"Teamwork."
Akira gave Sasuke a high five. It felt good to have been on the same page with her brother for the first in a while, and it felt even better after having nabbed one of the bells in this seemingly impossible test. She stared at the bell for a moment. It was like a trophy more than a bell.
"Impressive," Kakashi conceded.
"Now, don't you go back on your word, Sensei," Akira insisted, pointing a finger at Kakashi. "This bell counts for both me and Sasuke."
"Yes, yes, don't need to threaten me." He turned to look over his shoulder. "Enjoy your lunch."
In a moment he'd disappeared, and reappeared beside the bento box lunches he'd somehow managed to purchase while the test was going on. Naruto had managed to escape his dangling prison and had spotted the boxes. Just as he was about to open one of the boxes, Kakashi dragged him off and tied him to one of the three posts near the lake, upon which sat the bento boxes.
Sakura appeared moments later, seemingly unharmed, but when she spotted Sasuke, she screamed and fainted. He and Akira shared a glance and shrugged. Sasuke went over to wake her up and, unfortunately for him, was tackled in a hug the second Sakura had woken up. Akira laughed and took a moment to appreciate her brother's suffering before the alarm clock that announced lunchtime rang.
"You really thought that eating lunch before noon was a good idea?" Akira asked, walking over to Naruto.
Naruto stuck his tongue out at her, and she laughed, then took a seat beside him. Sasuke sat beside her a few moments later, dragging Sakura along as she was still latching onto him. As if on cue, all of their stomachs growled.
"Uh oh, stomachs growling. That's too bad—I've got something to say, first," Kakashi said, crouching down to the Genin's level. "I've decided that I won't be sending any of you back to the Academy."
"What? I passed?" Sakura asked, thoroughly confused. "All I did was scream and faint. Did I get points for that?"
"Then—then all four of us," Naruto began, "We're—"
"No," Kakashi said sternly.
The smiles on everyone's faces immediately vanished.
"Akira will become a Genin. The rest of you... are being dropped from the program. Permanently."
"What? Drop us from the program? But that means we'll never become ninjas!" Naruto protested. "You said that if we didn't get the bells, we'd get sent back to the Academy!"
"And what about Sasuke! You said that if a team got a bell, it counted for everyone involved!" Akira exclaimed. "You can't just change your mind like that! How could you do that?"
"Because they don't think like ninjas, they think like little kids, like brats," Kakashi-sensei said.
Sasuke launched himself at Kakashi, eyes filled with anger. But like with Naruto, Kakashi had his student pinned to the ground.
"Apparently, everyone except Akira thinks it's all about you."
"Let go of Sasuke! You can't just step on him like he's some bug!" Sakura shouted, tears welling in her eyes.
"She's crazy, but I have to agree," Akira said, irritated.
"I'm sorry, Akira, but they don't know what it means to be ninja," Kakashi said condescendingly. He looked at Naruto and Sakura. "You think it's a game, huh? Why did we put you on squads? Did you ponder that question for a moment?"
"I don't know what you mean," Sakura said.
"I mean, no one except Akira understood what this exercise was all about!" Kakashi stated. "Not even close."
"What it's about?" Naruto said, confused.
"Yes. That determines whether you pass or fail."
"But that's—I wanted to ask you that from the beginning," Sakura said.
"Use your head! Four people on a squad—why do you think we would do that?"
"Why don't you ask Akira, she knows the answer!" Naruto said, bratty.
"Because she already knows! Because it's basic! She even said it moments ago!"
"It's teamwork," Akira said with a sigh.
Everyone's expression stiffened, and they all gazed at Kakashi-sensei.
"Just working together? Is that what you mean?" Sakura asked.
"That's what I mean," Kakashi said.
"But Akira only teamed up with me, not all of us!" Naruto complained.
"That's not exactly right," Akira said, awkwardly scratching the back of her head. "Clearly, to get one of the bells, we'd have to work together. Kakashi-sensei is a Jōnin—there's no way we could even dream of taking him on alone. But you all ran off the second the test started so... I had to improvise."
"What?"
"I asked Sensei if two people caught a single bell, whether that bell counted for both people or just one? When he confirmed that if two people got a bell using teamwork, I sent a clone to each of you.
"If I got a bell by helping one of you, and if Kakashi permitted it, then I would have gone helping the rest of you get your own bell. That way, we all would have gotten one."
"It was a good strategy," Kakashi said. "But it's too late now. If you hadn't fallen for my traps so easily, you might each have a bell by now."
"Wait a minute," Sakura said. "You set it up with three bells and four people. You purposefully pitted us against each other!"
"I did. I wanted to see if you could overcome that and put the squad ahead of yourselves! A Genin should naturally lean towards teamwork, but—the thought never even crossed your minds!" Kakashi said, sounding increasingly dismayed. "Sakura—you obsessed about Sasuke who was gone, while Naruto was right there and you didn't lift a finger to help him. Naruto—you do everything on your own. Everything! And you," Kakashi said, pressing Sasuke's face harder into the ground, "you, Sasuke, thought that the others were so far beneath you they were worthless. Arrogance!
"Ninja missions are carried out in squads. Of course, you need individual skills, but teamwork is the most essential element. Every shinobi knows this. When individuals put themselves above the squad, this can lead to failure and death. For example—" Kakashi removed a kunai from one of his pouches and placed it against Sasuke's neck. "Sakura, kill Naruto now, or Sasuke dies!"
Akira, Sakura and Naruto looked scandalized.
"That's what happens on a mission." Kakashi put the kunai away. "The enemy takes a hostage and you've got an impossible choice. And someone ends up dead. On every mission, your life is on the line..."
Kakashi got off Sasuke and slowly walked over to a large stone.
"Did you look at this stone? The names engraved on it?" he said, stopping in front of it. "They are all ninja that are honoured as heroes in our village."
"That's it, that's it, that's it!" Naruto exclaimed. "I decided I'm gonna have my name engraved on that stone!"
Akira's head swiftly turned towards Naruto, and she glared at him so hard that he visibly recoiled. Even Sakura, who wasn't directly looking at her, could see the viciousness in her glance. It was dark and murderous—nothing she'd ever seen on Akira before or something she wanted to see ever again.
"They are... a special kind of hero," Kakashi said, looking back at the students. "They're all, K.I.A."
"Oh, that sounds real cool!" Naruto said, but Akira's glare made him shrink again.
"K.I.A. means killed in action Naruto, they all died!" Akira growled. "The Uchiha name is the most prominent one on that stone."
Naruto's happy-go-lucky expression died in an instant, and sadness filled his eyes. Even Sasuke, who usually had the emotional range of a teaspoon, narrowed his eyes at the stone. Sakura's shoulders slumped, and she glanced at Akira's profile; her jaw was rigid with anger.
"This is a memorial," Kakashi said calmly. "The names of my closest friends are engraved here."
Akira let out a slow breath as her anger melted away. She watched Kakashi's eyes as they stared at a few places in particular. He did that for a while and said nothing, leaving his students to wonder just how many people Kakashi had lost. Against her better judgement, Akira went to stand beside him. She looked down at the names of her parents, her uncles, her cousins.
"This might be too... soft, of me. But you could give them another chance," Akira muttered, just loud enough so that Kakashi could hear. He glanced sideways at her. "My father never cared much for second chances, but... I think that if you believe in someone, they were always worthy of a second chance." Akira shrugged. "I believe in them."
Akira looked up at Kakashi. He seemed to be deep in thought, from what she could see of his face as if he was remembering or debating something in his mind. After a few moments, he looked away and addressed the three other students.
"All right, I'm going to give you one more chance."
Akira closed her eyes and breathed a sigh of relief. As if by chance, when her deep blue eyes reopened, they fell on her father's name. For a moment, she felt defiant, but pride swelled over when Naruto and Sakura cheered. Akira turned to look at them and laughed.
"But I'm going to make it much harder on you," Kakashi stated. "You'll only have one hour to accomplish the task.
"Eat lunch now to build up strength, but—Naruto doesn't get any. It's your punishment for trying to eat by yourself. And, if anyone tries to feed him, that person will immediately fail. Akira—you already passed, which means you can't help them in any way. Got it?"
Naruto was about to protest, but Kakashi-sensei cut him off before he could say anything.
"I make the rules. You follow them. Got it?"
"Yes, sensei," Sakura sighed.
With that, Kakashi disappeared from sight, but Akira doubted he was very far away. She took three of four lunch boxes and handed one to Sasuke and the other to Sakura.
"Oh no, mine has spicy karaage," Sakura said sadly.
"Do you prefer shrimp?" Akira said, showing her box to Sakura. "There are sweet potatoes, too."
"You want to trade?"
"Yeah, sure."
Akira and Sakura traded bento boxes and began eating. Sasuke plucked the umeboshi out of his rice and dropped it onto Akira's, who passed it on to Sakura when she spotted it. However, their friendly lunch was consistently interrupted by the growling of Naruto's stomach. He kept insisting that he'd be fine without food for a whole day, but none of them believed him. If Akira had still been participating in the exercise, she'd have fed him against Kakashi's instructions, but she had to count on selfish Sasuke and air-head Sakura to do it for her, instead. And just like that, to everyone's surprise, Sasuke cracked the fourth bento box open and offered it to Naruto.
"Here," he said, sounding annoyed.
"No, Sasuke! You can't do that!" Sakura said, voice hushed. "You heard what Sensei said!"
"Kakashi's gone. We need to get those bells as a team. If Naruto's hungry, he'll be weak and ineffective. That hurts the team and jeopardizes the mission," Sasuke said. He looked over at his sister. "At least that's what Akira would say, or... something like that."
Akira laughed at her brother, who was trying very hard not to look like he wanted to murder Naruto. With a sigh, Sakura cracked the chopsticks for the fourth bento box and offered to feed him since his hands were tied, which nearly brought Naruto to tears. Unfortunately, after Naruto took his first bite, Kakashi appeared in front of them in a big cloud of smoke.
"So dramatic," Akira muttered, stuffing a piece of tamagoyaki in her mouth.
"You!" he shouted at Naruto. "You broke the rules. I hope you're ready for the punishment!"
Akira shook her head and kept eating, watching the scene unfold like some television series Kai liked until her lunch blew away as a result of the storm Kakashi was brewing for effect.
"Any last words?"
"Yeah, you made my lunch fly away, Sensei," Akira said, annoyed. "You're buying me another."
"But—but you said—"
"Yes?" Kakashi said, taunting.
"You said there were four of us! That's what you said, and that's why, uh..."
"We're all on this squad, and we're all in it together!" Sasuke said, standing up.
"Yeah, that's right!" Sakura added. "We gave Naruto some food because the four of us are one!"
"The four of you are one? That's your excuse?" Kakashi-sensei said, looming over the four students. "You pass."
Akira snorted and laughed as Kakashi stared at them with smiling eyes. The storm began to dissipate, and the blue sky returned.
"We passed?" Sakura said. "How'd we pass?"
"You're the first squad that ever succeeded," Kakashi-sensei said. "The others did exactly as I said and fell into every trap. They couldn't think for themselves. A ninja must see through deception. In the ninja world, those who break the rules are scum, that's true. But... ninjas who leave their friends behind are worse than scum."
"Heh," Naruto chuckled. "You're kinda cool, Sensei."
"The exercise is over. Everyone passes! Squad Seven gets their first mission tomorrow!" Kakashi said, with a thumbs-up. "Let's go home."
"Oh, no you don't! You owe us lunch!"
While Sasuke, Sakura and Naruto stood up calmly, smiling (at least a little in Sasuke's case), Akira ran up to Kakashi with an annoyed look on her face.
"Lunch?" he said, blinking stupidly.
"Yeah, your dramatic-effect storm blew it away!" Akira insisted.
"Oh, uh, sorry about that."
"By the way, what was that?" Akira's annoyance had suddenly vanished, replaced by a gleam of curiosity in her eyes. "I know I read about it in a scroll somewhere..."
"All right, come on," Kakashi said with a laugh, "I'll tell you about it over lunch."
Kakashi dropped a hand on Akira's head and ruffled her hair, which she protested immediately. But instead of swearing, like she usually did when Kai did the same thing, Akira laughed and swatted his hand away. She was grinning like a child, nearly bouncing as she walked, more excited than ever to know she was going to be trained by a ninja like Kakashi. Akira looked back to Naruto, who was annoying Sakura as usual, and she smiled. Looking up at Kakashi lazy expression, last week's jealousy in the face of Iruka and Naruto acting like brothers had vanished, replaced by the warm sensation of contentment.