Missions

Naruto groaned as another ball slammed into his face. They were currently doing a teamwork exercise, throwing a ball back and forth at each other, of course this being only Sasuke, Naruto, and Sakura. However, there was one problem with this exercise, they were blindfolded.

Naruto groaned. "Oh my Kami. This is ridiculous, do we have to keep doing this Kakashi-sensei?"

"Yes, Naruto. Teamwork can prove the difference between life and death on the battle, therefore until I deem you all successful in this we will not be doing any sort of jutsu training, or weapons making, at least, not until we reach a good enough level of teamwork," Kakashi responded.

Naruto groaned even more, throwing the ball to where he remembered Sakura to be.

"Sakura-chan, catch."

Sakura nodded and put her hands out. She felt the ball impact on her hands, and clasped down on it, catching it. She smiled as she found herself to be successful.

"Sasuke-kun, catch the ball."

She threw it, gently, too gently. Kakashi sighed. He could understand her if she wanted to make sure Sasuke could catch the ball, but she was throwing it too gently for it to even reach Sasuke. It also meant that Sasuke wouldn't even get to touch the ball before it reached the ground. Kakashi then decided now was the time to up the challenge. He shot forward, grabbing the ball and twisting it in midair; he then fired it directly at Naruto, who was not paying attention as Sakura had not called his name.

As the ball flew towards Naruto there was one thing that allowed him to realize the ball was coming towards him. The speed. The ball was letting out a whistling sound, allowing him to realize the ball was coming towards him, however it mattered not. Even though his hands were up he didn't have enough strength to catch the ball and was sent flying backwards, rubber burning his hands. However, before he hit a nearby tree he channeled chakra into his arms and legs as he slammed his feet into the ground. By doing so he managed to maintain his balance and stop the power behind the blow, although his hands were burning.

Naruto dropped the ball and ripped off the blindfold, glaring at Kakashi with an unearthly rage.

"What the hell!? Sakura-chan doesn't have the power to do that, what did you do Kakashi-sensei!"

Sasuke took off his blindfold, confused, as did Sakura.

"Dobe, what are you talking about," Sasuke asked. "And why didn't the ball go to me?"

Naruto frowned as he glared at Kakashi who was eye-smiling. "Well," Kakashi began. "A person, who shall not be named, did not throw the ball hard enough; therefore I decided to improve the speed of the ball. I just lost control over it a bit," Kakashi said, eye-smiling innocently.

Naruto growled at him, reading the lie that was expressed all over his face. However, Kakashi didn't seem to care.

"Naruto, Sasuke, go to the Hokage tower. Sakura, stay here, I have something I want to talk to you about."

Naruto and Sasuke nodded, taking off in two separate bursts of speed, looking like blurs to the untrained eye, however to a person of Kakashi's caliber they would think they were moving in slow motion. Along with the fact that anyone could tell they were racing each other there.

"Kakashi-sensei, you wanted to talk to me," Sakura asked, looking at Kakashi with wonder.

"Yes, Sakura, I think you need to give up on Sasuke," Kakashi said.

Sakura immediately glared at Kakashi. "Why, because you think I'm not good enough?"

"No Sakura, it's not that. From what I can tell from what Naruto has told me about him, even though he himself hasn't known Sasuke for a long time, plus my own personal experiences on the boy he isn't the type to fall for a girl over looks. In fact, I highly doubt he cares about those. Sakura, for your age you are attractive, but Sasuke doesn't look for attractiveness, he looks for kunoichi who train and are strong, along with ones that aren't afraid to defy what he thinks. At least, that's what I think. You don't have to take my word for it, but if you actually trained I bet Sasuke would think better of you. Also, even if he doesn't, you're always ignoring Naruto, when he truly does care about you that will be all."

Sakura's face went through a series of emotions at hearing that. The first was, of course, outrage, then curiosity, then back to outrage, before landing on a confused look.

"Let's head to the Hokage tower now," Kakashi said and started walking from the training ground. Sakura followed, deep in thought, and at a much slower pace than Kakashi.

'Am I really doing something wrong? Am I driving Sasuke-kun and, heck, even Naruto-baka away from me?'

XxX

"Is everyone in position," Kakashi asked over a headset. The responses came in immediately.

"Yes, sensei, can we go now," the three asked, all with annoyed expressions on their face. They had done this mission three times already, mainly as the damn cat had escaped as soon as it was brought back to the tower, each and every time. And people thought jonin were useful, yet they were too lazy to stop the damn cat.

"Then go."

Naruto, Sakura, and Sasuke all sprang from their hiding places like an eagle descending on it's pray. The four-legged creature hissed and jumped away from them; however, with two quick bursts of chakra-enhanced sprints, Sasuke and Naruto caught it, Naruto cutting off the path in front of it, and Sasuke behind it. The creature sprang towards the left; however Sakura appeared through foliage, arms outstretched. She clasped her hands together, just as the creature fell, avoiding the hands, however Naruto was prepared. With a chakra-enhanced leap he fell onto the figure with a loud, 'oomph.'

Naruto slithered his arms under his stomach, grabbing a furry creature before lifting it into the air, a defeated look on its face.

"Caught," Naruto said as he looked at the thing. He was seriously debating skinning the cat already. He had come to hate the furry creature.

"Has it been identified by the ribbon?"

"WE'VE BEEN CHASING IT THE ENTIRE DAMN DAY, I KNOW WHAT IT FUCKING LOOKS LIKE SENSEI! But ribbon confirmed," Naruto roared.

Kakashi just cringed at the loud voice before nodding. "Head back to the Hokage tower."

XxX

"Oh, my baby," said a rather…large lady. She was hugging the cat very tightly, squeezing the life out of it.

"Here is your money, times three for the trouble," the woman said as she placed the money on the desk. The Hokage nodded kindly as the woman left the room, only to receive piercing glares from the three genin.

"What," Sarutobi asked.

"That blasted cat, Tora or whatever, better, and I mean BETTER, count as three D-rank missions," the genin hissed. "If it doesn't…" the let the sentence drag out, each one drawing a kunai from their pouches.

"Let's just say we'll be having cat for dinner."

Sarutobi gulped. He made a mental classification to wait a LONG time before giving Team 7 the, 'Capture Tora,' mission, again. With that done he smiled sagely.

"Yes, that will count as three missions, here is your share," the Hokage said, handing out the money. Naruto took his money with greed in his eyes, as did Sakura, however Sasuke just took it calmly, after all, he had an entire bank filled with money because of his clan. Compared to that, this was poor people cash, even though he didn't deny the more money the better. Kakashi just smiled and took his money. While he wouldn't gain any significant change in his funds, this was equal to the amount of a C-rank mission. Of course, there would be more if the village didn't take part of the cash to keep the economy running smoothly.

"Any other missions for my squad Hokage-sama," Kakashi asked.

The Hokage nodded. "Cleaning the Inuzuka kennels, painting old George's fence, picking weeds from Ms. Rusk's garden, or carrying the groceries of Ms. Ural."

Kakashi smiled and began to think on which one to accept. Since this was going to be marked as three missions and his goal was four missions per day, as in one week that would mean he had reached the requirement for the Chunin Exams, 20 D-rank missions. Then, he could focus on training his team wholeheartedly for the exams, with a couple of missions mixed in here or there.

"No," Naruto said. "Unless we do something worthy of my caliber I refuse to take any more missions for the rest of the day."

Kakashi sighed and ignored what Naruto thought, still intent on choosing a mission.

"We'll take the painting mission, Hokage-sama."

Naruto groaned as Sarutobi nodded.

"Get to it then, Kakashi."

XxX

It had been multiple weeks since Team 7 became official, and it had been a hectic couple of days. The team had upped their teamwork exercises, with all of them throwing it at each other without calling out the others names, along with Kakashi interfering once-in-awhile to make it even more difficult for the genin.

However, that was unimportant as Naruto was heading over to Hinata's place. Naruto walked up to the gate guards, who despite not liking him let him in per Hiashi's orders. The orders that Hiashi would persuade the boy to work for him, so he would be allowed on the grounds at all times, however what Hiashi did not know was that the Hyuga elders disagreed with this decision, however they had yet to stop it, realizing it's benefits.

"Hina-chan!" Naruto called as she took a break from sparing with Hanabi.

"Naruto-kun," Hinata said, smiling at Naruto.

"Hey Hina-chan, I was wondering if we could spar."

"Onii-chan," Hanabi called latching onto Naruto's leg. You see, while it had taken a while, Naruto had warmed up to Hanabi, and had become a sort of big brother figure in her eyes.

"Hey, monsoon-chan (Monsoon)," Naruto said, looking at Hanabi.

Hanabi's cheeks inflated. "I said don't call me that, Onii-chan," Hanabi said, lightly pounding on his leg.

Naruto just laughed and pattered Hanabi's head, whispering, "Sorry, Hanabi-chan."

A cough interrupted the touching moment. Naruto turned to see Hiashi looking at him, Neji right behind him.

"Hiashi-sama. Neji," Naruto said.

"Naruto-san," Hiashi said.

"Naruto," Neji said.

The two sisters went quiet as they looked at the three. Anyone could feel how tense each of them were, Naruto and Neji more so. Ever since taking a brief training session with Tenten's team Naruto had disliked Neji. He tried to put both Lee's and his own dreams down, and crush them, saying they weren't good enough. Naruto had taken offence to that and fought Neji. Needless to say he lost, however ever since that day Naruto had trained harder to beat Neji. He had become his secondary rival of sorts.

"So Naruto-san, why have you come today," Hiashi asked.

"I came to spar with Hina-chan. I wanted to see how much more she improved since she became a ninja," Naruto responded immediately. Hiashi nodded at this, but still made the familiar, "Tsk," sound an adult made when something bad happened.

"I'm afraid Hinata cannot do that. However, Neji would be more than happy to do so."

"If I may, Hiashi-sama, but why is Hina-chan unable to do so?"

Hiashi growled mentally. He honestly had just lied to see if Naruto would fight Neji again, however the boy had avoided it, whether or not he knew it.

"Because, she is training Hanabi. While one of them will not become the heiress to the clan both of them must be strong, therefore they are training."

Hiashi couldn't hold back the small smirk. He had cleverly avoided Naruto's unconscious ploy.

"Okay then, I'll spar with Neji, no jutsu as usual right," Naruto asked.

Hiashi nodded as Neji walked down towards the duo and Hinata lead Hanabi away. However, one last glance from both of them at Naruto let him know they were worried about him.

"Don't worry Hina-chan, Hanabi-chan, I got this." Naruto said as he dropped into his stance.

In all honesty though, he wasn't sure if he could beat Neji. The teen had much more practice than him in both taijutsu and being a ninja; therefore the odds were heavily against his favor. He would have to quite literally pull a victory out of his ass to win this one.

"Begin," Hiashi said.

Neji moved quickly, shooting out a palm aimed directly for Naruto's stomach, however Naruto avoided the blow, albeit barely, before launching a punch at Neji. Neji pushed the blow out of the way before raising his hand and shooting it forward. Naruto grabbed the hand as it made contact with his body, pushing through the pain and pushing out another punch.

It made contact.

It slammed right into Neji's face, sending him stumbling backwards. As Neji stood up again, blood dripping from his nose Hiashi called the match off.

"Naruto-san, Neji, stop fighting."

Both boys dropped to the ground as he said that, although Neji stood up almost as soon as his knees touched the ground.

Hiashi walked over to Naruto, a fake concerned look on his face. He activated his Byakugan (All Seeing White Eye), and looked at Naruto's chakra system. He was immediately surprised. Naruto's chakra reserves were huge, even larger than his or the Hokages. His entire chakra pathway was shining in a bright blue hue, and it was actually scaring Hiashi. If the boy had this much chakra if he wasn't on their side he could be a major threat. He could quite literally fire jutsu off for days and never run out of chakra. Sure he grow tired as the days dragged on, but since the boy knew no high-costing jutsu, to Hiashi's knowledge, other than the Kage Bunshin (Shadow Clone Technique), which admittedly didn't drain Naruto of to much chakra, he would be hard for Neji to actually beat.

"Your chakra system is fine; however Neji that attack was to close to Naruto's chakra coils. Any closer and without the Byakugan activated you may have killed him. You must start to know where the tenketsu are, as your Byakugan was off, which could have led to Naruto-san's death. Go study."

Neji nodded, mumbling out a, "I apologize Hiashi-sama," and walked away. Hiashi then looked at Naruto.

"Be more careful. Now, go do what you were going to do with Hinata," Hiashi said.

With that he stood up. He had to be more careful from here on out. He had slowly but surely been making the boy more comfortable around him, as the only reason Naruto was so tense earlier was because Neji was there, however that would matter not if the boy kept his anger towards Neji. Hiashi had to make those to friends to strength Naruto's bond with the Hyuga's.

It would prove to be fatal if he didn't.

Hey guy's it's Kuma Akuma. First off I want to say this chapter is kinda short because it's a filler chapter. Secondly, I want to say sorry if there was no clear plot in this chapter, but I just wasn't feeling it, I forced this one out. Also, to those of you who sent in OC's, trust me they will be used, I haven't really diverged from plot yet, but they will be. Also, the major plot divergences will not really be happening until after the Chunin Exams, sorry. But, I already have one OC that will be coming in soon. Who created it I will not say, as even they don't know there's will be included, but hey. See you guys later, and avoid the Earl.