A/N: Fun Fact: This chapter was released over a week ago on the HoS tumblr :)) (it's just hosffblog on tumblr for those of you tired of missing out on extra content)
—
"For a place called 'The Forest of Death', this place sure is mild," Sasuke murmured as Team Seven walked along the forest floor, careful not to get too far away from the path they'd planned out.
The other two laughed quietly, keeping their eyes peeled for danger and their footfalls silent as they waited for the signal.
So far, their trek through the forest had been pretty tame, aside from the occasional giant insect or poisonous plant. All three shinobi kept their location seals within easy reach and their chakra tightly suppressed, their heads on a metaphorical swivel.
"Position?" Naruto whispered, his brow furrowed.
Katsumi swallowed, her eyes narrowing unconsciously. "No more than two kilometers away," she answered, feeling the faint trio of familiar chakra signatures almost due west of their location.
"They need to hurry up and find a team…" Naruto muttered impatiently, his mouth in a grim line.
Sasuke rolled his eyes. "We have a plan. Don't lose your head, Naruto."
"And pay attention to your seal," Katsumi added. "We're just moving around to keep any would-be attackers away from us."
The plan was simple but brilliant: Teams Seven and Nine were all outfitted with seals courtesy of Naruto that had two main functions: when one person saturated their seal with a small amount chakra, it transmitted the signature to the seals of the other team as well as the location. When Naruto made these, the original intent was for Team Seven to be able to find each other no matter the distance once he perfected them, but he figured the unfinished versions were workable for the next day as long as he made some 'small tweaks'. When both teams were strategizing, he introduced them to the group, they'd jumped at the idea as a way to signal each other during the Exams as their temporary alliance only worked if they could communicate.
Though Katsumi probably could find them without the seals, her accuracy depended on how close they were whereas the seals had a fifty-kilometer range with no drop in accuracy according to Naruto. When a signal was transmitted, the seal would heat up enough to catch the attention of the carrier of the sister seal. The way in which the seals operated was brilliant. Naruto had the idea of mixing chakra-induced magnetic ink in with the regular ink he used to make his seals so that when they were activated, the seal itself would shift on the paper in the direction of its twin in order to lead the squads to each other when they needed reinforcements.
Team Nine would hunt for teams other teams since they were more fit to track since they had both Suki's senses and Hanako's eyes. When they signaled Team Seven, they'd come in and help take down the other genin and the two squads would split the spoils.
The idea of just traveling in a group was tossed around until Sakura brought up the fact that them staying together in such a large group would make it borderline impossible for any decent sensor to miss them and it would draw attention to them. It was a gamble, hoping that the other team wouldn't double-cross them, but it was a worthwhile risk. Katsumi more or less trusted the other team and she had faith that they wouldn't turn on them.
If they did, she'd just have to eliminate them from the competition in retaliation.
But hopefully, it wouldn't come to that.
Naruto pulled a face, puffing out his cheeks in irritation. "I wasn't lo—"
Sasuke held up a hand, halting their conversation in its tracks suddenly.
"Suki's seal went off," he said, pulling the seal out from one of the pockets of his pants and examining the ink. "Let's move out!"
Team Seven sprang into action wordlessly. Sasuke took point as he circulated minute amounts chakra through his legs, jumped onto a decently high branch of the nearest tree and started leaping from tree to tree, Naruto and Katsumi close behind him in a spearhead formation with Naruto on his left and Katsumi on Sasuke's right.
She felt a spike in chakra and jumped a little farther than necessary, landing on the branch next to Sasuke, shaking her head at his newly red eyes. "Not yet," she admonished. "You might not even need it. Just wait until you have to."
He scowled, but said nothing, nodding curtly and deactivating the Sharingan as Katsumi fell back into her position in the formation.
It wasn't long before they came to Team Nine's position on the edge of a clearing by a decently wide river, their chakra signatures buzzing low as they suppressed them tightly.
Team Seven landed a few meters away on silent feet, their eyes on the seemingly unsuspecting team of Ame genin barely out of earshot filling up their canteens, hurrying over to the crouched girls.
Suki flashed a sharp-edged smile. "Took you lot long enough."
Sasuke rolled his eyes. "Traffic was awful."
Katsumi shifted her weight to her knees. "What's the situation?" she asked, cutting their banter off in favor of focusing on the topic at hand.
The girls had picked a smart place to meet as the sound of the rushing water would mask the sound of their voices.
They still took no chances, speaking hardly louder than a whisper. "Three males, all from Ame, likely between fifteen to eighteen years of age" Sakura answered. "From what we've gathered, the skinny one there," she pointed to a genin with a shock of black hair and a rebreather strapped on over his mouth, "he's the leader. The one with the glasses is a sensory type so keep your chakra leashed tight," she warned.
"What about the little one?" Naruto queried, jutting his chin in the direction of a smaller genin with brown hair and a mean look in his eye.
Sakura shrugged. "No idea. He hasn't really done anything or said much. The other two don't really talk to him. But watch out for that scythe. Judging by the way he moves, he knows how to use it."
Katsumi winced, examining the aforementioned weapon on his back. It was wicked, the silver blade glinting dangerously in the dappled light of the forest.
"He has the scroll," Hanako mentioned. "I saw the glow of the chakra in his pack with my Byakugan."
"Are you sure?" Sasuke pressed.
Hanako glared at him, clearly offended that he would doubt her. The boy scoffed and turned away.
"Can you tell which type it is?" Naruto chimed in, his bright blue eyes curious.
Hanako shook her head. "Just that he has the scroll."
"Alright, what's the plan?" Suki asked, not taking her eyes off the unsuspecting trio of boys near them.
"How much time do we have?" Sakura asked, her brow furrowed.
"Not much. Looks like they're going to be moving out within the next couple minutes," Suki offered.
"We ambush them," Sasuke said, punching his palm. "We rush them two on one and take their scroll. Done."
Suki sent him a smile. "I like the way you think, Uchiha. Who fights with who?"
For a moment, no one said anything before all five genin turned to look at Katsumi expectantly.
She sighed.
Katsumi had been hoping that she wouldn't be the one to do all of the strategizing, but if someone had to do it, she was a little glad that she was leading. From her admittedly short track record, she was pretty good at it as long as she didn't get too overwhelmed. Plus, it was flattering that they all wanted her to formulate their plan of attack.
And it wasn't like she hadn't already thought about it while Sakura was briefing them on the situation anyway.
"Naruto, you're with Hanako-san. Use your clones to cover her blind-spots. While she's rushing the leader, feel free to use seals to supplement her taijutsu to take him down," Katsumi said easily. "Sasuke and Suki, you guys take out the little one with the scythe. I'm assuming you can use that katana on your back, right Suki?"
At the brunette's aghast expression, Katsumi figured she was right and continued. "Right. You and Sasuke are the best ones to get around his scythe. Your footwork is bound to be better than ours since you're both swordsmen. Take him down but watch it with fire," she warned. "We don't want to accidentally destroy the scroll." She paused, locking eyes with the other team's strategist. "You're with me on the sensor. Try to get him with genjutsu while I distract him up close."
"Are we killing?" Hanako asked, her dark brows knitted together in determination.
Katsumi shook her head. "Try not to. But if it's between you and them, end it. Any questions?"
At the chorus of answers in the negative, Katsumi nodded. "Alright, let's get this scroll."
With that, they sprang out of their hiding spots and descended on the team of genin.
—
"Left!" Sakura called, prompting the other girl to throw herself out of the way of her onslaught in order to not get caught in it herself. She did, but only by the skin of her teeth, narrowly missing getting slashed by her dual tanto.
Katsumi frowned. "Whatever happened to genjutsu?" she called out, observing the girl's skill with her knives and the bloody slashes in the shinobi's clothing from where he hadn't been fast enough.
"Didn't want to waste the chakra," she got out between harsh breaths, slashing at the boy with vigor.
The boy tried his hand at dodging before he sent her flying through the air with a wicked kick to her chest. Not wasting any time to see Sakura right herself mid-air and roll, Katsumi immediately filled in the gap, forcing the older boy back with a series of ruthless taijutsu moves to wear him out, making the gash in her upper arm stretch painfully.
He blocked her kick, baring his teeth and swearing at her in a language she didn't understand when Katsumi substituted herself with a fallen branch, landing away from him allowing Sakura in a flash of pink to come in while he was still confused. Sakura slammed the flat of her blade into his nose, the loud crunching making Katsumi cringe.
The accompanying spray of blood was impressive, dousing the forest floor below him. He bellowed in pain, moving to attack Sakura before Katsumi knocked him out with a swift hit in the back of the head with the hilt of her kunai. The Ame-nin dropped like a rock, his eyelids fluttering shut as he fell, landing face down on the forest floor.
"Nice assist," Sakura complimented, catching her breath with a half smile.
"Tie up this guy. I'll finish Naruto and Hanako's work over there," she instructed, jutting her chin in the direction of the fallen Ame nin whose bonds were a little too loose for Katsumi to be comfortable with.
It looked like the boy had been trained in getting out of restraints and with a few more minutes, he'd soon become a problem again.
Katsumi walked across the clearing, her hands digging in her hip pouches for spare wire when Sasuke swore several meters away.
"Tch. We already have a Heaven scroll," Sasuke scowled, breathing hard from where he and Suki finished their fight and had been rifling through his bag.
Suki let out a whoop. "We don't," she sang.
When she tried to grab it from him, Sasuke darted away.
"Like we'd let you have this until we got our Earth scroll," he sneered, his grip on it tight.
Suki pouted and crossed her arms over her chest, opening her mouth to begin to protest.
"You'll get this," Sasuke said, waving the scroll, "when you help us get an Earth scroll."
Suki scowled. "Like hell we will!" she exclaimed, making a grab for it.
A spike of chakra and Sasuke's nondominant hand was on fire. "Or I could always burn it and we could start over," he said, moving the flames threateningly near the scroll. Suki's mouth closed abruptly and it was her turn to scowl while Sasuke smirked triumphantly.
Katsumi grinned at her teammate before turning her attention back on the task at hand, yanking at the wire reinforcing the ropes around his ankles before moving to the wrists. Sasuke was a lot more clever than she gave him credit for it seemed.
With nimble fingers, she finished tying the wire closely around the leader's wrists, tightening the ninja wire to the point of pain and ignoring the older boy's swearing and struggling. He kept insulting her, cursing at her in his native language, and pulling roughly against his bonds and generally giving Katsumi a hard time as she fought to keep him still enough to incapacitate him.
They should've knocked him out when they had the chance.
She gritted her teeth as the gash on her arm was torn open a little more in her efforts, causing a sharp pain to slow her down. The injury was from a kunai she hadn't been able to dodge completely during the fight. To be fair, it was originally aimed at her heart but she moved instinctively to the right and ended up getting sliced in her upper arm instead.
The blood was beginning to stain the sleeve of her shirt. The cut itself wasn't particularly deep she didn't think, but by the Sage, did it hurt like a bitch to deal with. She'd need to bandage that at some point.
A hand landed on her shoulder. "I got it," Sakura said, pushing in her good arm lightly away from the enemy nin.
"That's going to need stitches," she commented offhandedly, her sharp eyes taking in the injury.
"No shit," she replied with a frown. After their battle together, Sakura looked different to Katsumi somehow.
Fighting with Sakura was… an experience. The other girl was the textbook definition of calculated, helping Katsumi keep the sensor on his toes and not giving him a single centimeter of space. At first, Katsumi was miffed that Sakura seemed to completely disregard her instructions of staying out of the fight for the most part until she could pin him with a genjutsu but she'd even had an annoyingly good point when it came to the conservation of chakra. To be honest, the fight was over before it started anyway so it didn't really matter she supposed. Sakura had been ruthless with her dual blades, slicing with expert precision while giving Katsumi plenty of openings to finish it. Sage, Sakura was impressive and Katsumi respected the other girl a lot more after fighting alongside her. Sakura was skilled and dependable now, much different from the girl she was before they were made genin.
Katsumi got up off her knees, handing control of the restraints to her and pulled out her first aid kit from her bag. After getting her fingers on a roll of bandages and rolling her sleeve up to wrap them carefully around her upper arm, she watched as the pink-haired kunoichi went through a half dozen hand signs, finishing in a tiger seal. The air around them shifted slightly, wavering like it does when the weather gets blisteringly hot. The boy slipped quickly into unconsciousness with the other two as Sakura cast a genjutsu over the three of them.
"That'll keep them knocked out for the next day or so."
The rush of air next to Katsumi signaled their teammates coming over to inspect their handiwork.
"There's no one around for, like, the next two kilometers," Naruto reported slightly out of breath from his trek through the woods with Hanako. They finished their fights first and were sent to scout the area and look out for any unwanted visitors.
Hanako nodded. "We should head northwest parallel to the river. I saw a team from Kusa heading to the tower six kilometers from here," Hanako offered, shifting her weight to her other side. "We are halfway there at this point. We should finish this promptly so we can return to civilization."
"Sounds fine to me," Suki chirped, darting around to collect stray kunai littering the clearing where they'd fought.
"Do we leave them like that?" Naruto asked, gesturing to the sleeping boys they'd taken down earlier.
"They could die out here, y'know."
Sakura bit her lip, looking torn. "Well—"
Hanako scoffed, cutting Sakura's response off. "They were well aware of the risks of competing in the Exams," she replied, wiping a bit of blood away from her brow a result from a cheap shot her opponent got on her. Her glare darkened when she focused on the sleeping figures of the boys.
"They'd do the same to us," Sasuke added, his eyes hard.
They were all quiet for a moment, as they realized the situation, all collectively feeling a lot older than twelve and thirteen. Katsumi paused in dressing her wound. She was conflicted. She had no real allegiance to these boys or Amegakure as a whole. Gods, if she remembered correctly, the village hated Konoha and would've gladly slit their throats in retribution for what transpired during the Second and Third Shinobi World Wars. It was just… as they were, sleeping and quiet, they weren't a threat. Every time she had every attacked someone with the intent to kill — other than with the bell test — it was because they posed an immediate threat to her or her team. But right now? Those boys were as harmless as the day was long. She couldn't justify leaving them completely helpless in the middle of the Forest of Death.
It was cruel.
"Sakura, how far away can you be to release an illusion on someone?" she asked with the end of her bandage in between her teeth, tying it off carefully with a measured tug.
Her green eyes widened at the question before looking upwards as she thought. "Uh, like a kilometer and a half away, maybe?
Suki jogged up to them again, her pack bulging with the other supplies she'd pilfered from their opponents. "So what's the plan? Are we separating to go track the other team?"
"We'll go track the Kusa team while you guys finish up here," Katsumi instructed, rolling her sleeve back down and adjusting the weight of the bag across her shoulders. "Wait for our signal and we'll do this all over again. Hopefully, they have an Earth scroll this time. We get our scroll, we give you yours, we book it to the Tower, and we finish before nightfall. Everyone's happy."
"And what if you lot run off with our scroll?" Hanako asked with narrowed eyes, her hand on her hip.
Katsumi smiled blandly. "We still need you guys and while we have what you need, you still need us; the status quo remains unchanged. Now I'm trusting that you won't double-cross us because we certainly have no plans of betraying you guys so let's just make this easy and be honorable, ne?"
If Katsumi were paying attention to anyone other than Hanako, she would've seen the begrudgingly impressed expression on Sakura's face, the respect on Suki, and the satisfaction lining the faces of both of her boys. Hanako's face twisted like she'd tasted something sour and she grunted, turning away from Katsumi and stalking over to the river, taking out a canteen and filling it up, all the while still fuming.
Suki whistled low. "Well, if Hanako didn't hate you already, she definitely does now."
Katsumi shrugged. "I'm not worried. She can hate me all she wants after we finish the Exams."
"Just go ahead and get on those Kusa-nin. We'll be waiting for your signal," Sakura said, nodding at the members of Team Seven individually. "Don't die."
Naruto laughed, a light blush on his cheeks, his hands akimbo as the other two genin got ready to move out quickly and quietly. "Ma, ma, Sakura-chan, we'll be fine! I mean, what could go wrong?"
And they were off.
—
They were closing in on the trio of faint signatures when they disappeared from Katsumi's senses completely.
She lost her balance on her next jump to a tree branch, her misstep sending her falling five meters downward before she changed direction mid-air and landed on another branch, slightly out of breath as she tried to wrap her head around three genin-level chakra signatures disappearing entirely.
Both Naruto and Sasuke jumped down next to her, concern and alarm evident in their stances as Sasuke looked around for an invisible assailant on the branch where Katsumi was crouched.
"What happened?" he asked in a low voice, his daito out and Sharingan swirling to life.
Katsumi shook her head, straining her senses and finding nothing. "The signatures of the Kusa team completely disappeared," she said. "I can't— they're just gone."
"Well, what does that mean?" Naruto's brows were furrowed, his hand drifting towards the pocket where he kept the location seal.
"It means you've fallen right into my trap, children," a smooth, disembodied voice said from above them before an unbelievably strong gust of wind blew the three of them off a tree and the world went to hell around them.
—
A/N: We love a good cliffy.
Shoutout to Katsumi for keeping the status quo unchanged. I got a little inspiration on that bit from a really good movie. Kudos to anyone who can guess which one. Does anyone else feel like Katsumi lowkey would make a really good pirate? The next chapter is a mf MESS so good luck. It's suuuuper long too, so have fun lol (I might release that one early on tumblr too so be on the lookout...).
Entering: The Snake Sannin!
Shoutouts: The tumblr fam as always including the newest members of the fam: huohuaduvessa, jaehyunniespeach, and blogthreehundredandninetyfour ! I love you guys! Welcome to our merry band of crackheads.
Arkytior's Song: I'm glad you liked that, because I sure did lmao. Also THANK YOU FOR HAVING COMMON SENSE. It makes absolutely zero sense that in a world like theirs, where there is geographical, cultural, and ethnic diversity that they have no changes in language or even a differing dialect. Thanks for the support! I really appreciate it!
KyRa-ChAn008: Happy belated birthday, dude! Send me an idea for a oneshot or a scenario with the characters and I'll see about whipping up a birthday present for you. Thanks for the support and happy birthday!
Yuma: Thank you for the review! I like Katsumi and Suki's dynamic as well! The best way I can compare it is if Kiba and Shikamaru were friends, but even then, there are so many different nuances between Suki and Katsumi that it's not that comparable even still. Sasuke's problem is pride. He doesn't want to have to ask for help from anyone because he thinks that their team is the best. He's also uncomfortable around Sakura, and the fact that Katsumi made the decision without asking him for his input probably grated a bit. He likes having control and Katsumi regularly takes it from him. It's both endearing and infuriating and Sasuke is trying really hard to separate the two. I think your observations on Naruto and Sasuke are pretty spot on on whether or not they're going to get promoted especially when you take into account the Council and their roles in who gets picked for a promotion. But honestly, at the risk of sounding sexist, I think the girls of Team Nine and Seven have pretty good shots at becoming Chunin.
But we'll see.
Thanks for the support and the review!
Krei: Your english is great, my friend! Better than mine lol. And tbh, you're spot on as to who is likely to get a promotion when all of this is said and done, but I'm curious as to why you don't think Hanako would make the cut. One could argue that she's the most ready to lead people on missions so I'm intrigued as to your thought process. Also thank you, thank you, thank you for the compliment on my attention to detail! I try reaaally hard to make the characters more realistic and showing different parts of their personalities. I think it makes them seem more like real people that you may know in real life, but to hear you say that is really, really gratifying so thank you so so so much! I'm glad you like the story so far, dude!
kayna96: I'm happy that you like the arc! It's going to go sideways next chapter so strap in lol. The teamwork has been an interesting angle to work through so I hope you like how the arc draws to a close in the coming chapters. It's a lot. Teamwork is an important theme. Thanks for the support and for the review! Ilysm!
QoTP: I know the story has, like, zero romance in it (right now), but who out of the characters, if any of them, would you like to see together as endgame?
Mkay, onto the next!