Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, but I do own your soul.
Yorimi opened his eyes to a very blissful setting. The sun hadn't risen in the east yet, but the dark of the night was quickly being stripped away. Around him, the plain was quiet. Yorimi got up, and walked around the camp a little. He quickly noticed Shoji was still fast asleep, but Ichuga-Sensei was already gone. Yorimi was a little concerned over his Sensei's departure, so he activated his Sharingan to try and track any movements around the plain.
Yorimi quickly realized that things were simply too quiet. He quickly ran back to the campsite and wake up Shoji.
"Hey, Shoji get up!" he said. Leaping over a small shrubbery, he was surprised when he didn't see Shoji, or any other part of the camp. "Wha- what's going on here?" he said, starting to tremble.
"So it can see through Gen-Jutsu," Ichuga said behind him.
"What did you say?" Yorimi said as he whirled around. "Where's Shoji?" he barked.
"I'm fine Yorimi," Shoji laughed as he stepped out from behind Ichuga.
"Yorimi," Ichuga called out, "your new training is starting today. We're going to be heading north to the mountains for a while. Once we're their, the thin air will be perfect for training. While we're on the move though, I'm going to tell you all I know about your Bloodline Limit, as well as work on your chakra control."
"Really? Wow. So what do you know about my eyes?" Yorimi asked.
"For now, all I'm going to tell you is that I only want you to have your Sharingan on when I say so, or when you think you're in a dangerous situation."
"Wait, why do you want it off?" Yorimi asked.
"Because when it's on, the sheer amount of information going into your mind is staggering. It's very dangerous to keep it on because your brain won't have the time to process the dump of information, and that could very easily lead to insanity," Ichuga said matter-of-factly.
Yorimi could only stare blankly at his Sensai. Taking the silence as a cue to continue, Ichuga went on to say, "The only times I really want your Sharingan on is in the morning. Every day before heading out, I'll teach you a little about your Limit, and other things that all Shinobe have to learn anyway. Then I want it off until we stop training for the day. Once you go to bed, it should be off again. This gives your mind time to sort through all the information dumped into it while we're traveling, and while we're sleeping. Go it?"
"Yes Ichuga-Sensai. I understand."
"Good. Now lets be off. I'm going to hound both of you on our chakra reserves, so that means we're moving fast. Before we go, I want both of you to make as many Shadow Clones as you can, and race them the entire day. I don't think anyone's going to be seeing us, so go ahead and make as many as you can. Then follow me!" Ichuga said as he leapt off as the sun began to show itself over the horizon.
Yorimi and Shoji nodded to each other, and made their shadow clones. Yorimi managed twenty, while Shoji managed eight. The entire group was off in a hurry, desperate to catch up with Ichuga. The Sannin-gone-Missing-Nin was over a mile ahead of them, but easy to track because of the flatness of the plain. They were all heading due north anyway, so it wasn't hard to keep going on the right path.
Because of the frailty of the Shadow Clones, Yorimi and Shoji found themselves replacing them repeatedly as the hours drifted by. Both Uchihas were completely exhausted by midday, and found themselves coming to a halt when Shoji lost his footing on the ground, and missed making another leap. He fell into the grassy plain face-first, and Yorimi stopped to see what had happened to his brother.
"Crap… Shoji, are you alright?" he yelled.
"I'm… yeah, I'm fine," Shoji feebly called out, raising his head enough to show a frail smile. The young Uchiha was covered in sweat, and his clothes were badly torn. He was wearing an opaque colored vest on top of a skin-tight blue shirt, and below that he wore tan colored cargo-shorts. Shoji also had dark hair that went about an inch below his neck, and almost no baby fat on his body. He was too young to be rippling with muscle tissue, but Yorimi still thought he looked pretty cool for an eight-year-old.
"Alright then, you better get up. All your Clones exploded when you fell so you should build up some chakra before we move again. Better make it fast though; Ichuga-Sensei's probably getting mad at us because of our pace," Yorimi said with a hint of concern.
Twenty yards away, Ichuga sat behind an outcropping of rocks. He had been sitting there when his two new students came bolting through. At the last second, he had cast his Frozen Swamp Jutsu right under Shoji's foot, only allowing enough Chakra to flow to make a few cubic inches to be transformed. The effect was perfect though, and he was waiting for them to get moving again. Within a minute, the two were off again. Shoji had managed to make six Shadow Clones, and Yorimi had upped his number to twenty-five. He smiled when he noticed Yorimi's progress, and wasn't surprised that his brother was already feeling exhausted. He sighed when he realized you could only push one as young as him so hard. After the unforgiving sun started to drift a little further to the west, he'd stop them for the day. Ichuga wanted to test them under harsh conditions, and pushing them through the unending plains in this heat, with the occasional booby trap, and under constant strain from keeping Shadow Clones around was perfect.
Aside from that, he knew that if anyone was tracking them they'd realize that they were tracing about thirty people. While he was thinking about being tracked, he remembered all the violent encounters with Sound-Nin. He knew that there had been very bloody fighting between the countries east of Night Country, but their Hunter-Nin were never able to find out the situation in any of the countries. No matter though, Ichuga thought to himself as he leapt out from behind his hiding place. We'll find out soon enough. With that, he made a frantic pace to catch up with the two Uchiha brothers, and used a cloning technique on a shuriken to prey on some of the Shadow Clones. I wonder how I can do this before they notice, he thought.
Stopping to pick up the real Shuriken, he heard a rustling and a sudden tap on his shoulder. Surprised, he whirled around but his arm was suddenly caught by Yorimi's waiting hand.
"Boo!" Yorimi said with a laugh as he let go and jumped off again.
Ichuga smiled again when he realized he had been duped the whole time. Yorimi, it seemed was smarter than he thought. He must have been hanging back among his group of clones, spreading them out in some kind of formation so that he could monitor whatever was happening around him. Shoji though seemed to have just been charging along. So when he cast the Frozen Swamp Jutsu, another clone, or possibly the real Yorimi saw the ground suddenly change beneath Shoji's feet with his Sharingan. Realizing that having his eyes on meant he was disobeying his Sensei's orders, he then remembered that he also said, in a dangerous situation.
The kid must have realized the danger when he saw me hanging back. If there was a threat, he still had the Shadow Clones ahead of him, and one was already helping Shoji. That was probably enough for him to think to turn it on, he thought to himself. Then remembering Yorimi catching his arm in mid-swipe, he realized that Yorimi was deactivating it so he could see that he wasn't disobeying his Sensei.
"Yorimi, you're a smarter kid than I gave you credit for. This training trip might be more fun than I thought," he said as he used the Shuriken to knick his thumb. Stowing it away, he made some hand seals and summoned a small Puma.
Lord Ichuga, what a surprise. What's happening? the small furry summon said.
"Hiya Koneko, just had a little job for you to do," he said as he pet the young Puma.
Oh? Sounds fun! What is it? it said as it started to purr.
"Find the real Yorimi, and track him. Stay out of site of the rest of his Shadow Clones though. Don't worry, you'll only have to keep this up for an hour or so."
Just an hour? Alright! Will do Master Ichuga! the young Puma said as it bounded off in a blur.
"I keep telling you guys, just call me Chief. Sheesh…" Ichuga said. Looking up into the sky, Ichuga realized that he had been out of Night Country for about a week now. This midday sun was the seventh he had seen since he was a child.
It's a little shorter than I was hoping, but it's still good. Ichuga-Sensei's small summon, Koneko is really just that, a kitten. I don't know Japanese at all, so I just found the word for kitten and thought it was fitting.
I'm showing that Yorimi's a good tactician in the field, but Shoji's still wet behind the ears. Also, the exercise I'm having them do is pretty decent for building up Chakra reserves, IMO. Heh, I can't wait for someone to actually review this 0.o
Pretty please? I'll give you a cookie! Haha