A/N: I'm genuinely sorta blown away by the initial support for this. I kind of figured this one would be smaller, but I'm not complaining at all. Thank you all for the follows, favorites, and reviews!
Time for Chapter 2
Enjoy!
Satsuki blew a strand of hair out of her eyes as she impatiently awaited the arrival of her teammates. The night of their assignment to their cell, a note had appeared at the girl's door ordering her to arrive at the training fields at seven o'clock sharp. Logic dictated that her fellow genin had received the same note, which was why the fact that it was ten minutes past the allotted time was so aggravating. Neither her teammates nor her sensei had arrived yet.
The weather was far from freezing, but it wasn't particularly warm either, leaving Satsuki in a perpetual state of slight discomfort as she stood alone in the miniature plain. According to what she had been told several years ago, the genin exam was actually broken up into two stages, with the first of which being the clone test, and the second being a field exam. All signs pointed toward the present day being the date of the field exam.
'It's a smart system. Just being able to make a worthless copy of yourself shouldn't be enough to become a ninja. Merit in action is everything.' she thought to herself. What exactly the test would entail was unknown to her, but no matter what it ended up being, she was fairly confident in her ability to perform. Of all the things she had struggled with over the years, showing up when it counted had never been one of them. What concerned her was the idea that the assessment would be judged in terms of the team as a whole.
In that vein, it was far more difficult to be fully confident. Shikamaru was clearly intelligent, as he accidentally revealed numerous times throughout their years together in the academy, but he was also the opposite of decisive. Naruto was bullheaded and determined, but also lacked the ability to plan ahead. And even Satsuki herself was fairly poor at working with others. They were hardly a compatible combination of personalities, which made their placement together all the more puzzling.
Broadly speaking, teams were put together to fill a particular niche, be it tracking, frontal assaults, or interrogation. There were other categories, but those three were the most prevalent. Team Seven didn't seem to fit any of them. Shikamaru seemed suited to interrogation due to his family's paralysis jutsu, Naruto was nothing if not well-suited to attacking things, and Satsuki was something of a jack of all trades, master of none. They were mismatched puzzle pieces.
'Unless they're trying out an all-terrain unit, then I don't grasp their logic.' the Uchiha girl pondered. As she considered the numerous lines of reasoning possible pertaining to the formation and selection of Team Seven, footsteps caught her attention from behind.
"I'd heard he was late to most things, like I said before, but I was hoping I'd heard wrong, honestly."
Satsuki glanced back over her shoulder at the sound of the new voice, catching sight of Shikamaru entering the training ground as she did so. The Nara certainly looked tired, as his eyes were half-lidded and his posture was hunched, but he had managed to arrive within twenty minutes of the scheduled time. His arrival also confirmed that all of Team Seven had indeed received the same note Satsuki had.
"You can't rely on anybody these days, I guess." she said as her teammate sat down on the grassy ground and leaned back to rest on his elbows. A slightly chilly breeze then blew across the field, drawing a slight shiver from both of them.
"Any clue where Naruto is? He's a lot of things, but tardy has never actually been one of them." Shikamaru asked tiredly. The Uchiha girl shook her head and brushed a few blades of grass from her shirt.
"Nope. He's not my responsibility. Better if he doesn't show up, honestly. He might hurt our chances." she said bluntly. The Nara raised an eyebrow.
"Our chances of doing what, exactly?" he asked skeptically. The raven-haired girl gestured to the terrain around them and then back to them
"We're out here to be tested. The clone test was just a test to see if we're ready to earn the right to be Ninja." she explained. Shikamaru considered the logic for a moment before shrugging his shoulders and laying flat on his back with his hands laced behind his head.
"Decent deductive reasoning. About Naruto, though. I don't think he'll be a dead weight. If nothing else, he's a hard worker. Have you seen how much he runs every week?" he replied. Satsuki scrunched her brow and eyed him.
"Wasn't it something like eight miles per day?" she recalled. The shadow user shook his head and held up two full hands out in front of him.
"Apparently it's more like ten. Maybe a half-marathon. Kid is a freak. Couldn't be me, that's for sure." he corrected. Satsuki pushed down her urge to whistle. It certainly explained Naruto's never-ending lung capacity. A few moments after learning of the blonde's cardiovascular prowess, the sound of a stray twig snapping drew her gaze away from the horizon and back behind her once more.
"Look what the cat dragged in. How kind of you to join us." Satsuki jeered as Naruto dragged himself onto the training grounds. From the look of him, he had overslept. His hair was slightly disheveled, his shirt was ruffled, and there were circles under his eyes.
"Save it. My alarm sucks." Naruto grumbled. He soon joined his teammates in the same general vicinity and flopped down on the ground in similar fashion to Shikamaru.
"Is he not here yet?" he asked vaguely. Though his words lacked specific detail, their meaning was perfectly clear. Satsuki shook her head and glared at the entrance point of the clearing. Waiting was growing tiresome, especially now that peace and quiet were no longer an option.
'If he isn't here in the next ten minutes, I'm going home.' she silently vowed. For the following seven and a half minutes, it seemed that she would be forced to reckon with that vow, as Kakashi was nowhere to be seen or heard. Just as even Naruto began to mutter something about leaving, however, a puff of smoke off to their left broke the streak of uneventful stillness.
"It's a long story that involves a stray kitten, an elderly woman, and several bars of soap." Kakashi said abruptly as he exited the cloud of illusionary smoke, preemptively responding to the demands he knew he would inevitably receive.
"You're a bad liar." Naruto said with an edge of irritation. Kakashi shrugged and looked them all up and down. Once he was seemingly satisfied, he cleared his throat and cracked his neck.
"As I'm sure at least one of you deduced from the note, we're out here to finish up your genin exam. Unfortunately for you, your test is going to be a little bit old-school." he said, producing a pair of bells, both of which were hanging on strings.
"Recently, the village has been shying away from hands-on testing for entrance into the ranks, but I quit being a conformist a long time ago. You're going to try to take these from me. If you succeed, you're my team. If you don't, you get shipped back to the academy. Are we clear?" he explained smoothly. Shikamaru raised his hand soon after the speech concluded, and posed his question upon being gestured to speak by his superior.
"How long do we have to get this done? And why are there only two bells?" he asked skeptically. The silver-haired Jonin held up four fingers.
"You've got four hours. I think that's reasonable, don't you? As for the number of bells, it's a filtering tool. Only two of you make it out of here genin. The person who can't get their hands on a bell fails this exam, and has to try again next year. We have our ways of filling in that extra spot, don't you worry." he replied calmly. Satsuki opened her mouth to protest the ludicrous details of their test, but Naruto beat her to it.
"How the hell is that fair? We all earned our way in. Why shouldn't all three of us be able to pass?" he questioned. Kakashi briskly tied the bells to his belt and hopped back a few meters.
"Life isn't fair, kid. Think of it as your first lesson in loss. Now let's get started. When I say the word, you can all begin trying to take a bell off of me." he said. Then, much to the confusion of the team, he took out an orange-covered book and flipped it open. Satsuki narrowed her eyes.
"What's with the book?" she asked. The jonin shrugged and turned a page in the strange softback.
"I'm a decent multitasker. I'm behind on my reading this month. Just give me a minute to finish this page. I want to really take it in." he said. At this, Naruto growled and lowered into an aggressive posture.
"Screw this. You can read later, asshole." he snapped, clearly sick of Kakashi's nonchalant demeanor. He then charged forward at his sensei. Shikamaru stepped forward to stop him, but faltered when he realized it was far too late.
"Are you dumb? He'll kick your teeth in!" he called to his teammate, who paid him no heed. The blonde soon arrived in front of the jonin, where he planted his feet and swung for his head. With an ease that almost seemed disinterested, Kakashi ducked underneath the wild punch, seized Naruto's wrist, and flung him back toward his teammates.
Before she could react, Naruto landed directly on top of Satsuki, sending them both crashing to the surprisingly harsh surface of the training ground. The raven-haired girl groaned as she propped herself up on her elbows with Naruto painfully sprawled perpendicular across her.
"Get the hell off of me." she hissed as she squirmed her way out from under him. The blonde obliged and climbed to his feet, not bothering to offer a hand as Satsuki rose to meet him.
"You're a decent landing pad. I guess you're good for something, at least." he goaded her before turning his attention to Kakashi, who was looking on with great amusement.
"Watch your mouth." Satsuki growled, dusting herself off as she spoke. Shikamaru quickly snapped them back to attention with his voice.
"You can beat each other up later. Focus on what we're here to do." he said. The silver haired Ninja then shifted in place.
"I hadn't given you the word to start yet, Naruto. Learn some patience." he scolded the blonde, who merely stared at him in response . He then sighed and shook his head.
"If you're all so eager, then fine. Come and get me." he said. The moment the words left his mouth, Naruto took a step forward. Before he could charge again, Satsuki's hand shot out and gripped his shoulder.
"Unless you want to get tossed again, or knocked out, don't rush him. There's no way attacking him head on is going to work." she reasoned as calmly as she could. Shikamaru nodded in agreement.
"Seconded. I've got an idea, I think. We do have to get close to him to get a hold of the bells, but we need to cover our entries into his range. Since you're so eager to get at him, Naruto, Satsuki and I will cover you." he then looked to the Uchiha girl.
"How many kunai and shuriken did you pack?" he asked. Satsuki briefly sauntered back to her awakening that morning within her mind.
"Eight kunai, twenty-four shuriken. I'm guessing you want to keep him occupied with projectiles while Naruto rushes in?" she asked. Shikamaru nodded.
"How's that sound, Naruto?" he said to his male teammate. Naruto gave it a moment's thought before nodding.
"Yeah, sure. I suck with shuriken anyway." he said approvingly. The genin then all assumed their positions and prepared to begin their assault. It wasn't an especially complex plan, but it wasn't meant to be. A few beats later, Satsuki launched a shuriken straight at Kakashi's neck. For the briefest of moments, it seemed as though the serrated star would actually strike him. At the last second, however, he caught the shuriken on his finger without even bothering to turn his head. He then flicked it back at her, with Satsuki barely managing to move her head out of the way as it whizzed by.
"Just unload on him. I'll make sure he can't dodge them." Naruto ordered. The Uchiha and Nara obliged, rapidly launching their projectiles at Kakashi. As expected, the silver haired ninja easily and succinctly dodged each and every one of them. In the midst of the fray, however, Naruto had succeeded in closing the distance between himself and Kakashi.
"I respect the effort, kid, but you've all got a lot to learn." the jonin said as he pivoted around Naruto's attempt to swipe a bell from him. As the blonde stumbled past him, Kakashi kicked his legs out from under him and caught him by his collar.
"Lesson number one: your own comrades can easily be turned against you." he announced to Satsuki and Shikamaru, who were fresh out of projectiles. Before either one of them could react, Kakashi bent Naruto halfway over with a half-nelson and put a kunai to his throat.
"Your plan was sound in some ways. It provided a distraction, and had a clear end goal. The issue is that, in a real life scenario, Naruto would be cold and dead right now. Never use your allies as a battering ram, even if they ask you to." he lectured them before releasing the blonde and kicking him in the back, sending him stumbling back to his fellow genin.
"Isn't there a cell specifically designed to be a battering ram of sorts?" Satsuki pointed out. Kakashi nodded and took out his orange book once again.
"Yes, but they play a more conservative game then you're probably aware of. That unit functions as exactly that. A unit. If one of them falls, the rest retreat with them in tow. Coherence is key. It'll save your lives some day." he said. He then eyed the teens intently.
"You still have well over three hours. Either come at me again, or come up with something." he commanded.
A collective nod from the genin signified the beginning of an absolutely hellish gauntlet.
Satsuki coughed painfully as she flopped to her back. Never before had she been so utterly spent, both physically and mentally. For the past three hours and fifty-five minutes, she, Naruto, and Shikamaru had relentlessly pursued their Jonin instructor in the hopes of acquiring one of his jealously guarded bells. They had failed completely and utterly to even begin to approach taking even one of them. They had been outmaneuvered, outmuscled, and outsmarted at every turn.
In short, Kakashi Hatake was every bit as skilled as his reputation dictated. More depressing still, it was abundantly clear that, outside of a singular exchange between the Uchiha girl and the more experienced ninja, Kakashi had hardly even been trying.
"He...really whipped our asses, didn't he?" Naruto breathed through his exhaustion as he hung upside down by a rope trap from a tree branch. Satsuki slicked back her dark hair, which was now damp with sweat.
"At least I managed to touch a bell. You were just a punching bag." she retorted weakly. The usually-bold genin sighed heavily and glanced at Shikamaru, who was by far the least battered of the three.
"What's that make him then? He just sat back and threw kunai at him." he complained, eliciting a bored shrug from the Nara.
"Pick your battles. The one time I tried to play taijutsu with him, he kicked me in the ribs so hard I thought I was gonna break in half. Also, I did more than throw Kunai. I managed to paralyze him once." he corrected tiredly. Satsuki winced as she rotated her sore wrist.
"You had him for all of five seconds before he broke free and decked me. Some plan that was." she said irritatedly. Slowly but surely, the three-way bickering gave way to silence as they awaited the inevitably depressing verdict from Kakashi, who had disappeared at the end of the four hour time limit. Though it took a painstakingly long amount of time, eventually, just as they all began to argue to pass the time once more, Kakashi returned with his usual puff of smoke.
"Forgive the wait. I just had a few things to sort out." he said. He then glanced at the dangling blonde.
"I hung you up there at least a half an hour ago. How are you still stuck?" he asked skeptically. Naruto wiped sweat from his inverted brow and scratched his cheek.
"I'm way too tired to get out by myself, and these jerks won't help me." he explained. Kakashi sighed in response and flicked out a kunai that severed the portion of rope suspending him in the air. Naruto instantly crashed to the ground in a heap, groaning painfully as he sat up and rubbed his head.
"I'll be honest with you all. I expected you to come closer to snagging a bell. Most of the kids I test make contact with a bell at least twice, and you three only got there once." he began, causing all three teens to hang their heads in disappointment.
"But, you also just so happen to be the first group I've ever worked with to have grasped the point of this exam right from the jump. Your plans weren't perfect, and your execution was laughable at points, but you worked together. You acted as a team, if a dysfunctional one." he continued, drawing their gazes back up from the ground as he spoke. A smile then formed on Kakashi's face beneath his mask.
"As such, I'm going to give you all a passing grade. From this day onward, you're members of Team Seven. Be proud of that. You're my graduates." he congratulated them jovially. Satsuki furrowed her brow and pointed to the bells that still hung at the jonin's waist.
"The bells were just a focal point for us to bite onto, I'm guessing?" she asked. Kakashi nodded and detached the bells from his belt.
"Spot on. The point of them is to be a common goal to unite behind. Unfortunately, kids your age tend to be incredibly selfish. They try to think up ways of taking a bell for themselves, because they actually buy into the lie that only two can pass." he replied. Naruto frowned.
"You openly lied to us while you were explaining the test. That's a little fucked up, honestly." he said. The silver haired ninja chuckled and pocketed the bells.
"Watch your language, kid. And yeah, I lied to you. Deception is a way of life, and it's the way of life you chose when you entered the academy. You're going to be damn good liars by the time you retire. Well, or by the time you die. No guarantees you'll all survive." he said, a darker tone slipping into his fairly pleasant voice. He then swiftly changed the topic.
"I'm guessing you're all hungry. Eat up." he said, producing a pair of bentos as he spoke. He promptly tossed the boxes of food at the newly-formed team.
"Why are there only two?" Shikamaru asked as he carefully took one of the bentos into his lap, leaving the other between Naruto and Satsuki.
"You've all got a feel for teamwork, but you still don't get along particularly well. That much is clear. Learning to share is a great way to bond. Have fun, and try not to kill each other." Kakashi said before vanishing again. For a time, the team sat in silence. Shikamaru, having claimed one of the bentos for himself as soon as he could, broke the soundless streak by opening the box of food and beginning to eat.
"You two figure it out. I'm not the one getting into shouting matches." he said between bites in response to the questioning glares being shot his way by both the Uchiha and the blonde. Though both certainly wished to retort, they found that his logic was sound. Once that conclusion was silently reached by both Naruto and Satsuki, they both eyed the bento that had landed between them. Strangely, Naruto quickly looked away from the food and scooted away a few inches.
Deciding to test the nature of the reaction, Satsuki slowly grasped the bento and took it for herself. When Naruto didn't react, she frowned to herself.
'What's with you? You're all for arguing with me most of the time. Hell, that's all we do. Why are you being so subdued? You're no more tired than I am.' she pondered. It almost seemed as if Naruto felt as though he had no right to the food. Initially opting to take advantage of his apparent apathy, the Uchiha girl opened the bento and began to eat. She hadn't made it more than five bites when the obvious sound of Naruto's stomach grumbling alerted her. Suddenly feeling a pang of guilt, Satsuki reached into the bento and extracted a piece of chicken.
"Hey, Naruto." she said, gaining his attention quickly. She then held out the chicken toward him.
"Eat it. I...probably can't finish it all." she said a tad awkwardly as her teammate stared at the food. After a few moments, Naruto took the chicken from her and quickly consumed it, further giving away that he was indeed very hungry.
"Thanks for that." he muttered under his breath. Satsuki then glanced into the bento, seeing that there was still a fair amount of food left inside.
"Tell me if you need more." she said quietly. Although he stubbornly refused to ask for the following ten minutes, Naruto eventually did request more chicken, to which the raven-haired girl obliged.
Unbeknownst to the team, perched in a tree several meters away, Kakashi wore an approving smile.
A/N: Okay, so I kind of glossed over the bell test, but I think that writing a whole chapter for it would have been fairly pointless, as what happened during it is somewhat meaningless. The scenes before and after are what matter, I think.
Tell me what you thought :)
See you next chapter! Read and Review!
