Hinata's Story: Underneath Your Clothes

Chapter 8: The Chuunin Exams Begin

See Chapter 1 and don't attempt to charge anyone to read this story unless you're sure you can get away from the ANBU hit squads
Naruto could see Sakura-Chan waiting by the building the Chuunin Selection Exam would be in. It was the same one as before. He might have wondered if they were going to use that same genjutsu trick like they did the first time, but he was more worried about the look on his teammate's face. She looked madder than a hornet. Naruto was sure that if a dog bit her right now, Sakura-chan would probably bite it back.

They agreed to get there early to make sure they had enough time to register. Naruto was a little late. He had wanted to walk Hinata there, so he had set off early to meet with her. His first thought had been to meet her at her home, but the Hyuugas always made him wait and would never even tell him if she was there or not. They were probably all having a laugh at his expense anyway.

So Naruto had decided to go to the hospital first. Hinata had been spending a lot of nights there recently. At first he had thought that she was wearing herself out during her nightly training. He did that plenty often enough and if he didn't have the fox he would probably need to go to the hospital too. But Hinata always seemed to be fine the next day. He'd have thought that the doctors were holding out on him, but she even ended up in the hospital some mornings when he knew he'd walked her home!

She'd been there when he arrived today. The lady at the front desk of the hospital gave him a dirty look, but at least she always did her job and let him know if Hinata was there. He'd gone straight to her room and found her with a nurse. In an uncommon act of kindness the nurse had assured him Hinata was fine. There had been an embarrassing moment however, when he had asked Hinata if he could help her. The nurse had assured him that she wouldn't be letting Hinata leave the hospital if she couldn't dress herself. There was a loud crack as Naruto left the room. Naruto wasn't sure if he'd gotten the blush off his cheeks by the time Hinata come out, but the nurse hadn't stopped laughing.

After they had left the hospital he'd asked Hinata if she was really all right. She had assured him that she was, but that didn't stop him worrying. It had been pretty easy to find out how often she was in the hospital. There wasn't a pattern he could figure out except that it was often and seemed to be getting worse. But that wouldn't tell him what was happening to her and the Hospital staff had all been insistent that they couldn't tell him for some doctor/sick-person confa-something-or-other. He wanted to break in and look at her records, but he just couldn't do that. If she said she was fine he had to respect her judgment and her wish for privacy. So he just walked beside her trying not to worry as they approached the Chuunin Testing Center.

Worrying about whether or not Sakura was going to hit him or bite him was a lot easier to deal with than trying to worry about why Hinata was constantly in the hospital. But as soon as she saw them her face twisted into that wicked smile of hers. The one that always meant she was up to something and usually meant bad news for him. Whatever she was plotting would surely keep him to busy to worry about Hinata, mostly…

Hinata wasn't paying much attention to their surroundings. The Konohamaru Corps. had come to wish Naruto and Hinata well in the Chuunin Exam. After several well wishes and Naruto-kun's exclamation that they didn't need luck, they had raw power, Konohamaru, Udon and Moegi left dragging their Sensei with them. But just as they were leaving Moegi turned to Hinata and told her to remember what she'd told her.

Hinata remembered all right. How could she forget? She hadn't been able to look the young Kunoichi in the eye since that day she'd tracked her down after they had left Naruto and Hinata at the ramen stand. "Please give Naruto-onii-san a chance," the younger girl had begged Hinata. The girl had then gone on to list all of Naruto's virtues.

A part of Hinata wanted to tell Moegi that she would do anything to get Naruto to give her a chance. But she knew that she'd tell her friends and they'd tell Naruto. And Hinata was sure that Naruto wouldn't be able to respect her if she wasn't strong enough to tell him herself. And then when Moegi mentioned how great of a daddy Naruto-kun would be; well she couldn't very well talk to such a young and impressionable girl about that now could she?

Sakura grinned evilly at her teammates as they approached her. Her grin got even wider when she saw her Hinata was blushing. "What have you two been up to?"

Naruto grinned nervously and put one of his hands behind his head. "We w-weren't doing anything." Naruto stuttered out. He didn't know if Hinata had told Sakura about all the time she was spending in the hospital, but if Hinata didn't want her to know, he didn't want to be the one to let her know. "We were just walking."

Naruto looked awful suspicious to Sakura and Hinata was blushing. But then again Hinata usually blushed when she was around Naruto, except when they were sparring. Then it looked like she was trying to tear him into little pieces.

"Ah, Sakura, let's go. We don't want to be late." Sakura was sure Naruto was trying to distract her. But Naruto was right they needed to get to the testing room. Besides she could just get the information from Hinata later, when they were alone.

The Test would be administered in room 301. Team Alpha climbed a flight of stairs and walked down a corridor right past a group of Genin hopefuls crowded around a room in the hall. Naruto made it past the door, but he heard Hinata make a small squeaking sound when one of the older genin grabbed her shoulder.

"Where do you think you're going sweet thing?" the genin that had stopped Hinata asked. Naruto almost growled at him. He and another young man that didn't look to be more than a year or two older than Naruto were blocking a door that was labeled 301. "The Chuunin Exam is dangerous, we wouldn't want a pretty lady like you to get hurt now would we?" The larger man stepped close behind Hinata and leaned his head close to Hinata's neck as if to smell her.

Naruto smirked. "Then you can let her go, because we're the best."

"Che!" the man sneered at Naruto over Hinata's shoulder. "Chuunin are squad leaders, they responsible for making sure their missions are completed and keeping their teammates from dieing. It's punks like you that think you're the best that get their entire teams killed."

"That lady has already proven that she would never let her teammates die." Naruto's eyes turned stony, and when he continued his voice was cold, "Now get your filthy hands off of her!"

"Or you'll do what?" The man whose hand was still resting on Hinata's shoulder smirked.

Naruto smirked back, letting out a single chuckle. "I'll laugh when the lady behind you punches you through the wall of the next building."

Hinata and both of the ninja blocking the door turned to look at Sakura. She was massaging her knuckles and looked furious. Her lips were curled back in a snarl and there was a vein throbbing on her forehead. But it was the orange haze rising from her green eyes making it look like they were on fire that scared the genin into taking his hand off of Hinata's shoulder.

Sakura's face changed once the offending genin stepped back from Hinata. Sakura's eyes twinkled above her triumphant smirk as she stepped forward and started to usher Hinata toward the stairs. "Thank you," Sakura said as she patted the speechless ninja on the shoulder.

The three genin had successfully slipped through the crowd when the other ninja that had been obstructing the door spoke up for the first time. "Hey where do you think you're going?"

"Upstairs," Naruto yelled back. A part of him wanted to tell everyone about the genjutsu, as this was only the 2nd floor, room 301 was on the next floor up, but Jiraiya had insisted he treat this like a battle and that all of the other teams were his enemies. But it looked like he wouldn't have to, because Sakura spoke up.

"We have some paperwork to turn in on the 3rd floor," Sakura yelled without even looking back. She knew she shouldn't help the other teams like that, the genjutsu was put in place to keep any teams to week to enter the exam from being able to for their own protection. But trying to fool her with that weak of an illusion was so insulting that she had to say something.

"Neh, Sakura-chan," Naruto called once they were out of sight of the other genin, "that was a cool genjutsu you did with your eyes."

"It's just an X-ray jutsu, but it looks scary," Sakura replied offhandedly.

"You mean you can see through people's clothes?" Naruto asked loudly as he tried to cover himself with his hands.

Sakura was about to say yes until she realized what Naruto meant. "No you baka!" Sakura bellowed as she punched him in the head. "It only lets me see people's bones."

Naruto was still rubbing his head when they got to the testing room. This time there was no one waiting to greet them; not Kakashi-sensei, or Jiraiya or even Hinata's sensei, Anko. Naruto's hand fell off his head to hang lifelessly on his side. He'd only ever been to this room once before, that had been his first and only previous Chuunin Exam. That time Kakashi had been waiting for them. Naruto remembered it, because Kakashi-sensei had threatened to kick them out if they hadn't all come together, but he hadn't told them, because he knew that Sakura would do it even if she didn't want to if Sasuke asked her to. Sasuke, was that why he was so depressed? The last time he had taken this test it had been with Sasuke.

A part of him rebelled, not wanting to take the exam until after they brought Sasuke back. But Sasuke was Orochimaru's apprentice; surely he'd become a jounin by now. Naruto couldn't let him come back and not even be a chuunin could he? But would he keep his rank when they brought him back?

Naruto paused in front of the double doors for several long moments. Sakura didn't know what to think about Naruto's sudden sullen attitude, but Hinata was worried. Naruto isn't one to worry about challenges, he thrived on them, but the last time he took this test he had to fight Neji and there had been the attack by the Village of Sound. Was Naruto worried?

"Naruto-kun," Hinata's voice pulled Naruto out of his reverie. Slowly he twisted to face his shy friend. This test wasn't about him, or about Sasuke, it was about Hinata! He was here so she could take this test and prove herself, and he was going to be with her every step of the way to help her do it.

"Ready to show them what we're made of?" Naruto's eyes had a glint of steel in them and his face showed the beginnings of a smirk. Without waiting for her or Sakura's answer he stepped forward and slapped the doors with his palm sending them open wide enough for the three of them to step through.

The low thump of Naruto hitting the door drew everyone's attention as he and the rest of Genin Cell Alpha entered the testing room. And the quiet and determined way he walked to one of the vacant corners of the room and leaned back giving the entire room a casual glance was so cool. At least that's what Rensa Kei thought.

"That's him," Kei whispered to her best friend, Hamaya Yumi. The slightly older girl looked up from the arrow she was inspecting. Kei didn't know whether Yumi-chan had pulled it out of the quiver on her back or the on hanging from her hip. Kei knew that when her purple haired friend was nervous she inspected her arrows. She had three more lying across the Dark purple tabard she wore over her short black tights. The purple cloth had a leaf print that was surprisingly good camouflage. She knew from experience that you could be well within her arrow range and never see her through the leaves.

"Hmm," Yumi lifted her arrow higher so she could look along its shaft toward where Kei was looking adoringly. "He is good looking," she said thoughtfully

"And he's strong," Kei gushed. "He's that guy that beat Hyuuga Neji in the Chuunin Exam all those years ago."

"He's that boy," Kei could hear Yumi's grin in her voice. "And he's gotten even better looking."

"I know he looks so strong and serious…and look at his eyes."

They both giggled at that, but Yumi quickly became serious again. "But what's he doing here? If he's that strong he got to at least be a Chuunin by now."

"You're right," Kei put her hand on her chin thoughtfully "Hyuuga Neji's already a Jounin, if he's stronger than him…"

"Do you think he might be a proctor in disguise?" Yumi was excited. They were one step ahead of everyone else if they'd discovered a secret examiner.

"What?"

"You know a plant to watch us while we don't know the proctors are here or to see how we do against the real thing?" Yumi's eyes sparkled as she considered what the testers might be planning and how she could use it to her advantage.

"I don't know," Kei knew her friend was better at solving mysteries than her, but Kei was more interested in solving the mystery of how to get into a particular tall blond's heart. "But I'm going to pass this exam so I can show that I'm strong enough to be on his team."

"Well I'm definitely passing this exam," Yumi replied archly. "So you'll still be behind me when there's an opening on his team."

"Well I hear there's going to be an opening really soon." Kei said smugly

"Why?"

It wasn't often that Kei knew something that her more observant friend did not, so she casually adjusted her hitai-ate /forehead protector/ and took out her leather whip and began to polish it…

Naruto was oblivious to the attention his entrance garnered as he strutted confidently into the room. He looked over the other ninja crowded around the tables in the room. They didn't look very impressive.

He remembered that the first time he'd been in this room the other ninja had all been bigger than him and had all looked terribly menacing. He'd been so intimidated that he had challenged them all. This time they were mostly all around his age and didn't look very powerful at all. They just didn't look strong enough for it to be fun to challenge them, so he walked to the nearest corner and leaned against the wall where he could see the entire classroom.

It didn't take him long to see them. The cloud ninja from before were in the corner opposite him. No one seemed to want to sit too close to them. The Hidden Village of Cloud wasn't allied with Konoha, so it wasn't usually invited to Konoha's Chuunin exam. Naruto could see that many of the other teams were nervous about having Cloud ninjas in the exam.

After he'd run into the Cloud punks he went straight to Tsunade-ba-chan to confirm that they were supposed to be there. Apparently they were denying that they had tried to kidnap Keiko-hime and were demanding concessions because Keiko-chan was marrying Renjiro-kun. Naruto didn't know how they could get away with it; Toshiro-ji-san had been right there. But it made Naruto angry. It was the same thing that they'd done when they tried to kidnap Hinata, they just lied and everyone was supposed to believe it because they said so and give them what they wanted. When he became Hokage, Naruto was going to find a way to keep them from being able to do that, but for now he just glared at the Cloud ninja standing in the corner.

Hanabi glared at her sister when she entered the room. She guessed that it had been too much to hope for the genjutsu they were using on the second floor to fool someone with byakugan eyes, but Hanabi wanted out of her weak sister's shadow and if her sister had been to weak to even enter the exam, then Hanabi would have proven how completely superior she was. Hanabi was confident that she could defeat her older sister in the stupid match they had planned, but she wanted her sister to fail before then so that she could prove once and for all that her weakling sister didn't even deserve to even fight her.

Especially now, after her father's training Hanabi was sure that she would be able to make it through to the end and win the tournament. She'd earned it. Every day after her missions were done her father had kept her fighting on that water until she could barely stand on solid ground. After nearly a week of that exhaustive training, Hanabi had stopped falling in the water even when knocked down. So her father had added another element to her training: standing on her head. Because it's easier to control chakra in the hand, doing a handstand on the water was easier than standing on it. But as she expected her father had devised had come up with a way to make it immensely more difficult. He'd forced her to stay upside-down for so long that she had to use her chakra to keep her arms straight. Then he'd made her use the wall walking technique to hold balls on the bottom of her feet. It was one thing to use chakra two places at once, but it was exponentially harder when those two things were almost the exact opposite. But her father hadn't even stopped there. He'd made her walk on her hands and then moved to her finger tips. Eventually after hours of sparring she'd spend the remainder of her day balanced on one finger over the water while keeping rubber balls adhered to her feet and another one floating above her hand with her chakra. And as the days went by Hanabi's control and focus got better and she was able to train for longer and longer. She'd learned incredible control and she noticed that she had even more chakra at her command. She now possessed even more power than her teammates, possibly more than anyone else in this room. Yes, she'd earned her place over her sister.

Naruto's teammates weren't as oblivious of the tension in the room as he was. Sakura had just smirked when everyone in the room had turned to size up the new comers, but she saw that Hinata wasn't taking it as well. She had pulled her arms in close in front of her and kept staring at the ground to keep from looking at the mass of shinobi in front of them.

Sakura didn't know what exactly was bothering Hinata. She knew that Hinata had always been the shy self-conscious type, so having the whole crowd of shinobi taking the exam sizing her up had to be intimidating, but there Hidden Village of Cloud had sent two teams of shinobi for this test and Hinata had plenty of reasons to have problems with them. And to top it all of Sakura could see Hinata's sister. The pompous, self-righteous little girl was glaring at her older sister.

Sakura wanted to do something for her teammate to help her keep her spirits up. She'd followed her very nervous looking teammate to where she stood against the wall a couple of feet away from a broody looking Naruto. Sakura was going to try and say something supportive to Hinata or make a large show of strength to intimidate the other ninja until she remembered that Hinata had attended their first chuunin exam with them. She had a better idea.

Putting one hand on her hip and pointing straight at the assembled crowd. Smirking she yelled out: "We're Genin Cell Alpha! And we won't lose to any of you!" Sakura grinned widely as she turned to face Hinata, who was now staring unblinkingly at her. "Right Hinata?" Sakura winked.

It seemed to take Hinata a moment to get over her shock and remember. But when she did a shy smile began to grow on her face. "Right," Hinata nodded while Sakura began to laugh manically at the crowded room full of angry faces.

Before any of the angry chuunin hopefuls could do anything to retort the front of the room exploded in a cloud of smoke and a harsh voice yelled out. "All right you punks, quiet down, this is the chuunin selection exam."

"There will be no fighting with other teams unless the examiners tell you before hand, and even then, killing will not be allowed." The smoke cleared revealing several Chuunin, each wearing similar uniforms.

"What is this some kind of test for weakling pacifists?" The black-cloaked kunoichi from cloud asked. "We're shinobi, not gardeners!"

"What's the matter?" one of the Chuunin asked haughtily. "Don't you have the skill to control your attacks, or are you so weak that the only way you can win is to go all out while everyone else is holding back?"

The cloud kunoichi seemed to sulk underneath her hood. It was odd to see something so menacing pout and mumble under its breath like a petulant child.

"Now everyone will need to turn in their applications and receive one of these numbers, which will tell you where you will sit while we wait for the chief examiner to arrive."

While everyone was waiting on the examiner, Jiraiya was waiting for his drink at a small out of the way bar, which coincidentally happened to be near some hot springs. He finally had some time off now that his apprentice would be busy with the Chuunin exams for the next few days. So what should he do with his newfound free time?

He'd probably end up doing what he'd been doing for nearly the last month. Tsunade had told him that she didn't want him to teach Hinata anything, so he'd let the boy do that. Going over the fundamentals and teaching them to someone else is a great way to learn. There are just some things that you can't understand or that you don't even think about until you've taught it to someone else. And working with someone who saw chakra as differently as those two naturally do was bound to give them both whole new insights and plenty of new ideas for ways to fight and to train.

So he'd left her to the boy's tutelage, which basically meant that he'd leave them alone to train with minimal instruction or just not show up at all. It's difficult to determine how much coaching is necessary and how much is too much, but Jiraiya was confident that he'd found the right balance, even if Naruto had complained loudly about it. He was not only lucky to have one of the best senseis in all of Konoha; he'd taught the Fourth Hokage after all. But he was also getting to spend plenty of quality time with a girl who obviously wanted him. Neither of his students had been as good with the ladies as him, but obviously just spending time around someone as charming as him had rubbed off on them both.

Well there was no rest for the weary. Once he was done here, he'd need to get back to work doing research for his books.

Back in the real room 301 everyone had been assigned seats and were waiting impatiently for the chief examiner to arrive. The room was very quiet as apparently no one was sitting next to anyone they knew. So, most everyone was fidgeting quietly in their seats. It grated on Naruto's nerves. He was bored and he really despised waiting.

He guessed he had more practice than most people in the room as he had started out as a genin under the eternally late Kakashi-sensei. And while Ero-sennin wasn't nearly as bad, he seemed to like to make Naruto wait as well. He claimed it was part of training Naruto to be patient. The old man repeatedly said that a good ninja mission was one tenth planning, nine tenths waiting and a few deadly moments of execution. Though Naruto thought it had more to do with the old pervert running out of ideas on what to do to train him and wanting to go out womanizing as he often ended up watching him do. When Naruto brought this up he'd been told to pay better attention and take notes.

Naruto was sitting up near the front of the room a little closer to the front than last time, but unlike last time he wasn't sitting next to Hinata. Instead he was sitting next to this strange girl with dark black hair that had a slight greenish tint to it. She was wearing tight black pants and a baggy green camouflage shirt that hung down below her waist. She had a charcoal colored flack vest that unlike the chuunin and jonin vests had a solid piece in the front and back that molded to her body and came up to her mid chest where it was held on by straps that weren't much wider than an inch. It was pretty similar to the vests he'd seen some anbu wear. She also had cloth wrapped around her wrists all the way up to her elbows, which he supposed was to keep her sleeves from getting caught on the leather whip she was polishing. All in all it was pretty normal ninja attire, it was what she was doing that was weird.

She sat there with this grin like she'd won something and would turn to look at him like she was about to say something but would turn back around as if she'd changed her mind. Or she'd just look at him when she thought he couldn't tell. And then there was the way she was polishing the whip. She'd thoroughly polish a section a little less than a foot thoroughly before pulling the whip back and doing the same to another section. She'd start off very slow, almost caressing it through the cloth she was using to polish it. Then as she'd slowly tighten her grip and speed up until she was satisfied and moved on to the next several inches of the whip's length. Naruto assumed there was a reason for why she did it this way, but he didn't know much about polishing leather. She wasn't the only person in the room using the time to inspect their equipment. Several people had kunai or other knives and shuriken lying out in front of them. A girl in the back was polishing her arrows and the black cloak wearing cloud ninja had taken her impressive golden gauntlets apart and was carefully cleaning and oiling their parts, which included two long spring-loaded blades.

Naruto may have been oblivious two Rensa Kei's intentions, but his teammates definitely weren't. Hinata was glaring daggers at the vulgar girl sitting next to her Naruto-kun. And Sakura didn't look any more pleased than Hinata until she saw how clueless Naruto was. Then she had to turn a way any time either of them looked her way to keep from laughing.

Kei, however was eating it up. She couldn't believe her luck getting the seat next to Naruto-sama. She'd only just been able to get his name, the room was so quiet that even if she whispered it could be overheard by nearly the entire room, so she hadn't wanted to say too much more yet, but that wasn't going to stop her from getting his attention. And judging by the way Naruto-sama's teammates were reacting she definitely had a chance.

Naruto may not have known why, but he could definitely feel the tension building around him. When he looked over at Hinata, she'd just smile slightly and bury her blushing face in her arms. He'd thought that the way that they'd been working together recently that they had gotten beyond that, but sometimes he really couldn't understand girls. And that went double for his other teammate. He didn't know what, but he thought that Sakura was angry at him the way she'd been glaring, but now she just turned away. It didn't look like she was mad at him, but he still felt like there was a knife pointed at his back.

So Naruto was very relieved when the silence was broken by a loud bang and a cloud of smoke at the front of the room. "Yo," drawled a lazy voice that even after all these years Naruto would recognize anywhere.

"You're late!" Naruto and Sakura both yelled as the smoke cleared to reveal their former sensei. Who, unlike them didn't seem to have changed a bit in the years Naruto had been gone.

Everyone seemed taken aback at the two genin's antics toward the newly arrived jounin. It was after all not a good idea to yell at an examiner during a test. And most of the genin had realized that it had obviously been a test to see how patient they were when the examiners sitting around the room started making notes on each other's clipboards. The life of a ninja after all was by and large filled with long periods of waiting punctuated by brief terrifying battles. It was only logical that they'd be tested on both aspects, as no matter how terrifying your combat skills they could all be useless if you couldn't wait for the right time to use them. And they might have been right. How were they supposed to be able to tell the difference between examiners taking notes on each other's clipboards and people playing hangman and tic-tac-toe?

Oblivious to the outrage Kakashi and his former students each chuckled nostalgically. "Well, the copy machine was out of it's black-powder-ink stuff when I was trying to print your test papers, so I had to go to a store to get more, but apparently there is more than one kind and you have to know what kind of machine it was. So I had to go back…"

"Liar," Naruto shouted. Sakura remained silent this time. Kakashi-sensei's excuse didn't sound like the crazy lies he used to tell when he was late. And Kakashi-sensei never used to look shocked when they called him on it before.

And Kakashi definitely was shocked. His one visible eye was widened in stunned disbelief. That was without a doubt the best lie he'd ever told. He'd spent the entire time walking across town to get here coming up with it. He even acted like he didn't know what toner was called just to make it more believable. How could Naruto have figured it out? He must not have paid attention to his excuse and assumed…

"Aren't those the tests over there Kakashi-sensei?" Naruto pointed at a stack of papers on one of the other examiner's lap.

"Tomeo-kun," Kakashi looked mildly surprised. "You had the test papers?"

"Uh, Kakashi-senpai, you told me to take the test papers and guard them with my life." the chuunin fidgeted nervously. "You said not to let any of the little brats get a look at them."

"Oh," Kakashi said lazily, acting as if it was all news to him. "Well pass them out to everyone while I explain the rules."

Kakashi cleared his throat as he turned to face the assembled genin. His voice got louder, but he still sounded completely disinterested in what was going on. "I'm gonna explain the rules to this test. Please listen carefully, because I'm not going to answer any questions and I'm too lazy to write them down."

"Why won't you answer any questions?" one angery voice in the crowd asked

"Too lazy, what kind of excuse is that?" another voice yelled.

Kakashi's one visible eye looked at the muttering genin stonily. "If you're taking this exam, then it means that you already believe that you're ready to be chuunin, so act like it! Not like some snot-nosed genin fresh out of the academy. If you can't follow directions after hearing them explained once, then you have no business being here. We're not here to help you become popular, or look cool. We're here to separate those of you who are ready to lead squads from those who aren't. If you don't have the skills to be a chuunin, then just pretending like you do is only going to get you and your team killed." Kakashi's voice had been harsh, but then he continued on in his lazy like drawl. "If any of you aren't ready to be chuunin, you and your teammates can leave right now; I'm too lazy to deal with you."

Kakashi waited for a moment before he continued. Unfortunately it didn't seem anyone was going to leave. He really didn't want to deal with them. "Each of you will take a ten question test. You all have ten points. You will have an hour to take the test. When the hour is up each question you have answered incorrectly or left blank will cost you one point. You will be graded as a team. So only those teams with the highest collective scores will pass. However if anyone has zero points by the end of the hour, they and their entire team will fail.

"But how many points do we need to pass?" another person seemed to forget that there would be no questions permitted.

"Ah, I haven't decided yet," Kakashi answered lazily

"What?" several people yelled, but were silenced by Kakashi's stony glare.

"However during the test we will be watching you," Kakashi's voice and demeanor reverted back to laziness. "You will lose two points any time you do something that makes the examiner's believe you are cheating. If anyone loses all of their points they will be asked to leave out that door," Kakashi was pointing toward the back door that they'd all come in through. "There will be no complaining, whining, questioning or recourse…Oh, and from now on anyone that asks me a question will lose three points."

"Oh, and you can start anytime you want," Kakashi said off handedly as he pulled out a novel and began to read.

The rules sounded like they wanted everyone to cheat, or at least that they were daring everyone to. To Uzimaki Naruto it felt like the examiners had issued him a formal challenge, and he loved challenges. He wanted to prove to these people that he could cheat right under their noses, but he had two teammates to worry about, and he needed to make sure that Hinata got to her fight. He would not allow her to fail this test and be branded with that seal because he couldn't control his competitive urges.

So Naruto decided to calmly look over the questions. The first one was simple enough. It was asking about triangulating the distance to a target. It was obvious just from looking at it that the target had to be about 375 meters away, but they wanted him to show his work. He hated when Ero-senin made him write down all the math and numbers, it was just much easier to use your gut. But Hinata was worth it.

The next question was easier. They just wanted him to decode a basic dual alpha-numeric cipher. It was just one of the rules of shinobi conduct. Ero-Senin's spies used a much tough cipher and he'd insisted that Naruto learn how to encode and decoded messages so he could work with them.

The third question was about the arc of a thrown shuriken and what could be derived from it. It looked like the test was a lot easier than the one they had taken the first time.

Sakura remembered the rules from the first and only time she'd taken the exam. It sounded like they wanted them to cheat this time as well. A quick look at the questions and she realized that none of them were questions a genin or even a chuunin should be able to solve. Well she could definitely solve them, but likely only a handful of chuunin could do it. For that matter she remembered a few of the questions from her last exam, the cipher was even the same rule of shinobi conduct. So the question was did she just answer the questions or test out how well she could cheat?

Since the officially said that you were supposed to answer them yourself they shouldn't be able to penalize anyone if they could answer them themselves right? Well, no Kakashi was always talking about how ninja needed to see underneath the underneath, they'd only passed his bell test by disobeying a direct order. He'd fail them. But then again as long as she waited a couple of minutes to start she could always claim to have cheated so well they didn't see it. And she needed to make sure that Hinata beat her sister or Hinata and Naruto would pay the price.

But what were her teammates going to do? Hinata could just use her Byakugan and get the answers without anyone being the wiser, but if she could do it so could her sister. Meaning unless one of her sister's teammates messed up, they were going to get past this test just as easily. So it all came down to Naruto.

But the question is how well did Jiraya-sensei teach Naruto to spy? Was it good enough to get past all of these chuunin examiners? Kakashi hadn't uncovered his sharingan eye, so it would be possible to cheat. Risking a look at Naruto, Sakura looked up and nearly swallowed her tongue in shock.

Sakura had to restrain herself from yelling in disbelief. There was no way the Naruto she remembered could know the answers to these questions, but there he was hunched over his test writing away. He looked completely engrossed in his work. Jiraiya-sensei was good! If he could teach Naruto to spy so effectively that he could already have the answers, then he'd just proven why he was considered one of the legendary three ninjas of the last shinobi war.

Sakura continued to look over the questions while the rest of the people in the room realized what she had already figured out. Almost as one the entire room began filling in the answers they had stolen, this was Sakura's signal to begin.

Just as Sakura surmised Hinata and Hanabi both used their Byakugan to steal the answers. Hanabi filled in her answers a little more slowly than Hinata. She waited until she could check the answers of everyone in the room to make sure that she got the right ones. She filled in all the answers until she got to the tenth question, which only stated would be given by the examiner 45 minutes into the exam.

She didn't stop there however, she looked over the examiner's clip boards to see who they had caught, her blood line limit allowed her to see anywhere in the entire room while she had her eyes never left her paper. She'd just noticed that she and her sister had both been caught for cheating once when the first person and his team was kicked out of the test. Closing her eyes she released the chakra in them, dispelling her blood-line-limit's powers. She didn't dare use them again until the last question.

Hanabi's teammate Deido Suraido used the distraction afforded by the exiting team to make his move. Using his new powers he found someone who was just now found someone to cheat off of and covered their paper with a thin sheen of dust. The pencil's movements through the dust provided him with the answers.

Once Yumi realized they were supposed to cheat, she'd known exactly who to copy. Kei had said that they'd put the boy from that chuunin exam and the Hokage's apprentice on a team with Hanabi-chan's sister to make sure she could get to the end of the exam to fight Hanabi-chan to prove who was stronger. Like the Hyuuga would gamble with the fate of their house! And even if they did, no one would choose two teammates that obvious for the girl. No they had to be there for this test.

So from the back of the class Yumi was used the technique that made her archery-based ninpou possible. The eagle eye jutsu allowed her to magnify her vision many times greater than even that of a real eagle, making it possible to precisely hit targets most couldn't even see from great distances. Or more importantly right now it let her read the boy sitting next to Kei's answers by looking at the reflection of the chief examiner's Hitie-ate/Forehead Protector/. She may have envied Kei the opportunity to sit next to such a cute guy, but it would definitely be harder for Kei to cheat without getting caught sitting right next to the guy that had the answers.

Kei was in luck. It seemed that Naruto-sama was a mumbler. Using listening skills honed by years of listening in on other people's conversations and looking for gossip she strained her ears as hard as she could to hear what Naruto-sama was saying. He wasn't just giving out the answers by any means. But by listening to him mutter she was able to figure out how to solve the questions; though she did have to weed through a lot of extraneous information. He apparently didn't like someone he called 'Ero-senin' very much.

Mitarashi Bishamon had finally picked his man. He had considered using Yumi, when she'd apparently immediately found someone who had the answers, but since they were on the same team it might look suspicious and get points taken away from both of them. So it was time to implement his plan, before his mark got kicked out for cheating.

"Excuse me sensei," Bishamon raised his hand nervously.

"Didn't I say that anyone who asks me any more questions would lose three points?" Kakashi didn't even look up.

"Well, it's not a question…well not really,"

"Oh?" Kakashi didn't even look up.

"Well, it's just you took so long that…ah…I have to use the bathroom."

"Hmm," Kakashi's mask completely covered the bottom half of his face and one of his eyes was covered by his Hitai-ate, but Bishamon could have sworn he saw an evil smirk on the jounin's face. "Mihoshi-chan will escort you."

And when he saw the look in the buxom chuunin's eyes as she fondled a pair of handcuffs, Bishamon got the distinct impression that he did not want to let that woman handcuff him. Swallowing hard he got up and scooted behind the sand ninja sitting next to him. He noticed that there was a long, extremely thin needle sticking out of his lower jaw. He didn't know what this was for, but a quick glance showed that two other sand ninja had them as well.

But that wasn't his concern right now, his mark had just barely managed to steal the last answer without being disqualified, so after the scary chuunin started yanking him by a rope tied to the handcuffs toward the back door, Bishamon tripped and fell.

"Hey, what are you doing with my paper?" A bulky looking ninja yelled in Bishamon's face as he lifted him off the ground by the lapels of his black leather jacket.

"Put him down, now." The chuunin who had handcuffed him yelled at the genin threatening Bishamon.

"I just fell," Bishamon pleaded before pointing at a sheet of paper on the ground. "It's right there."

The large ninja lumbered down and picked up the paper, looking it over carefully. "This isn't my test," he sounded outraged.

"What?" Bishimon did his best to sound shocked.

"You planted this on me. Give me my test back!"

"I'm wearing handcuffs," Bishamon held his hands as if to prove he couldn't have done anything. "What are you trying to pull?"

"It doesn't have my name on it," the genin placed the sheet in front of Bishamon's face. "See, it's someone else. Why would my test have someone else's name on it?"

"How should I know why you put someone else's name on your test," Bishamon shouted.

"I didn't, give it back…"

The larger genin was pulling his fist back when Mihoshi spoke up excitedly. "It looks like I get to search you!" Her voice squeaked and she was holding a knife in one hand.

A very large pile of weapons and a very personal pat down later and Mihoshi hadn't been able to find the missing test paper on either of them.

"I feel like I should buy you a drink," Bishamon said after he put his leather jacket back on over his fishnet T-shirt.

"I can't believe you booby-trapped your jacket." The Chuunin decided not to respond to her prisoner's verbal barb.

Bishamon looked up at the three darts that had been embedded in the ceiling when she'd accidentally triggered one of the hidden dart launchers in his jacket. "Uh, it's my favorite jacket," he replied uncertainly.

Mihoshi didn't say anything. She just shook her head and dragged him out of the room, down the hall and into the men's room. She wouldn't even uncuff him when she opened up the stall for him, but she did at least let him close the door. Once out of sight he removed the handcuffs and dropped a powerful stink bomb into the toilet while providing some appropriate sound effects. He waited until his chuunin watcher had closed the bathroom door behind herself before he took out the test form he'd stolen and began to memorize the answers. He didn't have too long to memorize them before he had to get back into the classroom to hear the final question.

Back in the classroom Doushi Torio held his bag-like mask still as he turned his head to look at the pink-haired girl's test. The mask was designed to look like a simple bag with black dots over his eyes, but it was much more. As a member the Doushi clan of the Village Hidden in the Clouds, he was one of the unrivaled master's of fear. Even his clothing, which made him look like a scarecrow was designed to inspire fear by making himself look inhuman. The mask he wore was the result of years of experience and design. It was created using a secret process to allow it to block out the neurotoxins and other fear inducing agents his clan used. But more importantly right now the mask was completely transparent on the inside. So while the examiners saw the black dots of his scarecrow mask looking studiously at his paper he could blatantly stare at his neighbors test.

Torio didn't know why the girl had waited to start giving answering the test, because it only made it look like she was cheating. But by watching her closely he could see that she knew the answers on her own. He hoped she wasn't stupid enough to think it would deter people from stealing her answers. After all, it didn't matter how she got them, if they were correct there was no reason not to steal them from her.

Not far away, conveniently sitting near the center of the room Torio's teammate, Satsu Tenshi had finally finished cleaning, polishing and reassembling her gauntlets. Now that she'd seen all of the answers by seeing the reflection of several people's test papers in the now shiny pieces of her gauntlets she could start writing them down.

Hakumei Kanojiro had it far easier than either of his two teammates. His Kurogan allowed him to astral project himself over the room allowing him to look over any test in detail. He'd paid particular attention to Uzumaki Naruto. Most everything he could find out about him from the villagers in Konoha indicated that he was the village idiot with no particular talent, except for a few tittering girls who obviously were enamored of him. Though, it was obvious that the entire village was hiding something about the boy and that made him even more curious.

Uzumaki's test didn't help Kanojiro resolve the ambiguities in the information he'd gathered about the leaf ninja. Uzumaki had only answered seven of the nine questions that they'd been given and his answers were different and less detailed than the ones everyone else was using. Was he so dumb he didn't realized that the whole point of the exercise was to test their covert information gathering skills, but he was smart enough to be able to answer eight out of nine of the questions or was he skipping one and giving shorter answers to keep it from looking like he was cheating?

While the Cloud's premier genin was contemplating the enigma that was Uzumaki Naruto, Mitarashi Bishamon had put his handcuffs back on and walked out of the bathroom to find his escort.

It seemed that he had been right. The hapless ninja he had stolen the answers from hadn't been good enough to steal the answers again. The very disgruntled genin was storming down the hall with two dejected looking ninja trailing behind him. But when he saw Bishamon he suddenly became furious and charged.

"Hold it right …" The Chuunin, Mihoshi started to yell, but stopped when her prisoner ran past her. The boy flipped into the air so that he was upside-down with his feet nearly brushing the ceiling. When he landed somehow the handcuffs he was wearing were now on his attacker.

"Got a test to finish, bye," Bishimon chuckled as he left four shocked ninja behind. He didn't see the boy he'd handcuffed try to chase after him only to be jerked back by Mihoshi pulling on the chord connected to the handcuffs.

Mitarashi Bishamon was still laughing when rushed back into the test room.

"Quiet!" One of the chuunin commanded. "And where's your escort?"

"Well…" Bishamon stopped and scratched the back of his head. "We, uh…got attacked by someone that apparently didn't appreciate you guys kicking him out of the test."

"And you left her to deal with it alone?" Kakashi asked from his spot in the front of the room. His eyes never left his book, but his voice sounded disapproving.

"Well I detained the guy, but I needed to make sure I didn't miss the last question." Bishamon was beginning to worry that his little stunt might get him into trouble.

"Meh," Kakashi muttered. "Just get back in your seat. You've got a couple of minutes yet. I wanna finish reading this chapter first."

Relaxing a little Bishamon took his seat and did his best to act casual as he scribbled his answers down as quickly as he could. He'd just barely finished when he heard the chief examiner close his book.

"Well I guess it's time for the last question," Kakashi said lazily. The intent stares of the entire room didn't seem to faze him. "I guess I should tell you that the reason we're giving you this separately is that there's another rule for this question."

Kakashi smiled behind his mask when he heard the collective intake of breath as the genin in the room began to sweat over what this new rule was. "First you will have to decide if you'll even take the last question."

"And if we don't?" A voice called out.

Kakashi sighed, 'so much for them remembering not to ask questions,' he thought. "If you don't then you will fail and will be asked to leave out that door." Kakashi pointed to the side the door near the front of the room.

"Baka!" another ninja yelled. "Then why would anyone leave?"

Kakashi chuckled for a moment before he answered. "They'll leave, because of the last rule. This last question will be a competition in your squad. The answers will be graded on their accuracy and how detailed they are. The person with the worst answer will never be able to become a chuunin, even if your team passes this test."

"What!"

"That's not fair"

"You can't do that!"

"Yes, I can!" Kakashi said harshly. "You're in this test to become Chuunin! If you can't handle the consequences of your decisions, how are we supposed to be able to trust you to lead a team?"

Kakashi looked over the silent crowd before continuing. "So now's your chance, anyone that isn't willing to take this question please raise you hand, and you and your teammates will be asked to exit out that door." Kakashi pointed again, while eyeing everyone intently.

While everyone at the test was drinking in the consequences of taking the last question, Tsunade was drinking in something else. Sitting behind her desk, which was covered with untouched paper work and several bottles. The fifth Hokage was biting her thumb while deep in thought despite her semi-inebriated state when her assistant Shizune opened the door to admit her guest.

"Hokage-sama!" Shizune scolded as she rusted toward her Sensei's desk. "What are you doing drinking while there's work to be done?" The younger woman immediately began to grab the bottles.

"Do you think they'll be all right?" Tsunade asked absently as she refilled her cup with one of the bottles that her assistant had yet to grab.

Shizune stopped. Still hunched over the desk holding one bottle in the air she examined the Hokage's face. Shizune knew that Tsunade cared a great deal about Naruto-kun. She did too. And right now worry was written all over her teacher's face.

"You're the one that keeps telling me about how powerful that girl is," Shizune straightened up and placed the bottle in her hand with the others she was carrying under her arm. "If what you've told me is true, than there is no way her little sister can beat her."

"But they have to get to the fight," Tsunade's sentence was punctuated by her head jerking back as she emptied her cup. "There are two tests before then and they can't all be beaten by a strong fist."

"Hinata's always made it before," Kurenai stepped toward the Hokage's desk and spoke for the first time since entering the room

"So has Sakura," Shizune was quick to add. Though, she left out that Sakura had only taken the test once.

Tsunade didn't look convinced so before she could object Kurenai spoke up. "I fought Hinata recently."

This definitely got the Fifth Hokage's interest. "So, how did she do?"

"It was like fighting a totally different person," Kurenai replied. "Her fighting style was very different and very confusing and my genjutsu was useless."

"Was she able to fight with her full power?" Tsunade asked.

"I don't think so," Kurenai admitted, but she continued before the Fifth could say anything. "But she fought a lot harder and with a lot more confidence than she used to and was able to bring herself to hit me solidly. I'm sure she'll be able to bring herself to defeat her sister now."

Tsunade considered the Jounin's answer. Hinata definitely wouldn't need to use her full strength on her sister. She'd probably kill the little girl if she did. It was all a question of if she could bring herself to hurt her little sister. If she could, she'd win. But she still had to get there. "But the first test doesn't involve fighting, they have to pass Kakashi-kun's test."

"She's on a team with Sakura and Naruto, the only team to ever pass Kakashi-san's bell test. They'll be able to pass his test again."

"But what if the bet influences their decision?" Tsunade suddenly felt much worse

"Don't worry. Naruto will find a way." Shizune replied

"You've put all your faith and all of you dreams for the future in him," Kurenai looked directly into Tsunade's quavering eyes. "You shouldn't be the first to doubt him."

"Why do you believe in him so much?" Tsunade asked.

"I don't," Kurenai replied. "But Hinata does, and that's good enough for me."

Sakura thought as fast as she could. She was so absorbed in thought she didn't notice the first two teams give up. They absolutely couldn't fail this test. Hinata had to become a chuunin or she and Naruto would be marked. So if one of them had to be prevented from ever becoming a Chuunin, Sakura would choose herself. It went against her principles, and she'd never done it before, but Sakura was sure she could not only intentionally get the question wrong, but get the worst possible answer.

Once she came to this decision, Sakura looked up to see Naruto raising his hand.

"Do you give up Naruto-kun?" Kakashi asked.

"Uzumaki Naruto never gives up," Naruto slammed his fist on the table. "If one of us can't ever be a Chuunin, that I'll make sure my answer is the worse to make sure that Hinata and Sakura-chan can. I won't ever turn my back on my friends!"

Something flashed across Kakashi's one visible eye before his face, what could be seen of it anyway, turned furious. "There will be no cheating in this test Naruto-kun! You, Sakura-chan and Hinata-chan, through that door now." Kakashi's whole arm quivered as he pointed toward the side door.

"What?!" Naruto screamed. "But Hin…"

"My word is final," Kakashi's voice drowned out his former student. "Through that door all of you!" Kakashi stared Naruto down until he got moving. "And no grumbling," he yelled when Naruto started to mutter.

Naruto was too dejected to notice the raised hands his that immediately followed his outburst, including the reaction of the girl in the seat next to him. Vainly trying to figure out what he could do he didn't even notice the two teams sitting in the room he'd walked into until he heard a chuunin in the front of the room calling out for everyone to sit down and wait, because the chief examiner wanted to talk to them after the test was over.

Sitting down at one of the chairs in the room, Naruto turned to his teammates. "I'm sorry Hinata, I've let you down…" Naruto began to apologize, but was drowned out by shrill screaming.

Everyone's eyes turned to the smallest genin in the room, Hyuuga Hanabi as she began screaming at her teammate for giving up and getting them all thrown out of the test. Fortunately everyone that came in afterward just sat down like everyone else, because no one could hear the chuunin in the front of the room, or anyone else for that matter.

Hanabi was still yelling when Kakashi finally stepped through the door and shut it behind him. "That's enough yelling little girl." Kakashi had to yell as loud as he could just to be heard.

Hanabi glared at the jounin who'd interrupted her. "Who are you calling a little girl? Thanks to my idiot teammate, we're here instead of in there." She pointed back toward the room they'd come from

"Then you should be thanking you teammate," Kakashi smirked behind his mask.

"Why should I do that?" Hanabi asked archly. Now that they weren't in the test she saw no reason to act submissive in front of a commoner.

"Because, everyone in there failed?"

"What?"

"No way!"

"How?"

People all over the room began asking questions at once. "Because the only people that got the last question right are in this room," Kakashi answered.

"But how can anyone here have gotten the answer right, we weren't allowed to get it, because our teammates gave up!" Hanabi whined.

"Giving up was the correct answer." Kakashi looked pleased.

"But how can giving up be the answer?" Hanabi interrupted.

"A ninja must always look underneath the underneath. The last question wasn't designed to test you knowledge or even you ability to covertly gather information like the first nine. The last question was designed to see what you're made of."

"So only cowards can pass your test!" Hanabi yelled scornfully. "A ninja has to be willing to risk their lives on every mission. Cowards that give up on missions and don't follow their orders are scum! And I trust my skill, so I'm always willing to risk my life on any mission."

"But it wasn't your life you were risking now was it?" Kakashi replied. "It was your teammates. It was easy to think that you won't be the one of your three-man cell that does the worst on your question. Just like it will be easy to think that you won't be the one to die on a dangerous mission; but what about your teammates? It's true that we call cowards that don't follow orders or abandon missions scum, but those who abandon their friends are less than scum. If you're the type of coward who's willing to let a teammate die to save your own life, then you have no business leading a team of ninja.

"In Konoha we have a monument with the names of all the shinobi who have died to protect their home. My sensei and my best friends' names are engraved on that stone. I invite all of you after this exam is over to take a look at that stone and remember that generations of shinobi have given their lives so that you could be here today. Remember that when you became a shinobi you inherited a powerful legacy. Now is not the time to celebrate, you have a lot to live up to."

Kakashi paused to let what he'd said sink in before he dismissed them. "Your next exam starts immediately. Make your way to training area 44. If you can't find it just ask someone how to get to the Forest of Death."

End Chapter 8

I apologize for how long this took to get out. I had actually finished the first draft over a week ago. I kept forgetting to get this out to betas and when I finally did I found I had trouble getting the E-Mails to everyone who volunteered. Sadly I realized in the history of this story only two of the people I'd ever sent chapters to have ever responded with any corrections and I'd lost their E-Mails, so I don't remember who they were.

So I'm releasing this chapter without beta work and if any one would like to be a dedicated beta for this story please contact me and I will save your E-Mail in a safe place this time. If any of you would like, feel free to copy this chapter into a word document and send it back to me with any errors or comments highlighted, Bolded or in another color and I will update the chapter with any corrections it needs.

So stay tuned in for the next chapter of Hinata's Story: Fun in the Forest

See how Hinata reacts to sleeping next to Naruto-kun and how she deals with the vulgar hussy trying to steal him away from her!