A/N Hello again everyone! Long ass chapter to compensate for the measly 1k ch yesterday! I had a lot of fun writing this, and how things are going next ch will be as well. Hope you all like it
BR
Chapter 13: The Chuunin Exams Pt.2
We were told the second instance of the exams would be held in Konoha's 44th training ground the day before. To us genin the information held little meaning, except for the fact that it was more commonly known as 'The Forest of death'. We had been told it was an extremely dangerous place, full of wild beasts and poisonous plants, but as in everything in life, one does not believe what one has yet not seen or experienced. But that didn't mean we did not do our research before going in. any good shinobi makes sure to be very well informed of the situation around him before departing on a mission. Since Akira-sensei had refused to help us in any way until the finals, we took it upon ourselves to do the research.
Konohagakure's library was not as great an information source as one might have thought. Living in a world of shinobi, keeping important information in parchments easily stolen seemed like something very silly to do. But in spite of the fact that our superiors and ancestors were rather reluctant to let the posterity know all of their secrets, we managed to find some Intel that would help us get us through our exam. We managed to fish out some maps, flora and fauna guides and a list of rather unusual beings that lurked the forest, as well as an addition to the list of poisonous plants we had been given during our time in the Academy.
The second instance of the Exams, the Survival Trial, was meant to be an escort/ kidnapping mission. Ten teams had survived the first part, of which five would escort a proctor to the tower in the centre of the forest, while the other five attempted to kidnap and take the proctors to the same destination. Whichever team failed to take a proctor to the tower within three days would be disqualified. The client or hostage would have to be in perfect health and shape, which made the knowledge we were looking for every bit as important.
Now, after a long day of reading and a rather nervous night's sleep, Team 8 stood at one of the forty four gates of the dreaded training ground. Behind the metal fences, the forest loomed over us like a particularly threatening storm, completely blocking our view of the sky with its almost solid looking canopy.
The somber atmosphere of the situation before us seemed not to be enough, because the proctor (or in this case 'client') that had been assigned to us was most definitely not your average shinobi. For starters, I didn't dare use defining pronouns, and could not for the life of me figure out which rank or specialty they held; not to mention the fact that their unmoving, ever-present, all-seeing kind of aura made me more than just a little uneasy. They had long, brown hair and dark almond shaped eyes that were too cold to look at directly. Their figure and face were slim and athletic and very much androgynous. The only detail that caught my attention, which at the time seemed irrelevant, was the faceplate they wore. It was the exact same design our late Nidaime Hokage.
Our team moved out as soon as we heard the signal, taking a defensive formation with Hotaka on point and Takahiro and I to the sides of our client. The Forest of Death loomed over us ahead, and as we made our way through the gate and into the training ground, the deep dark green of its shadow seemed to engulf us, like a giant swallowing all four of us whole. Trees taller than the Hokage building and thick only as a Fire Country species could grow, were quite threatening on its own, and to that we had to add the different threats that could be found among those trees, as well as the other teams. Visibility was poor and maneuverability limited among such gigantic plants, which in turn made the threats within the forest even more dangerous. The worst kind of enemies is that which you can't see.
We rushed our client at a speed any civilian adult could keep (we did know the proctor was capable of going even faster than ourselves, but we wanted to do things as correctly as we could) and tried to cover as much ground as our client and the terrain allowed. We climbed over fallen trunks, ducked under low branches, avoided clearings in which vegetation seemed not to grow, and although our progress was rather slow, we guided the proctor steadily and safely through the forest. Every five hours we took a break, one of us genin on watch while the rest of us made sure we were going in the right direction and replenished ourselves and the client's energy.
Our first day in the forest went rather well, two teams had attempted to catch up on us, but Taka's ever incredible trapping abilities had prevented that from happening. We advanced steadily until sunset, and before visibility was nearly gone, we settled in for the night. Hotaka checked for anything suspicious in one of the many holes in a gigantic tree, and when he gave us the all clear, we started to set up camp.
I pulled out the supply scroll I'd packed that morning, and unsealed it to reveal three bed rolls, a pack full of energy bars, a first-aid kit and extra weaponry. Hotaka helped me set everything up, and when we were done, redistribute the extra kunai and shuriken I'd brought. As I lay out the bed rolls, my team mate dug a pit to start the fire in, while in the darkest corner of our little 'cave', our client watched our progress silently. Before long, Takahiro reported back in and with camp all set up, we began to plan out the night watch shifts. Taka would take first and I second, leaving dawn watch to Hotaka. We would take turns with the bedrolls so that our client could sleep through the night.
"We really need to be more careful tomorrow," said Hota as I unfolded the map of the Forest I'd brought in front of us. "Bakahiro's traps may be brilliant, but Inuzuka-san has got the Haimaru brothers, and your other Uchiha friend has the Sharingan."
"And I don't have much to work with left, even if I take my share of the extras you brought, Akane-chan," continued my other team mate, completely ignoring Hotaka's nickname for him out of sheer habit. "I spent most of it on the traps to delay our pursuers and just now on making the perimeter."
As the fire cracked lightly inside the pit and the three people inside the tree hole with me stood silent, I realized they were waiting for me to give them instructions. Both my team mates had reported their individual situations to whom they had selected team leader the previous instance of the exam, and were now waiting for their orders. As the situation sunk in, I tried to come up with something, anything that would shift the balance in our situation. Trying not to forget any of the variables our situation presented, I went silent.
"We'll have to pick up the pace tomorrow" I said finally. "As helpful as Taka-kun's traps are, they are slowing us down marginally. And I don't know much about the other teams, but Itachi's and Hana's rely rather heavily on speed."
Both boys nodded and waited for me to finish while our proctor listened in silently from their dark corner inside our makeshift camp. It was rather intimidating if I were to be completely honest.
"We'll also have to use the forest to our advantage and compensate for the lack of traps guarding our backs," I continued. "Which should also save Taka-kun a lot of material in case he needs it later on. As for the Haimaru brothers and Itachi's Sharingan, we can attempt to fool them as best we can, but we can't really count on them being fooled. Just delaying them a bit would be enough."
Taka-kun, who had shifted his attention to his remaining kunai and had been polishing them, turned his head confused.
"But how are we supposed to fool the Inuzuka and a Sharingan user? One of them we could manage, but both of them?"
"Baka, you forget they aren't on the same team. We could mask our scent as much as we can, and travel through more forested areas so that what remains of our traces can be masked." Said the only Hyuuga in our team.
I frowned. It was a good plan, but we still needed to avoid being noticed by the Sharingan, and that was near impossible in an area where visual tells could be spotted with the bare eye. Even without his Sharingan, Itachi was an unbelievable tracker; Shisui had made sure of that. But being a prodigy's sister had its perks: there was nothing my brother had tough Itachi that he hadn't taught me first.
"We would have to be extremely careful not to leave any visual tells behind, and since making decoys would take extra time, we'll have to forgo those too."
My team mates nodded in approval, and when we had made a plan taking into account any variable we could think of, and went through it a couple more times so that it would be clear to everyone (even our proctor), Taka-kun went out to take first watch while Hota-kun and I mapped out the rout we would be taking the next day.
::
"Why is it such a big deal? It's not like I'm going to start dating my team mate, for Kami's sake I'm ten!"
Shisui and Kakashi sat by the table pretending to work, but still unable to hide their amusement. This, as well as the fact that I didn't consider the matter important, made Itachi go red in the face with frustration and just a tiny bit of embarrassment.
"What if he brings personal matters into the field? Or what if he makes irrational decisions out of sentiment?" answered my friend in an attempt to make me understand his viewpoint.
"Are you saying it would be my fault then? That I'd become a distraction? Because if that's what you're implying I might be tempted to hit you, Itachi."
But even with a threat so plainly up in the air, my friend had never been one to care for atmospheres, or good at taking hints for that matter, not in the human relations department anyway.
"It wouldn't be your fault, but you would certainly become a distraction, and were something to happen because of it, you would feel responsible for it, Akane. You always do."
::
Just as I was about to fall asleep, my conversation with Itachi had come to mid. Of course he had been right, he was my best friend after all and sometimes seemed to know me better than I knew myself. But the punch I'd thrown at him had definitely been out of frustration more than anger, he couldn't always be right, that wasn't how things worked. I knew I would feel guilty were something to happen and I would beat myself about it, and the fact that Itachi knew that frustrated me to no end. I knew I'd have to address the issue sooner or later, whether I confronted my team mate about it or he confessed; but for the time being, I thought it was best to leave it be as long as it didn't compromise the dynamics of our team.
It felt like I'd only slept for a couple of minutes when Taka-kun woke me up for my shift. My head had been working a mile an hour and it felt like I'd got little to no rest at all. Second watch was already hard enough without the lack of sleep. The entire shift was dead silent, and awfully boring, and had it not been for the fact that we were not only taking part of the Chuunin Exams, but also in the forest of death; I might have fallen asleep. Hota-kun's shift didn't come fast enough, but when it did, I was very glad I could have a couple more hours of rest.
Morning greeted us with noticeable lack of tea and very poor breakfast. Of course I had been expecting this since I had been on missions before, but with how badly I'd slept, I found myself missing my morning tea more than I should have. Breakfast was water an energy bars, which made the trick but wasn't quite what my body needed. All this complaining I kept to myself, I knew everybody felt the same way, and we knew this was just another aspect of the life we had chosen for ourselves. Had I valued comfort over the safety of my loved ones (and some time ago my own ambition and pride), I would have listened to my obaa-chan; and lived a civilian life before getting married.
As soon as we were done eating and re-sealing our supplies, we filled Taka-kun in on the rout we would be taking, and waited for him to disarm the perimeter; before hiding the remains of our camp and setting off. Using the same formation we had the previous day, we advanced through the forest as fast as we could while concealing our presence. During that morning we covered almost half the distance we had the day prior, and it wasn't until we were an hour away from the tower, that another team managed to catch up to us. Hotaka had been keeping an eye on them the entire time, so when he gave us the heads up; we took the time we had left to choose a battlefield that would give us the advantage.
I felt their presence before I could make visual contact. There were six signatures evenly distributed around us. Our team took a defensive formation with our client in the middle and waited. The tension in the air almost made me want to back away, almost. This was my life, this was my job, and I would see it through with as little regrets as I could.
Hotaka activated his Byakugan, Takahiro grabbed two kunai from his holster and took a defensive stance, and I put my new gloves on and waited. Every second seemed like an eternity, every heart beat loud and clear in my ears.
One heart beat.
A drop of sweat runs down my spine.
Two heart beats.
Taka tightens his hold on his kunai.
Three heart beats.
Hota shifts his foot slightly.
With the fourth beat of my heart, the first of the Haimaru brothers comes out of the foliage and pounces at me.
I turned in my place and lifted my left leg off the ground, bracing myself for the impact that would come, before my heel made contact with the still developing pup. I'd always hated Hana for making me hit puppies, but had later agreed to train with them only so that they wouldn't get themselves killed in the future. I still didn't like hitting dogs, even if they were bigger than myself and attempting to murder me.
The first of Hana's partners went flying sideways and hadn't even hit the ground when the other two attacked. The remaining pups went for Hotaka's feet, aware the Gentle Fist technique the Hyuuga Clan was known for, relies heavily on the upper limbs for precision rather than using their legs. At the same time, Hana went for Takahiro, who had little to no experience with the Inuzuka fighting style, while one of her team mates came at me as a follow up, and the remaining one went for our client.
To anyone watching, the situation was rather dire for team eight. We were not only outnumbered, but faced with a cunning enemy, who had basic information on their target and had planned accordingly:
Hana, the member of her team with the most battle experience and assault- based training, had gone for the trapper and saboteur, who by definition is a middle to long range fighter and no good in hand to hand combat. They had also set two little but fast and deadly attackers on a Hyuuga who, in theory, would have a hard time striking precise blows on his enemy and therefore would be incapacitated. Finally they had planned a combination attack on an Uchiha without the Sharingan who, again in theory, would not be able to follow the proceedings and would (if bested by her opponent's unknown abilities) be defeated. And while all of this took place, the remaining member of the team would take their hostage and retreat while his team mates finished up.
It was a good plan, a very good one if I were to be honest, but they had failed to take into account what training we had received, as well as their own weaknesses. They were not an assault team, they were trackers and backup. Hana, despite her mother's training, would become the medic and vet of her team, and the other two were, as far as I knew, no front liners either.
Team Akira was an infiltration, sabotage team. We were trained to infiltrate and destroy or gather Intel inside enemy territory, which was the main reason why we worked hard to master any combat style that would suit our specialization best. Taking all of this into account, the situation at hand might and would be turned around.
As soon as my heel connected with Hana's pup, Hotaka and I exchanged places with a swift motion. Now to my right, Tahahiro avoided the Inuzuka's first punch and with a swipe of his leg to her feet, threw her off balance and onto the floor. To my right, Hotaka hit the tenketsu in his adversary's arm and blocked his chakra coils before sending him flying back with a kick to the chest. I for my part fended off the remaining ninja hounds before intercepting the incoming enemy dropping down from the canopy and onto our client. Since the boy deflected the kunai I threw him, I decided to grab our client and drag him away before he could be taken. Now, with all enemies visible and on the ground, I decided it was time for Plan B.
"Boys, formation beta." I said once my team mates managed to disengage.
Both of them nodded and without another word, took our client and run off deeper into the forest and out of sight. The other team hesitated a moment before Hana sent her team mates on their way as she remained behind.
"I hope whoever wins today, there will be no hard feelings, Ha-chan." I said taking a defensive stance.
"Of course, just try not to be too disappointed when I win." Answered my friend with a grin.
And with all trash talk out of the way, and nothing left to do but fight, Hana and I engaged in what would be the most fun fight we'd ever had.