Title: Shambled Genin
Ship: None
Warnings: bamf!Rookie9, passing!othergeninteams, strong friendship, canon divergence
Disclaimer: I don't own anything. Please read the warnings and decide for yourself whether this fic is something for you or not. This story's content doesn't correlate to the author's life in any shape or form.
Date of Revision: 03/12/18
Support: Every bit of support and constructive criticism is appreciated! Thank you for writing comments, hitting favourite/follow and reading this fanfiction!
In Shambles
Unlike most people tend to think, the Hokage just suggests which teams of the genin graduates seem to harmonize. Teams such as Ino-Shika-Cho are always accepted unless there are more suitable compositions. In the end, the teams are decided by the council and the Hokage can put in a veto if they go too wild.
Sarutobi Hiruzen scrolls through the folders made out of loose papers with the genin and their appointed jonin and freezes. So far, it had been a bit unconventional with his son being the sensei of three non-clan graduates. Well, he guesses somebody else has been deemed better to teach the new Ino-Shika-Cho formation.
He's wrong apparently. Who the hell decided to break them up? Huh... when he thinks about it, it does make sense. While the Ino-Shika-Cho formation is already trained to work together they would miss the trial of having to improvise with others. Even though it's weird to have three boys or two girls on a team, it's not forbidden. The third Hokage takes a drag from his pipe and goes over the last three teams again.
Team 7 with Naruto, Sasuke and Kakashi is exactly what he'd been expecting but to have Nara Shikamaru in it? He thinks about it and then nods. There have been incidents with the girls of that class stalking the young Uchiha. Maybe it's better not to risk a fangirl being on the team to aggravate Sasuke further. Also, Naruto doesn't need any healing due to the Kyuubi's chakra, Sasuke is pretty fast and will activate his Sharingan along the road so his dodging is going to be good and Shikamaru, prone to have a high chakra control with the nature of his clan's jutsus, can always pick up some medical jutsus. He is a genius after all and the general team formation fits the premise of "two highly promising ninja with the dead last firmly squeezed in". Hiruzen agrees with Kakashi as the jonin. The silver-haired man will teach them well if he sees potential. With the last Uchiha, the Kyuubi vessel and the most intelligent clan's heir, the Hokage is sure there is an overflowing pool of just that.
Also, with three boys on the team it'll be nearly impossible for Kakashi to see his own genin team in them. The council has understood the need to bury any resemblances to Nohara Rin for it is a weakness to be constantly reminded of the incident that cost him her life.
Colour Hiruzen impressed. He hadn't thought the council would, after years of having no common sense at all, gain said trait all of a sudden.
He stamps Team 7 as "Hokage approved". Now to Team 8. Normally, a genin team with two kunoichi is bound to be weaker because girls most of the time have less chakra than boys and they aren't as aggressive as their male counterparts with their lack of testosterone. But! As far as he knows, Haruno Sakura and Yamanaka Ino have a harsh rivalry going on. They will be fierce kunoichi and Sakura has no qualms about hitting her classmates. With Aburame Shino as a buffer between them and Yuuhi Kurenai as a strong kunoichi herself he can see that even if the two girls are hesitant to hit the enemy, the genjutsu mistress and adept jonin in general (if she'd just been unusually good at genjutsu she'd be a tokubetsu jonin) will show them how to overcome their weaknesses.
There are other good points for this composition, so Team 8 is approved as well.
Team 10 makes him blink. Genma of all people should teach Akimichi Chouji, Hyuuga Hinata and Inuzuka Kiba? Granted, Chouza had been Genma's jonin sensei so he will know how to teach young Chouji. Perhaps this team is as it is because of the Inuzuka's feral nature and to counter it, two of the most peaceful genin? The Hokage rubs his nose bridge. It could be interesting. Three heavy hitters combined with a tokubetsu jonin known for his analytic mind. Kiba will learn how to assess the situation and how to be stealthy, Hinata will be slowly prodded out of her shell and Chouji can profit from somebody who has knowledge about his clan's techniques.
Interesting... Hiruzen scratches his chin. Interesting indeed. Team 10 isn't as far-fetched as he'd initially thought it to be. He's getting old, he muses, too old to see past the kids' clan affiliations. The council obviously thought about it more thoroughly than he had.
For the last time of the day, he stamps the folder – this time with the number 10 on it.
"Aki-kun?" the old man calls out for the genin corps member.
An unsure "Y-Yes Hokage-sama?" answers him. The boy shuffles into the Third's office. Hiruzen holds out his hand with the folders and puts them in the wide-eyed fourteen year old's arms.
"Please give them to the archive secretary on floor three." With that, Retsu Aki heads off "And Aki-kun?", only to stand ramrod still when the dignified and legendary Sarutobi "The Professor" Hiruzen asks for him once more.
"Y-Y-Yes Hokage-sama?" He doesn't turn around, doesn't want the man to see his shocked face.
Hiruzen raises an eyebrow. Sighing, he says: "Eat and drink something, will you? You look like you'll pass out."
"...Yes Hokage-sama. Archive on floor three, was it, yes? I-I'm just going to put the files there. Now. Excuse me!" Aki runs.
As soon as he gives the secretary the folders, he slumps down in relief when he's reached the outside of the Hokage's tower. Oh god. His hands are shaking. Hopefully, he didn't screw something up, he thinks to himself. "But Hokage-sama would have said something if anything felt amiss!" Aki mumbles incoherently.
Contrary to Hiruzen's belief, the council hasn't gained a sudden bit of sense. No, even though their meeting was packed with powerful shinobi and even ANBU, they had decided to do the genin corps something good by entrusting one of them the newly appointed genin teams. Their fault, really.
Aki had heard about "Uchiha Sasuke and Uzumaki Naruto with..." and that was it. When he had tripped on his way to the Hokage and every paper had fallen out of their folders, he'd nearly begun crying. His father had always told him he'd never be a decent shinobi and then he just had to prove the alcoholic right.
Luckily, Aki possesses a spark of intelligence and sorted the teams according to what he knew and what was obvious. Hatake Kakashi has the Sharingan, right? Of course he'd have the last Uchiha on his team and as mentioned, he overheard Uzumaki being on there as well and from what he remembered someone with an S is the third team member.
Maybe Sakura? No, this didn't seem right. Aki had observed a scene between the Uchiha, the Uzumaki and Sakura. Who in their right minds would put them on a team? No, the council was composed of intelligent men and women (in Aki's naive mind) so they'd never do something so stupid. He knew the Nara were unprejudiced against Uzumaki (against what others were prejudiced, he had absolutely no clue), so he had to be the third member of Team 7!
The other teams were sorted with beads of sweat running down his face and his pumping heart in a tight grip of fear. He didn't want to be thrown out of the genin corps! His fellow mates were all nice. Aki had never felt camaraderie before, definitely not on his own genin team where he'd been bullied for being weak and kicked off of when they hadn't even passed a simple test about teamwork (how the others didn't notice it was about that, he'd never understand). So he put all of his smarts in this task. He could have asked the council but... he was scared.
What if they decided he was unfit to be a genin corps member?
What if they took the last chance of becoming a great shinobi away from him?
The teenager had poured all of his thoughts into it and considered how the council would assort the teams and ended up with... certainly not the correct order. He knew it, too. Aki wasn't idiotic enough to think he hadn't made mistakes but at least the teams would be able to work with the information he had gathered from their Academy evaluation.
That the council intends on failing 66% of the newly graduated genin, he didn't know at the time (and later on, he'd think it plainly stupid).
And then he had given his modified folders to the Hokage. Aki had reasoned that if the old man thought to be something wrong, he'd speak to the council again and they could sort through it.
Now, the fourteen year old is kneeling on the ground and this time, tears of relief flow from his face. He's done it! He isn't going to be sacked! Aki slowly stands up, lets out a heavy breath and shakily follows the Hokage's advise – Ichiraku's it is.