Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. It belongs to Masashi Kishimoto and I am making no profit from this story, it is only for entertainment.

Just to let you know that I will be updating a chapter of this story every Friday!

Chapter Summary: In which Team 7 get beaten up by their sensei for the greater good and Rio hates burpees

Chapter 13: We've Come So Far But We've Got So Far To Go

Genma entered the training ground, spotting his genin stretching beneath the shade of the trees on the opposite side of the clearing. As he came up to them, they each jumped to their feet still stretching their arms out. He paused for a moment, taking his team in.

They'd all grown in the two years since they'd become a team. Not just in height but they way they held themselves had changed; confidence really made a difference. They wore almost the same outfits as when they'd graduated although there were subtle changes. Naruto had traded his shorts for black trousers; Genma had made sure both the boys tied up the ends of their trousers with bandages within the first month. Hana had avoided this, sticking with her black biker shorts. He'd managed to wrangle the boys into wearing black on missions but in the village he just left them alone. Naruto's orange t-shirts were a major disadvantage in their stealth exercises even without the long, bright red hair that was tied up in a high messy bun today. Kazuya was slightly better, muting the purple tunic with an open brown waistcoat although he was wearing brown gloves today. Thank Kami for Hana; the girl stuck to black.

"Training today is going to be a bit different today," he announced, immediately attracting wary looks. "I know how well you work as a team but I'm going to fight you individually today to see how far you've come and what you still need to work on. Your aim is to beat me."

"Why?" Kazuya narrowed his eyes as the other two started warming up.

"I'll tell you later. For now, you boys go sit down. Hana, we'll start with you."

Hana darted through the bushes, finding herself back in the clearing. Her breath escaped her harshly and the forming bruises distracted her from her search for her sensei. She sniffed and rolled out the way, her sensei appearing where she had just been standing. She staggered to her feet, throwing a couple of kunai at her sensei to buy herself a breath.

Genma-sensei hadn't been kidding when he said he was testing them today. It had started as a taijutsu fight and Hana felt pretty good about it. Taijutsu was her strong point and her clan's style was particularly brutal; against a jounin though that didn't mean much. She had managed a couple of good hits but he'd got twice as many on her. It went downhill from there. He'd trapped her in three genjutsu and shot at least four fire ninjutsu at her while she had been in the trees, trying to catch him by surprise. Tracking him wasn't the issue; actually using his location to her advantage was. Even when she's used Shikyaku no Jutsu before entering the trees, this had only just kept her out of reach.

She thought she'd managed to catch him out with Bakuretsu Koinu, but the kunai released from the technique missed and that was the only technique she could use in such an enclosed environment. She didn't have that issue now. Her hand's quickly flipped through the familiar seals, the Haimaru brothers gathering around her.

"Juujin Bunshin!" she yelled, smoke briefly clouding her vision as her dogs transformed into her.

"Gatsuuga!" she screamed immediately after, spinning with one of the transformed dogs, the other two flanking the jounin.

She slammed into the ground, Genma-sensei jumping backward and deflecting the swipes from her dogs' claws with a kunai. She picked herself back up; she only had enough chakra for one more.

"Gatsuuga!"

She pushed forward, faster, further. She caught the edge of his arm as he dodged again. As the spin stopped, she felt someone grab her arm and yank her off her feet. As she felt the cold metal tip at her throat she tried to push down the tears of frustration.

"Well done."

She looked up into her sensei's smiling face as she was helped up. The Haimaru bothers transformed back around her and she limped towards her teammates, Genma-sensei beside her. She should have done way better; had she really made so little progress since graduation?

"Here."

Hana looked up from the ground to see Naruto holding out two water bottles. She took it gratefully pouring half of one down her throat and pouring the other into the bowls already set out by the boys. She patted the head of each of the pups, pride briefly dampening her disappointment. They'd done so well.

"You never told us you had gotten so good with your clan techniques," Kazuya piped up once she put down the empty water bottles.

"Yeah," grinned Naruto beside him. "That was insane! I'd be fucked if you ever broke out a Gatsuuga in our spars."

She smiled slightly, the boys comments helping to raise her morale even just by a little bit. She looked towards her sensei.

"You got me good with that last one," Genma-sensei congratulated. "They're right; your clan techniques and taijutsu are shaping up nicely."

Hana nodded in thanks, still catching her breath. She watched as Genma-sensei wrapped a bandage around where she'd hit and felt some satisfaction. At least she's managed to land a proper hit on him; he definitely hadn't been taking it easy on her either. Genma-sensei beckoned to Kazuya next and she lay back, staring at the clear blue sky and taking a moment to feel the soft breeze caress her heated skin.

Sometimes it didn't feel real. Often she though back to that lunchtime, how innocent she had been to how that one question would change her life. Nothing had been easy since that day and she wouldn't change a thing. She graduated early, the first Inuzuka to do so in over a decade; she was a part of the youngest genin team in the recorded history of Konoha; she had never seen her mother so happy than the day of her graduation; best of all, she got to do it all with her best friends.

Hana knew the other two lived together with Naruto's younger brother. There was a level of friendship between them she doesn't think she could ever compare to. They did everything together; it was rare to see one without the other. They even finished each other's sentences. The closest thing Hana could compare it to was Makoto and Nakano. They were the oldest members of the clan and have been married almost forty years. Every time Hana saw them they were either bickering with or helping their other half.

It hurt sometimes. When she would hear them talking about things that she hadn't been there for it made her feel like the odd genin out. When this happened though, she had to remind herself that the same happened with her; she had an entire clan behind her and her teammates could never understand that. When it was team training or missions though these thoughts never occurred. They were equals, each with something to contribute and something they could help the other with. Hana was the physically strongest with the strongest taijutsu and she knew she had her clan to thank for that. They were also united in their suffering; no one else had survived being Genma-sensei's students and Hana knew even without the bond they had formed in the academy that the training exercises would have united them.

She heaved herself back up, her breathing finally back to a normal rhythm. She returned Naruto's smile and look over to the clearing just in time to see Kazuya diving for the tree line.

Kazuya immediately channelled chakra to his feet and leapt up, sprinting up the tree. As he made it halfway up, he switched trunks and continued to run. He needed to think about this. He didn't have the Hana's taijutsu or Naruto's speed. He had medical jutsu and kunai; he was the smart one, the one with the books. He needed to figure out a plan. This would be so much easier if he knew where Genma-sensei was.

He climbed higher as he heard shuriken thump into the section of wood he had just stood on. Think, think! What can he do to get close? He had his chakra scalpels and his kunai. He had finally managed to distil the oleander from the Yamanaka's to a gel-like liquid he had spread on the edges of his kunai although it had taken him all night. Genma-sensei would dodge that easily if he threw it and he had a limited supply. He just had to get close to Genma-sensei without getting beaten up. He looked down to see Genma-sensei had joined him on the tree, swirling a kunai on one finger.

"A dead-end this early? I expected better."

Kazuya looked around. It was pretty dense but his sensei was right; he couldn't go any higher. An idea popped into his brain and if he wasn't so hopped up on adrenaline right now he would have dismissed it outright. This was an idea worthy of Naruto which is how he knew it might be crazy enough to work. As his sensei took another step towards him, Kazuya took a kunai out of his pouch, the gloves protecting him from the poison. He sent a prayer to whoever was out there before he pushed off the truck, beginning to fall headfirst towards the ground. He twisted to face the trunk and only caught a glimpse of his sensei's shocked face as he slashed at him, catching the same arm Hana had damaged before.

As he continued to fall he dropped the kunai, frantically pushing chakra into his hands and trying to reach the trunk. He managed to slam his right hand back onto the tree and a cry left him as he came to an abrupt halt. His shoulder was yanked forward and fully out of its socket. Kazuya cut the chakra and dropped the rest of the way to the ground, unable to roll to distribute the weight. His shoulder screamed and he couldn't move his arm but it worked. It worked and he didn't die! All he had to do was stall. Lessons on fixing a dislocation flashed through his mind but he didn't have time; he eyed the tree in front of him as his sensei's footsteps finally started back up. He ran into the tree, screaming as his shoulder was shoved back into place.

He barely scrambled away in time and shot back towards the clearing. He broke through the tree line and turned back to face his sensei as he also emerged. Kazuya wiggled his fingers; okay, good, they still moved, he hadn't damaged the nerves. It hurt so much though. He hadn't hurt like this since he lived with his uncle.

He focussed on his sensei in front of him and formed the chakra scalpels he'd painstakingly practiced over the past year and half. Genma-sensei eyed them warily as Kazuya exploded forward. His sensei flashed to his right side and Kazuya couldn't raise the scalpel in time to stop the hand that forced his head in the ground. He released the chakra and just puffed angrily into the dirt. That had been pathetically short.

"Good effort," Genma-sensei took his hand away and rolled him over, checking Kazuya's shoulder. "Short but that move you pulled surprised me. If you hadn't dislocated your arm doing it, it would have worked brilliantly. Those chakra scalpels too, you'd be excellent in close quarters if you trained on them specifically for combat rather than the hospital."

He helped him up and Kazuya followed him back to the others. His eyes caught the beads of blood on his sensei's sleeve and he grinned.

"I didn't totally lose, Sensei."

Genma turned to him in confusion and Kazuya plonked himself next to Hana.

"I cut you."

Genma nodded, not getting it.

"I would have died then but you'd be dead in a few hours," he explained, throwing Naruto the scroll that had thankfully stayed in his pocket.

The redhead rested his hand on the scroll and soon summoned a vial of light purple liquid. He offered it to Genma and their sensei took it with growing understanding.

"Nerium oleander." Kazuya grinned. "Pretty flower, nasty poison."

He watched Genma-sensei knock back the antidote and a sense of pride glowed within him at the grin on Genma-sensei's face.

"Brilliant. When did you start getting into poisons?"

"Yesterday."

"What?"

"He literally spent all night making that," Naruto offered, shooting a fond but exasperated look his way. "He literally bought the flowers yesterday and spent the whole night figuring out how to weaponise it."

Genma stared at him for a moment longer before his head was thrown back in a loud laugh. He shook his head.

"Even two years later, you're still surprising me."

Kazuya another thought and decided he might as well say it now.

"I know my dream now, Sensei."

At the looks from his team, he continued.

"I want to be the best poison expert in the Elemental Nations."

"I thought you were going to be a medic nin," Naruto wondered, raising a red brow.

"I am," Kazuya nodded. "When I say I'm going to be the best I mean it all; best at using it, making it and treating it; best at using the same flower to kill enemies and help allies. I'm going to be both the medical expert and fighting expert when it comes to poison and the best at using these same ingredients as a medic nin to help people."

It had come to him at 2am that morning as he'd sat surrounded by books and on his third attempt at distilling the concentrated poison. This is what he wanted to do. He'd loved working in the hospital but nothing had truly grabbed him. Not like this.

"I'm glad you figured out your dream, Kazuya," Genma-sensei smiled.

"It's an awesome dream," Hana added.

He looked to Naruto to see the younger boy holding out a fist. He brought his good arm up and bumped it.

"You're gonna be amazing, Pinku-baka."

"You know it, Aka-chan."

Naruto pulled his fist back and stood, bouncing slightly in place. Since he was last, he'd had some time to prepare and his new explosive tags were firmly stuck to his kunai, ready to be launched. He was almost definitely sure Genma-sensei had chosen this order specifically to give him more time to prepare; Hana was the strongest so she had no time to plan and Kazuya only had a short time to figure something out being the next strongest. That left him for last, the youngest and weakest of the team.

He followed his sensei to the centre of the clearing. The trees weren't an option; he knew what the other two had been going for but it wouldn't work against a jounin. They couldn't beat him with taijutsu so they went for the guerrilla tactics; they'd been practically living in the trees since they graduated so against a shinobi from any other village it might've worked. It was also difficult to use long range tactics since Genma-sensei was fast enough to dodge if they didn't catch him by surprise.

They came to a stop in the middle of the clearing and Naruto faced the jounin, swallowing his nerves. As Genma-sensei called for the start, Naruto dropped his hand into his pouch and snapped his kunai out, spraying them out in all directions. Genma-sensei cocked his head.

"What're you aiming for?"

Naruto scanned the field. Good, he managed to cover at least half the clearing. His attention was grasped by Genma-sensei appearing in front of him. Naruto dove to the side and flashed through his modified hand seals for kawarimi. He switched with one of the kunai on the outer edges and as he hit the ground quickly formed the modified snake seal to trigger the kunai closest to where he could feel Genma-sensei.

He grinned as an explosion rocked the air. Worth every single time he set fire to the coffee table... and the trees after Kazuya had kicked him out when his medical textbooks got a bit singed. His grin dropped as the explosions kept going, a chain reaction that was rapidly working its way to him. He scrambled away and stood, watching the massive trail of smoke rise into the air as the explosions died out.

Note to self, space kunai further apart. Naruto ducked as he felt Genma-sensei pop up behind him. He swept his leg back but his sensei jumped and the two separated to face each other. Naruto's grin returned at the sight of the soot covering Genma-sensei's face although it looked like he had avoided the actual fire part.

"Not bad, Naruto, but what will you do now you've used up your best weapons?"

"Bold of you to assume those were my only weapons."

Genma-sensei opened his mouth but before he could comment Naruto threw another kunai into the air above.

"Kai!"

He rolled out of the way as the boulder he'd stored into the seal appeared, dropping to where they had just stood with a loud thud. Naruto smothered a laugh as swearing reached him from where his sensei had dodged. He reached back into his kunai pouch and took another two kunai out; only three left. He had no idea what was in these; it'd been so long since he prepared these ones. Maybe he should note these things down in the future.

He threw one to roughly the area he could sense his sensei and released the storage seal. As a deluge of water rained down he felt Genma-sensei appear behind him and pain shot through his head. As he felt another blow to his leg he dropped to his knees, frantically yelling kai and hoping this one didn't have the other boulder. Packets of instant ramen appeared and Naruto groaned; he definitely needed to label these things in the future. He felt Sensei's kunai on the back of his neck and groaned louder, leg and head throbbing. His sensei lifted the kunai and he rolled over, panting. That had been even shorter than Kazuya's.

Genma-sensei helped him up and helped him back to the rest of team. Naruto tried to keep the tears at bay; he knew he was the worst on the team but this was pathetic. He stared at the ground as he sat down, shame filling him.

"Hey."

Naruto looked up into his sensei's eyes.

"You're incredible, you know that?"

Shock raced through him. He was present for that fight, right?

"I don't even know jounin who can use seals so creatively."

"Yeah, Aka-chan!" Kazuya piped up. "You literally dropped a boulder on him!"

"And blew him up!" Hana added.

"Yeah," Genma-sensei grimaced, looking back at the ruined training ground. "You really went all out."

Naruto wiped the tears off his cheek, chuckling.

"So." Genma-sensei clapped his hands. "Let's review today's training."

Naruto's smile dropped and he shared nervous glances with the other genin.

"So I know you're wondering why we did this today-"

"You mean why you suddenly decided to kick our ass," Kazuya interrupted.

Genma-sensei shot him a look but continued.

"I wanted to get a feel for your abilities as a whole. I know your skill level in stealth and intelligence gathering from your missions and you all pass the dodge training within ten minutes now. I didn't test the full range of taijutsu, genjutsu and ninjutsu today but what mattered was how you coped with a stronger opponent."

Their sensei grinned around his senbon.

"You're high genin level in all these basics but it's the extra stuff you've been doing that pushes you all to almost chunin level."

"Chunin?"

Genma-sensei smiled at Hana.

"I'm going to nominate you for the chunin exams!" he announced cheerfully.

Naruto's voice joined his teammates in shock before a thought occurred to him.

"Wait, it's in Iwa this year."

"I'm talking about next year's July exam in Kumo," Genma-sensei nodded. "We did this to see what we need to improve before then."

"Hana, your taijutsu and clan techniques are already chunin level along with your tracking but your stealth needs a lot of work. Your genjutsu and weapon handling need improvement too and although you're the physically the strongest, you're also the slowest."

He turned to Kazuya next.

"You panicked which meant you got both corralled and injured. You're at a disadvantage compared to these two in situational awareness but I know you're the best at genjutsu and strategy. Your medical jutsu are really coming along too; those scalpels could really be incredible if you got the hang of them. You could be brilliant in close range combat with both your scalpels and poisons in the mix."

Finally, he set his warm brown eyes on Naruto.

"Your basics need a lot of work but between your sensing and fūinjutsu you can keep up no problem. You're the fastest on the team, your weapon handling has come a long way and even with your red hair you are the best as far as stealth and tracking go. I meant it when I said you were incredible when it came to fūinjutsu. The plan you had to swap with the kunai to keep out of reach and blow me up at the same time was good, but there are some kinks we need to work out."

"So essentially, we suck as much as we're awesome?" Kazuya summarised, chin in his hand.

"You've all come a long way," Genma-sensei took a seat. "On our first day you couldn't dodge a kunai, now you're good enough to ruffle a jounin on your own."

Naruto took in their sensei's appearance. Some of the soot had been washed off his face from the water and the bandana covering his hair was more black than blue at this point. His uniform was rumpled and bandages were wrapped around his arm.

"We didn't even get you to spit out the senbon, though," he pointed out.

"That's a jounin exam level feat," Genma-sensei winked.

He reached into one of his pockets and pulled out four small sheets of blank paper.

"We can work on your individual weaknesses but there is something we can work on that concerns all of you," he said, handing each of the genin one and keeping one for himself. "You all need to expand your ninjutsu repertoire."

Genma-sensei held up his paper and Naruto's eyes widened as they watched it catch fire and burn up.

"This is chakra paper and it tells you which element you have a natural inclination for," Genma explained, brushing the ashes from his fingers. "As you saw, mine is fire which is the most common in Konoha."

Naruto looked down at his own paper and sent a pulse of chakra through his right arm. As the paper sliced cleanly in half, Naruto looked up to see his friends' papers crumble to ash in a similar manner to their sensei.

"Okay, so Hana and Kazuya, you have the same as me. Fire is strong against wind but weak against water. Naruto, you have wind which is weak to fire but strong against lightning." Genma folded his arms. "This is a great mix for combinations since Naruto's wind techniques would make you two's fire even stronger."

"So? We're going to learn ninjutsu?" Kazuya asked, wiping his hand on his trousers.

"Once you become chunin you can learn how to change your chakra into your chakra element but for now, you don't need to do that. Knowing your natures just makes it easier for you to learn your element's jutsu. We'll start off with a couple C-ranks jutsu next week to get you started."

Their sensei stood and Naruto slowly followed, rubbing his leg.

"Right now though, we'll go get you checked out at the hospital."

Naruto followed his teammates out of the training ground, limping but excited for the year to come. He could be a chunin this time next year.

Rio stumbled into the apartment, panting and wheezing as he landed face first on the couch. As his brothers walked in behind him, talking about something he was too wiped to listen to.

"Want some breakfast?"

He groaned loudly into the pillow.

"That's a yes, then."

They hadn't been kidding when they said they were going to start his training for the academy. They'd started dragging him out at the crack of dawn to build up his stamina and Rio could only make about two laps. He'd spent most of the time dying by the gates as he watched them appear each time they completed a lap; he hadn't bothered counting. That wasn't even going into the torture of the press-ups and sit-ups and horrifying things called burpees.

It had taken a while for it all to sink in but in the time since he'd found out about his parents and the Kyūbi nothing had really changed. Nii-san and Kazu-nee didn't treat him any different; if anything Nii-san had been more open than ever, telling him stories about the family he never got to know. Rio looked at things a little differently now though, the new information filling in gaps that he hadn't even realised were there.

A knock came from the door and Rio could hear Kiba's loud greeting. Oh man, he had promised to hang with Kiba at the park today. His friend landed on top of him and Rio yelped, sitting up abruptly and dumping the Inuzuka on the ground. He glared down at his best friend as he sat up grumpily, limbs protesting as he melted back into the cushions.

"What's up with you?"

"He went out training with us," Nii-san spoke up, sitting down heavily beside Rio and flinging his arm around Rio's shoulders. "We've started him on the training menu we used when we were your age."

Kiba nodded in understanding.

"Mum has been putting me through the wringer too," he grumbled, ruffling his already messy brown hair. "I could barely walk after the first training session."

"Would you believe me if I told you that you'll grow to enjoy it?" Nii-san laughed like the sadist he was.

"Naruto, move your stuff from the table."

Nii-san sighed and got back up. Rio watched him gather his sealing stuff from the table and move it into his room. He wasn't allowed to touch that stuff and he'd seen enough incidents of it going wrong that he was willing to follow that rule to the letter. They were on their third coffee table and Rio was still wondering why they kept getting wooden ones.

"Kiba, come set the table and Rio, go wash up a bit."

Rio heaved himself up to the bathroom as his friend bounced into the kitchen. Once he felt marginally more human, he went back through and plonked himself next to Kiba at the table.

"Have you guys got training or missions today?" he asked, as Kazu-nee set out the four plates of omelette rice.

Nii-san put down the bowls of miso soup next to the plates, holding up his hands as Kiba shot him a look.

"I didn't make it, just helped carry it over."

"We don't want a repeat of Ramen Week."

Nii-san shot a betrayed look at Kazu-nee as Rio muffled his giggles.

"Kazuya-nii, you can't ever get a cold ever again," Kiba laughed out loud.

"Try once to help out and stop my family from starving and this is what I get?" Nii-san dropped into his seat opposite Rio, an offended look wavering into a grin.

"I liked Ramen Week," Rio chirped.

"Of course you did," Kazu-nee rolled his eyes, placing the steaming cups of tea on the table before taking a seat himself.

"I've raised you so well," Nii-san wiped a fake tear from his eye.

Rio clapped his hands and thanked Kazu-nee for the meal before digging in.

"So missions or training?" Rio repeated.

"I'm at the hospital today," Kazu-nee shrugged. "I finally convinced Ikeda-sensei to let me shadow him in the poisons division. I'll get to see the different treatment techniques and if I'm lucky, I can pick his brain for some decent books."

Rio shared a disgusted look with Kiba at the mention of books. It was definitely not their strong suit.

"I've got taijutsu training all day," added Nii-san. "Got a new menu from Gai that's going to add some power to my kicks."

"Nee-san is with mum today. Said they were going to work on her coordination with the dogs," Kiba shoved some more egg into his mouth, the red fangs on his cheeks bulging out.

"And you two?"

"We're going to the park," Rio answered his brother. "Shikamaru and Chouji are going to meet us there."

"That's the Nara and the Akimichi, right?" Kazu-nee asked, taking a sip of tea.

Rio nodded with his mouth full and Kiba took over.

"Yeah! They're gonna be in the academy with us."

Rio swallowed, washing it down with the warm green tea.

"Shikamaru is super lazy and wants to look at clouds all day but he's really smart," he added. "Chouji always has the best snacks."

They'd met the pair the month before at the same park they were meeting at today. Rio had tripped over Shikamaru while he'd been gazing at the sky and by the time he'd picked himself back up and apologised to the other boy, Kiba had begun sharing food with Chouji. Last week there had been some blonde girl who yelled at his new friends; Rio was hoping she wouldn't be there this time.

"You can bring the riceballs I made yesterday with you to share for lunch," Kazu-nee offered.

"Thanks Kazuya-nii!" Kiba cheered. "You make the best food!"

"Are we going to meet these new friends?"

"Probably," Rio shrugged.

"Calm down, Aka-chan," Kazu-nee chuckled. "Maybe worry about that new seal you've been working on."

"It's finished," Nii-san frowned.

"If by finished you mean that it's meant to zap you every time you use it then, then yes you're all done."

Rio finished up his last mouthful and began to help Nii-san clear the table, Kiba joining them after a moment as Kazuya sat back and nursed his cup of tea.

"Smartass."

"Just skilled in pointing things out that dumbasses can't figure out for themselves."

Rio snorted as Nii-san repeated Kazu-nee's comment in a high, nasally voice. They got all the dishware next to the sink and Rio moved to grab the box of riceballs to shove into his backpack next to the door. As he shoved his feet into his sandals, Kiba bounced next to the door.

"Thanks for the food, Naruto-nii, Kazuya-nii!"

"Have a good day!"

"Dinner's curry tonight!"

Rio yelled a bye over his shoulder as he and Kiba left the apartment, beginning to make their way down the stairs.

"I love hanging out at yours," Kiba grinned next to him. "Your family is great."

"Yeah, they are," Rio smiled.

His family was the best.

Thanks for reading!