Everyone adjusted to Ino's odd personality switch fairly quickly, except Sakura, who seemed to never quite get it, and for some reason would keep trying to challenge her for Sasuke, despite the fact that Ino was clearly not interested anymore. Hinata and Ino quickly struck up a friendship, bonding over their shared shyness about approaching their crushes.

"These will be your team assignments until you make chuunin at least," Iruka said, holding up his clipboard.

Sasuke watched Iruka read out the names, finally reaching his name. "Sasuke Uchiha, Naruto Uzumaki, Shikamaru Nara."

Naruto and Sasuke traded happy glances, and Shikamaru yawned widely.

"Team 8, Ino Yamanaka, Hinata Hyuuga, and Choji Akimichi." Iruka continued, all three people called exchanged shy glances, Ino and Choji immediately looked away, both blushing furiously.

Shino waited patiently for his name to be called, hiding his hands in his jacket. He'd picked up Naruto's drawing seals everywhere habit, it really was a good stress reliever, and was trying to not draw seals all over the desk in front of him. Or all over his arms. He didn't want to give too much away to his new sensei, especially not if the second test rumors were correct. Afterward, he would reveal what he had not during the secondary test.

"And finally, Team 10, Sakura Haruno," Sakura looked hopeful as her name was called. "Kiba Inuzuka," Sakura drooped somewhat, glaring at Kiba, who was glaring right back. "And Shino Aburame."

Shino sweatdropped. Of course, he had to be with the two loudest people in the class. It had been Sakura and Ino, then Ino had that incident. Ah well, thank Kami for silencing seals.

Naruto patted Shino's shoulder and flashed him the sign for sympathy.

"Come back after lunch to meet your jounin sensei," Iruka instructed. "You have thirty minutes."

'Where should we go for lunch?' Naruto asked, making sure all three of his best friends saw the signs.

"Somewhere they won't be nearby. Why? Because while they are busy glaring at each other, they won't be forever," Shino murmured, glancing at his teammates.

'Have some seals to draw?' Sasuke asked, a slight smirk on his lips.

'They're already drawn,' Shino signed back. 'Now I'm coloring them. Why? Because if they match their clothes so they won't notice for longer.'

Naruto perked up. 'Can I help? I like coloring!'

'It's going to have to be one color, Naruto,' Shikamaru somehow managed to drawl in hand signs, as he always did.

Naruto shrugged. 'So?'

Shino shook his head and watched Sakura and Kiba leave, still glaring daggers at each other. 'Let's just do it here, actually. Why? Because laying on the sidewalk is uncomfortable.'

Shikamaru cracked a slight grin. 'And it's too troublesome to move.'

Naruto giggled silently. 'Alright, I have crayons, where's the silencing seals?'

They had finished and stored the seals away by the time everyone came back in, with only Iruka being any the wiser.

"Your jounin sensei should be here shortly," Iruka informed them, then sat down to work at his desk.

A bearded jounin came in first, glancing around. "Team 10, you're with me."

Shino sighed, reluctantly getting up and following his new teammates and sensei out. Thankfully, Sakura and Kiba seemed to be busy squabbling quietly and paid no attention to him as he gently tapped each of their backs, putting the silencing seals in place. He just had to activate them. They both frowned at him when they felt the tap on their backs, but he just watched them steadily until they went back to their whispered argument.

The whispered argument quickly dissolved into a fistfight when they reached the training ground, Sakura yelling something about being able to hit things and Kiba yelling right back that she couldn't.

Shino looked to his sensei. "Are you expecting introductions out of us?"

Asuma blinked at the catfight and shook his head. "Nope. I was going to, but I can read your files. Or ask if I need to. You may leave, but be back here tomorrow at 8 in the morning."

Shino nodded. "I will be there. Why? Because it is expected." He faced the catfight, and make the ram symbol. "Fuuinjutsu: seal." When he walked away, the catfight, er, dog and human fight, continued, but it had been silenced completely. Asuma stared after him in slight wonder.

It took a bit, but Kakashi finally arrived and had them follow him to the roof.

'You already know us Sensei,' Naruto deadpanned.

"You are correct, so, instead, I want to know how Shino's doing. Kurenai has her team of shy children, you lot are basically all mute, and Shino has the loudest kids in class."

'Silencing seals,' Naruto signed with a smirk.

Kakashi nodded. "I will inform Asuma. He will manage?"

Sasuke nodded. 'He will manage.'

Kakashi stared at them for a long moment, then sighed. "The Chuunin Exams are going to be fun."

Shikamaru yawned. 'We'll see about that.'

"Alright you three, scram, and be at that big red bridge I taught you lot signs at tomorrow at 7." With that, Kakashi shunshined away.

'Hey, we can finally pester him about teaching us that!' Naruto cheered.

Sasuke nodded happily. 'Finally, I can actually use Cousin Shisui's taijutsu style properly!'

'What's that, your third style mastered?' Shikamaru signed, yawning.

'Fifth,' Sasuke corrected.

Naruto glanced around, then hopped up. 'C'mon, we can go practice!'

'Alright,' Sasuke signed.

Kakashi slid into the booth, signaling for a cup of sake.

Asuma sighed, tossing back a drink. "Don't you have the three mutes?"

"Two mutes and one that's too lazy to bother speaking," Kakashi corrected.

Kurenai slid into the booth next to Asuma, dragging a hand down her face. "These three are the shyest people I have ever met. They barely said a thing during introductions!"

"Ino was one of the loudest kids in the class," Asuma commented idly.

"Inoichi said she had a mind destruction technique blow up in her face. She went through a personality change a year or two ago." Kakashi muttered, tossing back a shot of sake.

Kurenai sighed. "I'm sure that both Ino and Choji have a crush on each other, and, even worse, they know that the other has a crush on them, they're just so freaking shy, that they basically refused to acknowledge it! It's so infuriating, even worse than Hinata's crush on Naruto." She sighed and drank more sake. "I think I'm not ready for a team of the shyest people I have ever met."

"Ask the Hokage, and see if you can trade two of them," Asuma groaned. "I'm just waiting for Sakura's parents to hound me about her getting a silencing tag stuck to her back courtesy of Shino."

Kakashi shrugged. "I have no problems with my kids. Although, I may trade Sasuke for Neji or Tenten upon occasion so that he can spar with Lee and Gai. I'm not leaving Gai with four genin at once, that would be cruel. Maybe I'll take Tenten and teach her more about the tanto."

Asuma groaned again, drinking more sake. "And I'm betting that Tsume isn't even going to complain cause she'll be too busy laughing her backend off!"

Kakashi sighed and prepared to most likely take Asuma and Kurenai home at the end of the night.

Naruto spent more time at his friend's clan compounds then he did at his apartment. Honestly, he couldn't care less if his apartment building burned down right now, he didn't keep anything valuable in it, and he had clothes in all three of his friend's closets. Admittedly, they all had clothes in each other's closets, a result of spending many, many nights over at each other's houses and staying up all night studying together. Sasuke's compound was used for taijutsu and ninjutsu training, the Nara compound was mostly for book work, and the Aburame compound was mostly just general sleepovers. And school work, couldn't forget the school work.

Currently, they were at Sasuke's house, Naruto and Sasuke discussing tactics while Shikamaru napped. For the fourth time that day.

"Am I interrupting anything?" Shino asked, walking in.

Naruto's head snapped around to look at him. 'Nope!' He signed. 'How'd it go?'

"My teammates were squabbling, so after a bit, I silenced them and walked away to continue with my day."

'How'd Asuma take that?' Sasuke asked, interested.

"He was staring at me as I left. He is most likely getting drunk right now Why? Because he is most likely anticipating the headache that will come from Sakura's parents."

'Kiba's mom will be too busy laughing to even think about confronting him about it,' Sasuke agreed, a very slight smile on his lips.

(A/N) DeadGirlRisen was behind the Kiba's mom thing. So, yes, I usually have Sakura's parents like they are in canon, so, ninja.