Hanako ran alongside Kabuto and Team 7, Momiji on her back and the pups safely returned to the Summoning Realm—despite their many protests. Clean, dressed in a fresh set of clothing conveniently stored in her seal, and her head wound healed by Kabuto's iryo ninjutsu, she felt much better. Sakura had brought her up to date while they washed up, telling Hanako about the Oto nin's attack on Sasuke. Luckily, Orochimaru had gone after her instead of the Uchiha, so both he and Naruto had been able to fight them off. Sakura still cut her hair, though, and Hanako was a little glad her meddling hadn't robbed the other girl of her first big step toward character development—one of the only ones Kishimoto had ever given her, the miser.

The closer they got to the tower, the higher their chances of being ambushed became. She knew something else happened to the team in canon, but she couldn't remember what.

Without warning, she felt a nauseating film drape over her mind. A genjutsu! Luckily, the seal on her mind which rendered her immune to the Yamanaka hiden techniques also granted her some immunity to most basic illusions. Unfortunately, because of this, she'd never felt the need to study them and would likely fall victim to one cast by anyone with actual skill.

Everyone needed a weakness, right?

Privately resolving to add genjutsu to her study regimen, she reached up and flicked Momiji's ear. The dog startled.

"What was that for?"

Hanako held a finger to her lips, raising an eyebrow in silent signal.

The group stopped for a breather and she seized her chance.

"Gimme a sec, I'll be right back."

She turned her back on the group and ducked out of sight, followed only by the sound of Sakura explaining why no one should follow her. Heh.

Once they were alone, she and Momiji exchanged a heavy glance. Forming the hand sign for kawarimi, Hanako waited until the Papillon's brown eyes widened in understanding. In the next instant, they'd traded places, human and dog conveniently henged into each other. Hanako then kawarimi'd with a cluster of leaves she'd loaded with chakra a few trees back, filling the air with smoke as she left. To anyone watching, it would look like Momiji had unsummoned herself.

And there were people watching.

She'd forgotten the details of the attack on the way to the tower, but she did remember Naruto exposing his massive chakra reserves to Kabuto as a result. They all got out of it ok and everyone made it to the next round, so she didn't have to worry about them. Dropping her henge as silently as she could, she leapt higher into the trees, falling back on the knowledge that most of the shinobi participating in the Exams hailed from lands without significant tree cover. Most of them wouldn't instinctively know to look.

Following behind her group, she kept a diligent eye out for whoever cast the genjutsu. So far, they were doing a pretty good job of staying hidden. Pulling down her mask, Hanako scented the air. Leaves, dirt, animals, people; nothing that didn't necessarily belong.

Drat.

Covering her face, she watched as the others began wandering in circles, no doubt caused by the genjutsu. Then, they stopped and began...shadow boxing? The illusion must have changed to include combat. A kunai flew from the trees, grazing Kabuto's arm.

Aha!

Hanako quickly made her way to the kunai's point of origin, careful to keep herself both out of sight and downwind. The attackers turned out to be a trio of genin from Ame.

Ame, as in Nagato.

As in Pein.

Shit.

Wait, no. This could be a valuable opportunity. If she could get these guys to send word back to Nagato, maybe warning him about Obito, then she might be able to mitigate some of the damage the Akatsuki would cause in the future.

Maybe.

No. No, that was a stupid idea. These guys wouldn't tell Nagato anything just because she told them to. She'd need a little insurance.

Settling down on the conveniently wide tree branch, she pulled her fuinjutsu kit from her seal. Unrolling a paper tag, she dipped her smallest brush into the ink.

Compulsion seals were tricky. She normally used seals to negate actions, not encourage. It was just easier that way; it cost less chakra and did less damage to the minds of her victims—ahem, opponents! A compulsion seal involved implanting a foreign desire into an otherwise sound mind. If the afflicted noticed the compulsion...well...everyone knew what happened to Rin.

Why couldn't she have been reborn back then? She could have completely circumvented all of Obito's nonsense just by saving one person. Ugh.

So, the compulsion had to be subtle enough to go unnoticed but strong enough to be obeyed. Hmmm. How to do it?

Maybe...targeting Konan would be better. She was less...stabby. She didn't want to kill the poor kids. She was also more likely to be seen in public than Nagato or his Peins. Yeah. Yeah, that could work.

Decided, she began outlining the basic components of the seal. So, when whoever got this thing saw Konan, they'd be compelled to speak to her. She was nice—sort of—and these guys were kids, so she'd probably listen.

Looking over the framework, Hanako sighed. Making people do things was one thing, but making them say things...

Ugh.

The sounds of fighting intensified and she knew she was running out of time. Hastily adding in a phrase she hoped would make sense, she added chakra to the seal to activate it. Now, all she needed was skin contact.

Looking down at the Ame genin below her, she called up her silk threads from within her seal and launched them down. The chakra laden strings wrapped around an unsuspecting boy and pulled him up. His scream alerted his teammates, of course, but it also alerted hers. Team 7 was upon them before they could come after her and Hanako made her way up higher in the trees. A swift hit to the temple had the boy unconscious and she quickly undid the fastenings of his khaki body suit. Rolling him over, she pressed the seal between his shoulder blades and filled it with chakra. The longer she held it there, the deeper the seal would adhere. Once she was confident it lay on the lowest layer of dermis, at least, she redressed the boy and tied him to the tree trunk.

Naruto scrunched his face at her when she joined them down below.

"Hana-chan! You knew there was a genjutsu!" He crossed his arms with a huff. "Why didn't you say anything?"

"Mah," she said with a shrug. "I didn't want to risk tipping them off. I found them, didn't I?"

Naruto grumbled, clearly still dissatisfied. Sasuke regarded her coolly before turning to his blond teammate.

"Go and grab their scroll, dobe. The tower is right there."

Ah, the tower. Hanako felt her body drooping at the thought. Soon, she'd have a hot bath and fresh food.

Momiji leapt onto her shoulder, agitating a bruise and making Hanako hiss in the process.

Yes, a bath would be wonderful.