The team walked through the village with Takao constantly being evasive about where they were going, but only saying that it was an interesting mission.
A few minutes later, Kudo and his friends scrunched up their noses at the smell of sewers raging throughout the area.
"We are here; your mission is to clean the sewers and restore peace to the villagers of Konoha," Takao said with a smirk, catching the pale faces of his students.
"Nooo!!" Ai shrieked, her hands constantly swatting the smell away. Enya was over on the side, kneeling over as he hurled his guts out. Kudo wanted to sigh in relief, but the smell was on a warpath.
"Well, get to it. Knowing how you are excellent students, I will give you 3 hours to clean this section's 5 sewers. Good luck!" Takao flickered away, his laughter echoing over the horizon.
" Ughh. Eew. Ai was poking the stagnant water with a broomstick. Enya and Kudo were clad in sewage cleaning gear as they dived in, having accepted their demise. "Guys, we are going to this one at a time. The sewers are too large to do alone, and it's about teamwork. I will take care of unplugging the sewage reservoir. Enya handles the discharge. Ai, the scrubbing." Kudo said, and both of them nodded.
Kudo headed to the other end of the sewage reservoir. The design was such that the sewage reservoir was rectangular and sat on a bank, leading down; if it opened, the sewage water went into the channels beneath, meant to funnel the sewage water away from nearby forests.
Reaching the bottom of the slope, he looked overhead at the massive wall and the blocked hole with drippings of water. Investigating the situation, plies of wood were blocking the exit, probably from illegal deforestation. "Haaa, is this what it means to be a shinobi?" Sighing, he got to work; they were forbidden from using dangerous jutsu to avoid damaging the sewer system.
Time marched on, and one sewage reservoir after another, the team eventually finished as they stood over the last sewage reservoir, watching the sewage water funnel out of the reservoir.
"Don't sniff yourself, heck, nobody is seeing me like this," Kudo said, feeling the grime on himself made him shiver in disgust. "Can't you just shut up?" Ai spoke, her fists ready. It was something she had learned: this annoying guy only responded to a beating, something she was ready to dish out right now.
Team 5, looking somewhat clean, headed towards the Hokage's building. Standing right outside was Takao, looking bored out of his mind, turning to them, "So, how was your first mission?" He asked enthusiastically.
"Don't you know, sensei, your clone was with us the whole time!" Ai barked, instead she got a sly grin from Takao, "Good, no matter how menial a job, always pay attention to your surroundings. Anyway, let me go file this in. We still have 19 of these to do." Takao responded, heading into the building. Left outside, Ai was shaking so much that Enya and Kudo just ran. ' I can't blame her, this sucks. I didn't become a shinobi to till the lands or clean sewers. I'm gonna see what Naruto is up to.' Kudo ran on the tiles heading to the apartment district.
A few minutes later,
"I guess he is not in." After having rung the bell several times, there was no answer. Just as he was about to leave, "What are you doing here?" Naruto's voice, laced with anger, came from behind him. Kudo turned to look at a Naruto full of scratches that only added to his whisker lines. His body was a hotbed of claw marks. " Pshh-Hahaha, what the heck happened to you?" Kudo burst out laughing.
"Come in," Naruto beckoned his spirit a bit down, "You have no idea what our sensei made us do! A cat! We spent the day chasing after a lousy ninja cat. That thing was so fast. If it weren't for my being able to walk on walls, we wouldn't have caught it, but hehe, you should have seen its face when I squished it. Hmph, serves it right." Naruto collapsed onto the ground, chuckling, but hearing no response, he turned to see Kudo shaking in fury.
"A CAT?! You guys were chasing cats while we had to clean sewers, huh?" Kudo sat down in defeat. "Ohh, so that's it. No wonder you smell funny!" Naruto, pointing at him, exclaimed with a eureka look of triumph.
Kudo smelled himself a bit, groaning after, "I guess I'm heading to the bath house, are you coming?" Kudo asked as he stood. "Of course." Naruto rushed after him. Walking down the streets, Naruto still received some glares, but they had reduced a lot. Kudo, for some time, was treated as a freak for being friends with the demon fox brat during their academy days, but it wasn't something some vengeful pranks could solve. Now, around the village, they were to give them whatever they wanted unless someone wanted trouble.
Evening,
Kudo headed home after a long and tiring day; he craved sleep after a warm bath. Getting home, the lights were out, and for a moment, a shock and fear of that day came to him, but he was soon calmed by the sudden realization that his mother had left with the merchant group to do work outside the village.
'I hope nothing happens,' his thoughts circled to his family. She was the only thing giving virtue to his life, and he didn't want to lose her because then his path would have no meaning. His path was one of strength to protect, just like his father had told him on the eve of his successful acceptance into the shinobi academy.
'Tomorrow is the day I master the water style; waterwall jutsu. C rank jutsu are indeed difficult; it's been 5 days since I have been focusing solely on it. I am comfortable with the hand seals its just a matter of speed.
In the headquarters of the root;
"Damn you, Hiruzen, so this was your ploy, hmph. It's time for the resurrection of Root. You need me, Hiruzen. This village needs me." Danzo snarled, his face laced with frustration. He was being isolated, but not for long: "Shadows cannot be eradicated; they always claw to the surface." His eyes glinted with revenge; a Sharingan gleamed in his left eye. Though he had lost Shisui's eye, he had plenty of Sharingan at his disposal.