Chapter 39

Gaara (one week later, approximate time: 7:00 AM)

His siblings were following him now. He walked up the stairs of the building the orientation and the first phase of Chunin Exams were meant to occur in. He ignored the budding crowd of people on the second floor, guarded by what felt like two jonin chakra signatures under a Transformation Jutsu. They avoided him anyways, though the jonin—what we know to be tokubetsu shinobi—did spare them a second glance, for having noticed and nonchalantly avoided falling into the time trap to weed off the more pathetic Konoha genin. Gaara didn't even seem to notice the look, though his siblings did.

They were among the first shinobi to the third floor waiting room.

Kankuro (approximate time: 8:10 AM)

Kankuro walked out of the first exam room with his teammates, breathing relievedly. "Not bad, right, sis?"

Temari gave her brother a look. "Did you even see the Konoha-nin? What are those proctors, blind? They didn't even notice that one girl rig mirrors to the ceiling. Sealed into paper airplanes, Kankuro. From scrap paper. Mirrors and paper airplanes. That would have gotten a civilian failing a written exam. A civilian, Kankuro."

"Well, the sealing jutsu used on them must have been something?" Kankuro tried. The exam, ever the shinobi exam, that they had just taken was not meant to be passed using one's own knowledge but one's ability to acquire it discreetly.

Temari shot him a glare. Temari had tapped out a message using something not dissimilar to our Morse code during the exams, asking for his aid, to which he responded. And that managed to catch a bit of the proctor's eye. In truth, the Konoha-nin's inattentiveness—or laxness—whatever it was—benefited all of the exam takers, including Temari, as Kankuro had in essence also done a similarly civilian-esque thing by passing her a minuscule ball of notes after "using the restroom". He didn't really get his sister's irritation.

Looking to Gaara, who had rather nonchalantly both cheated the written exam they were not meant to actually answer using their own knowledge and ignored the heated discussion, Kankuro felt like he was at a loss.

"Favoritism. Clear favoritism. We'll see how she does in the later parts of the exam," Temari said a moment, putting on a vindictive smirk.

Kankuro frowned. The next portions of the exam were bound to be interesting.

Katiya (approximate time: 8-ish. )

There was a separate room for the sensei to stay in since the beginning of the exams. The jonin sensei were allowed a space to temporarily reside and watch from what was essentially a "jonin break room" via Konohagakure's hidden camera system but as the next exam portion was meant to take up to five days to complete, they were able to do as they wished, so long as they remained in the isolated building in the middle of their "Forest of Death". Somehow Lord Orochimaru, that other Oto-nin sensei of the one dispatched team of Oto genin that existed, must have gotten a signal from Kabuto, thus leaving. Katiya paused, not knowing if she was meant to follow or to stay and cover up her lord's absence.

The reason for her lord's action now was obvious as there was very little one could do to influence a written exam in terms of making contact with a vessel, this second part, a survival challenge, being the first viable potential time of contact. The first part, having too many eyes. Lord Orochimaru very likely needed no aid from her in terms of making contact with the Uchiha he was after or sneaking past the Konoha-nin guarding the exam participants. But he was also the sort of person who liked it when his specimens surprised him with usefully deviant behavior and before leaving her, he had made a comment about how her chakra signature and water jutsu would be somehow useful in disguising his own (rather nauseously slippery) chakra signature, her chakra being imbued in her water and her water being capable of covering an object or permeating some sort of presence and decidedly being not nauseously slippery.

None of the other shinobi interacted with them very much, and by covering Lord Orochimaru with her own chakra-laced water jutsu, she could disguise his chakra more than what he, simply not flaring his chakra could. Likewise, her clone of him would have felt more natural to sensory-type shinobi, putting out the same chakra signature as she did—or her lord did—with his chakra disguised by her water jutsu.

Katiya let out an exhale and made two shadow clones. One to send out to follow her lord out and provide him whatever aid necessary, and one to remain under a Transformation Jutsu and fill in for his absence among the other sensei. The clones dumped themselves out of the bathroom window as she walked back out into her main quarters and quite casually went back to her reading.

Kankuro* (approximate time: 2:30 PM)

Gaara took the lead into the forest, as was expected for his command position. But when Gaara led them without prior scouting, warning, or verbal coordination, to one random batch of Ame-nin, Kankuro was not surprised. He took in their weaponry—umbrellas and shinobi standard gear as they made death threats. Kankuro was slightly older than the majority of the Konohagakure genin participants, but the shinobi in front of him were older than that—older than he or his sister were—meaning potentially higher amounts of battle experience.

"I've heard enough out of you. Let's make this quick. I don't want to waste time on you," Gaara rasped unperturbed by the enemy's armaments and additional experience.

Kankuro, on the other hand, had his own qualms. "Hey—Gaara—wouldn't it have made more sense to follow these guys and gather information first? I mean, if they have the same type of scroll as us, we're just fighting an unnecessary battle."

"I don't care. They looked at me the wrong way… so now they'll die."

This is exactly why I didn't want to be stuck in a forest with him, Kankuro grimaced. Kankuro and Temari readied themselves for an attack, preparing to do a Body Flicker and a few subtle blocks because they both knew to doubt Gaara that would be so considerate as to shield his teammates. They were on their own to protect themselves, standing a meter away from each other and not being able to rely on their "leader".

"If you think you can kill us, then try it!" the apparent enemy squad leader in front of them yelled. He attacked with a Senbon Rainstorm, calling out the move and explaining something about his jutsu like an attention-seeking genin while it was being executed.

Temari Body Flickered and batted away the incoming needles, gratified to see her brother do the same with his puppet, a Transformation Jutsu hiding the action as he wanted to be discreet about his Puppet Jutsu. Kankuro nodded his head to his sister imperceptibly as verification he was alright, the only indication that either of them had moved. As expected, Gaara had shielded himself but not either of them.

"Is that all you can do?"

The head honcho of the enemy group was startled at Gaara's lack of injury at the hands of the Senbon Rainstorm. Kankuro, on the other hand, picked out the needles that got through his own puppet shield and checked them for poison. There was luckily none.

"A senbon rainstorm, huh? I have an idea… let's make it rain blood instead," Gaara rumbled. Their opponents startled again, realizing the jutsu he was using was a wall of sand despite their being in a dirt filled forest. Them, likely not having noticed the gourd on his back. And unfortunately to the enemies they were facing, Gaara's unique lineage and chakra circumstances allowing him to tap into the spirit realm's additional sand resources, and pull sand from there even if no hardy rocks were available for the creation of his weaponry—unlike the average Suna-nin that relied on the presence of existing sand.

"That's right. It's a defense and nothing can get through it. He carries around all that sand in a gourd on his back, and when he's attacked, he uses the power of his chakra to harden the sand. It's a jutsu only Gaara can do. And somehow, it happens independently of his will so that any attacks against him are doomed to fail," Kankuro announced, glazing over all the more important details but giving their enemies and bystanders enough to learn to fear the Jinchuriki of Sunagakure.

"Yeah? Well we'll see!" The Ame-nin still seemed adamant they'd win. "Just give me a break," they said to Kankuro's analysis.

That punk's a dead man…

"Sand Coffin," Gaara said in response as his sand rose to grasp his prey, ignoring their words. "… All I have to do is cover your big mouth and you'll be dead." He grabbed one of the discarded umbrellas and held it up, expecting rain. "But that would be too easy and too boring…" Gaara lifted one of them—the leader one—up into the sky, a giant sand-made cloud. "Sand Burial," he intoned as he squeezed the water out of the sand-wrapped human cloud above himself.

Temari and Kankuro covered themselves again, this time from the "rain" that would be much harder to wash off than that of water.

"There wasn't any pain," Gaara said listlessly, seemingly talking more to himself than the remaining two Ame-nin. "I crushed him with more force than necessary so it was over quickly… the corpses' bitter crimson tears flow and mingle with the endless sand, feeding the chaos within me and making me stronger..."

"Just take the scroll—go on—"

"Just take it. Just please spare us."

Kankuro bit the edge of his tongue as Gaara discarded the umbrella he had and used his Sand Coffin to destroy the remaining enemy shinobi. "We got lucky. It's a Heaven Scroll. Now let's head to the tower," Kankuro announced, focusing on reappropriating the abandoned gear and weaponry.

"Just shut up. It's not—it's still not enough for me…"

"Come on, Gaara, let's go," Kankuro replied to Gaara's bloodlust-driven revelation.

"What are you, scared? Coward…"

"Look, Gaara, I know this test is no problem for you, but it's dangerous for Temari and me. One set of scrolls is good enough. It's all we need to pass," Kankuro tried, playing on the one caveat their father set to Gaara's "leadership" and hoping the latter would abide by it.

Gaara wasn't.

"You can't tell me what to do."

Kankuro changed tactics slightly. "Alright. That's enough. Sometimes, you've got to listen to what your big brother says," Kankuro said, pushing himself into Gaara's closer vicinity and grabbing him. There was no intent to harm, so it was not automatically pushed away. Rather, Kankuro simply wanted to stop Gaara from harming other people.

And Gaara himself thought his brother too insignificant a threat to pull his sand towards him. "It's too bad I don't think of you as my big brother at all... If you get in my way, I'll kill you," Gaara replied. Kankuro met his brother's cold stare before Gaara himself pushed off the arm that was grabbing him.

"Wait. Just wait. You… don't have to treat us like you're our enemy. Just do it as a favor for your sister," Temari said, trying to defuse the situation now. "Please?"

Gaara held his hand up for a Sand Coffin, contemplating, his fingers clawed. Kankuro inhaled deeply and he could see Temari's mental gears shifting, trying to figure out a way to get them both out alive. All Gaara really had to do was clench them. Damn it—!

"Gaara!" Temari yelled, seeing sand shifting in the air.

Kankuro closed his eyes as his brother clenched his hand.

"Alright. This time."

Kankuro reopened his eyes, sweating nervously. Gaara had only refilled and reformed the plug to his gourd. He trudged off and the two remaining Sand Siblings at the scene of the battle let out a long exhale.

They would be the first team to pass the survival challenge, the quickest team in the history of the Chunin Exams—using only ninety-seven minutes to pass a test that allocated them five days. Time at finish: 16:07.

Katiya* (five days later, approximate time: No idea.)

Her clone popped itself a while back—it had only existed for about an hour—and the information it brought back was less than useful. Her clone only engaged minorly with a random team from Kusagakure in order for Lord Orochimaru to assume one of their forms. The memories from it that came back indicated that Sasuke was successfully Curse Marked—with a curse mark formula she helped to create—according to Lord Orochimaru. But besides that, nothing notable occurred in the entire five-day period she was stuck in a wheelchair, in a building stuck in the Forest of Death, and so in her opinion, it took Konoha just a bit too long to inform her and her lord of the second part of the exam's conclusion.

She was all too eager to be walked into a bunker-like fight room.

There, there was the Lord Hokage, one who apparently had a relationship with her own lord and made her grateful for her decision to throw her chakra-carrying water over her aforementioned lord. The aging man of a Hokage gave some sort of speech, then it turned over to some sick Konoha jonin that coughed just a little too much to still be on active duty in her mind. Said Konoha-nin proceeded to explain that there were too many kids around so they were having a preliminary sudden-death round before then.

Katiya clasped her hands on her lap, leaning back in her wheelchair, watching the genin and listening to the background chatter. When the Uchiha participant's hand flew to his left shoulder from Lord Orochimaru's handiwork, the words of Konoha's tokubetsu shinobi taking notice were of interest to her. A scantily clad voluptuous woman Kabuto's files labeled as the very same Anko Mitarashi she was meant to be weary of was quite adamantly arguing to lock the Uchiha up. She had quite the heated discussion with a calmer mask-wearing silver haired jonin.

That must be the "Kakashi-sensei" of that kid's—Naruto's, Katiya thought as she bit back a derisive snort. The sensei seemed to have an odd set of priorities, preferring to mind the kid's wishes than the safety of everyone else, though she supposed there couldn't have been a real fault to that. Keeping people happy and therefore alive tended to be in the compromises one made.

Kabuto then ducked out of the exams, with a small glance to his disguised lord and another to her. Interesting. The conversation then shifted to the former as a subject matter.

"There's something before his time in the academy," Anko read off her clipboard after listing out Kabuto's battle record, "Do you remember the child? The one who was found after the Battle of Kikyo Pass? The only survivor…"

"I remember the story," the Hokage replied, "It was said a small boy was found among the enemy dead on the battlefield. He was found barely alive and brought back from a jonin from the medical unit. You're saying this is that boy?" the Hokage asked rhetorically, referring to Kabuto.

The woman named Anko nodded her head in response and Katiya filed away this other part of Kabuto's story she had not heard before. Very interesting.

Kabuto* (approximate time: 3:00 PM)

"Kabuto, what do you think you're doing? Have you forgotten Lord Orochimaru's orders?" his teammate yell-whispered to him as he passed by, en route to leave. Kabuto narrowed his eyes and tapped the metal plate on the back of his glove, vibrating the sound with his chakra to dampen the resulting noise to a sound-muffling buzz. His teammates, ambitious and loyal to his lord as they were, were also overconfident and far from the brightest to not have done so before asking him such a question.

"I'm leaving all that to you," Kabuto replied easily. "What's the problem? For someone with your abilities, it should be no trouble. This is your chance to prove yourself, Yoroi. After all, you've always wanted to take my place, haven't you? Go for it," he taunted.

You may be Orochimaru's favorite but be careful you don't push it too far."

Overconfident and stupid as they were, he knew his teammates would fail. And though their jutsu would spare them the deaths of people expendable to Oto, he took their suggestions as items ultimately of little value to him.

"Thanks for the advice, I'll keep it in mind," Kabuto replied dismissively.

He turned and waved goodbye to a few of his fellow Konohagakure genin—the ones that weren't on his team—and happened to be tasked with tracking over the course of the five-day survival challenge. He mentally apologized to them, those genin not on his team, that was. The words that came to his mind cited a desire not to have his cover blown. But perhaps there were another few items lingering on his mind as well, that excuse rendered shabby considering those items.

He knew having two "sensei" from Otogakure was extraneous—so it meant that something was there in his lord's mind that required two. While his lord being there could have been simply to view the Uchiha and the work done on him, that could have easily been reported on via himself, his teammates, any genin from Otogakure, or Katsu. Lord Orochimaru therefore could not have thought to trust any of them to report accurately, meaning each one of them were all getting only portions of planning information. But Katsu specifically being there as a sensei, rather than solely his lord, meant something as well.

There was something there in the early stages of the Chunin Exams for her to see, that he was not aware of. The question was whether he would be able to ask what it possibly was before or after he had to report in for Lord Orochimaru, or before or after his own plans would be set into action. And, how relevant this new development of Katsu's was going to be to him.

Katiya (approximate time: still don't give a damn.)

The first match was the Uchiha's versus one of Kabuto's teammates, Yoroi Akado. He was the one Kabuto stopped to speak to before leaving and the one who helped her siphon the chakra off of her failed-sort-of-not-failed attempt at replicating her mother's jutsu. Coincidentally, a disadvantageous match for the Uchiha. Katiya privately mused that the "randomized" pairings were far from randomized.

The genin dispersed and she moved to follow. Only to pause as the genin were walking up the stairs.

Stairs. Walking.

Her own team hiked up them with little thought, along with Lord Orochimaru in his disguise, leaving her on ground level.

Stupid—you damn ableist shinobi—how am I—!?! Wheelchair, you—!

Unfortunately, in most of the shinobi nations besides perhaps the Land of Lightning, elevators were not yet in widespread use. Katiya moved to fish out her scroll of water. A voice stopped her. "Allow me," it said.

Katiya turned. It was the same silver haired jonin Naruto had said she resembled. He had remained on the floor level to speak to the Uchiha, and so would be one of the last people to climb up the stairs. Katiya felt her wheelchair lift up before being Body Flickered up to the elevated viewing area.

"Thank you," she said once she landed.

"No problem," the jonin replied with a laid-back smile of his eyes.

"See! I told you! It's like a near complete replica!" Katiya heard the voice of Naruto shout.

Some distance away, Lord Orochimaru spared her a bemused glance, as did her own… students with their own surreptitiousness. Katiya mentally groaned. The relationship between herself and their target's teammate—no matter how nonexistent—might come back to bite her.

"Naruto! You can't say that about everyone who wears a mask—just look at that guy!" what appeared to be Naruto's pink haired kunoichi teammate yelled, pointing out another Konohagakure shinobi.

"Yeah, well that's totally different—I mean—just lookit how loose those masks are compared to—glurp!" Naruto was cut off as his kunoichi teammate proceeded to give him a hematoma.

"Heh. Genin, gotta love them, right?" Naruto's sensei asked sheepishly.

Katiya bowed her head in acknowledgment of the statement.

"Kakashi, Kakashi Hatake," he introduced with a relaxed two-fingered wave.

"Katsu, of no clan lineage."

Naruto's sensei's gaze seemed to shift at that. A shinobi of no clan lineage, or of a family that did not have a family name was not uncommon, but most people tended to use their home region as an alternative secondary designation. Though she had stated she was not of clan lineage, she did not introduce herself as "of Otogakure", the shinobi village she was supposedly from as was typical of a shinobi without a clan name. It implied a potentially wavering loyalty to her village—a lack of acknowledgement of the location as a home—or a sort of self-decided meaning she put into her position as a clanless shinobi. Both would have been atypical to villages like Konohagakure that valued community.

"Making friends with the other shinobi already, Kakashi?" someone else interrupted with an odd emphasis on the first syllable of the name. It was a bowl-cut shinobi in a green unitard under his flak vest, his hitai-ate worn on a red belt on his waist. The bowl-cut jonin gave her a thumbs-up and a gleaming smile before turning to speak to one of his students. It must have been a Konoha thing, the frequent use of thumbs-ups. "See this, Lee? See what the Power of Youth can grant you? Despite being crippled, this kunoichi here found her way to becoming a true shinobi—" there was an odd emphasis on those words as well "—What did I tell you, Lee? Determination and hard work. If she can do it—so can you!" the unitard-wearing sensei said impassionedly with yet another thumbs-up.

Katiya tilted her head to the side, trying to decipher the… underlying message, if any, of the bowl-cut sensei as she noticed the student he was addressing—yet another bowl-cut green unitard wearing person—this one, nodding his head eagerly. "Yes, Gai-sensei!"

"I… was only rendered crippled… recently?" she tried.

Kakashi cleared his throat. "Sorry, that's my—um—colleague—"

"THE MIGHTY MAITO, GAI-SENSEI!" the green unitard wearing jonin yelled with a flex of his right arm, little… miniature impassioned… flames? hopefully only metaphorically spewing from his eyes.

"AND I AM ROCK LEE!" the other green unitard wearing… genin… exclaimed, equally as impassionedly.

"AND I'M NARUTO UZUMAKI, BELIEVE IT!" yelled Naruto, just not to be outdone.

Katiya narrowed her eyes, slowly bowing her head (or cringing). She distinctly remembered being introduced to Naruto previously so she didn't know who he was introducing himself to. "Uh… huh," she replied. Yep, definitely a Konoha thing. Katiya coughed politely. "I… will just be over there now… with my team… from Otogakure..."

"Good call," the relatively normaler jonin of the people around her (though his electrically shocked explosion of hair might beg to differ) said out of the side of his mask-covered mouth.

Katiya fought very hard with herself not to cringe more, rolling herself over to her team, also trying very hard to ignore the stares she was receiving from all four of them... And the jaunty awkward wave of the Konoha jonin with the mask as he tried to calm his passionate colleague.

Oh, Konohagakure, why are you all on crack?

Author's Note

"Maito Gai" is the same person as "Might Guy"—I just prefer typing out "Maito Gai" rather than "Might Guy" to try and ease off the weirdness I get from the name itself… I had him introduce himself as Maito, Gai (with a comma) because English has first name then last… and IDK how the dubs do it.

Note on Gaara's sand jutsu: In the anime, there are other shinobi capable of using sand jutsu, only it requires the presence of existing sand (like Gaara has in his gourd). To sort of "up" Gaara's abilities compared to those other shinobi, those other shinobi can't "form" or pull sand out from the spirit realm my mind says exists to explain the unexplained NARUTO magic… while Gaara can. Sort of like the difference between Haku's ice jutsu versus that of a shinobi from Yukigakure.

(Anyone think Gaara during the canonical Chunin Exams used way more sand than the volume capable of filling that one gourd on his back? I'm capable of entertaining the idea that he gradually hollowed it out as he fought but… it still seems like more than what "ooh, yes, I tightly packed some sand to stuff more into my gourd made of sand" should be capable of in my mind… you can't exactly compress liquid water, for example…)