The Boy in the Team

Chapter Nine

The Yondaime personally assigned the missions. It was obvious, but when you were in the team with his daughter, things didn't exactly work out in the normal and common way.

There was another flash.

"Mooommmm…" Naruko's high-pitched whine echoed through the room, as the red-haired woman who had presented herself as Naruko's mother took yet one more photo.

"Now come on, it's my baby's first mission 'ttebane! I have to get some photos of it!"

Naruko was actually red from head to toe. "You're embarrassing me 'ttebayo!"

Shinku was the one who'd rather want to crawl in a hole and die. He just wanted to do a mission —the nervousness was killing him. What was he supposed to do? What would their first mission be about? He hoped it would be nothing complicated or above their level. Sure, his teammates were prodigies…but he wasn't.

"Now, Kushina," the Yondaime said kindly, "Kakashi's already late as it is."

"Sniffle," the woman had tears in her eyes, "My little Naru-chan's all grown up now."

"Let's go," Naruko grumbled, grabbing by the sleeve both Sasuke and him —surprisingly— before pulling them out of the room with Kakashi following them after waving goodbye.

Naruko let go of his sleeve, as well as Sasuke's, once they were already way out of the tower. Kakashi slowly reached them, before bonking on the head Naruko with the mission scroll. "Well then," the silver-haired Jounin said, "Here you go. Your first mission is to capture Tora."

Shinku's eyes widened briefly.

They had to capture a tiger?

No, even more…there was a tiger free somewhere!?

Maybe a circus? Was there even a circus in Konoha?

"What? Kakashi-Nii! That's unfair!" Naruko whined, "I heard about him from dad! Why are you punishing us, eh!?"

"First of all, it's Kakashi-sensei," the Jounin remarked. "Secondly, it is punishment. You arrived late today, didn't you?"

"B-But!" Naruko stuttered.

"Dobe, so it's your fault then!" Sasuke snarled. "That…I heard no one captured that cat in less than an hour!"

Shinku swallowed. Then, he blinked. "Cat?" he muttered. He exhaled the next instant. It was just a cat.

Two hours and a half later, with his face bleeding and his sleeves torn, he would not be calling that thing 'just a cat' any longer. Still, he had managed to corner the feline in a dead-end and the rest of the team was converging on the position.

The small radio in his ear buzzed with Naruko's voice.

"Ohi! You got him cornered Shin-chan!?"

"Ah…ah…yes," he exhaled deeply, holding his arms wide as he slowly took a step forward. The cat hissed. Shinku showed his teeth back.

"Hold him there," Sasuke's voice came next. "We're coming."

The cat hissed, showing its claws. "Good kitty," Shinku murmured, trying a smile. "Nice kitty," he added, keeping his hands ready. If only he had a bag of sorts…the job would be over far faster.

Tora jumped once more.

The cat's claws aimed at his face, and Shinku instinctively brought his hands up. This time, instead of ending up with his forearms to shreds because of the cat's onslaught, his knuckles punched the animal straight in the face. It was an accident, but Tora the cat ended up sprawled on the floor meowing softly.

Blinking, Shinku lowered his forearms.

He kneeled next to the downed cat the next instant, grabbing a hold of it by the sides and lifting it up.

"Ah," he exhaled, holding on to the knocked out cold beast. "I got him," he chuckled. "I got him!"

Tora woke up in the next second, and finding itself trapped within a pair of arms, it began to bite in a bid for freedom.

Shinku ground his teeth —the bites of a cat weren't extremely painful, but they did hurt and…and it was as if the cat knew how to make them hurt more. Shinku keeled over, falling on the ground with his knees as he hissed in pain trying to hold the cat down. Blood droplets fell from his arms, but as long as he held on to the cat then the mission was successful.

He was the dead last on many things…

But he would hold that cat within his arms even if it killed him.

"Ah!" he heard Naruko's shrill scream from the start of the alley. "Shin-chan! You didn't have to kill it!" he turned, grimacing as he held on to the thing.

"I've got it," he weakly said. His arms looked flailed, to say the least. Even holding the cat by the neck didn't stop it from scratching with its rear paws, and whenever it could it would bite at his fingers or hands.

The effect was pretty bloody, but the cat remained unscathed.

"I'll hold it," Naruko said, moving closer and grabbing the cat by the scuff of the neck. She smiled then, sweetly, towards Tora. Naruko's right arm began to move fast up and down, as the cat meowed in shock from the way she spun the limb —as if she was going to throw the creature in the air.

"It sounds like a siren!" Naruko chuckled as the cat went 'meowwww' while spinning. "You think if I slam him a bit against the wall he'll feel it?"

"I don't think…we should," Shinku stammered out. "Isn't it…the Daimyo's cat?"

"Ah, well, she can always get another," Naruko shrugged as she stopped mistreating the animal, who actually retched out its breakfast. "Now listen here, fur ball," the girl said, looking straight in the eyes of the cat. "You run away again and I swear next time I'll really fling you against a wall, understood?"

The cat meowed, nodding strongly as it began to sweat.

"Good and now apologize to Shin-chan! Just because he's the dead-last doesn't mean you get to be mean to him!"

The cat actually meowed again in Shinku's direction, with pleading eyes.

Naruko snorted with a knowing nod, before grabbing a gentler hold of the cat. "There, that's how you do it, Shin-chan. If the animal feels your fear then he's going to give you a hard time. Just like fighting sharks, kick their faces and they'll pipe down."

"Fighting…sharks?"

Naruko blinked. "You never fought one? They're pretty common around Uzushiogakure's shores."

"I've never been out of Konoha," Shinku replied, his eyes slowly travelling down to his bleeding arms. Using his index finger and his thumb, he began to pull backwards his sleeves. Really, had the 'beast' steel claws? It had managed to rend through his clothes with ease, as if they were made of paper.

"Once we finish doing these boring D-ranks we'll get a C-rank one! Those are always out of the village and it's going to be fun! It will be like camping, only you go on a trip somewhere else and sometimes you've got to risk your neck doing a mission or another," Naruko nodded to herself, bringing her right hand to her chin as she used her left to 'mark' the important passages. "Then there's the B-ranks and the A-ranks, until you reach the S-ranks which are Kage-level missions or only for highly specialized shinobi."

Sasuke jumped down next to them the next moment.

"Shinku," the Uchiha said. "Where is the cat?"

Shinku blinked. "Isn't it…" he then looked towards Naruko, who looked down at her two free hands.

The girl's shoulders began to tremble as she realized she had let the cat go.

"Dobe? The cat?"

"Ohi! It's not my fault! Well, maybe it is, but! It's not completely my fault! I was explaining mission ranks to Shin-chan!"

Sasuke snorted, and then he gazed back towards Shinku's arms.

"Are you trying to set a record for most hospital visits in a week?"

Kakashi appeared then, holding Tora the cat by the neck and with a bored expression etched on what little of his face was visible.

"It's getting late, and I have better things to do than wait for you lot to capture the cat," he flung Tora at Sasuke, who grabbed it firmly. "So deliver the cat back and then see you all in training ground Seven…at five o'clock this afternoon," he looked towards the sky. "You have two hours to go eat something somewhere."

With that said, he disappeared in a flicker of leaves.

Naruko eyed the cat murderously, before mimicking slicing its neck.

Tora actually meowed for help, holding on to Sasuke's shoulders as if he were his saviour.

"You better be sorry," Naruko hissed. "You better be."

"Let's deliver the cat and then go somewhere to eat," Sasuke deadpanned.

"Last one to the Hokage tower pays for everyone!" Naruko yelled aloud, before flickering away.

"Wait, Dobe!" Sasuke snarled, before growling as he looked back towards Shinku. "You don't know the Shunshin, do you?"

Shinku shook his head.

"Ah," Sasuke exhaled loudly. "Fine. Let's go," and with that, the Uchiha began to walk, quietly followed by Shinku who kept nursing his arms.

"You should get those checked at the hospital," Sasuke said along the way. "Just go in and…"

"Sasuke-sama," an elderly voice said, stopping the Uchiha on his tracks. "Always doing a good action," the voice belonged to an old woman, who seemed to own a stall with fruit on it. "Come get an apple, it's free of charge for you and your friend."

"I'm sorry, but we're on a hurry," Sasuke replied curtly, before beginning to walk once more. Shinku followed quickly, but…

"Sasuke-sama?"

"Sasuke-sama!"

"Sasuke-kun!?"

"Sasuke-sama!"

Shinku actually lost sight of Sasuke halfway through a small crowd of women and girls that formed around him, and in the end, he remained alone at the side of the road. There really was no sign of Sasuke anymore, even when the crowd parted way.

A blond-haired boy calmly stopped right next to him. He was holding Tora the cat in his arms, and his eyes were darkly gazing at the crowd.

"This is why I don't usually walk on the streets," he muttered, "People everywhere."

"If you want to go ahead…" Shinku began, only for Sasuke to snort.

"No thanks, I know how much Naruko eats. I'm not letting you lose without at least a fair chance at the competition."

"T-Thanks?"

"You're welcome."

Shinku mentally sighed in relief. Maybe he was just overthinking it all. He wasn't being pushed away by his teammates, it just happened that probably, he didn't speak loud enough to be heard. He just had to soldier on. His arms hurt, but eventually they'd stop hurting.

If all days ended up like this one after all, what was the worst that could happen?

Author's notes

Shinku's a jinxer.

As I see it, the Academy can be passed by people of the calibre of Ino, Sakura and Kiba, Ami and the likes. Practically, only Canon-Naruto could fail it.

You didn't need 'motivation' to pass Academy. (Sakura and Ino were there for Sasuke) or brain-smarts. Academy was…considering 12-13 age bracket of end, something like a 'obligatory' school that began at five.

Like, elementary school+middle school.