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However even those simple-sounding actions, to a ninja who was trained as Anko had been opened up a whole world for her to dive into. From such exploration she was all but certain of a plethora of skills Naruto had and was still developing even if, as she suspected, he was completely unaware of their existence.

Firstly his observational skills were keener than most Academy students and one or two genin she'd seen; how Kakashi's last would-be team had been expected to pass when the dead-last of the threesome needed someone to pick his nose for him when he didn't have his glasses on was completely beyond her. In some ways he really was a mouse, or a squirrel was perhaps more accurate, scurrying around looking for tasty acorns to store and bury. No wonder Muruda-san says he gets a lot of scrap out of him; watching him hold another battered weapon, this one a length of snapped chain that looked like it had come from a misfiring trap mechanism, to the morning light to examine it, the Snake Mistress had grudgingly accepted that the weaponsmith had been right in one regard; by the time he's gone over the training grounds the genin can't find anything – like a field of corn after the locusts have gone through.

Apart for observation and as she'd suspected from very-early morning and late-night workouts, his stamina was impressive though his actual strength and speed, when not over very short distances at least, weren't quite at genin level, though give him time and he would get there, he was only six. His flexibility though, now that was something she had an interest in; though she might have to do some fancy verbal fencing to sweet-talk Sarutobi around, she inwardly swore to herself that by the end of the month Naruto would be able to dislocate at least one of his joints and have the basics of escapology down pat. Aside from his body though, what she saw of his mind confused her slightly; when at work and even when getting some training with the nin he met on the field, some of whom she knew and some of whom were strangers to her, he seemed pretty much like a regular kid talking to an adult; he was attentive, asked a lot of questions and was occasionally happy-go-lucky and a little hyper, especially if he managed to do something right.

Occasionally though, very occasionally, she sensed hidden depths to this veneer of normality; a kind of genius that terrified her almost as much as it caught her intrigue; she'd seen it already in his figuring out a way to climb trees and, having been regaled with the tale of how Slim had come into being when she finally caught note of the stick strapped to the side of his rucksack, the chunin realised such flashes of inspiration weren't isolated events. But what brings them out in him?; it was part of the puzzle she hadn't slotted into place yet – what made him think of such off-the-wall solutions to problems that should, much like some of the weapon she'd watched him wriggle up a tree to get, have been beyond him? She didn't know but the ability was there – all she had to do was find a way to bring it out in him more often.

The Mouse of Konoha, Chapter 5