Chapter Thirteen – 'Zero Hour'

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In this exciting episode of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream', The 7 Fighters go to take the first part of the Chunin Exams. Naruto's in the house!

I've also done a bit of tightening up of some of the chapters, in particular the last one. A few timeline contradictions here and there, and the flashback scene in the previous chapter reads far better. I think I still need to be more consistent on the spelling of Hyuga though (or is it Hyuuga).

It would seem that breaking the 60k word count for the story helped significantly, as I am now at over 32k hits, 226 Favorites and 210 Alerts. This is also the first chapter to break the 8k word count, although just barely in this case. That said, thanks all who read and review!

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When Nagato first infiltrated six Hidden Villages, he had to start off by building a support base. Roping in Suna and Ame spies alike helped him gather intel at the beginning for those who would be most apt to join underneath the banner of the Akatsuki.

From Iwa, he had managed to secure the support of demolitions expert Deidara Kurei and a kenjutsu legend, Fuchi Kuroi. They both later went nukenin, however, with the latter taking the surname of Ankoku, so Nagato had to find somebody less suspecting to take over in Iwa. He would find a regular jonin who served an administrative position in the research and development department to head the Iwa Akatsuki brotherhood.

In Kiri, home to the first jinchuuriki Kage, who had just taken the reigns of the seat from the Nidaime Mizukage, with a second jinchuuriki in his early teens, the red-headed Rinnegan wielder found several more talented kenjutsu wielders. Hoshigaki Kisame and Enshoku Ebicha were the two most influential ones that he could find. However, both of them being members of the Kiri no Shinobigatana Nananin Shu, they were far too high-profile to trust management of the Akatsuki branch to, merely membership. He eventually settled for handing control over to a minor member of the Koori clan.

Kumo was a tough nut to crack, as both the Sandaime and the Yondaime Raikages were very heavy on their security, and both employed trusted assistants that would never undermine their leaders. Their cults of personalities extended throughout the village, with little dissent to be found. The best fighter Nagato could find was a young prodigy of the Konpeki clan, an archer who had recently figured out how to add elemental manipulation to his arrows. Even Aoi was more warrior than administrator, so the head of the Akatsuki in Kumogakure turned out to be yet another obscure shinobi, this one a kunoichi in her early twenties with the Tokubetsu Jonin status.

In Konoha, Nagato had the most trouble picking out a leader to head up the Akatsuki. Eventually, he settled with one Hyuga Chokkan, a branch member who had managed to become powerful even with the Caged Bird Seal present on his forehead. From Konoha there was a wealth of supporters, spawned from the aftermath of the Kyuubi attack, but few were at the skill level of some of the other ninja he had recruited from the other hidden villages. Still, there was a pool of talent, and he took aside several of them to train them, as best as he could with his attention stretched in seven different directions. One such candidate was a Yakushi Kabuto, a young medic-nin in training. When Kabuto was approached by Orochimaru to become a spy for Oto, playing a quasi-double agent, Nagato encouraged him and taught him in the ways of espionage so Orochimaru would be none the wiser. Kabuto would later pick up a minor lackey, one Touju Mizuki, who would also be converted to the Akatsuki.

As the years went by, when the Kyuubi jinchuuriki Uzumaki Naruto joined Akatsuki, Nagato's alter-ego in Konoha had to slowly ease the idea of his presence to those who called themselves brothers and sisters in the Leaf Village. Particularly resistant at first were the twin chunins, Goma and Kinako Kushi, Mizuki, and the ANBU known as Kawauso, who had refused to give his true name or ever show his true face. It was to be expected; after all, the Kyuubi no Kitsune was the only bijuu who had been able to actively cause destruction in the last century, and Konoha had strong memories of the beast's devastating deeds.

It had been difficult and at times became a bitter fight, but Naruto had ultimately been able to win over all of those who naturally distrusted them. Nagato however still had trouble with Naruto himself, as the young blonde was often quite bitter and prone to fits of depression at the daunting hand that life had dealt him. Over time, the secret son of the Yondaime had managed to cheer up, though he was far more reserved than he apparently had been beforehand.

Eventually, Hyuga Chokkan had to drop his administrative duties with the Akatsuki as the Main House of the Hyuga reared its eye and decided to make him the bodyguard for one of the clan elders. Nagato was forced to take over the duties for Konoha once again just as he was able to wind down his alter-ego in the other villages. It took him another few years before he could finally find somebody who would be able to work as a leader; the jinchuuriki, Naruto Uzumaki. At the time, the boy was nine, and would not be able to make heads or tails out of paperwork.

However, Naruto exuded a strange sort of charisma, one which even Nagato himself found he was being pulled into. As Naruto had since converted those who disliked him over to his side, Nagato had no worries about internal strife. It was after a year of administrative training that Nagato finally turned his duties over again, this time to the Uzumaki. In hindsight, he would class this decision as a smart one, as many major events of the future would seem to revolve around Uzumaki Naruto.

---

Although the Chunin Exams were always an economic boon for the village that was hosting it, the vast majority of foreigners who came to watch always came around for the third and final exam; which was reasonable, considering the first two exams were usually private. Hence, it was with little fanfare that a half dozen teams arrived from Sunagakure three days before the beginning of the exams. The instructors for the team was led by the famed Baki no Yaiba, creator of the Kaze no Yaiba, who had taken on the three children of Sabaku no Akira.

Four of the teams were there for nothing more than to gain experience from the first two exams; it was not expected that they would reach the third. The final two teams, however, were expected to be able to make it to the third and final round. This would mean that Suna genin would be participating in the public tournament, giving the Yondaime Kazekage the pretense he would require to attend the third exam, allowing him to be present for the Oto-Iwa invasion. The Suna teams would make sure to stay out of the general attention of the Konoha public, not wanting to put up with the publicity they would likely get. One Sabaku no Gaara, in particular, went straight to the hotel once he arrived in Konoha for a good nap.

Conversely, there were three Iwa teams, filled up of genin that had been in training for the last three years, who had been through gruelling drills and lectures over the last year. Their orders from their Tsuchikage were clear; kill off as many Konoha genin as they could where legal, with at least one team making it to the finals. While present in Konoha, they had to converse covertly with each other, well aware of the ANBU that would be tailing them at every turn. Meanwhile, the instructors observed and investigated the state of the village when they could get the chance to walk around, in particular taking a look at the walls and trying to identify several sectors where the infrastructure was falling apart.

There was also a single team from the new village of Otogakure. On the surface, nobody paid much attention to it. However, Konoha's top military leaders new that Oto was lead by Orochimaru, and thus had the best of the best of the ANBU watching where they went. Unlike the Iwa teams, who knew they would be watched by ANBU, the Oto team might not realize they were being watched, and could slip something up in their activities, giving the Leaf something to exploit.

Hidden amongst the general commotion was a trio of Kumo ninja, who had to be escorted directly to the Hokage so as not to alert the Hyuga clan of their presence. There, they exchanged the head of Konoha nuke-nin Kagura for a small sum of money along with several scrolls containing mid-level Earth jutsus. After confirming that they were legit, they left the village, joining up into a large complement of a dozen shinobi; after all, the Raikage would never dare send only three ninja into Fire Country territory, not when a war hawk like Danzo was around. It would be far harder to swallow the excuse that fifteen of his finest ninja happened to be ambushed on their way back from Konoha.

Still, there was some buzz over all the foreigners in town. The Sabaku children were the grandchildren of the Nidaime Kazekage, while there were still bitter memories over the Third Great Shinobi War, in which Iwagakure had nearly breached Konoha's walls on a few occasions before being pushed back permanently by the resurging Leaf forces, led by Namikaze Minato. As they could not openly make any move against them, the civilians and shinobi both settled for scowling at the Iwa ninja whenever they walked by.

Finally, word had spread throughout Konoha about the home teams that were participating; in particular, two teams made up entirely of clan heirs and heiresses, along with another team that had the heir to the Uchiha clan, for a total of three rookie teams out of the nine that had graduated in the most recent academy semester. Truly, the final tournament session was bound to be an exciting one.

---

Naruto sat up in the bed of his apartment. He looked at the clock on his wall, but didn't really need it – like any fighter from the shadows, he had long since internalized his body's time clock so he could know off-hand the relative time of day.

Within a couple of hours, he would have to be at Room 301 at the Ninja Academy. What happened there and in the exam thereafter would set the stage for the events of the third exam, the tournament, and many years to follow. He had Yahiko-sama's faith in him to uphold, and he would not screw it up. He had fine-tuned his plans with the rest of the Akatsuki, taking care not to let his thirst for revenge screw things up. He admitted it was a character flaw of his, but one he still had difficulty working with. Nevertheless, he was closely hitting zero hour with the Akatsuki's first phase in their master plan, and he would not let it control him.

He thought about what he had been entrusted by Yahiko-sama and Nagato-sama to do. It would be gut-wrenching for him to pull it off. He hated to think in terms of 'the greater good', but that had been what the Akatsuki used to justify all their scheming. Now that it was hitting home for him, it was more personal and harder to live with that phrase, but he would still do it. After all, Inori too accepted that it had to be done.

*Flashback – The Night Before*

Naruto sat across the table from the blue-hue hologram of a man with platinum-blonde hair, his hands clenched together in anxiety. "You know what I plan to do, right?" It was an entirely rhetorical question, so Naruto continued on without waiting for an answer. "I would much like to hear your thoughts on the matter."

The Yamanaka shook his head, though whether it was a casual gesture towards Naruto's request or an unconscious habit to shake off the thoughts that haunted him, the whiskered teenager was unable to tell. "In all honesty, I do not like it. I will be devastated, and it is at times like this I question what we are doing. But," here, with his hands in open sight, he made fists with them, while grinding his teeth. "But, I know it must be done. Peace must be had, even if it is through methods like these, and a small number of deaths here prevents a greater of deaths in the future." Nodding at Naruto, he finished, "Do what you must, Naruto-san. I will not hold it against you or the rest of my brothers and sisters."

Naruto sighed in relief. He genuinely liked Inori, and he did not want for the older man to lose his mind in grief at what several of the members had earlier come up with for the few Akatsuki agents that were participating as genin in the Chunin exams.

*Flashback end*

Dazedly, Naruto shook his head out of his reminiscing. He knew that he was going to be absent from Konoha for the next week thanks to the exams, so he had handed over temporary control to two brotherhood members; Hyuga Chokkan and Uchiha Raika. Their clans may have had a century-long feud, but he knew they would never let such a thing come in between co-administering of Akatsuki duties.

They were also the two who helped to temper his own attitude as they often substituted for his own duties as required, along with Kaiju Seto, and all three of them had done so even before he became the leader of Konoha's Akatsuki brotherhood at the age of ten. He was still naive in some ways; it was his charisma and his boundless determination, as well as a deep-seated paranoia about the brotherhood being discovered being by Konoha, that had made him the leader in the first place.

Compressing his body back and point his legs skyward, he allowed the recoil to push him into the air, off his bed and onto his feet. Satisfied that he was still capable of performing such a movement with ease, he turned to face the far wall. Putting his hands together in a cross-shape, he quietly whispered, "Kage Bunshin". With a wisp of smoke, an exact replica of his figure appeared. Knowing what it had been summoned for, the clone stood still, until Naruto dismissed it, with another poof of smoke being left behind.

Naruto cursed at that. He had tried for many years to fine-tune his chakra control to the point where summoning a Bunshin and getting rid of it would make it fade out into non-existence, but even now doing both caused a small amount of smoke to appear as a byproduct. The smoke was a result of leaking chakra, something which he did not like as a sensitive chakra sensor could easily pick up on that.

Shrugging the thought aside in his head for now, he decided to finally make his way out of the apartment, and off to the ninja academy. There, he would meet his teammates and participate in what he knew to be a written exam, proctored by Ibiki Morino, head of Konoha's Torture and Interrogation department.

---

As he climbed the flight of stairs going up from the first to the second floor of the ninja academy, Sasuke Uchiha reflected on the last eight months, since he had graduated from the Ninja Academy and secured a spot on Team 7. He had certainly never expected such a tumultuous ride as he had; on his first C-Class mission out of the village, his team had encountered an S-Class nuke-nin, which ended up with his first sensei losing his Sharingan eye before being replaced. In retrospect, some good at least had come out of that. Kakashi might have been a good ninja, but he was a poor instructor, and Yamato was both punctual and didn't beat around the bush when it came to training and drills.

Coming to the top of the stairs, he observed a sign saying 'Room 301', with several dozen people around it, trying to get in. The door, however, was being blocked by two people in chunin flak vests, who oddly enough looked younger than just about everyone else there, almost as if they had been chibified.

Blinking for a couple of seconds, Sasuke realised just what was going on. Quickly grabbing Naruto and Sakura by the sleeves of their clothing, he subtly moved away from the door, out of the attention of the other genins. Sakura came along quickly, but strangely enough Naruto didn't protest.

That was another thing he had not expected - Yamato had gotten him in to see a therapist. What he had seen wasn't strictly a therapist however, but rather a ninja psychologist who specialized in turning mental disorders to the ninja's advantage. Having brushed up on Sasuke's personal history beforehand, the psychologist had diagnosed him with an inferiority complex in comparison to his brother. When Sasuke had automatically responded he had no such problem, the psychologist questioned him as to whether he was liable to brag and show off in front of others.

That much was true, which Sasuke admitted to the psychologist. With that fact in the open, the psychologist pointed out that doing so gave away his own weaknesses and strengths to the enemy. It was far better, said the doctor, to stay underneath the radar.

It was food for thought that Sasuke had to digest, and he had mused over it from time to time. However, the bulk of his thoughts turned to his male teammate. Naruto. How had the whiskered blonde managed to progress so quickly once they left the academy? The Uzumaki had become stronger in leaps and bounds that Sasuke could barely keep track of, and was nearly comparable to him in overall prowess now. It made him jealous, to be honest, and he often tried to think about how Naruto was doing it.

A sudden epiphany struck his thoughts. Could Naruto have been holding back some of his skills in the Academy? It would explain a lot, as the blonde would slowly let his true strength shine. If that were the case, then just how powerful was Naruto? He hadn't shown any noticeable increase in technique in the last few weeks, so maybe he had already hit his peak. If that were the case, then he would still be weaker than Sasuke was, but he would at least provide a good challenge to fight. Truthfully, he only called the whiskered boy a dobe out of habit these days, as a semi-affectionate form of teasing.

The onyx-eyed boy let that line of thinking pass for the moment, as the trio of thirteen-year-olds that made up Team 7 made it to the real Room 301. Brushing the door open, he entered, Naruto and Sakura behind him. This should be interesting.

---

Naruto barely paid attention when Ino flew through the room and jumped on Sasuke's back, Shikamaru and Choji following behind, his only thought in the manner being gratefulness for Team Ten coming to the exam. While Sakura and Ino continued to banter at each other in a depraved manner, he scanned over the room, taking a quick estimate of over 200 genin. He quickly picked out the three Iwa teams that had come to the exam. He didn't recognize any of them, but he didn't expect to, either; the leaders of Iwa were not foolish enough to send any high-profile shinobi, instead having opted to take nine promising ninjas-in-training out of their own academy and having them go through a gruelling acceleration program so they would be leaps and bounds above other genin precisely for this exam.

Konoha would not know it, but the two teams of Ame genin who had come into the test had been trained for the exact same purpose. With the last hostility between the two nations occurring during the Second Great Shinobi War, they were unlikely to suspect the Rain Country shinobi of anything that occurred in the survival test. It was just a shame that they could not wear the regular Ame headband with the slash through the middle as those loyal to Yahiko in Amegakure usually did; it would draw attention to them here in the Hidden Leaf Village and mark them as supposed nuke-nins.

Vaguely, he noticed Inuzuka Kiba, second-in-line to the Inuzuka Clan, coming up to Teams Seven and Ten. Kiba wasn't somebody to register on his radar. However, his teammate, Aburame Shino, was. While Shikamaru was the lazy genius type, Naruto knew Shino to be quiet, but analytical of everything around him. If there was anyone in his academy class who could have seen through him, Naruto knew that it was Shino, and so he always had to be careful around the bug-user.

"You guys should quiet down," A voice came from behind the three rookie teams. Naruto perked up, recognizing the voice, and turned around to face the white-haired med-nin. Kabuto continued on, drawling his words out, "You guys are rookies fresh out of the academy, right?" Not allowing anyone a chance to answer, he pointed out the two hundred odd shinobi behind him. "All of these ninjas here have at least a year and a half of combat experience, if not more." Dropping his voice down, he added, "And not to mention there are three Iwa teams here."

Kiba piped up at that. "Yeah, so? What has Iwa got to do with this exam?"

Those present that were acquainted with history either facepalmed or gave off a sigh of exasperation at the query. Kabuto practically hissed in response. "You fool! Iwa was embarrassed by Konoha in the last war, and even today they still look for any opportunity to undermine us! Do you know that killing is usually allowed in this exam?"

Kiba paled as the implications sunk in. Naruto tuned out the rest of the chatter, looking around the room again in a lazy manner. Too bad Fū was already a Chunin. It would have been nice to get her to come to the exams and meet up with her in an unsuspecting manner. Oh well. There was always another four months from now, and the day that he would inevitably break away from Konoha.

He was broken out of his thought process by his chakra sense, which alerted him to the presence of several chunins and a few special jonins, judging by their vests. Looking to the front of the procession, he saw a man with a large nose and several scars across his face, wearing a bandana around his head. He had been warned about this man, Ibiki Morino, and his skills; while he was an excellent interrogator, he was even more skilled at observation. As Ibiki barked out orders, Naruto knew that he couldn't slip up here.

---

The regular shinobi academy taught its ninjas-in-training many things, such as taijutsu, basic ninjutsu, and how to exercise and stretch to make your body effective. However, it failed in many ways, particularly in exploiting every little quirk that your body had to offer the mind.

For an excellent example, one only needed to observe the eyeball and the muscles that surrounded the socket. An inexperienced shinobi who wanted to look to something in the side of his vision would flicker his eyes over left or right. However, there were too many theoretical situations where allowing your eyes to move around in their sockets could be detrimental. In this case, with over two dozen chunin and several members of Konoha's Torture and Interrogation branch present and observing for any possible cheating methods, it was one of those many theoretical situations. A person who could keep their eyes pointed straight forward, while still being able to read words on the sheet to his left or right or below him by looking out of the side of his eye, without slipping up, would be a natural to pass the test. Most people were using chakra techniques, expending gross amounts of detectable energy that would have seen them kicked out immediately if this was for a jonin or ANBU examination. Being able to look out of the side of one's eye was a useful technique, and was nearly indetectable; only a slight movement and growth of the pupil indicated that a person was doing this, as their sclera was still facing the direction they were watching.

In Naruto's case, however, he was using it to observe the girl who sat right next to him: Hyuga Hinata. Originally she and her team had not been in his plans for the upcoming exams, being too high-profile of a target. However, he had not expected her to be sitting right next to him, and this was a golden opportunity. In this first exam he had a couple of allies he could use, and he could exploit Hinata's own nervousness and her obsessive crush on him to his advantage. It was while he was giving off nervous glances at his paper, all the while chewing his pencil, that he caught the telltale movement of the Hyuuga heiress' head, looking towards him and his paper both. This was far too perfect.

Continuing with his pretense of being nervous, he looked around the room at the different proctors. Finally, he allowed his gaze to sweep past the pair of Izumo and Kotetsu, both there to help proctor the exam. They understood perfectly, and all he got was a pair of quick eyeblinks in return. No nod was imperceptible to an elite like Ibiki, but a few seconds of rapid eyeblinking in response to an examinee looking at the proctors was nothing to be suspicious of.

A few minutes later, a kunai flew right past Naruto's face, forcing him to jump up in his seat as a pretense of surprise, while it landed right beside him, pinning Hinata's paper to the desk. The Byakugan wielder let out a short 'Eep' before facing the proctor who had failed her. Ah, good old Izumo. Hiashi would undoubtedly learn who had failed his daughter and give him hell for doing so, but the pay-off was so much more satisfying. Him and Kotetsu could be clowns at times, such as down on the second floor earlier, but they always would get serious and perform the job to satisfaction when they were needed.

"Number 123, fail!" Izumo barked out in a no-nonsense voice. "Take your team and get out of here." With wry amusement Naruto noted that a couple of the other proctors looked at their fellow chunin with surprise. It would seem that certain Konoha teams were automatically earmarked to go onto the next round regardless of what they did during the first exam (because in all honesty, that Team Eight hadn't already been thrown out for Akamaru constantly barking on top of Kiba's head was ridiculous), and Izumo had violated the list.

Naruto wasn't a total machine, though. He did take pity on Hinata as a forlorn look crossed her face, before utter defeat took over her body posture, her shoulders slumped and head down as she got up, the sounds of two other chairs scraping along the floor indicating her teammates leaving as well. From what he knew, Hyuuga Hiashi was a ruthless bastard, and that his daughter was the one who failed her team in the first exam was a fact that would not escape his attention. Still...

Sorry, Hinata, Naruto offered to her in his thoughts, But a large amount of the branch family likes you. The Hyuuga divided is better than the Hyuuga united. As if gaining a sudden bout of inspiration, a look of understanding crossed his face. Snapping his fingers, he quickly picked up his pencil and started to write down some barely adequate answers for three of the questions. He knew his teammates would have been watching him for a few minutes after Hinata was thrown out, so it would be best to show them that he had seemingly been able to answer a few questions in a stroke of thought. That way they would not worry when it came to the final question if he chose to stay.

---

Unbeknownst to Naruto, his female teammate at least somewhat suspected what he had done. Did he just do what I think he did? Sakura thought to herself. It was certainly possible; since they had graduated from the Academy, Naruto had shown himself to have minor skills in deception, and in the past eight months some of his actions seemed to show a ruthlessness she had never known he possessed. It did not seem out of his scope to know about Hinata's crush on him, and use that to lure her into a trap of looking right at his paper, getting docked marks for what seemed to be an obvious display of cheating. With Hinata gone, what looked to be one of the most dangerous teams in the competition was out for good.

The pink-haired girl let out a short shudder at that. Naruto must have been at least somewhat acting in the Academy, she thought to herself, chewing on her lip as she went over several incidents in her head. Truthfully, I don't think anyone could have ever been that energetic and optimistic all the time. He must have felt that if we knew how merciless he could be when it was necessary, we would shun him, and we ended up shunning him anyways when he started acting like a clown. Oh Naruto. Quite fortunate for Naruto, Sakura didn't go any further in her deductive reasoning. After all, Naruto was still Naruto – it wasn't like he was more ruthless than he was cheerful, right?

---

The tenth question went as planned for Naruto, as he turned his head back to face both of his teammates. He nodded to signal to them that he planned to stay, and so they fell into line with his own will. Following the first exam, which only fifty-four people passed, Ibiki Morino gave the chunin hopefuls an explanation of the purpose of the test. It was nothing that Naruto was not already used to, having dedicated his life's work so far to Yahiko-sama's goals.

They were currently out in front of the gates that blocked off access to Training Ground 44, more commonly known as the Forest of Death. Taking a glance at the purple-haired proctor for the survival test, who he had identified as being one Mitarashi Anko, the former protégé of Orochimaru before the Snake Sannin defected from Konoha, he suppressed a shiver. That girl scared her. She was worse than Fū was when provoked, having thrown a kunai at a Mist genin who had made a snarky comment in response to her warnings about the Forest of Death, before licking the blood off of his cheek.

Afterwards, she started handing out some waiver forms, again trying to scare the genin participants. Naruto looked off to his female teammate, and saw Sakura shivering at Anko's presence. Fearing what she might do in current state, Naruto squeezed her shoulder. When she turned to him, he gave her a reassuring look, which she let out a small smile to. It was good that she so easily responded to that; if she had a realistic idea of what would be going on in the Forest soon, she would probably have dropped away in a dead faint, which would disqualify them before they could set foot into the Forest of Death.

Half an hour later, they were finally in the Forest of Death, with an Earth Scroll in their possession, held by Sasuke, while both Sakura and Naruto each held a rock Henged to look like a Heaven Scroll. Sasuke stopped the other two for a team huddle, and asked, "What should we do? Should we try to make it to the tower right away, or hang back and gauge the strength of the other teams?"

Sakura was quick to answer. "They might have something else for us to do at the tower, but I can't imagine they would administer it to each of us individually. More than likely they'll wait until the end of five days to do it, so if we get there quicker, we have more time to rest up than several others will."

The trio traded remarks and comments; in particular was the worrying fact that the Iwa ninja were likely out to target Sasuke. After a while, Sasuke finally finished with a 'Hnn'. "So it's decided then, we'll try to find another team to get their scroll, and make it to the center of the forest as soon as possible. I'm not good at recon, though, so did Yamato teach either of you anything to help us around the forest?"

Naruto snapped his fingers, drawing the attention of the other two. Interjecting in the conversation, he quickly explained, "Yamato-sensei explained to me the original purpose of the Kage Bunshin. Rather than using it to spam bodies against an opponent like I once used it for, shinobi used it for scouting purposes. What a Kage Bunshin learns is sent back to its creator once it is dispersed, allowing me to scout several areas at once. For fighting purposes, I can send a clone to learn a person's strengths and weaknesses without fighting them in the flesh."

Sasuke was quite impressed at finding that out. Knowing just how many clones the blonde could summon, he responded, "What are you waiting for then, dobe? Make some and send them out."

Naruto tossed a foxy smirk to his Uchiha teammate. "As you will." Putting his fingers together in a cross shape, he quietly whispered, "Kage Bunshin no Jutsu", before coughing on the amount of smoke that appeared. Once the smoke had dispersed, there were well over a hundred dark-clad bodies. To Sasuke and Sakura's surprise, very few of them were actual visual replicas of Naruto; most of them had darker hair and eye colors, along with different facial features. Neither of the two were aware that Naruto had gone so far as being able to summon several clones with their features changed. However, for reconnaissance duties, it made sense to do such a thing, so the targets that would be scouted out would not recognize Naruto's clones.

The whiskered blonde looked at his clones, before barking out orders, "All of you, pair up in groups of two. Split off into two pairs per group. The first pair should mark another team's location, while the second pair should try to observe what each genin does and his or her strengths and weaknesses." The clones quickly took off in response to his commands; not that the verbal orders were needed, as they were summoned knowing exactly what he wanted. He had just said his piece for Sakura and Sasuke's sake.

Of course, twelve of the clones knew that they had different orders to fulfill. Four of them in particular knew they had to bury what emotions they possessed as clones for their mission.

---

Shikamaru never more than now cursed the fact that he was lazy and had let his physical stature go away. A fit adolescent had on average a lower heart rate and better blood circulation than an inactive one. He unfortunately fell into the latter category, and now his hearing was almost completely gone, blocked out by the wild pounding of blood in his head.

It was one of the few times his game plan had failed him. He had keenly observed all of the teams that remained after the first exam at the academy. Oto, Iwa, Suna, Kiri...he had analyzed their behaviours and mannerisms. He thought he had figured all of them out. Most of them were bloodthirsty, but were mainly interested in the pursuits of strong enemies. Team 7, with Sasuke in it, and the one Suna team, with the children of Kuroisuna no Akira, were the prize targets, weren't they? The three Iwa teams might have banded up together to eliminate as many Konoha-nin as they could, but they had been placed on opposite sides of the forest. It would have taken them at least twelve hours to meet up and put their plans into motions if that was the case.

He hadn't accounted for meeting an opponent that was apparently as vicious and ruthless as this one was. Whoever it was, he or she was merciless. Shikamaru only now realized that he had overestimated his analystical skills, and underestimated just how far a ninja could discard his emotions to satisfy the mission. Nobody with any sort of conscience...nobody...nobody could have killed in cold blood with no apparent justification.

Ino had been the first of the three to fall. They had been stumbling around the forest, trying to find a cave to hideout or the hollow base of a dead tree, and she had complained of a sting in her chest. Minutes later, she slumped over, suddenly dead. In shock, Shikamaru didn't think to get himself and Choji out of there with her body. Instead, he had stood there, trying to figure out the cause of death. It took a bit, but he finally found the reason: A senbon straight through the heart.

It had taken him minutes to deduce that from the small bloodstain on the front and back of her battle dress, and the very small puncture in the fabric on both sides. To his horror, he had taken too long to analyze the wound, because then Choji had started complaining of an itch around his left breastbone. It was one of the few times that Shikamaru had panicked in his life, and quite possibly would be the last time. He had grabbed Choji by the arm and high-tailed it out of the clearing they were in, trying to get underneath some tree-cover.

Running only killed his portly friend quicker, forcing the heart to pump blood quicker. This also had the effect of giving Choji a dose of the pain before he succumbed to the same method of assassination that Ino had. Shikamaru was unsure whether he would survive long enough to ever sleep again, but if he did, he knew that the Akimichi's twisted face and glassy eyes would haunt his dreams.

Now...now his only hopes for survival lied in utilizing one of the Nara Clan's most secret techniques. The Nara were well known for being able to manipulate their shadows and the shadows of others, but above all they were ninja, and ninja were to not be seen. The pinnacle of their skills was being able to hide in the shadows, wrapping a cloak of darkness around their bodies. It was this that he was using to stand up against the base of a great tree, using to mask his presence and make himself invisible in the shadow of the great tree.

If Shikamaru had had a little more training in thinking under pressure before being put in the exams, he would have been able to push above his panic and think properly. As it was, he would have realized that all he did was block off visible light rays from revealing his position. Any enemy who was capable of seeing chakra emissions, or in other parts of the light spectrum, could still see him. Any enemy could still hear his heavy breathing, or the pounding of his heart. Any enemy could smell the sweat dripping down his forehead. A rare few would even be able to taste the palpable taste of fear on the air. As it was, he had broken under pressure. The only condolence he would have was that, distracted as he was, he would not feel the same sting and itch that his teammates had, and death would come to him before he saw its advent. All he would see that was out of the ordinary was a small puff of smoke coming from a tree branch a few dozen meters away.

He would never feel as another clone came around, using a kunai and several obscure jutsu to desecrate his corpse, making it look as if he had been attacked by an animal. He would never again be able to watch the quiet drifting of fluffy white clouds, as Choji noisily ate fried potato chips beside him all while avoiding Ino's nagging for them to get to work. Never again.

---

Eh, I originally had a much lengthier author's note down here but decided to trim it down. Still, some explanations.

Killing off Team 10 has been something I've been planning since the start of the story. The various Akatsuki characters have been nattering on about sabotage and so forth for so long that it was finally nice for me to show where I get off by having the summary state the story is Dark!Naruto other than him just being angst a lot. You'll see in Chapter 3 that Naruto looked like he was building camaraderie with Team 10. Of course it would probably hurt Naruto to have to do this, but nobody will ever suspect him of killing Team 10 since he was their friend.

For in-verse motivation, this wasn't random either. Naruto did it for several reasons; first of all, Shikamaru is the heir to a clan of geniuses, Ino is the heiress to a clan of mind-probers, and Choji is the heir to the Akimichi clan, who I guess makes military rations and soldier pills? In any case, the loss of two clan heirs and an heiress will devastate the respective clans, thus dropping their morale, and each clan will have to train a specific person to take over as clan head (even with my "a clan has more than one family line" world the heirs and heiresses would still be taught in all the clan techniques as well as politics and finance, while others might only learn part of the clan's skills). Furthermore, losing his entire team will demoralize Asuma, which by proxy will devastate his father, Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Sandaime, not to mention the politics of it – sending three rookie genin into a test where killing is allowed. He would have done Team 8, but Hinata is far too high-profile, and Naruto would be wary of trying to take out a team that is geared to reconnaissance, particularly with Shino, who has kikai bugs that might be able to pass on a message after death.

Lastly, Naruto can do it NOW because there are genin teams from Iwa, Konoha's sworn enemy, and Konoha will automatically assume the Iwa team did the act, and never actually try to see if that is true or not, so great their hate will be. It also means that if I killed off Team 10 you now know that I actually have the balls to kill off major canon characters, and are probably quickly thinking over who else I might kill off, and when.

Also, to clarify on how Naruto killed Team 10; he threw a senbon through their hearts. They barely felt the bleeding and died before they even realized what was happening, as their heart was losing its life blood. This is somewhat based on a real assassination, that of Elisabeth of Bavaria, who was stabbed in the heart with a nail file, never realizing that she was dying before she died (hers was different, though; she had a tight corset on, so when she loosened it all the blood that had gathered in her heart burst out, killing her nearly instantly). When Konoha finds their bodies, they will first assume it was animals. If they figure out the real cause of death (if of course real animals haven't eaten a large part of their bodies by then) then they will assume Iwa did it.

I'm not quite sure if I did the beginning part right with the first exam. Basically, with your vision, you can see out of the side of your eye without actually moving your eyeball around. The Hyuuga can use the Byakugan to achieve a similar effect, except they can see all around and have more focus in the 'side' of their eyes. Naruto was pretending to have trouble with the exam so that Hinata would forget the situation in her worry over him and actually physically turn her head to look at him and, more importantly, his exam paper. Looking at someone else's exam paper is obvious cheating, so she looks at his paper either on five separate occasions or long enough to count for five marks docked off to get thrown out of the test. As for why Naruto did it, he hints at it in his own POV during the exam; she will be shamed for having failed the first exam, and if the main family begins to look down on her even more while the branch family likes her it causes internal divisions. Similar results go for Kiba and Shino, but to lesser extents since it will be well-known that it was not them that was responsible for failing the first exam, and as I have written it neither of them are clan heirs, so less pressure for them to excel.

Kabuto didn't do his ninja-cards thing or bait the Sound ninjas because he's actually trying to stay fairly inconspicuous here.

Starting next chapter I'll probably start writing up short mini-profiles for the various spies working under the Akatsuki, particularly all the members I mention in Konoha.