Runner

V.

"Hello, my name is Hakka. It is nice to meet all of you."

The girl cocked her head to the side, her eyes slipping closed and her lips twitching in a smile.

There was silence on the rooftop as the three males standing with her stared expectantly. She continued to smile. They continued to stare.

She smiled.

They stared.

She smiled.

And.

"Hakka-chan," the blonde man and only adult in the group said, chagrined, "You're supposed tell us more about yourself - about likes, dislikes, hobbies, dreams - so we can have a better idea about what kind of teammate you will be."

"Oh." Her strange, jade green eyes popped open. "I am sorry Namikaze-sensei, but I do not like or dislike anything, nor do I have any hobbies or dreams."

The roof was once again plunged into silence. One of the boys, goggles nestled in his messy dark hair, glanced at his sensei and the other familiar looking kid who was supposedly his other teammate. Both of them looked about as lost as he did. No likes or dislikes? Frankly, he called bullshit. Even the other guy, as bland as he was, had responded with something.

Training this, training that, blah blah blah, best shinobi ever. Boring. But still something.

"Oh come on, there has to be something you can tell us!"

Her gaze zeroed in on him. He began to sweat under the weight of that disconcerting stare. Was she upset? Angry at him? Finally, thankfully, she broke eye contact, shaking her head.

"Well, uh…" Namikaze-sensei began, saving the boy the trouble of saying anything else, "Then I guess that's all for today then. Alright, Team 7, we'll be meeting at Training Ground 3 tomorrow."

"For training, sensei?" the dark haired boy asked excitedly, "Ooh, or a mission? Will it be cool?"

The other boy snorted.

"Not quite Obito-kun," Namikaze-sensei answered, "I will be testing you and Hakka-chan, to see whether or not you really will be working with Kakashi-kun and me. If you fail, you will be sent back to the Academy."

"WHAT?!"

(He'd swear later on that he hadn't shrieked like a girl.)

It was already bad enough that he was going to be on a team with a now very familiar jerk and a creepy weirdo, and not with Rin-chan. Now he may not even be on a team period.

What did I do to deserve this?

VI.

"My apologies, Hatake-san," someone above him murmured.

The sun blocked his view of their face. He would have lifted an arm to block the light streaming down into his eyes, but not being able to move anything from the neck down made that a little difficult.

"What did you do?" he grit out, pretending he couldn't hear the loser howling with laughter in the background.

"Senbon coated with a mild paralytic agent," his teammate responded clinically before kneeling beside him and swiping the inner side of his arm above his armguards with a finger, "Nicked you right here while you were punching me."

Somewhere between enraged and impressed, Kakashi offered a simple, "Hn."

He began to panic a little when she pulled another senbon out and made to jab him with it. Though he'd never admit it, he was more than a little relieved when Minato-sensei was suddenly there at her side, grabbing her wrist to keep her from sticking it in him. Kakashi watched as she blinked before looking at sensei questioningly.

"The match is over Hakka-chan," the blond explained calmly, tugging her wrist down.

Because he knew his sensei, he could see the worry and disappointment that lurked in the man's expression. It wasn't obvious though, sensei was a jounin for a reason.

"I know that," Hakka commented, "But Hatake-san is still paralyzed. I need to reverse it."

"Reverse…?" he heard sensei murmur, before a light went off behind sensei's eyes.

One last measuring look, and then he released the girl's arm. In a flash, she stuck the senbon into Kakashi's arm right where she'd gotten him with the first one. The boy winced at the feeling and for a terrible moment, wondered if she would be cold blooded enough to lie to their sensei and really harm or kill him while he was defenseless.

The minute feeling began to return, his body tingling strangely as it did, he finally dismissed that worry and chided himself for doubting the man's ability to tell truth from lie. Minato-sensei moved to his side to help him sit up. For a moment, he wanted to ask sensei something about his female teammate, but whatever it was got stuck in his throat. It wasn't like he really wanted to know anything about that creepy girl anyway.

Instead, he settled for watching as she trotted over to the moron who was still rolling around on the floor and flicked him on the ear.

"Uchiha-san, please stop laughing. This is the first and likely only time I will ever best Hatake-san. With knowledge of my methods, he will be able to counter any attempts I make to paralyze him in future spars. Now," she paused to grasp the other boy by the forearm and pull him to his feet, "It is time for our match."

He watched her drag a babbling Obito into position across from her. The idiot began to sweat when he noticed her holding several senbon between her fingers as she settled into ready position. Kakashi attempted to hide his own flinch from sensei at the sight of them, narrowing his eyes so it would seem like he was focusing on watching the fight instead.

"Stop glaring Kakashi-kun," he heard the man say, as hand came down on his head, "You know she's right. You'll learn from this."

Frowning under his mask, he leaned away from the hand.

His body was still tingling.

VII.

Not for the first time, he wished sensei wasn't such a damn pervert.

Minato really hated these clandestine meetings Jiraiya-sensei set up in the red-light district. Even though Kushina was so understanding about his sensei's eccentricities and him getting caught up in them, he really wished she didn't have to be. Hanging around in the red light district would usually be reason enough to make any normal person's girlfriend upset. Only once had he ever voiced his complaint to sensei, only to be laughed off by him and teased about being whipped.

If he hadn't shaken away his thoughts right at that moment, he would've missed catching sight of something peculiar through the beaded doorway of a brothel he was passing. As it was, he had looked up and his eyes had landed on a girl. He wasn't blind; he could see she was attractive. And younger than him, but there was little else worth noting. Still, something about her gave him a vague sense of familiarity. So familiar, it had him stopping in the middle of the street for a closer look. When just looking at her didn't get him anywhere, he extended his chakra sense.

Maybe she was just one of the usual girls hanging off sensei's arm when he was in Konoha. When the pulse of Minato's sense reached the girl's chakra and started feeling it out, his heart just about stopped beating and internally he recoiled at the recognition.

Her signature was one that he had become very familiar with during the last months.

It was a struggle to stay right where he was, instead of marching in there and snatching her up and away. Sighing, he instead leaned against the wall opposite the brothel to wait, watch, and try to understand what this was. After a second of thinking it over, he performed a quick genjutsu to make where he stood go unnoticed by passerby and then summoned a toad to send a message to sensei. He didn't know how long this would take, but Jiraiya-sensei could wait.

He remained camped out there for almost half an hour before he felt a sudden displacement of air at his side. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of Jiraiya-sensei lounging against the wall right next to him. Normally, he would've greeted him, but he was too engrossed in his stakeout to do so.

"This is your more important business, Minato?"

"Hai."

They watched as the girl nuzzled closer into a client's side, and bared her neck for him, giggling coquettishly when the man's lips attached themselves there.

"Cute," the older man commented with barely feigned disinterest, "Who is she?"

The younger man had to take a calming breath through his nose before responding.

"That's my student, using an advanced partial genjutsu technique to augment her appearance to look older."

Even though he didn't look, he could tell that the other man was taken aback.

"I thought you said she was ten! They're not supposed to-"

"I know that," Minato said, his words trailing off into a growl.

"But you didn't know about this."

"No." The blond man shoved his balled up fists into his pockets. "But I'm going to find out why."

A hand dropped on his shoulder.

"Jeeze," Jiraiya-sensei huffed, "And I thought Kakashi-kun was your problem child."

Minato chuckled darkly.

"So did I."