Today was the big day. The big day that years of hard work, training and getting beaten over the head during sparring matches lead to. Unmistakably the soft pitter patter of the rain made the courtyard of the ninja academy shine in that characteristic way, that way that only Amegakure rain could make pavement shine. This courtyard would be familiar to the students that were lined up now, standing in a neat row organized by the sensei in advance, awaiting the arrival of the leader of the rain – a woman shrouded in as much mystery as the hidden rain itself. Not much more was known than her name. Kaguya Yogensha. Any other information was reliant on vague rumors to those not privy to meeting her privately, from the way she dressed to the way she fought. She had observed the students once or twice, though not openly, so the students would likely also not be familiar with the woman.

The monotony of the sound of rain pouring down from the heavens was broken by the entrance of two guards wearing masks and long hoods, appearing from the gate leading to the academy. ANBU. Not surprising, considering the leader of the Rain was visiting. Unseen by the academy students were the myriad of other ANBU that were hidden in plain sight on the buildings around them. A moment of silence passed before a figure wearing a similar cloak, though beige in color and not black, passed in between the two ANBU standing at the gate. She was looking down, and continued walking until she stood in front of the students. She looked up then, looking over the line of shinobi left-to-right, and then back, before smiling at them. The woman, presumably the kage, had a peculiar style of makeup on her face, with red dots on her forehead and the edges of her eye, as well as one on the bottom part of her lip. Her hair had been carefully combed and parted, then pulled backwards behind her ears. Two tails hung down to her shoulders, draped along the front of her body.

There was something awkward about her smile. It wasn’t a genuine smile, and it did not take a genius of social interaction to know this much. It had a hint of sorrow in it, as if she was remorseful about the graduation of these students. Perhaps they had been deemed not good enough, and had been passed only to bolster the ranks of the shinobi armed forces in Amegakure.

Following shortly was a man, about a full head taller than the woman. He was much more well known, as he was the assistant to the kage, and did most of the public business that the kage did not attend. He was not wearing any cloak, but instead wore armor resembling that of a samurai perhaps – although modified to be more agile and stealthy. He was a known kenjutsu-genjutsu specialist, and a dangerous and formidable foe in any capacity otherwise. This face would be known to the students, as he had observed the classes openly more than once.

It was not the leader, this ‘Yogensha,’ that would speak up. Instead, it was the assistant. “Students,” he started, “if I may call you that still.” He raised his hand, furled into a fist clutching on to a large amount of shinobi headbands, marked with the stripes of the hidden rain village. A worthy prize for any shinobi that had proven themselves in the academy. And a source of pride for those who earned it.

“Unfortunately, you are not done learning just yet,” he continued, lowering his fist again. A few drops of water started running down the metal of the forehead protector. “In Amegakure no Sato, the rain never ends. Just like the rain, your road to shinobihood never ends. It is an everlasting path you must walk.”

As the assistant spoke, behind him Yogensha peered up into the sky and slowly formed the tiger seal, mumbling to herself, “Ukojizai no jutsu,”, barely audible to anyone, to which the rain offered a brief moment of respite and let up, allowing the sun to shine through only momentarily.

The assistant continued, stepping forward and beginning to hand out the headbands to everyone in the line.

“Now that you have passed your exams, you must remember; mistakes are no longer the difference between passing or failing an assignment, they are the difference between life and death. Not just for you, but for your comrades too. Your assignments, starting now, are going to be greater than you – greater than your own life.”

The students had been instructed prior to the event during the rehearsal with their sensei to not put the headband on until the command was given, so they were left standing there with the headband in their hand. The assistant did not seem to let up and only continued his speech, as boring as it may have been.

“Remember what it means to be a shinobi of Amegakure no Sato.” He stepped back, standing next to Yogensha once more. Before he could continue, she filled in the next line for him, letting the students hear her voice finally.

“Being a shinobi of Amegakure no Sato means you bear the burden of sacrifice so that others do not have to. Congratulations, shinobi,” she told the students in front of her, once again flashing them an ingenuine smile. This was the signal that the shinobi could put their headbands on, and probably the moment they had all been waiting for.

She turned around and mumbled to herself as she proceeded towards the gate where the two ANBU guards were waiting for her while she formed the tiger seal again. “The rain weeps for you, and the suffering you will cause and receive.” On cue, the sky darkened again and the gap that had allowed the sun to shine through closed, before a blast of thunder lauded the entry of more rain showering down on the fresh graduates.

The assistant carried on, continuing where Yogensha had left him off. “You will receive a week off to collect yourselves, enjoy time with your family, and spend a well-earned break with friends. After that week, you will receive notice from your sensei. Good luck, shinobi.” His address of the students as shinobi rather than students was specifically chosen, as he was no longer speaking to children, but to soldiers of Amegakure no Sato, part of the armed forces now that they had officially secured their ranks. And with that, he too marched off, leaving the new genin to celebrate with their peers and the family that might have shown up to celebrate with them.

---

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Excitement electrified the air, buzzing from one near-graduate to the next. Though they all stood in their places, their faces in rapt attention, it was all the little cues that belied their nervousness, their anxiousness, but most of all, their anticipation at finally moving on to the next stage of their lives. For each of the children standing assembled before the Amekage and her entourage, each one held a different focus than their neighbor: some focused on the Amekage herself - some on the Kage's assistant, their eyes hungrily gazing at the headbands held in his hand. Others still looked to their parents, their former teachers, or each other. Most found it difficult to keep their fingers still, their feet calm, or their mouths unclenched.

In such an atmosphere, Hikari couldn't help but be infected by it.

For her, her head was tilted upwards. Her focus was towards the sun that broke free from the cover of the ever-present gray that clouded it Her focus was towards the sun that was always shining. At her parents insistence, she was forced discard her usual wear for the graduation and instead don something formal, something befitting to celebrate the current momentous occasion in her life. The young girl pouted and fought against it, but right now, in this moment, she would be eternally grateful to her parents for making her do so. The deep blue sleeveless qipao she was made to wear allowed every inch of her skin to drink deep of the sun's warmth, the golden Fumetsu tree that highlighted and coiled all around her dress glittered and glowed as if it had dipped itself into the bright rays and painted the falling rain around her into blinding stars.

And then just as quickly as it came, the rainclouds above ate up the sun once more. Broken out of her reverie, the loss punctuated by a crack of thunder, she noticed that in one hand she held her new headband. She hardly remembered when it had been given to her or when she had taken it, but she supposed this actually was what she had come here for. Her, and the many friends that surrounded her.

Hikari stared at the now suddenly heavy weight that she held in her hand before her eyes quickly shifted back towards the front as the Amekage spoke for the first time to the assembled and newly named shinobi. A hand clenched tight around a newly received headband as the Kage spoke of sacrifice, of the new responsibilities that now rested on all their shoulders.

But as before, Hikari soon became caught up in the quiet jubilant glee of her comrades as they all together tied their headbands on, now becoming full-fledged ninjas of Amegakure. As the assistant said his final comments and turned to follow his master, a singular roaring cheer sounded behind him.

Hikari's voice was among the loudest, her voice ringing pure and clear as she became one step closer to achieving her goal, her face beaming and bright.

Just like the sun that was swallowed up by the clouds however, Hikari quickly became swarmed by the sea of friends she had made during her time at the Academy. Memories were shared, tears were shed, wishes were made aloud, and the young star did her best to earnestly speak and respond to each one. There were two faces she was looking for in particular however that she couldn't find among the crowd, instead finding them out among the outskirts of it.

Deftly and gracefully, she navigated from body to body and from conversation to conversation as smoothly as she could, doing her best to give her full, albeit brief, attention to every person that spoke to her until she linked arms with the first person she was looking for and then dancing her way and linking arms with the other, pulling the trio of them out from the masses. On one side of her was a taller girl with beautiful short black hair and a bandage placed carefully over her nose, and on the other was a surly boy who, despite the occasion, looked like he had just rolled out of bed.

"Sadako~, Kyosuke~," the acrobat intoned playfully, her elbows fiercely locked around theirs as she exaggeratingly threw her head from one sourpuss to the other. "You both are planning to go to the party with all of us at Saito no Kareraisu aren't you? Especially after all the trouble I went through to organize everything right~? I mean, you would not believe how long it took me to make and deliver all those invitations. I imagine you both know how hard it is to sneak out of the orphanage, but do you know how hard it is to sneak anything in?"

---

---

Sadako yawned, stretching her right arm up and over the top of her head while the left rested carelessly behind her head, before moving to the front to rub her eyes with her arm. Once she’d sufficiently caused her vision to go blurry and a hundred-and-one colors, she let her arms fall down onto her lap, staring blankly ahead in the girls barracks of the orphanage. Around her there were several empty beds of those unfortunate souls that had morning practice, who had to get up at 4AM and be on the field at 5.30 precisely to start their training. Other beds were still full, stuffed with tired bodies hiding under their blankets before they, too, had to get up and attend to chores. Luckily for Sadako, that time was past her now, and all she had to worry about was making it to the graduation ceremony on time. A beam of light cracked through one of the windows through the slit between the two curtains, shining directly in Sadako’s face. “Hngg..” she groaned, slowly getting up and turning herself to the side of the bed, slipping her feet into some slippers before getting up, shuffling her way past the other beds towards the door to enter the common room where she could have breakfast.

Breakfast was served by a moody man, late 50’s, who seemed to have no particular interest in helping poor sad orphans get a healthy meal before they were subdued to hours of rough training. “Hard labor produces hard shinobi,” was what the sensei’s told them. Probably true, in Sadako’s mind. That, too, was now over! At long last. She sat down with the plate of food, setting it down with a satisfying loud clack, and shovelled it down her throat. She was never one to mind her manners when she was in her own headspace, too preoccupied with other pressing matters such as wondering whether people liked her or not. Once she was done, she stood up and returned the plate, turned around and went to walk back to her bed to get dressed. She raised her arm again to rub her eyes some more, and while she half-assedly blinded herself, she bumped into someone. A cacophony of apologies was quick to burst forth, “Sorry, sorry! I didn’t see you, I apologize!”, quickly lowering her arm only to see a fellow graduate in front of her – Kyosuke, a genjutsu and medical expert – which prompted her to smile as wide as she could. “Goodmorning, Kyosuke! Are you ready for the big day? I heard the kage herself is coming to visit us! Oh, I’m so excited to…” She trailed off momentarily, caught in her own thoughts, completely forgetting that she was still in her pyjama.

Am I annoying him? Kyosuke really doesn’t like talking to people, much less me… I should probably just go…

“A-ah, well, I guess I’ll uhh.. see you at the academy!” She once again flashed the boy a smile, this time much less wide and much less sincere, before turning around the boy in an effort to get past him, before hurrying along to the girls barracks in a pace that only someone ashamed of themselves could match. Once she was inside, and had the door shut, she sighed at her pitiful attempt at making friends. Throughout the years at the academy, she’d often wandered from friend group to friend group, only to end up leaving them when she’d convinced herself that her new ‘friends’ didn’t really really like her. Why would this time be any different? She was an idiot for even thinking of talking to him.

Once she found her bed in the row of tens of bed, she quickly got dressed again, wearing the same outfit she always wore. A black sleeveless croptop that she’d cut herself out of a shirt, some beige-ish hand-me-downs from an orphan that graduated a few years ago, and her shoes, probably the only thing that she’d actually gotten to fit her. She strapped her pouches to her leg and to her waist, and then made ready to leave. “One.. two.. three.. one.. two.. three..” she murmured to herself, stretching herself from left to right with her hands above her head, before getting ready in a running position. She took off towards the other side of the hall, aiming at window, and once she got close enough, she grabbed the windowsill and hopped out, turning her body so that she’d be hanging off the edge. She let go with one hand to allow herself to rotate her body a bit, peering down at the entrance of the orphanage just in time to see Kyosuke make his exit out of the building. Sheesh, how long had she taken to get dressed? Well, no time to worry about that now. She leaped off from the windowsill, and landed on a nearby roof, with just enough space to take two steps and leap up towards a nearby platform attached to one of the many metal pipes that ran through Amegakure.

---

The actual ceremony went much like they’d practiced, and was about what Sadako expected. There was nobody there for her to cheer her on or celebrate with her, and when the assistant to the kage was speaking, her mind was focused on herself, wondering what this new change in her life would mean for her. Finally, she could be independent, and rent her own apartment, live alone without the rules of the orphanage. But, what else would it mean for her? She’d get to work in a team. What if they didn’t like her? What if she messed up and they started hating her for it? The sky broke open, momentarily, and the sun came through for once, the rain making way for it. But Sadako was still deep in her thought. What if I become a failure?

She was taken away from this train of thought when a shinobi headband was pressed into her hand by the assistant, forcing her to look up and acknowledge the man, nodding her head up and down to acknowledge his words, too. She understood what he was saying. When the assistant moved back, Sadako’s eyes were drawn to Kaguya Yogensha – the kage of the hidden Rain – watching her lips as she spoke. To Sadako, Yogensha might have well been the most beautiful woman alive. There were very few role models like her in the orphanage, someone that dressed and moved with grace. Let alone what her powers might be. But her words, her words were what resonated with Sadako. She repeated after the kage, speaking to herself, “to bear the burden of sacrifice so that others do not have to…” That was a nindo worth living for. And that, too, was the will of the Rain, perhaps not officially, but it was present in the hearts of the shinobi of the Rain. At least, Sadako hoped so.

The assistant gave a few closing words while Yogensha made her way out of the courtyard, and while they were meant to put on their headbands when the assistant spoke again, Sadako paused for a moment. She stared at the stripes on the headband, signifying Amegakure no Sato. So… this is it, huh? This is what we spent our time working for? A piece of cloth and some metal. With a shaking hand she raised her arm and tied the headband around her forehead, where it would temporarily rest for now. I guess cloth and metal is more than I ever had, she thought to herself as the rest around her cheered.

She was quick to droop off in a similar direction as Kyosuke would go, since the two of them would be heading back to the orphanage to prepare for their moving out – at least, presuming Kyosuke wanted to get out of there as much as Sadako wanted to. Being trapped there for even longer just to help with the orphanage’s chores was not something she was looking forward to. However, as she stood on the outskirts of the group, alone, a sudden touch from behind alerted her. Before she could react or even see who was there, she was dragged to the side towards where Kyosuke had been standing.

Sneaking out of an orphanage? Sneaking in to an orphanage? Saito no Kareraisu? Oh, shoot! She’d completely forgotten that Hikari had hand-delivered the invite to her in the orphanage, and estimating from Kyosuke’s presence, she’d done the same for him. She’d just assumed it was a pity-invite, guessing that someone as popular as Hikari had no wish to hang out with someone like Sadako, but maybe she was serious after all? Or was she just pulling a prank on her?

“A-ah… the restaurant…” she said, with a hint of insecurity in her voice. She looked down for a moment, staring at a puddle on the ground. Then she looked up to Hikari, flashing her the widest smile that anyone might’ve ever seen, before throwing up her hand and sticking up her thumb. “Of course! Wouldn’t wanna miss it for anything!” She smiled at Kyosuke as well, before a sudden realization set in. Her sudden cheerfulness made way for something else entirely. “Umm… Hikari-chan.. I forgot I don’t have any money. Maybe I can join you guys next time..?”

Kyosuke opened his eyes and breathed in deep, pulling in some of the hot, moist air and them letting it out with a relaxed sigh. Relaxing, he sunk down even deeper in the hot spring water, until it covered his whole up to right below his nose. As he breathed he could feel the water getting pushed away from his nostrils. He looked around the hot spring, he was alone. It was very clean and well-ordered. The pool itself vaguely resembling the shape of a kidney. On a shelf nearby was a pile of white, clean and folded towels of varying sizes to grab for whatever needs you had. The whole place was surrounded by a thick green bamboo-fence at least three meters high to keep peepers out (not that there’d be any out there to begin with). The last side was taken up by a house where you could get changed and probably have a shower or something to drink and eat. He wasn’t quite sure as he’d never explored such a place fully before. The sun was shining bright in the sky and the warm rays worked wonders with the warmth of the water. With another deep, relaxed sigh he closed his eyes and tried to forget for a second what day it was.

Suddenly three loud bangs on the door startled the boy and as his reflexes kicked him into battle-mode his hand found a sharp edge on the old and worn tub. The cut wasn’t particularly painful, but enough to break his spell and as his eyes opened he was back in the orphanage’s dark and dank bathroom.
“I said a quick bath, you’re going to be late!” Crowed an old woman’s voice through the door. Kane Miyako, one of the so-called caregivers working at the orphanage. She’d seen the better part of a century, had decided that she didn’t like it and that everything that didn’t go exactly as she’d planned was bad or needed a good beating, probably both. He didn’t reply, and as her dragging steps slowly started making their way away from the door Kyosuke glanced at the old clock on the wall. The ceremony was a bit more than an hour away, he’d need only a few minutes to get dressed and the academy wasn’t far. He could easily stay in the bath for at least half an hour to get a really good soak and still have time to grab something in the kitchen to eat on the way to the ceremony. But now he was annoyed and wouldn’t enjoy the bath anyway, it would probably go cold soon as well.

He gave himself a good scrub with the sponge and washed his hair. He got up, dried off and picked up the mirror beside the tub that he’d used to put himself under the illusion. It was fogged up and he wiped it off with his towel to reveal the same face he’d seen every morning for years. Shoma Kyosuke, orphan, genjutsu artist, medic… Ninja.
In his mind he tasted that last word. Technically he’d been a ninja for quite a while, it all depended on your definition on when you became one. If the talent to mould chakra made you a ninja then it was something you were born to. If actually molding chakra into jutsus was the key factor then most became ninjas as young children. However, no matter what, the graduation from a proper ninja academy, and the evidence of this in the form of a forehead protector carrying the mark of your village, no one could argue with that. And today was the day he’d finally get his. He’d start going on missions, make some money and finally get out of this dump.

He went back toward the dorms to get dressed, only wearing his pyjama bottoms. Running around half-naked was pretty common in the orphanage, especially when going to or from the bath so it didn’t raise any eyebrows. Just how invisible he was didn’t really occur to him until he sidled himself along the wall of the dining hall and one of the girls got up and elbowed him right in the head as he was trying to get past. Sadako. She immediately started to apologise and he gave her a grunt of intermediate displeasure as a reply, hoping to cut the interaction short so he could get away. She started talking about the graduation and by reflex he gave an annoyed sigh which cut her off. He hadn’t really meant it like that, but if it worked, he’d take it. She excused herself, they did the “trying to get past”-dance for a second before they managed it and she ran away in the direction of the girls barracks.

Miyako was in the dorm when he arrived. She’d looted the donation bin and picked out some “nice clothes for you to wear to the ceremony”. Kyosuke picked them up from his bed and eyed them. The shirt wouldn’t have fit him two years ago, and was clearly too small. The pants were alright, but so worn that the black looked almost greyish white. He put on the pants first, the waist fit sort of, but he had to fold the legs so he wouldn’t trip. Then he made a show of trying to put on the shirt, just to show that he could get one arm in, the sleeve would end way before his wrist and if he had one arm in then he could not get the other one on as the arm-hole was somewhere in the middle of his back. Miyako got visibly annoyed at him and started tugging and pulling at the shirt, painfully bending his arm as far as it would go to get it into the hole. He gritted his teeth went into himself as to restrain the violent impulse to take out his frustration on the woman. Lacking in the physical department compared to his class mates he was still more than strong enough to beat her to death. Luckily most of her strength had left her long ago and she wasn’t actually capable of seriously harming him. After a good twenty minutes of anguish, screaming and tears she gave up and told him to “fix it yourself then” before she left, muttering to herself.

Kyosuke pulled the shirt off and dried his tears on it before he crumbled it into a ball and threw it in the donation bin. He sat down on the bed for a few minutes, glad only for the fact that he was alone in the dorm.
“I’m getting out of here.” He told himself, voice breaking. “As soon as I can, I’ll live in a fucking box if that’s what it takes, as long as I’m not in this hellhole…”
He’d thought about running away before. Many times. But he understood enough about the world to know that a sort of, slightly trained, half-shinobi would not fair very well in the world. If he didn’t get killed while he tried to run away, he was bound to run into a real ninja sooner or later who would finish the job.
It took a few minutes for him to calm down enough to get out of his own head. A clock on the wall told him that time was seriously running out. He reached into the donation bin, rummaged around for a bit and drew out a short-sleeved, striped shirt that was meant for a much larger body than his. But he could stuff it into the pants and it would be wearable.

He ran through the orphanage to get to the door. No time to comb his hair, no detour through the kitchen to get a bite of breakfast. Shoes on. Door.
As he went through the gate he heard a swoosh above and saw the blurry figure of Sadako speed past him, going the rooftop path to the academy. Kyosuke would do the same, but wasn’t too fond of the thought of crossing the broader streets that way. Falling did hurt, and any other day he’d kind of take it and move on, but he’d rather not turn up at the graduation looking like a pig that had rolled in the mud. Normal foot-walking would do, he did have enough time after all.

The ceremony felt like it went on for hours. It had been bad enough during rehearsal, but doing it all again, this time knowing full well exactly what to expect and when was definitely worse. He grabbed his forehead protector and shared a quick look with the kage’s assistant. He was pretty well-known to Kyosuke as he was an expert genjutsu artist and had held a lecture for the special class once, and visited a few times. He put it on at the same time as everyone else and filled the space with a collective “schwii” as scores of headbands were tightened all at once. It was a strange custom to hand out a piece of armour like this, but he knew the story well. One of the strongest and ironically most common attacks with a sword was the straight downward slash, often one of the first attacks tried by regular swordfighters. In the old days before the truce between ninjas and the samurai some unknown genius developed a dashing attack, head first, straight into the attack. The enemy’s sword would clash with the forehead protector and gave the ninja free access to all those lovely vital organs.

After what seemed like an eternity the newly graduated genin were given a week to relax before missions would start. Kyosuke hated the sound of that sentence. The faster he could start earning money, the better. He looked around and saw relieved faces, some of whom belonged to students from his own special classes. Some of them were decidedly not ready for their future. He understood that the academy had been a cake walk and that he was expected to work with a team from now on. He only wished he wouldn’t have to do all the work in his future team, they better pull their weight.

The ceremony ended, smiling faces all around. They had obviously not grown up at the orphanage. There was no way Kyosuke was heading “home” before dark. He turned to leave, but something grabbed his arm. His instincts kicked in immediately and he fruitlessly tugged at his arm to get loose. Whoever it was was stronger than he.

Hikari, one of the girls from his normal classes had somehow managed to catch both him and Sadako at the same time, talking about some party she’d planned. He then remembered that she’d come by the orphanage not long ago and brought an envelope each for him and Sadako. An invitation. For a brief moment he felt a bit guilty for not having opened and read it, but then remembered that it wouldn’t have changed anything. He had his plans for the day all figured out weeks ago.
Sadako started making excuses for not being able to go to the party and Kyosuke shot her a sharp look, trying to figure out if she was just making excuses or if she actually meant it.

“It’s graduation day.” He said, not bothering with saying hello, smiling or being polite in any way. It was a statement with layers. Hikari probably wouldn’t understand.
For most students on the ninja academy it would mean one of the happiest days of their life. The day they were accepted into the loving arms of their future life and the day they were asked to stand beside the legendary giants of the ninja professionals. Not as equals, they were just genin, but as comrades in arms.
For the orphans, or perhaps only for Kyosuke he came to realise, it was a horrible day.
He’d been living at the orphanage for almost as long as he could remember. Every year had a graduation day, when the older children dressed their best, left in the morning and came back around lunchtime with a headband to a nasty surprise.

Graduation day was the busiest day of the year for the orphanage. There was usually a line of prospective adoptive parents waiting by the time the newly graduated orphans came back. Many times the children weren’t even allowed to have something to drink or a bath before being rushed into the meeting room for an endless series of interviews with hopeful future parents.
Kyosuke shrugged at the thought. These people were not driven by the sudden realisation that their household lacked the pitter-patter of tiny little trained assassin-feet. Their households lacked a reliable income. Genin typically didn’t make much, only enough to rent a tiny flat and keep themselves fed and clothed if they didn’t go overboard. However, for many of the poor people in Ame, having a genin in the house could double their earnings.

For some it was the life they’d hoped for, but for Kyosuke it was too little, too late. No one had wanted him for years, there was no chance in hell he’d give his dire earnings away now that he was so close to finally getting them. If he didn’t come home, they couldn’t auction him off to the highest bidder as no one in Ame, not even the poor and desperate, would take even a genin at sight unseen.

“I won’t be there” Kyosuke said to Hikari, and in a moment of weakness as a group of former students almost collided with the trio, he managed to twist his arm free from the young kunoichi’s grip and gain some distance. He didn’t stick around. His work here was done. If Sadako had needed to be reminded of what probably awaited her then he’d done his good deed for the day. After gaining a few steps of distance from the two he leapt high into the air and landed with chakra-enhanced grip on top of the wall that surrounded the academy. He turned and took one last look at the academy, it’s busy courtyard and empty classroom windows, before he turned away and made another high jump, aiming for the roof of a nearby building. He should’ve felt something, sorrow, remorse, even relief. The characters in his books were always so emotional when they were leaving something and heading toward the sunset. Kyosuke just felt… Done. He discarded the academy and what had happened there much like he’d discarded the shirt that didn’t fit him earlier that morning. He didn’t have any friends there to tearfully say goodbye to, “We’ll stay in touch”, “We’ll still see each other on weekends”. What a joke.

He made his way across the village carefully. From rooftop to rooftop. The rain made everything slippery, so he didn’t have the luxury of just leaping from tree to tree like he’d heard ninjas from other villages could. Without a firm layer of gripping chakra spread evenly over the soles of his feet he’d get to meet the pavement on the street four stories down sooner than he’d expected.
He didn’t move faster than he had to. He wasn’t in any kind of rush. If someone wanted to tail him or even catch up to him, most of the other new genin would be able to do so without much trouble as he headed toward the village library.

Footsteps echoed through out the apartment, the steady staccato rhythym would have been almost peaceful if not for the loud clacking of hardened plastic on wood that followed with every step. Having put up with the noise for over an hour already, a tall, slender woman with pupil-less golden eyes made her way toward her child's bedroom. As she drew neared, a steady mumbling accompanied the pacing, a mantra that she had overheard far too many times in her opinion. Not bothering to knock, the mother simply pushed open the door before ducking her head. As if on cue the dull thud of metal on wood sounded behind her, she didn't need to look to know that it was one of the senbon needles hidden about her son's person. It wasn't the first time he had thrown the weapon when startled, and probably wouldn't be the last.

Raising her head toward the ceiling with a sigh, Takamori Asane brushed a few stray hairs from her face before locking eyes with her son. Arm still outstretch in the throwing position, Masae had a sheepish if not outright embarrased expression on his face. Pale blond hair disheveled from constantly running his fingers through the un even locks and his pale golden eyes, so similar to hers were blown wide. Stumbling off the ceiling when the realisation of who had just attacked caught up to him, the younder blonde just barely managed to catch himself as he reached the floor.

"You're going to be late if you don't hurry." Asane said with a roll of her eyes at the child's antics. However before he could respond she continued, "If your going to do this, do it right." her voice clipped in disapproval.

Knowing that trying to explain his reasoning for wanting to be a shinobi would only be an excercise in futility, Masae simply nodded his head before excusing himself to clean up.

---

After a quick shower and breakfast, Masae caught wind of the time and rushed toward the academy. As he hopped from rooftop to rooftop, ge couldn't help but wonder if he had overdressed. His dark blue changshan shirt was formfitting, with silver waves that curled from his hips, up his sides and finally ending at the cuffs of his capacious sleeves. He thought it may have been too formal, even when paired with a pair of simple black harem pants but he wanted to make a good impression.

Fortunately his worries were for naught as many of the graduates had thought along the same lines and decided to dress up for the occasion.

During the ceremon, the pale blonde couldn't help but focus his attention on the Amekage, even as her assistant spoke and handed out the Hitai-ate. She was almost ethereal, with her elegant charm and apparent quiet nature. The antithesis of how the history books described the now bearly extinct Kaguya clan. A shining example of how anyone can overcome the stigma of their family with enough dedication and work. He was so lost in his admiration for the village leader that he almost missed the symbolic tying of the headbands that concluded the ceremony.

Sighing in relief that the formalities were over with, Masae trudged through the crowd looking for a certain silver haired girl that had invited most if not the entire graduating class out to eat. Upon sighting the girl he hurried over making it just in time to see a boy in slightly too large clothes jump away.

'Kyousuke was his name, right? I'm pretty sure we shared some of the specialised medic classes.' He thought to himself before addressing the two females before him.

"Hikari, um...Sadako? Right? He asked reluctantly, not quite sure he had gotten the dark haired girl's name correct before continuing with a small blush, "We're still celebrating at that restaurant...right? What was the name?"

---

---

Hearing Sadako worrying about money, Hikari rolled her eyes and gave a smile in return, pressing herself closer towards the taller girl affectionately. Kyousuke received a much less courteous response as befitting of his own cold dismissal of her invitation, especially when he broke free from her grip. Annoyance found its way onto her face in the form of a pout, a fat raspberry being blown at the curt orphan's back as he dashed away. Still, she couldn't help but notice the look he had given to Sadako and the way he had pointed out that it was graduation day, despite them obviously having just finished their graduation.

Before she could ponder about that too deeply however, and just as the last "-bbbbt" sounded out from her lips, a boy with blonde hair and the most well-fitting blue dress Hikari had seen walked over and greeted the two girls. "Macchi!" She returned brightly, her newly freed arm already snaking its way through the crook of the feminine boy's elbow. The acrobat began leading the new trio on a slow walk towards the gate as she continued to talk, consciously keeping the three of them away from the largest crowds and allowing themselves to be caught in the natural traffic as all the new genin sought all their own various friends or family.

"Yes we'll still be celebrating at the Matsushina's restaurant: Saito no Kareraisu. The broth for all their nabe are just heavenly and all their ingredients are always super fresh! And Sadako, don't even worry about paying. I made sure to save up enough to cover for anyone today," taking a moment to thrust out a hip and pat a pouch on her thigh conspiratorily.

"But man, that Kyosuke can be a real butt sometimes can't he," she said with an apologetic grin towards Sadako, even if neither of them had anything to apologize for. "I know he can't be exactly blamed for how he is, but it wouldn't kill him to at least know how to say sorry or something. At least, I think it wouldn't kill him." Hikari let the statement hang in the air as she pondered on whether she had heard Kyosuke ever actually apologizing about anything to anyone.

"Then again, it looked like he had somewhere important to be. You know Sadako, if you already had plans too it's completely ok; you're always free to join us after. And if anything we've got the whole week to hang out! It'd be the perfect time to have a date! Or, aaah~, ne ne," she said excitedly, her elbows pulling Sadako and Masae closer towards her, her arms shaking up and down in increasing intensity, "what if all three of us were teamed up? How cool would that be?!"

"Sadako and I would go in and be the heavy hitters and take out all the baddies. We could stomp anyone in no time flat, especially with your gudōton. The way you use them is so cool! And then if anything happens to us Macchi would swoop in and save us by locking down the bad guys and heal us all up with his medical ninjutsu. We'd be unstoppable! What sensei would be able to handle a dream team like us do you both think?"

---

---

Sadako stared at Kyosuke as he spoke, knowing what he was talking about full well without really wanting to acknowledge it. Rather than huff and puff at his sudden dismissal, she only gave him a firm nod. She knew what he was going to do -- and she was doing the same in her own way. “Hm! I understand,” she told him as he hurried off, before she was forced to turn back to Hikari, who was blabbering on about having saved up. The truth was, Sadako really didn't have any money since the orphans didn't exactly receive an allowance, and being an academy student didn't pay.

But she wasn't going to make a point of that to Hikari. For all her virtues, she didn't exactly seem to understand the life of an orphan in Amegakure. And educating her on the matter wasn't something Sadako was going to do -- the hardships of the orphans were better left to themselves to process. Or at least, most orphans seemed to believe so, since all of them were adverse to the otherwise friendly showings of empathy that 'normal' people seemed to give them. It was then that Masae arrived on the scene, politely confirming Sadako's name, to which Sadako once again nodded to indeed confirm that that was her name.

“I see,” Sadako replied to her patting her pouch, smiling at the girl with a glimmer in her eye, “I won't say no to a free meal!” A-ah.. was that too callous? Was that rude of me to say? She played it off with a smile while her eyes trailed off into the distance as Hikari continued her little rant on Kyosuke. She really doesn't understand.. does she? Sadako pondered to herself, but she gave Hikari an empathetic smile regardless, understanding that Hikari didn't particularly dislike Kyosuke either. She was just ranting off about something, making small talk, something like that. A skill that Sadako had never seemed to master, or at least so she thought.

The inquiry towards Sadako's plans was unexpected, and surprised Sadako a little bit. Someone wanted to know about her? And her plans? “Uuh.. well, like Kyosuke said, it's graduation day.. so..” she slowly said, considering that maybe it was better to do the same as Kyosuke and just run away, hide in a corner and wait until the genin-auction was over. “So... I guess being an orphan means I have all the time in the world to celebrate with you, since I don't exactly have.. uhh.. parents.. to come home to. You know?” She said it like a joke, but it wasn't exactly funny. In order to mask her own idiocy, she laughed at her own joke like a madman, as if she thought it was the funniest thing in the world, before simmering down a little bit. “I mean.. I mean to say I'll come with you!”

Better to hide with a free meal than in a rainy corner somewhere doing nothing, right?

Talking about the teams made Sadako both nervous and excited. To be honest, being in a team with Hikari and Masae would be awesome -- the both of them seemed really nice from their short little interaction just now, although Sadako had tried to befriend them both a few times before, before isolating herself once again. Hopefully they hadn't held that against her, although it seemed like they didn't. Masae barely remembered her name. The compliments on her black rod release made her blush a little, raising a hand to wave the comment away while smiling at Hikari. “I-it's nothing, I wish I could use water like you do, that's way more versatile and cool! Besides, you look like a dancer when you use it! I just look like a weird girl with black poles coming out of her hands.”

The bell rinkled as they entered Saito no Kareraisu, a restaurant owned by the family of one of their peers. “HELLO!” Sadako blurted out, before realizing that that was totally uncalled for, and she rushed to cover her mouth in embarrassment with her one free hand. The other was still trapped in the confines of Hikari's potent elbow lock jutsu. “Ahh.. Hikari, why don't you.. take the word?”

---

---

“Trespassing is illegal, and punishable by death, don't you know?” The voice came from behind, on one of the walls that surrounded the compound of the Uragiri clan, which was established in one of the middle class areas of the village. If Unmei were to look back, she'd see the same figure standing there in the shade of one of the nearby trees, rain falling down on him as if he were unbothered by it. Luckily for her, the area around the koi pond was covered by some roofing, with a gap where the pond was. The pond was massive, as there were easily a thousand or more koi in it. The pride of the Uragiri clan.. well, the pride besides Sakana, that was.

The young chunin set himself off from the wall, and landed behind Unmei, taking a few more steps forwards so that he stood besides her. “Although I suppose you come here so often you might as well bear the name of the clan. Unmei Uragiri,” he said, referencing the fact that he'd seen her sitting here more than a few times by now, although this would be the first time he'd said something about it. Had he been spying on her, or was he just very attentive?

He glanced over her shoulder at the paper folders in her lap, immediately making the connection. “Sakamachi Sadako, Shoma Kyosuke, and Ueda Tadasu,” he said to himself, slightly hushed. His dark, black eyes focused on the koi pond ahead, seeking for the characteristic prize koi that were in there -- the yin-yang koi.



He sat down on the edge of the pond, putting his hand into the water and swirling it around, instantly attracting several of the large koi. Strangely enough, any strangers that tried doing this always failed, as if the koi were only attracted to those of the Uragiri clan. “Interesting team,” he said to Unmei, “I've seen them around the academy. They look dirty.” How much did Sakana even know about random people? It was almost creepy, the way he managed to conjure up information so randomly.

“I suppose that's to be expected from orphans. They look average, and disgusting half the time. But the training they receive is pretty good. As for the Ueda, he's a nobody. Hmph. I suppose we'll see what comes of them,” he informed her, before standing up and shaking his hand to get rid of the water on it, shaking a few of the drops of muddy water in Unmei's direction. He turned around and jumped off towards the wall again, landing on it nonchalantly. “Tell them Uragiri Sakana says hi. Let's hope they survive their first mission.”

He jumped off in a random direction, before uttering his catchphrase to himself. “If the sage wills it.”

---

---

The bad part about being a heavy sleeper is that waking up tends to be a long, drawn-out process. But on this particular morning, Suko woke up to a wet pinky being jammed into his ear. The result was a bout of flailing limbs and a string of curses from Suko, who ended up face to face with his grinning little sister in a tangle of blankets.

"Suko! Yesterday, Naya told me about wet willies, do you know what those are?" How Fumika had so much energy so early in the morning was beyond Suko, who was in the trenches of his teenage years at this point, meaning sleep seemed a lot more important these days. Suko squinted at his younger sister, wiping the gunk out of the corner of his eyes and letting out a brief yawn. He then dramatically raised one finger, making sure he had Fumika's full attention before placing the appendage into his mouth, prepping a wet willy of his own. Finally understanding the danger she was in, Fumika let out a squeal and attempted to flee the bed. Unfortunately for her, Suko struck faster than she could react, drenching her ear, inspiring disgusted laughter from the both of them.

"If you stick any of those grubby little fingers of yours near me again I'll bite 'em off!" Suko always feigned seriousness when he threatened his sister, and Fumika always feigned fear until they both would burst out laughing. Their mother happened to walk in during their latest bout of this, and if it had been any other day their conversation wouldn't have been as clipped.

"Suko! Why aren't you dressed yet? Your father is already stressed as it is, he shouldn't have to worry about his son being late to his graduation ceremony. Fumika, come on sweetie, it's your brother's big day, one that he'll be late to if he doesn't get his ass into gear." Fumika pouted as she hopped off her brother's bed and stomped out of the room, making sure Nishioka knew she was mad for ruining the siblings' fun. Suko's mom sighed and shook her head, "have two kids they said, it'll be fun they said..." Suko chuckled, sliding out from under the mess of blankets he had created and began rifling through his clothing to find something suitable for the day.

"Nervous?" Nishioka asked tentatively, knowing that Suko had been training nonstop for years in preparation for this day. Suko shrugged as he stepped into his outfit for the day. The teen shifted over to a mirror in his room, checking to make sure he looked presentable. Presentable always seemed too vague for Suko, who for the most part refused to wear clothing that covered his tattoos. Today was an exception though, because despite his complaints, Suko was dressed in dark joggers, a white shirt (most shirts are normally a no-go for him), and his trademark black vest.

"I'm probably less freaked out than Dad is, to be honest." Nishioka just nodded sympathetically. "he'll be fine, it's not every day that your son becomes a genin though. Have I mentioned how proud I am of you yet?" She came to stand behind him so that both could see their reflections in the mirror. Nishi ruffled her son's hair before ushering him out the room. "Dad said he'd be waiting outside for you after you eat and everything." Suko nodded, wondering why his father wanted to walk him to the ceremony instead of eating breakfast with them all like he normally did. Maybe he was doing work right now and was going to walk him to the ceremony because he wouldn't be able to attend the actual event. This type of skepticism was normal for Suko, who operated under the assumption that his dad was always up to something. Breakfast seemed to tick by like molasses, but Suko kissed his mother and sister goodbye with a full stomach. "I'll see both of you later at Saito for dinner, tell Dad that if he's late he's getting thumped right in that old, wrinkly forehead of his," Nishioka clucked her tongue, "Watch yourself bub, I'm the same age as your father and I don't look a day over thirty," she called out after him.

Suko opened the front door of his house and wasn't surprised to see his father waiting at the bottom of the front steps. Matsushina Tanji was a stone-like character, made of strong angles and what seemed like an absence of softness. As his son approached, the man unfolded his arms from his chest and smiled, a gesture that looked weird to Suko just because of its rareness. Once in range, Tanji clapped a hand on Suko's shoulder and drew him to his side. "Excited, bud? Your journey as a shinobi begins today, is anything pressing on your mind?" The man began walking as he talked and Suko fell into step with him, pondering the question given.

As his son ruminated, Tanji seemingly pulled a pack of cigarettes out of thin air, along with matches that he kept who knows where when he wasn't using them. The man took a cigarette for himself and then, after hesitating a moment, offered one to Suko.

Eyeing his father suspiciously, Suko hesitated to take the tobacco product before finally relenting. "I figure, if you're old enough to fight for our village then one of these can't be the worse thing for you," was Tanji's explanation. After lighting it with a match, Suko put the cigarette between his lips and inhaled lightly. Tanji chuckled when Suko's face scrunched up as he coughed lightly. "Ugh, Dad, you do this for fun?" Tanji flicked some ash away from his person and shrugged, "It's actually kind of calming when you get used to it." Suko grinned, "Calming? I'll take nerves over this shit any day."

"Fair enough, bud, fair enough."

---

Anticipation was practically palpable in the courtyard of the academy. Suko stood with his classmates proudly, feeling the contagious excitement vibrate through him. He did his best to soak it all in, the Amekage, her assistant, his classmates, all of it. Since he didn't know much about his own Kage, Suko was curious about what kid of person she was, she certainly acted in an interesting manner. It was hard to not be drawn into her words though, which sat in his mind-space to be chewed on later. Being a shinobi of Amegakure no Sato means you bear the burden of sacrifice so that others do not have to. And then what followed that, the rain weeps for you, and the suffering you will cause and receive. Suko repeated those words in his head as he looked down at his forehead protector, as if repeating them enough times would reveal something he didn't notice at first.

You finally did it, you're a genin now, do you feel any different? Do you feel like you've done something of worth? Suko pondered this as the ceremony came to a close and he came to the decision that he felt good about today, but his work was no where near finished. In fact, it had only begun. Pulling himself out of his thoughts, Suko grounded himself in the present moment. The next thing to do was head to Saito
for the meal with his family.

Taking the back roads, meaning the rooftops, Suko arrived at Saito in record time from the academy. Slipping through the back door, Suko managed to sneak by without attracting too may eager adults wanting to ask him questions about graduation. Finding Nishioka wasn't hard, as she was sternly giving orders to one of her newer cooks, the poor guy looked like he wouldn't last 'til the end of the week the way he had his tail tucked between hid legs. "Sorry to interrupt but where are Dad and Fummie sitting?" His mother gestured to a table in the quieter section of the shop, where the rest of their family sat.

As if right on cue, Suko heard Sadako's loud voice enter the shop. The newly-appointed genin shifted past his mother and out to the front of the restaurant where he could see if his ears were deceiving him or not. Seeing three of his classmates drew a smile to his lips and he waved enthusiastically.

"Sadako, Hikari, Masae, those are some cool looking Hitai-ate, are they new or something?" He asked this with a grin as he ushered them deeper into the restaurant. "But seriously, what's up guys? Come here for some post-grad grub?"

---

If one thought that Masae's face was flushed before speaking to the girls, then he must have been fluorescent upon hearing the new nickname from the platinum haired kunoichi. "M-ma-macchi?" he stammered to himself as Hikari entertwined their arms in her all but patented arm lock. Knowing that it was practically impossible to break the surprisingly firm hold without hurting himself of the girl, he sent a resigned smile Sadako's way. He remembered her approaching him a few month's back but figured he had pushed her away with his obsession toward becoming a medic.

As he listened to Hikari speak, the blond found himself paying closer attention to the ravenette of the group. He could tell that she was becoming uncomfortable however, whether that was due to Hikari's offer to pay for the meal or the way she was speaking about Kyosuke was unclear. Nevertheless, he wanted to helper her get more comfortable. So doing the only thing he could think of he opened his mouth to speak. At least was going to, until Hikari mentioned the next week being perfect for a date.

Sputtering at the notion, Masae stumbled on his feet. Fortunately he was saved a rather embarrassing faceplant due to said silverette pulling her, partially, willing companions closer.

'At this rate I'm going to catch a fever.' He thought to himself while trying, and failing, to will the blush from his cheeks and ears.

As the subject of being placed on the aame team was brought to light, the feminine boy found himself nodding as he spoke almost quietly.

"That is one of the most common patterns for teams. A ninjutsu expert, close combat specialist and a medic/support member. The go-to set up for an assault team." Upon hearing Sadako's view on her own abilities, he sent a reassuring smile before adding,"Hey, those Black Rods are pretty useful. Besides, your no slouch in a fight with out them if I remember those taijutsu spars correctly."

Upon entering the family restaurant, Masae took in the decor. It had a homey feel that he could definitely get used to. He didn't make a habit of eating out, a trait he shared with his mother, preferring home cooked meals. Despite that, he could see the appeal.

He smiled at Matsushima's joke before gesturing toward Hikari with a cheeky smile.

"Perhaps should ask our resident party planner?"

---

“Trespassing is illegal, and punishable by death, don't you know?”

A quiet 'tsk' followed after. Not in a disrespectful manner but more the kind that came from someone who held back a chuckle. Unmei knew who was behind her even before she looked, as mistaking Sakana's voice was quite hard on its own- and he was probably the only Uragiri that would openly approach her and even so, she still found it strange that the boy decided to randomly make conversation. She cast a glance back, her left eyebrow arched as she idly ran her eyes over his figure before focusing at his eyes.

Before Unmei said anything, he voiced how he observed her sitting there a few times; even suggesting, possibly jokingly, that she should bear the clan's name. "I'm sure it would make me seem more trustworthy than simply Unmei, hm?" She chimmed, finally replying and breaking the monologue. Her voice was soft and sweet, although quite low. Sakana mentioned the names he saw on the files Unmei had on her lap, which made her subconsciously shuffle them around while peering down at what was written. His comment was ignored, up until he mentioned the boy from the clan Ueda.

"Everyone is a nobody until they do something to change it, hm?" And the Ueda clan wasn't particularly bad- in fact, they did pretty well at least economically speaking. Their situation didn't matter, however, the life of a shinobi was never dictated by status, Unmei didn't voice that openly though, instead choosing to reply to his next comment as she stood up, placing the files under her left arm.

"I'd rather not throw the life of our shinobi into the hands of fate or a sage. I only hope that they find within them the will of pushing through without failing. Take care, Sakana-kun, and if the sage wills it, we will meet again." There was no change in her tone at all, except when she said the last phrase, which was clearly playing around Sakana's own saying. Once he left, Unmei simply sat again and observed the koi, focusing on the prized koi of the Uragiri, the yin-yang koi.

Unnerving boy, this Sakana...

---

Unmei was already preparing herself mentally and physically for this endeavor. She was completely inexperienced and, while she wasn't one to let it show, anxiety was taking its toll on the young jonin. She decidedly distracted herself with training, pushing herself further and exerting herself as much as she could do, a trick to keep herself busy. Between teas, eating, training and resting, Unmei decided it was finally time to set up the team's official meeting that would happen in two days from now.

Unfortunately, she didn't have any creative idea of how to approach them other than being very direct, which was probably for the better. They probably didn't want to waste any more time- knowing Kyosuke and Sadako were orphans meant that they were likely anxious to start working with missions and receiving some sort of income. Tadasu at the other hand had a lot to prove on his own. Unmei actually liked her team right away; they were all eager, willing and with a lot of potential. Unknown, invisible names that could become known powerful shinobi from Amegakure.

Knowing their routine, locations and having easy access to them made everything easier. Unmei didn't need to speak with them directly just yet, but the three of them would eventually find a kunai with a piece of paper tied to it being thrown next to them. Not dangerously close at all, but clearly noticeable. Hopefully they'd pick it up and read the message, which was written in hasty handwriting, but still readable:

---

There wasn't much to observe. A street, with next to no movement because of how early it was. You'd see the occasional worker arriving - or exiting here and there, sometimes a passerby but other than that, nothing extraordinary. Although it was foggy and light rain poured down from the sky, Unmei wore no protection against the weather and carried none against the rain, either. She was standing next to a wall, her back planted against it, hands clasped in front of her. Her eyes occasionally analyzed briefly the surroundings to see if any of the genin had arrived. Once someone did arrive...

It didn't matter which of the three arrived first. Unmei would simply nod and gesture idly with her head. As odd as it was, she was probably going to wait until all three of them had gathered here before saying a word. Hopefully, none of them arrived late, otherwise, that'd earn a slight cold question such as: did I not inform you to get here on time? Nonetheless, now that her team was here, she'd propel herself forward and move her hands behind her, eyeing the three of them over, blatantly analyzing their features. Did they look like promising shinobi? No, but in times like these, rarely any of the new genin did.

"Sakamachi Sadako, Ueda Tadasu and Shoma Kyosuke," At each name, she'd pause and give the mentioned genin a brief look. "I'm sure none of you know me, so... I'm Unmei. Your Jonin or sensei - but of course the three of you knew that, I hope. There is not much to say about myself, I've been a jonin for a short time and in fact, this is my first team- hopefully you weren't expecting a more experienced jonin. Nonetheless... let's hear about you, now, Sadako-chan. Tell me all you want about you, then, answer me: Why do you want to be a shinobi? After you, it's Tadasu's turn and lastly, Kyosuke."

---

---

The rest of the diner went about as well as one would have expected. Frankly, Sadako felt a little out of place, but did her best to try and fit in. That said.. 'fitting in' for Sadako was a lot of awkward bursts of random yelling when her true self came out before realizing that it was out of place half the time. The other half were shy agreements with whatever the topic at hand was, with Sadako being too afraid to really interject for fear of scaring Masae and Hikari away. Ultimately, Sadako excused herself after a few hours, preparing to go back to the orphanage now that the prospective parents had all gone away.

When she returned, she quietly slipped into the orphanage to avoid rustling the elders, who would no doubt be on her case about missing 'adoption day,' and berate her for her careless attitude. In reality, they were probably mad that the adoption fees wouldn't go to them now. It was fine by Sadako, just a few more days and she'd never have to step foot in this ugly building again.

Over the next few weeks, Sadako spent her time lazying about, training, and going on 'dates' with Hikari, who made a point of it to spend time with Sadako (and seemed to not take Sadako's subtle 'no, it's fine, we don't have to!' for an answer). Truthfully, Sadako enjoyed Hikari's companionship, although her overbearing social skills made Sadako nervous more than once.

After a day of forced shopping with Hikari, Sadako was on her way back to the orphanage wearing a pair of brand new shinobi sandals, which she was forced to purchase on Hikari's dime, when the sudden thud of a kunai alerted her. Unfortunately, the kunai was sent low, and hit the wall close to Sadako's ankles, after which Sadako stepped forward just in time to catch her foot on the kunai impaled into the wall. “W-waah!” she yelled, promptly engaging her 'groundpound headbutt no jutsu.' Normally, she'd have fallen face flat on the floor and received a large bump on her forehead for her clumsiness, but with the new forehead protector firmly mounted on it's place on her forehead, she only received a heavy metal clank for her mistake. “Aiaiaiai..” she whispered to herself while grabbing her forehead.

Once she'd spent a few minutes laying there holding onto her head, she took the kunai out and read the message attached to it. “Hnggg.. sensei.. couldn't you find a better way to let us know..” she continued, getting up slowly and turning around, continuing her way to the orphanage while holding on to her head.

---

---

It was early, but Sadako was used to it. Her days in the orphanage prepared her for this kind of schedule, waking up early for forced training with the other kids. But now, she wasn't waking up for training, she was waking up to earn money and perform missions for the village. Finally something with an actual practical goal in mind for her to do! She was up by 4AM, doing her morning routine, such as getting breakfast, showering for five minutes, brushing her teeth and getting dressed. She probably triple, if not quadruple checked her gear. She patted down her pouches numerous times even as she was heading to the window to escape the orphanage once again, making sure she had everything she needed.

And then she leaped out of the window, the cold breeze hitting her skin before the rain did. Luckily it was a small drizzle today and not pouring like usual. Not yet, anyway. Trailing over the rooftops and industrial pipes going everywhere, she made her way to the Lumine building, an old industrial site that had been used for various purposes over the years. She wondered why the sensei had chosen this location, but didn't pay too much mind to it as she was to focused on not falling off the rooftops.

As she landed, she noticed she was the first to arrive, and waved hello to the sensei. “G-good morning, Unmei-sensei!” she proclaimed, but was met with a stoic silence. Sadako took this as a sign that her sensei wasn't really willing to talk, so she just stood around and waited for a while a distance away from the sensei.

When the rest came around, Unmei-sensei started questioning them after explaining that she was an inexperienced and new jonin. Frankly, Sadako hadn't put much mind to whether or not they'd get an experienced sensei. “A-ah... me first.. uhh, well, I'm Sakamachi Sadako, I'm from the orphanage, and uhh.. I don't have a clan, so I don't really know anything else about myself. Ummm, I like reading history books, and uhh.. that's it.” She stared around at the rest of her team rather blankly, knowing that Kyosuke's explanation would probably be sort of the same, but she still wondered what else he'd have to add. As for the other team member, Sadako had no real idea of what he'd say.

She waited a few more moments, not realizing that Unmei-sensei had asked another question. “O-oh! And I want to be a shinobi because I want to..” she said, trailing off a little bit, maybe pondering the question, although in reality she was looking for a way to frame it just right. “I want to be a shinobi so that I can make sacrifices so that others do not have to make them.”

---

---

As the trio walked toward the restaurant, Hikari rolled her eyes at Sadako, headbutting her shoulder gently. "There's never a thing like a free meal silly, or did you already forget all about that one time Sensei 'accidentally' left behind his 'secret book of notes?' Or am I remembering why we had to spend a week having class outside wrong," the blue eyed sunbeam laughed, letting the joy, nostalgia, and the slight tinge of sadness of all their years together color the mood inside her. "But I promise you my payment will be much less life threatening than what Sensei did. You just have to promise me that you'll have fun," Hikari beamed at the older girl. "Ah! But I'll make sure that you have fun too Macchi," emphasizing her point with a tight elbow squeeze.

When Sadako made a joke about her orphan status and exploded into laughter however, a small guilty shadow dimmed Hikari's eyes as she wondered once more whether she was acting the right way for her friend. After all compared to Sadako, Hikari considered her family troubles rather trivial. While there was a time where she did feel abandoned by her parents (a fact that she hated to admit) and there was a time where she intensely feared losing either or both of her parents once she understood what their professions actually once were, the worst of those times were over now. It may have taken them some time, but now Hikari had the pleasure of getting to see her parents everyday, of being able to play with them, work with them, and learn from them, even having the simple pleasure of sitting down and eating a family dinner with them (even if most of the meals made by either of her parents often fell on the side of survival rations rather than what might be typically considered a home-cooked meal).

Whenever Hikari was with Sadako (or Kyosuke, for that matter), she was never quite sure how to adapt to her, what persona she should adopt to make the other girl feel more at ease around her. All that the girl with the lonely childhood knew was that she hated it whenever anyone had pointed out her "poor, unfortunate circumstances" when she was younger, and she figured that the girl with no parents probably felt the same way judging by how hard she was trying to create a fun atmosphere. It was obviously very uncomfortable for the older girl, or at least she wasn't quite used in doing so quite just yet, but Hikari loved her for trying to do so anyway and was one of the reasons why the small, bright eyed butterfly persistently tried to befriend and remain a friend to the awkward, diligent, interesting mess of a person that stood beside her, no matter how many times Sadako tried to pull away from her. It was, after all, Hikari's duty to remind all her friends and companions that no matter what rain may drown them, no matter what darkness may envelop them, the sun will always be shining afterwards, and it was her greatest and most selfish wish to be that gentle star to everyone in her life.

And so just as quickly as the guilty shade came across her face, Hikari banished it with an even brighter smile as the trio plunged headlong into the next stage of their lives: a graduation after-party.

The excited blue sunbeam gladly took center stage among the three as they strode into Saito as her two companions metaphorically pushed her forward. It was also then of course that her bright face was replaced with a toothless smile as she had a sudden, terrible, and utterly horrible realization as she remembered she had forgotten to do two crucial things in preparation for today: give Mitsushina Suko his invitation and furthermore forgetting to tell him about the party in the first place. Before Hikari could even open her mouth, a deluge of students came pouring into the restaurant, all seeking refuge from the everpresent rain, a warm meal among friends, and staff ready to serve them.

After personally seating Sadako and Masae in places that she felt would be most comfortable for them, Hikari spent the rest of the time profusely apologizing to the Mitsushina's and attempting to help them in any way she could, even if she had to resort to being a shameful, inelegant, blubbering mess to force her way into doing so.

---

---

After doing her best to make up for her gross negligience in party planning to the Mitsuhina's, Hikari spent the first two days hanging out with anyone she could, with one day specifically reserved to only being with (and at some points dragging along) Sadako with her on a day around the village. She had made some effort to invite Kyosuke and some other people she knew inside the orphanage while she was there, but Hikari figured that Sadako was a touch uncomfortable with larger crowds and so had done her best to ensure that the day was only for the two of them for the most part. However, that didn't stop a few others from spontaneously joining them whenever the social butterfly passed by her other friends. It also didn't stop them from consistently running into merchants, couriers, guards, and just people in general that she knew from her many ventures exploring the village, often when she was out working with her parents. Fortunately, and rather persistantly, she managed to politely wave off all the tagalongs that stuck with them with everybody else relegated to short conversations before the two girls were left alone once more.

When Hikari received the letter from her new sensei, she was ecstatic and spent whatever time she was able in between all her plans asking everyone she knew whether they were on the same team or not and being delighted to meet them, no matter who they may have been. Once she managed to brute force her way into finding her other two teammates, she persistently buzzed the both of them to go out and do a number of things together in order to bond, chief among them being a sparring session between themselves and then later on her parents. There was only so much time she could find to spend with her new team before she was forced to attend to all the prior engagements she had made, however. Still, she had found her team, and so she was one more step in becoming a true ninja.

---

If Hikari was buzzing with excitement when she received her letter, her body was beating like a hummingbird when she found herself standing at the steps to the Amegakure Temple. Despite being so eager to meet her new teammates, she had wanted to keep everything about her sensei as a fresh and new experience for herself, especially since she had exactly zero knowledge of who her sensei was aside from what little she knew about the Sasaki Clan.

The jumbled feeling of finally getting to meet her team Sensei for the first time continued to expound and grow stronger as she stood waiting in the halls as instructed by one of the attendants. Her stomach continually twisted and knotted itself inside her, her body restlessly moving in an impromptu dance to the sway of the incense smoke that permeated the temple and flowed along with the chimes and gongs that sounded throughout. All around her were monks moving to and fro all with seemingly clear determination and purpose. Hikari herself hoped she did not stand out too much having chosen to wear a gleaming black rain cloak with a grey underside in a similar scheme to the monk that had visited her home, though underneath she wore a cropped maroon tank and loose sandal brown knee pants (a fashion she picked up from Sadako) as she was unsure whether her sensei would have her own tests today. Still, it was the first time in a long while since she had felt so uncomfortable and so alone among a crowd.

Relief flooded her system as soon as she had met up with Masae and Suko and the trio of them were led to their new sensei by one of the female monks.

The first impression Hikari received when she saw Amaya was how she looked to be in complete zen. The walls were adorned with numerous talismans and literature, the room itself permeated with a longstanding past of religion and history as the mist that roiled from the figure sitting in the very center of it all only added to the mystique. Then with utmost grace and care, the figure rose and turned to reveal a woman who seemed to sculpted with poise and molded by power. She stared at each of the genin in turn, and all Hikari could do in response was to stare in awe. So intense was her gaze that it was actually a great shock when her Sensei's porcelain face was broken by a warm smile, so much so that a laugh escaped Hikari's lips before she managed to stifle the rest.

She managed to reign in her emotions enough to quietly listen to her Sensei and her teammates speak until she was picked to do. Without pause she turned her body slightly to bow to both Amaya-sensei and her teammates, her lips already in a natural smile as she straightened out and spoke. "My name is Hoshino Hikari, and it is an absolute pleasure of mine to greet you all as my official teammates. I wish to get along with all of you as a team and as friends, and that I can be a source of happiness and help for you all. Considering I already know Suko and Macchi already, I hope we'll be able to work well together Amaya-zensei!"

---

Location: Saito no Kureraisu | Time: Morning
Interactions: @Vox@Odin@FourthKing

---

Masae could not contain the small chuckle that escaped as he watcher Hikari profusely apologise to the Matsushima's. Only the Sunbeam of Amegakure no sato would forget to invite someone to an after party at their own family restaurant. Thoroughly amused at the situation, the effeminate boy gazed about the room. He saw so many happy faces and carefree smiles, children who seemed to be completely unaware of the danger they had agreed to put themselves through for the sake of their village. His amuses grin fell at the idea, briefly wondering if he himself was prepared for that same danger. These thoughts lingered throughout the duration of the party and only settled, slightly, when he decided that it was time for him to leave.

He arrived home shortly after having excused himself from the restaurant, only to be met with a sight that he was unprepared to see. His mother was on her knees before the small shrine in the living room, a single picture of a man with white hair and pale yellow eyes. Her late husband, his father. Keeping himself quiet and out of sight, he listened as his mother prayed.

"What am i going to do Shirai? Our child has your bullheadedness and refuses to listen to reason. I dont want him to face the hardships that we did, to meet you in the afterlife long before he's had a chance to truly live!" Asane cried before her late love's altar, voice thick with emotion. Furiously, she tride to rid her face of the tears as she continued, "If only you were here, perhaps he'd listen to you."

With tears threatening to spill from his own pale orbs, Masae crept up to his room quickly. He couldn't bare to continue to intrude on such an intimate and private moment.

---

---

As the break between team assignments and meetings began, the young man found himself spending most of his time either training or working at his mother's apothecary shop. There was a strange tension between them since the day of graduation. They had not spoken more than idle pleasantries or the occasional "pass the salt" at the dinner table since then. He didn't know how to breach the subject of what he had overheard that day without it being extremely uncomfortable. So, he has simply dedicated his time to the shop and training since.

It was while he was out delivering medicine that he caught sight of Hikari and Sadako shopping. He hadn't wanted to intrude and simply greeted the duo before saying farewell, though not before agreeing to go on an outing with Hikari and a few others at a later date.

He caught himself blushing when he thought of the day, not used to going out with others due to his dedication to training. He was pleasantly surprised that shortly after he recieveda note from his sensei, that he was to be on the same team as the silverette.

---

Location: Amegakure Temple | Time: Early Morning, 4AM |
Interactions: @Vox@FourthKing@MesuOkami

---

On the day that he was meant to meet with his team, Masae found himself waking up much earlier than he had expected. Whether that was sue to nerves or excitement, even he couldn't tell you. Nevertheless, he rose from his bed and started to go about his usual morning routine before starting some light chakra control training. The exercise was rather experimental, using one's chakra to balance the tip of a kunai on their finger. Needless to say, he was cut quite a few times.

After trying, and failing to complete the exercise for the fifth time in a row, the blond decided to head to the temple. It was still as dark as night outside, the low lighy peaceful as the young medic tried to clear his head of all the thoughts about what was to come.

Taking his time to arrive, it wasn't long before he met up with his teammates and the three of them were escorted by one of the priestesses to a dark haired woman with a ponytail that seemed to exude an aura of strength and tranquility. This was their sense - Amaya.

Having been entranced by the aura of the Jonin, Masae was caught off guard when she told him to introduce himself first. Saying the first thing that came to mind with a blush, the effeminate genin spoke.

"I'm Takamori Masae and I am working to be the greatest medic in the elemental nations." He sputtered slightly when his response registered with himself. Before he could second guess it he continued, eyes locked on the floor, "My hobbies are studying anatomy and medicine as well as training my chakra control. I hope that we can all get along and live to be successful shinobi. When he was finished speaking he simply gestured to Suko, too flustered to voice his request that he speak next.

Kyosuke left the library building and tucked what looked like a small parcel into his leg pouch. If Amegakure was known for one thing, that one thing would obviously be the rain, so the library had a habit of rolling their books up in plastic to keep the rain out. It always fell, day and night, summer as winter. An outsider would probably think that it would snow during winter, not rain. It wouldn’t be a stupid thought as such, the problem was only that the temperature very rarely dropped low enough for the raindrops to actually freeze into snowflakes, so what they got instead was damn-near-ice-cold rain instead of the luke warm rain they had in the summer and the just irritatingly cold rain in between. Once Kyosuke had asked the adults at the orphanage how it could rain almost all the time at this one spot, and (because even as a small child Kyosuke had an eye for strange things) why someone would build a village right on top o such a spot. He’d been yelled at for being a smartass, and sent to the library to figure it out for himself.

Of course, the finer points of air streams and humidity transference was a bit too heavy a subject for a child, even one so eager to learn as Kyosuke. Heäd never even seen most of the characters in those texts before and didn’t even know where to begin to figure out what they meant. They had been told that if they needed help they should ask the librarian, and so that was what he did. The old librarian was an old crone. He didn’t remember her name, but she looked 500 years old, only held together by her glasses and wrinkles. He’d asked her about the meaning of some characters, and it hadn’t taken her long to figure out that translating the whole thing one character at a time would take years (and quite like most of her age, she figured she didn’t really have that long). She asked why he was reading such a difficult text, he told her and she did her best to explain that Ame was situated in a kind of area where many winds met and as they clashed they could either go up and away again (which sometimes happened with warmer winds and resulted in sunny days), but most often would go down, bringing the rain with them. She as well had no idea why anyone would build a village in such a place, and as the child pointed out, she agreed that it did sound pretty daft. Kyosuke had liked the old crone. She wasn’t really that fond of children as such, which he would understand as he grew a bit older, the younger kids didn’t really get the whole “sit still and be quiet”-rule of the place. She did however act fairly, and as long as you obeyed the rules, you could pretty much spend all day in there, no problem.
Kyosuke had spend many days in the library. Sadly, she’d died while Kyosuke was still a kid and replaced with a younger man who really didn’t like questions.

From the library Kyosuke made his way back toward the orphanage. He wasn’t going home, and even took a slight detour to always have at least one building between himself and the place. Even if someone would spot him, he’d be too far away to go after just like that. Past the orphanage he traversed a few buildings and then quickly turned and disappeared into one of them. There was an unused spaceright below one of the floors, like someone had planned to build another room for their apartment and almost finished it, only forgotten to put an actual door in and then forgotten about the whole thing altogether. While the mystery of it was intriguing, Kyosuke was scared to bring it up, afraid that someone would figure out they were missing a room, knock the wall down and claim it. So he kept quiet about it.
It wasn’t like they were missing much. There wasn’t even enough room for any furniture, and even Kyosuke who was still on the small side couldn’t stretch out all the way in any direction really. But it was a nice little quiet place to read and try to forget about life.

He opened his bag and unrolled his book. It was a collection of traditional fairy tales. He enjoyed the, and wondered how much (if anything) of it was actually just history, passed from mouth to mouth and corrupted over the centuries. The first in the book was about the gallant shapeshifting Ogata Shuma Hiroyuki who could turn himself into a toad, he fell in love with the beautiful slug princess and fought an evil snake wizard. He wondered if they could be ancient ninjas, but from a time before that was even a thing, and if something like that could’ve ever happened.
A few hours later his stomach started to groan. He was hungry. He hadn’t even had a chance to eat breakfast, and he didn’t have any money to buy food. Instead, he picked up the book again and read the next story as the drumming sound of the rain drowned out any noise coming from outside…

Five days later

To be at the meeting place at 5 in the morning meant getting up before the sun. Kyosuke wasn’t much of a morning person to begin with, and meeting so early was rough on him. He really had to drag himself out of bed. He’d been so anxious about meeting his team and his new sensei that he’d had a hard time falling to sleep, which he was now paying for. His eyes only opened enough during breakfast (which he had to steal for himself as no one else was up quite so early, he did react to not seeing Sadako, but knowing her she’d probably done breakfast already). He had to dip his head in the cold water he brushed his teeth in just to wake up properly.

He left the orphanage with time to spare. He usually liked to arrive early, it gave him some time to familiarize himself with the surroundings of a new place and if something should happen on the way he’d have some time to sort it out without getting late. He hadn’t travelled long before a blurry shadow crossed his path a house or so ahead of him. It was still a bit dark and foggy, but that blurry silhouette was very familiar to him. “Sadako..? No, don’t tell me they put us in the same team.” He said to himself and picked up the pace so he wouldn’t lose sight of her. True enough, she headed right toward the Lumine building and once there quickly identified the only person in the vicinity that could pass for a jounin. He circled the building once just to make sure before he too made the last bold leap and landed close to his new sensei. He had misjudged the jump somewhat and had to steady himself against the wall to not fall after landing, but nothing worse than that.

He looked up at the adult woman, expecting a scolding for not landing perfectly. She didn’t say a word and her eyes were strangely non-committed, like she was really just watching for the time being. She gave him a nod, he nodded back and then, still only using her head, she pointed him toward where Sadako was. He staggered over there, a bit blindsided, that wasn’t how adults were supposed to act, but it wasn’t all bad.

As their third member finally arrived Sensei made a short introduction. He wasn’t fond of the idea of getting an inexperienced jounin, but didn’t say anything. Complaining would probably not fix it, and in a worst-case scenario he’d get to experience what getting beaten to a pulp by a jounin felt like, and he wasn’t really up for new experiences.
Sadako was called first to introduce herself. Kyosuke could not muster up much enthusiasm. He knew her already. He thought he’d take the time to think about the answer to sensei’s question, why did they want to become shinobi? He honestly didn’t know, he had never thought about it. At the orphanage they’d have him tested and then trained with all the other potential ninjas, why? Because that was how it was.
Suddenly he was jerked out of his thought process by Sadako’s words and he couldn’t help but squint as he looked at her “I don't have a clan…” she said. “Of course you don’t have a clan, you’re an orphan, that’s pretty much the definition of it”. It even got worse, she hadn’t thought about why she wanted to be a ninja either (he figured), she just regurgitated the same like they’d heard a few days earlier at graduation about sacrificing so other didn’t have to. If his whole body could roll its eyes, that would be what he looked like.

Before he was done with that set of mental gymnastics sensei’s eyes turned to him. He snapped out of it, opened his mouth and began to speak, but his mind was racing through fifteen different things he could say and his mouth couldn’t keep up. He stumbled and mumbled for a second before he paused, took a breath and put his thoughts in order.
“I’m Shoma Kyosuke, an orphan like her” he said as he let his gaze wander, avoiding eye contact, and nodded his head in the direction of Sadako “!...” and he bit his teeth together for a microsecond before he continued “...also like to read, and…” he sighed, wondering what else he should say. “I can do medical ninjutsu”.

With another sigh, a heavy one, he focused his eyes on the mortal between two bricks in the wall next to sensei. “I want to become a ninja because…” he fell silent for a second, his mind working like a computer trying to come up with an acceptable answer, but he just couldn’t think of anything “...it is what I can do”. He gave a small smile that seemed to say “yup, that’s it” and a small shrug and turned to the team’s third genin.