Shino sat in his room, his bag still packed and his fingers tapping against the wood of his desk. They just returned from their mission, making it to the gates at eleven in the evening. It was too late to report to the Hokage, so they agreed to meet at his office first thing tomorrow morning.

"And if you could all come over to my place afterwards, I'd like to congratulate you on your first successful mission outside of Fire Country!" Kurenai had said with a kind smile.

And if you could all come over to my place, I'd like to talk about our next steps so you won't be caught again, had been what she meant.

It surprised him that Kurenai trusted them in less than half a year than the village she'd been serving her whole life. It was quite the dedication she had for her students, and the heavy proclamation against the Hokage struck a particularly deep chord in him; he was sure it was like with Sakura, Kiba, and Akamaru as well. Besides Kurenai they had no supporters in their corner, and there really wasn't much they could do to bring others to their side without activating the seal or being accused of treason.

He glanced to the glass enclosure filled with crystal clear butterflies. It sat on his nightstand, tended to by his father when he wasn't home.

Shino's brows furrowed.

Cat had some sort of an acquaintanceship with them, didn't he? He gifted them with things he believed they would enjoy and use to their greatest extent, and clearly they did. Yet he'd never revealed himself to them or stepped up as the one leaving them the gifts even though they were positive it was him.

And now that he thought about it, they'd never even seen Cat since he'd thanked them.

'I wonder if he ever went to the memorial.'

A few insects trickled out of his shirt and crawled onto his desk. His small bursts of chakra had them retrace phrases winding about his mind and it made him think; insects were such versatile beings, especially at the beck and call of a shinobi. Kikaichu like his were born and raised in his body, wore his chakra like a second exoskeleton, were able to transmit chakra over vast distances, and could mimic his natural ebb and flow to distract sensory opponents or to lure them in..

He could pull infinite possibilities with his clan's jutsu—but what else could he add to the team to help bring them up another level? Sakura had taken that sword and would more than likely start training in kenjutsu, Kiba had delved into the arrays and puzzles of fuuinjutsu, and he—

Shino suddenly sat up and peered closer at his insects tapping carelessly along the top of his desk. He pulsed chakra through them and felt as they flared with his signature. When he bent it slightly, he felt theirs mimic his.

Their team was crafted by blades and ink and fangs and illusions.

Perhaps he could add another advantage to the list as well?

As he experimented with his insects and sent differently charged chakra pulses through each of their tiny bodies, he never noticed his father standing worriedly outside his closed door, debating whether or not to walk in.

It's one in the morning when Shino makes a breakthrough and Shibi walks back down the hallway without saying a word.

::

"Team Eight is requesting an audience," Cat—an ANBU who spent nearly a fourth of his time guarding the Hokage's office—informed.

"Ah, send them in, please," Hiruzen smiled as he tipped his head, and as Cat turned around to fulfill his duty, his smile fell a touch as four (five, he supposed) fully-intact bodies entered the room. He carefully noted that Kurenai stood behind her team, not in front, and that there was no accusatory gleam in her eyes that suggested she'd learned something new from her team. That might just be good acting, but a touch of relief settled in his old bones. Team Eight wouldn't—couldn't—have told her anything. Not willingly, at least. "Good morning. Were there any complications with the mission?"

"Just one; a man named Kusabi and his band of criminals," Kurenai reported. "We looked into him and found he was part of the mercenaries hired by Gato. They must've stayed to cause more trouble, I'm sure."

Hiruzen set his pipe against his lip. "How terrible. They've been taken care of?"

"Yes, I took down a good half of them on my own. They attacked on one of our perimeter rounds and we were fortunate enough to all have been caught simultaneously instead of being separated," she replied. His free hand twitched, hidden beneath his desk and out of sight. "They shouldn't be any more problem in the future."

He was disappointed. Frustrated, unsatisfied, wholly displeased—but he smiled his easy smile and nodded. "Congrats to you all for a job well done, Team Eight. You're dismissed and may collect your payments at the missions desk downstairs."

Hiruzen watched them bow and lead themselves out, three frosty glares staring straight into his eyes until the moment their backs were to him and they stepped out of the room. As the door shut, he dismissed the ANBU from his office and secured the area with a few taps of his fingers. He didn't look up when his door clicked open, then clicked closed, then locked.

"I want this to end," Hiruzen promptly stated. "Nothing good will come of it."

"Are they dead?"

"No—"

"Then it must continue," Danzo replied simply. His cane tapped against the floor as he neared the desk and his eye roved cursorily over the paperwork on top. "The mission served a perfect opportunity to eliminate them, yet still it hasn't been managed." He sneered. "Yuuhi wasn't supposed to be there when they were attacked and it seems like you failed to give that Kusabi proper instructions. Please tell me you weren't more of a fool and gave him full reimbursement before the task was completed."

"I'm not an idiot. They received a quarter and would have received the rest had they succeeded," snapped Hiruzen. He exhaled harshly and rubbed his face. "Kusabi was low genin at best; it's no surprise he fell at Kurenai-san's hands. The only reason he was selected was due to his former ties to Gato and because of his near-confrontation with Team Seven, his cowardice sending him fleeing when he found them too strong. He was the only viable mercenary to use and you know that fully well."

Danzo huffed. "I also said to allow ROOT to take care of the problem, but you've refused and dug yourself an even deeper hole."

"Their disappearances or deaths would be too suspicious if you use that route," Hiruzen stressed with a sharp gesture of his hand. "It needs to be a coincidental accident. There are two clan children on that team, one of them of noble blood. This is the only approach."

"Then do a better job next time," growled the councilman. "They have the runt of the litter, a few pests, a pink-haired nobody—it shouldn't be this hard. Genin. You could killed them with the wave of a hand if you weren't so weak of heart!"

"Tread carefully, old friend. I'm still the Hokage," the Sandaime warned, his eyes glinting slightly with the steel of his past youth. Danzo scoffed and rolled his eye, his teeth bared as he gestured mockingly towards the window and towards the village of Konoha.

"And we're standing here in your honorable office planning the murder of three children who were smart enough to piece together your mistakes," he said. Glee trickled in his mockery as Hiruzen flinched. "Don't try to act so high and mighty now, old friend, or else you'll have your predecessors rolling in their graves."

::

Red eyes watched in amazement as a blue sheen swept over the entirety of the apartment before fading back into the seals it came from. Kiba grew smug before Sakura reached over and clipped the back of his head.

"Ow!"

"See what happens when you make that face again."

Kurenai could feel her amusement in the pit of her stomach, but it wasn't enough to climb all the way to her face. She was too worried, too concerned for their well-being. Whenever she closed her eyes, she saw a pitch black burn on a pink tongue. She cast a wary glance across her walls.

"Will it hold well?" she asked. Kiba scratched the back of his head.

"Er, I don't know? But—hey, hey, hey, let me finish—it'll flash red if someone's trying to break it, then orange if it's broken, so it's not like we won't know it's happening."

Sakura lowered her proffered fist and Shino pushed up his glasses. "I give thanks every day that you're not as stupid as you appear to be."

Kiba didn't know if he should take that as a compliment or an insult.

Kurenai regathered their attention by setting down a pitcher of juice and a pitcher of water onto the table. They each poured themselves their own helping, juice for them all and water for Akamaru, before she sat down and pulled a blank expression. The genin quickly picked up on her aura and the easy energy that charged the room quickly dimmed.

Sakura picked up her glass. "What would you like to talk about first, Kurenai-sensei?"

"Your seals," she answered instantly. "If I could get another look at them...?"

Shino, who sat closest to their teacher, set his cup down, unzipped his coat down to the base of his neck, and stuck out his tongue. Seeing it in person for the second time didn't nullify her fears, but increased them, because now she knew for sure it wasn't a dream or trick of the light.

She phrased her next words carefully, trying to figure out what exactly the boundaries were and how to work around them, what would or wouldn't constitute as 'intent against the caster'. "What made the assailant believe you deserved those seals?"

Sakura slowly sipped her drink. "... We found out a truth," she said. "Some people don't like that."

"A truth?"

"Like the Kyuubi or Namikaze Minato's legacy," Shino added. His tongue pulsed faintly, and his teeth clenched in pain. "Things people should know about, but don't."

Kurenai tapped her lip. She already knew the Hokage was a part of the whole debacle—her team wouldn't be treating him with such hostility and he wouldn't be taking it with a cowed head otherwise. But who else was in on it? There had to be more people involved, no matter its obscurity. But a conspiracy involving the Hokage had to have involved more people. Jounin? ANBU? Council members? Clan Heads? The variables were endless.

"But you must've had research prior to this, right?" she mentioned. "I know you can all be very thorough when you want to."

That earned her strange glances. She'd never told them she was there when they discovered Naruto's origins, but Sakura answered nonetheless. "Gone," she stated bitterly. "I came back to my apartment one day and there was nothing."

"But there were le—" Kiba started, but his tongue tingled and his mouth snapped shut. Suspicions he never had before clamored up his spine. The seal reacted to the letters? So they'd been placed for—for what? For them to get caught? Anger spiked deep in his core as he met his teammates' eyes and they silently came to an agreement that the letters would be a topic of later discussion. He pushed down his rage. "—er, files that appeared outta nowhere." Oddly, the seal gave no indication that the files had anything to do with Danzo or Hiruzen, so he pushed further in that direction. "We don't know where they came from, but they kinda nudged us the right way? We found out more stuff, went to do some other... stuff, and got caught."

So they did have allies somewhere. Who, she didn't have a clue, but she was glad someone had been there for them when she wasn't. And hopefully they had no ill intention.

She was coaxed out of her musings when Shino reached into his coat and pulled out a folded piece of paper and held it out. Kurenai reached for it curiously, and once unfolded in her nimble fingers, her eyes went wide.

Shoushagan no Jutsu

Alternatively: Vanishing Facial Copy Technique

Ninjutsu, B-rank, Supplementary, Short-Range

Steal the face of a foe, wear it as your own. Leaves victims faceless.

Genjutsu Shibari

Alternatively: Genjutsu Binding

Genjutsu, B-rank, Supplementary, Short to Mid-Range

Blind your opponent, render them incapable of movement.

Keiyaku Fuuin

Alternatively: Contract Seal

Fuuinjutsu, B-rank, Supplementary, Short-Range

Implement on a summoner, have them lose control of their creature.

Below the descriptions was the list of hand seals for each technique. Quickly committing them to memory, Kurenai's head snapped up. Kiba was pouring himself another cup of juice while Sakura sipped at her own, gaze ever unwavering.

Shino gestured toward the paper. "There are some jutsu we found while we were..." His hand swished from side to side. "You know. Why are these the only jutsu we have? There was not much we could leave with. Three special techniques is fair recompense for the trouble it took to obtain them."

Special techniques indeed, Kurenai thought as she studied them. In her hands were jutsu she'd never seen before—and to think they were in her team's possession made her rethink just how capable they really were. They certainly could fit into the Infiltration/Reconnaissance specialization without issue and were proving their worth; stealing techniques, learning sealing, unnerving a Kage...

She narrowed her gaze once more at the list of hand seals. They were in Sakura's handwriting. "Did you manage to figure out the jutsu composition yourself?" she questioned, a tad incredulous.

Shino and Kiba looked to Sakura as she shrugged. "Ame's known to be a center for original techniques, so they spend a lot of time teaching chakra control, jutsu overlays, things like that." Kurenai's eyebrows rose and Sakura hastened to explain. "I was homeschooled so my curriculum was a little advanced, even by Ame's standards."

Kurenai laid the paper on the table and smoothed out its wrinkles. "And does that mean you've been homeschooled on the Seven Swords of the Bloody Mist as well?"

Sakura held her stare for a long few seconds before she puffed out a resigned sigh,shouldering the weight of her team's curiosity. Kurenai knew for a fact that Shino and Kiba had no idea what the swords were, and she admitted her knowledge of them was sketchy at best, completely fallible at worst.

"... My father wasn't originally of Ame, though I was raised there," she said. She was conflicted, eyes roving from one spot on the table to another but never to her teacher's face. "He used to be a Kiri shinobi."

Kurenai nodded. She expected as much.

Shino, Kiba, and Akamaru traded looks. They knew about her father being a missing-nin, a very alive missing-nin who worked under a boss, but she hadn't mentioned the Kiri part.

Sakura continued. "In Kiri, there are a group of shinobi called the Seven Swordsmen whose strength is only second to the Mizukage.They are said to be capable of taking down nations with nothing but the swords in their possession: the Seven Swords of the Blood Mist. There's Kabutowari; the Bluntsword, Kiba; the Thunderswords, Nuibari; the Longsword, Shibuki; the Blastsword, Samehada; the Greatsword—" She tried not to pause— "Hiramekarei; the Twinsword, and Kubikiribocho, the Seversword." She unclipped a scroll from her belt—Kiba's recently completed project—and laid it out on the table. Kurenai moved the pitcher to the counter, Kiba and Shino picked up all the glasses, and Akamaru leapt onto an empty chair and placed his paws on the edge of the table to get a better view. Sakura nicked her thumb and swiped her blood on the scroll and suddenly, a fine cloud of smoke erupted and an enormous sword took up the entire length of the table, and then some.

"Damn," Kiba murmured. He didn't get quite a good look at the sword back in Wave, but after observing it up close, all he could say the thing was ridiculously huge. "Which one's that?"

"Kubikiribocho," Sakura said as she stared down at the blade. There was respect in her eyes, even a smatter of admiration. "Each of the Seven has their own unique ability, and this one regenerates from the blood of the enemies it cuts down. A whetstone never needs to touch it—all you need to do is fight."

Before, Shino didn't know why Kirigakure earned the moniker 'Chigiri'. The Bloody Mist. But he was starting to get a good idea.

"They also call it the Executioner's Blade because the semi-circle near the hilt was made for decapitation," she informed, pointing to the particular spot. Sweat started to collect in Kiba's palms, but he was silent as he listened closely. "The Seven Swords are passed down from generation to generation as tradition denotes, so it's every Kiri shinobi's dream to be worthy enough to be chosen as a future wielder." Her eyes flamed for a brief moment. "Kiri doesn't have the best political climate, never had, and I don't know if it ever will. Rogues spill out of that village by the tens, so it was only a matter of time that the Swords followed. As far as I know, Hiramekarei is the only one left in Kiri's possession. All the other six have been taken elsewhere."

Kurenai looked at the blade's razor-sharp edge and wondered how many hundreds, if not thousands, had died to sustain it. "And you'll learn how to use it?"

"It would be more than an honor," said Sakura. "I'll make my heritage proud."

Her teacher nodded. "I'll find someone who can introduce you to kenjutsu," she promised, earning a surprised blink for her statement. "There are a few off the top of my head that I can think of... and I'm assuming this sword will need to be kept a secret, even from your eventual mentor?"

"I won't wield Kubikiribocho again until I become a good enough swordswoman to do it justice," was the only reply. Kurenai nodded again and turned her eye to the duo to her left.

"Moving on. Kiba, would you please expand upon your sudden interest in sealing?"

He perked up. "Oh, well, uh, I found a book when we were doing research. It was kinda interesting when I read up on it and I thought it was all pretty cool, so I started making some seals of my own."

Kurenai tilted her head. "The Inuzuka pride themselves on offensive attacks and taijutsu, and I don't think a seal master has ever come out of your clan," she said. "Do you take to them easily? Did Inuzuka-sama introduce the concept to you?"

"Nah, Mom doesn't know 'bout it. Neither does Hana," he said. "Shino and Sakura were the ones freakin' out over this Rubik's cube I solved."

"He'd never seen one before and solved it in five minutes," Shino added immediately. "Sakura recognized his capacity for that type of problem solving and tested him."

"We didn't have time to go over his results," commented Sakura. "By the time we got around to it, he was working on the scroll we used to hold Kubikiribocho and we figured there was no reason to worry about his paper tests. I still have the results, if you want them."

Kurenai readily accepted the small sheaf of papers her student pulled from her pouch and carefully scanned them through. She lent half a mind to listening as Sakura answered more questions her teammates had about the swords, but it was hard when the results in her hands took her so completely by surprise. These tests, ones so unlike those issued at the Academy, included different logic puzzles, notes from the hands-on solving of mechanical puzzles, and escape strategies answered thoroughly and unusually—but not at all incorrectly. There were no math questions, no convoluted word problems, no reading or grammar comprehension. These questions relied on instinct and were directly applicable to the real world.

"Everything here..." she started, shaking her head as she flipped through the pages. "Kiba, if you're capable of this much, why were you struggling so much at the Academy?"

His face dropped a bit as he laughed sheepishly and stuck his hands in his pockets. "The teachers were, I dunno, moving kinda fast, I guess? They didn't really care that I cut class anyways, so I didn't see the point of sittin' through boring talks and stuff."

Akamaru whined as Kurenai's brows creased together. Not only was Kiba a clan child, but he had just as much potential as anyone else in the class—why did the Academy let its less focused students stay astray? Maybe later she'd write to the council for a more thorough hiring of teachers, or at least for the Board of Education to implement a stricter code of student success.

Her lips pursed. "If the school didn't help you, who did?"

Kiba turned his head towards Sakura and she looked at their teacher unblinkingly. "Standardized tests aren't an indication for intelligence, just memorization, so it's not weird that he did good in something he thought was fun versus what someone else expected of him. All he needed was extra time; if I wasn't going to help, who was?"

Point taken.

Kurenai cast another cursory stare at the tags on her walls, a niggling paranoia raising the hairs at the nape of her neck. If anyone came across an apartment rigged with seals and faintly buzzing with an Aburame's insects, they would ask questions she didn't want to answer. They really would have to be quicker with these types of conversations.

"I can get you books on seals that have jounin clearance," she said, smiling slightly at the way he brightened. "If you have any requests, just let me know and I'll find a way to get them. Other than that I should have a decent stack of books for you to start on by the end of the week."

Akamaru barked and his partner flashed a wide grin. "Thanks, sensei!"

Shino was staring at Kurenai with a calculating look behind his dark lenses. He'd contributed to the conversation, of course, but he'd still been quiet for the most part. She gave him a questioning tilt of her head. He sat up.

"I don't understand why you decided to stand by our side without question," he said. "Why? You've been a Konoha shinobi much longer than you've been our teacher—there is no reason to side with us and against your Kage." Sakura and Kiba had gone quiet as their eyes flitted back and forth. "We are genin, children in your eyes, I'm sure. And you have no idea what we've done, nor why the sealer took such lengths to sew our lips shut. You have no obligation to us. You have no reason to believe us. Why would you go so far for us?"

Trust was a strong word, yet one of those words that loses meaning the more its used. To see her team have so little made her heart sink in her chest. Their eyes were cold and their faces were stone; too old to be coddled but too young to have already been betrayed. It was true—she was twenty-seven and had served as a faithful shinobi for eighteen years. She was all too aware that she knew nothing of what they'd done.

But in the words of her own father...

"You all listen closely," Yuuhi Shinku said as he eyed the group of teenaged shinobi before him. The barrier around them did nothing to block the echo of the Nine-Tail's roars of rage or the collapse of building after building. "The young ones—all of you—are to stay away from the Kyuubi."

A chuunin Kurenai narrowed her eyes. "What do you mean?"

"We are not fighting other villages here, we're trying to control a situation that may be too far out of our hands. You cannot risk your lives."

"Speak for yourself!" Kurenai snapped. Her father's gaze softened as it landed on her, but it doesn't lessen his intensity.

"We are not guaranteed long lives, so please take these words of an old shinobi." His red eyes, a perfect match to his daughter's, returned to look over the cluster of listless teenagers. "You are the future of this village. Who will we be if none of you live to create it?"

"I... don't know how bad Konoha seems to you," she admitted with a shameful slouch of her shoulders. "I don't know when it started, but how you're all feeling could have been going on longer than you've all been alive. Longer than I've been alive." She straightened once more with one hand around Kiba's test results and the other against the edge of the table. "Never in my life have I questioned the Hokage because that's not what we're made for—but the Will of Fire has burned you and no one's noticed."

She closed her eyes for a brief moment, but all she could see was a black hexagram seal. Kurenai forced them back open. "If it were treason you would've been executed or imprisoned, but no one knows about this, do they?" Slowly, they each shook their heads and anger shoots through her. "Were you given a choice?" Again, they shook their heads. "Then there's every chance that what's been done to you was unjust and I will never stand for it. Even if I lose my Will of Fire, as Konoha seems to have done, I still have my free will. You don't." She sighed tiredly. "I meant what I said in Wave."

The digital green clock on the oven struck 9:17 AM and a hush fell over the table. Shino and Sakura were still standing, but Kiba had taken back his seat and Akamaru's tail had stopped wagging nearly half an hour past. All eyes were on Shino now, and though both his teammates could add interject, they wouldn't. Not for this.

"... I see. But we won't let it come down to your death, Kurenai-sensei," replied Shino. His eyes—for a split second—grew haunted. "We don't intend to let anyone die for our sakes. All we want to do is bring justice for those who were never able to do it for themselves. Why? Because someone has to."

The clouds in his gaze left as he regained his normal composure. "I also intend to become a field medic to minimize the chances of imminent harm."

Kiba sputtered into his cup and Sakura grimaced as her pants were splattered with juice. "Medic?! When the hell did you decide that?!"

"This morning."

"This mor—Shino, what the hell."

"Medics raise the chance for mission survival up to 75% on occasion. With our penchant for... misfortune, it's safe to assume our need for as much assistance as feasible," he explained. "I am willing to study it and have become intrigued with what my kikaichu's application to medicine could mean."

Just as with Inuzuka and seal masters, no dedicated healers had ever come out of the Aburame Clan as far as Kurenai could think of. They were special because of their ability to use jutsu-like techniques without the use of hand signs and invaluable because of their unparalleled sensing techniques. Their chakra molding abilities were said to be exemplary, but it had never been applied to the medical sector. Had it really never been thought of?

If anything, it'd make more sense for Shino to expand on his sensor abilities and Kiba to have piqued an interest in taijutsu styles. But when had her team ever taken the easy road?

"There's a field medic program at the hospital—small, engaging, always on the lookout for more people." She folded Kiba's results and slid them back to Sakura as she eyed the sword still gleaming on the table. "Luckily you won't need anyone's seal of approval except for mine, so I'll put in a request and get all the paperwork you'll need to start the program."

Another glance at both the clock and the seals told her they'd spoken under the silencers longer than intended and she motioned for them to be brought down. Sakura quickly sealed Kubikiribocho back into the scroll and tucked it away while Shino pulled back his kikaichu. They all assumed their normal seats as the orange light of broken seals enveloped the room, a faint wave of chakra brushing them by.

"... So." Sakura looked at Kiba. "Is now a good time to kick your ass for spitting juice on my pants?"

::

Kurenai wove through the streets of Konoha with a bag slung over her shoulder, a sea of admittance forms in one hand, and her nose buried in Senju Tsunade's published manual: Green Fire on the Front Lines: A Future of Field Medics. She was currently on page thirteen of two hundred and thirty-four, scrutinizing each line as the sealing books in her bag tapped rhythmically against her thigh. She still had a few hours before she was to meet her father at his favorite sweets shop and talk to him about kenjutsu. He was an instructor and overseer of chuunin and jounin after all, maybe he wouldn't mind overseeing a genin for a little while—

She halted her steps a millisecond before she had the chance to collide with the body in her path. She looked up and immediately smiled as she met a soft, dark gaze.

She'd recognize such gentleness anywhere.

"It's unusual to see you out and about in the middle of the day," she mused. "You're usually on duty aren't you?"

Tenzou chuckled. "Yes, I suppose I am. Unfortunately, my leave has racked up to its limit. I've been ordered to take an extra day off every two weeks." He nodded towards the papers in her hands. "What about you? You're mostly with your genin during the week."

"Thursdays are weapon days. I had them practice with senbon and it seems Kiba has a surprising knack for it," she sighed, but the smile was still on her face. "They were working on their aim and were exceptional, so I let them off early for the day."

He fell into step beside her as they meandered down the busy street. He tucked the bit about Kiba and senbon as a note in his mind as he glanced back at those stuffy papers. "A medic, Kurenai-san?"

"For Shino," she replied. There was an open intrigue on his face and she tapped his arm with the forms. "If you're so interested in my genin, you know you can meet them, right?"

He smiled easily and turned his head back to the road ahead of them. "I'd like to one day, but maybe not too soon." There was something in his voice that made her want to ask more, but she didn't pry.

"Are you afraid of what they'll say to you? Sometimes they'll give you gray hairs, but my genin really aren't that bad, Tenzou-san," she joked. Well, maybe it wasn't too far from the truth. When she was combing her hair yesterday she did see a single, pesky silver strand that she was sure wasn't there before. Maybe she should check her stress levels next. Or her blood pressure.

Tenzou laughed, half at her words and half at the thoughtful pout that suddenly took up her face. "I'm sure they're good kids," he said. "But... I think it'll be a while."

"Yeah? You ask about them a lot, and I think they'd like to meet the person who built their obstacle course."

Kurenai didn't know that he started to think of labs and seals and consequences, and she frowned when his smile turned sad.

"When I'm ready to face them, I will," he promised. But for now, Cat will have to do.

She opened her mouth to ask what he meant because it sounded like he'd met them before, somehow, somewhere, but she was stopped when she caught sight of brown hawk overhead, a white circle under each wing.

::

"I assume you all already understand why you've been summoned," Hiruzen said as he surveyed the tens of jounin in his office, his face a perfect mask of indifference.

Asuma's cigarette hung in his mouth as he spoke. "The other villages have already been notified, right? There's a little more of them around the village than usual."

"And when will it start?" Kurenai questioned. She held the old man's stare that bored into her before it moved to address the group as a singular body.

"One week," said the Third. Her teeth clenched together, but no one noticed—they were too occupied with their surprised whispering. One week? She was supposed to have a month to train them and that same month to prepare! They'd just gotten back from that useless mission and failed assassination attempt only for her team not to get a fair chance like the rest of them?!

"That's sudden," Kakashi said. His trademark orange book was nowhere in sight. Hiruzen was quiet as he took a long draw of his pipe and blew out a steady stream of smoke.

"I will make the formal announcement shortly," he continued like no one had mentioned anything before him. "Seven days from today, on the first of July, the Chuunin Exams will begin in Konohagakure. Now, I ask for those in charge of the rookie genin teams to step forward."

This was simply procedure. Those with rookies would come forward, announce that their teams would not compete, then the teachers who've had genin a year or longer would come and nominate their own teams or pass until the next exams.

At least, that was the play-by-play since the stunning all-rookie nominations from five years ago.

"Hatake Kakashi, Yuuhi Kurenai, and Sarutobi Asuma," he stated as he looked each of them over. "Are there any genin you recommend for next week's exams? As you well know, the qualifications are that a single genin must have at least eight formal missions on record."

Kakashi moved first, the fingers on his right hand forming the seal of confrontation as a testament of truth to what he would say next. "I am the leader of Team Seven consisting of: Uchiha Sasuke, Hyuuga Hinata, and Uzumaki Naruto. I, Hatake Kakashi, nominate all three for the Chuunin Exams."

Kurenai's wide eyes immediately leapt to Hiruzen. Satisfaction curled in their depths as one of his fingers twitched. He knew he couldn't stop her now—not with Kakashi's recommendations, not when two noble clan children won't be refused. She raised her hand and formed the seal. "I am the leader of Team Eight consisting of: Aburame Shino, Inuzuka Kiba, and Sakura. I, Yuuhi Kurenai, nominate all three for the Chuunin Exams."

Asuma was the last to speak, but murmurs were already flying around the room as he raised his hand. "I am the leader of Team Ten consisting of: Akimichi Chouji, Nara Shikamaru, and Yamanaka Ino," he said. "I, Sarutobi Asuma, nominate all three for the Chuunin Exams."

The office exploded in chatter, but Kurenai didn't hear any of it.

One week.

Seven days.

And there was still a lot of work to do.

::

And here we have some great Stumble [Rewrite] fanart by maippet !