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[color=white].	Wednesday, 9:31 [right]Amegakure	.[/right][/color][/h3][/sub][/b][/color]

[quote][i]Meet at Shigeki.[/i]

-	Sakana[/quote]

The cryptic message had been left in the mailbox of every single member of his team, save for Unagi, who simply had it slid under her door early in the morning, long before anyone should have been up. But for the trio of shinobi that served under Sakana, Shigeki must’ve been one of the most familiar places by now. It was a small restaurant not far from the Uragiri clan compound, located high in one of the many industrial skyscrapers, and home to almost every single team meeting Sakana held. It offered a perfect overview of the clan compound and – more importantly – the koi ponds themselves. And while Sakana was hard to read, it had been rather obvious to most that the koi ponds were one of his favorite places – it had been the first place they met after they were assigned to his team – team 3 – and where they had their first ‘test’ – a simple battle [i]in[/i] the water, sloshing around while the koi tried to steer clear of the four of them.

The test had no real purpose other than to see how quickly the three of them would stop cannibalizing each other and instead turn on the real threat, [i]Sakana[/i]. But when you tell three shinobi to spar, they tend to focus only on the winning. A valuable lesson was learned that day, at the very least.

As the team got together, they were served with a pot full of stew. A dreadful looking one – the water looked like mud – but one whose taste was unrivalled. [color=black][b]“We’re on stand-by duty today,”[/b][/color] Sakana told the trio. As per usual, Sakana was sitting on one side of the dining booth, while the other three were sitting together on the other side – even in their sitting arrangement, the hierarchy was quite clear. [color=black][b]“So you know the drill,”[/b][/color] he continued, [color=black][b]“don’t stray from my side and keep your head down.”[/b][/color]

Without even looking down, Sakana spooned a spoonful of stew into his mouth, his black eyes scanning the trio in front of him. They were certainly a team of characters – a golden boy, whose family had quite a reputation, Sakana’s own sister, who spent far too much time looking into a mirror, and an orphan, and a stubborn one at that. Usually teams were constructed by virtue of some sort of unifying strategy or capability, but this team seemed to be built mostly around how little they had in common. 

[color=black][b]“Gareki,”[/b][/color] Sakana suddenly said, interrupting the silence, [color=black][b]“chunin exams are going to take place in six months. I’m signing you up.”[/b][/color] He continued to look at Gareki, his eyes peering through the younger boys’ eyes, looking for any hint of a reaction or a response that wasn’t words, before his eyes fell on the two chunin that flanked Gareki. [color=black][b]“You guys passed the test a year ago, so you’ll be helping me get Gareki ready. I’ll be satisfied when—”[/b][/color]

The door to the restaurant suddenly slammed open, an alarmed shinobi running in. This was strange, since the only form of conventional business that Shigeki’s restaurant seemed to have was team 3’s visits. Otherwise, the place was more or less empty all the time. [i]“Team 3, you are needed at the eastern border – Konohagakure forces are trespassing and the Amekage has summoned you to respond!”[/i]

For a brief moment, Sakana paused, looked at the shinobi, then looked back to his team. [color=black][b]“—… when he can take you both on at the same time. Practice whenever we aren’t on standby duty.”[/b][/color] Once he had finished his sentence, Sakana slipped to the side of the booth and stood up, stretching his hands, and then his arms. [color=black][b]“Been a while,”[/b][/color] he said, finishing his slight stretches, and gesturing to his team. When they left, he put some money onto the table to pay for the stew that they’d barely gotten to touch.

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[color=white].	Wednesday, 9:46 [right]Amegakure Eastern Border	.[/right][/color][/h3][/sub][/b][/color]

Traveling towards the eastern border was not an affair that usually took long at all, and the team arrived more or less precisely on time. Border response was a natural part of the work of an Amegakure shinobi, so for most of them except for perhaps Gareki, this would probably not be the first time they performed such an impromptu mission. 

When team 3 arrived at [i]the[/i] spot, it was pretty clear that shinobi had passed through here. There were footprints on the small clearing in the forest, leading east to west – Konohagakure forces, most likely, heading from Konoha to Iwagakure or Sunagakure. Perhaps on a mission.

However, mission or not, it was not permitted for foreign shinobi to travel in and out of Amegakure without explicit written permission from the Amekage. And if these shinobi had permission, then the seal on the writ would’ve prevented the barrier team from noticing the entry of these shinobi. 

The solution was clear – the Konoha shinobi needed to be removed from Amegakure or killed. Usually, shinobi caught with their pants down by Amegakure shinobi were happy to leave – there was plenty of war in general, there was no need to risk another one with Amegakure, a village who had not just made threats of assassination in the past, but had also made good on them. While an outright war with Amegakure would be over quickly, the fact that Amegakure could most likely assassinate high ranking targets and cripple an entire military decisively in the span of a month was enough deterrence for most villages to leave them alone – besides, the land Amegakure was built on wasn’t worth much.

But sometimes, shinobi’s pride got in the way, and they refused to leave. 

As the team drew closer to the end of the tracks, they would slow down, avoiding a situation in which they might end up giving away their position. Beyond the treeline ahead of them, the shrouded figures of four shinobi moving around was hard to miss. A full team, perhaps?

Using the remarkable speed of a shinobi, Sakana jumped forwards into the clearing, maintaining distance between himself and the four unknown shinobi. Sakana had not explicitly ordered his team to do anything, and since they had been together for a year now, there was no reason for him not to trust their intuition and decisions. Whether they hid and waited, or joined Sakana in the field, Sakana would speak up to the four hooded figures. 

[color=black][b]“You’re trespassing. You need to leave Amegakure, and travel through the land of Grass to get to Iwagakure, and through the land of Rivers to get to Sunagakure.”[/b][/color]

Caught off-guard, the foursome turned around and faced Sakana, revealing their faces in the sunlight that was starting to appear even through the thick Amegakure rain clouds. Their headbands bore the marks of Konohagakure, so their intel had been correct in that regard. 

[i]“By whose order?”[/i] the tallest of the four asked – a black haired man, a few years older than Sakana at the least. 

[color=black][b]“Mine,”[/b][/color] came the reply from Sakana. 

[i]“We’re just passing through. We won’t take longer than an hour, we just want to rest here,”[/i] the man tried to argue, gesturing towards his three companions. They all seemed a little younger – roughly Unagi’s age, perhaps. Either genin or chunin – the lack of flak vests made it hard to tell. 

One of the three younger shinobi had a large scroll on his back, protected on either side with a metal cap, preventing it from getting damaged if it accidentally bumped into anything. The other two wielded weapons – one, a large sword, the other two smaller swords, lighter and faster than the large sword. The man who was supposed to be the jonin was unarmed except for his shinobi pouch, which doubtlessly carried a great amount of kunai. 

Sakana shook his head. [color=black][b]“No. Rest when you leave Amegakure. You’re only an hour away from the border.”[/b][/color]