Raikage? He wasn't completely over the fact that he had been promoted to Kage. It was a weird change of lifestyle for him, as he'd always been so carefree and not serious. He wasn't going to let it change him, but people would actually see that he could be serious at times. This was one of those times. One of the first things that came across his desk was a mission that was more than a little dangerous. With how suddenly he became Kage, some people might not think that Sato was strong enough or mature enough to handle the position. This was his chance to prove them wrong, if they existed. Plus, he was happy to help make the village a safer place, especially now that he had a daughter to protect.

The only problem is that the odds were kind of stacked against him. The smart decision would be to find a partner for the mission just to be safe. As he sat at his desk and read through files for a partner, he stopped on one particular file. Nara, Kuro. The man had been doing a lot of missions for the village recently and had more than proven himself as a fighter. He would turn to one of his new Anbu guards and speak in a friendly tone. "Sorry to ask you to do something when I don't know your name, but would you go find Kuro Nara and ask him to meet me here for a mission briefing? Thank you!" He said kindly. The man nodded and disappeared, making Sato guess that he wasn't the social type.

While he waited on his potential comrade, he would look through the mission dossier. It was best for him to get a good knowledge of their opposition before telling someone else what they would be doing.

Word Count: 312

Kuro had been taking the down time to train himself and relax. He heard that recently, Amara had stepped down as Raikage and someone else had taken her place. He was left to wonder why that was, but he was never one to worry about something for too long. Perhaps the girl just had her reasons. It didn't really matter to him who was in charge, or who ran things; the politics of the situation never interested him. Kuro wasn't one of those kids that wanted to gro up one day and be a Kage; no, Kuro wanted an excuse to use and develop his abilities. He wanted an excuse to hurt people. Not good people, not innocent people, no, not just anyone. He wasn't evil or anything like that. No, he wanted to hurt those that deserved it.

He figured someone would possibly come along if Amara didn't come herself, and explain what happened and why she was stepping down in her role as Raikage of the village. Kuro thought he was about to get this answer when the ANBU agent landed in his backyard, where he was training his Shadow techniques amongst an audience of crows. "The new Raikage requests your presence at the Administration Complex," he said, and with this message delivered he jumped and was out of view in seconds. So perhaps the new lead wanted to get to know him. He'd been doing alot around the village after all.

At the Admin Complex, at the office of the Raikage, there would first appear a crow. Not any ordinary crow; this one was much larger than normal. it's head and eyes darted around, a CAW sound coming from the large black beak that looked like it could pierce steel. Several other crows flew in and landed as well, and then Kuro himself could be seen crouched upon the window opposite the first. Since becoming a crow sage, Kuro changed his appearance somewhat, much to the disdain of his mother, taking on a more "goth" look. He allowed his hair to grow out longer and shaggier, hanging in his face some. His complexion was pale, making his skin look almost white. There were dark rings around his green eyes.

With his forearms resting upon his thighs as he crouched upon the window sill among several of his crow followers, Kuro waited to see what the new Raikage would say to him first in silence.

"..."

407 words

After a few minutes of sitting peacefully, he heard something land on the window to his right. He would look to see a crow standing there, followed by a caw from it's beak. It was soon joined by another, and another, until eventually Kuro appeared at the window. So that's where the crows were coming from. He could only wonder why, but he wouldn't dwell on it. Maybe the guy just liked birds. "Thanks for coming, Kuro. I'm Satoshi, the new Raikage, but you can call me Sato if you like. I'm not good at this whole Kage thing yet, so forgive me if I'm informal. I need to pry Amara away from her mother duties so I can learn some etiquette." He said with a smile as he closed the file on his desk. "Anyway, I know we haven't met before, but Amara made some great notes about you in your file and it seems like you have been doing quite a bit for the village. First of all, thank you for that. Secondly, Your dedication has gotten you an opportunity to join me on a mission, if you'd like." He would stand up and walk over to where Kuro was, handing him the file.

"The mission is quite simple really. Five rouge ninja have plans for the village that aren't good. We need to stop and eliminate them. We have a man on the inside, but he has been MIA for about three months. We need to contact him and see what his status is. These ninja are very powerful, so we will need to be careful if we want to come out of this unharmed. However, if one of us gets hurt, I'm a great medic, so I can heal us." He spoke very plainly as he explained what the file already stated in better details. He didn't need to explain all of this, but it helped him not fill awkward while he waited on the man to read it. He would wait for Kuro to respond before he asked something else. "The file was very vague about your actually combat capabilities, so I'd like to know what you can do before we go into it. That way we can have a strategy ready in case things go south quickly." Now it was time to wait and see what kind of person Kuro was. Sato was sure he was a nice person, but each individual had to be handled specifically, or so Satoshi found.

Word Count: 312 + 429 = 741

"Thanks for coming, Kuro. I'm Satoshi, the new Raikage, but you can call me Sato if you like. I'm not good at this whole Kage thing yet, so forgive me if I'm informal. I need to pry Amara away from her mother duties so I can learn some etiquette."

Satoshi. He was the new Raikage. That was cool, as already stated, it didn't matter who ran the village to Kuro. Amara had kids, as indicated by his 'mother duties' statement, which let Kuro know one probable reason as to why she stepped down as village lead. Kuro couldn't help but to wonder a little who the lucky guy was. He could almost hear his mother's disappointment to know that she was taken, since she had some weird fantasy that they'd end up together happily ever after somewhere over the rainbow. Yeah, as if...

"Anyway, I know we haven't met before, but Amara made some great notes about you in your file and it seems like you have been doing quite a bit for the village. First of all, thank you for that. Secondly, Your dedication has gotten you an opportunity to join me on a mission, if you'd like."

Recognition. Kuro didn't look it, but he liked that. "...Just doing my part," was his response, in one of his rare moments of speaking. The crow next to him gave off a loud CAW, as if to say thanks for the vouch. Next, Satoshi said that Kuro was welcome to join him on a mission. If it involved using his skills to pick apart bad guys? He was all for that.

He didn't get his hopes up for nothing. Satoshi walked over and handed him a file. He read it at the same time listening to what he said. "The mission is quite simple really. Five rouge ninja have plans for the village that aren't good. We need to stop and eliminate them. We have a man on the inside, but he has been MIA for about three months. We need to contact him and see what his status is. These ninja are very powerful, so we will need to be careful if we want to come out of this unharmed. However, if one of us gets hurt, I'm a great medic, so I can heal us."

5 of them. Nice. The ones that he would deal with probably wouldn't even see him coming. He'd dealt with a similar situation to this just the other day, but those guys weren't as skilled as all of these were. A grin crossed his lips as he read the file. This was sure to be interesting. Satoshi said he was a medic, so if someone got hurt he'd be able to heal either one of them. "The file was very vague about your actually combat capabilities, so I'd like to know what you can do before we go into it. That way we can have a strategy ready in case things go south quickly."

Kuro handed the file back. "...I'm of the Nara Clan. We Nara aren't exactly frontline fighters, we are more brains than brawn. Tactics. We have the ability to manipulate shadows...but I will show better than I can tell. Amara, the former Raikage, granted me permission to travel to the village of Niwaurushigakure, so seek out sages...I made an alliance with the shadow crows, who reside at the tops of the tallest trees...They will aid us if things get too heavy."

583 + 407 = 990 words

Satoshi couldn't help but smile when the guy spoke for a prolonged amount of time. He was a tad odd, but he was smart from the looks of it and was a too the point kind of guy. He was glad to see that Kuro was on board with the mission, as he needed to get to know more people in the village. As Kuro explained his powers, Sato's head started racing with different things that could be done with Shadow Control. Plus he was a Crow Sage? Oh this was going to be fun. "Nice. Now that I have an idea of what you do, I'm more than confident that we can do this. We can probably eliminate them without them knowing we were there. I'm a Takayama clan member, meaning I can heal people extremely well with Doton, and I'm a Jun Chi clan member, meaning I'm really good with Katon. On top of that I use Yoton, specifically liquid concrete. I also can do a little Taijutsu and normal Ninjutsu."

Now that they were familiar with each other's abilities, it was time to head out. "Unless you need to grab anything, we can go ahead and leave once I get my armor on." He would move to a display case that held his armor in it, opening it with a key. He first took of his shinobi sandals and put on the boots, followed by the chest piece and gloves. He was officially ready to go. His Kage garb sat on his desk, awaiting his return. He would turn and look at his new comrade with a confident smile. "Let's go!" He said moving as he jumped out of the window onto the path to the meeting.

Word Count: 741 + 298 = 1,039

Satoshi spoke of striking at the enemy before they knew what was hitting them, which was the normal way Kuro usually worked. Take them by complete surprise. In the confusion, finish them quickly. Fast and clean, and usually no one but the designated targets were the only ones to get hurt. That was totally fine with him. Staoshi also said on top of being a medic, that he was skilled in the use of earth techniques, or Doton. He could also manipulate fire, or Katon. What he said next made kuro raise an eyebrow: Yoton, liquid concrete. This was a mystery to Kuro, and he would wait to see the technique put to use for himself. There was no use asking a bunch of questions now when there were 5 criminals wandering around out there. Finally, Satoshi said, along side being a Ninjutsu user, what nearly all shinobi could do, he also could fight physically. So it seemed that Satoshi would likely be on the front line while Kuro struck from the shadows. Satoshi would possibly grab their attention, leaving the unknown element that was Kuro to strike at their blind spots however he saw fit...unless he had other plans. This was yet to be seen. Either way, he was ready for anything.

Next, Satoshi donned a pair of armor, at the same time saying that if Kuro needed to grab anything, now was the time. Kuro didn't really need any equipment or supplies at the moment; everything he needed, he already had. Anticipating that they were about to be on the move, the many large crows inhabiting the windows began to take off, emitting a chorus of CAWs. When Satoshi turned to give Kuro a confident smile, Kuro simply nodded his head, ready to get into the think of it and play his part in the protection of the village, his family, his Kage and all of the innocent citizens. Satoshi jumped out of the window, and Kuro lunged backwards, falling upside down after him.

337 + 990 = 1,327 words

With Kuro following, the new Raikage darted through the streets of Kumogakure with quickness. The meeting that was set up with the mole was in 15 minutes at the east gate of the village. Luckily, that was only a 10 minute run from where they were. Normally he wouldn't be going his top speed, as he didn't know Kuro's travel speed, but the man was a Crow Sage and could probably fly there if he so chose. The blood red haired shinobi made quick work of the little trip, arriving there 2 minutes earlier than expected. As he stopped, he looked for his contact. From the picture in the file, he tried to see if anyone matched that description. Behind a building came a wisper that caught his ear. He turned to see the very man he was looking for trying to be secretive. Sato chuckled and did a quick glance around for Kuro. Hopefully, the ninja would stay back and wait to introduce himself to the fight.

Sato walked casually over to the man who went by the name of Riku. "You're Riku I take it? We haven't heard from you in months. Status report please." He spoke with a normal tone despite the man looking quite nervous. Whether it was the fact that they were about to fight with 4 high ranking ninja or something else, Satoshi wasn't sure. "I've infiltrated their group and have had to stop communications because of their suspicions. Everything is as planned, they are on their way here to meet me. We can strike then." The man spoke with a tenor voice that trembled ever so slightly. "Good, how long until they arrive?" Sato asked curiously. "About 5 minutes. Prepare yourself, these guys are no joke." He said with a look that said he knew from experience. Satoshi could only nod at the comment.

"I want you to meet them as planned. I will then strike out of this position." Satoshi spoke with a confident expression, causing the man to nod. Sato could only hope that Kuro was close enough to hear the plan and had some strategies running through his head. Something felt off about this, and he might need to intervene quickly. Now it was just time to wait for the group's arrival.

Word Count: 1,039 + 390 = 1,429

So with the way he'd read it, there were 5 S-ranked ninja in the village. Maybe with the change in heads they figured this was a good time to come in and knock the new guy out of the picture, and possibly take over for themselves. As they were alll S-ranked criminals, Kuro decided to pull out all of the stops. His sage jacket appeared, moving about behind him like a makeshift cave. His eyes began to glow a red color as the world around him became much clearer. Before smashing into the ground, Kuro engaged his flight technique and began gliding inches above it while sensory reached fourth in a effort to locate these intruders.

Remiel, the head man, used Doton Techniques and Taijutsu. He was a close range fighter. Kuro figured that the guy would be right up Satoshi's alley in terms of a battle. Sasha was his partner, who used Water and seals in combination with Remiel's Tai and Doton combo. She could prove to be a problem, and Kuro deducted that she be one of the ones put down first. She sounded like the brain of the team, sort of like the shoes he himself would possibly fill.

Lumina sounded like a big giant of a woman; powerful but slow. She could be handled easily enough. She wielded what sounded like a large sword and had skills with Katon. Then there was Tematsu, who was a Genjutsu expert. He sounded sneaky, robbing people of oxygen and using the fear to fuel his mind tricks. Something like this sounded sort of fascinating to Kuro to be honest, but Kuro decided that Tematsu would be his first target. Kuro had a knack for using fear as fuel to his techniques as well, Genjutsu or not. What was about to happen to Tematsu would seem like a trick of the mind, but he would find that it was in fact very real.

Enhanced Hearing allowed Kuro to pick up on the conversation between the Raikage and the mole Riku, who was reported to be good with Raiton and a bow and arrow. The 5 were on their way. Satoshi planned to strike from where he was. Tematsu and Sasha would fall to Kuro, while he didn't quite know how the others would play out. Tematsu was first, then Sasha next to prevent her helping Remiel and Lumina.

The telepathic link with the large Shadow Crows let Kuro see the 5 unsuspecting Ninja heading in a direction that looked to be going toward the Administration Complex. A Tai Fighter, his female partner, A big woman in armor with a broadsword and a dark dressed and masked individual that fit the description of a Genjutsu user. It seemed almost too good to be true that he was hanging back behind everyone, bringing up their rear. It made stretching the shadows across the ground to grab and drag him into the shadows of the nearby building all that much easier as well...

500 + 1,327= 1,827 words