"Bring him in." Sarutobi said to the man on the other table across the room. He nodded and left through the other door before returning with a man that reeked of alcohol.

'Holyfuckingshit! This guy REEKS!!' Naruto yelled mentally as he covered his sensitive nose in a vain attempt to block out the offending smell. "Do you bathe in boos?!" He practically yelled

"Now Naruto, don't be rude to the customer." Kakashi scolded in his normal lazy tone

"But he reeks!" Naruto complained but on the inside he picked up on a different topic 'are things back to normal now?' He asked himself, he looked at Kakashi out of the corner of his eye before letting the tip of his tongue slip out of his lips and he tasted the air. He had his answer. The ability of the demon snakes was to taste another creature's emotions and soul through the aroma in the air, and right now, Naruto tasted hidden disgust.
Tazuna looked at the group of young ninja with slight worry. This worry was not hidden or truly expressed, or at least seen due to the drunken haze that turned his worry into aggression.

"These brats are supposed to protect me?!" He asked in disbelief, he scanned his protectors with a dulled yet critical gaze and decided that none of them were good enough to protect him. He doubted that they would be able to protect him from bandits, that was what he had officially asked for and he at least expected that much from the great village. The drunk's doubts were not only his; it was their first team mission and it was actually a good cause of worry.

"I think that my studen-students and I are good enough to protect you from anything that tries to attack you." Kakashi said while correcting his mistake before anyone could notice. His words seemed to put the drunken man's mind at ease enough for him to pay the money that it cost for the group of ninja. "Alright, meet us at the Front Gate in two hours" Kakashi told his genin before puffing out of sight. The three students looked at each other dryly before Naruto turned to the drunken client.

"Meet us all at the gate in four hours, and prepare yourself for the hangover!" Naruto said while ending in a yell before he puffed away to his small apartment to pack.

"What he said." Sasuke added before he too puffed away. Sakura looked at the remaining smoke before giving a small sigh of annoyance and then proceeded to walk out of the room.

~Four Hours Later~

Naruto jumped down from the last tree that led to the main gate and quickly took notice of the now half sober Tazuna that had been waiting for them.

"So, I guess that you didn't take our advice then huh?" Naruto asked, causing Tazuna to jump and spin around. This was a dumb move due to the ever nearing hangover and the man instantly felt a strong headache from the sudden movement.

"I thought ninja were supposed to be punctual." He stated rather than asked

"Most are," Naruto began to explain "but our team leader is always late and we don't want to sit around waiting for him all of the time." He finished while motioning to where the client had been sitting.

"Huh" was his clever response, nothing else was said until the rest of the group had come together and set out. As the main gates opened, Naruto felt himself exhaling a breath of relief as he was no longer in the village. It was the first time he had ever been beyond those walls and while he was excited and relieved, he was also a bit on the anxious side about the new environments he would undoubtedly be seeing. For now, at least, it was all still a thick forest, he could live with that.
The group walked without pause, their only disruption being Tazuna needing to stop to use the rest room. Naruto stared at the ground beneath him and noticed a slight difference in the color of the dirt. He let himself be distracted by this and focused solo on the shade of dirt until he realized something.

'Since when is dirt blue?' Naruto almost asked out loud before looking up to see if he had been daydreaming. 'Nope' Naruto thought to himself 'The sky's still blue too.' He then looked to the group of people near him and took notice that they all had been glowing slightly in different shades. The amount each of them glowed varied as much as the color. He looked first to analyze Kakashi; he goes a slight gray/silver hue and sizzled slightly in small amounts of electricity, Sasuke had a bit of a mix of colors but mostly red with a little bit of sizzling energy similarly to Kakashi, Sakura was next and she grew much less then Sasuke, who glowed like a flashlight in the dark, and had a slight mix of brown, green, and pink. Tazuna was the last person and he barley glowed, his color being unstable, Naruto looked back to the floor beneath me. The glowing was only really in a certain area but was spread out enough to tint the floor with two slightly different shades of blue. His eyes widened in surprise as he realized that he had been looking at everyone's internal energy, slight horror in the realization that they were not alone. At the moment of this realization, two men sprang up from a nonexistent puddle that had been overlooked, the two springing to attacks the two closest to the rear: Kakashi and Naruto. Kakashi puffed into a piece of shattered wood, an allusion of blood spraying on the floor and the attacker. Shock flashed through the the several other genin's eyes, horror following quickly, as the second attacker made a violent slash at the momentarily paralyzed blonde. He made a cry of pain as the bladed claws sliced his back, arm, and front in one go, making his glowing red blood fly out of his being at the insertions. Sakura made a screech of the blonde's name as the boy fell to the ground, his blood still leaking, as Sasuke sprang forward to meet the assassin's blade with his own as his shock at the sudden attack wore off as adrenaline replaced it instantly. There was a cling noise as the two blades met as Sasuke's more advanced training payed off. Sasuke managed to keep the other at bay for a mere five seconds of attack before the other attacker raced past, aiming his eager blade at the their true target with the intent to kill. Tazuna gave an indigent screech of fear just before a kunai deflected the attacker's aimed blade.

"So, the Demon Brothers decide to sink low enough as to attack a group of Konohan ninja?" Kakashi asked lazily with a slight hint of sarcasm in his voice. Sasuke smirked at the now tied up brothers and walked to the other's side, pausing slightly and looked towards Naruto, who was now sitting up and looking towards their sensei with a slight look of hurt. He had an arm pressed to the other in an attempt to slow the bleeding enough so he wouldn't pass out before it were all healed. Sasuke turned his gaze into an emotionless one, and turned away to join his teacher. Sakura rushed towards the blonde but stopped suddenly, as if remembering something, and walked away from the demonic child. After all, demons didn't deserve affection.
Naruto forced himself to stand as his body healed itself completely, though his internal turmoil still bleed into his soul painfully. He walked to rejoin the others, who had knocked out the two attackers and had begun to walk away on the path without him, as if he weren't there. As Naruto passed the two brothers he passed and looked at them before walking towards them and raiding them of all of their belongings, sealing it all into himself and consuming what appeared to be an antidote the the poison that had begun to make the blonde feel nauseous. By then the others had made it out of sight, never once stopping to check to see if the blonde had followed. Demon's didn't deserve human kindness.
Naruto sped up a bit, a pain exploding inside of him as his internal demons released KI inside of his mind, though the many seals made it remain there. He knew that they were only trying to help and that it wasn't their fault but it always gave him a migraine that lasted for hours every time it was this bad. Naruto bit back tears, even Tazuna, who had no idea of what he was, had left him without care. Tossed him aside when his usefulness was nonexistent.

"Just like every other mortal, they only ever use you for your worth and toss you away like last week's trash." Kurama hissed to him, her anger getting the better of her. She hated most humans after all, and never realized the effect her comments had on the blonde's already damaged mind. Naruto sniffles before choking back his tears, forcing his hormones to become usual again and barring his negative emotions, forcing a perfect smile onto his face to mask his pain before running to rejoin his quote on quote "friends" with a sense of normality, ignoring the phantom pains that seemed to attack him at every movement.

~Unknown Time, Unknown Place~

A small malnourished boy sat in the corner of a metal cage, trembling and holding onto his nearly nude figure with both cold and fear. The metal chain on his neck and limbs doing nothing to help him in his efforts to find the missing warmth whom he so longed for. The sound of a heavy metal door scraping the old tiles of the floor pierced the previous silence, three figures walking into the room with distinctive taps sounding their way over the sudden sound of animalistic screeches that had been held off by the soundproof walls and bolted door. The first person, this one having pinkish hair tied up high in a bun, opened his cage door and grabbed his chain, the one that connected to neck, and gave a hearty pull. The small boy was flung outside if the cage in moments before being grabbed by the men behind her and brought into the other room for today's experiments, which had become more and more painful by the day. By the time it all ended, the boy' throats had become hoarse from screams that he had once promised himself to never make again, a promise that had been broken in a way similarly to his ever diminishing spirit. He whimpered as his bindings were unlocked, releasing him from the table before he was dropped onto a cart and strapped down once more, the sound of wheals being the only thing to let the damaged child that he was being moved. Once again the sounds of animalistic screeches rang through his abused eardrums as he paused through a dark room that stretched on, various cages littering the walls and giving way to pitch black darkness, the only sign of life inside being their cries for help, for release from the pain being given by them through the experiments, cries that wished for death, that and their now glowing eyes.
This startled the child as he had never before seen their eyes glow and knew from experience that normal eyes did not do that. He was torn away from his musings as the door heavy door shut behind him and he was unstrapped from the cart before being chained into the cage. The cold floor greeted the boy and he shivered once more, he was certain now that it was colder in here then it should be, it was warmer in the other room to the point for him to be at least somewhat comfortable. Now, though, he felt the cold grasp of the metallic bars and stone floor beneath him drain what little comfort he had left. The wounds in his body began to quickly heal with speed it had never done before.
The man smirked at him evilly at the sight as he closed the soundproof door behind him and stacked over to the cage, getting out a few things from the cart as he went. To the boy's horror the items where a needle, a knife, and a whip with small blades attacked along the end. The man tortured the poor, making him cry out in pain and fear as if hoping to be saved, such a thing never happened. As usual, the man eventually left with his cart and a content smile plastered onto his face at his actions, leaving a bloody mess behind him. The man opened the door before halting instantly in fear as a pink-haired woman stood behind it with cold eyes, this woman was in charge of most everything in here. The man gulped at being found out, the boy smiling to himself at the feeling of redemption as he felt the man would be punished at some degree for his actions, his smile falling off quickly as he found that not happening. The woman turned her icy green eyes towards the boy and mouthed a single sentence before his torture restarted with new vigor. You're not worth mercy