Previously:

'That was close…' Naruto thought, sweating nervously. 'Okay, I've decided I'm not going to cheat.'

"Naruto-kun…" Hinata whispered softly.

"!" Naruto looked at her, surprised.

"You can look at my test," she whispered.

Naruto stared at her in shock. 'Huh?'

Chapter 42: The Tenth Question!!

"Ha?" Naruto whispered back, not believing his ears.

"You can look at my answers, Naruto-kun…" she repeated timidly.

'What is she saying? Why?' he wondered, puzzled by her sudden generosity. "…" He stared at her, frowned slightly and furrowed his brow. "!!" he gasped, startled when a dangerous thought occurred. 'Could it be…' he wondered, narrowing his eyes slightly, 'some kind of trap?'

"!" Hinata's blush deepened under his intense gaze, and she looked down at the desk, fidgeting nervously under his scrutiny. "…"

'Nah… Hinata wouldn't do something like that…' Naruto thought, still tense. Hinata might be a little weird, but he knew she was a nice person. '… But if Kiba told her to…' He could totally see that jerk pressuring her into something like that. "Hey, Hinata, why are you willing to do that?" he whispered warily.

Hinata flinched a little at the blunt question. "Because…" she whispered, playing nervously with her fingers. "…" Her blush deepened. "… I…" she gulped, swallowing the lump that formed in her throat. "… Don't want you to disappear here." She knew it was important for him to pass the Chūnin Exam in order to fulfill his dream to become Hokage.

"…?" Naruto stared at her, still a little skeptical. What was that supposed to mean? It still didn't explain why she was willing to risk her neck for him.

"See… the ten of us are the only rookies…" she continued anxiously as an excuse, not ready to reveal her deeper feelings for him yet. "We need to work together…"

Naruto looked at her for one moment longer before breaking out in a smile. "Hehe… Oh, I see…" he whispered, feeling relieved. "I was kind of confused…" He felt sort of bad for suspecting her now. 'Anyway… How lucky I am,' he thought. 'Good thing I'm next to Hinata.' "Hehe," he laughed quietly as she leaned over, pretending to cover her paper, while she subtly slid it a little closer for him to see.

"!!" Naruto flinched, stopping in his tracks when he heard the sound of another pencil moving. He glanced sideways at the testing officers and saw that one of them was writing something down. "…" He frowned and furrowed his brow, worried he might have been seen.

The testing officer smirked.

"Hinata… you don't understand," Naruto whispered nervously, keeping his eyes away from her paper.

"Huh?" Hinata whispered, confused.

"An incredible ninja like me doesn't need to cheat," he explained with a reassuring smile.

Her brow furrowed slightly with concern. "… Naruto-kun… But…"

"Plus, because you helped me cheat… you could get in trouble too," he pointed out.

"Huh?" Hinata gasped, surprised. She had been so worried about him that she had almost forgotten about that. 'Naruto-kun… But…' she thought, still concerned. The fact that he seemed more worried about her than himself made her want to help him even more, but…

'And if I get caught it will cause problems for April, Sakura-chan, and Sasuke… I can't blow it here…' he thought with a frown, sweating nervously. He didn't want to drag them down with him, and the thought of what they might do to him if he got them all disqualified for a lame reason like cheating was even more terrifying than being caught by the testing officers.

Hinata saw the expression on his face and looked down at the desk. Even though she wanted to help him, she could tell he wouldn't accept it, and she wanted respect his resolve. "I'm sorry…" she apologized quietly. "You're right…"

"No problem," Naruto whispered back confidently with a smile, before turning away to mourn the tight situation he had just put himself in. 'Damn… I'm an idiot…' he thought with trails of tears streaming down his face. Why did he have to act so big? 'Now what am I going to do?'

'This doesn't look good…' April thought, concerned when she observed the exchange that almost took place. 'It looked like Hinata was about to let Naruto cheat off of her, but then that testing officer spotted them…' She wondered if he had at least managed to get an answer or two out of it to help cancel out the penalty for getting caught. 'If only there was a way for me to get my answers to him…' She frowned while remembering why it wouldn't work. It was a problem that she had been placed so far behind him. The mirror on the ceiling, which would have been an ideal tool to take advantage of, was also placed in a position too awkward to be of use to him, since he would have to twist and crane his neck around in a very unnatural and obvious way just to get a glance at it. And he was so focused on the test in front of him, that everything behind him might as well have ceased to exist. If she was in front of him, she may have been able to get his attention, but as things were, any of the more plausible methods she could come up with to get his attention long enough to pass information to him would be too obvious, and would also grab the attention of Ibiki and the testing officers. And anything more subtle, like rolling a tiny scroll down to him under the desks and over the floor, wouldn't be noticeable enough; and there was too big a risk that someone else would intercept it. Worse case scenario, no one would grab it, and it then it might roll all the way down to Ibiki, and he knew what her handwriting looked like from all of the forms he had her fill out during their first meeting.

'Thirty minutes have passed… only thirty minutes left,' Naruto thought, furrowing his brow as he glanced at the clock above the blackboard at the front of the classroom. 'Then… I'll have to risk it on this,' he decided, staring down at the instructions for the tenth question. There were only fifteen more minutes until it would be revealed.

'Ok, done,' Sakura thought proudly, smirking as she wiped away some of her sweat. 'Now I just have to wait for the 10th question.'

'This is working well…' Sasuke thought, also smirking at his own ingenuity while he kept his Sharingan trained on April's neighbor. 'I was going to copy a few more people, but… I hit the jackpot with him.' April had stopped writing, but her neighbor was still going strong.

'I need to stop worrying about Naruto and finish checking my own work,' April decided, double-checking that all of her numbers and words were in the correct order, and that she hadn't misread anything, before cautiously comparing her own answers to her neighbor's. 'So far, so good…'

"!!" Sakura gasped abruptly and flinched as if someone had thrown a bucket of cold water on her.

April paused for a moment to spare a glance in her direction. She narrowed her eyes when she saw the odd expression on her teammate's face and risked another glance in Ino's direction to see that she appeared to be sleeping. 'Ino… If I'm right, she's related to the Yamanaka who used a strange mind-reading jutsu on me when I first came here…' April thought with a frown. 'Did she… just do something to Sakura…?' It would explain why the pink-haired girl was now greedily memorizing her own answers. April made eye contact with Shikamaru, who had also looked in Ino's direction, as if he was expecting something from her.

He tensed, and a bead of nervous sweat slid down his face when he realized they had been caught.

'So, they were up to something…' she thought. April briefly considered turning Ino in, but decided against it. They didn't know what kind of test would come after this one. Eliminating competition was good, but April wouldn't rule out that their old classmates could also be potential allies in the future. Besides, even if she turned Ino in, this one cheating attempt would only be worth one 2-point penalty, so they would still be in the exam, and her team would still have access to all the answers she memorized. It would be better for her to focus on continuing to check her own answers instead.

'!' Shikamaru thought, surprised and relieved when April turned her attention back to her own test without saying anything. He was grateful, but he suspected she was probably already thinking ahead and wanted them to feel like they owed her. Girls were like that, and he knew from prior experience facing off against April in a game of kick-the-can once that she was a fairly decent strategist.

"No. 102, stand up. You fail," one of the testing officers announced when another Konoha genin exceeded his limit.

"No… damn it!!" the leaf ninja cried, trembling with shame while held a hand against his sweaty face.

The clock's ticking seemed to grow louder as the time left before the 10th question's revelation grew shorter.

"Number 23, you fail," another testing officer declared, moving to grab the disqualified genin with help from one of his colleagues when the boy started making a fuss.

"No!!!" he yelled while they dragged him kicking and screaming from the room.

"43 and 27. You fail."

'That's thirteen teams that have failed...' Kabuto thought, keeping track of the dwindling competition.

The sand ninja that was just accused slammed his hand against the desk and stood up with a vein throbbing on his temple. "Do you have proof that I cheated five times?!!!" he demanded angrily. "Are you guys watching all...Ugh!!" he grunted in pain when the testing officer he yelled at crossed the room and delivered a hard blow with his elbow to the whining genin's chest, pinning him against the wall like a fly, before he could even finish his sentence. "Gu…!!!"

"Listen, among chūnins, we are the elite that were chosen to watch over this exam," the testing officer told the sand genin. "We haven't missed anything you've done. You could say that this strength is our proof."

"!!" the defeated sand genin grit his teeth in frustration, while the majority of the remaining genin gulped nervously and shivered. It was startling for them to see that the testing officers were not above responding with physical attacks.

"…" April had paused to see what would happen, but calmly continued to carry on once she was sure a real fight wasn't about to break out.

Ibiki noticed there was one kid in the room who didn't even blink at the disturbance. 'Hmm… What's that kid up to?' he wondered, watching while the redhead with eyes that had disturbingly dark rings around them proceeded coolly through the ruckus without even batting an eyelash. 'Completely calm during all of this… very impressive...' he thought with a smirk.

April furrowed her brow slightly, puzzled when she noticed some sparse particles of dirt or sand floating around. It didn't seem natural, so she turned her test over again. She knew Sasuke wasn't depending on her since his pencil had started moving during the last time she did this. She figured he had also picked her neighbor out as a target, which was good, since all of his answers appeared to be correct.

"Excuse me," someone said suddenly.

April recognized the voice. Its owner was the sand ninja who picked on Konohamaru. 'That guy… If I remember correctly, that dangerous redhead, Gaara, called him Kankurō...'

"What is it?" a testing officer asked.

April noticed it was the extra one.

"I need to go to the bathroom…" Kankurō replied.

The extra testing officer stood up and crossed the room to put handcuffs on the sand genin, leading him by the rope that was tied to them. "We have to follow you to the bathroom," he explained.

"I see..." the sand ninja said, allowing himself to be led from the room without protest.

'Me, too…' April thought, narrowing her eyes slightly. She also noticed the mysterious and suspiciously large bundle that he had been carrying ever since their first encounter was gone. She didn't know what was in it or how it related to the appearance of the extra testing officer, but it was obvious that there was some connection between them. 'So, that's why there was an extra… he must have somehow planted that guy to gather answers with the plan to get them in the bathroom...' She had seen enough of this world by now to know that virtually anything was possible, and it would have been safe to assume they would send an officer with anyone who left to prevent cheating. 'It was smart to use it to his advantage, but…' Her eyes traveled back to the front of the classroom to look at Ibiki. He was the one who put this part of the exam together, so she had no doubt that he had already noticed the unplanned increase in the number of his subordinates.

'Hehehe, we've gotten rid of the trash. Now, let's get to the main issue… It's about that time...' Ibiki thought. "Ok, we will now start the tenth question," he announced grimly, getting everyone's attention.

"!!" Naruto gasped.

"..." April tensed slightly, but kept her expression calm.

'Here it comes!!' they thought, bracing themselves. He was sure this question was his last chance to avoid complete failure. She was sure it would be some kind of trick.

'Hmph… about time...' Sasuke thought. He didn't see why they had to be so dramatic about it.

'This is the final mountain,' Sakura mused, feeling nervous, but still confident that she could climb it.

"Now, before we get to it, I would like to go over the added rules for this question," Ibiki stated.

'I knew it!!' April thought, tightening her grip on her pencil, while the rest of the room gasped. She probably would have been surprised, too, if she hadn't had the advantage of already meeting the expert interrogator once before.

Creak—!

With the classroom quiet enough to hear a pin drop, the small whine of the opening door sounded like a roar to the tense genins' ears.

"Heh… nice timing..." Ibiki congratulated the sand ninja on his lucky return from the bathroom. Any later, and he would have been barred.

"!?" Kankurō stood in the doorway, surprised by the extreme shift that had occurred in the room's atmosphere while he was gone.

"Was your doll-playing beneficial?" Ibiki asked him.

'Doll…?' April wondered, furrowing her brow slightly, as she turned a little to study the extra 'testing official' standing next to him. Ibiki must have hit the mark, because the sand ninja was glaring at him and covered in a nervous sweat. 'I thought something was off, but… does that mean that thing is some kind of puppet?'

"Just sit down," Ibiki ordered the sand genin. Fortunately for him, it didn't add up to enough to disqualify him. Yet.

Kankurō returned to his seat, brushing his hand against his sister's on the way to discretely pass her the cheatsheet he had made in the bathroom.

Ibiki took two steps forward to face the whole room of remaining examinees. "I'll explain now. These are… the hopeless rules..."

"Well… It sure is boring without my team," Kakashi admitted to his fellow jōnins, Asuma and Kurenai, while they relaxed on a different floor in the academy. The jōnins in charge of teams entered into the exam had all been placed on standby. "The missions will have to wait."

"Don't worry, you'll be busy again soon," Asuma told him.

"Why is that?" Kakashi asked. It wasn't like his friend to say something like that after having entered his own rookies into the running. He hoped Asuma wasn't looking down on his team.

Asuma tapped some of the ash on the end of his cigarette into the ashtray next to his seat. "I heard that this year's first proctor is Ibiki Morino."

"..." Kakashi stared at him. A bead of sweat slid down the side of his face. "Not that sadist..." he sighed, already feeling sorry for the poor kids. 'Passing the exam may be difficult for them...' He was pretty sure April would hold up all right against the psychological warfare, because she seemed to have the best fortitude of the four when it came to mind games, but… he couldn't say for sure whether it was a good thing that she and Ibiki had already encountered each other before. He didn't know exactly what had passed between them, but he hoped seeing him again wouldn't bring up too many nasty memories for her…

"!" Kurenai furrowed her brow, taken aback by Kakashi's description of the exam proctor. "Sadist?"

"Kurenai, you're a new jōnin, so you probably don't know..." Asuma said, unsurprised that she was unaware of him. Ibiki was not someone the average ninja in their village crossed paths with, nor would they want to. "Though I guess one of your kids might..." he added, sharing a knowing look with Kakashi. Most of the top jōnin at the time were aware of the truth behind April Starr's sudden appearance in the village, but even their information on the girl was limited beyond the Hokage's official decision to accept that she wasn't a threat; an assessment made based on the information gleaned from her through the efforts of Ibiki Morino and Inoichi Yamanka.

"Yeah..." Kakashi confirmed. "Though I don't know the full details myself..." After the initial investigation into her origins, the Third had declared this knowledge forbidden information on the same level as Naruto's identity as the Nine Tails in order to prevent a possible panic, so it was difficult to ask questions after the fact. Ibiki didn't appear to have used physical torture on her, but she had still spent a lot of time being examined in the hospital afterwards. Well, they could probably put that down to her being labeled a 'mysterious being' since she was supposed to be from another world.

"… Who is this person?" Kurenai asked, concerned for her students. Even the unflappable Kakashi seemed slightly unsettled.

"A pro..." Asuma replied, taking a drag on his cigarette.

"A pro? Of what?" she asked, wishing they would give her the full details instead of beating around the bush.

Asuma exhaled and looked at her, wearing the hint of a smirk. "Torture and interrogation."

"What!?" Kurenai gasped.

"Well, there may not be physical torture during the test itself, but… he's sure to use his skills as an interrogator to torment them psychologically," Asuma explained. "That is... Konoha Anbu's Torture and Interrogation Unit Marshal, Tokubetsu jōnin, Ibiki Morino."

'Hopeless… rules?' Naruto wondered, gulping nervously.

'I've got a really bad feeling about this...' April thought with a frown. It sounded like Ibiki was ready to take the gloves off.

"First, for this 10th question, you must choose whether or not you will take it," Ibiki stated grimly.

'Choose whether to take it?' Sasuke thought, furrowing his brow.

"Choose?!!" the blonde sister of the three sand siblings said incredulously. "What happens if we choose not to?!!"

'Probably something outrageous...' April thought, a bead of sweat sliding down her face.

"If you choose not to, your points will be reduced to zero… You fail! Along with the rest of your teammates," Ibiki declared dramatically with his face cast partially in shadow.

"What does that mean?!!" a hidden mist genin shouted.

"Then, of course we will decide to take the question!" the girl sitting next to him yelled.

'No, he isn't finished yet...' April thought warily, waiting for the other shoe to drop. She was sure he would add on something equally unacceptable to the option of accepting in order to make them feel cornered.

"And now… the other rule," Ibiki said, confirming her suspicions.

"!" Sakura gasped. 'More? Give it a break already!!' she thought, starting to get fed up.

"If you choose to take it… and fail…" Ibiki continued ominously, "that person will lose the right to take the Chūnin Selection Exam again."

"!!" Naruto and April gasped.

'Oh, that really is nasty…!!' she thought, frowning and furrowing her brow. Now she knew why he called this new set of rules 'hopeless'. They were meant to crush the hope of anyone who heard them.

"What kind of stupid rule is that!?" Kiba demanded angrily with Akamaru barking to back him up, ready to jump from his chair to rip him a new one. "There are guys here who have taken the exam before!!!"

"Hehe… Hehehehehe," Ibiki laughed, startling the shaken genin further. "You guys were unlucky. This year, it's my rules," he stated with a dark look that said he was dead serious.

'It could be a bluff to spook us into eliminating ourselves by giving up…' April thought, the crease in her brow deepening. '… But I wouldn't put it past him to do exactly as he's promised...'

"But I am giving you a way out," he reminded them.

"Huh?" Kiba asked, faltering slightly in surprise.

Ibiki smirked. "Those who aren't confident can choose not to take it… and try again next year."

'So basically, if one of the three decides not to take it, then everyone fails,' Sakura thought, biting her lip. 'And if you decide to take it… and get it wrong, you'll be a genin forever… both options are bad!! What a decision!!'

'Damn! This guy could sell used cars for Satan...' April mused sardonically, her frown deepening. She was pretty sure she knew why he was doing this, though. It wasn't just to be mean. 'This kind of impossible choice…' She remembered the hard choices they had to make during their mission in the Land of Waves—to leave their sensei to die or stay and risk their own lives along with their client's to save him, and the choice of who would kill Haku—and also the scenario Kakashi gave them the day of the bell test…

"Sakura!!! Kill Naruto!!! Or Sasuke dies!!!" he said quickly, holding a kunai to Sasuke's throat, while he watched them panic. "You see? After getting someone taken hostage, you will be faced with a difficult decision, and someone will die. In every mission, you put your life on the line."

'This is probably the same thing...' April thought. 'This question's rules are testing how we'll react when presented with a mission that could cost us our lives, by seeing how we'll handle it when our futures are threatened. Will we accept despite the possibility of death… or will we abandon our teammates and the mission to save our own necks?' She noticed Naruto was trembling in his seat. To be honest, she was scared, too. Despite being a sadist, she knew from experience that Ibiki could be reasonable. But this exam was new territory. There was no guarantee the test would end with their decision to accept. Ibiki really could have another difficult problem prepared for them to answer, and he might really intend to follow through on his threat to ban them from future exams. 'But… I believe in you guys… so I won't raise my hand!' she thought, closing her eyes for a moment before looking out at Sakura and Naruto's backs. 'I think we can make it, but… if you aren't ready yet… then I won't hold a grudge.'

"Now, let's begin… the 10th question," Ibiki said. "Those that do not wish to take it, raise your hand. Once your number is confirmed, leave."

A heavy silence filled the room while the genins struggled with the terrible choice he gave them.

'What kind of question is it going to be?!! Damn it!!' Naruto wondered anxiously, gritting his teeth with sweat dripping down his face. 'If I get it wrong, I'll be an eternal genin… No way!! But if I choose to avoid it… April, Sasuke, and Sakura-chan will fail too. I don't want that Either!!'

'I won't raise my hand. I have confidence that I can answer it,' Sakura thought, determined to see it through. 'Even if Naruto causes us to fail… It's not like I got the question wrong, so I can try next time. But… But, Naruto, you're different… You should forget about us and think about the next chance.'

One of the older Konoha genins, a man with facial hair who was sitting next to Naruto, stood up and raised his hand. "I..."

"!" Naruto and Hinata gasped. Was he going to do it?

"… won't take it!" the older genin cried, shaking like a leaf. "I'm sorry… Gennai, Inoho..."

"No. 50, fail!! 130, 111, also fail!!" a testing officer announced, cutting him and his teammates from the group.

"Damn it!!" Naruto's frightened neighbor cursed, ashamed of his own weakness.

"…" Naruto bit his lip while he watched the other genin's walk of shame to the door, his own anxiety rising.

"Me too!!" another genin shouted nervously as he shot out of his chair with his hand raised in the air.

"And me!!"

"Sorry guys..."

"I quit."

"Me too."

'Looks like the floodgates have opened...' April thought as more and more genin began to surrender. No one had wanted to be the first, but now they were dropping like flies. She wouldn't be entirely surprised if that first genin and his team had also been a plant to help facilitate the process. She furrowed her brow and clenched her jaw when she looked ahead at Naruto. Sakura looked perfectly steady, but he was shaking hard and seemed to be avoiding looking at any of them. Knowing Sasuke, there was no need to check on him. 'Naruto… whatever you decide is fine. Just make sure you choose whatever you'll regret the least…'

'Naruto… why aren't you raising your hand?' Sakura wondered, concerned. "..." Sweat rolled down her brow while she watched him tremble and waited for him to save himself. 'He...' She remembered how excited he had been when they passed their test to become genins, how annoyingly upbeat he always was, and his constant noisy vows to one day become Hokage. Yet, here he was… refusing to raise his hand, even though he was shaking that badly. 'Always acting like a fool who only knows one thing… Hokage, Hokage… I'm sorry Naruto… That impossible dream of yours…' she thought, allowing a nervous, rueful smile to cross her face, preparing to raise her hand. 'I don't want to see it crushed!!'

"!" April's eyes widened slightly when she saw what her female teammate was about to do. 'Sakura…!?'

"!" Both girls gasped when their attention was drawn by a sudden movement in front of them. 'Huh?'

"He… Ibiki knows the human mind completely. That's what makes him scary," Asuma told Kurenai. "By attacking their mind, he can gain control over their spirit. That person's weaknesses will all float to the surface. You can't escape his interrogation."

Naruto's trembling hand was raised high in the air.

'Na… Naruto…!!' April and Sakura thought, surprised and alarmed. Neither of them thought he would ever actually do it.

"!!" Sasuke and Hinata gasped.

WHAM!!

"Don't underestimate me!!!" Naruto roared furiously as he slammed his hand back down on the desk in front of him. "I will not run!!!! I'll take it!! Even if I'm a genin forever…!! I'll will myself into becoming Hokage anyway, so I don't care!! I am not afraid!!!!!" he declared defiantly, snorting like an angry bull, with a vein throbbing on his forehead.

"..." Hinata smiled at him, relieved.

'He wasn't thinking about us at all...' Sasuke thought wryly with a rueful smile. 'What guts...'

'Yeah… You're that kind of idiot...' Sakura thought with a smile.

'That's right… That's how it's gotta be! That's our Naruto!!' April thought, grinning proudly at his steady back. She should have known. It never took long before his fear turned into determination. He was too much of a sore loser to give up. You could never keep Naruto down.

"I'll ask you again," Ibiki addressed Naruto, keeping his expression grim. "Your life is riding on this decision. This is your last chance to quit."

"I'm not going to take back my words… That's my ninja way!" Naruto answered without hesitation, eyes burning with determination.

Ibiki gazed out at the rest of the genin in the room. Nervous looks of uncertainty had been replaced with confident smirks. The atmosphere had changed in an instant. 'Interesting kid, he blasted away everyone's worries. Eighty left… more than I expected...' he thought with the hint of a smirk. 'Stretching this out any longer won't make any difference.' He glanced at his testing officers, who nodded in agreement. Ibiki turned his attention back to the remaining genins. "Good decisions," he told them. "Now, to everyone still remaining..."

The whole room tensed. April tightened her grip on her pencil, bracing herself for another glimpse of hell.

"I congratulate you on passing the first test!!!" Ibiki boomed with a grin.

"!!" April gasped, eyes widening slightly.

'Ha?' Naruto thought as his pencil feel from his hand, absolutely stunned.