Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
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Chapter Ten:
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"If you would follow me, I have taken the liberty of reserving an unused room here in the academy for our first team meeting," Ebisu said as he led the genin away from the classroom where team assignments were still being made. The group's destination had once been a third floor conference room that was set aside with the intent of teaching an elective course on medical ninjutsu. Those plans fell through not long after their driving force, Princess Senju Tsunade, left the village. Since then, it had served many purposes, from storage space to temporary instructor's lounge. No one ever did get around to teaching that medic course.
"This place seems way smaller than the last time I saw it," Naruto commented to no one in particular. He was following directly behind Sensei, Tenten at his side with Neji lagging a few feet behind.
"How long has it been?" Tenten asked curiously. "Oh, I'm sorry, I should introduce myself. I'm Higurashi Tenten. It's nice to meet you." She smiled and extended her hand.
Naruto shook the proffered hand firmly and grinned. "It's nice to meet you, Tenten! I'm Uzumaki Naruto." They were in the stairwell now, but progress was halted as a class of children, none looking older than nine, was escorted to physical training disguised as recess by a harried looking chuunin. She gave Ebisu a nod of thanks for allowing her horde to pass uninterrupted. To Tenten, Naruto answered, "It's been just over two years now since I was withdrawn from the academy. I hope I wasn't as small back then as these midgets!" He pointed to the back of the final student to file past their group, a kid with wearing a long scarf and funny hat. Naruto's example turned to glare, looking ready to fight, but the chuunin escorting the children just grabbed hold of his scarf and dragged him away.
If she was confused earlier, now Tenten was just dumbfounded. It was clear her blond teammate was at least a year younger than her or Neji, and he spoke of being taken out of the academy years ago, so how had he been assigned to her team?
Naruto laughed when he noticed Tenten's expression. To answer her obvious, if unspoken question, he said, "I was in a bad accident and had to be withdrawn from the academy because no one was sure if I could be still be a ninja or not. Once I proved I could work around the problems caused by the accident, the Old Man hired a tutor to teach me, and here I am!" A fist-pump and hop in the air punctuated his awesomeness.
By this point they were in a third floor corridor one hallway over from the stairwell. Ebisu led them into a slightly dusty room, one side of which was piled high with broken training dummies and stacks of student-abused textbooks, the other held a wooden table with half a dozen matching chairs flipped over resting on the battered tabletop. Once the chairs were removed and placed on the floor, Ebisu sat and gestured for his team to sit opposite him.
"As you were informed, my name is Kunugi Ebisu, a jounin of Konoha," Ebisu said by way of introduction. "My area of greatest expertise is the instruction of other ninja, thus I am well versed in all of the ninja arts and skilled in passing my knowledge along to my students. The goal I will work toward, with your assistance, is to mold each of you into the most effective ninja you can be. You may address me by name or refer to me by the moniker of Sensei or Mentor." He focused his attention on Naruto, sitting between Tenten and Neji, and almost bouncing in his seat. "Beginning with Naruto, I would like you each to give a brief introduction," he prompted.
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Naruto wasn't sure about this business of Ebisu letting them call him anything but Sensei. More often than not he forgot the man had any other name.
"Uzumaki Naruto here, nice to meet you both! Even if we do already know each other's names and Tenten and I did just kinda do this. Whatever! I just turned twelve a few weeks ago. My favorite color is orange and my favorite place to eat is Ichiraku's; ramen is the One True Food. Sensei taught me to be such a kickass ninja that I got promoted early, which is gonna make it even easier to become Hokage one day, so you can believe he really knows his stuff!" If Naruto had his way, he'd become the Godaime even younger than when his father rose to his position as Yondaime. Unlike dear old dad, Naruto planned on sticking around long enough to let the Old Man actually enjoy his retirement. It would be embarrassing for the Sandaime to have to take over again in twenty or thirty years.
Naruto felt hesitant to share this next piece of trivia, since Sensei was the only one he'd told so far. "I used to think I was just a no-name orphan, but I found out from the Old Man that the Uzumaki's were a powerful clan in the village of Whirling Tides, a long time ally of Konoha. It was destroyed by a bunch of other ninja villages 'cause they were scared of how awesome Whirling Tides was, and that kicked off the last big ninja war." There, that wasn't so hard at all.
"Tenten, if you would?"
"Right! I'm Higurashi Tenten and I'm thirteen years old. I'm the first ninja in my family, though many of my ancestors were samurai in Iron country. I wish to become a powerful and respected female ninja just like Princess Tsunade. My hobby is mastering the use of all the different weapons sold in my parents' shop. My father did not want me to become a ninja, he'd prefer if I stuck to the family business, but my mother has always encouraged me to follow my dreams!"
Naruto had all kinds of crazy ideas he wanted to talk to Tenten about.
"And Neji?"
The white-eyed boy's response, after several uncomfortably long moments of silence, was, "I am Hyuuga Neji. My destiny is to become a powerful ninja." He offered nothing more.
Naruto wasn't sure about this guy at all. No, he was sure Neji had issues.
Sensei did not act perturbed by Neji's less than comprehensive intro. "As a newly formed genin team, you are expected to regularly engage in D-Rank missions. These missions are supposedly meant as team building exercises. In reality they are a form of low cost labor and busy work intended to give your team leader time to adequately train you to undertake more difficult C-Rank missions. Therefore, unless you desire to earn extra spending money, we will perform only the minimum number of D-Ranks necessary to meet Chuunin exam entry requirements."
What the hell, Sensei? Naruto actually needed that spending money. Sensei hadn't said anything about it, but now that he was a genin, wasn't he supposed to move back into his apartment? He would much rather stay with Sensei and pay the man rent than live alone in his free apartment. Ramen wasn't cheap, either! Not in the quantities he consumed.
"We will allot a minimum of six hours per day, six days a week, to your individual and team training. If you have personal commitments that will interfere with training, I would prefer to be informed well in advance."
They were going to get a day off every week? And only six hours of training a day? Naruto wasn't sure what he would possibly do with that much free time. He'd have to check with the Old Man to see if there were any solo D-Rank missions he could take.
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"In the coming weeks, my priority will be to begin filling in the gaps in your education left by the academy. Neji, your taijutsu is excellent, of course, and Tenten, your prowess with weapons, especially at range, is quite noteworthy. There will be a time to further refine your base skills after I am satisfied with your progress in other areas." Ebisu removed several sheets of chakra paper from his vest and pushed one across the table to each of his students, Naruto included. It seemed like just yesterday when he first performed this ritual with the boy.
"When you channel chakra into this specially prepared paper, it will react in a telltale manner indicative of your chakra affinity. Ninjutsu techniques that utilize your chakra affinity will be much easier for you to learn and will require less chakra to cast. They will also tend to be considerably more powerful than would otherwise be expected. An example, please, Naruto?"
Knowing just what to expect, Naruto gripped the slip of paper between his thumb and forefinger, channeling just enough chakra to cause the paper to react. His control was much improved, that's what mastering seventeen different varieties of chakra control exercises will do for a guy, causing the paper to simply take on a silvery metallic sheen without expelling a huge amount of extra chakra as visible light. Naruto didn't stop with turning the paper into iron. A bit more chakra was applied and the transformed paper smoothly morphed into a kunai. Tenten's breath hitched and she leaned in close to examine the newly created blade, trying to discern what trickery or sleight of hand was involved.
"Chakra natures commonly fall into five categories: earth, fire, lightning, water, and wind. As Naruto demonstrated, there are, however, other chakra natures. Outside of a Bloodline gift, only the most extraordinary circumstances imbue one with a non-standard chakra affinity."
Tenten was still staring at Naruto's new kunai. He grinned and held it out to the girl, hilt first. "You can have it if you want, Tenten. I didn't put much chakra into it, though. It might last a few more minutes." She accepted, but set it aside for the moment, determined to discover if she too had the kind of chakra that would let her turn stuff into weapons.
Mimicking Naruto, Tenten gripped the paper between thumb and index finger. Her control was certainly better than Naruto's first attempt. There was no flare of visible chakra as the paper crinkled itself almost in half. "Very nice, Tenten. You appear to possess a very powerful lightning affinity. When you learn elemental chakra conversion, your many weapons will become even more deadly. Tomorrow I will have a scroll prepared detailing a number of simple, but effective lightning-based ninjutsu that should be useable with your current chakra reserves."
Tenten smiled radiantly. "Thank you, Sensei!"
Naruto nodded approvingly at the girl's form of address. He was liking her more already.
All eyes soon turned to Neji. With a put upon sigh and a small grimace, as if expecting it to burst into flames, the boy touched a single finger to the paper. It immediately crumbled into small pile of dust.
"Earth-natured, a rarity among the Hyuuga, if I'm not mistaken," Ebisu commented. "As a frontline taijutsu specialist your earth affinity, properly developed, will greatly expand your control of any battlefield. Though my repertoire of earth ninjutsu is not extensive, I will have no trouble preparing a scroll of techniques for you to begin with." Ebisu stood. "We will break early today. Do not expect that to happen often. Please arrive at the Hokage Tower tomorrow morning no later than seven AM."
Instructions delivered, he disappeared in a Konoha body flicker.
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"Heh, that's Sensei for ya. He might seem stuffy, but he's really cool once you get to know him!" He didn't want Neji or Tenten to get the wrong idea about Sensei. "If you guys don't have anything important to do, I know a training ground that'll be empty. We can spar or I can show you some chakra control exercises for your affinities."
"I have clan duties to attend to," responded Neji. Without further words, the Hyuuga exited the room.
Tenten did not look surprised by Neji's refusal of the offer. "Don't mind Neji, he's always been a stick in the mud. This time last year he probably wouldn't have bothered to give a reason before leaving. In another five or six years he might be a real conversationalist." They shared a laugh at their departed teammate's expense.
"So how about it, Tenten? I've got a training ground all to myself and there's still plenty of daylight to burn."
"Lead the way, kiddo. Mom and dad won't be looking for me till supper time."
"Kiddo? I'm only a year younger than you!" Naruto whined.
A passing chuunin instructor stuck her head into the room to bust the kids for playing hooky in the junk room, saw that they wore forehead protectors, and went on her way; just a couple of the recent grads lagging behind.
Tenten moved to follow her pouting teammate, not forgetting to snag the miracle kunai. They hadn't even reached the stairs when the girl's close examination of the kunai – it was the proper weight, well balanced for throwing, and the edge was razor sharp – when it reverted to a piece of paper then disintegrated into a puff of dust so fine it might as well have been smoke. She, "aww'd" at its loss.
"Told ya, Old Lady," Naruto said, with a grin.
"Fine, fine, you win, Naruto. You're not kiddo if I'm not Old Lady."
"That'll work, I guess. Can Neji still be asshole? That's what I'm currently calling him in my head since Sensei would probably get annoyed if I said it aloud."
Tenten giggled, looking much more like a young girl and not a trained ninja who had just been fawning over a well made blade.
This was going really well, as far as Naruto could tell. His interactions with girls had been few and far between, but Tenten seemed a lot like the guys, except she giggled sometimes. Well, there had been that one time Kiba was talking about some magazine he'd found in the garbage. Poor Akamaru had finally resorted to ankle biting to stop his human's weirdness.
They walked in companionable silence for a few minutes before Naruto said, "Sensei says you've got crazy good aim with your weapons." No need to mention his review of her academy files just yet.
"Yeah, they're my specialty actually. I'm good with melee weapons, like Sensei said, but I'm really good with all kinds of projectiles. I had one hundred percent accuracy on every throwing drill throughout the last three years at the academy." Tenten was rightly proud of her accomplishment. It was a record that would probably stand for years to come. Even though she didn't manage Rookie of the Year, her instructors were impressed enough to give her a small plaque, engraved with a pair of kunai and a shuriken stuck in a bull's-eye, commemorating her achievement.
"How do you feel about explosives?"
That question was odd and off topic enough to draw a puzzled stare from the girl. Finally, she asked, "You mean like explosive tags?"
"Yep. I was thinking, someone with your range and accuracy could be a real fiend in combat if you were flinging around exploding kunai."
There was an exciting thought. Tenten smiled at the mental image of a horde of bandits, their bloodied remains lying burned and broken, courtesy of a few well placed explosive tags. "I know how to use them, we just covered that in class not too long ago. Mom and dad wouldn't let me have any from the store, though. They're kinda expensive and dad kept going on and on about me losing an eye." That was slightly embarrassing to admit to her fellow ninja. Overprotective parents were a drag.
Never fear, Uzumaki Naruto is here! Naruto thought with a silent cheer at the awesomeness he was about to unleash upon the world. He drew an unremarkable kunai from his weapon pouch and showed it to Tenten. "See, just a normal kunai, right?" He concentrated for a second, pushing chakra and imprinting a very specific pattern into the crystalline structure of the blade. The only outward change in the kunai was a small Uzumaki spiral mark that appeared at the base of its blade. "Now it's an exploding kunai. Just like a tag, but with shrapnel! It works the exact same way as a tag, too. Just prime it with your chakra and you can set it to detonate in a few seconds or on command."
Tenten froze, the implications of her teammate's feat rendering such things as walking totally unimportant.
Naruto regarded his motionless teammate with concern. He really hoped he hadn't broken her already.
Slowly, over the course of several seconds, Tenten sorta seemed to transform as Naruto watched. Her eyes lit up – was that a chakra trick he'd never heard of – and the smile now decorating her face was positively scary. When she spoke it was in a whisper that made Naruto's spine shiver. "This is the start of a beautiful friendship, Naruto. They won't know what hit them." Whoever they were, Naruto pitied them.
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A/N: As I told one reviewer a few days ago, Tenten is going to be a Weapons Mistress of Mass Destruction, a WMMD! I'm going to have fun with her character.
Neji is hard to write. I know the character well enough; he's just such a tool that I don't want to seem like I'm bashing him unduly. As a heads up, though, don't expect him to start tossing "loser" or "failure" or anything like that at this Naruto. Neji recognizes talent and skill and knows when someone's "destiny" has aligned in their favor. We'll just have to see how he develops.
Sadly, I'm going out of town tomorrow and won't be back until next week, Monday at the earliest but probably Tuesday. I won't even have access to a computer to get any writing done. My update a day streak will be coming to an end.
Please review. Comments and criticisms are greatly appreciated.
Published: 6/6/2012