Summary: No one was sure where she came from when they found her after the Kyuubi attacked that fateful day. She was a girl with no past, and presumably no future. Who would have guessed she'd grow up to be a weapons' mistress?

A/N: Poor Tenten, she gets no character development or back story. I feel bad for her. I've been wanting to write a NejiTen story for a long time, something along the lines of a girl next door theme. Well, while I was thinking, once again, about how to go about such a thing, my train of thought wandered off track taking what should have been a simple one shot, and turning it into something more. I totally shouldn't be doing this either. I have too many projects in the works already. But I need to get at least part of it typed out, or I'll lose all of it by morning. Anyway, my girl next door starting point got sidetracked and turned into a "where the heck did Tenten come from, and why doesn't she have a last name?" story. So, this is what my mind thought up in response.

Mandatory Disclaimer: Naruto is not mine. Tenten isn't either. But since the person who owns her wasn't responsible enough to give the poor thing a back story, I'll give her one instead.

Prologue: Mystery Child

It was chaos. Buildings lay crumbled in the streets, corpses of ninja and civilians alike scattered amidst the rubble. The civilian casualties had thankfully been kept to a minimum thanks to a quick evacuation effort, and the fact that Kanoha's population was mostly ninja to begin with, but it was still messy. The ramen stand owner and his young daughter were frantically trying to dig through the remains of their shop in search of the girl's mother, and were soon joined by a silver haired teenager whose forehead protector dipped low over one eye while a mask covered his features beneath his eyes.

With the actual danger sealed away inside the late Hokage's infant son, those who had been fighting were free to help. There was no time to grieve those who had been lost, not yet. They had to help those who had survived, to tend to the injured, and find the lost. As such, the retired Sandaimo stepped forth to once again take charge in his successor's place. The remaining ninja were split into teams. The strongest were given the task of clearing away the rubble left in Kyuubi's wake. The swiftest were charged with gathering civilian's who had fled the village during the attack and may have gotten lost. And any med nin were immediately set to the task of treating injured survivors. A few of the younger ninja were given the task of watching the children in the village so that their parents could help with the recovery.

Maito Gai was one of the strongest ninja in the village, if he was to be believed. But, he was also young, only a teenager. Thus, he had been assigned to the search teams. As he began to wander the remains of the village toward the gate, he sent a sharp look toward the remains of the ramen stand, where his eternal rival seemed to have escaped search duty and was attempting to comfort the owner's tearful young daughter. A call from the leader of the squad Gai had been sent to search with pulled his attention back to the task at hand.

They were to scour the still standing portions of the village as well as the forest beyond. The youthful teen had been sent into an alley between two rows of apartments to look for any signs of life, though having hidden within Kanoha would have been rather foolish, but civilian's didn't always think clearly in moments of panic. The alley seemed perfectly clear to him, anyway, not a sign of life until he turned to walk away and heard a soft whimper. Dark eyes narrowed slightly as he approached the source of the sound. A stand of trash cans.

Whatever was making the noise was clearly trying to suppress it, the next time the whimper reached Gai's ears, it was softer than before, despite his being closer to the source. Carefully, he peeked behind the garbage cans, blinking in surprise at what he found. There was a little girl huddled and shivering in cold and fear as she stared at him with wide brown eyes. The child couldn't have been more than two or three, with soft brown hair barely long enough to be pulled into the twin pigtails it displayed. On her diminutive figure she wore a blue and red Chinese style top, couple with puffy red shorts.

Upon spotting the ninja the toddler recoiled, scooting further back against the wall, murmuring something he didn't quite understand. It almost sounded like a foreign language, but he chalked it up to baby talk. Regardless, it was clear that the attack had left the child terrified. Once more the teenager's gaze swept the alley. There was no sign of anyone else. No adults that could be the girl's parents, no corpses that might have once been them. Looking back at her, the normally boisterous man seemed to instinctively know that shouting would only frighten her further. Slowly, he extended his hand, as one might do when meeting a puppy for the first time.

Deep brown eyes shifted to glance warily at the hand as Gai spoke in words the child couldn't comprehend. Still, she made no move toward him. Not until he smiled. It was the smile that made her trust him, the warmth of his gleaming smile caused her to reach a pudgy little hand out to grasp his.

"There you go, little flower of youth!" He chimed brightly as he swept her into his arms, bouncing her lightly, causing her to give a squeal that sounded like a mix between excitement and nervousness, "Let's go find the others, and see what to do with you!"

Emerging from the alley way, Gai carried the small girl toward the place where he was to meet his squad after sweeping his designated alley before moving on to his next assigned location. As he came into view a certain teenage girl with a rough edge and a skimpy outfit blinked once, then twice, then burst out laughing.

"Wow, Gai! I never saw you as the daddy type!" She called to him in the distance as soon as she had been able to discern it was a child in his arms. The teenage ninja girl doubled over in laughter as the male in question sent her a scowl that was regrettably unyouthful.

"I found her in the alley I was searching, Anko," Gai explained, though of course the teasing girl already knew that, "But there was no sign of who might have left her there."

An older female ninja stepped forward, a medical liaison for their squad, and took the child carefully from Gai's arms, "Well, I'll take care of her now. We'll take her to the med team to make sure she's uninjured. And if no one claims her as their own, she will be taken to the orphanage until she is old enough to live on her own."

As the liaison walked briskly away with the child in her grasp, Gai watched them fade into the disarray of Kanoha. He wasn't sure why, but he had a feeling he hadn't seen the last of that little girl.