¤By Small Means¤

Here is the first chapter of By Small Means, I hope you all enjoy it…

"Ohayo" Speaking Normally

'Ohayo' Thinking Normally

"Oni" Bijuu/ Jinchuuriki in demon mode speaking

'Oni" Bijuu/ Jinchuuriki in demon mode speaking

Chapter One

Naruto tiredly opened his eyes, finally waking up from his alarm clock. He looked at the time and saw a flashing 6:30 and was thinking why he had to get up. He had a vague inkling that there was something, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. He then remembered that the academy started that day and he only had half an hour to get ready and there. His eyes opened wide at this revelation. 'Crap… first day at the academy and I'm going to be late' was the thought going through his head as he bolted into the shower. He finished his shower, put on his white shirt and blue pants, and sped out the door to his future.

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A certain indigo-haired girl was sitting down, looking around at the other students at the academy with her. 'Everyone here looks stronger then me… I'll be too weak to be a ninja… everyone will look down at me…' were just a few of the thoughts running through her head, each one making her put her head down more, until her attention, along with nearly everyone elses, was caught by three students in the column left of her.

In the chair closest to her sat a guy who had snow white hair and black pants accompanied by a black t-shirt. He was just laying his head slightly back, snoozing. A girl was sitting next to him, seeming to do the same thing. She had jet black hair and wore the same type of clothing. Hinata thought that they looked related in some way (due to the fact that classes were separated by age, she thought that they were twins). Hinata could only see the third persons back, which revealed a midnight blue shirt. However, what caught the people's attention was that they all had specialized weapons.

The boy with the white hair had two charka knives (Asuma's weapons) in a holster on his side, the girl had a coiled whip on her back, and the last person had two long katanas strapped to their back.

While Hinata was thinking about this, a shinobi with a chuunin vest and a scar on the bridge of his nose walked into the room. Hinata's attention was brought back to the front of the room at this and she guessed that this was their teacher. "Hello everyone, welcome to the Ninja Academy" The chuunin said. "My name is Iruka and you will call me Iruka-Sensei as long as you are here. Understand?" A resounding "Hai, Iruka-Sensei" filled the room.

"OK then" he said. "Now I'm going to call attendance. However, I don't much care for clan names so I will only call out your own names. Chouji." Hinata turned around to see a rather large boy with a bag of potato chips in the row behind her. "Mhm… here" and just kept eating. Iruka made a mark on his clipboard and then called out "Hinata." She looked back at the front of the class and said "H-Here" rather nervously. Iruka made another mark then said "Hiroshi." The boy with the charka knives said "here" as well, opening his eyes. Hinata let out a small gasp, along with the rest of the class. They were dark red. Quite a few people were surprised at this and even Iruka paused for a second before regaining his senses. He then continued with "Ino", who also responded with a cheery "here."

Just as Iruka was about to call out the next name, a blonde-headed boy with a fire emblem t-shirt ran into the room, panting "sorry that… I'm late." He then looked around the room, seeing nearly every pair of eyes on him. "Heh… sorry for interrupting" he said, putting a hand behind his head and grinning sheepishly. Iruka just sighed at this, saying "Just take a seat so we can finish." While this was happening, Hinata realized that she remembered seeing the boy before. She then thought back to when she first noticed the blonde.

Chibi Hinata was six, walking with her father, Hiashi, back home. Suddenly, she could feel hate build up in the air. Looking around, Hinata saw a beat up looking blonde kid walking in the opposite direction that she was. When he saw her, he gave off a smile to her. However, Hiashi pulled her to his other side, giving a glare to the blonde and speeding away. Hinata looked back at the blonde and wondered why her father acted that way. Every once in awhile, she would see the blonde alone and noticed that her father was only one of many people that treated him like that. She was wondering about that when she was brought back to reality as the blonde sat next to her. Remembering her manners, she attempted to introduce herself when Iruka continued with attendance, saying "Kane."

Hinata heard a "here" from the person with the swords on his back. From the voice, she determined that the person was a boy. Iruka called out "Kiba", to which he replied with a "here" and a dog on his head barked a "yip". Then, Iruka called out "Naruto". The boy next to her said "here" as well. Hinata quickly memorized his name for future reference. "Nozomi" Iruka said, the girl with the whip responding with a "here". Hinata glanced at the boy and girl that she now knew as Hiroshi and Nozomi, realizing that they were twins due to their eyes and facial structure.

Iruka finished up his role call with Sakura, Sasuke, Shikamaru, and Shino, all of them responding with a "here". Iruka looked at the list one more time, and then looked up at the class. "Ok everyone, welcome to the Ninja Academy…"

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After Iruka went over the basics of the Ninja Academy, he led everyone out to the front of the school so they could give a brief description of themselves if they wanted. They got in a circle and sat down on the grass under the tree. "Class, if you choose to answer, just say your likes and dislikes, nothing like 'I am the best at the game ninja' or anything like that, Ok?" A chorus of "Hai, Iruka-Sensei" rang out. "Alright Chouji, do you want to tell us about yourself?" Hinata saw Chouji sitting next to a laying down Shikamaru, who Hinata saw was looking at the clouds. "Ok …munch…" Chouji said while eating chips. "I like my best friend Shikamaru, eating chips, ramen, and barbeque pork …munch…, and I hate it when people insult Shikamaru or call me fat, …munch… I'm just chubby, hurray chubbies! …munch…"

"Let's see, Hinata, what about you?" Iruka said. Hinata shyly looked back at Iruka. "A-Ano… is it a-alright if I don't say?" Hinata asked nervously. "Sure Hinata, Hiroshi? What about you?" Hinata saw the white haired boy sitting next to his sister. "Sure, I'll take a crack at it." He replied. "I like making weapons and sailing and I hate people who enjoy inflicting pain on others or themselves and people who have no self-control."

"Hmm… Ino, you're up." Hinata saw the blonde headed girl look up from talking to the pink haired girl. "I like my best friend Sakura and flower arranging, while I don't like people who insult me or Sakura."

"Ok, how about you Kane?" Hinata turned and noticed that Kane was sitting next to her. This was the first time she got to see him up close. The first thing she noticed about him was his eyes. They were dark green; however, it seemed as if they had a slight reddish ring right around the pupil. He also had dark red hair just above his neck line. His shirt was a turtleneck and he had black shinobi pants.

"Lets see…" Kane said while thinking. "Well, I enjoy carving things, mostly crystals though, and I enjoy helping and cheering up my friends when they are in need of it. I, however, hate it when people degrade other people. When anyone does that they are just wastes of flesh on this earth." Kane said the last part with disgust and venom in his voice. Hinata wondered if he had seen a lot of this in his life. A couple of other students were also wondering about this when Iruka called out Kiba. "Well, I like dogs, especially my companion, Akamaru. Oh, and I dislike cats" Kiba said, not really surprising anyone.

"Ok then…" Iruka said. "Naruto, you're up." Hinata looked over to the blonde, interested in what he had to say. "Well, I like ramen and old man Sarutobi because he helped me and befriended me when…" Naruto went silent for awhile, looking slightly sad. However, a second later, he was smiling his foxy grin and continued with "and I dislike the three minutes it takes to make instant ramen!" Nearly everyone laughed at this.

After the class settled down and Iruka stopped chuckling, he called out "Nozomi, what about you?" "Ok" she replied. "I like hanging out with friends, going shopping with friends," Hinata then heard a muttered "yeah right, only liking it isn't going every other day and being the reason for the store managers retirement ten years earlier then expected…" Hinata couldn't help but giggle at this.

Kane, who was the one that said that, smiled and whispered "sad thing is, the main way she gets all of the stuff is my profits from selling glass and crystal items… she still owes me from yesterday too…" adding the last part with an aggravated face. He smiled, however, when Hinata giggled again. "Hey, my name's Kane, what's yours?" he asked as he put out his hand slightly. She shook it, meekly replying "H-Hinata…" "Well, it's a pleasure to meet you, Miss Hinata", He said while mock bowing with a smile still on his face. "Well, it seems as if Nozomi is nearly done with her introductory monologue. I'll talk to you later I guess." Hinata then realized that while they were talking (mostly him, she realized), Nozomi was still saying what she liked and disliked.

She looked around at what everyone was doing and saw Naruto laying down with Shikamaru, both of them looking up at the clouds, Hiroshi had his face in his hand, slowly shaking it, basically yelling out 'this is NOT happening again…' with his actions, and Iruka looked zoned out. Everyone else was just talking with their neighbors or thinking, with only Ino and Sakura listening. However, as Kane predicted, she ended with a "…and I hate people who betray their friends most of all." Hinata could have sworn she could hear a "finally" from Naruto as he sat up, Shikamaru still lying down. After a second, Iruka noticed that she was done speaking and said "Ok… let's see…" as he was trying to remember who went next. "Sakura." She gave a similar response to Ino's.

"Sasuke." The chibi Uchiha looked up and cheerfully replied "I love my Nii-san and I like training to be like him and I dislike his fan-girls, even though it's funny to see them chase him once in awhile, so I sometimes let them know where he is. I also get some money to buy kunai's from them if I give them some of his clothes." He said the last part in a mischievous tone of voice and everyone was laughing until a large amount of killing intent came from behind Sasuke. Said Uchiha slowly turned around to see an ANBU with a weasel mask on his face directly behind him and said "H-Hi aniki… ano… H-How m-much did you h-hear?" Itachi replied with a frighteningly calm voice, saying "all of it." Sasuke paled at this and slowly said "I should run, shouldn't I?" "Yeah, that would be a good idea right about now…" The older Uchiha once again calmly replied.

Sasuke looked back at Iruka and said "I-I'll be l-leaving, sensei." Iruka only nodded as Sasuke bolted off, Itachi evilly saying "You can run, foolish brother, but you can't hide!" and disappearing in a swirl of leaves, leaving a wide-eyed Iruka and a gaping class (the majority at least, Kane holding in laughter, Shino only raising his eyebrows and Shikamaru was still laying down, muttering troublesome…). After a few minutes, Iruka finally said "Ok then… let's finish…"

Iruka then called out to Shikamaru, who only said "it would be too troublesome" (which got him a hit on the head from Ino), and then asked Shino, who only said "No."

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After class, Kane found Hinata and asked if she wanted to talk. "Ano… I c-cant right now, I have to go back h-home right after class t-today." "Alright, I'll talk to you later then Hinata!" "B-Bye Kane-kun." She said as she walked towards Neji.

Kane decided to walk around the academy to see what the basic layout of the place was. One of the things he couldn't stand was not knowing where something was. However, as he went around, near the back he heard a noise. When he turned the corner, he saw a few training dummies arranged for single or team practice. On the third one, he found where the noise was coming from. It was the blonde boy, Naruto if he remembered correctly, training.

He watched for awhile as Naruto practiced, hitting it, then blocking, sometimes being knocked down, yet still going, no matter what. After a few minutes of this, Kane became impressed by his determination and decided to introduce himself. He walked up behind Naruto and said "pretty determined, aren't you?" Naruto quickly turned around, slightly in fear of who was there. As a result, he got hit in the back of the head by the training dummy and fell down.

Kane ran over to him, offering his hand. "Heh… sorry about that, I'm Kane by the way." The blonde took his hand and pulled himself up quickly, grinning and saying "I'm Naruto." "So, why aren't you at your home training with your parents?" Kane asked. Naruto's smile faltered a bit at this. Kane realized what happened and quickly apologized, saying "Oh… I'm sorry." "It's ok, they died a little bit after I was born." Naruto replied, putting his grin back on. "What about you, Kane? Why aren't you with your family?"

Kane wondered how to answer this and decided to reply "Well, their techniques won't work for me until I am slightly older." Naruto thought about this and asked "Why is that? What makes you different from them?" Kane became slightly more defensive at this, however, he realized that Naruto did reveal a part of his past to him, so he should to do the same. "Well, a lot of things, however, in this instance, their technique relies on their bloodline, which I don't have. Their bloodline gives them natural talent to control their nature element. I can manipulate my elements, which are fire and air, pretty well; however, I don't yet have the same abilities as them so I train with myself or friends until I am at their level."

"Why wouldn't you have their bloodline? Were you adopted?" Kane sighed exasperatedly and continued with "You could say that… I was found abandoned, nearly dead, by the side of the road as they were traveling. They searched around for my family nearly, however, they couldn't find them, and so they decided to bring me into their clan. My family is unsure of which clan or nation I'm from. I wondered about it for awhile. My memory is vague of the period before they found me. I was five at the time…" Naruto was surprised at this. "Oh…" Both of the boys were quiet for a little after this.

Kane broke the silence with "So, why are you so determined? What goal do you have that presses you so much?" Naruto sighed at this but then put on his biggest grin yet. "So that I can become Hokage and have people acknowledge me." (Naruto doesn't have any friends yet so he hasn't grasped the concept of his 'precious people' yet.) "A lot of people, for some reason, hate me, including most of the kids that I have met, the only ones that don't are in our class." Kane thought about this. He wanted to help the blonde, so he cheerfully replied "I'll be your friend and help you achieve your goal. I don't know why they hate you, however, you are kind and I will stay with you to show them that you don't deserve their hate. Then everyone will have to acknowledge that you are strong and kind, because all of the Hokage's have to be like that!" Naruto's face kept on brightening when he heard this until it seemed as if it would burst. "YEAH! We will become the greatest ninja ever!" Kane smiled and put out his fist. "It's a deal" he said as Naruto hit it with his own.

Meanwhile, The Kyuubi no Kitsune began stirring from its slumber...

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Well, how was the first chapter. I will be holding most pairing votes later on, however, I first will lay ot the foundation.

Votes in next chapter.

R&R
-Static