A/N: Wow, there are a lot of people who have read this story! As a thank you to everyone I want to share with you the statistics on this story: 14 reviews, 2203 hits, it is in 11 communities, has 17 favorites and 53 story alerts. Thank you all for spending time reading this story! That is as of 7:31 pm PST on June 28. WOW.
Oh: insert standard HERE: blah blah blah. I wish.
XxOOxX
Emotou—little sister
Outoto—little brother
Otou-san-- a father
Aa-- yes (more masculine than hai)
Yatta-- an exclamation, like yelling "YES!" or "Cool!" in English.
XxOOxX
Eventually even Kaiyou gets bored of yelling at Konoha's arrogant, resident hentai-gay boy. And so she departed to get her photo taken. Her father had left orders with the photographer not to take any photo in which she was not looking normal--blonde hair with reddish highlights knotted at the back of her head, tan skin, thin black whisker-marks, blue eyes, a rusty-orange vest, and dark shirts and pants (which ranged from blue to black on any given day).
Having expected her father to do as much Kaiyou had only made a half-hearted attempt by using a mild genjutsu to make her eyes purple, hoping the photographer wouldn't notice. He did. Kaiyou left with a completely normal ninja ID, listing her as a genin of Konoha. She was on her way back home when she saw a large, square rock following her. A wicked grin lighting up her face Kaiyou slipped around a corner.
When the rock followed her she sat on it, with a yawn. "Lucky this rock is here, I don't think I could make it home I'm so tired," she lamented putting all of her weight on the cardboard contraption.
"Nee-chan OFF," mumbled a voice from under the rock. "You're killing us," Konohamaru cried out.
"I dunno, I think you three should be punished for such a lousy disguise. Ah well, I can't very well hurt Udon or Moegi." Standing up she let the three younger Academy students up. Suddenly an idea occurred to her.
"Neh, neh, Konohamaru! Wanna' do me a favor? Huh?"
Grinning at his 'nee-chan' the younger boy looked up. "Only if you teach us your cool jutsu, the one where you become a boy, so we can escape better after pulling pranks!"
Obviously Kaiyou had been a bad influence on Sarutobi's grandson. She gladly took the deal though. "Okay! I'll even teach all three of you. It's a pretty simple variation on the henge. BUT before I teach you Konohamaru you have to promise to find out about what Shika-kun is doing—where his team trains and when they're leaving on missions. Okay?"
The three kids sweatdropped. Couldn't Kaiyou just find out herself or ask her dad? (The answer was no—she didn't think her dad could deal with her having a crush. The first time she'd come home saying that girls were chasing Sasuke he'd just about gone through the roof, yelling that they were too young to know anything about love.)
So the deal was made and Kaiyou spent the next hours, the last of her free time before her survival test in the morning, teaching three pranksters how to avoid getting captured. Nobody looked for Kaiyou to become a blonde haired little kid after pulling a prank, letting her walk right by chuunins who were chasing her. She'd kept her jutsu a secret to all but fellow pranksters--her young protégés would do well. And she'd keep tabs on Shikamaru.
XxOOxX
Kaiyou didn't eat breakfast, just an apple early in the morning. She did bring her frog wallet with her so she could buy ramen as soon as the survival training was over. Deciding her older brother would be late she didn't show up to Training Area 7 until 7 am. Shino and Sasuke were already there. Kakashi didn't arrive until 9. She wondered vaguely if he was later than usual as part of the test, or if she had ticked him off yesterday outing him about always being late.
So for two hours she was stuck with two silent boys. One who annoyed the hell out of her. She was beginning to think that Hinata and Kiba had the better team--at least Sakura talked, and who knows, maybe she could be decent without Sasuke around? …Nah. Kaiyou didn't quite believe that.
Her morning was spent trying to get Shino and Sasuke to talk. Turns out the two boys were even quieter in the morning. Kaiyou had already realized the day before that Shino could talk about bugs forever, and bore her to death in the process. Sure it would be interesting for the first few hours. But after that bugs just weren't on her list of interests. Now if bugs made ramen it would be a different story.
Sasuke on the other hand only insulted her when they spoke. Nice words didn't come out of his mouth… Kaiyou realized that she wasn't sure that he had any friends at all. Most of the time he was just this enigma, a haughty boy who did nothing to stop fangirls from fawning all over him, beyond glaring at the whole world. She knew about his family, some, but surely he wasn't a bitter old coot already!
It was determined by Kaiyou that she would get these two out of their shells. Or go insane trying. The silence was threatening to her: silence meant that she was being watched, that friends weren't near; that when she left people would whisper about her—the Hokage's daughter, the demon. Silence was enough to drive Kaiyou crazy.
Maybe the boys would talk about their families? Kiba always seemed willing to. Hinata didn't talk about hers as much, but hey, she didn't talk as much as Kiba or Kaiyou did period. "Neh, Shino-kun? Did you ask about the testing from your dad? I didn't even TRY asking mine, he would just evade my questions…"
Aburame turned his bespectacled eyes towards the girl on the team. Slowly, in his quiet, serious voice he spoke. "Aa, he informed me that only teams that have all members pass may take missions as ninja. He did not inform me what happens to those who fail, or give advice as to how best to accomplish attaining a passing grade."
Kaiyou blinked. Why did Shino have to use such big words? It sounded faintly like gibberish to her.
Sasuke noticed her confused expression. "Pff, I should have known they'd saddle me with a dobe. You may have some skill, but you're just another dumb blonde." Preventing the girl from getting violent or worse, yelling in his ears, Sasuke decided to translate Shino's speech. "Dobe, he means all of us must pass or we all fail. Most of the genin teams will fail."
Understanding flashed into Kaiyou's eyes. Now she knew what the test would be about! Her dad was always talking about teamwork, that he normally assigned missions in teams. They'd already been assigned a team. This wasn't testing individual survival skills, like they did at the Academy. This exam tested whether they would manage to survive with each other.
The question was: survive what?
The three genin lapsed back into silence, but for the occasional remark about Kaiyou not having given them enough warning about how late Kakashi was (Sasuke) commenting that if Kakashi made a habit of being late their advancement through the ranks would be delayed (Shino) and complaining that they should have eaten more for breakfast, perhaps ramen (Kaiyou). Shino gave a nod to the other two and then stood up, a small bug flitting over and landing on his finger.
Paying heed to the unspoken cue Sasuke stood up as well, followed by Kaiyou who finally caught on. Just then Kakashi walked up to the bridge lazily, hiding away an orange book. He'd learned his lesson: no orange books were to be read within sight of Kaiyou.
The three didn't even bother informing Kakashi that he was late: Kaiyou had warned them that such a comment would result in an annoying, obvious lie being told as means of an excuse. "So what do we have to survive? Are we going camping," Kaiyou asked.
Kakashi chuckled and presented a pair of two silver bells. "No, you have to get these and survive me. You have two hours. Only those with a bell pass."
"But I thought we work in te—" Sasuke slammed his hand over the girls' mouth, and dragged her off as Kakashi chuckled and announced that they should begin.
XxOOxX
Did they already figure it out Kakshi mused. The three genin had disappeared even before he had finished saying 'begin'. He began to look around for signs of their movement, sensing for their chakra signatures. He found all three of them together and smiled lightly. So they were going to think this through. He patted the bells my his waist. They could plan all that they wanted, but if Kaiyou didn't keep quiet, and unless they showed some skills that he was not expecting they still would not manage to get the bells. Not when he knew they were coming.
They had some tricks up their sleeves however. Tricks that went by the name of Kaiyou having inside information, distracting him. Tricks by the name of fire jutsus performed by Sasuke, and tricks by the names of tiny Kikai bugs having already been on his person, allowing the three genin to know exactly where
The three genin used a very underhanded technique. Kaiyou distracted him, sending twenty different clones at him of herself, and two of Shino and Sasuke apiece. Unbeknownst to Kakashi Shino's clones were created by him, and as soon as Kakashi hit the clones to dispel them they broke into bugs that swarmed him, draining his chakra. All the while Kaiyou continued to make clones, all of them of Sasuke and herself, with the two of them intermixed. It was now a taijutsu only battle on Kakashi's end. A battle he was distracted, and mildly fearful during.
"..Yesterday I caught you with that orange book open on the rooftop during Sasuke's introduction, and the week before while I was at the park training with Hinata you opened it and read it under the tree instead of paying attention to our chakra control exercises. Maybe I should tell my dad about that?" All of the clones were chanting at him, telling him different times at which he had disobeyed her fathers' orders about never reading porn in front of his daughter. Needless to say he was scared, and trying to tune her words out. It wasn't completely successful.
Sasuke's clones were running around, him interspersed between them. When he made to use a katon jutsu, so did all of the clones at the same time. When he broke into taijutsu so did all of them. The clones weren't real, thankfully they hadn't taught Kaiyou the shadow clone jutsu yet. No, she got to learn that after she mastered the new control technique she'd been awarded for graduating. Then he'd really be in trouble.
Sasuke, and then Kaiyou landed a hit. Suddenly a clone behind him had a kawarimi no jutsu used on it and turned into Shino, who restrained him. The bells were gone within seconds. Sasuke spoke up. "Hmm the dobe and I have bells, and Shino has you. I think we pass don't you?"
Kakashi wanted to hit his head. I never should have underestimated them. Sensei is going to laugh his head off. These brats aren't going to give me any time to myself. None! I'll never get back to my story; poor Natsuki and panda-kun! Wait for me… Kakashi's mind might have been shutting down on the inside, but he did managed to nod his head that the group of genin passed. "Same time tomorrow. Training and missions. Now go away," he grumbled.
Shino released him, and Kaiyou and Sasuke backed off, Kaiyou dispelling all of the clones. So many clones, so much chakra left. But the expenditure of chakra, and the light breakfast had left her hungry. "Let's go get ramen," she cried out and grabbed the wrists of the boys, manhandling them, dragging them towards Ichiraku's.
XxOOxX
A month later and Kaiyou and Sasuke still fought like cats and dogs, most days. Sasuke would smile at Kaiyou occasionally, and she would needle him into being more social. The two had somehow, miraculously, become good friends. Shino had also opened up more, but he was still quiet around the two. He made observations, helped everyone come up with plans, and argued against eating at Ichiraku's Ramen. He was the first person to convince Kaiyou that maybe vegetables would be a good idea; why else was she so petite? Her father wasn't that short to warrant a daughter that was under five feet tall, at 12 years old.
Kakashi wondered how Shino, with Sasuke's assistance, had managed that feat. The two boys were louder and spoke more often, if only to shut Kaiyou up. With two more friends to add to her collection of precious people, Kaiyou managed to be a little bit quieter. She had learned that it was important to listen to what friends' said. Otherwise there would be fighting, and Kaiyou—though loud, annoying, and brash, sincerely wanted her friends to be happy.
Each of their skills had improved. Every morning the team would train, warm up. Then when their bodies were loosened up (or worn out in the case of the boys who had much less stamina than their female counterpart) they would take a D-rank mission. Following that, they would work on chakra control or learning techniques. The boys each received training from their families—Kaiyou's dad was too busy to train her on a regular basis, but did spend a few hours with her on weekends, so instead she received help from Kakashi.
Shino could now boast of being able to use his Kikai bugs more efficiently, and was steadily improving in his taijutsu. Many of the jutsus that would have been taught to another member of his team were not taught to him, other than to learn their weaknesses'. Until Shino developed a larger store of chakra within his body many techniques would be impossible to him, as his Kikai bugs consumed much of his chakra.
Kaiyou had finished with the scroll she was given for graduating. She had then devoured the kage bunshin, shadow clone, technique and was now able to make a large number of clones. Her taijutsu, which had always been on the better end compared to many of her classmates, had also improved. Kaiyou was currently working on coordinating the movements of her clones. Until her clones could work together smoothly the fighting would be more of a brawl than anything else. Only when her clones could work together smoothly would she be able to incorporate her small library of jutsus more effectively.
Sasuke had been training with his brother Itachi, who was currently an ANBU member, when he was not on duty. He was working on learning more fire element jutsus, and genjutsu. Despite Sasuke not having an interest in genjutsu it was something that the Sharingan eye would help him with, so it was best if he was prepared for when he activated it.
It was on days when Itachi was picking up Sasuke that the fights would suddenly stop. As soon as Itachi would appear Kaiyou would get strangely silent. Shino and Sasuke didn't quite understand why, but Sasuke was silently thankful for the relief. It wasn't actually any fun for him to argue with Kaiyou for hours on end. Kakashi just figured that the ANBU was one of the people who had caught her after she pulled a prank, and that she held it against him. Kaiyou meanwhile was trying to figure out what the guy was like, why he caught her attention.
The other times when fighting would be at a minimum was when they were training with Team 10. She would instead pester Shikamaru. The boys, and Ino, would groan at this. Ino had no idea why the blonde liked Shikamaru, and the boys all were just glad that they didn't have her undivided attention. It was always scary when she focused completely on a topic. Sasuke couldn't help but think that Shikamaru had the right of it, to be intimidated by women. After one such training session he lightly hit the other boys shoulder and muttered at him, "At least you don't have her everyday."
Exactly two months after the three genin had beat the bell test, without Kakashi even having had a chance to use his signature lines about testing taijutsu, ninjutsu and genjutsu, the three were chasing a foul demon. Tora, Kakashi mused, might as well be possessed by the nibi, a cat-like two-tailed demon. Thankfully he was sitting on a fence letting his genin take care of the operation. He merely flipped open his book, making sure that Kaiyou wasn't in eyeshot, and half-heartedly listened to the communicator. Standing next to Kakashi was Itachi, who was visiting with his sempai, as Kakashi had formerly been in ANBU. In his mouth was a stick of strawberry Pocky.
Through the static on the walkie talkie he heard Kaiyou's voice.
"Ramen Queen in position. Over."
"Sunshine in position, over," Shino grumbled. He didn't quite understand how Kaiyou had come up with the code-name of sunshine for him. She'd said something about drawing the sun with sunglasses, but he didn't understand what that had to do with him. He didn't wear yellow or orange.
"…Uke in position, over," grumbled Sasuke. He could not believe he had to say that aloud, on a walkie talkie. He secretly dreaded finding out that another team had turned their communicators to the same frequency for a just a moment, trying to find a free one. He would never live it down, and his fangirls would probably faint with nosebleeds, imagining him being in a relationship. Taking control of the situation, before he had to listen to anymore of Kaiyou's laughter, that he had actually used the code-name she'd assigned. "Team move out."
Kakashi chuckled, and listened to the scratching and squealing. He was so glad that he did not have to help catch that cat. Suddenly he realized that he was the only one chuckling. He looked over at his companion to see Itachi with an expression on his face. The seventeen-year old ANBU member was staring, pocky almost dropping out of his mouth.
"You okay?"
Suddenly Itachi began laughing. He managed to choke out, "What did outoto do to deserve that code-name?"
Looking at the younger man Kakashi smirked. "I believe he managed to accidentally kiss emotou-chan. She tends to hold a grudge--but the thing is she doesn't actually hate him." Itachi raised his eyebrow. "No really. She used to, she really hates fangirls. Now they're friends, but the nickname remains. Even if he gets married I don't think it'll go away."
Itachi shuddered and decided in that moment to stay on the girls' good side. The cute little girl had a devilish side. A very unique young girl, indeed.
XxOOxX
"No, NO more D-rank missions! I want to do something heroic! Not chase cats or do gardening. We're good! Ask Nii-san! Geesh, even ask Itachi-san! We're good, we can do this!" Kaiyou was arguing, and losing against her father and Iruka-sensei, speaking up loudly for the first time in the presence of Itachi since the day they'd met.
Itachi watched with a small bit of interest in his eyes. Hokage-sama and his daughter were a lot alike. Both were stubborn. He was amused to note his little brother speaking up more, being more open around her. The elder Uchiha brother envied his brothers' ability to open up, even though he only managed it just a little bit.
"Dobe is correct. We have trained hard, and work as a team. We managed to get one-up on Kakashi, once. We can deal with a C-rank mission." Shino merely nodded and stood firmly behind the two shorter ringleaders.
Iruka sighed. "You're still just new genin! You can't expect to manage a C-rank mission so soon! You're too young," he began but was interrupted by the young ANBU member.
"I was younger Iruka-san. I think the three will do fine. Kakashi-sempai can keep them safe." Minato sighed, glancing between the five people standing before him. "Fine, I acknowledge your skill. However Kaiyou is not to go."
Protests arose all around. How could a team member not go on a mission. Minato held up his hand, silencing the three. "She is too well-known. You are to disguise yourself so that your identity will not be known. Come back tomorrow morning and I will assign you a C-rank mission. Do not come as yourself, daughter."
Shino and Sasuke assumed that Kaiyou was not to go as herself because she was the Yellow Flash's daughter, the child of a Hokage who had many enemies in foreign countries. That was true enough. What the others in the room also knew was that as a Jinchuuriki it was not safe for her beyond the boundaries of the village. A small disguise would serve her well, at least until she had learned some more offensive tactics and could keep herself safe from the average shinobi that she might encounter.
"Yatta! Neh, neh! Can we go now otou-san? I wanna tell Shika-kun, Hinata-chan and Kiba!" Not waiting for an answer she ran off, not realizing she just may have opened a can of worms. Her father hadn't known she was close to Shikamaru. Now he was left to wonder what the Nara boy had to do with his daughter…
Sasuke, not realizing that the Hokage was not aware of his daughters crush, muttered under his breath, towards his brother. "And she says she hates fangirls—sometimes she is one.." Minato heard.
A/N: This is not my favorite chapter, I'll confess. I wanted to put more of Itachi in, and some more humor, while continuing on with the storyline. The big mission outside of Konoha begins in the next chapter. It will be the Wave arc. There are a few things I'd love for my readers to vote on, if you don't mind too much. Also sorry I am not a great action-scene writer. I will try to put more details in on further battle scenes!
1: Should Hinata be paired with Shino or Kiba?
2: Should Haku be a male or a female?
