"Headband off," Kosuke barked an order, the first time I had ever sensed urgency from him, "Keep your sunglasses on at all times."

I obeyed, hastily taking off my Konoha headband and stashing it within my pack. My sunglasses, which had previously perched on the tip of my nose to leave my eyes exposed, were pushed up to conceal my eyes. Even in the hotel room, far away from the four Iwa nin, I couldn't help but feel anxious.

"Kusa is relatively neutral ground. So the chances that they would pick a fight with us here are... somewhat slim. Admittedly, higher than I would like." Kosuke sighed, "Prepare for combat if needed, but let's just stay in the hotel room for now, okay? No tourism for us, I suppose."

"We will have to venture out to find our client eventually, yes?"

"Yes, we will. And we'll plan around them if we must," Kosuke said, "The likelihood that we'll run across them in a village of this size probably isn't too high either."

I nodded.

"What can you tell me about the Iwa nin? How about chakra? Potential threat level?"

I zeroed back in and refocused on the four of them. One larger man, with a highly developed chakra system. Jounin, if I had to guess. Two smaller ones, genin, I think. And one that was perhaps chunin-level, give or take.

I told Kosuke this.

"Physical features?"

"Jounin one is a rather sickly looking man, crazy spiky light brown hair," I said, following the four of them around as they walked around Kusa, "One of the genin ones is a boy. Short black hair, brown eyes, pale skin. The other genin one has long black hair, blue eyes. And the chunin one..."

I paused, my breath catching. I took another look.

...

Tiny Deidara!?

"... long blonde hair. Blue eyes," I reported back to Kosuke.

He was about my age, actually. He looked to be a year or two older than I, probably. I scanned him more thoroughly than I did the others in the squad. There was a notable lack of mouth-hands. I'm pretty sure it was Deidara, though.

What were the chances?

Kosuke sighed, leaning back in the creaking wooden chair in which he was sitting, "Iwa does border Kusa, and is on pretty good terms with Kusa, as every country is. It's not surprising that if we're here, they would be too."

"Hm. So what do we do in the meantime before the client gets here?" I asked. We were effectively stuck hiding from the Iwa nin up here, and it wasn't as though there was much to do.

"Keep watch over the Iwa nin. Observe their movements for as long as you can before your eyes get strained," Kosuke said, "At the very least, you'll be getting some decent reconnaissance practise out of this."

And so I watched, focusing pale eyes on the four Iwa nin.

Tiny Deidara gave a light smile at the comment of one of his teammates, the jounin in their squad walking ahead with a grave expression on his face, crazy brown hair waving in the wind. They walked in a street near the northern border of my visual limit.

And day thus was spent uneasily cooped up within the hotel. Lingering dread lightly dusted the room as my eyes flicked back and forth keeping watch over the four Iwa nin. Why were they to roam around in the streets of Kusagakure while we were to stay here?

But a fight would not do, so we waited tensely in thick silence.