Discliamer: Don't own a single name of Naruto. Just the name Katy.
Remembering what was forgottten
Chapter 21
The group followed Anko to a familiar heavily gated forest. Sasuke nearly flinched at the sight of the dark forest. This was the place where he and Katy were found unconsious by Anko. It seemed ironic that they were found by the place that would hold an important event. Then again, Sasuke's life was full of iron now. (A/N: Ain't that the truth?)
Anko smirked and turned to the group. "This is where you will have the Second exam. This place is called the Forest of Death. All of you are going to find out first hand where it got its name."
Naruto began mocking Anko to which Sasuke pitied him. Anko saw this, smiling, then threw a kunai at him. Naruto winced when the kunai cut his cheek. She appeared behind him and began licking the blood off his cheek.
"Your kind are always the first ones to go," Anko said, savoring the taste of Naruto's blood. (A/N: Ah! Vampire!) Sasuke made a slightly disgusted face at that and she noticed. She turned to Sasuke with a grin on her face. "Well, well, well! If it isn't my favorite little student, Sasuke Uchiha! I had a feeling we were going to meet again soon."
Everyone around Sasuke gave a look of horror at him and Anko. Sasuke scowled, folding his arms.
"Yeah, hi, Anko," he muttered.
"Whoa! You know this crazy lady!?" Naruto yelled in surprise. He cried out in pain when Anko hit him in the head.
"Know this guy? I trained him for awhile!" Anko proudly stated. She went over to Sasuke and grabbed him the shoulders, grinning. "This guy was a weak, little shrimp the first time I met him. But I fixed that and whipped him into shape! He was pretty fun to mess with, too." She pinched Sasuke's cheek, pulling it. Sasuke slapped her hand away, frowning. He hated it when she did that. He always wondered how Anko became Katy's friend.
Naruto laughed at Sasuke.
"Ha ha! You were weak before she trained you!"
Sasuke narrowed his eyes at him.
"Shut up, Dobe."
"Make me, teme! Oh, wait! You can't because you're too weak to!"
He laughed even harder.
Sasuke growled. Naruto was so dead! No one called him weak and got away with it! He was about to attack the blind to show him who was boss. He stopped when Anko suddenly whipped out a kunai and pointed it behind her. Behind her stood a Grass ninja (A/N: I'm sorry, but does anyone know the Japanese name for the Grass ninjas? Please tell me if you do!) with long black hair. Her long tongue held out Anko's kunai to her.
"I believe this is yours?"
Anko grinned and took back her kunai.
"Thanks. But you shouldn't appear behind me unless you want to die."
Sasuke glanced over his shoulder and held a dark look at the Grass ninja as she left. He wasn't fooled by that stupid disguise. He knew exactly who that person was. All he had to do was to be careful around her and he would be fine. Hopefully...
Anko went back to her position in the front and started explaining what they were all supposed to do. Each team would be given one out of two scrolls to hold onto. Once they entered the forest everyone was given five days to go get the other scroll they needed. Once they had both scrolls they would need to head to the tower in the center of the forest. But before they could start, Anko had to have them sign a consent form for deaths. She guaranteed that there will be deaths in this exam. Then she passed out the forms.
Sasuke received his form and scanned it. What he read made him think. Anko was serious when she said that people would die. There were many things in the forest they were about to enter that could and would kill them. That didn't even include any of the other ninjas. How did she expect them to survive in the Forest of Death for five days? And how were they going to get consent if they were dead? That didn't make sense.
"Sasuke-kun!" A loud squeal sounded throughout the whole area. Sasuke didn't even have time to react to his name when he was suddenly tackled to the ground. He felt someone heavy sitting on his back and he had a good idea on who it was. The person giggled. "Good to see you passed the First exams, Sasuke-kun!"
Naruto laughed and grinned at the person to tackle Sasuke. "Nice one, Katy-chan!"
"Thanks, Naruto." Katy smiled cheekily then went to a sweet one when seeing Sakura. "Hi, Sakura-chan!"
"Hi, Katy-chan! What are you doing here?" asked Sakura.
"I'm on a delivery run. I'm here to bring dango to Milady."
"Who?"
"She means Anko. Katy, get the hell off of me!" Sasuke groaned, pushing himself up to get her off. Katy stood to her feet and helped her friend up. Sasuke dusted off the dirt on his knees, glaring at her. "Do you have to tackle me?"
"Yes. And besides..." She grinned. "You should have been able to sense me. Not much of a ninja, are you?"
"Sasuke is right, Katy-chan. You shouldn't tackle him before he takes an important exam," a voice said behind them.
Katy pouted at Haku right behind her. She sighed.
"Right. I'll be more careful, Haku."
"Hey, Haku. What are you doing here? The teme told us you weren't entering the Chunin Exams," Naruto said. He eyed the paper bag that Haku was holding. "What's that?"
"I'm accompanying Katy-chan on her delivery run. I also decided to spend the day with her. Someone has to watch her."
"And that reminds me..." Katy took the paper bag from Haku and yelled, "Milady! Your dango and juice order is here!"
"Yay!" There was a purple and tan blur as someone glomped Katy. Team 7 didn't react very much as the paper bag flew out of Katy's hands. Haku quickly caught it before it fell. Katy could hardly breathe as she was being hugged very tightly by Anko. "My dango's here from my little follower!"
"Follower?" Naruto asked.
"She means friend," explained Sasuke. He watched as Katy suffered a near death by hug. It was hilarious to see Katy struggled to breathe. He wished he had a camera with him right now. He smirked. "Anko and Katy are friend. Katy also calls Anko, 'Milady.'"
"So...They're friends?" Sakura skeptically asked.
"Yeah. Katy always makes the weirdest friends."
Anko finally let go of Katy by that time. While Katy tried to learn how to breathe again, Anko accepted the paper bag from Haku, gave the money to him, and went her merry way. Katy wheezed to the group, "You know you called yourself weird too, Sasuke."
"Says the girl who eats duck egss," Sasuke muttered under his breath. But Katy heard him anyway.
"Hey! Balot is good! Don't hate me because I'm pinoy," she snapped at him. She already recovered from the glomping earlier. "And now that I think about it, I haven't had any Filipino food in awhile. Maybe I should make some lumpia. I'm kind of in the mood for it," she pondered, thinking of all the Filipino food she hasn't had in months.
Sakura, Naruto, and Haku stared at Katy like she just spoke another language, which she did. Sasuke also began thinking about filipino food. Ever since they became friends, Katy introduced her ethnic food to him. At first, most of them looked and tasted strange to him. Over time he began to like the food and had favorites like lumpia (egg rolls). Oddly enough, he found himself missing ube in a bread roll. And he didn't even like sweets! he just liked ube even though it was a sweet yam and purple. Why it was purple, he would never know.
"Uh, Katy-chan? What did you say?" Sakura sked for her, Naruto, and Haku. They were all confused on what she just said.
Katy took awhile to respond then smiled at them and said, "I was saying I should make some recipes my mom taught me. They're really good and I haven't had them in forever!"
"Your...mother?" Haku asked. "I didn't know you had a family. You've never mentioned them before."
"Oh, yeah. He's right! Why haven't you mentioned them before? And shouldn't you be with them?" Naruto asked Katy.
Sasuke saw Katy visibly tense up. Any mention of her family was always touchy with her. The same was said with him. Katy wringed her hands together in anxiety and sadness.
"Ah...well...Something happened that made me be far away from my mother," she explained. "I ended up here because of it and I haven't seen my mom since then."
"What about your dad? You only mention your mom."
"My dad died when I was very little." Katy grinned a bit. "I don't remember him much, thought. I was happy with my small family of three-well, two if you don't count my brother."
"You have a brother?" Naruto and Sakura simoultanously asked.
Katy bit her lip and nodded. Sasuke could tell that she could start crying any minute now if they stayed on this subject. But by how Sakura, Naruto, and Haku were curious, she had to continue.
"Yes. I had an older brother once but he...d-died when I was eleven." Her voice cracked at the end, signaling that she would start crying soon. It was always so hard to mention him after what happened. Sakura and Haku grew silent as Naruto sobered.
Sasuke knew that Katy would start crying soon. He quickly grabbed her hand and led her away from the others and into the trees nearby. he didn't want her to cry in front of a group of ruthless ninjas. She would be humiliated by it later. Once in the shadow of the trees and hidden from the others, Katy let loose some of her tears. She sat down on the base of a tree with her back against the rough wood. Tears softly fell down her skin and down to her lap. Sasuke stood in front of her, waiting for her to finish crying.
"S-Sorry for al-almost crying in front o-of everyone, Sasuke," Katy quietly said. She sniffled, wiping away her tears. "It-It's just hard to talk about Kuya."
"Hn." Sasuke knew that she was sensitive on the subject of her brother. It was always hard to talk about him. Katy always grew teary at the mention of him. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and scowled at her tears. "Stop crying, will you? Crying will do you no good."
"S-Sorry." Katy finished crying and wiped away all signs that she cried. Except for her pink-rimmed eyes, it looked like she never did cry. Taking a deep breath, Katy stood to her feet and grinned. "Okay. Emo phase over with. No more tears. And now onto business!"
"What business?"
"About the Second exams, of course!" Katy stated in a matter-of-fact tone. She gave a sly grin that reminded Sasuke of Naruto. "I have an idea on how you could avoid getting bitten by Pedo-snake. It's pretty obvious that you don't have a plan yet. I bet you were going to wing it or something like that."
Sasuke didn't even reply to that one. She was basically right. "So what's your idea?" he asked.
Katy reached into the small pouch she had on her hip. After learning she had no pockets to hold anything she had in her outfit, she borrowed one of Sasuke's weapon pouches, emptied it of weapons, and held her small items in there then tied it to her hip. Her hand dug through the pouch until she felt the thing she was looking for. She wrapped her fingers around it and pulled it out. Grinning, she held it out to Sasuke. "Tada! Here is the answer to your problem."
Sasuke raised an eyebrow at the item. It was a cylindrical object that was colored a deep red. On one of the flat ends of the object was a wick. He identified the object as a firework. He stared blankly at Katy as if saying, 'You can't be serious.' "Katy, seriously? A firework?" he asked.
"Yes, I'm serious."
"Why would you want me to use that to avoid getting bitten?" He pressed on. What good would a flashy explosive do against an evil, malicious snake lord?
"Well, not exactly help you avoid getting bitten," Katy said. She leaned back onto the tree behind her. The wood roughly pricked her bare shoulders but she didn't mind. "I'm giving you this because it will signal where you are in the forest. My plan is that when Pedo-snake comes in that girly disguise and says you two have to fight to the death for the scrolls, you light up the firework and throw it in the air. I'm going to go to Anko and say I saw a strange man with snake eyes enter the forest later on. Anko will most likely freak out and when the fireworks go off she'll head to that location which is where you are. Anko will fight Orochimaru and during that time, you and Team 7 bolt out of there. Then you get your scrolls and head to the Tower where you're home free!" She smiled brightly. "Any questions?"
Sasuke was silent for awhile. He couldn't know what to think of her plan. All of that could occur from one measly firework? Something that was supposed to be used for entertainment on the Fourth of July, New Year's, and Chinese New Year's? (He celebrates the Chinese New Year's even though his mother wasn't Chinese. She only did it because she, at first, thought Sasuke was Chinese. Wanting him to know his heritage, they celebrated it.) It was hard to grasp that something so small could help avoid something so big. But he had to.
"Do I have to use that?" Sasuke questioned.
"Yes, unless you have a better plan...?" Katy stared at him expectantly. Sasuke didn't even say anything when she was right. She smiled smugly, knowing she got him. "Yeah. That's what I thought."
Sasuke scowled. He snatched the small explosive out of her hand, then shoved it into his weapons pouch. He didn't want to use the firework but it was all he could use at the moment. Katy's plan did sound like it could work. What bothered him was that everything could go wrong.
I just hope it does work and nothing goes wrong.
He shoved his hands in his pockets and walked out of the covers of the tress. Katy frowned at his retreating back, moving to follow him.
"Your welcome!" Katy called to him. She huffed, stalking after Sasuke. The least he could do was thank her for coming up with a plan when he didn't have one in the first place. "No 'thanks, Katy!' or 'You're the best, Katy,' or even 'You saved my life, Katy! What would I do without you?!' The ungrateful little-"
Katy stopped speaking. A horrible feeling suddenly overcame her and it felt like she was being watched. A shiver went down her spine. Katy glanced around the area to see who could be watching her. Her brown eyes sweeped around the area, seeing many ninjas signing their consent forms. Then, out of the corner of her eye, she met a pair of eyes. She turned her head toward the eyes and soon wished she didn't. The pair of eyes she met were yellow and snake-like. Those eyes belonged to the Grass ninja that returned Anko's kunai. The person was watching her with an almost predatory look. It was like he was a lion watching a little lamb graze in a meadow and waited for the moment to strike. The bad part was that Katy was the lamb.
When they eyes connected, the Grass ninja licked her lips with that long tongue of hers and smirked. It looked like she was chuckling. A spike of fear shot up her spine. Katy started to tremble and quickly started walking back to where Team 7 was. Her mind ran faster than her feet.
Oh no, oh no, oh no! Orochimaru was watching me! Does that mean he was watching me and Sasuke talk? How much did he see?! She thought urgently. She was freaking out. If he saw them talking, then he must have seen her handing him the firework! This could ruin eveything they worked for! This is bad! This is very bad! I have to tell Sasuke!
Katy began to pick up her pace until she was coming nearer to the team. They were all talking about what could happen in the next exams, but stopped when seeing Katy.
"Katy-chan, are you alright? I didn't mean to make you cry," Naruto hurriedly apologized.
"Huh?" Katy blinked, staring blankly at him. Realizing what he said, she gave a grin. "Oh, you don't need to apologize, Naruto. I know you didn't mean to. You guys were just curious about my family was all. No harm, no foul!"
Naruto grinned, happy he didn't hurt her feelings too much with whatever he asked. He moved off the depressing subject and began telling Katy how excited he was for the next part of the exams.
Sakura, Sasuke, and Haku listened to the two speak. Katy grinned at most of Naruto's comments and giggled at some parts. The three noticed that Katy was grinning animatedly and almost laughing too loud. It was like she was forching herself to laugh. They glanced at each other. Something was up with Katy. The question was what?
"I'm sure you'll get through the exams," Katy encouraged. "You're one of the bravest ninjas I know."
Naruto brightened up at that.
"Really?"
She nodded.
He grinned even wider.
"Thanks, Katy-chan!"
"Your welcome." She turned to Sasuke. Sasuke immediately saw the scared look in her eyes. "Hey, Sasuke? I need to tell you something before you enter the forest."
Sasuke heard the quivering tone in her voice. It wasn't hard to identify when she was afraid since she used it alot in the past.
"What is it?"
Katy opened her mouth to say something when another interrupted her.
"Alright, maggots! It's time for the Second part of the Chunin exams to begin!" Anko announced. She pointed over to the stand with the curtain in front of it to avoid others seeing which ninja got which scroll. "Turn in your consent forms over there where you will get your scroll. Once that is done, pick a gate where your team will enter the forest. One team per gate!"
"We should get going now. Bye, Katy, Haku." Sakura waved goodbye to the two and startd walking over to the stand. Naruto gave a quick grin and wave before following her. Sasuke nodded at Haku in goodbye. He smiled in return. Sasuke was about to go when Katy suddenly hugged him. He was caught off guard by the hug and didn't understand until she spoke.
"You better be careful in there, Sasuke. I don't want to hear that you died in this forest or-or worse!"
Sasuke could feel that Katy was shivering. Not from the cold, but from fear. She must have been really scared. His almost-brotherly side appeared as he hugged her.
"Stop worrying or you'll get wrinkle lines," he muttered. "I'll be fine."
"But still! I'm...I'm afraid that..." She trailed off, afraid that someone would overhear them. Katy cried in surprise when she felt a flick to her forehead. She glanced at Sasuke. He scowled.
"Just stop. I'll be alright. I'll come back in one piece, okay?"
Katy frowned, releasing Sasuke. She bit her lip and nodded.
"Fine. But I'm holding you to that promise, got it?"
Sasuke smirked.
"Got it."
He walked away from Haku and Katy to go to Naruto and Sakura. He met up with them and waited until they could turn in their forms. Katy followed their movements towarsd the stand until they disappeared behind the curtain. She didn't relax fro one second even when they walked back in sight and disappeared again to go to a gate. She was really worried for what would happen to them.
"Don't worry, Katy-chan." Katy practically jumped out of her skin at the sound of Haku's voice next to her. Whirling her head towards him, she saw him giving her a comforting smile. "They'll be fine. I believe they will be."
"Yeah..." Katy gave a half-hearted smile though it seemed real to Haku. "I guess you're right."
I just hope you're right, she added quietly. She had a feeling that something bad was going to occur in the future. She just knew it.
---
Yay! I'm finally done with this chapter! And just in time for the Super Bowl too! Not that I care. I only watch it for the commercials.
Ugh. I'm really sorry this is late. I'm getting really busy with school work, especailly for World History. We're doing this big project for our World War I unit where we're having a 'Grand Jury Inquiry' as my teacher puts it. Six countries are going to plead their case that they did not start the war and my classmates have to act as lawyers in order to argue their cases to the Justices. And I'm a justice. That's bad in a way because I have to ask questions throughout the arguments and I'm really shy. I'm freaking out about this because I have to ask or else I'll get a bad grade for the project. Ugh, this sucks!
Okay, now that I'm over that, I have something to ask you guys. I'm already past the Itachi returns arc and I need help deciding something. This is going to reveal some of the stuff that's goiing to happen in the future but oh, well. I need help on whether or not Katy should be put into a ninja team with Haku, Anko, and another person I shall not reveal yet since she could become a ninja if she wants. I want her to, but then I don't. So please, please, please help me decide!
Please tell me if I should or not in your reviews! Please review as always!
-Twilit Angel
P.S. here's the translations for the Filipino words. I'm Filipino myself so I know them by heart! XP
Balot- Duck egg
Lumpia- Egg rolls filled with meat and vegetables
Ube- A sweet purple yam that can be used for all types of food such as a cake flavor, filling, and in ice cream (Which I totally love!)
Kuya- Older brother. I call my brother this all the time and I can't call him by his first name. It's too weird to. I actually thought his name was Kuya until I got older. Like with Nii-san, it cand be used with friends and older relatives. Ex: Kuya Anthony, Kuya Sasuke, etc.