Kneading Fate

Second installment in Canon Patchworking with Uchiha Ren series

Twenty-First Thread

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ATTENTION

The contest is still on. For further detail go see 'Seventeenth Thread'.

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This chapter has been beta'd for you by hestia8639. Thanks a lot!

I have been meaning to do this for a while now, but only now got to it. My tumblr name is KillerGirlFuria, in case any of you wants to spam by askbox. I'm pretty open person, and if anyone would like to discuss CPwUR, or anything else, really, you're very welcome.

"Leaders are interested in gains. However, they acknowledge that there is no gain without pain. They embrace the pain."
― Israelmore Ayivor, Leaders' Ladder

0

They make it in time, of course – with five minutes to spare, no less. At first, the sheer distance from Iwa to some sort of mountain frightens them, but it turns out that ten minutes of chakra-enhanced sprint is really all it takes to get there. Hana complains that if her ninken were big enough to carry people, they would've made it in under seven. But then, how on earth can simple, two-legged humans, even chakra-enhanced ones, outrun an animal, with the perfect build for running and four legs at that? Ren knows for sure that the Haimaru brothers can keep up with them almost without using any chakra. Damn dogs and their four legs.

But hey, they've made it, and they don't even look on the verge of death from exhaustion! Even Hibiki, because Ren and Hana may or may not have been targeting him specifically for the last three months in order to force the Hyūga to move and build up his stamina. To bystanders – and Hibiki himself – it most likely seemed like they were making it a point to ruin his life (which, actually, theywere – but hey, who said they couldn't kill two birds with one stone?) but they were sneakily forcing him to make an effort. And it worked!

Somehow, Deidara gravitates towards their team, which doesn't escape Ren's attention. He is standing closer to them than to his own, in fact, though the two of them don't really seem to notice. This time, it's actually Hana who makes a move first, even if it is just a small wave and a smile at the blonde. He looks uncertain for a bit, then shrugs and actually half-smiles (Ren is willing to bet that he still thinksthem both batshit crazy) and jogs up to them.

(The fact that he'd rather spend time with two Konoha ninja who he apparently deems crazy beyond redemption than with his own team is more than just slightly concerning. It speaks volumes, actually – volumes Ren does not wish to hear. Ever.)

(Volumes she hearsevery time she looksat Naruto, whenever there are more people.)

"Stupid riddles," Deidara mutters, dusting his brown ninja-pants. He is wearing a red, high-collared shirt, without a right sleeve, but with the left side long and open.

"Gotta agree with you on that," Hana huffs. "We got the third one right only because we met Kisame-san. And then found the map only because we were lucky."

"They hid ours in a goddamn flower pot, can you believe that?" the tiny blonde (seriously, he was something like two years older, yet still smaller than Sasuke) scoffs, nose raised high in the air.

"Our was in a sauna," Hibiki mutters. "And the chūnin who had it was a troll."

"He's just exaggerating," Hana rolls her eyes.

"Troll," Ren agrees instead. "Gave us a scare for no real reason, the douche."

But before any of them can say anything else, something in the front explodes with a lot of white smoke. It fades fast, however, and reveals three people – jōnin, most likely – who looks at the gathered teams with quite a bit of disdain. One whispers to another, and then they all nod, moving forward.

"The hour has passed, no more teams will be accepted," one of them says in an unnervingly monotonous voice. "Now, as the pathetic were weeded out, we will proceed onto the second stage of the Exam in order to remove the weak and mediocre, which will be more than half of you."

The Iwa jōnin either has no social skills or his hobby is offending people. Probably both.

"Within this mountain is a complex maze – an ever-changing one. Your task is simple; you must find a scroll and then deliver it to the center of the labyrinth within the set time limit. You have three days, but if you laze around, you might face a few very unpleasant surprises. Being late never pays off – being greedy rarely does, too."

His smile turns feral, and Ren narrows her eyes. The fact that there is more to 'find that and bring it there' is quite obvious, because otherwise the task would be too easy. And they have a time limit, but it is implied they should do it even faster. Why?

"You have twenty minutes to prepare and to sign the mandatory documents," one of the other jōnin says, as they start handing out pamphlet-looking papers.

"Why?" one of the genin – from Suna, most likely, Ren doesn't pay much attention to his appearance – asks, to which the jōnin snorts.

"Because brats like you die out there," he says with a grin. "And this way we won't be held responsible. Listen up, brats! We aren't letting you any further without signed papers! Last chance to step down!"

"We're going in?" Hibiki asks, and Ren can't decipher whether he's scared or excited; whether he wants in, or out. Probably both, because he's just like that.

"Of course we are," Hana nods, and one of her ninken yips in agreement.

"So sure of yourselves?" Deidara asks, raising his visible eyebrow.

"Well," Ren claps her hands together, "we either do it, or we die trying. I didn't become a ninja to be a genin forever, and, as someone wise once said, no pain, no gain. And no game, no life," she grins, even though she knows that none of the three understand the reference she had just made. Deidara only response is to nod and look at his paper, then look up at them again.

"Anyone have a pen?" he asks. "I honestly don't care if Kurotsuchi and Akatsuchi chicken out like the cowards they are-"

"Deidara!" a feminine voice shrieks, loud enough to gather the attention of some people. She sees a girl, with hair and eyes black enough that had she been any paler, she'd be able to pass as an Uchiha, stomping towards them, and an instant later Deidara is next to Ren. His hand clutches her belt – or rather the forehead protector she's using as one – as if for protection and reassurance, as he glares daggers at the girl.

"What do you want, Kurotsuchi," he hisses. Ah, so that's the mighty future Fourth Tsuchikage – a short brat, a year younger than Deidara who will make a name for herself later by spitting lava at people. Sweet. Right now, though, she doesn't seem like anything special. At all.

"So that's how this is, huh?" Kurotsuchi taunts. "Iwa ninja are too hard for you, huh? Need to hang with the Konoha softies?"

Ren suddenly feels very tempted to bring her fist down onto the kid's head. Hana most likely does as well, judging by how she moves forward and squeezes Ren's hand until it hurts. Ren does the exact same thing, and, though just a tiny bit, it works, since neither of them end up mauling the brat.

"Or maybe Iwa ninja are just too mediocre for him, and he wants to spend his time with someone better," Hibiki scoffs, and for the first time in forever Ren feels like there might be hope for him yet. Kurotsuchi blanches, then reddens, and throws herself at them with a shriek – only to be intercepted by one of the jōnin grabbing her collar.

"I expected better from the apprentice of none other than Sandaime-sama," the jōnin says. "I'm thoroughly disappointed, Kurotsuchi. You can settle that within the maze."

Ren shoots the kid a glare that promises bloodshed. Kurotsuchi wavers, but perhaps it's because Hana also sends her the exact same glare. Neither girl lets go of the other, and Ren is fairly certain that her palm is bruised now. She doesn't care. She'll fry the brat if she finds her.

"See you in the center," Ren says in a voice still lined with anger, but when she looks at Deidara, she's mostly calm. "Who knows, maybe we'll be set against each other in final tournament?"

"Maybe," the kid shrugs, but red has already crept onto his cheeks. "Thanks. I mean. For saying I'll make it there."

"No problem," she snorts and pats his head, having finally let go of Hana. He huffs, but doesn't swat the hand away. "See you, brat."

The maze is dark, cramped and moist. And boring. But, with nothing better to do, they walk. And walk. And walk. And then walk some more. To the point they lose their sense of time, actually. Ren and Hibiki had agreed to carry one Haimaru brother each, so that no one can possibly determine by their footsteps that there are more than three of them. Currently, in the dark tunnel, they can rely on nothing but their sense of hearing and touch. Or, in Hana's case, her sense of smell – and that's exactly why she is the one leading them. Hibiki can't just waltz around with his Byakugan activated, because that would strain him a lot, and neither can Ren, with her Sharingan. They do flash their respective creepy eyes every once in a while, but mostly rely on Hana and her heightened senses that just are, and don't need chakra to be maintained.

But they are going forward. After a while Hana manages to catch a scent in the tunnels – the scent of a person, quite recent but definitely too old to be one of the participants. It smells like the rest of the tunnel, from what Hana claims, but also smells like sweat and cheap cologne. And explosives.

(Iwa ninja and their love for making things go boom. Ever wonder where Deidara gets that from? They have entire troops whose sole purpose is blowing stuff up! They actually train terrorists. And they say that people from Konoha are insane. Ha!)

One person in the team had been given a timer, which counts backwards. It had started at seventy-two hours, and will gradually tick down until then. Useful little thing, really – except for the fact that the jōnin who had given it to them had said that if they fail to get to the center by the time it stops, well. The watches are set to blow up – hard enough to take a hand. Or, at least, that's what they said. They are torn between scoffing at this ridiculous idea and actually believing because, well, Iwa ninja and explosions.

Before long, they find the source of smell. It takes them about two hours through the slippery, dark tunnels, which is actually decent timing. None of them complain, not really. The faster they're out of there, the better. Now, they find themselves in something that looks like a cave. It is lit, at least, however dimly, and they can see a man – a chūnin, Ren determines, and Hibiki agrees, after having Sharingan'd and Byakugan'd him, respectively, to check his chakra level – sitting on a chest. Hibiki verifies that within the chest, there are many identical scrolls - the objective of this portion of the exam.

"Oh my," the chūnin says, grin apparent in his voice. "Honestly, I did not expect the first team to find me to be Konoha. I was betting for my homies."

"We have to get through you to get the scroll, don't we," Hana asks, eyebrow raised. The dog she carries yips, and it actually sounds like an insult. From Hana's face it's easy to read that it's exactly that. Her only answer is the sudden appearance of three mud wolves that spring up from a wet patch in front of the chūnin and lunge at them. Before she can even react, Ren is in front of her and already going through hand signs.

Tiger, Ram, Monkey, Boar, Horse, Tiger.

Fire flickers in the glossy coal of her eyes milliseconds before a massive fireball speeds towards the wolves and the chūnin behind them. The mud wolves, dried and almost burnt, crumbles to dust, no longer active, as the man shields himself with one loud "Doton: Doryūheki", raising a slab of stone. The fireball crashes and crumbles apart, both fire and earth, but the wall holds true, if charred.

Before they can move, the chūnin darts from behind the wall and right at them, muttering something that sounds suspiciously like 'Doton: Domu' – the very same jutsu Kakuzu had used to take down the door of the temple, and she knows she doesn't want it meeting her ribs. Hibiki comes forward, veins running from his eyes to his ears, a cry of "Jūken!" on his lips. The Haimaru brothers leap from three sides - left, right and behind - biting and immobilizing with their painful bites, and Hibiki's palm strikes the chūnin's kidneys. He gawks and falls onto his knees, hands around his stomach.

"You fucking little monsters," he breathes, tears dancing in his eyes. "Fuck. Take the fucking scroll and get lost," he wheezes, and there's a chuckle from somewhere. Two more chūnin appear next to him, and one promptly slaps the back of his head.

"This is why we're here in groups, you're hardly able to test any more genin," she chuckles, and motions at Team Four with her hand to, indeed, get lost. So, they do just that. They take a scroll, checking the chest beforehand (just one, Hana says, greed doesn't always pay off) and rushes to try to find the center. The venture is… boring. Most of the time. There are giant centipedes, bloodthirsty moles and a giant spider in one of corridors. A giant spider, with which Ren actually converses through her own spider, who letsthem through and actually pointsthe way.

(Uchiha Ren, what the fuck, Hibiki thinks. Just what the actual fuck.)

Nothing happens. At all.

And then something does.

"Yōton: Sekkaigyō no Jutsu!"

"Katon: Gōkakyū no Jutsu!"

A fireball, moderate in size this time, clashes with quicklime halfway through and promptly explodes. It's not a good sign that the tunnel shakes slightly, but Ren doesn't really have the time to worry about that right now, too busy staring into the crazed eyes of Kurotsuchi. Some sort of personal vendetta, maybe, for talking the twerp down? Ren doesn't care.

She just burns things until they stop being a problem.

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Last omake was actually pretty much canon. That Joro Spider (Nephila clavata, native to Japan, China, Korea and Taiwan - they're quite favored in Japan, and Japanese spider demons, Tsuchigumo and Jorogumo, are based off of them. They're, like, most popular Japanese insect) is one of many Ren just picked up somewhere and she stuck. She's quite small and her name is Ōjo. And she's always written down jut because of how common her species is.

ThePlotbunnyBreeder - she's very much a pyro, trust me.

mujoona - Ren doesn't have spy network. That's for noobs. Ren has spy web C And yes, fire and spiders, those are things Ren enjoys the most. If there's no spider thrown at your face, you'll msot likely get hit with a fireball the size of a house.

donstehly2 - she's not sassy, just plain rude and absolutely tactless. And, as much as I understand them, since I'm like that, too, I also really admit writers who just let it slide.

academysscholar314 - don't beg, they're coming anyway, just wait for them. And, well, I'm not exactly honest saying I have life. Social one at least. People just don't like me. Like, at all. And those who do are technically shut-ins. Just like me - because in my case opposites don't attract, we have to have at least a bit in common.

snowleopard314 - she. This spider is a she, actually, this time. And spiders will be half a reason Danzo falls, actually, because he always writes them off. Because they're just spiders, amirite?

ladyres - good to know she's worthless only because she's not going to end up as a breeding stock in the future. Thanks for the info. Your comment is totally not sexist or chauvinist. At all. Yeah.

Blackfire283 - nah, I personally like to thing that, even if it's always different, the exam follows the same scheme - 1st info gathering or something, 2nd survival and 3rd tournament. But, yeah, if it wasn't for Dei's voice, which is pretty deep, all I would be left with at first would be my trap sense tingling.

Mortred101 - Ren is scary - wait for her minions to grow into proper monsters!

OTrizy - Tarantula is pretty normal spider, too. Well, spider is spider, some are just prettier, some creepier, tarantulas are fluffier. And bigger. And, well, tormenting Danzo - well, that's my jam right there. He's the villain of Naruto, after all.

starsarebright - nah, Ren is pretty mcuh like me in terms of clothing. She just feels wrong when naked, even if clothes are henged. People don't go dispelling henges majorly because kunoichi use them instead of make-up, and someone once or twice made mistake of dispelling it. Never again. (Or, at least, that's my headcanon.) And Danzo's arrogance will be half of the reasons of his downfall, really.

HikariNoTenshi-San - well, Orochimaru is my top favorite, actually, and Danzo? Top hate. From all fandoms ever, in fact. That means something, yeah? I mean, he's actually pretty good character, with how awful, sick and disgusting he is. Well-made, perfect for hate. And it's not like Ren is underestimated - the spiders are. Because they're just spiders. I feel like many people underestimate Aburame for that very same reason - they use bugs instead of flashy techniques, and yet, here is Shino who can sink fucking warship with them.

animeloverpragya - he does, actually. He just allows Ren to gather more and more intel on him because he's arrogant bitch.

GoTherka - well, yeah. But I'm trying, now that I realized how childish I was. But hey, I said I'm that, too, so. And, well, Kisame is amazing, what can I say?

deathgeonous - I have a beta now, so it should be better.

Rainbow-shark - Ren doesn't have spy. She has a spider. That is overlooked by literally everyone. That can slip through tiniest cracks and eavesdrop without being discovered... Uh, yeah, that's essentially a spy, I guess? xD

Someone - well, yu don't like him, and I like to ship him with Very Painful and Gruesome Death. What can I say? It's a match made in hell c:

Guest (chapter 25 . Feb 18) - I wanted to keep it a secret and failed miserably, most likely, but yes, she is. Shortly after Chunin Exams, actually.

Tsuki - early-ier...-ish? I guess. I don't want to spoil too much stuff, but a bit earlier than in canon.

Aka-chansama - there will be both adding and taking members from Akatsuki, as we're keeping count of 10 (Oro counts, he just skedaddled with his ring and couldn't be replaced). Obitobi is too vital to remove him, sadly, but I can already say that there will be two Akatsuki members who won't make the cut as they originally did - at least right now I planned two, still debating over third because why not, but I'm more into not. I'm not telling who, and the order of meeting them doesn't affect it the slightest.