It's been a minute... I'm so sorry :(
I hope you enjoy this chapter, I'll try to get the next one out sooner. I'm not very good at fighting scenes, but hopefully that won't take away from everything else. The next chapter will start at the beginning of Gaara and Lee's fight.
Also I don't have a beta reader, if you see anything I should fix please let me know!
The match between Sasuke and Akado happened much the same as it did the first time. Naruto is a little surprised he had expected anything different, even with the absence of the curse mark. Though Sasuke is undoubtedly having a much easier time of fighting the other male without the pain coursing through his body. In the end, Sasuke still won by using Lee's taijutsu move, except this time Kakashi doesn't have to step in and support him or take him away for a poor attempt at sealing Orochimaru's mark. Instead Sasuke walks up the stairs to where Naruto is standing with the other rookies, a satisfied smirk on his face.
"Good job Sasuke-kun! You were so cool out there!" Ino gushes over him, face bright red.
"Hn." He walks past her, staring down Lee who is studiously looking back at him with a wide grin.
Lee is about to say something, but Naruto steps between them, not wanting any sort of confrontation right now - good or bad.
"Teme! You stole Lee's move! That's cheating!" Arms crossed, Naruto glares. There's no real heat behind it, and he hopes no one notices how half-assed it really is. Sasuke rolls his eyes.
"Shut up, dobe." He continues walking past the two of them, now staring at Gaara. The redhead however is staring at Naruto instead of paying any attention to the Uchiha.
Shikamaru lets out a heavy sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose. Really he shouldn't be surprised at this point, Naruto will always be Naruto after all. Even in his attempts in acting.
"Oi, Naruto. Come over here for a moment." Shikamaru whispers over to him, the blonde perking up slightly. They walk a little ways from the group, settling against the wall behind them. They don't say anything to each other, just sitting on the ground and looking over each of the people leaning over the railing to watch Shino's battle. They're both confident in things continuing as they had, so there's no need to watch what happens. Naruto sits as close as he can to Shikamaru, their knees pressed together. Right now they are both heavily suppressing their emotions and memories - if not then they would without a doubt break apart. They can't let anyone know something is different, that something has happened. They're already stretching things by sticking together like this. Yes, they had been friends at this point in their life, but not this close. Ignoring each other though would be too much for either of them. They will have time to mourn when the preliminaries finish and they are sent home.
If Naruto's apartment can be called home. Shikamaru frowns.
"Hey, Sasuke-kun?" Sakura's voice reaches them, her words uncertain.
"What?" he asks sharply, focused on the swarm of bugs.
"Do you remember Naruto and Shikamaru being close before?" she asks him, and Naruto lets one of his eyes partially open to squint at his two teammates.
"Who cares? Just ignore the two idiots." Sasuke tells her. Sakura sighs, turning back to the match.
"Maybe we should -" Naruto starts, voice low, but Shikamaru snags his hand into an almost too-tight grip.
"No. Whatever else we do, we stick together."
Naruto seems to visibly melt, a soft smile on his face that rarely ever happens. He squeezes Shikamaru's and gently before letting it go. "Take a nap, Shika."
"Tsk. Troublesome, I was already planning on it."
Naruto rolls his eyes, turning his attention to those around them. Gaara is still staring at him, the attention causing Temari and Kankuro to shift anxiously. Even Sasuke is beginning to grow a faint twitch in his eye at being so blatantly ignored by the teen he had previously challenged.
Naruto hopes Gaara won't try to approach him, it's already taking everything he has to be around his friends. Adding Gaara to the mix would tip Naruto over the edge. There had been a point in time, shortly after Chio brought Gaara back to life, that Naruto had a huge ass crush on the redhead. Nothing ever came of it and the feelings eventually fizzled to nothing, but Naruto still cares a great deal for him.
A soft sigh leaves him, Naruto's body relaxing. Nothing is going to happen right now, and there's still time before his own match so he rests his head against Shikamaru's shoulder. The other only slides an eye open for a few seconds, relaxing again when he sees it's just Naruto. It takes a few moments, but eventually they're both in a light slumber against the wall, relaxed. If anyone knew where to look though, they'd see the slight tension lingering in their bodies and hands strategically placed near weapon pouches.
"Hey, since when was Shikamaru so close to Naruto?" Kiba asks no one in particular. He's turned to stare at the apparently deeply sleeping teens.
"Dunno." Choji answers him, waving Ino off to her fight with Sakura.
"How can they both just sleep like that? Shikamaru I understand, but Naruto too? Usually he's so full of energy it's annoying." Kiba wrinkles his nose at the memories of bouncing loud blonde. Choji nods along, mouth full of his favorite chips. They fall back into silence, watching the fight underneath them.
"Sakura-san!" Lee's voice reaches Naruto, the sound muffled. He shifts slightly, then settles back down when someone shushes the boy. Naruto assumes it was Kakashi, but it's hard to be certain without actually looking.
"Is she going to be okay?" Lee asks, much quieter this time. Thinking over the timeline, Naruto realizes there's not much time before it's Shikamaru's turn. He's curious about how his friend will handle the fight this time.
"Yes, they should both wake up in about half an hour." Kakashi responds, and a collective sigh of relief follows his words.
Falling back into his slumber against Shikamaru's shoulder, the warmth of his body heat helps Naruto relax. It feels like he's only had his eyes closed a few minutes when there's a sudden shaking motion coming from the body beside him.
Jerking right into full wakefulness, Naruto snaps his eyes open and switches to a crouched position over the sleeping Shikamaru, a kunai in hand and a growl just barely suppressed. The glare on his face immediately fades at seeing Asuma crouched beside them, hands raised in the air. The man's face is full of shock, and Naruto quickly realizes his mistake. Putting the weapon away, Naruto tries to laugh.
"Heh. Sorry about that Asuma-sensei! Wow, that was some intense dream I had just now! There was soo much ramen but someone wanted to steal it!" Naruto laughs, hand roughly rubbing at his neck. The words seem to make the man calm down, taking Naruto's words at face value.
"That's alright Naruto. It's Shikamaru's turn now though so I need to wake him up." Asuma says, smiling down at Naruto. He notices he's still standing protectively in front of Shikamaru and smiles sheepishly. Turning around to wake him up, Naruto isn't surprised to find bored eyes already open and staring at him. There's a slight tilt of his lips, something Naruto knows means Shikamaru's rather amused.
"Let's get this over with." Shikamaru says, standing with a heavy sigh.
"Be careful down there Shika!" Naruto says loudly. Though they both know he's warning Shikamaru to keep his guard up. The presence coming from Orochimaru is extremely difficult to not notice, the man standing in the viewing section with the Hokage.
"Yeah, yeah." Shikamaru says, jumping down from the balcony.
"Why didn't he just walk?" Ino asks, confused.
"Walking takes a lot more effort." Naruto answers her, only to have four different people staring at him like a weird specimen.
"What? Is there something on my face?" He asks, patting his cheeks.
"Well, no, but…" Ino trails off.
"You're acting weird, dobe." Sasuke finishes.
"Am not, teme! I'm acting perfectly normal!" Naruto yells, glaring. Sasuke just huffs and turns back to the fight. Curious, Naruto moves to where he can see Shikamaru standing in front of Kin. He hopes Shikamaru doesn't do something like one of the techniques he isn't supposed to know yet. Naruto shrugs to himself a second after having that thought, Shikamaru is too much of a genius to do something so ridiculous.
A moment later, Shikamaru is making the signs for his shadow possession jutsu, the black tendril shooting out from his own shadow to connect with hers in just a couple seconds. Naruto frowns - the shadow was slower than usual. Maybe he did that on purpose? It seemed to be fast as before while in the forest. Naruto will have to ask him about it later. He expects the shadow possession to stop there, but it continues up Kin's body to suffocate her. Shikamaru doesn't let go until she goes limp, unconscious but alive.
Naruto is pretty sure Shikamaru was supposed to not go that far. He wasn't able to move the shadow possession like that the first time through this. Naruto sighs, which gets him a strange look from both Sasuke and Kakashi. He just sighs again, then wonders if maybe Shikamaru rubbed some of his personality off onto him.
It's his turn next, and Naruto wants to groan at hearing Kiba's excitement over getting lucky. Shikamaru is beside him a second later with a pat to his shoulder. Then Asuma is beside them, bombarding Shikamaru with questions.
"Tsk. What a drag. I've been training, Asuma-sensei." Naruto hears him say.
Jumping over the railing like Shikamaru had, Naruto stands in front of Kiba and Akamaru, wondering how to go about this.
"We lucked out Akamaru! This fight is as good as won!" Kiba says, getting a small woof in response.
"Yeah right, as if I'd lose to you!" Naruto yells back at him, not bothering with questioning Akamaru being there. The connection between an Inuzuka and their nin-dogs isn't one to scoff at like he had previously.
"Begin!" Is said a moment later, and Kiba immediately crouches down to the ground to gather his chakra. Akamaru stands to the side again, then Kiba is rushing at Naruto.
Jumping out of the way just on instinct, Naruto berates himself for not letting himself get hit by the teen.
"What the -" Kiba growls low, startled at not hitting his target.
Quickly changing directions, Kiba charges towards Naruto again and this time he consciously stays put. The force from Kiba ramming his elbow into him throws Naruto into the wall behind them.
"Ha! I knew that first dodge was just a fluke!" Kiba preens, grin on his face. It slips when Naruto stands up, completely unscathed.
"Don't underestimate me!" Naruto growls out. He's not sure on the extent of what he can do in his younger body still, but Naruto does know Kage Bushin is safe to use as much as he wants, along with the academy three. Or in his case, academy two. It will be easy to mostly keep the fight as it had been. But he'd rather get it over with. In that case, better go with option five.
"Come on Akamaru!" Kiba says, and the two start running towards them. Naruto has to keep the grin off his face when he sees the smoke bomb in Kiba's hand. He crouches slightly in preparation, waiting, then as soon as the three of them are covered in the smoke Naruto channels chakra into his Kage Bushin, then makes his clones turn into Akamaru. There's a loud yip to his left, Kiba attacking one of his clones. It's swiftly followed by a curse, then a second one when Kiba seems to realize what's happening.
"Akamaru! Akamaru where are you?" He tries, only to get around fifty responses. Naruto changes himself into Akamaru as well just as the rest of the smoke lifts, and he grins at the shock coming from everyone.
"But that's impossible! You couldn't do any of the academy three well enough to pass before!" Kiba says, scowling. Naruto has one of the Akamaru clones respond, getting a smirk from Kiba just before he pounces and the clone pops. Another one yips, and as if that was the signal they all attack Kiba, jumping onto the boy with teeth and claws out to latch on. Naruto makes sure to keep one of them back like before, to stand with the real Akamaru who's unsure on what to do in this situation. Naruto makes more just as they're popped, creating a seemingly endless number of clones.
Kiba is getting tired now, unsteady on his feet as he glares at the frankly ridiculous amount of Akamaru clones. He's not sure how Naruto of all people managed to get so much better after a short amount of time.
"Akamaru, come here boy!" Kiba tries. He watches carefully as his friend dashes towards him, weaving through the group. A few of the clones move to stop him, but Akamaru chomps through them in quick succession. Kiba grins, but it quickly falls when he realizes Naruto has disappeared.
"Damnit, where'd he go?" He sniffs the air, Naruto's scent gone from the area.
There's a loud yelp, jerking Kiba's attention back to Akamaru. The nin-dogs body is partially buried, Akamaru turning his head in various directions to try and squirm out but he quickly tires and stops, whining softly.
"Akamaru!" Kiba says, beginning to panic. Naruto is still missing, the clones now dismissing themselves one by one. The area is covered in the smoke from the clones popping, making it impossible to see, when Kiba feels something grab his ankles and yank down, only stopping when his head is the only thing left above the ground.
"What the?" Kiba tries to squirm, but he's too firmly stuck, his head bobbing around in his efforts. A moment later he catches Naruto's scent again - a strange mix of forest, fire and sadness.
Actually, thinking about it, Shikamaru smelled like cigarettes, sadness and what could have been freshly fallen rain. Kiba frowns to himself; their scents are almost completely different from what they were before the chunin exams. He wonders if that should be concerning or if he should tell someone. Kiba shrugs it off though, refocusing on what's happening when he's declared the loser of the fight.
Naruto is making his way back up the stairs, grinning and hardly injured. He feels rather accomplished, having been able to defeat Kiba and Akamaru without such embarrassing measures, and without using anything major that would sound alarm bells. He's saving that for the final round.
Reaching the top of the stairs, he pauses when Hinata's soft voice reaches him. Seeing her holding out the ointment, her face bright red.
"But, I'm not badly injured, are you sure I can have this Hinata-chan?" Naruto asks her, scratching at his cheek.
She nods her head quickly, so he gently takes it, "thank you!"
"Y-you're W-welcome!" She says quickly, as Naruto walks away. Half his attention is on Neji who's glaring at the girl with as much malice as he can manage.
He put some ointment on a scratch though it was already starting to heal. Naruto sighs, stopping beside Shikamaru and hands it over to him. He raises a brow at Naruto in question, getting a shrug in response. Shikamaru sighs and stuffs the jar in his pocket.
"Troublesome, you could have said no." Shikamaru whispers.
"Could you say no to Hinata? Especially when she's about to be put into such a situation?" Naruto asks him, leaning against the railing. Kakashi looks over at them, curious, so Shikamaru doesn't answer. Naruto already knows he wouldn't be able to say no either.
"I don't want to watch this." Naruto says, Neji already standing in the arena waiting for Hinata.
"It will not be an easy fight." Kakashi responds, making Naruto jerk his head up towards him.
"Kakashi-sensei?" Sakura says, confused.
"Just watch and see." Kakashi tells her. Naruto's grip on the railing tightens, knuckles turning white from the pressure. Shikamaru shifts slightly, hating how they have to face this all over again. Have to watch their friends suffer, unable to do anything to help. Just like in the war.
The brunet shifts again, this time letting his elbow knock against Naruto's in a weak attempt at comfort. They've already shown too much to everyone.