The fog spread quickly over the small town of Konoha. Like a snake it slithered between houses making visibility next to none. A lone figure weaved their way along the narrow streets, physically they appeared relaxed but the told a different story, these eyes had seen much, much which they wanted to forget.

In Konoha's half-way house a small petite woman sat behind the reception, running her self-manicured fingers through her bleached blonde hair. She barely looked up from her beauty magazine as it creaked open.

"Excuse me".

She looked up to see a small mousy brown haired girl. "Yes?"

The girl swayed slightly, "Um… do you have a room I could rent?"

The receptionist looked the girl over, she couldn't have been more than ten years old. She smiled "You her with your parents?"

The girl bowed her head slightly hiding her eyes. "No"

The receptionist was puzzled. "What is a small girl like you doing all the way out here without your parents?"

The girl slowly tilted her head to face the receptionist. "I'm here for the chunnin exam".

The receptionist let out a snigger. "You're a ninja?"

"Not yet" came her cold reply.

The receptionist shook, her voice was different. It wasn't the voice of a little girl, it sounded of the voice of a killer, an avenger, the voice of evil.

"Can I have my room key now?"

The receptionist handed over a key. "Room 219"

"Thanks"

The receptionist could only stare as the girl walked off down the hall.

"Again"

Naruto wiped the sweet dripping from his forehead using a equally damp sleave. "What do you mean again? I did it right that time". He gave his forehead another wipe.

"Eww that's disgusting Naruto".

"Well I'm sorry Sakura"

"Can't you at least use a towl?" She looked over to where a young attractive boy stood, "like Sasuke". Her eyes lingered as a dreamy expression crept over her face.

"Sasuke" mumbled Naruto each syllable filled with hate and envy.

Sasuke Uchiha stood on the edge of the cliff, parted from the rest of the group. "What a waste of time, he's never going to get it" he thought, just as Naruto sailed past his left shoulder.

"Ouch, that hurt Sensei!" Naruto turned to face his teacher, a masked grey haired man who was currently leaning against a tree his nose in the "Hot Date Paradise" the latest slightly pornographic novel by Jiraiya.

Kakashi Hatake aka the copy ninja, seemed oblivious to his students complaints, "Again" he mumbled and continued reading.

"This is stupid, he isn't going to get it"

Naruto turned to a very bored Sasuke with fury burning in his eyes, "I AM GOING TO GET IT SASUKE! YOU JUST WATCH!"

"Whatever" mumbled Sasuke as he stood up and turned to walk away, bumping into a small girl with mousy brown hair.

"Sorry".

Sasuke scoffed, "So you should be".

The girl's eyes widened, "You're Sasuke Uchiha". She let out a squeal of excitement which annoyed both Sakura and Naruto.

"Who does she think she is, flirting like that", screamed inner Sakura.

"I'm Naruto Uzumaki", yelled Naruto proudly, puffing out his chest for extra effect.

The girl turned to Naruto, an annoyed expression on her face, "Yeah, whatever", then returned to questioning Sasuke, "So you're the last remaining member of the Uchiha clan right?"

Sasuke looked down at this girl with a pained expression on his face, "Yeah, I am. What's it to you anyway?"

The quickly broke eye contact with him, "Nothing really, I'm just here for the Chunnin exam and I thought that perhaps I should check out the rivals so to speak", she slow lifted her head, giving Sasuke a very nervous smile before quickly running off.

Naruto turned to face Kankashi, "Chunnin exams?"

Their Sensei looked up from his book, a playful expression on his face that wasn't covered by the mask, "Yeah, I told you right?"

"What Sensei?" asked Sakura.

"I entered you all in the exam. It starts tomorrow"

Naruto couldn't hide his excitement of perhaps didn't want to, "Chunnin exam, I Naruto Uzumaki am going to become a Chunnin and then Hokage".

Sasuke shook his head, "In this case I am going to go home and practice", and with that he strode off the wind pulling at his hair.

"Uh Sensei?" asked Sakura, "are you sure I'm ready for the exam?"

Kankashi just smiled "if you think you're ready turn up tomorrow".

384 people, 128 teams sat in the classroom, the tension was high with everyone carefully eyeing up their competition.

Sasuke saw the small girl he had met yesterday among two rather large and forbidding ninjas, chatting like she didn't have a care in the world. She caught him staring at her and gave him a cheeky wink. Sasuke quickly broke eye-contact and looked over to where a red haired boy with dark hateful eyes stared at him intently.

What's wrong with these people.

"Ok listen up" A large man stepped in front of the group, the exam will commence if you could all just find a seat. All the ninja rushed to find a seat next to there team. "There is two things, one- you can't sit with your team and two you are given ten points, if you answer a question wrong you lose one point, if you are caught cheating you will lose two points as soon as you run out of points you are not allowed to continue the exam". He turned around, "oh and one more thing if anyone of you team fails you do too."

Great! Sakura looked at the back of Naruto's head, you better not fail idiot!

Naruto sat down with and exasperated sigh. There was no way he was going to fail, was there?

Sasuke watched his male team mate. You better not stuff this up Naruto, because if you are responsible for me failing you will have a lot more to worry about than failure!

"Hi Sasuke" the small girl from yesterday sat down next to the Uchiha, "I forgot to introduce myself earlier, I'm Tani Matsumoto from the village of Thunder.

Sauske just stared at this small girl, she wore a pink summer dress and pink sandels. What does she think she is getting into? This exam is not like a stroll in the park!

"So anyway what's the story between you and Gaara?"

Sasuke looked puzzled, "Gaara?"

"Yeah Gaara, the Sand ninja. From what I've heard about him, he's not the kind of guy who you would want to meet in a alleyway at night".

"Are you always this talkative?"

"No, it's just that …" her voice trailed off as a member of her team signalled to her. "We'll do the usual, so don't try anything ok". She turned back to Sasuke "Sorry about that, it's really hard to be in a team with those idiots. But at least I don't have to any heavy lifting"

Yeah, heavy lifting thought Sasuke.

"Silence please, the exam has began, you can now turn over your papers".

There was a loud rustle as everyone turned over their papers.

Shit! thought Sasuke looking at the questions, Naruto you better answer at least one question.

Forty minutes had conceded and Sasuke had managed to answer most of the questions using his Sharingan and copying the-person-in-front-of-him answers, but his eyes strayed to Tani's sheet which to his surprise was empty, but was surprised him the most was that she sat there as if she was waiting for the exam to end. Sasuke sighed and moved back to his work, Oh well better luck next year.

He looked back at her page and was shocked, every question had been answered to perfection. But how? There is something very strange going on with that girl.

Across the room Naruto opened his eyes after pray to God to show him some miracle and nearly screamed, all the questions on his sheet had been answered, including working out. How had this happened, I only closed my eyes for two seconds and all of a sudden BANG! The answers appear right in front of me. AWESOME!

The guy next to him looked at Naruto then at his sheet and smiled. You couldn't resist, could you.

The Ninja's who passed the exam filed out of the room talking about what method that they had used to cheat their way through the exam without being caught.

"I can't believe you got perfect score Naruto", said a surprised Sakura.

"Neither can I", replied Naruto.

There is defiantly something fishy going on here, thought Sasuke. First that girl and then Naruto. Hmmmm…

Just then the girl walked by surrounded by her two teammates who were deep in conversation, "Tani, you left a little late I mean I was dying in there".

Tani just smirked, "time is on our side idiot, I can never leave it to late."

"And what was the deal with doing the kid's page next to me. I'm sure you found it funny, but I sure as hell scream out in surprise".

"He looked lost so I helped him out and plus he's on that Uchiha's team."

Her teammates stiffed at the name and quickened their pace.

"Wow" said Naruto, " It looks like they're in a hurry".

It was early in the morning when Sasuke finally decided to rise from his sleepless bed and go for a walk. He walked away from the fog of the village to the light breeze and cover of the training grounds. A lone figure stood in the middle of the training ground, lost in thought. Sasuke quickly jumped behind a bush as he felt a sensory jutsu come from nowhere. Finally feeling confident he raised his head to get a better look at the person.

Thack! Sasuke found that he couldn't move. What's happening, this came out of nowhere .He looked down at his feet and was shocked. His clothes were pinned to the tree courteously of at least a dozen Kunai. But how? The shots are so clean and precise, even Kakashi-Sensei couldn't pull this off.

"Seen enough?"

Sasuke looked up from his feet, "You. How?"

Tani smiled, "easy, just a little target practise. Not that you were the only one." She gestured to the middle of the ground where a very frustrated Gaara stalked across. "He followed you here, he's pretty good but his charka is very strong so I could have detected him miles away."

Sasuke frowned, "How powerful".

"I'll let you find that out yourself".

"But…" Sasuke turned around and saw that Tani was nowhere to be seen. Damn it! She always seems to have the upper hand and I don't like it.

The next day all the teams who passed the written exam assembled in the Konoha countryside. "I hear that this is meant to be really hard and people have like died in here, Sakura." Ino pointed to the large inclosed forrest.

"Don't worry Sakura, I'll keep you safe", Naruto smiled.

" Keep me safe? Naruto are you alright?"

"You just want Sasuke to keep you safe!" retorted Ino.

"Maybe, but your just jealous that your not on his team!"

"Well in my opinion you guys arguing is a total drag", drawled a bored Shikamaru, "as you can see Sasuke is kind of hitting on someone else". He pointed to where Sasuke stood talking to Tani.

"I am going to kill that girl", growled Sakura and Ino simultaneously.

"If you could all please gather round the second test can get underway".

Naruto turned around to see a youngish female ninja standing in front of pack.

" Alright, now that I have your attention could you please find your other team members and collect a scroll from over there." She pointed to a small hut.

Sasuke turned around to see Tani talking to her other team members, "Don't do this, just stick to the plan, we're nearly there and I don't want to have to explain to him why we failed. Come on let's go." She dragged her two team members with relative ease over to the hut.

"Sasuke? Sasuke you want to go now?"

Sasuke looked down at Sakura, "Yeah" he grunted and stalked off.

"Ok. Naruto.." she looked to where he stood attempting to pick a fight with a older, larger and generally more powerful looking Geninn. "Come on Naruto, let's go!" she gave him a quick slap to the back of the head and dragged him away.

10:10am hours-

Ten minutes into the challenge.

Team 13

The three ninja sat in a small circle their backs to any attacker. To any other ninja it would appear as a weakness, but this team knew what they doing.

"Three ninja at 3 o'clock"

"Travel speed 15k/m"

"Estimated arrival time?" asked a female voice from above.

The three ninja looked up moments too late, three kunai embedded themselves into the three ninja's skulls.

"Gee, you could have been a little less violent, you know"

The female shrugged, "They had it coming, sitting like that, having complete confidence in their jutsu. It's just plain stupid, no one can pull that off".

"Except you, of course" The second ninja appeared from the bushes in the far corner.

"That's true" replied the first.

The female tapped her foot impatiently, "Come on! Can we please get going".

10: 20am

Twenty minutes into the challenge

Team 13

The tower stood before them, it was a truly wonderful structure. The detailed wood was breath taking and team 13 took all the time in the world to admire it. Time wasn't an issue for them.

"Well,are we ready to go in?"

The female scoffed, " Are you crazy? It is only like twenty minutes into this five day task. What did we say about exposing our abilities before we took on him."

Themale ninja bowed his head in shame, "No exposing of abilities unless we need to."

"Well done" her voice was cynical.