AN: What's up everybody! I'm really appreciating the feedback I'm getting from you guys about this story and it's predecessor! Thank you! Without further ado, I give to you: Chapter Two!
Chapter 2:
The Konoha Academy was normally a very quiet place. Dedicated to educating the very future of the village, the teachers who taught at the illustrious place of learning took their jobs very seriously. They lectured about a great many things, taught practical lessons concerning physical ninja skills, and gave stern admonishments to students who stepped out of line. In one, Iruka Umino's classroom, a perfect example of a stern lecture was currently happening.
Iruka's eyebrow twitched as he glared down at the three students standing before him. He had never felt so angry in his life. As a teacher, surely he deserved more respect than he was being given right now!
His eyes fixed on Sasame Fuma, who had her gaze lowered to the floor in shame. He felt bad for punishing the girl along with Naruto and Sasuke, but he couldn't just let her off the hook: she had skipped class as well, and had been present at the Monument while the boy's were. The lack of paint on her clothing signified that Sasame did not paint anything, yet at the same time, perhaps she was simply an immaculate artist.
Iruka sighed heavily. At least Sasame knew how to look properly embarrassed for her actions. Naruto and Sasuke however, had Iruka at his breaking point.
"Got any fives?" Naruto asked as he sat cross-legged on the floor, studying his hand of cards critically.
"Hn, go fish." Sasuke replied, eyeing his own hand.
Iruka felt something in his brain snap. Showing his mastery in the art of strange and exotic ninja techniques, he performed his Konoha-famous, sealess technique: The Giant Head of Rage Jutsu.
"PUT THOSE CARDS AWAY AND AT LEAST ACT LIKE YOU'RE SORRY ABOUT WHAT YOU DID!"
Naruto and Sasuke turned to look at Iruka, and both blinked in unison. Quickly stuffing the cards into their pockets, they adjusted their positions so they seemed to be kowtowing before their enraged teacher.
"Please, forgive us, Iruka-sensei!" Naruto said in his most pitiful sounding voice. "We were fools!"
Sasuke said nothing, but nodded his head in agreement with Naruto's statement. Iruka's eyebrow twitched in annoyance. Did the two boys think he was blind and deaf? He could see the smiles on their faces and hear their muffled laughter under their breaths.
There was an uproar of laughter from the class, and the last straw was when Iruka's assistant teacher: Mizuki Touji, who was standing next to him, snickered. Iruka felt his blood boil.
"DO YOU THINK THIS IS FUNNY!?" He roared. "YOU TWO COMPLETELY DEFACED ONE OF OUR VILLAGE'S GREATEST TREASURES! YOU SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF YOURSELVES!"
Both boys were silent, until Naruto started shaking with repressed laughter again and Sasuke muttered:
"The only thing I'm ashamed of is my failure to use the right color paint..."
Iruka threw his hands into the air in exasperation.
"The only one of you that I'm even thinking of excusing for this transgression is Sasame; at least she has the decency to take responsibility for her actions!"
Sasuke deadpanned and gave Sasame a thumbs-up.
"Good for you Sasame." He said flatly. Sasame stuck her tongue out at him behind Iruka's back, but the rest of the class laughed again at the quick exchange.
Iruka face-palmed and sighed.
"You two are the top boys in the class!" Iruka reasoned tiredly. "You should be setting a better example! I have half a mind to ban both of you from taking the graduation exam tomorrow afternoon!"
Both boys froze in place. Sasuke's smug look faltered, while Naruto's chuckles ceased instantly. Iruka smirked.
'That got their attention.' He thought in triumph.
Naruto lifted his head up and regarded Iruka with a look of terror.
"NO! Iruka-sensei!" He pleaded. "You can't do that!"
Iruka crossed his arms defiantly.
"Last I checked Naruto," he replied sternly. " I was in charge of this class, so if I want to: I can."
Sasuke also raised his head and glanced at Iruka with a pleading expression.
"Iruka-sensei, please," Sasuke began. "Be reasonable. If anything, since it was Naruto's prank: punish him, and have mercy on me..."
Naruto glared at him.
"TRAITOR! YOU ARE AS GUILTY AS I AM!"
Sasuke averted his eyes from his indignant brother's harsh gaze.
"I am sorry Naruto," Sasuke replied in mock-sadness. "I will make sure to accomplish our dreams when I become a genin..."
Iruka sweat-dropped and looked at Mizuki, who shrugged and shook his head helplessly. Groaning harshly, Iruka rubbed at his temples, regarded the two boys, and sighed once more.
"My earlier punishment still stands. The three of you will still have to go apologize to Lord Hokage, AND clean up the Monument. Otherwise, I will not let you take the exam tomorrow-"
"WOOHOO!" Cheered Naruto, hopping to his feet at once. "We'll do it, Iruka-sensei!"
Sasuke got to his feet, albeit more slowly, and nodded at Iruka.
"Hn."
Sasame bowed, blushing fiercely.
"Thank you, Iruka-sensei." She said softly. "This won't ever happen again, I promise."
Iruka rolled his eyes.
'How many times have I heard that one before?'
Hiruzen Sarutobi's eyebrow twitched in annoyance. He sat behind his desk, hands folded in front of him as he regarded the four people standing before him.
One was a fairly petite and light-skinned woman of slender build. She had long and untamed, shoulder length black hair, and ruby red eyes. She was donned in a red mesh armor blouse with only the right sleeve visible. Covering this was a very broad material that resembled bandages with a rose thorn pattern on them. Her hands and upper thighs were also covered in bandages, and she wore a Konoha hitai-ate on her forehead and standard shinobi sandals on her feet. This was Kurenai Yuuhi, the Genjutsu Mistress of Konoha.
Standing next to her, a cigarette hanging between his lips, was none other than Sarutobi's own son: Asuma Sarutobi. Asuma was a tall man with brown eyes, short, spiky black hair, and a beard. His clothing consisted of the standard Konoha ninja uniform with the sleeves rolled up half way, flak jacket, regular shinobi sandals, and he too wore his hitai-ate on his forehead like Kurenai. Around his son's waist was a sash that had the kanji for 'Fire' on it. This signified that Asuma was a member of the Twelve Guardian Ninja, a group that protected the Land of Fire's daimyo. Asuma also had a pair of black bangles and bandages that wrapped around the arms of his sleeves.
The two people that were causing Sarutobi no small amount of irritation however, were not these two aforementioned ninja. No, it was the next two.
One of these ninja was a tall man with gravity-defying silver hair, and a lazy expression in his only visible, cobalt-colored eye. He wore a mask that covered the lower part of his face completely, and was donned in the standard Konoha shinobi uniform, flak jacket and all. His hitai-ate was worn in such a way that it covered his left eye on a downwards diagonal. This was none other than Konoha's famous Copy Ninja, Kakashi Hatake. Kakashi was currently ignoring the woman cursing at him obscenely under her breath, in favor of reading a small book with an orange cover, giggling perversely as he did so. Sarutobi's fingers twitched towards his desk drawer, where the latest copy of the same book was safely stowed away. How he longed to end this tedious meeting so he could go back to enjoying the sheer brilliance of the literature within. His eyes met Kurenai's, and she narrowed them when she traced his previous gaze to Kakashi's book. Sarutobi blushed slightly, coughed awkwardly, and regarded the last person standing in front of his desk. A woman that was responsible for calling this meeting. Again.
She had long, purple hair that was tied into a pony-tail that hung to her mid-back, and cocoa-colored eyes. She wore a tan trench-coat over full-body fishnet mesh-armor, that ended slightly past her knees, and an orange mini-skirt. She wore her hitai-ate on her forehead, and standard shinobi sandals on her feet. This was none other than Konoha's Snake Mistress: Anko Mitarashi. Anko was glowering at Kakashi and cursing him out, although the man paid her no heed whatsoever.
Finally, Sarutobi had heard enough, and slammed his fists on his desk.
"ANKO-CHAN, ENOUGH!" He bellowed, shooting her a stern glare that instantly shut the woman up.
Anko crossed her arms and returned the look, albeit more subdued than before.
"Come on, Lord Hokage!" Anko whined. Sarutobi was grateful that the woman had the foresight to not call him by his more affectionate nickname of 'Old Man' in the presence of his son and the other two jounin. That would be mortifying. "I totally called dibs on those three! And now, you mean to tell me that I can't have them!?"
Sarutobi sighed as he rubbed the bridge of his nose with his fingers. Anko had called a meeting concerning this subject over ten times already, each time arguing more adamantly against his final decision. But there was nothing he could do about it now. The teams were finalized. He had tried to get this through the stubborn woman's head, but she remained just that at each attempt: stubborn.
"Anko-chan," Sarutobi sighed wearily. "I have explained this to you so many times that it is making me nauseous. You can't have those three for obvious reasons. Two of them you have trained already for over six years! And the other, lives with you! There is too much of a personal interest involved. You know that you can't show favoritism amongst your students-!"
"Bullshit!" Anko spat in reply, crossing her arms. "Kakashi has just as much personal interest in them as I do, and you know it! I have no doubt in my mind that his decision is based on favoritism too!"
Kakashi made no response other than to momentarily look up from his book at the mention of his name, and then quickly returned to reading his book, giggling again. Kurenai shot him a look of the utmost disgust at his choice of literature.
Sarutobi sighed once more as he folded his arms once more and regarded Anko resignedly. However, Anko wasn't done making her point.
"Besides, Lord Hokage!" She continued. "You asked us to pick who we thought was best for us to train! I know all of Naruto's, Sasuke's, and Sasame's skill sets! I also know them better than anyone else here!"
Sarutobi placed his head down on his desk and groaned.
"Exactly." He sighed. "That's why I didn't choose you to be their sensei. You know them completely, and they know you!"
Anko puffed up her cheeks indignantly.
"That's a good thing!" Anko retorted. "They'll be more comfortable knowing that I'm going to be the one leading them!"
Sarutobi lifted his head, and looked at Anko fiercely, causing the woman's anger to subside somewhat.
"Becoming and training as a genin is not supposed to be about comfort." Sarutobi replied sternly. "I know that the tree of them would be more comfortable with you, that's why I'm giving them to Kakashi. Out of all of them, Naruto is the only one who has met Kakashi, and they don't know each other well at all. I want Team 7 to have to step out of their comfort zone!"
Anko, somewhat mollified, opened her mouth to retort, but just at that moment, Kakashi cleared his throat, intending to speak up.
"If it's to your liking Lord Hokage," began Kakashi coolly, causing everyone to look at him. "Why don't you just make Anko and I joint instructors of Team 7?"
Sarutobi blinked and then narrowed his eyes at the silver-haired jounin. Anko's eyes widened as she listened to Kakashi's suggestion.
"What purpose would that serve, Kakashi?" He asked skeptically.
Kakashi shrugged.
"I don't know," he replied lamely. "I just want Anko over here to stop bitching about this whole thing..."
Anko's eyebrow twitched wildly as she restrained herself from assaulting the one-eyed ninja right before their village leader. However, that did not stop her from stomping on Kakashi's foot, hard.
Kakashi winced in pain and glared at Anko, who grinned widely at him. Sarutobi turned to the other two jounin in the room and addressed them.
"Please tell me that you two are not having second thoughts about your team assignments?" He half-asked, half-begged.
Asuma blew out a cloud of smoke and grinned.
"Nah, I'm good Dad," Asuma assured him. "No problems here."
Sarutobi nodded gratefully at his son and gazed at Kurenai who nodded.
"I'm fine as well, Lord Hokage." Kurenai replied. Her gaze drifted over to where Anko was now trying to put Kakashi in a choke-hold and she sweat-dropped.
"Umm, sir," She continued awkwardly. "May Asuma and I be excused if there's nothing else we need to discuss...?"
Sarutobi rose his eyebrows at his son, who averted his gaze from his father, his cheeks dusted with pink.
Sarutobi smirked.
'That's my boy!' He thought gleefully and then nodded to Kurenai, signifying that the two of them were dismissed.
Kurenai bowed before she began to walk away, while Asuma just gave a friendly salute and trailed after her. Sarutobi watched them until the door closed behind them, and then gazed at Anko and Kakashi. The two jounin were now locked in a heated stare-down.
He sighed as he placed his head back on his desk. He was getting way too old for this shit.
Naruto scowled as he dunked his sponge into his bucket of water with an almighty splash.
'Stupid Iruka-sensei!' Naruto thought, as he scrubbed at the thick paint he had placed earlier on the Hokage Monument. Naruto was currently scrubbing the stone cheek of Hiruzen Sarutobi where he had written 'Ero-Jiji' (Perverted Grandpa). As he dunked his sponge yet again, he scowled even deeper when he thought about his scarred Academy teacher. Iruka had taken Naruto's camera from him right before the boy was able to snap a photo of his and Sasuke's handiwork. To put it simply: Naruto was royally pissed.
He growled as he scrubbed at a particularly stubborn piece of paint. How did Iruka-sensei expect the three of them to finish this in one evening!? Naruto had not expected to be caught, so he made sure that the paint was a special mixture (of his own creation) designed to be extremely difficult to get off. This meant that his current task was taking him three times as long to do instead of if he would've used normal paint.
"Well, that was a stupid idea..." Naruto grumbled as he dunked his sponge yet again.
He sighed as he threw his sponge back into its bucket and glanced to his right to see how Sasuke and Sasame were faring.
Sasuke was almost done, taking to the task with gusto. Naruto assumed this was simply because he was still bitter about how badly his work turned out. Sasame, to his surprise, was already finished. Curious to know how she accomplished her job so quickly, Naruto bounded over to the girl, who was currently sitting on top of Hashirama's stone head, relaxing.
"HEY, SASAME-CHAAAN!" Naruto shouted, causing the girl to nearly jump out of her skin in alarm. When she realized that it was just Naruto, she huffed.
"What, Naruto-kun?!" She snapped, still irritated that she got dragged into the two boy's punishment.
Naruto smiled sheepishly as he scratched the back of his head.
"Well, um; I was just wondering: how did you finish up so fast? That paint was mixed to be extra durable!" Naruto informed her.
Sasame smirked and withdrew a kunai, momentarily causing Naruto to back away in fright. Ever since Anko had taken Sasame under her wing, Naruto had become extra wary of Sasame when she had a weapon of any kind in her hands. Sasame frowned when she saw Naruto's reaction.
"Calm down, Naruto-kun," Sasame assured him. "I'm not going to attack you! Besides: I got over wanting to maim you and Sasuke just a few minutes ago!"
Naruto sighed in relief.
"Well, that's-WAIT WHAT!?" Naruto bellowed in fright. Sasame giggled and motioned for him to follow her, which he did: making sure to stay at least three feet away from her as he did so.
Sasame found a small patch of paint and bent down over it. Taking the kunai in her hand, she pointed the blade at the paint and began to pick at it. Instantly, the paint chipped and broke apart.
"I just used a kunai to scrape the paint off." Sasame explained casually. "Anko-nee-chan was right! You can use kunai for just about anything!"
She beamed at Naruto who was currently curled up in a ball, weeping.
'I wasted all of that time...' He lamented as a rain cloud formed over his body. 'I could've been done by now...
Naruto was brought out of his funk by Iruka, who appeared on Hashirama's head in a puff of smoke. The scarred chuunin raised an eyebrow at Sasame when he noticed Naruto curled up in the feta position, and the girl just giggled. Shaking his head, Iruka turned to look at Sasuke who was viciously attacking the paint on the face of Tobirama, where he had had given the esteemed leader bright blue eye-shadow. Iruka sweat-dropped.
"What's wrong with Sasuke?" He asked no one in particular, wincing when he heard the boy scream something about 'the eye-shadow not being symmetrical on both sides'.
Naruto hopped up to his feet and chuckled when he heard his best-friend screaming.
"Sasuke's just mad that he can't paint." Naruto laughed.
Sasame giggled again, and Iruka palmed his face in exasperation.
"Listen up," Iruka began, causing Naruto and Sasame to look at him. "We're going to have to postpone your apology to the Hokage."
Naruto's eyebrows rose in interest.
"Why's that, Iruka-sensei?" He asked.
Iruka scratched his nose awkwardly.
"Well, apparently he's in the middle of a meeting...A meeting that's been going on for the last three hours..."
Naruto and Sasame shared a quick grin as they looked at each other and said:
"Anko."
Iruka raised an eyebrow in confusion, but quickly decided that he didn't want to know what his girlfriend was up to this time.
"Anyway," Iruka continued. "You two are free to go, unless you'd rather wait for Sasuke-"
Iruka didn't get to finish. Naruto and Sasame flashed by him so fast he was certain the two of them had just used shunshin. He chuckled and shook his head. He then turned to Sasuke who was still scrubbing furiously at his portion of the monument.
"Hey Sasuke!" Iruka called, causing the Uchiha to glare at him. Iruka repressed a shiver at the pure anger in the boy's eyes. "Um, well; when your done, you can, uh...go home..."
Sasuke nodded briskly and returned to attacking Tobirama's face with renewed vigor.
Iruka sweat-dropped.
"I feel bad for whoever has to take these kids on as genin students..."
In a remote apartment, a man sneezed loudly, and wiped at his nose.
'Somebody must be talking about me...' he thought as he went back to what he was previously doing.
AN: And that's a wrap people! Thoughts?
