It was early morning, and the sun was shinning bright and warm on Ichigo’s face from where she lay in the grass. Though it was early her heart was beating fast and her breath was ragged.

The past few weeks she had been training as hard as her body let her. She hadn’t even slept the past few days, and spent the nights dancing with her rain instead. Now she lay there, out of chakra and energy, letting the early sun dry off her soaking cloths.

It felt like her eyelids were drooping, but she couldn’t really tell if they were. Since there were no chakra signatures around, her world would be dark even if her eyes were open. With a sigh she rolled over onto her stomach, and into a small ball. Right now was the perfect time for a cat nap even though it was hard to get to sleep.

The reason she had been training so hard was that Yanagi had signed her up for the upcoming chunnin exams, saying it was about time she progressed. It was also why she was training so hard. She wanted to become a chunnin so badly, and all because of what had happened just a few days after Obito’s funeral.

The three children stood in the Hokage’s office. The old man was staring at them while taking long drags from his long pipe.

“I know that the ideal replacement for young Obito is Ichigo, but I simply can’t allow her to join your team.”

“But why!” Kakshi shouted his first balling up. Rin was hold Ichigo tightly, since the small girl had begun to cry.

“She isn’t a ninja of our village. She was never a gennin, and never registered.”

“Neither did I old man.” Minato said, forgetting that he should try to be the least bit polite.

“You were at least in the academy for a bit before you were taken for training, plus as soon as you came back you were given the rank of gennin, and a team.”

“Then why can’t you do that for Ichigo?”

The old Hokage sighed and took another long drag.

“She isn’t a member of our village. I have sent a letter to the Raikage. He has yet to send a reply, but until then things will go on as normal. You four may leave now.”

When Ichigo had gotten home, she told Yanagi all about the meeting. Her teacher just ran out of the house, coming back saying that she had signed up her student for the exams. Every one was looking forward to the exams, a thing of pleasure and entertainment after the long war.

Of coarse there was only one small problem with Ichigo being signed up.
She didn’t have a team. And without a team, she couldn’t participate.

So basically she was working her ass off for nothing. The only incomplete teams were already all chunnin or higher. Also none of the other gennin teams that were signed up had missions right now with the exam in only a few days. So with no chance of them loosing a team mate, there would be no slot for her.

With a sigh she rolled over again, and than lay there still, until she fell into a dreamless sleep.

When Ichigo awoke her noticed two things:

One was that someone was poking her

Two was that she didn’t know this person.

Now as Kakashi, Obito, Minato, Kushina, and Jiryah had all painfully found out, no one is ever aloud to poke her when she first wakes up. If the man hadn’t been an ANBU then he would have found himself with a small, but deep, shoe print imbedded into his face.

“The Hokage wishes to see you.” said the ANBU as he picked a leave out of his hair before jumping away. Ichigo sat there and watched him leave, before sluggishly getting up and slowly walking over to the Hokage’s tower.

--

When she got there she first noticed the two sullen looking children sitting by the Hokage’s desk. One was a girl, her blonde hair tied back into a thin braid. The other was a boy with very light brown hair. Though all Ichigo could see was the light blue chakra of the boys, and the incredibly strange one of the girls. Along the perimeter, near her skin, it was a brilliant blue. But, when you got closer and closer to the core, the blue was over being over taken. It faded from blue, to purple, to at the very center a bright splotch of brilliant red that reminded Ichigo of fire, or freshly spilt blood.

The Hokage turned to the shocked young girl and smiled.

“Ichigo, let me introduce Yugito and Sendo from the Cloud, they are going to be your new team mates.”