(Author's note: Wretched Yuri: I'm doing a time skip here. Because well, really the same things that happen in the original happen here, except that team seven can already tree walk, so team ten learns that while team seven learn other things. The story will pick back up at the start of the Chunin exams after the teams return from the villages they visited. And once again, it has taken me aaaggeeesss to update. And again the only real excuse I have is that I'm always busier than I expect to be (my military boyfriend was home on mid-year leave last week, please forgive me for being distracted. I can only ask that you stick with me and my lack of updating consistency, as this story has a long way to go! I give you, Chapter 6.)

Chapter 6

When Naruto joined her teammates at the entrance to the academy, the three of them grinned at each other, excited. Their trip to Wave Country and Wind Country had changed the three of them slightly. Sakura had dropped her Sasuke fan girl ways for the most part. Sasuke didn't have a stick up his butt anymore and actually talked. Naruto wasn't as loud or brash anymore. She thought about what she did before she did it. The other two had found that she was like the calm in the eye of the storm. She was the rock in their group that kept them strong, Sasuke was the coldness that kept anyone from messing with them and Sakura was the gooey, sticky mess (in other words the broken bones if they disagreed with her) that kept them together. When they walked up to the door that said room 304, the three of them did a double take. Naruto tilted her head, her ears picking up the sound of feet and movement from the floor above. Kusachi, curled up with his head on his front paws on her head, yipped at her.

"I know Kusachi." The three were amused to see team Gai present who winked at them with amusement.

"Excuse me we'd like to get past." Sakura said politely. The two boys standing in front of the door grinned.

"You don't want to do this." They told her. Sakura raised an eyebrow.

"I don't want to go in there. I want to get through this crowd." She replied calmly. The two boys disappeared, flashing to a halt in front of Sakura. Sasuke was there instantly, catching their punches.

"Nice job spotting that genjutsu Sakura." The boy told his pink haired teammate. Sakura grinned, pleased at the compliment. "Excuse us." Sasuke said pushing the boys away. The jumped him again, only for Lee to catch one guy's foot. The other was met in the air by the other boy from Team Gai and hit the wall, sliding down it, his eyes uncrossed as Neji landed gently on the balls of his feet in front of Sakura. Lee held the guy's foot and pushed it away before bowing to Sasuke.

"Uchiha Sasuke I wish to fight you." The boy told him. Sasuke smiled.

"I want to fight you too Lee." The other boy grinned in triumph. "Neji?" Sasuke asked, looking at the other boy. Neji shook his head with a small smile.

"You are talented Uchiha but you are not who I wish to fight." He bowed to Naruto as she joined them with Tenten.

"Bring it on Neji." The girl told him with a grin. He smirked.

"I look forward to beating you Naruto-chan." He retorted with a grin. Her grin widened and she stopped and looked at the two boys who'd tried attacking them.

"Izumo? Kotetsu?" They both just groaned. Naruto picked Izumo up and took him over to Kotetsu, leaning him against the wall next to his teammate before walking off with the others. They found an empty area and Lee and Sasuke started their fight while Naruto yawned and slumped against a nearby pillar, the other three joining her. Soon enough, Maito Gai, the sensei of Lee, Neji and Tenten arrived in his usual green spandex suit with the Jounin vest on over the top and wearing bright orange leg warmers. His hair was cut in a bowl around his head and he had hugely thick eyebrows. Lee was almost his exact carbon copy. The boy dressed the same, had his hair the same, even his eyebrows were the same. When team Gai left, with Gai telling Lee off as they went, team seven followed them at a distance up the stairs and onto the third floor. In front of room 304, Kakashi stood waiting.

"Ah I'm glad you guys could make it. It's a good thing you're all here. Only teams of three are allowed in." He said. They glanced at each other but understood what he meant. If he'd told them it had to be a group of three, Sakura would have gone just for Naruto's and Sasuke's sake, whether she felt she was ready or not. Because Sakura had gone of her own willingness they could enter.

"I just wanted to tell the three you good luck and that I'm proud of you." Kakashi told them all with an eye smile. His three students flushed with the praise. Praise from their sensei was rare so this compliment the three of them would cherish. They opened the door and Kakashi watched them enter, worried for them. The door swung closed and he left to join the other senseis that were going to watch the test in a special room. His three students looked around at all of the genin in the room. There was a large amount of KI aimed at them, but Sakura and Sasuke, who had Naruto as a teammate just rolled their eyes and nodded at the girl. She frowned but realised a shockwave of Kyuubi's KI, sufficiently causing people to soil themselves. One boy, sitting in the back of the room with his brother and sister, grinned. He had been knocked unconscious by that girl and dragged into her mindscape where Kyuubi had beaten Shukkaku to a pulp and her father had fixed Gaara's seal. Gaara was one of the only people to know about Minato now. He and his family, his entire village, owed a debt to that girl with the glowing blue eyes. Her gaze met his and he grinned at her getting a sly wink in return. The other rookies joined team seven.

"Did you have to do that? Akamaru's still shaking." Kiba told the girl. Kusachi lifted his head from the top of his paws on Naruto's head and yipped at the shaking puppy under Kiba's hood on his head. Akamaru stopped shaking and barked at the fox kit that yipped at him again.

"Sorry. Their KI was making my nose itch." Sasuke explained, rubbing his nose. Sakura nodded her agreement rubbing her nose as well as Naruto shrugged. A grey haired, glass wearing boy came over to them.

"Quiet down you lot. You're all rookie here against experienced genin." He told them. Kusachi started growling at him. Naruto breathed in and the growl that reverberated from her had the boy backing up a step.

"What the hell? I'm just being nice." He told her. Her blue eyes were cold and frosty. Distrust and dislike shone in them. The rookies, all of who were familiar with Naruto's ability to judge people accurately, looked at the boy warily.

"My name's Kabuto. I've done this exam seven times, so it's made me a bit of a pro." He told them.

"If you were a pro, you would have passed." Kiba snorted at him. Kabuto glared at the boy slightly.

"I have information on people if you'd like to know. I keep them in these special cards I've collected." He told them, pulling the card out. Sasuke got slightly curious.

"Do you have cards on Sabaku no Gaara, Rock Lee and Namikaze Uzumaki Naruto?" He asked. Sakura frowned.

"Why do you want information on your own teammate?" She asked him stiffly.

"I want to see how good his information is. I know Naruto, so if his stuff on her isn't up to scratch, then I know that none of the rest is." Sasuke shrugged. Kabuto frowned and pushed his glasses up.

"Sabaku no Gaara. Genin of Sunagakure, third child of the Kazekage. 50 D-rank, 25 C- rank, 2 B-ranks, and an A-rank?" Kabuto whistled. "Impressive. Also it's said that he has some ability with sand. He's never come back from a mission injured, not even a scratch." They all glanced at Gaara who raised an eyebrow at them, a small smile tugging one corner of his mouth. After meeting Naruto and the other Konoha ninja, the boy had come out of his shell. He was no longer a psychotic killer, although most of the time he still acted rather psychotic.

"Rock Lee. Genin of Konohagakure. 60 D-rank, 35 C-rank, and 1 B-rank. Taijutsu specialist. No known abilities in genjutsu and ninjutsu." Rock Lee muttered something under his breath. "Very talented bunch so far." Kabuto commented before pulling out one more card. The whole room went quiet to listen to this one.

"Namikaze Uzumaki Naruto. Genin of Konohagakure. Only child of the Yondaime Hokage Namikaze Minato. Taijutsu specialist. Very adept at ninjutsu with very little genjutsu skill. Spent the first 13 years of her life masquerading as a boy and hiding her heritage so that she wouldn't be killed by her father's enemies. Very skilled at Henge. 100 D-rank, 60 C-rank, 3 B-rank and 1 A-rank." An Iwagakure (hidden village in the stone) ninja threw herself at Naruto.

"Your father killed my family! I'll kill you!" Naruto stepped lithely out of the way and bent, snapping her foot out and effectively kicking the girl back into her seat. The girl sat there stunned, looking at the other girl.

"ALRIGHT LISTEN UP YOU BRATS!" Most of them jumped and turned to see a tall scarred man surrounded by Chunin.

"My name is Morino Ibiki and I am your proctor for this section of the exam. Take a seat where your name is up there." He said, pointing at the desks and seats. Only when she had sat down did Naruto discover that she was next to Hinata and that her teammates were in other sections of the room. Luckily for them, Shikamaru, who had already worked out the meaning behind the test, having discussed the proctor in depth with his father before, had murmured it to Naruto who had then devised a plan with Sakura. Once Ibiki finished explaining the point to the test, everyone got to work.

Kusachi stood and shook his little fur out, his tail swishing behind him while golden eyes looked around the room. Many of the Chunin were unnerved by the sight of the fox. Ibiki at the head of the room smiled when the fox started yipping quietly as it looked around and the young girl whose head it sat on, started writing as she leaned on one hand, looking bored. Sasuke could have used his Sharingan but didn't want anyone knowing he had it, so the plan worked for him too. Sakura, smart though she was, had looked at the test and gasped. Not even she could answer these questions. She'd glanced at Shikamaru to see him writing away. She silently thanked him for warning Naruto. Without that plan, Sakura would be toast. She made it look like she was writing on her paper. Once she was done, Naruto leant back in her chair and turned her gaze on the window. She concentrated and it blew open, the wind rushing into the room. While the Chunin were distracted trying to close the window, Kusachi picked her paper in his mouth and raced over to Sakura, who gave him the empty one, who raced it back over to Naruto. Sakura filled in her name at the top of the page, amused by the fact that Naruto had written the test in Sakura's handwriting.

Once the empty sheet was back with Naruto and Kusachi was back on her head, the window closed off its own accord and Naruto started writing out the answers once more. Once she was done again, she looked up to see Ibiki watching her closely. She held his gaze and let one eyelid droop close in a lazy wink as the pencil being held by the boy at the desk closest to the door at the front, burst into blue flames. The boy dropped his pencil with a yelp, lifting his paper off the desk as the desk caught alight. The Chunin moved over to him, but Ibiki kept watching Naruto. Her eyes narrowed at him slightly and his desk caught alight, as well as the blackboard behind him. He yelped and pulled his hand away from the desk. The second he was distracted, Kusachi was off swapping papers with Sasuke. The other members of the Konoha 12 as people had started calling them, having seen Naruto playing with her fire, wondered what she was up to until they noticed Kusachi, her little fox kit, swap papers with Sasuke and then rush back to Naruto while Sasuke wrote his name at the top of the test and sat back. Naruto glanced at the plants at the front of the room, then the chairs the Chunin were sitting on and those burst into flame too. She wrote down the answers for the third time, this time in her own handwriting and wrote her name at the top of the paper. Once she was done, the fires all went out suddenly. Ibiki turned on her.

"NAMIKAZE!" She raised an eyebrow.

"Yes proctor?"

"Show me your test paper." She held it up for him to see. He sighed. It was filled in just like it had been every other time he'd looked at it. Meanwhile in the special room in which the senseis were watching the proceedings, Kakashi was rolling on the floor laughing as all the other senseis chuckled and wiped tears of laughter from their eyes. They'd seen the girl's ploy as the wind raced through the room and her fox had raced over to Sakura and back and then done the same thing with Sasuke while things were on fire.

"Poor Ibiki!" Kakashi gasped.

"How does she do that?" Kurenai, the sensei of team eight asked curiously. Kakashi shook his head.

"Sorry Kurenai. I can't tell you. It'd be unfair on my student to give you information you might pass on to your students who might later face her in the exam."

At the end of the test, Naruto made her speech and everyone stayed. Anko jumped through the window and gave her speech and then everyone left. Just as Ibiki was picking up Naruto's test her desk flashed and words appeared in the wood, flames the same blue as the ones that has set his desk alight. His eye twitched. Then he read the message and froze.

Ibiki.

The genin from Konoha Kabuto, is a spy. I don't care if he's the son of the medical division head. I know what I smell, and what I smell on him is the scent of a certain 'snake'. I'd know that scent anywhere. It's the scent that got Kyuubi in his prison. Foxes hunt snakes. Let the Hokage know that we have a traitor. Both my team and I can deal with Kabuto in the second part of the test or someone else can. I think snake-teme is after Sasuke's eyes. I have a score to settle with him. Let Jiji-san know that the invasion is beginning. Have fun Ibiki. Sorry about burning your hand.

Namikaze Uzumaki Naruto.

As soon as he finished reading, the words vanished. He raced from the room after collecting the other papers, going flat out for the Hokage's office where all of the Jounin were gathered.

"Ibiki what's wrong?" Sarutobi asked. Ibiki, out of breath took a few seconds to get his wind back.

"Invasion's- about … to –start." He gasped. Everyone froze.

"How do you know this?"

"My –source.. smelt – snake… on - traitor." Ibiki almost had his breath back.

"Who is the traitor?"

"The genin med nin Kabuto." Ibiki said, straightening up.

"Your source of information is sure?"

"It doesn't get any surer Hokage-sama."

"Who provided you with the information?" Ibiki grinned.

"What are snakes afraid of? What hunts them?" Everyone smiled tightly.

"Foxes." Sarutobi said. Then realisation dawned. "That means he's here. It also means that Naruto's going to let Kyuubi rip him to shreds. Does she have any idea what he's after?" Ibiki nodded.

"She believes that he may be after her teammate Uchiha Sasuke's eyes." Everyone groaned. It was quickly becoming apparent that the Uchiha clan was worth more trouble than anything else.

"Very well. Have the spy, Kabuto arrested the moment he exits the second part of the exam." Ibiki nodded and left.

"What are we going to do Hokage-sama?" One Jounin asked. Sarutobi looked up at him in surprise.

"Why we're going to let nature take its course of course."

"What do you mean? We're not going to do anything?"

"We don't need to. Nature's cycle will run its course and the fox will hunt the snake as it has done so since the beginning of time."

"You're going to let a genin go up against him? Kakashi why aren't you arguing? This is your student we're talking about!" Kakashi shrugged.

"You'll understand why I'm not arguing with him when the time comes." The jounin said vaguely.

"Welcome to the forest of death." Anko told them all with a vicious grin. Most of them gulped audibly in fear as they stared up at the huge, towering trees on the other side of the fence. "Also known as training ground 44. You're home for the next week. You will be given a scroll, and you will have to acquire the opposite scroll and take them to the tower in the middle of the forest before the end of the week. Do not open the scrolls until you are in the tower. Bad things will happen." She grinned nastily. "This is to test your ability to be trusted with documents. There will come a time as a Chunin that you will be asked to steal precious documents and bring them to your village. This is testing your trustworthiness."

"What will we do for food?" Chouji asked. Anko smiled viciously once more. "Forage for food in there of course." She glanced around at them all smugly, seeing fear on their faces. Satisfaction seeped through her until she noticed Naruto's bored expression. The girl yawned. Anko flicked a kunai at her and the girl moved her head out of its way. Anko appeared behind her, a kunai resting against the plate on Naruto's glove as she held her hand in front of her throat, which Anko had been aiming for. A long tongue reached over them both, and both females turned to see a young female grass Nin holding the kunai Anko had thrown in her long tongue. Naruto's eyes narrowed and a growl worked its way up her throat, her KI spiking and then vanishing. Foxes in the forest began yipping, and appeared at the fence. Kusachi sat up on her head and yipped back at them. Some of the genin gasped at the size of some of the foxes, who were easily as big as the little building next to the fence.

"What a strange ability you have with foxes little girl." The grass Nin said once Anko had taken back her kunai. The girl retracted her tongue. "But whatever could be the problem with you and your pets?" She asked sweetly. Naruto bared her teeth at the girl in a feral grin that promised pain.

"We can smell the one thing we love to hunt most." Naruto said. Anko's eyes widened slightly but other than that she showed no signs of realising what Naruto meant.

"Well I wish you luck with your hunting." The grass Nin said before moving back to her team. Naruto's eyes bored into her until they'd each received their scroll and gone to their respective gates. The scroll was in her pocket. They figured that because Sasuke had taken the role of leader, everyone would figure he had it.

"Naruto what was that all about?" Sakura whispered.

"The snake's here. You know that one that killed Kyuubi's mates and kits? Well he's here in disguise as that grass Nin girl. I think he's after your eyes Sasuke. He wants your power." She explained quietly to her two teammates.

"Well he can't have it." Sasuke vowed just as quietly. The alarm was sounded and the gates all opened.

(Author's Note: Wretched Yuri: Well there you go, chapter six. This one is nice and short, but filled with - I hope - things that will make you smile or giggle. Oh and thank you for the updates and follows and favourites I've been getting! It makes my day to log into my email and see them! If you feel there is some part of my story that doesn't work properly, please let me know! I'm so pleased you like my story! Until the next chapter, which I will post either tomorrow or Sunday (my two days off)!