What Could've Been

by Concentrated Awesomeness

Naruto gets pushed to his limit early on in life. The same could be said for Sasuke. Follow along as both go through hardships that test their sanity. The two have to rely on each other to prevent the darkness that could have been. More mature, God-like Naruto. Good Sasuke, probably also God-like or close to it. May have some pairing(s) later on in the story, but no yaoi.

18. Chapter 18

Welcome back once again. Not much to I don't own Naruto. say here, so just enjoy.

Hah, I put my disclaimer in a different place this chapter.

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There was a bright flash of yellow light in front of the exam tower. When the light died down, Team 7 was seen standing there, with Naruto panting heavily.

"Well… it worked, but damn it took a lot out of me." Naruto said.

"Wow that felt great!" Hinata said with a smile while Sasuke nodded.

"Alright lets get inside, I need some rest." Naruto said as he and the others walked inside the tower and opened their scrolls.

There was a poof of smoke and Itachi stood in front of them. "Good job. Naruto come with me, Sasuke, Hinata, your room is on the third floor; go rest for now." He said as he and Naruto shunshinned away.

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Basement of the tower

Hiruzen, Jiraiya, Yugao, and Zabuza were sitting in a room along with a medic-nin waiting on Naruto to arrive.

They didn't wait long before Naruto and Itachi appeared inside the room.

"Ah, Naruto-kun, how are you?" Hiruzen said as he stood up and walked over to Naruto.

"I'm fine Hokage-Jiji. Just a bit tired." Naruto replied.

"Good. I'd like to have Jiraiya look at your seal, and have this medic give you a check-up."

Naruto simply nodded and removed his shirt before sitting down in an exam chair.

Jiraiya walked over and looked at his seal, as well as the place where the cursed seal was. "Well, everything looks fine to me." He said as the medic came over and began his check up.

"Everything appears to be fine for the most part. You have a mild case of chakra exhaustion, but it is recovering at a rapid pace. You should be fine by morning."

"Thank you, you are dismissed." Hiruzen said to the medic nin, before he disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

"Now, Naruto, at this point in the exams, you will be given an option to quit before the preliminaries or the final round, whichever happens. You and Sasuke may now quit and resume ANBU duties without hurting Hinata's chances or your mission, seeing as everyone will be in proximity to the exam now. I want your team as the guard around the Kage's box. Itachi, you will be in the box with me as my personal guard. Any questions?"

Hiruzen took everyone's silence as his answer. "Dismissed." He said as everyone shunshinned away.

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Team 7's room

Naruto appeared in the room in swirl of flames, startling Hinata and Sasuke, who were talking about strategy for the next part of the exam.

"Way to scare the shit of someone." Sasuke said.

"Hah. Sorry." Naruto said as he rubbed the back of his neck. "Anyways, Sasuke, we're out of the exam now. The next round is going to be individual fights, so we are to withdraw and resume ANBU duty."

"Sweet!" Sasuke half yelled out as he wiped a tear away. He had to fight the urge to jump up and hug Naruto.

"What about me?" Hinata asked.

"You will continue the exams as normal, and when the invasion starts, you will help evacuate the civilians along with the other genin." Naruto replied, earning a nod from Hinata.

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3 days later

The 5 day limit for the exam had now passed; Team 7, team 8, team 9, team 10, and Kabuto's team from Konoha made it, along with Gaara's team, a team from Kumo, and one from Kiri. Now we find all of the chunin hopeful in a stadium inside the tower.

"First off, I'd like to congratulate you all on making it this far. Next, I want to remind you all of the real reason for this exam. The chunin exams are an alternative to war; instead of countries waging wars, we gather twice a year to compete and showcase the talents of our up and coming shinobi. Now then, the rules for the competition." Hiruzen said before he was interrupted.

"Cough cough Allow me Hokage-sama cough I think I should explain the rules since cough I am the proctor. I am cough Hayate Gekko. The rules, cough simply put, there are none. Cough The screen will randomly pick two names, and cough the two contestants will fight until one is dead cough, one of you surrender, or I call the match. When I say stop, cough you stop, or you will be stopped. Understand?" Said a sickly looking jonin with a bandana for a hitae-ate.

All of the genin nodded, prompting him to speak again. "Alright, do any of you wish to cough quit now? Your decision will not cough affect your teammates from now on."

Naruto, Sasuke, Kabuto, and one of the Kiri genin all raised their hands.

"Very well, you are dismissed." Hayate said as the 3 walked off to the observation area.

The screen then flashed through names for a moment before stopping on Rock Lee and one of the Kumo shinobi.

"Would cough Rock Lee of Konoha and cough Kazama from Kumo please come down."

"YOSH! I AM THE FIRST TO GET TO SHOW MY FLAMES OF YOUTH!" Lee shouted out.

"YES LEE! SHOW THE WORLD HOW BRIGHTLY YOUR YOUTH BURNS!" Gai shouted

"GAI-SENSEI!"

"LEE!"

"GAI-SENSEI!"

"LEE!"

"GAI-SENSEI!"

"LEE!" the two yelled as a genjutsu of waves crashing into a beach with a setting sun overhead appeared behind the two.

Most everyone in the stadium sweatdropped or face-faulted at seeing this, including Hayate.

"Oh what the fuck! I don't even wanna be a chunin if I have to deal with that! I quit!" Yelled out Kazama.

Several seconds later, after Hayate recovered, he declared Lee the winner before calling out the next pair.

"Tenten of Konoha cough and Temari of Suna!"

(Insert canon fight here)

"Winner cough Temari! Hinata of Konoha and Kiba Inuzuka cough of Konoha!"

Both contestants walked down to the arena and bowed to each other before hearing Hayate yell "Begin!"

Kiba immediately charged towards Hinata before jumping into the air and spinning. "Tsuga!"

Hinata dodged the strike at the last second before stretching out her hands "Sen'eijashu" she yelled as 4 snakes flew out of her sleeves and into Kiba's tornado, stopping him in his tracks. She then swung him around and threw him into the nearest wall.

"Oww dammit!" Kiba yelled out as he stood back up. He was about to blindly charge back in when he thought back to his 'training' with Sasuke. He was, however, brought out of his musings by Hinata's voice.

"Suiton: Teppodama!" she yelled out as she spat 3 water bullets at Kiba.

Neither Kiba or Akamaru were able to dodge them all, and were both slammed into the wall once more.

"Grr. Akamaru!" Kiba said as he stood back up and began to dig into his pouch for a soldier pill.

He never made it before he found himself wrapped up in a tree, with Hinata holding a kunai to his throat.

"Magen: Jubaku Satsu." Hinata said before Hayate called the match.

"Next match cough Neji Hyuga and Choji Akimichi of Konoha!"

The two contestants made their way to the center of the arena. When they arrived, Neji began to speak.

"You may as well give up now. Fate has already decreed me the winner of this fight."

"I can't do that, there is too much riding on this fight!" Choji said with a fiery passion

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Flashback, 2 minutes ago.

"Next match cough Neji Hyuga and Choji Akimichi of Konoha!" Hayate called out.

"Damn, there's no way I can beat Neji. Maybe I should just give up." Choji said as he began to raise his hand.

"No! Choji, do your best, and all you can eat barbeque is on me later!" Asuma yelled out from the area where all of the jonin sensei were after seeing his student about to quit.

"Free barbeque?! Yea!" Choji said as he ran to the arena floor wide open

End flashback

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"As you wish. I will not go easy on you." Neji said with his tone of superiority.

"Neither will I! Baika no Jutsu! Nikudan Sensha!" (multi size, human bullet tank) Choji yelled out as he grew large and round, before his head, arms, and legs disappeared and he began to spin in place.

Choji spun in place for a moment as Neji watched, before he shot out of his spot and rolled towards the Hyuga. Neji was able to jump out the way of the attack, and quickly noticed that Choji couldn't turn well in this form.

Neji spent the next couple of minutes leading Choji around the stadium before he came to a stop right beside the wall. Choji rounded on him and ran straight at him, but Neji jumped out of the way at the last second, causing Choji to crash into the wall thus stopping his spin. Neji quickly ran over and delivered several palm strikes, rendering Choji unsconscious.

"Winner, cough Neji Hyuga. Next up is Gaara of Suna and Tetsuo of Kumo!"

The two came down and wordlessly began their match. Tetsuo used a couple of raiton ninjutsu but Gaara's sand was able to block them all with ease.

Tetsuo stopped to try and think of a plan, but was interrupted from his thoughts as he felt something grab his ankle. He looked down to see that it was sand coming out of the ground. He tried to struggle and get away, but he was trapped and the sand soon covered him completely.

"Sabaku Soso." Gaara said flatly as he raised his open palm and squeezed it shut, causing the sand to implode and sending a fountain of blood out onto the ground, before he simply walked off.

After Hayate choked back the urge to vomit, he announced Gaara the winner and called the next match.

"Next match cough Shikamaru Nara and Misumi of Konoha."

"What a drag…" Said Shikamaru as he walked to the center of the arena.

Misumi didn't bother to speak as Hayate began the match.

Misumi quickly ran at Shikamaru before stretching his torso out to wrap around Shikamaru and crush him.

Shikamaru stood there unmoving until Misumi was only a few feet away, before bringing his hands into the rat symbol and catching Misumi in his shadows. Shikamaru then reached to his right hip and grabbed a kunai, before pulling it up to his throat as Misumi did the same. Did I forget to mention that Shikamaru didn't have a kunai pouch on his hip? Shikamaru held his empty hand to his throat while Misumi had a real kunai in his.

"Winner; Shikamaru!" Hayate yelled as Shika dropped his jutsu and lazily walked out of the arena.

"Damn. He's so lazy he just won a match without moving…" Ino said, causing everyone around to sweatdrop.

"Next up, Shino cough Aburame and Yoroi of Konoha."

The match began wordlessly as Yoroi started to run towards Shino, intent on draining his chakra. He didn't make it very far before a cloud of bugs flew out of Shino's coat and flew towards him. He managed to dodge them for a second before they got him.

"I surrender." Yoroi said, realizing that he was losing all of his chakra.

"Winner, Shino Aburame! Now then, Kankuro of Suna and Yasuo of Ku-cough cough cough what the cough cough fuck! Cough cough. Alright then, Yasuo of Kumo."

"You should go on and quit to save yourself some pain, your puppets don't stand a chance against me." Yasuo said as Kankuro simply grinned.

"Not gonna happen." Kankuro replied.

"Fine, we'll do this the hard way." Yasuo said as he charged towards Kankuro, launching a flurry of kicks and punches. Kankuro managed to dodge most of them, but finally one contacted his cheek, releasing a bolt of lightning from Yasuo's fist.

As the blow made contact, the lightning passed through Kankuro's head making it explode.

Yasuo grinned at his easy victory, but quickly realized something was wrong.

"Shit! No blood, that means that-" Yasuo thought before he felt something peirce his stomach. He looked to the source of the blade to see that 'Kabuto' was now a puppet with six arms, and had a spike protruding from one of it's palms, which was buried into his stomach.

The bandaged lump on puppet Kankuro's back then unraveled to reveal the real Kankuro.

"That blade is covered in a powerful neurotoxin, you will die in five minutes if you don't get the antidote." Kankuro said as he held up a small vial. "Surrender and it's yours."

"Shit… I give up." Said Yasuo as Kankuro tossed him the vial of antidote.

"Winner is Kankuro. Cough Next match: Sai of Konoha and Nobu of Kiri!"

"Kirigakure no Jutsu." Nobu said as soon as the match began, filling the entire arena with a thick mist.

"Give up now, I have the advantage in this mist." Came Nobu's voice from everywhere at once.

"Hmm… Choju Giga." (Super beast imitation drawing) Sai said as he pulled out a brush and a notepad before doodling furiously. After a second or two, several small ink rats ran off his notepad and into the mist.

After a moment, Sai made another drawing and said "Choju Giga." As 2 ink lions ran off of his pad and into the mist. Soon, screams were heard before Nobu ran out of the mist and right into Sai, who pinned him to the ground with his Kodachi.

"It's over." Sai said simply as Hayate called the match.

"Ino Yamanaka of Konoha and Masaso of Kiri!"

"You're going down!" Ino yelled out as the two made their way to the floor.

"As if you weak bitch!" Masaso replied.

Hayate then began the match before Masaso went through some hand seals. "Suiton: Teppodama!"

Masaso shot out 3 balls of water towards Ino, who dodged them all with ease.

"Hmph, is that all you got?!" Ino shouted out before pulling several kunai and throwing them at her.

Masaso dodged the kunai without problems before she did another set of hand seals.

"Suiton: Teppodama!" She yelled out as she fired a single water ball at Ino, who once again dodged it.

Just as Ino landed on the ground again, Masaso appeared in front of her.

"Nighty night bitch." She said as she punched Ino in the face and knocked her out.

"Winner: Masaso. Cough Now then, congratulations on all of those who passed. In one months time, we will meet at the stadium in the village for the final round. Now that you have all seen the skills of your potential opponents, you can spend this month off training and preparing yourself for the next round." Hayate said as everyone began to file out of the arena.

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Not my best work here, but it is tiring trying to write so many fights that aren't really important to the plot, yet need to be mentioned. Anyways, I hope you enjoyed.

I have a poll up on my profile concerning Naruto's relationship, I have my own opinion but I will consider what the reader's want as well.