Inheritance

An S-Ranked Mission!

Sarutobi studied the portfolio open in front of incredibly carefully. Inside lay the the images and profiles of some of his most capable, and perhaps more importantly his most trusted Shinobi. Should there be a mission of high importance, these were the ninja that would be called upon to do it. Of course there were a range of skill levels and abilities, from Umino Iruka to Hatake Kakashi; just about every possible mission or task that needed to be undertaken was covered. These were truly his 'best of the best'.

However, the latest task that would be assigned to one of these exceptional shinobi was proving to be particularly hard to match a profile to. It was to be a long term mission of the highest importance, and therefore would be S-ranked. meaning the mission details would be off limits to all but Sarutobi himself and the ninja undertaking the mission. Normally, this kind of mission would be left to the likes of Kakashi, or some of the especially high ranking ANBU. However, the cycloptic Jonin was due to take a Genin team in precisely a week, so he was out of the running. Not only that, but this mission was of extreme importance to the Sandaime himself; and as much as it pained the veteran Hokage to admit it, there were too few ANBU that he could fully trust, to be able to use one of the higher ranked for this mission.

He had narrowed down his choices to two candidates. They were both Tonkubetsu Jonin rank, one was still part of ANBU, the other part of the Interrogation and Torture department. Both were of adequate ability to fill out the role, however as memories of both candidates began to fill his mind, one candidate in particular began to stand out from the other.

A slight smile found it way onto Sarutobi's face as he rose from the chair in his office. He would have the shinobi summoned immediately.

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Uzumaki Naruto however, had a very different dilemma. After his brief conversation with the Sandaime about the events of the previous night, he had been informed that the formation of Genin teams was being held back by a month. This would normally have outraged Naruto, but after that nights events; even he was had reached the limit of his stamina, and therefore the consequences of that particular announcement were not realised until midway through his breakfast.

Of course, the 'realisation' had not been subtle, and as a consequence he was now being 'forced' to eat breakfast at Ichiraku's. Also, if anyone were to ask if he knew anything about the Hokage's underwear being dyed orange... It wasn't him. He wasn't even there, Okay?

The delay in the creation of the Genin teams left him with absolutely nothing to do for a whole month, besides having to meet with the Hokage in the afternoon. And possibly again once the orange underwear he had nothing to do with was discovered. It didn't take him long to set his sights on what he wanted to do. Train. And then train some more. But that led to another problem, what should he focus on. While he was confident of his skills, he wasn't arrogant enough to believe that he didn't have any faults. His jutsu range was decidedly poor compared to the rest of the graduates. Most of the clan heirs had training in their family jutsu as well as the academy jutsu, even Sakura had a few genjutsu to her name. Not to mention he had no formal taijutsu style to speak of. He knew the katas to the academy style, and could perform them reasonably well. But despite this, every time he tried to spar using the style, he couldn't seem to get the movements to flow together.

Whilst he could try and learn some jutsu, or a taijutsu style, these things required a teacher. He would need to find someone who not only was willing to actually teach him, but someone who had the time. The only person who could fit the bill was Iruka-sensei, who had already thrown himself back into teaching at the academy. But Naruto knew what his reply would be should he ask him. Iruka would simply tell him he had to improve his basic knowledge and skills before he could be taught the more advanced things he craved to learn.