Feel free to ignore the essay of an author's note I wrote, but it may answer any questions you may have.

Summary: Kassien was destined to fail: this was fact. It really was too bad her new friends didn't believe in destiny. Another OC on Team Seven fic. Something new, slightly serious, and a little silly.

Or, in which Real Life hits that cliche hard.

Characters: Naruto, Sasuke, Kakashi, OC, and Kiba (although, not necessarily in that order), but there will probably be an appearance from all our favorites, let's be honest.

Warnings: Swearing, OC, violence (this is Naruto, where babies are killed for the sake of science. And to prove one's worth), Maito Gai. Pairings are undecided as of yet, and are unlikely to go anywhere for the time being, but anyone who likes OC stories should find this one fun. Hopefully.

Kind of follows canon? Maybe?

No knowledge of the future in this one. Sorry guys. This is the first universe our OC is born in. She's also a bit of a head case. If you're looking for a strong personality in an OC, you've come to the wrong place. Not everyone can be Type A.

Stylistic Choice: a bit dense and passive at first, for a reason. Should lighten up later, but who knows how OC will change. You can take a breather-I won't bombard you with tons of hais and ano sa ano sa and futons and dotons and whatever the hell-I don't know any Japanese and I won't pretend to. However, since honorifics have importance to the culture, I'll do my best to uphold tradition. I may get it wrong, and if I do, politely inform me in a PM or review or something. Nevertheless, I may switch to the Japanese word for something (for example: Taijutsu, Genjutsu, the word Jutsu, names for particular food dishes, etc) when it sounds better than the English equivalent in that particular situation. Admittedly, I am fairly partial to the 'Maa' or 'Mah' other fanfiction writers use with Kakashi. It captures his (perceived) laziness so perfectly. Again, I'm going with whatever sounds good. Sorry if that bother you, but, as always, don't like, don't read.

Remember, this is pure fiction, created for both your and my entertainment. If you get something out of it, good. If not, oh well. I'm not looking to win any prizes here, just trying to have fun, and hopefully create something enjoyable :)

Sorry for the long author's note, but if you can't tell, I'm a little nervous.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. If I did, it would be significantly less weird.

Have fun!


Chapter 1: A Day of Firsts


The classroom was noisy today.

Usually, Room Four at the Academy was a haven of calm—a starch place inhabited by orderly rows of desks and chairs, settled within an atmosphere of respect that inspired quietude through the boredom and chalk dust they breathed. A place for sleepy children, attentive children, for children who've yet to allow duty to calcify in their bones. Somewhere Kassien had long associated with warmth and safety, despite the dubious topics of study.

Today, however, young voices fought to be heard, humming in and out of coherency as Kassien's focus shifted, like the gentle thrum of a river as its necessity for survival, or lack thereof, determined her attention. Sunlight bathed the classroom through large square windows, touching upon the heads of her year mates as they flitted from table to table, excited with the promise their newly earned forehead protectors awarded them. Although distinct groups discordantly flocked the classroom, their discussions were more or less the same, wondering for the future now that their dreams had become a reality. The level of noise plummeted and rose erratically when the Uchiha boy settled into his seat, propping his chin upon still fingers and gaze resolutely ahead. His fangirls, hearts in their eyes, flocked together and cooed in creepy unison, and then fought amongst themselves for the single seat next to him. Kassien linked from her corner, quite disinterested, and wished there was some way to staple their mouths closed without extensive consequences for herself—if anything, Iruka-sensei would be Most Displeased. Choji, plump and oblivious in the seat below Kassien's, was equally noisy, kicking his feet to scuff the floor with his toes, chip packet crinkling as he stuffed himself stupid, pale crumbs dusting his desk. Beside him, Shikamaru remained miraculously asleep. On the opposite side of the classroom, Shino huddled into his jacket, ducking into his collar like a timid turtle, and Kassien wondered if he was bothered by the noise as well. She herself considered slipping out the back door, or possibly a window, but the dramatic entry supplied by the two-man circus that was Sakura and Ino put her plans on pause. And, she supposed, such cowardice would be marked down as insubordination.

Repressing a sigh, Kassien resigned herself to wait out the noise until their Chunin-sensei arrived. Kassien liked Iruka-sensei. He was kind and patient and composed . . . that is, at least until Naruto grew bored and did something to shatter the calm spell of instruction, and Iruka-sensei would have no choice but to shout and throw things—which Kassien did not like—because Naruto did not listen to Reason. And made a mockery of Transformation Technique. And encouraged boys to ditch class when boredom itched at his spine until he had to do something. Really, Naruto Uzumaki was naughty, but perhaps it was this calm safety of the classroom that made the demon feel he could be so loud here.

Kassien blinked once more, and tucked herself further into her seat when the loud one with red clan markings dropped into the chair on her left. Naruto was here, crouched on a desk and peering with uncomfortable closeness into the face of the Uchiha. Why was Naruto here? His failure to pass the Genin exam last week hadn't been a secret. And yet, here he was, the silver leaf swirling on his forehead from underneath wild strands of spiky yellow hair. So why . . . ?

"Oh, sick, dude!" Kiba cringed, stuffing his blonde pup further into his jacket and zipping it tight.

"Troublesome." Shikamaru was awake now, and vaguely disturbed.

"I was not mentally prepared for that," Kiba whined, scrubbing at his eyes with closed fists. A high-pitched yelp of agreement sounded from within his jacket, muffled and almost complementary. "Ugh. There's got to be a Time Jutsu for shit like this."

"Unfortunately not," Shikamaru muttered, returning his head to the pillow of his folded arms. "Believe me; I've checked."

"Poor Naruto," Choji mourned, downtrodden as he carefully pocketed his unfinished bag of chips. The majority of their female classmates simultaneously rolled up their sleeves, radiating a hatred (and a worrying predisposition for murder) Naruto could sense himself—that is, Kassien assumed he could from the tense line of his shoulders, but he did not turn to face them. He instead continued to use his sleeve as a napkin, scrubbing his tongue with a compulsive fervor as though it would wash away the accidental kiss. As though sharing the thought, both Naruto and the Uchiha shared a glance, and shuddered.

A nudge to her side startled Kassien from her thoughts, and she scooted back in alarm, her chair shrieking as it skid beneath her.

It was only Kiba. "Why aren't you down there with them?" He gestured over his shoulder with his thumb, indicating the Room Four Uchiha Fangirls versus Naruto Uzumaki showdown. It wasn't much of one. Kassien mentally cringed at the image, preferring Kiba's bold features to the unfair match. "You're a girl. I thought girls like Uchiha."

Shikamaru breathed a sigh of long-suffering into his elbow. "Don't bother, Inuzuka. She's mute. She couldn't talk to you even if she wanted to, and I don't see why she would. I don't even want to talk to you most days."

Something hot and thick spiked up from Kassien's stomach, brushing unpleasantly at her throat before plunging sharply back down. Was this what people thought of her? It surprised Kassien that people thought of her at all. That she'd been noticed, despite all efforts not to be. Kiba thought she was an Uchiha fangirl. Shikamaru believed her a mute. She'd never given it a thought before, that others had opinions of her, strong in her belief that she'd pressed herself so far into the walls that she was nothing to these people. But the Nara's assumption had thrown her. She felt lightheaded. And now she couldn't help but wonder what others thought: did they agree with Shikamaru, that she didn't talk because she couldn't? Or were they like Kiba, who seemed to believe that all girls were the same? Did they think her a bad ninja? A bad person? Stupid? Did they think her shy? Why did they think of her in the first place? She didn't want to be thought of.

Kiba slammed his hands to the table, pushing himself to a stand. "You got something to say, Pineapple Head?"

"You're annoying," Shikamaru groaned, settling from a hunch over his desk to a slouch in his chair, arms crossed over his chest and head tilted to the ceiling. His dark eyes lazily marked Kiba's ire. "And you take everything so personally. Why do you have to fight over everything? Just relax. Iruka-sensei's not going to be here for at least another five minutes."

Choji nodded as though Shikamaru's word settled the matter.

There was a twitch in Kiba's draw. "You lazy types really piss me off," he said, and gestured roughly to the leaf headband tied around the Nara's arm. "How'd you even get that, when all you ever did was sleep in class?"

Shikamaru's eyes narrowed slightly, and the corner of his mouth pulled down. "How'd you even pass the exam, when you've fought Naruto for the honor of being Dead Last?"

The desk creaked under the pressure of Kiba's hands, white-knuckled around its lip. His parka trembled and growled. Shikamaru, still slouched, merely raised an eyebrow. Choji had regained his appetite, snacking at such a pace his hands were a blur to Kassien's eyes.

Kiba joined the growl—a deep, feral thing from within his chest that Kassien felt in her bones. "When this stupid thing is over, I'm going to skin you and feed your scraps to the—"

"I'm not mute."

The three boys, previously having forgotten her existence, now eyed her in open surprise. Kassien struggled with the urge to curl in her chair like a pill bug. She didn't know why she said it. She had no right to step in, and fought the instinct to apologize. Quickly, she analyzed her actions, surprised at herself. Maybe she wanted to correct their assumptions; she disliked inaccuracies, something she learned about herself after years of studying the ninja arts. Maybe she wanted to rid of these palpable feelings of antagonism. Whatever the reason, it worked. Her response was a little late, but as she'd little experience interacting with her peers outside an academic setting, she excused herself for this mistake.

The silence between them stretched over the peripheral noise of her other classmates, and her heart stuttered in her ribcage. She overstepped some unspoken boundary—it wasn't her place to speak. These weren't her friends. She didn't have friends. Kassien's palms sweated, and she brushed them against her black pants in hopes that friction would warm them. She didn't know what she was supposed to do next. She swallowed. She shouldn't have said anything.

"So you can talk," the Nara said at last, eyes normally glazed with sleep now sharp with an intelligence she hadn't seen before. It felt assessing.

Strengthened by the lack of aggression, Kassien turned to Kiba. "And I'm not crazy."

Kiba's slanted eyes widened from beneath his forehead protector, and he raised his hands in the same placating manner she'd seen Naruto do just moments before. His usual grin had cowed into something small and nervous. "I never said you were."

Kassien blinked. "You asked me why I wasn't helping those girls punish Uzumaki-san. My answer: I'm not crazy."

Another silence, this one shorter and less oppressive than the one before. Kiba's eyebrows—dark and sharp, tempered by generations of simplistic, canine expressions—furrowed in brief confusion before he threw his head back and laughed. It was an obnoxious thing that attracted attention and left her ears ringing. Slightly concerned, Kassien looked to Shikamaru. The intelligence had gone now, back to its sleepy-eyed boredom. His smirk held no answers. Choji was no help either, but at least his binge eating had slowed to a healthier pace.

When Kiba's laughter subsided into intermittent giggles, the boy threw his arm over a startled Kassien, dragging her close to his side. The shock at such easy comradery kept her from pulling away, as did the warmth spreading across her shoulders, seeping through his thick jacket and the five points of pressure on her arm. Her nose was very close to his armpit. Earth's nature musk clung to him in an ephemeral film, muting the less pleasant odor of wet dog, sweat, and something else she couldn't really name. She felt out of place, like a rook jolted diagonally, and she could only think that she'd never been so intimate with another human being before.

"You're alright, for a girl," Kiba told her. "Weird that I'd never noticed you before, but I guess that's what makes a good ninja, right?"

Shikamaru groaned again, muttered something about "too easy." For her part, Kassien didn't know what to say. It was as though she'd hit a wall, and she felt woefully unequipped to deal with such a foreign situation. Taijutsu training recommended a hit to the groin—the nearest vulnerability—but other options were equally available, and most likely more effective: breaking the fingers of the hand that held her; pressure points in the back of the neck (but no, the hood of his parka protected him from most of that); crushing his windpipe with her foot; throwing him over her shoulder and onto the desk (as well as Shikamaru and Choji as collateral damage); a hard thrust to the stomach, and then to the chin when he doubled over; climbing up to his shoulders and using their combined weight to pull them down. Her Genjutsu admittedly needed more work, but she could Body Switch with anything in the room. Distract him with a clone . . .

But . . . no. He wasn't harming her. And she wasn't completely opposed to what she now recognized as a hug (defined: the act of holding tightly in one's arms, typically to express affection). Should she say something? Thank him for his kindness?

Before she could make a choice, Kiba let her go. He held out his other hand. "I'm Kiba Inuzuka."

Kassien already knew this—they'd had class together since the age of eight—but society dictates introductions as a reciprocal activity, and any previous knowledge would be deemed irrelevant. Relief soaked her tense joints. This, she knew how to do.

"Kassien Otawa," she said, shaking his hand.

He then unzipped his jacket—and Kassien, feeling as though she'd been peeled off the wall and flung into a metaphorical pile of highly sociable wolves, had a fleeting moment of hysteria that he'd start undressing—but thankfully stopped when the blonde pup poked through his previous prison. It gave a cursory sniff. "And this is Akamaru!"

The puppy yipped, its fluffy head brushing under Kiba's chin, and Kassien had to smile.

True to Shikamaru's word, Iruka-sensei entered the classroom five minutes later, his very presence inspiring an instant quiet unlike anything previously displayed in all their years at the Academy. A few boys in the front row instantly stilled, scrambling to hide a glossy magazine, eyeing their teacher with equal guilt and suspicion. Naruto woozily sat up, holding his stomach, as the fangirls hastily retreated from their pile. Even Kiba, who'd been keeping a steady, almost one-sided stream of chatter about the dogs at his family kennel, quieted at Iruka-sensei's entrance. It was a silence charged with anticipation, every eye trained on the scarred teacher before them.

Iruka-sensei smiled, scroll in hand, and began a speech detailing their expectations as Genin of Konoha. How they would be split into teams of three, led by a Jonin-sensei. At this point, Shikamaru sighed, clearly bored. Kiba's leg jittered under the table.

"And now, your team assignments," Iruka-sensei said, and opened the scroll with an unnecessary flourish. There would be nine teams, he'd explained, and her read down the list, immune to both cheers and groans at each assignment. Kassien sat still in her corner, Akamaru a ball of warmth on her lap, and watched Iruka-sensei's mouth shape each syllable, almost unhearing as she automatically charted each team, cataloging the skillset and relative ranking in class, wondering at the system used for each grouping. From what she could tell, it was completely erratic. Some teams had an average collective of talent, while others boasted a clan affiliation, or a strong intelligence. In essence, unpredictable. Kiba glanced at her recurrently, and Kassien wondered if he wanted his dog back.

". . . Team Seven: Kassien Otawa, Sasuke Uchiha, and Naruto Uzumaki."

The demon shot up as though his seat had bit him. "Iruka-sensei!" he shouted, pitch loud and angry as he pointed to the ever-impassive Uchiha across the room, "why does an outstanding ninja like me have to be on the same team as that fucker over there!"

"NARUTO!" Iruka-sensei-s face achieved the hue of a ripe tomato. "That language is highly inappropriate! And as for your placement, Sasuke's grades were the best of all twenty-seven graduates. You were dead last. Do you understand? We had to do this to balance the teams!"

Naruto scowled and crossed his arms as the majority of the class poked at his admonishment. This was a normal occurrence in class, but, surprisingly, Naruto's shoulders itched toward his ears under his orange jumpsuit, mouth pressed to a thin, pale line. Usually the demon would do his best to have the last word. Perhaps this tense line, silent amongst the petty mirth of his classmates, was an acknowledgement of Iruka-sensei's ugly truth. Kassien's fingers twisted in the soft fur of the puppy, the corner of her mouth twitching downward in sympathy. She'd never liked the easy humiliation candidly handed to Naruto. It hit too close to home for her own comfort. Surely, even demons felt rejection and failure.

"Just don't get in my way . . . Dead Last." The Uchiha's softly spoken words seemed to project with the same volume as Naruto's shouts.

"What did you just call me?"

This is hell. Kassien decided to emulate Shikamaru and slouched in her chair, gradually inching herself to the floor as though the action would encourage spontaneous knowledge of a melting jutsu so she could slip to the floor and just lie there. Kiba watched her do so, glee bubbling under a carefully maintained expression of polite interest her usually saved for hour-long lectures, but Kassien couldn't bring herself to care. She'd make a good puddle. No need for speech. No need to meet this combative team from hell. She'd be safe from scrutiny and expectation as a lowly, skill-less puddle, and then she could make her inconspicuous getaway. With Akamaru in her seat, a random puddle underneath him wouldn't be so farfetched. But Kiba halted any plans of anonymity as he burst into laughter, drawing the attention of the entire class, including the new teammates she'd been trying to avoid. Kassien gripped Akamaru tightly, feeling rather ill.

Iruka-sensei scowled. "Is something funny, Kiba?"

Kiba grinned gamely. "Just appreciating the irony, sir!"

Mirth touched at Iruka-sensei's brown eyes, which darted to Kassien and back, but his mouth remained unsmiling. "Save it for after class, Kiba." He then consulted his scroll. "You're on Team Eight with Shino Auberame and Hinata Hyuga."

"Sounds like the teams are stacked, Sensei," Kiba said, still grinning. "I like it."

The mirth faded from Sensei's features, and with its absence shadows seemed to collect under his cheekbones, darkening the suddenly tense line of his mouth and the wide gap of scar tissue strained across his nose. His eyes sharpened, but when all Kiba did was grin, Iruka-sensei ignored him in favor of the scroll.

"Since Team Nine is already in effect, the last of our class will fill Team Ten." Iruka-sensei's voice had returned to its normal calm droll, rolling the scroll with a decisive snap. "Choji Akimichi, Shikamaru Nara, and Ino Yamanaka."

"So predictable," Shikamaru muttered to Choji, who nodded in acquiesce.

"Your Jonin-sensei will come along to collect you shortly," Iruka-sensei continued, clasping his hands at his lower back. "As you are now legal adults, you hardly need me for supervision any longer. I wish you the best of luck. You will do Konoha proud."

When he smiled, there was something troubled about it, but the sentiment was genuine.

Not long after Iruka-sensei left, Jonin came to pick up their charges, emptying the classroom in a slow trickle. Kassien thought she'd recognized a few of them—at the market handling produce with a clinical eye, dropping down from rooftops like leaves from trees to them walk amiably down the street, sitting at food stalls alone or with comrades, guarding plates of food with hunched backs and pointed elbows—but she couldn't be entirely sure. Memory wasn't one hundred percent accurate. Shikamaru's team was among the first to leave—the boy himself uttering a pained "what a drag" as he reluctantly staggered up from his seat to follow a passingly familiar man out the door. As he left, Kassien realized with a funny jolt that this was likely the last time this class would gather in its entirety; she'd never heard of Academy reunions. That observation likely explained the longing nostalgia tugging at Iruka-sensei's smile before he disappeared into the hallway. A woman wrapped in bandages came to collect Kiba's team, and the boy grinned winningly at Kassien when she returned the puppy to his care, promising her a visit to the family kennels.

It wasn't long until Kassien, Naruto, and the Uchiha were left alone in the classroom. Silence pressed around them with the same suffocating closeness as a crowd on festival day, difficult to wade through and more than a little stuffy. One of the girls had cracked the windows open an hour ago, and a pleasant spring breeze slipped into the classroom, cleansing chalk dust and luke-warm remnants of nearly thirty little bodies from the corners. Birds twittered just outside, the sound weaving through the occasional thud of weight and chakra as ninjas perused the rooftops. The Uchiha hadn't moved an inch since that morning, elbows on the table, head resting upright on his thumbs, fingers clasped before his nose as he stared straight ahead. Kassien had yet to witness him blinking, which was more than a bit concerning. Naruto wriggled in his seat, but had managed to keep a rare hold on his mouth. In all, it was peaceful, if not a little boring.

That is, until Naruto realized they were the only ones left and surveyed the classroom, eyes glossing over empty seats until they rested upon Kassien in her corner.

"Hey, are you that Kassien chick? The one on our team?" he asked, squinting up at her.

Nerves blossomed in her chest—so rarely was she directly addressed by those other than her father—and she nodded, unable to speak without croaking like a frog. The Uchiha looked over his shoulder, then away. It felt like a dismissal. Kassien swallowed.

"I'm Naruto Uzumaki!" The demon gestured to himself with a thumb to his chest. It seemed her known acquaintances of four years were to reintroduce themselves today. "Hey, hey, you should come down here with us! We're teammates now, so we gotta get used to each other."

Stay away from that demon. Her father's coarse words ripped through her mind, and she hesitated from the slightest of moments. As a former ninja of Konoha, Shoin Otawa was a respectable man of experience and intelligence Kassien couldn't ever hope of achieve herself, and to disagree or disobey him would result in embarrassment on her part, as well as a crippling sense of shame for having disappointed his expectations. If he said Naruto Uzumaki was a demon, then that was what he was. The only problem: Kassien wasn't entirely certain what being a demon entailed, or what one looked like. Her father never said. And as she sat in her corner, silent and watchful as Naruto invited her over (to converse like a normal person), grin wider than Kiba's and just as friendly, she couldn't help but think Naruto looked more like a boy than a demon.

Her introspection must have taken longer than she originally thought, for Naruto's welcoming smile dimmed like the sun resting over the horizon after thanklessly lighting the day, and she nodded without further thought. She licked her lips. She'd seen him that day, a despondent lump of orange on the tree swing, arm curled around the chain as he watched the celebrating families of their peers from afar. Shadows had struck him with an uncharacteristic bitterness. She'd looked away for a moment, searching for her own father, but when she turned back to the lawn, Naruto had gone. It had been such an odd sight—Naruto was normally so cheerful, even after taking an embarrassing beat down from the Uchiha—and Kassien had to refine her definition of a demon once more. After years of observation, Kassien could only conclude that Naruto was harmless. Maybe her father was trying to protect her, but like most parents, had overestimated the danger. Despite everything, demons had feelings, too.

Her heart shuddered within the cage of her ribs, disrupting her ability to breathe until splotches of anxiety faded from her back and chest. Tremors skimmed strength from her legs. Another heartbeat, and Kassien managed to stand. Hesitation held tight to her remaining grace, and she feared tripping down the steps to the lowest platform with her teammates.

But when Naruto's smile returned to its full force, Kassien knew she made the right decision. It warmed her with a courage that replaced her previous anxiety, and she could walk and breathe normally. Surely a happy demon was a friendly one. Father would understand. All she had to do was keep him happy.

Kassien took the seat between Naruto and the Uchiha, awkwardness settling upon her shoulders. The Uchiha gave no indication he noticed her presence, head still turned to the window, deep in thought. The sun glared from the rooftops, trickling down to the quiet residential street across from the Academy. Wind tickled blades of grass into gentle, swaying movement that mimicked the branches above, scraping at cloudless skies with rigid fingers.

"How come I've never seen you before?" Naruto asked, and Kassien twisted to stare into the bluest eyes she'd ever seen. The color echoed daytime sky, and it was beautiful as it was intimidating.

The Uchiha let out a rude noise. "Because you're self-centered and imperceptive."

Naruto's fist fell sharply to the table, startling Kassien nearly out of her seat. "Was I talking to you, Bastard?"

The Uchiha smirked, saying nothing.

Slowly the snarl walked itself off Naruto's face, the angry wrinkles bunching between his eyebrows smoothing back into an open friendliness. He blinked at Kassien as though she'd appeared out of nowhere.

"Your eyes are strange," he remarked.

Kassien fumbled with the sleeve of her shirt under the table. "Oh."

"Ah, I mean, not bad strange!" Naruto exclaimed, voice pitched at least half an octave higher. He waved his arms as though to wash away his previous words. "I meant that I've never seen green eyes before. Not like yours." His hands fluttered helplessly. Then, he brightened. "You shouldn't worry about eyes, though—lots of people in Konoha have weird eyes. Like Hinata-chan. Her eyes are scary. And she must have a lot of uncles or brothers or something, because they're everywhere. And then there's those awful red eyes the policemen had, believe it—"

The Uchiha snapped to attention at this, and from her periphery she watched him slowly lower his hands to his lap.

"—they hated me, and those stupid sticks they carried hurt." He paused, eyes scrunching in thought as he scratched at his head. "I haven't seen them in a while, though."

"I have my mother's eyes," Kassien offered, for lack of anything better to say.

The demon grinned widely enough his cheeks pushed open eyes into happy crescents, and a tension Kassien hadn't noticed before released in her stomach. So, demons were nice. Or, at least, this one was. She didn't know why her father was so worried. Guiltily, Kassien wondered if there were other demons around. They were much easier to talk to than humans.

Nevertheless, Kassien couldn't hold a conversation for long, especially given her lack of practice and asocial tendencies, and their talk of weaponry and favored Taijutsu stances and Iruka-sensei petered out into a mutual question of where their Jonin-sensei could possibly be. Kassien's throat burned with use, and she swallowed thoughts of cool water and hot soup until they gurgled in her stomach. It was about time for lunch, now. Naruto had apparently exhausted his ability to sit still, humming a familiar tune as he puttered about the classroom. With sure fingers he tilted thick volumes of The History of the Ninja to stand on the bottom edge of their spines before slotting them back, and the swiped at the dust coating the shelves. Settled himself in Iruka-sensei's Very Forbidden Do Not Touch Chair, smile elated at his daring. Picked at kunai grooves in Iruka-sensei's desk. Balanced white sticks of chalk upright on the sill, then pilfered one to draw a fair imitation of Hokage Mountain on the blackboard. He gave the Fourth more attention than the others, adding an extra spike and narrowing the curve on his jaw after consulting the view just outside the window, feet kicking at the air as he pushed himself half out the classroom. Kassien herself wished she'd the forethought to bring a book. Instead she resigned herself to waiting patiently, her thoughts vying for attention as Naruto's puttering quieted in a reflective study.

In the back of her mind, Kassien considered multiple possibilities for their sensei's absence, each accumulating the nerves in her chest with more strength than others: he simply forgot, and was now sitting at the barbeque house eating his fill of sizzling pork; he slept in, tired from a night of partying at the places her father forbid her ever enter; he was on a mission, and couldn't return because he'd been defeated in battle; he won the battle, but now lay injured in the hospital, unconscious as medic-nins reattached his arm . . .

"What are you doing now, Idiot?" the Uchiha asked, scorn picking at his lip.

Naruto now stood tiptoe on the seat of a chair he'd pulled from the first row, wedging a blackboard eraser between the wall and the sliding door. "I'm going to get Sensei so good!" he snickered.

The Uchiha's eyes slitted hatefully. "No Jonin's going to fall for that."

Eraser firmly in place, Naruto hopped down from the chair and kicked it back to its place. "Hey!" Naruto's shrill call sliced clean through the previous calm, and Kassien could no longer recall the birdsong she didn't know she'd been listening to. "I'll have you know I prank many ninja—Chunin and Jonin alike! They always fall for it because they don't expect to be pranked by the totally awesome Naruto Uzumaki!" He nodded decisively, smacking his hands together to rid the evidence of his transgressions. Dust like white smoke plumed from his palms and dissipated into the air. "Besides, it serves Jerkface-sensei right for being so late. Everyone else is gone but us!" Naruto twisted to inspect his masterpiece, hands on hips, and nodded again. "Right. I'm bored. Wanna play hangman?"

"Pass," the Uchiha snorted.

Derision peeled Naruto's lips over straight teeth. "I wasn't asking you, you nosy prick. I was asking Kassie-chan."

The warmth of inclusion fluttered in her stomach again, and Kassien nodded her approval before her father's voice could hold her back. The nickname had surprised her, but like Kiba's impulsive side-hug, she found she didn't mind in the least. No one had ever called her Kassie-chan before. Today seemed to be a day of firsts. It was more wonderful than she could have imagined. Her fingers and toes jittered with a pleasant energy, and she squirmed happily in her seat.

Naruto grinned at her. "All right!" He pumped his fist, then raced to the blackboard in a blur of yellow and orange, drawing up the hangman's noose in the free space beside his rendition of Konoha's famed landmark. Underneath, he marked five blank spaces for each letter.

Having had Naruto in class for the past few years, Kassien had a strong suspicion she knew what it was. However, she found that, rather than prove her knowledge, she wanted to prolong the game; she waited a few letters before 'guessing' the letter 'A.'

The Uchiha, however, had no such compunctions. "It's 'Ramen,'" he snorted.

More than a little pissed, Naruto pelted the Uchiha with his chalk. "Shut up, you bastard!" he shouted. "I thought you weren't playing!"

"Don't make it so obvious." The Uchiha scowled down his front, brushing the stick of chalk from his leg before smudging its fine dust into a smear on the fabric of his right shoulder. It didn't easily rub away. "I thought you were a ninja."

"I am a ninja!"

"Mah, mah, what's the ruckus?" came an unfamiliar voice from the door. Clear and mild, the voice swept underneath theirs, and Kassien and the others had turned in surprise as a gloved hand slid open the door. As a man stepped through, the eraser immediately dropped into his hair, dusting him in years of accumulated projectile calculations and punishment lines before continuing its fall to the floor. The man watched its progression blankly with one eye, hand still clamped around the door.

Bewilderment stretched the Uchiha's face into asymmetry until he pressed it into apathy. Kassien's eyes were wide.

Naruto, true to his character, had doubled over in laughter, one arm wrapped around his stomach while the other pointed at the man. "He fell for it! He fell for it! I told you he would! Hahaha, Naruto Uzumaki strikes again!"

The man scratched idly at his mask. "My first impression of you?" he said mildly, lone eyelid drooping as though he was in danger of falling asleep. "You're annoying."

Incredulity cut Naruto's laughter short. "We're annoying? You're LATE! We've been here for three hours."

The man raised a silver eyebrow, which disappeared briefly into his slanted forehead protector. "And you all just sat there?"

Naruto's mouth dropped open. The Uchiha's eyes burned.

"Meet me on the roof." And with that, the man disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

Stunned into momentary complacency, the three of them exchanged expression that were either chagrined or confused—both, in Naruto's case.

"I'm guessing that was our sensei," Kassien said when neither of her teammates made any movement toward the door.

"Obviously," the Uchiha scoffed, and Kassien hunched into herself as though to soften a blow to her stomach, all previous feelings of comfort and inclusion shrinking from her extremities to curl like a wounded dog in her chest. The boy then shouldered his way past Naruto, steps both indolent and deliberate, drawing the door wider to disappear into the hallway.

She shouldn't have said anything—once again, she crossed some sort of unspoken boundary she knew nothing of. Kassien swallowed, and it was thick in her throat. She only wanted to get along with her team. She thought they'd been making progress.

Clearly not.

Calloused skin interrupted her contemplation of the desk, pink with health and weathered lines faintly crossing the smaller, deeper gouges that come with catching shuriken. Dirt smudged at the wrist and dug into grooves left by swirling fingerprints. It took Kassien a moment to realize she was looking at a hand. She raised her head. Naruto grinned, the thin, dark marks scoring his cheeks curving around his projected carelessness. He'd stepped into a pillar of light, and the sun bent around his hair, shrouding him in a film of gold.

"Come on, Kassie-chan," he said. "We'll make those bastards see us. You'll see."

Timidly, she took his hand. Her fingers barely curled around the back curve of his palm when he yanked her out of her seat and dragged her out of the classroom. She stumbled after him, sandals slipped unsurely upon slick gray tile as she willed her legs to keep up, surprised by his speed. Walls like thick, emerald fern blurred on the fringe of her vision. Protests stuttered ineffectually from her mouth, unheard and tumbling to crash at her feet only to be stomped by Naruto's haste. Just as she was about to ask how to even get to the roof, Naruto reached out and jerked open a door, and swung her around to enter before him.

"I'll race you to the top!" Naruto yelled, and crashed up the stairs, steps erratic and heavy as Kassien's racing heart. Surprised (although she really shouldn't have been), Kassien shook her usual propensity from her frame and darted up after him, pumping her arms in an effort to propel herself forward. Stale, damp air invaded her lungs, burning through the exhale. Both she and Naruto passed the Uchiha on the way up. The boy's mutter of "undisciplined idiots" almost made her stop in shame, but the demon cheered her on, and Kassien found she couldn't. She was a few seconds behind Naruto when he kicked the door open, flooding the dim stairwell with blue skies and a cool breath of dusty cement and leaves.

"Hah! I win!" Naruto cried, both fists in the air.

Kassien stopped beside him, hands gripping her thighs as she heaved to her knees.

"That . . ." she gasped, "was ridiculous."

Naruto rubbed under his nose, giving his usual mischievous snicker. "Heh, it's even funnier because you beat the bastard up here."

Kassien tilted her head curiously. "How so?"

Naruto blinked. "'Cause you're a girl."

"Oh." Kassien nodded like this made sense. It didn't.

An abrupt throat clearing caught their attention. Their new sensei sat at the edge of the roof. He slouched over his waist, arms crossed over the standard, muted green flak jacket awarded to those ranked Chunin and higher, long legs straight out before him and connected at the ankle. Dark blue fabric reached under his baggy long sleeved shirt and stretched upward to palm the majority of his face, over his nose and along his cheeks, ending just under his right ear. Like most Konoha ninja the man's forehead protector rested above his eyebrows, but unlike all others it skewed to cover his left eye, leaving about an eighth of the man's face exposed. As though dissenting the confined nature of his attire, a shock of silver hair sprouted in reckless abandon atop his head, standing on end like he'd just stuck a fork in an electrical outlet.

"You sure took your time," the man stated, blinking lazily at them.

Naruto vibrated with anger, fists clenching and unclenching as if he'd like nothing more than to wring their new sensei's neck. "You . . . you . . ." He pointed one finger at the man in challenge, trembling within the wrinkled orange jumpsuit, face contorting in strange shapes as he struggled with the words to adequately describe the man in front of them. "You . . . !"

The man tilted his head, his one eye closing upwards in a way that eerily reminded Kassien of a baby doll. "Me," he concluded happily. He could have been smiling, but Kassien couldn't really tell. The inability to judge his emotions for herself unnerved her.

Naruto deflated, expelling breath like a popped balloon, and turned to Kassien. "I'm actually so annoyed I can't feel anything anymore," he said, eyes wide in wonder. "Is this what it's like to be Iruka-sensei?"

"You're an idiot," the Uchiha informed Naruto from behind them, blinking into the bright day before he adjusted, eyes forming their usual irate slant. He trudged forward, hands in the pockets of his beige shorts. "Why don't you do us a favor, Loser, and gag yourself with that headband?"

"I will when you remove that stick from your ass!" Naruto yelled, dogging the Uchiha's steps. Anger visibly blossomed within his face, flushing through his cheeks to scrunch around his eyes, in between his eyebrows, and in the usually jovial corners of his mouth. The Uchiha merely sighed, only stopping the sit on the steps before their sensei.

"What energetic students I have," the man said lightly.

Naruto, figuring now wasn't the time for a fight with his proclaimed rival, sat as well, choosing the furthest corner from the Uchiha, back turned to the boy, lip bubbled in a pout. The man inspected the Uchiha—who'd rested his elbows on his knees to hold his head upon interlocked fingers—to Naruto—whose arms folded in silent protest against his chest—to Kassien—who had yet to move from her place by the stairwell. He tilted his head in question.

Kassien realized her mistake with a start. She hurried to sit on the step equidistant from her teammates, folding her hands in her lap, shame striking her cheeks with muted fire.

"Well!" the man said brightly, clapping his hands together once, "I think some introductions are in order. How about we start with the loud, orange one?"

More introductions? Kassien thought, a little underwhelmed. Well, at least I get to meet one new person today.

The demon's arms unfolded, and he turned to face their sensei completely. "What do you want to know?"

The man shrugged. "Your name, what you like, what you don't like, hobbies, goals for the future—that sort of thing."

"Hey, Sensei, how about you go first?" Naruto suggested, his anger at the Uchiha momentarily forgotten. He rocked forward in excitement. "Show us how it's done!"

The man's eye closed, and he gave off a deep hum. "I'm Kakashi Hatake. I don't really feel like talking about my likes and dislikes. I have many hobbies. Dreams for the future?" He tilted his head in consideration, but didn't say anything. A few birds few overhead, twittering faint as the wind twisted it away. If Kassien trained her ear hard enough, she'd be able to pick up the quiet mumble of the marketplace just a few blocks down the street.

"Now you go," Kakashi said after a long minute.

"Right." The demon shook himself from his open stare. "I'm Naruto Uzumaki. My favorite thing is ramen, especially when Iruka-sensei treats me to ramen! I hate the three minutes it takes for ramen to cook. My hobbies include gardening and comparing different types of ramen—"

So demons love ramen, Kassien concluded, quite bewildered as Naruto's eagerness at the subject grew exponentially at every word. Does he dream to open a ramen shop?

"—and my dream is to become the Hokage, so everyone will respect me and accept me for who I am!"

Kassien blinked. That was nearly as abrupt as his haywire emotions.

Their sensei, nevertheless, remained unaffected. "Now the girl."

The three of them turned to look at her, and Kassien's tongue instantly cemented to the roof of her mouth. Her previous desire for the melting jutsu returned with frightening clarity, but her team expected something from her.

It's just an introduction, Kassien told herself, licking her lips.

"I'm," (her throat was terribly dry, a little cracked from her prolonged conversation with Naruto earlier, and she cleared it before trying again) "I'm Kassien Otawa. I like . . . I like . . ." What did she like? She wasn't completely sure. Her hands were uncomfortably clammy, and she clenched her fingers into the baggy fabric of her black pants. Dry and starch, perfect for excessive activity in temperate weather, familiar under her palms. She could do this. It was only an introduction. Just tell the truth. "I don't like or dislike much of anything," she said honestly. "My hobbies . . ." What did she do for fun? No, that's not right. What did she do when she'd finished her duties? Homework, Taijutsu, and "Reading. Uh . . ." She forgot the last one, and appealed to Naruto silently. His blue eyes were much closer than she'd anticipated, encompassing the entirely of her vision. Something unpleasant and cool slid down her back. She didn't think she liked this much attention.

"A goal for the future," the demon prompted helpfully.

"Right." She took a deep breath. This one was easy. "I want to become someone my father can be proud of."

Kakashi nodded. "And the dark, broody one."

The Uchiha's dark eyes narrowed at their sensei, but flicked back to something that may be a burn mark on the roof as though nothing else was worth his time. "My name is Sasuke Uchiha. I don't like many things, and I dislike more things. Hobbies are pointless and a waste of time. And my dream is more of an ambition . . . an ambition to restore my clan . . . and to kill a certain man."

The words chilled the flow in her veins, raising gooseflesh on her arms and the back of her neck. Girls like that?

Naruto's laughter rang in her ears, pulling her from her perplexed terror and back onto the roof of the Academy. The demon had fallen off the low step they sat on, clutching his gut as tears streamed in transparent rivulets down his whiskered face. For a moment, Kassien was concerned—had the Uchiha punished him again?—but as her sense of sound reconnected to her thoughts, she understood Naruto's tears were of mirth, not of pain or sadness. She blinked at the sight, then shrunk back at the Uchiha's glare: two pits of black anger chipped from a face of marble, hatred usually reserved for Naruto etched in the line of his mouth and the set of his eyebrows.

"Mah, so critical, Kassien-kun," Kakashi said, but his tone was far from reprimanding. He sounded almost gleeful.

It was then that Kassien realized she said her last thought out loud.

Horrified, Kassien fastened her hands to her face. This only made Naruto laugh harder.

"Oh my God," she said. "I'm so sorry, Uchiha-san. It slipped out."

Kakashi coughed into his fist. Twice.

The Uchiha grunted low in his throat, and lifted his chin to peer at her from the end of his nose. It seemed that, in her aspiration to become a respectable ninja of Konoha like her father, she'd offended the last of the Uchiha and befriended a demon.

It seemed she only existed to be a despicable human being.


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Updated: September 2017