The nightmare was always the same. A happy Akira and Sasuke were running around the Uchiha compound together, laughing, throwing water balloons at each other, then everything turned red. There were bodies everywhere, sprawled across the ground, blood pooling around them. Their parents, laid out in the family room, cold and dead, Itachi looming over. That's when Akira woke up in a cold sweat, chest heaving and eyes wide as if she'd truly been seeing what was in her dream. After a few calming breaths, Akira turned to check the time.
Akira dragged herself out of bed and got dressed slowly, pushing her nightmare to the back of her mind. She made herself a cup of tea and debated whether to eat something before leaving, despite her sensei saying not to. She stared at the leftover rice and grilled vegetables in the fridge but decided against eating for the simple fact that Kakashi-sensei had asked them.
Akira went back to her room and packed all of her ninja gear: she placed at least a dozen of kunai in her thigh pocket, a dozen shuriken in the pouch attached to one of her fabric belts and strapped knife sheaths on her arms, one on her inner forearm and the other on the outside. Akira even attached a strap to her ankle to hold a small knife.
Akira and Sasuke set out in silence and headed in the general direction of the designated training ground. The sky was littered with lavender and dark blue tones rather than the pitch black it was earlier. The birds were still asleep, the silence was peaceful, and the scent of flowers covered in dew reached Akira's nose when passing the main avenue. Akira looked over and sighed, suddenly missing her usual morning rituals with Kai, Kiba and Shikamaru.
Sakura and Naruto were arriving simultaneously as Sasuke and Akira, but they seemed to be nearly sleepwalking. Everyone was just as tired, but of course, Sasuke Uchiha couldn't show any kind of weakness.
"Morning," Sakura said sleepily.
"It's not morning until the sun is up," Akira said lazily. "I'm usually asleep at this hour."
Naruto plopped down where he stood.
"So what do we do?" he asked.
"We wait, I guess," Akira said.
The first orange hued rays of sunrise arrived much later, and they shone down on the late morning as the four students sat, waiting for their sensei. Akira looked around at her teammates then up at the sun, squinting, and stretched up her hand into the sky. She let the soft amber glow of the sunrise pour through her fingers and onto her upturned face.
"Morning everyone, ready for your first day?"
Everyone turned towards the calm voice, and in a split second, Sakura was on her feet, pointing accusingly at Kakashi-sensei. Naruto did the same. Even Sasuke was glaring.
"You're late!" Sakura and Naruto chorused.
"Well, a black cat crossed my path, so I had to take the long way," Kakashi provided as an answer.
"I'm too tired to argue with that," Akira yawned.
As Naruto growled at him, Akira stood up and brushed the dust off her pants.
"Well," Kakashi cleared his throat. "Let's get started." He went over to a nearby tree stump and placed an alarm clock on it. Akira furrowed her eyebrows. "Here we go. It's set for noon."
Akira looked at the clock. Whatever Kakashi-sensei was planning, they'd have four hours to do it. Then, sensei took out three bells, each on a red ribbon.
"Your assignment is very simple. You just have to take these bells from me. That's all there is to it," Kakashi-sensei said. "If you can't get them by noon, you go without lunch. You'll be tied to those posts, and you'll watch as I eat my lunch in front of you."
Akira gave her teacher a scathing look. So that's why he told them not to eat breakfast—to make it harder on them. She suddenly regretted passing up on the leftover rice and vegetables.
"Wait, Sensei," Akira said. "There are only three bells."
"Well that way, there will be at least one of you tied to the posts and ultimately disqualified for failing to complete the mission," he said. Akira swore he was grinning underneath that mask. "That one... goes back to the Academy. Then again, all four of you could flunk out too. You can use any weapon. If you're not prepared to kill me, you won't be able to take the bells."
"Those weapons are too dangerous, Sensei!" Sakura said, concerned.
"Especially since you couldn't dodge that eraser," Naruto laughed.
Akira frowned at her teammates. He was a Jōnin, an elite ninja. He'd deceived them already by failing to introduce himself properly and somehow convincing them not to eat breakfast. Surely he'd let the eraser fall on him on purpose to give them the impression he wasn't all that good (and earn Akira an easy five ryō). But Akira had a feeling that taking a bell from him wasn't going to be an easy task at all. So what was the best way to take them away?
"Class clowns are usually the weakest links, you can safely ignore them," Kakashi said.
A light went off in her mind. If they'd all work as a team, they could easily overpower one ninja even if he was a Jōnin. She looked at her brother. He seemed to be thinking a lot too. Hopefully, they were thinking of the same thing.
"When I say start, you can begin."
Suddenly, Naruto launched himself at Kakashi-sensei, unsheathing a kunai from its holster. As he swung at him, Kakashi grabbed his hand and turned Naruto around, pointing his own kunai at the back of his head. Akira barely noticed any movement from Kakashi-sensei as he'd done that. He was fast, and she was right; they'd get nowhere working alone.
"Don't be in such a hurry," Kakashi said. "I didn't say start yet. But, you came at me with the intent to destroy me, so... how can I say this? I'm actually starting to like you guys."
Akira chuckled.
"Get ready," sensei said, and Akira looked over to her brother. "And... start!"
Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke immediately jumped and fled the glade, off to hide somewhere, leaving Akira alone with Kakashi-sensei, and looking more annoyed than anything else.
"Great. I turn to my brother to tell him we should all work together, but no! They all hide!" Akira growled and began walking away calmly. "Does anyone use their brains anymore?"
"Akira?"
"Hm?" she hummed and faced Kakashi-sensei.
"Usually, a ninja doesn't reveal their plan in front of the target."
"Yeah, well, you don't know how we'd work together, do you?" The girl sighed. "Well, I'm going to go find Sasuke. Have fun being attacked by Naruto, sensei."
Akira stopped and turned again, an idea forming in her mind.
"Sensei?"
"Yes?"
"Can one bell count for two people if obtained together?"
"Yes."
"Interesting."
Akira then leapt into the nearest tree and moved around until she found a good spot to conceal herself. She then put her hands together to form a hand seal, and a Shadow Clone of herself went off to find Sasuke while she observed the glade. As predicted, Naruto was already challenging Kakashi-sensei on his own.
"You and me! Right now! Fair and square!" he shouted.
"Idiot," Akira muttered under her breath.
She then produced another Shadow Clone and sent it off to help Naruto. Akira knew that none of them would want to work together: Naruto had to prove himself after Kakashi-sensei called him a loser; Sasuke was so used to doing things on his own the thought probably never crossed his mind; and Sakura was, well... Sakura. Akira sent another clone to her just in case she did decide to come out of her hiding spot.
The plan was in motion. Technically, a two-person team was still a team. If a bell was obtained with one of Akira's clones, she and whoever she'd gotten it with would get a bell and become a Genin. After that, she was free to help everyone else, her placement ensured.
"You know, compared to the others, you're a bit... weird," Kakashi told Naruto.
Akira watched as Naruto ran to attack Kakashi-sensei. To either antagonize him or show that Naruto posed no threat at all, Kakashi began reading mid-combat, stopping all of Naruto's attacks with one hand. This kept up until Kakashi seemingly got bored and suddenly appeared behind Naruto. He said something about one thousand years of death, and then Kancho'd Naruto so hard he went flying into the lake. Kakashi watched Naruto land and then went back to his reading, which made Akira chuckle under her breath. While he hadn't yet proved to be as nice as Iruka-sensei, he sure was a lot more fun.
Just then, two shurikens came flying out of the water towards Kakashi, who stopped them by deftly catching them by the hole in the middle of each shuriken. Akira frowned. He hadn't even looked. She crossed out the idea of a long-range attack out of her mind; there would be far too many things that could go wrong and far too many ways Kakashi could evade her.
Naruto then angrily crawled out of the water and began shouting at Kakashi-sensei about not eating breakfast, which made Akira's stomach growl against her will. She was beyond hungry, and it was starting to affect her thinking. However, her mind was pulled away from the rumbling of her stomach, and towards the shifting of chakra in one of her clones, which emerged out of the water with seven other Naruto's. They all attacked at once, Naruto clearly doing more work than the Akira clone. Meanwhile, Akira watched closely as Kakashi used the Substitution Jutsu to switch places with one of Naruto's clones. Naruto assumed that Kakashi had fled and, noticing something shining on the ground, he went to pick it up. Akira's clone shouted something, but it proved to be of no use as Naruto's ankle was snagged by a hidden rope. Akira sighed and dispelled her clone as Naruto swung from the tree.
Kakashi appeared above him, sitting comfortably in the tree, but jumped down and looked up at Naruto to lecture him. Then, Akira felt another shift in one of her clones' chakra, and it felt closer than last time. She stared at Kakashi for a moment, and it came to her; his back was turned—it was the perfect time to strike.
Six shurikens flew out of the trees nearby, and Akira knew it was her brother. She positioned herself to exit the trees unnoticed just as Kakashi was distracted by the shuriken hitting him dead in the back. An annoyed huff left her mouth as Kakashi vanished into a puff of smoke and turned into a log.
Akira heard leaves rustling to her right, and she hoped it was was Sasuke changing locations as he'd just given away his position. She rose a hand into a seal and dismissed the clone with Sakura; if Naruto had gotten caught and Sasuke was changing position, the next target was surely her. Kakashi had already seen one clone, and if he saw another, he'd most likely get suspicious.
A scream resonated throughout the nearby forest. Akira could tell it was Sakura but hadn't the faintest idea what in the woods could make her scream in such a way. But as Sakura screamed a few more times, the reason came to her mind, and it made Akira sigh in irritation.
"Genjutsu," she muttered to herself.
Naruto was trapped by the ankle, swinging aimlessly like an idiot; Sakura was apparently stuck in some kind of Genjutsu, and Sasuke was off someplace giving away his position like a first-year Academy student. At least her plan, she hoped, hadn't been compromised. Her final hope was Sasuke. She'd need to secure a bell with him to go help the others get their own.
Sakura screamed again.
"Oh, come on, Kakashi-sensei," Akira whispered.
The man definitely wasn't going easy on them. One the one hand, Akira didn't think it was fair. They weren't even official Genin yet, and he was already training them as they were Chūnin or Jōnin already. One the other hand, however, Akira could only imagine the satisfaction after winning a bell off of Kakashi-sensei.
Just then, she spotted Sasuke and her last clone out in the glade with Kakashi, and Akira slowed her breathing to better eavesdrop on the conversation.
"—not like Sakura and Naruto."
"Say that after you guys get a bell," Kakashi said.
Both Uchiha turned towards their sensei and then shared a roguish look. Sasuke and the Akira clone sent kunai and shuriken at Kakashi, which he easily dodged to the left. But the siblings had something planned. The clone threw a seemingly innocent kunai in no particular direction. Still, it hit a hidden rope that unleased more shuriken and kunai towards Kakashi, who was forced to dodge more. Akira looked at Sasuke and her clone, impressed—they'd been busy.
The real Akira slowly inched towards the battle, making sure to remain silent and hidden in the bushes. Sasuke and the clone kept Kakashi distracted by attacking him head-on. With two reasonably capable Genin attacking him left and right, it left Akira the opportunity to sneak in. In one swift movement, her right hand reached for the holster on her left, and from it, she pulled a small knife. She agilely jumped out of the bushes, and as she landed, she swung her blade outwards, extending it into a long tachi. Akira sliced the ribbon attached to one of the bells on Kakashi's belt and tapped the bell towards her with just the tip of her tachi. The ringing sound brought Kakashi away from the battle, and as the clone vanished into thin air, he looked behind him. Akira was holding a bell with a proud smile.
"Teamwork."