Match Over:
Anko Mitarashi managed to make it to her appointment on time.
Doing double-duty in the Chunin Exams was not fun. Especially when she'd only recently narrowly avoided dying in a showdown with Orochimaru, but she'd managed it, and now she was standing in a wide-open hall. The Hokage was sitting a good distance away, watching. Meanwhile, the various would-be Chunin were waiting.
"Alright, everyone, listen up!" said Anko, moving forward. "I'm Anko Mitarashi if any of you forgot! And this is the elimination round for this section of the Chunin Exams! I will be acting as the judge and announcer for this part!
"Any questions?"
"Um, excuse me, Ms. Anko, weren't you the proctor for the last section?" asked the pink-haired Sakura. Her file was... unimpressive, but Anko was willing to judge by what she saw. "Shouldn't there be someone else?"
"Ordinarily, Hayate would," said Mitarashi. "But he's getting treated for lung cancer at the moment. Remember, kids, smoking is bad for you.
"So I'll be filling in.
"Now, a couple of ground rules here, and they're my ground rules. First off, death is an acceptable outcome. Injury is an acceptable outcome. If you kill your opponent in a match, you are, technically, not liable.
"Murder, however, is not an acceptable outcome.
"If you accidentally slash your opponent's throat and they die, that's one thing. If they are helpless and you stab them to death, that's against the rules. Am I clear, Gaara?"
Anko looked to where Gaara was looking on with narrowed eyes. He didn't seem to like them. "Understood."
The little psycho had killed at least three genin, though none of them had left bodies. Just blood on the sand. "Right.
"Now, next matter. I reserve the right to call the match at any time for any purpose. The Hokage reserves the right to overrule me, but other than that, my power is absolute. If I say the fight is done, the fight is done. No second winds, no 'I'm getting serious.' Nothing.
"Matches will be one at a time and one on one.
"If a fighter taps out, says 'I give up', or is incapable of continuing, you stop attacking until we call the match." Then Anko looked around. "Also, to all Jonin Sensei in this room.
"You know your students better than anyone. If you believe they are at their limit or about to be murdered, you are allowed to stop the match. Doing so will be an instant forfeit for them, obviously." And she sighed. "Finally, we have one final rule to go over.
"On the off chance that you end up sorted into a match with someone you have a vendetta with, keep it off the field. Ninja has to remain impersonal if they want to succeed at their missions.
"This is not personal, and it is not political. Whatever reason you might have for wanting someone here dead, leave it at the door." She looked to Hinata and Neji, who had a long-running family feud going. One of them could try to legally murder the other here, and she was going to head that off. Hinata probably wouldn't do anything; her record showed her as kind and timid. But Neji had a vendetta with Hinata's father. Worse still, his profile indicated a fatalistic outlook on life. While he had excellent synergy with his team, he was something of an antisocial loner.
Anko suspected he might view this as a now-or-never chance for vengeance. She might be in his position. "Now, a bit of advice.
"Know when you are beaten. If you get knocked out of the tournament and humiliated, you can always come back next year. Virtually no one becomes a Chunin on their first try. The first attempt should be considered a learning experience.
"The fact that you've gotten this far is already impressive. So don't push it.
"You're worth a lot more to your friends, families, and village alive than dead."
"That's a lot of rules," said Naruto. "Are all those really necessary?"
"Yeah, can we get those written down?" asked the blonde-haired girl, Ino.
"There are hung on each wall. You can read them there," said Anko. "Break any of these rules, and you are disqualified at best. We could also press charges if your actions were criminal.
"The purpose of the Chunin Exams is to weed out the wimps. It is not to get the wimps slaughtered to show how tough the stronger ones are."
"Isn't all this a bit tame?" asked Kin, a girl in camo with long, black hair. Profile was vague, but she had sociopathic tendencies. Plus, her relationship with her team was strained.
"You just got here through a place called the Forest of Death," noted Anko.
"She has a point," said the bandaged Dosu. Dosu was a high-performing shinobi and had done well in the matches.
That reminded Anko, those two were Sound Ninja given a hit on Sasuke. Orochimaru had always wanted the Sharingan, and he'd appeared out of nowhere. The timing was suspicious, so there might be a connection.
But she didn't have much time to think about it because she was talking with Kakashi and Sasuke pretty soon. And listening to the stupidest request, she'd ever heard. "Let me see if I've got this straight Kakashi;
"Sasuke here has a curse mark on him, put on him by my old sensei Orochimaru."
"Yes," said Kakashi.
"And you haven't finished sealing it fully yet?" asked Anko. "And you're asking me to let him participate? Do you even know what that thing could do to him if it goes out of control?" She'd spent months suffering under it, after all.
"No," said Kakashi. "However, he will be more than capable of fighting with taijutsu, so long as he remains focused."
"Not in my ring, he won't," said Anko. "You're not fighting without a fully sealed curse mark."
"You can't just shut me out of the Chunin Exams!" said Sasuke.
"Actually, I can," said Anko, drawing out a contract. "You see right here on the contract you signed?
"The village reserves the right to deny candidates entry into elimination rounds. Especially if doing so could get them killed."
"I can control it!" said Sasuke.
"Maybe you could," said Anko. "Or maybe you're wrong, and the second you walk into that arena, you'll get even alive. I have a curse mark just like that. It nearly killed me while the Old Man figured out how to seal it."
"But I have to pass!" said Sasuke.
"Anko, this shouldn't be a problem," said Sarutobi coming forward.
"What do you mean?" asked Anko. "You were the one who sealed me; you know as well as I do how dangerous it is."
"Well, if we disqualify Sasuke now, we'll also be disqualifying his competitor. He ought to get his chance as well," noted Sarutobi. "Fortunately, there is no rush to have the match.
"We can postpone it until after the curse mark is sealed.
"There's no sense in sticking to the rules if the rules benefit precisely no one."
"Thank you, Hokage," said Sasuke.
Anko nodded. "Alright, kid, you got lucky. Now go back there and get treated."
The matches began, and Anko watched each one with interest. Naruto faced off against Kiba, and it was a fairly good match. Kiba was triumphant; however, Naruto ultimately overcame him using his shadow clone jutsu.
It concluded for all to see with no interference. "Match over.
"Naruto Uzumaki is the winner." Anko moved forward. "...Well, I would say that Kiba is stronger than you in terms of raw stats. I'd recommend going back to basics."
"What do you mean?" asked Naruto.
"You're creative and strong, but you've got a lot of holes in your fighting style," said Anko. "You're going to have to repair your foundation if you want to build anymore on it."
"Oh, thanks," said Naruto. "But... how does everyone else have a strong foundation?"
"They paid attention in class," said Anko, showing Naruto a list of his grades.
The next match continued, and Anko watched Ino fight Sakura. It was... pathetic. The two punched and kicked and made big speeches about their feelings. Little to no strategy, Sakura was going all out, Ino was treating her with kid gloves.
Eventually, it ended with both punching eachother out.
"Match over, double K.O," said Anko, moving forward. "Now, in this situation, I reserve the right to decide who was more worthy of advancing to the finals."
"Really?" asked Ino. "You mean one of us might make it?"
"So who is it?" asked Sakura.
"Well, after observing your combat styles, I can't decide," admitted Anko. "You're both equally terrible."
"What?!" said Ino.
"I mean, I guess that Ino is probably way better at hand to hand, and that trick with your hair was okay," said Anko. "But that doesn't matter because she didn't have the guts to beat Sakura to a pulp as she could have. She held back and used a needlessly complicated strategy.
"One that ultimately failed because you couldn't even possess your enemy properly. You were too weak-willed to force her down. That's your specialty technique, and you couldn't even possess Sakura. How do you plan to do it to a hardened, armed and dangerous shinobi?
"You are way superior to Sakura.
"But that doesn't matter.
"The Chunin Exam finals are intended to be a display of your inherent abilities. All to advertise your powers to potential clients. That's why we have such a rigorous system for weeding people out. Ino, I'm guessing you got through the Forest by virtue of working well with your team. But, if Choji or Shikamaru were separated from you on a mission, what options would you have?"
"Well, um..." Ino halted. "I..." And she sighed. "I knew we were the weakest team in this tournament."
"Probably, yeah," agreed Anko. At least she knew it. "Although getting through anyway means you at least know how to use your abilities. So props on that. But, if I were to put you through to the Chunin Finals, you'd only damage your career prospects. And you'd be wasting everybody's time.
"You don't want to get a reputation as 'that loser who lucked their way to victory,' do you?"
"No, I guess not," said Ino.
"What about me, sensei?" asked Sakura, looking far too bright-eyed for one of her skills.
"You're pathetic," said Anko with a smile. "You only got through the Forest of Death because the Uzumaki kid is a lot smarter than he looks. And because the Uchiha was holding your hand. I've read your files. So far, the crowning achievement of your career is 'was not completely useless in the Forest of Death.' Or possibly 'was willing to cut her hair to save her friends.'
"You have no special abilities or bloodlines to speak of, but that's no excuse. If you don't have any special talents, you should have been focusing on improving what you did have. There isn't a single another person in this tournament you could have even put up a showing against. Not unless they were suicidally overconfident and you got desperate.
"I guess you can be pretty creative when your back is to a wall, and everything depends on you.
"But if you can only deliver when everyone else is already dead, what good are you to the team? What if somebody had died out there in the Forest of Death? What if the Ino-Shika-Cho trio hadn't arrived? Or what if Ino decided she didn't feel like risking her neck for a traitor who threw away years of friendship over a guy?
"What would you have done?
"If Sasuke and Naruto had been slaughtered, could you have even gotten out of the Forest of Death? Let alone avenged them."
"I..." Sakura looked utterly heartbroken, which was unfortunate. She needed to hear this. "I tried-"
"You tried too late!" said Anko, seeing tears streaming down her eyes. "You waited until the last possible to grow a backbone and take action, and by that time, it was a moot point!
"God, you're pathetic.
"I'm going to make this simple for you, Sakura. You have two choices going forward;
"One.
"You resign as a ninja and go into civilian work. You aced the written exam, so you might make a good analyst. That option is probably going to be a lot easier for everyone, but it's your choice.
"Two.
"You stop whining, get your act together, admit you're a pathetic excuse for a ninja, and fix the problem. Now get out of my ring; I've wasted enough time on you. Talk to your sensei about your training; that's not my job."
Sakura ran away crying. Kurenai looked down at her. "That was uh...
"That was a bit harsh, wasn't it?"
"She needed to hear it," said Anko. "The sooner you realize you're terrible, the sooner you can get about fixing it. Now out, we've got another match."
It was Hinata and Neji to start with.
Neji initially made a speech belittling her and nearly convinced her to forfeit. But then Naruto cheered her up, and the fight started. Both were actually pretty good, but a close look revealed Neji had the advantage the entire time. Eventually, he revealed that he'd sealed all of Hinata's chakra points. All without her realizing it.
"Match over!" said Anko.
"What?" said Hinata. "But I can still fight, I was-"
"No, you can't," said Anko, noting she was panting to breathe. "You put on a pretty good show. But Neji has a far superior form to you and more experience. You are exhausted, and he's not even sweating. And now you've had all your chakra points sealed.
"You're done, kid.
"If you try to fight him hand to hand, you could end up seriously injured, even killed. And even if you won, it'd only be because you got a lucky shot.
"If you want to beat him, train up a bit and come up with a strategy. Now get out."
Neji halted as Hinata left. Anko blinked. "...What?"
"So far, you have had advice for everyone," said Neji.
"Oh, right," said Anko. What advice could she give? Well, he was already one of the strongest people in the tournament. His team had gotten in here with little effort or trouble. And he was clearly a master of the gentle fist. "Um...
"I can't think of anything. Next match."
Neji looked a little annoyed as he walked away. All the more so when everyone started congratulating Hinata instead of him.
"Hinata, that was amazing!" said Naruto.
"Yeah, great job!" said Kiba.
"Indeed, you've certainly proven yourself to be in possession of the power of youth," said Lee.
"Thank you," said Hinata, blushing with pride.
Neji looked absolutely furious at this but said nothing and kept his distance. His gaze at Hinata turned to outright hatred.
Anko didn't blame him.
Rivalry or no, they were both on the same team. Given that Neji had won the match, his teammates ought to have congratulated him. But apparently, Lee regarded him as the 'bad guy' of this match even though he had played completely by the rules and won legitimately.
Although the brown-haired girl, Tenten seemed to be concerned and spoke to Neji to one side.
Anko shrugged.
Not her problem; she just made the calls.
Speaking of which, Tenten ended up in the worst possible matchup. She, a ranged combatant, faced off against Temari, a girl who controlled the wind. Needless to say, Tenten's every attack was deflected, and she was thrown head over heels into the air. She then smashed spine first onto Temari's fan.
Nothing had broken; Tenten was an acrobat and flexible.
But Temari had just tried to snap someone's spine to strike a pose.
"Match over, Temari is the winner," said Anko, annoyed.
"Well, I should say that's obvious," said Temari. "Is this really all you Leaf Ninja can do."
"Oh, stop looking so smug; this match was a foregone conclusion," said Anko. "You lucked out and faced someone whose entire fighting style is hard countered by yours. That doesn't say anything about your skill as a ninja.
"Just that you're lucky.
"If you want to prove yourself powerful, go after someone who can defend themselves. If you had any pride at all, you'd have shrugged the victory off and walked away. The fact that you feel the need to gloat speaks volumes of your character.
"Now go find a puppy to kick and get out of my ring. Loser."
Temari walked off, looking like she'd actually been affected. Meanwhile, Kiba quickly sheltered Akimaru as she passed by. Which got an amusing reaction from Temari, who realized people thought she'd sink that low.
"Ugh..." said Tenten. "I think I've broken something."
"Oh, that's just shock," said Anko. "If you'd broken something, you'd be screaming. Take your time."
Tenten pulled herself up.
"So, Tenten," said Anko. "On the one hand, you got a run of bad luck. Your enemy had a hard counter to everything you threw at them. On the other, it only happened because you didn't diversify your tactics.
"If you'd gone at her in melee, you might have been able to force her into an unfavorable position. It was her battle to lose, but you didn't do anything which could make her lose it."
"Well, I did have explosive tags, but uh... Guy-sensei told me not to kill any fellow participants," said Tenten.
Wait, her first reaction to something she could throw kunai at was to blow it up. "Huh.
"Good point."
And then came Kankuro Vs. Misumi. Misumi snaked around Kankuro and tried to strangle him, at which point Kankuro turned out to be a puppet. The puppet then threatened to crush Misumi to death if he didn't forfeit.
Misumi forfeits.
"Match over, Kankuro wins," said Anko. "Misumi, that was an obvious play. You were too quick to rush in and didn't consider how your enemy might act. You ought to have analyzed the situation and considered what the bundle he was carrying was. And what he'd do with it.
"If you'd gotten it out of his hands quickly and thrown it away, he might not have been able to sway. At the very least, you might have had time to react."
"Fine, whatever," said Misumi, stalking off.
"Poor sportsmanship," noted Anko. "Kankuro..."
"Yes?" asked Kankuro.
"I have no idea," said Anko. "I know nothing about puppet jutsu, so giving you advice would be futile. But, next time, I would recommend not letting your enemy get that close. Misumi might have been setting a trap of his own to draw you out.
"If so, you'd have been left exposed with your puppet occupied."
Kankuro nodded. "I'll keep it in mind."
The next match was Kin Vs. Shikamaru. Anko watched with interest and saw Kin immediately utilize bells with genjutsu. Soon Shikamaru was collapsed in agony, and as soon as he did, Kin karate chopped him over the head.
"Count yourself lucky this was a no-kill tournament," said Kin. "I was hoping to cut you up nice and slow."
Sweet kid.
It reminded Anko of herself when she was her age. "That wouldn't have been smart," she said. "If you take the time to gloat over someone, that gives them time to prepare a counterattack.
"Even a weak opponent can be dangerous if they get desperate and you have your guard down. Just finish things quickly and get the job done."
"Fine, fine," said Kin. "I'll keep it in mind."
Next up was Shino Vs. Zaku, and it was interesting.
Zaku attacked Shino hand to hand. However, then Shino unleashed his bugs and hemmed him in. Zaku summoned his sonic blasters, and Anko judged the number of bugs converging on him. At this rate, one of them was liable to kill the other.
And Zaku's sonic blasters weren't working while the bugs were getting closer.
"Match over!" said Anko. "Shino wins."
"What?!" said Zaku. "No! I'm not done, I'm not-"
"Kid, you've been outplayed," said Anko. "Even if you could unleash your sonic blasters in this situation, his bugs are at too wide an angle. They could have gotten you even as you pulled your arm out of that sling."
"I have to win!" said Zaku, desperately.
"No, you don't. Now get out of the ring; I'll talk with you later," said Anko.
Zaku sulked off, and two beetles scuttled from his hands unnoticed. Anko then turned to Shino. "Shino, well fought.
"Clogging up his sonic blasters with beetles was a little ruthless, though. It could have blown his arms off."
"It's good to have an ace in the hole," said Shino. "Two aces is even better."
Next up was Gaara against Lee.
And this one was very, very entertaining. Lee was fast and had powerful attacks, while Gaara had an immense defense. Anko thought at first Lee might pull off a win if he did hit and run tactics long enough. But he chose to go all out with the eight gates and attacked Gaara head-on.
At first, it seemed to pay off, but Gaara managed to survive. Lee landed and was in too much agony to move as Gaara sent forth his sand. Anko shot forward with Guy and halted it. "Match over!"
"Why?" asked Gaara. "He failed."
"Don't care," said Anko. "My job is to make sure valuable village property doesn't get wrecked, psycho. Lee is incapable of fighting on; the match is over. Get back to your post."
"But I can't be defeated!" said Lee. "I have worked too hard to be the only one not to make it in!"
"Too bad," said Anko. "Better luck next time, the medical team over here!"
Guy-sensei landed. "Don't worry, Lee. We'll have you back to normal, and you can try again next year. You went too far with this, but you'll make it. I'm sure of it."
"Yeah," said Tenten. "I mean, I got knocked out, too, after all. And even Neji probably couldn't have taken that guy out."
"Yes, thank you, Tenten," said Lee as he was brought onto a stretcher.
"I told you it was futile," said Neji, smiling wider in a... creepy fashion. He was enjoying this.
Far too much than the situation warranted.
Things had gotten personal.
"Just you wait, Neji. I will defeat you one day!" said Lee as he was pulled away.
Neji then turned to Gaara in full view of Lee. "Gaara, my compliments on your defeat of Rock Lee."
"What?!" said Lee.
"What?" said Tenten.
"What?" said Gaara, looking up in shock.
"I believe you did an excellent job in your match," said Neji. "You've proven yourself a talented Shinobi, and I admire your talent and hard work."
Lee was gone by this point, but he had heard.
Those words had not been chosen idly. After he got snubbed by his team, Neji had seethed for the entire tournament. What he'd said there had been giving Gaara the respect Lee had always wanted from him. It had been said specifically to hurt Lee and no other reason.
"...I did not justify my existence," said Gaara.
"I'm not sure what you mean by that, but I admire how you fought," said Neji.
Gaara seemed to look at him and consider things. "...Thank... you..."
Then he walked off, not knowing what to do with himself.
"What the hell is wrong with you?!" said Naruto, running forward. "Your teammate just got really hurt, and you're complimenting the guy who beat him up?!"
"It does seem that way, doesn't it?" asked Neji.
"Why you-" began Naruto.
Anko stepped between them. "And no, no, break it up. We are not having interpersonal drama in the ring; we are having matches. Settle it later.
"Both of you made it into the Chunin Exams. Maybe you'll fight there. Grudge matches tend to get good ratings, do it there.
"Next!"
Dosu Vs. Choji, the final match, was...
Pretty anticlimactic. Choji used the only technique he knew; he wedged in a corner and was promptly blasted by sonic.
"Match over, Dosu Kinata wins," said Anko. "That was...
"Kind of an anticlimax, to be honest."
Choji rubbed his head as he stood. "You're telling me. I thought I had a shot there for a minute."
"You deluded yourself," said Dosu as he walked off.
Anko looked to Choji. "Choji, you need to diversify your techniques. You seem to be pure brawn, with very little finesse at that. That played right into Dosu's hands.
"If the only thing you can do is smash things, you're style is easily countered."
Dosu didn't seem to want any advice; he'd already walked out, so Anko didn't give any. Instead, she looked to the remaining contestants.
The last match was Sasuke against some guy whose name Anko couldn't remember. She tried to check his file, but Sasuke had already wrecked him with absolute ease by the time she found it. And since Sasuke had done it with zero effort, Anko couldn't really make any insights on his skills.
"Okay, good game, everyone," said Anko. Pack it up and head out. There should be catering available in the next room.
"All matches complete, and nobody was seriously hurt.
"You three stay." And she pointed to Dosu, Zaku, and Kin.
"Why are we being singled out?" asked Kin.
"Yes, what is going on here?" asked Zaku.
"Oh nothing," said Anko. "I just thought I'd like to have a chat with you about your boss..."
The Chunin Exams semifinals concluded.
Nobody was seriously hurt, nobody died, and there were no blood feuds created on this day. Amazing what you could avoid when you had a responsible referee.
