After a bit of effort, Hiro finally came off. After they finished this, Lee stood in front of the class. "Now then, my youthful pupils, you see beside me a door." Lee motioned towards said door. "Beyond this door is the second and final part of the test. It comprises of three rooms, each testing one of the basic jutsu types that a ninja must learn. The first is taijutsu. The next room is the genjutsu room. The final room is the ninjutsu room. Also, please note that you need not use the jutsu type specific for the room. It is possible to make it through this test with hard work and intense specialization, but points are docked from your score, as this is a test of your versatility. You shall each go in one by one, starting with the first person to have finished the written test. Which I believe is you, Gasa."

Gasa grinned and walked through the door beside Lee. About fifteen minutes elapsed, and Lee motioned for Akira, then Hiromaru fifteen minutes after him. Finally, Kimbo was called on.

He took a deep breath. "Well, here goes nothing," he thought to himself. Opening the door beside Lee, he found himself in a white room. It was a long hallway, and at the end Kimbo saw the door to the next room. Kimbo shrugged and took a step. Then he dropped to the ground clutching his stomach. A wooden ball about the size of his fist had been launched from a wall. "So I have to use taijutsu to avoid the balls," Kimbo realized. With that thought he broke into a run. The balls started whizzing by. Three came in straight for his face. Taking out his kunai, he deflected all three. Then one came whizzing towards his midriff while another zeroed in on his head. Thinking quickly, he bended backwards and placed his hands on the floor. Both balls barely missed him. "Crap this hurts!" He thought tearfully as he scuttled across the floor on all fours with his belly facing the ceiling, only to see another come towards his… um, area. Needless to say, he was reasonably worried. Thinking quickly, he brought his legs up and did a backhand spring, landing on his feet and running backwards. Gripping his kunai once more, he threw it at the wooden ball. Turning a smart about face, he ran like a cat on fire to the exit, balls whizzing past. "Lee sensei," he panted, "I don't know how, but you're paying for this!" To his horror the door was slowly closing downward. "Oh no you don't!" Kimbo cried, and took a running dive through the quickly narrowing gap in between the ground and door. Now sure he was away from danger, he opened his eyes, and saw that he was in a different room.

"Well, the good news is I didn't die," Kimbo sighed and looked back. "Bad news," he said, contemplating the door, "I've lost my pants." Indeed, his baggy shorts had been caught as he had popped out of the door, and were now stuck between the ground and the door. He took a few minutes to attempt to wrest his trousers from the door of general annoyance, but to no avail. He shrugged, and looked to see what predicament he was in now. This room was smaller then the hallway he had just gotten out of, and was encrusted with doors. There were doors the size of his head, doors twelve feet in the air. There was even a perfectly normal sized door at ground level, which just so happened to be bristling with spikes and very obvious deathtraps. Kimbo sat down and thought for a second. He was going to enjoy the peace and quiet of this room for a little while. "Well, this is the genjutsu room, but how am I supposed to use genjutsu to get through?" The answer came instantly. "Of course!" He quickly made a sign with his hands. "Transform!" In a poof of smoke, where Kimbo once was, there was a cat with wild eyes and red marks on his face. Looking around, he saw a door that seemed big enough for him a few feet off the ground. With a well placed jump, he got his front paws onto the door's threshold. Pulling himself up, he wriggled through the opening for about three feet and popped out of the other side.

He fell about twelve feet down into the next room. Getting out of his henge, Kimbo got up and looked around. This room was a little bigger then the last room. It was about the size of a small training area, and the door out was just in front of him. Kimbo was suspicious. After the George Lucas like run through the taijutsu room, and the million and a half unreachable doors in the genjutsu room, he knew that there was going to be some kind of odd surprise here. To make matters worse, this room was testing his weakest subject, ninjutsu.

He tried to figure out what was the deal with this room, but nothing came to mind, so he fell back on his "fail safe" backup plan of winging it. He took a few furtive steps towards the door, but nothing happened. He took a few more, and still nothing changed. So with that he dashed across the room like mad and lunged for the door. As soon as he had touched the doorknob, he felt someone pulling him away and throwing him back to the other side of the room. Looking at it, he saw a perfect mirror image of himself, wild eyes, red markings, every single detail of the person's face echoed the same feature on Kimbo's. The only thing not his was the cold and determined grimace set on the thing's face.

Kimbo just about cried. "How the heck am I supposed to defeat you!" he yelled incredulously at what he guessed was a doppelganger. It just stared back at him with the same look of determination. Once again, Kimbo turned to his plan B, and started to make signs with his hands.

As said before, ninjutsu was not Kimbo's strong point, but he did know a few techniques. His main one was an old standby from the Inuzuka clan, the quadruped jutsu. It was a useful jutsu in the fact that it pulled reserves of chakra from the center of the body equally to each of the limbs, allowing a person to move ridiculously quickly and agilely on all fours.

As he finished the seals, he was rewarded with a feeling of intense warmth and energy that spread to every part of his body. Hunching down onto his hands, he took out a long hunting knife. Oddly enough, his doppelganger merely dropped into a fighting stance. Kimbo then realized that it probably couldn't use ninjutsu. With that thought, he launched himself towards it.

His knife was parried by a kunai his clone had taken out. It batted the knife away expertly and jabbed at Kimbo's midriff. Kimbo spun to one side and ran on all fours to one of the walls. He then used the momentum to bounce off the wall and fly parallel to the ground towards the clone. It took out another kunai and first parried Kimbo's second blow with one, then threw the other one at him. Kimbo dropped to the floor and then hand sprung himself back up, launching one foot downwards towards the clone's head. It brought its wrist up to parry, then grabbed Kimbo's ankle with his free hand. Kimbo grinned and bent his back towards his clone. He grabbed the back of both knees and pulled, bringing him down, but only for a moment. Once the clone had hit the floor, it tumbled backwards back onto its feet and aimed a kick at Kimbo. Kimbo caught the leg and swept his foot forward, knocking the clone down again. He then raced towards the door and tried to open it. Once again he touched the door, only to be wrenched away by his clone once more. The clone then landed a barrage of punches onto Kimbo, only to be knocked into the wall when Kimbo whipped around in a circle and landed the back of his ankle onto the clone's face..

"The leaf whirlwind," Kimbo said panting, "I guess I'll have some points docked for using taijutsu." As he tried to walk, he collapsed. His right leg had given out, apparently the stress from using one of Lee sensei's taijutsu techniques had strained the muscles too much. Limping on his one good foot and his hands like a wounded dog, he opened the door, only to once again be thrown onto the opposite wall by his clone, who looked almost completely untouched by the kick Kimbo had landed on his jaw.

"This is too much!" Kimbo yelled at the clone. "What is this! Why aren't you defeated! That kick would have sent my uncle through the wall! How are you unscathed! AND WHY ARE YOU JUST STARING AT ME!" he cried. As expected, the abomination just kept looking at him intently.

Kimbo realized that he would have to calm down. "Okay, let's think logically," he said to himself, "my opponent is a dude who is either at or slightly above my level in taijutsu. He doesn't attack me unless I attack him or go for the door. I can't knock him out or kill him apparently, so logically the only thing I can do is restrain him." He looked at his clone, and the clone looked back which just made him angry. What right did that thing have to wear his clothes? How did this thing have the nerve to look like him, save for the fact his clone still had pants on. The likeness was exactly the same from his long T shirt, his spiky brown hair, the red marks on his face, and his flowing parrot head shirt… Kimbo grinned as he realized what to do. Taking out his hunting knife, he put a kunai in his mouth and placed three in his other hand. He grinned through the hilt of the kunai and charged towards the clone. He slashed with his hunting knife, and the clone dodged it. He slashed again, and the clone ducked. As the clone dropped down to dodge another slash, Kimbo suddenly dropped down and kicked him up into the air. While in the air, remembering Hiro's ordeal with Tenten san, he threw the three kunai in his hand, pinning the clone to the wall by the sleeves and the third one aimed below the fork in his legs. Taking the kunai out of his mouth, he pinned the shirt's tails with it and his knife.

"Now just hang out there and chill for a while, okay?" He grinned as he walked towards the final door and opened it.

"What the heck!" he almost yelled as he beheld the scene in front of him. He was in the testing room he had walked out of

"Kimbo, there are still people taking the applied test, so if you would be so kind as to find your seat," Tenten san said firmly but not unkindly.

Still thoroughly confused, Kimbo wandered back to his seat, where Gasa and Akira were waiting for him. They grinned at the look he had on his face. "That was interesting huh?" Akira said grinning.

Kimbo mumbled an expression of utter confusion. Akira and Gasa laughed until Gasa decided it was time for them to enlighten their poor friend. "It was genjutsu," Gasa explained.

"And a really complex one apparently," Akira said. "To make an entire set of rooms, and to keep them consistent for each person, and with all the variables like the balls, the doors, and the invulnerable clone at the end, it's on a completely different level then even most jonin."

It took a second for all of this to sink into Kimbo. Then finally he said rather carefully, "okay, but guys, I have a very important question to ask you two." His friends listened carefully. "Am I," he started uncertainly, "am I wearing pants?"

Akira and Gasa just stood there for a second. "This truly is a serious question," Akira said stoically.

"Indeed," Gasa said seriously, "and we shall employ all of our tools of perception to answer said question in all accuracy." The two then spent ten minutes observing Kimbo with magnifying glasses, stethoscopes, telescopes, microscopes, even one of those little airport scanner things Akira had found in his coat, until they finally looked at a very embarrassed Kimbo and delivered their verdict.

"After an exhaustive study, we have come to the conclusion that you are not, in fact, wearing pants," Akira said in a monotone.

"You, sir, are wearing shorts," Gasa informed, before the two fell down laughing. Kimbo wondered once again if it was worth it to have these two as friends.

"And now that we have wasted a good few minutes, we still have some time on our hands, and I think if we launch another pushpin at Hiro, he's liable to kill us," Akira said smiling deviously.

Gasa smiled back. "Well I'm sure that you have something in your Technicolor dream coat to amuse us, Akira."

Akira laughed and stuck his hand in one of the many pockets of his drab, drab tan coat. He took out a deck of cards and started shuffling. "Seven card stud, anyone?"

The three then played cards for the rest of the time. Of course, in the end, Gasa won. They all knew he would. Gasa claimed that he could read minds, and they weren't ones to doubt the dude.

"You know, looks like almost everyone's done," Akira said looking around. Indeed, the place was almost completely full again. "Do you know who's the last one to finish?"

Gasa thought for a second. "You know, I want to say that it's-" but before he could begin to answer the question, an explosion ripped through the walls of the room. Chairs, tables, people were flung to every corner of the room, pencils became deadly needles of death, and the three boys found themselves under a pile of rubble and people.

Kimbo was finally able to climb out, to behold Colleen, the girl from Oyamadagakure standing in the middle of what was once the room the kids had walked into. A very putout looking jonin with long black hair and red eyes was staring at the poor girl, and Lee was looking exceptionally crispy. Poor Tenten had fallen under one of the desks that had been blown away by the blast, but other wise everyone looked relatively unhurt. For a few moments all that could be heard were the collective groans of everyone present. Then Lee called out in a surprisingly high-spirited voice for someone who had just been roasted like a Christmas turkey, "very good, students! This completes the second part of the exam. I, Tenten chan and Kurenai san shall review everything that you did, and we will give reports out at the end of your lunch break, which is right now. Class adjourned!"

Akira, Gasa, and Kimbo shrugged and went to get their lunches. Kimbo took his out of his backpack. "Well, that was one heck of a way to end the exam."

Akira took what appeared to be a two foot long sub out of his coat and laughed. Kimbo once again found himself contemplating his friend's coat. It was quite possibly the singularly most amazing garment of clothing he had ever seen in his entire life. Somehow it always had what he needed in it, whether it was a lunch, his I pod, even some decidedly odd items. One time Kimbo said that he had a headache, and Akira had pulled out a thermos of black tea, a few herbal candles, a CD player, a few CD's of the sound of the ocean, and a large foam mat. He, Akira, and Gasa spent twenty minutes in a wonderfully relaxed state, but after words Kimbo got a headache trying to figure out how and why Akira carried all that stuff with him. Not that Gasa's way of carrying lunch was much more normal.

"I guess we were just lucky that we made it out without much collateral damage," Gasa said while taking his bento out from under his rain hat. "I heard that every window in the academy shattered though."

"Kukukukuku," Kimbo laughed evilly, relishing the idea of the sucker who would have to put all those windows back in.

"Kimbo, no offense man, but that kind of creeps me out" Gasa said uneasily as he ate his lunch.

Akira looked beyond the two and sighed. "Speaking of creeps," he said, nodding towards an oh so obvious figure sauntering towards them.

"Oh, Hiromaru. It's so good to see you again," Akira said pleasantly, "how's your bum doing?"

Hiro looked upon the tall spindly frame of Akira with the icy stare of pure, impassive hate. "Better then your test scores, I'm sure."

"Oh, I'm not too worried about them. I saw your face when Tenten san threatened to take you out of the test though."

"You're lucky you have such great friends like us," Gasa said grinning.

Hiro just stared at the three smiling boys. "And you're lucky that green buffoon of a teacher is watching over you idiots now. But after the exam, I promise you, you're dead." He then walked off.

Only to find himself surrounded by the three. "Going off to easier prey, Hiro?" Akira said, towering over the Hyugaa.

"Hopefully not a certain girl from a distant village," Gasa whispered behind him. Though rather unassuming, Gasa had a way of being scarier than the two larger boys put together. "Now listen to our promise to you."

Kimbo brought his head an inch away from Hiro's. His eyes were the wild feral orbs of an angry dog. "Hiro, if you make fun of Colleen ever again, we, but especially I, will make sure that you suffer from a fate so cruel that you'll want to crawl back into your mother's womb and never come out."

The three pushed Hiro away. He looked at the trio with his usual contempt, but also with something else. In his pale cream colored eyes were the traces of fear. He sneered at them and walked off with his nose in the air, but the boys knew they had won a victory over him.

Akira finally plopped back down on the grass. "Jesu Christi, that seriously tires me out. I'm too lazy to be an angsty avenger type."

"I agree," Gasa said drinking a can of soda, "but I think it was worth it to see the look on Hiro's face. He need's someone to put him in his place."

Akira finished the rest of his delicious sammich. "Indeed, but Kimbo, you were kind of getting into it. I thought you might just tear his jugular out with your teeth."

Kimbo brooded over his steak and barbeque rib sandwich. "I guess you're right. I don't know what it is about the guy, but lately I've been wanting nothing more than to punch him as hard as I can in the face. Just wipe that smug look he has off once and for all."

Then a chunnin appeared before the boys, flung three papers at them, and disappeared. Just like that. No hellos, no smile, just poof, fling, poof again.

Akira grinned. "Well, let's see what we'll rub in Hiro's face tomorrow."

The three opened up their reports. Kimbo and Akira had gotten a perfect 100 on the written test, with Kimbo coming second with an impressive 96. Kimbo got the best score of the three in the applied test with a 94. Akira had gotten a 90, and Gasa had gotten an 87. All around, very commendable grades. Beside each grade was a stamp of the Konoha leaf and the word "pass" in capitol letters. The three grinned at each other.

"You know, I wonder how Colleen did?" Kimbo thought out loud.

"We should probably go talk to her," Gasa said, folding up his card. "She was looking kind of distraught going out."

The three got up and looked around. They finally found her, in the middle of a patch of trees with her knees pulled up to her head. She wasn't crying, but there was a definite sadness in the way she looked. The three walked up and sat around her.

"Hey," Gasa started, smiling slightly, "cheer up, emo kid."

Colleen looked at the three, smiling sadly. "Hey you guys, how are you?"

"A little bored," Kimbo said shrugging, "we usually bother you when things get dull, so what's up?"

Colleen looked at him with that same sad smile. "I think a few pieces of the academy roof still."

"Ohhh, come on Colleen," Akira said chuckling, "you're not letting a thing like blowing up half of a classroom keep you down, are you?"

That statement seemed to have been the last straw, because Colleen started crying uncontrollably. The other two boys glared at a very apologetic and embarrassed Akira. As smart as the dude was, he never was very tactful. Luckily though, he was a nice guy, and quickly began to resolve what he had done.

"Sorry Colleen," he said, and plunged his hand into one of his coat pockets, coming back out with four orange sherbet popsicles and passed them out. "Here. But seriously, why are you so sad? Everyone knew it was an honest mistake, no one's blaming you."

"It isn't that," she said sniffling through her delicious popsicle. "It's this." She showed them a card with two numbers on it. One was a perfect 100. The other was a 20. Beside the numbers was a red stamp that read "failed" and a note that said, "work on chakra control".

The three looked at it. Finally Kimbo looked up. "Wow, a twenty. You must have really impressed Lee sensei with that explosion."

Colleen started to cry again. "You guys just wouldn't understand! I know that all three of you passed. You don't know what it's like to see other people around you move forward and you just stay in one place and watch them go by!"

"Quite the contrary actually," Gasa said "I think we all know."
"You see, back when we were eight, the Hokage got paid for one mission in apple tree seedlings by some crazy daimyo dude," Akira explained.

"Why didn't he give them back and ask for real money?" Colleen said, rather curious.

"Well, technically, daimyo are still samurai," Gasa said.

"So if he did give them back, he would have insulted the daimyo's honor," Kimbo put in. "This would mean that the dude would either be insulted and mount an invasion on our village, or kill himself to preserve his family's honor. Either way, the village loses the dude's business."

"The Hokage thought it would be simpler just to take the trees and smile. So he gave us kids the trees and let us go to town. Gasa being our resident plant dude, said we had to prune them."

"Pruning is a polite way to put it. We essentially had to hack off all the branches and our trees just looked like sticks," Kimbo said "Everyone laughed at them, because while ours were stumpy, the others had kept theirs untouched and pretty."

"We even had to pluck off the blossoms for two years so that they would grow" Gasa remembered "By now the others had even bore fruit. They were these sour little things and tasted pretty bad. But still everyone said that at least theirs had fruit, while ours hadn't done a thing but grow."

"Then three years of hard work and ridicule later, something awesome happened," Kimbo said, remembering the wonderful moment. "Our trees started to bear fruit. And it wasn't little crab apples, but huge delicious sweet fruit. We had so much we ended up selling a lot of it for money."

"And to this day, we still have great fruit every autumn. It's the same with you, Colleen," Akira said smiling. "You need a little more work, but I have a feeling that the fruits you bear will be far more numerous and greater than anything us three losers could hope to make."

"Yeah," Gasa agreed, "besides, you turned half a school room into a crater, and stayed standing. I don't think any of us has enough latent chakra to even do that, let alone walk away unscathed."

"Colleen," Kimbo said, looking straight into her eyes, "you have the makings of greatness in you. And don't let anyone say otherwise. Especially Hiro."

"You know, I've been thinking about that," Akira started, "and Colleen, I honestly think you intimidate Hiro. I think he realizes your potential like we do, but he's trying to keep you from realizing it, or you might actually become a threat to him."

"So next time he harasses you, just kick his sorry butt," Gasa smiled.

Colleen looked at the three boys and smiled through her tears. "I don't know what I did to deserve you three. Thanks. You rock."

"We know," the three said in unison and laughed.

Akira looked at his watch. "Well, you all know how much I love hearing my awesomeness being acknowledged, but I need to be back at my house. Take care, everyone." And with that, he leapt off towards his house.

"Me too. See you everybody," Gasa said, and did the same.

"Ditto," Kimbo said and smiled at Colleen. "Take care."

Colleen smiled back. "You too."

With that, Kimbo leapt off to go tell his dad about all the things that had happened. Today had been a very eventful day indeed.