Lone Wolf

Intro: Chapter 10, yeah I type and think kinda fast. Okay, Atara, Assai, and Neko are going to take the chuunin selection exam with the others. The first test is going to be kinda funny, if you have this weird sense of humor like me and that's where this chapter is going.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of the original Naruto characters. I do own my own OC's, which so far, yes so far, include Atara, Assai, Neko, Kaji, Tenshi, and Takai. You may not use Atara, Assai, or Neko.

The First Test, Chapter 10

Atara woke up to see the sunshine lighting up her room and Assai came in her room with a warm smile. He brought her breakfast along with his own, two bowls of piping hot soup, French toast, and orange juice. Atara smiled and asked, "What's the occasion?"

"The chuunin exams start today, Atara. I just thought that we'd better get a good breakfast so that we'd be ready for it." Atara smiled and took her food and ate in her bed, with Assai sitting next to her on a stool by her bed eating.

Suddenly a grey pup with a star over her eye jumped onto the bed followed by a black panther with pale blue eyes. "Hey Hoshi and Yabun!" Atara exclaimed, acknowledging them. "So did you guys train with your partners while I was gone?" she asked Assai.

"Yeah, we had to connect with their chakra so that we could learn our special moves. Kaji also told us that wherever you were, Yabun would still be teaching you things. HE said that they do it automatically. That's what these bracelets are for. By wearing them, they recognize us as their partners and they teach us what they know. In this way, we both have the same strengths. So what did Yabun teach you?"

Atara looked into Assai's eyes. She was silent for a while and in this time Yabun walked up to her and laid his head on her lap and closed his eyes. Atara finally replied, "He taught me of this wonderfully magical place called Home. When I was striving for power, Yabun helped me to realize that this is where I wanted to be—with you, and all my friends and rivals. This is my home and these people here will still like me just as much when I'm worthless as when I'm the most powerful ninja in the world. Ultimately he taught me, power is nothing compared to love."

Assai's eyes were kind of watered up now and he fought back his tears of happiness and understanding. "Is that why you came back? You found your place?" he asked.

"Yes, my place is here. I can't be a lone wolf, not now that I know what it's like on the other side of that line." She had a warm smile. Suddenly, they both heard a knock on her door. "Atara? Assai?" Neko's voice called them from outside.

"Come in Neko," Atara said politely. "Sorry to barge in but you didn't answer and…"

"Don't worry about it, Neko," Atara and Assai said simultaneously. Neko came and sat on the bed, and she was greeted by an excited Hoshi who gave her many kisses. Then Tenpin jumped up onto the bed and tackled Hoshi playfully. Although they'd grow a lot, they were still just like a little pup and a cub.

Yabun looked sad that he'd been excluded from the action. Noticing this, Hoshi came up to him and laid beside him grooming and licking his face. Tenpin wasn't as quick to go to Yabun. It had been a while since they'd seen each other. They touched noses and Yabun gave her a lick on the nose in friendship.

The three partners laid there for a few seconds before Hoshi started something by grabbing Yabun's ear and they ran down the stairs playing. The three teens laughed together before they decided to walk around the village. "Maybe we can go talk to our friends before the start of the exams," Neko said as she led the way. Atara caught up with her and she and Neko ran away from Assai forcing him to run to keep up. Finally, Neko and Atara saw Naruto and his team eating at the ramen shop.

When Naruto spotted Neko, he said loudly, "HI NEKO!" Everyone that was standing around turned to look. Neko had an annoyed expression on her face as did Sakura, who smacked him in the head. Sasuke had to force himself to keep from grinning the slightest bit at Neko's face. Atara was grinning on the inside but she didn't laugh out loud although she wanted to.

"Hey Naruto, Sakura…Sasuke," Atara said quietly. Sasuke looked at her with the same gaze she gave him. It wasn't hatred, but more like an understanding that they were rivals. They had to try to be better than the other. Neko sat down between Sasuke and Sakura and started talking to Sakura.

Atara went to sit and talk to Naruto as Assai's figure finally appeared from behind a building. He saw them and started towards them. Atara didn't even look towards him as she said, "About time, Assai."

Assai gave her an annoyed look and he sat on the stool beside her as she continued her conversation with Naruto. "Wanna have another contest?" Naruto asked. "I wanna win this time." "Nah, not hungry," Atara said. "Oh, well that would have been better for me," he replied to her answer. He turned around and watched Sakura with jealousy as he saw her casting flirting glances toward Sasuke.

"Naruto, you like Sakura don't you?" Atara asked. "Huh," Naruto said, snapping out of his trance. "How do you know?" he asked. "It's kind of obvious. Why don't you just try to be more romantic and less well—loud. Maybe she'd consider you then." "What makes you say that?" Naruto asked in an unusually quiet voice keeping the overall volume of their conversation low.

"Naruto, look at the person she likes. Sasuke, he's mysterious, strong, mature, quiet. And she likes him because of it. So why don't you just try to be more romantic towards her and a little bit quieter. In that way, you will be like Sasuke only you'll be paying her some attention and then she might find that she likes you."

Assai looked at Naruto and gave him an approving gaze. He stood behind Atara with his hand on her shoulder. "Atara and I were just friends until I expressed my feelings. If you never tell her then she'll never care."

Naruto was thinking about his friend's comments when Sasuke got up and started walking away with Sakura who called, "C'mon Naruto! We'll be late if we don't hurry." He said goodbye and then ran away following them. Neko came over to Assai and Atara as she watched him going away. "We better go too," she replied.

They nodded and followed the other three. When they finally got to "Room 301" they saw that a crowd had gathered. Two leaf ninjas were tormenting a weird boy in green spandex with black hair. When they had made their way to the front, Sasuke had told them that this whole thing was a fake and that he was going to the real room 301. Before they knew it, the black haired boy was in between Sasuke and the other boy both of his hands gripped on their foot.

Atara looked at him confused. Was he the same person that was being teased a moment ago? Sasuke, Naruto, and Sakura left the crowd and proceeded to go to the next floor. Atara, Assai, and Neko followed. Neko thought, How did he do that? He caught their kicks, both of them. He is fast, faster than anyone I've ever seen.

She silently admired him for his feat and wished she could do that. When she looked up from her daze, he was there again, this time confronting Sasuke for a battle. Atara wanted to see this. As the battle commenced she saw Sasuke's futile attempt at using Sharingan on the black-haired ninja.

She stood off to the side and watched as Sasuke suffered a humiliating defeat. When they finished she walked up to the black-haired ninja in spandex. "I am Atara. What's your name?" she asked remembering Sasuke's comment about giving your name first. "Rock Lee," he replied. Satisfied, Atara decided she'd torture Sasuke a bit.

"Don't get hurt too bad before the exam. I don't want to fight someone who's already taken a good beating by some bushy eyebrow boy." Sasuke gave her a hateful look as did Sakura who clearly didn't like Atara saying things like that to Sasuke. Lee was totally mad with himself now. Not only did he ruin it with Sakura but now this other girl was making fun of him. Naruto was trying to suppress his glee that someone was not in complete admiration of Sasuke.

Everyone walked away now, going to the third floor. Atara, Assai, and Neko stayed in a group behind Naruto, Sakura, and Sasuke. When they finally got to room 301, the other people were already gathered and Naruto was busying himself with yelling. When the instructor came down, everyone took a seat.

Assai sat next to Sakura, Neko next to Naruto (opposite side from Hinata), and Atara found herself next to an annoyed Sasuke. When he saw her, he rolled his eyes and asked, "Why aren't you sitting by Assai?" Before Atara could answer the instructor had ordered them to be silent and was giving directions for the test.

Once the test had started, Atara looked at the questions and realized that she knew none of the answers. A few minutes into the test, she noticed that Sasuke had stopped. When she stopped and thought about this test. Her eyes widened as she realized that they were actually encouraging them to cheat, but not get caught. Suddenly a plan came to her mind.

She focused her chakra into her finger and shot it at the power cords leading to the lights. Everything went black. While the lights were off, she jumped over the desktop and up to the person in front of Sasuke. She noted his answers and quickly returned to her seat just in time to get back before the lights came back on.

When they did, the instructor looked at her and a grin came over his face and he shook his head as everyone continued the test. Atara wrote down her answers quickly and then waited for the tenth question.

After the test had been in progress for about 45 minutes, the instructor asked them to stop. "Time for the tenth question. There is a rule for this question." Rules, rules, rules: Power has no rules. Get on with it, Atara thought slightly annoyed. "If you get this question wrong then you'll never be able to take this exam again. You'll always be a genin. And for those who don't wish to take it, you and both of your teammates will have to leave." Atara rolled her eyes. Even so, you can still get stronger even if your stupid rank doesn't increase. Hurry up. Neither Assai nor Neko raised their hand. They weren't scared either.

After he'd eliminated all of the scaredy cat people, he announced that those remaining had passed the first test. No tenth question. Funny, he did it to try and cut the number of us down. Good job.

A sudden commotion in the front of the room alerted them of their next test instructor.

End: Right so, was the fact that she used her shadow powers to cheat funny at all. Probably not, but who cares? Alright now they are going to take the second test in the next chap and to omit confusion they will get their scroll from a random team from like the grass village or something so that I don't have to name them and they will not be in the way of any of the actual teams that passed the second test in the manga from passing. Please R&R.

Neko Pairing:

Naruto0

Rock Lee1

Shikamaru0

Neji1

Kiba0

Shino0

So plz vote so I can make Neko not be alone anymore (otherwise she might start singing: cuz im all alone, there's no one here beside me,…) yeah I think u get it. (Shrek: Donkey sang that.)