"What's wrong?" asked Naruto, looking up from a scroll.
"My mother had to dress me," said Sakura after a brief silence. "I kept breaking laces and shredded two tops. I crushed the doorknob before I was completely awake this morning."
"Ouch," said Naruto.
"This is so FRUSTRATING," complained Sakura, kicking out at a tree.
CRUNCH!
"That's hopeful, you didn't knock the tree down," said Naruto.
"I suppose," said Sakura, flopping down.
CRASH!
"Great," said Sakura as the newly fallen tree continued to make cracking noises as various branches gave under the weight.
"Still having problems with that?" asked Sasuke as he arrived.
"You need help applying burn cream to your face?" asked Naruto.
"No, I mostly got it," said Sasuke, taking out a small mirror and tube of burn cream.
"How did you manage to burn yourself?" asked Naruto. "I thought you completely controlled fire around you."
"I startled, okay?" Sasuke glared briefly at Naruto. "My control slipped."
"Oh," said Naruto.
"Yes, 'oh'," agreed Sasuke as he finished applying a thin layer of cream. "So what are you working on?"
"Something I saw when we were There," said Naruto. "Everything can be described in certain terms. Fuuinjutsu can be used to make pocket spaces and seal things and make explosives, but there's so much more. Fuuinjutsu is a way to describe things."
"So... what are you saying?" asked Sasuke.
Naruto scribbled out three notes and then stuck them on different sides of a large boulder. "Say we had a mission to clear boulders from a field."
"That would be a particularly lame mission," said Sasuke. "But I suppose we could let Sakura toss them to the side."
Sakura didn't get up from where she had sprawled out, merely raised one arm to deliver a gesture.
"Well, what I just wrote was a gravity seal but I reversed a section, and so -" Naruto backed away from the boulder.
"Yo!" said Kakashi, appearing atop the boulder.
"Kakashi-sensei, the timer's about to go off, you really don't want to be-"
WHOOSH! went the boulder, falling up into the sky.
Kakashi landed, then leaned back to watch roughly three tons of rock become a speck in the distance. "Interesting. How do you control where it comes down?"
"'Control'?" asked Naruto.
All three genin and one jonin watched the speck vanish into the distance.
"It was kind of an experiment, Kakashi-sensei," said Naruto.
"Hmmm," said Kakashi, checking the wind and doing quick calculations. "How long do you suppose the effect will last?"
"Maybe fifteen minutes, I didn't put that much chakra into it," said Naruto.
"Well, there's nothing out that way for a few miles, it'll probably be okay," said Kakashi.
"You seem chipper," said Itachi, not sounding as if he cared at all.
"I'm feeling good. Me and Samedha, we're invincible," said Kisame. "Nothing in this world can hurt me as long as I can drain their chakra. Why wouldn't I be chipper? I could fight the gods themselves in my current shape."
KA-THWAM!
Itachi paused in the process of pouring himself some tea. There was a brief sound of dirt tumbling down. "Kisame?"
"Ouch," said a voice as the boulder shifted slightly.
Itachi finished pouring his tea, took a sip at it, and considered. "Perhaps you should avoid challenging the gods today."
"Sounds like a plan," said a pained voice. "A little help?"
"So what kind of mission do we have today, Kakashi-sensei?" asked Naruto eagerly.
"Are you three really up to doing missions?" asked Kakashi.
"No," said Sakura.
"Uhm, well, we really need some kind of money coming in now," pointed out Naruto. "Or at least I do."
"I'm good," said Sasuke, standing up.
"If I handle anything, I'm liable to break it," pointed out Sakura.
"I've got an idea on that," admitted Kakashi.
Pang pang pang pong crunch
"How strong ARE you now, Sakura-chan?" asked Naruto nervously. Sure, Sakura hadn't hit him once since they'd gone to that Between place. He remembered getting hit though, clearer than ever since that visit. He didn't estimate his head as having much chance against her fist nowadays.
"I don't know," admitted Sakura as she dropped the useless handle and reached for another hammer. "I get the feeling that we're still growing into our full abilities."
Sasuke concentrated and blew a thin stream of fire into the furnace to reheat it and then turned it briefly on the hammerhead Sakura had held. The broken wood inside the hole in the middle flash-fried and he reached for a fresh handle to insert.
"When you can beat out the dings in those pots and pans without flattening the utensils," said Kakashi, turning a page in his book, "there's another exercise to perform."
Orochimaru considered the report briefly. "I need verification."
"A problem, sir?" asked one of his minions.
If this is true, someone survived the Between. Was it because he was an Uzumaki? Were there other factors involved? Nobody has tried these experiments in years because the results were always fatal - without exception. Orochimaru ignored the minion as he worked things out. There are so few Uzumaki though. "I need to relay a message to one of my contacts in Konohagakure."
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(Posted Sat, 20 Jun 2015 16:04)
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