Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or anything copyrighted.
Naruto counted the seconds by as the receptionist looked over his papers. Seriously, what took so long to check to see that the doctor had in fact signed his release form? After counting two minutes of sitting there while she idly flipped through the papers, Naruto was at the cracking point, his fingers were starting to curl into fists and his jaw was clenched tight. One might be wondering why Naruto seemed to be so agitated by the simple process, despite having gone through it without troubles before. Well, it wouldn't have bothered him, except that he had been kept in the hospital three days after he had woken up. Three days! He had been in top health a few hours after he woken up. He could swear that some of his doctors had a sadistic streak.
The other reason for his impatience was simple really; he had a chance to spar with someone new for once. While he enjoyed sparring with Lee, as he would often come up with new and exciting ways to fight with the boy, the problem was that Lee had the same move set each spar. Mind you, it was a move set that was devastating and Naruto had lost more often than he would like to admit. Nonetheless, having a chance to battle against an unknown enemy, and possibly having another gauge for his strength was very enticing to the young boy. He was practically vibrating with excitement.
After took what seemed to be forever, the receptionist looked over to the young boy and told him that he could leave. Her eyebrows then quirked upwards when the boy shot off in an impressive display of speed as he launched through the doors and leapt upwards, grabbing onto the roof of a nearby low building. After pulling himself up, he turned towards the direction he knew the armory to be located. He hadn't himself been there before, as he tried to avoid going into any stores. He'd had Gai picking up his equipment for him. It seemed a selfish thing to do, but the man had insisted that he be allowed to shop for the boy after the clothing incident that had happened earlier in their time together. That and the fact that it gave the man a chance to buy new weights for the boys. The man truly could be sadistic at times.
As the boy raced over the rooftops he got to thinking about the upcoming spar. What kind of techniques would she use? Would she be a close range fighter or a long range fighter? If she had any cool techniques, would she be willing to teach him? Naruto didn't know the answers to his many questions, but that was alright, he would find out soon enough. Deciding to try and get a good guesstimate of her abilities, he thought about what very little he knew about her.
He knew that she apparently liked being in a smithery, and her father appeared to be the master blacksmith in the town. That led to the belief that she was probably somewhat more likely to use weapons. He had also noted that she had a very firm body, muscles taut from training, though not overly big. He blushed at that, he had only noticed her firm body when she had been pushing against his body in order to avoid detection from her father. Her firm body however pointed towards some training in hand to hand combat, though not stressed. Otherwise her muscles would have been more pronounced, not just toned.
As for her jutsu capabilities, that was impossible for the young boy to discern. He supposed that she didn't rely entirely on them, since her body showed physical training, but that could just mean she was trying to be a balanced shinobi, much like himself. Once again, he was left wondering, but then, that was what had provided the excitement to spar in and of itself. His thoughts resolved to just find out during the battle, since she didn't exactly have a better grasp of his abilities than he did hers.
Naruto's thoughts had been distracting him during his run, and now that he was back in focus, he noticed that he was very nearly at the store. If he had continued to think to himself, he probably would have passed the shop, and that would have just been embarrassing. Stopping on the building overlooking the store, he took in it's layout. The store was two stories, though it looked from the windows that were open that the second story was in fact where the family lived. While the downstairs portion was the store itself, with all the weapons lying therein, apt for grabbing up by the family if they needed to protect themselves at night. Behind the store was a small patch of bare dirt, probably worn that way by training of the young kunoichi there. At the far end of the land was another building, though if the plume of dark smoke coming from the wide chimney was any indication, Naruto figured that had to be the infamous smithery.
Naruto hopped down onto the street after his inspection and opened up the door to let himself into the store, hoping that he wouldn't be thrown out before he at least talked to Tenten about their spar. As soon as he walked in, Naruto's eyes widened and started shining. 'So many sharp and pointy things!' Was the only thing the young boy's dazed mind could come up with when he was assaulted by the sight of the multitudes of weapons that were on racks, on the walls, and some even hanging from the ceiling. He wasn't entirely sure if he had stepped into his wildest dream, or his greatest nightmare.
The boy started idly wandering down one of the hallways, looking left and right with amazement clearly plastered all over his face. He had never really looked into using weapons that much, figuring that they were an item that could be lost or damaged. While his body was something that couldn't be lost, and well, it could be damaged, but that was part of the shinobi life. However, suddenly looking at the mass of deadly looking weaponry that adorned the walls, he couldn't help but feel that he had overlooked another great aspect of weapons in general. They were fucking intimidating! He would definitely have to reconsider his thoughts there and possibly play with the idea of choosing a weapon to add to his arsenal of fighting capabilities.
As he finished walking down the aisle way, he located the register. Ironically, he had passed it near the beginning of his amazement. The register was located right next to the entrance, so that a person couldn't run in and grab a weapon without the person behind the counter at least getting some idea of the identity of the thief, if not being able to outright stop them. Luckily for Naruto's ego, it seemed that no one was at the register at the moment, so he could save face by not having to admit that he had been completely astounded by the room.
Walking up to the counter, he saw that there was a little bell to ring, and he was reaching for it when the door behind the counter opened up and the terrifying old man that he had been introduced to before walked out from the back room. Naruto's hand paused, and he could curse his luck. He had been hoping that Tenten would be at the register, not her father. This was likely to end up with him having to come up with something quick.
"Can I help you, brat?" The old man asked, while taking a seat behind the counter.
Naruto's eye twitched at the comment, he truly hated being called a brat. Although unlike the majority of the time when he was called a brat, there was no hostility or hidden malice in the word, more used as the man's common way of referring to children.
"Uh…yeah, is Tenten-san around here somewhere?" The boy asked, making sure to say the girls name with an appropriate suffix attached.
"Hmm? I thought you didn't know my daughter. Or were you lying to me at the hospital?" The old man leaned over the counter, and put his face near the now truly terrified boy.
"Umm…oh, uh, no, I ran into her a little after you left. That's all."
"Well, what do want her for, boy?" The man's eyes narrowed, and Naruto realized just how protective this father really was. He was really standing on thin ice here, and there was already a crack running down the length of it.
"Oh, well, she said we could have a spar sometime after I got out of the hospital, and I was hoping she was available for it." The boy said, thankful that he didn't have to lie about that part.
The man's eyes judged him for a moment, and finding no lie in the statement, responded, "Hmph, well, she's in the back moving boxes for me. Wait a moment while I go fetch her."
Naruto sighed with a relief and released a breath he hadn't known he had been holding when the man exited back out the door he had arrived through. That was the second time the man had gotten to Naruto, and he wondered idly if he would ever be able to talk to the man without seizing up in irrational fear. Apparently, fathers were just scary if you wanted to talk to their little girl.
After a few moments, he heard some voices talking in the other room, though he couldn't hear what they were saying. He was able to make out the old man's voice, and a female voice, which he remembered was Tenten's voice. It sounded like Tenten was surprised, then excited as she talked with her father. After a loud "Thanks, pop." The conversation ended, and a few seconds later the young girl entered the main store.
"Good timing, Naruto, my father just let me get out of work so that I can spar with you. Considering how many boxes I had left, I really do owe you."
"Hehe, don't worry about it, so where do you want to do this?" The boy embarrassedly scratched the back of his head.
"Oh, well, my normal training area is just behind the store, unless you're planning on using any moves that would massively change the landscape or something."
"Oh no, that's fine I suppose."
"Right, well, follow me then." The girl opened up a partition in the counter and let Naruto in behind it.
He followed her through the doorway behind the counter and his eyes bugged out when he saw the amount of boxes that were in the backroom. It was nearly enough to fill a warehouse, at least in his mind. Several stacks of boxes were still wrapped up, and Naruto figured those to be the ones that Tenten was going to be going through before he arrived. Off to the side, he noticed a stairway that headed up to the second story and figured that was the entrance to the family's household portion of the building.
Following the young girl out the back door, he got a good look at the training area from the ground level, and noticed a lot of things he hadn't noticed from the rooftop nearby. For one, there were a lot of thin gouges in the ground, and several small craters. He also noticed lots of tiny targets painted on painted all over the places. They were painted with colors just barely off from whatever they were on, so that they'd be harder to spot and focus on. There also seemed to be wooden dummy with several targets painted brightly on it. The target spots seemed to be most of the vital locations, and each one had several kunai or shuriken embedded into them.
One location caused Naruto to pause and suddenly reconsider the spar, since he really didn't want to end up at the hospital to remove any sharp, pointy things located in that particular area. Naruto must have whimpered slightly, because Tenten had turned and quirked an eyebrow at the boy who seemed to be crossing his legs and holding a hand over his sensitive areas as he looked at the dummy. When she realized why he was acting like that, she broke out in a very melodic laugh that caught the boy's attention.
"Don't worry, I'm not going to try and make you a eunuch during a friendly spar. My father is the one that emphasizes my learning how to strike that area of the male anatomy." Once again Naruto decided that the old man was a very, very protective father, and decided not to do anything at all that could ever be construed incorrectly and end with his life either being forfeit or horribly changed.
"R…Right. Well, let's start shall we?" The boy said, while walking over to a spot a few paces away from the girl and adopting a guarded but adaptable stance.
"Yeah, let's go." The girl nodded and dropped her hands down towards the weapon pouches on her legs.
Both waited for the other to move at first, until Naruto got fed up with that, and shot forward that shocked the girl. Tenten had not been expecting to be facing that kind of speed, but grinned to herself as this would finally provide a chance for her to test her accuracy on a fast moving target. She reached down into her left pouch retrieving a handful of shuriken to throw off en masse at the oncoming blur that was Naruto.
Naruto was thrown off pace when he suddenly had several shiny pieces of metal flying through the air that would have pierced him if he hadn't jumped into the air. This was the first time he had someone take aim accurately at him when he was moving at full tilt. Once he was in the air, things just got worse, as he saw the grin on the girl's face and realized she had wanted him to go to the air. Seeing her retrieve two handfuls of shuriken, Naruto realized the error in going to the air against an opponent like her, and quickly starting making handseals.
With a flick of her wrist, Tenten shot off both sets of shuriken, one coming straight towards him, while the other swung at an arc to attack him if he were somehow able to stop the ones in front of him.
"Katon: Goukakyuu no Jutsu." The boy screamed out and blew a moderately sized fireball in front of him, he didn't want to kill the girl after all.
Of course, he hadn't noticed the side arc shot shuriken and as when he saw them coming in, he had no time to use any techniques to thwart the attack. Thinking quickly, the boy flooded his left side with chakra, hoping to minimize the damage. He was quite surprised when he did so, because right before the sharp metal could pierce his skin, he felt a boost in the chakra fortifying the skin. This hadn't happened before, and it was weird time to learn something new about his body.
What truly surprised him though, was that the shuriken hit his skin, and merely bounced back off, each leaving a scratch instead of a deep gouge in his skin. Naruto shook off the surprise, he'd worry about it later, like when he didn't have to worry about more shuriken flying at him. He looked back to his opponent to find her gawking at his side much like he had been earlier. Taking this as a good opportunity for himself, Naruto landed on the ground already ready to blast off at full tilt. He closed the gap instantly, and was already halfway into punch before the dazed girl had the wits about her to try and block it.
However, since she was late in the attempt, not entirely focused, and just physically weaker than Naruto overall, her attempt to block was completely blown through and her stomach almost retched when Naruto placed his fist deeply into it. Her body had been lifted off the ground with the punch and as she fell back, she decided right there and then to not let him get close to her again in this battle. He obviously outclassed her in hand to hand, and at least had one ranged jutsu to combat hers.
Once she landed, Tenten frowned, he also had stopped her last attack with a burst of chakra. Weird as that was, it wasn't unheard of really. She had heard of something similar being used by the Hyuuga, but this boy didn't look like a Hyuuga, nor had the technique he used seem to be there techniques.
Deciding that she couldn't afford to play nice in this battle, she pulled out two scrolls from her back pocket. She would have to go all out of the boy, and hope he would survive but lose nonetheless. She hadn't yet developed a move using these scrolls, but she had packed them full of weaponry. Taking each scroll and unwinding them as she used a nearby tree to catapult her high into the air, she slapped different kanji symbols to have different weaponry that she fired off.
Naruto looked up into the air and saw a huge torrent of weaponry raining down towards him. 'Oh crap.' The boy thought before reflexively going through the seals for the Headhunter jutsu, not even bothering to form an earth bunshin since it wouldn't be able to stand up to that kind of assault. He quickly locked onto Tenten's chakra signature and moved towards her location as he heard a thunderous roar from the ground as multitudes of weaponry embedded into the soft dirt.
Tenten landed outside the drop zone of her weaponry, and looked a little anxious as her eyes roamed over the spot where she had seen the blonde boy last. She was hoping to find him there, maybe a little injured, and unable to continue. She hoped that she hadn't killed him, but she was taking his ability to apparently reflect weapons into account. What she hadn't expected, and what she was seeing, was her weapons all embedded into the ground, with no sign of the boy anywhere around her.
"Did he use Kawarimi or something?" She mumbled as she looked around for him.
Suddenly, two hands grasped at her ankles, and she could only gasp before her body was pulled underground, with just her head still showing.
"Well, unless you know how to get out of there, it's my win." Came a voice from behind her, and although she couldn't twist around to see it, she was sure that Naruto had a grin on his face at her predicament.
With a heavy sigh, she admitted it. She had lost, badly, to the boy. He didn't seem that he had gone all out, and wasn't even breathing hard. He had owned her in this battle. Just how strong was he?
"No, you win. I can't escape from this. Now get me out of the damn ground."
"Haha, right." The boy pulled her up, and helped her brush some of the dirt off her back.
"I'm impressed, ya know, you really are something. Are you sure you aren't a Genin already?" She asked, slightly miffed at how badly she had been beaten.
"Well, I'm sure that I haven't taken the test yet, and I've younger than you, ya know."
"That doesn't make me feel better." Tenten clenched her teeth together.
"You're right, how about I teach you that last move then? So that you'll be able to get out of it next time."
A/N: Alright, to sum up the reviews. Kyuubi is more active in this, interfering more than he does in canon story. There is a reason for this I only briefly brushed upon in earlier chapters. I never said that I was making Naruto too restricted; he'll blow away any other Genin (except Lee, since I think Lee got screwed with his opponent in the canon story). I never said that Naruto wouldn't eventually be able to reign in his control. He still hasn't met Kyuubi face to face after all. As far as making this story more "realistic" by putting more obscene amounts on a person's limbs since the story isn't in a realistic sense anyways. I'm not exactly following the traditional rules of canon Naruto, since this is my envisioning of the world that it is set in. So basically, to get off my soap box for a minute. No, I'm not ignoring your criticism, I simply haven't explained everything in the story yet, and if I say that I'm going with things one way, then I'm not going to change abruptly in the middle of the story, that would cause more problems then if I just go ahead anyways. For point of reference, since it was asked as well, I am completely up to date with the manga, but I don't really want to rely on most of the rumors or theories that influence most of the fanfiction out there. I hope I haven't soured your idea of my story, but I have to establish where I'm going with the story. Thank you the reviews, and I hope you enjoy this chapter.
