Disclaimer: No I do not own Naruto, but I'm starting to wish I did. Oh well.
Wings of the White Angel
Chapter 27: New Meetings
"So this is all of them? Wow…what a small number considering we haven't even entered the first part of the exam yet." Kakashi lazily glanced about the waiting room that held almost all of the remaining entrants for the Chuunin Exam. ("Then again…") If it wasn't for the fact he was wearing his mask, someone would have probably noticed the fact that he was rather angry. ("Those two…")
Pain sighed and glanced around at the other Genins who sat nearby him. "I swear," he muttered under his breath, "If any of these inferior ninjas so much as touch me…"
"You will be calm and not kill them anymore, unless you would like to answer to Death-sama." Next to him sat a red-haired boy wearing a pair of thick goggles over his eyes that almost concealed his face with their size. "After all, Pain, don't forget that you're not on the best terms with the rest of the Seven. Pride was a rather…self-centered and hot-blooded person, no?"
Pain scoffed. "I could care less. He's dead now, and my alliance under him is no more. For now I'm filling in for that little brat of Wrath's, though considering what I've heard of him you might as well have just chosen to go with only two. He was nothing…" The Smoke Ninja froze up slightly as he felt a strong pressure push down on him.
Hatred very slowly sat down right next to Pain, his eyes pointed towards the ground. "If you ever…ever…speak badly of my little brother…" His dull eyes flashed blood red. "I'll beat your love of death right out of your body."
"U…Understood…" Pain felt fear, and that was a rare thing for him, considering his constant brushes with the other side. But in the case of Hatred he was willing to make an exception…because that ninja scared him. ("It's like there's something deadly waiting for me if I anger him…something deadly enough that even I won't be able to live through.")
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Kai slowly walked into the waiting room and looked around at the rows of benches that seated all of the remaining ninja. ("Only 45 in total, if my calculation is correct and everyone besides my team is already here.") He realized that some of the ninja teams were looking at him rather intently, and he felt rather irked by this kind of bizarre treatment. ("I swear…if they don't stop looking at me like I'm some kind of low class…") His hands started to very slowly move, forming the seals for his fireball technique.
"Cool down, Kai." Yurei placed his hand on his teammate's shoulder soothingly. "I'm surprised you'd be so quick to respond with violence…"
"I…I sensed something strange as I entered. It's a bizarre feeling that shortly this room will be filled with a violent aura." Kai glanced back at Kin, who was slowly approaching the doorway. ("No, it couldn't be from him. As much as I'd love to test his powers out right now, that aura was too strong to be him and too weak to be the demon. So, that means it's one of the people in this room.") Pulling his sunglasses out of his body-suit's hidden pocket, he was about to put them on when he felt a tingle run up his spine. For a passing second his eyes flashed silver. "Kin…I would…"
The moment the Watanabe entered the doorway, he was forced to duck as a kunai shot right above his head. "GAH!" Because of the forced form of the dodge, he crumpled to the ground in a rather ungraceful fashion. "What the hell?"
"Heh…as to be expected from a member of the Inuzuka clan." A strong female voice said from near the front of the rows of gathered ninja. The general chatter had gone quiet now, as Kin's yell had caught everyone's attention. "It makes sense you'd be unable to dodge that well, considering the animal your clan has such an affinity for."
"Huh?" Yurei tilted his head to the side, looking rather thoughtful. "Inuzuka? Hm…"
Kin leapt to his feet, veins bulging out of his forehead. "Who threw that, dammit? I'll beat the crap out of you!"
"Oh? I'd love to see that." A slim female form hopped over a couple of benches and landed just a few feet from Kin, just out of striking range but close enough that if she had to she could attack without hesitation. "I'd love to see you try, Inu-chan." She had to have been at least fifteen, with blond hair and a pair of strangely piercing yellow eyes. From her clothing it was easy to tell she was Genin, wearing just a strangely form-fitting suit that resembled the ones that both Kai and Kin wore because of their running speeds.
Kin glared at her in a way that seemed angry, but not quite as angry as one should be when they were almost skewered. "Who are you?"
"Me? Tsuyu Kusamura." The girl crossed her arms across her chest and gave just a little smirk his way. "I'd think that would be obvious, Inuzuka."
"Watanabe." Kin corrected her.
"Inuzuka." She countered.
"Watanabe."
"Inuzuka."
"Watanabe."
"Enough already!" Yurei propped his elbow up on Shadow Goddess' hilt. "So, you think our dear friend Kin here is a member of the Inuzuka clan? What brings that kind of thought around?"
"Isn't it obvious?" Tsuyu pointed right at Kin's canine ears. "Those…are the ears of a dog! So obviously this boy has an affiliation with the Inuzuka clan!" Smirking, she gave him a self-satisfied grin. "How stupid do you think I am?"
"Rather stupid," Kai muttered under his breath, and then immediately regretted it as he was plastered underneath a bench that was thrown at him.
Yurei whistled and rubbed his chin quizzically. "Tell me, do you know Ayumi by any chance? I recognize the speed of the bench-throwing."
"Who me?" Tsuyu chuckled. "Ayumi huh? Yeah, I know her. She and I go way back, after all."
A calm male voice chimed in from right next to Tsuyu. "Tsuyu, please remember not to get too violent in here. After all…" The speaker was a boy that was just a couple of inches taller than Kai and Kin, though shorter than Yurei. He had red eyes and a strange length of black hair which curved across the front of his face, the curved part being highlighted crimson. "Sensei told you to rein your temper in. Besides, that isn't a member of the Inuzuka clan."
"What?" Tsuyu stomped over to Kin and reached out to tug one of the ears, only to withdraw her hand right before Kin's hand intercepted hers. "Heh…you've got some rather quick hands…"
Kin narrowed his eyes slowly, no longer looking amused. "Please don't touch them. As much as I'd love to play along in your insane little game, I'm not a member of the clan you're so angry towards. In fact…"
"Kin! I'm not out yet!" A loud and hearty roar came from down the hall behind them.
Kin face-fell to the tile, leaving behind a small cloud of dust in his wake. ("He's already conscious?")
Kirin was charging towards the waiting room, eyes burning with a passionate flame. "I want to end this fight once and for all! Your so-called win was just a fluke, this time I'll show you my real power!"
"Kin?" Tsuyu blinked down at the still face-fallen boy. ("Where did I hear that name mentioned before?")
Kin slowly stood up and turned to face his charging cousin. "Damn it! I'm going to make sure that next time you won't be able to stand up for a week!" His hands slowly were coming together to form the seals for the White Wing Feather. He would just machine gun punch the life out of Kirin at full speed.
"Not this time!" Kirin launched into a full-bodied aerial roundhouse kick that forced Kin to disengage his attempted seals. And then the moment his feet touched down he was moving, sending in a flurry of punches that forced everyone around the two to back away. "I figured out the best way to take you down! I'll stop you from using your speed and running!"
Kin ducked underneath a punch aimed for his head and retaliated with a punch that was easily blocked. ("Damn, he's right. At this rate I'll lose. In these closed quarters my speed isn't anywhere near as useful…")
Tsuyu hopped back as Kin took a rather large hop towards her with his back. ("He's trying to widen the range he has to move…maybe I was wrong to call him a dog. Perhaps a little bird would be a better description.")
"Give it a rest already!" Yurei pondered whether it would be wise for him to just Kage Mangetsu the both of them and leave them for dead. ("Like a pair of dogs, they just go at it when they see each other.") He would have found a whole lot more irony in that sentence, but at the moment he was too busy watching as Kirin was slowly working Kin into a corner. ("No time to form seals, so what will you do Kin?")
Kin felt his back touch the wall behind him. ("Damn it, there's nowhere to run! I'll have to use that move!") He suddenly reversed directions, slamming his forehead into Kirin's as hard as he could.
Kai barely flinched as Kin's face was the one that took the most damage from that. ("What are you doing, idiot? Who does something like that to themselves?")
Kirin sneered and cocked his right fist back. "You know I won't back down or be moved by one of your weak blows, so why…" He felt a sudden change in the chakra around him…like it was beginning to spin. ("Why? What's going on?")
Kin, blood from the cut he gave himself by head-butting Kirin dripping into his eyes, returned the sneer his cousin had given him a short while ago. "I'm going to beat your ass into the ground…Ras…"
There was a blast of white smoke that swallowed up the two of them, and then a sound like a thousand little bubbles bursting at once. When the smoke cleared, there was someone standing in between the two of them. "You two give our clan a bad name…"
Kin felt his entire body as it instantly went numb from the icy chakra embedded into it. ("Damn it…he's here?")
Kirin snarled and tried to escape, but to no avail. ("I can't move…")
A white-haired form stepped out from between the two frozen Genin and glanced over at everyone in the room. "My apologies for my two stupid cousins." He wore a strangely thick jacket with no sleeves, leaving his rather thin arms completely bare. His ice-blue eyes swept across the crowd in a passing glance before he adjusted his forehead protector. Then he turned and glared right at Kin and Kirin. "As for the two of you, if I hear of you two fighting before the appropriate time again, I'll be sure to tell your elders. Kin, I'm sure your mother would just love to hear that you were picking fights with Kirin. And Kirin, I can already imagine the painful welcome your father would have for you if he knew you were so quick to unleash your full power." Then he released his chakra's hold on the two, letting their bodies go lax. In a burst of white smoke, the person was gone.
Yurei scratched the back of his head, an expression shared by most members of the room in one form or another. "That was…pretty creepy. Who was that?"
Tsuyu looked rather unhappy at these turn of events. ("And here I wanted to see what the 'legendary' Watanabe clan was capable of.") She had no doubts in her mind of their identities now. Honestly, she was more just looking to stir up a little trouble than to actually hurt anyone. But after what she had just seen, she knew that her new intention would be to find out just how powerful this clan was. ("Ayumi spoke of Kin Watanabe…the golden retriever, was it called?")
The red-eyed boy sighed and rubbed the back of his head as well, which made him seem just like Yurei for a moment. "This is rather annoying. We went through all that just to wind up back where we had started from."
Yurei nodded in agreement and extended his hand to apparently the only other sane person near him. "Trust me, when you deal with these kinds of guys you come to expect it. I'm Yurei Akurei."
"Rei Higanbana." Rei grasped Yurei's hand with his own and shook strongly. "You look to be a rather intelligent person, which makes me glad to know someone with brains is leading a pair of rather unstable ninja."
"I'm standing right here, you know." Kin frowned in distaste, but felt rather unwilling to do anything physical. ("Holityu…what was he doing here?") For one of the Jounin Watanabes to actually be in Konoha at any time was strange enough, but to actually run into him here was even more scary.
"Yeah well…" Yurei smiled and was about to say more, but his entire body started to tremble. ("That…that energy…")
Kin felt his entire body shuddering as he detected it to. ("Death? Here?") Slowly he turned his head and glanced down the hallway. And he saw him…no longer hiding beneath his thick cloak, but strolling down the hallway like he owned the entire village already.
Death knew that Kakashi wanted to keep some semblance of order to this Chuunin Exam, but he knew that he couldn't make things that easy. His visor limited his sight, but he knew what was just ten feet in front of him. ("Prize…how good of you to be in the open.") He pondered simply grabbing the boy now, but immediately decided that would be too much trouble. ("No…I came here to watch my pawns in action, and to evaluate the rest of the other countries' ninjas.")
Kin was fully facing Death now, his entire body trembling uncontrollably. ("Why couldn't I sense it up until this point? Beforehand…when we battled him before, I couldn't sense his energy to the level I can now…we would never have been able to beat him. He's a monster…that's it…just a monster.")
Death walked past his prize without a single thought on the matter. "I hope you don't mind me, Kakashi. I'm just here to listen in is all."
Kakashi glared right at the visored monster. ("This is lovely…he's barely keeping his power in check at all.")
Death strolled right down both sets of benches and walked right past Kakashi, not in the least bit worried of a sneak attack. He reached the far wall and turned to look out at the gathered Genin. ("Is this it? Perhaps the number of quality ninja is going down?")
Rei and Tsuyu stood there in silent amazement at the power they felt coming from this man.
Yurei gripped the hilt of Shadow Goddess tighter, his mind formulating a series of different plans to attack Death. But each and every one ended up in one conclusion.
Kai had recovered from the rather painful meeting with a bench, and he was standing and looking at Death with the darkest gaze humanly possible. ("This arrogant bastard thinks he can just walk in here…")
"Thank you for joining us, Kemukage." Kakashi spoke the words out like they were poison. ("He knows the absolute truth. We could probably take him down, but in the process Konoha would be completely annihilated. Only a few ninja in this whole village could survive just what his right arm can do…") It was blackmail. Death knew that if they tried to attack him, he'd just have to use his right arm and kill everyone in the village at once. ("He's got the whole village hostage, and there's little we can do but welcome this killer with open arms.")
"Is there something the matter, Kakashi?" Death's body-covering cloak rippled slightly. "I thought you were going to begin with the explanation of what was going on with the Chuunin Exam. Perhaps I was incorrect?"
Kakashi took a couple of relaxing breaths to try and ease his initial answer to that question. ("Goading him would result in disaster. For now we'll just have to accommodate this sick monster until we figure out a way to kill him in an instant.") Turning his head to look out at the gathered Genin, he held up a hand. "Everyone, I will now explain what this Exam will compose of.")
To be continued…
To Seeker of the Soul: I shall answer all of these questions in due time, of course.
To Yurei Akurei: I said I'd bring it back, just let me get my Naruto mental groove on first.
To Yami Hikari: Well, that is a very big honor to receive. Thank you very much.