What An Excellent Plan
Part 4.2

Rin
リン

Obito seemed to almost have a heart attack when he saw his team-mate.

"Naruto, what happened to your hair?!"
Rin couldn't help but stare. They were stood outside the academy with all the other participants, awaiting further instruction. And then Naruto had turned up, with hair almost as short as Obito's. Little wisps of blonde hair sticking up on the sides of her forehead that looked oh so much like their soon to be Fourth Hokage. She grinned, rubbing at the back of her neck before letting out a little sigh.

"I figured it'd get in the way during an exam, can't let it bog me down." The blonde stretched her arms out before turning to look at Rin herself. Her expression became unreadable for a second before a small smile lit up her face, lifting up the whiskered cheeks as she smiled. "Hi Rin, been a while."
It had. With the war raging on and the whole alliance with Kumo just recently, every ninja had been busy. They'd not even been able to celebrate the alliance yet, the war with the other three nations was too prominent right now.

"Let's do our best Naruto-chan," Rin responded, clasping both hands in front of her body and nodding her head to the exuberant girl.

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Stood between them, Obito grinned, rubbing at he back of his head as his other hand adjusted his goggles. The raven haired boy had changed a lot since they'd been at the academy. He hadn't run up to her and called her name loudly; instead he'd approached at a slow, almost lazy approach, and he was actually early.
She'd quickly found out why though, Naruto had told him the meeting time was an hour early, and the boy had shown up all flustered and in a rush, only to be told he was in fact, on time. He'd dropped to the ground, stared at her for a bit before biting out a curse on his team-mates name. Rin hadn't been able to stop the giggle at that.

And then there was Naruto. Back at the academy, she'd been so mysterious when she'd shown up that one day, so far out of their league and so much closer to Kakashi than any other wannabe in skill level. It wasn't surprising though, her sensei had been quick to inform her she was Jiraiya's adopted daughter, which pretty much explaining everything. Hell, even her happy go lucky personality could be pinned onto the man's influence, so she wasn't too surprised. The way she clicked with Obito though, that was a surprise. Weren't too similar forces suppose to repel each other? Either that wasn't true, or there was a lot about her current team-mates that she wasn't getting right now.

"Okay then, lets head in!"

Naruto
ナルト

From the corner of her eye, Naruto watched Rin like an Akimichi watched a salad, with the deep scrutiny of one who did not want to be in this situation. However, her pride, and need to be a Chũnin won out over practicality, and so Naruto found herself stood alongside another lot of Chũnin hopefuls.

In front of them, Shōgo Yamanaka, current head of torture and interrogation, was stood upon a raised platform, hands placed behind his back and an innocent, almost cheerful smile upon his face. His hair was long and blond, as expected of his clan, with a grizzly scar running across his jawline and up his cheek.
He spoke clearly, though there was a hint of a slur -possibly due to the trauma his face had suffered through- as he addressed the lot of them.

The room was mostly filled with Konoha teams, but Naruto had managed to pick out the team from Kumo. Her eyes locked onto the female blonde, who stared back at her with an obvious display of curiosity.
She could imagine why; the girl would be able to sense the demon chakra with her, but not able to fully pin-point it to what it was. It would leave the girl guessing, just in the same way that Naruto was currently left guessing with the girl's own power too.
She was almost certain that this was the female Jinchuriki from Kumo, but didn't want to go right up and say anything. Not only would that give the game away, but they had such a tentative alliance right now, seeing as Minato and A had drawn it up in the field, tending over Bee's fallen form. There was no way that'd hold if they started messing the cloud's Jinchuriki, either one of them.
So grinding her teeth together, Naruto turned her attention back to the torture and interrogation specialists before her, determined to actually pass this exam. She could always approach the girl later after all.

"So, you will pass through one of these doors behind me. Each room contains a select variety of poisons. Out of the ten there, three won't cause any ill side-effects. Five won't cause you any serious damage; as as for the other five? Yeah, you won't be able to finish off the exam if you pick one of those. You must drink two different bottles. As soon as your team completes this task, you will move on to the next one. You have one hour, now go pick a door."

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Looking to her two team-mates, Naruto frowned.
Obito had two hands on his head, fingers curled up in his hair and a look of utter dejection on his face. The boy clearly had no experience with poisons what so ever, but that was to be expected of a Genin. Rin on the other hand, was training in medical ninjutsu, which meant that she'd probably be able to identify the worst poisons.
There team was well balanced really, both she and Obito were heavy hitters -well, Obito was getting there- and then the had Rin to back them up. Whilst Naruto loathed to admit it, it was probably a good thing that the girl was on their team.
Even if she was jeopardising Naruto's personal mission of saving the world.

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Stood before the wooden door, Naruto took in a deep breath as Obito pushed it open, following her raven haired team-mate inside. A long, steel table was presented in the center of the room, with nothing else. Ten glass bottles sat on the surface of the table, each a different colour and shade, the neck of the bottle corked.

Rin stepped in nervously after her and Naruto began chewing her lip, rubbing at the back of her skull.

"How long will it take you Rin? He said we have an hour?"

"I should be able to get them done before times up," the brunette murmured, making her way forwards before slowing to a halt in front of the vials. Her palm lit up a light green and it slowly hovered over the first one, a bubbling purple concoction that Naruto was sure she'd seen in one of Orochimaru's hideouts in a previous time. She would be forever thankful that the snake was long gone from Konoha now, having abandoned them some time before the war started when his experiments were found out. It hadn't been too long after her father had been announced as Hokage actually.

Sighing, she turned her attention back to Rin, who had now taken out a small pen and was writing on the glass bottle.

"What's it say?" Obito peeked around the medic's shoulder and Naruto rolled her eyes at the two of them.

"It's a maybe. A few notes on possible side-effects I could detect, but I'm not sure to be honest."

"That's okay Rin-chan, just keep going. I'm sure you'll get it."

Obito
オビト

Obito cringed, looking at the clock again to see that they only had five minutes remaining of the time allocated to them. And they only had four definite no's.
There was a light sheen of sweat coating Rin's forehead as she looked between the last six bottles, obvious pressure settling upon her shoulders.
Naruto was sat upon the table now, frowning at the liquids before her when the timer for the last five minutes came on. Rin actually jumped at the buzzing noise, whereas Naruto let out a harsh sigh before reaching forwards and snatching up the first two bottles in her reach.

"Naruto, what are you-" Obito cut off his sentence, watching in morbid fascination as the girl popped the cork out and downed the possibly poisonous substance without even flinching.

"Peach juice," she murmured, smacking her lips together before placing the empty bottle upon the table.

"Naruto, wait, I'm not sure-"

"Doesn't matter," Naruto grumbled, downing the second bottle in the same manner she'd drunk the first. This time, her expression twisted up in disgust and she actually dropped the bottle, one hand going to her throat and clawing at it.
Obito could feel the panic rising in his stomach as he looked to the door, an examiner bursting through not a second later.

And then, the biggest belch he'd ever had the displeasure of hearing since Kagami went on a stag do echoed through the air, silencing the three of them. Naruto had stood back up straight and was jumping from foot to foot, and certainly not looking like she was about to throw up.

"Kid, you just swallowed the worst one. How the hell are you still standing?!" The examiner, a Nara Obito noted, stared at the blonde girl in the same manner that both he and Rin were doing. The blonde oddity just shrugged, rolling her shoulders back before sighing.

"I have a very high poison tolerance. It'd take at least ten times the amount for me to even start feeling the effects."
The Nara murmured something about medically impossible, whilst Rin just flat out stared at the girl. Obito however, was more than willing to accept that. He knew his team-mate had an accelerated healing rate thanks to whatever funky bloodline she had going on, it wasn't that hard to believe it stretched outwards towards a poison tolerance, even if the Nara disagreed.

"Well, I guess you pass then."

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The next room was as boring as the first introduction room; steel walls, steel chairs, steel tables, and steely faced Genin staring at the three of them.

Naruto dropped into the first chair she saw, tenderly rubbing at her stomach as if she'd eaten something nasty.
Which she actually had, but Obito wasn't about to point that out. It was only thanks to her that they'd even gotten through. Rin had done her best, but Naruto had clinched them victory. Which meant this next test was Obito's time to shine, without a doubt.

Dropping into a chair alongside his blonde team-mate, Obito let his eyes sweep over the competition, frowning to himself as he did so. The team from Kumo that they'd run into was there, along with three from waterfall and two from grass. However, the vast majority was of leaf genin. Including-

"Naruto-hana!" The green whirlwind that was Gai launched itself across the room, narrowly missing Naruto's form and all Obito could do was blink in surprise. Naruto had managed to dodge him somehow. Obito had barely seen him coming, he'd never have been able to dodge that.
Naruto growled slightly, and Obito would swear on his dead grandparents that the girl had murmured something about how she 'understood Sakura now'.

"Gai, let go of me," Naruto shook her leg form side to side until the green blur flew off it, earning a chuckle of amusement from Gai's team-mates. Ebisu and Genma sighed, the latter shifting the toothpick in his mouth about, the only sign of his embarrassment at his team-mate. "I've told you. You want a date, you gotta earn it in a spar."

"Right Naruto-hana, the springtime of youth is upon us! I will secure a date with you or run five hundred laps around Konoha!"

"You said you'd date him if he won?" Obito stared at Naruto, who just looked back at him with her bright blue eyes, blinking once before she smiled lightly.

"Well yeah, if he wants to. Though he's about ten years too early to win against me."
He wasn't too sure at why his stomach bubbled at the thought of Gai being on a date with Naruto. And then Obito realized what the problem was. It was the same feeling he got whenever Rin went asking Kakashi on a date. Was it jealously?
Why the hell would he feel jealous if Naruto was on a date, especially with Gai of all people? Because his rival was getting stolen?
That had to be the answer.

Grim faced, Obito turned back to the instructors as the final bell rang; completely missing the look of obvious confusion that Rin gave him.

Yeah, here we go. Forest of Death next, as you can probably guess. I'm not totally happy with this chapter, but I feel you guys have waited long enough, so yeah.

Also, in another note, I've set up a blog for this on Tumblr, in which you can ask the cast of this story questions. And as long as the answer doesn't spoil the plot, then they'll be answered. The blog is 'whatanexcellentplan. tumblr. com, so if you feel like dropping by, go for it.

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A few reminders;
Sakumo is alive; has been since early Part 1, in which he describes an orange blur saving him and his team-mates on the mission, which they then completed. However, it got around that he was planning to abandoned the mission to save his team-mates, hence the disgrace.
Kumo and Konoha have a very delicate alliance, created due to the fact Bee passed out from the time-travel. Whilst it would be risky sending their own troops into Konoha, it is also a show of alliance towards the other villages they're currently fighting against; a show of, if you full out attack them, you deal with us too. Both sides benifit.
Finally, Pakkun found the scent by trailing back the on the group of orphans scent until it was a full group, until he found a scent that broke off from the others. Hence how he found the kid.

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AMERICAN'S & HOLIDAY GO'ERS!
Does anybody here live/regularly visit Florida Orlando? Because I'm coming over in July (the 8th I do believe) and ever time I've been we have never found anywhere half decent to eat. I'm looking for a place that isn't too expensive, but that's not too touristy rubbish. I'm quite fond of steaks or something like that, so yeah. Any recommendation would be good.

I've decided instead of the above buisness of the best picking the next fluff at 800 reviews, I'll pick a random reviewer and let them decided between the options from here on out.

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Well, that's all for now, thank you so much for reading,

Tsume
xxx