Happy New Year, people!
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Seeing how fast these numbers have been going up, I have to ask you: How did you find this story in the first place? I'm interested in knowing.
Anyways, enjoy!
The Test/Working As A Team
"So do we pass now?"
When Naruto arrived at the Third Training Ground, Sakura and Sasuke were both already there, sitting on a log with no sign of Kakashi anywhere. The lateness of the supposed jounin wasn't really a surprise considering he was infamously late most of the time - according Old Man Danzo at least. No one actually knew what he did to arrive so late.
The place was a wide, open, grassy area with a forest and a small lake surrounding it. Large bushes lined the edge of the forest, making for excellent hiding places, and the trees were tall enough for their thick branches to support multiple people.
Sitting down next to his teammates on the log, Naruto noticed how tired they looked. In fact, Sakura actually wasn't trying to get close to Sasuke; instead she had a hard time keeping her eyes open, her head drooping once in a while. Sasuke was using his hand to steady himself while doing his best to avoid falling asleep.
"Wow, what happened to you guys?" asked Naruto in mock wonder. He himself wasn't tired at all, having woken up about an hour ago.
"Been here for almost an hour now," said Sakura. She sounded more like she was talking in her sleep than anything else.
"Absolutely bored right now," added Sasuke, turning to Naruto. "What about you?"
"What about me?"
Sasuke sighed. "How are you right now?"
"Probably like you in a moment if Kakashi doesn't appear soon." He knew that wouldn't happen for at least an hour if what Danzo told him was true, but why worry them?
They sat there in silence for a while, until Naruto decided there was no point in wasting their time sitting there. "So, either of you think we should just go have breakfast and then come back?" he asked.
"Kakashi specifically told us not to eat," chided Sakura.
"Yeah, well, he's not going to be here for at least an hour, so...?"
Sasuke jumped to his feet. "Well, I say we go. I am not sitting here for another hour on an empty stomach."
"But-" Sakura's argument was cut short by her own stomach growling, and she looked down in embarrassment.
"Three out of three say yes, what are we waiting for?" Naruto asked, already walking away. "I know a place we can crash. If you guys have money, that is, because I'm broke."
Sasuke reached into his pocket as he and Sakura followed their teammate. "Well, I was planning on buying something later today..."
Kakashi arrived at the designated training ground two hours late, already rubbing the back of his head sheepishly.
"Sorry, sorry, I got lost on the... road... of... life?"
To his shock the place was empty.
"Where are they?" he wondered out loud. He looked all around him, but found no evidence of his students' presence. They couldn't have gotten lost, could they? He gave clear orders to be here by nine o'clock - disregarding how he himself wasn't there on time.
His ears picked up a conversation approaching from behind him. It was faint, too far away for words to be made out, but he didn't need them to know who it was - or rather who they were.
"Hey, look!" Naruto's voice called out, no doubt pointing at him with his finger. "It's Kakashi! See, I told you he'd be here by the time we came back."
Kakashi smacked his palm against his forehead in irritation, but quickly recovered when Naruto's words registered in his head.
Came back? he thought as he turned to face his students. He could see Sakura finishing a dango stick. Did they deliberately go against his orders not to eat breakfast before this test? What nerve!
"I still can't believe he is supposed to a jounin," Sasuke remarked. The trio was now sitting on a log a few meters away from Kakashi.
"Nice of you to show up," Kakashi said flatly. He would have sighed, but knew it was better not to show any signs of irritation.
"He does know that's what we should say to him, right?" Naruto whispered to Sasuke who nodded.
Kakashi sighed at the childish behavior, reached into his pocket and produced two small bells. He showed them to his students and then tied them to his waist as he explained what to do.
"Alright then. Your task is to get these two bells from me before noon - which is about one hour from now. If you succeed, you pass and officially become genin; fail and you all go back to the academy. No exceptions. Any questions?"
Sakura raised her hand for a permission to speak.
Kakashi nodded his head towards her.
"But there are only two bells. Does that mean one of us has to go back no matter what?" she asked, lowering her hand and stabbing the stick into the log.
"Excellent question, Sakura! And yes, you are correct. One of you will have to go back to the academy while the other two get to be genins."
Kakashi expected them to react with cries of horror and disbelief, but instead received raised eyebrows and shared glances among the three. What was wrong with kids these days?
"So, when do we start?" asked Sasuke with a hint of excitement in his words.
Naruto seemed deep in thought, the fingers of his metal glove tapping the log impatiently. Next to him Sakura appeared to be ready for anything, squeezing her hands into fists.
Kakashi sighed again, wondering why he was wasting this much time when they were already supposed to start the test. Better late than never, it seemed.
"We start right now!"
The team jumped into action right away, but in the way Kakashi had not expected.
Sasuke and Sakura immediately jumped into the surrounding bushes and trees while Naruto sprang away from the log to the other side of the field. They hid well, but Kakashi was a jounin for a reason and easily knew where each of them was.
Kakashi smiled under his mask as he reached into a pouch and took out an orange book. He opened it and began reading it, waiting for the first one to attack him. His eye moved from side to side, only keeping the book in front of him to hide where he was looking at any given moment. He kept himself on edge in case someone decided to throw kunai and shuriken at him.
Then, as he lowered the book to look over it, Kakashi realised that unlike his teammates Naruto simply stood on the other side of the field. There was something fishy about the boy, and Kakashi knew it. He put the book back into the pouch and faced the blond.
Naruto gave him a small smile as he opened the left pocket of his coat and took out his headband. He started walking forward while tying it around his forehead. As the boy finished tying the knot to fasten the headband in place, he stopped a good three meters away from Kakashi, staring at the jounin like a hawk.
"I'm surprised you are not attacking me head on, Naruto," said Kakashi, quickly glancing from left to right to see if someone was flanking him. He saw no one. "What is a mama's boy like you going to do, I wonder."
Instead of flying into blind rage from the comment and attacking like expected, Naruto brushed off the insult like he had heard it a thousand times. The only indication he was even acknowledging it was the raised eyebrows and the subtle shift in his stance.
"You really should try taking things seriously."
"And you should ask yourself how a man like you is a jounin, cyclops."
"Hey! That hurt!" Kakashi wasn't really angered by the boy's comment, but it did make him analyze the situation again. The blond clearly wasn't afraid of him nor was he going to back down without a fight.
There was rustling in the bushes to the left. Kakashi knew it was Sasuke since Sakura was spying on them from a tree branch to the right. Were they planning? Waiting for an opportunity to present itself? Whatever it was, Kakashi had to prepare for anything.
"You should heed your own advice, Kakashi," Naruto said, crossing his arms over his chest with a quiet chuckle. "Letting yourself get distracted will only get you killed someday."
Kakashi's narrowed his eye. "And you are an expert on this matter?" he asked. It was more of a joke than anything serious.
Naruto looked down at his feet, his arms falling back to his sides. "You have no idea, Kakashi," he whispered in a dangerous tone. "You have no idea." He shook his head and lifted it up to resume their staring contest. This time, though, there was an angry glint in his eyes that promised nothing but pain.
A kunai flew overhead, lightly touching the very top of Kakashi's silver hair. The man drew a kunai of his own to deflect two more. They had all come from Sasuke who used them as a distraction while switching bushes. Kakashi spun around to face Sakura's direction on pure reflex in case she tried to copy Sasuke's move. Fortunately none came.
"It's not wise to turn your back to your opponent."
Kakashi's eye widened in shock as he heard it; not because of the words themselves, but because they were spoken right next to his ear. In an instant he turned again with his kunai ready to force the boy back. To his surprise Naruto caught his hand, pushed it away and grabbed his head with both hands.
"What are y-?"
Naruto gave him a brutal headbutt, the metal plate of the headband slamming right into his exposed eye.
The stunned silence was only broken by Kakashi's cries of pain as he staggered away from the only opponent who had ever caught him this off-guard. He covered his eye with his hand while trying to prevent Naruto from closing in by swiping the kunai from side to side blindly. He had prepared for anything, but this was simply something one couldn't have expected from a genin class ninja.
Sasuke was waiting for the perfect chance to swipe one of the bells. He knew Sakura was also doing the same. He hadn't expected such an unusual tactic when he threw his kunai to distract the jounin, but why look a gift horse in the mouth?
"Aaargh! Fuck! Son of a-!"
Kakashi's rage fueled curse was cut short when Naruto's boot struck him in the groin. He bent over in pain and collapsed on the ground, holding his aching groin and eye, moaning pathetically in agony. He was out of the fight quite easily.
Now's my chance!
Sasuke ran from his hiding place as did Sakura, and each swiped a bell before Naruto could do more than blink. To his credit, he didn't seem more than mildly irritated.
And when Sasuke thought about it, he felt there was something else to the test altogether.
But what could have it been?
Kakashi stood up a few minutes after the devious blow struck him low. His crotch still hurt and so did his face. He had never thought a boy who was barely a genin could have devised such a cunning plan and defeat him. Had this been a real battle situation, he would have died right then and there.
"Are you OK, Kakashi?" asked Sakura's voice to his right.
"Well, I just kicked him in the nuts, so what do you think?" asked Naruto's voice as Kakashi's vision began to finally clear.
"Don't you think that was a little overkill, Naruto?" asked Sasuke in turn from behind him.
"He'll be fine."
Kakashi rubbed his face as he tested his wobbling legs, doing his best not to aggravate his groin. It was surprising how much boots could hurt; he had never been kicked in the groin before, but he had known it hurt quite a lot.
"Please, don't do that again, Naruto," whispered Kakashi, hiding his pain with years of practice and experience. "Ever. I mean it."
"So do we pass now?" asked Sasuke.
Kakashi blinked - half from confusion, half to clear his vision. He touched where the bells were supposed to hang and found naught but air. With his mind in doubt and denial he looked at them one by one. Sasuke and Sakura held bells in their hands. They had succeeded; he had been beaten. He was going to be the laughing stock of every ninja in the village if this got out.
What an embarrassing defeat.
On the bright side, though, his students had worked as a team, proving themselves worthy to be a genin team of Konoha.
"I can't believe I'm saying this," Kakashi started, his eye doing its best to stay open despite still watering, giving an impression he was crying in joy. "But I am proud to inform that starting tomorrow, we are all officially Team Seven!"
"Huh?" was the general response to his words, none of them understanding why all three of them would make up the team. After all, Kakashi's instructions clearly stated that only the two who had swiped the bells were to pass.
"You worked as a team to get the bells in time," explained Kakashi with calmness that belied his injuries. Apparently he was oblivious to the fact that there was no actual plan or teamwork to speak of, just simple opportunism. "You showed capability for teamwork and good judgement for a team fresh out of the academy. You see, the only way to get the bells from me was through teamwork, and you proved that even an experienced jounin like me can be defeated with it; I got cocky and paid for it."
"I think I get it," said Sasuke after a moment of thinking.
Naruto and Sakura turned to look at him with curiosity and confusion; both wondered what he was talking about. Even Kakashi was curious what the young Uchiha prodigy had understood of his test.
"The point was not about the bells and who could get them at all, but about teamwork! It's like you said: We were meant to work together to get the bells, because alone we couldn't have done it. The comment about only two of us passing was just a trick to drive us apart."
Kakashi nodded his head, proving his deduction was correct. He discreetly shot a look at Naruto who was stroking his chin and nodding his head as he listened to his teammate.
"Does this mean even Naruto gets to be in the team?" asked Sakura somewhat hopefully.
"Yes, Sakura," answered Kakashi, possibly widening his smile under that mask of his - it was hard to tell. "So, Naruto. What was your plan, if you don't mind telling me?"
Naruto was taken aback by the question, but answered anyway after a second or two of hesitation. "Well, you already witnessed it. After you went down for the count I was going to take bells and that would've been it." He glanced at his teammates briefly before adding. "It seems they understood what I was planning and acted accordingly."
Kakashi raised an eyebrow at the simplicity of the plan, then asked something that was bothering him. "What was that about being an expert in getting distracted and killed?"
Naruto's eyes filled with deep longing as he started remembering something from his past. Sasuke also noticed that he was suddenly guarding his right leg behind his left for some reason.
"Death has come close before," he replied simply, moving the leg to front again.
To their shock, he dropped to one knee and lifted up his pant leg from his right leg enough for them to see something horrifying. Sakura gasped loudly when she saw it; while Kakashi only raised his eyebrow. Sasuke himself stayed quiet, pondering what kind of a place Naruto had lived in.
There was a big, diagonal bite mark on his shin that was easily visible since the scar tissue prevented leg hair from growing, leaving a line of barren spots. The size of the individual scars showed how large the teeth had been and suggested that they had penetrated all the way to the bone, biting through flesh like paper. The bite had obviously been very painful and traumatic for the boy. One couldn't help wondering what kind of a creature Naruto had faced to have such long-lasting marks and survive.
"It has been almost four years since that day," Naruto said solemnly as he covered his leg again. He turned around and stared at the sky, deep in thought. "It's a miracle I even survived the gorgonopsid's bite."
"The what now?" asked Kakashi, curious to learn more. Considering Naruto was a total enigma to everybody, this was more than understandable.
"The thing that bit me," Naruto clarified, turning back to face them. "I didn't listen to mom's warning to stay close and wandered too far away. If it wasn't for her, I would have died then and there."
No one said a word for a long while, until Kakashi decided to get them back on track.
"Well then, I'd like to show you something. Follow me!"
Kakashi led them to the memorial stone, a vaguely kunai-shaped, black stone, and explained how the names of all the ninjas who had died in action were etched on it, including his old teammates.
"Those who break the rules are trash, but those who abandon their comrades are worse than trash," he told them. He explained how he lived by those words. It also explained why he demanded teamwork from his students above all else. He also mentioned how he had failed every team of hopefuls before them because they lacked teamwork.
Kakashi told them to meet back at the training ground at the same time the next day for their first task as an official genin team. After that he left to report of the team's success, leaving the three alone yet again.
And that's the end of that.
Bye!
Fun Fact: Originally Naruto would have arrived just after Kakashi.