Hallo! Here is Chapter two, up quickly because I got so many happy reviews! Finish the chapter all the way through, the ending is my favorite! And I know that 'innocent bystander' is not spelled the same in French as it is in English, but I only took two years and was to lazy to go find my dictionary. -.-
Chapter Two: Entre le Bystander Innocent!
A dark eyed glare rewarded the chirpy little girl across the rows, surrounded by beginning ninja and twirling one strand of blonde hair around a middle finger. The glaring young shinobi rolled her eyes and shrugged her backpack off once the bell had rung. After settling a critical eye over the contents of her bag, checking for her daily necessities, she sat down and leaned back in her chair quietly. No friends in her class. It was her luck to be isolated from the rest of her friends every year when it came to selecting students for each class. She stared at the teacher, having nothing else to stare at that wouldn't infuriate her for the time being.
Iruka was currently battling with the attendance sheet, trying to reprimand one student for throwing shuriken in the classroom for the fourth time that month, and balancing the scale of students that were absent verses present. It was amusing to watch the morning ritual, and for some reason it never got boring. He always had a new challenge. Whether the challenge be in the form of some bratty eleven year old, or possibly that tall white haired shinobi with the mask. The two squabbled like a married couple sometimes.
The dark hair and sunken eyed girl considered this for a moment, eyes fixated on Iruka while considering the plausible idea that Iruka-sensei was in fact gay. She giggled to herself, smiling as a confirmation. Definitely gay. She decided, finally looking around to focus her eyes on something else.
"Ronna-chan? Are you- ah, there you are. You're skills have improved so much that you blend in with your surroundings wonderfully!" Iruka grinned to the dark eyed girl.
She snorted, pleasing him with a half hearted smile. "Yeah, right..." she muttered, watching him finally swat away a tattling senpai of hers.
He gave her an encouraging smile before calling out the next name, finally deciding that the student was absent when he only received a dull roar from the rest of the class. With a sigh he looked around at the boisterous classroom, smiling proudly at the balls of energy that bounced around the room. The smell of untamed chakra in the morning. He breathed deeply, sticking his fingers in his mouth and blowing a shrill ear shattering whistle to silence all the students in unison. They scrambled for their seats, sitting attentively for the most part.
"Good morning everyone."
"Good morning Iruka-sensei." they echoed back, obedient as they were.
Iruka thrived from hearing that. He beamed all the brighter to them. "Today, I have decided to give you all a treat. We are going to do strength training!"
The class groaned simultaneously, glaring with lack of amusement at the cheap trick. He grinned brighter. "But we're going to go outside this time!"
Arm pumps circled the room, beady eyes meeting with friends as silent plans were made and agreed upon to ditch the class on campus somehow. Iruka saw every little glance between friends, and all the whispers that established meeting places once they had escaped the gaze of their teacher. He chuckled, hands on his hips as he let them scheme and plan for a moment. So far only one student had ever left his vicinity of knowledge, and that was because she had no sense of direction and took the wrong trail while running laps in the campus' forest. He had found her of course, sitting at the base of a tree with tears in her eyes, but he never forgot that he also had to watch out for the little ones who weren't trying to escape.
"But first, I have papers to pass back. On a whole you all did very well on this quiz, some low grades, but not bad." he winked, taking the stack of neatly tapped papers from his desk and beginning to pass them out accordingly. The first one on the pile made him smile. He walked up the length of desks towards the back, letting the kids chatter happily as he passed out the papers. He set the quiz down on the girl's desk, hand over the grade before she could glance at it. "Ronna-chan, I am very happy to see how much you have improved. I am very proud of you!" he raised his hand to display a bright red B+.
"Oh... wow... um... thank you." her cheeks tinted pink, looking into Iruka's pleased face.
Iruka smiled at the girlish blush. "And we'll have you throwing straight shuriken in no time!" he promised.
She blushed deeper. "Ah... uh... how's your leg doing?"
"Healed!" he patted her on the head with a bright smile, going to the next student to reprimand the D-.
Ronna looked at her paper, pleased and surprised at the same time. Apparently it did pay of to study.
o0O0o
"Alright... we're going to start off simple and work the abs a bit. Everyone on their backs!" Iruka couldn't help the evil smile when they groaned in unison while dropping down to lay on the soft spring grass. They prepared, hands behind head and elbows in the air. "Crunches!" Iruka declared, counting off and watching the obedient little ninja's-to-be raise the upper half of their bodies from the ground with the count.
After reconciling that most of them could no longer work their abs, Iruka had them turned over for push ups, followed by paired sit-ups. Satisfied that their stomachs hurt immensely, he sent them to the jogging trail, counting them all as they passed him to make sure he kept the same number the whole time. At this point in the outside physical training, Iruka tended to lose kids to hiding places in the forest. Fortunately for him, he knew every hiding place possible and only had to go in a prod a bit to get the kids to keep running.
He had been a student once after all, of course he knew all the hiding places.
After mentally agreeing with himself finally, he was positive that three of the boys had found a spot to escape their sensei. Iruka tramped in through the woods, sensing out the little balls of chakra that weren't moving. Of course they'd chosen the spot furthest from where he was standing.
Ronna was puffing slightly by now, having taken a detour the long way so as to find the peace and quiet of being able to jog without moaning whining senpais behind her. Unfortunately, this path was rough terrain, meant for harder training but a good place to be in solitude since almost everyone took this course at a different pace.
She stopped for a moment, scanning the steep hill ahead of her, barring down threateningly. She ran a hand through her short dark hair and heaved a forfeiting sigh, starting up the mountain at a careful pace. The first few steps had been relatively painless, but the hill only seemed to grown taller whenever she looked up to check her distancing. Planting her foot on what look to be a sturdy rock, she pushed... only to slide back down faster than she had been able to get up. She gasped, turning over to slide on her back. With a quick reflex, she planted her feet onto an indent in the side, standing up all to quickly and stumbling the rest of the way down the hill.
At the bottom she collapsed, gasping for air and sitting in a pile of avalanched dirt, some of which was still sliding down the hill around her. "Phoo... " she muttered, panting and staring at the pebbles and dust which now crowded around waist.
She shifted, a load of dirt repositioning to reveal what looked to be an oddly colored rock. She halted her shifting and reached down to pull the out-of-place rock from it's mass of dirt, only to have fingers pull through the silt a soft cover bright orange book. She stared at the sorry looking book for a moment, snorting. What a place to find a book. Guess it wasn't very good. She beat the dust-ridden book against her just as dusty leg, causing a large cloud to surround her breathing area.
Coughing with dirt filled lungs, she climbed up to sit on a rock that lay off to the side, beckoning her rest. It was an obvious resting point, for many a scratch lay on the surface and shoe prints at the base indicated its use.
"Icha Icha Paridisu volume 11..." She read the cover out loud, wincing a bit at the name. "Hm. Interesting."
She flipped the front cover open, reading the title page curiously, then started the story with semi-interested but mostly-looking-for-an-excuse-to-rest air about her. After a few moments her eyes grew wide in surprise.
"Oh my."
It's kind of funny... No, I take that back. We had a mud slide against the side of our house and my 1965 mustang was the target. Thankfully I can't lose a car in a mudslide, but apparently I can jinx myself by writing about them. Weird huh? As soon as a wrote about a mud slide, BAM! Mudslide!
And then Andraia was blessed with two thousand dollars to appear in her hand! And her car was restored! And she was accepted into the college she wanted!
Wait for it... wait for it...
...