Disclaimer: Still don't own Naruto.

Chapter 11

Team 8's Showdown: Hinata Shines!

Medal Count so Far:
Sand Team: 9

Team 8: 4

Team 6: 3

Team 9: 3

Team 10: 3

Shino's bugs struggled silently with the tree that Satame was trying to crash down on them. Hinata watched by, paralyzed.

"Grr… Bug-boy Aburame, you are getting on my last nerve!" Satame shouted, bringing his other telekinetically levitated tree and swinging it at them horizontally. The strike caught both Hinata and Shino and sent them flying across the clearing. Shino slammed into a tree, but before he could fall down to the ground, Satame shot a beam of green after him, which hit him and began to spread. Soon, Shino was being contained in a green sphere attached to the tree.

Shino punched the sphere, then released his bugs upon it, but to no result.

"I can't get out… you have to defeat him, Hinata. That will release it." Shino said, sitting down in the green prison.

Hinata nodded. Could she do it? She hoped she could. She had to show how much she had improved, but this guy…

Satame's eyes narrowed, and he suddenly looked dangerous.

"I know about you, girl… you're the Hyuuga heiress, the one who they call a failure. Neji… yes, your cousin, he's the only Hyuuga I want to fight, he's the prodigy! You're just a nobody! This world isn't determined by family and blood, but by pure skill! I'm proof of that! I wasn't born into one of Konoha's precious clans with their Kekkai Genkai's and special clan jutsus, but I've proven that we can still be strong!" Satame exclaimed, "You, Hyuuga heiress, your kind is the epitome of what I hate."

"Y…you're wrong…" Hinata said softly, "I may have been born into the main branch, but thanks to Neji and N-Naruto… I decided to work hard, and I've invented my own style!"

Satame nodded slowly.

"All right… so you do know something of hard work after all… I know what it's like, to work so hard to invent your own jutsu, just to have people downplay it in comparison to those of a clan's, or Kekkai Genkai's! This will be a good fight between us two who have had to work hard to get where we are! Now don't hold back!" Satame exclaimed.

Hinata nodded, taking her stance. She wouldn't lose this, she told herself.

Hinata gasped as Satame swung both of his trees at her. Leaping in the nick of time, she pushed off of one of them, propelling herself towards her opponent, her hand extended for a Gentle Fist blow…

Satame, however, had other plans. After making three hand signs, he held out his hands towards the incoming Hinata.

"Satame Style: Telekinetic Blast!"

An invisible blast of Telekinetic energy shot out, hitting Hinata out of the air. She fell to the ground on her back, stunned.

"Satame Style: Telekinetic Wood Spears!" Satame shouted.

The two trees suddenly split themselves into hundreds of smaller wood spears, surrounding the fallen Hinata, and then shooting forward from all sides…

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"Double Wolf Fang!" Kiba's voice rang as the two-headed monster started spinning towards Dorusake.

"Earth Style: Stone Spire Shield!" Dorusake said, more stone spires coming out of the ground, reinforcing his barrier, making it thicker and thicker.

Kiba impacted the first set of stone spires, snapping them in a matter of seconds. Dorusake's face was dripping with sweat as he raised spire after spire in front of him to block the attack, but Kiba kept coming.

"He's snapping the stone like twigs!" Dorusake thought in amazement as his second to last layer crumbled. He couldn't raise anymore, because he had nowhere else to raise them; the last layer was just in front of him.

As the spinning tornado of death pierced through the last layer, Dorusake tried to leap aside- but he still got hit by the edge of it, sending him flying against a tree. His axe was still in the ground where it had been as Kiba came out of the spin, he and Akamaru un-transforming back to their normal selves.

"How do you like that?" Kiba asked.

Dorusake stood weakly.

"See, I figured you out." Kiba said, "While using your jutsu, you never moved once. I figured that to maintain your jutsu, you had to stand still so you could channel your chakra through something- your axe, am I right?"

"You got one part right." said Dorusake, "I can't move while using my jutsu. But it wasn't my axe…"

Dorusake's feet began to glow green.

"It was my feet! Earth Style, Spire Prison Jutsu!" he yelled.

Kiba gasped as huge spires shot up around him, leaving gaps too small for him to get through, and the top solidified over his head. Dorusake held out his arms to his axe, which floated up from the ground and shot over to him, where he caught it.

"I'll make your death swift." he said, "Earth Style, Piercing Execution!'

Spires popped out of the ground from outside the prison, shooting through the gaps and impaling Kiba.

Who exploded in a puff of smoke and turned into a log.

"What? Since when?" Dorusake exclaimed, looking around.

A shadow darted behind him, and he swung his axe at it- but he hit nothing. He turned as he heard footsteps, seeing Kiba charging at him with claws and a feral look about him, claws rending. Bringing his axe around, he smashed through the Inuzuka- only to find he had disappeared.

A sudden kick from behind sent him sprawling forward on the ground, his axe falling away from him. A Kiba appeared in front of him, punching him upward in the jaw, so he flew upwards. Then the real Kiba appeared above him.

"I can't believe I'm actually copying a move off of that idiot Naruto… but hey, if it works, why not?" Kiba said, starting to deliver punch after punch to Dorusake's chest and stomach as they began to fall towards the ground, "Kiba Inuzuka Barrage!"

When they were about ten feet above the ground, Kiba kicked Dorusake with his feet, propelling himself further in the air, where he turned and went into a Gatsuuga. The spinning attack collided with Dorusake just as he hit the ground, sending dust flying everywhere. Akamaru barked in dismay as the force of the attack sent him flying backwards into a tree.

When the dust cleared, Kiba was revealed standing beside a crater, in which an unconscious Dorusake was at the bottom. He held a medal in his hand that glinted in the sunlight.

"We did it, Akamaru!" Kiba exclaimed, his dog yipping in excitement.

"Now, let's go find the others." he said, then, "I've got to come up with another name for my new move, so it doesn't seem like I completely ripped off Sasuke and Naruto…"

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The spears launched at her from all sides as she stood, her Byakugan barely recognizing the fact in time. She quickly brought her arms up, hoping this would work.

"Protection of the Eight Trigrams, Sixy-Four Palms!" she said, her arms moving in a circular motion, sending out chakra darts rapidly. Each time the dart hit one of the spears it deflected it ever so slightly so that instead of launching at Hinata it fell to the ground. But there's so many…

Hinata willed her arms to move faster, to catch all of the projectiles before it was too late… even so, one of them got through her defense, piercing her in the shoulder.

"Impressive… but you still got hurt." Satame said, "This time I'll do three trees!"

Three more trees lifted out of the ground in the same fashion as before, with a green aura around them, the trunks breaking into wooden spears, and firing straight at Hinata.

She thrust her own arms forward rapidly, shooting darts at the projectiles as quickly as she could. For a second they were at a stalemate, then as Hinata began to tire, the stream of wooden spears began to advance towards her. Finally she got fed up of shooting them down one by one and threw a kunai with an exploding tag, jumping out of the way.

While the cover of smoke was up, Hinata ran at Satame, thrusting her arms forward for Gentle Fist. However, the enemy leaf-nin must have sensed her, because he jumped to a tree branch to the side just as Hinata was about to strike him.

"You'll have to…" Satame said, out of breath, "Do better than- ugh!"

Satame coughed blood as two Chakra darts from Hinata had pierced his heart and lung.

"I see… you really have invented your own style." Satame said, "You can fire those like projectiles, similar to the Hyuuga Gentle Fist, but not as strong. It still closes my Chakra points and causes internal damage, though." Satame coughed again.

Hinata fired more darts at the branch he was standing on, snapping it. Satame tumbled to the ground.

"Don't think I'm out just yet!" he said, "My ultimate attack: Satame Style, Telekinetic Tornado!"

Satame lifted his hands, and five trees burst into pieces, spinning around and around as Satame willed them into a deadly cyclone of debris, heading towards Hinata. She tried to run around it, and avoid it, but it kept blocking her off or following her wherever she ran.

"You see, this attack is both defensive and offensive." he said, "You won't survive if you get caught in it!"

"Th-that's what you think!" Hinata said, running forward, her hands moving, straight into the tornado.

"What? Does she have a death wish?" thought Satame, "Oh well. It's over now."

But it wasn't over. A figure sprang form the tornado of debris, right at Satame, who was too surprised to dodge.

"Gentle Fist!" she called as she struck him in the heart, releasing a huge burst of chakra. Satame's heart skipped a beat from the strike, and he fell to the ground, coughing blood.

"It's over." she said, taking his medal off his neck.

"H-how?" Satame asked.

Hinata smiled weakly. Now that he thought about it, she looked extremely battered too.

"I… I formed a kind of shield with my chakra in front of me to shield from most of the attack… even so, I still got hit from the side and back pretty hard." she said. "I wouldn't have done it… if not for Naruto…. it was like something he would have done; taking a hit in order to win."

Satame coughed again.

"This Naruto person… he seems pretty important to you."

Hinata nodded.

"Well… I'm sure he'd be proud of you today." Satame said, still coughing.

Hinata smiled back and blushed slightly, thinking of Naruto. The thought made her feel faint- or was it just the beating she took from running into the tornado?

She could hear Shino dropping down from the tree, freed as Satame grew weaker. He ran over to her and caught her as she fell, carrying her somewhere, probably back to the campsite.

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"Shino, she's awake!"

"Yip! Yip!"

"…"

Hinata passed slowly into consciousness, seeing Kiba and Akamaru's concerned faces hovering over her. She sat up quickly, looking around. Shino was sitting a ways away from the fire.

"You ok, Hinata?" Kiba asked.

"Kiba…" she murmured, "Yes, I think so. Did you win?"

Kiba laughed.

"Of course! It was easy!" he said, then seemed to grow serious. "Shino told me about your fight, Hinata. I never thought you would have been able to beat somebody that Shino couldn't. He made it quite clear who did all the work."

"…" Shino was still silent.

"O-oh…" Hinata murmured, "But, you did save me at first… right Shino?"

"I'd rather not talk about it." Shino said.

"See? Shino isn't perfect after all!" Kiba said, getting barks of agreement from Akamaru, "I was right all along! He's just embarrassed because he got stuck in that guy's trap."

Hinata felt around her neck, feeling two medals. She sighed in relief.

"Yeah… we still have to get one more set… but we have four more days. You should rest for now, Hinata."

"We'll just head towards the tower and look for medals on the way." said Shino, "It shouldn't be too hard, considering how fast we found our first set with our scouting skills."

"Ok… let's do that…" Hinata said.

"After you rest." Kiba insisted.

"Ok…"

Hinata laid back down, thinking as she began to doze. Would Naruto really have been proud of her today?

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Medal Count So Far:
Sand Team: 9
Team 8: 9 (It's implied that they just go and find three more with their scouting abilities)

Team 6: 3

Team 9: 3

Team 10: 3

Next Time: I never thought I would see the day, when Neji was having trouble defeating an opponent and I, Rock Lee, the Green Beast of Konoha, would have to come to the rescue! Yosh!

The Power of Youth Explodes in the next chapter! R&R please!