"You idiots got nothing on me! I'm the best! I'm incredible!"

He was flying from rooftop to rooftop, whipping by telephone poles he'd grab at the last moment for sudden changes in direction, bouncing from wall to wall down shadowy alleys before racing out onto crowded streets, ducking low between people and sometimes between their legs as he darted ever forwards.

Yeah, the day before, that wasn't him. Bullying little kids. What was he thinking?

Bullying was for the weak. He would not be weak. He'd be the strongest!

This was what he knew. Pranks. And the thrill of running afterwards.

Most of the time, nobody bothered to chase him. He was a bit fuzzy on the whole ranking thing, but knew that only the fastest, even among ninja, could catch him - once he had a few seconds head start. Plus, usually his pranks were small stuff, not worth wasting the time of those better ninja. Ninety percent of the time, he could get away with a stink-bomb in a grocery or a dye-bomb in a crowded plaza.

Today was one of his masterpieces. It had taken weeks of prep work.

He had rerouted the lines underneath the fountain at the center of the eastern Market Plaza, where the high-end clothing stores and women's handbags and leathercrafts were. What a weird look for that fountain. Two big stone hands rising from a little pool, from which water normally jetted thirty feet into the sky.

He got those bitches today! Oh yeah!

With a kick at the valve, he'd set it off from under the street and oh yes, how sweet were those cries and screams. It would have been smarter to retreat through the sewers, but he had just totally needed to go up and see for himself. It was a physical need, and the rush as he burst up from the grate to the sight of dozens of prissy chicks with their kids and hubbies running like crazy as piss and semi-liquid crap rained on them from the fountain...

And of course, then there was the chase, oh yes. And every time he'd let those lesser, slower ninja goons get close, he'd casually kick at a pipeline or valve he had preset that they'd just happen to pass by at that very moment... and kablooey! They too were sprayed with horrific amounts of piss and shit!

He had kept up the chase for an hour so far, and he still had dozens of trapped areas set up ready to go!

The screams already carried for miles! And the smell!

He only felt alive during times like this.

What sucked was that sooner or later, the perfect moment always ended.

"YEEEEAAAAGH..."

Holy shit! His neck was killing him! He was stopped so suddenly his head whipped forward and then back and oh... crap...

"What do you want!"

That smarmy face looked like it was in much too good a mood. He wanted to smack it. He hated that blond hair. Who was that teacher fooling, trying to be cool with bleached hair? How the hell did he catch him anyways? Naruto knew that only mediocre ninja taught at the Academy, and this guy had caught him like he was standing still.

He flailed his arms and legs a bit. Crap. The guy wasn't just fast, he was strong - usually, when he whipped his limbs in sync like that while he twisted his hips and shoulders, the momentum would rip him free of a one-handed grip, possibly at the cost of a torn jacket, but it was almost always enough to get loose. The day before, he'd really felt too guilty about picking on those Saru-whatsits kids to try hard at getting away, but today, he was in super-escape mode. This guy didn't look like he even noticed the attempt.

"Okay, that was pretty awesome. In fact, it was so awesome, and today, you were so good, you actually got some jounin with this stunt. The Hokage himself sent me to get you. So that nobody else would get you first and kill you."

Naruto put on his best cheeky grin.

"Nobody can prove it was me," he said with absolute confidence. "All that stuff was chance, you know? Hey, you know what - you guys should really sue the contractor who did the sewage system. That's what I think."

The big jerk smiled.

"You are absolutely right, orange-boy. They'd never be able to punish you in court. Thing is though - you're a Ninja Academy student now. A cadet-soldier. And ranking ninja can do nearly whatever they want to punish their subordinates, without needing to prove it first, so long as they can justify it to their own superiors."

Oh shit. He had always been able to plead his way out of those civilian juvenile courts before. Was that true? Shit. The last time he'd pulled a major work of amazing-ness was just before he'd started ninja school.

"You're not my teacher yet though!" Naruto exclaimed. "So, uh. I'm not your subordinate?"

"...Hmm. Don't think it's ever come up before during the summer, in between terms. Usually, the ninja's parent decides when it's out of school - but you don't have parents, do you, orange-boy? Well. You should be glad I found you and not any of the others..."

"Iruka! You have that monster! Let me kill him!"

...Oh man. Another one. A chick. A chick he had covered in a spray of raw sewage.

"Um. Please stop laughing mister... You're... making her madder."

"Kurenai-chan! I can't believe he caught you with that! Bwahahaha!"

"I'll forgive you for being a shit, Iruka. I'll forgive that asshole brother/father/whatever of yours for dating my Mom, I'll even forgive that one time I saw you and Eikichi at the night club drooling over Mom and stuffing bills in her g-string... if you let me have five minutes with this... thing."

"Hmm, very tempting."

Naruto was shivering now. What the hell! The chick was almost glowing! Oh crap! His heart seemed to want to explode out of his chest. He could barely breathe.

"But nah, Kurenai-chan. I got the mission to get this guy straight from the Old Man. He decides, and you being such a stickler for the rules and all - well, you'll abide, won't you? Which means, you drop your genjutsu before the kid coughs up blood and such."

"One of these days you little twerp... I'm going to get you."

She disappeared in a whirl of leaves. And sewage.

"Waaagh!"

The spatters caught Naruto, who glared at the laughing creep. The ass had whirled him about in the air in front of himself like a shield.

"You are really something else, orange-boy. We'd better go before anyone else finds you and the killing starts to happen."