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Chapter 13:Shopping with the Girls

"Last lap!" Naruto called cheerfully as she ran beside her genin. Eriko glared at her, and the Hyuuga twins shot her disgruntled looks.

They had been running around Konoha to wind down after a hard day's training. About an hour after lunch, the brunet – Naruto-sensei's relative – had appeared with the Copy Nin Hatake Kakashi during their training at their usual training grounds. Eriko hadn't been able to hear what had been said, since the genin were practicing water-walking for the first time, and had been falling into the little stream at the edge of the training area quite a few times. Naruto-sensei had also stationed a kage bunshin at the water's edge when she noticed Eriko trying to sneak nearer to listen.

Hatake Kakashi was slouching languidly, the handsome brunet had a faint scowl on his otherwise expressionless face, and Naruto-sensei looked a little livid, and was arguing with her relative. It was pretty much a one-sided argument, from what Eriko could see. The handsome guy (she had yet to ask Naruto-sensei his name) only spoke a few words once in a while, while Naruto-sensei was going on and on with her hands gesturing. Suddenly, Naruto-sensei shouted something and jumped back, puling out a kunai. The man jumped back in the same instant and pulled out his chokuto.

The spar had been short and furious. Naruto-sensei hadn't brought out her katana, but seemed to be holding her own pretty well. A shout of encouragement from Eriko unfortunately caused her to look toward the three genin, and the handsome man quickly took advantage of the opening, and knocked the kunai out of Naruto-sensei's hand. He had then sheathed his chokuto, and engaged their blonde sensei in a taijutsu fight. Sensei was fast, but the other man was just as fast, if not faster, and seemed able to predict her movements easily. After a few minutes, he had swept a leg under hers, causing her to lose balance. He twisted her arms behind her back and forced her to the ground as she tried to regain her balance, and kept her there with a knee on her back.

Naruto-sensei was red in the face with anger, and her kage bunshin guarding Eriko, Ichiro and Nichiro was in a rage, hopping angrily on the spot. It was quite comical, actually.

The man leaned over and said something to Naruto-sensei that made her really mad. She struggled but it was ineffective against the man's hold. The man had a satisfied and triumphant smirk on his face. Naruto-sensei snapped something at him that widened the smirk a fraction, and he leapt off her to land a safe distance away. Naruto-sensei jumped to her feet with a red face, and pointed accusingly at the Copy Nin, who had his nose buried in a blue book and seemed to ignore her. After a few minutes of fuming on Naruto-sensei's side (something about invading their training area and stupid bastards looking for fights and lazy sensei), the silver-haired jounin slipped the book into his weapons pouch, gave Naruto-sensei a happy crescent-eye, collected the handsome brunet, who had been standing to one side with his arms crossed, staring at them argue (or rather, Naruto-sensei argue), and left.

Naruto-sensei came stomping towards the water and her kage bunshin dispelled. Eriko had been a little intimidated by the anger emanating from Naruto-sensei. Their sensei had taken a few deep breaths, then announced that training was over for that day, and they had to run three laps around Konoha to cool off.

"I wonder which of us needs to cool off more," Ichiro had muttered sarcastically under his breath as they started running, and Eriko agreed.

They were now running their last lap (arigato, Kami-sama! Eriko thought fervently while puffing tiredly). Their route led them past the Hyuuga compound, so they slowed down to a jog, and left the Hyuuga twins there. Naruto-sensei then accompanied Eriko back to her home, listening to Eriko chatter about some handsome guys she had seen the day before.

They made their way towards the market area, where Naruto-sensei made some purchases and muttered under her breath about parasitic bastards, and Eriko glared at anyone who dared look at Naruto-sensei the wrong way. Naruto-sensei caught her at it, smiled gently at her (Eriko liked seeing Naruto-sensei smile like that, it made her look even more pretty than she already was), and told her to ignore those people. Eriko made an affirmative noise and continued glaring at those ill-mannered people behind Naruto-sensei's back.