A/N:

just for a warning, there's something vaguely similar to a panic attack at the end, though i doubt it's enough to cause any issues

thought i'd mention it just in case anyway; it's the last sectioned off part of the chapter


Rei stared down at his blank test, and despite his best attempts to dredge up any feelings of frustration, he found that he was just… tired.

His throat didn't close up, and his eyes didn't grow hot with tears. He realized, with slow-coming clarity, that he hadn't actually cried in years.

He'd hated the way he was so quick to cry Before - hated how he'd been called all sorts of variations of 'crybaby', 'whiny,' and what have you - but now, with exhaustion weighing him down and a horrible, empty feeling in his chest, he wished that he'd ever envied those who could control their tears.

Rei took a breath and glanced over his sheet once more. He doubted he could answer more than a question or two. Ironic, given how much of a goody two shoes he was Before.

Not that he could've done much about his lack of ability. While it'd be far too obvious for his instructors to mark his scores down, there was no one stopping them from pretending he didn't exist, leaving him to rot even when it was clear he didn't understand the material.

He wished, absently, that he'd actually bothered to learn Japanese instead of dropping it once it became annoyingly difficult.

An elbow was knocked into Rei's side, and he suppressed a grunt, eyes flicking to the side. Kiba, who'd swapped seats to sit next to him the day after they met, jerked his head towards his test, which, while not entirely filled out, had more answers than his own.

Rei raised his gaze, brows furrowing, and Kiba rolled his eyes before motioning between their two tests, then unsubtly mouthed, ' Copy .'

…Oh .

Rei's eyes drifted towards the front, where Iruka was working on marking their homework, and then settled back onto Kiba. He opened his mouth to tell him no, but Kiba narrowed his eyes, glaring at him, and made another jerky motion, and reluctantly, he nodded.

Kiba grinned, pushing his paper slightly to the left so Rei could make out the answers, and winked at him. Rei rolled his eyes - perhaps more fondly than he'd like to admit - and got to work.


"Man, you look awful!" Kiba explained, watching as Rei desperately tried not to puke his guts out. "I was gonna ask if you wanted to be partners, but maybe I should take you to the nurse or something."

Rei grimaced and lifted one of his hands, offering a shaky thumbs down.

"You sure?" Kiba asked, then put his hands up when Rei shot him a look . "Alright, alright. Man, you totally look like you wanna kill me! Or well, you would if you also didn't look like you're aboutta pass out." He placed a hand on his chin. "Actually, hey, how come your stamina's so crappy anyway? Even the other civs aren't doin' as bad as you are. Hm… Maybe we should ask Iruka-sensei?"

Rei opened his mouth to force out a firm "No," but all that came out was a strangled " Nngh. "

"...Yeah, we should definitely ask," Kiba decided, ignoring Rei's glare. "Come on, I'm sure he can figure it out."

As per usual, Kiba grabbed hold of his arm and dragged him towards the man instead of allowing him to follow like a normal person. When they were a few steps away, Iruka looked their way, expression becoming slightly pinched when he saw Rei.

"Hey, sensei!" Kiba greeted, coming to a stop, "I think something's wrong with him!"

Rei closed his eyes for a long, painful second, before opening them to view Iruka's confused expression.

"...Sorry?" he asked after a moment, looking between Rei and Kiba.

"He can barely run for like, five minutes before he looks like he's gonna die," Kiba explained, gesturing wildly even though he was still holding onto Rei's arm. "And he looks like he should be goin' fast, but he always falls wayyy behind everyone else!"

"Uh…" Iruka let out before shaking his head and reluctantly turning towards Rei and looking him over with a frown. "Are you injured? Sick?"

Rei shook his head.

"Right…," Iruka muttered, then sighed, turning towards Kiba. "I don't know enough to say for sure what might cause this. You'd probably be better off going to ask the nurse."

Rei's expression soured, and Kiba huffed. "It's not that bad," he told him, then asked Iruka, "Can I take him there?"

Iruka frowned, but after a moment, nodded. "Just come back quickly, if you can."

"Gotcha," Kiba agreed, then grinned at Rei. "C'mon!"

Rei resisted the urge to scowl, allowing himself to be dragged along by Kiba. Iruka watched them go with an odd look on his face until they turned the corner, and the two headed inside.

"I don't actually know where her office is…," Kiba said, glancing around. "Gah… Sucks that there are no directions…"

Rei privately agreed. He knew that it was to make sure that foreign ninja wouldn't be able to find anything, but his awful memory and terrible sense of direction had him going the wrong way on a near-constant basis.

"Hm… Oh, wait, I think this is it!" Kiba said excitedly, pushing open a door to reveal a surprisingly normal-looking nurse's office.

A middle-aged woman glanced up from her computer - which was practically ancient, compared to what he was used to Before - and looked over both of them with a frown. In the background, a pen faintly scribbled down notes. "Someone's injured already ?"

Kiba laughed. "Nah," he said, then tilted his head. "Well… kinda. I mean, I think there's something wrong with Rei, but I dunno what."

The woman pushed up her glasses to look at Rei, and aside from a flicker of recognition, her expression didn't change. "What's the problem?"

When Rei didn't respond, Kiba spoke up for him. "His stamina is super bad, and he's super slow and weak compared to everyone else," he repeated for the third time in a span of twenty minutes. "He's not sick or hurt, so it's gotta be somethin' else."

The woman hummed, then stood up. "Come here," she said. Rei looked at her warily, and she gave him an unimpressed look. "Now."

Reluctantly, Rei moved to stand in front of her, and tried not to twitch when her hand began glowing green.

"Hm…," she let out, eyes narrowed. After a moment, she pulled her hand back, giving Rei an inscrutable look. "Tell me - have you ever had problems with your chakra?"

Rei stilled, thoughts screeching to a halt.

"You're right - there's nothing physically wrong with you. And, while I couldn't be sure without a Hyuuga to take a look at you, I'm led to believe that must mean there's something wrong with your chakra." She pursed her lips. "It happens sometimes, where chakra doesn't properly move through a person's coils. That tends to only happen with injured shinobi, though. Either because their coils are too damaged to shape chakra at all, or their chakra 'forgot' how to move through their systems. In the first case, as far as I know, there's nothing that can be done. In the latter, you'd have to learn how to channel your chakra consciously and hope it becomes easier with time."

Rei stared at her, realization settling in. Oh my god…

"Eh?!" Kiba let out, looking between Rei and the nurse with wide eyes. "Can't you say which one it is?!"

Everyone else was unconsciously enhancing themselves with chakra.

The nurse gave him an unimpressed look, which Rei was beginning to think was her default expression. "Do I look like a Hyuuga to you?"

Kiba flushed, and Rei tuned out the rest of the conversation and focused on the cold feeling that always ran through the branching rivers beneath his skin. As per usual, it flowed not slowly, but casually, not in a rush to go anywhere.

Which is probably how it'd been moving when he'd been performing the exercises, instead of powering his muscles or organs.

Tentatively, he prodded at his chakra, startling when his arm flexed involuntarily. After a moment's pause, he pushed on it, attempting to speed it up.

Perhaps predictably, his entire body twitched, and he felt like he'd downed half a dozen energy drinks in a row. That , he decided, slowing it back down and trying to force down his sudden dizzy spell, is probably not how that's supposed to feel.

It'd definitely be something to work on, at least.

(And after he finally did figure it out a few days later, he couldn't help but feel incredibly smug when he passed Kiba several times around the track without breaking a sweat.

Unfortunately, he still sucked at nearly everything else. Pity.)


Rei had, more than anything else, dreaded the idea of going through the glorified yoga poses that Iruka insisted were stretches.

Much to his surprise, though, while his balance left much to be desired, he didn't fall over like he'd expected to. And, even after holding a pose for a few minutes straight, he didn't feel a familiar, burning ache in his legs, or a sharp, needling pain in the arch of his foot.

It was… a little freeing, to know that his past physical issues hadn't followed him into his next life. Before, he could barely bend backwards without being stopped by an aching back, but now he had a second chance. He'd never be much of a powerhouse - not based on his physical strength, at least - but he could certainly be far more athletic than he used to be.

His lips twitched into a faint smile, but a moment later, he let out a quiet, strangled noise when he began to wobble. His arms shot out to his sides, but his legs remained firmly stuck in place, and he toppled over, grass peeking into his mouth.

Kiba snorted, then burst out into full-on cackling when Rei choked on dirt.

Alright, he reminded himself, pushing himself up and resolutely ignoring his burning ears, walk before you run, Rei. Walk before you run.


Scratch that , Rei thought glumly, watching his kunai sail straight over his target, some things do stay the same .

"You're holding it right," Kiba noted with a slightly confused look on his face. "How are your throws so bad ?"

Rei pressed his lips together, unamused by Kiba's observation. Even the civilians were doing better than him, and this time, he couldn't blame it on something like chakra issues. He just had embarrassingly awful hand-eye-coordination.

"Do it again," Kiba said after a moment. "I'll watch."

Rei rolled his eyes, but obliged. Unfortunately, he completely forgot to actually start letting go of the kunai until he was over halfway through the motion, and the weapon wobbled through the air, briefly, before going completely off course.

"Um… You have to let go," Kiba pointed out. Rei resisted the urge to throttle him.

His only consolation was that he wasn't as terrible when it came to exercises that required holding onto the kunai - digging, cutting, breaking, and whatnot.

Not that it meant much, since a literal toddler could figure out how to jam a kunai into the dirt, but he'd take what he could.


Rei should've figured that something would go wrong, eventually.

Breathe in.

His thoughts grew fuzzy as Iruka explained what they'd be doing with a smile. Numbness seeped into his bones as he followed his classmates outside. He was distant, almost separated from himself, as Kiba chattered next to him, poking his finger through a trapped cage.

Breathe out.

He knew that shinobi life wasn't all sunshine and rainbows. Knew that he'd be forced to kill people, at some point. Even Naruto, for all he'd been 'kid friendly,' had killed a few characters offscreen, even if it was less gory than it should've been.

Breathe in.

The thought of taking a life was even more off putting to him than death, at times. At least he'd actually experienced the latter. He didn't want experience—

Breathe out.

He'd never even seen a dead body before - had barely even been acquainted with the concept. He was too young to remember any of the funerals he'd attended, and he'd never lived in an area where he'd be forced to face death, or where his peers would mention it regularly. He doubted he could handle seeing one - an empty husk - let alone a bloodied one. Let alone one he'd killed.

Breathe in.

He swallowed, eyes flicking towards Kiba. The boy pinned down the rabbit he'd captured, and Rei jerked his head away just as he heard a quiet squelching sound, eyes shuttering closed.

Breathe out.

Killing animals wasn't the same. Nowhere near the same. But there was something about seeing bloodied, matted fur, watching as the light faded from their eyes, knowing that one day, he'd be doing that to a living, breathing, person—

Breathe in.

"Hey, Rei!" Kiba called out, catching his attention. "You might wanna hurry - Iruka-sensei's coming around to check on us!"

Breathe out.

Rei stared at him for several seconds before his eyes began to drift downwards, towards the ground. His kunai lay in crimson-stained grass, and he couldn't help but notice that the soft, whimpering sounds had ceased.

Breathe in.

He swallowed back a mouthful of bile.

Breathe out.

Kiba frowned, shifting towards him. "Hey man, are you okay?" he asked, and Rei caught an airy, rust-like scent. Kiba's palms were slick with blood.

Breathe in.

"Rei—"

Breathe out.

"—need—"

Breathe in.

"—calm down—"

Breathe out.

"—wrong?"

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

Breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out, breath in, breath out, breathininbreathoutbreathinbreathoutbreatheBREATHEBREATHE—

A steady hand pressed against Rei's trembling shoulder. He looked up, watching someone's lips move through blurred eyes. He didn't hear a word.

He could still smell the blood.

His face scrunched up, his head jerked downwards, and he vomited into the grass.


A/N:

basically, this chapter is just a bunch of snippets over the months, where a bunch of different things are introduced
I headcanon that they introduce basically everything (except taijutsu, and the more complicated things) in the first year in order to weed out those who might want to drop out, then start a more organized curriculum the second year onwards

here's the summary:
CH5:
In the first section, Rei takes a test and Kiba helps him cheat, making him realize that he's not all alone in this world anymore. In the second, Rei is trying not to pass out after running laps, and when Kiba takes him to the nurse, he realizes, 'oh im an idiot, i've not been using chakra.' In the third section, Rei does stretches and realizes that he has a bit of a fresh start here, then falls over and eats dirt. In the fourth, he learns that he sucks at shurikenjutsu, because he's never been too great at the 'throwing' or 'depth perception' things. Finally, he's forced to face what being a shinobi means when, after a few weeks of going over the anatomy of general forest critters, they go outside to test their knowledge and have a bit of a camping trip where they have to kill the animals they catch. Rei does not react well, to say the least - less because he has to kill an animal, and more because he knows what that leads to.

so!
hope that chapter was alright. i know it was broken into random, awkward segments, but i think each one was important in order for Rei to figure something out
i'd also like to mention: I think I might be writing Iruka a little OOC because he's a little less antagonistic than he is in canon, but you can blame that on Kiba being around, ig... or maybe I'm writing him correctly, who knows?
and the nurse? yeah, she cares for no BS and while a bit of a crabby lady, she doesn't care about Rei being the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki at all

anyways!
Thanks for reading!