The Harsh Truth

Chapter 16

The sun's rays barely filtered through the thick canopy of leaves of Konoha's lush park trees. For the runaway, it was a moment of distraction that declared his capture. One of its soft paws took a single step on a twig, snapping it, and the next moment, hell broke loose.

"Futon: Daitoppa!" the forest's leaves that had fallen from their branches suddenly left the ground, scattered by a powerful wind gale, that sent them flying straight into the face of the cat. Blinded, a white blur tackled him on the ground, all for a hand, this one smelling fiercely of dog, to grab him by the collar. Then a white eyed girl hit him in the belly, and all Tora the Nineteenth, the cat that survived, saw, from there on, was nightmares of him being smothered by the fierce and lethal wife of the Daimyo.

Then, it was all cut short when his brown haired jailor looked at him, and said, without possibility of misunderstanding, in a set of low hisses and growls.

"If you escape again, I'm barbequing you, you damn bag of fur," Kiba's murderous tone was enough to make the cat meow in reply, and swiftly turn into the most adorable and fluffy bag of potatoes ever to be carried by a Genin.

He even purred excessively when he was delivered straight into the waiting hands of the Daimyo's wife, who, strangely, was looking with a mixture of joy and trepidation at the fact that the cat was, indeed, alive and meowing…and even a bit excessively cuddly.

The three Genins, with Naruto behind them, smiled as they received their pay, before turning to stand in front of their sensei, once more.

"Well then, seems that, after two months, you have comfortably entered the Fixer's team's routine, huh?" Minato spoke quietly, with a small smile, as Kiba grinned widely.

"You can bet on it Hokage-sama!" the Inuzuka's normal jacket had been removed, to lay the place for what looked like dark black and green armguards kunais tied to them, a sleeveless brown shirt, short dark green trousers, and his clan markings sported a noticeable change in color, from red to dark green. Akamaru stood on his head, as always, but the white dog now had a little Konoha's forehead protector.

"Kiba-kun, stop being so rude," Hinata retorted, her own jacket, normally white, was now a mottled ensemble of dark blue and dark brown, the fishnet, black in color, still there, and her trousers having a black tint. Katsumi was the only one who still had her dark red attire.

"Well, since you completed the mission so quickly," Minato spoke, "There is another one, just waiting to be taken care of, there is a potato batch that…"

"C-rank!" Katsumi yelled, "Sends us on a C-rank mission Otou-san! We're ready for it! These D-ranks are getting boring!"

Iruka's forehead sported a tick mark, but he couldn't say anything, since, after all, it was the Hokage's daughter that had spoken.

"Katsumi-chan, C-ranks, in this period, are…" as Minato began speaking, Katsumi's pout turned into a light scowl.

"You already sent Sakura-chan and her team on a C-rank! What is it? It was the Uchiha's rant huh? Why can't you send us too!?" the Hokage winced, before looking at the pile of papers, and then, carefully, grabbing one.

"Escort mission, C-rank, a paranoid bridge builder wants an escort to reach Wave: there should be little to no contact with enemies, but it's at least a week or more away from the village, is that enough excitement for you?" as Katsumi was about to retort, Naruto swiftly pushed his right hand in front of the red haired girl's mouth, silencing her.

"It is. We will take that mission," and after a really bad stare at Katsumi, who silenced herself, Naruto grabbed the scroll with the details of the mission.