Life of a Ninja: Renascence
/syn·er·gy /ˈsinərjē/
noun
the interaction or cooperation of two or more organizations, substances, or other agents to produce a combined effect greater than the sum of their separate effects.
Senju Tobirama watched with barely disguised amusement as Hatake weaved through the Uchiha's attacks, mocking the graduate with the grace and ease in which he did so. Allowing the boy's hands to brush the bells, before leaping away.
The foliage rustled, and Tobirama didn't even need to look up when Nagisa joined him in his tree, there was a large, predatory grin on the blonde's whiskered face.
"Traps set, Taichou~" Nagisa chirped quietly with a cheeky salute when the white-haired boy groaned silently in exasperation. She glanced at the show in front of them, wincing as their dark-haired teammate was buried up to his neck with a well-placed Headhunter jutsu, and their maybe-sensei jogged back into the woods with a jaunty wave.
"Should- should we help him out?" Nagisa asked,
"No," Tobirama muttered, "leave him. He needs to learn his lesson." At Nagisa's disapproving look, Tobirama continued, "We'll come back for him," He assured her.
-((-))-
Kakashi had expected that Sasuke would attack him on his own, however, he had not expected his other two possible students to lay traps.
He had managed to escape the surprisingly well made traps, with only a missing sleeve and singed clothing. The jonin arrived in the memorial stone clearing to find one Uzumaki Nagisa waiting for him, kunai held in a reverse grip, and a completely blank expression.
The young kunoichi seemed off somehow, but she didn't give him the chance to make any conclusions, or even speak, before she lunged.
He blocked the kunai with one of his own, eye narrowing when he noticed that the weight of her weapon was different than it should be, what the hell? She was fighting as if she was wielding a sword-
Kakashi leaped backwards, and Nagisa followed. He moved his head back to avoid the blonde's attack, and felt the sharp pain that came with being cut centered on his forehead.
But that shouldn't be possible... I moved out of her kunai's reach- His eye narrowed.
A small smirk stretched across 'Nagisa's face, "I'm not surprised you figured out so quickly," That was not Nagisa's voice, and her form shimmered before seeming to melt.
The body grew taller, the face became more masculine and pale, the long golden hair shortened and turned silver, and the large blue eyes narrowed and changed to a pale red.
"Impressive," Kakashi said, wiping the blood from his brow.
Standing in front of him, katana held at his side, was Senju Tobirama. "Nagi's henge seal is still a work in progress."
Kakashi raised a brow, "I've never heard of a henge seal."
"And you wouldn't have," Tobirama drawled, "it is Nagisa's invention."
An unseen grin stretched across the Hatake's masked face, "Even more impressive." The Senju smirked, and Kakashi ducked under a volley of kunai that came from behind. He spun, foot lashing out and connecting with a leaping Nagisa's stomach.
Poof!
The clone dispelled, and when Kakashi waved the smoke away, he was alone in the clearing. Glancing around, the silver-haired cyclops hummed, "Impressive. I might actually have a worthwhile team this year."
-((-))-
"That was fun," Nagisa said brightly as she and Tobirama bound through the trees towards their dark-haired teammate. Her silver-haired partner smirked slightly,
"Hatake-san is quite impressive." Tobirama agreed, "He is much more intelligent than he leads others to believe."
"He's not an A-Rank threat for nothing." Nagisa added, "He has the potential to become S-Rank. It's not everyday you find someone graduating the Academy at five, a chunin at six, and a jounin at twelve. He did all of that before he got that sharingan. Don't forget he was also ANBU from fourteen to twenty when Jiji all but kicked him out."
Tobirama couldn't stop the chuckle that slipped past him, "I'm not even going to ask where you get all your information from."
The blonde grinned cheekily.
Sasuke was glaring daggers at them when his two teammates leapt from the trees, and landed in front of him. At the sight of the Uchiha's 'decapitated' head sticking out of the ground, Nagisa released a snort of amusement, before clapping a hand over her mouth to muffle her giggles.
"Get me out of here, and I might not kill you." The dark haired boy snarled as his blonde teammate continued to snicker at his predicament.
"You know," Nagisa said with a large grin, "when you say it that way... You can just stay there."
Tobirama sighed as he watched his two teammates bicker back and forth, rather playfully on Nagisa's part as she riled her dark-haired counterpart to the point of 'gunna-fucking-decapitate-you-if-you-don't-stop'.
"Your words wound me-"
"That's enough." Tobirama interrupted, cutting Nagisa off mid-sentence. "We're running out of time." With a simple hand sign, the ground surrounding Sasuke grew damp enough for him to climb out with a little help from Nagisa. The Uchiha glowered as he wiped mud and dirt from his clothing, but he didn't comment. "We have less than thirty minutes to retrieve the bells, we'll need to work together."
Sasuke sneered, "I don't need your help-"
Nagisa poked him in the nose, and he went silent in bafflement. "Shush you." She admonished, blue eyes serious. "Hatake was only leading you on. Making you arrogant by letting you touch the bells. He's an A-Rank Jounin; you serious can't expect that a freshly graduated genin could one-up him, did you?"
Sasuke's silence spoke for him, and Tobirama sighed in exasperation.
"Uchihas..." The Senju muttered under his breath, before speaking loudly enough for his teammates to hear. "Konoha was built on the premise of teamwork. That is what our village is about; no one shinobi can do everything on his or her own. We are the only village who actively advocates teamwork; our genin teams are made to balance the members. Where one is weak, the others are there to cover them." Tobirama lectured, unconsciously slipping into 'Hokage-Mode', his sharp gaze flickered between his two teammates, filtering what he knew about their strengths and weaknesses as plans flew through his mind. He may not be a Nara, but he was a Hokage. "A shinobi is nothing without his or her team."
-((-))-
Kakashi had honestly been surprise when, with ten minutes left until the end of the test, both Tobirama and Sasuke darted from the tree line. The Senju held his katana loosely in his hands as he pulled ahead, the blade moving in a graceful sideways arch towards the jounin's side.
He was already moving, a kunai in hand as he blocked Tobirama's vicious attack. The ringing sound of steel-on-steel resounded through the clearing as sparks leaped from the screeching metal, and Tobirama used the power behind Kakashi's deflection to jump away from the one-eyed jounin, flipping gracefully in the air and landing lightly on the balls of his feet.
This all happened with a few seconds, and in that time frame, Sasuke had been running through hand signs. The moment Tobirama's feet hit the ground, a safe distance from their possible sensei, Sasuke had unleashed a raging ball of fire towards the silver-haired jounin.
Kakashi leaped out of the path of the inferno, but the glint of metal in the corner of his vision made him twist in mid air as an arrow flew past him from behind, and a volley of kunai and shuriken from his front. As his feet touched the ground, he was once again forced to turn out of the path of another arrow as it whistled past him before plowing through a tree.
The jounin blinked in surprise at the whole in the tree a few meters from his, and the arrow stuck in the stone behind it; that arrow was laced with wind chakra!
"Impressive."
These kids just kept surprising him, but-
BRIINGG!
The shrill sound of the alarm going off caused all motion in the field to cease, and Kakashi turned to the two male genin and gave them an eye-smile. "But it would seem you've run out of time. I have no choice but to f-"
"We passed."
Kakashi blinked as Nagisa shimmered into view beside her teammates, two bells clenched firmly in her hands and a bow and quiver slung over her shoulder. When had-
The arrows. They had been aimed at his waist, he hadn't given it much thought at the time but Nagisa must have managed to cut through the string keeping the bells attached to his belt!
Nagisa shot him a grin, as if she knew that he was putting the pieces together, and she tossed the two bells to her male counterparts. "We passed." She repeated.
"Ah... So you did." Kakashi agreed, eye-smiling at his students once more. "Now, which of you is going back to the Academy-"
"No one." Surprisingly enough, it was Sasuke who spoke up. The dark haired boy palmed a kunai and easily cut through the silver bell in his hand. "You never said the bells had to be whole." Sasuke stated as he placed one half of the bell in Nagisa's hand. "'Look underneath the underneath.'"
("Uchiha Sasuke is a spoiled, pampered little boy, with a superiority complex the size of the nation. I have no patience to teach a boy who believes he deserves everything he wants, a thinks he has no need for teammates.") Kakashi stared at the Uchiha in surprise, maybe Sasuke could overcome his arrogance and work with a team.
"The purpose of this test was to see if we could work as a team." Tobirama spoke, drawing their sensei from his thoughts. "The test was never about the bells, you just wanted to pit us against each other."
A small smile grew under his mask, and Kakashi's eyes softened, an almost melancholic air surrounding him. "In the ninja world, those who break the rules are scum, that's true, but those who abandon their friends are worse than scum." He said, drawing the attention of his students. "A close friend of mine, my best friend, said that to me years ago when I was your age." Kakashi absentmindedly brushed a hand across the cold metal of his hitai-ate, eyes fixated on the KIA Stone. "He died a few hours after tell me those very words; he refused to abandon his teammates to the very end." He turned back to the three children, their young faces peering up at him.
Team Seven... The cursed team number.
He couldn't - wouldn't allow them to turn out like their predecessors. He wouldn't be able to live with himself if he allowed what had happened to the Team Sevens before them to happen to these children in front of him.
"Congratulations, Team Seven." Kakashi said, a smile curving his single visible eye. "You pass."
TAHDAH! I bring you the next installment of Life of a Ninja: Renascence!
I finished this a few days ago, but was kind of hesitant to post it after I received my very first flame (which completely crushed what little confidence I had worked up after all the positive feedback for my stories). I mean, seriously, what is the point of flames anyway? All they do is make the author feel horrible about their work and want nothing more than to just stop writing all together.
Sorry for the wait!
~Uzu
