it bite you, either, if it can."  He stretched and
scratched himself.  "I guess I should check on me and see how
supper is going."  He looked around.  "Anyone want steak with
their meal?"

	"No."

	"No."  Sasuke looked a little green.

	"No."  Hinata blushed a little at her weakness.

	"Eh…  okay.  Just checking."  He gave them a little
grin.

	"I do have a question," Sasuke said quietly, looking at
him.

	Naruto raised an eyebrow.

	"Where did you learn about tool marks in flesh?"

	"I…"  Naruto opened his mouth, then closed it again and
smiled.  It was not a nice smile.  "You know, that's a funny
story.  It's directly related to why all this," he gestured
around them, "is making me hungry.  I tell you what.  After
we eat, if you still want to know, I'll tell you."

	Sasuke nodded.

	"Come on, Hinata, I could use a hand with the food, you
always were better with the rice than I am.  We'll have a
nice supper on…  the roof of the house."  He smiled.  "Meet
you there."


	o/~


	"We alone?" Naruto asked, slicing pickled vegetables
into thin strips.

	Hinata peered around suspiciously at the kitchen, in
actuality looking through the walls with her bloodline and
scanning for eavesdroppers.

	"Yes, we're alone," she confirmed, resuming her task of
adding salt and vinegar to the rice.

	Naruto washed his knife and lay it aside.  "Weird.
That was probably the least subtle way of getting the two of
us alone to talk I've used since we've been on this team.
I'd have been curious."

	Hinata grinned at him, looking positively mischievous.

	He chuckled.  "Yeah, this whole team business did turn
out a lot weirder than I imagined.  I knew my plans had gone
to hell when we got Sasuke, but I'm kinda starting to be glad
of that.  I'm not nearly as pissed at him now as I was
earlier."

	Hinata shrugged.  "He finally started listening to you,
which is good.  I still want to hit him in the face a few
more times."

	"Trust me, you've done that enough for today," he
replied wryly, stirring sauce in a pan, which he then tasted
by dipping in a finger and touching it to his tongue.  "What
did you notice when he froze up?"

	She frowned thoughtfully, folding rice without looking.
"I'm not sure, really.  The smell didn't bother him, but he
did react to the sight of blood.  It doesn't fit what we know
of him."  She smiled suddenly.   "And if it doesn't fit what
we know of him and he does it anyway, we clearly don't know
him well enough, right?"

	Naruto nodded, tapping the end of her nose playfully,
jerking his finger back when she nipped.  "That's my vixen."

	Hinata practically glowed with pleasure.

	"Did you notice anything specific about the way he
reacted?"

	She nodded.  "He remained tense and ready, but his
heartrate slowed when he first saw inside the barn before it
sped up.  Blood is related to conflict for him, which isn't
uncommon, but his first thought wasn't anticipation of
battle, it was fear.  When he first saw the blood, he looked
to the top left.  Then, he moved his eyes to the bottom
right.  He remembered a past traumatic event, one which
caused tremendous fear and pain.  He was most likely
remembering the death of his family at the hands of his
brother, or possibly some other even more upsetting event,
which must have been horrible indeed if it was worse than the
Uchiha massacre.  Then he quickly imagined a future scenario
based on whatever had happened and was momentarily frozen.
However, he quickly blinked slowly and breathed, a meditation
technique, and was able to regain full control over himself,
with only a slight widening of his eyes to indicate shame at
his loss of composure."

	Naruto added fish to the sauce, stirring it rapidly
over the gas flame of the house stove as he listened to her
report intently.

	She finished spreading the rice.  "It seems unlikely he
would have seen comparable amounts of blood since the
massacre, so he probably thought himself in complete control
of his memories and emotions reguarding the event.  To be so
suddenly reminded that there are things in the mind you
cannot fully control was most likely an unsettling
revelation."

	"It is," Naruto agreed without rancor.

	"I would have expected him to shut his emotions in
after that, but given the joke he made to defuse his stress,
I would guess he's more likely to talk now than at any other
time."  She sighed theatrically, tapping her wooden spoon in
her hand.  "And given the way your eyes have shifted up and
your heart has remained absolutely steady for the last few
moments, I have only been confirming what you already
thought."  She paused, going crosseyed.  "And you put pepper
sauce on my nose."

	Naruto grinned at her.  "No I didn't."

	"Yes, you did.  I can see it."

	 "No you can't.  No one can see the end of their own
nose without a mirror."

	"Well I can," she declared, giving him an exasperated
look.

	Abruptly Naruto dropped his spoon and seized her in his
arms, planting a rather wet kiss on the end of her nose that
sucked off the tiny dab of sauce and quickly dropped lower as
his lips met hers and she melted against him.  He held her
like that for several long moments, then released her and
quickly saved his fish from burning.

	"Happy now?" he asked rhetorically, not bothering to
keep the smile off his face.

	"…yeah," she replied dreamily.

	"I honestly don't know what I'd do without you, Hinata-
chan," he added.  "I'm sorry I snapped at you earlier today.
I rely on you so much I sometimes take you for granted, which
I found out when I chased you away, then passed out.  I
really needed you then," he said bitterly, carefully not
glancing at her out of the corner of his eye as he removed
the pan from the heat.

	She paled, her heart skipping a beat as she remembered
how she'd failed him, how she'd ran and not been there to
protect him.  "No, no, you don't have to apologise.  I was…
I was speaking improperly.  I should have…  I should have
been what you needed, Naruto-sama.  It won't happen again, I
swear," she said, the last coming out as a whisper.

	"You are what I need," he countered.  "You read me
better than anyone.  You know my moods.  When to be
unnoticed.  When to be deadly.  When to play.  You are my
left hand, Hinata.  You are the one closest to my heart."

	She smiled at him, and there were tears in the corners
of her eyes.

	He smiled at her like a fox with a cornered rabbit.
"Together, we will make things be what we want.  Never forget
that, Hinata."

	She swallowed and nodded, a distant, hard look coming
into her eyes.  Unnoticed by her, the tough bamboo spoon
snapped like a dry twig in her hand.

	His smile became a grin.  "And some things will be
quite a bit easier if we have the amazing Uchiha as an ally.
Listen, I think we should try something new tonight.
Something which, ordinarily I would never suggest we do with
someone we don't fully trust."

	"What do you mean?" she asked.

	"You said Sasuke is more likely to talk now than we've
yet seen.  Let's bait him with some truth, and see if he gets
hooked."  His eyes gleamed.

	"Truth, Naruto?"

	"Yes.  I think you and Sasuke need to have a little
chat.  And tonight, well, you'll need to be reluctant, but
here's what I want you to do."


	o/~
Begin chapter five.

	
	"You have many talents, Naruto," Sasuke said quietly as
the trio, now comfortably full, settled themselves into
comfortable positions on the shallow slope of the barn roof
peak.  He left his backpack mostly packed, but he had gotten
out a sleeping bag, and now lay on top of it, using it as
padding to make the rough wooden shingles of the barn more
comfortable.  His pack lay underneath his feet, propping his
legs up.

	"Still want to hear how I got them, huh?" Naruto asked,
laying out his own sleeping bag to Sasuke's left, also with
his pack at his feet.  However, Naruto chose to once again
remove his jacket, and also his t shirt, then wad them up and
sit cross-legged on them, close to the very peak of the roof.
He kept his usual pants on, but, in deference to the heat,
only wore a single layer of black mesh armor for a shirt.
"Why don't you ask Hinata how she learned to cook that good.
Remember, she made the rice."

	Sasuke hesitated, turning his head slightly to look at
them.

	Hinata was on Naruto's left side, also laying on her
sleeping bag, but unlike Naruto, she had turned so that her
head was lower than her feet, and had partially flattened her
pack so that it made a pillow instead of a footrest.  She had
also removed her jacket once again and used it to smooth out
the lumps in her pack.  She kept a black shirt on over her
mesh, making Sasuke idly wonder if she was still wearing the
chest wrap beneath.  She said nothing.

	"You assumed either her mother taught her, or it was
kunoichi training, or, at any rate, just something girls
know, right?" Naruto said with a hint of mockery in his
voice.

	"…Hn," Sasuke agreed reluctantly.  It was true.  He'd
never really thought much about such things, it was just one
of those things girls did.  "It was very good rice," he added
a few moments later.

	"Yeah, it was," Naruto agreed, then lapsed into
silence.

	The silence lengthened and deepened, turning awkward
fast.  Sasuke lay there for several minutes, wondering if he
was supposed to say something, and if he was, whether or not
the awkward tension was worse than the effort of bothering.

	Finally, "So where did you learn to cook like that,
Hinata-san?" Sasuke hazarded.

	"Kunoichi training."

	His cheeks were not burning.  They were not.  It was
just hot, despite the blanket of night that had settled over
the farm.

	"That's not very nice, Hinata," Naruto said
reproachfully, warning clear in his tone.

	"I-" she said, quite a bit louder, then closed her
mouth with a click of teeth.  After a moment, she said, "I
taught myself from a recipe my mother left."

	Sasuke actually raised up into a sitting position,
looking across Naruto's bed at the inverted girl.

	"Surprised, Sasuke?" Hinata asked bitterly, not turning
her head.  "Yes, I had a mother once, too.  Or did you not
even know I don't have one now?"

	Sasuke sat there for several moments while Naruto took
over.

	"Hinata, the idea is we're supposed to relax while
we're waiting for the murderous chakra bears to come mutilate
cattle.  Not rehash the fights we had today."  He rubbed her
leg with one hand in what was supposed to be a comforting
manner.

	Hinata sighed.  "Sorry, Naruto.  But his indifference
has been pissing me off since we were teamed with him."

	Sasuke frankly stared at her, astonished beyond
measure.  "Who are you and what have you done with Hinata?"
he demanded finally, a kunai springing into his hand.

	"Who am I?" Hinata repeated, also rising partially to
glare at the dark haired boy.  "Who am I?!   Just who the
hell are you, you-"

	"Hinata!" Naruto snapped, his voice ringing with
command.

	Hinata's jaw snapped shut again.

	"Sasuke!" Naruto said again, as he was rising to his
feet.  "Sit down, please," he added, toning it like a
request.

	Sasuke glared at him, resentful of the command, for
such it was, however polite, and positively taught with
tension over the verbal assault Hinata had hurled at him.

	"Please, Sasuke," Naruto repeated, and this time there
was actual pleading to it.  "This is sort of my fault.  Let
me fix it."

	"Your fault?" he asked, disbelief clear in his tone.

	Naruto shrugged.  "Sort of.  Hinata has been getting
irritated at you for a while, but I've convinced her to let
it slide.  I kind of assumed you'd be less of an asshole once
you got to know us.  However," he continued quickly, seeing
the darkening expression on Sasuke's face, "you haven't
gotten to know us, and maybe that's my fault as well.  I
don't really like talking about the past."  He shrugged again
and gave Sasuke a wry smile.  "You'd know something about
that, I'd guess."

	Hinata lay back on her pack with an air of resignation.
"Sorry, Sasuke.  But the rest of us have our demons to track
down and kill just like you do."

	Sasuke was nonplussed.  Hinata, who, thus far had been
little more than Naruto's personal, if rather pretty, shadow,
claimed to have a demon of her own.  While it could hardly
compare to his brother, she seemed to feel it was pretty
important.  "What is it?" he asked, his anger ebbing as his
curiosity rose.

	"You don't get to know that," Hinata replied, though
not as angrily as she did at first.

	"Whoa, Hinata.  Actually, I think I'm the one supposed
to be telling a story, right?"

	Sasuke nodded reluctantly, reminded of something that
had been tickling his mind since Naruto had first walked into
the barn.  His weary muscles also reminded him that is had
been an eventful day, so he sat back down on the roof.  But
it wasn't very comfortable to crane his neck and look at
Naruto from the side.  So he turned around and sat, using his
pack for a back rest.  The roof wasn't too sharply slanted,
and the shingles were rough, so his pack actually felt pretty
stable.  He leaned against it, ignoring his minor aches.	

	Naruto was looking up at the sky.

	Sasuke watched him stare at the sky for a moment, then
looked up as well.

	The night was clear, warm, and still.  Only the very
faintest of breezes stirred the air around them.  The stars
shone brightly in the sky, easily seen in the near total
blackness.  The moon would rise sometime after midnight, but
for now it was nearly pitch black.  Only, despite the
presumably bloodthirsty monsters which might or might not be
lurking in the impenetrable swamp, it was almost sort of a
comforting night.

	"Gorgeous, isn't it?" Naruto said quietly, still
staring at the sky.

	"Yeah.  You don't get nights like this in Konoha.
There's always lights around you," Hinata agreed quietly.

	"And every time we've been away, we've spent our nights
in the forest.  I don't think I've ever seen a night quite
like this."  Naruto scratched his head idly and looked
around.  "I was going to tell you how I learned about cuts in
flesh, right?"

	"And why, opposite of normal sensibilities, you seem to
find copious amounts of blood appetizing," Sasuke reminded,
having silently wondered any number of things about his blond
teammate.

	"Yeah.  Same story," Naruto agreed.  "It has a lot to
do with someone I don't think you've met.  He's a high
ranking ANBU member, a division head, actually.  I met him
six years ago.  His name is Morino Ibiki."

	Sasuke didn't react, having never heard the name.

	"Yeah, didn't think so," Naruto continued after a
minute.  "Well, you should hope that if you ever meet Ibiki-
san, it's under purely social circumstances, though I'm told
he usually unnerves people even then.  Ibiki-san is the head
of Torture and Interrogation.  And even though, honestly, I
sometimes wonder why it was allowed to happen, I was
introduced to him one day."

	Torture and Interrogation?  That was…  that was not
what Sasuke was expecting to hear.

	"You have to understand, Ibiki-san isn't like normal
people," Naruto explained.  "He's, I guess for lack of a
better term, practical.  And effective.  Very, very
effective.  When he wants to know something, it's best to
just go ahead and tell him.  He's going to find out anyway,
and, if you really cooperate with him, maybe he won't hurt
you."  Naruto chuckled abruptly.  "There was this one time
two years ago, when I had…  Ah, but that's not relevant.
Anyway."  He paused and chuckled again before turning more
serious.  "Anyway.  Ibiki is a master of psychological
torture.  He can break your mind before he even touches your
body.  That being said, he's also a master of inflicting
physical pain.  He's the expert, and sometimes they call him
in when someone else is tortured."

	Naruto's voice grew quieter, as if coming from a long
way away.

	"Since he's used them all before, he can tell by the
marks left on your body exactly what was done to you."

	They sat there in silence for a while, Sasuke looking
at Naruto, who didn't move.  Gently, Hinata put her hand on
Naruto's leg and squeezed.  Startled, he jerked in alarm,
brought out of his memories by the touch.  He took her hand
in his and continued.

	"So, long story short, he taught me how to recognize
the marks made, not just by torture implements, but by
everything which could conceivably be used to hurt someone.
It was really quite interesting."

	Sasuke inclined his head in acknowledgement, of what,
exactly, he wasn't sure, but feeling the need to respect it
anyway.

	Naruto stretched, cracking gristle in his back and neck
as he did so.  "Other than old man Hokage, Ibiki-san was the
first person to take an interest in my education.  Taught me
a few things they neglect to cover in the academy lectures,"
he added with a smirk.  "I never had any family, I'm an
orphan from birth, or so they tell me, but it didn't handicap
me.  Ibiki-san made sure I didn't slack off, and let me tell
you," he said seriously, as if imparting wisdom of the
deepest import, "when a torture and interrogation master asks
you if you did your homework, you'd better have your homework
done."  He stared intently, and Sasuke could feel his eyes
boring into him even in the darkness.

	Then Naruto chuckled again.

	"So, heir to the great Uchiha, what's the story with
your family?" Naruto asked.

	Sasuke stiffened.  "That's none of your damned-"

	"Grow up, Sasuke," Hinata spat, interrupting him.  "You
ask me about my family, but you won't even answer a simple
question about yours?  How sad for you, the tragic genius."
Her voice lashed with anger.

	"And just what would you know about being me?" he
snarled back, voice dripping with contempt.  "Your clan still
exists-"

	"That's right, Uchiha," she snapped right back, rising
to glare right back at him.  "What would I, the eldest child
of Hiashi Hyuga, possibly know about being born heir to a
powerful bloodline and the most powerful clan in Konoha?"

	"Your family wasn't slaughtered before your eyes," he
growled back, eyes burning with rage.

	"So your family was killed and you live," Hinata shot
back.  "Have you ever imagined what it would be like if they
lived but you didn't?"  She jabbed her finger in the air at
the Uchiha.  "Your family is dead to you, and yet you
breathe.  And I am dead to my family, and yet I still
breathe.  Which of us, then, has it worse?"

	"Sasuke…  What happened?" Naruto asked, his voice
dropping into a hiss with his raw need to know.

	Sasuke looked back at him in contempt.  "Why, so you
can use the knowledge to make me dance to your tune, like
your fangirl over there?"  He snorted in derision.  "I don't
think so."

	"I think you're so wrapped up in being the tragic boy
who lived, alone, friendless, untouchable to the people
around you, you can't even recognize Naruto's offer for what
it is," Hinata countered, rolling to her knees and moving
onto Naruto's bed, aggressively closing the distance.  "Just
what do you think I am, you misogynistic cock?"  She edged
closer, and Sasuke rolled away, wary of the damage her juken
techniques could do at short range.  "A fangirl?  You think
I'm like one of those empty headed bimbos that follow you
around like cats in heat?"

	She drew herself up, looking both noble and terrible at
the same time, her liquid white eyes shining luminously in
the starlight.

	"I… am… Hyuga."

	  Sasuke crouched defensively.

	"I follow Naruto because he teaches me things no one
else ever bothered!  I follow Naruto because I learn how to
do things only he knows how to do!  Subterfuge!
Misdirection!  Deceit!  I follow Naruto because he, and only
he, has ever shown me how to get the things I really desire!
Things I dreamed of!  Things I despaired of, because I knew I
would never be able to reach out and grab them!  Power!
Respect!"

	She leaned closer, placing one hand on the roof for
balance.

	"Revenge!" she hissed.

	She drew back, once more sitting on her heels.

	"Your sharingan are said to be able to copy and predict
an opponent's moves perfectly.  My byakugan can pierce
objects, read chakra, and understand the finest nuances of
movement.  But Naruto sees things we could never hope to,
because we can't understand what he understands.  Naruto
showed me how to conceal things so well even the all seeing
eyes of my father are blind to them.  What he can't see-"

	"-he can't defend against.  The advantage is mine,"
Hinata said from directly behind Sasuke, her hand suddenly on
the back of his neck.

	"What…?" he hissed, startled, slipping away from her
hand in an instant.  "Another one of Naruto's shadow clones,"
he declared, shooting a glare at the blond, who was watching
expressionlessly.

	"Am I?" the new Hinata asked.

	"Or is she one of mine?" the first Hinata asked.  "Does
it matter?  Because, either way, the effort put towards my
triumph is the same.  And I put the same effort back for
Naruto.  Together, we are stronger than either of us could
hope to be apart.  Allies, working together, sharing effort,
sharing goals."  She leaned forward again.  "So-"

	"-dear Uchiha," the new Hinata said, her voice
saccharin sweet and making Sasuke jerk his head back and
forth, trying to keep them both in sight,

	"I would appreciate it if you did not dismiss me for
what you think I am not.  I get enough of that from my
family, and I only tolerate that for now, because I must."

	Her eyes glittered.

	"And soon, even that will end."

	"Are you so very different then, Sasuke?" Naruto asked
mildly.  "You said when we first met that the only true goal
you had was to kill one man.  Who is that man, Sasuke?  And
why do you want to kill him?"

	"He is my brother, Itachi," Sasuke whispered, his gaze
far away, lost in the night and the years of his past.  "I
will kill him because he killed our clan.  I will kill him
because he killed our parents."  Abruptly his head swivled,
focusing his gaze on Naruto.  "You speak as if you know what
it's like to be tortured."

	"I do," Naruto allowed.

	"As do I," Hinata replied warily.

	"You speak as if this Morino Ibiki you think so highly
of is capable of inflicting more pain on a single person than
anyone else alive," Sasuke continued, his eyes losing focus
again.  "I've never met him.  But I do know this."  His eyes
bored into them.

	"He is an amateur compared to Itachi."

	"Slapped you around a little, eh?" Naruto asked.
"Maybe held you down, cut you up with a knife for a while,
just for fun.  Maybe he got a little playful, a little slap
and tickle.  Maybe he looped wire around your neck and pulled
real slow, so you had time to focus on every hurt he was
giving you as the wire bit into your throat and made it
harder to breath one agonizing breath after another."

	"There are some tools that leave no marks," Sasuke
replied with the infinite patience of one who knows better.
"Imagine the worst thing that ever happened to you.  Then add
the worst things that could ever happen to you."  His voice
lowered.  "Now…  add the things that couldn't possibly happen
to you because they're just not possible.  If you hurt
someone too much, they die.  But what if you had the ability
to send them to hell after they die.  And then, bring them
back to life.  They'd be grateful, right?  But then you hurt
them until they died again, and then you sent them to hell,
again.  Over and over and over.  Death is not a release.
Being alive is an endless horror."  Sasuke's eyes were
staring, dull, lifeless, and empty, the repressed nightmares
of another realm replaying itself in his mind.

	"I might understand better than you think," Naruto
replied.  "After all, I heal faster than anyone.  I know a
little something about finally feeling my body let go, then
waking up to see it's still happening."  He paused.  "How did
you survive?  You don't heal like I do."

	"Itachi has gained the most powerful ability of the
Uchiha, the Mangekyo sharigan.  He is more powerful than
anyone else when he uses it, and if he wants, just by looking
at you he can transfer you to a world he has made and
controls absolutely.  There is no running.  You cannot fight.
He can do anything he wants to you for as long as he wants."
Sasuke's hand clenched into a fist.  "Power like you wouldn't
believe!  Killing intent that suffocates you just by being
near!  Pain that can kill you without leaving a mark!"

	"Oh, it always leaves a mark," Naruto said, shaking his
head.  "And it left plenty to see on you, even if you don't
have eyes like Hinata."  He rose, put his arm around Hinata,
and squeezed her close.  Uncharacteristically, she didn't
melt into him, chosing instead to remain stiff and aloof,
just, now, she was under his arm.

	Sasuke just stared back at him.  "The marks are
irrevelant.  I must kill him.  He let me go from that world
and told me to become strong."

	"Strong, huh?" Naruto replied.  "We all want strength.
Hinata, how do you become strong?"

	"By having people to fight along side you," she replied
promptly.

	"Why is that?" Naruto prompted.

	"Because no one is the best at everything.  You pick
your allies carefully, choosing strengths that augment your
own, weaknesses you can make up for, skills you can rely on,
and potential you can help unlock.  No one gains anything new
from training on their own, they can only refine what they
already know."

	Sasuke snarled.  "Is that what you want from me?  An
ally?  Someone to help you with the things you can't do?"

	"Why yes, actually.  That's sort of what friends do.
They help each other.  For instance, Hinata needs assistance
to become skilled enough to shock and awe her family.  I've
been helping her.  And, if it weren't for Hinata killing
Mizuki-sensei, I'd be dead right now."

	Sasuke paused.  He'd never heard what had actually
happened to Mizuki.  "Hinata killed him?" he asked, just to
make sure.

	Naruto grinned hugely, pride shining in his eyes.
"Burst his heart.  She's still not the greatest sparring
partner in the world, but when it came down to life or death,
Hinata didn't flinch."

	"I was weak once," Hinata said quietly.  "I was shy,
and hesitant.  My father thought I was stupid.  I showed no
special talent for my family arts.  I improved.  I am worthy
to be the heir to my clan now.  But perception is everything,
isn't it, Sasuke?  They saw me as weak then, they see me as
weak now.  So I can't simply be adequate.  I have to gain
enough skill and power to completely destroy how they see me.
Unlike your foolish brother, I have no intention of killing
any of them unless I absolutely have to.  I'll just force
them to obey me."

	"I am not weak," Sasuke replied disdainfully.

	"Ah, but how strong are you?" Naruto replied, quirking
one eyebrow.  "Hinata could have killed you today.  _I_ could
have killed you today.  And yes, you had opportunities to
kill each one of us.  Seperately, we're all close enough in
ability that it could go either way, however likely it is
that any given one of us might win.  But I ask you this,
Sasuke, prodigy of the Uchihas.  Could you, right now, take
both Hinata and I together?"

	"Yes," he replied stubbornly.

	Naruto snorted.  "Hinata would have a better chance of
taking you down in a fair fight than you'd have taking us
down in a fair fight.  And, Sasuke, if you haven't figured it
out already, we don't fight fair."

	Sasuke frowned.

	"Now, I ask you, did you learn nothing from the bell
test?"

	He closed his eyes, remembering Naruto's whispered,
perfectly confident words.

	 "'Three genin can take a jounin,'" he repeated.

	"Three chunin can take a kage," Hinata added.
	
	"And three jounin can take a village," Naruto said with
an air of finality.  "And let me assure you, I have no
intention of stopping at jounin level.  Do you?"

	Sasuke shook his head and looked away.  "It sounds
good, but I think it's nothing more than a platitude."

	Naruto snorted.  "History shows us otherwise.  Second
Mizukage.  Poisoned by his son and his son's teammates.  They
successfully held off his dying attacks, then assumed power
over his cooling corpse."

	"The Sannin of Konoha.  They're credited with changing
the course of two wars with their actions."

	Naruto quirked a smile.  "If Itachi is so powerful, why
did he flee the village after he slaughtered your clan?  He
took out a district of unsuspecting off duty ninja, old men,
women, and children.  Then he ran.  Imagine, Sasuke, if you,
after gaining the skill and power you feel you need to be
able to confront him, tracked him down in some hideout
somewhere.  You confront him.  He scoffs at your power.  Then
you, and a dozen of Konoha's best, counter his every move,
his every plan, and crush him attack by attack.  When you
finally put the blade in his throat, it's a mercy, not a coup
de grace, and you get to look into his eyes as he realizes
it."

	Sasuke shook his head again, not trusting himself to
speak.

	"Think about it, Sasuke.  Your brother isn't right all
the time.  You're not right all the time.  You never know
when you might need someone else.  Wouldn't it be best to
have people with you, ready to catch you if you stumble?"

	"You're not right all the time, either, Naruto," Sasuke
whispered.

	Naruto's grin grew wider.  "Obviously.  But I know I'm
not right all the time.  That's why I'm looking for people to
help guide me.  I can't do it alone, any more than you can.
I was a fool until I stumbled across Hinata.  I don't have to
be a genius to see that I'd be better off for your assistance
as well."

	Sasuke remained quiet.  Naruto let him have his peace
for the moment, rustling around as he settled into a
comfortable position on his makeshift bed.  Hinata cuddled
close to him.

	"Good night, Sasuke," Hinata whispered, not raising her
head from Naruto's side.  "Just remember, you don't have to
be alone."

	That was the last thing he heard as he drifted off to
sleep.


	o/~




				20 Lies

20 truths, People Lie style.



1.  Naruto never stole.   He'd never stolen anything before Mizuki gave him the
assignment to pilfer the scroll of kinjutsu from the Hokage's tower.
Ibiki said it was wrong
to steal from your own people, it ran counter to proven principles
that made for a healthy
village.  It wasn't like he needed to steal, after all.  As an orphan
and person of interest to
the Sandaime Hokage, he was provided a monthly stipend to cover his
living expenses.  As
an apprentice and person of interest to the ANBU division head Morino
Ibiki, he was
taught how to properly manage his money and get the things he needed.
He wasn't
wealthy by any means, but he never lacked for what he truly needed.
All that being said,
when he'd stolen the forbidden scroll, it had been a thrill far beyond
the purely
intellectual.  Naruto found he liked stealing.  He knew he'd have to
watch that impulse lest
it, like all vices, prove a weakness and lead to his downfall.
Naruto to Ibiki.

2.  Ibiki hated his job.  Most people who knew him thought he was a
sadist, given that he
was the one to perform tortures on people deliberately trained and
conditioned to
withstand pain and deprivation, but that wasn't true.  Ibiki hated
pain, hated death, hated
the sight of blood.  He'd been tortured several times in the past,
twice by amateurs who
thought that a red hot kunai pressed into flesh was scary, and once by
a professional who
truly did enjoy his work.  Ibiki knew exactly what the people turned
into his care were
going through and the thought sickened him.  But despite his loathing
of pain, Ibiki was a
pragmatist above all.  Konoha was the strongest and the most
compassionate of all the
ninja villages.  Just by existing, Konoha reduced the amount of pain
in the world.  Konoha
had to be protected, and sometimes, someone had to be tortured to
protect it.  He might
not like it, but it needed to be done, and he was the best in Konoha to do it.
Ibiki to Naruto.

3.  Sasuke still loved his brother.  Despite the mind rape in Itachi's
genjutsu, despite the
death of his clan, his father, and especially his mother, despite the
pity the village heaped
on him, despite the utter destruction of everything he'd ever held
dear, Sasuke still
missed his brother, the only family he had left.  Itachi told him to
become strong, he'd
admitted that to the ANBU who'd questioned him after the slaughter.
What he'd never
admitted was why Itachi wanted him to become strong.  When Sasuke had
finally turned
himself into the perfect killing machine and surpassed his brother in
the ninja arts, he
would finally have Itachi's respect and be invited to take his place
at his side.
Sasuke to Itachi, as imagined in a revenge fantasy.

4.  Hinata had a deep seated rage lurking in her heart, a need to hurt
those around her.
They say it's always the quiet ones, and never had that been more true
than in the case of
Hinata Hyuga.  Abandoned after the death of her mother, effectively
disowned by her
father, dispassionately ignored by her sister, mocked and denigrated
by her cousin, and
regarded with a mix of disgust, fear, and hate by the rest of the
branch family, Hinata was
a person alone in a crowd.  Even outside of her family, she remained
shy and hesitant
around people, but most people misunderstood the reason why.  It
wasn't because she
was afraid of them, no, not at all.  She was afraid of herself, and
what she knew she was
capable of.
Hinata to Naruto.

5.  Kakashi read porn because it was a tiny slice of a life he could
never have for himself.  A
life where people were shallow, concerned largely with their own
pleasure, where men
met women and women met women and sometimes where men met several women
and fell in love and had a few minor squabbles but nothing that
couldn't be fixed with a
good solid chapter of kinky sex and everyone smelled good and no one
had been raped or
stabbed in the chest with a kunai or watched a comrade get crushed by
an avalanche of
chakra infused rock right before their eyes- or in short, a world
where nothing really
mattered, people just thought it did, and a smart, strong, skilled
person would be free to
just be himself for once in his life.  Kakashi sometimes had to stop
reading because his one
visible eye would be clouded in tears and his fingers would be slowly
tightening on the
pages and his heart ached, because he was a smart, strong, skilled
person in a world
where things really did matter yet it seemed like almost everyone
around him was an idiot
and thought nothing did.  Like so many other people, Kakashi wanted
something he could
never have.
Kakashi to a scadalized, but cute, village girl.

6.  Iruka wore the scar across his nose as a reminder of his shame.
It wasn't just so
everyone else could see it, no one still alive even knew what it
represented, but Iruka
knew.  He could just see the break in the smooth profile of his nose
if he crossed his eyes
and stared at it.  In a village known to have produced some of the
greatest medic nins of
the last three hundred years, techniques for removing scars,
especially extremely visible,
iconic identifier scars, were quite advanced.  Even an extremely minor
illusion, easy to
create and maintain, could have given him back his original face.  But
Iruka didn't want to
get rid of the scar, for it was a constant reminder that he must never
run away again, like
he'd done once against a Mist ninja who'd nearly blinded him and was
preparing to run his
teammate through.  He'd failed Shiziro, and if their jonin leader
hadn't shown up just
then, his cowardice would have cost him a friend and companion.  He'd
never ran away
from a fight to save a comrade since, and he never would.
Iruka to himself.

7.  Sakura had no limits to what she would do to prove herself to
Sasuke.  An average
kunoichi throughout school, her sharp intellect was dragged down not
by her lackluster
body, but by a weak spirit.  In another world, with a little more
encouragement, Sakura
might have discovered a warrior's soul, a rebel, a fearless, feisty,
ferocious persona within
herself.  Sometimes, she felt like something was missing, and she knew
herself to be an
incomplete person.  Desperately, she latched onto the one thing that
seemed like it might
complete her, the single most perfect man she'd ever seen.  He was
larger than life, he
would fill her up.  And so she would do anything she had to do to get
him.  Lie.  Cheat.
Steal.  If she believed he would love her if she brought him the still
beating hearts of her
parents, there would be two fewer Haruno in Konoha that night.
Sakura to herself.

8.  Ino, Shikamaru, and Chouji were tremendous disappointments to
their parents.  True,
Ino had a truly deft touch with her family's mind jutsu and a recently
discovered love of
beating the shit out of people with good old fashioned taijutsu that
brought a tear to her
father's eye.  Shikamaru was a quiet prodigy at games of strategy and
puzzles, better than
his father at that age.  Chouji could smell the faintest trace of
arsenic in a single dumpling
in an entire banquet, and had the immense physical strength that far
outstripped even his
most advanced classmates.  No, the disappointment their parents felt
in them had nothing
to do with their skills, and everything to do with how they got along.
 There was no soul
melding friendship there, just the cool all business politeness of
three people willing to
work with each other because they were told to.
Ino to Sakura.

9.  Tenten resented the rivalry between Neji and Rock Lee.  Neji was
cool, strong, aloof,
nearly perfect in bearing and ability.  Lee was coarse, unrefined,
friendly, and had the will
of a force of nature.  Their clashes were epic and mighty.  Tenten was
confident, skilled,
and feisty, and she was also a woman.  So she hated being caught
between them, unable
to encourage Lee without a disdainful sniff from Neji, feeling guilty
about complimenting
Neji on a job well done since everything he did was well done.  She
was swept up in the
maelstrom as they pushed themselves to greater and greater heights of
skill and daring.
Tenten didn't dare let them too close to each other, but when they
glared at each other
with hate and envy and worry, she felt like her skin would be scorched
from each side.
They strove against each other over every little thing, including her.
 She was not a piece
of meat to be fought over, a prize to be won or stolen.  No girl,
especially not Tenten,
would want such a thing.
Tenten to the boys.

10.  Shino feared the loss of his individuality.  As a living hive, he
wasn't one, but many.  As
a member of a clan, he wasn't just one, but one of many.  His clan was
one of many in
Konoha.  Konoha was just one city in the Fire Country.  There were
more countries, more
islands, more continents, and, above all, more people than any one
person should be
aware of.  But Shino was Aburame.  They knew all about numbers.  He
knew how many
bugs he had, down to the last injured five legged insect living under
the skin of his neck.
He knew how many parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles and
cousins there
were in his clan.  He knew how many people there were in Konoha.  He
had a pretty good
idea of how many people there were in his country.  He even had a
pretty good ballpark
figure for the number of people in the world.  To the average person,
this was just a
number.  But to Shino, it meant something real.  He was just one of
many.  A great many.
Shino kept it all in perspective, that was what he was good at.  But
sometimes, the one
thing a human, and Shino, for all the bugs living in and on him, was
human, can't afford to
have is a sense of perspective.
Shino to Kiba.

11.  There was only one person on Team Gai who didn't wear thong
underwear.  Gai wore
thongs.  Panty lines under skin tight spandex?  That is so not keeping
in with the spirit of
youth.  Lee wore thongs.  He dressed exactly like Gai, and agreed with
him.  A smoothly
profiled ass was indeed best to show off your youthful fire.  Neji
wore thongs, really,
traditional twisted undyed cloth underwear.  He was Hyuga.  They were
big on tradition.
Tenten wore thongs.  She was a beautiful young woman surrounded by cute males
saturated in testosterone.  She liked feeling sexy, and there's
nothing like a strip of silk
right in the crack of your ass to make you feel attractive.  Every
single person on Team Gai
claimed to wear thong underwear.  One of them was lying and too
ashamed to admit it.
Gai to Kakashi.

12.  Hinata was the first one to kill another person on Team Seven.
Naruto, for all his
dismissal of his emotions, hadn't actually killed the man he'd helped
torture to death in
the sterile halls under a nondescript building in the center ring of
Konoha.  Ibiki had
offered the man's life to him.  Handed him the scalpel.  Closed his
fingers around the
handle.  But the childlike wonder had left Naruto's eyes when he
finally realized that this
was it, he was going to kill someone.  And he couldn't do it.  He was
still a child, despite
what had happened to him.  He didn't yet have it in him to take a
man's life in cold blood.
It was a lingering source of shame, a secret known only to him and
Ibiki.  He would be
more ruthless, colder, and far, far more cruel to his enemies than he
ever would have
been had it been his hands that opened the man's neck and caused his
life to drain away.
Naruto to Sasuke.

13.  Kiba fell in love with Sakura the first time she spoke up and
told both he and Shino that
they were wrong.  His sense of smell was comparable to most dogs, and
he'd always
thought she smelled pretty.  Like jasmine and wildflowers, of soft
sheets and a nearly
spotless environment.  His mother was many admirable things, but a fastidious
housekeeper she was not.  Sakura smelled like a fresh, healthy female,
plenty to get his
interest up, and she was easy on the eyes, too.  But it wasn't until
she spoke, really,
honestly said what was on her mind, that he realized she was more than
a pretty face.
There was someone home in there, and Kiba rather thought he loved her.
Kiba to Sakura.

14.  Naruto loved taking care of his bonsai trees.  He started with
one, given to him by Ibiki.
He'd added another when he'd taken Hinata under his wing.  The third
he'd added when
they'd been teamed up with Sasuke.  If asked, he'd say he liked them
because they were
little physical representations of perfection as seen through his
eyes.  Sophisticated,
thoughtful, powerful men kept bonsai trees.  Naruto liked the thought
of being ranked as
such.  Really, though, Naruto just liked occasionally snipping pieces
off of a living being.
Naruto to Kakashi.

15.  Kakashi didn't much like Maito Gai.  In fact, if it wasn't for
the concealment of his
mask, everyone around him would see the flexing of his jaw muscles as
he ground his
teeth whenever Gai showed up wearing bright green spandex and a
moronic smile.  Gai
accused him of acting hip and cool, since Kakashi obviously pretended
indifference
whenever he was around.  Gai was sharp enough to spot the act, but too
self centered to
determine the reason why.  Kakashi will never admit it, he owes the
freakishly strong
taijutsu master for too many last minute saves to ever break the poor
guy's heart, but
really, he'd be a lot happier if Gai would just leave him alone.
Kakashi to a mocking Anko after he lost a copy of Icha Icha in a bet with Gai.

16.  The Sandaime Hokage had a pretty strong suspicion that Naruto was
going to be
Hokage one day.  He had the intelligence, the drive, the wit, and the
power.  Yes, there
was the whole issue about the Kyubi and the villager's hatred, but the
boy was a bright,
cheerful spot of orange in a sea of drab green and grey.  When it came
to honest talent,
the boy shone with a brilliance not seen since his father had
sacrificed himself.  The
Hokage knew that that kind of talent and drive is what it takes to be
the supreme leader
of a ninja village.
Sarutobi to Naruto, a month after he became Ibiki's unofficial apprentice.

17.  Anko and Kurenai slept together once.  Or, more specifically,
Anko, Kurenai, and
Asuma had slept together once.  It was a lengthy class A mission,
requiring Kurenai's
genjutsu talents, Asuma's skill at close quarters, and Anko's
specialty, a ruthless, brutal
killing spree.  It had also involved a three day stay at a seedy inn
in southern Fire, waiting
on a contact to drop off vital information.  Sake was involved.
Kurenai woke up with a
funny taste in her mouth and an unexpected hand cupping her breast.
Anko woke up
with a snakebite on her hand and a serious need of a shower.  Asuma
didn't wake up until
the next day.
Anko to Asuma.

18.  Shikamaru was never allowed to sign the family summoning contract
for the deer of
the forest.  It wasn't really his fault, but regardless, the ancient,
powerful stag that was his
mother's most powerful summon had made it clear in no uncertain terms
that the lanky
boy would never be allowed to call on the herds of Konoha for aid if
he needed it.  The
best he and his parents were able to achieve by the way of appeasement
was that his
children, assuming he had any, would be allowed to prove themselves,
and, if found
worthy, would be allowed t