Hi everyone! I am back from my week-long hiatus! Tallman tells me I can't really call that a hiatus, but it is what it is. For those of you who messaged me/reviewed for me while I was gone, thank you, and I tried to get back to you all once I regained access to a computer. That being said, I hope you enjoy this chapter and I look forward to hearing what you all think!

The genin huddled around the entrance to the mine doing their best not to look as cold and miserable as they felt. It had been raining earlier, the crosswind making the drops feel like tiny icy daggers. The temperature had dropped low enough now that the rain had become a flurry of snowflakes, so the soaked genin were now starting to freeze over in their damp clothes.

Beki stared into the gaping maw of the mine entrance. It was wide enough for two grown men to walk in side by side, but only tall enough for children to walk in without crouching. The group of competitors had been separated into sets of four and led to their own mine entrance. Even though they were a good fifty feet from the entrance, Beki caught herself longing for that temperature controlled darkness. There would be no wind in the caves, so even though the temperature would be cool, it would be much warmer by comparison. Ren's hair flapped around her face viciously in the wind. She was doing her best to keep on her war face but she had to spit out her hair four times already. After another gust whipped her with her own hair, she swore violently and rammed wads of her hair on either side of her ears on top of her head and gracelessly pinned it down with a barrette. She looked like an angry toddler who had tried to do their own hair. In spite of the solemnity of the task ahead Beki caught herself chuckling.

One of the Konoha teams was going to be heading in with them. They were shaking in the cold but kept up impressive game faces. In any other situation Beki would have comforted them or tried to help them out, but during the chunin exams it was best to act like you were out in the field for real. She didn't want them to grow up thinking every Getsu shinobi they ever met would be so accommodating.

Another group that was heading in with them were Iwagakure shinobi. Beki had heard plenty eavesdropping on conversations in Konoha to know that they were fairly ruthless and there was lots of bad blood between them and the Leaflings. The way they looked at the kids made her nervous, but once again it was not her battle to fight. One of the Iwa shinobi turned and sized up Team Honey. He turned to his comrades and said something that made them laugh. Daiske shuffled uncomfortably. He caught Beki's concerned look and shook his head.

"It's got to be what it always is," He smiled uncomfortably. "Look, there's a team with two girls and a boy, so the boy has to be the girl. You two are more man than me, blah blah blah."

"Keep your game face up, Daiske," Beki slapped him on the back. "They talk shit because they've never seen us fight."

He gave her another melancholic look. "You know they put us all together because I have three sisters and I'm used to henpecking."

Ren shot him a dirty look and pinched him. "No, stupid, they put us together because you are the glue that holds the team together. Without your setup, Beki wouldn't get the openings she needs and without your protection I could never successfully snipe."

Before he could reply, the Cloud ninja proctoring their group shouted for their attention. "Alright, listen up. The first portion of the exam is going to take place here in the mine. I'll lead you in to the area where the shafts split and set you all loose. Your objective is to locate a scroll left somewhere in your shaft and then bring it to the Cloud ninja on the other side," He explained. "This test is to measure your perseverance and wherewithal in sensory deprived environments."

"This sounds too easy," Ren whispered as she shook her head. "It's giving me a weird feeling."

"What should we do, then?" Daiske asked.

"We'll be in those shafts, so you're probably best to take the lead," Beki said. "Be ready to put up a wall at any moment. Ren will stay in the middle and I'll cover our six in case we're blitzed."

Daiske sighed and then centered himself. "Got it."

The proctor led them in. Beki made a point of squeezing Team Honey between the Iwa shinobi and the Leaflings. The fourth team were Cloud shinobi that hung to the back. Of course they would, Beki thought. They've got the home court advantage. After the initial drop from the small entrance, they found themselves in a mine shaft about six feet high and four feet wide. At points, rock outcroppings and scaffolding narrowed the available width of the tunnel. The floor was a treacherous combination of gravel pockets and slippery stone. It was pitch black inside; the lantern light from the proctor only gave them about three feet of visibility.

If I use any water jutsu in here I think I'd drown us all, Beki thought. There was no visible ventilation or drains of any kind. That gave Beki the impression that this space wasn't some specially designed space for chunin exams and may have at some point actually been a mine. Beki was not comforted by that thought; mines were notoriously unstable. She stole a glance at Ren and Daiske. Daiske had recovered nicely and was doing a good job ignoring the Iwagakure ninja cracking jokes about them only a few feet ahead. Ren, on the other hand, was looking more frazzled than before. Beki figured the cockamamie hairdo didn't help but her friend looked downright worried.

"I'm useless in here, Beki," Ren caught her eye. "How the hell am I supposed to help in here? I don't even know if I can draw my bow." She gestured to the narrow walls. "And I don't wanna be throwing around shuriken in kunai in here if I can't see that I'm not going to be hitting one of you."

Beki squeezed her shoulder. "Just be our spotter. You sense anything, you see anything, you let us know. Let Dai and I deal with it."

Ren looked down at Yukihana's gauntlets on Beki's wrists. "Can you even use those?"

Beki nodded. "I can get nice and personal with these and I can't be disarmed."

"Okay," Ren sighed and nodded but the worried look didn't dissipate. "It's hard to breathe in here."

After a few more feet of stumbling in the darkness the tunnel opened up and the group found themselves in a room carved from the stone. It was about ten feet at its widest point and had five sides and each wall had an archway. The proctor waved for them all to come in close.

"Each team with position themselves at each of the archways-"

Ren perked up. "Do you hear that?"

Beki opened her mouth to ask Ren what she had heard when the room started shaking. The proctor stopped talking and looked around in surprise. "Cave in! Everybody out!"

Suddenly all the bodies in the room were in motion as they tried to make their way out of the collapsing shaft. Beki looked at the swarm of bodies flailing to get back through the entrance. She grabbed Daiske and Ren and pulled them back toward the center of the room.

"What are you doing?!" Daiske yelled. "We have to get out!"

"There's no way we'll make it out that way," Beki motioned to the narrow entrane. "There's a way out at the end of each of these tunnels."

Ren nodded. "She's right. I'd rather die with a fighting chance than getting trampled in an overcrowded tunnel."

Daiske sighed and shook his head. "Alright, pick a tunnel, quick."

Ren looked at the tunnels and narrowed her eyes. "That one," She pointed at the second tunnel from the left. "I think it's brighter than the others."

Team Honey ran down the archway, leaving the cries of panic behind them.

"God I hope you guys are right," Daiske cried as he ran blindly ahead of them in the darkness.

After a few dozen feet Beki's foot caught a rock wrong and she lost her balance. She ate it and fell forward into Daiske, taking him down with her. They landed with an oomph and Ren almost ran right over them.

"Are you okay Dai?" Beki said as Ren blindly yanked her to her feet.

"Yeah," He grunted as he pushed himself onto his hands and knees. "This sucks. I don't have a light in my kit."

"I hope they don't have any more surprises down these tunnels," Ren sighed. "It doesn't feel like this tunnel is unstable. Maybe we'll be okay if we go slow."

Beki held up her hand and used the illumination jutsu her father taught her. The narrow tunnel was cast in a soft blue glow. It made them all look like ghosts, but they could see.

Ren smiled. "So you have been training."

Beki beamed back sheepishly. "Told you so."

…

The blue flame illuminated several feet in front of them but every turn Team Honey met was fraught with anxiety. They would slow down, approach the corner, and then quickly clear the tunnel. There was never anything there. After they had proceeded about five hundred feet through the tunnel, Daiske stopped and picked up something half submerged in the gravel.

"Look at that," He grinned. "The scroll."

"Let me take a look at it," Ren took the scroll and examined it. "This paper is flimsy as shit. If you sneeze on it this thing will disintegrate."

"That can't be a good thing," Beki crept forward through the tunnel. "I wonder if they'll let us continue on if that thing gets damaged."

Daiske sighed. "The plot thickens."

…

The first trap caught them completely unawares. A trapdoor had been set in the floor of the tunnel and covered in gravel. As Daiske walked through the tunnel, he sprang the trap door and plunged into a shaft full of ice cold water. There was a crunch as his body broke the thin layer of ice that had formed on top.

"Daiske!" Ren hollered. "Are you okay?!"

Daiske surfaced, his teeth chattering. "Shit it's cold. I'm okay, but I'm going to slip into hypothermia if I'm not out of here soon."

"Stay back, Ren," Beki took some rope out of her kunai bag. "This is probably set up to ruin that scroll."

Ren nodded and receded into the tunnel. Beki lowered the rope to Daiske and tied it around her waist, then turned so that the rope went over her shoulder down into the shaft. "You secure?" Beki yelled down to him.

"Yeah, the line's set," Daiske had the line tied around his waist. If Beki could just hoist him a few feet he could probably jump for the edge.

Beki pulled on the rope with all her strength as she walked away from the trapdoor with effort. She silently thanked her father for putting her through so much strength training with the kanabo; without it, Daiske would be hopeless right now. Once he had cleared the top of the trapdoor, the girls stood guard at either end of the tunnel while he undressed and squeezed out his clothes.

"You okay?" Beki stared into the blackness before her.

"Well, I'm just damp now," Daiske shuddered. "I hope we'll get to the end soon, though. "I could catch pneumonia."

Ren let out a small gasp. "Do you have all your gear?"

Beki heard Daiske patting around himself. "Looks like it. My stash of gunpowder's trash, though."

"You didn't lose your retainer in there, did you?" Beki turned and gave him a concerned look.

Daiske shot her a look and shook his head. "I didn't bring my retainer down here. Why do you two always bring up my damn retainer?!"

"Because you don't have headgear anymore so we can't tease you about that," Ren walked forward in the tunnel, careful to avoid the trapdoor. As she passed her damp teammate, she gave him a wry smile. "Come on Daiske. Let's get you out of here."

…

The next few traps were treacherous: a bridge that collapsed and a wall that shot out senbon. The bridge had collapsed after Daiske had cleared it. As Ren and Beki fell into the darkness, Ren grabbed onto Beki, who extended the claws in the gauntlets and caught them in the sides of the pit. The claws weren't strong enough for Beki to climb up with, so Ren had shot an arrow in the dark above them with the rope attached. Daiske had caught the arrow and pulled them up to safety one at a time.

The wall of shooting senbon Ren had triggered accidentally when she had ran ahead and stumbled in the darkness. The needles had covered the opposite wall in a polkadot pattern that would have been guaranteed to take at least one of them down.

"Damn," Daiske blinked. "They're pretty serious about this."

"This ain't no graduation exam," Beki picked Ren bodily up off the floor. "They don't mind a few casualties."

It was only a few hundred feet later when they caught sight of the exit. Beki smiled but then sobered herself. It could be another trap, after all. Ren sniffed the air. "It's the real deal. That's our way out."

Team Honey carefully made it's way up to the tunnel's exit. It was set five feet off of the ground and was an opening so small they would have to crawl out of it. They sent Ren out first, then Daiske gave Beki a boost, and then the girls pulled him out together. The Kumo shinobi who stood guard by the exits looked at them passively.

"Do you have the scroll?"

Ren reached into her shirt and pulled out the scroll, completely undamaged. He nodded at them and then gestured to a flat outcropping of rock behind him where the other teams were resting. Ren blinked. "So that's it? That was the first part of the test? Working our way through tunnels?"

The Kumo shinobi sighed, as though he had to explain this to every participant that made it out and he was sick of it. "A shinobi will face many challenges, which will make the mission seem impossible. On a real mission, you can't give up and go home if things get rough. You have to press through to the end."

"So the tunnel collapse was staged," Daiske shook his head. "Well, go team, we did it."

"Do you have any blankets?" Beki asked at the sight of her shaking teammate. The kumo ninja jerked his head toward the rock again. "They're over there."

Beki saw that the Kumo ninja in their group had made it through the tunnels, and so had the Iwagakure shinobi. She hoped that the Konoha ninja had just been disqualified for turning back and hadn't been claimed by the tunnels. Ren helped Daiske get wrapped in a blanket.

"Oh, Daidai, did you fall for one of the traps?" Yuu's voice cut through the low chatter of the competitors. Daiske rolled his eyes.

"Hi Yuu, good to see you made it through."

Yuu smiled at them. "Why don't you guys come sit with us? Solidarity between teammates from the same village and all that."

Beki and Ren let out twin groans and followed Yuu over to the rest of Team Hunter. Ren and Daiske sat on either side of Beki, although their intervention was unnecessary. Shinichi had his back to the group and was staring up at the setting sun. Bo sat beside Yuu, however her was as statuesque and unresponsive as ever. Only she looked at them and forced them into conversation.

"They said they're going to bring us food," she gestured toward the proctors. "I guess we're expected to hop right into the second portion after this."

"Without any rest?" Ren blinked. "Is that legal?"

"Sweetheart, this is their chunin exams," Yuu smiled. "They can do whatever the hell they want. For most of us, that test was a cakewalk," She shot the shaking Daiske a mocking look and he glowered at her. "I'm just giving you a hard time, Daiske. I want us all to make it to the third portion. That way Getsu is almost guaranteed a winner."

Silence fell between them again. Yuu tried to pry more conversation out of them but Team Honey was exhausted and needed to conserve their strength. True to their word, about twenty minutes later proctors came through the tunnels with large bentos for each of them. The teams mostly ate in silence. After all the empty boxes had been collected, the proctor that had met them at the exit stepped forward and clapped for their attention.

"So here's what's going to happen. We're going to lead you guys further down the mountain. Proctors will lead each team to a different opening in the mountain. Each team will receive only one kind of ration: food or water. It will take you about three days to navigate through the caves, so that's how much of your resource you will receive. You can either try to survive on what you have, or you can take resources from another team."

"Shit," Beki said under her breath. The team that received water would be fine; it was uncomfortable but not debilitating to go hungry for a day or two. The team that got food, however, would almost have to assault another team for their water. After twenty-four hours without water, cramping and headaches set in and it went downhill every hour thereafter. Ren and Daiske both paled. They had figured out the ration problem, too.

As they prepped to go down in the caves, the proctors let each team keep a blanket. The snow hadn't let up, so exposure would be an issue even down in the tunnels. Beki felt the cold biting at her ears and her nose and Ren's whole face had gone pink and wind chapped. The proctor that approached them was the same one that had taken them down into the caves for the first portion. He had a backpack on and made no effort at making conversation with them.

The anxiety mounted as they hiked slippery mountain trails. Ren lost her balance and Beki caught her hand to stabilize her. Long after they had passed danger, Beki held on to Ren's hand, who would occasionally give her a squeeze of reassurance. After another ten minutes of hiking, they reached a cave entrance that looked suspiciously like a mouth. The proctor set down his backpack and took out three flasks and a flare. Beki closed her eyes and let out a small prayer of thanks. Their team had water.

"Now you may think this is a good thing," The proctor said as he gave them their flasks. "But this will put targets on your backs down there. Be smart. You won't ever see them, but there will be Kumo proctors in the caves. If you want to surrender, fire this flare and one of them will come to escort you out. This is forfeiting, of course, so only do it if you're dying or desperate."

That was all the advice he gave them before he shooed them into the caves. Team Honey's footsteps crunched through the snow that had aggregated toward the entrance.

Ren stared into the darkness ahead. "Beki, this is bad."

"It's fine," Daiske took off the blanket and wrapped her in it. "It just looks spooky is all."

"No, Daiske," Ren looked at him, her eyes bulged with fear. "This place feels like death is close by."

Daiske continued to utter reassurances but Beki kept quiet. She could feel it, too. Her dad had told her that some mountains have a lot of metal in them, which does weird things with magnetism, like make compasses spin ominously. He also told her that because there is so much electricity in people's bodies, sometimes this phenomenon would make them feel strange or have a sense of foreboding. Beki prayed that was all this nagging sensation was; that it was iron in the rocks making her hair stand on end and chills creep down her spine. That's what she told herself it was, but her instincts knew better. Blood would be spilled here.