A/n: Thanks for reading this story, this is the last chapter, but squad 11 will be in over stories so watch out to see how Shino, Rei and Kiba grow. And maybe some love interests will pop up in the village between certain Shinobi?? Ooooo cant wait.
Also, check out my new story I am working on called "the day the adults disappeared" which is a story that takes place in Konoha over the course of two days where no adults are present. Oh man, what would happen?? Go read it and find out you crazies
-love love love-
R&R
Chapter 4: completing the test
Kiba smiled a little to himself as he and Rei made their way to a small bamboo grove they had seen earlier that day. It was already dark outside and the only light they had was the small amount of moonlight sifting in through the tree tops. It made maneuvering around the forest very difficult. Rei was leading but Kiba was only a few steps behind, watching to make sure neither of them ran into anything since his eyes could see better in the dark than hers could.
Rei made no attempt to make sure Kiba was still behind her, or to even speak to him. She wasn't really a person to get angry easily but the fact that Kiba obviously had vastly underestimated her, made her want to punch him. Not to mention he didn't think she could walk alone in the woods. A few minutes of stumbling through the woods brought them into a small bamboo mangrove which was brighter due to fewer trees above them. Rei stopped and let her eyes adjust before moving to the nearest stalk of bamboo. She reached out and touched it, running her hand over the hard, smooth surface, checking for holes or rot. Kiba couldn't help but feel a little aroused by the way she was touching the bamboo, but he quickly shook it off.
"Need any help?" He asked, trying to make some conversation. Rei pulled out a kunai and in one quick and fluent motion, cut down the stalk and caught it in her left hand, replacing the kunai back to its pouch.
"Nope." She said as she smiled up at him. Kiba raised an eyebrow to her before shrugging and leading the way out of the mangrove and back towards the camp.
o0o
From the moment Kiba and Rei had left, Shino had fallen asleep. It took a lot of work for him to keep up the calm and emotionless attitude he usually wore around Rei and Kiba. Rei made him want to smile, just because it was so contagious. And Kiba made him want to punch the boy square in the face. Unfortunately, he awoke the moment Kiba plowed into the clearing.
Kiba had seen the bug boy leaning against the tree with his head cocked a little to the side and sensed he was asleep. So, of course, he decided to make as much noise as possible upon entering the clearing. "Hey, bug boy, we're back." He said smiling, hoping to annoy the young Aburame. Shino simply straightened his head and continued facing forward, not making any movements at all. Kiba was thoroughly disappointed, but didn't really care; this kid wasn't worth his effort anyway. "So, it seems that we made it through our first day alright." Kiba stated, Rei nodded but did not turn to him when she spoke.
"Yeah, I have a gut feeling that tomorrow will be much more difficult, it's the middle of our three day period out here and I am almost certain that Kurenai sensei will make it the hardest of them all. So we really need to watch out for each other."
"Don't worry Ill watch out for you Rei." Kiba smiled and waited for her to thank him, but she didn't.
"We all need to work together." Is all she said before handing him a piece of bamboo filled with the canned food they had been given, it wasn't particularly tasty, but it was food. Once they all finished eating Shino spoke for the first time since he had asked Rei if she was cold.
"We should sleep in shifts, two people sleep while one stays up for a couple hours. That way no one can sneak up on us." Kiba reluctantly had to agree. The bug boy wasn't many things in Kiba's eyes, but he had to admit that Shino was pretty smart about some stuff.
"Ill take the first shift." Kiba said, mainly because he was too awake right then to fall asleep. Rei said nothing but climbed into the tent, Shino followed after a few minutes. He wanted to give her time to get into her sleeping bag before he went in. Kiba lay back on the ground and stared up at the stares that could be seen perfectly through the clearing in the trees. I wonder what will happen when we run into other ninja tomorrow.
o0o
The next morning when Kiba woke up, Rei and Shino had already cleaned up everything except the tent which Kiba was sleeping in and they were eating a few pieces of bread from Kiba's backpack of food. He yawned and started taking down the tent.
"How long have you two been up?"
"Since four" Rei answered.
"Since 3 when I took my shift" was Shino's response. The shift sequence that night had gone: Kiba from 11 to 1, Rei from 1 to 3, and Shino from 3 until 5 when they decided they should all be awake. Luckily, Kiba had woken up almost exactly at five o'clock.
"Oh. Well I guess we should get going then huh?" He asked. Rei nodded and Shino made no response. What the hell was with these two? Kiba didn't understand why they were so…unresponsive. But he didn't really care, this was the second day and if Rei was right, this would be the day when they would surely be attacked and tested.
o0o
A few hours past and they could see the rock face from where they stood upon a small hill. Again, they had not spoken the whole time up until now and the silence, which Rei and Shino seemed content with, was deafening to Kiba's ears. "I am not sure what is wrong with you guys," he said as the descended the hill. "But you two really need to wake up and say something, or do something, I don't know but I am starting to go crazy with all the silence." Rei looked up but didn't say anything; she seemed to be looking right past him even thought he had stopped and turned to face them. Kiba sighed and looked down, closing his eyes to the soundless response. What happened to her smiles he wondered?
A quick buzzing sound passed his exposed ear and sent a few pieces of hair into disarray on his head. He looked up and Rei was standing sideways with her right hand straight out and facing Kiba, she smiled. He turned around to see a ninja pulling a Kunai out of his shirt sleeve which had pinned him to a tree. Kiba let out a small scoff at the fact that he hadn't even smelt the guy approaching.
"Sorry Kiba, I wasn't really paying attention to what you said. I felt that guy following us for a while and was waiting for when he made a move." Rei said as they all moved together facing the enemy ninja, ready to fight.
So she wasn't ignoring me, good. He thought.
"Same, I am surprised your mutt nose didn't pick it up." Shino said almost inaudibly. But Kiba heard it and turned, growling, at Shino who acted as if he hadn't said anything. The enemy ninja disappeared while Kiba and Shino exchanged looks, not that Kiba could even tell that Shino was glaring at him. But they continued the death look anyway.
Rei turned, her blue-green hair flying around so fast it came around the other side of her head and hit her face. She brushed it off, her dark green eyes flashing angrily at the two boys.
"Alright, knock it off, right now." Both Kiba and Shino turned to look, confused, at Rei, they didn't know she could get so mad. "We are supposed to be a team, and the fact that you two start fighting even with an enemy ninja, or maybe more than one, around us? That means that you two obviously are not ready to work as a team. And Kurenai sensei is going to fail us and be very angry if we don't work together so whatever the hell your deal is, fix it, now." She said, finishing off her sentence with a small growl that made Kiba take a step back. He had never heard such a nice, small, beautiful girl growl in such a fierce way, and it scared him a little bit.
"Fine then, how about a truce?" He turned to Shino, sticking out his hand.
"Fine," Shino answered but did not return the handshake, Aburame did not shake hands in such a way. Rei, realizing this was as good of an apology as she was going to get, turned and began walking forward but didn't get very far before she sensed something in the ground. She attempted to jump back from whatever was right below her, but mid jump, a hand reached out from the ground and pulled her down. She landed hard on her back and flipped onto her stomach to get a better grip on the ground. Kiba and Shino ran to help, both reaching out to her, but two ninja fell from the trees and blocked their paths, both wielding kunai.
"Rei, hold on, we're coming!" Kiba yelled as Akamaru jumped out of Kiba's coat and got ready to fight, growling up at the ninja who was blocking his master's way. Rei struggled against the pulling of the ninja who was rising out of the ground to get a better grip on her body. His head was no visible but, with the masks the ninja were wearing; it made it impossible to tell who the ninja were from their faces. The ninja reached up and grabbed Rei firmly on her shirt and began sinking into the ground, forcefully pulling Rei down with him. She produced a Kunai from the pouch on her leg and drove it into the ground to try and stop from being pulled under. Her hand slipped and before Kiba could jump down and grab her hand, she was gone, swallowed up by the earth, and only one of her kunai was left behind.
o0o
Kiba and Akamaru had finished off their ninja quickly, as did Shino but they had no chance of reaching Rei before the ninja dragged her down into the ground with him. Kiba knelt down in the spot that Rei had been dragged into and sniffed the air. Her sent was heavy in this spot. Akamaru began sniffing the spot as well as the surrounding area and began barking loudly when he picked up the faint underground scent of Rei and her captor. Shino began releasing bugs from his finger tips to scout a 20 foot radius around them so the sneak attack would not happen again while they were distracted with finding Rei.
They followed the smell to a large dirt clearing not far from where they had been fighting earlier. When they entered the clearing they noticed three figures standing in front of them, one of them holding an unconscious figure in their arms. Rei was the only thought that crossed both Shino's and Kiba's minds simultaneously. Kiba moved forward, but was stopped by a hand on his shoulder.
"Slow down, we don't want to be too hasty." Shino said quietly into Kiba's ear.
"But they have Rei, we have to rescue her."
"We will, but in time."
The enemy ninja laughed. "You two cant possibly made a plan that could stop us, you are just genin and we are jounin, what exactly do you expect to do?" They laughed and the one who held Rei placed her on a nearby rock. Kiba growled in a low tone, as did Akamaru. He turned to Shino and said "I can't wait for you to decide on something, I am gonna destroy these guys."
"Kiba, she isn't in real danger-" but he couldn't finish before Kiba was crouching down and preparing for an attack.
"Beat mimicry, fang over fang" he yelled and Akamaru jumped up on his back and in a poof of smoke, looked just like Kiba. Suddenly they jumped into the air and spun so violently that they took the form of a horizontal tornado and took off towards the enemy, swirling around each other.
The enemy looked taken aback for a minute but the head ninja turned to avoid the boy and his dog and he kicked the passing tornado. Kiba flew sideways into a rock. Akamaru stopped the jutsu and ran to his master, turning back to dog form and licking Kiba's face.
Shino stepped up to the plate and raised his hands and bugs came flying out. They flew towards the enemy and wrapped around them like rope. He was about to make a jutsu sign with his hand when a poof of smoke occurred and all three ninjas turned into logs.
Replacement jutsu, I should have known. Shino thought as he turned from right to left trying to figure out where the enemy was.
Suddenly he was knocked to the ground from behind, when he looked up one of the three enemy ninja held the awoken Kiba in his arms while he himself was being held. The third, once again, held the limp Rei in his arms.
"Guess you three fail. Kurenai is gonna beat you guys into a pulp." They all laughed. But out of no where the ground began to shake and break apart, the grips on both Kiba and Shino were released as mounds of earth shot up from the ground and covered all three ninja, making it impossible for them to move. They stood, covered from the neck down in a pyramid of stone. Rei's body had flopped out of the third ninja's hands and onto the ground.
Everyone in the clearing looked extremely confused. The lead ninja spoke: "I guess we spoke too soon. This was a great jutsu, which one of you did it?" He asked while smiling at the two boys. They shrugged with confused looks on their faces, even Shino who never showed emotion, looked utterly bewildered. Then a poof of smoke appeared in front of the third ninja and Rei's body was replaced with a log.
"I did." Came Rei's voice as she emerged from the ground. She was beaming, apparently very proud of the fact that she single handedly captured the enemy ninja and saved her team mates. The ninja looked confused but smiled at her as she released them from their confines.
"We will be sure to tell Kurenai that Iruka was right about you. You really are something." The second ninja said before they disappeared, leaving Shino and Kiba in a state of shock. How had she done all that and neither of them had even had a clue, let alone the ability to take down the three ninja.
She turned and smiled at Kiba and Shino. Kiba looked the most confused, he had been wrong about her this whole time, so utterly wrong and she hadn't said a thing to defend herself. Had she been waiting for a chance like this to prove herself to them? Well, whatever the case was, she definitely was not the weakest link on the team anymore, she was the strongest and both boys stood in awe at the smiling, beautiful girl that they had so wrongly accused of being weak and helpless. Even Shino was kicking himself for thinking she wasn't as strong as this.
"We should get going if we want to reach the rock face in time." She said but she was stopped by a slender hand on her shoulder.
"No need, all three of you pass." Kurenai said as they all looked at her in confusion, they hadn't even been there for two whole days. She saw the confusion on their faces and decided to explain. "You three worked well together, not anywhere close to how I would like for you two be working together, but close enough to pass. Kiba and Shino, you two fought in the beginning but pulled together to try and save your friend. And Rei, you and Shino were the first to detect the ninja that were following you and you helped to bring Kiba and Shino into working together whether you meant to or not. But you all worked very well and I am proud of you three, especially since this is the first time you have worked together and you have never even practiced before." She smiled. "Let's head back to the village."
They all nodded and followed their sensei back to the village, all the while realizing that it was nice to fight together and they couldn't wait for training. And both Shino and Kiba couldn't help but think about how amazing it had been to be proven so utterly wrong by Rei. They would surely make a great Squad and fight well together from then on.
R&R
