Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, the characters, concepts, names and related indicia. They are copyright (c) Masashi Kishimoto. I forget where this fic was going... I'll need to find the rest of the chapters on one of the discs lying around my comp. and post them. Until then, here's what was saved from the purge! (my comp crashed from too much anime downloading :( )
She hunched forwards, breathing heavily as the pain slowly drained away, leaving her alone in the darkness. She felt the cold chains soothing her skin around her wrists, ankles and neck, retraining her. She remained hunched over for a few more moments, before reaching for the keys and unlocking herself, standing shakily and moving towards the door. Although she hated this, at least this time she had something to look forwards to. This morning she would be placed onto a three cell gennin team and meet her new sensei.
The door opened silently and she stepped out into another room, making her way slowly up the stair and pushing through another door into the kitchen. Her house was small, but with the money she had it was all she could afford. A team of Anbu had found her alone in the rain a few years ago, with little memory of how she had gotten there, and had taken her back to Konoha to live as a shinobi. Once they found out her secret, there was no one who wanted to take care of her and she had been forced to live alone since the age of nine.
A small amount of sunlight was breaking over the horizon, flooding into her house. She brushed a few strands of dark red hair from her eyes and flopped back on one of the kitchen chairs, still breathing heavily. After recovering fully, she moved towards the bathroom, grabbing her usual outfit and entering.
She looked in the mirror, frowning slightly. She had small, delicate features and smooth skin, framed by dark redish purple hair which complimented her strange, red eyes. Her hair constantly covered her left eye, hanging down and stopping just before her chin, the ends neatly feathered. Her eyes seemed perpetually angry, because along with her incredible beauty came her fierce temper. She wasn't loud or overly serious, but if you annoyed her, she had little patience and would promptly silence you.
Flicking her hair from her eyes, which did nothing to help, she slipped off her outfit, pulling on another. It consisted of heavy black shorts that reached down to her knees and had a dark red lining on the bottom edge. She pulled on a black t-shirt, the sleeve and collar lined with the same deep red to match her hair, and quickly brushed her hair, stepping out of the bathroom and back into the sunlight.
Having spent the entire night up, her skin was pale, small bags under her fiersome eyes and an all over sickly look which took away from her looks, but she could do nothing about it. She slipped on a pair of sandals, grabbing her Konoha head-protector uneventfully and stepping outside, slamming the door roughly behind her.
Out of all the Acadamy students, she had been the least enthused in recieving the symbol of the Konoha shinobi. Sha had simply accepted her passing through the classes, taking a protector and leaving. Quite frankly, she didn't care in the least. She looked up at the sky as she headed towards the acadamy, it was going to be another steamy, hot Konoha day.
As she neared the Acadamy, she glaced at a boy speaking to his parents about graduating from the Acadamy. They were speaking excitedly as the boy flashed his forehead protector around, grinning widely. She sped up, pushing through the doors and heading down the hall, her hands in her pockets as she turned into the room she had been instructed to meet in.
She was one of the first ones in there, only a few other Acadamy students waiting ecitedly for Iruka-sensei to announce the teams. Actually, she noticed, Iruka was nowhere to be seen, his usual desk empty, without so much as a paper on it. She silently took a seat at the back of the class, away from the other few students. She sat back, closing her eyes and trying to relax her tired body, dozing lightly as the class slowly filled with more students. When she opened her eyes a few minutes later, the class was almost completely full, although there were still a few people missing.
She spotted a crowd of girls crowding around one person in particular, one she knew to be Uchiha Sasuke. She felt nothing towards him, she rarely felt any emotion at all except anger or sarcasm. Looking around the room, she noticed a few others. There was Uzumaki Naruto, probably the most easily recognizable, Nara Shikamaru, asleep as usual on the desk beside his friend Chouji, who was munchin wildly on a bag of chips. Further down sat Hyuga Hinata, looking over at Naruto nervously, a little ways from her sitting Yamanaka Ino, speaking with a bunch of girls. There was no one speaking to her, they never did. Perhaps they were afraid of her, but she doubted it. She just plain never bothered to make friends, and so she had none. She knew their names and they knew hers, sometimes a few words would pass between them, but she didn't really care.
Her eyes shifted to the front of the class as Iruka appeared, rearranging a pile of papers as he made his way to the front of the class, holding up a hand for silence. The silence was almost immediate, the students giving their full attention. Despite her uninvolvement, her stomach squirmed slightly, today she would meet the people she would be forced to team up with for the next few years possibly. She hoped they would be easy to get along with. Or better, that they weren't freakishly strong and made her look like a weakling.
"Today you will be put on to your team, officially graduating from the Ninja Acadamy. There will be ten teams of gennin, with a total of thirty gennin, three to a team, and most likely two males and a female to each team. Listen carefully for your name to be called, I won't be repeating it again," said their sensei. The air was thick with anticipation as he began calling off the teams.
"Team one will consist of Arato Kazumi, Etsuku Denbe, and Simizu Ken. Team two is Saigo Zenshin, Yunakawa Atasuke and Ryusaki Yuki. Team three is Oyama Takuya, Yano Riku and Takasu Sora. Team four is Murkami Aya, Nagano Tango, and Kuno Yutaka. Team five is Izumu Shizue, Kuroki Midori and Idane Ryuu..."
There were various cheers and whispers or groans passed through the room as he continued listing off the teams. "Team six is Inokuma Kimiku, Nittu Osamu and Nanami Hikaru. Team seven is Haruno Sakura, Uzumaki Naruto-"
There was a loud shout of triumph, interupting Iruka. "- and Uchiha Sasuke." this was followed by an overexaggerated groan as Naruto hit the desk dejectedly.
"Team eight," he announced, ignoring the interruption, " will consist of Inuzuka Kiba, Aburame Shino and Hyuga Hinata. Team nine is Amakaze Raiko, Kageri Shike... and Kasumi Izumi."
Izumi looked around, unsure of who her team mates were. She had never heard of them before, and after a few moments of searching, she gave up, leaning back. Team nine, huh? she thought. With Shike and Raiko.
"And Team ten will consist of Nara Shikamaru, Akamichi Chouji and Yamanaka Ino. I will call the teams up in reverse order to pick up some papers which include information on your new sensei's and where to meet them. Team Ten plese come forwards."
Team ten, or two of its members at least, stepped forwards, walking down to the front of the room. Soemone pushed Shikamaru, waking him up where he grumbled something about the whole thing being too troublesome before slowly making his way to the front. Izumi agreed with him, this was troublesome. The three new gennin looked over the papers before leaving the room in silence. All eyes turned back to Iruka.
"Team nine please come here," he ordered. Izumi remained seated for a moment, before pushing herself up, flicking her deep red hair from her eye and moving towards the front of the class. She caught sight of her other two team mates, two boys the same age as her. She followed the boy with black hair as he took the paper and led them out of the room in silence as well. They paused outside of the door, reading over the paper.
'I can't believe I got stuck with you," muttered the dark-haired boy. He was glaring angrily at the other boy, who had deep blue hair, almost black but not shiny, instead navy blue like looking at a shadow within shadows, unnaturally dark. He grinned at the black-haired boy.
"I can. This should be interesting," he said. He turned to Izumi.
"I'm Amakaze Raiko," he said, introducing himself.
"Izumi," she said curtly. The other boy folded the papers.
"I'm Shike," he said quietly, eyeing her. She turned slightly, facing down the hallway.
"We're supposed to meet our sensei at Training Field four, but it doesn't say who he is. Or she," said Shike, adding the last part as an afterthought.
"Ugh, I hope we don't get Gai sensei. I rather put up with you than with his eyebrows," said Raiko, shivering in disgust. Izumi, being antisocial as she was, said nothing. There was an odd tension between these two that she could feel strongly.
"Let's go," said Shike, turning down the hall. She walked in silence beside them as they slowly picked their way towards the end of town, heading towards training field four. There was a young man with raven black hair leaning against a tree casually, a small hawk on his shoulder, and Izumi moved towards him until the other two stopped, calling out to him.
"What are you doing here, Daisuke?" asked Shike, standing about ten feet from the jounin. Daisuke raised his head, frowning.
"I could ask you the same... I'm meeting my new team here." he said.
"You, a sensei?" said Raiko, snorting.
"Shut up," muttered Daisuke, scowling. "And what are you doing here? Don't tell me you're meeting your sensei today as well."
Realization seemed to dawn on the three boys and their faces paled. "Dai-Daisuke... What team number do you have?"
"Team Nine," he replied.
"Great," snorted Raiko, throwing up his hands. "Hello, sensei."
"Oh God no," muttered Daisuke, sinking to the ground. 'Why me? Why did I get stuck with you two?"
This is a Jounin sensei? thought Izumi. Daisuke's hawk stretched it's wings, readjusting itself on his shoulder.
"I got two guys who can only think about killing eachother and... even better. You're Izumi, right?"
"Yes," she said curtly, flicking her hair annoyingly from her eyes again. Daisuke seemed to shrink as he looked over his team.
"Great," he muttered, looking at her. She glared at him and he sighed, closing his eyes for a moment. "Well, I suppose we should try to get along until the next chuunin exam and I can get rid of you. So... We'll go around and each of you will tell us about youself, likes, dislikes, intrests, goals... I'll go first. My name is Kurome Daisuke, I'm twenty years old and a Jounin of four years. I like my hawk, Akame, and I dislike children, weakness and Kumogakure. My intrests include training and sleeping, and I have a short temper, so don't bother me too much. I have no goals."
He turned to Shike, who was leaning against another tree, arms crossed over his chest. "I'm Kageri Shike, fourteen years old. I like training and fighting, and I dislike Raiko. There's not much that intrests me, and my only goal is to become stronger and join the Anbu."
Daisuke nodded, turning to Raiko who had fallen back onto the grass, his hands behind his head. "My name is Amakaze Raiko, fourteen years old. I like training, the colour blue, and relaxing under the stars. I dislike Shike, ramen and stupid or weak people. Goals... My goal is to learn all of Konoha's jutsus and becomw a hunter-nin."
Daisuke nodded again and finally turned towards her. She felt like the odd one out in the group, the other three seemed to know eachother fairly well, but they knew nothing of her. She flicked her hair form her eyes again, leaning back against a tree. "My name is Kasumi Izumi and I'm also fourteen years old. There are not many things I enjoy, aside from sleep when I can get it. My list of dislikes is too long to cover fully, but some of my dislikes are loud noises, hot weather, annoying people, fighting, being sick so often and bright lights or colours. My goal in life is to rmember what happened to me before I came to Konoha. I also hate sleep."
"Huh, how can you hate sleep and like it at the same time? And what do you mean, 'before I came to Konoha'?" asked Raiko, tilting his head to better view her.
"You wouldn't get it," she replied simply, ending the session. Daisuke sat back, sighing.
"Now that that's over with, I bet you are dying to test eachother's strengths. What do you say to a free-for-all, every man for himself battle?"
"Sure," said Shike, glaring at Raiko.
"Yeah," said Raiko.
"What about you, Izumi?"
I know I shouldn't, I have no enrgy left. I'll pay for it later if I fight now, bu I don't want to look weak in front of them. "I... Fine."
"Great, this way I can relax," said Daisuke, leaning back against the tree. "But, Izumi, don't you even have your weapons pouch?"
"I never use weapons... I already have everything right here," she said, holding up her hands. It was true, unless required, she had never used shuriken, kumai or senbon at the Acadamy.
She felt the other two gennin staring at her interestdly, wondering about her attacks. She had never needed to seriously fight in the acadamy, so she had never lost control, but this was different. If she lost control of it here, Daisuke would find out, and eventually, so would the Hokage.
"Are you alright to fight right now? You look a little... sick," asked Shike, eyeing her.
"I'm fine, mom," she retorted sarcastically. Raiko snorted at Shike and stood as well. Daisuke looked up at his new team.
"Well, go do whatever. I'm tired so stay around this training field where I can keep track of you, so go ahead whenever your ready."
"Shike, I'll deal with you later. Let me..." Raiko pulled out four kunai and dashed at Izumi. He was fast, but she was faster and managed to flip back and face him properly in silence. She felt a familiar twinge in the back of her neck as she struggled within her mind, trying to restrain herself. She was very worn out from this morning and knew she would either have to lose or release it, and there was no way she was going to lose.
She took a step forwards, but suddenly fell to her knees, clutching her head in pain that flashed through her mind violently, tearing at her nerve and threatening to overthrow her mind and body completely. She felt her mind slowly slipping as she struggled to keep control, feeling an unfamiliar force burning through her. She looked down at her hands and noticed her nails forcing out into points, almost like claws, and she tried to hold it back further.
'Are you alright, Izumi?" asked Raiko, abandoning the battle and stepping forwards.
"Don't come any closer!" she growled, her hands clutching her head again. Her feathery red hair completely covered her face, hiding the animal-like eyes that she was now showing. Her body relaxed eventually, before she broke into a coughing fit. She covered her mouth, hunching over and gasping for breath between coughs, eventually calming down again. As she pulled her hand away, she noticed it was speckled with tiny droplets of blood, which she quickly wiped away.
"I can't..." she gasped. After regaining her breath, she pushed herself up shakily, her hands wrapped across her stomach as she faced her sensei.
"I need to go," she rasped, clutching her stomach in pain. Daisuke looked up.
"Already? You haven't even fought yet. If you think you're going to lose, than forfeit," he said. Something inside her snapped.
"Ugh... You just don't get it do you? I need... I need to..." she broke off, glaring at her new sensei before turning and vanishing, dashing back into the village, back to her own house and closing the door behind her, leaning on it for a few moments before slumping to the floor.
It had been getting worse steadily for the last while, and she knew that sooner or later she would need to tell someone about it. If she fully lost control, the results would be disasterous. She closed her eyes for a moment, calming herself before deciding to continue keeping it a secret. Someone would find out sooner or later, so why bother?