The next day, Shisui went to Hanako's house little before sunrise. To avoid waking up her family, he looked for the window to the brunette's room and entered through it without making a sound. He observed the girl sleeping peacefully and doubted for a moment waking her up. However, they had a lot to do regarding Hanako's training and the thought of it cleared all doubt from his mind.

"Hey Hanako, wake up," he muttered next to her ear while shaking her a little. The brunette just groaned and turned her back to him. "Oh come on, sleeping beauty, don't make me use the trick to wake you." Hanako opened her eyes a bit and looked at him sideways.

"You wouldn't."

"Oh...yes I would," he said with a grin, coming dangerously close to her.

"NO!" In a fraction of a second, the girl was out of bed and in the other side of the room, pressed tightly against the wall.

"Well, now you seem more awake than ever!" Shisui commented with a big grin. "Go eat some breakfast and meet me in the training grounds at seven sharp." Hanako sighed as she looked at the clock on her nightstand. It read six thirty in the morning.

"You have no idea how much I hate you right now..." she muttered under her breath.

* * *

After training nearly all day with Shisui, exhausted least to say, Hanako had to walk her way back home. She couldn't even take a step in less than half a minute. "Damn Shisui... He really overdid it; he shouldn't have discovered my ability to heal." Hanako muttered to herself. She stopped in the middle of the road, and looked down at her hand curiously. "But why do I...?" Hanako took a kunai from her pouch, raised it to her wrist, and dragged it down against her skin. "Why do I heal so fast?" She observed with interest as the cut closed itself and disappeared without leaving a mark that assured it had been there.

"Hanako-san, what are you doing?" Hanako jumped when she heard Hiroki's voice at her back. She quickly put the knife down and turned slowly to meet him, hiding the weapon from his sight.

"Hey, Hiroki...how's it going?" She grinned slightly.

"Fine, thank you..." Hiroki narrowed his eyes at her, his voice dubious. "What about you?" His eyes drifted to her hands ¾carefully hidden behind her back¾ and then back to her face.

"Well, fine obviously..." Hanako did everything possible to sound the most convincing, but he gave her a look of such pity that made her stomach churn.

"Are you sure?" Hiroki walked closer towards her. "You cannot deny that you were harming yourself just now, though, can you?" Hanako arched her eyebrows, faking incredulity. "I saw you cut yourself, Hanako. That's not a good sign." He tried to take her hand, but Hanako took a step away from him.

"What makes you think I could do such thing to myself?" Hanako glared at him, clearly annoyed. But he only ignored her, as he observed her intently, analyzing her expression for a moment. Before she had realized it, he had snatched her hand and turned it upwards, finding nothing but fair unharmed skin. "Is that convincing enough for you?" Hanako let the words roll out of her tongue in a cold voice as she pulled her hand back. "I am fine," she said.

"This can't be..." Hiroki muttered, more to himself than to her. Confusion was visibly marked in his face. "I swear I saw¾"

"You imagined it," Hanako rolled her eyes. "Don't you remember what I said in the hospital? About the nurses casting illusions on the halls so patients wouldn't run away?" she asked. "I wasn't joking."

Hiroki visibly paled. "I..."

"You should go back home before you hallucinate something you regret," she continued, nipping her nails as a small smile curled her lips up. "Just a word of advice."

Hiroki nodded and turned away from her, hurrying back the way he had come from. Hanako burst into laughter as she watched him rush away in despair; it amused her when people fell for her tricks. Turning in the opposite way, she continued her way home. She still had the kunai in her hand, she noticed, and put it back away.

Hanako's house was filled with the smell of food as her mother cooked. "I'm back," Hanako put her sandals beside the door and entered the main room.

"Welcome home, Hanako," Akira smiled at her from the kitchen. Hanako returned the gesture, reaching to help her clean the counter. "How did it go with Shisui-kun?" she asked.

"Awful," Hanako said, discarding the used utensils into the pile. "I can't feel a single muscle in my body."

"Well, that's good, isn't it?" Akira said, looking at her daughter from the tip of her eyes. "Like your father's training..." Hanako almost dropped the dishes she was picking from the cabinet, but held herself. "You are becoming strong," Hanako's mother smiled.

"Probably," Hanako shrugged. 'Why did you have to mention Dad?' Hanako looked down at the plates in her hands, tightening her hands around them. The air around them suddenly became tense, making it hard for them to breathe.

Later that evening, Hikari returned from her mission and sat with them to have dinner. They ate silently, but Hanako barely touched the food in her plate. She didn't feel hungry at all. Finally giving up, she excused herself from the table and took her unfinished meal back to the kitchen.

There was a window over the sink, and strangely it was open. Hanako frowned and looked back at her mother sitting at the table. Did she leave it open? No, she couldn't have. She never opened that window at all. Hanako turned back to the window and put her plate aside. She was about to close it when a strange movement of a branch outside called her attention. Hanako couldn't feel any trace of chakra around, and she shrugged it off. But then she saw him. There was a man standing right outside her house. Without further thought, Hanako raced to the backdoor and swung the door open before rushing through it.

Hanako stopped when the cold breeze hit her; she didn't know what to do outside or where to follow. There wasn't a trace she could use to track down the man. She was about to go back inside, when a faint sign of chakra called her attention. It was moving in a direction away from her, and she followed it.

Hanako ran through the forest until she reached the edge of a cliff. There, she lost the trace completely, as if he had just vanished into thin air. Hanako took a deep breath as the breeze caressed her cheek, making her close her eyes. "Look who we have here..." Hanako recognized that low dark voice, and opened her eyes again with her Sharingan activated. "It's been awhile," he said, "since the last time we met." Hanako narrowed her eyes. The man who that voice belonged to was still hiding among the trees, mocking her from where she couldn't see him. "Rumor has it you killed your opponent in the preliminaries, who was also a formidable Genin from the Stone Village." Hanako didn't say anything, and he continued. "I see you haven't satiated you thirst for revenge."

"I have honestly no idea what you're babbling about," Hanako frowned.

"Come on," he scoffed. "They killed your father, mocked your clan, your village...and now they're going to betray it and watch it burn from the inside out." Hanako's eyes widened in surprise.

"What? How do you know that?"

"I have some valuable sources of information."

"What else do you know?" she asked again.

"Find out for yourself," he finally dared to appear from the shadows, always wearing his mask to cover his face, and his black robe. "Come with me, there's something I want to show you." He started to walk back into the forest. Hanako followed him. They walked slowly for a couple of minutes until he suddenly came to a halt. "Here should be alright," he muttered. After that, a strange force coming from the hole in his mask sucked Hanako into it. She could feel as if she had been pulled away from the ground, floated in nothingness for a moment, before she was thrown hardly against the ground of a different place. Hanako looked around, she was still in a forest, but it wasn't the same forest that surrounded the village. She looked in front of her and found boulders piled up, covering ¾and crushing¾ what used to be a cave. Moss covered the area, growing on the tops of the rocks. Hanako looked up at the masked man, for a moment ¾even through his mask¾ she could swear she saw a glint of nostalgia in his eyes, but she quickly discarded it. This man, who she knew was a rogue Uchiha, ought to have the kind of past he wouldn't ever discuss with anyone.

The masked man pushed a loose rock from the pile, revealing an entrance to the cave. Hanako looked down at it. "Come," he ushered her to follow him, as he walked into the cavity. Hanako looked around, looking for anyone who might have followed them, but the forest was deserted. She turned back to the hole and cautiously walked into it. The passage way was so dark, even with her Sharingan it was hard for her to see. She walked slowly testing the ground before taking a full step; and she ran into someone. It had to be the masked man, she thought, as she didn't think anyone else would have been there with them. But she hadn't realized how wrong she was for having thought so.

"You're back..." a voice greeted them. It had been so cold, Hanako felt a shiver run down her spine. For some reason, she found the voice familiar, but she couldn't place it anywhere. When she looked up, she could see the figure of an old man staring at her with a curious red eye. 'He is also an Uchiha,' Hanako thought with a dull ache in her stomach. Now she hoped she hadn't accidentally wandered into some sort of Uchiha cult, where they praised some fictitious god and needed a young member to sacrifice to him. Hanako shuddered. "And I see that you didn't come alone..."

Something stood beside Hanako, but she was too afraid to even look at it. "She's just a brat..." It ¾or was it a he?¾ muttered into her ear. She turned her head to look over her shoulder and her jaw dropped. There stood a strange white person with a malicious grin plastered on his face. Hanako screamed and moved as far away as she could, until she bumped into the masked man again.

"What do you think you're doing?" Hanako quickly turned on her heels, grazing her arm against one of the sharp rocks on the walls of the cave. She hissed in pain as the hot blood trailed down her arm. The masked man grabbed it and inspected the wound; Hanako bit her lip. "Stupid girl, you hurt yourself," he said, proceeding to clean the blood with his robe. When he finished, Hanako observed as his eyes widened upon finding no wound at all.

"What is it?" the old man asked in a dark voice, making Hanako flinch. She had forgotten for a moment that he was there.

"Nothing, a small scratch none the less," the masked man quickly replied. He narrowed his eyes at Hanako, letting go of her.

"I see..." the man said before taking a deep breath.

"Zetsu, try not to scare her anymore." The masked man directed at the white humanoid.

"Hai, hai, Obito-san..." he replied.

"Obito...?" Upon hearing the name, Hanako's mind wandered back to the moment when she was visiting the Memorial Stone. She remembered seeing the name Obito Uchiha carved into it; her eyes widened. He couldn't be that person...could he? "Obito...Is that really your name?" Hanako waited for his reply but he only ignored her question as he walked towards the old man.

"So...why don't you tell me more about yourself?" The white thing ¾whose name now Hanako supposed had to be Zetsu¾ approached her.

"What in the world are you?" She looked at him dubiously.

"I can already guess where this conversation is headed..." he grinned widely.

* * *

"Hanako..." The girl wandered aimlessly around the Uchiha Compound. Her mind was focused so deep in her thoughts, that she didn't even notice that there was someone calling her. "Hanako..." The voice called again, but Hanako didn't hear it. What had Obito meant when he had said that Iwagakure would watch them burn from the inside out? "HANAKO." She almost screamed when the voice almost yelled beside her. "Are you okay?" Hanako looked over her shoulder at Itachi, he was looking at her worriedly. "I tried to get your attention but you wouldn't listen."

"I'm fine," Hanako snapped at him rudely, but regretted it soon after. She cleared her throat and tried to smile at him. "I just zoned out, I'm sorry." She looked away; he was looking at her with a strange intensity that made her feel uncomfortable.

"Can I ask you a question?" Hanako glanced back at him.

"If I say no, would that stop you?"

"Not really..."

Hanako sighed, "Then why bother asking for permission," she rolled her eyes, looking at him expectantly.

"I'm guessing Shisui already told you about your opponent in the final rounds..." Itachi started saying.

"He did."

"Don't you get a weird feeling coming from him?" Itachi wondered with arched brows. He had hoped that Hanako would agree with him, and when she did she would blurt everything to him, but the reaction he got from her he really didn't expect at all.

Hanako looked at him with a raised eyebrow. "I think we both have more important things to pay attention to," she said.

Tired, Itachi grunted. "Hanako, don't pretend you know nothing. I know that Shun's body turned into ashes the day you were in the morgue." Hanako froze.

"You walked into the room, didn't you?" she accused with a frown.

Ignoring her, he continued. "I know something happened in the Forest of Death, of which you don't want to talk about." Hanako gazed at the sky, inhaling deeply. She hadn't originally thought of Itachi as a nosy one, but he was indeed curious. She had hoped he would stay on margin, just like everyone else seemed to be. That was probably what had intrigued her about him in the first place, he wasn't like everyone else. But that didn't tell her if he could be trusted, if she could tell him what had happened in the civilian town, or in the Forest with Isao, or even why Shun's death had had such an effect on her. She didn't know if she could trust Itachi. And more importantly, what would he even think of her if he knew all that? He wouldn't look at her the same way, would he?

Hanako shook her head and turned away from him. She couldn't give him what he wanted. She had begun walking again but Itachi grabbed her arm, right above her elbow, making her stop. "Don't even try to escape," he said. "Tell me the truth, Hanako. What is going on? Is Iwagakure really planning an attack?"

Hanako chuckled. "I don't have much of a choice, do I?" she asked as he looked at him sideways.

"No."

"Fine, come with me." Hanako grabbed Itachi's hand and pulled it away from her arm, but she didn't let go. Instead, she dragged him with her along the road, until she found the way to the forest. They walked for a while, Hanako dragging the Uchiha boy behind her. Itachi could have pulled away, but he didn't. Strangely, he didn't want to. Somehow, the warmth of her hand felt comfortable in his.

When they reached a clearing, Hanako finally let his hand drop. Itachi looked around; most trees had small indentations in them, as if someone had recently pierced knives into their barks. "This is where Shisui and I train," Hanako explained after noticing his curious stare. "No one should listen to us here. But, before I start talking, I need you to promise me something."

Itachi finally looked at her. "What is it?"

"You can't tell a soul any of this, do you understand?" The urgency in her voice made Itachi gulp.

"I promise I won't say anything."

* * *

Shisui walked among the crowds of people in the streets, his face was deadly serious as he thought about the situation going on in the village. The Stone ninja were hosted in a small hotel not far from the center, and he decided to go take a look. They should be out training Isao, so he supposed he would find the place empty.

When he arrived at the place, he went to the reception and asked for the Iwa Shinobi's room. The receptionist refused to give him the number. Shisui sighed and closed his eyes, opening them again with the Sharingan. When the receptionist looked back at him, she dropped everything she had in her hands and entered a trance. Suddenly, she blurted out the number Shisui was looking for. With a grin, he thanked her and hurried up the stairs.

Shisui opened the door of the room and wandered inside, closing it silently behind him. He didn't know if there was someone there, but he couldn't take his chances. He searched the beds, the cabinets, the windows and under loose floor boards, but he couldn't find anything that could suggest they were planning an attack.

"Looking for something?" a voice asked behind him. Shisui straightened up, narrowing his eyes with the Sharingan still activated. "Just as I thought, you are hosting us so that you can keep an eye on us, are you not?"

Shisui turned slowly, looking up at the man behind him. He was the Jounin tutor of the Genin that qualified for the final rounds. Shisui recognized him from the preliminaries. Apparently he wasn't out training his student.

"We wouldn't have the need to keep an eye on you if you weren't under suspicion of hiding things from us," Shisui said. The man just chuckled. "Besides, it's just a revision."

"Why would we hide something from you?" The sensei raised an eyebrow at the Uchiha. "Let me remind you that there is a peace treaty among both our nations that forbids such doings." He paused for a moment as he stared intently at Shisui's bright red eyes. "But of course, I tend to forget that the Uchiha aren't even close to understand the concept of peace. Such a disgraceful clan, war addicts¾" he didn't get to finish the idea before Shisui pinned him against the wall with a knife pressed tightly against his neck.

"I dare you to say that again..." Shisui's tomoes around the pupil started to move around in an unremitting cycle. "Can you?" The ninja from Iwa was paralyzed by terror, seeming to finally recognize the Uchiha in front of him.

"Shunshin no Shisui..." he muttered softly. His eyelids started to close against his consent, and the sensei fell to the ground knocked out cold. Shisui quickly searched his mind for any kind of information that might help him, but he found nothing. With a groan, Shisui wiped the recent memory of his appearance from the sensei's mind, and left the room through the window ¾he headed towards the Uchiha District, hoping Hanako would be waiting for him in their training spot.

* * *

"That's what I know," Hanako sighed. She had finished telling Itachi what had happened in her mission, what she heard from Isao in the Forest of Death, and what Shun had said to her before he died. Surprisingly, he didn't look at her with disapproval or disgust, he remained calm. It was like he was still going through everything she had said ¾in his mind.

"You're saying, that what they want is revenge?" Hanako looked at him fixedly. He had walked closer to her, until he stood right in front of her. "And are you going to let Isao have it in the final rounds?" he asked.

"Of course not," Hanako frowned. "But that doesn't mean it won't be a battle to the death. He is making a show out of his revenge."

"Are you going to be okay?" Itachi's gaze softened.

"I am," Hanako smirked at him. "Stop worrying, Ita-kun, Shisui has been training me well." Itachi's eyes widened and he felt something flutter inside of him when Hanako called him 'Ita-kun'. He knew she was only mocking him, since they had agreed to call each other by their first names.

Hanako looked at her side when she felt a new chakra approaching. The bushes moved a little and Itachi finally looked away from Hanako, pushing his thoughts aside. Shisui walked into the clearing, looking at Itachi with astonishment.

"Oh, am I interrupting something?" he asked. There was a mischievous grin playing at his lips, making Hanako roll her eyes.

"Fuck off, Shisui. Itachi and I are just friends, stop shipping us together," she smirked. Itachi looked away, feeling a pang on his chest. Shisui noticed and smiled sadly. "Unless you want me to ship you with my sister more than what I already am." Shisui looked back at Hanako.

"Does that mean you're admitting you and Takeshi are actually something and have been hiding it from the rest of the world?"

Hanako jumped at the thought and glared at Shisui. "Obviously, it's not like that."

Shisui chuckled, shaking his head. "Fine, whatever... Anyway, I have something to tell you that you might want to know." He looked seriously at Hanako, pointing at Itachi with his head softly. Hanako seemed to get the hint and sighed.

"It's okay, Itachi knows already."

Shisui arched his brows. "He does?"

"Just say it ... We don't have all day." Hanako sighed.

Shisui cleared his throat. "Okay... I visited the hotel in which the Iwa ninja were staying. I checked all their stuff, turned their room upside down, but I couldn't find anything that could suggest they're planning something," he said.

"Of course not..." Hanako commented, crossing her arms in front of her chest. "If they had a scroll with a detailed explanation of their plans, it'd be kept in Iwagakure -in hands of the Tsuchikage himself."

"I also checked the mind of Isao's sensei," Shisui added. "If there was something they were planning, he'd definitely know about it." He frowned. "But it was blank."

"Probably all their memories are blocked with a jutsu, like Shun's were," Itachi suggested. "They have to protect all their pieces that stand on enemy territory."

"Maybe..." Hanako shrugged. "I'll guess we just have to wait and see what happens."