Genin Takedown! All Twelve Rookies Face Off!

Honako, Kyoko, Link and I approached Asuka-sensei, who didn't seem to be very pleased. "You're late," she announced, crossly.

"Sorry, sensei, but we got held up by the funniest thing ever!" I cried, my face splitting into a grin. "So Sasuke got his butt kicked by this guy with the biggest eyebrows ever and-"

"I don't have time to hear your excuses!" Asuka snapped and I fell silent. "There is something very important that I have to discuss with the four of you."

"The rules of the Chunin Exam, yada yada. Yeah, we know," Kyoko said, impatiently.

"No, it's not - well, you see," Asuka hesitated. "the Hokage made an exception on the rule that there would be squads of three for you four and allowed there to be an extra member to your squad. But the Chunin Exam won't be as kind."

"What are you saying?" Link asked, his Playboy away and his cigarette put out. Asuka seemed to have captured his full attention, as well as Kyoko's and mine. But I could tell by the look on her face that Honako knew what was going on.

"I'm saying that only three of you will be able to participate in the Chunin Exams."

"What?" I cried in disbelief.

"How come you didn't tell us this before?" Link yelled.

"This is bullshit!" Kyoko shouted.

Honako, however, seemed eerily calm.

"I will give you the four of you a few minutes to decide which one of you won't be participating," Asuka said, quietly and disappeared with a poof!

"Can you believe her?" Kyoko said, angrily.

"So...who is it gonna be?" Link asked.

"Me," I volunteered and three sets of eyes landed on me. "I mean, I'm an angel, right? So I've got this huge advantage already...I guess I can wait another six months for another shot at the Chunin Exams."

Honako snorted. "I should've known you would wimp out the first chance you got."

Kyoko turned to face her, her eyes blazing in anger. "I don't see you volunteering to wait to take the Exams! Tsunami is offering to give the rest of us a chance to become Chunin, not because she's scared!"

"I'll sit out," Link interrupted and we all stared at him. "No one would really be that bummed if I don't participate. And anyway, I could use the six months to really work on my skills. Besides," he turned to face me and winked. "I think you have a lot more to prove than I do, sweetheart." And he jerked a thumb in Honako's direction, who rolled her eyes.

"Link, are you sure?" I asked, suddenly feeling really guilty.

"Yeah. I guess I'll get going now. I'm going to take this," Link waved the Playboy in my face. "and - er - read it while I go to the bathroom."

Honako and Kyoko made disgusted faces, but I just grinned at him when I realized what he really meant.

"Okay. Thanks, Link. We owe you one," I said and he replied,

"Oh, I know," and then walked in the direction of his house. The three of us watched him as he got smaller and smaller, until he was finally gone.

"Wow," Kyoko said and I could tell by the look on her face that I wasn't the only one feeling guilty. Honako, on the other hand, seemed glad to be rid of him.

"He could use the training," she scoffed.

"What do you mean by that?" I snapped.

She shrugged. "I mean, we've never actually seen him do anything when we train. He's always buried behind that stupid magazine of his. We don't even know how strong he is - or isn't. We wouldn't want him to make Asuka-sensei look bad."

Before Kyoko or I could open our mouths in retaliation, there was another poof! and Asuka-sensei appeared in front of us. She noticed the missing member and raised an eyebrow.

"You sure seemed to make such an important decision awfully fast," she commented.

"He volunteered," Honako pointed out.

Asuka briefly reviewed the rules of the exam and then let us inside the room, where we kept an eye out for any of the other rookies. Almost immediately I saw Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura standing at the middle of the room and I sprinted towards them, Honako and Kyoko on my heels.

"Chief! You made it in!" I cried, happily and pulled Naruto into a tight hug. While Honako and Kyoko socialized with Sasuke and Sakura, I muttered to Naruto what had happened just five minutes ago and he gaped at me.

"I can't believe you volunteered not to take the Exams! It's a good thing Link stepped up or I would have killed you!" he cried and I grinned.

"What's the matter? Afraid of taking the Exams without me?"

"Yeah, you wish! But you and me have to become Chunin together, that's what I really meant!"

Suddenly I heard footsteps approaching and a voice squealed, "Sasuke! Where have you been?" I saw Ino running up from behind Sasuke and wrapping her arms around his neck, flirtatiously. "Boy, you have no idea how much I was hoping you'd show up here! I've missed those brooding good looks of yours!"

"Hey, you porker! Back off! He's mine!" Sakura yelled.

"Miss Forehead, they let you in? Still got those big frown lines on your billboard brow, I see!" Ino taunted.

"Leave my forehead out of it!" Sakura cried, and Ino stuck her tongue out at her.

I rolled my eyes. Just another Ino/Sakura fight over Sasuke, nothing exciting. But then I realized, if Ino was here then that also meant...

"Oh, it's you guys," a bored voice broke out above all the others and I nearly tackled my other best friend to the ground at the sight of him.

"Shikamaru!"

"Yeah, yeah, that's my name. Don't wear it out," Shikamaru said and then pushed me off him and studied the other rookies. "I knew this was gonna be a drag but I didn't know it was gonna be this lame."

Naruto, who already looked annoyed that Ino was here, now looked doubly annoyed after seeing how warmly I had greeted Shikamaru and the two were glaring at each other. "Oh look, the Three Stooges are here!"

"Hey, you know what, pipsqueak? Ah, forget it, you're a waste of time!"

While Shikamaru and Naruto glared daggers at each other, I grinned and greeted Choji, who was munching away on barbecue chips.

"Well, well, whaddaya know? Looks like the whole gang's back together again!" Kiba said as he approached with his squad and I gave him a tight hug, too. Naruto didn't have time to be annoyed at this because Hinata Hyuga had muttered,

"Oh...hi, Naruto," and he looked at her, puzzled.

"You guys, too, huh? Man, everyone's here for this stupid thing!" Shikamaru commented.

"Yep. Here we all are, the thirteen rookies!" Kiba cried with a grin and then looked around. "Hey, where's Link?" And then I explained to him and the whole group what Asuka-sensei had told us about only squads of three competing.

"This is gonna be fun! At least, for those of us good enough to make the cut!" Kiba said, grinning. "Right, Sasuke?"

"Kiba. Careful you don't get overconfident," Sasuke replied, coolly.

"Just wait! We're gonna blow you guys away! We've been training like crazy."

"What do you think we've been doing? Sitting around, picking daisies? You don't know what training means!" Naruto cried, angrily.

"Don't mind Kiba...I'm sure he didn't really mean anything by it..." Hinata said in that soft, shy voice of hers.

"Huh?" Naruto asked, turning to look at her and she blushed. Kiba turned to look at her as well but Kyoko jumped in, glaring at him:

"God, Kiba, you always were arrogant. Looks like some things never change!" And then I grinned, remembering how much Kiba and Kyoko disliked each other.

"You're right, Kyoko, some things don't change. Your ugly face is one example," he replied back with a smirk and Kyoko's eyes burned with rage. She started to jump on him but Honako and I had to restrain her, while he just laughed.

At that moment, Choji stepped towards Kiba and Akamaru but Shino stuck a foot out in front of him to stop him.

"What do you want? What's wrong?" Choji asked, and they both looked down to see a small, black bug scuttle across the ground in front of Choji.

"Thought maybe you hadn't seen it. Didn't want you steppin' on it," Shino said in that creepy voice of his.

"Why? You saving it for lunch?" Choji argued and I stifled a giggle.

"Hey! You guys!" We all looked over to see a tall man with silvery-gray hair and glasses walking towards us. "You might want to try keeping it down a little. I mean, no offense but you're the twelve rookies, right? Fresh out of the Academy? I wouldn't go making a spectacle of yourselves. Just cool it. This isn't a class field trip."

"Well, who asked you? Who are you?" Ino asked.

"I'm Kabuto Yakushi but really, look around you. You've made quite an impression," he said.

And he was right. There was a roomful of older, more experiences and scary looking ninja, glaring at us in a way that made my skin crawl.

"See those guys? They're from the Rain Village, very touchy. They all are. This exam makes everyone tense, and you don't want to rub them the wrong way right now," Kabuto explained. "You can't help it. I mean, how could you know how things work? You're just rookies. You remind me of myself a while back."

"Kabuto. Is that your name?" Sakura asked.

"Yeah."

"This isn't the first time you've taken the exam?"

"No. It's...my seventh." Did I hear that right? "Well, they're held twice a year so this will be my fourth year."

"Wow, a veteran!" Sakura cried in amazement. "You must really be an expert by now."

"Yeah, sort of," Kabuto replied.

"Cool! You can give us all the inside tips!" Naruto exclaimed.

"Yeah, some expert. He's never passed!" Shikamaru said, rolling his eyes and I had to agree. If this guy couldn't pass the first six times, what made the rest of us think we had a shot?

"Well, seventh time's the charm. That's what they say, eh?" Kabuto said, nervously.

"So I guess all those rumors about the exam being tough are true. Oh man, I knew this was gonna be a drag."

"Hang on! Don't give up hope yet. Maybe I can help you kids out a little," Kabuto said and pulled out a large deck of cards. "with my ninja info cards."

"What the heck are those?" Sakura asked.

"It's hard to explain, but these cards have been chakra incoated with everything I've learned over the past four years." Kabuto kneeled down and put the deck of cards on the floor. "I've got more than two hundred of them. So you see, I haven't been completely wasting my time. They may not look like much to the naked eye. In fact, they appear blank." To demonstrate, Kabuto flipped the top card rightside up and there was nothign written on it. "You don't want just anyone seeing this stuff."

"What are you doing?" Honako asked as he put a finger on the middle of the card and it started to spin.

"I'm using my chakra to reveal their secrets. Like this for example," he said and there was a poof! and the once blank card now had a small map written on it.

"Awesome! A map! Of what?" Sakura asked.

"It shows the geographical distrobution of all the candidates who have come to take the Chunin Exam: what villages they come from and how many from each village. Why do you guys think they all come here to take the exam together, at the same time? It's the foster friendship between nations, of course! International brotherhood and all that. And it's true enough, as far as it goes."

"But there's another reason," Sasuke said.

"Yeah. You see, the important thing is that this way they can carefully regulate the total number of shinobi that end up in each village. Thereby, maintaining the balance of power."

"Oh yeah, balance of power," Naruto said, with his arms crossed over his chest.

"Balance of power, big deal. It's all a drag," Shikamaru complained.

"What's the big deal about balance of power, anyway? Why does it matter?" I asked.

Kabuto put his hand on the card and with a poof! it was blank again. "If the balance doesn't maintain, one nation could wind up with many more shinobi than it's neighbors. And it might be tempted to attack them. So, they try to maintain the status quo. Makes sense, I suppose," he explained.

"Do those cards of yours have any info on the other candidates...individually?" Sasuke asked.

"They might. You have someone special in mind?"

"I might."

"Well, I can't promise my information is complete or perfect. But I've got something on just about everyone. Including you guys, of course. So which one is it? Tell me anything you know about them: a description, where they're from, whatever. Anything at all."

"He's Gaara of the Desert," Sasuke said and I perked up. Ooh, the hot one? I thought. "And there's Rock Lee of the Leaf Village, while you're at it."

"Man, that's no fun! You even know their names! That makes it easy," Kabuto complained and picked out two cards from his deck. "Here they are."

"Show them to me."

"Okay. First up is Rock Lee," Kabuto said and put his finger on the card and made it spin, and then reveal the information. "Looks like he's about a year older than you guys. Mission experience: eleven C ranks and twenty D ranks. His squad leader is Gai. In the last twelve months, his taijutsu has radically improved but his other skills are pretty shaky. Last year he got a lot of attention as a genin but for some reason, he chose not to participate in the Chunin Exam. This will be his first time as a candidate, same as you guys. His teammates are Tenten and Neji Hyuga.

"Okay. Now for Gaara of the Desert," Kabuto revealed the information on the next card. "Mission experience: eight C ranks, and get this: one B rank as a genin! There's not a lot more information on this guy. He was a rookie from another land, originally. But there is this: he survived every mission without getting a scratch on him."

"The dude's done a B rank as a genin and has never even been injured?" Shikamaru asked in amazement.

"What's the deal with this guy?" Naruto asked.

Damn. This guy must be really good. The last mission I went on was a C rank that was supposed to be a B rank, with Naruto and the rest of his squad. And when I did that mission, I died...twice! And for this guy to come back from a mission with the same difficulty without any injuries? It seems impossible...

Kabuto got out a new card and it revealed itself to be the first map: "Leaf, Sand, Rain, Grass, Waterfall, Sound. From the looks of it, they've all sent exceptionally skilled candidates to the exam this time around. Of course, the Hidden Sound Village is small. It's sprang up recently, no one knows anything about it. Those guys are a mystery." Kabuto wiped all of his cards blank and put them back in his deck. "Well, you get the point. The competition is going to be intense this year."

"So it would seem. It's almost enough to make you lose your confidence," Hinate murmured.

"It's a fine time to start talking like that!" Ino cried.

"Do you really think it's gonna be tougher this time?" Sakura asked.

"Oh yeah. In the four years I've been coming, I've never seen a crop of candidates with this much potential as this bunch. Yep, we've got our work cut out for us."

I was starting to get a little scared. Not for me, but for my friends. Okay, a little bit for me. I had already died a few times and I wasn't looking forward to it happening again, especially if these guys were cruel and merciless. But my friends and teammates could get really hurt in this exam, or die. And unlike me, if they died, they don't get to come back...

"Hey," Sasuke said in a hushed voice. "Don't worry, Naruto, we'll be fine." That was when I realized that my best friend was shaking. But not from fear, like Sakura thought. He was shaking from determination.

"My name is Naruto Uzumaki, and I'm gonna beat every one of ya! Believe it!" Naruto cried, a finger pointed in the other candidates' direction.

"Hey! What's that idiot trying to do? Get us killed?" Ino yelled in Sakura's direction. "Tell your boyfriend to keep his big, fat trap shut!"

Boyfriend? Something stirred inside of me and I found myself glaring at the pair of them with intense hatred.

"Who's boyfriend?" Sakura shouted, angrily.

"Oh, I forgot, you can't get one!"

"What'd you say?"

Shikamaru noticed me glaring at Sakura and Ino at smirked at me. I ignored him.

"YEAH! I feel a lot better now!" Naruto cried.

"Uh, can you say that again a little louder? Didn't quite catch it," Kiba said, sarcastically.

"You moron! Are you trying to get everybody in the place to hate our guts or what?" Shikamaru asked.

Naruto just laughed but Sakura came up behind him and used the crook of her arm to strangle him. "Naruto! You idiot! Why'd you have to go and say something like that? You obnoxious little - " Then she noticed the whole room of candidates was staring at her. "Oh, hi, everyone! Don't mind him. Sometimes he says these spazzy things! He doesn't really mean them, they just kinda come out! He's got this uh, conditon, you know? Kind of a psychological thing. He really should be on medication." She turned back to Naruto. "Now see what you've done, Naruto? You've hurt everybody's feelings! They think you don't respect them, but that isn't true, is it, Naruto? Would you just for once in your life think about what you're doing? Think about the rest of us!"

"Fine," Naruto pouted.

Two kunai knives hit the ground in front of Kabuto, who slid backward to dodge them and a Sound Village ninja appeared in front of him, almost out of thin air. The Sound Village ninja's fist swung at Kabuto, but he quickly dodged it. Kabuto smirked but then the lenses on his glasses broke, and shards of glass fell to the ground.

"Oh, I get it. So it was that kind of attack," Kabuto observed, removing his glasses that now had empty frames.

"Hang on, I saw it all! He dodged the attack. How did that happen?" Sasuke asked, stepping forward.

"It must've come closer than it looked. Heh. Look at him, acting like it was nothing. Real tough guy," Shikamaru said.

Suddenly, Kabuto gasped and then fell to his knees, looking petrified. He then vomited.

"What? Did he just - ?" Naruto started.

"Kabuto, what's wrong? What is it?" Sakura asked.

Three Sound Village ninja stood smirking while Kabuto started to cough. Naruto and Sakura ran to his side.

"Hey, Kabuto! Are you okay?" Sakura asked.

"Yeah. I'm fine..." he replied, and started to get up.

"Are you sure?" Naruto asked.

"Not such a tough guy, after all, I guess. Maybe that's why he's on his seventh try," one of the Sound Village ninja said, menacingly.

"Write this on your little card, punk! The genin from the Sound Village will be Chunin when this is over. Guaranteed," another one said.

Suddenly, a large puff of smoke erupted at the front of the class and a hard voice called out, "Alright, you baby-faced degenerates! Pipe down and listen up!" A large man with many scars on his face had said those words, and dozens of Chunin were standing behind him. "It's time to begin. I'm Ibiki Marino, your proctor. And from this moment, your worst enemy."

"Man. This guy is like the male version of Asuka-sensei," Kyoko whispered to me and I nodded in agreement.