Yo.
It is with great sadness that I announce the end of the "Without Further Ado" Thing that I'd been doing, because I forgot to do it last week, and it seems like a good time to stop having to come up with them, because they were, quite honestly, a bit tiring.
Fun stuff this chapter, along with the conclusion of the Chuunin Exam's Second Round (Finally).
Chapter 21: All to Survive
Zaku's head was fuzzy.
Where… am I?
His right arm ached horribly, though he couldn't quite remember why. He knew that Orochimaru had broken it a day or two ago, but that pain was so much different from what he was experiencing right now.
Faintly, he heard a voice say something, a voice that sounded familiar, but one that, once again, he couldn't quite place.
What's going on?
A voice rang so clearly through his head that it felt like it pierced straight through him.
"GET UP!"
…Dosu?
"Zaku Abumi is no longer able to fight." He was at the end of a tunnel, hearing a voice from the other end as he lied down on a cold floor. He could feel nothing but pain, but the voice that spoke to him was indifferent to his plight. It sounded like he'd often imagined a god would sound, completely unaffected.
Uncaring, and merciless.
He heard murmuring around him as his head lurched in pain, and he went to reach for it with his right arm, trying desperately to take hold of something, to feel something other than pain.
And yet, nothing happened.
He looked up, trying to see anything, and found a familiar face staring down at him. Albino white skin, with purple markings around his eyes, Orochimaru looked down at him without pity, without satisfaction or glee.
It was simply interest.
His head rang again, another voice calling out to him, though this one was different from his teammates cry. It was younger, sounding almost like Kin, in a way. The memories that flowed though him, however, said that it wasn't hers.
"Zaku…" The voice spoke to him simply, carving into his brain like a knife, and he opened his mouth to scream, yet nothing came out except silence.
"Zaku…"
They were being chased, he knew it, but what was chasing them?
His head felt like it would split in half at any moment.
Who was that other boy?
A name came to the forefront of his mind. He writhed in agony as it seemed to dispel the fog that he'd told Orochimaru to place there.
Reis.
And suddenly, he was 8 years old again, residing in a dump on the outskirts of the Sound Village, and living off scraps like a beast.
/-/
"Hey… Zaku…?"
He ignored the boy before him, trying to drown out the shouting that came from nearby. They were getting close, he could tell. They'd be on them in a moment, and then that would be it for the both of them.
'You could run.' His treacherous brain spoke to him, whisperings of betrayal echoing in his head.
"Shut up!" He shouted at both his friend and his own horrid mind, gazing down at the boy below him with a fury born of pain and suffering, tears rolling down his face like a churning river. "Just shut up! I'll get us out of this!"
"Zaku…" His friend spoke quietly, closing his eyes for a moment, for a horrible moment, and for just a second Zaku thought he was gone. His eyes drifted back open, and Zaku let out a relieved gasp, his hands shaking.
"You have to go, Zaku."
The boy reached his hand out, touching it to Zaku's forearm, which even still was desperately trying to sew the boy's wounds together. Somewhere, in the back of his mind, he already knew it wouldn't be enough.
"Shut up, Damnit!" He shouted down at the boy. A second later, he heard the yelling from just beyond them go quiet, before, with a resounding cry, it suddenly grew more frantic, and, to Zaku's horror, began to close in on them.
He reached down under the boy's back, and beneath his knees, and tried with all of his might to lift him.
"Zaku, please…" His friend reached up towards the sky, trying to reach up and wipe his tears away, try and erase all of this, to go back to yesterday, when it was just two kids against the entire world, and they could laugh and enjoy their lives.
But there wasn't a point. The tears wouldn't stop falling.
Reis looked him directly in the eye, steel in his gaze.
"Go."
He felt his will to resist crumble as he heard the sounds around him grow even closer. His survivor instinct, the thing that had kept him alive all these years, kept Reis alive, told him their was no point to this. He had to go.
He let his hands fall to his sides, pushed himself up off the jagged concrete below him, and took a step backwards.
"Reis… I…"
The boy smiled up at him, then closed his eyes, folding his hands atop his chest.
"Hey, Zaku?" Reis spoke quietly, never opening his eyes, having truly accepted his fate. "Can you promise me something?"
"Anything." He spoke desolately, tears streaming down his face in spades.
"Get out of this place." The boy reached one hand up in the air, and to him, it must've seemed like he grasped the stars. Yet his fist fell a moment later, having never held anything at all. "Get out of here and live your life how you want to, don't let anyone else tell you how to live it."
Zaku wasn't sure that'd be possible. Children like them didn't tend to get happy endings.
But even still…
"I… I'll do my best."
Reis seemed to relax at that, his body going limp, his arms sinking into the skin on his chest, just a bit more than they had before.
His lips trapped in a perpetual smile.
/-/
The flashback stopped suddenly, even as a few tears rolled down Zaku's cheek. Everything was so clear in the back of his head, everything he'd told himself to forget, he'd remembered.
Did it even matter?
Who cares? His mind supplied. Reis told me to live, so that's what I'll do.
"Thusly, the winner is-"
And I can't live…
He felt his left-hand grab hold of something, dragging his entire weight with all of his strength off of the floor.
If I don't stand up!
He found himself on his feet finally, having dragged himself up using the proctor's jacket. The man in question shot him a surprised look as he took a step back, walking to once more stand in between the two fighters.
"Mr. Abumi, please!" A different man than before, this one clad almost entirely in white garb, spoke worriedly. "Your arm-"
"Shut up…" He had tried to shout, but found himself without the strength, his voice instead coming out as what might as well have been a whisper. "I have to win…"
"It's only the Chuunin Exams, if we act quickly, we can sew your arm back on, and you can heal much faster!"
Sew my arm back…
He looked down, finding himself not even the least bit scared. When he saw the stump that had previously been his arm, he didn't flinch. There was no time for that.
If he was going to survive, if he was going to win, then this had to be fast.
"Only the Chuunin Exams", the man had said. He wanted to laugh at the absurdity of that statement. This wasn't just a game to him, not like it was for all the rest of the students here, this was life or death.
"I'm not eliminated, am I?"
"W-well, technically, you got up before the proctor could declare you unfit to continue, so-"
His smile became wide, almost feral, as he pushed the man out of the way, drawing a kunai from his bag with his left hand. He found his left arm in a similar amount of pain to when his right had been broken, and when he looked down, he found holes running up it, with small insects crawling out of them.
Such a sight should've disgusted him, but right now, he was apathetic. He looked towards his opponent without hate, without rage, without any feeling at all. He knew only one thing as he charged the boy before him…
I must win.
Because if he didn't, then he wouldn't be the only one to pay the price. It would be Dosu and Kin who would pay for it as well.
Did he like them as much as he had Reis?
No, not quite.
But that doesn't mean I can abandon them either!
He'd run away from Reis, let the boy be killed by the men pursuing them. In that moment, he'd committed a sin so terrible that even he, practically a beast, had been unable to live with it. he'd asked Orochimaru to erase his greatest mistake, but even a man as powerful as the Snake Sannin hadn't been able to rid him of it.
And so now, with his actions, he was determined to prevent it from happening again. He was determined to claim victory here, to allow his teammates to live, just a little bit longer.
Maybe they would still die. Maybe Orochimaru would use them like pawns even still, throwing them away at his soonest convenience. But maybe, just maybe…
They could survive.
The boy before him, the one who had, at the very start of their fight, plugged up the holes in his arms with his beetles, knew nothing of the weight Zaku carried. Just as he'd said to that girl earlier, Sakura, he didn't blame the boy for that. It wasn't his fault that the world had been kind to him.
And the fact that Zaku was about to destroy him wasn't his fault either.
The boy with the glasses blocked his first strike on his own kunai, drawing another and threatening to stab it into Zaku's chest. Instinctively, Zaku reached into his bag with his right hand and brought out his own second Kunai to counter.
He realized his mistake only an instant before it would've been fatal, dodging backwards as he ran through plans in his head, trying to conjure up some method of victory.
Right, I don't have a right arm at the moment. Zaku backpedaled, coming to a stop a way's away. OK, so what can I do?
A swarm of bugs shot out of his opponents coat, flying right towards him as they buzzed annoyingly. His head ached at the noise, and he felt a small bit of rage course through him.
"As if I didn't have enough shit to deal with already…" He took a step forward, taking his kunai and placing it between his teeth, clamping down on it as he reached into his bag once more, pulling out one of his emergency items.
As the swarm threatened to overtake him, he threw the paper bomb directly inside it.
These bugs absorb chakra… I'm taking a gamble that they can't do it to something inorganic.
He practically sighed in relief as the explosion went off, scattering the remaining bug's corpses in different directions. He wanted to take a second to rest, but he was starting to feel a bit woozy from losing blood, so he instead charged back into the smoke, throwing a kunai at his opponents previous position.
There was a small shout as the kunai connected with something, and he wanted to assume that the Kunai had hit the boy, but he knew he couldn't. It wouldn't have been hard for him to pretend to be hit by it, only to be secretly waiting, unscathed, for his unsuspecting opponent to emerge back from the smoke.
Assume the worst, hope for the best.
He jumped as high as he could as he appeared out of the smoke, looking to his left and seeing that, as he'd hoped, his opponent now bore a fairly serious cut to his abdomen that he was nursing with his left hand. The boy brought his right hand in front of him, and more bug's billowed out of it, massing towards him.
He had no way of countering it. That had been his only paper bomb, and now, he was left with only a single kunai, the one resting in his mouth.
Instead of trying to dodge the bugs, Zaku tried something truly insane, charging right through them.
They steal chakra, right? Then that's fine!
As he hit the swarm, he felt his energy dwindle rapidly, burning away like fuel added to a flame.
You can have it! Take it all! But in exchange…
He hit the end of the bugs as almost all of his chakra was absorbed, but he didn't stop. The boy in front of him hadn't been expecting him to emerge from his makeshift wall, and he hadn't been expecting the kunai that now lodged in his shoulder either.
I'll take your damn king!
He drew the Kunai out and held it directly over the boy's throat, threatening to kill him right there.
"Give." Was all he said.
The boy below him gave a quiet chuckle, before, with a small buzzing noise, the clone dissipated into beetles. To his left, a faint buzzing was quickly growing louder.
Shit!
He was knocked to the side by a massive swarm of the things, and they swirled around him in spades as he writhed on the floor, the last of his chakra being steadily absorbed.
"Surrender." The voice of his opponent called out from somewhere beyond the cloud of insects. "Or the beetles will take the remainder of your chakra, and you will perish."
Surrender… Yeah, that sounds good… Zaku thought, feeling the last of his energy leave him as he fell to the floor. I guess… I'll lose here… maybe Dosu and Kin can…
His eyes shot open.
Dosu… Kin… Damnit! I can't lose!
His consciousness was fading, his chakra completely spent, and his bag completely empty of any more tricks.
I can't lose…
His right arm, or what was left of it, seemed to hum with energy. The metal tube that stuck out of it shook, even as more bug's crawled into it.
I can't lose…
He reached as deep into himself as he could, to the very core of his chakra, and found a small, almost nonexistent pool of chakra. He tapped into it, readying himself for one final attack. He forced it into his right stub and pointed it into the ground.
I can't lose… To this goddamned kid!
There was an explosion of chakra, stone, and beetles as the arena below him was blasted away. What was left of his arm erupted in pain, but he knew he couldn't stop, couldn't slow down.
"How can you still stand?" The boy across from him seemed confused, not even reacting to his opponent.
"How!?"
He forced himself up as fast as he could, running full speed at his opponent, who seemed to recover from his shock just a moment too late.
"Because my life depends on it!"
He rammed into the boy, using his head as a makeshift battering ram as he brought his fist into the boy's stomach, causing the bug-user to cough violently. A second later, he tried to respond, a few bugs swarming out of his left sleeve, but Zaku was faster, sweeping the boy's legs out from under him and tackling him to the floor.
"YIELD!" He screamed as he headbutted the boy, causing the back of his head to impact against the stone beneath him.
The boy clicked his tongue, allowing bugs to flow out of his sleeves and prepare to surround them both.
He headbutted the boy again, but the pain he received in return was nothing to slouch at. He brought his fist up and hit the boy's face, cracking his glasses as he connected. Even as he felt the beetles begin to crawl on his back, he knew he couldn't stop.
He zoned out as he felt the skin on his knuckles begin to peel off, slamming over and over again into his opponents face. His chakra felt like it could give out at any time, and him along with it, but he kept going. He fought like a cornered beast, striking with no regard for the boy beneath him.
As he brought his fist up one final time, preparing to finish his opponent off, he felt someone grab his arm. He turned around with a shocked expression to see a female Jonin he didn't know.
"That's enough." The woman spoke. Concern, and a fair helping of rage, evident on her face. "Shino Aburame concedes."
"Let him say that himself!" Zaku roared at her, looking back down at his opponent as he did, trying to break his arm free of her grasp, but finding his breath get caught in his throat as he did.
The boy below him was breathing heavily, blood streaming from his obviously broken nose as he did. His cracked glasses lay beside him, though a few shards of glass were embedded into his face.
"You win." The woman spoke distastefully. "Now get off of my student."
She lifted him by his arm and pushed him away, towards the medic who still sat by the side of the arena. Having been so lost in the fight, he'd forgotten that the man had initially tried to stop him, tried to get him to rest on the stretcher he'd brought out.
He felt the pain in his arm return as the adrenaline began to wear off, and he nearly fell backwards from the dizziness.
After all of that, am I really going to die of blood loss of all things?
He did fall a second later, though he was held up by the doctor behind him, who led him onto a stretcher, and then proceeded to place his blown off arm on top of him. Zaku couldn't help but feel a bit queasy about that, which was an odd change of pace from how'd he'd felt about everything a few minutes ago.
He chocked that one up to the heat of the moment as well.
As he was slowly pulled out of the arena, he couldn't help but let his gaze wander. He looked up at Dosu, who nodded solemnly at him. Zaku tried to return it but found that his head wouldn't move. A second later, his eyes connected with Orochimaru's, who stood just a few feet back from his teammate.
The man smiled down at him, his lips spread with a cruel glee.
In that moment, he recalled Reis' words.
"Get out of here and live your life how you want to, don't let anyone else tell you how to live it."
Here he was, living according to someone else's rules, doing someone else's bidding. No wonder he'd chosen to forget his time with Reis, he'd not only abandoned his only friend, but then he'd gone and disgraced his last promise to the boy.
I've got to do something… Zaku thought aimlessly to himself. I can't just serve Orochimaru for the rest of my life.
…But what choice do I have?
As he thought about that, he looked back towards the boy he'd fought against, who was being taken away to a medical bay on the opposite side of the arena.
The boy's teammates, The Hyuga, the Inazuka, and their sensei, who he now recalled was a Genjutsu specialist, all flocked around him, watching him carefully as they all walked with him.
Seeing that, he felt a tiny pain in his chest, like a pinprick.
A small twinge of pity, along with a growing regret.
/-/
Sakura was stunned as the two boy's were carried out of the arena, both of them terribly wounded.
She'd been a part of a lot of battles to the death recently, but that one had to have taken the cake. Neither boy had been willing to give up, until their very lives were on the line.
"How!?" She recalled the sound ninja's screams. "Because my life depends on it!"
Zaku's words echoed in her head for quite a while, even as the next round was delayed so that the arena could be brought back into presentable shape. As it stood currently, it was covered in holes from where paper bombs and Zaku's wind had blown through it, and there were a couple thousand dead bugs lying around it as well, along with copious amounts of blood.
So, his very life was at stake, huh? Sakura thought glumly, kicking herself as she did. I'd bet Orochimaru's got something on him… That has to be why…
"Hey, uhm… Sakura?"
She snapped to attention almost immediately, meeting Sasuke's gaze as he gave a small wave.
"Oh," She struggled to think of what to say, but ultimately defaulted to a general question. "What's up?"
"Nothing." The Uchiha admitted, rubbing the back of his neck as he did, and then taking the spot next to her on the railing, looking down into the arena. "I just noticed that you looked… a bit out of it."
"Am I that obvious?"
"No… well, not entirely, we've just known each other a long time, and-"
"Yeah, yeah, I get it." Sakura sighed as she leaned further forward, putting her entire weight on the metal bars in front of her and sighing as she sunk into them. "I just… That fight was horrible to watch… first Zaku's arm got blown off, and then those bugs were crawling everywhere, and then Shino nearly got beat to death… I guess it just shook me a little."
"Yeah," Sasuke sighed. "I think it shook all of us. Hell, even Naruto's looking a bit depressed."
The boy pointed off to his right, where, just as he'd said, a melancholic Naruto quietly against the back wall, gazing off into nothing.
"It's not just you." Sasuke gave her a small smile, before walking back over towards Naruto and sitting down next to the boy, beginning to banter with him about something or another, before the Jinchuuriki yelled out that he wasn't feeling down at all.
Sakura laughed at the exchange but couldn't quite help but zone back out the moment a distraction was gone. Luckily, she didn't have to wait that long for a new one, as a hand on her shoulder brought her back out of her thoughts again, though this time it was her new mentor.
"Yo." The woman brought her hand up in greeting, sliding in next to her and hitting her lightly with her behind, knocking her to the side slightly. "That was a rough fight, especially for the Chuunin Exams. Most of these kids are too scared to even threaten another person's life with a Kunai to end a match, let alone beat each other to death."
"Yeah, I know I… I think, if my opponent had called my bluff before… I wouldn't have been able to kill him." Sakura admitted as her right hand shook slightly. "I'm glad he surrendered when he did… If he hadn't, I'm honestly not sure what I would've done."
"So you're not the killing type, then?"
A small shiver ran down Sakura's spine at her mentor's words.
"Gods, no. I'm… Honestly, at times, I think I'm a little too soft for all of this." Sakura rubbed the back of her neck absentmindedly, leaning into the woman beside her without meaning to. "I don't really like hurting people… So why…"
"Why what?" Anko asked curiously.
"N-nothing, sorry." Sakura lied, laughing embarrassedly. "Just thinking out loud."
Her mentor sighed.
"You're wondering why you nearly killed that girl in the forest, right?"
The clairvoyant guess had her reeling, her hands shaking as she grabbed the bar in front of her for support, though she needn't have bothered, for Anko had already held her beneath her arms, helping to keep her steady.
"C-could you not be… weirdly psychic for like 5 minutes?"
Anko smiled at her, ruffling her hand with her left hand as she brought it out from under Sakura, before putting it in the pocket of her trench coat.
"No can do, being weirdly psychic is one of the few advantages we adults have over you kids." Anko gave her a wide smile, before it tapered off, being replaced by a somewhat sad expression. "Do you wanna' talk about how you're feeling?"
"…Not really." Sakura admitted a bit pathetically. "M-maybe later, it's just-"
Anko ruffled her hair for a second time, leaving her bangs to hang directly over her eyes.
"I said if you want, don't feel pressured to or anything. I'm just saying that sometimes it's better to make your feelings known, instead of bottling them all up inside you."
She considered the woman's words as her mentor walked away, moving to speak with the leader of their team and his protégé, who had returned from hitting on Ino around the same time she had. Well, it would've been hitting on her, except for the fact that he still claimed he didn't have a crush on her at all, and somehow actually seemed to believe that, and thus he wasn't very direct about it.
Luckily for him, Ino seemed to see right through him, and so she'd taken his kind words in stride, flirting back and forth with him, even if she had no intentions of getting together with the boy. Sakura could never really decide whether that trait of hers was a kindness or not.
Still, it was refreshing to see Haku as a blushing mess of a teenage boy instead of the cold, almost emotionless killer he'd been when they'd first met.
The screen on the back wall began to spin, but by this point, nearly everyone in the room had already fought. No matter the result of the roulette, the following match was already confirmed, so no one really seemed to care as the spinning came to a stop.
Tenten vs. Shikamaru Nara
/-/
Tenten did her best to keep her breathing as calm as she could as she stepped off of the metal stairs and onto the cold stone floor below her.
Lee and Neji were both still in the infirmary, so it had been Guy alone to send her off for her match. If she were being honest, the man's enthusiasm had been enough to motivate her on it's own, but she still would've preferred having the whole gang to see her off.
As she faced down her opponent in the center of the ring, she couldn't quite shake the feeling that he didn't want to be there.
"I will briefly recount the rules of this bout." The proctor began, before, as usual, everyone in the arena zoned him out.
Tenten was on edge about the boy before her. From what she knew of the Nara family, which wasn't all that much, they manipulated shadows as a form of attack, defense, and utility. They could use them as blades, shields, and even as tethers or ropes. However, she'd also heard that most of those techniques were of a higher level than what a Genin could accomplish, so she figured she wouldn't be seeing any of them in this particular encounter.
Still, doesn't hurt to be cautious.
As the proctor finished, and inquired as to whether they were both ready to fight, Tenten studied her opponent. On the surface, he was a bumbling mess. His guard was down, his eyes were glazed over, and he seemed to yawn at least 5 times a minute.
Still, the likelihood that it was all an act was high.
No one gets to this stage of the exam just to treat it as a joke. Tenten reasoned, taking a battle stance as she confirmed her readiness, drawing her staff across her arm and pointing it in her opponents direction. I'll keep a secret weapon on me, just in case.
If he's going to use shadows, then I'll use light.
"Then, Let the ninth round of the Chuunin Exams Second Stage… BEGIN!"
The boy in front of her tensed suddenly, going from lax to prepared in half a second. It would've been an impressive maneuver if she hadn't been expecting it. He brought his hands up in front of her in a hand-sign that was unfamiliar to her, but not one that she couldn't guess the meaning of.
So that's the sign to bend shadows?
She charged forwards, preparing her trump card in her left palm as she did, drawing a few shuriken by slotting her fingers inside them and hurling them at her opponent, forcing him to bob and weave, not allowing him to sit still and focus.
Even still, she ran out of the small arms eventually, and the boy continued to backpedal, jumping backwards every time she gained ground, and throwing out his own kunai as he did.
Even still, I can deflect these with ease, so why –
One of the kunai began to glow, and she had half a second to realize her mistake before she was blown backwards by the paper bomb, landing hard on the cold stone beneath her. A second later, she felt an unfamiliar feeling run up her entire body, like something was grabbing her everywhere all at once.
"Alright, well, that wasn't so bad." A voice came from out of the smoke, and a second later, so too did her opponent. He wore no smirk, nor any other sign that he thought he was victorious.
He moved slowly and with a seemingly large amount of effort, drawing his left hand over to his leg, and retrieving a kunai that rested there. At the same time, Tenten found herself suddenly standing, and beginning to mimic the motions as the boy did them, reaching for nothing on her left leg, gripping nothing, and bringing nothing up in front of her.
"I don't suppose you'll surrender now, will you?" The boy named Shikamaru gave a dim smile, tilting his head slightly. "It'd save both of us the trouble."
She gave only a glare in response, to which the boy in front of her simple laughed, taking small, careful steps towards her.
I need to test something first…
With her right hand, the one held before her against her will, she tried to flex her fingers, just a small bit.
They moved, but only just.
That's fine, it's enough. I just need to get closer.
Another step. They were perhaps 10 feet apart.
Just a bit closer…
The boy in front of her took another step, raising his weapon and gesturing like he would throw it.
Just a bit…
He took one final step.
Closer.
She opened her left hand as hard as she could, which resulted in only a small gap being formed. Luckily, that was all she'd needed.
"A flash-bomb!?"
As the small object hit the ground, Tenten's world knew only light for a small moment, but that was fine. She still knew where the boy was.
As she brought her staff forward and slammed it into the boy's position, she felt a solid connection on the other end. She followed through with another two strikes, and then another.
Until, all of a sudden, control of her body was wrested away from her once again.
"W-what!?" She shouted, finding her vision still swirling, but finally managing to regain some small focus.
Below her was a small pool of black shadow.
"Heh," Her opponent laughed, stretching, and gently massaging the large red welt growing on the side of his face. "Did you really think I wouldn't have an answer to my most obvious counter?"
As the spots in her vision finally cleared, she saw that the field emanating from her opponent, a decently sized black circle with him at the center, stretched around 5 feet in diameter.
"Well, you were almost right, at least." The boy continued, raising his hands in the air, and thusly, hers. "I came up with this little technique a few weeks ago. You see, even when a flash bomb is set off, a shadow is still created. The problem in using it correctly is that, generally, I can't actually see what's going on when that happens."
The boy raised his hands in a 'what can you do?' gesture, as did she.
"Still, I figured that if I could create a circle, then, at the very least, I can capture anything near me without needing to see." At this, the boy once more drew his hand across his cheek, Tenten doing the same to her own. "Still, without my eyesight or hearing, the only way to confirm you're near me is to take a few hits."
She couldn't quite control her temper. She'd had him! She should have had him, at the very least, and yet here he was telling her that all of this was in some master plan?
And to think, she'd asked Guy sensei for a flash bomb after finding out her match-up, thinking herself so overly clever too. She'd gotten the idea from the Forest of Death, when her and Team 7 had escaped from the Snake Sannin Orochimaru using one of their own.
…And it had all amounted to nothing.
I completely…
"Anyways, I surrender."
…Won?
"WHAT!?" The entire arena seemed to shout at once.
"Wait, what?" Tenten asked herself, completely confused. "But why?"
The boy gave a small chuckle, before, a second later, the shadows around him receded, and the boy fell backwards, sitting calmly and sighing exhaustedly.
"Despite what I think is a good idea behind it, I couldn't put that jutsu into practice because it drains me way too fast." Shikamaru spoke, managing to get to his feet a second later, smiling tiredly. "I can only keep it up for maybe 30 seconds, and that's at full reserves. But I'd already drained myself quite a bit in the forest, and then again with the first shadow imitation."
"That flash bomb was a pretty good idea, I'm guessing you knew a little bit about the Nara clan?"
"Y-yeah." She spoke after a second, still a little shocked by the last minute's turn of events. "I'd heard about them every once in a while when I read up on famous Leaf Ninjas… your dad's pretty famous."
"Heh, yeah, my old man's got a bit of a reputation." Shikamaru laughed quietly, though it was more of a sharp exhale than anything. "Alright, well, good fight."
As Shikamaru began to climb the steps back to his team, the proctor, who up until then had seemed a bit stunned, called the match.
"If that's the case, then the winner if Tenten." The man walked over to her, asked her a few questions about the exam, and then sent her on her way.
As she walked back up the stairs, she couldn't help but hear Naruto cheering her on, and smile just a bit as she made it to the top, shooting the boy a thumbs-up from across the room, which he returned with a sunny smile of his own.
She spoke briefly to Guy about the victory, him congratulating her strategy, and even if she knew she should've been proud of herself for coming up with the idea, she couldn't help but feel just the smallest bit disappointed.
She'd been declared the victor, and yet…
She didn't feel like she'd won that match.
Not at all.
/-/
As Zaku awoke, the first thing he felt was horrendous amounts of pain coursing through his body. The second thing he felt was that his right arm was once again attached to his body, which was a noted improvement from it being a few feet away from him on the floor.
He opened his eyes, finding them a bit glazed over. From what he could see, he was in a small medical bay. It wasn't much, a few pieces of equipment to monitor his vitals were sat beside him, along with a small piece of bread, and with a glass of water.
The latter went much appreciated. He'd only been asleep, from what he could tell, for a couple of hours, and yet even still his throat was killing him. He reached for the cup with his right arm and found that it responded decently well. It wasn't perfect, there was a sensation similar to when his arm fell asleep present in the tips of his fingers, but it would do well enough for the time being.
He drank the entire cup in two gulps, taking a couple deep breaths afterwards. He wolfed down the small piece of bread as well, sitting back against the headboard behind him and sighing deeply as he finished, feeling the food move through him and energize him.
"Oh, you're awake."
The voice startled him, and he reached for a nonexistent kunai even as he turned towards it. A second later he stopped, breathing a silent sigh of relief as he did.
"Kin, you're alright." He didn't let his feelings show on his face, choosing instead to regard her with a look of neutrality, but he felt a quiet happiness below the surface.
"Yeah, I sort of drifted in and out of consciousness for the first day, but since then I've been recovering." The girl gave him a tired smile. "And then a few hours ago you got wheeled in here, covered in blood, completely passed out, and missing an arm. Honestly, way to boost my stress levels just as I was calming down."
"Yeah, uh…" Zaku rubbed the back of his neck, feeling a bit embarrassed despite himself. "Sorry about that."
"Don't worry about it." The girl laughed quietly, leaning back into her pillows, and pulling the small hospital blanket back over her. "Honestly, I've only been awake this long to give you Dosu's message."
"What did he say?"
"Just "I won.". That's it."
Zaku let out a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding, smiling despite everything that had happened that day.
They'd survived. Maybe just for one more day, but they'd done it.
"Do you know who he ended up fighting?" Zaku asked, a small bit curious.
"Apparently the Cho from the Ino-Shika-Cho." Kin explained. "Well, it was one of their kids, but from what Dosu said, he was a pretty easy opponent."
"That's… that's good."
"What, were you worried?"
He looked over at her and saw a faint smirk on her face, one which he couldn't quite make sense of.
It hit him a second later.
She doesn't know.
She hadn't been present when Orochimaru gave them their ultimatum, she'd passed out just before it, when he'd stitched up her wounds as best as he could. She still thought that this was just another mission. Even if, perhaps, she had a bad feeling somewhere in the back of her head, she didn't know their lives were on the line.
Do I tell her?
There was something to be said for blissful ignorance. If she really could believe that everything was going to be fine up until the very final hour, then she might be in much better spirits. She wouldn't have to deal with he crippling knowledge that he and Dosu possessed.
That they were meaningless.
But that didn't matter. Even if it had it's merits, the cons were far too many. Not the least of which was that, if something did happen to the two of them, she'd have no way of knowing until it was too late.
And he wasn't going to have another life on his conscious, even if he wouldn't be around to know about it.
"Hey, Kin?" He began, sitting up in his bed and turning towards the girl, letting his legs dangle off the side of the bed.
"What's up?" The girl responded, turning on her side to face him, face perplexed.
"There's just… Something I have to tell you."
/-/
Naruto, much like the other 9 victors of the Chuunin Exams Second Round, stood with bated breath as the Hokage made a grand speech about their accomplishments.
If he was being honest, he kind of just wanted to go home already.
The stress of the Forest of Death, Sakura's curse mark, Sasuke and him nearly dying a few times, and then their own fights in the second exam were finally starting to weigh on him. All Naruto wanted to do now was go back to the Leaf Village, find Ichiraku, and down a couple thousand bowls of Ramen, before going to bed approximately 3 seconds later.
C'mon, old man, I'm exhausted. Naruto pouted as the Kage went on and on about the honor and prestige of the competition. Lord Third, seemingly reading the atmosphere of the room, sighed, and handed things over to the exam's proctor.
"Thank you, Lord Hokage." The man coughed into his fist, before gesturing to a small blackboard behind him, onto which he placed a piece of paper.
Naruto jittered with excitement. On that page was, what he assumed, his match-up for the 3rd round! It'd be the opponent he'd set his sights on for the near future.
"The Chuunin Exam's Third Stage will take place a month from today. These will be the first opponents you will go up against on that day, but do bare in mind that if you hope to win the entire competition, you will likely need to face off against 2 or 3 more opponents." The Proctor finished, coughing again into his hand. "Now, if you will all come up one at a time-"
The man's words went ignored, and instead, a crowd of excited teenagers all tried to read the same leaflet at once, hoping to catch a glimpse past the others to see who they'd be facing.
Naruto Uzumaki vs. –
"Gah! I can't see my opponent!" Naruto yelled out, before being elbowed in the face by the Puppet user from the Sand Village. "Hey, watch it!"
"Out of the way kid!"
"Oi! Why don't you make me!?"
"Naruto, stop picking fights in line!"
"He started it, Sakura!"
"I don't care if he started it!"
As he was once more buffeted backwards, he felt a small tug on the sleeve of his jacket, and turned around to see Hinata standing before him, looking down at the floor, seeming incredibly dejected.
"Uhm… Naruto?"
There was something about the girl's voice that always managed to calm him down. It wasn't that he was more comfortable around her than his friend's, but it was more like he could never imagine the girl raising her voice. She sounded like a cool autumn evening.
"What's up, Hinata?"
The girl met his eyes for a fraction of a second before once more challenging the floor to a staring competition. She balled her hands into fists, seemingly working up the determination to say or do something.
"I-I… I look f-forward to facing you!" She bowed deeply as she said it, before, with a small meep, as if she'd only just realized what she said, she turned and fled back to her Sensei, who stood a way's away, smiling fondly at the two of them.
Forward to facing me? Naruto questioned mentally. What's that supposed to –
…Oh.
He turned back towards the sheet of paper on the blackboard. By now, everyone had seen their first opponent, and so they'd all moved away from it, walking back towards their teams, or, in Sasuke and Sakura's cases, waiting for him to join them.
He walked to stand in front of the sheet, read off the match-ups for the next stage, and had his suspicions confirmed.
Naruto Uzumaki vs. Hinata Hyuga;
Zaku Abumi vs. Tenten;
Sasuke Uchiha vs. Kankuro;
Sakura Haruno vs. Gaara, Winner vs. Dosu Kinuta
End Chapter 21
Sorry to tease.
I'm not actually sorry. I in fact live for it.
Longer chapter than normal, but mostly just because I wanted to get this part of the Chuunin Exams done this chapter, and not have it bleed into the next. We are officially in the endgame now!
Not really. We're probably halfway done. I forgot how long the Chuunin Exams were until I went back and re-watched them for this story, and holy crap, it's just never-ending. Stretches from episode 27 all the way to 80.
Suffice it to say this story will be... abridging certain sections.
Obviously some will be changing as well. A lot of which should be happening in the next few chapters.
First OC This chapter. Don't worry, that won't be a theme. Zaku doesn't get a lot of characterization in the manga or anime, so I decided to give him some. There may be an OC occasionally, but they'll never be more relevant than Reis was here.
Anyways, see you all next week!