A/N: Wow! So many reviews last chapter! I almost forgot it was Thursday--I've had a rough week.
I own Sashimoto Ayame, but the rest of the Naruto characters belong to their creator.
Check it out, it's an AU!
Chapter Nine: Take a Fall
June 11
Genma and Ayame walked together to training ground. He had discovered, three weeks back, that his apartment was just a street down from her house. It was now a routine for him to stop by and walk her to their team meetings. It had certainly improved her timing: team meetings now started when they were supposed to.
But it was not a team meeting today. No, what they were going to do was go down to the training grounds for Iruka's little demonstration of his talents. Iruka had been a little reluctant, but Genma had eventually gotten him to agree to show Ayame as well. Genma, quite personally, thought Iruka was more trouble than the brat was worth. Despite a ready smile and a joking personality, Iruka was difficult and stubborn. The easy smile was a front, and a surprisingly thin one.
Genma fingered that thought, and glanced down at Ayame. He wondered if the girl knew Iruka's outrageous behavior was mostly an act. Likely not, the way she reacted to the boy's antics...but Hayate, it seemed, knew Iruka quite well. Genma pondered the lopsided team-work his Genin had. Hayate and Iruka worked well together. Hayate and Ayame worked well together. But Iruka and Ayame's team-work was haphazard at best. With Hayate as a mediator, everything smoothed out and missions got done. But when Genma arranged it so that Hayate was not immediately in the mix...well...
When they entered the training ground, Hayate and Iruka were easily visible. They were sparring, in a fast-paced exchange of blows and blocks. Hayate was fast, but small for his age, and easily overpowered. Iruka was not that fast, but he had strength. Genma shook his head as Iruka caught hold of Hayate and easily tossed the smaller boy to the ground. Ayame, on the other hand, could win against either boy. That would only last a few years, however, until the boys started growing.
"Oi," Genma called, though he knew the two had probably sensed them coming.
The two fell apart. Iruka whirled and beamed. "Genma-sensei! Ayame! Ohayo!"
Hayate looked a bit dusty. He coughed briefly. Genma winced at the familiar barking coughs: they sounded awful. Hayate finished the fit with an odd, retching hack. He glanced up at them. "Hmm. Look at that bird." He pointed behind Genma and Ayame.
Genma glanced that way, as did Ayame and Iruka. Genma grinned to himself when he heard Hayate spit. Hayate had started that particular routine after Ayame had declared how gross it was for him to spit out what he coughed up. Hayate had given her a rather exasperated look at the time. Genma did not blame the boy.
"I'm ready to demonstrate my super-cool, awesome ninja abilities, Genma-sensei." Iruka sounded entirely too pleased with himself, as he gestured with both hands.
"Well, I'm watching," Genma told him. "What's first?"
"Taijutsu," Iruka answered. He bounced on his toes, eyes bright. "With assistance from the lovely Hayate." Beside him, Hayate rolled his eyes.
"But we've seen Iruka's taijutsu," Ayame commented. She sat down in the shade of the tree. "I mean, he doesn't use the stances he's supposed to, but I thought he was just being lazy."
"I'm never lazy!" interjected Iruka. He set his feet carefully, and moved two steps. It was an attack, but Genma could not recognize the footwork or the way Iruka's hands were spread. And Iruka's whole manner of moving had changed: instead of the solid moves of the usual Konoha taijutsu, Iruka flowed, balance swinging easily from one foot to the other. Instead of the awkward forms of Iruka's usual fighting stances, this was liquid, natural, and he moved effortlessly.
"Okay, Hayate. Remember what I said."
Hayate nodded. He settled into a familiar Konoha stance, and at Iruka's nod, moved through a very standard attack routine. Iruka, instead of dodging the kick, caught Hayate's leg under one arm and leaned, grabbing Hayate's pants with his free hand. In one easy motion, Hayate was on the ground. He rolled easily to his feet, and attacked Iruka again. Iruka angled his wrist and forearm to divert the blow, snagged Hayate's sleeve and a handful of his pants and threw him again, effortlessly.
Iruka was smiling, eyes bright. Hayate looked somewhere between amused and resigned. He attacked again, a quick pattern of kick-strike to the face, and Iruka flipped him to the ground again, only this time maintaining a hold on Hayate's wrist, twisting the boy's arm up at an angle likely to dislocate it, given enough pressure. Hayate twitched, and Genma caught the flash of fight that ran across his face.
"Whoa, easy," Iruka said, releasing Hayate quickly. "I told you not to fight. I don't want to hurt you."
Hayate shook his head as he sat up. He rubbed his shoulder. "Gomen, I couldn't help it."
"While that's impressive, you're only throwing Hayate around," Genma pointed out.
"I could throw you around." Iruka grinned a little. "I only picked Hayate 'cause he knows how to fall really well, and he trusts me." Iruka nodded, and gestured expansively with both hands. "I wouldn't really hurt him, 'cause he's my team-mate, but some of those throws are designed to seriously hurt an enemy. The last one I used, if it had been a real fight, I would have broken his arm or dislocated his shoulder, whichever gave out first."
Iruka reported this in a perfectly matter-of-fact manner, with a conversational tone and his usual wild hand-motions. Hayate, sitting on the ground beside him, looked somewhat amused by this. Genma was unimpressed. It was true, Iruka's moves looked liquid and strange, but Genma doubted the boy could actually throw him.
"I know how to fall," he told Iruka. "Give Hayate a break and we'll see if you can throw me."
Iruka grinned, and it was sharp, almost dangerous. Genma felt a sudden surge of wariness, but chalked the expression up to the boy's confidence and strode forward. Hayate stood and walked over to the tree. He sat down in the shade beside Ayame. Genma looked at the boy in front of him: Iruka looked absurdly small, after some of the opponents Genma had faced over the years. Genma shifted into a steady stance, and watched Iruka set his feet.
"Ready?" Genma asked.
Iruka looked up. The sunlight glanced off his eyes with a glittering flash of blue. He was smiling, and it was a smile that made Genma's stance shift instinctively to a more defensive one. He had seen that smile on veteran ANBU. It did not belong on a child. It was wide and sharp and wicked, bloodthirsty and wild and just that bit insane. It made Genma's palms itch for the weight of honest steel, his fingertips tingle for poisoned senbon to throw.
He attacked almost out of pure reflex when Iruka moved, launching himself at the opening he saw. His fist was met by a much smaller palm, the attack not blocked but shifted aside. Iruka's free hand closed on Genma's shirt, high on his shoulder, and the boy pivoted, pulling. Genma's weight tipped over his center of balance and he went down, Iruka's hold on his arm restricting him to only one hand to break his fall...only the angle was all wrong; if he tried he would break his arm. Genma relaxed the split-second before he hit the ground, let the impact recoil through him. It nearly knocked the breath out of him. He registered the flash of movement towards his face and rolled, hands flying for a weapon, all his senses on high alert.
Genma rolled into a crouch and then froze, realizing Iruka had gone still. The boy had one foot raised. Genma had an array of senbon in either hand, adrenaline threading through his veins. He realized he had just come very, very close to making a poisoned pincushion out of his student. Iruka was grinning, but it was his usual mischievous grin, not that predatory expression of before.
"And that was where I would have kicked you in the face," Iruka told him. "Breaking your nose, likely shoving the bones up into your brain. Or if not, you would at least have been distracted long enough for me to use a kunai on you."
Genma realized, with a wash of shame, that he had underestimated the kid. The easy throws with Hayate had not been flukes. Had this been a real fight, Genma very well might have been dead, or close to it. He stood, and briefly considered the senbon in his hands. He lifted the ones in his right hand and nibbled on a tip. The taste was sharp and bitter, alkaline. Ah, left hip then, his hands must have been crossed when he reached for them. Easily, he slipped the senbon back into their cases.
"Pretty impressive, brat," Genma allowed. He noticed how Iruka brightened under the implied praise. "But you nearly got yourself full of senbon."
"Yeah, but they're senbon." Iruka shrugged. "It's just an extra-large needle-poke. Or maybe like a super-big mosquito."
Genma flicked a non-poisoned senbon into his right hand, and snapped it towards Iruka. It struck the boy in the shoulder. Iruka jumped, startled, and a handful of kunai appeared in his left hand. His right did not move. The arm hung limply, and Iruka looked down at it, bewildered. Genma smirked, and sauntered closer.
"That extra-large needle, as you said, is now lodged in the brachial plexus, preventing both motion and sensation," Genma drawled. "And it's going to hurt like heck when I pull it out. I don't know what they taught you in the Academy, but I know from personal experience that many shinobi coat their senbon with poison."
Like himself. Genma steadied Iruka's shoulder with one hand. Iruka pouted up at him, but held still. Genma pulled the senbon free with a swift, smooth snatch, straight out, the same way it had gone in. Iruka yelped and jumped beneath Genma's hand. A few drops of blood appeared at the tiny hole, but that was all. Genma felt a little guilty--even if his pride was bruised, he hadn't really needed to hurt the kid to make his point. And that particular nerve cluster did indeed hurt when messed with, as it was a major bundle of nerves. Iruka had put his kunai away again and was rubbing his shoulder, making pained faces.
"So, the lesson is, it doesn't matter if it looks harmless. It could still kill you." The lesson went for himself, as well. He had underestimated the child in front of him. Genma twisted his hand around on Iruka's shoulder and pressed his thumb to a certain point. Iruka flinched again. "That ought to make it stop hurting." He lifted his hand away.
Iruka rolled his shoulder, winced a little, and flexed his hand instead. "Ow. But they taught us in the Academy that it's hard to throw accurately enough in a fight to do that."
"Practise," Genma answered. "Practise, practise, practise." He laughed a little at Iruka's frown. "It's not talent. And besides, if the senbon are poisoned, accuracy doesn't matter quite so much."
"Like kunai with exploding tags?" Iruka asked, grinning again.
"Eeto, sort of."
"No, exploding tags are cheating," Ayame called, in a sing-song manner.
"Then I cheat!" Iruka declared loudly, whirling to face her. "I'm a ninja, and I lie, cheat, and steal!" He cackled.
Genma sighed in exasperation. He doubted he had ever been as childish as these three...but then, he had grown up during a war, where nobody was childish. Perhaps, he mused, it was a good thing they could enjoy being young and at peace. But then it could also get them killed, if they did not learn to take these lessons seriously. Genma frowned as he watched the usual fight break out between Ayame and Iruka. Hayate shook his head and offered soft, soothing interjections, acting the peacemaker again.
"Oi," Genma called. Lately, that had been enough to make them all calm down. It worked this time as well. "Is that all you can do, Iruka? Just different taijutsu?" He knew it was not, but all Iruka needed was a little prodding.
"Chigau! I can do lots more!" protested Iruka. He spun to face Genma, and flung his arms wide. "I know lots of different jutsu, too! And they're all super-cool!" He waved his arms to emphasize his point.
And sometimes Iruka could be downright amusing, Genma thought, fighting not to smile.
"Then show us," Ayame demanded. "Don't just talk about it!"
"I will!" Iruka nodded vigorously, and then trotted towards the small pond on the training grounds. "Kitte!" he demanded.
Hayate scrambled to his feet, and offered a polite hand to Ayame. Genma shook his head. He put the senbon away, after wiping it clean on his sleeve, and sauntered after Iruka. The boy was dancing impatiently at the side of the water. As soon as they got closer, Iruka laughed aloud, spun on a heel, and darted out across the surface of the water, tracking ripples.
Genma had not started teaching his Genin to water-walk yet. He had started them on trees first, because it was a little easier to get the hang of that. The trees gently attracted chakra, but even so it was hard to maintain a constant flow. Ayame and Hayate had almost gotten it down. But to Genma's puzzlement, Iruka's progress had been very inconsistent, despite his excellent chakra control. Some days he was perfectly fine. Others he was constantly falling off the trees. Water was more difficult to walk on, being almost completely neutral to chakra, and walking on it required strict control.
Iruka skidded to a halt in the middle of the small pond, and bounced on his toes. He grinned, wild and bright at them. His slender brown hands flashed through a rapid series of signs. The water beside him rippled and bulged, rising upward to suddenly become a mirror-image of Iruka: a water clone. Iruka slapped the clone on the shoulder, making the surface image ripple. They leapt apart, and began to spar atop the water. Genma, tracking the chakra patterns, could only just tell which one was the real Iruka.
The longer he watched, the more impressed Genma was. Iruka's chakra control was not just good: it was fantastic. Not only could the boy keep his footing perfectly, but even when the clone threw him, Iruka remained atop the water. Not even his ponytail was wet. Iruka was using chakra to enhance his Kiriga fighting stances, and judging from the way the clone's outline deformed when Iruka hit it, there was a considerable amount of power going into those knife-handed strikes.
Iruka was smiling. It was a wide, tooth-baring grin, eager and wolfish. His eyes glinted and glittered blue beneath the sunshine. Genma shivered a little as Iruka's strike finished off the clone, a strike straight through the neck. The look on Iruka's face in that moment did not belong on a child of only twelve.
A/N: Pride goes before a fall, as Genma learned this chapter!
Many many fervent thanks to the people who reviewed this chapter (Five! FIVE! I'm floored!): Suicidal - Shinigami, Ally Plz, charlotte, Ice Dragon3, and Ryo Yuriko!
And to Ryo Yuriko's request: Hayate likes bees. His aunt keeps them. He explained why he doesn't like wasps: because wasps will kill a hive of bees. (Besides, who doesn't like bees? I like them!)
Next chapter: Hayate and Iruka flirt with trouble. Because you never have to make trouble, it finds you!
Chigau It's different, used in a negative sense to say "you're wrong."
Kitte Come!
A note on Iruka's fighting style: Iruka's Kiriga taijutsu is based on Akido. It is a very beautiful martial art, liquid and seeming effortless. The style is focused on using opponent's attacks and force against them, using various throws and holds. Using this, it is conceivable that a much smaller Iruka could in fact throw Genma. (As a side note, I'm imagining Konoha's taijutsu style as more similar to karate.)