The Unsung Story of the Inconspicuous
A/N: Here in chapter 19, Raiku freezes, Daisukenojo suffocates and Gaara intimidates.
So yeah. Business as usual.
Thankyou Vanya, your efficiency is truly amazing.
I do not own Naruto or any of its characters of affiliates.
Raiku stood, arms tucked under her armpits, hair plastering to her face and scalp, and shivered. Her teeth chattered noisily and she instantly clamped her jaw shut. The inside of the tower was in a state of disrepair, cracks lining the concrete walls and rust corrupting the steel attached. It was lit by sunlight streaming in through worn, old windows, smudged and dirty. Ryuu was singed slightly and even more disgruntled than she was, arms folded across his chest and remaining obstinately silent.
'If you do not possess Heaven,' Daisukenojo read from the giant sign on the far wall. 'Gain knowledge and be prepared. If you do not possess Earth, run through the fields and seek strength-,'
'You'd know all about running, wouldn't you Raiku?' Ryuu sniped.
'Sh-shut…u-up,' she said through chattering teeth.
'-if you open both Heaven and Earth scrolls, dangerous paths will turn to safe ones,' Daisukenojo finished, stubbornly ignoring them. He looked down at the scrolls in his hands, raising his eyebrows. 'Should we wait for the fifth day to open them, or do it now?'
'Now's as good a time as any,' Ryuu said, rubbing his scorched hands gingerly. 'I save you yet again and what do I get? Electrocuted,' he muttered to Raiku. She tried to glare, but was shaking and dripping too much for it to have the desired effect.
Daisukenojo shrugged, grasping the scrolls and opening both at once. He shot them a weird look. 'I've never seen anything like this.'
'S-s-s-,' Raiku broke off, shivering too much to do anything.
'Seal?' Daisukenojo volunteered.
She shook her head, making a fist and then splaying her fingers out.
'Boom? I don't get it.'
'Summon?' Ryuu tried, grimacing in pain.
She nodded, tucking her hands back under her armpits again.
Daisukenojo looked down at the suddenly smoking scrolls. 'Shit.'
'Put them down and back off!' Ryuu ordered, taking a step back. Daisukenojo compromised and threw them away. They hit the far wall and rebounded, quickly engulfed by the smoke billowing up from them.
Raiku coughed feebly, and ended up sneezing.
'If you get sick I am so not healing you,' Daisukenojo warned.
Her answer was another sneeze.
'Long time no see,' a very, very familiar voice said, as the figure of a tall, masculine humanoid became identifiable in the fog.
'That Examiner guy was a summon!?' Daisukenojo exclaimed, stumbling back.
Ryuu's expression flattened. He cuffed the shorter boy over the back of the head.
'H-h-hey,' Raiku chattered out. As the smoke cleared, the bandaged man nodded in her direction.
'You guys have obviously gone to a lot of trouble.' His gaze lingered on Raiku's drenched, shaking form. 'And… effort.' He coughed into his hand, slightly awkward.
'Why the hell did you come out of that summon scroll!?' Daisukenojo demanded, pointing accusingly.
He shrugged, smirking, and put his hands in his pockets. 'The Chuunin were assigned a group to talk to about the next Exam if the group found both scrolls. I drew you guys.'
He gave a slow, mocking clap. 'So, well done.' His smirk turned into a fully-fledged grin as he took in the scorched, drenched and relatively unharmed Genin respectively. 'I guess you guys went after the hidden scroll.'
Instantly two furious sets of eyes slid over to shoot Raiku hostile looks. She sighed, dropping her head. 'S-sorry. H-how many t-times d-d-do I have to s-say it?'
'Shut up, toaster,' Daisukenojo muttered darkly.
'Anyway!' the bandaged man said loudly, interrupting what he suspected would have been a long, repetitive argument. 'I'm Hagane Kotetsu, Team Yamada. Congratulations on passing the Second Exam!'
Raiku sank to her knees in relief, settling in a rapidly expanding puddle of highly electrified water. Kotetsu snickered to himself. 'My other mission is to explain what's missing from up there,' he said, jerking a thumb at the sign on the wall behind him. 'It's something the Hokage wrote for anyone trying to be a Chuunin. Or,' he added. 'Shinobi at all. "Heaven" refers to a person's head, while "earth" refers to the body-,'
'Toaster, remember to breathe.'
'Yeah, speedy, you're going to pass out again!'
'W-will not.'
'HEY!' Kotetsu roared, looming over them threateningly. 'This is important, punks! Pay attention!'
When he was satisfied they were terrified into submission, he continued. 'So if you lack "Heaven" you should gain knowledge and be prepared. So, for example, none of you are using your heads to think about this!'
Three winces.
'So you should study, and become smarter and wiser, as well as preparing for missions. Got it?' Kotetsu asked, suddenly cheerful. Raiku stared at him, trying desperately not to draw parallels between him and Yamada. 'And if you do not possess "Earth", you should run through the fields and seek strength. That means if you aren't sound in body, you should train, seeking strength. You got it so far?'
'Yes,' Ryuu said coolly.
'And if you have both "Heaven" and "Earth", then even dangerous missions will become safe ones.'
'What about the letter that's missing?' Ryuu asked, jerking his head at the sign. 'It's not finished.'
Kotetsu grinned, sticking his hands in his pockets. 'It's the letter than symbolises a Chuunin. The symbol for "human" that was on the scrolls goes into that space.'
'Clever,' Ryuu said dryly.
Kotetsu scratched the side of his jaw absently. 'Call it what you want. These past… two and a half days, for you guys, tested the basic survival abilities required of a Chuunin. Since you passed, you've got basics down.' He looked at Raiku, and snickered. 'Well… most of the basics.'
She narrowed her eyes at him.
'But a Chuunin has to do more than just survive- a Chuunin is a leader, in the commander-class, and needs to have the ability to lead a team and accept the duty of doing that. So it's important that you remember to commit to heart the message up there- the importance of both strength and preparations in missions. If you remember that, you will succeed as a Chuunin.'
He stopped, raising his eyebrows in silent question. 'Huh…' he said eventually. 'That seems to be all I had to tell you. So, I wish you three luck with the Third Exam. You'll have to go and wait for the end of this one.'
'Wait… whe-,'
With a puff of smoke, all four of them vanished.
They appeared in a hallway lined with typical waiting room seats. There was a potted plant standing next to the grey chairs, leaning against the worn, brick-coloured walls.
'D-dry me off,' Raiku ordered Ryuu through chattering teeth, dripping onto the tiles. There was a clock, ticking obnoxiously high on the wall to her left.
'Whoa, you guys want a room or something?' Daisukenojo asked, holding up his hands.
'Sh-shut up!' she gritted out, hunching to try and conserve body heat. 'H-he can d-do it w-with his t-t-,' she failed to force out the word on the first try, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath before trying again. 'T-t-technique,' she finished triumphantly.
'Daisukenojo, heal me please,' Ryuu said boredly, sitting in one of the uncomfortable grey chairs and ignoring her.
'Aren't you going to do your…' Daisukenojo wiggled his fingers vaguely. 'Wind thing?'
'Absolutely not,' Ryuu said, glaring at Raiku out of the corner of his eye. 'Not after I saved her from drowning and she tried to barbecue me.'
'A-a-accident!' she maintained damply, turning her nose up in offence.
Daisukenojo held up a hand over Ryuu's scorched face, glowing faintly with his pale chakra. 'You two are made for each other,' he grumbled testily.
There was a stunned silence in which both parties simply stared at him.
'Barbecue him,' Ryuu ordered.
'Waaaaay ah-head of you,' she growled, rolling up her sleeves. The threatening demeanour failed when the air conditioned air hit her wet, sparking skin and she instantly covered it back up. She sat on the floor in her growing, sparking puddle and sighed heavily. She stared up at Daisukenojo's focused face, just opposite Ryuu's cold one.
Daisukenojo had a crush on Tenten? That would be… interesting. He was naturally belligerent, argumentative and stubborn. But he was cute, in his way, and growing to be handsome. His red hair, right now practically shaved, was more attractive when long, granted, but his freckles were fading into his tan and his eyes were bright and challenging. He was muscular for his height, now roughly level with hers, and confident in his own physical abilities. That being said, he generally attracted the shy ones, so Tenten would be a challenge for him. Not to mention who Tenten's Plot was saving for the oddly haired girl- Neji.
There was where Daisukenojo would encounter the most trouble, Raiku suspected. Neji was statuesque and beautiful, dignified and powerful. Daisukenojo was the antithesis of Neji's physical attributes, far more earthen in his appeal. In fact…
Unwillingly, she looked over at Ryuu. Ryuu would be more of Tenten's type. Ryuu's face was statuesque in a similar fashion to Neji but not as beautiful, his cheekbones too sharp and his eyes slightly too narrow to imitate it, giving him a more dangerous impression. He conveyed iciness, and his lean, tall frame only enhanced his natural air of sneakiness. His yellow eyes, however, made him seem like some sort of predatory animal, and his naturally light sensitive pupils shrunk in normal light, making them seem cat-like. His grey hair was off-putting for normal girls, but tragically her plan had backfired and he now seemed partial to the short, loose spikes his hair formed.
Raiku looked down at herself, and growled in frustration. Raiku was still stick-thin, long limbed and spiky-haired. Goodie.
Ryuu probably had a crush on no one, which was troublesome. If he would just get a damned girlfriend her life would become much less dramatic. It would be much, much worse if Tenten moved on from Neji to him though, and her gaze had certainly been somewhat interested when Ryuu showed up.
Raiku shuddered suddenly, earning her Ryuu's dispassionate stare. She'd heard two girls from her Rookie year talking about how Ryuu always had something in his mouth. She'd tried to bring up that it was usually a piece of grass, but then they'd started on about oral fixations and talents…
She turned faintly green.
It was lucky for Raiku she had the characteristics she did, really: there would be no need to think about someone's… talents, for her. Not now, not ever. A layer of cloth surrounded her world, giving her a disembodied sort of relationship with the people connected to it. Contact was, whether people liked to admit it or not, one of the key points of a personal relationship. Without that ability Raiku failed to establish intimate connections, and probably would never be able to. And under that layer of cloth was something much more personal: that layer of electricity. It was, in all senses of the word, her only intimate relationship.
All in all, a life devoid of all physical contact, much less skin-to-skin contact had given her a somewhat detached sense of life, as well as developing something far more inconvenient:
It was the family's suspicion she would have developed that chronic fear of touch, though she couldn't know for sure.
'Done,' Daisukenojo announced, removing his hand and instantly, easily breaking her train of thought. He stepped back, proudly surveying his handiwork. 'Not bad, if I do say so myself.'
'Your chakra control has improved rapidly,' Ryuu acknowledged, voice slightly hoarse. 'But you allowed it to go too far from the point of injury. If you keep letting it do it, you'll be drained quicker and the injury will take longer to close.'
Daisukenojo snorted, folding his arms across his chest defensively. 'I know- I'm working on it, alright?'
Ryuu nodded.
'You gonna do your wind-y crap?' Daisukenojo asked, following his line of sight to the curiously absent Raiku. Ryuu shook his head.
'Not yet. Raiku,' he said, raising his voice and snapping his fingers in the air next to her. 'Snap out of it.'
She frowned and gave his fingers a half-hearted glare.
'I think she's going to freeze,' Daisukenojo observed, sitting heavily in the chair next to Ryuu. They folded their arms and tilted their heads at her, considering.
She fidgeted under their gaze, shifting uncomfortably.
'Probably,' Ryuu agreed.
'Do you think if we stare at her for long enough, she'll blush herself out of it?' Daisukenojo grinned.
'For a medic's son, you don't know much about the human body.'
Daisukenojo flushed. 'That was a joke, asshole!'
'Of course,' Ryuu snorted.
For the next few minutes the only sound was the steady clicking of the analogue clock on the far wall, measuring time spent and left.
With a quiet plume of smoke, three more Genin appeared. The beautiful blonde Sand-nin blinked in well-concealed surprise as she took in the presence of three other Genin, but took it in stride. More specifically she took in the sight of the soaking wet, nigh-hypothermic Raiku, and grinned.
'So, I guess a team made it before us after all… eh, Kankuro?' she drawled, crossing her arms and deliberately shifting her weight to one leg.
The cat hat boy smirked.
Raiku sent Ryuu a pleading look, under the none-too-friendly gaze of three sardonic Sand-nin.
'Felt like swimming?' Kankuro asked, grinning hugely.
'N-n-not really,' Raiku forced out, pleading look intensifying by five hundred. She turned to the Sand-nin and managed a somewhat friendly, if stiff wave to the third member, before sticking her hand back under her armpit. 'R-Ryuu,' she said beseechingly, looking over at him again.
Ryuu sighed. 'Promise not to do it again?'
'C-can't,' she said helplessly. 'D-didn't mean t-to d-d-do it at all.'
He rolled his eyes. 'Fine.'
He leaned forward, shifting his hand into his curious seal and concentrating intensely. Raiku sighed with bliss as the air around her shot up in temperature. 'Th-thanks,' she sighed happily.
'The next time you electrocute me, I'm leaving you to drown,' he cautioned. The blonde Sand-nin relaxed into a chair with easy grace, tossing the other team a dismissive smirk. Kankuro took a step closer to Raiku, bending down.
He flicked the side of her mask, earning him a quiet squeak. 'You Konoha-nin have a thing for masks, huh?' he asked, grin spreading for reasons Raiku didn't know but instantly didn't trust.
'I n-need it,' she said, finding speaking growing quickly easy. Or, as easy as it ever was for her. Which was to say: not easy at all but constantly somewhat awkward, regardless of circumstances or company.
He grabbed a small part of it and pulled lightly, tenting it over her skin. 'Why's that, kid?'
'Because I d-don't actually have a m-mouth. I s-speak with t-telepathy,' she joked weakly. 'It's a s-serious illness.'
'How old are you, kid?' he asked, disregarding her terrible joke.
'Th-thirteen,' she answered warily.
'You seem a lot younger,' he said, letting the mask snap back onto her face.
'It's b-because I'm a t-twig,' she said nervously.
'Ah,' Ryuu said to himself, quite at random. Kankuro turned his head, and Raiku instantly used the distraction to inch away along the floor.
'Something to say?'
'No,' Ryuu dismissed him with offensive ease. 'But I remembered where I knew your teacher from.'
'What? Bandage guy? Where?' Daisukenojo asked in surprise.
'He was the one who said he'd eat his own forehead protector if we made it through the storm,' Ryuu reminded him carelessly. 'I wonder if we can still cash in on that.'
A wicked grin appeared on Daisukenojo's face. 'That would be awesome!'
Ryuu expression was perfectly deadpan. 'Undoubtedly.'
Kankuro straightened, as there was no longer a Raiku next to him to quietly menace. 'We'll see,' he shrugged with deceptive carelessness. Ryuu nodded, eyes cool.
'I suppose we will.'
Raiku inched too far. She squeaked again as she ran into something unyielding, twisting herself uncomfortably to try and see what it was. She learned a valuable lesson.
Gaara is even more terrifying from below.
Her eyes rounded to roughly half the size of her face, and blinked. 'H-hey,' she offered slowly, inching back the other way, realising Kankuro was there and standing up instead. She hesitated, unsure of which side was worse, and turned to Gaara again. She creased her eyes into a smile. 'Nice to s-see you again, mystery-nin,' she said pleasantly, holding out her hand to shake.
Gaara's blank green eyes flicked down to her hand, arms remaining folded across his chest.
'It wouldn't k-kill you to- Ryuu, this t-technique is magic,' she said over her shoulder, casting him a relieved look.
He sniffed, looking away.
'But it wouldn't kill you to tell me your name,' Raiku finished saying to Gaara, raising her other hand to rub the back of her rapidly drying hair nervously. Drying meant it wouldn't be straight for much longer, and it was already rising into the air slightly.
Gaara's eyes narrowed minutely.
Raiku tilted her head, eyes still creased. 'Please?'
The clock couldn't bear the silence any longer, and ticked louder. After it had been ticking obnoxiously loud for several minutes, Gaara spoke.
'Gaara,' he said coldly. he seemed to expect some sort of reaction, but Raiku had been trained. She was ready for that.
Raiku's smile upped in wattage. 'Nice to meet you, Gaara! Well, officially,' she amended awkwardly, dropping her hand. 'Because I've already met you twice. Well, three times. But the second time didn't count because you… didn't talk. And my foot was stuck in sand,' she frowned, losing the train of the conversation in favour of her own distractions. 'Sand? I mean… sand? That's just … confusing.'
'Toaster.'
'Also, it seems sort of weird! The only substance that I genuinely have trouble with that isn't water-,'
'Toaster!' Ryuu barked, cutting off her impromptu explanation of her weaknesses. She yelped in surprise, spinning to face him.
'What!?' she demanded.
'Focus,' Ryuu sighed. 'You were talking to someone.'
She winced, spinning back to face Gaara, ducking her head in a bow. 'I'm sorry! I… uh… get distracted,' she said sheepishly, rubbing the back of her head again. She lifted her head to smile at him again. 'Nice to meet you though!'
'He's called Gaara of the Sand,' Kankuro said from just behind her. She flinched.
'Why does everyone like sneaking up on me…?' she asked herself in an incredulous whisper, before snapping out of it. 'Gaara of the Sand? I'm Raiku of the self-explanatory!'
The clock ticked.
'It's… it's because of… nevermind.' Raiku deflated.
'Because of the electricity?' Ryuu sighed wearily.
'Yes,' she nodded. She set her hands on her hips. 'Well, it was nice to see you again, Gaara! I'm sorry that I sort of rambled.'
Gaara looked at her for a moment. He seemed to contemplate killing her, but then abruptly turned and walked to a seat.
Raiku sighed heavily, shoulders slumping. 'I'm not good with new people,' she said sadly to Kankuro. He snorted and sat with his teammates, clapping her briefly on the shoulder.
'You're an idiot,' Ryuu announced as she walked back towards them.
'Yeah, yeah,' she mumbled.
Daisukenojo took pity on her, as he usually did, patting her sympathetically on the shoulder and moving over a seat so she could sit between them. 'One day you'll meet someone who doesn't instinctively hate your guts, toaster! Promise!'
'And then I'll kill them, because I kill everyone who I spend extended periods of time with,' she muttered darkly, earning her a look from Kankuro.
'We're still alive,' he pointed out.
'I got pretty close to killing Ryuu today,' she countered.
'Yeah, but no one cares about-,' Daisukenojo was cut off, suddenly moving his lips without sound coming out.
Raiku glared at Ryuu. 'Was that necessary? He healed you after all.'
Ryuu looked nonchalant. 'Don't know what you're talking about.' She rolled her eyes.
Daisukenojo continued to flail, clutching his throat. He was starting to go red, tapping Ryuu weakly on the shoulder. Raiku shot Ryuu a horrified look. 'Did you steal his oxygen!?'
'Possibly.'
'Give it back!'
'No.'
She pulled at the leather of her glove threateningly. 'Ryuu…' They glared at each other for a few seconds as Daisukenojo went blue in the background, before he finally growled in frustration and conceded.
'Don't get used to it, toaster.' He snapped his fingers and Daisukenojo inhaled sharply, resting his hands on his knees.
'I… hate… you,' he panted.
Raiku sunk down in her chair wearily, hiding her face. 'Still… the worst team… ever.'
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