Urume-sensei used to tell me that it was ridiculous - just stupid to fight with my eyes closed. That stopped the first time I pinned him without opening them. It was my way of raising the stakes on my own terms. The world wasn't going to accommodate me, and my fear wouldn't leave with some desperate hope.
Since Kakashi had given me a handicap by keeping one hand on his book, I evened the odds. I shut my eyes. I wouldn't let him insult me, not without doing the same. Humiliation is a double-edged sword.
So. My blind punch took him off guard. He blocked it with his palm and grunted in surprise. I felt my spirits rise a little as I twisted and aimed my other fist down - possibly toward his gut. I threw and collided with his knee. Knowing I'd broken my knuckle, I hissed in pain and shifted my weight to my back foot. I put my front foot on his stomach and pushed. We slid apart, sandals sliding over grit. I heard the bells jingle.
I sunk to one knee and caressed my hand, now warm and tingling- it'd go numb in a minute. My eyes were still shut, not that they'd be much use to me now - they were watering. A sob was coming on. I breathed. Once. Twice -
"Why do you have your eyes closed?" Kakashi asked. I could hear him about twenty paces away.
"That book," I snarled. I could hear his eyebrows go up.
"If you're gonna read, I'm gonna shut my eyes - that's fair, right?" I spat. I drew air in sputtering stops and starts; the pain spread up my arm, like it was slowly sinking into boiling water. I stood.
"Not really," Kakashi replied, "You're not quite up to my level yet, I'm afraid. If you're looking for fair, well-"
"-I came to the wrong place?" I interrupted, "Good one, sensei, I've never heard that one before."
I could chock that comment up to pain-induced delirium later. His silence egged me on.
"I mean, people have been saying that forever. "Life isn't fair." How many times have you heard it?" I accused, only half meaning it. I rambled on,
"Did you even stop to think how insulting it is - to be upstaged by a fucking - by "Icha Icha"? Like - like knowing all that matters to you is a damned erotic novel? I guess our futures are so unimportant that you can't be bothered to care."
I knew it was a strategy, of course - that he did all he could to provoke us into attacking. And I knew that we passed or failed on our own, and he took the place of the messenger. But right then, I seethed, and it pumped me up. I really wanted to shoot that messenger.
I snapped my pack open and pulled out my boxing tape. My hand shook beyond my control now. I was seized by a sudden fear that Kakashi had left; this fear was silenced when his voice, strangely quiet, said,
"Hika, I'm not patronizing you. I'm using a tactic. In a situation like this, you can't afford to feel victimized, or it'll cloud your judgment."
That made my eyes snap open. I stood there in stoic shock for a good ten seconds.
"You know, it's funny how when my mom says that, it doesn't sink in, but when you say it, suddenly…" I trailed off. I wiped my tears with my good hand.
"I never liked crying," I muttered, which seemed like a non sequitur, but Kakashi let it pass. I brought the tape around my index finger and came very close to screaming when I felt a piece of bone move, detached, inside my skin. I wrapped several times, bit the tape, and started on my other hand.
"You should've done that beforehand," he said wryly. I agreed with him. I should've put on boxing tape before punching my sensei in the kneecap. It wasn't that I had too much pride and thought I could take him down with a bare-knuckle brawl; I expected him to go easy on us, to show some restraint, but clearly he wanted us to prove how strong we were. We wouldn't give 110 percent if Kakashi went easy on us.
To my surprise, he put away his book.
My shoulders slumped. The adrenaline seeped out of my bloodstream. I sighed and, despite myself, launched a punch with my unsullied hand. A tired punch was better than no punch. Right?
I hit air. It had a certain irony; now that I fought with my eyes open, I couldn't hit him. He'd vanished. One second he'd been there, the next he had gone, not even a halfhearted puff of smoke. I spun around ungracefully, looking for the familiar sprout of silver hair to no avail.
"Down here," came a muffled voice, as a hand burst from the ground, wrapped around my ankle and pulled me under. In a flurry of dust and gravel he buried me from the neck down - in the ground. Kakashi squatted on the surface in front of me. I squirmed and wriggled my body, but I was well-stuck.
"Earth-style: Headhunter Jutsu. Can't move, huh? That was ninjutsu, the third shinobi battle skill," he said, dripping with so much smug I could've wrung him out like a dishtowel and filled up a bucket.
"You were talking about "fair" just a second ago," I said, failing to make air-quotes. I pointed a glare at him.
"Ninjutsu is fair in ninja battles, last time I checked," he said, taking out his book again.
"Urume-sensei was right to transfer you; your squad didn't work well together. But I can't see this one being much better for you," he said. As he walked away, I had an epiphany.
"Holy shit- YOU BASTARD!" I screamed, unable to contain my rage. Kakashi didn't turn back. I don't think he even blinked.
"That's the point, isn't it?" I said, quieter this time, "I get it."
I heard a distinct, irritating ringing, and I knew we'd all lost. My heart skipped.
"No!" I had just figured it out, the point of the exercise; I wouldn't have if Kakashi hadn't dropped the hint, but I was still more enlightened than my teammates.
Footsteps approached my position and I twisted my head around - a surprised Sasuke. He stopped.
"Kakashi?"
"Headhunter jutsu," I explained, and his face cleared, "Did you hear the timer go off?"
"Yeah. You didn't get a bell?"
I shook my head, surprised that he asked. I didn't think he held my abilities in such high esteem.
"Me neither," he said, looking down, nose wrinkling in disgust.
"Hey, could you get me out?" I pressed. Not that I didn't feel like bonding with Sasuke by being broody, but I didn't feel like spending the rest of the day trapped in a hole in the ground. He obliged and dug me out. Exchanging meaningful looks, we silently decided to trudge back to the posts, bearing the weight of failure around our shoulders as we walked.
Naruto was tied up already. The rumbling of his stomach greeted our approach and we sat down on either side of him. We were facing a disappointed jonin and, behind him, a large, obsidian stone.
"Sorry, Naruto," I said. The poor guy had already exhausted himself by spending chakra on shadow clones, and he hadn't eaten anything today. I still had a granola bar in my pack, and maybe-
"Stomach's growling, huh?" Kakashi said, "That's too bad."
I scowled, sick of his attitude. A sensei wasn't supposed to act like this. They were supposed to care about their students, encourage them to succeed, not discourage them from failing. Failing was a good and healthy necessity of life, but Kakashi made me feel ashamed for not getting a bell.
"So, I've decided that I won't send any of you back to the academy."
In the pause that followed, precisely three things happened at once: 1. I realized Kakashi's manner of speaking was way too uncharacteristically cheerful, so this meant bad news. 2. Naruto started to celebrate and struggle against his bindings. 3. I glanced at Sasuke and blinked twice. A signal in case this turned out to be a trap.
"So that means all three of us - I mean, all three of us -"
"Yes," Kakashi said, "All three of you are being dropped from the program. Permanently."
I'd seen it coming, at least a little bit, but poor Naruto was taken so off-guard I felt genuine hatred for Kakashi.
"But - but why?" Naruto cried.
"Because you don't think like ninja. You think like little kids - like brats."
Sasuke, usually the level-headed one, apparently didn't take too well to being called a brat and took the chance to charge. I didn't know what he planned to accomplish, but if it was "get pinned by Kakashi in the most humiliating way possible", he did a bang up job. Kakashi took him down in half a second and rested his foot on Sasuke's head.
"You don't know what it means to be a ninja - you think it's all a game, don't you?" I considered an attack right then, because Sasuke occupied his attention, but I rethought that strategy when I realized Kakashi's mood had shifted. Suddenly his tone carried a biting hostility, like we'd gotten on his last nerve. He'd shed his casual outer layer only to reveal he really did care, not about us, but about the lesson he was trying to teach us. I felt intensely proud that I understood why he was so pissed off, and also embarrassed that I hadn't thought of it sooner.
"Why do you think we put you on squads? Do you stop to think about that for one moment?" he asked, and it sounded like he said it through gritted teeth. I mustered up some scraps of courage in my stomach.
"Yeah," I said quietly, and his eye rolled to me, "The goal - we had to work together, right? And - well, we failed pretty badly." Kakashi looked a little surprised beneath the annoyance.
"No student I ever tested could grasp that concept," he said, "To work as a group, as one cohesive whole, should be a shinobi's first instinct. It's so basic. If you can't understand teamwork, you'll never cut it as a ninja. It's one thing to know it, but to use it effectively is another thing entirely.
"Naruto," Kakashi said, like he was accusing a criminal, "you do everything on your own. Everything. Even if it means hurting the team, you have to be the best."
He turned to me, and my chest went cold.
"Hika. You let your fear and pride cloud your judgment. If you hadn't tried to "insult" me by closing your eyes, you wouldn't be sitting there with a broken hand."
Oh yeah… I looked down. I hadn't noticed the growing discomfort of the injury - it had swelled inside the bandage, and now it was impossible to ignore.
"By all means, insult your opponent if it gives you the upper hand, but don't do it because you feel belittled."
I took his words to heart like a dagger in the chest, but he couldn't destroy the small shred of pleasure I'd gained from getting the mission goal right.
"And Sasuke. You thought the others were so far beneath you that they weren't worth your time. You were so arrogant that, even though you can do an adequate fireball jutsu, you still couldn't beat me. Do you guys get it yet?" he asked us all, "Do you see how, if you'd all been working together, you might have been able to beat me?"
"Even though you're a jonin," I said.
"Even though I'm a jonin."
"But then, why two bells?" I asked, "Even if we'd beaten you and taken the bells, only two of us would've passed."
"Exactly. I wanted to see if you could put your individual goals aside for the good of the team." I vaguely remembered the term "superordinate goal" from a Psych class.
Kakashi snapped open his pack.
"If a team can't work out its differences, people get distracted; they move a little slower, or they use the wrong technique at the wrong time; the team fails and someone winds up dead. For example," he twirled a kunai around his finger, "Hika, kill Naruto now or Sasuke dies!"
I stiffened with fear, but after a second Kakashi resumed speaking,
"That's how it is. You're on a mission, the enemy takes a hostage, and you have to make an impossible choice."
He let Sasuke up and turned his back to us. He walked to the black stone, shaped like a prism on its side. Names were etched in its surface. Instantly, I knew-
"On every mission, your life is on the line. Did you look at this stone? The names engraved in it?" He spoke deliberately, and his bitterness made a wave of sadness wash over me. "These are the names of our village's greatest heroes."
"That's it that's it that's it!" Naruto shouted. For once, I didn't find his boisterous attitude endearing.
"I've decided I'm gonna have my name engraved on that stone! I'm not going to live and die for nothing like a dog! I'm gonna be a hero!"
Kakashi turned his head a little. I didn't have the heart to say what had to be said. I stared at the grass.
"They are a special kind of ninja," Kakashi said, "They're all KIA."
"Oh that sounds cool!" Naruto exclaimed.
"Naruto," I said. I kept my voice low and eyes angled downward. "They were Killed In Action. It's a memorial stone."
Kakashi bowed his head.
"They gave their lives for the village," I said.
"The names of my closest friends are written here." Kakashi brought a hand to his headband, a gesture I didn't fully understand.
Naruto realized his mistake and his face twisted with regret, but I didn't look at him. Kakashi stood still as a statue.
"I'm going to give you three another chance," he relented. My heart lifted, but his voice was still distant, as though he drifted between bad memories. "The rules are harder this time around. No one gives food to Naruto, and no one unties him. It's his punishment for trying to eat alone. Break the rules this time and you really will pay for it."
"Sensei," I started. Naruto overrode me,
"Alright! Thanks, sensei! You won't regret this!"
Kakashi didn't respond, he just left with a puff of smoke.
"Naruto," I warned, "Don't do that again."
"Do what?"
"Were you paying attention? He was talking about his dead friends. Think about how you would feel."
Naruto's head sank.
"I wouldn't know. I don't have friends," he muttered spitefully. I grabbed his face with my good hand and forced him to look at me.
"You got at least one, buddy," I said. Naruto's stomach growled like a small dog I always wanted to kick.
"Hey," I continued, "We're all a team, all of us. If we fail, we fail together. Right, Sasuke?" Sasuke frowned, but he looked available for friendship. I pulled out my last granola bar and unwrapped it.
"Here," I ran over Naruto's protests, "I don't care if we get in trouble."
"He's no use if he's hungry," Sasuke agreed with a nod. He opened a boxed lunch and held it out for Naruto.
"Th-thanks guys," he said with tears in his eyes. He could be a real dork.
Naruto took a bite.
The next thing I knew, the sky had gone dark and thunder and lightning filled the air - Kakashi returned and he wove a sign.
"YOU!"
My heart raced in my chest. I'd had enough.
"You broke the rules! I hope you're ready for the consequences!"
My remaining patience snapped like a twig.
"Can it, Kakashi! What did you want us to do, exactly? Did you want us to work together or not, because if you can't make up your mind I don't think we'll be a very good team!"
"Yeah!" Naruto added, "You said the goal of this thing was to be a team, right? They just gave me their food because otherwise we couldn't work together!"
"Go ahead and fail us!" I yelled, praying he'd do the opposite, "At least we'll do it as a team!" I shrunk inwardly at my phrasing, but I didn't back down.
The storm cleared and Kakashi folded his arms behind his back. To my surprise, he chuckled.
"You pass."
"We… what?" Sasuke started.
"You. Pass."
I could hardly dare to believe it.
"Congratulations," Kakashi said, and he gave us a thumbs-up, "None of the other students ever tried to work together - they followed my directions to the letter, and none of them ever succeeded."
"So the bells-"
"Were a red herring. They don't mean anything," he said, tucking them into his pocket. "I wanted a team who would defy orders and back up their teammates.
"In the world of ninja, people who break the rules are treated as scum, that's true. But people who abandon their friends are even worse than scum."
He was an okay guy after all. I could follow him - his principles aligned with mine, at least. His methods were harsh, but the truth often was.
"We pass," Naruto sighed; he looked like he was about to cry. When I thought about it, I kind of wanted to cry too. It had been a hellish hour-and-a-half.
"Let's go home," Kakashi said. He and Sasuke turned to go.
"Don't you live on the other side of town?" I wondered aloud. He shrugged.
"It's a figure of speech, Hika."
I cut Naruto loose and we all left the grounds.