Guardians of World's Harmony

"..." - speech

'...' - thought

'INNER SAKURA'

Chapter 1: Assignment

‚It seems like everyone is here now', with that thought Sarutobi Hiruzen (An: Is this his real name?) took in the view in front of him. With a calculating gaze he looked at every single occupant in his office, all of the 25 ninjas ranging from rookie jounin to elite ones. Especially on one of the last group, even if he didn't seem like it on the outside, his gaze lingered for some more seconds with a slight tinge of worry before he began to speak.

"As I'm sure, the majority of you may already know, or at least suspect, why you are here", seeing confirmation in the nodding of heads, he continued. "As of yesterday, 24 of this year's graduation class passed the exam and are now qualified to test for genin. Every one of you showed the necessary abilities and skill required for a jounin instructor, but now I ask you: Who of you would be willing to take on the responsibility of a genin squad leader?"

Silence took over the room, everyone knew this question would be asked and all of them were ready to give the answer, but nobody wanted to be the first one to make a call. 'The same as every year, heh', Sarutobi smiled knowingly to himself. 'Well, let's see who has the courage to go first this time. What luck that Guy passed his team last year, even remembering the selection sends shivers down my back …', shuddering at the thought of Guy, he brought his attention back to the case on hand. 'Hm, if I had to guess, I'd put my money on –'

"Ladies first then, I guess. I would like to take on a team."

"Yuuhi Kurenai", ending his thought by speaking it out loud, the old hokage addressed the young, and quite beautiful, kunoichi in front of him. "I'm sure some genin would benefit from your knowledge. So, who else would like to try?"

With the initial stone thrown in the ring, it wasn't long until six more jounin stood calmly besides Kurenai. Sarutobi happily noted his son Asuma among them, seeing it as a way to flatten the rocky ground between them a little more. Hearing a book suddenly be shut and tucked away, he couldn't help but feeling a sudden shower of worry, fear, curiosity, but also a little bit of hope rushing over him. So, he slowly turned his head to acknowledge the eight and last candidate, whom he knew beforehand, would agree. Fighting back the bad feelings, he once again turned to the rest who didn't take him up on his offer by now and seeing as none of them seemed to complain about the choices, he nodded.

"As nobody else is about to change his/her mind, all except you eight are dismissed", and with a wave of his hand, the room quickly cleared out. Silently regarding his options in front of him, he readied himself for the battle that surely was going to start about which genin would be on whose team, or in at least one case let's better say, was not going to be. 'Well, better get this over with', opening a folder in front of him, he took out a pile of papers with names and assessments of the graduates. "First I would like to know if one of you already has someone you would like to train under you?"

Two hours later – academy

Nervousness hung all over the room. All of the 23 students occupying it knew what was going to happen today: they would officially be shinobi of Konohagakure no Sato, the village hidden in the leaf, and, oh man, how it was gonna be great!

As unsure they were about their future, their excitement overshadowed it by far and so, they used their adrenalin and energy to pass the time while they were waiting for their academy instructor to come and place them on a team. Some boys could be seen sitting in the back chatting happily or playing cards – and hereby cheating, of course, they were ninja after all; Meanwhile, others were either munching one bag of potato chips after another or lazily sleeping on the desk, dreaming about watching clouds and how those were murdering crazy, screeching fan girls with Silencing jutsu.

Speaking of the girls, well, all except one silent little girl in the back, were circling, screaming and fighting (guess who) one another over and around one person, a brooding blackhead trying his hardest to ignore all the touches and confessions of love thrown in his direction while moving as little as possible and avoiding the tempting thoughts similar to those dreams before, except with sharp kunai instead of clouds and jutsu.

All the while, none of them noticed the small figure slowly entering the classroom and taking a seat in an empty row, staring out of the window. It's not until one lazy pineapple head rose up form his desk being blinded by a 'kill me'-screaming bundle of neon orange, that the figure was noticed at last.

"Oi, Naruto, what are you doing here? This class is for graduates only", the lazy guy called out for the boy sitting by the window, catching the attention of the rest of the class.

Caught off guard, the boy jumped in his seat, causing his stool to fall backwards, taking the boy with it. Immediately, a storm of laughter broke loose, some of the kids pointing directly at the blonde boy lying on the ground and rubbing his head out of pain, while grinning like and idiot, before pointing at his forehead to show it covered by a leaf hitai-ate. "Troublesome", the boy acknowledged before, again, laying down his head on the desk.

It was this moment that their sensei decided to grace them with his presence. The laughter quickly died down and everybody took a seat, of course, not before a loud struggle between a blond and a pink haired teen as to who would get to sit next to their object of desire. None of them spent another glance on the blonde boy on the ground, whose smile had vanished the moment the others gaze turned away from him, only to be replaced by a look of determination and a clenched fist to ready himself for what was coming.

"Welcome all of you and congratulations on passing the exam as of now, you are considered adults in the eyes of the ninja, with all the responsibilities to come with it, so don't disappoint us. The way of the ninja is hard, but if you trust in yourselves and your friends and comrades, I am sure you will succeed in everything you do. Now pay close attention as I will call out your names and the teams you have been assigned to …"

'Why, of all the people, does it have to be him', that thought passed through one of the three teen's mind. 'He's gonna be annoying the hell out of me. Why can't he just disappear and leave Sasuke-kun and me alone, he is only going to hold us back. And Sasuke-kun is now pissed too and doesn't speak to me because this dead-last decided to pull some stunt to pass the exam. Sure as hell he knew that he would be placed on our team and wanted to mess with Sasuke-kun's and my love.' 'YEAH; IT'S ALL THE BAKA'S FAULT. LET'S BEAT THE CRAP OUTTA HIM!'

Scowling, the pink-haired girl turned to the boy at the window. "Oi, Naruto-baka!" No reaction. 'What's up with him?' 'HE'S SO ANNOYING!' She clenched her hand in a fist and strode towards the silent boy. "Hey, I called out for you, Naruto-baka", and with that her fist connected quite powerful with Naruto's scalp, shocking the boy and sending him to the ground again, the second time that day.

'Hn, being hit by one of the weakest girls, if not the weakest, in class? What kind of a ninja are you, dope?" asked the last occupant of the room, who had turned his head to see what was going on. "Sasuke-kun is absolutely right" 'YEAH, AND THE PART OF ME BEING WEAK HE DIDN'T REALLY MEAN' "How did you pass anyway? You couldn't even produce a decent bunshin yesterday and I know you failed the written test. No way could a stupid dead-last like you have been able to answer those questions." Crossing her arms in front of her chest, as if stating a fact, she looked at the blond, waiting for an explanation.

Naruto rubbed his head and turned to her, immediately putting up a goofy smile. "Sakura-chan, were you worried about me?" he asked the pink-haired girl happily.

"Worry?! Who the hell would worry about a baka like you?!" she screamed at him, punching him even harder this time. Glancing at her crush, she saw him scowling at the commotion and had to restrain herself from beating the blonde nuisance to a pile of crap for annoying her Sasuke-kun. Eventually, she turned around, not seeing the grin on the blonde's face fading away from his face nor the flash of pain it showed briefly, and walked back to her seat beside Sasuke.

'Arrgh, where the hell is our damn teacher? All the other teams left already three hours ago. Sasuke-kun is getting more and more annoyed of Naruto, why could the baka not be on another team … or better: just disappear and never come back, he surely wouldn't be missed …' 'YEAH; YOU ARE RIGHT – HEY! MAYBE SENSEI CAN REQUEST A REPLACEMENT FOR HIM. HE'S ONLY GOING TO HOLD US BACK AND SASUKE HAS TO GET STRONGER: I AM SURE THERE HAS TO BE A POSSIBILITY TO CHANGE THE TEAMS WHEN A SENSEI ASKS FOR!' At that thought Sakura smiled. 'That's it. Now sensei only needs to appear and Naruto-baka can get lost for all I care. I'm sure the moment sensei sees what of an idiot he is, he will change the teams. Yeah!'

As if on clue, the door of the classroom opened and a masked man walked in, at least he looked like a man to Sakura. She couldn't be sure, as the only part of him where you could tell that he even was human and not some walking pile of clothes was his right eye as well as a patch of gravity-defying, grey hair.

"Meet me on the roof in five minutes" the figure said and disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

'Ah, here they come', the masked man thought as he was lazily sitting on the fence surrounding the rooftop, while he waited for the three genins to arrive. Slowly, they approached their new sensei.

The first was the dark one, Sasuke, hands in his pockets and a face that showed, or was supposed to show, that there was nothing he had to fear and care about. His whole body language screamed miles away 'I'm the best – out of my way.'

Not far behind, and in Sasuke's opinion not far enough, strolled the sole girl of the small group. Sakura's expression seemed to change according to her feelings – 'She will definitely have to work on that', the man noted – at a faster rate than the jounin would have thought possible, although to him it seemed almost like some kind of pattern in the changes as if the girl would be in some kind of conversation and reacted accordingly to her thoughts during the talk. 'Weird.' Reaching her sensei, she immediately mimicked Sasuke's movements and sat down, again not far enough for Sasuke, beside her crush, covering her face with her hands hiding her blush while constantly sending glances at the raven.

Last but not least, the third member also arrived, bearing a large grin on his face and hands behind the back of his head and joined his classmates on the small stairs.

Seeing that everybody was comfortable, not that he would mind if they weren't yet, the masked man spoke. "Well … ok … as it seems we are supposed to be a team from now on. So fist of all, I want you to tell us something about yourselves so we get to know each other a little." He looked expectantly to his pupils, waiting for one to start.

"Eh, sensei? What do you want to know exactly?" Sakura asked, not knowing what else to say. Hiding his surprise behind his mask, the man eyed the supposedly smartest girl of this years class before answering. "Mah, just some information. Like your name, likes, dislikes, hobbies, your dream if you have one – doesn't really matter …" He sighed silently at the girl's confused expression and decided to start and get this over with.

"Ok, for example: I'm Hatake Kakashi. My likes are, well … I don't really dislike anything except some things. My hobbies aren't of your concern and my dream doesn't matter. So, now you – ladies first and all that."

Completely stunned for only learning about his name, the girl began. "My name is Haruno Sakura. My likes are … (insert giggle and glance at Sasuke), my hobbies are … (insert more giggles and another glance at Sasuke) and my dream is to … (insert combination of brackets before together with squeal and pink-like-her-hair blush)." At that point all three males had at least sweat dropped once and shared common thoughts of 'WTF!!' and 'Arrgh, FANGIRL!!!' before the introduction ended with a confident, for once, "And I hate Naruto!"

'…'

"Ok", the jounin said awaiting a reaction from mentioned blonde boy, but surprisingly none came. 'Hm, from the reports of their teachers it seemed like the boy had a little crush on Sakura, always trying to get her attention. But now, instead of being sad, he almost seems indifferent, as if he couldn't care less', thinking back he also noticed that Naruto wasn't quite the loudmouthed boy he had expected after reading al the reports of the various pranks he had played and from what he had heard from the teachers and the hokage. Oh, he seemed happy, hell, if his grin was any indication of his emotional status at the moment the jounin expected him to begin jumping around the next second. Nevertheless, something just didn't seem to be right. The question was what exactly. '…, mah, maybe just a bad day.' "So, how about the broody Uchiha next."

"Sasuke-kun isn't broody, Sensei! Don't say that", the girl spoke up while, again, a blush decorated her face, causing all three males around, again, to sweat drop.

"Hn", the black-haired boy commented, "I am Uchiha Sasuke. There are a lot of things I dislike and not much that I like. I have no hobbies and I don't need a dream as I have an ambition. I am going to kill a certain man and then restore my clan."

'Hell yeah … wait, did he say he wanted to restore his clan? ……… ME, ME, ME, ME, ME, ME, ME, DAMN IT, TAKE ME!!!'

'As expected from the last loyal Uchiha.'

'…'

After a couple of minutes in silence, Naruto at last decided to take the initiative, seeing as he was the only on who hadn't introduced himself yet.

"My turn it is", he laughed, preparing his speech. "My name is Uzumaki Naruto and I like ramen the most, especially the one Iruka-sensei teats me to at Ichiraku's. I don't like the three minutes it takes for the ramen to be cooked. My hobby is to compare different sorts of ramen. And my dream … my dream is to become the greatest hokage ever, one that will surpass all the ones before. Then people will respect me and acknowledge my existence." With that he stretched out his arm in front of him, his hand in a fist. "Believe it!"

"Hn, as if a stupid dope like you could ever become hokage, loser" was the only reaction beside sceptical looks all around, followed by a "Sasuke-kun's absolutely right, idiot."

To prevent further aggravation and to keep the now frustrated Naruto form charging, the jounin interfered quickly. "Ok, ok, calm down now. You had your fun, back to business." That brought back the attention of the three teens. "It's time for me to explain a couple of things. First, tomorrow we will going to have al little test, kind of survival training", here he stops, enjoying the shocked faces, and one deep scowl, of his students at the news. "Before you tick out and scream at me, I will tell you why. It is necessary so we can see who of the graduates really is ready to be a shinobi. Also, only nine of all graduates will be allowed to become genin, the others will be sent back to the academy."

At that time some expressions had changed: Naruto seemed even more shocked, tough with a tiny hint of determination manifesting itself in his eyes. Sakura on the other hand looked like she was going to explode at the news and Sasuke, well; said boy was clenching his hands in front of him, his face showing no doubt that he was going to pass anyway.

Well then, see you tomorrow at training ground 7, six o'clock in the morning. Oh, and one last thing: Better don't eat any breakfast, you might throw up." And with a last wave of his hand, the masked ninja puffed away, leaving the three to their own thoughts. 'So, I have a broody genius with talent and an avenger-complex, a fan girl per definition and … well, seems like it's going to be interesting tomorrow.'

Next Chapter: Final Exam

Ok, that's it - first chapter of my first story up - hurray!!!

I know it's not very different from the original story, but don't worry, it will be later. As for mistakes: please bare with me, english is not my native language and it's not really part of my everyday life, at least not writing it myself. If there's anything you don't understand because of bad writing, just ask. As for questions regarding what happens in the story itself I'll try to answer as long as it will not be part of future chapters.

Hope you enjoyed it nontheless (or at least a little bit :-))

Don't own Naruto, unfortunately.