Alright Chapter three. I have six written at the moment, though i'm making changes. If everything goes like i plan, this story will be around twelve long, though things don't normally go like i plan.
I Don't own Naruto.
Shiori woke up extra early that morning. There was no real reason for her to, seeing as her team didn't meet for, by her best guess, ten more hours. But, as it was the day of her first team meeting, she couldn't help but feel anxious. She had been dreaming of this her whole life, and now that it finally happened, she planned on making the most of it. She didn't know much about her other teammates. She wondered what they did normally, what they were like, if they were getting up this early, like her. True, neither struck her as the type, but first impressions could be wrong. It was entirely possible that Shinsuke was as excited as she was, or that Hideko was currently wandering aimlessly around Konoha trying to find something to do to pass the time, like she was.
Or not.
Either way, she was starting to wander, subconsciously, to their meeting place, the small shack where the scroll had been stored. She didn't even realize it until she had reached the gate. She stopped, staring in. She considered entering and tracing the path that she had taken the day before. After a pause, she decided against it. For one thing, it was still a long time until her team met. For another, she had no idea if anyone had disabled all of the leftover traps. So instead, she kept walking without a destination.
This was not going to be her best day. She could feel it. It was as if someone in her head was telling her 'Hideko, just stay here. Nothing good can come from getting up.' Of course, she couldn't listen to it. Not right now, anyway. After the exam, she went directly home and fell asleep. So now, she was practically starving. She willed herself out of bed, which took much less effort than she had thought. She ate quickly, and headed out. She still had a few hours until her team had met, and she was curious as to how the other teams had done. Of course, her Sasuke's team had passed. They practically had to. But as far the others, she had no idea. She wondered if Ino was awake. She would know who passed and who hadn't. She headed toward the Yamanaka's flower shop, trying to think of exactly what to ask when she got there. One thing she had learned was that you had to be careful about how you worded things to actually get the answer you wanted, and not just some side story on a vaguely related subject.
'11, guess this is as good a time as any to get up.' Shinsuke had been putting it off for as long as possible. But now it was getting unavoidable. He tried to think of an excuse to tell himself as to why he didn't need to wake up, but couldn't think of anything. He got up like every other day, got ready like every other day, and left like every other day. And out of all of those days, he had never enjoyed waking up. In fact, the only thing separating this from those days was the time. He had nowhere to be until 3PM. He could take his time, instead of just hurrying through with his routine. Still, he never even left his apartment until it was almost 1 o'clock. He walked toward their training area, area 12. He wanted to be a little early, since he sincerely doubted that Etsuya had disabled anything in those woods. He wasn't sure why, but something about him just struck him the wrong way. It was probably just his imagination, but he still didn't want to go through there on his own. So he felt relieved when, on his way, he ran into Shiori. Or rather, he heard his name from a random alleyway.
"Shiori, you on your way to the shack also?"
"Why, what time is it? I was planning on just wandering for a little while longer."
"Well, I don't recommend it. We have just under two hours, and our sensei doesn't strike me as the type to put in the extra work of clearing out those traps."
"Why? Its not like he did anything. Besides, I think we tripped almost all of them."
He laughed at this. He really wasn't thinking about it, but on the way back, they did seem to set off almost everything in those woods. At this point, there probably wasn't that much left.
"Well, I'm gonna get going. For the first day, we should probably get there early."
It took her a few seconds to completely realize what had happened. One moment, she was walking to through the woods to the clearing, the next, there was a rope around her legs, again, and she was hanging upside down. Again. She had hoped that her new sensei had the common sense to clear all of these traps out of here. Instead, she was stuck in a tree. She reached for her pack and pulled out a kunai. She knew that it was going to hurt when she fell, like last time, but it was the only way down. Unless her team showed up, but she doubted that, seeing as it was still twenty minutes until they actually had to meet. She cut the rope, closed her eyes, and braced for impact. She had expected to land on the ground. Instead, she had landed on top of someone, knocking them over. She opened her eyes and looked around. She was directly on top of Shinsuke. A few feet away was Shiori, who had obviously jumped backward when she hit Shinsuke.
"Hideko, I have no idea where you were or what you are doing, but I would definitely appreciate it if you got off of me."
She got up quickly, flustered. "I'm so sorry I was just on my way to the meeting and then I got caught in this trap and then I-." She probably would have gone on like this if Shiori didn't cut her off.
"We get it. That lazy idiot never cleared the forest and you got caught."
"Well, I wasn't really paying attention, seeing as I assumed that he had cleared the area out already."
Shinsuke staggered to his feet. "Obviously not. We should probably stay together while we're going through here, just for safety's sake."
Etsuya got up. He had brought in some furniture to the broken down shack in the middle of nowhere, but the place still didn't feel very comfortable. Admittedly, it didn't really have to, but he still didn't like it. He headed outside for fresh air. He couldn't imagine why they had made a building with no windows, for training purposes or not. He leaned against the wall, waiting for the team he was forced to pass to show up. He felt pretty much positive that he wouldn't be good at it, and he definitely knew that he preferred A and B rank missions to C and D rank ones. A few minutes later, he saw his squad walk up.
"Alright, looks like your all here, so I won't wait. Go inside and get a seat." The three walked inside. He came in right behind them. He didn't know what they were expecting, but they definitely weren't expecting what they saw. It wasn't as if he had done much. In the center of the room were two couches, with a table between them. In fact, he almost felt insulted. It took a moment for any of them to say anything.
"How on earth did you get all of this through the woods? And why didn't you disarm those traps out there?" The black haired girl asked. It took a minute to remember her name. Hideko.
"It wasn't hard. I had them on a summoning scroll. As for the traps, I sort of forgot that they were there. Thanks for reminding me. Now that that's done with, I suppose we should start. Since we're a squad we need to work together. As such, we need to know as much about each other as possible. I want each of you to say your name, as well as anything else you feel like sharing. Let's go from left to right."
"I'm Ushiba Shiori. There really aren't any other ninja in my family, so I have had to train myself so far."
"I'm Maeno Hideko. From the almost famous Maeno clan. I might not be very good at taijutsu, but my ninjutsu makes up for it." Shinsuke had barely started when Etsuya cut him off.
"Almost famous? I've never even heard of it."
Hideko sighed. "Well, if you haven't heard of us, I'm sure you've heard of our bloodline."
"Which is?"
"Suro Shiryoku." Neither of her teammates knew what it was, but it was obvious that their sensei did.
"Your proud of that! That's practically a joke among ninja." Hideko wanted to argue, but couldn't think of anything to say. Shiori, however, was still wondering what it was. "Yeah, I guess neither of you have heard of it. It does, in essence, nothing. It makes it appear, for the user, that everything is moving slower. However, that includes their own movements. It doesn't increase their speed, strength, senses, or chakra ability. In fact, it slowly drains chakra. At least, if the stories I heard are right." He looked at Hideko. She was staring straight down. However, he thought saw the faintest bit of a nod. Shinsuke, who had been watching this occur, decided to help her out. He started off with his turn.
"I'm Rokusho Shinsuke. I am a weapons expert despite my chakra control. I also have a pretty abysmal amount of chakra." Hideko turned toward him, grateful that he managed to distract their sensei.
"Rokusho, I knew I've heard that name before. Isn't that a missing-nin?"
"Aoi, yeah. He's technically my brother, but really I never talked to him much." He intended to end it there, but Shiori was wondering something.
"What exactly did he do?"
"Well, from what I heard he tricked some kid who failed the chunin exams into stealing stuff, then killed him and ran off. Of course, that was a long time ago."
"How long?"
"Two or three years ago."
"That's not that long." It was about this time when Hideko finally spoke up.
"Alright then, if you two are done, I wanna hear more about our sensei." The two stopped and turned. They hadn't even noticed he was speaking. Etsuya just sighed.
"Well, I guess I should restart. My name is Royama Etsuya. I excel at setting up traps, and avoid using genjutsu, since it takes to long to learn. I hate hard work, but enjoy the results. So now that that's done with, I want to have a little clearer idea as to your actual abilities. So if you'll follow me…" He got up and stepped out of the room. The three genin looked at each other, hoping this test wouldn't involve a forest filled with traps. They followed Etsuya out toward the back of the area, where a small area was cleared away. A river ran through the far edge, next to the fence to state the border of Area 12. Etsuya stopped, turning toward his team.
"Well, we're here. What I'm going to have you do is simple. The three of you are going to spar, and I'm going to watch. To decide on an actual training regimen, I need to have a rough idea of what your abilities are. The match will be a simple, three-way fight. Please form a triangle so that we can start." The three walked away from each other, then got into their fighting positions. Hideko was standing next to the river; across from her was Shinsuke. Standing farther from the river was Shiori. "Now then, begin!"
Okay, first fight scene. Took long enough. Oh, and if the english to japanese dictionary i used was correct, Suro Shiryoku means Slow Eyesight. It is around the fifth name i came up with, and seems to fit the ability pretty well. Read and review.
