A/N: Well, I just now figured out that the default setting for my account was to block anonymous reviews. I did not know that, so I have now enabled it for any people without accounts who feel the need to review. However, if this is abused by any overzealous Naru/Hina or Sasu/Saku fans, then I will switch it back, so don't abuse the privilege. That being said…on with the story.

Shadow Fox

"You three from the sound, what do you think you are doing. There will be no fighting at this point in the exam, is that clear?" Ibiki yelled at the three sound genin.

"Heh, sorry, guess we were just a bit excited." Zaku replied with a smirk..

"Ok, everyone shut up and take your seats so we can get this test started."

So all of the genin in the room found their assigned seats for the exam and began to mentally prepare themselves for the coming exam. Naruto took his seat next to some random genin from the hidden Rain village. He listened as Ibiki ran through the rules of the exam.(Again, you've probably read or seen this many times, so it's unnecessary.) Naruto smirked a bit at the rules, there was no way that they could ever catch him cheating. They may have been good, but they would never suspect what he could do, or more specifically in this case, what Kyo could do.

"All right, you can all begin your tests…now."

Naruto watched as all of the genin in the room, began to look over the test. He himself looked at his test and chuckled under his breath. He had no idea where to even start on any of these problems. He watched as all of the other genin began to find various ways to cheat to get the answers. He figured that he should get started finding the answers, so he leaned his head forward to create a shadow on the desk. Kyo then merged into the shadows and traveled to the shadow made by his head.

"Ok, Kyo, can you go find out some of the answers for me?"

Kyo gave a quiet yip to answer him, then he traveled around the room to gather some answers.

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'Damn, these are hard questions, they can't possibly expect most of the genin in here to know the answers to these problems.' Sakura thought to herself. 'I know that I can answer these, and that Sasuke will do well also, but I have no idea how Hokuro will do, we don't know much about him or how smart he is, I wonder if he will be able to get through this.'

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Hokuro was not really thinking about the test, instead, he had been sidetracked by the pale girl beside him with indigo hair.

'Why is her hair pointy in the back, it looks kind of weird.' (Ok, I am sorry again, I just can't help but take a few cheap shots at her sometimes, but seriously, why does she have her hair pointed outwards in the back.)

'Maybe she uses it for some attack, where she attacks them with a hair spike on the back of her head. It certainly would be useful for when an enemy sneaks up on you. I should try to make a spike out of my hair, then I would be menacing.'

Lost in his thoughts, he hadn't even realized that half of the allotted time had passed and he was still lost in his thoughts.

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Naruto had been writing down answers as Kyo was bringing them to him. No one suspected that he had a fox hidden in the shadows giving him the answers. He looked around the room to see how his other teammates were doing, and they seemed to be struggling a bit.

"Hey Kyo." Naruto whispered, "Go give the answers to Zaku and Kin-chan."

Kyo agreed and left Naruto once again, he figured that he had a while until the final question was revealed, so he watched to see how some of the other genin were cheating, since he figured that most weren't answering the questions on knowledge alone. He noticed that the red haired sand genin was using sand to form…an eye? That was a new one to him, rather strange. He watched as one girl was using mirrors on the ceiling to copy answers (ok, does anyone else think that those looked really obvious in the show, and think she would have been caught easily?). He noticed that Sasuke was using his Sharingan to copy the movements of another genin as he wrote. He noticed that Ino girl and saw that she was…asleep? Maybe she was unconscious, he figured that there was something here that he just didn't understand. There were other people around the room cheating various ways, many of which he didn't really figure out. He looked over at his replacement on team seven and saw that he was just staring out in to space, seemingly unfazed.

'He must have some sort of strange sight technique, or maybe a mental jutsu. Quite an interesting replacement they found for me.'

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'I wonder what the world would be like if trees were sentient(alive for those with lesser vocabularies). They are awfully big, so would they have enslaved humans? But they burn so easily, so would we rule over them? Maybe we would get along in peace and prosper with the help of each other. That would be cool, I wish that trees were alive.'…yeah, he was completely gone again.

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Kin kept looking over the test questions, wondering how in the hell they were supposed to figure out any of these problems. She noticed many of the other ninja cheating, but she couldn't really think of many ways that she herself could find out the answers from others. She let out a sigh until she noticed that the shadow formed by her head was moving. She watched as the shadow began to twist around until it formed a number followed by some words. She stared at it for a second when she realized that this was the answer to one of the questions.

'This must be Naruto's work, I really owe him one for helping me out here.' She thought to herself as she glanced over at Naruto and saw him watching all of the other genin.

"Thanks Kyo, tell Naruto thanks for the help."

Kyo gave another small yip, fearing that if he spoke to her, she might freak out and give herself away after all of the work he has done.

Kin smiled as she watched the shadow slip away again, this time heading towards Zaku.

'That guy, what would we do without him.'

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Naruto glanced at the clock and noticed that it was about time for them to reveal the tenth question.

"Alright everyone, it is now time for the tenth question, however the rules are a little different for this one."

Naruto listened as Ibiki explained to all of those remaining the rules of the tenth question. He wasn't that worried, he figured that he could get the answer fairly easily with Kyo's help. He looked around the room as he saw genin after genin raise their hand and leave the exam, afraid of staying a genin forever.

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'I am pretty sure that I can answer this question, but I don't want to take a chance and fail, causing Sasuke-kun to stay a genin forever, and we have no idea whether or not Hokuro could possibly get the final question right. They may be mad at me for this, but I can't hold them back because of me.' Sakura was thinking to herself.

Her hand was now shakily rising into the air.

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'There is just so much pressure from this question, I don't want to give up, but I also don't want to be a genin forever. Besides, what would Zaku do if I caused him to remain a genin forever…what would Naruto do, I don't want to let them down. I hope that they will forgive me for this.'

Kin too found her hand slowly lifting into the air.

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'Why is the village hidden in the Sand inside the wind country? Sand and wind don't really have anything to do with one another, shouldn't they have thought of a different name for the country or the village? And for that matter, why is the village hidden in the leaves the capital village of the fire country…no, no, this doesn't make any sense at all. Hey, the pointy hair girl looks nervous about something…Oh well, I'm sure it is nothing that important.' Hokuro thought to himself. He didn't even realize that the tenth question had already been issued, or that he might soon be remaining a genin forever.

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Naruto watched as he saw both Kin and Sakura raising their hands. He couldn't let Kin quit, he knew that they could manage this tenth question. He also didn't want to see his old team fail as he was sure that they could handle this tenth question easily. He bent forward and whispered something to Kyo, who gave another soft yip and disappeared into the shadows yet again as he began to form some seals with one hand underneath his desk.

Kin was raising her hand when she suddenly felt a resistance against her arm. She watched as her arm was caught in a shadow and was now being lowered back down to the desk.

'Naruto, what are you doing, I am not just doing this for me, but I am doing this for you guys also. I hope that you know what you are doing.'

Sakura likewise was feeling a pull on her arm that pulled it back down to the desk. Her arm was pressed down on the desk and she was unable to lift it back up into the air.

'What the hell is going on here, why can't I move my arm? I can't let Sasuke-kun remain a genin for ever, I have to quit now so that we can be better prepared.'

Meanwhile, Shikamaru was watching these events unfold with curiosity.

'There it is again, someone is using the shadows again. But who is it? He seems to be holding two peoples arms down, but he is holding down the arms of people from two different villages. From what I saw before, the one using shadows is probably from the sound, but why is he worried about a team from Konoha giving up?'

As time passed, and no one who was able to was raising their hand. Ibiki figured that this was as many people as were going to quit.

"Well, if that is everyone who is going to quit, then there is nothing left to tell you except…You all pass!" Ibiki answered with a smile.

Ibiki then proceeded to explain to all of the genin why they passed without a question as many genin were asking questions about what was going on.

'It's a good thing that Naruto stopped me from quitting, thank you Naruto.' Kin thought.

'Well, I guess that it was a good thing that someone kept my arm down, but who? I don't think that Sasuke-kun or Hokuro know any abilities like that, so who would have kept my hand down and why would they do it?' Sakura thought.

"Congratulations everyone, you have all moved on to the second stage of the chuunin exams." Ibiki told them all with a smile.

'I passed? Damn I am good, I passed without even realizing that I did anything.' Hokuro thought to himself.

Suddenly a large ball cam crashing through the window as a woman who revealed herself as Mitarashi Anko appeared, saying that she was the second examiner. She had a short exchange with Ibiki about how many students were left after the first exam, and then threatened to cut the number in half. She told all of the genin to follow her.

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All of the genin found themselves in front of a dark and foreboding forest that they were told was a training ground referred to as the Forest of Death. She explained to all of the genin the rules which involved getting a scroll opposite of the one that they were given from another of the teams in the forest. They all then proceeded to one of the gates that would lead into the forest as they awaited the start of the second test. Suddenly, all of the gates opened and the genin rushed into the forest.

"So Zaku, Dosu, what do you think that we should do?" Kin asked her teammates.

"Isn't it obvious, we find a team, beat them up, and take their scroll, it's as simple as that." Zaku replied with a smirk. (I make him smirk a lot, don't I)

Kin smirked in return, while Naruto sighed. Why did his teammates always want to fight? Didn't they realize that he or Kyo could easily sneak up on a team with their shadow skills and take their scroll without them knowing?

Later that day, the team of sound genin ran across a team from the hidden rain village. Of course, Zaku and Kin wanted to fight them. Naruto knew that he couldn't stop the two of them when they got like this, so he sighed in resignation and joined in on the assault.

Naruto managed to take down his opponent fairly easily as he surprised him from the shadows, the rain nin never saw it coming. The shadows pooled around his feet before they suddenly shot upwards and clamped shut, like a bear trap, making a dome of shadows. While he was trapped in the shadows, Naruto began to strike out at him from what seemed like every direction. (think of it like Haku's ice mirrors, only in a shadow dome, and he isn't moving faster, they just can't see anything in the shadows.) It didn't take long for the repeated blows to take their toll on the rain nin as he collapsed unconscious.

Zaku faired similarly in his fight. The rain nin had no idea what Zaku was capable of, so he made the mistake of charging in for close range comment. The rain nin knew that this would probably turn out badly when he saw the smirk on Zaku's face, but it was to late to do anything about it now. He held his arms out and gave a shout "Zankuuha." The rain nin then found himself not charging forward, but flying backwards until he hit a tree…hard, and fell unconscious.

Kin had grabbed her scythe and charged her opponent as they engaged in a battle of weapons. The rain nin was using a set of metal claws as his weapon and the two were exchanging attacks and blocks in what seemed to be a fairly even battle. However, when the rain nin pulled his hand back to make a slash with his claw, he found a chain wrapped around his arm, pulling it back. He took a second to look back at what was happening, and that was his last mistake. As he looked at where the chain had come from, he was met with a blow to his stomach from the butt of the scythe. As he doubled over in pain, he then met with a swift kick to the head, knocking him out.

The three of them searched the unconscious ninja and found that they had a heaven scroll, just what they needed since they had an earth scroll. The three of them traveled for a short while towards the tower until it began to get dark, at which point they decided to set up camp. They set up some traps in the area and spent a bit of time talking to each other before they decided to go to sleep. Zaku was going to keep first watch, followed by Kin, and lastly Naruto.

Zaku was sitting around, watching the small fire that they had made die down. He sat there thinking about whatever came to mind when he noticed that someone was suddenly inside their camp. He held his hands out and readied himself to attack. As the light of the fire revealed the face of the intruder however, Zaku's face went from one of determination to one of confusion.

"Orochimaru-sama, what are you doing here, you shouldn't be in here during the chuunin exams."

Orochimaru chuckled lightly before he answered, "I had some business that I had to attend to, however I will not be staying in this forest for long and I have a mission for you three."

"A mission right now? In the middle of the chuunin exams?"

"Yes, I want you to inform Kin of this mission, but do not tell Naruto about it. You will need to take him with you so that it seems like a normal occurrence of the chuunin exam, but do not tell him about the mission objective or the target, is that clear?"

Zaku hesitated for a moment, wondering why he could not inform his friend about their mission. After a short period of silence, he responded.

"Alright, what is the mission Orochimaru-sama?"

"Your mission is to kill a leaf genin by the name of Uchiha Sasuke."

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A/N: Yet another chapter. Sorry that the fight scenes are kind of weak, but this was not a very important fight, so I went through it kind of quickly. I will try to make all of the more important fights better.

Also on a side note: in encouragement of the Naruto/Sound girls pairings, both Dreamer of all Things Radical, and skarm have Naru/Tayuya fics going that are pretty nice. A lot of you have checked them out already, and I figure I should promote their stories since my actual devious reason for reviewing their stories was to get more people to possibly check out my story, I figured I should return the favor. Besides, I just like to promote Naru/sound girls stories, because the "evil" girls need love too.

Anyway, to the rant!

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Today's rant will be the yaoi rant since a lot of people seem to want that rant.

First off, to give the traditional disclaimer for any talk against yaoi. This is not a gay-bashing rant, but a rant against the abundance of yaoi stories…and fangirls, but I like to blame them for everything because it is fun.

Anyhow, the point is that there are way too many yaoi fics. It is the only thing that can outnumber the Naru/Hina or Sasu/Saku fics. The fact of the matter is, I am a straight male, and I don't want to read yaoi stories, it's just something I don't like to do. If you are gay, I don't care about you writing a yaoi story, however, I feel that the overabundance is due to, once again, the fangirls (because it is just oh so much fun).

Now I won't be hypocritical; while I don't do it all that often, I have read yuri stories because, well, I'm a guy(somewhat shallow, I know, but that is the case with most people.). However, if I think that two girls in the story are attractive, I don't feel the need to go write a yuri fic. The fangirls, however, decide "Oh, look at the cute boys, they are so cute together, let's go write an excessively large number of yaoi fics." I swear, if you based the plot of Naruto off of the fics on this site, one would swear that the village of Konoha would be doomed to obscurity since all of the males are gay, and thus there will never be any children. I mean, poor Naruto, he is obviously straight, and yet he is whored out to not only every girl, but every guy as well. He and Sakura are basically whored out to every character in the Naruto universe, male or female.

And of course, the vast majority of these yaoi fics are the Naru/Sasu fics. Now people, tell me this. If Naruto outright stated that he thought of Sasuke as a brother to him, doesn't that make it abundantly creepy if he loved him. Besides, Sasuke put his hand through Naruto's chest, and it sure as hell wasn't just trying to feel up his chest, it was a murder attempt people. Make all the arguments you want, the fact of the matter is, the paring is just not likely and kind of creepy (as much so as the Naru/Tsunade without an age change, although I have still read those anyway.).

And lastly, the point that if you are going to write a yaoi, LABEL THE DAMN STORY AS SUCH! I also have fallen into the same situation as one of my reviewers, reading through a story, only to suddenly find Sasuke and Naruto making out, at which point, you just kind of repeatedly hit the back button and slowly back away from the computer. So simply put, just label your stories if they are yaoi.

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That's it for today's rant, until next time.