A/N – PLEASE CHECK THE A/N IN BOTTOM! R/R! Thank You ! Love - me :)
Chapter 9 - Preliminaries!
Team 7 was sitting in the cafeteria. There were two other teams in there – Lee's team and Kabuto's team. While Naruto ate, Sakura and Sasuke thought about things. Sasuke thought about the team they had ran into ten minutes ago and Sakura thought about the nine tailed fox – The Kyuubi, which was inside of her team mate.
"So how do you think they got here?" Naruto asked, gulping down his tea.
"Huh?" Sakura asked, her eyes going focused again.
"How did the sound ninjas get here," Naruto repeated, "I saw how wounded they were in the forest."
"Oh them," Sakura spoke softly, before shrugging. "No idea."
"Aren't you worried?" Naruto enquired now, looking at her.
"Why should I be? They're just another team in the exams. No big deal."
Sasuke and Naruto stared.
"Someone had to help them," Sasuke then spoke up, trying to shrug off the feeling that something was wrong here.
"Yeah, they couldn't have healed that fast by themselves," Naruto agreed.
Kin, Dosu and Zaku had made it to the third round. They were completely healed and team 7 knew for a fact that they hadn't been in the hospital wing not once. Sakura suspected that there was someone in the woods working for Orochimaru. That someone would've had to help out the villagers from the sound. Right?
There were a lot of questions Sakura wanted to ask. Like what happens with Sound? Who will become the next leader? Will people be informed that Orochimaru was killed by the three of them? What will the sound villagers do when they find out that their leader has been killed by leaf genins. Would they start a war?
Sakura sighed out loud, gaining a weird look from Sasuke and Naruto, who had been heatedly discussing something.
"Are you okay?" Naruto asked.
"Fine," she replied. "I'm going for a walk outside, okay?"
"Okay," Naruto said, grinning as he ate some more.
"Hn," Sasuke replied, looking at her. "The exam starts in midday at the main room."
Sakura nodded slightly. She glanced at the clock. It was 10:30. There was time.
She slowly walked out of the tower. She looked around. The forest was beautiful around the tower. Of course, now that she was safe from it, she was allowed to think so. She definitely didn't think that while battling for her life.
She breathed some fresh air as she moved around the tower. The area which was safe wasn't that big, but she found a good spot to sit. She stared at the cloud, wondering what the third exam could be. Suddenly she felt a strong chakra approaching. She couldn't exactly hear the person, but her newly found and improved instincts picked up the trail of chakra.
"Hm." Sakura looked around. Who could've said that? She didn't see anyone.
Sakura peeked through the branches below her and yelled out in surprise. She almost fell down the tree she had been sitting on. Gaara was hanging upside-down on a branch near the one she had been sitting on.
"Invisibility jutsu?" Sakura asked when her heart started beating again. Damn, she needed to train the whole chakra feeling thingy.
Gaara nodded, climbing fully on a branch and staring into the distance. Sakura rolled her eyes inwardly. He comes here, sits on the same tree she was sitting and yet he doesn't speak a single word? She'll get him to talk. She made an oath to bring him out of his shell and she'd keep that oath. Or die trying. From the look on Gaara's face and from the stories Kiba had told her last night, both were possible.
"So what are you doing in my tree?"
Gaara looked up at her. His knees were brought to his chest as he leaned against the trunk, seemingly having no trouble keeping his balance. But then again, Sakura was sitting in the same position.
He didn't say anything. Sakura kept looking at him. He looked back.
"Sitting," he finally spoke, turning his eyes back towards the forest in front of them.
The two of them were sitting on the highest tree near the tower. Sakura was sitting almost in the top, where the number of branches was thinning. If she had tried hard enough, she could've jumped onto the ledge near the third floor. Gaara was about a foot or two below her, but still about fifteen feet from ground.
Sakura sighed and looked at the clouds. If Gaara didn't want to talk, she wouldn't make him. But if he didn't want to talk, why was he here in the first place?
A minute passed. Or maybe two or even three. Sakura didn't have a wristwatch, you know and you can't very well tell minutes by the sun.
"Do you know?"
Sakura looked down in surprise. Gaara was still staring far above the forests, his gaze unfocused. The wind was slightly picking up and the leaves were rustling a bit. His red hair was being ruffled by the wind but he didn't seem to notice at all.
She didn't know what to say. She knew what he was talking about of course, but she had no foolproof answer. Sakura bit her lip and glanced at the boy once again.
"Maybe," she answered carefully, "Would you want me to know?"
It took another minute before Sakura saw him shake his head. "No."
"Why not?" She shifted in her position and used a bit of her chakra so she could do so without falling of the treetop. She was now lying on her stomach, looking straight down at Gaara's red head. She couldn't see the look on his face, but she assumed he wasn't in the happiest mood.
Again with the waiting. It seemed that Gaara contemplated every thought extra carefully. Finally he spoke,
"You'd run. Just like everybody else would."
He seemed so sure of it. Sakura felt anger start appearing inside her once again. Still, she didn't let it show. Instead, she said,
"Well, if you haven't noticed yet, I'm not like everybody else. I have pink hair. See?" She flung her hair around a bit. Gaara looked up at her. He didn't smile. He didn't even smirk. Instead he looked grave.
"You don't understand," he said, his eyes narrowing into the position they were when Sakura saw him in the bathroom this morning. "I… I am not normal. I'm a freak. Nobody wants to be friends with a freak. Nobody."
"And you know how?" Sakura asked, suddenly jumping down a branch. She was still higher than he was, but not that much anymore. She looked straight at Gaara, not breaking eye contact for once. The wind tousled her hair as well, but she didn't care right now. Instead she kept looking.
Gaara's eyes narrowed even more, but he didn't say anything. Sakura sighed inwardly.
"He's socially handicapped."
"You think?" her inner asked back.
"Am I nobody?" she asked out loud.
Gaara's eyebrow scrunched a bit at the weird question.
"Okay, let me rephrase that," Sakura said, her legs tangling over the huge branch she was sitting on. "Would you like to be friends with a nobody?"
"That's… that's not what I meant."
"That's exactly what I heard," Sakura said, grinning by now. You just have to love the twisted logic of teens. "Which means that since I am not a nobody, then I'm allowed to be your friend."
"But you…"
Sakura had always been a bit aggressive. Around everyone but Sasuke that is, but right now, she wasn't with Sasuke, so she interrupted rather rudely.
"But nothing. It's my business who I'm friends with and who I'm not," she crossed her arms and glared, "You got a problem with that?"
Gaara growled slightly.
Sakura still glared.
Gaara looked away.
Silence
"I'm not human."
"…"
"What?" Sakura asked, staring at Gaara, who'd just declared he wasn't human.
"Not completely anyways."
"What do you mean?" She jumped another branch and now was sitting across Gaara. The boy's face was turned away from her, but she could see he looked… angry? Afraid? Relieved? Something…
"There's a reason everybody is afraid of me," Gaara was still staring towards the forest. "I'm a monster."
Sakura didn't know how to respond. Should she joke about it? No way. Maybe she could pretend to be shocked, like she didn't know. Not helping. Act scared? Nu-uh… What was she going to do?
Some time passed and Sakura was still trying to think for a good way to express her own thoughts. Her inner, that was giving her some really stupid ideas, wasn't helping either.
"Why are you still here?"
"Mm?" Sakura looked up. Gaara was staring at her again. Damn, that boy stares a lot.
"Because I was here first?" she offered.
Gaara looked around. "You can't force me to leave."
"Who was forcing you to leave?" Sakura asked surprised, "I'm fine with you being here."
"Didn't you hear me?" Gaara asked, staring her. "I'm a monster. A real monster. There's, there's a… demon in me."
"So?" Sakura asked, twiddling with a leaf.
"So?" Gaara repeated with a shock.
Sakura mm-ed. "Yeah, that's what I said. I don't honestly care about that."
Gaara looked like a gust of wind could blow him off the tree. "You don't?"
"Nope," Sakura said, inwardly cursing anyone who made Gaara so uncertain. He looked fragile. Like every word she said would affect his whole existence.
"Maybe you didn't understand," Gaara said after another minute of silence. Sakura smiled slightly.
"Gaara, I understood fine. It's just that I don't care about that," she said.
Gaara blinked. His inner demon hadn't spoken not once through the whole day. Well if not to count the short time after breakfast. He had been able to ponder about Shukaku, the demon inside him. There was a seal on his back. A woman had put it there when he was born but it had never worked. The seal was no use.
"It'll seal the demon and take away the pain," his uncle had once said, "You'll just need to heal the tricky wounds."
He had said that a night before he had died. A night before Gaara had killed him.
His eyes went back to the forest. The words had never made any sense to him. He didn't even have wounds. Nothing was able to injure him. So the question was, what would he have to heal?
At first he had tried everything to make the seal work. The demon inside of him made him afraid. It hurt him. But after a while he gave up and learned to accept the occasional pain and haunting voices. Sometimes he was able to stand up to the voices. Sometimes he wasn't.
He hadn't even thought of the stupid seal for a long time. If it didn't work there was no use of it anyways. But this morning he had thought of it… a lot. It still didn't make sense though.
"Gaara."
He looked towards her. Sakura smiled slightly. "Are you okay?"
Gaara nodded. His head ached a bit.
Sakura looked at the sky some more. By the position of the sun, midday was starting to close in.
"The ninjas from the sound village," she spoke, staring at the clouds. "I fought them, I wounded them, but yet they are completely healed. How's that possible?"
She didn't get a response. Not that she had waited for one anyways. Gaara was a guy with few words. She didn't know how long they sat on the tree nor did she care. The silence wasn't awkward, it was kind of comfortable. Gaara kept glancing at her every now and then as expecting for her to scream and run every moment now. So far, that hadn't happened.
"GAARA!"
Both Sakura and Gaara looked down at once. A blonde girl was frantically running around the tower.
"A team mate?" Sakura asked quietly.
Gaara nodded.
"You're going down?"
The boy looked at her this time and shrugged. "Maybe."
"Sakura!"
That was Naruto. Sakura looked towards the side of the tower, where the blonde girl and Naruto were staring at each other. She didn't hear what they said, but they departed soon enough.
"Sakura! The exams are starting!" Naruto screamed from the top of his lungs. Sakura rubbed her head at the look on Gaara's face. "Hyperactive as always…" she thought.
"I think we should go," she said to Gaara, who nodded. As she started to descend, Gaara quietly said,
"The guy with a ponytail and glasses healed them." Then a whirlwind of sand surrounded him and a moment later he was gone. It took a moment for Sakura to realize what he had been on about. She climbed down the tree and joined Naruto.
"Finally," the blonde boy sighed in relief, "I thought you'd never show up. Where were you?"
"Around," Sakura answered, grinning.
"Around?" Naruto asked. When Sakura didn't elaborate, he continued, "Anyways. The third exam starts in five minutes. We should be in the main room by now. Come on."
Together they hurried back into the tower. They joined Sasuke's side in the line up. Seven teams had made it. Only seven. Out of seven three were just rookies.
Sakura was surprised that Ino had made it here. But then again she had been one of the best kunoichis in the academy.
"Where were you?"
Sasuke was staring at front where their examiners stood, along with a lot of other ninjas as well as the hokage himself. While he spoke he didn't look towards her, but Sakura was sure that the question was meant for her.
"Outside," she responded. Sasuke looked emotionless as always, but asking was a sign of caring.
"He probably cared because he doesn't
want to be eliminated, since you're missing."
Sometimes Sakura hoped her inner wouldn't exist. Somehow it always said the
correct depressing things.
Sakura also looked towards the front, as Sasuke responded,
"Hn."
Sometimes Sakura wanted to grab his shoulders and shake him. He had been so… nice through the last few days and now he was being so… irritating. Hn, Hn, Hn… Oh, she'd give him a taste of his own medicine!
"Do you think they'll start soon?" Naruto asked.
"Hn."
"Mm."
Sakura was checking out the six other teams. Kabuto's team, which was completely quiet and stoic. So that man had healed the sound villagers. Did that mean he was on Orochimaru's side?
Hinata's team was chattering to themselves. Akamaru had hidden itself in Kiba's jacket for some reason and was shuddering in there, while Kiba threw looks at the sand genins. Hinata was glancing at Naruto every now and then, but when she saw Naruto looking back, she quickly looked down and blushed beet red. Naruto shrugged and turned his attention to the front of the room.
"Damn he is so blind," Sakura thought.
Sakura turned towards Lee's group. Tenten was spinning a kunai in her hand, while Lee was striking the 'pose.' Sakura grinned. Neji… Neji was eyeing everything as a potential threat. Keyword – everything. It was like he believed every floorboard was his enemy since it could make him stumble.
Sakura started to believe he might be a bit too paranoid. But then again, from what she heard from Lee and TenTen, he might've had a good excuse.
Shikamaru was looking like he'd fall asleep on his feet, while Ino kept talking and talking and talking and Choji kept eating and eating and eating.
"Do they ever stop?" Sakura thought.
"Probably. Choji needs to swallow sometimes. Right?"
"And Ino?"
"She'll have her moments… Like when she's
unconscious or something…"
The sound ninjas and sand ninjas were all quiet. Gaara's team mates kept giving
him long glances, but he didn't seem to care. He looked at her for a moment and
she gave him subtly the thumbs up sign. He didn't seem to get it.
"Can you say socially handicapped?"
"Shut up."
"Seriously, he seems to have some issues."
"Firstly- issues oh really? I didn't notice at all. And secondly – Shut up!"
"Gotcha!"
"…"
"Sakura."
Sakura turned, managing to stop herself from speaking just in time. "Mm?" she said instead.
Sasuke didn't take the bait. "It's starting…"
"Mm."
"I thought you weren't paying any attention."
"Mm." She won't tell him he was right. She just won't. She crossed her arms, indicating for him to continue. He didn't. He just gestured to the hokage, who had walked in front.
Then he started to speak about the real reason why chuunin exams were held in the first place. He went on and on about them, until Naruto asked,
"Is this the third exam? Do survive this… torture?"
"…"
Everybody stared at him. The older ninjas anyways. Most of the genins seemed to agree.
"Well listen up then," the hokage said, after he had stopped glaring at Naruto. He was about to explain them what the third exam was about when a man appeared. A jonin, Sakura guessed.
"Lord Hokage, please allow me to speak first."
"More speaking," Naruto crumbled. "When can we hear about the third exam?"
Only Sakura heard him. She rolled her eyes, giving her attention to the strange man.
"There's something I need you all to do before the third exam."
Everybody waited.
"Um," he coughed, "We need to have preliminaries before the real third exam."
The genins started to mutter all at once. They kept talking until Anko silenced them, using her extremely polite ways. [Hint – she said maggots three times
"Preliminaries?" Tenten asked.
"What?" Shikamaru shouted, probably waking up just now, "Why do we need preliminaries for?"
"We didn't expect so many of you to be here," the man spoke, coughing some more, "So we're holding preliminaries to reduce the number of you."
"So many? Only 7 teams out of 26 passed!" Kiba protested.
"Is it even fair?" Ino asked.
"We are allowed to hold a round of cough preliminaries any time we want to reduce the number of genins," the man replied, "Like Lord Hokage said, we cannot coughwaste the time of the important people who're coming to see the final exam."
"Hn."
Sakura rolled her eyes. "Mm."
Naruto stared between the two of them, before saying, "Ss?"
Both Sakura and Sasuke stared at him. He grinned sheepishly. "Another letter combination then?"
"Hn."
"Mm."
The two turned their attention back towards the man. Naruto scratched his head, but did the same.
"So if any of you feel like you're not in the top coughphysical condition," the proctor spoke, "then now is the time to cough quit."
"The preliminaries will start immediately." He added.
"What?" Ino asked, "But we barely finished the second task. We don't get to rest or anything?"
"Your own fault if it takes forever for you to finish," Gaara's team mate, the girl with blonde hair, spoke.
"Why you…"
The proctor coughed again. Ino stopped glaring the other girl and turned towards him.
"So if anyone wants to quit, then now's the time to raise their hand."
Sakura blinked. Nobody would want to quit now. After being in that forest and all. Who'd in their right mind…
"I'm out I guess."
Heads turned. That Kabuto guy just quitted?
"Right, you can leave," the proctor said after checking his name on the list. Kabuto did so.
"Weird guy," Naruto muttered. Sakura had to agree.
Kabuto walked out, smirking. He didn't need to go through the third exam. His master, Orochimaru, only needed him to collect some more data on the teams. So, Uchiha had completed the test far sooner than expected, but he still had collected more info on that sound team. After all, he had healed them. Some info in return is only polite.
Inside the room, the proctor asked if anyone else felt like going. Nobody spoke. No hands were raised.
Behind the proctor the hokage was speaking with some other ninjas. They were speaking about Kabuto as well as something else.
"So there are 20 of you cough," the proctor spoke, "That means we will hold ten battles. As you can figure the top ten will get to take the third exam. The preliminaries consist of ten one-on-one battles. There are no rules, you'll fight until one dies, admits defeat or is unable to continue the fight. In the latter case I will stop the fight. The winner of the match will proceed to the final exam."
"The opponents are chosen randomly using the display on that wall." As he spoke, Anko contacted someone using her microphone and a huge screen was revealed. "But before we reveal the first pair… Lord Hokage?"
"So he was informed after all," the hokage thought as he stepped in front once again. He looked at the 20 ninjas in front of him and spoke,
"A incident took place in the forest of death which I have to inform you of."
Sakura, Sasuke and Naruto abruptly stopped paying any attention to anything but the hokage.
"An S-class criminal was in those woods."
Kabuto's team mates seemed to smirk. The sound villagers looked more… shocked?
"It appears that the S-class criminal, namely Orochimaru, went after a genin from one of the teams, but he met resistance," the old man couldn't help but smile. His own apprentice or not, it was good to have him gone. "And the resistance killed him for good."
The expressions were priceless on Kabuto's team mates. The sounds looked more shocked than ever and even the sand genins didn't seem completely unaffected. But then again, nobody seemed completely unaffected.
"Was there ANBU teams in the forest?" someone asked.
"No. the resistance wasn't ANBU or any other high level ninja. In fact Orochimaru was killed by the team he tried to attack."
"A genin team?" Shikamaru asked, shocked. Everybody had heard of the sound village and their unofficial leader. He was supposed to be strong, being one of the three legendary ninjas and all.
"Yes," The hokage affirmed, "and for killing an S-class criminal, who was in a rather high place in the bingo book of Konoha's ninjas, those three genins shall receive a monetary reward as well as a medal. Also, with the consent of all three proctors, for the very first time in the history, a team is given a choice whether or not they participate in the preliminaries or move straight to the finals.
"A choice?" Both Sasuke's and Sakura's minds thought the same time.
"Monetary!" Naruto's mind screamed.
The whole hall was buzzing again as everybody tried to figure out who the team could be. Most suspected the sand genins; some thought it was a joke. The sound genins looked thoroughly shocked, not knowing what was happening to their homeland right now. Kabuto's team mates looked like someone had told them that sky was green with purple polka dots. A genin team had beaten their master? It was unbelievable.
"Guys," Sakura whispered, "What do we do?"
"Take the money," Naruto whispered.
"You moron," Sasuke said, "She's talking about the preliminaries."
"Oh," Naruto said, understanding dawning on his face. "We still get money though, right?"
"Mm," Sakura said, smirking slightly as Sasuke looked at her for doing so.
The boy didn't comment, but his eyes lingered on her for a small time, before he asked, "So what do we do?"
Sakura didn't respond. Gaara was looking straight at her with a questioning look in his eyes. Sakura wasn't completely sure if he was asking what she thought he was asking, but she nodded slightly anyways. Gaara nodded right back, his expression unreadable.
"So if we skip the preliminaries, we all get to the third exam," Naruto said, to clear stuff up. "So I say we go for it."
"But we wouldn't be able to test our powers in the preliminaries," Sakura pointed out, "Also then it's likely that 11 people will make the finals and then many should fight double."
"So we don't skip," Naruto said.
"Then we all might not make it to the third exam," Sakura spoke. She faltered. Who was she kidding? Sasuke would make it. Naruto as well. It was herself she was worried about.
"Then we skip," Naruto offered. Come on it was 50/50 chance he'll offer the right answer.
Sasuke seemed to read Sakura's mind once again, as he asked. "Are you up for it?"
Sakura looked at him. He actually let her decide. After a moment, she nodded. It was slow at first, but her confidence grew. She had changed in that forest. She knew it and now was the time for everybody else to learn the lesson as well.
XxXxXxXxXx
QUESTION – [I'm putting it here because
most of you probably skip the A/N-s I've been thinking… If Sakura makes it to
the third exam, should she train with:
a) Go to the Sand village and train with Gaara. Shock everyone's faces off
while being his friend and help him make his seal work. [turn him kind of
normal just for the kicks of it
b) Train with Deidara or Sasori. Became kind of friendly with them and when the
Atatsuki come we can have some fun lifts her eyebrow
c) Stumble onto Tsunade somewhere and somehow persuade her into training her. Which
means she'll come back into the village with her, make a fool out of herself
while cheering for Sakura and later become the hokage. [Since the third is too
old and wrinkly to be a kage
Honestly I can't decide. If you won't help me – I WON'T WRITE[
XxXxXxXxXxA/N – Long time no see, people. Okay, this chapter had a bit more Gaara again, but the only reason is that the exams only last a day. Means that Sakura has to be a bit friendlier with Gaara, since time is money, people! MONEY! Fine, I won't stress money… I WANT MONEY! But I don't get money for writing, I get reviews… Which means, I'll stress REVIEWS! GIMME!
Well about the reward. It's kind of logical they'd get something out of this. Not every day a dangerous criminal is killed by a bunch of fifteen year olds. Besides Naruto needs money for more ramen. I still haven't figured out how he can afford any.
Now, the chapter wasn't very funny or detailed, but it was longer than my last ones. Thank me by reviewing!