Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any other affiliated characters, locations or ideas. I do own all original content including characters, locations, jutsu and plot lines. Likeness to any real people or places is unintentional and coincidental. This work of fiction is rated M for adult language, adult situations, and heavy violence. Pairing will be OC-Temari.
- Prologue -
Little Outcast. The Devil's Child. Shit-face. Button-eyes. Captain Combustable. These are only a few of the names people have given to me, some admittedly worse than others; but one rarely gets the honor of choosing how their seen by the judgemental public of a city as large as the Hidden Sand - a place said to be the Eden of the Desert. Although I was legally born as Noriyama Junichi, that name isn't often used, if ever, by the general population. Not since the day I was "orphaned". Yes, I know it's rather cut-and-paste, right? What sets me apart is that both of my parents are still alive... I'm just the only one who knows it. I'll spare you the details, but suffer it to say that my parents had the most unique way to escape their problem child that I've ever heard - they had sex on an extremely hot day and got so worked up that the house caught fire and crashed down around them. Yeah.
I'm the little Outcast; and with the Kazekage as my witness, I hope I never see those bastards again!
Pilot Chapter: Escape From a False Eden
- Sunagakure academy -
Sand crunched against the bottom of his boots as the young man, Junichi, drew to a stop in front of the audience chamber of the air-conditioned ninja school. His heart quickened it's pace as he stared at the closed door - the thin wooden barrier stood between him and what he knew was his destiny; he was the child of two elite ninja afterall. Junichi took a deep, steadying breath, pausing to ensure that he hadn't forgotten to put on his pants, before brushing aside all of his fears and thrusting open the portal to his future! His grin couldn't have been wider as he crossed through the doorway like a God. Until his shoulder crashed very unimpressively into the frame and nearly threw him off balance. If he had a reputation it would have been ruined... As it was, a kid called "Shit-face" by half of the village didn't have very far to fall.
A thin chorus of chuckles, snorts, and giggles filled the room, bringing Junichi's attention to the crowd of preteen academy graduates seated in the bleachers circumventing the audience chamber. With a sigh, he suffered the injustice of being picked apart by the jeering children as he corrected himself and made a proper bee-line for the woman standing in the center of the chamber with a sly grin of her own etched into her spectacled face. "Red Sands... Is he really wearing a tee-shirt with only one sleeve? ...and it's even in the same overused tan color everyone wears...!" one little girl lamented witheringly to her neighbor. "I know! I thought his cargo shorts were a nice touch, but black is way over-used, too; isn't it?" the girl's neighbor instigated as well, the two either ignorant of - or more likely, dispassionate of - Junichi's feelings. "He's scrawny as Hell and has green hair. Is he a carrot?" an overweight brat grunted, much to the chamber's racousious entertainment.
Thankfully, he was able to block out the children until finally approaching the instructor, offering the woman only a sheepish shrug and wry smile - telling of his adamant resilience to their comments. They had hurt his feelings, true; yet all he had to do was change his clothes to set things right. They'd be ugly forever. However, before he could mutter a word, the amused teacher gently touched him on his sleeveless arm - sending a shiver through his body on contact - and spoke in a whisper. "You're a little too early, sensei; you're not supposed to pick up a team until after lunch." Shizuhara-sensei urged humorously, her eyes glinting with laughter.
Junichi knew what it was all about, too. Graduates of the academy were always between the ages of nine to twelve - while he was the ripe age of fifteen. See, it was common in the Hidden Sand for a ninja in their mid-teens to be capable of attaining the rank of jounin; but no one would ever risk being caught as a teenaged STUDENT. With a heavy sigh, Junichi leaned just a little closer to the teacher and whispered back, "My name is Noriyama... I trained myself using my parent's ninjutsu scrolls."
"Noriyama?" Shizuhara-sensei returned in a hush, her brown eyes widening behind her wire-frame eyeglasses in realization of Junichi's true identity. "Wait; didn't all of 'their' scrolls burn up while they were..."
"...library books about my parent's accomplishments...? Documentary films...?" Junichi corrected himself weakly, leaning closer to the woman with a stupid grin on his face.
"...and the Kazekage authorized placing you in one of our teams?"
"..." Junichi chuckled softly as he glanced away from the woman, unable to look her in the eyes. "Well, not personally... but Temari-san thinks I'll make an excellent Sandstorm-Trooper."
"...those are shock troops we use to distract enemies when we need to flank them with our real ninjas..." Shizuhara explained through the growing blue tint covering her face, "They die pretty fast, you know..."
"...you have to start somewhere..." Junichi tried valiently, fully aware that the room had grown deathly quiet in the graduate's attempts to overhear their hushed conversation; the attention caused his skin to tingle. He'd just have to put up with it if he was going to slip in and join the ranks of shinobi, though.
"Get out of my academy, Shit-face."
- Sunagakure Shopping District -
Junichi lay motionless in the shadow of a building with his hands clasped over his stomach and his eyes drinking in the passersby as they went about their daily grind. Now, he wasn't really fuming over having been physically thrown out of the school by the teacher and all of the preteen nutcases, but having lost his chance to become a genin certainly ruined all of his plans for the day. "Ah, who am I kidding; I'm pissed!" Junichi scowled as he kicked at a scorpion that was minding its own business, of which brandished its claws and stinger threateningly. "Shut up. I don't need you getting on my case too, little punk."
"You'd better be careful, Captain Combustable; he might kick your ass if you can't even become a genin at your age." a taunting familiar voice teased, signaling Junichi to look up and spot a young blonde kunoichi casually walking along a sandstone bridge, one that connected two buildings on either side of the bustling desert street. Just his luck that she happened to wander by at this exact moment. Then again, knowing the girl she'd probably been waiting for the perfect moment to pop out and make a dig at him. Junichi sighed as the young girl flipped out over the bridge and leapt down onto the ground near him, grinning as she crushed the scorpion with her landing.
"Yeah right, I'm probably already on a jounin level... they just never give me the chance to prove it. You should talk to someone about that, Temari-san." Junichi returned in a snarky tone, moving only to brush off sand that had been kicked onto his leg when the girl plummeted from the heavens. Would that make her an angel? he wondered. "Yeah right; who's ever heard of a thirteen-year-old angel?" he scoffed.
"What are you talking about all of a sudden?" Temari chuckled, unable to stop herself from crossing her arms, cocking her hips and allowing a smug little smirk to cross her lips. His only response was a shrug, dismissing his comment with the wave of his hand. "Anyway... I'm bored as Hell, so why don't you come on out of the shadows and talk to me. Or we can get all hot and sweaty..."
"Are you flirting with me?" Junichi accused in surprise as he shook his head, rubbing his eyes as an act to prove that he wasn't dreaming. Damn, he knew that he was a good-looking guy, but to be so up-front about it...!
Temari's usually pale face went even whiter mere seconds before an angry redness spread over her cheeks. "Definitely not!" she shouted indignantly as she grabbed him up by the tee-shirt and thrust him against the building he'd been leaning against. "I meant that we could do some training or practice with my father's scrolls!" she clarified rather harshly.
Junichi was more than a little grateful that she hadn't used her iron-fan to correct him. This time, anyway. Chuckling weakly, the teenager gently took his genin companion by the wrists, and then firmly yanked her arms away from his shirt. "I was kidding. If you want to know the truth; the only thing I want to do right now is go home and take a nap. I woke up at the butt-crack of dawn for absolutely nothing. I don't mean to sound like a jerk or some whiney prick, but I didn't get anything accomplished by going to the academy for a team so now I'm in a bad mood."
"Hah." Temari sneered as she pried her limbs free of his grip, using her own sweat to grease the way, "It's too bad, because that's exactly what you sound like, you nerd! Why don't you just move to Konoha or something? Coward. Sleeze. Baka!" the blonde genin shouted scathingly, completely disregarding the curious stares from the too-nosey crowd doing their best to pretend that they weren't watching the scuffle. A fight between the Kazekage's daughter and "The Outcast" wasn't the most anticipated fight in the village, but it was free entertainment none-the-less.
"Tch... bitch." The wind stopped blowing as Temari stared incomprehensively into his face; she was far, far too stunned to even begin processing what he had just said to her. The crowd grew silent; some of the wiser few increased their pace and left as quickly as they could. "What I meant was..." Junichi stammered in an attempt to rectify the situation, however, even he knew that there was no turning back now. Without muttering another word, the teenaged wannabe ninja hastily threw three smoke bombs to the ground to mask his escape before tearing into the rooftops and sprinting for his life.
Finally recovering from her eternity of stupification, Temari shouted loudly enough to strain her throat as she bellowed into the sky, "I swear that I'm going to send Gaara after you for that!" Needless to say, the crowd surrounding the abandoned girl dispersed very quickly. Some even ran.
Junichi didn't stop running until his apartment came into view, and even then not until he dove in through an open window and slammed the wooden shutter. Gasping for breath, the shaken teen glanced down at his hands and chuckled weakly, muttering "That was a stupid thing to do." as he shook his head in disbelief. After several long moments to calm his jackhammer heart and panting breath, the outcast - living in a single's apartment off of the inheritance from his parents - decided that the first thing he was going to do was lie low for a couple hours. After that... "Iwagakure might be a good idea; I hear all you have to do is draw blood from one of the instructors and you're automatically eligible to take the genin exam." First things first, though: he needed water and he needed it now.
He sighed as he finished off the entire glass of water in a single gulp. Helplessly staring into the empty glass in deep thought, Junichi shook his head in disappointment at how his life had turned out up to this point. "I seem to be some kind of fuck-up, though; so maybe Konohagakure might be a good fit afterall. They accept anyone, I hear." he murmured in reflection of his earlier concept of the Hidden Rock. Thus, with that decision made, the teenaged wannabe set about packing for his trip; he wouldn't be coming back to this little dust ball, so he knew that he'd have to pack intelligently.
- Two hours later -
Junichi took a deep, steadying breath as he shifted his heavy pack to redistribute the weight on his shoulders; this was the moment that would define the rest of his life and he knew it. With his charcoal eyes as hard as steel, the young man emboldened his step and threw his front door wide, allowing himself to be blasted by the hot desert sun. As a civilian with no parents there was really nothing that could stop him from leaving, and no one that would give chase to drag him back. Temari certainly wouldn't. "Gaku!" Junichi grunted as he crashed face-first into the rock-solid chest of a uniformed shinobi.
"Are you 'Shit-face'?" the middle-aged juggarnaught demanded in a baritone voice. The man radiated the kind of quiet power that commanded authority; likely one of the reasons why he'd been promotted to jounin so early in his life.
Grumbling, Junichi backed away a couple steps and gazed way up into the shinobi's face. Oddly enough the man had half of his face hidden behind a turban flap, with a red marcking tattooed into his other cheek. He knew this man pretty well, due mostly to his recent interactions with the Kazekage's only daughter. Clearing his throat, Junichi addressed the man the way only a teenaged boy would, "Among other names, yeah. What the Hell do you want now, Baki-sensei?"
"There's been a complaint from one of our academy instructors that you've been disrupting her class and making a mockery of the Kazekage." Baki replied moments before withdrawing a sharp kunai from a pouch at his belt, causing Junichi's blood to run cold ans his eyes grow wide. "Your punishment is..." in one swift motion the straps of his bag were split and the entire pack fell to the gound with a solid crash, throwing the teen off balance and forcing him to catch his footing quickly. "Community Service for the rest of the day. It would probably be in your best interest to do as I say, or this knife will become plunged into your heart instead."
"What, you guys don't exile anyone anymore?" Junichi grumbled coldly, his eyes still fixed worriedly on the jounin's knife. "I could be out of the country before the sun goes down and you wouldn't have to do a damn thing."
"Not this time, 'Shit-face'. Now, come." Baki commanded as he grabbed Junichi roughly by the collar of his tee-shirt, his grip so strong that the boy had no chance of breaking free. This was the man trusted with teaching the children of the kazekage, afterall. Junichi groaned, but realized that he was now up shit creek with no paddle; again his plans for the day were trashed.
It was only twenty more minutes before Baki shoved him towards what looked eerily reminicent of a pickaxe chain-gang, tasked with breaking sandstone from the surrounding mesas into large chunks for use in building. "Take the boulder at the top of that pile and break it down into gravel. Unless you fuck around, you should be done before nightfall. Otherwise you can leave as soon as you're finished." Baki instructed dutifully.
"Could I have some water first, at least?" Junichi demanded, though only to be a rebellious ass. Without grunting a word, his jounin supervisor grabbed a plastic canteen from a folding table provided for the prisoners and tossed it dispassionately to Junichi. After taking a large gulp, the teen stuffed the canteen into one of the large pockets in his over-done black cargo shorts and sighted up to the top of the pile of rocks. With no choice in the matter, he scaled the mountain of rocks without event and groaned as he heavted the heavy boulder. There was no way he was going to stagger down the pile with the chunk, so he simply tossed it to the ground and jumped down after it.
Another jounin was waiting for him with a pick in his hand; he was one of the men assigned to keep an eye on the prisoners. Junichi grabbed the tool from the man before turning to the stone and lifting his axe into the air. "Ouch! This is complete bullshit..." the teen grumbled as he flexed his right hand - his pick had struck a solid part of the stone and sent painful vibrations along the handle and into his arms.
"Ha ha, you're not much for being the Devil's Child, are you?" one of the filthy former-muggers laughed coarsly, pausing in breaking down his own rock to jeer at the newcomer. "Why don't you just melt the damn thing and be done with it... but I guess there aren't any women 'round here to get busy with, are there? Ha!"
"Fuck you." Junichi sneered as he brought the pick down again, growling when it stung his hands once more.
A new wave of laughter filled the canyon, forcing Junichi to growl and return his attention to the prisoner he was trading barbs with, who was now pointing his pick at the teenager and grinning wide enough to display his rotted teeth. "Oho; I haven't been in jail long enough for that, princess. From what I hear you're on a pretty good path leading you down this road, so maybe I'll see you later and take you up on the offer!" The catcalls were sickening, but the only thing Junichi could do about it was break his boulder down into gravel quickly enough to get away from the man before he ended up killing him - proving the moron correct in the process.
He swore again when his pick came down, but rather than bouncing off and hurting him again, the tip became lodged in the rock. "Is this some kind of sick joke to you, or something?" he growled as he pulled hard on the handle of his tool, though it refused to pry free. It had already been an hour at this point since he started and his muscles were already tiring from the strain of working so long in the scorching sun; he didn't have the strength to rip it free.
"...and to think that a weak little shit like you thought that you could become a shinobi in MY Hidden Sand village." Baki sneered coldly as he shoved Junichi out of the way and ripped the pick from the boulder with only his right hand; he tossed the impliment heartlessly into the sand before returning to the shade of the supervisor's tent. "Drink some fucking water and get back to work."
Junichi swore under his breath as he bent over to collect the mining pick, but before he could stand he noticed something half-buried in the sand that hadn't been there before. Ignoring Baki's command, he collected the new object as well before standing upright and inspecting it in his hand. A large chip had come free when Baki ripped the axe out of the rock; when all he had done this entire time was riddle the entire boulder with cracks and flakes. "Wait a minute..." he whispered as he dropped the pick and approached the rock, crouching over it and gently dragging his fingers over the dusty surface and muttering to himself.
"Holy shit - if he starts banging that rock I'm getting out of here!" one of the sweating prisoners proclaimed with a sickened look on his face, evoking a round of laughter from the others in the chain-gang. He was shot down by one of the shinobi guards however, informing him that his only two choices were to sit and watch him have sex with a rock or get back to work. As the prisoner did as commanded, the guard sighed and turned towards Baki, "What I want to know is why you're just letting him get away with this shit. I'd expect a mighty jounin like yourself to be on top of things like this."
"Shut up for a second." Baki commanded, not even worried that the guard was another jounin. "I may have judged him too harshly before." he realized as Junichi compared the chip to different parts of the stone. "That little piece of trash is checking for weaknesses; he's going to switch from random powerful swings to more precise strikes. It's what a ninja would do."
True to the jounin's suspicions, after downing another gulp of precious water, Junichi spun the axe more confidently in his hand as he took aim at his target. "Duriya!" he cried in effort as he brought the sharp tip down on the softer, grittier part of the rock. Sparks flew and the sound of metal striking a hard surface rang out, but a larger crack than normal cut into the rock; one more strike and an large chunk fell free and landed in the sand - it too had a crack already forming through it. "Ha! None shall stand against the might of Captain Combustable!" Junichi shouted as he brought his weapon down on the crack, shattering the chunk into smaller shards. "The Outcast of the Hidden Sand!" he cried, breaking a shard into smaller pebbles. "I'm the Devil's Child who inherits the Flame of Death! Those who meet my blackened eyes all shall die!" he laughed with a burning fire raging in his chest, the gleaming pick singing as he drew it back for the final blow, purposfully coating the tool with his chakra.
Sand crunched underfoot as Baki strode out from under the protection of the tent, carefuly tilting his head to avoid a flying peice of debris launched by the force of Junichi's strike. "You forgot Shit-face," he started, but in a flicker of blurred movement, Baki's arm shot out and caught the wooden shaft of the pick, stopping the sharp tip from digging into his chest. "You had better fucking tell me that you were so excited that you acted out of reflex, otherwise I'll tear you to shreds using only my bare hands."
Junichi stared in wide-eyed horror, gulping helplessly while transfixed in place by the refined fury of the practiced killer glaring at him from behind half of a veil. "It must have been the heat..." he supplied weakly, barely noticing that his knuckles had gone white from refusing to relent in his grip on the axe. "If I'm going to die, at least give me a fighting chance, okay?" he begged in a resigned tone.
"It took you four hours to do a twenty-minute job. Refil your fucking water and follow me, Shit-face." Baki sneered coldly as he yanked the pick from Junichi's hand and tossed it to the jounin he'd been conversing with. Junichi was getting more fed up with the lack of information than the title he'd been given - it was most common among the middle-aged adults anyway. So, after emiting a scoff, the teenager did as ordered, hardly bothering to walk very fast after tucking the canteen into his pocket again.
- Sunagakure -
Temari waved down one of the guards standing between her and the Kazekage's audience chamber, ducking around the young man to enter her father's office. Ever the impertinant young woman, Temari crossed her arms and frowned at the shadow of her father from behind his veil rather than falling into a respectful kneel. "Hey, old man? You remember what I told you earlier?"
"What do you want, Temari?" the Wind-Shadow grumbled in a frustrated growl. "Do you want to take back your request to send your brother after that boy? The one you call Corporal Explosion."
"It's Captain Combustable, daddy." his daughter corrected with a frown. "...he's a little annoying, but no one else treats me like a person except him. Don't think that I really care that much, but I don't really want him to die yet." Temari claimed, cocking her hips and shrugging to show her indifference.
"I didn't send your brother out to kill anyone, Temari. That boy is performing community service with your sensei for disturbing our latest graduating class of genin; you can see him tomorrow after your emotional training class."
"Ugh! I hate those lessons!" Temari complained, irritably glaring at her father through his screen.
"That's exactly why you're taking them, princess." one of the Kazekage's guards teased, moving forward on command to escort the girl from the room. When she was gone, the jounin turned back to the seated Kazekage and shook his head contemptuously. "I don't mean to tell you how to raise your own children, but I don't think that she should be consorting with that boy - he's a terrible influence and a rotten excuse for a ninja."
"I agree, Iguchi. I want you to figure out a way to keep those two apart without making it seem too obvious. You may engineer his death if it comes to it - he does not concern me." the Yondaime commanded. Turning to one of his assistants, he instructed to have Shizuhara-sensei summoned, claiming, "I expect her to have the genin exams from the jounin prepared for my authorization by now."
- Streets of Suna -
Junichi was already in a pretty sour mood, all things considered; unfortunately there wasn't anything he could do about his recent brush with injustice. Even had Baki been a member of the Sunagakure police force, they still answer to the Kazekage: a man who sat as dictator above the masses. He walked in an enraged silence, glowering at Baki's back as the two wove their way back to Junichi's house - he already recognized the path. What was unusual, however, was that Baki suddenly took a right turn through an ally rather than leading him to the intersection ahead. "Good, a shortcut will get me home sooner." Baki did not answer him, though. As they walked he couldn't help but notice that the alleyway had gotten wider suddenly - the buildings along the next street were spaced further apart than the last.
He was about to mention a better shortcut to his house when without warning, Baki leapt up into the rooftops and crouched on a ledge. A trap sprung around the teen while he was distracted with following his escort's movement - two barriers burst from the ground, extending from wall-to-wall and forming an open top box around Junichi. Before he could say a single word, the shinobi tossed something into the center of the trap, just out of Junichi's reach, and watched intently.
Junichi's blood ran cold when he recognized the object as an explosive device with no fuse - and that it wasn't a dummy. Terrified, all he could do was take a step away from the bomb and gulp; but in doing so he was able to feel the extra weight on his leg and hear the slosh of water in the canteen he'd put in his pocket. "Shit!" he screamed.
With a wave of Baki's hand the wooden walls fell back into the sand and were immediately recovered by four uniformed shinobi, who gathered the barriers and ran off. Dust kicked into the air when the sensei landed across from his target, slowly returning to an upright posture with his arms crossed over his chest and a calculating look in his one visible eye. Still huddling in the dirt with a frightened look on his face, Junichi had barely managed to save his own life by shoving the grenade into the sand and holding the plastic canteen over it. What this did was cause the water inside to direct the detonation down into the ground and away from his body; though hopelessly burning his hands, Junichi had at least survived the blast.
"I'm going to take you striaght to the hispital to have your hands looked at, but before I do that I need to ask you one question..." Baki prompted as he unfolded his arms and knelt down to toss Junichia's arm around his neck to support the young man, "How much do you wish to impress all of the students from the academy?"
"I don't give a shit about any of them... I only care about me." Junichi grumbled, gritting his teeth as he put forth the necessary effort to get to his feet. The explosion had affected more than just his hands; his ears were ringing and his heart had already skipped every other beat from the shock of nearly dying. Plus, he already felt himself losing consciousness from the stress.
"Good answer." Baki grunted under his breath. The next moment he flexed his knees and launched into motion, blurring as he dragged his burden along with him on his way to the Sunagakure hospital. It was only a couple more minutes before Baki dropped the unconscious body off in the hospital - under the moniker of "Sunagakure's Outcast" - and left to have a word with the Kazekage.
- Sunagakure hospital -
Junichi didn't wake for several hours; in fact he might have been out longer except for the fact that something rubbing against his face had woken him from his light recovery nap. Still unable to find the willpower to pry his eyes open, he found that whatever was on his face was incredibly soft, but also warm and smelled wonderfully clean. Again it pressed against his cheek and eye, sending a wave of relaxation and comfort through his entire body for reasons unexplained; but there was that incescent beeping drone interrupting him from both his nap and the soft sensation. However, by now he was awake enough to open his eyes; and when he did his heart nearly stopped - an effect proven by a loud beep from a nearby monitor. His surpirse was well-founded, however; he found that a nurse was in the process of rubbing her breasts over his face.
"Umm... you know..." he mumbled dumbly, mentally kicking himself for reacting like such a child. The woman wasn't even very busty or all that cute in the first place, so why should he freak out?
"Kya!" the young nurse gasped as she jerked away from his bed, flushing brightly as she struggled to close her top and hide her face. "Close your eyes! Don't look at me!" the woman begged as she worked the buttons of her uniform, cursing her unfortunate existance as she stammered incoherantly about having instructions to press the call button beside his bed should he show signs of waking up, and how brushing against him had been cooincidental. That he shouldn't even bother remembering that it had happened.
When the woman was finished with her scattered gibbering, Junichi groaned and reached out, slamming the call button with the side of his fist and shaking his head in irritation. "Alright, whatever. It was an accident that didn't actually happen. Where the hell is that jounin that left me here?"
"Actually, I don't know. I'm sorry." the nurse apologized as she demurely shook her head. Pausing, she gently took a seat in a folding chair provided for visitors and worriedly wrung her hands. Catching her eyes, Junichi couldn't help but feel that the poor woman was desperate beyond belief; the wretched, yet hungry look in her eyes almost compelled him to come close enough to be devoured. Before he could utter a word, the woman forced a light smile as she reached out and took him by the hand, "My name is Fuuko. It's a pleasure to meet you."
"Yeah, Noriya-" he began in introduction, but managed to catch himself in time to stop himself from inviting the hellfire that would follow should he answer with his real name. "Actually, the old people in the village call me 'Button-eyes' because they're dark and shine in the sun." Junichi replied, pausing to let the woman see his charcoal irises, though the sun had already gone down and would not reflect off of them until morning. He was about to ask where the hell his clothing had gone when he noticed something strange as Fuuko squeezed his hand. "Hey, didn't I burn my hands back there? Why are they perfectly fine now?"
"Oh!" Fuuko explaimed in excitement, suddenly smiling brightly as she adjusted her grip of his hand so that he could see his unblemished palm, "The medical ninjas came in here and fixed it super fast! It was amazing what they can do that our normal staff can't even dream about! Like magic..."
It was then that the door came open, revealing Baki as he strode into the room from the hallway; however, he was no longer dressed in his uniform. Instead, the jounin wore slate-colored slacks and a plain white tee-shirt under a brown traveling cloak; however, his right eye was still covered by the flap of his normal headgear. After sending the nurse out of the room - who begged for Junichi to call her later - Baki walked up to the young man and gruffly took him by the collar, ignoring his protests as he dragged the boy out of the bed and to his feet. "I have information for you, but first you must answer a question for me."
"What is it now?" Junichi scowled coldly, annoyed that the only thing he could do was glare into Baki's left eye and dream of punching him - for doing so in real life would be suicide. "I don't really want to do any more of these stupid tests of potential."
"Just listen, Shit-face." Baki grunted as he tossed Junichi to the side, ignoring him when he collided with the wall and swore colorfully. "Your punishment for interrupting Shizuhara-sensei's graduation class has been carried out, so you're off the hook for that. As for the tests of potential: those weren't my idea, but that doesn't change what I noticed when you were subjected to them. Now, listen to me very closely, boy; if you still want to be a shinobi then you'd better get your ass home so that you can make your meeting with the Kazekage in the morning." The next thing he did was to retrive a pile of clothing from within his traveling cloak and toss them onto the now vacant bed - they were the same ones Junichi had been wearing when he'd been admitted.
- The next day -
Junichi groaned as he dropped his new dufflebag on the floor and tossed himself heavily onto the western-style bed provided by the inn of the small border village. Despite what Baki had said the day before, he didn't feel that he had much of a chance of becoming a ninja of the sand; and even if he did, he didn't want to make a career out of survive through tests that could cost him his life. Therefore he'd quickly bribed a chuunin to escort him out of the country, who in turn smooth-talked the gate guards to turn a blind eye to their leaving without permission. So now the two men were resting in a small town just on this side of the Land of Wind.
"Alright. I'll give it twenty minutes for rest, but then I'll have to run all the way back to Sunagakure if I want to get there before I'm missed. I appreciate the donation you made to my family; my infant son thanks you the most; but it won't mean too much if I'm caught and put to death for abandonment."
"No kidding." Junichi agreed breathlessly, laying perfectly still on the bed, groaning as he felt the pulsing in his head and legs from the jog through the desert in the middle of the night. "All that matters is you got me through the desert without getting lost. I can make it the rest of the way from here."
"Well, good luck on your new life, and good night to you. I'm going to wait outside so that I can take off as soon as I'm ready." the Sand chuunin announced as he waved in farewell. Junichi merely grunted and let his arm flop as a goodbye. He was fast asleep before the shinobi had even crossed the room. The best thing about his escape from the ninja world was that as a civilian he didn't have to worry about being followed by assassins - or would the best part be his not having to have sex until he caught fire? Either way, he remained knocked out until just before lunch, when his stomach woke him with its protests.
"It's a good thing that I packed sandwiches for the trip..." Junichi murmured as he scratched his ass before climbing out of bed, blinking blearily in the bright sunlight streaming through the slats of the inn room window. After a quick rifling through his supplies and enjoying a patiently eaten jackel-meat and cabbage sandwich, Junichi shouldered his dufflebag and pulled on his sandals. His life would finally be his own the second he crossed the border into the Land of the River, though even he had no idea where he'd go or end up doing.