Thanks to KlausVxClaireR, Forgotten Werewolf, Adel, and Contresting_Death for reviewing, i really appreciate it and btw Adel i put up a new chapter of Eternal Spring before i put this one up, Thanks for reading, please review and flame! -Roxie

New Encounters

"Are you okay?" Minato said while offering out a hand. The girl on the ground looked up at him through a curtain of fire red hair. She was dressed in a kimono the same color as her hair. She met his gaze with beautiful emerald eyes.

"Yeah, perfect actually"

The girl said while she reached out and grabbed his outstretched hand. She was a little pissed that she had dirtied her kimono but she didn't truly mind. She probably would have done it herself sooner or later.

She was usually a mess, but today she had actually spent a little time on her appearance. Only because she was so far away from home. Otherwise she probably would have just gone out in shorts and a t-shirt like any other day.

Minato looked down at the girl nervously, he was wondering if she could be another one of his fangirls, but so far she seemed reasonably sane. She looked up suddenly, stared at his forehead for a minute, and then smiled.

"Are you going to be in the chunin exams tomorrow?" she asked while staring at his forehead.

"Yeah. . . how did you know?" Minato asked feeling confused. He hadn't said anything about being a ninja to this girl. She laughed once at his confused expression and pointed to his forehead.

"Your headband kinda tipped me off, so are you taking the exams?" she asked looking at him with her bright green eyes. He stared back into her eyes, admiring the color. Most people had black or brown eyes in Konoha.

It took him a minute to figure out that she had been staring at his village headband. When he looked back at her he could see that she had one as well, hidden under the thick curtain of her bangs. But he couldn't make out the symbol.

"Yeah, are you?" he asked with genuine curiosity. He didn't know why but he found this girl very interesting, from the odd color of her hair to her exotic eyes. She was just different from anyone he had talked to in Konoha.

"Yup! That means you're my opponent starting tomorrow" she said with a laugh. She smiled at him and he felt himself smiling back before he realized it.

She's so happy he thought, smiling at her she doesn't seem to have a care in the world. . .

"So you're a Konoha ninja" she said while taking a closer look at his headband. She was mildly surprised and a bit impressed. Konoha, being one of the five great villages, was known for their skilled ninja.

"Yeah, what village are you from?" Minato asked. He wanted to figure out more about this strange girl. She smiled happily before responding.

"The whirlpool village" she said while brushing her bangs behind her ears.

Minato could see the symbol clearly now. He was a bit surprised that any whirlpool ninja would have the time to take the chunin exams, they were in the middle of a war after all and smaller villages like hers needed any ninja they could get.

When he looked back up at her he noticed that she was staring at him intently like she was waiting for something. After a few seconds of them staring at each other she began to frown in annoyance. A few seconds later he realized she must have asked him a question.

Is this guy a retard? The redhead thought feeling annoyed or does he think he's too good to answer my question?

"I'm sorry" Minato said while scratching the back of his head. It was another habit of his; he usually did it when he was embarrassed "Could you repeat that?"

She sighed and shook her head. This guy really is a retard she thought with a small smile. "I asked you what your name was."

"Oh" Minato said. He was a bit surprised he hadn't introduced himself yet; he was usual pretty good with things like that. "My name is Minato Namikaze. What's yours?"

"My name is Ku-"

"Kushina Uzumaki!" an angry voice shouted. A girl with chestnut brown hair stood across the street. "Where have you been? Do you have any idea how long I've been looking for you?!"

"Ahhhh shit" Kushina said while sweat dropping "That's my teammate, Misaki"

"Sounds like she's pretty upset" Minato answered. Upset or psycho he thought while staring at the fuming girl across the street. She was still shouting to Kushina over the crowd. At this point Kushina was pretending not to have noticed her.

"Why is she so mad" Minato asked. He couldn't imagine a reason why anyone could be mad at Kushina; she seemed like a pretty nice person.

"Because I was supposed to be shopping with her, but I got bored and ran off and left her all alone. . ." Kushina said with a nervous laugh. She turned to him and gave him a quick smile "I better go . . . good luck tomorrow! You're going to need it"


Kushina ran across the street leaving Minato standing there alone. He watched as she bowed her head in apology while Misaki yelled at her like she was a dog. It was pretty funny to watch.

Suddenly he felt a hand on his shoulder. Minato whirled around and was surprised to see his sensei smiling at him with a huge grin. Minato stared back at him confused; why was he so happy?

"Hey, hey Minato" Jiraiya said while bending down to whisper into his student's ear "I see you found yourself a girlfriend"

"Are you drunk" Minato said flatly while turning away from his sensei to walk off. Jiraiya was going to say something back but decided not to waste his breath; besides he was drunk.

"Oh don't be like that" Jiraiya whined "What's her name?"

"I don't know who you're even talking about." Minato said feeling a little annoyed. This was one of the reasons he didn't talk to girls much.

As soon as he did Jiraiya would start asking him all these annoying questions. And this definitely was not a conversation he wanted to be having. Especially since he had only talked to her for two minutes.

"The red head, the red head!" Jiraiya said while gesturing to Kushina who was now giving some sort of excuse to Misaki. Jiraiya elbowed Minato in the side "She's pretty cute"

"Her name is Kushina; she's from the whirlpool village. She's here for the exams" Minato said. He didn't want to talk to his sensei about her especially since there were no feelings between them. Minato glanced in her direction.

Misaki was gesturing towards him, probably asking who he was. Minato watched Kushina laugh once and then give a reply.

I wonder what she said he thought absentmindedly

Jiraiya followed Minato's gaze across the street where the girls were now laughing. He smiled knowingly at his student and gave a quick wink. Before Minato could protest though he began speaking

"Takari was looking for you, seems like you ditched him inside of some shop" Jiraiya said while raising an eyebrow in disapproval "You better go find him"

"Oh, I totally forgot about him" Minato said "See you tomorrow, and don't be late!"

Before Jiraiya could respond Minato ran off and got lost in the crowd. Jiraiya sighed and decided to go to the hot springs to do some more "research"


Kushina saw a flash of yellow in her peripheral vision and realized it was Minato a second later, running through the crowd incredibly fast, like when he had ran into her. She smiled at that.

He's going to run into someone again she thought with a laugh guess he hasn't learned his lesson she reached into her pocket and pulled out a frog shaped wallet too bad he hasn't realized that I stole his wallet

"What's so funny?" Misaki asked while turning to face Kushina "And what's up with that wallet?"

Kushina laughed a little and Misaki followed her gaze to Minato who was getting further and further away. But with his blond hair he was still easy to pick out in the crowd. Misaki gasped and then giggled.

"You stole his wallet didn't you" she said in a low whisper, she was trying to look disapproving but she loved pranks just as much as Kushina did. Kushina's smile widened

"Only to teach him to watch where he was going" Kushina said defensively
I'll give it back tomorrow, at the exams, that's why I asked if he was going to be there. I'll let him sweat over it for a little while tonight though" she added with a wink

"You're so mean" Misaki said with a laugh. "We should go meet up with sensei though, were about thirteen minutes late anyways, because someone went missing"

"Sorry, but you should've known better! Taking me, shopping, what did you expect?"

"Yeah, yeah I know" Misaki said while giving her friend a look. Kushina was very pretty but she didn't have a boyfriend and one of the main reasons for that was because she was friends with all the guys and because she was too unfeminine.

"And what happened to that hair clip I bought you yesterday?" Misaki asked while crossing her arms. Misaki had given it to Kushina in an attempt to dress her up a little more. Kushina's hands ran through her hair and she realized it was missing.

"I must've dropped it when me and Minato collided!" Kushina exclaimed. She actually felt sad; it was a nice clip, and the only accessory that she owned.

Misaki shook her head disappointedly; Kushina was a lost cause. Even when she had run into a boy as handsome as Minato she hadn't even tried to flirt. Misaki couldn't believe it, considering she would've made a move the first chance she got.

"Let's just go" Misaki said "We'll never find it with all these people walking around anyways"

"Fine" Kushina said as she walked off with her friend to go find their sensei.


The next day Kushina woke up with a start. Misaki was leaning over shouting at her to get up. Kushina was still half asleep and couldn't figure out why she was so upset and then it hit her.

"Holy shit!" Kushina exclaimed while rolling out of bed. She got tangled in her sheets and fell to the floor but was up again in seconds. "We're going to be late!!!"

Kushina rushed to her dresser and grabbed a pair of shorts, they were baggy and fell to her knees but she couldn't care less about what she looked like. She quickly pulled her shirt over her head and threw on a tank top.

She threw some bread in the toaster and then got to work on her hair. She brushed it a few times then gave up and threw her hair back into a messy pony tail. By that time the toast had popped back up.

"Let's go" she said as she grabbed the food, eating it as she began to run. Misaki was a few feet behind her complaining about how she looked like crap.

"It doesn't matter" Kushina snapped. Being late and up this early had put her in a bad mood and she wasn't planning on listening to Misaki complain about things that weren't important the whole way there.

They ran through the village and got lost twice. By the time they got to the freaking stadium they were about to start the opening ceremony. Kushina sweat dropped as she saw the look on her sensei's face.

Her other teammate, the only boy on the team, looked just as mad. Kushina walked over while smiling apologetically and Misaki waved while trying to look innocent. As Kushina took her place with her team she felt someone staring at her.

She looked up, preparing to flip whoever it was off, but was surprised when she met a pair of blue eyes. She didn't know why she was so surprised (he had said he was going to be here after all) but he just looked different from how he did last night.

He wasn't smiling warmly or laughing he looked serious and focused. Like he should she thought but for some reason it bothered her a little. Is he mad that I took his wallet? She wondered. She reached for her pocket to check it was still there; it would be bad if she had lost it

Minato Namikaze she thought. She had heard that name before but she couldn't remember where. It had been bothering her ever since last night. She tried to remember but couldn't so she simply gave up

It doesn't really matter anyways she thought while trying to refocus her thoughts on the man, who she guessed was the hokage, giving a speech. She caught bits and pieces, something about a test and scrolls or something. Finally the speech ended, twenty minutes later.

Kushina looked over at Minato; he was standing with his squad. There was a girl with black hair who looked like she lived by the rules, and a boy who was slouching against a wall looking like he was liable to pass out any second.

The man with the white hair was the biggest surprise. Kushina recognized him immediately as one of the three sanin. He looked up and met her glance. He winked at her and she looked down embarrassed from being caught staring. She watched as she whispered something to Minato and she just felt even more embarrassed

A few minutes later she got over her embarrassment. She shrugged and walked over to Minato, tossing him the wallet. "You lost this yesterday" she said with a smile.

He didn't look surprised like he should have. He looked like he had expected her to do this. She stared at him, puzzled and he smiled back at her.

"Thanks" he said in a happy voice. He was enjoying her reaction; she seemed so surprised, like she couldn't comprehend that he wasn't mad. Truthfully he wasn't.

"You're welcome?" she said not really knowing how to continue. Minato looked past her shoulder and smiled.

"Your friend seems in a better mood today" he observed. He was watching Misaki get scolded by Kushina's sensei. The boy on the team just stared at him and Kushina with disapproval.

"Ah, well Misaki forgave me yesterday. . ." she paused and then wondered once again why he wasn't mad. It was really freaking her out so she decided to just ask "Why aren't you mad?"

Minato paused for a second, surprised by her blunt question. "Why would I be mad?" he smiled at her "just because you took my wallet? I'm not five"

Kushina turned red from the slight insult to her maturity and Minato continued on "Besides I have it back so it doesn't really matter, does it?"

"I guess not" Kushina answered unsurely. He smiled at her and then handed her a hair clip that she had been wearing yesterday

"Besides as soon as you took my wallet I took your clip, so were even" he said smiling even wider. Kushina gasped; she hadn't even noticed him taking it. That explained how she lost it. She felt a little annoyed but not to mad.

She could appreciate a good prank and since she had started it she couldn't exactly get mad. So she smiled, like he had done when she handed him the wallet.

Minato was surprised but he composed his face a second later. He didn't know how he thought she was going to react but, from what he knew of her, he had expected a stronger emotion from her, like anger. She laughed and then smiled again.

"I think we're going to be great friends" she said while holding out a hand for him to shake. "Truce?"

He looked at her hand for a second before extending his own. For some reason he felt slightly embarrassed. She grabbed his hand and they shook hands for a minute. She really did think that they would be friends.

If he was willing to take a joke than there was no reason why they wouldn't be. She looked up at him; he still hadn't let go of her hand. The look in his eyes gave her the impression he was spaced out, or lost in his own thought.

I wonder what he's thinking about she said while looking at his blue eyes.

Her hands are soft he thought in surprise. Kushina had long, slim fingers that looked like they had played the piano in another life. She had calluses on her palms, which he thought were the result of training, but he still thought she had soft hands.

She looked up at him expectantly and he froze; had she asked him another question. I forgot Kushina thought with a sigh He's mentally retarded. She looked pointedly down at their hands.

Minato glanced down to, and realized he hadn't let go yet. She smiled at him unsurely and he let go immediately as if her hand had burned him, his face turning a little red.

"S-Sorry" he said while scratching the back of his head. She smiled back at him tentatively.

"Do you always space out?" Kushina asked. The question might've seemed rude but Kushina didn't even realize it. Before Minato could respond Ayami his name.

"Minato" Ayami called "We're going to leave with out you"

"I'm coming!" Minato called back. He turned back to Kushina and with a quick wave ran back off to join his team. He felt oddly embarrassed and couldn't wait to leave. Kushina smiled and stifled a laugh at his behavior

He's so weird she thought with a smile as she walked back over towards her team. They were off to take some sort of test (which she new she would flunk; she had never been good in school).


Roxie: Thanks for reading! Please review and flame