A/N:

PREVIOUSLY: Hotaru, Akira, and Kaho pass Kakashi's bell test via flashbangs and shadows, followed by knockoff shounen nonsense. Hooray!

as for the notes...

this chapter was supposed to be a couple hundred words longer, but unfortunately, i had to shelve a section for later in order to preserve some sort of sense, hence why this chapter is a little short ;,D

anyway, woo! first mission!


"Hey!" Akira greets cheerfully as he walks up on the training ground, fireworks lighting at his feet. "I brought breakfast!"

Stormclouds spark lazily as Kaho rolls over and makes grabby hands towards the bentos in his arms. "Gimme."

Hotaru huffs when she immediately sits up to dig in, but is quick to put his book to the side when he's handed his own box.

"Ooh, what's this?" Akira asks, bending down to read the title. "Anatomy?"

"Someone has to make sure that we don't all die," Hotaru says as he flicks open his box. "Not only would that be inconvenient, but I'm pretty sure it might cause Kakashi to have a mental breakdown, and that man has enough issues."

Akira winces. "Yeah, that wouldn't be great."

"Wheredja get it?" Kaho asks around a mouthful of egg.

"Don't do that," Hotaru says with a flat expression, ignoring her mocking, ' Sorry, mom .' "And I got it from the hospital. I've been volunteering there for a little under a year now. Until recently they've mostly just been sending me around on errands, though, so I only really know the theory. The most thrilling thing I've done so far is bandaging up a genin's leg after he managed to impale himself with a kunai."

"Sounds exciting ," Kaho says with false cheer, and Hotaru rolls his eyes.

"I'm fairly certain that the nurses just see me as a free assistant," he says somewhat sourly, "But at least they've started giving me more things to do lately. Before, they wouldn't even let me look at their textbooks." He thinks of green chakra flickering weakly in his hands, and of watery shadows looming over him, and he swallows the words at the tip of his tongue. "Not much else, though," he finishes lamely.

Akira gives him a brief, odd look before shrugging. "That sucks. Hopefully they'll start you on something better later."

" Hopefully ," Hotaru echoes quietly, allowing the conversation to drop in favor of digging into his bento.


"Well, this is interesting," Kakashi says with a raised brow, crackling with electricity, and Hotaru glances up from his spot on the sidelines.

"One-on-one spars," he offers absently, and the man hums.

After sitting around for a while, Akira had suggested that they train while waiting for Kakashi. Eventually, their practice of katas turned into intermittent spars for the next few hours, which was… well, not enjoyable, since Hotaru is probably the worst at taijutsu out of all of them and knows that he'll be sore tomorrow, but he learned a few things, at least.

When Akira finally knocks Kaho - who, while smaller than both Akira and Hotaru, is almost nimble enough to make up for it - to the ground, Kakashi claps his hands together.

"Ah, my cute little genin are so responsible to be training without me!"

"Nice of you to show up, now that it's…" Kaho squints up at the sky as Akira helps her from the ground, "...Noon?"

"Ten-thirty, actually," Kakashi provides cheerfully. "We'll need to work on that."

"Whatever," Kaho grumbles. "What's your excuse this time? Dog eat your alarm clock?"

Kakashi blinks, eye wide. "How'd you know ?"

Kaho shoots Kakashi an unimpressed look, and he offers a cheeky eye-smile in response.

" Anyway , now that we're all here, I think it's about time Team 7 takes on our first mission, ne?"

"Woo, chores," Kaho says dryly. "I can't wait to do the dishes."

"Maa, don't think that way, Kaho-chan," Kakashi scolds as they start making their way towards the Mission's office, "You might get a better mission. Painting a fence, for example!"

"Question," Hotaru pipes up, drawing the man's attention, "Can you use jutsu during D-Ranks?"

Kakashi raises a brow. "I wasn't aware that you knew fence-painting jutsus."

Hotaru's expression remains flat, and the man lets out a put-upon sigh.

"Maa, it depends. It's an unwritten rule that ninja don't use jutsu on D-Ranks, though there are exceptions. For example, if the techniques aren't obvious, or if the D-Rank is far away from any civilian interference."

"Is the rule there for civilians, or is it some sort of training type of thing?" Akira asks.

"Both. Civilians have seen shinobi use jutsu, of course, but it makes some uneasy to see them outside of wartime. It's better to just not use them at all so there aren't any incidents. As for training… Well, aside from teaching genin the horrors of menial labor, it's also good to know that they're not entirely useless without jutsu, or are intelligent enough to find a workaround. Plus, it's good for team-building. Mostly though," Kakashi admits unabashedly, "Higher-level ninja find it funny to watch genin - and punished ninja who are forced on D-Rank leave - suffer."

"Of course the majority of the ninja population are a bunch of sadists," Kaho mutters. "Though I should've expected it, knowing you."

"So mean, Kaho-chan," Kakashi says, placing a hand on his chest. "I'm hurt. Really, I am."

"Stop calling me chan ," Kaho says distastefully, choosing not to pay attention to his attempt to rile her up.

"Kaho-kun? San? Sama? Hime ?" Kakashi lists off, looking increasingly amused as Kaho's scowl deepens.

" Nothing ," she finally says when he's halfway through another honorific. "Just drop it all together."

"Maa, that seems a little personal," Kakashi says, and although his tone is teasing, he does seem a little put-off by her response.

"I really don't care," she drawls, unaffected.

"Me neither," Akira admits easily. "Besides, we're a team now, so it matters even less."

When his teammates turn their gazes towards Hotaru, he looks away and shrugs. "Whatever is fine." A moment of awkward silence passes before he asks, "...Do we actually get to choose our mission? Or are they assigned?"

Kakashi glances at him before his gaze slides back to Kaho. "Care to answer, Kaho-ch— Kaho?"

"Why me?" she asks, annoyed, but answers nonetheless. "For D-Ranks, you almost always get to choose, though after that it depends. For C-Ranks, you're usually given a few options depending on what best suits your team, though sometimes you're just given one if you're specially requested, or if a mission needs to be completed quickly. For B-Ranks and above, you rarely get to choose unless you're like, a bigshot or something."

"Exactly right, Kaho," Kakashi praises, ignoring her flat expression. "And you finished up just in time, too. We're here!"

Hotaru looks straight ahead, where the Ninja Academy lies. Instead of going through the yard like they did as students, though, they head in through a side door that leads to the Missions's Office.

"'Do a good job'?" Kaho says under her breath, reading the sign that hangs above the desk. "The hell?"

"So vulgar," Kakashi says quietly, sounding amused. "It's mostly there for the clients."

Several ninja linger around in the room, and their chatter becomes noticeably quieter when their team properly enters the room. It feels almost stifling, and Kakashi must notice, because he picks up the pace and makes no detours on the way to the desk.

"Team 7," the Hokage - warm but controlled, like a tamed plume of fire - greets as they come to a stop, and Hotaru's lips twitch into a considering frown. He figured that the man had only been around for Team 7's missions because of Naruto, but it could just be that the man hung around when he had free time or didn't feel like doing paperwork. Then again, he could be around now because today most newly-graduated teams would be accepting their first D-Ranks and he wanted to 'send them off' into their new careers, so to speak.

"It's rude to stare," Kakashi says mildly, and Hotaru blinks, embarrassed. Beside him, Akira looks sheepish, and Kaho glances away and clicks her tongue, ears tinted pink.

The Hokage chuckles. "It's alright. I assume all is well so far for your team?"

Kaho looks up at Kakashi and gets a glint in her eye that makes him worry for the man's safety.

"Oh, yeah!" Kaho says, injecting her voice with enough cheer that it almost seems to startle the Hokage, "Sensei's just the best, you know? He's taught us like, sooo much already. Like, did you know that orange book he carries around him is—"

" O-kay ," Kakashi interjects cheerfully, "I think that's enough of that."

Kaho shrugs, wearing a smug expression as she turns back towards the half-amused, half-bewildered Hokage. The other ninja at the mission desk are looking between Kaho and Kakashi like they don't recognize what they're seeing.

"Right," the man says, gaze sweeping over their team as he lifts a paper from the desk. "Let's get to your first mission, then. You can choose from the following: Babysitting for an elder council member's child, painting the fence of a farmer, shoveling leftover snow around an apartment block, or finding a lost cat."

Akira lights up at the mention of the last mission, and Kaho raises a brow.

"A cat?"

"One belonging to the Daimyo's wife," the Hokage confirms, eyes twinkling with amusement.

Hotaru resists the urge to bury his head in his hands, knowing exactly where this is going.

"We'll take it," Akira decides without hesitation. Hotaru wants to throttle him.

"Are you sure?" the Hokage asks, looking too much like he's going to laugh to sound even remotely pitiful.

"What could be so hard about catching a cat?" Kaho asks with a huff. Someone at the desk covers up a snort.

"What about you, Hotaru?" Kakashi asks.

Hotaru looks between Akira's puppy-dog eyes and Kaho's raised brow and stifles a sigh. At least , he tells himself sullenly, those idiots will learn a lesson.

"Fine. We'll do the… lost cat mission."

"Very well then," the Hokage says, tossing the scroll over to Kakashi, who catches it easily. Then, with slightly more sympathy in his expression adds, "Be careful."

Hotaru resists the urge to groan.


Hotaru is having a great time.

"This isn't fair ," Akira whines, rubbing his hand over one of his numerous wounds.

"That thing is evil," Kaho whispers, voice filled with awe, even as she stands several feet away from Hotaru.

"I've never seen anyone tame that beast," Kakashi says, equally as impressed. Maybe a little terrified, even.

Tora purrs from her spot on Hotaru's shoulders, and he smirks smugly, knowing that he's the only one who escaped their little endeavor unscathed. Even Kakashi, who'd just stood around doing nothing the entire time, had earned himself a scratch.

It's funnier, he thinks, because he'd barely even done anything. Neither Akira's attempts to bribe Tora with food nor Kaho's attempts to catch her with shadows worked, but for whatever reason, she'd been receptive to Hotaru.

Kaho said it was something about 'the vibes' he gave off. Considering he was the only one who'd been calm in approaching Tora and had allowed her to come over by herself to sniff his hand before trying anything, Hotaru's pretty sure that Tora just favors calm people over boisterous ones.

"Back already?" the Hokage asks surprised when they step inside. "Don't tell me you gave up."

Akira lets out a wounded noise and Kaho huffs.

"Nope," the latter says, shoving Hotaru towards the front of the group. He relishes in the way the Hokage does a double take.

"I… Madam Shijimi isn't even here yet," a chunin at the desk says, then glances at the Hokage, who collects himself and waves the man off.

"Well," the Hokage says, "I must admit that I hadn't expected that." Tora cracks open an eye and when she lets out a scratchy meow, the man chuckles. "That's the fastest anyone's ever captured Tora before. Congratulations, Team 7."

"Oh, my baby!" a woman's voice calls out from behind them, and Tora tenses before moving into a standing position. Hotaru glances between Tora and Madam Shijimi, and when the latter meows at the woman, he hands her over.

Madam Shijimi immediately captures Tora in a bone-crushing hug, and Hotaru can't help but notice that although she's being incredibly vocal, she doesn't look unhappy .

"Poor little kitty-kitty," Madam Shijimi coos, rubbing her face against Tora's fur. "Oh, I'm so glad you're back with me."

"I don't know if I should feel bad or not," Kaho says mildly as she watches the affectionate(?) display.

"She's fine," Akira replies, pouting. "She could get away if she really wanted to."

A few minutes later, when Madam Shijimi finally leaves, the Hokage once again turns his attention towards Team 7, wearing a grandfatherly smile that doesn't quite manage to hide the mischief in his eyes.

"Since you finished that mission so quickly, how do you feel about doing another one?"

"That sounds like a great idea," Kakashi answers before anyone else can say a word. From beside Hotaru, Akira and Kaho both groan.

It sounds like music to his ears.


A/N:

i wonder if the tora section is as cringe as i think it is
...meh

i don't know if you could tell (you most definitely can), but i love writing kakashi, and it heals my soul to write him as a troll
also, god! i know i made him, but hotaru is way harder to write than he should be
i wrote his character profile one way, and i am now treating them as a loose guideline bc i don't want him to be edgy as heck
speaking of hotaru: yeah, he's a sensor. obviously fireworks aren't actually lighting under people's feet, shadows don't feel ''watery," etc. - those are just the 'feelings' he gets from people

anyway
Thanks for reading!