And So Fell The Tree
と壁をノックダウン
And so fell the tree, very slowly in Sasuke's eyes, and yet unable to move, he watched helpless as his teammate took his place. That little incident spurred some changes, as Sasuke learns more about his teammates and changed his destiny, their destiny and altered their future forever after…
-Chapter Three-
Small Fry Are Just Too Easy
"Our mission was to protect you from thieves and bandits…"
"You guys will receive training… You won't be able to defeat him without me."
There was a ringing noise in Sasuke's ears. He groaned quietly and instinctively shifted his head away from the unwanted sound. The sound repeated once again and this time he stuck his head under his pillow. When he heard that damn noise for the third time, he gave up. He opened his eyes blearily and saw his teacher's masked visage three inches from his face. This startled him so violently he jumped out of his futon and skittered back a couple of steps.
"Good morning Sasuke!" the man had the nerve to say, holding a plate and a spoon in his hand. Well that cleared out the mystery of that annoying gonging sound. He glared heatedly at the man. Kakashi smirked under his mask (Sasuke could tell and the aura of smugness radiating from the jōnin helped) and pointed to the Banshees.
"Wake up your teammates now, we're leaving in about fifteen minutes," the man informed him, jovially before walking out of the room.
Sasuke sighed. He contemplated leaving them there to oversleep but he knew they had to leave quickly. He reluctantly knelt over Sakura, shaking her until he was sure she wouldn't fall asleep before kicking Naruto in the ribs for his satisfaction. When they finally sat up, he repeated Kakashi's words to them before leaving them and going to the bathroom.
When he came out, he saw that the futons were folded away and the two idiots were waiting behind the door. While Naruto and Sakura took their turns going to freshen up, Sasuke ate a quick breakfast and occupied himself with checking all his supplies. They others mimicked his actions and soon they found themselves waiting in front of the door for their sensei to return. (It was a testament to how tired they all were when neither Sakura jumped on Sasuke nor Naruto uttered a single remark against him)
Thankfully, they didn't have to wait for long as Kakashi appeared less than five minutes after they started waiting. He took a good look at them and chuckled, resulting in the three all glaring holes into his back. He ignored them and led them through the empty streets (for who would be awake at five in the freaking morning) occasionally looking back to see if they were following him.
When they finally reached the gates, Kakashi nodded to the man who looked half asleep and soon they reached the forest. By now, Sasuke and his teammates were fully awake and took to the trees after their teacher. They followed him quietly until they reached a clearing away from prying ears and eyes. Kakashi signaled them to stop and they jumped down to the ground. Kakashi beckoned them closer and unfurled the map given to him by Kizoku that morning.
"Now listen carefully," he whispered quickly, "I'm not going to repeat myself twice."
"We start our mission now, our objective to get rid of the various bandit groups terrorizing these roads; it is very dangerous combat mission for you guys you have to listen to exactly what I say, understand?"
They nodded.
"Good," he seemed satisfied.
"Now," he continued, "we've got exactly one week to finish this mission so I took the liberty of borrowing this map form the client."
He showed the said object to them and watched them observe it quietly, they didn't get the chance to examine it closely back in front of the town leader but they did so now. The map was a simple one of Nikkō and they area beyond it. It showed the forest around the town green and a few springs in blue. But the most unusual things about it were the strange red dots concentrated in groups in the green expanse of the jungle.
"It seems a bit hard Kakashi-sensei, there are a lot of bandits here," Sakura observed, looking at the map intently.
"We should finish off those smaller groups first before heading out the bigger ones. They must be unorganized if they didn't already ally themselves with the others, easy pickings." Sasuke gave his opinion.
"Good plan Sasuke. Yes we should probably take on the smaller groups they would unorganized and easy, just as Sasuke here mentioned, but its best if we do this quietly, it'll be harder if they're on guard."
"But Kakashi-sensei, there must be about eleven small bandits here! How they hell are we supposed to finish them off and the bigger groups in one week?" Naruto whisper-yelled.
His two teammates looked at him disbelievingly. Naruto actually had doubts?!
"Maa, don't worry Naruto, I repeat, they are small and unorganized, think of them as armed civilians. Not that hard to fight now are they? We could probably take on three to four of them in a day," Kakashi tried to assuage his doubts. He probably succeeded as Naruto grinned at him. The Copy-Nin continued.
"Now, today, we'll take out the four smallest gangs and then attack the bigger ones. You must follow my every order and we must travel quickly and quietly, do you understand?" He looked at Sakura and Naruto when said this. Sasuke barely restrained a snort from coming out of his mouth. Instead he scoffed quietly. The Twin banshees can't ever be quiet.
The Idiot surprisingly refrained from answering him,probably because their teacher's glare on him but settled with giving him the stink eye.
"Of course sensei!" he chirped quietly. He was followed by the other banshee while Sasuke shook his head.
Kakashi nodded.
"Now the first group is about half a mile due east of our position, so we should hurry if we want to finish off our four groups."
"Hai," they all said together, before they jumped up to the tree-tops.
Kakashi signaled the group of genin behind him to stop. He watched the group of thieves from his perch on a tree branch as his students joined him.
"What do we do know Kakashi-sensei?" asked Sakura quietly. She had her doubts when they were discussing the mission but when she saw the so called bandits, her hope had risen a bit.
Sasuke barely listened to her as he scrutinized the scene before him. There were about six thieves sitting around a long-extinguished campfire, laughing raucously and telling indecent jokes that nearly had him blushing. They were quite obviously drunk, even at this time of the morning. They were poorly dressed and even more poorly armed. Quite the easy targets. He averted his eyes and listened to his teammate finish her sentence.
"We should probably take them all out at once, they would be caught off guard and have no time send out an alarm or go for their weapons. Each one of us goes for one of them, and I could use my Kage Bunshin," observed Naruto, watching their targets intently. He noticed that his teammates were gaping at him, their jaws hitting the forest floor below.
"What?" he growled out, slightly irritated. The rest of the group continued to stare at him for a few seconds. Sasuke was the first to regain his voice.
"That's a reasonable plan, idiot. We're just surprised that you actually had enough cobwebs in your head to think of it," he smirked, hiding his surprise expertly because that actually was a good plan!
"Sasuke-kun is right Naruto, that is a great plan! How come you thought it up?" Sakura repeated his words. Sasuke thought he saw the Moron's shoulders slumped down a bit but it surely had be a trick of the light. He turned to their team leader to hear his opinion.
"Yes Naruto, it is an excellent strategy. The best we can come up with for now so chose your targets quickly. Naruto create your clones now," the Copy Nin ordered quickly. Naruto nodded and quickly formed two clones then waited for the next order.
"Now team," Kakashi turned to them, "since I don't feel like it's the time for your first kill already," he paused dramatically and watched his students' reactions (Sasuke paled and both Naruto and Sakura turned green) before continuing, "We'll just knock them out. Just wait for my signal." They nodded and waited and soon jumped behind their specific targets waiting. When Kakashi gave the signal, they swooped down onto them like hawks on their prey.
The fight was over before it even began. The men didn't even notice their presence. It was like taking a teddy bear from its shelf, thought Sasuke, it was just too easy. They were now tying the men to acouple of trees where they would be collected by the local authoritiesat the end of the day.
"That was actually easy sensei!" Sakura exclaimed wondrously, as she if she could hardly believe it. It seemed like she had expected something like the Wave mission.
"Of course, these half-rate thieves are no match for the might of ninja!" Naruto yelled out for the whole forest to hear, an impossibly wide grin adorning his face.
"Shut up moron," hissed Sasuke, "do you want to reveal our presence to the targets?"
"Hey bastard, keep quiet!" Naruto returned his jab, albeit lamely.
"Now now children, that's enough," Kakashi tried to calm them down, his hands up to keep the peace. It seemed to work because they quieted down, but were annoyed by the term children if the scowls they sent his way meant anything.
"Now that we're all calm, I think it's best to inform you guys that we've got to finish our duty." He took the map from out of his jacket pocket and studied it before crossing out the dots in their current position.
"There is another group an hour's way due north so let's hurry now!" And Kakashi jumped into the trees.
The younger ninja nodded soon followed their teacher.
In the elemental countries, civilians considered bandits to be great thieves, the dangerous and tough type of thieves. They were avoided at all costs for they were known to rob everyone and anyone who unfortunately happened to be in their way. They were merciless, they were heartless, not caring who they killed and robbed, women, children and elderly included. They were common, deadly, and feared by all.
Well, all except the shinobi of course. For shinobi were the civilians' heroes. They were thought to be their talismans against these thieves. And they had a good reason to, for shinobi considered bandits to be nothing more than nuisances, mere cockroaches against their might. They were the ultimate defense of the civilians. Bandits were easy pickings to them because how could they, mere civilians wielding weapons, be of any danger to those who lived to kill?
On the other hand, these bandits feared ninja. They feared them like how rat fears the cat waiting outside its den. They could handle merchants, they could handle normal guards, but they could not handle shinobi. The shinobi were bogeymen, they were their predators; they stood no chance against them. Most of the time, they ignore them, let them be but if they weren't careful, they would hunt them down, erase their existence. And they could not fight it. For how could one fight against these gods of the jungles? They were in their territory, they could do nothing.
This time they did not need to stop to plan. They simply repeated Naruto's plan and each took out their targets. This time it was a bit harder as these men weren't completely drunk but it was still too easy. They tied them up again left quickly, following their teacher.
"Come on kids, it's time for our lunch break," Kakashi called out before dropping down in a clearing where he stood waiting for his students. While they resented the kids comment, they were hungry and quickly jumped down to eat their lunch.
They unpacked their bags and took out their lunches and ate them in silence.
"It's a ten minute break so you better eat up quickly," The white-haired jōnin decided to break the peace in the clearing. The glares and killer intent that were sent his way would have been enough to make Orochimaru flee as if Manda was chasing him. Because he was the lesser man, even when he tried to look away, the glares caused chills to run down his spine and his brain swam with visions of revenge and pink flashes of pain and humiliation like never before and ramen down his pants so like the good chicken he was, he decided to listen to his sense of self-preservation and he backtracked quickly.
"I was kidding, twenty minute break, it's twenty minutes!" he put his hands in front of him as a sign of what he hoped was a soothing gesture band also in case he had to defend himself. He held in a sigh of relief when the glares were averted and the genin returned their attention to their food. How the hell did three measly genin get the glare and KI of the Kyūbi itself? He shook his head and unpacked his own lunch while trying to inconspicuously move away from his students.
Sasuke ate his tasty, tomato-filled onigiri slowly; he had to enjoy his food after all and he was exhausted. The mission itself wasn't hard, it was how much they had to travel to reach the campsites. Without any breaks. He wondered if Kakashi was acquainted with the green freak that ran laps around the village on his hands every morning screaming about youth. It seemed likely enough.
He finished his delicious onigiri and ate the extra tomato he had packed then took a sip from his bottle of water. They still had about ten more minutes of rest; lying down wouldn't hurt one bit. He stretched his legs, put his arms behind his head and lied down on the grass and closed his eyes. The peace and quiet was very relaxing. He was about to drift off into the welcoming nothingness…
"BOO."
"YAAARGH!" Sasuke jumped about ten feet high and fell to the ground in an undignified heap, startled. It took him a couple of seconds to comprehend what happened before the shocked look in his eyes turned into a gaze of absolute fury, a face that he would have given his damn bastard of a brothe- wait, that man wasn't family- if he ever saw him again. He turned his furious face and saw the Orange Abomination laughing his ass off while the Pink Freak tried to stifle her giggles and glared at the boy.
"What the hell are you doing?!" Sasuke said, he did not yell at all because Uchiha Sasuke never yells, glaring at the Orange Monkey.
"Nothing Sasu-chan," Sasuke's glare intensified, "you were about to sleep so I had to wake you up." He said all of this with an innocent face that made the idea of punching him a bit hard to bear. He shook his head.
"But you disturbed Sasuke-kun's sleep Naruto!" How could you!" screamed the Pink Menace. She sure isn't helping matters anyway, damn annoying teammates, my ears will bleed soon.
He heard snickering in the background and turned around just in time to see his teacher giving him that-annoying-upside-down-U-smile and coughing. He gave the jōnin a withering stare. The amused look he got in return did not help his temper. He finally sighed and sat down on the grass, nursing his ears. Naruto really did it this time. Another shout like that and he would go deaf.
Kakashi checked the time. As much as he enjoyed his students' antics, break time was over and they had to finish their objective for today.
"Let's go guys, break times over." He relished the groans of disappointment that came from his cute little genin before he added something helpfully.
"Come on now, the bandits aren't going to capture themselves, you guys know that," he told them smugly. He consulted the map while they packed away their possessions. Satisfied, he only waited to see if they were ready before he darted into the forest, three pre-teens following him.
The day went on smoothly and soon enough it was evening and too dark to continue. They got all four groups, today, all were surprisingly easy. The team, even Kakashi expected more resistance from them but they obviously were less-experienced civilian thieves wielding weapons. All in all, it was a successful day, but the three pre-teens hoped for something more of a challenge, including Sakura.
The run back to the Nikkō was also uneventful. When they reached the town, they headed off to the headquarters of the local police force where they gave the locations of the bandits they had apprehended and headed back into the inn they had occupied and all three slumped down onto the floor exhausted. Then the complaining started.
"I'm tired Kakashi-sensei!"
"Hey sensei, will all our missions be like this?"
"It was boring."
They turned to him to see his reaction. Kakashi merely sighed before he too sat down. He settled on ignoring, if you ignore them, they would go away, right?
"Hey sensei, how come you're not tired?"
"Kakashi-sensei, can we sleep in tomorrow?"
"You told us the mission was dangerous."
Kakashi sighed and continued to ignore them until their voices died down.
"Done?" he asked wryly.
Naruto growled, and looked ready to yell at him then thought better of and kept quiet. Sakura blushed but neither she nor Sasuke said anything.
"Good," he smiled at them. "Now this will be our schedule till we finish off all the small fry. I want no complaints no whines, no protests, unless you'd rather go after those bigger ones alone, I wouldn't mind. Got it?" he waited for them to nod.
"Now then, let us relax for tonight because I want everyone up at seven, hear?" Their grumbles were music to his ears.
And Kakashi went out to get to explore the town, leaving his students gaping behind him.
The next couple of days went by quickly. Team Seven woke up at seven thirty, got ready by eight, went to the forest, catch bandits, lunch, catch bandits, return and relax. So far, it was monotonous so it was absolutely normal for the three pre-teens to be sitting around the table, bored out of their minds.
"Kami-sama, I'm so bored!" yelled Naruto that nightz. Directly into Sasuke's ears.
"There's nothing to do here," sighed Sakura.
"Keh. I agree."
"Gasp! Sasuke you agree?" Naruto asked dramatically. Sasuke scowled.
"Shut up idiot."
"Yeah, shut up Naruto-baka!" Sakura glared at Naruto. This caused him to quiet down.
For ten seconds.
"By the way, where is Kakashi-sensei?" The other two paused to think about it.
"Now that we think about it, where is Kakashi-sensei? He disappears every night," wondered Sakura. It was actually a bit strange as every night he left them to relax as he went out himself.
"Hot springs?" suggested Naruto. Sasuke shook his head.
"He comes home dry, moron."
Sakura cut off Naruto before he could retort. "Maybe he went out to drink?"
"Nah, he doesn't seem to be the type," this one came from the orange-obsessed boy.
"What type?" asked a familiar voice from behind him. All three jumped and turned around quickly. The smiling face of their previously absent sensei greeted them from where he sat behind Naruto.
"H-hey there sensei," Naruto couldn't help but stutter. Their teacher caught them talking about him, and you couldn't blame him for being worried about the consequences.
But apparently, Sakura didn't have such worries.
"Where were you Kakashi-sensei?" she asked in a voice that was barely quiet enough to be considered normal. Sasuke didn't say a word. The situation didn't require him saying anything and he preferred being quiet. It made him seem more mature compared to the idiots on his team.
"Somewhere," the Copy-Nin remarked offhandedly. "Because we finished all the small targets, I think you guys deserved a bit of a rest tomorrow."
All three genin cheered, although Sasuke did so in his mind. The previous days were very tiring and while they expected it, rest sounded very good right now. And the prospect of getting the harder targets seemed exciting and the boy couldn't help but want to show them he could do it. He had to be the best of them, excluding Kakashi.
"But you guys have better get ready, because I think it's time we do some extra training," he heard Kakashi say, and snapped himself away from his thoughts. He was a bit surprised because he didn't really think bandits would be so much of a threat that they needed extra training. But he couldn't help but anticipate what Kakashi would teach them now; he still doubted the jōnin was strong, he didn't teach them anything much.
The other two were curious about this training too and they made it known quite vocally. Even Sasuke had to hold back the urge to ask Kakashi about their training, it wouldn't do if he appeared immature in front of them. The man just smiled at them.
"I would love to tell you all about the training," he said slowly to the hidden joy of his students, "but it would ruin the surprise!" Their shoulders slumped down in disappointment as they watched their teacher sit down to read his book.
And they spent the rest of the night discussing tomorrow's training programs in hushed tones.
And this is the third chapiter ppl!
Personally, I'm not too sure about this one cuz it's shorter and it seems a bit filler to me. I would love to thank DarkSacredJewelXoX for giving me his/her opinion on my story. I would also like to thank Rosebunse and splitheart1120 for being the only people who reviewed the last chapter when I posted it. Do you guys know how sad it makes me when I see so little response? It just lowers my self-esteem. –sniff-
Kidding, but come on guys! I know you're all out there, give your opinions!
Now, onto my actual chapter, I'm not sure of my skill in writing fight-scenes which are greatly needed for my next chapters so if anyone is willing to help, please give me some tips. Also, I haven't made up my mind about what training our heroes will get from Kakashi so I'm open to suggestions made by the readers.
Now then, my school starts this week so please don't mind if my update schedule becomes a bit hectic. Besides, I will never give up on this story unless I'm dead or if it's the end of the world. If it's delayed, I would update eventually. This is to ease any worries you guys had.
Will try to update soon, dattebayo!