chapter 10

friends

It was the first day of their fifth year at the Academy, and Hyuuga Hinata was, as usual, nervous. She was sitting in her normal spot in the back of the room waiting for Iruka-sensei to start the class. Loking around at her classmates, she saw the usual faces, but noticed that there were a few less this year. A few more had given up on becoming ninja, something she couldn't do no matter how much she might want to; her father would likely disown her out of shame.

At this point, Iruka-sensei started talking and pulled her out of her musings. By his tone of voice, he seemed annoyed at something. "Welcome to a new school year, everyone. It looks like almost everyone is here, so let's get started." At this, everyone except Nara Shikamaru, who had his head down on his desk and his eyes closed, sat up and paid their teacher full attention.

"Well, I was going to start off by introducing a new student joining our class this year, but seeing that he is late... Anyway, let's move on to other things." No sooner had the chunin instructor finished speaking than the sound of pounding feet became audible from the hallway. Less than a second later, all eyes, even Shikamaru's, turned to the door as it slid open with a bang.

Hinata couldn't help but blush at the sight of the boy standing in the doorway, panting heavily and covered in sweat, as though he had just run a very long way. "Sorry I'm late, Iruka-sensei. I guess trying to squeeze my full morning workout into half the time didn't go as well as I had hoped." A small apologetic smile spread across his face, making the cute whisker-like marks on his cheeks stand out even more than they had a moment before. His hair, currently damp with sweat, was a dark shade of blonde and spiked out all over in an attractive way. His eyes were such a deep, clear shade of blue she felt she could get lost staring into them. And to top it off, his relatively tight black-and-orange clothes showed off a well-muscled body that none of the other boys could hope to compete with. The shy Hyuuga felt she had just found the love of her life.

"Ah, Naruto, there you are. Try not to be late again. Now come over here and face the class so I can introduce you." The new arrival did as asked. "Class, this is Uzumaki Naruto. He will be joining us for both this year and the following year. I hope you all treat him well and do your best to make him feel welcome."

While Iruka-oniisan was introducing him, Naruto took a moment to look around at his classmates. He noticed right away that nearly all the boys were looking at him with expressions of jealousy, and about half the girls had a sort of predatory look on their faces as they stared at him. Apparently he had forgotten to loosen his clothing after he had finished his exercises. Among the people he saw, eight stood out to the observant boy.

First to catch his eye was a quiet, brooding boy with black hair and equally black eyes, sitting off by himself to the side of the room. His shinkagan picked up a massive amount of anger and resentment coming off the dark boy, though not directed at anything in particular. Through it all, though, Naruto could see a good heart that seemed badly damaged and drowning in the negative emotions. He could also sense strong feelings of pride and superiority radiating from him. Right there and then, Naruto felt some sort of deep connection to the troubled youth and silently vowed that he would do everything in his power to help him.

Next was a girl with emerald-green eyes and long pink hair. One glance told him that she had feelings for the dark boy, though she likely wasn't aware herself of just how deeply these feelings extended. It looked as though she was very expressive of emotions close to the surface, though buried deep inside her he could see a firey determination and great strength of mind.

Sitting by the first girl was another, this one with long pale-blonde hair done up in a ponytail, pale blue eyes, and pale skin. She seemed like the kind of person who liked to take charge of a situation and was quite comfortable resorting to extreme methods to get what she wanted. A good bit of tension between the two girls was obvious, apparently over the boy, though the blonde's feelings for him were only skin-deep.

His attention now turned to a decidedly overweight boy with short brown hair and small, beady black eyes. Even as he sat in his seat staring forward, he was shoving chips into his mouth by the handful from a bag at his side. He appeared to be a very kindhearted boy who simply wanted to enjoy life and the pleasures it offered.

On looking at the next boy, his very first thought was "lazy." The boy already had his head down on his desk and looked to be half asleep. But his little dark eyes told the blonde that he was paying full attention to his surroundings with a very shrewd and intelligent mind, ready to help his friends if forced to.

The next person he took note of was a tall boy with short, thick black hair and wearing a heavy coat and small, dark sunglasses that completely covered his eyes. The boy was a mystery wrapped in an enigma. The only thing Naruto could really tell about him was that he based his life on cold, hard logic.

Fortunately, the second-to-last to catch the blonde's perceptive eye was infinitely more readable. He looked like a wild dog or wolf with his unruly black hair, rough appearance, large, sharp teeth and slitted eyes. He even had a small white puppy with him sticking out of the front of his grey jacket. He was brash, loud, and confident, maybe overly so, and it was clear that anyone who earned his trust would have his deepest loyalty.

Finally, Naruto's blue eyes turned to a shy, quiet girl in the back of the room. His mind started to fog over a bit, as she was the prettiest girl he had ever seen. Her pale, nearly white, pupil-less eyes and soft blue hair completely drew his attention, and the light shade of red on her face was quite... attractive. He found his brain a bit blurry when he tried to get a clear read on her emotions. It was easy to tell that she was shy and timid, and his shinkagan revealed that she had the lowest self-confidence of anyone he had ever met, but there was a great strength and need to prove herself shut away underneath the self-doubt. But when he tried to get a read on her feelings, his mind felt hazy. He resolved to talk to her as soon as possible to get to know more about her.

By this time, his introduction was complete, and Iruka-oniisan gestured for him to take his seat, which just so happened to be next to he brooding boy. "All right, class," said Iruka, entering sensei mode, "Now, just recently, a new and improved version of the henge no jutsu was created, and Hokage-sama had ordered that it be taught to all Academy students. Don't worry; it's not that different from what you're used to, just slightly more complicated and several times more useful..." Naruto smirked. He was enjoying his first day.

It was now time for lunch. Iruka had explained Naruto's improved henge to the class and called them up one by one to try it out; Naruto had taken the opportunity to note the names of the eight he'd picked out earlier. Out of the whole class, only Naruto, Sasuke, Shikamaru, and Hinata had successfully performed the jutsu right off the bat, while Ino, Sakura, and Shino had required a second try and Chouji and Kiba a third. The rest of the class still hadn't managed it properly, reinforcing Naruto's feeling that they weren't cut out for ninja life. The blonde-haired boy went off in search the pale-eyed girl he had taken special note of earlier that morning.

"You're Hinata, right? Hyuuga Hinata?" he asked, walking up to where she was sitting underneath a tree.

Seeing the boy she had been thinking about all morning walk up to her and ask her a question, the Hyuuga heiress blushed profusely. "Y-yes, that's m-me. A-and you're N-Naruto-kun, correct?"

He noticed that she had already added a "-kun" to his name. "Yeah. Would you mind if I sat with you, Hinata-chan?" The blonde couldn't help but smile slightly at the thought of calling her Hinata-chan. It just sounded so... right.

The shy girl blushed even deeper at his request and the suffix. "O-of c-course Naruto-k-kun." And so the two started talking; or, more like Naruto started talking while Hinata would occasionally say a word or two. He told her about himself and his life, but nothing too upsetting or personal, and she would occasionally stutter out a brief comment. When he asked her questions about herself, she would give a short, stutter-filled answer. This continued throughout lunch, and during recess, Naruto left to meet some of their other classmates who had gotten his attention, thinking about how much he had enjoyed just sitting by the quiet girl and trying to come up with ways to boost her self-confidence.

The first person he ran into was Sakura. Their conversation went something like this:

"Hi, your name is Sakura?"

"Yes, you're that new boy Naruto, aren't you?"

"Yeah, that's me. Nice to meet you."

"Nice to meet you too, but I'm busy looking for someone right now. Sasuke-kun! Where are you? Sasuke-kun!"

The next person he found was Kiba. The boy stood out from anywhere in the area with his strong scent of dog and loud voice. The two started talking and quickly found themselves good friends, with their similar personalities and shared joy of mischief. It was through Kiba that Naruto got the idea of pranking people, and his devious mind immediately started coming up with a list of people who needed to be pranked, what sort of prank would work best on them, and how to pull it off. During their conversation, Kiba's competitive nature came out and he challenged his newfound friend to a contest of strength, which the blonde won without even trying, thanks to the rigorous physical training he put himself through.

After finishing up talking to Kiba, Naruto saw Shikamaru and Chouji lying on the ground next to each other, sharing a bag of chips and watching the clouds. He took quite a liking to the odd pair. When he learned that Shikamaru enjoyed go and shougi, both of which he had learned while living with Akkio and Toshiro and had found himself to be quite skilled at, they agreed to play a couple games together after school. Chouji, on the other hand, was the first person he had ever met, excluding his mother, to share his love of ramen. They spent a while discussing the different flavors and how they compared to each other. Chouji, though, being a connoisseur of all foods and not just the noodles of the gods, insisted that the blonde come with him sometime to his favorite barbecue restaurant, an offer Naruto readily agreed to. Noticing that recess was drawing to a close, the energetic boy determined to meet Ino, Shino, and Sasuke the next day.

In the afternoon, Naruto tried and failed to pay attention to a history lesson about the Third Great Shinobi War. The constant mentions of the Yondaime forced him to either tune out the lecture entirely or risk exploding in front of the entire class about how the man so many held in such high regard was actually a power-obsessed, evil, deceiving, fucking bastard who had killed his mother and made his life a living hell and who he would gladly rip to pieces if he only could.

Following the lesson, they all went outside for taijutsu training with Mizuki-sensei, whom Naruto took an immediate dislike to, though some instinct told him to hide this fact. During the training, the entire class learned about Naruto's strange problem of being incapable of learning any traditional taijutsu styles and about how his strength and speed were great enough that it really didn't matter, as he won every spar with ease. Interestingly enough, he never found himself paired up with Sasuke, which was a bit of a disappointment, as he could tell by watching the dark-haired boy that he would have been the only one in the class to present a challenge.

At the end of the day, Naruto saw the parents and family of his new friends and, using his shinkagan, made an educated guess as to their reactions to his presence. Nara Shikaku, Akimichi Choza, and Yamanaka Inoichi, fortunately, all seemed to treat him as a human being, as did Aburame Shibi and Inuzuka Tsume. Hyuuga Hiashi simply glanced in his direction with a look that screamed "I have no need to bother with you, demon filth" and led his daughter away with a frown on his face, not even sparing her the glance he had given Naruto. Suddenly, her non-existent self-confidence made much more sense. The Hanuros were, in some ways, even worse. While Sakura's father walked right up to him and said straight out that if he ever caught the blonde so much as trying to talk to his daughter, he would personally beat the boy to within an inch of his life, Naruto's sensitive hearing picked up the pink-haired girl's mother ordering her daughter to never interact with him in any way. Oh well; at least he had made some friends finally. It felt good, he decided, to have people his own age he could talk to. In all of this, he noted that absolutely no one came for Sasuke, and the boy simply wandered off on his own.

Naruto met up with Shikamaru to remind him of their agreed-on games, and the lazy boy invited him over to his house, advising to watch out for his mother, as she was "troublesome." Upon arriving, the blonde couldn't help but agree with his friend's assessment for once. The lady, though quite kind and caring at heart, was very bossy and seemed to enjoy nagging her lazy husband and son about the smallest things.

Two games turned into several as the afternoon wore into evening, then night. The boys learned that Shikamaru would consistently win at shougi, though Naruto forced him to play to his fullest, and when it came to go, their positions were reversed, with Naruto turning out the victor by anywhere between a half to five-and-a-half moku. All in all, it was an enjoyable conclusion to an enjoyable day, leaving Naruto feeling the best he'd ever felt as he lay down to bed that night.

The second day at the Academy wasn't very different from the first. Naruto arrived a few minutes late again, once again covered in sweat after trying to shove his morning workout into a time frame too small for it. This time, though, he had remembered to make his clothes looser on his body before entering the classroom to avoid the looks he had received the last morning. As soon as he had arrived, Iruka passed out a written test on basic chakra thoery, something the blonde knew as well as the back of his own hand. He still failed horribly, though; proof that his inability to concentrate on paper tests and formulate his answers into written words was as strong as it had been two years previously.

When it came time for lunch, he again spent it with Hinata-chan, talking to her a bit more in an attempt to help her overcome her fear of speech. He didn't feel they knew each other well enough yet to bring up whatever family problems she had.

During recess, the blonde first attempted to hold a conversation with Shino, before confirming that the boy was only slightly more talkative than a rock and leaving him to his own devices.

Ino, on the other hand, he discovered, talked. A lot. The downside was that the only things they had in common were the similar eye and hair colors. He did, however, manage to learn quite a lot about flowers, clothes, how handsome Sasuke-kun was, hair care, and "forehead-girl,"as she had dubbed her main rival for the dark boy's nonexistent affections.

Finding Sasuke would have proved slightly hard, were it not for his constant stream of negative emotions that the shinkagan picked up as well as any scent. The boy was off by himself in the upper branches of a tall tree, and Naruto leaped up to join him.

"Hi."

No response

"Sasuke? What are you doing up here all by yourself?"

Still nothing.

"Jeez, you could at least answer me."

Sasuke stayed silent.

"I'm not leaving you alone until you speak to me."

The boy pretended he wasn't there.

"I'd like to be a friend to you, if you want me to. You don't seem to have any."

The reaction came in the form of rapidly-changing emotions. Naruto's keen perception picked up a drastic spike in the sadness and anger, along with the addition of a strong desire, which was quickly quenched by self-hatred and... fear?

"Anyway, what kinds of things do you like? From what I've seen, you're a pretty good ninja."

Apparently the boy had received so many compliments that he was immune to praise.

Naruto was about to try something different when the bell rang, signaling the end of recess. "Don't think you're off the hook. We're continuing this after classes end."

The rest of the day consisted of another history lecture, fortunately on the Second Hokage this time, followed by taijutsu practice again. Yet again, the blonde was paired up with everyone but Sasuke.

Wanting to make good on his promise to Sasuke, Naruto told Iruka-oniisan that he would be home some time later and left after the dark-haired boy.

"I told you I wasn't going to leave you alone."

Sasuke, now obviously annoyed, tried running away over the rooftops.

Naruto matched his pace easily. "Why won't you at least say something?"

He kept running, but there was a slight change in his emotions, and Naruto realized he was now going to a certain destination.

The blonde followed along in silence, thwarting the many attempts the other boy made to lose him.

Eventually, they arrived at a wooden pier, extending a few yards out into a vast, scenic lake.

Sasuke walked down to the end of the pier and started performing a jutsu.

Naruto took careful note of the handseals and the way the boy gathered his fire-natured chakra to his lungs, just as he had paid attention to Ojiisan's soundproofing jutsu the day he had come back. Even if he couldn't use them yet, it was good to know how they worked.

"Katon, Goukakyu no Jutsu"

A huge fireball shot out of the Uchiha's mouth and sped across the lake.

"Pretty impressive. I can only do henge and kawarimi right now. Then again, my chakra control sucks."

Sasuke said nothing.

Naruto decided it was time for drastic measures and instantly changed from playful to serious. "Why are you so afraid of the idea of having a friend?"

The other boy was stunned momentarily with the ease his emotions had been read. "Get away from me." Black eyes looked into blue with a glare that would have sent any of their other classmates running in fear.

Having finally achieved his goal, Naruto smiled slightly. "That wasn't so hard now, was it? See you in class tomorrow, Sasuke-teme." And he left.

As their time at the Academy passed, Naruto developed his relationships with his classmates.

Just being with Hinata-chan daily and talking to her was eventually enough to get her used to his presence and speak without stuttering or twiddling her fingers. As she began to talk more, he learned about her family situation, with her father who despised her for being "weak," her sister who disliked her for having been born first, and her cousin who just hated everyone. Her problems stemmed mostly from her strict father being unsupportive of her because he viewed her as inferior; Naruto decided to help her in her training in whatever ways he could.

Since outside of the Academy she was always cloistered away in the Hyuuga compound, he wasn't able to help her as much as he would have liked, but after learning that her family's fighting style relied almost solely on a unique brand of taijutsu supported by the Hyuuga bloodline limit, Naruto taught her how to make the same weight seals he had applied to himself and advised her on their best placement and usage for increasing her speed.

He also learned that despite her shy and timid nature, the pretty girl quite enjoyed talking once she felt comfortable enough and seemed to find having someone listen to her to be a refreshing feeling. She would talk near-endlessly about what she could remember of her mother, who, from her description, had been one of the kindest, most caring people in the world. Hinata herself seemed to have inherited this trait, along with many others, from the woman who had given birth to her. After all, blue hair was not normally seen in the Hyuuga clan.

Naruto also became closer to his other friends. He and Shikamaru would often be found playing go or shougi together, and they grew to enjoy their matches, being the only people they knew to present a decent challenge to one another. He also became closer to Chouji, frequently going out to eat with the boy and his family. The blonde found himself greatly enjoying the barbecue restaurant his friend had told him about on their first meeting, and the two would occasionally get into eating contests, which the larger boy would consistently win, though not by much. Except for when the food chosen was ramen; in those cases Naruto always turned out the victor by a large amount.

The blonde also began to enjoy his time spent with the wild Kiba. Their first prank victim was one of the store owners who refused Naruto services. The man would forever wonder just why he woke up one morning completely bald. The two also found each other to be good sparring partners whenever Naruto increased his resistance seal enough to give the dog boy a chance.

With Shino, Naruto made little progress. While he liked the mysterious boy well enough, his attitude and lack of speech resulted in a lack of interaction between the two.

As for Ino, the blondes found themselves liking each other despite the total lack of shared interest. Naruto had respect for the girl's authoritative attitude, and she in turn was in awe of his constant optimism and unmatched determination. On the topic of the Uchiha, however, she proved completely immovable. No matter how often he clearly explained to her that it wouldn't work and her reasoning for chasing him was completely wrong, she refused to hear a word of it, seemingly deaf to any insults to her "precious Sasuke-kun."

On the topic of Sasuke-obsessed people, Sakura had apparently taken her mother's warning somewhat to heart, being rude and condescending to the blonde boy those rare times she acknowledged his existence.

And with Sasuke-teme himself, Naruto had made it a personal goal to get at least one verbal response out of the brooding boy each day, no matter how far he had to go to do so. He had studied up on his classmates and their families outside of the Academy and was surprised to find out that out of the eight he had noted the first day, all but Sakura were from prominent ninja clans. He had learned of the Uchiha Massacre, of course, but the details were classified and, while he was sure Ojiisan would tell him if he asked, he didn't feel right bothering the old man about it. Nevertheless, having a greater understanding of the source of Sasuke's pain made Naruto all the more determined to help the boy somehow.

As far as Academy classes went, the blonde boy outperformed everyone else when it came to practical application of skills, but his written work was still the worst in the class. And due to the most ridiculous grading system ever conceived, this placed him firmly at the bottom of the class, below even Shikamaru, who only put in just enough effort to keep his mother from shouting at him.

In the area of detecting and dispelling genjutsu, their class was the best the Academy had ever seen. Despite not yet having his sharingan, Sasuke's Uchiha blood gave him an easier time detecting genjutsu than the average ninja. Ino's knowledge of the human mind required for her family's jutsu gave her a noticeable advantage in that area as well. Kiba and Akamaru's heightened sense of smell could break any illusions that did not target the nose strongly enough. Shikamaru was able to spot most genjutsu through his blistering intelligence alone. Sakura was similar, using her book smarts to detect even the slightest sign of something wrong. Shino's bugs proved to be all but immune to the most subtle of the ninja arts. Hinata's byakugan cut through all but the most powerful illusions with ease. And Naruto learned that another ability of his shinkagan was that it made any and all genjutsu completely ineffective against him.

In taijutsu, the whole class improved steadily except for Naruto, who had to settle for increasing his speed and strength to levels well beyond that of his classmates. Whatever the reason might have been, Mizuki-sensei always made sure he and Sasuke were never matched up together.

Their year learned one more more jutsu, namely bushin no jutsu, which created an illusionary replica of the user to serve as a distraction during battle. The fact that it was a genjutsu, however, rendered Naruto incapable of performing it, though, and unlike the henge, which he now had sufficient chakra control to execute the normal version of, any sort of improved version of the jutsu was impossible without inventing something entirely new, a feat the blonde was not yet capable of.

He also pointed out to his Oniisan the eight classmates who had caught his eye, and the chunin instructor readily agreed with his assessment that they would be the only ones out of the lot to succeed as ninja. Time went by, and eventually it was the day before graduation